Dead Angels

Chapter Twenty-Three

  I dropped through the canopy of trees that sheltered the woods. In the distance I could smell the fresh water of the lake, but I couldn't go back there, not now. I stretched out my wings and tensed my muscles. My wings didn't disappear, they just hung there. Inspecting my arms, I could see that those purple scars had gone, leaving my wings permanently on show. They were a part of me. Maybe they didn't want to hide anymore? Perhaps they wanted to be free. My mother had said they would get stuck someday if I used them too much, and it looked as if she had been right all along.

  I made my way through the woods to the grate and the tunnel that would lead me home. The grate was hidden by a blanket of leaves and twigs. On my knees, I brushed them aside and then stopped, my hand hovering above the grate. Someone had placed a folded piece of paper between the slits. With my heart racing, I pulled the paper from the grate and unfolded it. It wasn't a piece of paper at all, but a photograph. I looked at it and stumbled backwards onto my arse. Sitting amongst the damp leaves that covered the ground, I stared down at the photograph of Melody and me. But we looked different - we looked a few years older - late teens, maybe? We had our arms around each other, both of us staring into the camera lens. Melody looked beautiful, her hair free and flowing about her shoulders, as if caught in a gentle breeze. I could see those roses covering her arms and neck, bright and red and pink and full of life. But I had tattoos, too. They looked like black flames seething up my left arm and neck. There was a little stubby black beard covering my chin, and an eyebrow piercing in my right brow. Around my neck, not only hung Melody's rosary beads, but several others, and in my hand I carried a crossbow.

  I didn't have to wonder who had left the picture for me; I knew it was Melody who had somehow placed it there. I had given her the idea. Just like Steve Edwards had in the story that I had written for Melody, I sat and looked at the picture. But it wasn't of Michael Blake amongst a screaming crowd of adoring Marilyn Monroe fans; it was a picture of Melody and me from another time, another place - another when. But just like Michael had in the postcard he'd left for Edwards, Melody and I looked happy at last.

  I turned the photograph over, and across the back she had written the word PUSH!