by Amity Hope
So Ava had shown up and she was attempting to put on a cheery face for her parents’ benefit. She’d answered their questions about how she was enjoying the cabin or if she needed help fixing anything up. They asked her about her job and Leah insisted she was working too much but Ava just scoffed.
Her mom had already filled her in on the latest shenanigans at the vet hospital where she worked. Now she was attempting to look interested as her dad filled her in on his latest passion, a local organization called Helping Hands. He’d already told Ava all about it but in his excitement, he either seemed to have forgotten or deemed it to be so exciting that it was all worth repeating.
The organization volunteered around the community. They primarily helped the elderly, but really, anyone who was in need. For the most part, they did home repair and now that Daniel had gotten his parish involved, he couldn’t stop talking about it. He listed off people that were part of the team, people he thought Ava might know, as well as people who had been helped. Ava knew it was all in an effort to hold her interest.
She managed a well placed smile at the appropriate times and spent the rest of the time scooting her beans around on her plate. Her steak had long since gotten cold and her baked potato looked completely unappetizing by now.
Leah scowled at her daughter’s uneaten food but didn’t push Ava by saying anything. She was glad that she had come to dinner, getting her to actually eat something might have to wait until next time.
“You must have some free time coming up. Wouldn’t you love to help?” he asked. His voice emanated excitement. “It might take your mind off of things. You might meet some new people and we always need extra hands. We’ve gotten off to a good start but our list just keeps growing. Every time we cross a project off, seems two or three more are added on.”
Ava shrugged noncommittally. She wasn’t particularly in the mood to spend time with old friends, let alone meet new people. “I’ve been putting in a lot of extra hours at The Sugar Shack, Dad. Becky just ordered a new product line and she’s trying to get inventory done. She’s had me in the kitchen a lot, working some extra shifts. Maybe later in the summer, though, when things slow down. It sounds like important work.”
Daniel beamed at her, thoroughly pleased that she appeared to be considering it.
Leah cleared her throat, noting Ava’s persistent sullen mood even if her husband didn’t. It was a mood that Ava was trying to hide but not necessarily succeeding in doing so.
“How was shopping the other day?” she asked. “Did you girls have fun? Did you make a day of it?”
Ava smiled, relieved that it wasn’t nearly as forced as every other smile had been lately. “Yes, thank you for that. Molly went a little crazy picking things out for me but we had a good time. Lots of bright colors,” she admitted as she made a face. “We spent the entire day in Granville,” she told her mom, hoping to show enough enthusiasm to erase the worry lines that were far too evident. “We went out to lunch before we went shopping. Then we hung around the boardwalk all afternoon. It was nice.” There was no way she would admit why they did that.
“Good,” her mom replied with a relieved smile. “I’d like to see what you bought. Maybe I could stop out one night this week so you could show me?” Ava nodded and Leah motioned to the outfit she had on. “Is that new?”
She glanced down and nodded at her denim shorts—not the yellow pair that Julia had picked out—and her new fuchsia top that Molly had insisted upon. “Yes,” she said. “I’m actually going out with my friends tonight so I thought it would be a good time to wear it.”
“You are?” Daniel asked, unable to hide his relief.
Ava nodded. “I don’t think you know Tammy Foster but we were all invited over to her house. I’m meeting Molly and Julia there in a little bit.”
“What time?” Leah asked. “Can you stay for dessert? Or I could send it with.”
“I should probably get going pretty soon. You don’t need to send any with.”
Leah scoffed. “It’s apple pie. I made it because I know how you love apple pie so I am definitely sending it with. Just make sure you eat it,” she sternly ordered. “I’d hate to see it go to waste.”
“Sure,” Ava agreed with a smile. Surprisingly, apple pie did sound good.
She worked hard to seem back to her old self throughout the rest of dinner. She put an effort into sounding far more excited about going out with her friends than she actually felt. When she caught her parents sharing a relieved glance, it lightened some of the weight around her heart to know that perhaps they’d worry just a little bit less about her.
In the end, she decided to stay for dessert after all. Spending a little more time in the comfort of her childhood home suddenly seemed far more appealing than facing the droves of people that were likely to be at Tammy’s.
Even though she knew she should feel bad about it, she really wasn’t in the mood to discuss anything of importance with Dawson. She couldn’t imagine what he wanted to talk about that couldn’t be discussed while on her break. Sure, he was a nice guy and they’d remained friends. They actually chatted quite a bit but he hadn’t ever requested a chance to talk to her in private. At least not since they’d broken up. She wondered if maybe he, too, wanted to take a shot at telling her to snap out of her sullen mood. She mentally groaned at the thought.
Her mom wrapped up the last half of the pie to take home with her, after coercing a promise from her that she would eat it.
She was just slipping her sandals on when her dad reached for his shoes.
“Where are you headed off to at this time of night?” Ava asked.
He had an envelope in his hand. “I told Joanne I’d have these papers on my desk for her first thing tomorrow morning. I was going to run over to the church to drop them off now. I need to stop over at the Christopherson’s in the morning and I never know just how long that’s going to take me.”
