by S. L. Naeole
“That’s it, isn’t it? You can’t trust me because you don’t love me,” I whispered, my voice so soft, no one but God could have heard it; or an angel. “You don’t love me-” I felt the twist in my stomach and the burning pain it caused shoot directly to my heart. I shook my head, the words coming out having sealed out any chance for rebuke. I turned around and started walking back the way I came, fighting the pull inside of me that kept wanting me to turn around. It was screaming at me to turn around. It fought with the burn in my heart. My feet moved faster, not trusting the speed of a mere walk to get me out of that building fast enough, not trusting the pain of my perpetually breaking heart.
The darkness seemed blacker, my direction no longer destined, but random. My hands were mindlessly waving in front of me, no longer sliding on walls, but slapping them, bumping into them, crashing into them. I could feel the cuts and gashes caused by the sharp corners from lockers, and the growing throb of bruises yet to form from doorways and doorknobs that had been in my way of escaping the ever growing sound of the fracturing of my world.
I stumbled more often now, the laces of the sandal having grown decidedly longer and more dangerous. I finally surrendered to the exhaustion that my pain had weaned from me, and fell over my own feet, the cold tiled floor biting into my hip. I hissed at the sting, hearing it bounce off of the dark and empty halls, and then moaned in recognition as it was soon joined by the sound of broken sobs. I scooted myself back against a wall and felt my body shake with the crushing pain of loss.
It was far more painful than anything else I had ever experienced. The loss of Graham had been a mild irritation compared to this. It felt like I was drowning in my own emptiness, and the echoes of my pain were forcing me under.
I closed my eyes as I felt my heart slowly being torn apart, each fragment of hope and love being ripped to pieces as the seconds ticked by, each one being claimed by hurt, betrayal, and despair. The only part of me that could ever be truly immortal, truly like Robert’s and Lark’s was suddenly succumbing to the truth that I hadn’t been loved at all. And only now could I admit that, even though he had never said it, I had believed he loved me, and that I was a fool for doing so.
“You’re not a fool.”
My eyes flew open. His face was just inches away from mine. “Go away,” I whispered, my voice cracking with emotion.
He shook his head. “I can’t, Grace. Don’t you see that I can’t?”
I braced myself against the wall and with all of my might, I shoved him.
He didn’t move. He was a wall again, his strength too great for me to budge with any part of me…just like his heart. “Just leave me alone!” I cried, no longer able to keep quiet. If he wasn’t leaving, I would. I tried to stand, but he placed a firm hand on my knee, preventing me from getting up. I tried to push it off, the anger flowing into me just as quickly as the tears flowed out. “Get your hand off me!”
He yanked his hand away from my leg quickly, his eyes wide with shock.
I tried standing up once more, but again his hand shot out, this time to my shoulder, his fingers touching the bare skin that the straps of my costume didn’t cover. I could feel the fabric of my thoughts reach out to him, finding no way in—I was shut out completely, despite his nearness, despite his contact with me, despite how desperately I was still clinging to some kind of hope that I was wrong.
“Will you quit touching me?” I shouted, grabbing his wrist, ignoring the way the tips of my fingers prickled with sensation as I tried to pry it off of me. “Let me go.” I cried; the broken sound coming from my lips didn’t sound like me at all.
His hand once again swiftly pulled away, and I heard myself sob at the unbearable way I felt more at a loss without it there.
“Grace, I-” he started, his eyes wide, as he looked to me and then to his hand.
I shook my head, not wanting to hear anything else, not wanting to hear his voice which made my dying heart sing, even as it was breaking. “Stop, just stop it and leave. Don’t you see how much you’re hurting me?”
But he didn’t leave. Instead, he placed both hands on either side of my face and forced me to look at him. “Grace, listen! I feel this,” he said softly—desperately—as he rubbed his thumbs against my tear stained cheeks. “I feel it.” He lifted one hand away to rub a teardrop between his fingers, and stared in awe at me. He placed his fingertips against my lips, and brushed them, softly, gently. “So…soft?”
