He shook his head and looked away, furrowing his brow. She could feel the heat he radiated, the anger inside of him fuming like lava within a volcano.
"No, forget her, too," he said. "She woulda done the same thing, can't even support her brat kid. The whole world's just gone to shit. Can't trust anybody."
"Bret, who's Tina?" The truth she knew was slowly unraveling.
"It's this town. That's what it is. THIS town. I'll hitchhike to New York City. Maybe Stan still lives up there, can hook me up."
"But we can do it together! We're meant to be! Even you said so!"
He turned back to her, snapped from his thoughts. "YOU," he said, making her thin body jump, "have no MONEY! We can't POSSIBLY be meant to be if you don't even have a job."
He crumpled the poem and threw it at her feet. Her insides fell with the violated parchment. Never had she felt so empty. She definitely needed a drink. Her voice choked with tears and she tried to touch him.
"But I love you, Bret!"
This time he hit her. Her face twisted into confusion. Who was this guy? Bret would never treat her this way. She reached down to the ground and picked up her poem. Shaking, she handed it to him once more, pleading with her eyes.
Bret didn't even look at it. "Your money's gone, so I'm gone, Angie. See ya. Shoulda never trusted a damn kid!"
The skeleton left the alleyway and Angie ran after him, scared and not understanding why her dream had abruptly turned into a nightmare. She reached the street, the dim electric lights falling on her thin frame. He had disappeared. A lump entered her throat. She felt like throwing up. Gritting her teeth, she cursed him aloud, not caring if she woke up the entire neighborhood.
A grave silence followed her cries.
She looked down at the paper in her hands and squeezed it in her grip, falling to her knees as several months' worth of tears fell down her face.
Then, she heard singing.
She looked up, hoping that perhaps Bret was back and sorry that he had insulted her. No. It was just a man. A man with really long white hair, ironically humming one of her favorite rock songs as he briskly walked past her, probably in a hurry to get to one of the clubs on the strip. Angie blinked, thinking she was still tipsy. All of a sudden, the man tripped and nearly fell.
"Oh gosh, sir, are you okay?" she cried and got up from the ground.
Angie was always caring. It was out of pity that she had met Bret. He had been walking along that same street, stumbling drunk when he fell to the ground. Angie had run to his aid, and it had been love ever since. Or so she had thought.
"Yeah," said the stranger, limping. "I think I sprained my ankle—happens all the time. I tripped on something, probably my own foot. I'm so clumsy."
Angie let out a giggle and walked to him. She offered him a shoulder, but he insisted that he was okay, just needed to sit down a minute. They sat on the sidewalk in front of her apartment complex.
"I'll be fine," he said, releasing his charming smile. "I'm Gidyon. Nice to meet you."
Angie did a double take. Sitting beside her was the most beautiful man she had ever seen. Always paying attention to detail, being the aspiring writer she was, she noticed that his face was symmetrically perfect, his features so precise that they looked almost painted. His mane had a light bluish tint to it, a hair color she had never seen on a man or a woman. She looked into the deep blue of his smiling eyes. Within them were galaxies—whole galaxies!—of sparkling glitter.
"Are you okay?" he asked her. "You look like you've been crying." He touched the spot below her eye where Bret had hit her. "Something happen?"
Angie gave a nervous laugh, her cheek tingling, and said, "Oh, well my boyfriend just got really pissed off."
"Oh. I'm sorry."
"Well, I deserved it."
She felt a nauseous wave that knocked all thoughts of love from her mind. Her head was starting to hurt. And there was only one way she knew of that instantly got rid of that: more alcohol, and by any means. Luckily, she liked this guy. It wouldn't be so difficult giving a little of herself to him in exchange for a few drinks.
"But hey," she said, "you seem really nice." She placed her hand on Gidyon's leg. "Wanna go to Lektriks? It's the best club in town. Really awesome music. Three floors. I know a lot of people who hang out there."
The stranger looked down at the girl's hand. He opened his mouth to speak, but her hand moved further up. Looking away from her, he blushed. His discomfort confused her. He was male after all.
