The Angels' Mirror Pack 2: Books Four through Seven

  The thought of the man who had betrayed Jesus moments after his feet had been washed by the Savior left a bitter taste in his mouth, and he gagged, the acrid putridity of the toilet near him suddenly forcing itself into his eyes and throat, the odor coating his entire being.

  Ain’t I ever gon’ be clean, he wondered, idly rolling his pencil between his thumb and fingers, watching it dance in the dim lighting of the cell. God done did dis ta me, but I gots ta say, I can’t take no more o’ dis junk. I done did what I did, an’ can’t nothin’ change it, or what’s happen since. A’cause o’ all dat come befo’ t’day can’t do no changin’ but mebbe God can still change me… I sho’ nuf can’t.

  Those two songs had tortured him enough. Yet, there were the addition of Flying Colors’ Blue Ocean, whirling with color and emotion and the prayer to erase memories in the depths of water calling to him, too…. There was Tokio Hotel’s awkwardly haunting Alien, bringing images of Rosemary and the mirror to his heart and mind and reminding him that she was the closest thing he’d ever come to love bringing tears to his eyes as he parked in his bunk underneath thin blankets at night, and a song called Gibberish from Spock’s Beard called to him to be free, to accept things as they are. Prisoner by King’s X betrayed him as much as Judas, Jesus, and mocked his very life, but it, too, beckoned him, somehow.

  But why?

  And what was it about Deep Purple’s Chasing Shadows that drew on his energy, that pulled him inside out and messed with his head? The others – even Symphony X’s temperamental and beautiful The Divine Wings of Tragedy didn’t compare to how Chasing Shadows invaded his senses and cried out through his blood for help and gave him pause.

  The pencil in his fingers flung through the air as, in his nervous contemplation, he lost a grasp on it. It landed next to Maplethorpe, causing the man to startle.

  “What was that about,” he said, his English-tinged accent getting on Arthur’s nerves not for the first time. He picked it up and, barely looking Arthur in the eye, tossed it back in his direction, where it clattered to the floor at his feet.

  Bending to swiftly pick it up, Arthur continued sifting through his thoughts, as the song continued pouring through his mind. Images of broken wings falling into the ocean, drifting away into a long, dark night of moonlit glory mingled with those of a dying eagle, its head down, face to its chest, ready for death. And the eagle, once dead, turned into a machine; into a nothing oblivion of metal parts that configured themselves into the shape of a flame… but a flame, it could never be. But then there was grave-dancing, and the image of someone hooting in pride over his enemies and corruptors and those who had deserted – or was it hobbled – him.

  But what did it mean? And was it his song alone, or another’s?

  “Listen, Man,” he said quietly, “Gots ta aks ya somethin’, a’cause it’s drivin’ me up da wall. Sorry ‘bout dat dang pencil slidin’ through da air like dat, Maplethorpe.”

  His cellie sat up, revealing his recently shaven head and tired, wrinkle-rounded eyes as he pushed his legs over the side of the bunk. “Talk.”

  “So I dunno if dis gonna soun’ crazy-like or what, but I just gotta fig’re out what be hap’nin’ ta me, ya know?”

  Within minutes, he explained his dilemma; he spoke out a few of the lyrics that had been running around through his mind and, deep inside, he hoped the man would continue in his understanding way. It had been because of Maplethorpe that he was still in this cell, instead of on the mental health unit.

  It was because he had stood up for Arthur time and again – without asking for anything in return, and never judging him – that the two had become, almost, friends.

  Almost.

  He could see the wheels turning inside of his cellmate’s mind, his pupils dilating and lips spreading thin in thought.

  “I believe I’ve heard it before. let me ponder it for a bit, if you would. I’m almost positive I know what…”

  A sudden commotion rising above the everyday din startled the man, and he hit his head on the ceiling above. Jumping down quickly, he then rubbed at the front, where a recently healed-over scar shone pink against the white of his scalp.

