Now, when watching someone perform a backwards exorcism on their maybe-sort-of-not-really-boyfriend, one might wonder:

“Why?”

“How?”

“Is this a dream?”

Jury’s still out on the last question, but here's the answer to the first two:

Seb’s day started off relatively normal. Waking up, morning routine, all that stuff that you don’t actually care about. His parents were out on a trip, and his sister was off with her friends somewhere, so he had the house to himself. He hadn’t expected to be doing much, except maybe sleep longer than normal. But plans changed when someone knocked on his door and he found Rune on the doorstep.

Rune was a short, skinny guy. Same age as Seb and generally all smiley and chatty. A little cute. Today, though, he was different. His hair wasn’t quite brushed properly, and despite the cloudy sky, his eyes were hidden by dark sunglasses. Seb couldn’t recall ever seeing Rune wear sunglasses before.

Ignoring Seb’s hello, Rune marched straight into the house and shut the door. Asked if anyone was home. When Seb confirmed he was alone, Rune snapped his fingers, and the curtains drew closed. Before Seb even had time to react, he found himself unable to move, his limbs forced still as if surrounded by an invisible, rigid mold.

“Alright kid,” Rune said, removing his glasses. “You need to promise not to freak out.”

It was most definitely Rune’s voice, but it wasn’t quite right. Not quite Rune. Grumpier, more drawn out, as if he wasn’t used to speaking and was still getting the hang on making the words right. When Rune looked up, Seb saw that his eyes were pitch black, no signs of the whites or iris. Seb could see his own reflection in Rune’s eyes, calm and frozen. He couldn’t move his face to show the panic he felt.

Despite Rune’s request, Seb was freaking out. Of course he was freaking out. And it was strange because there was no physical response to correlate with the freaking out. No heart beating faster or palms sweating. No clenching muscles. He couldn’t run or turn or do anything.

Rune began to cough. A really bad hunched-over-and-wheezing kind of cough. All Seb could really do was stand there and watch. His mind was racing as he tried to figure out what was happening–how it was happening.

Rune pulled himself together and turned towards Seb. “I am not Rune,” he said. “I am, however, borrowing his physical form for a bit. So, I am going to release you, and you are going to play nice, because if you attack me, you’re attacking him. Got it?”

Seb tried to nod, but that didn’t really work.

A second passed, and Seb could move again.

Of course, the first thing he did was go for the door. And he was frozen again. Neck down, this time, his mouth still able to move. He tried to ask what was happening, but it came out awkwardly, a weird sort of grunt that didn’t communicate anything. His second attempt was better. “What are you?!”

Not-Rune didn’t look impressed. “Nice to meet you, too. I am an immortal creation of pure magic inhabiting your boyfriend's physical form.”

Seb got control of his body back, and he checked his head, because he was fairly sure he had to have hit it hard at some point. “I see now–” Seb nodded, suddenly understanding. “I’m dreaming. This is a dream.” He felt a little calmer, knowing that none of this was real. He relaxed a little.

Not-Rune rubbed his temples. “Why is your kind always so– fine, yes, this is a dream, whatever. Get up.” He crossed his arms, walking through Seb’s house. He paused to stare at a family photo on the wall. “I did not know where to go, so I came here. His parents freaked out about the whole possession thing. Very dramatic.”

“So, are you, like, a demon?” Seb asked. Seb didn’t usually have dreams this weird, but at least it was interesting.

Not-Rune looked as if Seb had just personally killed his pet right in front of him. Perhaps he was trying to look intimidating, but Rune had a very cute face when he was angry, so it didn’t work too well. “I was created before your kind even invented the concept of demons.” He threw his hands up, looking ridiculous, because he was in Rune’s body and Rune was so small and nerdy looking. “I am a being created of pure magic! I have existed for a millennium!”

“So, like, you’re basically a demon?”

Not-Rune looked like a murderous little kitten. “I suppose, if that is an easier concept for your brain to understand, you may refer to me as a ‘demon’.” His voice was pained.

“That’s cool. How’d you get in Rune’s body?”

“We do not have time for this,” the demon shook his head. “Look, your little boyfriend is dying. And if he dies, I die. So, we are both motivated to keep him alive, correct?”

 “Rune’s not my boyfriend.” If it wasn’t a dream, Seb would be concerned. But because this was a dream, Seb wasn’t too worried, just a little confused.

It was a dream, wasn’t it?

Because it didn’t feel like a dream. It felt like reality. But it had to be a dream, because it wasn’t supposed to be real. 

Seb felt a little dizzy, and head felt just a little too light. He grabbed onto the table, though it didn’t help much. 

The demon rubbed his temples. “Kid, I really do not have time for your stupid teenage drama.  He likes you, you like him, let us move on. Now–”

“Rune likes me?” Seb asked.

The demon looked disappointed in him. No, not disappointed– just tired. “What about ‘hey, why is he dying? Will he be alright? How can I save him?’” He made a high-pitched, mocking imitation of Seb’s voice.

“Why is Rune dying?” Seb asked. His head was really starting to spin now. 

Rune is fine, Seb told himself. Rune is fine. This is a dream. Rune is fine. This isn’t real. He’s not actually dying because this isn’t real. Rune is fine. 

The demon crossed his arms. “I have no idea.”

“Why tell me to ask, then?” It came off a little harsher than Seb intended. He didn’t like to be harsh. He wasn’t usually harsh. 

