THE TRAGIC + DIVINE

by MELODY FELIX-PRIETO

  “Are you jealous?” Milo’s lips rose to a smile.

  I scoffed then said defensively, “Of course not.”

  My eyes followed Milo as he continued his stroll around the room.

  “You can tell Skinny I’ll have his money later on today,” I told Milo.

  “You don’t have to worry about that. Your debt has been paid.”

  “Paid?” I asked. “How?”

  One side of Milo’s lip curled up, and his eyes sparkled with playfulness. He paid my debt, which meant I owed him more than the stupid bet.

  “I will pay you back,” I promised. “Every cent.”

  “Keep it,” Milo replied. “I don’t want your money.”

  “Then what do you want?” I asked, shivers racing up my spine.

  He answered with a wicked smile and a stare that could break a million hearts. My legs suddenly felt very warm, my knees almost turned to Jell-O. I let out a nervous laugh.

  “So, have you found your subject?” Milo asked abruptly.

  “Subject?” My mind still lingering over Milo’s intentions.

  “For your assignment?”

  “How did you know about that?” I blinked at him, shaken. How did he know about my project? The paranoia inside was beginning to kick in again. All those times I felt someone watching me—what if Milo was stalking me?

  “It’s on the board,” he answered.

  I stood there feeling like an idiot. Mrs. Mercury had the assignment information on the whiteboard written in red letters behind Milo.

  I brushed a hand through my hair. “Not yet.”

  Milo’s eyes scanned the room. He walked over to the vase Mrs. Mercury had us draw last week then removed it. I watched him curiously as he took his leather jacket off. Then his shirt. My mouth fell open all the way to the ground at the sight of his inhumanly chiseled rock-hard abs. You’ve got to be kidding me. Not only are they freaking gorgeous, but have bodies to match? It wasn’t fair. Angel or not, no one should be so perfect.

  The room suddenly became very hot. I could feel my heart in my throat as my stomach began to churn with nerves. For some strange reason, the sight of Milo semi-nude awakened something deep inside I never knew existed. Something I’d never felt with anyone else before.

  “Draw me.”

  His request caught me off guard. “Right here? Right now?”

  “Would you prefer we go somewhere more…private?”

  I blushed.

  “No. It’s just—” I cut off when Milo took his pants off exposing his black boxer briefs. “What are you doing?”

  “Giving you what you need.” He stared at me with his dark, seductive eyes as he dropped his underwear. “A nude model.”

  “Oh my god!” Shock and horror ripped through my senses as I quickly turned around and tried to process what I saw—a glimpse of him—all of him.

  “There’s nothing to be nervous about.” I could hear a tiny hint of laughter in the tone of his voice. Milo loved making me feel uncomfortable.

  “You’re naked!” I shrieked.

  “I’m fully aware,” he replied. “Are you going to keep me waiting all day long? Or would you prefer a different position?”

  I wanted to leave. I wanted to run home, curl under my covers and wipe this day out of my mind. I felt intimidated by Milo’s confidence and his unique ability to mess with my head, but leaving would imply I was weak—a girl who couldn’t handle a little nudity. And there was no way in hell I was about to back down.

  Taking a deep breath—my heart racing at a hundred miles per hour—I turned toward my desk and smacked right into the easel. I heard Milo chuckle softly as I held on tightly to the sketch pad in front of me refusing to let it go. I didn’t want to risk another glimpse of Milo’s body parts.

  Focus. I needed to focus. My hands were trembling as I dug through my desk for my charcoals. I tried to act calm and unaware of Milo’s nude body, but it was too hard. It was my first glimpse of a naked guy—a very hot naked guy—something I seriously thought wasn’t going to happen for another ten years, but yet here he was in all his tan glory.

  “You’ve never seen anyone naked before.” He sounded stunned like it was a new revelation to him.

  I hesitated a moment before answering. “That’s none of your business.”

  Another chuckle. “I’m glad I’m your first.”

