Vintage Memories

Chapter Four "A Resolute Warmth"

She knew all too well about his missing lover from his human life; they told each other everything. Dropping into hell around the same time, they were acquainted long before Angel fell into Valentino's grasp—long before his selfdom morphed into what it was today. Surviving exterminations together, going through hell and back to provide each other with anything they needed; they labored hand in hand to build themselves up from the concrete they came crashing onto. There was not a single denizen in all of hell that she trusted more than Angel, and she knew, without a toxin of doubt, that his view of her was tantamount to her own of him. So she stood by him loyally through his bad drug trips, let him spend some nights when he needed comfort and protection, and, of course, she would lend an attentive ear as he vented his pent up anger and sadness. She expected it of herself. After all, what he did for her far outweighed anything she could ever attempt to reciprocate...

"Thank fuckin' Lucifer it worked..."

"What worked? Tony, what did you do?"

Just the distant memory was still enough to cut her down the bone, but she hid it well under her gentle, assuaging hushes as she continued to hold him close.

She was there all though years ago, by his side when he came to the bitter conclusion after so many failed searches that Allen was dead and gone. They predicted it was most likely at the end of an angel's spear. It was then, like the snap of a single thread that had held him in place, and as inexplicably as that golden tooth that seemed to just materialize one night, Angel fully, and suddenly plunged himself into his sex career, staying out into the late hours of the nights, honing his performative persona at his new employer's demand, and, not to mention, the delve into his own choice of emotional anesthetics: hard drugs.

Drugs weren't the highlight of her worries. After all, she was even inclined to partake once in a while. What truly shook her was something far more nauseating to behold. She watched the metamorphic change with the incapacitation of a powerless bystander, gaping in horror when he came home one night just as the sun began to illuminate the red sky, beaten nearly half to death. Only to return to that source the very next night, bruises still fresh in their sickly yellows and purples. That was, but only, the first instance—a preamble for the many nights after that that he would return in such a gruesome state.

"It's my fault," he would always say, rambling on in stories about how he had 'fucked up' in some unreasonable way, and therefore earned his punishment. And then came his sudden and impromptu move from the home they had spent years cultivating together.

They would still see each other as often as his jam packed schedule would allow, but she watched as with each visit, he changed a bit more, and left a piece of his old self behind somewhere in the fray of pornographic filming, or in the back of another john's car. Even so, it did little to sway her, she loved Anthony dearly, and Angel was still Anthony, despite whatever changes he would incur. She loved Angel.

As decades passed, and by these unhealthy means, he had learned to accept his loss—or, more or less, skate by with passing fancies and momentary distractions. Though, now and again, he'd fall to pieces at certain triggers: jazz music, often heard by a transient street performer, a random sight or smell that, though he couldn't remember exactly why, struck him as familiar, or, on a specific occasion, he had come across certain books that Allen had read to him. Just what trigger had he run into this time?—she wondered.

After a few moments of muffled weeping, Angel's body stilled, pulling back from the embrace, a basin of fresh, charcoal mascara gathered underneath his eyes. He grabbed the towel with a groan and slapped it roughly over his haggard features. Crooning his head back over the back of the couch, the top of his head touched the wall. He laid motionless, face veiled in the wet rag.