My head was heavy, and my eyelids sore when I woke up hours later. The urge to let myself fall back into dream-filled sleep heightened at the way my chest felt like it was being crushed under the heavy weight of my newfound knowledge. I blinked up at the glowing light of the lamp on the side table beside me. The light seared my eyes, making them water. Brushing away the water from my eyelids, I pushed myself up to sit on the couch.
Deep-seated fatigue made my wired muscles ache with strain at the effort. I pulled my earphones out of my ears, letting them fall to the cushion beside me. Darkness still saturated the world outside of my curtains, cold and malevolent. Glancing at the clock as I went, I swept the blinds out of the way to find a blanket of angered clouds hanging over the city. It was so thick that I’d thought that it was somehow still dark out. The fact that it was nearly noon had ruled that theory out entirely.
I leaned on the windowpane, feeling the cold glass against my fingers, reminding me that I was awake. There didn’t seem to be much difference between my nightmares and life anymore.
My breath clouded the flawless screen, spreading across it like ice across a like in winter, between the rest of the world and I. Silence reigned over my apartment, a chasm with no certain end. A small corner of white caught my eye as I turned my back on the window, almost indiscernible from the ivory of my front door.
For once, hesitation didn’t hold me back, there was no fear instilled in me. I only moved forward and took the slip of paper from underneath the door, flipping it open.
The words didn’t immediately register in my head; they were just meaningless strokes on a page larger than any of the other notes had been. It was the handwriting it was different. I ran my fingers over the page, the impressions much deeper than any of the previous notes. Instead of the distant sensation of unknown hanging just out of reach, my mind fabricated a picture that I could see clearly.
Alex had written this, not long after I’d shut him out, figuratively and literally. I sighed, sat down on a stool at the kitchen’s granite island, and began reading.
Though you may not want to listen to anything I have to say right now, you only know the part of your history that deals with your death and the circumstances behind it. There’s more than just that; there’s still everything that happened between your death and your reawakening.
A cavernous sense of premonition took up residence in the forefront of my mind, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to hear what else had possibly happened to me.
When Lucy was shot, Azrael met her at the gates of death, as he does for everyone in her condition, he recognized her as one of mine, as someone who I was supposed to be protecting. Azrael was tired of the rising deaths he had to attend to, and the laziness of the guardian angels as a whole. In his mind, your death was the last straw.
You must know that people don’t very often get resurrected. Actually, it almost never happens, and hasn’t in many millennia. Azrael wanted to punish me, and give you your life back, and so he sent you back after the hype over you died down. He is the one who set up your life as you are now.
I finally knew who my mysterious benefactor was, and who had been sending me the notes. The fact that it was the Angel of Death only encouraged the thought that I could never go back to attempting to live normally.
Your restoration threw off the balance of Life and Death, and Death does not like to be cheated.
Shivers ran up my spine at Alex’s personification of death, and gooseflesh appeared on my skin. A queasy feeling simmered in my stomach, and I took a deep breath to calm it.
Because of this, you are more vulnerable to illness and harm. Death has a distinct mark, and it attracts trouble and unsavory characters into your life. A certain darkness taints your aura and it cannot be controlled.
Revelations opened themselves up to me, sending me back to all the times that I’d faced any kind of trouble. In each instance, Bear was barking, as if he were warding something off. My stomach lurched.
As a punishment of sorts, I was stripped of most of my power and sent down to protect you from anything I could.
The letter broke off suddenly from that, without a signature or a concluding line. I flipped the paper over, looking for something on the back, but it ended there. Bleary-eyed weariness and muscle fatigue washed away from my body in a downpour of the icy coldness spreading through my heart.
***
Soaked sidewalks greeted my black and white converse, soaking the hem of my jeans and into my socks. A steady stream of rain pattered against my jacket, running off of it in rivulets. The warmth of the air against the cool of the droplets had steam rising off the concrete, further obscuring my view of where I was going.
I didn’t even know where Alex lived, or if something was actually wrong. If he had been in danger, he wouldn’t have had time to slip the note under my door, right? It would have just been floating around somewhere in the hallway. Even so, I reasoned with myself, I had to check.
That would have been a great idea, had I known exactly where I was going. School would be a great first bet, but first I wanted to call him.
“Yeah, well you might’ve wanted to do that first, huh?” I criticized myself, throwing my car door open and sliding into the seat.
I removed my coat and chucked it into the backseat after taking my phone from it and dialing Alex’s number. The phone rang, and I waited until the tone to leave a message, just asking him where he was and trying not to sound too worried, just in case I was just reading too far into his abrupt ending.
The downpour strengthened, sending fat drops of water cascading in torrents down my windshield. Twisting the key in the ignition, my car rumbled awake, only slightly audible above the roar of the water slapping against the Audi. I took the road slightly slower than usual, more for the fact that it was difficult to see than the slickness of the wet roads.
I pulled into the school’s parking lot as close as I could get to the entrance. Forgetting my coat, I yanked the key out of the ignition and jumped out of the car into the weakening rainfall. I jogged toward the front doors, glad that it was about time for lunch when I entered the air-conditioned hallway. Droplets of water trickled down my neck uncomfortably, cooling on my skin.
Desperately, I cast my gaze over the hallway teeming with people recently let out from classes. I felt eyes on me, but I brushed the feeling off with ease. Let them look. I thought, jutting my chin out as an added show of confidence.
