It was one in the morning and Bella, Beatrice, and Lisha had all left the party by now. Bella had proposed they find some real wild parties, which enticed Beatrice and Lisha as to what they would find. So they took a girl’s night out while the rest were at a children’s party.

“Come on, you kids.” Diane said. “I’m going to take a picture of you all.”

The girls got together, but struggled to find Ben. It turns out he was behind a chair in the living room with his head and arms retracted inside his sweater like a safety bunker. He had his phone inside and was continuing his comic binge.

“Come on bro,” Sophie pestered. “You gotta get up.”

“Is it time to go?” he asked.

“No, it’s time to take a picture.”

“Can’t you take it without me?”

“Don’t make me have mom call your full name.”

“Fine, fine… I’m coming…”

Lizzy, Violet, Ben, and Sophie all got in front of a wall and started lightly shoving each other around and started giggling. They all posed like they were fashion models, except for Ben, who was trying to stand behind them all. Sophie wouldn’t have that and pulled him to the front and gave a meek smile and wave as Diane laughed and took the photo.

“Ben, you look like you’re in pain.” Violet laughed when she saw the photo.

“You were all posing like you were on a runway!” he complained.

“Should’ve posed with us.” his sister teased. “Would’ve looked beautiful.”

“Not as beautiful as me.” Jack said, putting his hands on his hips and shaking them back and forth, letting the tutu wave around. Sebastian laughed and pushed him.

“You’re all terrible.” Diane said with an eye roll. She elbowed Kevin, who snapped back to reality.

“Do what your mother said.” he told Ben and Sophie sternly, making everyone erupt into laughter and leaving him blushing.

“Keep not sleeping and you might be literally living the dream.” Diane giggled. “And you think I’m the-”

Diane never finished her sentence though, as she very suddenly had an awkward look on her face before it shifted to one of confusion and she began to fall. Both Kevin and Ben ran as fast as they could, Ben even dropping his phone, to catch her before she hit the floor. The two of them carried her and laid Diane on the couch. Jack had his mouth covered and Sophie was gripping Violet’s and Lizzy’s hands.

“Did… did anyone see her eat anything tonight?” Kevin asked, shaking. When nobody said anything he looked at Ben and Sophie. “When was the last time you two saw her eat?” They both kept silent, as neither of them could remember. Kevin rubbed his eyes and his kids already knew he was blaming himself for being too tired to notice his wife relapsing.

“Kev,” Jack said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “We’ll take care of it.”

“Jack, you don’t-”

“I’ll drive you, Diane, and the kids home.” Sebastian offered, putting on his coat and getting his shoes on.

“You-”

“She’s my sister, Kev.” Jack said seriously. “You don’t get to tell me no on if I want to help take care of you all.” Kevin looked like he was going to argue, but recognized he was too tired.

“Thank you.” he said, giving Jack a hug. “Come on kids, say goodbye to Violet and her friend.”

“Call me sometime.” Sophie said, winking to Lizzy and waving as she ran out the door. Ben slowly looked up at her and held out his fist, which she met with a fist bump.

“In brightest day,” the boy started. Lizzy remembered him teaching her this, but struggled to remember the words.

“In blackest night.”

“No evil shall escape my sight.”

“Make those who worship evil’s light…?” she said uncertainly. Ben sighed, disappointed and rejected.

“See you around.” he said before exiting.

“Goodbye, everyone. Have a good night.” Kevin said politely, Diane in his arms. “And congratulations on turning sixteen, Violet.” They left the house and left just Jack, Violet, and Lizzy there.

“Lizzy, are your parents coming back for you or do you need a ride?” Jack asked.

“Can I sleep over if I ask?”

“I don’t see why not,” he shrugged. Lizzy whipped out her phone and texted Lisha, since she knew that was the more likely option of yes.

“Can I sleepover at Vio’s tonight?”

“Yes don’t set the house on fire it’s not polite.” Lizzy wasn’t sure why she said that, but at least it was a yes.

“She said it was alright.”

“I’ll get the sleeping bag then.” Jack said, disappearing. Lizzy made sure he was out of earshot before whispering to Violet.

“Do you know about Diana?” she asked. Violet gasped, looked around, and whispered back.