My heart was pounding as the realization sunk in that he was talking about actually being able to feel what he was touching. I reached my hand up to his face. “Can you feel this?” I asked as I cupped his cheek. He nodded and turned his face into it, pressing his nose and lips against my palm. He breathed in the scent from my wrist, and kissed the pulse point there. It felt like my skin would burst into flames where his lips had just been.
“Soft. I’ll never be able to hear the word soft again without thinking about your skin,” he whispered as he grabbed my hand and pressed it harder against his mouth. I closed my eyes, trying very hard to keep from moaning, not wanting to fall into the oubliette of emotion that I could see was beckoning to me. Only one thing would keep me from falling…
“Do you love me, Robert?”
Silence would have been better. Silence would have been wonderful. Silence would have been less painful than the whispered “no” that incinerated any hope that I had somehow been able to scrape up from the bottom of my heart. I swallowed down the sob that choked me and nodded once, feeling my hand drop limply to my side as he let go.
I struggled to stand up, but did so without reaching for his aid. The pain in my side caused me to stumble, but when he reached to help steady me, I hissed and shrank away from him—he might have discovered what it meant to touch something and feel it, but he had also murdered my faith in the process, and I did not want the slaughter to continue.
“I-I’m glad that you now know what it feels like to…to feel, Robert…but that has nothing to do with me anymore. I could have stayed—I would have stayed not knowing whether or not you loved me, but I cannot now that I know that you don’t. I would have risked everything for the chance, but now that I know there isn’t any, I just can’t.”
I stepped around him, keeping my hands tightly at my sides as I did so, for even now they were traitorous and itched to touch him, his hair, his lips. I started to back away. I paused as I looked into the two pale moons of his eyes, ignoring the pained look in them and, without thinking, I pressed a kiss to my fingertips and then laid my fingers against his lips. “Goodbye, Robert.”
I started running. I didn’t look behind me; I don’t know if I looked ahead of me either. I just kept running, ignoring the aches and pains that were screaming at me to stop. Endless darkness and endless hallways finally relented; I saw the bright light of the moon through the doors that had led me to my dream’s end and rushed forward, glad for the exit towards…what? What was I running to? A life without Robert? Was that what I wanted? Was I giving up that easily?
I slowed my pace and my toes stopped at the line that separated darkness from light, Grace before and after Robert. But which was which? Would stepping into the light really mean stepping away from Robert? How could an angel be my darkness? The ache in my heart shouted at me the answer; he had brought the moon down from my sky. It’s last gift to me before it was gone was allowing me to find my way out of the suffocating dark that would smother me if I chose to stay. Taking a deep breath, I started to move forward, my feet heavy, as if all of my pain, all of my sorrow and disappointment had settled there, weighing them down like anchors. Slowly, I took a step and watched as the cool light grazed my toes.
From the darkness behind me, a sound tore through my body, through my heart, and into the deepest reaches of my soul. It was a cry of pain, and my mouth opened; the cry felt like it was my own, like it was coming from my lips, my mouth, my throat. It was agonizing and horrific, and I couldn’t stop it.
My body whipped a
round, the sound forcing me to turn towards it. I shook my head, refusing its demand. I tried to turn back towards the fading moonlight, shouting my objections, “This isn’t fair! God, this isn’t fair, to toy with my heart, to be so cruel! He doesn’t love me! Why should I care?” Again, the sound came, frantic and tortured. I shook my head, covering my ears with my hands, refusing to hear it, but it broke through and shattered the last ounce of strength I had left in me to refuse.
Compelled by some unseen will, my feet pushed me forward towards the anguished cry, not caring what I’d find, only that when I got there, I could somehow stop it. I raced through hallways, following the agonizing sounds that echoed and bounced all around me—through me—knowing who was making them, feeling the hurt crash through me as though I was the one suffering them instead—I wanted to be the one who suffered them instead, because my pain seemed so insignificant right now. The sound kept knocking me down, it was filled with so much hurt that it was heavy, weighed down by the intensity of it. I struggled for air as I fought to stand up, as I urged my legs forward.
