Halo (15 page)

I became adept at masking my feelings for Xavier in front of my brother and sister. I knew they were aware of it, but if they disapproved, they must have made a pact to keep it to themselves. For that, I was grateful. I sensed a rift between us now that hadn’t been there before. Our relationship seemed more fragile, and there were uncomfortable silences at the dinner table. Every night I fell asleep to the sound of their whispered conversations and felt certain that my disobedience was the subject of discussion. I elected to do nothing about the increasing distance between us even though I knew I might come to regret the decision later.

For now, I had other things to think about. I suddenly looked forward to getting up in the morning and leapt out of bed without needing Ivy to wake me up. I lingered in front of the mirror, trying different things with my hair, seeing myself as Xavier might see me. In my head I replayed snippets of conversation, trying to determine the impression I’d made. Sometimes I’d be pleased by a witty remark I’d delivered; other times I berated myself for saying or doing something clumsy. I made a pastime of thinking up sharp one-liners and memorized them for future use.

I was envious of Molly and her group now. What they took for granted, I could never have: a future on this planet. They would grow up to have families of their own, careers to explore, and a lifetime of memories to share with the partners they’d choose. I was just a tourist living on borrowed time. For this reason alone I knew I should curb my feelings for Xavier rather than allow them to develop. But if I’d learned anything about teenage romance, it was that intensity wasn’t dictated by duration. Three months was the norm, six months marked a turning point, and if a relationship lasted a year, the pair was more or less engaged. I didn’t know how long I had on earth, but whether it was a month or a year, I wasn’t going to waste a single day of it. After all, every minute spent with Xavier would form the basis of memories I would need to sustain me for eternity.

I had no trouble collecting such memories because soon there wasn’t a day that passed without me having some form of interaction with him. We looked for each other routinely at school whenever we had free time. Sometimes our contact was nothing more than a brief conversation at the lockers or sitting together at lunch. When I wasn’t in class, I found myself on full alert, looking over my shoulder, trying to spy him coming out of the locker rooms, waiting for the moment when he came onto the stage during assemblies or squinting to make him out among the players on the rugby field. Molly sarcastically suggested I might need to get glasses.

On afternoons when he didn’t have training, Xavier would walk me home, insisting on carrying my bag. We made sure to extend the walk by taking a detour through town and stopping at Sweethearts, which quickly became “our place.”

Sometimes we talked about our day; other times we sat in comfortable silence. I was content to just look at him, something I never tired of doing. I could become mesmerized by his floppy hair, his eyes the color of the ocean, the habit he had of raising one eyebrow. His face was as entrancing as a piece of art. With my keen senses, I learned to identify him by his distinctive scent. I always knew when he was close by, before I could actually see him, by the clean, woody fragrance in the air.

Sometimes during those sun-kissed afternoons, I would look around furtively, expecting heavenly retribution. I imagined being watched by secret eyes gathering evidence of my misconduct. But nothing happened.

It was largely because of Xavier that I went from being an outsider to an integral part of life at Bryce Hamilton. Through my association with him, I made the discovery that popularity could be transferred. If people could be guilty by association, they could achieve recognition in exactly the same way. Almost overnight I became accepted simply because I numbered among Xavier Wood’s friends. Even Molly, who had initially discouraged my interest in him, seemed appeased. When we were together, Xavier and I turned heads, but now it was more as a result of admiration than surprise. I noticed the difference even when I was alone. People gave me friendly waves as I passed them in the corridor, made small talk in the classroom while waiting for a teacher to arrive, or asked me how I’d done on the latest test.

My contact with Xavier at school was limited by the fact that we mostly took different classes. Otherwise I might have run the risk of following him around like a puppy. Apart from the French class we shared, his forte was math and science while I was drawn to the arts.

“Literature’s my favorite subject,” I announced to him one day in the cafeteria as if it were a vital discovery. I was carrying my booklet of literary terms, and I let it fall open at a random page. “Bet you don’t know what enjambment is.”

“I don’t but it sounds painful,” said Xavier.

“It’s when one line of poetry runs into the next.”

“Wouldn’t it be easier to follow if you just put in full stops?” That was one of things I liked about Xavier; his view of the world was so black and white. I laughed.

“Possibly, but it might not be as interesting.”

“Honestly, what is it you like so much about literature?” he asked with genuine interest. “I hate how there’s no right or wrong answer. Everything’s open to interpretation.”

“Well, I like the way each person can have a completely different understanding of the same word or sentence,” I said. “You can spend hours discussing the meaning behind a poem and have reached no conclusion by the end of it.”

