I sigh. “I know.”
He quiets again. He knows I know. “It’s fucked up, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, it is.”
“What are we supposed to do though? I mean, you have to pick a side. You have to fight for something. It’s them or us.”
I stare at him then. I used to believe that. So did Andie. So does everyone who still sees black and white, good and evil. Ally and enemy. But what happens when the gray blurs everything outside your own heart, when your conscience screams that we’re all just people trying to survive our circumstances? What do you do with the thought that each of us is born with the same capacity to be pushed or pulled, to bend and break against the currents of an existence that’s beyond our control?
I don’t hate Emery as she interrupts our silence with an angry crash through the door. I don’t even hate my father for abandoning me to a fate I don’t deserve. I hate their worlds. I hate the histories that pushed them to choose a path that will end Andie’s and mine.
“Get him up. We’re done with this,” Emery barks, motioning to Isaac.
I feel his hesitance and silently plead with him not to add another victim to this crime. He takes my arm to lift me off the bed when Stacy grabs the other side without a fraction of the same care.
“I’m sorry, Kaleb. But I know you understand,” Emery says.
I don’t look at her as they drag me from the room. I don’t look at anyone because she’s right.
I do.
Seventy-three. Seventy-two. Sev…
Counting is too hard. Breathing. I try to suck air into my chest, but it feels like they’ve emptied it from the room. Can’t do that either. Everything hurts. Everything feels broken after the latest video. The last one they said because they’re giving up. My father finally proved his point that he doesn’t give a damn about me. I’ve never seen such unbridled frustration.
I’m locked in gray consciousness now. That place where your brain drifts between agonizing light and the comfort of darkness. The concrete floor does no favors for my aching body, but it doesn’t matter. I’m on my deathbed. There are no more monitors, restraints, or chocolate pudding. No Isaac, Stacy, or Roy. No Emery. Just me and this empty cell waiting for my death so it can be cleared for its next victim.
I’m a number now. An RP-38C for someone to grumble over. I’m about to be nothing but a line item, a memory only one person will carry for the little time she has left now that I’m no longer valuable enough to save her.
My eyes catch fire from the salty tears stabbing at open wounds, but Andie is worth every burn, every sting as I mourn my final betrayal. I couldn’t keep her alive. She won’t hate me for it, and I try to pretend that’s enough to hold onto as my final exhalations empty into the desolate space around me.
“Andie,” I whisper. An apology, a plea, a promise that she was my last breath. The tears mix with blood as they pool on the concrete digging into my face. It’s an excruciating reminder of my slide into death, but I’m careful not to move. I want them to gather there, join together in one final memorial to my sacrifice.
This is my legacy. My fuck-you to a world that tried to break me with hate. It failed when it broke my body, because it’s love that owns my soul.
Fuck you, Fate. I am not a traitor. I am love.
Gray bleeds from the darkness and opens up the flood of pain again. I find it strange that my first sensation in death is pain. My second, disappointment. You hope for Heaven, but at the very least the relief of nothingness. Instead I get every stab of life without the promise of release. An eternity of…
No, there’s something else, and my heart explodes at the familiar scent. A warmth that’s replaced the concrete that guided me into the depths. This can’t be Hell because she’s here. Satan wouldn’t send my angel.
“Andie?” Despite the agony, despite the horror of each memory that’s followed me into eternity, my lips actually twist into contentment as I force my eyes open to accept my gift.
“You came,” I rasp in disbelief.
“Of course I did,” she sobs, burying her face in my neck as she cradles me against her. I don’t understand the devastation on her face. Angels are supposed to gaze down with glowing serenity. This one seems frantic as she tears her eyes away and casts them toward the door.
“Can you walk?”
I also never counted on angels having a sense of humor.
“Walk?”
I repeat the word like that’s my question. Not the fact that I’m in the afterlife with an Andie who makes strange requests.
She curses. “No, of course you can’t. Dammit!”
Okay, I know for a fact that angels don’t swear. She can’t be a demon. It’s not possible.
“Are you…” I try to lift a mangled hand to test its face for clues, but my joints don’t move.
“Shh. Just breathe. Stay alive, stay conscious. We’re…”
She’s gone again.
“Kaleb, do you ever wonder what our lives would be like without the war?”
She looks different today. Sure, same refugee clothes, same long hair twisted into a braid, same brown eyes taking in a world she’s struggling to accept.
No, she’s different because I’m in love with her. I’m in love with her smile, her curiosity, her light. With how she can face a monster like me and find beauty. But I don’t say any of that because I’m not allowed to love. Mine is an existence of hate, revenge, and dark voids.
“Hey? You there? That must be one interesting report you’re working on.”
I smile even though I’ll have to deal with a gloating assistant by giving in.
“I knew it! So?”
“So, what?”
“Do you ever wonder what our lives would be like without the war?”
“No, never.”
