“The Hierarchy opposing the Watchers?”
“Yes. There is good and evil in everything, in everyone. In the beginning, there was too much evil and so Earth needed a balance. That’s when the Hierarchy came.”
A balancing act- I could understand that. I was in pre-calculus, and I’d already learned chemistry. Sure, everything had to equal out, be the same on both sides. Then another question, of course, popped into my mind. “So how old are you?” I asked no one in particular.
Each of the family exchanged glances with the rest. Finally, Odeda answered, “Old.”
“I guessed as much, but how old exactly?”
There was a long pause, and then Uriel said, “We don’t know. It was before people kept track of time, there wasn’t any kind of calendar to mark a year’s passing.”
…
“Keira?”
I looked up at Uriel, my boyfriend, the man I loved, and tried to imagine him as being a thousand years old. I didn’t know exactly when the calendar was invented, but I knew it was a ridiculously long time ago. I couldn’t picture him in sandals and riding on a donkey. I could picture the top hat, suit, and little scepter walking stick thing that was the first image of the characters in the classic books that came to my mind that Uriel had gotten me to read. Mr. Darcy’s time was something I could fathom, but not Nero’s or Cleopatra’s, Aristotle’s or cavemen’s.
Uriel’s face was etched with worry, and I realized I had been silent for an extremely long time. I just couldn’t find any words. Thankfully, Azra came to my rescue. “I think that’s enough questions for tonight. It’s getting late, and Keira’s probably tired.” He stood from his chair and held his hand out for Odeda who took it and stood up beside him. “You have plenty of time to let everything soak in, so don’t rush yourself. Goodnight, Keira,” he said kindly before walking with Odeda further into the house.
“Hope we didn’t scare you off already,” Odeda called over her shoulder and gave me an encouraging and light smile that was accompanied by an intimate wink.
“Ahh, Keira can handle our secret,” Zev said. “Dagan, I’ll play you in one game before I turn in.”
Dagan smiled excitedly. “You’re on. But I get to pick which one.” He waved to me. “Night Keira. See you tomorrow in class.” Then he went bounding up the stairs to his play room and was followed by Zev.
“I love your family,” I told Uriel after a few seconds of being alone.
“I always suspected,” he said carefully. He was leaning a little away from me, studying my face for a reaction I hadn’t yet given. His arm was still in the same area as before, but now it was resting more on the top of the couch than on my shoulders. He was giving me space while still being right there beside me.
I drew a deep breath. “I… love you.”
Sorrow shot through his blue-gray eyes. “But…?”
“No buts. I love you, and I can accept whatever fantastic, unusual background comes with you.”
“Whatever fantastic, unusual background?”
I grimaced. “Just tell me how many other girls there have been.”
Uriel looked genuinely surprised at my words and I was glad at least that he wasn’t sad anymore about the rejection he wrongfully thought was coming. “Other girls?”
“Don’t pretend not to know. Just tell me how many others there were before me. I can take it.” I sat up taller, preparing myself for the blow his answer would deliver.
He kept the same expression- he was at a loss for words for the longest time. Then he found a couple of unbelievable ones. “There haven’t been any.”
What? “You honestly expect me to believe that you have never loved another even though you’ve lived for an incomparable amount of time?” I tilted my head to the side.
Uriel suddenly laughed. “That’s what you’re worried about? Out of all the other things you have heard tonight, you conclude that since I have lived many years then I must have fallen for another woman before you… You are one unique human.”
“You still haven’t answered the question.” An awful thought struck me. “Is it really that many?”
“I did answer your question.” I tilted my head again and raised my eyebrows in a don’t-toy-with-my-emotions way. Uriel leaned in closer to stare steadily into my eyes as he told me, “We said no more lies. And the truth is that there was never anyone else.”
I couldn’t keep my eyes from flickering down to his lips, but I brought them back up quickly. I didn’t want to get distracted when this was important to me. Mmm, he smells good wet, my thoughts betrayed me. “How is that possible?” I’m not sure if I was asking how he could possibly smell that good or how he could possibly not have had any other girlfriends, but he answered the later, since he can’t read my thoughts- thank goodness. I can’t imagine what I’d do if Uriel had that gift.
“I courted a century or two ago, but that was only for appearances. It has always been bearably acceptable for a man to never marry, so I never did.” His cheeks grew a shade darker. “Our first date, yours and mine, was the first time that I had ever been truly alone with a female for any extended period of time.”
Well, sure, if you’re going to walk around calling us “females” like that.
I let his words register. “So that’s why you reacted so strongly when we fell asleep,” it dawned on me. “I always thought you were a little old-fashioned, but you are seriously old-fashioned.” A small smile crept onto my face.
“Yes. I have traditional values even in today’s world.”
My smile changed from small to large. “I’m really your first girl?”
“Yes.”
“But you’re so good-looking,” I protested with another pang of self-doubt.
“Thank you.” Uriel gave that deep laugh again and my breath caught. “But I was always a firm believer that the longer the waiting, the sweeter the kiss.”