“And that doesn’t frustrate you? Don’t you want to know the answer?”

“Sometimes it’s better to stop trying to make sense of things. Life isn’t clear-cut, there are always gray areas.”

“My life is pretty clear-cut,” Xavier said. “Isn’t yours?”

“No,” I said with a sigh, thinking of the ongoing conflict with my siblings. “My world is messy and confusing. It gets tiring sometimes.”

“I think I might have to change your world,” Xavier replied.

We looked at each other in silence for a few moments, and I felt as if his brilliant ocean eyes could see right into my head and pull out my thoughts and innermost feelings.

“You know, you can always pick the lit students,” he continued, grinning.

“Is that so? How?”

“They’re the ones who walk around wearing berets and that I-know-something-you-don’t expression.”

“That’s not fair!” I objected. “I don’t.”

“No, you’re too genuine for that. Don’t ever change, and don’t under any circumstances start wearing a beret.”

“I’ll do my best,” I laughed.

The bell sounded, signaling the start of the next class.

“What have you got now?” Xavier asked.

I cheerfully waved my glossary of literary terms under his nose by way of answer.

I was always happy to be going to literature with Miss Castle. It was a diverse class despite there being only twelve of us. There were two sullen-looking goth girls, who wore black eyeliner and whose cheeks were powdered so chalk white they looked like they’d never seen the sun. There was a group of diligent girls with neat hair ribbons and well-equipped pencil cases, who were obsessed with grades, and they were usually too busy taking notes to contribute to class discussion. There were only two boys: Ben Carter, who was cocky but astute, and loved an argument; and Tyler Jensen, a brawny rugby player, who invariably arrived late and sat through the lesson wearing a stunned expression and chewing gum. He never contributed anything and his presence in the class was a mystery to everyone.

Due to the small size of the group, we’d been relegated to a cramped classroom in the old part of the school that adjoined the administration offices. As the room wasn’t used for any other purpose, we were allowed to shift the furniture and put up posters. My favorite was one of Shakespeare depicted as a pirate wearing an earring. The room’s only advantage was that it came with a view of the front lawns and palm-lined street. Unlike other subjects, literature class could never be described as lackluster. Instead, the very air seemed to be charged with ideas all vying to be heard.

I sat next to Ben and watched him look up his favorite bands on his laptop, an activity he kept up even once the class had started. Miss Castle arrived carrying a mug of coffee and an armful of handouts. She was a tall, slender woman in her early forties with masses of dark curly hair and dreamy eyes. She always wore heavy-framed glasses on a fine red cord around her neck and pastel blouses. Judging by the way she carried herself and the way she spoke, she would have been more comfortable in a Jane Austen novel, in which women rode in carriages and witty repartee flew across a drawing room like sparks. She was passionate about language, and it didn’t matter what text we were studying, she identified vividly with the heroine every time. Her teaching was so animated, people sometimes stopped to look into the classroom, where they’d see Miss Castle thumping the teacher’s desk, firing off questions or gesticulating wildly to illustrate a point. I wouldn’t have been surprised to walk in one day and find her standing on top of her desk or swinging from the light fixtures.

We’d started the term studying
Romeo and Juliet
in conjunction with Shakespeare’s love sonnets. Now we were assigned the task of writing our own love poems, which would be recited to the class. The studious girls, who’d never had to rely on their own imaginations before, flew into a panic. This was something they couldn’t look up on the Internet.

“We don’t know what to write about!” they wailed. “It’s too hard.”

“Just think about it for a while,” said Miss Castle in her floaty voice.

“Nothing interesting happens to us.”

“It doesn’t have to be personal,” she coaxed. “It can be a total figment of your imagination.”

The girls remained uninspired.

“Can you give us an example?” they persisted.

“We’ve been looking at examples all term,” said Miss Castle in a dejected tone. Then an idea for a starting point came to her. “Think about qualities you find attractive in a boy.”

“Well, I think intelligence is very important,” a girl named Bianca volunteered.

“Obviously, he should be a good provider,” her friend Hannah piped up.

Miss Castle looked at a loss. She was spared having to comment by a contribution from a different quarter.

“People are only interesting if they’re dark and disturbed,” said Alicia, one of the goths.

“Chicks shouldn’t talk so much,” drawled Tyler from the back of the room. It was the first thing we’d heard him say all term, and Miss Castle was graciously prepared to overlook its derogatory nature.