“Never?”
My smile spreads into a grin, and she looks relieved. “Of course I do. Every damn day.”
“Where would you be?”
“You’ll laugh.”
“No. I promise.”
I sigh and meet her dancing eyes. “I’d be on a farm, I think. Growing shit, I don’t know.”
She’s a total liar and has to wipe the tears from her eyes. “Seriously? ‘Growing shit’? If that’s your knowledge of farming, you should probably pick another fantasy.”
“Hey! This is a different reality, right? In that one I know how to grow shit.”
She shakes her head and rests her hip against the corner of my desk.
“What about you?” I ask, because this is getting too dangerous for my fragile conscience.
“Hmm… well, I think my answer just changed.”
“Oh yeah?”
She nods, that spark, that playful glint. “Yeah, because there’s no way I’d miss watching you try to grow shit.”
This time the gray is accompanied by rumbling and jerky movement. I can hear my own groan every time my body has to absorb another jolt.
“He’s waking up again!” My angel-demon is back. She’s moved me to a new location. This one is just as dark but more excruciating in its jagged motion. I thought spirits would float to their final resting place. The afterlife sucks.
“Kaleb?”
I blink, but I can’t see anything in the darkness. Still, I recognize that voice. Even in death, I can cling to every sweet intonation.
“I’m here.”
“Thank God!” she cries, nuzzling me again. I force away the cry of pain because I need her touch more. If this is eternity, maybe I’m in Heaven after all. I don’t care if she’s a demon. She’s mine, and that’s all I need.
“Is God here? Will I meet him?”
She chuckles. “You still have your sense of humor. You have no idea how happy that makes me.”
Except I wasn’t joking. I squint into the void for a mo
ment before the chill of recognition hits me.
“I’m not dead,” I say out loud. It’s not exactly a question, but not a statement either.
“No. Of course you’re not,” my real-live companion responds as the phantom disappears. “But they wanted you to be,” she adds with open bitterness.
“But how…”
Soft fingers find my lips and soothe away the questions. “Not now, okay? We just need to be quiet for a while. We’re on our way to safety, but we’re still a long way off. I’ll explain everything, just, right now we need to survive.”
Survive. Such a strange word. I survive beyond any explanation I can form in my head. I’ve survived for so long, through so many trials I’ve lost track of their stings, and yet, how can you call what’s left of me survival? But the command came from Andie, so I know I will. She owns me now that they don’t. That makes me smile again.
Her fingers slide along my face, somehow finding each nerve that hasn’t been bludgeoned, and I want to tell her how this is much better than when I’d “talk analgesics” with Emery. I flinch when her touch moves to my hair.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers.
“No, I am,” I try to explain. “They… lots of blood there.”
She pulls me tighter in her lap. “No, more, okay? No more.”
It’s her lips on my forehead this time. They linger for a while, and then I feel the prick of a tear. Hers sting my skin more than my own ever did.
“Andie, don’t cry.”
She plants another kiss.
“Don’t cry? You’re serious.” Her arms tighten around me again. “I love you so much.”
A few rays of light stream in through pinholes around us, and my eyes start to adjust enough to make out the details of her beautiful face. Her eyes as she gazes down and reminds me that sometimes Heaven is in Hell.
That’s when I also notice another face. Smiling. Observing us in silence. Andie follows my look and lights the rest of the space with her grin.
“You remember my mother?”
“Hi, sweetie,” the woman says, shifting closer.
“Hi, ma’am.”
“Oh no. Marta, please.”
“Marta. Yes, ma’am.”
I can see where Andie got her smile.
“Where are we going?” I direct back to my angel.
“Far away. I told you not to worry.”
“When did you get so bossy?” It comes out in a stuttered croak.
“You’re going to use every reserve of energy you have on sarcasm, aren’t you?”
“That wasn’t sarcasm,” I say. Well worth the effort for the gleam I get back.
“True. Not technically. But you’re not my supervisor anymore, so now I get to boss you around.”
I like that. “Just don’t expect me to do your filing.”
“Not even if you begged me.”
Eventually, I put a few of the pieces together. We’re in the back of a military transport vehicle. It hasn’t been reported stolen yet, and we’re headed to a remote location north of the border. She won’t tell me who’s in the front, however. She says it will lead to more questions, and we’re not ready for that long conversation.
The truck makes occasional stops. The hum of voices drifts through when we slide to a halt, but the back never opens. No confrontations or faces. It’s just motion and non-motion in what actually does seem like eternity. I know I’m alive now, but damn, if not for Andie this would have been Hell.
I’ve never been much of a theologian, but I’ve developed some theories over these last few hours. I wouldn’t be the first death survivor to devote the rest of his life to the study of the supernatural.
“Are you sleeping?”
“No, just philosophizing.”
“Oh yeah? Anything interesting?”