“How do you know about Diana?”

“She’s who makes your aunt like that, right?”

“I-I mean yeah, she does… But you can’t do anything about a voice in her head.”

“She’s not.” Lizzy blurted quickly. “She’s real and not just a voice.” Violet didn’t know what her friend was saying.

“What are you-”

“Vio, I have to be honest with you,” Lizzy said painfully. “I’ve been lying to you about a lot of things until now.”

“Ok, so the afterlife is real.” Lizzy started. “And the afterlife is divided into Heaven, Hell, and the Afterlife. So-”

“Hold on,” Violet interrupted. “The afterlife has an afterlife?”

“No, the Afterlife is in the afterlife.”

“Huh?”

“Ok, so the afterlife, lowercase letter, has three sections in it. The Afterlife, capital letter, is a section of the afterlife, lowercase letter.”

“That sounds… confusing.” Violet admitted.

“Try to hear my moms try and explain it to a 13-year-old.” Lizzy sighed, remembering it all. “It was a mess.”

“This is more trouble than it’s worth.” Violet moaned.

“You haven’t heard half of it.”

“So let me get it all straight.” Violet said, holding her head. “So you live in Hell.”

“Yea.” Lizzy confirmed.

“And one of your mom’s The Devil.”

“Basically.”

“Your other one is a dead lady who is a mental illness and fashion model.”

“Right.”

“And you’ve gone this long without telling anyone about it.” Violet took a seat, not thinking what to believe. “Did I miss anything?”

“Oh well, there’s Sausage too.” Out of her sleeve popped the scaly head of Sausage, making Violet fall backwards.

“And the snake that lives in your clothing.”

“I’ve got some other stuff, but it’s unrelated to this really.”

“Oh… ok.” Violet was on the boundary between complete disbelief and wanting to think it’s true.

“There’s only one other question to ask I think.” Lizzy said, digging through her pocket.

“What?” Lizzy took out a red key with a little devil tail at the tip.

“Do you want to see it?”

“No!” Violet said, scared. “And why are you holding that key like that?”

“This is the key to Hell.”

“But didn’t you say Diana was in the Afterlife, capital A? How’s the key supposed to get us there if it only goes to Hell and back?”

“Oh wait, yeah.”

“You got any ideas of any other way?”

“I don’t know how we’d get to mom’s workplace.” Lizzy sighed, falling over onto the bed. “I can’t exactly teleport across dimensions like my moms can.”

“Wait Liz, but you can.” Violet pointed out.

“I just said that I can’t.” Lizzy repeated, hopeless.

“How would you get from here back to Hell without your parents?”

“Ma’s house key.” she said, taking out the familiar key again. “I just do the motion and think where I wanna go in Hell. Or the opposite for the human realm. Or at least I’m pretty sure that’s how it works.”

“Ok, but what if you could do something else with it?” Violet wondered. “Like, what if you could use it to go to other worlds?” Lizzy bolted up.

“Do you think we can?” she asked.

“I think so.” Violet said, scratching her chin. “If we think of the worlds as a house, Heaven is the attic and Hell is the basement, right?”

“I guess so.”

“Then if this Afterlife place has so much influence on us, maybe it’s just like… a different room on the same floor.”

“You’re really smart Vio, so let’s say you’re right.” Lizzy proposed. “What are we going to do? Neither of us know anything about magic to make this key do that. Everyone I know tells me not to screw with magic, because it screws with you back.”

“Do you know anyone who might know about how to handle it then?”

“My moms are automatically out of the picture. Aunt Iris definitely wouldn’t help… and that’s it really.”

“Well, you said that those Cara… somethings are all around us, but disguised, right?”

“Yeah, can’t tell them apart from regular people.”

“But what if we could find one?”

“Vio, let me be real for like ten seconds.” Lizzy said. “Who do we know that could be a carvatian?”

“What do we look out for?”

“Wide hips, eats a lot but somehow isn’t huge, and doesn’t act totally like a person.”

“Hm… that sounds like… Mr. Riley.”

“He’s not…” Lizzy thought about it for a few seconds and shrugged her shoulders. “Ok, fine. Monday after school. Right after his metal working class.”