“Thank you, Tyler,” she said with underlying sarcasm. “You have just proved that the search for a partner is a very individual thing. Some say we can’t choose who we fall in love with; love chooses us. Sometimes people fall for the complete antithesis of everything they believe they’re looking for. Any other thoughts?”

Ben Carter, who had been rolling his eyes and wearing a martyred expression throughout the discussion, put his face in his hands.

“Great love stories have to be tragic,” I said suddenly.

“Go on,” encouraged Miss Castle.

“Well, take Romeo and Juliet for example: It’s the fact that they’re kept apart that makes their love stronger.”

“Big deal—they both end up dead,” snorted Ben.

“They’d have ended up divorced if they’d stayed alive,” announced Bianca. “Did anyone else notice that it took Romeo all of five seconds to switch from Rosaline to Juliet?”

“That’s because he knew Juliet was
the one
from the moment he met her,” I said.

“Puh-lease,” Bianca retorted. “You can’t know that you love someone after two minutes. He just wanted to get in her pants. Romeo is just like every other horny teenage boy.”

“He didn’t
know
anything about her,” Ben said. “All his praise is for her physical attributes: ‘Juliet is the sun’ and blah blah blah. He just thinks she’s a babe.”

“I think it’s because after he met her everyone else became insignificant,” I said. “He knew right away that she was going to be his whole world.”

“Oh God,” groaned Ben.

Miss Castle gave me a meaningful smile. Being a hopeless romantic, she couldn’t help but take Romeo’s side. Unlike most of the teachers at Bryce Hamilton, who competed to see who could get to the parking lot first after the final bell rang, she wasn’t jaded. She was a dreamer. I suspected that if I told Miss Castle I was a celestial being on a mission to save the world, she wouldn’t have even blinked.

Saving Grace

I’d never seen God. I’d felt His presence and heard His voice but never actually come face to face with Him. His voice wasn’t what people imagined, booming and reverberating as depicted in epic Hollywood movies. Rather it was as subtle as a whisper and moved through our thoughts as gently as a breeze through tall reeds. Ivy had seen Him. An audience in Our Father’s court was reserved for the seraphim alone. As an archangel, Gabriel had the highest level of human interaction. He saw all the greatest suffering, the sort that was shown on the news; war, natural disasters, disease. He was guided by Our Father and worked with the rest of his covenant to point the earth in the right direction. Although Ivy had a direct line of communication with Our Creator, she could never be induced to talk on the subject. Gabriel and I had attempted many times to glean information from her to no avail. So, strangely enough, I ended up imagining God in much the same way as Michelangelo had: a wise old man with a beard, sitting on a throne in the sky. My mental picture was probably inaccurate, but there was one thing that couldn’t be disputed: No matter what his appearance, Our Father was the complete embodiment of love.

Much as I savored every day spent on earth, there was one thing I sometimes missed about Heaven: how everything there was clear. There was no conflict, no dissension apart from that one historic uprising that resulted in the Kingdom’s first and only eviction. Although it had altered the destiny of humankind forever, it was rarely talked about.

In Heaven I was dimly aware of the existence of a darker world, but it was removed from us and we were usually too busy working to think about it. We angels each had assigned roles and responsibilities: Some of us welcomed new souls into the Kingdom, helping to ease the transition; some materialized at deathbeds to offer comfort to departing souls; and others were guardians assigned to human beings. In the Kingdom, I looked after the souls of children when they first entered the realm. It had been my job to comfort them, to tell them that in time they would see their parents again if they let go of their doubts. I was a sort of celestial usher for preschoolers.

I was glad I wasn’t a guardian angel; they were usually overworked. It was their job to listen to the prayers of their many human charges and guide them out of harm’s way. It could get fairly hectic—I’d once seen a guardian try to come to the aid of a sick child, a woman going through a messy divorce, a man who’d just been laid off, and the victim of a car accident all in the same instant. There was so much work to do and never enough of us to go around.

___

Xavier and I sat under the shade of a maple tree in the quadrangle, eating lunch. I couldn’t help but be aware of his hand, resting just inches from my own. It was slender but masculine. He wore a simple silver band around his index finger. I was so engrossed in looking at him that I hardly noticed when he spoke to me.

“Can I ask a favor?”

“What? Oh, of course. What do you need?”

“Could you proofread this speech I’ve written? I’ve done it twice, but I’m sure I’ve missed things.”

“Sure. What’s it for?”

“A leadership conference next week,” he said offhandedly, as if it were something he did every day. “You don’t have to do it now. You can take it home if you like.”

