Chapter Text
Eddie thumbed through the yellowed pages carefully. It was a library book of questionable age given the thin brittle quality of the paper and he really couldn’t afford the costs to replace it alongside his current rent and tuition. He was still pretty skeptical of this whole thing but really what did he have to lose; besides Bill seemed quite sure of this working.
Eddie was mostly convinced this would just be a big waste of time; not to mention a fire hazard. He’d already drawn out the chalk circle and symbols though and he didn’t want that to go to waste, since it would definitely be a pain to clean up after the fact. The mixed smells from the strong incense given to him from Bill only added to the ridiculousness. Mostly the smoke just irritated his nose and had him feeling like he should be reaching for his inhaler. He known the inhaler was fake for years now and still had to work to shake some of the old urges to use it, even if he'd thrown his last one away ages ago.
Eddie got to work writing a few nonsensical symbols onto a crisp sheet of paper. The book also called for blood to be used but that was too unsanitary for his tastes.
Red pen would just have do.
He was already going against the black candle recommendations anyways, so why quit there. Myra would probably be pleased to see that he lit the damned pumpkin spiced things and she really didn’t need to know the context for it.
Eddie felt incredibly silly sitting inside the chalk circle, but he at least had the comfort that the librarian hadn’t thought too hard about him asking after this stupid succubus spell.
Bill had been right about Mike being a solid library aid who was quite knowledgeable in the occult section, not that he was about to doubt his childhood friend on things like that. Mike seemed intrigued with Eddie’s weak excuse of it being for a creative writing project asking more questions than he would have liked given it was an on the cuff lie. Still he seemed nice enough and had Bill’s approval so that was enough for Eddie to trust him on the book choice, well that and he also didn’t want to spend his whole day flipping through the books himself.
He read over the passage one last time before closing the book, hoping his symbols were close enough to count as properly legible. Eddie was desperate to fix his relationship with Myra- not enough passion she complained often. He really didn’t want this to fall through, mostly because he would never hear the end of it from his mother, not that he would ever admit that last part to anyone else. So, he’d gone to his closest friends, Bill and Stan (who were conveniently roommates), who after laughing had offered some rather poor advice. Bill jokingly told him to summon a demon to help him and Stan seemed to agree, although thinking on that now he was probably just being sarcastic about it.
The worst that could happen at this point was that nothing would happen and he would have to find another way to learn how to woo Myra.
Well that or his curtains could catch on fire... but he was trying not to worry about that right now.
Sighing deeply and preparing himself for the worst, Eddie tossed the folded-up paper into the candle in front of him. A plume of smoke rose up and he closed his eyes, coughing against it.
“Oh shit, are you alright?” Eddie coughed harder, not registering the obviously masculine voice. He felt someone gently patting his back in a poor attempt to help him stop choking on the smoke. “Crap! I don’t know I’m doing,” the person whispered probably not as discreet as they’d like to be.
Once he felt like his lungs weren’t trying to dislodge themselves from his body, Eddie opened his watery eyes to assess the situation. He was still wheezing a bit and was regretting not taking his inhaler out for this. There was still someone patting his back a little harder than necessary and Eddie had to refrain from shoving them away.
He turned to tell them off and felt his words close and die off in his throat.
Dark brown hair piled up in curls and waves combined with sharp angular cheekbones, freckles and wild dark eyes behind thick glasses frames, and what was very clearly a masculine being despite the horns nestled in his hair and winding tail swishing behind him.
This was not a succubus.
Something had definitely gone wrong somewhere.