"Angie," he said, taking her hand and placing it back in her lap, "I don't think that would be a good idea."
Looking at him like a frightened child, she whispered. "How did you know my name?"
Without giving one word of explanation, he took the back of her head into his left hand and held it firm. She tried to move, but his grasp was too strong.
Don't be scared, she heard his voice say to her, but he never moved his lips. I am going to free you.
Her eyes went wide. Gidyon formed his free hand into a C and placed it before her mouth like a catcher's mitt. He stared intensely at her lips until she felt her veins begin to burn. The crystal around his neck glowed like a diamond under the brightest of lamps. Her entire body began to tingle with waves of heat and coldness. Then a sharp pain went through her limbs like her very essence was being brutally stripped from her. Gidyon's eyes stayed on her lips. The swelling inside her body became so severe that she closed her teary eyes and opened her mouth to scream, hoping the tiny knifelike stabs would escape through it. No sound came forth. Instead, a dark, grayish mist seeped through her lips and collected in a vapory sphere in the cave of Gidyon's palm. The pain lifted from her body and she tingled with sweet release. Gidyon's hand didn't move. His face was that of a doctor performing the most dangerous of surgeries. Angie closed her mouth as the last bit of vapor escaped it. The nauseous headache was gone. She could think straight. She was clean.
The light in Gidyon's crystal faded, and he held his palm facing up between his chest and the girl's. A swirling ball of vapor hovered over it; tiny dragon-like creatures swam madly within its walls.
Very seriously he said, "A little bit of the drink is okay. But drink too much of it, and it gets a mind of its own, and unattractive beings are drawn to it, beings you normally can't see from this side of the veil. It'll all control you like a puppet; I've seen it a million times."
Angie stared in horror at the creatures gnashing their little razor teeth at her. She saw them clearly with a sober mind. It had been months since she was completely clean. The sensation was frightening. But it gave her the power to see the shocking reality that the stranger held within his hand. She looked into his eyes.
"But now it can't control you anymore," he said, closing his hand into a fist on the orb. "Unless you let it. And I don't think you will."
His fist glowed as he squeezed it tighter. A demonic cry like the sound of tortured rats sounded from within the grip. When he opened his hand, the sphere was gone.
Angie couldn't even blink. She had dropped the poem during the magical healing. Gidyon picked it up and read as she looked on in astonishment.
"This is wonderful," he said honestly of the piece. "Are you a famous writer?"
Angie blushed, "No, I wish. How did you—"
"This is really good stuff! You should write more. I bet you have tons more at home, don't you?"
"Well, yeah, but how did you—"
He handed her the poem, the paper smooth as new. She took it. He stood up. His ankle was fine.
"I think you should go home," he said. "Your mother is probably worried about you. Tell her you're clean now. Tell her you want to write. I bet you have all kinds of stories in your mind just waiting to be written. Magic just waiting to be created."
How did he know about her mother? Angie cried again. But this time it was tears of joy. Gidyon smiled and started to walk down the road. The girl stood to her feet with new energy. She didn't just feel sanitized inside. She
felt freedom. And she couldn't help but smile.
"Who in the world are you, Gidyon?" she said.
He kept walking, but with a playful wink over his shoulder, he briefly took the cloak off his wings, flashing them for one fleeting moment.
Angie lost her breath.
"Oh," she whispered. "I see."
***
Noam
Noam went north. His boots made soft, echoing steps against the smooth sidewalk of a middleclass neighborhood. He enjoyed being away from Gidyon, and sighed in frustration as he replayed what the healer had said to him in the church, telepathically so Max could not hear:
I don't know of any rules about hiding our identity from believers on Earth. Anyway, this man is here. And being here, praying in the middle of the night, he's showing an honorable attempt at faith. He could be why Michael sent us here.
