Heavenly (30 page)

"She's in her sister's arms now," Matthias' voice was soft. "She's safe." I melted. Gathering my senses, I tilted my head at him. "Thank you."

"Yes, thank you so much." Mom held out her hand to shake Matthias.' Without a hint of awkwardness, he clasped his

hands behind his back and gave her an efficient nod.

"My pleasure. Now, if you'll excuse me. I'm off to chase some hooligans down in the bird sanctuary. A pleasure

meeting you all. Have a dandy day."

Mom, too enamored with Matthias to notice he'd purposefully declined physical contact, withdrew her hand. "A

pleasure meeting you, too, Matthias."

"Thanks again," Dad said.

Matthias turned to me.
You take care, Zoe.

At first I wasn't sure if I was really hearing his thoughts or my wild imagination was getting out of hand. My heart

danced.
I
will. You... too.

"Stay close to your big sister now," Matthias spoke to Abria, but his blue eyes stayed with mine. A shiver of delight tickled my spine.

"Thank you so much for helping us," I said.

"Of course."
Goodbye, Zoe.
Matthias stole through the crowds, swift, smooth and efficient. I didn't take my eyes off of him—couldn't. My heart soared.

I love you.
He was too far away to hear the exuberant thoughts of my heart, thankfully.
Yes, I love you. So much.
A rush of emotion engulfed me. I blinked back the beginnings of tears.

His form was nearly out of my vision, his halo of hair glistening in the distance, when he turned and looked at me.

My heart pounded. His gaze held mine across the busy expanse of the lunch area. Seconds turned into minutes. Bodies

flowing between and around us seemed to wind down to slow motion. Mom's voice. Dad's. Abria's chattering. Every sound

softened, melting into the slow... pounding... beat... of my heart.

Zoe.

Time blinked. In a flash he vanished.

"Zoe?"

"Honey, are you all right?"

“Zoe?”

"What's wrong with her?" Mom's frightened voice echoed through my stalled brain. "Something's wrong."

Dad moved into my line of vision, his face taut. His hands were on my shoulders, warm, reassuring, firm. He gave me

a shake. Where was Abria? She wasn't in my arms anymore. Mom held Abria's squirming body against hers.

The moment came into focus with the measured shift of a kaleidoscope.

Matthias.

He'd heard the tender feelings of my heart. He'd looked at me.

And only said my name.

I stood hollow. Gouged. Empty.

"Abria, be still," Moms tone held frustration—that old companion, the rock each of us carried perpetually in our

shoes.

"I'm okay." I didn't recognize the fragile voice coming from me.

"You sure? You turned white as a sheet." Dad held me between his strong palms, eyeing my face. "You want to sit down a minute?"

"Can I ride in the wagon?" I whispered. I wasn't joking, but Mom and Dad thought I was. Smiles broke the tight

worry on their faces. My legs—I couldn't feel them. My arms hung useless at my sides.

Hollow.

Gouged.

Empty.

Dad took Abria from Mom's arms and put her into the wagon. Mom followed Dad as he started pulling Abria to the

next exhibit. How my legs moved, I wasn't sure. I trailed them, the sound of their chat about the animals drifting into one ear and out the other like a deafening vapor.

Matthias.

The words I'd uttered squeezed a merciless fist around my heart. Tight.
Tighter.
Bursting.
Tears rushed behind my eyes. Mom and Dad were busy pointing out hyenas to Abria.

Too many tears to blink back. Streams. Down my face.

I turned away, my heart shattered.

Wiped tears.

Held back a sob.

Closed my eyes.

Took a deep breath.

More tears.

"Zoe?"

"Coming. Got something in my eye."

"We need to keep moving, she's getting antsy."

I nodded. "Be right there."

Sounds mixed with tears and puddled in my brain. I couldn't believe he'd heard the tenderest words of my soul and

had only said my name.

Zoe.

Hopelessness.

Everything I knew and understood—the unbreachable gap of Heaven and Earth that stood between us.

In his tone.

I don't remember the rest of our visit to the zoo. Somehow, I was in the car, in the backseat next to Abria.

