by L. Penelope
A grin spreads across her face and she nods self-consciously. Though she looks different on the outside, inside Genna is the same as Viv, same personality, same shyness, same intelligence shining through her sparkling eyes. And I am smitten again — though I’ve never stopped loving her. Not for one moment.
It hurts, almost physically, to hold back. To not settle into the old familiarity, sweep her into my arms and press my lips to hers. To not feel her silken skin against my fingertips and make all the promises I’d made before and strived to keep. Soon, though.
In the hallway, I become invisible. It’s easier to walk around unseen here unless I’m in Genna’s presence. My first days in the this world were spent at the library, brushing up on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries before I ventured out to find her, but everything is still new to me. Luckily, I’m used to observing the rapid changes in human society — I spent such a long time in Euphoria watching before venturing down here that adapting is something I’m quite familiar with. So far, I’m quite fond of this time period.
My skin color does not cause so much as a second glance, much less an angry glare or harsh word. According to my dam, Kalyx, my human form strongly resembles my father, a man she met during her time in Malta two hundred years ago. All I know is that he was a sailor and she fell in love. She told me nothing more.
I arrived in London in 1939 knowing some of what to expect. Having prepared myself for the sinister side of humanity as well as the good, I faced down the appraisals and repudiations. To some I was just another “colored,” there to take jobs away from hardworking white men. To some I was an assumed servant, beneath notice and lacking in humanity. To others I was a curiosity or an exotic, representing a problem to be solved or guilt to be assuaged.
Through luck, skill, unexpected kindness, and a sparing use of my powers, I was able to circumvent some of the barriers of that time for those with brown skin. But now, I walk across a college campus filled with faces of all colors. Douglass University itself is a mecca for students of all kinds, particularly those of African descent. Humanity’s failings are no less widespread, but I am glad to see improvement.
Dusk has settled into the creases of the day. The late summer heat is high. My angel form is impervious to heat and cold, but my human body relishes the temperature changes. The living world is so different from the Wasteland, and every day I’m grateful for the experiences I collect.
Only a few dozen yards from the dormitory, I find Maia lying curled in on herself on a bench. She looks so frail there, so small. Like a girl whose demons run unchecked. Dark makeup circles her eyes. Her hair is shaved on the sides with the top pulled into a ponytail. She wears aggressive black clothing with a fair amount of zippers and buckles. Silver rings grace all five fingers, and her black nail varnish is more absent than present. Another silver ring bisects her plump bottom lip.
She looks up as though she can feel my perusal. Stares at me, right in my eyes, as if she can see me.
“What are you?” she whispers. I take a step forward almost involuntarily. Is she talking to herself?
“What are you?” she says again, louder, her gaze still pointed in my direction. “Why are you haunting her? Are you here to hurt her? Is that why she can see and hear you? She’s no one to you. She’s actually annoyingly good and sweet, you know? Just leave her alone and move on. Cross over or whatever it is you’re supposed to do.”
Her words are anguished, accusatory. Other students passing on the walkway shoot alarmed glances her way. Maia’s eyes dart around, noticing the stares — then she peers back at me, confused. She is looking at me. Talking to me. But that’s not possible.
Just then a hulking guy, a footballer by the looks of him, heads straight for me. I’m so enthralled by Maia that I don’t move out of the way. He plows right into me and stumbles back.
“What the fuck?” he says looking around.
“Tripping over thin air now, Anderson?” one of his friends jibes. “Maybe that’s why Coach benched you.”
The guy grumbles, looks around angrily, and stalks off.
Maia gasps. Sputters. Lets out a sound that holds infinite agony and sorrow. It’s a sound that reminds me of the Wasteland. A sound I remember well.
She crumples forward, her chest hitting her knees. I rush toward her. I have the presence of mind to become visible, making sure everyone nearby has their eyes averted, and pull her into my arms.
