Grand Adventures
Page 43
He wasn’t in love with the kid, no. But he was seeing him through Ernie’s eyes, and suddenly he wasn’t just an average-looking kid with a bright smile and a fumbling attempt at a higher education. Suddenly he was brilliant, like the glory of God shining down on a wooden cup, or the magnificence of wings.
And at the same time, Gabriel was hearing the way Jamie snorted when he laughed, and seeing the parade of pretty boys he’d been dating since high school, and recalling the way his eyes tended to glaze over when someone was talking about something he wasn’t interested in. Jamie still tried—Gabriel had to give the kid credit—he feigned interest, so as not to hurt another person’s feelings. That was becoming a lost art, Gabe had discovered while sitting in the coffee house.
Ernie loved him—but not blindly.
Just totally. Unconditionally. With no caveats or exceptions. Ernie loved him when he was dating some other boy, and he loved him when he was between losers. (Gabriel’s word, not Ernie’s. That kid was far too nice about the boys Jamie slept with. Gabriel would have killed some of them in their sleep for sport, and he was supposed to be a good guy.) Ernest Wilkins loved James McPhee without expectation or reserve.
It was a truth, like rain being wet and the sky being blue and Gabriel’s faith in his boss.
And Gabriel couldn’t even look at the boy anymore without vision clouded by that truth.
For two hours, he was in agony. He couldn’t look away from the boy Ernie loved, and he couldn’t look at him. He wriggled in agony on the vinyl seat and yearned for a battlefield and something to smite.
When Ernie walked in, and all that helpless, celebratory yearning blew from Gabriel’s chest to its rightful place, Gabriel almost cried.
Ernie stumbled when he walked through the door, as though he’d caught something heavy, and then he straightened up and squared his shoulders. Two buses out of his way, just to see Jamie. He wasn’t going to squander it because his load was a wee bit heavy, was he?
Hardly able to breathe, Gabriel watched Ernie’s timid, relentless march to the counter and then watched him fish in his pockets. Gabriel could feel a dollar twenty in change, and he sighed.
And then smiled.
And then pulled the flaming ballpoint pen of justice out of his sweatshirt pocket.
Jamie, would you like to meet me after work sometime?
Perfect. Probably not Ernie’s handwriting, but since it wasn’t Ernie’s twenty-dollar bill that Ernie pulled out of his pocket and put on the counter, well, that shouldn’t matter, right?
“Hi, Ernie—another Caffè Americano?”
Ernie smiled shyly. “Yeah. That would be really amazing—thank you. I see the rat-bug is fully functional.”
Jamie grinned and reached for the twenty. “Yeah. I should take you for a ride sometime. It’s got a sunroof, right? It’s got to stop raining e—” Jamie actually looked at the money in his hand. “—ventually…. Ernie, did you write this?”
Ernie’s eyes got big. “Write what? I didn’t even know I had that in….” He stared at the twenty and then stared at Jamie. “Oh,” he murmured, and whether he’d written it or not, the flush that washed over his face was unmistakable. “Uhm. Well, not that I wouldn’t want to, but, I mean, I’d love to, but I know you wouldn’t….”
Jamie smiled, and Gabriel, from his distance, could tell there wasn’t a cruel intention in the world that could permeate that smile, but Ernie couldn’t.
“You know, I don’t need coffee today,” Ernie said hurriedly, and then, to Gabriel’s horror, he started to bail out of the Starbucks, through the six customers between him and the door, and straight for Gabriel. Gabriel watched as Jamie turned and battled his way through Maritza and Steve to get to the back so he could get around the counter, but dammit, the bus was coming, and Ernie was going to be out of there by then.
Oh hell.
Gabriel sighed and stuck his foot out, just as Ernie got near the door. Ernie went down—flat on his face, kersplat.
“My bad,” Gabriel said unrepentantly. “You going to be okay?”
Ernie squinted at him, as though trying to match his tone to his words, and then, to his horror (and Gabriel’s relief), Jamie hustled up next to him.
“Jesus, Ernie, are you okay?”
Ernie had been trying to get to his feet, and at the question he abruptly sagged to the floor. “No,” he replied miserably. “I’m pretty much fucking embarrassed, really. Can’t you just let me make my bus?”
