When September Ends

25. Destiny

September 28th--2 days

Skyla awoke for school, the memory of the dance still fresh in her mind. She stretched as far as she could and then hopped out of bed. She looked on the table beside her bed and her mother had left her a note. Pauline and Isabella had gone to school already, but she was going to allow Skyla to sleep a little longer because she needed her rest. Skyla smiled, grateful for her mother's consideration. She started to lay back down but remembered she hadn't got the chance to write about the experience in her diary yet. She got it out and got her favorite pen she always wrote with. She began to write. It only took her about ten minutes because she was excited to tell the story to someone else besides the ones who had been there. It sounded stupid, but this was her thought process.

Skyla shut the diary and was about to lock it when a folded piece of paper fell out of it. She opened it up and stared at it intently. It was a calendar page from a planner. She had forgotten about it. Skyla had started to count down the days until her death on it when Michael told her about it. Tears came to her eyes as she realized what day it was. She only had two days left. Her heart started to race with fear. The unbelievable life she had been living for a month now was almost over. But she didn't want it to be.

Tears came to her eyes as she threw the page back into her diary and locked it up. Skyla realized the pain in her heart was back and more relentless this time. Crying uncontrollably didn't help. She ran into the bathroom and stared at herself in front of the mirror. The more tears that came, the more pain she felt. Her breaths were becoming shorter and faster and her heart couldn't take this kind of stress. She grabbed her chest and ran back into her bedroom. She sat there on her bed for several minutes trying to calm herself down. She thought she had been ready. She thought it would have been easier to deal with by now.

A cry of agony escaped from her. She sounded like a wounded animal. Skyla doubled over in pain, hoping no one heard her. She was alone in the house, so she knew no one did. She closed her eyes and prayed it would go away.

***

Up in Heaven, her cries were heard loud and clear. Adam had been keeping an eye on her these last few days. He wanted to make sure everything was going like it was supposed to. Standing now in front of the big mirror in the conference room where he and the other angels of destiny had just met, he could see Skyla was having a hard time adjusting to the new level of pain her condition was delivering.

He waved his hand over the mirror and switched to see Michael. He was at school waiting for her to arrive. Adam extracted a smaller mirror from his pocket and opened it up. He said Michael's name out loud, his voice booming.

Down on Earth, Michael nearly jumped out of his skin. He always waited by his and Skyla's first-period class until time for her to arrive and then he would make his way to the lobby. And he was usually alone. He looked all around him, but he didn't see anyone. Then something happened that had never happened before. His pocket was glowing. Michael stared at it for a minute, unsure of what was going on. Then he took the small compact mirror out of his pocket and opened it up. Adam's image was already inside.

"Adam?"

"I don't usually communicate this way, Michael, but there's something wrong with Skyla. I think she's having major pain this morning. She was praying for it to go away."

Michael's eyes widened. "It must be really bad then. I have to go to her."

"You can take it away temporarily. Of course, you know that" Adam stated. "Just hurry."

"So you have been watching her all this time?" he questioned. "I always wondered--"

Adam cut him off. "There's no time, Michael. Go. I will speak to you later."