“No, it’s fine.”

I was flattered that he valued my opinion enough to ask me. I spread the pages flat on the grass and read through them. Xavier’s speech was eloquent, but he’d missed some minor grammatical errors that I spotted easily.

“You’re a good editor,” he commented. “Thanks for doing it.”

“It’s no trouble.”

“Seriously, I owe you one. Let me know if there’s anything I can do for you.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” I said.

“Yes, I do. By the way, when’s your birthday?”

I was taken aback by the question.

“I don’t like presents,” I said quickly, in case he got any ideas.

“Who said anything about presents? I’m just asking for your date of birth.”

“Thirtieth of February,” I said, throwing out the first date that came to mind.

Xavier raised an eyebrow.

“Are you sure about that?”

I panicked. What had I said wrong? I ran through the months in my head and realised my mistake. Oops—there were only twenty-eight days in February!

“I mean thirtieth of April,” I corrected and grinned sheepishly.

Xavier laughed. “You’re the first person I’ve ever known to forget her own birthday.”

Even when I made a fool of myself, my conversations with Xavier were always engaging.

He could talk about the most mundane of things and still manage to make them fascinating. I loved the sound of his voice and would have been happy listening to him read names from a phone book. Was this a symptom of falling in love, I wondered?

As Xavier scribbled notes in the margins of his speech, I bit into my roast vegetable focaccia and made a face as a strangely bitter flavor assaulted my taste buds. Gabriel had introduced us to most food products, but there were still plenty of things I had yet to try. I lifted the top cautiously and peered at the substance smeared under the vegetables.

“What’s that?” I asked Xavier.

“I believe it goes by the name of eggplant,” he replied. “Sometimes called aubergine in fancy restaurants.”

“No, the other stuff.” I pointed at the layer of crumbly, green paste.

“Dunno, pass it over.” I watched him take a tentative bite and chew thoughtfully. “Pesto,” he announced.

“Why does everything have to be so complicated,” I said irritably, “including sandwiches?”

“You’re so right,” Xavier mused. “Pesto does make life much more complicated.” He laughed and took another bite, pushing his own untouched salad wrap toward me.

“Don’t be silly,” I said. “Eat your lunch, I can cope with pesto.”

But he refused to return my sandwich despite my whining. I gave up and ate his instead, enjoying the familiarity between us.

“Don’t feel bad,” he said. “I’m a guy, I’ll eat anything.”

On our way to class after lunch, we came across a commotion in the corridor. People were talking agitatedly about some kind of accident. No one was too sure who was involved, but students were moving en masse toward the main doors, where a crowd had gathered outside around something or somebody. I sensed human pain and felt a wave of panic rise in my chest.

I followed Xavier through the crowd, which seemed to part instinctively to let the school captain through. Once outside my eyes found the shattered glass littering the pavement, and I followed the trail to a car with its hood completely smashed in, smoke curling from the engine. There had been a head-on collision between two seniors. One of the drivers was standing by his car, looking dazed and disoriented. Thankfully, he seemed to have suffered only minor scratches. My gaze shifted from his mangled Volkswagen to linger on the car now entangled with it. I realized with a jolt that the other driver was still inside, slumped in the seat, her head lolling against the steering wheel. Even from where I stood, I could see that she was seriously hurt.

The crowd watched with open mouths, unsure what was required of them. Only Xavier managed to keep his wits about him. He vanished from my side to call for help and alert the teachers.

Not entirely sure what I should be doing, acting more on impulse than anything else, I moved toward the car, coughing as thick smoke filled my throat. The driver’s door had been crushed from the impact and had almost completely detached from the body of the vehicle. Ignoring the hot metal that dug into my palms, I pulled it free and froze when I saw the girl close up. Blood was flowing freely from a cut on her forehead, her mouth was open, but her eyes were closed and her body was limp.

Even in Heaven I had always felt faint watching scenes involving bloodshed unfold on earth, but today I hardly thought about it. I looped my arms under the girl’s shoulders and, as carefully as I could, began to pull her from the wreckage. She was heavier than me, so I was grateful when two well-built boys, still in their gym gear, sprinted over to help. We laid the girl on the pavement at a safe distance from the smoking vehicle.

I realized that was the extent to which the boys could help. They both kept looking nervously over their shoulders, waiting for assistance to arrive. But there wasn’t time to wait.