Jamie grimaced and offered him a hand. “Well, yeah, but not before I get you your coffee. And your change.” He hauled Ernie to his feet and then stepped a little closer than strictly necessary. “And set a time to meet,” he said softly into Ernie’s ear.
Ernie’s hope was painful to see. “Yeah?” he asked, his voice wobbly. Well, so what? Gabriel’s chin wasn’t any steadier.
“Yeah,” Jamie said. He swallowed awkwardly, making his throat bob. “Yeah. I’d, uhm… you know….” He looked up and grimaced at the crowd of people at the counter, all gazing back at them with interest. “Let’s get your coffee and change first, okay?”
Ernie nodded and took a deep breath and then did what Gabriel had seen him do for most of his life: trudge timidly into the future. Except this time, Jamie was at his side, and his steps were maybe just a little more forthright, and his future maybe just a little brighter.
“So,” Camael said from Gabriel’s elbow, “are you ready to come back to work?”
Gabriel scowled at him. “You promised me a week,” he said. “I was enjoying my vacation.”
“That’s excrement, and we both know it.” Camael’s mug of coffee materialized in his hands, and he hummed with happiness.
Gabriel looked at the counter to watch as Ernie underpaid for his maximum coffee. Jamie had taken his money and was now writing a time and a cell phone number on the side of the paper cup. He handed Ernie the cup and made sure their hands brushed as he took it. Ernie’s smile lit up that plain, pointed face with more glory than most humans could stand.
“I can look in?” he asked, feeling surprisingly humble. “Just, you know. Check. Make sure….”
“Make sure they don’t ruin this sublime moment with their humanity?”
Gabe watched as Ernie left reluctantly, trying to catch the next bus. He was happy—as happy as Gabriel had seen him, during that tentative, torturous exploration of his past the night before. “It’s been known to happen,” he said protectively.
“Indeed,” Camael replied. “But that’s what we’re here for sometimes.”
“To trip the good guys?” Gabriel asked sardonically, and Camael grinned.
“To remember the good parts of being human. Now, come along—Abraxos has the entire country on the brink of war.”
“Oh hells!” Gabriel swore, rising to his feet. The entire population of Starbucks stared at him, as though he’d just materialized out of nowhere. “It’s been less than one human day!”
“Well, yes,” Camael said, standing reluctantly. Their mugs of coffee disappeared, and then so did they, and they faded from their audience’s awareness as they rose up, up, above the shoddy little suburb, up above the polluted valley and the beautiful mountains, up to where they had a full view of the curvature of the earth. “Yes, Abraxos does tend to fuck things up abominably, and then he needs a little lesson in humility, and then he’s ready to fall.”
Gabriel was almost startled out of the sky. “Fall?” Angels did fall—in fact, there had been a rash of fallings in the past few turns about the sun. They fell to earth, sometimes in the company of other angels, and walked the surface of the planet and sinned and loved and lost and yearned. And then, when their mortal shells were exhausted, if they had learned enough, had yearned enough, had suffered enough, they were allowed to rise back into the heavens.
So yes, angels fell—but Abraxos and Camael were not just any angels.
“Of course, dear boy,” Camael said serenely. “Falling is my favorite part of the job.
And last time, Abraxos fell as a female, and I fell as a male, and we had a lovely interlude.”
Gabriel stared at him, seeing nothing but angelic perfection, and was awed. “If I ever fall,” he muttered, “you can be damned sure I’m falling as a male.”
Camael laughed. “Well, that would depend on who you fell with, dear boy, but I think one little lesson in humility is enough this century, don’t you?”
“Amen,” Gabriel muttered, and together they flew away to where mutters of global war portended the colossal screwup of heaven’s first angel. Gabriel could sympathize. Apparently angels were human too.
By ERIC ARVIN from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
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By ERIC ARVIN from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By ERIC ARVIN from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By ERIC ARVIN from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By ERIC ARVIN from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
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Vignettes from Jasper Lane by ERIC ARVIN
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By TJ KLUNE from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
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By TJ KLUNE from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By TJ KLUNE from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By TJ KLUNE from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
By TJ KLUNE from DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com