Joanne was the church secretary and a bit of a spitfire when it came to having things done promptly. Ava knew as well as her dad that if those papers weren’t there for Joanne in the morning, someone would be hearing about it.
“If that’s all you’re doing, I can take them,” Ava offered as she held out her hand. “I’ll be going right by the church anyway.” She didn’t point out that she wouldn’t mind wasting just a little bit more time.
She left with the envelope tucked under her arm and the pie plate balanced in her hands.
***
She knew she should just set the envelope on her dad’s desk and be on her way but she couldn’t force herself to leave quite yet. There were volunteers who cleaned the church on a rotating schedule but more and more Ava had been finding solace just by being in the sanctuary. Now that she was here, she walked along each row of pews, straightening the hymnals and gathering up stray bulletins that had been left behind. She started in the back, wandering her way to the front. When she reached the altar she slid to the ground.
She was regretting promising her friends that she’d go to the party. It was one of the last places she wanted to be. They would not be happy with her if she canceled but that didn’t mean she was going to be in a rush to get there. She’d already decided she would get there late and leave early. At least then, she’d have done what she’d told them because she’d never agreed to any specific length of time.
She pulled her knees to her chest, leaned her head against the railing and closed her eyes. This was the place where it had started. The beginning of the end. The scenes of that night flashed before her closed eyelids, far more vividly than any memory had the right to be.
The recollection of learning that Gabe was Nephilim, that his father was a demon and that Grier was Grigori flitted through her mind. The memory of being pulled into Gabe’s thoughts, of seeing inside of his head so intimately was almost suffocating tonight. This church held so many memories for her. Some of them were terrifying and some of them were comforting because it was here that she realized that Gabe was
willing to do anything to protect her. She just hadn’t realized at the time just how far that sentiment would go.
If only they could go back to that night and change things somehow. And yet, Ava couldn’t imagine what they could have done differently. They, or Gabe, rather, did the only thing that could be done to capture a demon. While she had just sat by and watched. A sob caught in her throat at the thought. She vowed she would never feel that helpless again.
The church creaked and moaned around her, each sound disrupting the silence as if it were a presence that had more to say. She ignored it. She had spent far too much time chasing sounds and shadows into nothingness these past few weeks.
The wind had picked up. She could hear it from inside. It rattled the windows in their panes. A branch tapped irritatingly against the side of the church somewhere. Amidst these sounds of nature was the unmistakable sound of something else.
Despite her earlier resolve to stop imaging things that weren’t there, this sound piqued her interest. Held it tight.
At first she thought it was footsteps but quickly realized that it was a ridiculous thought. She shook it from her head. She was alone. It had to be the wind. She closed her eyes again and leaned her head back once more as she tried to relax and clear her head.
“Can you help me?” the voice, low and quiet on its own, echoed softly amongst the acoustics of the high ceiling.
Her eyes flew open at the sound. She was on her feet before she realized she had even moved.
The voice had struck her with a familiarity that cut like a dagger. But the person before her seemed almost foreign as he stepped through the doors and stood in the aisle at the opposite end.
Yet he was heart-achingly familiar.
He backed away timidly as Ava took a step toward him. The nearer Ava drew to him the more rigid his movements became. Like a small child wary of a dangerous animal drawing near.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered, backing away. “I…I didn’t mean to disturb you.” His eyes, such a familiar shade of ice-blue, were cautious and mistrustful as they settled on her. His gaze bore into her as his feet edged back down the aisle. He jumped, panicked when he collided with the door at his back. Ava could see his Adam’s apple, prominent in his thin throat, bob as he swallowed down what looked like fear at the sight of her. He spun, his hand flat against the door, pressing it open. His thin body slid between the two as one creaked open.
“Gabe!” Ava cried as he disappeared from the sanctuary. Her heart rattled painfully in her chest as she stumbled into a run down the long aisle. She darted through the double doors he’d just disappeared through. She expected him to be gone, to have vanished like he had the times before this but he was there. He was across the narthex now, grappling with the door handle that would lead him out of the church.
“Stop! Please! Please!” she begged.
“I’m s-sorry ma’am,” he stuttered, “I didn’t…I didn’t mean to intrude.” He looked terrified at the sight of her. It could have been the wild look in her eyes. Or the fact that she’d managed to whip his skeletal frame around, plastering him up against the wall as her delicate frame caged him in.
Or likely, it was a combination of these and other things unknown to her.
Ava inhaled sharply as she received a psychic sucker punch to the gut. Like an explosion of fireworks, fragments of realizations lit up and cascaded down around her. A million subtle nuances surrounded her at once, embedding themselves into her conscious mind.
Her friends had been right. This person, he looked like Gabe, but not like him as well. His hair was a tangled, greasy mess. His skin, so pale, was dressed in a layer of grime. His cheekbones, so sharp they stood out like blades beneath the overgrown stubble on his face. The shadows under his eyes, so dark they looked as though they had been painted on. His jeans were filthy, ripped. His t-shirt, black and yet obviously dirty, hung from his thin body.