  “That smarts,” he said, scowling. “Whatever is going on has got to-”

  The alarm sounded between the bars of their cell and the one across, and Arthur made haste to stand, as well, as one of the officers came over the intercom to announce there was a fire in one of the other corridors.

  “From closest to furthest block, all will be ushered outside into the yard. As your cells open, do not attempt to run; walking will suffice, and you will listen to instructions once you are under way,” a deep, velvety voice told them all as men began shouting. Arthur heard a few laugh, and a singular scream of terror as their cells unlatched. The smell of burning chemicals mixed with the smell of the urinals and sweaty men as Arthur and Maplethorpe joined the jostling crowd toward the outdoors, and fresh air.

  “Haken,” Maplethorpe finally said with a shout above the field of prison blue surrounding them. “The song is by Haken. It’s called Falling Back to Earth. And it surely isn’t about eagles and robotic fire,” he continued.

  “It’s a song about how pride, as the saying goes, comes prior to falling; it causes us to stumble, and therefore, to come to ruin. But it goes even deeper than that, and I don’t have the words to tell you… you’ll have to gather better understanding for yourself.”

  As the doors to the yard opened and men poured out into the dirt, cement, and grass, Arthur trembled and a chill ran down his back. He began to shake on legs that didn’t wish to keep moving, but which he forced into action to keep from being trampled.

  What was God telling him now?

  Or was it even God to begin with?

  With each of the songs that had been coursing through him like wind through the currents of a river, how was he to tell what was there for his good, and what was simply his mind working overtime? Was the music still here for his good, as a gift?

  Or had it become a curse?

  Seven

  Meridian, Mississippi… May 10, 2025

  Calico jumped as her husband spoke in the darkness of the room, his hands moving to cradle her against him. Their son, Angus, was asleep in her arms as the three lay side by side, and she was thankful for the blackout curtains in their hotel apartment now, more than ever.

  So much had happened in such a short time that her mind refused to stop racing; her heart refused to stop pounding through her like a locomotive pushing its way across a desert in the heat of the day.

  And here it was, a day barely begun to begin with.

  Angus’ breathing had been so bad the night before that Romeo had insisted he stay with them overnight. Even if it meant another night without much privacy. The boy’s diabetes had given them more than one scare since the day they’d rushed to the hospital with Clementina to have her heart checked.

  Romeo’s chin resting on the back of her head, and his arms around both she and their son, she could feel his heart beating its rhythm against her back, and it soothed her as tears began to fall in their silence.

  Breath was the only sound she could hear. Breath, and the beating of her own heart.

  How had life come to this? Where everything was life and death, once again, and there was the constant reminder that only God was in control?

  As He should be.

  But oh, how she wished things were predictable sometimes; that they could foresee so much more than they did. That God would give her – give each of them – further glimpses into what would happen in the days and weeks ahead.

  “What are you thinking about,” she heard Romeo whisper behind her. “I can tell you’re crying, even if you’re trying to hide it, my Love.”

  “I just….”

  How could she explain what had been on her heart, her mind, for the past few weeks since Clementina had her scare? How could she tell him about her fears without causing fears of his own to enter into the picture, as well?
Or causing her own to loom larger and become bigger than God in her mind?

  She couldn’t do that. God was larger than anything she could ever face, but in order to remember that, she had to keep from speaking; at least for now. She couldn’t continue to dwell on the past, or on the fears she had for the future, either.

  Her nightmares had become intense again, after a handful of months where they almost didn’t exist. Nightmares about Arthur Reynolds, and Andrea Juarez; nightmares where she was still Rosemary Jenkins, still in Ol’ Dabney’s basement against her will. And in the dreams, it wasn’t Andrea who was pregnant, it was she, herself. In her nightmares, she was carrying her precious Angus, the only son of her marriage, and Arthur had found her and forced her to show herself and she and Angus had died instead of Andrea and her unborn child.