I stared out the window.

Cars raced by.

Cities passed.

Mom and Dad talked their voices a low murmur. Abria silent.

The hum of the engine.

"You're awfully quiet." Mom—wondering.

I hurt inside.

What did you expect? That you'd live happily ever after? That he'd come back to life? What did you think would

happen, Zoe?

I closed my eyes, rested my head against the cool window. "Tired."

"Oh." Relief coated Mom's tone. "Rest honey."

Rest? I welcomed death. Anything but the cavernous blackness slowly seeping into the hollowed, gouged emptiness.

Matthias.

The car came to a stop. I opened my eyes. Home. I didn't want to move. I could have stayed in the car forever,

disintegrated into the seat. What did it matter if I became part of an object? My heart—that which made me human—hurt too

much.

Being an object would be easy. No pain. Just existence. Abria had fallen asleep during the drive. Dad carried her

inside. Mom followed. "You coming?" she mouthed to me from the porch.

I hadn't moved. The car door was still shut. Glass and steel separated us.

Not Heaven.

I nodded, opened the door and willed my body inside.

- - -

Despair, desperation—both emotions swirled in a quiet storm inside of me. I took the stairs to my bedroom, shut the

door, and fell onto my bed.

Silent sobs, the kind that start at your core—like an earthquake— wracking your being as if an unseen hand has

reached inside and is shaking you. Violent. Without mercy. Sobs that drown from the inside out.

Drowned.

Eyes open, bedspread wet beneath my face, I stared at the wall. Old photographs. Yearbooks. Desk. Bookshelf.

Posters. Useless things. Objects I'd have given anything to trade places with.

Then I wouldn't hurt.

"Zoe."

Mom. Mortal comfort. Her arms wrapped tight around my body, offering a soft shoulder to weep on. Not the soul

penetrating comfort Matthias gave me—like living in baptismal water.

"Honey, what's wrong?" Her hand caressed my head, my back, in loving strokes.

"Nothing. I'm fine. Really."

"You haven't been yourself since the zoo. Did something happen?"

Yes. I told the man I love that I loved him and he didn't say anything. Only my name.
As if he stood on one side of the Atlantic and I on the other and there was no possibility of a bridge. Too far. Impossible to build, let alone cross.

"Nothing happened."

"Zoe. Please let me help you. I don't want you to feel like you... like you have to turn to another source."

"Don't worry Mom." Matthias had helped me with my footing whenever I climbed a mountain. My steps were surer

now. I wasn't going to fall back.

"Is there anything I can do? I'd do anything to help."

"I know."

More soft strokes. I closed my eyes. Tired. And slept.

When I opened them again. Mom was gone. My head, my back, where her gentle strokes had caressed, was cold. My

skull throbbed from weeping.

Had I dreamt the day?

My damp bedspread reminded me that, no, the tears I'd shed over Matthias were real. He'd only said my name.

Zoe.

The Atlantic. Me on one side, Matthias on the other.

Rattling of pots, pans, and the scent of dinner filled my senses with the temporary comfort of food. I rolled onto my

back, not at all hungry.

I stared at the ceiling.

My cell phone vibrated in my pocket. I ignored it. It vibrated again. I pulled it out. Brady.

u comin 2nite?

The last thing I needed was a party. People getting what they wanted would only remind me that no matter what I did,

I would never get what I wanted.

On the other hand, noise would smother the sound of Matthias' voice that kept playing in my head on a loop of

hopelessness.

- - -

Zoe.

- - -

The silent storm of despair and desperation that had been swirling inside of me started to gain momentum. I sat up.

Frustration.

Anger.

Who did Matthias think he was? Someone who could come in and out of my life, tormenting me with something I

couldn't have? How wrong was that?

I stood, took a deep breath and looked at my ravaged face in the mirror. What would a night of partying with friends

do for me?

Laughing.

Playing.

Flirting, lots of flirting.

I could do some tormenting of my own. Unlike Matthias, I could touch and be touched by anyone I damn well pleased.


EIGHTEEN


Weston's house throbbed with heavy music. Cars lined the street. I looked for Britt's white mustang but didn't see it.

