by C. L. Coffey
“Twenty-four.”
“Then start acting like it,” I told him, stamping my foot down in exasperation.
He shook his head. “Why did you come here?”
“It’s a waste of time telling you,” I told him through gritted teeth.
“Why did you come here?”
“Because I have some information about your murder victim, but you’re not going to believe me,” I admitted, finally realizing that was the case. “It’s related to angels. Now give me the keys.”
“Joshua!” Maggie called, appearing on the porch. “Dinner will be ready in ten minutes. You two should come in and clean up.”
Joshua’s eyebrow disappeared up under his fringe as he looked at me expectantly. “Fine,” I conceded, throwing my hands in the air.
He grinned and lowered his, handing my keys back to me. I snatched them off him and followed him into the house, glaring at the back of his head.
The smell hit me as soon as I walked in and my stomach grumbled appreciatively. “Bathroom’s down the hall, last one on the right,” Joshua told me, pointing down the hallway.
I headed into the bathroom and slumped back against the door, banging my head against it a couple of times. Then I took a deep breath and moved to the sink to wash. Finished, I followed my nose to the kitchen and found Joshua seated, wearing a similar plaid shirt to the one I was wearing.
“It smells delicious,” I told Maggie, making my way to the table. I pulled out the chair and was momentarily stunned as Joshua acted the gentleman and stood while I sat down.
“Help yourself to vegetables,” Maggie smiled, eating her small plate of food.
I was starving but when I looked at the spread she had put on, I was expecting another three or four people to come through the door and join us. There were bowls of just about everything – new potatoes, roast potatoes, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, sweet corn, green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, sprouts, and carrots – the list seemed endless.
Seeing as Joshua was politely waiting for me to find something to accompany the chicken, I moved quickly, placing whatever was closest onto the floral china, and yet it earned a disapproving look off Maggie. “Pile that plate up – don’t be shy. You need to put some meat on those bones of yours. I know you young ones don’t eat properly these days.”
“Maggie,” Joshua groaned. “Leave her alone.”
“Don’t make me start on you,” Maggie warned. “I bet if I were to look around that apartment of yours, you wouldn’t impress me with the contents of your refrigerator.”
Joshua promptly spooned a large portion of mashed potatoes onto his plate. I dived in. I would never have made it back to the convent without stopping to get some food from somewhere, and this food was delicious.
When my plate was half empty (and that hadn’t taken long), Maggie turned to me. “Now, dear. Why don’t you tell us about yourself with that adorable accent of yours? What brought you to New Orleans?”
“My parents died in a car accident and my aunt who was living out here was my only relative,” I explained matter-of-factly. It had taken a while, but I had finally gotten to the point whereby I could discuss it without breaking down into tears.
“I'm sorry,” Maggie said, sympathetically as she leaned over to pat my hand.
“Thanks,” I muttered, inadvertently glancing up at Joshua. Seeing the kindness in his eyes made me uncomfortable and I reached for my glass of water, quickly swallowing it in one go.
“And what are you doing now?” Maggie asked, moving the conversation along – into just an awkward a topic.
“I'm still... trying to find my way,” I offered, quickly sticking some chicken in my mouth.
“I wish Joshua was still trying to find his way,” Maggie told me. “His job is far too dangerous.”
“It’s what my dad did,” Joshua sighed, in a way that told me he had covered this conversation many time before.
“And look where it got him,” Maggie shot back before turning to me. “His father was killed on duty when Joshua was eighteen.”
It was my turn to mutter the apology. “I'm sorry.”
Joshua shrugged. “New Orleans has its dangerous areas, like any city.”
“What about your mother?” I asked, curiously.
“She’s not here anymore,” Joshua answered before Maggie could. “Maggie’s my father’s godmother,” he added. “She’s the one who raised me.”
“Sorry,” I muttered again. I set my knife and fork down. “That was wonderful, Maggie,” I quickly told her as Joshua gave me a grateful smile. “I think you made far too much, though.”
“Joshua will take the leftovers with him,” Maggie informed me, rising to start stacking dishes.
I jumped to my feet and took them off her. “Let me – you cooked.”
“And you’re a guest,” she returned, trying to get the dishes back from me.
“You go sit down, Maggie,” Joshua told her. “Angel and I can take care of these. We need to talk anyway.”
Maggie looked between the two of us before nodding. “Very well,” she agreed, leaving us alone.
I followed Joshua over to the sink and began filling a bowl with soapy water while he scraped all the leftovers into one dish. “I'll wash,” Joshua offered, piling the dirty plates next to me.
“I don’t know where anything lives to put them away,” I pointed out, causing Joshua to pick up a tea towel. A silence fell over us. “Maggie has a nice place,” I said, filling the silence.
“It will be,” Joshua sighed. “Once I can finally afford to get the roof fixed.”
“What happened?” I asked, curiously.
“Katrina,” he replied. “The insurance company took forever to pay out and then John, her husband accidentally paid cons to fix it. It’s already leaking and she can’t afford to get the roof done properly. John died before we found that out.”
It was awful, but Maggie wasn’t the only person I'd heard of that happening to. “So what do we need to talk about?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“My murder case you seem to have information about,” he said, instantly, suddenly watching me closely.