  Was it because of the new environment catching up to her? Was it because of everything that had been happening with Angus’s health, or with the anniversary of her father’s passing a few days prior? She wasn’t sure.

  And she wasn’t sure she wanted to know why.

  She just wanted to get on with her life; with the life she and Romeo and Angus had carved out for themselves in California; she missed their home, and she missed being around people she knew and had learned to trust. And now, with a new set of HUVA people, she’d had to begin all over again.

  Trust didn’t come easy; it never had with her. And she had trusted the wrong people in more than one instance.

  Hollywood Underground Victim’s Assistance had done more than their fair share in helping her learn to trust again, but it was really between she and God, wasn’t it? And it was a choice.

  Trust, like love, always really was.

  Trust, like love, always came with a price but, in the end, was worth it when there was someone on the other side of it that cared… even and especially when things felt off or awkward. Perhaps that’s when people need, instead of falling away from each other, to pull together and sit down, face to face, talking things out until it was all talked out.

  It wouldn’t take a day, or a week, maybe… it might take a few months… but wasn’t the trust, the love worth it? Wasn’t knowing that someone loved you, and that you could trust them, enough to make their presence in your life worthwhile?

  And wasn’t that what life was about?

  Loving and trusting God and the people He called you to love and trust? Those He called to love and trust you, even when you didn’t feel you deserved it? Even when you were still healing from trauma or past hurts?

  Trust and love; those two, along with hope and faith, were worth everything that had come before. No matter the pain of the past, God could heal it if she let Him, counseling or not. And He had done much with the love and trust of Romeo to bring that healing to her life and heart.

  Looking back, Calico realized that the times she’d most wanted to push Romeo away were the times she needed him most. The times she had hesitated were the times she should have embraced the pain and allowed him to love her as she was, in her pain, and help diminish the pain with God’s grace.

  But she hadn’t, and she couldn’t change it.

  She was just thankful that he had never given up on her, even when she felt she was spinning out of control. And perhaps, at times, she had been. Between depression and nightmares, and all that Arthur had done, she’d never wanted to love someone again.

  She had loved Justice, and he had chosen another; she had cared for Arthur, and he had caused her great pain. But that was no longer the present. It was behind her… and she was grateful for the man God had given her, even when she felt unworthy of his love and attention.

  “Talk to me,” Romeo said again, his voice soothing her fear-ravaged heart, his tone mellow yet beckoning. “What’s been going on with you lately? If you don’t tell me something, I can’t help with the situation, and I really want to. I can’t stand to see you hurting like this, over… over what?”

  With a sigh, she carefully turned toward him, the comforter moving with her as she carefully let go of their son, who shifted back against her.

  “More nightmares?”

  She nodded in the silent throb between them, tears now coming faster. Her heart raced within her, and she tried to calm her breathing, which had moved into a fever pitch.

  “I dreamed that I was back in that basement and that instead of Andrea being with child, that I….”

  She paused.

  Should she say something about the dreams when her precious son was right there, at her side? Where his heart would hear what she said even if he didn’t comprehend the words? People could hear in their sleep, it had been shown… even if they don’t recall what was said, there remained an imprint, emotionally, of the impact of what happened around them.

  Could she subject Angus to the thoughts that had flitted through her mind; invaded her dreams; stirred fear within her? For it would bring fear to his very soul, and questions into his mind, would it not?

  “I’ll have to… I’ll have to say something about it later, when… when we’re not….” She paused again.

  “It involved Arthur and Angus,” she said, trying to keep her voice even as she slid a hand over her cheeks to wipe away the tears rolling in a stream down the slant of her face toward the pillow. “I don’t want to-”

  “You don’t want him to hear about it, is that it,” Romeo asked, his red hair, sprinkled intermittently with whitened blonde, tickling the skin of her forehead as he moved to hold her closer again.

