“Did you tell her…anything?” Celia asks, looking from me to Lev and back again.
“No. I wanted to wait.”
I hate the suspense and wish someone would just blurt out something. Anything would be good.
“All right, I will,” Lev says, responding to my thoughts as he sits on the arm rest of the couch beside me. “Just don’t shoot the messenger, okay?”
I nod slowly, trying to prepare for whatever he’s going to tell me. I can’t read their faces. I know the truth is there, but I can’t see it.
“You wanted to know about your father,” Lev begins, taking my hand. “I don’t have the whole story, but I do know that everything I am about to tell you is going to be in the news tomorrow. First the television and sooner or later the paper. You have to trust me and not freak out, okay?”
“Why?”
“His body will be discovered.”
Inhaling sharply, I stare at his face, trying to focus on the warmth, on his eyes, on anything but the horrible words coming out of his mouth. “I don’t understand,” I whisper, hoping that if he repeats it again, the words will be different and won’t sting so badly.
“Two hikers will be turning up your father’s body tomorrow along the path by the falls.”
“Oh God!” I whisper, suddenly feeling very light-headed as though I can’t breathe quickly enough. The world seems to spin madly around me. “How long has he been dead?”
Evan and Lev exchange glances. “Since before you left Hauser’s Landing as a baby.” Lev slips his arm around me and softly begins stroking my side, the heat of his fingers radiating through my shirt.
“Easy,” Lev whispers. I can feel the weight of his touch, and since he’s aware of my thoughts, he probably expects me to lose it. I’m half-expecting that myself.
“Who killed him?” I close my eyes, trying to make myself focus on anything except the frantic beat of my heart.
“We don’t know, only that your dad was murdered,” Celia says in a careful tone.
My gaze snaps to her face. “Why are you so damn choosy about what you know?” I demand. “You’re angels!”
“Meaning we’re supernatural beings, not omnipotent ones. We don’t have all the answers either. And sometimes having answers doesn’t make it any easier to swallow the truth.”
Finally I turn to Lev. “So why did you bring me here? Couldn’t you have told me this at home?” I stare woodenly ahead.
“You want to freak out there?” Lev asks softly, frowning. “Jimmie is pretty much on the edge, and I don’t know how much more he can take. We’re hoping that by the time the news breaks, you can find some way to calm him down.”
Evan stands. “Because this isn’t just about your father, Elizabeth. It’s about you. We knew there’d be a big precursor to the danger you’re going to face. We didn’t know what it was going to be, but I don’t think you get much bigger than an unsolved racial murder in a small town.”
My body trembles, and my mind hears what he says but it’s a step behind in understanding. When I finally rewind his words and replay them in my mind, I understand. They’re telling me somebody is about to try killing me. The thing we’ve all been waiting for. I inhale sharply and look down.
“You won’t be alone,” Lev whispers. “Ever.” He kneels in front of me, and even from that position I have to look up to meet his eyes. One hand stretches to my face, and he brushes his fingertip across my cheek.
I want to believe him. I really do, but I’m terrified. “What do I do?” I whisper, taking his hand and resting the side of my face against it.
“Trust me,” he whispers.
I look into his blue eyes and wince. Stay with me tonight, please, I think.
He swallows and nods, telling me he’ll be there. He leans over and kisses my forehead.
“It won’t be that long, will it?” I ask softly, looking from one face to the other.
“No, probably a couple of days,” Lev replies, rising.
“Then you know what happens?” Evan shoots Lev a meaningful glance, but Lev won’t meet his eyes.
“We should get you home, Elizabeth.” He walks to the hook and grabs my coat.
“No, I don’t know what happens,” I say. “So tell me.”
Evan looks away and starts to walk out of the room, but I reach out and grab his arm. Celia, too, stands like this is some kind of a meeting that has been adjourned, all items on the agenda resolved.
“Tell me. What happens after all this is done? I’m somehow a part of this. I have the right to know.”
“No,” Lev says to Evan, shaking his head. “I’ll tell her.”