And his hand, which she held in her own, it was not the strong, sure hand of her Gabe. It was trembling, the bones jutting out like the ribs of a starving animal. But that was nowhere near the worst of it. There was no recognition in his eyes. He had plastered himself against the wall in such a fashion it looked as if he were trying to push his way through it, trying to get away from her.
“Did you…” she whispered, thinking her voice sounded like a reverberating church bell, “did you call me ma’am?”
He slowly nodded, and though he towered over her, he looked down upon her as if she might at any moment attack him for just being there. For the first time he seemed to notice she was holding his hand in hers. He pulled it gingerly away, as if it had been submerged in a vat of muck and not held in the hand of someone he once loved. He slid it behind his back, afraid she might try to retrieve it.
She reached for his face but he flinched, trying to back away even though he had nowhere to go. Her hands froze in place and she clenched them into fists before letting them fall to her sides. He was a mess but he was Gabe and he could’ve been covered in mud and rolled in garbage and she would still want to put her hands on him. Or her arms around him. But the look on his face, his entire demeanor toward her…it stopped her.
It froze her in place.
“Don’t you know who I am?” her quavering voice asked, even though in her shattering heart she already knew the answer.
“I…” He shook his head. “No…” After a silence that echoed painfully between them, he shoved out words that he instinctively wanted to keep buried yet he somehow knew they must be said. “I don’t know who I am.”
Chapter 5
It had taken more than a little coaxing and a whole lot of begging and pleading to convince Gabe to come with her. After admitting he had nowhere else to go he pretty much lost the argument that he didn’t need to go home with her. She didn’t dare take her eyes off of him as she quickly rummaged through the stacks of donated clothes in the church’s basement.
He was so tall and had lost so much weight that jeans were a problem. She found a few pairs of sweatpants that would have to do. She also managed to scrounge up a few t-shirts, shorts and other necessities she thought might come in handy until she could get him something decent to wear. The ride to her cabin was tense.
He had looked at her with something suspiciously close to mistrust when she’d told him his name was Gabe. She was quiet for a moment after that, waiting for the bit of information to take hold. Finally, not looking completely convinced, he managed a small nod.
She’d tried to assure him she was a friend of his. She didn’t dare say more than that. Instead, she’d spent her time trying to convince him that she knew him and that she only wanted to help him.
Gabe had looked at her warily the entire drive. As if he was afraid she might try to reach over and touch him again. She drove on autopilot. Her head in a fog, her mind a complete blur, her stomach tangled up so tightly in knots it was making her ill. Her emotions were a twisted mess. She should be elated and she was but she was terrified that this wasn’t real. That he’d disappear like he did the other times she was sure she’d seen him.
Why didn’t he remember her? How had he come back? How long had he been back? Where had he been? Why had he flinched at her touch? And why, why, why didn’t he remember her?
Tears burned behind her eyes but she refused to give in to them.
When they arrived she had gently ushered him toward the bathroom. She only had coconut scented shampoo and body wash, which she set out for him along with a clean towel, new toothbrush and any other toiletries she could think of that he may need. She apologized for only having a pink, disposable razor for him to use. He simply shrugged as if he didn’t see what that mattered.
She paced outside of the bathroom door, waiting, fearing he would evaporate and disappear, swirled away with the water down the drain. Or possibly he would do something less dramatic. Such as crawl out of the window to get away from her. When the water shut off she ticked off the minutes, wondering how long it took a guy to dress
, shave, get a comb through that tangled mess of hair and brush his teeth. After seven minutes she decided he had taken long enough. She knocked on the door.
After the most long drawn out seconds of her life, he cracked it open an inch. A familiar ice-blue eye peered out at her.
“Are you okay? I mean, are you almost done?” she asked, trying to keep her voice as non-threatening as possible.
His brow furrowed. “Do you need to go to the bathroom?” he asked, pulling the door all the way open. He was dressed in baggy sweatpants and a t-shirt that had seen better days. But he was cleaned up. He’d managed to shave and his damp hair, which was longer than he usually wore it, was no longer a mess. He looked more like himself.
And he was still there, in the flesh. It took every bit of restraint that she had to keep herself from flying into his arms and quite possibly scaring him away for good.
She felt herself blush as she forced herself to answer his question. “No. It’s just,” she motioned to the kitchen, “I made you something to eat.” I can’t stand being away from you for another second. “I didn’t want it to get cold. I was just wondering if you were ready?” Because I just want to touch you but if I can’t do that, then please, please just be somewhere that I can see you.
“Oh, okay, yeah. I’m done in here,” he said.
He followed her into the kitchen and with shaking hands she placed the food on the table. Sitting next to him felt so surreal. Everything seemed brighter, louder and more intense.
He devoured the whole frozen pizza she had prepared and she chided herself for not putting in a second. Instead, she offered him a slice of the apple pie her mom had sent home. He ended up eating three. After downing several glasses of milk, he finally seemed to be satiated.