“It must have been a lonely existence,” my voice came out in a whisper. Then I forced myself to speak at a normal volume. “Of course, all of the amazing events that have happened in history had to have made life more interesting and distracting.”
His voice was like honey again. “Cinda Williams Chima wrote, ‘More and more, there were no revelations, but simply the uncovering of truths long known but dimly remembered. Everything had been written long ago. There was nothing truly new in the world, but only the slow, circular march of time that revealed the old things once again.’”
Damn, I thought, I love when he does that.
“That is the way that I felt… until you. Everything had become routine; I was going through the same motions year after year. I was slowly growing to resent being what I am, but now I know that if I had not lived forever, I would have never had the intense pleasure of knowing and loving you.”
If I was the type of girl to swoon, I would have done so right then. But I’m not, so I sighed and said, “You talk just as well as you quote.” I leaned into him. “But how about we don’t talk for a little while?”
I leaned in further, but Uriel moved backward some with a pensive expression.
I frowned. “Please don’t start that again.”
“Start what?”
“Getting distant and being careful of every move you make.”
“I’m not; it’s just…” His gaze shifted from me to the carpet.
“What? And while we’re talking about your distance,” I had a question that had been burning in me since before his big secret surfaced, “why didn’t you kiss me months ago? Was it an old-fashioned thing or was it something else because I, personally, had been dying every night at the doorstep as you walked away?”
“I didn’t want to move too quickly when I didn’t know how strong your feelings were for me. I couldn’t be sure if what you felt was passing fancy or something deeper.”
“You didn’t know,” I repeated. How could he have not known? He was all I thought about for months in the beginning. My grades just started getting better recently no
w that I was trying to focus on something other than him every second of every day. And then other things like reading and sports were all I could bear to think about when it hurt too much to think of him.
Uriel took my hand. “You never told me how you felt.”
Is he seriously telling me that he couldn’t decipher the goofy-eyed look that I got whenever he was around? He needed me to tell him that I was head over heels? “You didn’t say anything either!” I stubbornly protested.
“You never wanted me to meet your parents!”
“Whoa! Random. What are you talking about?”
He gave me an oh-come-on look. “You really thought I wouldn’t notice that I never picked you up at your house except when they weren’t home? Why don’t you want me to meet your parents, Keira?”
“I was protecting you,” I exclaimed like that was a completely obvious and logical answer.
Then Uriel started howling- not literally, that’s something I could only picture Zev doing. Uriel was laughing so hard he dropped my hand and held his stomach which was flexing -into a washboard, I found myself imagining- with each chuckle.
Laughing was not the reaction I had expected. “What’s so funny?”
No response- he was still laughing too hard.
“What?” I demanded.
“You… protecting me… from your parents!” he managed.
I couldn’t see what was funny about that. He clearly didn’t understand the gruesome situation I had saved him from. Fine, I’d make him understand. “Tomorrow night they’ll be home. I’ll talk to them, and you can all meet Saturday. But you cannot say that I didn’t warn you ahead of time. You asked for this.”
At last, Uriel stopped laughing, but still his eyes remained in a good mood even though his face was more serious. He didn’t look intimidated, and I was proud of him. Of course, he hadn’t met my mother yet, so I’d have to wait and see how he fared afterward.
Uriel cupped my cheek in his hand. “Thank you for humoring my old-fashioned ways.”
Then I got my kiss.
We arrived at my house a half hour later, and after another delicious kiss goodnight, I walked inside the dark fortress. I stood at the window and watched Uriel’s Escalade- he’d said he wouldn’t need the awesome Veyron anytime soon- disappear down the street. When I turned from the window, I thought of how over the past few weeks, my home had started to feel too capacious and vacant when I walked in alone, but that night, it felt like it was back to normal. I checked the living room and kitchen to make sure Maria and Jerry hadn’t stayed up, and then I drifted to my room and lay down on my bed, looking forward to a night of blissful dreams starring a blond angel.
Impending Visit
Chapter 18
Uriel
Come what may, for that moment, all was right with the world. Sitting in the bleachers of the school’s gymnasium waiting for Keira to come out of the girls’ locker room, I couldn’t keep the smile from my face. The other girls on the team came out in packs with their heads pressed together, and I nodded politely as they passed by. I paid little attention to their whispers- it was a diminutive expression of their curiosity compared to the squall of gossip that had followed Keira and I as we had walked through the hallways earlier that Friday. The mortals really needed some other form of entertainment. Had television already become a bygone amusement? I did my best to block out the inane guesses about what had changed between us. Their speculations, of course, could not come close to the reality.
As was her usual, Keira was the last out of the locker room. When she noticed me there, she abruptly stopped, clearly surprised to see me. Once the shock quickly wore off, her face lit up. “Have you been waiting long?” she asked as she strolled over with her overly large athletic bag hanging from her small shoulder.
“Jazz let out fifteen minutes ago, and I came over afterward.”