Her sobs vibrate through me as I wrap my arms around her. Her grief is alive, clawing its way out of her body. I know then that I’m to blame. I’ve made her feel this shame, this loathing. I soothe her, lulling her into a layer of sleep, unnatural but cleansing. She needs time to regroup and shouldn’t have do it here in the middle of campus.
With another flash of power to avoid the gazes of the nearby students, I turn both of us invisible and hold her close, continuing the soothing, even in her sleep.
We stay there for a long time. When Genna turns off the light in their shared room, I carry Maia back upstairs and lay her on her bed. With a sweep of my hands, I remove the layers of makeup, revealing a lovely face. Delicately boned. So beautiful without its scowl and fiercely crafted mask.
I glance at Genna, resting peacefully as ever, before brushing Maia’s hair off her face and retreating back to my post near the ceiling. Hopefully the soothing will bring Maia some solace and sweeter dreams. She deserves them, since it was I who brought the nightmare.
Chapter Four
THE TEMPERATURE DROPPED ten degrees today. The Yard is full of students showing off their summer wardrobes while they still can. Even I put on a tank top, but I covered it with a sweatshirt, which I don’t plan to take off. I need the extra layer of protection after yesterday.
And speak of the devil, on my way to the cafeteria it’s like the sea of people parts and there he is. I don’t miss a step this time. Half the people on the sidewalk could be dead for all I know. Well, I’m pretty sure about the girl who looks like a Madonna copycat. Teased hair, jelly shoes, elastic bracelets creeping up her arm. It’s not Halloween yet, and while some of the fashion majors could probably pull the look off, the tear-stained makeup and general air of desolation is also a clue. Unless they’ve given themselves a purpose, like protecting a motherless child, for instance, many of the dead seem to be tortured in some way. They look for those they’ve lost or try to enact revenge for their suffering. A chill runs up my spine, and I push away the unwanted memory. My fists clench — well, my right fist clenches. My left hand can’t do much of anything anymore but twitch involuntarily.
When I pass him, Ghost Boy looks at me significantly. He wants me to acknowledge him, but there is no way that’s happening. Fool me once and all.
He sighs and stuffs his hands into his pockets. He’s also figured out a way to change his clothes, another new trick. Today he’s got on a noisy red T-shirt that says Petrovsky Family Reunion. It’s snug, emphasizing the muscles in his chest and arms, which is the only reason he doesn’t look like a complete dork. But then I look at his shoes, and they’re these weird black sneakers with a huge Velcro strap on top. Who dresses this guy? His grandma? I snicker and keep going. He leans to the side a little bit and sort of fake trips over his feet and bumps into this stoner kid walking by carrying a skateboard.
“Sorry, man,” the kid mumbles.
“My apologies,” Ghost Boy says, then raises an eyebrow at me. His voice is like melted chocolate, with a slight British accent. My knees wobble, but then I remember that I don’t let hot boys with dreamy accents affect me. Especially when they’re dead. Or whatever he is.
He bumps into, like, three more people, apologizing each time, which makes him look like the klutziest person on earth but also proves that other people can see him now.
I turn to face him. “What do you want?” My teeth are clenched, and I twist my face into the harshest leave me alone expression I can muster.
“I just want to talk to you.”
“Leave me al
one. Go talk to Genna.”
He falls into step beside me, and I know there’s no getting rid of him. When we arrive at the caf, he opens the door and ushers me through. So he’s got manners. Must mean he died a long time ago, because those are in short supply these days.
We don’t speak as we wind our way through the food line. I stick to my usual, a burger and pizza. Ghost Boy disappears for a moment, well, not literally, and reappears next to me in the checkout with a salad, french bread, a bowl of minestrone, and — is that a pomegranate? Where’d he find that?
“So you eat?” I ask him.
“Yes, I eat.”
“Whatever.” I shrug and turn away to swipe my dining card. He follows me to one of the perpetually empty tables no one else likes because it’s too close to both the exit door and the kitchen entrance and too far from the action. He sits directly across the table, uninvited, and digs in to his food.