“I think I told you that I spoke to my aunt yesterday,” I began. “She suggested that maybe I need to help. When I was in the precinct yesterday, I spotted something in your case.”
“You’re going to play detective?” he questioned, skeptically.
I sighed, dropping the rag into the bowl, and stared at the bubbles. “You make it really difficult to help you, you know?”
“Maybe I don’t need your help,” he retorted, setting a plate down on the side with a little more force than was necessary.
“Really?” I asked, rounding on him. “So you’re aware that you have a serial killer then?” I asked, finally voicing my theory.
My question shocked him only momentarily before he rolled his eyes at me. “A serial killer? You are aware that by definition, you need more than one murder victim, darlin’?”
“You do!” I cried in exasperation, yanking both tops up to reveal the scars on my abdomen. “I would be one of them.”
“Oh, come on!” he yelled, closing the gap on me. “When are you going to quit with this crap?”
“It’s not crap – I'm dead!” I yelled back in exasperation.
His hand went for me and I braced myself for the fist that was coming. Only it didn’t. I opened my eyes as his hand went straight on my chest – his face inches from mine. “If you’re dead, how come I can feel you heart-” He stopped suddenly and moved his hand slightly to the left, pressing it against me harder. Then he jerked it away. “Why can’t I feel a heartbeat?” he whispered.
My own hand replaced his, still feeling the warmth from it. I was technically dead, so not having a heartbeat shouldn’t have been a surprise. But it was. After flogging myself on the treadmill, I knew for a fact that I hadn’t imagined my heart pounding against my ribcage. I couldn’t explain it, and with Joshua looking at me like I
was a freak of nature, I did the only thing that did make sense to me – I turned and fled.
* * *
I charged up the stairs as fast I could, the sound of my flip flops slapping my feet echoing around the corridor. Once in the safety of my bedroom, I darted into the bathroom, stripping my clothes along the way until I was naked in front of the mirror, to examine my reflection.
My cheeks were flushed and through a combination of the running and my panic, I was breathing heavily – both evidence that my lungs and circulation was working. I knew my digestive organs were working because I could eat and had to go to the bathroom. So where the hell was my heartbeat?
I pressed one hand against my heart, while the other went to my throat to try to find the pulse there. Then I felt one strong beat. I stood there for several minutes, counting. At first, I counted four beats a minute, but as I calmed down, relieved to feel even that, it dropped down to two beats. Two beats a minute! That wasn’t normal. I mean, I was dead, but I was moving around – so that wasn’t exactly normal either – and I shouldn’t have been surprised. But I was.
I moved back into my bedroom, pulling on my nightclothes in a daze. As I sank into my bed, staring up at the ceiling, I realized that of everything that I had discovered, this was the most mind boggling. I wasn’t alive, and I wasn’t dead. How on earth was anyone supposed to get their head around that?
I was still wide awake when the bells of Michael began ringing in my head. I leapt out of bed, and quickly dressed in my uniform, before hurrying up the stairs. Michael was already in front of the door, waiting for me.
“We need to move now,” he informed me, grabbing my hand.
I didn’t have time to prepare myself for that feeling of water being dunked over my head, and the next thing I knew, I was in another nameless alleyway, feeling like I was going to throw up.
It was the sight of the girl that made the sickness disappear. She was slumped against the wall, clutching at her side. I ignored the sound of movement behind me and glanced up at Michael.
“We still have time,” he whispered, pulling his hand free from mine. “Do you think you can be tactful?”
“No,” I told him, sarcasm lacing my tone. “I’m going to march over to her and tell her she has seconds to live and she has to make a decision before she dies as bluntly as possible.”
Michael sighed. “Perhaps you should wait over there?” he said, pointing a little way away from the girl. I was ready to tell him I was being sarcastic, but his expression told me to back away. I took a couple of steps backwards, but stayed close enough to hear what was going on.
Michael crouched down beside the girl. At a guess, I figured she was old enough that she didn’t need a fake ID, but I wouldn’t have pegged her much older than me. She was dressed up for a night out, and her neck was surrounded in beads of every color. “Help me.”
Even from my distance away, I recognized the desperation in her voice. She knew she was dying. “I want to,” Michael told her, as he dropped down beside her. “I can either give you eternal life, or eternal happiness, but it has to be your choice.”
She was crying now. “I’m going to die?”
I stepped back. I didn’t want to relive this in the slightest. I looked up and down the alleyway for something to distract me. It looked like we were off Bourbon Street again. Great – just what this area needed: a serial killer who preyed on drunken girls.
Movement behind me caught my attention again and I turned to see what the source of it was. At the far end, behind one of the dumpsters, I could see a shadow moving. I moved over to it, expecting it to be a cat, or a raccoon or something like that, so I was caught off guard when something heavy and wooden connected with my head, sending me flying against the opposite wall. Through my blurry vision, I saw a flash of red, and that was it.
The next thing I knew, Michael was standing over me, glowing in a golden light, looking every bit an angel in it. “You’re golden,” I mumbled, trying to stop the world from spinning while I coughed up my lungs.