Weston had probably picked her up.

I drove my silver bug onto the lawn, shot a grin at one stunned guy standing out front, and parked. The day's

disappointments still clung to my heart, like gremlins picking, pinching, piercing.

I checked my face in the rearview mirror. It had taken hours of ice packs to get my swollen eyes back to normal.

Even now, my cheeks were still flushed with scattered blotches.

Matthias.

I gazed at the house. No outside lights were on this time, and only a smattering of red and amber snuck from the

windows. The place seemed darker than the last parry.

Why was I nervous? I'd been to tons of parties. I knew the game, and I'd come to lose myself in harmless flirting and

fun. There was nothing wrong with that.

I scanned my outfit: nice jeans, red knit top with
Playee
silk screened across the front. Silver earrings dangled from my ears and silver beads and bangles cuffed both wrists. I'd sprayed my favorite perfume behind my neck— just in case a

hottie got close enough.

I left my bag in the car, tucked my cell phone and keys in my hand, got out and locked the door.

"You parked on the grass," the stunned jock observed.

"Yeah." I straightened my shirt. My palms were moist. Why?

I took a deep breath. There didn't seem to be as big a crowd at this gathering. And from where I stood, the forms I

saw mingling through the window were mostly guys, fewer girls.
Nice odds.

I took a step and heard my name.

Zoe.

My heart leapt. I whirled around.

Matthias stood five feet behind me, a soft beam in the dark night. His hands were in the pockets of his light slacks.

The washed-white shirt he wore intensified the blue in his piercing eyes.

Joy filled me, and the joy spilled into the caverns he'd left behind when he'd said my name.

I couldn't melt. Couldn't let his comfort, his serenity, the essence of his being surround me and dissolve the frustration

and hurt. He'd never be mine. I had to accept that.

I had to forget him.

Move on with my life.

It was then I noticed two others like him. One stood on the east side of the house, the other nearer the front window.

Both were dressed similarly to Matthias, both beings illuminated an incandescent glow.
Guardians.

How odd there were only two.

One was a young man, about Matthias' age. He stood by the front window, focused on someone inside. The other was

an older woman with white hair. Her gaze was locked on an exterior wall of the house—as if she had x-ray vision and saw

beyond brick, mortar and wood. Both guardians attention was riveted to people I couldn't see. My gaze slid to Matthias,

whose attention was fastened to me.

"Don't go inside," he said.

The force of his warning rammed through me. My knees trembled in the aftermath, but I lifted my chin. "Why not?

It's just a party. I've been to lots of them."

His gaze held mine in a tight line, unbreakable, boring into my soul. In that moment, I knew I should not go inside.

To do so would put me in danger. He was there, after all, to protect me.

"Zoe."

"Stop saying my name!" Hopelessness ripped through fresh wounds. "Why do you care, Matthias?" I strode to him, then stopped. If I got too near him, he'd toss his aura over me like a comforting blanket. I wouldn't be able to think.

"Uh, are you okay?"

I jerked left. The jock who'd seen me park stood wide-eyed, watching. I glanced at Matthias, tense as a panther ready

to pounce. Was this jock a threat to me? I took a step back.

"I´ m fine."

His lip turned up in amusement. "You were talking to yourself. You high?"

"Yeah, actually, I am. Seeing things, too."

He nodded. "That's cool. You got any to share?"

I almost rolled my eyes. "I don't share."

"Oh." He shrugged. "No problem. Westonś probably got some stuff inside. You coming in?"

I slid a look to Matthias. "I sure am."

I turned around, fighting the urge to steal another glance of satisfaction at Matthias, and crossed the threshold.

Red lights. Bodies. Shadows. Pulsing music broke through the walls in a violent vibration, a rhythmic pound meant to

seduce.

Just what I needed.

The jock I'd followed inside smelled good. Spicy and male. Deep down, a suppressed primal hunger wet its lips. The

guy clicked looks over his shoulder at me; I sent him my best flirtatious smile.

A few familiar faces greeted me with nods. Girls scanned my outfit with curious jealousy. Guys eyed me with that