Evan slowly nods, his gaze averts from my face, and I slowly ease my grip so he can walk away.
“So tell me,” I demand. Why does it feel like I’m going to hate this more than knowing someone is trying to kill me? Why does it feel like this is the pin pulled from a grenade and everything I know and understand is about to explode in my face while I watch?
Lev waits until everyone else has vacated the room. Then he takes both my hands in his. He’s not looking me in the eye. I can see his Adam’s apple nervously bobbing. His shoulders curve beneath a weight I can’t see but am able to feel just the same.
“Lev, you’re scaring me. You’ve got to tell me.”
He nods. “After someone tries to kill you, one of two things will happen. Either I fail, and I will have to go through losing you all over again…I won’t. I can’t.” His voice dies and he shakes slightly. His eyes appear even bluer as tears brim in them.
“Or?” I prompt him. “What is the other thing?”
“I save you. And I leave.”
“No!” I yell and jerk my hands back. “No!” My voice thunders furiously, and I can’t think of anything else to say. Nothing. I want to make him take the words back because right now I’m beginning to think a bullet isn’t so bad.
“No!” I yell.
“Elizabeth, you’ve got to calm down,” he says in a quiet voice as he lays his hands on my shoulders. A single tear rolls down his face and I want to scream at him because he’s so calm, so okay with this, and I’m not. This is what I’m trying to survive for? This?
“No!” I yell again. “You tell God to take that back!” I rip myself out of his hands and run toward the door. In a flash, I’m outside, running. I see the bridge and I keep running. There is no ice to slip on tonight, but I’d prefer that to this. This…. My chest feels like it’s going to explode and I just keep running. I barely miss the headstones. I don’t know where I’m going. I don’t care.
Nothing matters.
Chapter Sixteen
Arms wrap around me; I can’t move. Still, I thrash my legs and my body finally dissolves into sobs I can’t hold back. Nonetheless, I fight. Maybe I can’t reach God, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.
“I won’t do it!” I yell. “I won’t!” My voice is hoarse from tears. “I’d rather die because at least I can return to you. It might take years but that’s better than never seeing you again!”
I can’t speak anymore. I’m crying so hard it hurts to breathe. Some part of me wishes it would just stop. I won’t be able to fight much longer. I don’t have it in me. Lev turns me, and I throw my arms around him. Maybe he is an angel and maybe he is stronger than my imagination. Maybe he has powers I can only dream about. But none of that matters because he’s never going to make me let go. I bury my head in his chest and cry until I can’t cry anymore because I’ve shed everything and there is nothing more to come out.
I know we’re moving, but I just don’t know where. There is nowhere else to go. I look up and try to imagine Heaven, hoping God sees this broken heart. He wanted Lev to learn to love. Now he has. So where does it say a lesson learned is just over and now Lev must leave? I learned to love, too, so am I collateral damage?
“Shh,” Lev whispers.
“It’s never going to be okay again.”
He kisses my forehead, nudging my head u
p and out so I have to face him. His face mirrors my own, wan and tear-streaked. Yet all around us, I see the heavens, the stars, the magic of silence and grandeur occupied, for the moment, by only the two of us. The starlight glows off his wings and golden hair. “You have to do this, Elizabeth, and so do I.”
“No, I won’t.” I shudder and close my eyes.
He brushes his hand across my face. “I came here so you would live, and you will, even if that means I won’t be here afterward.”
I shake my head vehemently. “If I die, we get to be together. That’s the only thing I want.”
Lev shakes his head. “We’ve been down this road before.” He closes his eyes and his expression softens. “I fell in love with you over a century ago, and you couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing me again. You didn’t panic when the rifle went off and I wasn’t close. I assumed I would know by your thoughts when the time was near, but you focused on the earth and the grass and the gurgling brook near the hillside and why the sky is blue in the face of all that carnage. And I was so transformed by your thoughts, so taken aback, I couldn’t tell what had actually happened until it was too late. The blood, all that blood. The snow and the blood. I couldn’t put it back as much as I wanted to. It was done and could not be undone, not then.”