Noam had replied with an expressionless face. He liked to pretend that Gidyon wasn't that ignorant. It was the only thing he could have done not to slap him out of his denial. Noam stomped his foot. He knew that he was just as big a fool as Gidyon was to fall into the Devil's trap—a trap that was painfully obvious now—but to continually refuse the truth? And on top of that, Noam knew Gidyon was already forming an alliance with Max. Together they would go on a crusade to try and get him, the poor, pitiful, speechless angel, to talk once again. The Thanatakran could hear every word that was said and unsaid about him, could read the plan in his comrade's eyes. But he chose not to speak, or let anyone read his thoughts for that matter. He didn't see the point in talking anymore.
It was Gidyon's fault that he was not speaking.
Everything would have been fine.
If only they had not dared to venture behind Hell's gates.
Many times when Noam closed his eyes to sleep, he was bombarded with images from that terrifying place. His heart beat faster as he picked up his pace, wishing that he had never gone with Gidyon, but knowing that he could not have let him go alone. Only under grave circumstances would the Almighty have sent anyone besides the Archangels down to Lucifer's realm of torture—and the constant, raging, angelic war was a grave circumstance, no denying that. But Noam blocked that detail from his mind. It was easier to just blame Gidyon.
The dark-haired warrior blinked his eyes, trying to think of where the enemy might be. Malynko was a tough one, sometimes difficult to predict. He could be anywhere, with anyone, doing anything. Noam deeply loathed each and every angel of the Order of Lucifer, but somehow Malynko always managed to be near the top of every angel of light's hate list. The Thanatakran took in a deep breath, remembering the many times that he had exchanged blows with the dark-haired Elitist. He had never beaten Malynko. But Malynko had never beaten him either.
His memories overflowed with hundreds of bloody battles, all of which he would have loved to forget, but the gory details would never leave him. They were a part of him as much as his very wings. The people of Earth would never truly understand the horrific experiences of real angels. Noam was definitely not the stereotypical cherub found in sculptures and paintings: small, chubby, and playing a harp. No. He was a deadly weapon.
A deadly weapon that went speechless after spending just a few moments in Hell.
Realizing the neighborhood had come to an end, he turned his attention to an empty parking lot, then the grocery store to which it belonged. His probing eyes darted from abandoned shopping carts to cement walls then to the little girl in the white coat.
Little girl?
The angel looked again. Yes, he did see her. Wearing a snow-white coat with soft fake fur around the neck, she pranced like a fairy on the empty sidewalk, instantly fascinating him. He turned his head to the side in wonder, watching the pixie quietly prance past the gray buildings around her like a drifting snowflake. She did not notice the gentle warrior standing across the empty lot, enthralled at her every graceful movement.
Why was she wearing a heavy jacket in such temperate weather? He noticed the coat's thick, snowy fur caressing her neck at the top, and then another strip touching her bare knees along the bottom. The hood was down, revealing a cap of copper hair that circled her delicately freckled face like an oval frame. She looked to be around six or seven years old. Her wide, doe-like eyes were set firmly on the path in front of her.
Noam's eyes began to flicker with electrical green charges of curiosity. With his head still slightly turned, he wondered who the pretty child was and why she was out so late without an adult. Surely so young a girl would be afraid to roam at such an hour. But Noam sensed no panic. He read her mind and saw that she was reciting a nursery rhyme, the comforting tune playing over and over in her head, repeating like a broken record. There was something about her, something he couldn't quite put his finger on, something that reminded him of a time in his past, someone he once knew.
Then, as if waking from a dream, he saw the lass turn a corner and prance out of sight. He looked around, turning at the speed of light, making sure he had not just been tricked by an illusion. The streets were empty. He realized then that he had been holding his breath out of fear that the little doe might have been frightened away by any movements. Letting the air slowly seep from his lungs, he shook her pretty image from his mind. He had a more important matter to attend to.
Listening for screams or cries or sounds of destruction, he narrowed his eyes.
Then they opened again, tiny green sparks streaking across the irises like little shooting stars.
Of course.
With sudden swiftness, he spread his invisible wings and flew into the air, his ears ringing with the music of the nightclubs.