***
Drake stepped out of Biology, detesting the cheerleader hanging off of his arm. She was so much more difficult to get rid of than anything else he’d ever encountered, and that was saying something. Outside, thunder rolled above the clouds, and Drake waited for the flash of lightning that should follow it.
Blaise hadn’t come to school this morning. Too scared, was she? Too afraid to face him after he’d terrorized her the day before? It hadn’t been him trying to hurt her, he reasoned, just a version of him. The profound guilt plaguing him was just as hard to purge himself of as Tina.
A flash of lightning lit the gloriously thunderous skies, drawing Drake’s eyes to the windows nearest to him. Framed in a dangerous swirling aura of gold light and dingy black, stood Blaise Anthony.
Drake stopped short in his stride, taking in her exuding confidence, even though she was soaked. Her brilliant eyes were ablaze with vivid violet. Her hair was a tangled mess of soaked silvery blonde hair, slipped loose of its tie, cascading down to her shoulders. All in all, she was the picture of perfection, and because of that Drake couldn’t tear his eyes off of her.
Then an unendurable throbbing set off in his head, crushing his skull with a vice-like grip. Drake’s conscience slipped away, giving in easily. Shame still flooded through his veins, even as he gave up control of himself.
***
Now that I was here, I felt stupid. What if Alex wasn’t here, after all? A driving force defied that theory entirely. I remembered Lucy’s killer instincts, and hoped that I had carried them through into this life by myself, without Alex acting as them for me.
A warm hand rested on my shoulder, and I turned to find Drake standing next to me, a wicked grin on his handsome face. I yanked my shoulder away from his grip like he his hand was on fire. Whether yesterday had been my mind playing with me or not, I didn’t trust him. I should have listened to Bear the first time I’d met Drake Landry, instead of letting him worm his way into my life.
“Get away from me,” I hissed.
His dark brown eyes flashed with injury before they resumed their cold, insensitive gaze. “Why should I?”
I tugged my drenched sleeves down over my wrists, letting my eyes quickly search for exits. There had to be another way to find Alex. One that didn’t involve Drake. “Because I’m telling you to.”
He pressed forward, his full height imposing on my space. “You don’t sound too sure.”
“Yes, I do,” I snapped. “Don’t make me ask again.” Even I had to admit that my words were bold, and even more daringly spoken. I felt the door handle cold in my hand, behind me. The electricity in the air was insane, but I didn’t know whether it was from the storm or the tension between Drake and I.
Drake’s head tipped back, a rough laugh prying itself unnaturally from his chest. I sent frantic glances to the student body around us, but none were taking notice of us. While his attention was directed away from me, I pushed the door open hard and spun to follow it out.
The metal hit the side of the building with a harsh clang, lost beneath the deafening crack of thunder. Puddles flashed by under my converse, adrenaline fueling my every move. I realized that it wasn’t a smart move to run away from the body of people inside school. Startled eyes switched to look for the source of the metallic bang, but didn’t seem to notice me, or Drake.
I came to pass the Audi, throwing a look over my shoulder. Drake was no longer there. Sharp impact threw me off my feet and onto the cracked, swamped tar. The breath was driven from my lungs, leaving me gasping for air. Black dots crowded for my attention as I struggled to inhale.
Black shoes came into my line of vision as he crouched in front of me, grinning down at me like he’d won the lottery. His eyes glittered with a black malevolence that I’d never seen before. Sharp stinging on my tongue had me spit out blood on the road under his feet.
“Go to hell,” I spat, my chest heaving for air.
“Been there and back, babe.”
I pushed my hands against the tarmac and got to my feet, standing and looking down on him. “I’m not afraid of you.”
Truth rang clear in my words, as defiant and strong as I’d ever been. The stone cold resolution showed in the set of my face, even in my stance, I was sure of it.
Slowly, he rose, his stature unfolding in front of me until he once again towered over me. “You are,” He assured. “Let me remind you.”
His hands brushed over my neck, and I came to the revelation faster than he could have taken a breath. Drake had been the one who had tried to kill me. He had made an attempt on my life during that horrible game with Morgan. I swallowed my instant panic and shook my head, ignoring the uncomfortable warmth spreading from his fingers into my throat.
“If you wanted to kill me, you would have already.”
I had startled him, I knew, caught him off guard. Drake’s hands sank from my throat to my shoulders, his face creased with confusion and… struggle. “It has to happen.”
His voice was so lost and empty, that I was silent for a second, trembling slightly underneath his grasp. “No it doesn’t.”
My shoulders felt like they were grinding together as he warred with himself, the depth of his eyes shifting like the light of the sun on a cloudy day. I stayed as still as I possibly could, fighting with myself about the delicacy of this situation. My fate was left in his hands, and I wasn’t sure what he would choose.
I searched for his eyes, willing him to see past whatever was influencing him. No one could do this willingly, or so I hoped. My heart might have burst, waiting for his decision. Try as I might to keep Drake separate from my racing heart, I had a soft spot for him, though I knew it wasn’t good for me. We’d spent time together, and talked. Though he’d been just about as bipolar and confusing as Alex, he’d been more reliable, which was strange to say.
The pain and guilt, mixed with hatred and anger, only made me want to reach out to him more, to console him and rid him of such horrible emotions. They warped him. Drake had a beautiful soul somewhere underneath all the dark he held in him.
Very carefully, I reached out to him, my hands brushing over his taut face and I kissed him.
He was beautifully damaged, and so was I. How could I not try to save him?