The demon shook his head. Well, it was Rune’s head, really. “Because the questions you were asking were stupid.” He passed Seb, walking into the kitchen. He studied Seb’s house, as if it were a strange place. It wasn’t a strange place, just a normal kitchen in a normal house in a normal neighborhood where demons weren’t common. “It is Sebastian, correct?”

“Most people call me Seb–”

“Sebastian.” He pronounced it strangely. A little too drawn out, like he was sounding out a word he didn’t know how to say. “Rune was fine. Healthy, even. Then his parents found out about me, and tried to remove me with this weird, human-ritual. And now he is dying.”

“Like, an exorcism?”

“Yes, ‘exorcism’, that is what they called it. And also,” the demon said, leaning against the wall, “The kid refuses to speak to me.”

“Speak to you?”

“I get to ignore my host. They do not get to ignore me.” The demon threw his hands into the air. His hands were shaking when he lifted them, as if just that strained him a little too much. “How am I supposed to fix his physical form, if he won’t tell me what the issue is?”

“Why won’t he talk to you?” Seb asked.

“I do not know, he did not say. He just stopped talking to me after the ritual.”

Seb poured himself a glass of water, because trying to figure things out was making him thirsty. He handed a glass to the demon. The demon had sat down at the kitchen table and was studying the wood grain. He sat much straighter than Rune normally would, and was more focused, even if it was only on patterns in wood. Seb set the glass down on top of the table, and the demon shifted his focus onto the glass.

“How do you normally talk to Rune?” Seb asked.

“What kind of question is that? I simply talk to him.” the demon took a sip of his water. He drank awkwardly, in steps– first raising the cup to his mouth, then pausing, then drinking, then pausing, then swallowing. “I live in his head. I hear all his thoughts. We just talk.”

“That’s not really talking. That’s thinking.”

The demon wiped his mouth. “Sometimes we will talk in dreams, I suppose. I do not know. I can disappear when I want– he is not supposed to.”

“You can disappear?”

“I can go into the abstract realm. Leave the physical world. Humans should not ever leave the physical world unless you are asleep. Or dead. But Rune’s been gone too long to be asleep, and he’s not dead.” The demon set down the glass. “It must be why he is dying–his physical form wants to have a consciousness. It does not know what to do if it doesn’t.”

Seb had a lot of questions. Did that mean being asleep was like being dead? Were dreams like a temporary afterlife? What does ‘abstract world’ even mean? He settled on one question. “Aren’t you a consciousness? Like, shouldn’t you count?” Okay, technically it was two questions.

“I do not count. I am not a real person.” The demon glanced around the house, moving to stand in the open space of the living room. He put his hands on his hips, studying the area. “You are close to Rune–does he suffer any recurring ailments?”

“Not that I know of.” Seb glanced at his arsenal of horror movies, on display next to the TV. “So, you’re, like, trying to help him? Why?”

The demon looked offended. “Dying. Currently. Not a fan of it.”

Seb raised a brow. “Okay, but if I help you get Rune’s body fixed, are you gonna, like, try to run off with it?”

The demon raised a brow. “Run off? To do what?”

“I dunno. Conquer humanity.”

“What? Why should I care about humanity?” The demon sat down on Seb’s couch. “Why are humans always like this? My hosts are so obsessed with ruling other humans. You know what that always ends in? My host getting assassinated. No thank you.” The demon shook his head.

Fair enough. “Every single host you’ve had has tried to take over the world?” Seb found that a little hard to believe. If he had a demon in his head, he might have some other priorities. Mainly, getting the demon out of his head.

“Kid, you do not summon me for fun. If it is not taking over the world, then it is getting revenge. Why else would you need my power?”

The thing was, Rune didn’t seem like the kind of guy to try to take over the world. And if he was going to take over the world, he would have told Seb. “Did Rune summon you?”

The demon paused. A confused look formed on his face. “He is the exception. He might have summoned me for fun.”

“The exorcism must have caused this, then,” Seb concluded. The demon looked unimpressed at his conclusion. “So, like, what if we reverse the exorcism?”

“Reverse the exorcism?” The demon asked, frowning. Suddenly, the demon winced. He clutched his side. “This… odd feeling keeps attacking me.”

“Pain?” Seb asked.

“Pain,” the demon repeated. “This is what that feels like?”

“It has various forms.”

“Terrible. Why do you put up with this?” The demon shook his head. “Having a physical form is terrible.”

“Well, it’s gotta be better than just being stuck inside someone’s head.”

“I suppose…” the demon’s hand was shaking. “No, nope. This is awful. I am not meant to exist within the physical realm.”

Seb supposed that, with his previous arrangement, the demon could just hide when things got painful. He wondered if the exorcism had been painful—he hadn’t actually seen a real exorcism before, but they sounded painful. Is that what scared Rune off? Or was he trapped somewhere? How does one fix a botched exorcism? “What if we did the exorcism, but backwards?”

“What?”

“Like, if the exorcism got rid of Rune, doing it backwards would bring him back.”

“That is a child’s logic.”

“Okay, but like, what if it works? If the exorcism is what made Rune go, then reversing it might bring him back.”

Even with the pain he was in, the demon managed to squint at him. “‘Summoning’. The word you are looking for is ‘summoning’.”

“Yeah, whatever. Is there a chance it would work?”

“No. It is stupid.”

“Do you have a better idea?”