He eats like a normal boy — big shovelfuls enter his mouth — but somehow he’s more graceful, less urgent. Still, it seems like he’s enjoying it. I remember I’m supposed to be ignoring him and not staring at his mouth.
He doesn’t say anything else, and while the silence isn’t uncomfortable, my curiosity gets the better of me. “So, are you going to stalk me, too?”
“You could always see me?” he asks, dabbing his face with a napkin like he’s the friggin’ prince of England or something.
“Yeah, I see dead people,” I whisper. His blank face doesn’t register the pop culture reference. “I guess you died before that movie came out.”
I look around. There’s nobody close enough to hear, but I still feel like I shouldn’t be sharing this, as if saying it out loud will immediately result in me being put back in that place. Like the van and the men in white coats will come take me away in a straightjacket. Not that that’s how it really happens.
But he’s staring at me with his hypnotic eyes, blinking, and I remember that the dead don’t blink. It’s something I forgot after I stopped looking at them on purpose.
At my first foster home, there was a kid who hung around named Brayden. His mom had killed him. Locked him in the basement until he starved to death. His bones protruded from his sallow skin, and his eyes swam huge in his face. Eyes that never blinked. We used to have staring contests and he won, every time. I quickly learned never to play games with the dead.
“What’s your name again?”
“Caleb,” he says, and dammit, my gaze is drawn to his mouth as he makes the word, and I wonder what his lips would feel like. It’s a crazy thought, and I have no idea where it came from. That thing inside someone that makes them attracted to other people is broken in me.
I should have told the guy in the drugstore that, yesterday.
“Caleb,” I repeat. The name feels good coming out of my mouth. “I’ve seen the dead all my life. Not as fun as it sounds, trust me. What I can’t figure out is what kind of ghost you are. You’re different from the rest.”
“Because I’m not a ghost.”
I stare at him for a moment. “What are you, then?”
“I’m angelborn.” He says it like it should make some sense. Like he’s just explained everything with that simple word.
“What?”
“Angelborn. Half human, half angel.”
“But you’re … you’re not all blinding and bright.”
He sits back, shock apparent on his face. “You can see angels as well?”
I nod, then sit up straighter. Caleb’s back is to the room, so he doesn’t see what just appeared on the other side, by the main doors. “In fact, there’s one here right now.”
His whole body stiffens, golden brown skin turning ashen as his eyes widen. I don’t blame him. Whenever an angel shows up, it’s bad news for someone.
“How many?” he whispers.
“Just one. There’s only ever one at a time.”
His posture relaxes a fraction, but he doesn’t turn around, he just watches my eyes as I observe the scene taking place behind him. “Then they’re not here for me.”
“No, it’s here for him.” I nod with my head as a kid — Nate, I think his name is, we had freshman English together last year — collapses.
The bright ball of orange-red light expands and takes the vague shape of a person next to Nate. Angels are brilliant as the sun — you can’t even really look at them without giving yourself a headache. Nate gets off the ground, blocking the light for a second, while another version of him lies still and motionless, covered in fries from when his plate turned over as he fell.
A group of kids crouches around him, and chaos erupts. Someone starts beating on his chest, trying to give him CPR. A security guard rushes over, speaking into his walkie-talkie.
“Aneurysm, maybe,” I mutter. “Or heart failure or something?”
Ghost Nate looks at the hubbub, then back at the angel. I hold my breath, hoping, hoping that he’ll make the right choice. I remember sitting in the row behind him last year and him telling a story about his bar mitzvah when we were asked to share something with the class during the section on memoir. Maybe that will make a difference, though I’ve seen ghost priests and preachers, nuns and rabbis.
The angel holds out a glowing arm. I force myself to look, still not able to breathe until it’s done, until the choice is made. Ghost Nate takes hold of the arm, and then he begins to radiate with a white, clean light, different from the angel’s more colorful one. They shine, shine, shine, until I have to squint my eyes, and then they disappear in a blazing comet that streaks away.