***
Malynko
Malynko weaved through the crowd like a snake. In the stuffy darkness, the people around him were unaware that they brushed his soft, invisible wings that fell down his back like a cape.
A young man just out of his teen years, and rather handsome, bumped into him. Malynko stopped amidst the bodies and looked down at him. The man looked up, his longish dark hair in his face. The angel of darkness grinned and brushed the soft strands back to look into his wide eyes of youthful masculinity.
"Hmm," he purred.
The instantly enchanted human lost all inhibitions and leaned in to kiss him. But his greedy lips missed Malynko's, the Elitist having found the bar and pulled away. The hunter had spotted a much better target.
***
Melissa
The night had grown so incredibly boring. Melissa sat on the curved palm of one of the hand-shaped barstools that Lektriks was known for, while her "friends" danced drunkenly with their dates amidst the hazy mass of heavy partiers. Barely eighteen, Melissa still carried the look of a young girl. Her slender face, sprinkled with freckles, gave her a youthful appearance that she hated now but would be thankful for in her later years. She sat with her arms crossed, unaware that she was being watched, and looked at everyone around her move their bodies to the music. The smell of smoke and booze filled the air as people, some dressed in shining, sparkly colors, others in black, their faces heavily made up, gave themselves over to the night like Greek gods at a futuristic bacchanal.
An ugly boy dressed in Gothic apparel approached her.
"Hey," he said, his eyes bloodshot and dilated, "what's up?"
"Umm," Melissa said, leaning away from his saggy face, "not much."
The boy, his thin lips and beady eyes slightly open, nodded woozily. "Same here. Hey, you party?"
"Uhh."
Melissa didn't mind the gothy look, but there were some people who looked freaky enough already without the extra flare. She suddenly felt woozy from all the flashing lights. She placed a small, weary hand on her head, hoping he would just go away. Sighing, she asked herself again why she continued to follow the morons she hung out with.
"Oh, yeah," she said aloud, her voice drowned out by the loud electrical music, "because they're popular."
She crossed her arms on the bar and laid her head down, closing her eyes in d
espair. Sweet blackness covered her sight.
Melissa had managed to get with the "in crowd" as soon as she started dressing like them and going to places they wanted to go. But as the screeching guitars blared in her ears, threatening a headache, she wondered if being in was worth it.
A person sitting a few seats away dropped his beer bottle, and the shatter made her jump.
"Hey, you awake?" the boy asked.
Had he not left yet? It was so time to go. Her eyes stung from all the thick makeup she had plastered on, and her head itched from three coats of hairspray. Lifting her heavy head, her eyes blinked away their sleepy haze, but then shot open as they met the glowing green orbs of an absolutely fascinating guy. He stood behind the boy and lightly tapped him on the shoulder.
"What?" the kid said defensively, turning around.
"You're in my seat."
When the boy looked into his hard, handsome face, he nodded and blurted out, "Sure, man, sorry." Then, he walked away, taking brisk steps.
The gorgeous stranger sat down in the hand-shaped stool next to Melissa and said, "You look like you need a drink."
"I, uh," she tried, but words failed her.
Hopelessly captivated, she became lost in his luring gaze, lost in his maddening sexual presence. This was definitely not the usual reaction to people she'd barely met.
"I'm curious," he said. "Why's a girl like you sitting here by yourself? You look like you're one of the popular kids. Heh, when I went to school, I only dreamed of dating girls like you."
She decided that he was one of the rare people who could successfully pull off the gothy punk look. His face wasn't covered in makeup like the misfit boy's was. No, he had just the amount of black lined around his big, green eyes to make them utterly penetrating, and his face—it looked authentically white. But she had never seen anyone with skin so pure and flawless. It had to be makeup.
"Wow, well, uh, actually I'm not that popular," she said nervously, then closed her eyes. Why she would say something so stupid?
"Oh," he said, turning away. "I thought you were. Wow, I feel kinda stupid now. I always say stupid things."
Wings of the Divided: The Divided Book 1 Page 8