  It was apparent from the sexual undertone in his comments, Milo was after something more than just a date, more than I was willing to give. It was the main reason Eddie cheated. It was something he tirelessly pursued after only two months of dating but never got.

  I rubbed the promise ring my dad gave me when I was eight. He always told me self-respect was far more important than a brief physical fling. ‘A boy will go as far as you let him. If you’re not ready and if he can’t wait, he’s not the guy for you,’ he’d say. So I kept it under wraps. The ring was a reminder to remain pure—at least in body anyway, because right now my thoughts were bordering on the sinful side.

  Trying my best to ignore him, I focused on my drawing. Once Milo settled into a pose, my discomfort slowly vanished, and I began to sketch his face, his eyes, his…lips. I couldn’t observe him as closely as I’d like, the way I did with other models who were fully clothed, so I improvised, allowing the sketch to flow in the direction of my memory. Anytime I took a peek at him though, I had to be very careful not to stray south.

  “How long have you lived in Dixon?” Milo asked breaking the silence.

  “We’re getting up close and personal now?”

  “Normally before I undress in front of a girl,” he said, his voice deep and smooth. “I like to get to know her better. I don’t get undressed just for anyone, you know.”

  I scoffed a little too loudly.

  “You don’t believe me.”

  “Nope.”

  “So you think you’ve got me figured out?”

  “Yeah. I know how guys like you operate,” I answered, sketching furiously. “You’re the type who whispers sweet nothings into a girl’s ear—anything really—to get them into your bed.”

  My voice was tight, irritated and maybe even a little angry. I hated guys like Milo. Guys who went around playing with girls emotions as if they were disposable. He must’ve sensed my agitation because he grew silent for a long moment until he opened his mouth.

  “Let me change your mind.”

  “You’re not my type.”

  “What is your type? Football players?”

  Even though he couldn’t see me, I rolled my eyes.

  “Human.”

  “The type of human who likes to kiss pretty blonde cheerleaders?”

  I almost dropped my charcoal, my throat tightened and dried. Milo’s words stung harder than a bee sting. Who the hell was he to remind me of my past failed relationship, but more importantly, how did he know about Eddie cheating? Milo seemed to be well informed about my life, and I’m pretty sure Dawn had been filling his brain with Alexis 101. She’d been spending so much time with Dylan, she probably saw Milo every single day.

  “You deserve better than that,” he said sounding sincere.

  “And Scarlet doesn’t?” My voice was cold and harsh. “You flirt with other girls when your girlfriend is not looking. Talk about hypocrisy,” I added quickly.

  “It’s not hypocrisy when the other person is just—”

  “A friend?” I said cutting him off.

  “Something like that.” If I wasn’t already repulsed by Milo, I was even more now. He was such a player.

  “How can you… ” I stopped trying to find the right words.

  “My intentions are always clear about what I want, every girl I’ve been with knows that.”

  So he and Scarlet were friends, with benefits.

  “What are your intentions with…me?” The words escaped my mouth before I could process them. I bit my lip and slapped my forehead. Did I really just ask him that? If there was a hypocrite in this room, it was me. One minute I�
��m expressing my distaste for his lack of morals, the next I’m swooning over him? I could feel him smiling on the other side of the easel.

  “My intention is...” he began. Would he be so bold to tell me exactly what he really wanted? “To get your phone number. An exchange, for posing,” he finished.

  I let out a sigh of relief.

  Well played Milo. Well played. If I learned anything from being cheated on; a player knew how to play the game.

  “Broke my phone the other day.” For once in my life, I was happy I didn’t have a phone. “I don’t think I’m getting one any time soon. They’re too distracting. I need to focus on school if I want to get out of here.”

  “Where are you going?” Milo asked.

  “As far away from here as I can get.”

  When I finished my sketch, I realized Milo’s wings were missing. Looking over the easel, I noticed his wings were already unfurled, almost like he’d read my mind. His wings were large enough to cover his entire body and black like a crow. They were nothing at all like the white angelic wings displayed in famous paintings, something I found weird.