“Angel, what happened?” he demanded. “Are you alright?”
I groaned and sat myself upright, regretting it as I did when the world lurched and spun. My hand instinctively went to the point of contact, causing me to cry out in pain as I touched it. I jerked my hand away, spotting something wet on my fingertips in the dim light.
“Angel, we can’t stay here,” Michael told me. “I need to take Emily to Peter.”
Before I could ask who Emily or Peter were, he had grabbed my hand and the sensation of water being poured over my head numbed the throbbing pain. With a flash of light, we appeared in the middle of a beautiful flowery meadow, with the flowers dancing gently in the wind, and the sun shining down around us.
I didn’t really have time to take in my surroundings as I stumbled to the ground and brought up the chicken dinner I had eaten a few hours ago. Once out, I was already feeling better, despite my throbbing head, and I made myself stand.
Michael was watching me with a small frown on his face. Next to him, in a pretty white summer dress, was the blonde haired girl from the alleyway, watching me in confusion. She was also glowing with this brilliant pure white light, which was making my eyes water. “I’m glad I chose eternal happiness,” she muttered.
I couldn’t say I blamed her, as I once again questioned if I had made the right choice. “I’m supposed to get used to it?” I offered.
Michael ignored me and turned to the girl. “You made the decision that was right for you. This is as far as we can go now.”
“You’re leaving me?” she asked, looking scared again.
“You have nothing to fear,” a new voice told her. We both looked to its owner. If I’m honest, he looked like Father Christmas in a dressing gown, with the same golden hew to him Michael had, but he greeted Michael like an old friend. “Michael, you bring me another?”
Michael nodded. “She is yours to watch over now.”
“Is this going to hurt?” Emily asked Father Christmas.
He gave her a kind smile and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “There is no hurt or pain here.” He glanced at Michael. “Until next time.” Then the pair of them walked into the horizon, slowly fading from sight.
I turned to Michael. “Who was that?”
He gave me a look of complete disbelief. “Who? Saint Peter?”
I shrugged. “I guess. What’s he a patron Saint of? Meadows?”
“Saint Peter?” Michael repeated in disbelief. “As in Saint Peter, Keeper of the Keys of Heaven.”
It took a moment for me to think, thanks to the relentless ache in my head, but I shook my head, and then winced at the action. “I take it that should mean something to me?”
“You have never heard reference of Saint Peter standing at the Pearly Gates?” he asked. He looked like his eyes were going to fall out of his head.
That reference did ring some bells. “That Saint Peter?” I glanced around. “Did I just throw up in heaven?”
Michael merely shook his head in exasperation and grabbed my hand. I had barely managed to cry, “Oh no!” and we were back in his office. This time, he caught me before I hit the floor and led me over to his couch. When I looked up again, he was offering me a glass of water, which I took and drank greedily. “I don’t like teleporting,” I mumbled.
Michael knelt down in front of me, and gently lifted my face, examining the cut. “It is healing already. You should be recovered in a few hours.”
“Thanks,” I muttered.
“What happened?” he asked me.
“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “I thought I saw something, and then that something hit me around the head and sent me flying. Then I saw you and you were glowing this wonderful golden color.” I frowned. “You still are.”
“That’s my aura,” he said slowly. “Are you sure you don’t remember anything?”
I closed my eyes, trying to replay the scene. The dumpster’s lid was partly open, overfilled with bag
s and it was sitting in a puddle of what could have been trash juice. Ducked down behind the dumpster was a figure. My eyes flew open. “It was a woman. I didn’t see her properly. I think I may have startled her.”
There was a very long silence before Michael spoke again. “You should get some rest.” He got up and walked over to his desk. “Cupid will keep you busy tomorrow.”
I got up and left the room, confused. I couldn’t be entirely certain, but I swear he knew something about this that he wasn’t telling me. My head was still throbbing by the time I climbed back into my bed and a squeezed my eyes closed, clearing my mind.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Notifications
I awoke to another bright, sunny morning, and Cupid bouncing on my bed with his usual excited puppy cheer. “Today you are going to hit that target,” he announced.
“We’ll see,” I sighed, grabbing my workout clothes and ducking into the bathroom. I re-emerged, dressed and we headed downstairs for some breakfast.
“What’s wrong?” Cupid asked.
I looked down and realized I had been pulling a banana muffin to pieces, rather than eating it. “I met Saint Peter last night.”
“Pete? How is he?” he asked, leaning back in his seat.
“I didn’t really get to have a proper conversation with him. I didn’t realize who he was,” I muttered.
Cupid pulled a face. “You mean, you didn’t realize who he was, or you didn’t realize who he was when Michael told you.”
I narrowed my eyes. “I don’t like you,” I informed him as he started laughing at me.
“How could you not know who Saint Peter is?” Cupid asked, laughing loudly.
“I didn’t think Saints existed any more than angels did,” I muttered, poking my finger into the soft muffin. “I never exactly sat down and read up on any of this when I was alive. Besides, the guy looked like Father Christmas!”
“Maybe you should,” Cupid suggested. “Read up on it, I mean. It might make it so that less things surprise you.”