Carrie puts the ring on Joshua. She decides it would be better to believe Jacqueline than to risk Joshua dying. She had just called the doctor a few minutes ago and he told her to wait outside her house, so she did. The doctor came with the bags of blood and left without saying a word.
“Well, I guess it’s time to see if you drink blood.” Carrie says to Joshua, picking him up and holding the bottle of blood up to his lips. He sullenly opens his mouth and she sticks the bottle in his mouth. She expects him to refuse and cry and scream like usual, but he smiles and looks very content. Some of the blood dribbles down his chin and she wipes it off. When Joshua finishes the bottle, he smiles and giggles, it’s as if life was suddenly restored to the stoic baby. His tongue and lips are ruby red.
“What the hell are you?” Carrie whispers, shivers going up and down her spine. But Carrie couldn’t just put the thing on to the street. She took the thing home and by god she was going to take care of it.
A week later, Dr Taylor got a visit from a very healthy baby boy and his caregiver.
“Wow, this is the biggest turn around I’ve ever seen!” Dr Taylor said, smiling at the little child. Carrie smiled and rambled on about some made up story where Joshua was throwing up the food when she didn’t know it. Wow the truth really is stranger than fiction, eh Joshua? Carrie thought looking at the baby who was currently being weighed. Joshua’s ice blue eyes stared directly at Carrie’s amber ones and he giggled a little knowing giggle, as though he heard every word she said. Coincidence. Just coincidence. Carrie tried to convince herself, shivers once again running down her spine.
As the years went by, Joshua grew just like a normal healthy boy. The mysterious doctor continued to send them blood by the packages and Carrie continued to give Joshua one package a week. He was very thin and strong, with brown hair that was sometimes black. His ring grew with him, sparkling in the sunlight. Carrie, try as she might, couldn’t get the darn thing off. His eyes continued to give Carrie the heebie-jeebies until one day Joshua confirmed the strange feeling she got at the hospital. The two of them went from place to place, apartment hopping, but were currently in a nice one now, with a steady income. Carrie had thrown a small get together with a couple high school friends while Joshua was at daycare. When she was walking home with him she was thinking about how annoying one of them was. God what a bitch! Carrie thought. Joshua turned towards her, looked her straight in the eyes and said, “Now mommy, that’s not nice!”
“W-what? What do you mean sweetheart?” Carrie asked shakily.
“You said a bad word!” Joshua exclaimed.
“How did you hear that?!” Carrie demanded, near hysterics, grabbing the boy by his shoulders.
“Well, you said it so loudly, silly!” the three year old giggled in his three year old way. Carrie closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down. She tried her hardest to never think around him again.
Even so, it wasn’t until the next year that Carrie decided she couldn’t take it anymore. Joshua had started JK and was having lots of fun. Crayoned pictures were plastered all over the fridge, and Carrie nearly forgot all about Joshua’s demonic tendencies. She was fixing him one of his favourite breakfasts, an English muffin with peanut butter, when she cut her hand. Joshua was standing on a step stool beside her, helping clean dishes, and Carrie looked over at him. He wasn’t looking into her eyes like usual, but at the cut on her hand with his head cocked to the side. So she looked into his and couldn’t stop a gasp of horror. He looked almost like somebody had punched him in both eyes and covered it up with red eye shadow. When she looked closet she saw the whites were pink, and in some places dark red, and the ice blue was no longer there. Instead it was like liquid silver. The next second he looked up into her eyes and was a normal boy again.
Joshua didn’t go to school the next morning. Carrie had decided to take him to a foster home that had 12 other kids, from ages 6-15, and rather extreme beliefs. It was a five bedroom house with a run down barn next to it.
“Now, sweetie, it’s just for a little bit until mommy gets back on her feet.” Carrie lied. It seemed he couldn’t tell when she was lying.
“Edna and Chuck are very nice people.” she lied again. She wouldn’t send a child anywhere within ten feet of those creeps. But Joshua wasn’t a child in her eyes. He was a demon-boy and deserved whatever he got here. If Joshua had heard her thoughts, he didn’t give any sign of it.
A hillbilly looking male walked up to the parked car. He had a baseball cap over his greasy black hair, and a plaid vest over his wife beater.
“Hello, you must be little Joshua! Why don’t you come on out and Edna’ll show you around the house. Don’t that sound like fun Josh?” Chuck said enthusiastically. Joshua’s eerie blue eyes locked Chuck’s with obvious hostility.
“It’s Joshua.” he said softly with an iciness surprising for one so young. Chuck smiled and said, “Well Joshua, I suggest you get outta that car so me and your mommy can talk.”
Carrie half suspected Joshua to give him the demon eyes or something other than smile with bright innocence and hop out, running past him to the large female brunette by the house.
“I see what you meant about the boy. Don’t worry, we’ll get it out of him.” Chuck assured her. Shivers ran up and down her spine and at that moment she couldn’t tell who she gave her more heebie-jeebies, Joshua or Chuck.