He wipes his face with the back of his hand. “No matter what, you have to live, Elizabeth; I can’t watch you die again. I’d rather God destroyed me Himself. And if you die this time, I will pray for that, for there will be nothing left in me but that one last wish. It will be the reward of a failed steward.”
So where does that leave us, I wonder. Me alive but forever broken or me dead and Lev seeking respite from a merciful God. Either way, it doesn’t matter.
I close my eyes and lean against his chest. “How do I let you go?”
“You take each moment as it comes; that’s all either of us can handle.” He kisses the top of my head. “I should get you home before it gets too late. Jimmie’ll want his pancakes.”
“Yeah,” I say but it’s mechanical, not me. Just a voice. Lev shifts a bit and dips into a shallow glide, his wings outstretched, banking in lazy spirals. His arms wrap gently around, bracing me against his back. I lay my head between his shoulder blades. Although I try to muster some feeling about anything, it’s as though I’ve been given an industrial-strength shot of Novocaine. That numbness is pervasive, leaving only the reflex of breath. In. Out. In. Out.
How do you define life when, very soon, the one person you love above all others will no longer be a part of it? I stare ahead, ignoring the effortless turn and slip of our flight and the gentle rustle of Lev’s wings. I focus on nothing really at all, and I don’t even feel it when Lev’s feet touch the ground, as though weightless, leaving nary a trace of his footsteps in the snow. I come alive again only when his arms loosen from around me.
“I’ll go get your purse and my keys so I can drive you home.” He’s waiting for me to say something, anything, but words now are useless, and I am broken. Lev leaves alone beneath that immense stretch of sky with a million new questions for God.
A moment later he returns, slides his arm around me, and leads me to the truck, where he opens the passenger door and I get inside. He watches me, but I just sit there, my eyes drifting to his.
“Please put your seatbelt on.”
“Whatever,” I whisper, but put it on anyway. It clicks in place before Lev is willing to shut the door and get in himself. He turns the engine over, constantly looking at me, probably trying to figure out what to say. We drive and past the bridge, he reaches for my hand. It takes everything I have not to react.
“I know this is hard. It’s not any easier for me.”
I grit my teeth. “I just want to know why. Why do I have to lose you? God didn’t ask me to love you, but I do. How can He give that to me and then take it away?”
“There’s a reason, Elizabeth. We both have to believe that.” He turns back to the road ahead. I lean against the glass, staring out into the darkness just in time to see a shooting star.
Still foolish enough to believe in stupid things, I close my eyes and make my wish. Let Lev stay when all of this is done because I can’t bear the thought of life without him. I can’t.
We drive in silence the rest of the way until Lev asks, “Are you all right?” We turn into my neighborhood.
“Sure,” I managed to say. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
He pulls into my driveway and I open the door even before we stop. I’m almost to the porch by the time he gets out.
“Elizabeth, wait.” Unwillingly, I stop and wait for him to catch up. “I know this night wasn’t what you wanted.”
“Doesn’t matter.” My tone is flat and I stare at the ground, the dead, yellow grass in the yard appearing dark in the moonlight.
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing matters.”
Lev turns me to face him. “Listen to me; it’s important. I know everything feels confusing, but it’s not going to be like this forever.”
“How would you know? It’s not like you’ll be around to see how things turn out.” I brush past him and step inside, pushing the door to with Lev still on the porch. Thank goodness Jimmie is upstairs so he can’t see me leaning against the door and starting to cry all over again. It’s dry tears this time, and silent as the grave. Lev is still standing out there, I know, and it takes everything I have not to open the door and reach for him but I have to start somewhere. Otherwise, how in the hell am I going to get through?
A stupid inside voice tells me I’ll find a nice boy to fall in love with. A mortal this time, someone without 700 years of destiny hanging over his head. But I don’t want a boy; I want Lev. I savagely wipe my tearless face and take the stairs two at a time, sprinting down the hall to my bedroom. Maybe there I can pretend this night never happened.