  Without saying a word, I sketched his wings not taking my eyes off them. When I finished, I walked over to him fully aware of his eyes monitoring my every move. I had a sudden urge to touch them, feel the feathers under my fingers.

  “Can I touch them?”

  “Go ahead,” he replied softly.

  I reached for his wings slowly, almost too afraid to touch them. I lightly brushed my fingers on his feathers. They were soft like fur. Unreal…otherworldly.

  “Wow,” I said amazed. “Why are they black? Shouldn’t your wings be white?”

  He looked away with a troubled expression, almost as if he was hiding something. Why would such a simple question bother him? When he looked back at me, his face softened. He leaned in closer, our eyes level, as he tilted his head like he was going to kiss me.

  No. This can’t happen. I don’t even like Milo—or did I? Yes, I found him very handsome, sexy, and so hot, and maybe there was a small part of me that wanted to know what it was like to kiss an angel, but the other part—probably the upper logical part of my body—found him egotistical.

  My mind swirled with contradicting emotions as I braced myself, waiting—maybe a little eager—for Milo to kiss me. I wondered if I should stop him. But before I could, his face was an inch away from mine, so close, I could feel the heat in his breath.

  Suddenly, the door burst open making us both jump. Mrs. Mercury dropped a box full of art supplies and covered her mouth.

  “Oh, dear lord!”

  Milo flew through the window shattering glass all over the floor. I tried to catch my breath as I placed my hand on the bar tool for balance. I couldn’t believe I almost kissed Milo.

  Minutes later, Mrs. Mercury was sitting in her desk with her glasses on examining every inch of my sketch as the janitor cleaned up the glass—Mrs. Mercury told him there was a crack in the window already.

  She lowered her glasses when she finished, then placed a hand over her chest as if she were trying to control her breathing.

  “Oh my, I love your portrait,” she finally said. “His wings are”—she cleared her throat—“enormous!”

  I blushed, embarrassed.

  “Is he your boyfriend?”

  “No. Definitely not my boyfriend,” I answered shaking my head.

  “Oh, that’s a shame. He’s beautiful,” Mrs. Mercury gushed.

  Beautiful or not, Milo and I were never going to happen.

  CHAPTER

  14

  I rushed past the front door when I got home, my backpack heavy with Milo’s clothes and boots. I was halfway up the stairs when my mother came out of the living room and called after me.

  “Where are you off in such a hurry?” she asked.

  “Uh—uh,” I stammered trying to hide the guilt I felt in my voice as I searched for any excuse to give her, so she didn’t grow suspicious. “I’ve got homework. Tons of it.”

  “What is that?” She pointed at my arm.

  My body went stiff. “What?”

  “Under your arm?”

  “Oh. It’s my sketch pad, for art class,” I said, gripping it tightly.

  “Can I see it?”

  An anxiety-ridden lump formed in my throat. “I need to get started on my work—”

  My mother reached for the sketch pad and took it from under my arm before I could stop her. The blood drained from my face. I stood there helpless watching as she thumbed through the pages inching closer to my latest drawing. She stopped to admire some of the sketches for The Girl in the Black Mustang. And just before she flipped to the next page, there he was—a naked Milo—dangling underneath her arm. I had to distract her, I didn’t want to risk room confinement for the rest of my life.

  “I heard about Mrs. Mercury’s unorthodox way of teaching. Does she still hire models for your class?”

  “Sometimes, not always,” I said reaching for the sketch pad. “Mom, I have two papers due tomorrow…” My mother’s bewildered expression caught me off guard. “What’s wrong?”

  “You called me mom.” Her eyes glossed over, and her lip almost curled into an awkward smile, but once she realized what she was doing, she straightened herself and continued flipping the pages on the sketch pad.

  The last time I’d called my mother ‘mom,’ I was nine-years-old. We lived in sunny southern California surrounded by the love of our family and my dad; she used to be happy then, full of life, she laughed a lot and hugged us every day. I don’t remember the last time she told me she loved me or turned out to one of my soccer games. Since marrying Paul, she turned into a pessimistic woman drained of life. Nowadays she resembled an empty shell; she hardly smiled, and when she did, it was forced and detached. I missed my mom. And I feared I would never get to see that person again.