She dropped her bag on the first step of the bleachers and picked up one of the many basketballs still scattered around the gymnasium’s floor. Her expression was pensive. “Not that I’m not glad to see you, but why did you stay for me?”
Having to tell her the truth, I answered, “I wanted to make certain you remembered to tell your parents about us tonight.”
“Ah,” she nodded. “You know me too well.”
“So you were going to conveniently forget?”
“I was considering it,” she admitted.
I stood and stepped down to her. She was rolling the basketball over and over in her hands, looking at it instead of me. I placed my hands over hers to still the motion, and Keira lifted her eyes to me then. “What is so troubling about my meeting them?” I asked her.
She took a moment to gather her thoughts and then confessed, “I don’t want anything to screw this up- what you and I have. Of all the things that could go wrong, I can’t have it be my mother. And don’t give me that look. The woman sinks her claws into every aspect of my life that she can. She’s a control freak, and I can’t imagine how she could possibly take the news that I am in a great relationship with grace and acceptance. And-”
“Calm down, Keira.” She was really working herself up over this, but I didn’t see why. Men have been meeting women’s parents ever since I could remember. “Everything will go smoothly. There’s nothing to worry about.”
Her eyes wanted to believe me, but her mind was skeptic. “How can you know that?”
“I know us,” I stated. “It’s as simple as that.” I slid the basketball that was positioned between us from her hands and dropped it to the side. Keira sank into my arms with an acknowledging sigh. Her chin sat comfortably in my collarbone- like we were made to fit each other. I ran my hand up and down the length of her spine. It was amusing to compare my image of how Keira’s mother must be to the nightmarish monsters I had faced. “Your mother is no match for us. I promise. We can take her on together.”
“I’m gonna hold you to that,” she whispered into my shoulder.
A throat cleared, and Keira’s head jerked up instantly into my chin. “Ow,” she said as she rubbed her crown. I had barely felt the impact, but the popping noise it had produced was loud enough for Zev to hear from the gymnasium’s entrance where he was standing now, laughing at the effect of his cleared throat. Keira looked back at me after seeing who had interrupted us. “Did you know he was here?” removing her hand from her head she accused me.
And for good reason. “Yes,” I answered truthfully. “But I didn’t know that you were going to react in a way that would cause you pain.” Zev chuckled as he walked closer to us. “And you,” I indicated my brother, “need to learn how to give warning of your intrusions.” I remembered the first time Keira had come over to the house and what had happened in my library- or rather what had not happened.
“I’m here for practice. You two are the ones who are out of place. Hey, Keira,” Zev said as he stopped a few feet from us.
“Hey, Zev,” she returned. Keira bent down to pick up the ball I had dropped as well as a few others. She unloaded them onto the roll-away ball receptacle that could hold multiple basketballs at once and that was brought out before every game and practice and put back into a specified room afterward. Keira rolled the clever, simple device over to the storage room’s door, but she stopped before opening it. Zev and I shared a silent, quizzical exchanged glance. Keira selected one of the basketballs and walked back over to us. She looked expectantly at me.
“Yes Keira?” I prompted.
“Now that I know what you are, I’d like to see what you can really do with this.” She held up the ball in her hand and continued, “I was thinking of all those practice sessions I had with you two, and it occurred to me that you both had to have been holding back. It made me wonder what you can really do.”
I glanced at Zev who shrugged his shoulders and said, “Go ahead, Uriel.”
“Was anyone else in the parking lot when you came in?” I checked first.
“No, we’re all clear.”
I foc
used back on Keira, and she handed me the ball.
I accepted, “Alright.” I dribbled out to the middle of the court. Once I got there, I stopped, held the ball in both hands, bent my knees, felt the muscles in my legs and core contract, and then sprung forward through the air. It was a quick flight to the basket, and slamming the ball in the middle was almost effortlessly easy. I landed softly and turned to my witnesses. Keira’s mouth was hanging open- an expression I was getting used to as of recently.
I retrieved the ball from where it was still bouncing, and returned it to its rolling holder. Once I had put the thing away in the room Keira had confronted, I made my way back to her. “Was that good enough?”
“No, I think you should dunk it from one side of the court to the other next time,” she replied sarcastically with a smile, having regained her composure.
“I’m not sure that I could.”
Keira blinked. “But you’re a-” she scouted around the gymnasium before whispering, “-Nephilim.”
I couldn’t suppress my grin. “True, but even-” I mimicked my voice to hers, “Nephilim,” and then returned to a normal volume, “have limitations.”
Keira mustered up a small scowl for me. “If you want to meet my parents, I suggest you stop making fun of me.”
I tried but failed to wipe the happy expression from my face.
A moment later, a sophomore on the basketball team walked into the gym for the varsity guys’ practice. I recognized him as the starting point guard; he was exceptionally talented for his age and species. The sandy-haired boy greeted Zev instantly and then acknowledged Keira and me as well. That was our signal to leave; their practice was about to start.
As I picked up Keira’s athletic bag, I spoke to Zev. “I’ll see you at home.”
“Yeah, see you. Bye Keira.”
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