The night passes but I don’t sleep. Really, how can anyone sleep with such weight over her, just waiting for the rope to give? Besides, Lev has been helping me sleep so much I’ve missed watching dawn bruise the sky as day approaches. How do you not count minutes when you aren’t sure how many are left?
I shove all this back into whatever dark corners I can and pretend today is no different from yesterday. I force myself to down a couple of pieces of toast to settle my stomach. I’d cook for Jimmie just to give myself something to do, but, this is his only day off, and he’s still sleeping, unaware of anything that is coming. I grab my coat on the way to the door, intending to go warm up the Jeep. There’s a knock at the door.
I open it to find Lev. No surprise. He’s more than likely been somewhere around here all night beyond my sight just in case. He smiles at me as though nothing has happened, nothing has changed.
“Morning, Elizabeth.”
“Yeah,” I mutter, not looking at him. I try to think about what it’s going to take to get through the day.
“I came to give you a ride.”
“Yeah, I know. My Jeep is frosted over and your truck is already defrosted, right? Do you even have to wait for it, anyway? Don’t you just snap your fingers or something?” I start shaking, not sure how I’ll ever get warm on the inside again. Lev takes the coat from my hands and holds it out for me.
“No, I came because I knew you weren’t doing well this morning and it’s going to be a rough day.” He tries to make eye contact, but I won’t. I can’t.
“Let’s go,” I snap, yanking the door shut. As I step off the porch, a blast of cold air greets me, and I shiver. Lev slips his arm around my shoulders and pulls me close. I feel his warmth slowly envelop me, driving back the wind.
I spend most of my day doing this autopilot thing. I nod in all the right places and feign an interest in Shelly and Bree’s passing comments, but to tell the truth, nothing sinks in, not when I’m xpecting them to pull me out of school to give me the bad news. How long will it take to identify my father’s body and how long before all hell breaks loose after?
I know Lev is w
orried about me. I can feel it. He’s watching me like a hawk, waiting at my locker, and when I reach to open it, I shudder and my stomach recoils. I see the turkey dangling there, at least in my head, gutted, its lifeless eyes black and wide and staring not at me but at the rope knotted on the coat hook up top.
“Here, let me.” Before I can argue, Lev slips his hand in front of mine and pulls it open. For an instant it’s there, just like I thought it would be, but of course it isn’t. Not really. No red paint. No turkey. No blood. The clean walls allow me to release the breath I’ve been holding so I can stack the books inside. My arms are empty. Lev bangs the door shut and, taking my hand, he leads me to the cafeteria.
“Hey, at least your locker didn’t have any surprises. Isn’t that something to smile about?”
Looking up, I offer him the fakest smile I can muster.
“Or not. That looks like it hurts.” His tone forces a real smile from me and he leans close. “I knew it was in there somewhere. You’ve got to stop thinking about the future.”
“Isn’t it?” I whisper as we stroll toward the salad bar. Once upon a time, Lev would’ve asked my preferences. Now it’s a no-brainer. I don’t want indigestion.
Once our plates are full, we make our way back to the usual table. I glance around the room and spot Gail and Griffin chatting warmly. Some part of me hopes he’s figured how just how much Gail really likes him, but I’m so not holding my breath for a miracle. From another nearby table, Shelly and Bree watch us and smile knowingly.
“Earth to Elizabeth. You might want to eat.” I turn to Lev and he points at my tray.
“Yeah, I guess I should.” I reach for the saltshaker and my hand stumbles over an open can of soda. I try to grab it, but my reflexes are too slow and the fizzing liquid shoots all over the table, barely missing us both.
“Way to go, hotshot,” Lev smirks and shakes his head. He rises and looks around, spotting Mr. Henley just finishing mopping up another mess four tables down. Giving me one last look, he heads to the janitor and quietly explains the situation. Henley looks in my direction, a disgusted frown on his face. He shoots Lev an unkind word or two and Lev nods, drifting back to our table. All the while, Henley stares malevolently my way, a look that makes me try to clean up the mess on my own rather than relying on him. I have a big part of the mess mopped with saturated napkins by the time Lev comes back.