  Luckily, a knock coming from the front door stopped her from going any further. My mother opened it and found Jane smiling.

  “Hi, Mrs. Torrez. Is Alexis home?”

  “Jane?” I asked surprised. “What’s up?”

  “Did you forget? We have to paint the peep board for my booth,” she said holding up a basket of paint.

  Like all the other school social events, I forgot about the Dixon Fall Fest. In exchange for rides to school, and the occasional lie to my mother about going to the movies when in reality I was hanging out with Dawn and Julian, Jane enlisted me in extracurricular activities I wasn’t too crazy about. My mother didn’t like my friends, and the only person she trusted—even if she found her obnoxious—was Jane.

  About an hour later, I was stroking the paintbrush up and down like The Karate Kid adding the finishing touches on a mural of a farmer and a scarecrow on a large piece of plywood. As I painted the orange pumpkins, flashes of Milo popped into my mind. The way his muscles flexed with every move he made, his perfectly sun-kissed skin. Just thinking about him caused a fluttering effect inside my stomach. There was definitely an attraction there on my part, even if I didn’t like he was an angel.

  “Jane,” I began. “Would you ever consider…dating an angel?”

  She put her paintbrush down and gave me a baffled look. “Of course not. Why do you ask?” A look of realization crossed her face. “Don’t tell me you’re thinking about dating one?”

  “No. I was curious if it ever crossed your mind.”

  “I’ll admit, it has a couple of times”—she smiled—“but I could never,” she said shaking her head as she struggled to lift the piece of plywood off the floor. “It’s unnatural. Besides, you wouldn’t want to mix with their race. You’d taint your DNA with theirs and have weird looking babies.”

  I helped her lift the board and placed it against the tree.

  “I thought angels couldn’t procreate?” I asked.

  “Well, not that we know of—yet.”

  “Would that be so bad, though?” I asked. “Having a relationship with an angel?”

  “And risk
being branded as a quill lover? No thank you.”

  I thought about it for a second. “You’re right.”

  “Does this have anything to do with the angel in the school parking lot?”

  “You saw him, too,” I frowned.

  “Everyone at school saw him. With or without his wings, I knew he was one of them.”

  Shame suddenly seeped into my veins.

  “It’s weird though, they know they’re not supposed to set foot inside Dixon.” Jane’s tone of voice implied she knew more than she led on. I eyed Jane quizzically, searching her face for any hint of it but she remained composed and focused on her painting skills.

  “Is there a law that doesn’t allow angels in Dixon?”

  “What?”

  “You said the angels can’t set foot in Dixon.”

  “Oh, no, I’m assuming they’re not welcome here since Mayor Dixon has made it abundantly clear how she feels about them,” she said brushing it away.

  I wasn’t buying it. I had a feeling Jane knew more than she was telling me. What if Mayor Dixon and Pastor Hayle were part of the Knights Army? The most notorious angel-hate group in all of Georgia? And if Jane was telling the truth, why would Milo and the other angels risk coming to Dixon if they knew they weren’t allowed? Things didn’t make any sense. There had to be more.

  “How does your dad feel about them?” I asked.

  “He never talks about them, actually. But between us, I think he hates them just as much as Mayor Dixon. He’s just too Godly to raise judgment.” Jane went back to her booth which told me she was done talking. I wanted to ask Jane more questions, but I had a feeling she wasn’t going to tell me anything.

  After Jane left, I took my dinner—a sliced cucumber with lime, salt and Valentina hot sauce sprinkled with potato chips—to my room and ate on my bed contemplating whether I should continue sketching my storyboard or do homework. As I wrestled with the thoughts, I noticed a part of Milo’s leather jacket hanging out of my backpack that was sitting on the floor. I stared at it a moment, my mind debating if I should take it out and maybe go through the pockets for clues; receipts, a matchbox from a strip club, a library card? I laughed. I couldn’t picture Milo inside a library. The strip club scenario was more likely.