  She nodded, carefully, in the darkness. Romeo’s chin slipped off, anyway, and Angus’ thin little arms moved against her. She saw that the clock behind her husband read 6:12 in the morning, and tried to calm herself again.

  “I know it isn’t seven yet,” she said, “but I think I’m going to try to finagle my way out of here and into the kitchen to get breakfast going. I can’t… I can’t just lay here anymore. I want to, but every time I close my eyes, I just see…”

  She carefully extracted herself from between her husband and son, allowing Angus to curl in closer to Romeo before she moved from the room. Making her way toward the restroom, and then the kitchen, she took several deep breaths, trying to resettle her nerves; her heart; her racing mind.

  Maybe if she concentrated on getting breakfast ready for everyone, the taunting remnants of her dream would go away; maybe with the new rhythm, God would move on her heart and bring much-needed peace.

  Romeo lay in the darkness, the quiet snoring of his son the only sound in the room aside from his own breathing, and pondered what Calico had meant.

  Their sweet little Angus, and that monster Arthur?

  While he had never met the man, he’d heard enough to make his blood boil like a cauldron just thinking of him, and what he’d done to Calico when she’d been Rosemary; what he’d done to her friend, and to his own child.

  How could anyone be so cruel? So heartless, and selfish, and callous? How could anybody take it upon themselves to lock other people up and think it was alright? Imprison them in a basement, torture them? Take away nearly every basic right they had, and think it was okay?

  He had never seen a photograph of the man, but he had heard stories from his wife; from Justice and Midge; from Keith, and from the wives of some of his friends who, somehow, had been part of that other world altogether and known about what had happened. Some had been at the trial; others had recollections of seeing it on television, or hearing about it second-hand.

  A cold shiver crept up his spine, and sweat covered him from head to toe within seconds.

  The man had no right to interfere in their lives still… not from afar, and certainly not up close.

  But what could be done? They had forgiven him, and still he pursued them in the dream world.

  How could they let go of what grabbed them with an invisible fist of terror? How could they get it to release them? The years had come and gone, and the terror remained in the night, not every night, but every handful of months, dreams came
to fruition and brought the fear back to their hands.

  And he was tired of it.

  Tired of feeling like a prisoner inside his own life; tired of his wife never knowing if and when terror would strike in her dreams. Tired of seeing the pain she went through every time her dreamtime tormentor came visiting, as though her ordeal had begun all over again and taunted her; taunted them. Taunted their future.

  And yet, most of the time, she said nothing. He could see the pain behind her eyes; see the torture in them when she unmasked the feelings at night she kept hidden away in the closets of her mind so Angus wouldn’t see it.

  Romeo rolled over and opened his eyes, groggy, blinking slowly several times before sensing Angus moving again behind him.

  As much as he wished he could stay in bed another few hours, he had too many conversations to participate in – both on the phone and in person – and too many tasks. The sooner he was up, the sooner he could finish.

  Or so he hoped.

  Readjusting the blanket for his son, he moved toward the living room and down the ramp where his wife had left the door cracked for him to see. As he took the first few steps into the light, he heard his phone telling him that a call was coming in: a call from Brice Marshall, of all people.

  As he made his way toward their Mirage TM Wave Recepting Imagebar computer-television and told it to open the screen. He glanced at Calico, who stuck her head out of the kitchen a moment before going back to what she’d been doing.

  Once he’d gotten used to the device, it had come in handy. He could gain a better holoview of the person he spoke with, and therefore, was better able to gauge their mood.

  “Brice,” he said as the man’s visage popped onto the screen, blurry-eyed and disheveled looking. And at not quite four in the morning, it was no wonder. What would have caused him to call so early; so… middle of the night. “What can I do for you, Boss?”

  “Oh, come, now, I’m no longer your boss, and you now know as much as I do, but there have been some,” he paused to yawn, his arms stretching and pixelating before Romeo. “Pardon me,” he continued. “There have been some new developments that need immediate attention to detail, and I don’t know whether they’re for the better or the worse of it.”