I release the breath I’d been holding and lean back. “They’re gone.” And Nate has made the choice to move on and not become a ghost to haunt the world. One less ghost, one point to heaven — or wherever. I remember something about Jews not believing in heaven.
Caleb is staring at me, all tension gone from his body. “What?” I ask him, self-consciousness heating my cheeks.
“He went with her? The boy?”
“Her?”
“Onyx, one of the angels of death. This is her territory, I believe.”
I raise an eyebrow. “You two are on a first-name basis?”
He snorts, which seems so out of character from his polite and mannerly behavior.
“Yeah, he went with her.”
The paramedics strap Nate’s body to a gurney and wheel him out. A bunch of students run through the doors to watch. The atmosphere inside the cafeteria is charged with an electric silence for a few moments before the drone of conversation resumes.
I study Caleb, trying to figure him out. Trying to decide if I believe him or if this is all just an elaborate ruse by a dead guy with some weird agenda.
“So … you’re half angel?” I try the words out on my tongue.
He nods. “There are two types of halflings. Angelborn and humanborn. Humanborn have human mothers and angel sires; angelborn are the other way around.”
So far, it makes sense. “Are there any other differences?”
“Many. The most relevant is that humanborn halflings are born with souls, while angelborn are not.”
This seems odd and unfair. Caleb reminds me of Genna in a way, oozing syrupy goodness. I can’t imagine that he doesn’t have a soul. “So, does that mean you’re evil?”
He chuckles, and the warm sound wraps its arms around me like a hug. Like how it felt when he carried me the other day after I embarrassed myself shouting at him when he was invisible. I thought I dreamed that, but now I think it must have been real.
But then his expression saddens. “No, I’m not evil.” He stares down at his empty plate and taps a finger on the tray. His whole manner just changed so suddenly, I can’t help but wonder what happened.
“I mean, you don’t seem evil to me,” I offer, feeling guilty. My hands dart out of their own accord to straighten his discarded silverware.
I may not be the best judge of character on the planet, but I can spot bad intent a mile away. Some internal warning deve
loped inside me since Natasha, and it’s kept me out of some hairy situations. Caleb’s vibe is anxious, good-natured, and a little sad. Wistful, even. But none of my alarms are ringing.
He looks back up at me, intensity in his eyes. “Souls are beautiful and powerful, but not inherently good or evil. They’re just energy … the spark of creation in this world.”
“And why don’t you get one?”
“Because angels don’t have them. My dam, my angel mother, if you will, didn’t have one to share with me, as yours did. It’s different there, in Euphoria. More different than you can imagine.”
* * *
Before
I spring back from the golden portal just in time to miss being hit by the arc of silver that slides through.
“You should say ‘incoming’ or something, so I can get out of the way.”
Kalyx settles into her angelic form, a gentle, silvery light in the shape of a woman.
“How was I to know you would be blocking the portal? Have you been here watching the entire time I have been gone?” she asks. Her voice is dispassionate, but there is censure coming.
“Not the entire time. How did it go?” She’s been gone for thirty cycles, nearly a full year of human time, though of course it passes differently in Euphoria.
“You seek to avoid my questioning, Caleb. I am not unaware of your techniques.” She closes the portal, and the glowing golden space darkens.
“One mission. Please? Just tell me of the last one. Was it a man or a woman? What kind of dreams did they have? Pleasant or nightmarish?”
Whereas a human mother might become annoyed at the barrage of questions, an angel does not feel those emotions. Kalyx disapproves for entirely other reasons.
“Did you visit the Recordkeepers, as I asked?” she says. “Mannix was expecting you.”
“Yes, of course. I shadowed Mannix for three cycles. I don’t think I could become a Recordkeeper. It’s far too repetitive. And they never leave Euphoria.”