Rounding the corner that led me back to that fateful hallway, I saw him, bent on his hands and knees, his back arched in pain; I fell down in front of him, slamming my knees against the cold floor. “Robert-Robert what’s wrong?” my hands gripped his shoulders, trying to pull him up. Realizing that that was impossible, I allowed my hands to roam his body, trying to find what was hurting him.
He shook his head at my searching and opened his mouth to say something, but another cry erupted from his lips. It sounded like the scraping of metal against each other, and I covered my ears. He was in pain—undeniable and invisible pain—and I couldn’t stop it. His body twisted from the force of it, his muscles straining, twitching from unbearable agony. “Robert tell me. Tell me what’s wrong!” I pleaded, my voice sounding frantic as I backed away from his flailing limbs.
His reached for me with a shaky hand. I watched as it trembled and fell; he was too weak. Again, he raised it—reaching—and finally fitted itself against my face. I grabbed his wrist with both hands, keeping it there, not wanting to lose this small connection. I tried to pull him up, tried to help him, but even weakened, he was the impenetrable wall. I finally stopped trying and cradled his head in my arms, my mind trying to erase the look in his face, erase the way his eyes had looked so colorless and drained from the excruciating torture. Please, Robert…
He fell on his side, his head landing in my lap. I placed my hand on his chest, searching for his heartbeat, finding it weak and desperate. He closed his eyes and moaned.
“I love you, Grace.”
And the wall tumbled down.
CHANGE
The sight of Robert collapsed in my arms did things to me that nothing else ever could. The desperation in that moment was suffocating. I couldn’t scream for help. Who would hear me? Who could help me?
Lark? Lark! My mind was screaming. It was screaming its denial, its hurt, its misery. I clutched at Robert’s still form, not caring that it felt like he was boring me through the floor. I wouldn’t leave him. No matter how he had hurt me, no matter how late his final utterance, I would not leave his side. He had said he loved me. He had said it and that meant it was true, and there was nothing that could take that away from me now.
“Don’t leave me,” I sobbed softly into his hair, my fingers absentmindedly running through it. “Don’t tell me you love me and then leave me. Don’t break my heart and then put it back together again only to shatter it once more. I’m not strong enough for this.”
I tried to find his heartbeat, tried to find his glow, even the one that was pitch and ominous in its darkness, but there was nothing. There was no warmth, no breath, no life. Whatever it was that had cause him to suffer so horribly had taken from him, from me, his immortality—it had killed him.
I kept stroking his hair as a strange sound started echoing in the empty hall. It sounded airy, and harsh. It bit through me, vibrated through me, and I admitted to myself finally that it was the sound of the sobs that were ripping through my chest, splashing the darkness with my colorless grief. I sank into him, pressing my face against his, needing to feel his skin against mine. I brushed my lips across his, once, twice. “Feel this. Feel me. Please, please…feel,” I pleaded, not caring about anything anymore.
It was as though I were telling myself to feel; I felt the numbness of loss settle in me, so familiar, and so hated. First my mother, then Graham, and now Robert. Surely the heart couldn’t stand for so much destruction of its reason for beating. It had been robbed of a mother’s love, denied the love of a friend, and now, now that I knew what being in love really meant, what it meant to live for love and lose it, to risk for love, and to pay the cost, what was there left to beat for? What else could there be now after this?
“Robert—no!” a voice cried out from the darkness.
I looked up as the gasps of horror reached me and saw the stark white faces of Ameila and Lark—shock and grief battering their beautiful features. They had heard his cries of pain, felt it as deeply as I had. They had come, not caring what they were doing or who saw them. They had dared to hope, praying that they would be in time to help him, save him.
They had lost.