I’d laugh if I could. I settle on a grunt. “I think so, but I doubt anyone else would.”
“No? Try me.”
“I thought we weren’t supposed to talk.”
“We weren’t when we were in heavily occupied territory, but we should be in the clear for a while.”
In the clear. I like the sound of that, but I’m not so sure I’m up for a debate about my new theology.
“Sorry, I know. I just…”
The wince comes at an opportune time for once, and her face falls.
“Of course! Rest. The meds aren’t doing anything for the pain?”
“Meds?”
“Yeah, you swallowed two pills a couple hours ago.”
“I did?”
“Yep. And you called me a demon-angel. I don’t know what that is but it sounds pretty badass.”
I groan through a chuckle this time.
“Stop! You can’t laugh.” She grins and applies another kiss on my forehead.
“Then stop making me.”
“I’m not. I’m just reporting back the scene you apparently missed.”
“Did I say anything else?”
“Um… just that I was the love of your life and you can’t wait to grow tomatoes with me.”
“Tomatoes and all, huh?”
She nods before betraying herself with a giggle. “No. That was part of my own philosophizing.”
“Yours makes a lot more sense than mine.”
“Really? Okay, you have to give me something.”
I sigh. “Fine, but you can’t laugh.”
“I promise I won’t.”
“All right.” I draw in a painful breath. “I was thinking about how God might drive you around in a delivery truck and your reward or punishment is meted out in the quality of your ride. Like, if you’re in Heaven, it’s a nice smooth journey surrounded by those you love. If you’re in Hell it’s all bumpy and chaotic, you know?”
She stares at me. Three long, agonizing seconds of stunned silence. Then the dam breaks and my heavenly hell-ride becomes an echo of laughter. Even Marta is cracking up.
“You promised,” I say.
“I know. I’m sorry, but you just told me God is a trucker!”
I grin.
“So let me get this straight. In your theory, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, supreme authority over all angels, demons and earthly realms has decided in His infinite wisdom that the best way to finalize the miracle of life is to chauffer your butt around in a truck bed for all of eternity?”
It doesn’t make as much sense when she puts it like that.
“I said I was working on it.”
“Wait, does he wear a hat too? Oh! Does he have a uniform?”
“Stop.”
“No, really. I have to know. Does his dog ride along in the passenger seat?”
“It’s metaphorical. Obviously, there’s no dog.”
“Ohhh, okay. So He’s a metaphorical truck driver.”
“I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, I love this. You know, I’ve read the Bible. A few times actually. Not once do I remember anything about semis, though. Now, camels…”
“Shut up.”
She kisses me again, and I forgive her. Heaven is Andie Sorenson. And maybe camels. Forgot about those. Time to rework my theory.
I wouldn’t trade our banter for anything, but as the drugs wear off, so does my ability to find humor. Andie understands and settles into a somber embrace when my pain starts to separate us again.
“Kaleb. Kaleb, come on, baby. Stay awake.”
I try to open my eyes, but they’re fused together. Unintelligible sounds pass through my lips instead.
Her hair soothes my skin as she burrows into me.
“I hate this,” she whispers. “I’d do anything to take his pain. Anything.”
“I know, sweetie. We’re going to get him help.” I love that Andie has a mother who calls her sweetie.
I don’t have groans anymore. Just the raging fire that radiates from each pulsating wound on my body. Even worse are the replays I can’t stop. That final video that sent me from a functional human with a broken wrist to a breathing corpse. The message of this one was clear. We hope you’re happy with your decision, Roberto. Good luck living with this on your conscience.
It was a primal scene. Where the others were calculated scripts, the finale was a barrage of ancestral rage. I just wasn’t supposed to be the one lying awake remembering. Why they didn’t end it with a death stroke, I have no idea, except maybe for the paperwork implications. Better if I die of “natural causes” after an interrogation than during one. I don’t blame them. The paperwork in that place sucks.
Pain swells in my stomach, casting a new wave of nausea every time those fists slam into my memory. The burns. The crack of ribs and thud of boots. I don’t know how many. It couldn’t have been more than a few since I doubt Emery would widen her circle of co-conspirators right at the end. But god, it felt like a hundred, and I could do nothing. Completely powerless to defend myself as the restraints buckled me into nothing more than a pile of flesh for their fury. No counting because the rhythm of numbers doesn’t work when it’s overpowered by a stronger beat.
I’m going to be sick. I tense in alarm, but I don’t know any way around it as the truck bumps and jerks each recoil through my stomach.
Andie doesn’t curse, barely reacts as I do my best to roll away so I don’t include her in my horror. The coughs that follow nearly knock me out again, but her voice soothes me back into a relaxed paralysis as she wipes a clean cloth over my face.
“Shh. It’s okay. Hey, it’s okay.” Her lips are on my head again. Once, twice. A couple more splatters of her tears, and I feel my own start to well deep inside my chest.
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