Stephen King Book Club Novels & Stories

I choose a Stephen King paperback – Salem’s Lot - from the lower shelves and struggle to decipher the pages, my curvy body sinking into the cushy couch. I’ve always been more size 12 than two, and look like those dumb pictures of Eve – soft sloping stomach like van Eyck’s Ghent altarpiece, pert breasts, and curving hips for days. The words of my chosen book all turn up like mush. The leather smells like the cigars Samael smokes, the spice of his orange and musk cologne, and rain. It smells like him. I close my eyes, inhaling the scent. Memories of him from my childhood haunt me, the man cloaked in shadow, the owner of my soul.

CHAPTER 1: The living room was packed with people I either barely knew or wished I didn't know at all. Relatives that I hadn't seen in years. Family friends who asked too many questions—and distant cousins who pretended to remember me but clearly didn't. The annual summer barbecue at my parents' house had turned into a full-blown reunion, and I was trapped in the middle of it with no way out.