“Keep the crowd back,” I instructed them and turned my attention to the girl. I knelt down and placed two fingers against her neck, as Gabriel had once shown me. I couldn’t find a pulse. If she was breathing at all, it wasn’t obvious through any visible sign. In my head I called out for Gabriel to come and help me. There wasn’t a chance I could get through this on my own. I was already losing the battle. The warm blood oozing from the gash on her forehead had become matted in her hair. There were bluish rings under her eyes and she was deathly pale. I suspected internal injuries but couldn’t put my finger on exactly what they were.

“Hold on,” I whispered close to her ear. “Help is coming.”

I cradled her head, sticky blood staining my hands, and focused on sending my healing energy through her. I knew I had only minutes to help her. Her body had almost surrendered the fight, and I could feel her soul trying to detach itself. Soon she would be looking at her inert body from outside it.

I concentrated so hard I felt I too might lose consciousness. I fought back the light-headedness and focused even more deeply. I imagined a power source surging from a deep well within me, traveling through my blood and arteries to charge my fingertips and flow into the body on the ground. As I felt the power draining from me, I thought that maybe, just maybe, the girl might survive.

I heard Gabriel before I saw him, urging the crowd to let him through. In the presence of authority the students breathed a collective sigh of relief. They had been absolved of further responsibility. Whatever happened now was out of their hands.

While Xavier went to the aid of the other driver, Gabriel knelt beside me and used his power to close the girl’s wounds. He worked quickly and quietly, feeling for the broken ribs, the punctured lung, the twisted wrist that had snapped as easily as a twig. By the time the paramedics arrived, the girl’s breathing had returned to normal although she hadn’t regained consciousness. I noticed that Gabriel had left her minor cuts unhealed, probably to prevent arousing suspicion.

As the paramedics were lifting the girl onto a stretcher, a cluster of her hysterical friends rushed over to us.

“Grace!” one cried. “Oh my God, is she okay?”

“Gracie! What happened? Can you hear us?”

“She’s unconscious,” Gabriel said, “but she’s going to be fine.”

Although the girls continued to sob and cling to one another, I could see that Gabriel had calmed them.

After directing the students back to class, Gabriel took me by the arm and led me up the front steps, where Ivy was waiting for us. Xavier, who had not followed the others inside, ran over when he saw my face.

“Beth, are you all right?” His walnut-colored hair was ruffled by the wind, and his tension showed by the veins pulsing in his neck.

I wanted to answer, but I was struggling for breath and the world was starting to spin. I sensed that Gabriel was anxious for us to be alone.

“You’d better get to class,” he said to Xavier, adopting his teacher voice.

“I’m waiting for Beth,” Xavier replied. His eyes swept over my untidy hair, the bloodstained sleeves of my shirt, and my fingers clutching at Gabriel’s arm.

“She just needs a minute,” Gabriel said more coldly. “You can check on her later.”

Xavier stood his ground.

“I’m not leaving unless Beth tells me to.”

I wondered what kind of look was on Gabriel’s face, but when I twisted my head to see, the steps I was standing on felt as though they were about to give way. Or was it my knees that were giving way? Black spots appeared across my field of vision, and I leaned against Gabriel more heavily.

The last thing I remembered was saying Xavier’s name and seeing him take a step toward me before I fainted quietly in Gabriel’s arms.

I woke up to the familiarity of my room. I was curled under the patchwork quilt on my bed, and I knew the balcony doors were not completely shut because I could feel a breeze carrying the briny scent of the ocean inside. I lifted my head and focused on comforting details like the peeling paint on the window-sill and the pockmarked floorboards softened by the amber glow of dusk. My pillow was soft and smelled of lavender. I buried my face in it, reluctant to stir. Then I saw the time on my alarm clock—seven p.m.! I’d been asleep for hours. My limbs felt like lead. I panicked momentarily when I couldn’t move my legs before realizing that Phantom was lying across them.

He yawned and stretched when he saw that I was awake. I stroked his silky head, and he looked at me with his doleful, colorless eyes.

“Come on,” I murmured. “It’s not your bedtime yet.”

I must have sat up too suddenly because a wave of fatigue hit me like an avalanche and I nearly fell back again. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and tried to muster the effort required to stand. It wasn’t easy, but I managed to slip on my robe and stumbled downstairs, where Schubert’s “Ave Maria” was playing in the background. I sank into the nearest chair. Gabriel and Ivy must have been in the kitchen; the smell of garlic and ginger filled the room. They stopped what they were doing and came out to greet me. Ivy was wiping her hands on a dish towel, and they were both smiling. This took me by surprise as it felt like a long time since we’d been on anything more than civil terms.