“My son. My son!” Ameila wailed, ripping his body from my arms. She buried her face into his chest, her soprano keening blending with the alto of Lark’s sobs, the harmony of their grief filling my ears, but not my arms that now felt empty and cold, useless sticks that hung limp at my sides. I couldn’t see anymore, my tears too thick with grief to focus on the orange glow that blazed from their bodies, filling the hallway with the tragic light of their loss. I shut it out. I shut it all out and closed my eyes, pushing myself away into a corner to be alone with my sorrow.
“Oh my God,” Lark whispered, her trembling voice mirroring the pain I felt pulling me under.
I wouldn’t look. I refused to look.
“Mom, let him go. Let him go, Mom, look!”
I looked.
The body of my beloved angel started to lift, his arms hanging lifelessly at his sides. His legs dangled below him, bending at odd angles, his shoes planted flat on the ground. Ameila reached for his hand, bringing it to her lips and kissing it, while brushing his hair out of his eyes. All things a mother would do to a child who slept soundly. Did she not realize that he wasn’t asleep? She began to rise as his body did, never dropping his hand, never breaking contact from him. I felt the heat of jealousy bubble up in me as I stood up, too. He loved me. He loved me and I should be the one holding him now.
But I couldn’t say it. The thought alone burned me, and added to the guilt that was slowly starting to build up inside of my chest as I played over and over again in my head the last exchange I had had with Lark about Robert, about not caring about hurting his feelings. I had lied out of anger, and spite, and now I’d never be able to tell him that I was sorry, beg him to forgive me for being so selfish for being so…human.
Another gasp brought my attention to his shirt—one that I didn’t recognize—as it started pulling at his front. The buttons were straining against his chest, and one by one, they popped off, sailing into some obscure corner or rolling under a door. Higher he floated, until, as we stood around him, his head was nearly level with ours.
“Robert…” the three of us whispered together.
His shirt hung open behind him, and beneath his back—no, from his back—I could see a grotesque branch-like staining of his flesh bulging and pulsing with darkness. Ameila hissed at it, and lurched forward to—I don’t know what she planned on doing, and I probably never would because Lark held her arm out to stop her.
The sound of Ameila crashing into Lark’s arm sounded like a giant hammer hitting a steel beam. It echoed around us, but only I seemed to notice it. Lark and Ameila were both staring at the grotesque markings that were spreading across Robert’s back. I watched in fascinated horror as the branches started to protrude out towards the floor. The skin was pulled
so taut, it was nearly translucent, a dark film of flesh and…bone.
“Oh my God, it’s his wings,” Ameila breathed, her hand over her mouth in shock, her other hand gripping Lark’s shoulder so tightly, I could see a grimace of pain on her lips.
The branches and skin stretched further as Robert’s body rotated so that he was upright, his head lolling to the side, like a puppet whose string had been cut. I wanted to help hold his head up, the silly human worry that his neck would get stiff causing me great concern, but Lark shook her head, her hand grabbing a hold of my arm to prevent me from interfering.
As his body rose higher, the branches on his back stretched further. Wings, Ameila had said. Biology class was paying off in a strange way as I could make out the rough skeletal shape of a wing in the base of the branch, but the outer branches, they were not so easy to identify. As the branches grew in number, smaller and smaller still, the dawning of recognition hit me. Each one of the divisions weren’t bones. They were feathers.
“Yes,” Lark breathed, nodding her head in agreement. Her face was filled with awe.
Fully formed, fully plumed, the span was surely beyond even the width of the hallway. I shook my head in amazement at such an unfathomable sight. Robert’s body was still limp, but stretched out behind him—in a magnificent display of unintentional beauty—were his wings. Full, glossy, and…
“Black,” Ameila gasped.
Like the wings of a raven.
His body started to lower, his wings folding inward. Lark rushed forward to catch him, her diminutive form belying her strength as she handled him with ease. She gently laid him to the ground, carefully settling his wings around him, shimmering tears falling from her face as she did so. “Brother, you did it. You’ve got your wings. Open your eyes and see them. Open your eyes and see that those who care the most have shared this moment with you.”