by A L Crouch
I shrugged, not entirely certain that what he said was true, but wanting it to be true more than anything.
“You cried out in faith in the cemetery that an answer would come and it did. You are speaking with me now because your mother’s letter shattered the doubts in your mind that I could exist. You are doing this Alexandra, not me. You are exactly the woman your mother hoped you would be,” Donovan continued.
A faint sob escaped my throat at his words and I fought to keep the tears away.
“Then why can’t I see you here beside me? Why can’t I open my mind enough to see?” I asked.
“That will come with time. Right now you just need to remember that I am here with you, even when you can’t see me,” Donovan answered gently.
“Where do you go? When you’re not with me? You can’t be with me ALL the time . . .”
Donovan smiled. “I exist separately from you as I’ve said. I am from the spiritual realm, where you are in the physical. Where I am, time does not exist. For you, things are linear, life progresses on a forward line. It’s not like that or me at all. For me, everything is a series of moments . . . thoughts, feelings, all separate from time. I am always with you in that way, and in that way . . . I always have been.”
“Why me?” I asked.
“Why not you Alexandra? He sends us to protect all of His children, just like you read in that psalm today. But you are special. You’ve been given a unique gift, the gift of sight. You can see me, feel me, speak to me as you are right now. That is rare. It could be because of your mother’s prayers that you were given this gift.”
I contemplated what he said. I sure as hell didn’t feel like anything special. My mother had been. So why then was I here while she was gone?
“Where was my mother’s Guardian then? Or Gary’s? Where were they that night? Why wasn’t anyone protecting them? What about my childhood prayers for them?” I asked, trying to keep the anger that rose up from my gut from spilling over.
Donovan bowed his head and sighed, pain showing on his face.
“All I can offer you is assurance that it was their time to leave this world, and it was not yours. Your purpose is not finished.”
“My purpose? So what was my mother’s purpose then? To die young? To be violently murdered?” I spat, my words sounding too harsh even for me.
“No, Alexandra. You can’t judge a life by how it ended. Just know that her beautiful existence had a purpose. We all have one Alexandra, even me,” Donovan soothed.
“And what is yours exactly?” I sighed, the fight going out of me.
“To protect you,” he said looking into my eyes.
His words and the force of his stare made my heart skip in my chest.
“Protect me from what?”
“From an evil that would keep you from fulfilling your own purpose.”
“ I . . . I don’t understand.” I stood and paced the floor in front of the mirror. “What evil are you talking about?”
Donovan watched me pace and held my eyes in his. He spoke slowly.
“From the same evil that took your parents away from you fifteen years ago.”
I froze mid step. “The murderer . . . you know who he is!”
Donovan shook his head in the mirror. “No, I don’t know anything that you don’t. I just . . . sense things,” he tried to explain.
“But you were there that night! I remember. You had to have seen him!”
He raised a hand to rest it on my shoulder.
“I saw only you – that is all I was meant to see. This is your journey. I am not meant to interfere, only to ensure that you are able to see it through.”
I sat back on the bed, throwing my hands up in frustration.
“What does that even mean?”
Donovan motioned to the letter in my hand. “It’s like what your mother wrote in that letter: ‘You don’t always have to understand the twists and turns in life, you just have to have faith that the journey will make you into who you were destined to become.’ Your mother understood that after your father left. She accepted that his leaving was making her into who she was meant to be. Just like her death and what you must go through now will make you into who you are meant to become.”
Sighing, I laid back on the bed. I didn’t know what to think. So much was going through my head. I had never thought about my mother’s death that way. The anger and dejection had become comfortable to me. Donovan was forcing me to reevaluate the last decade and a half of my life.
“What if I don’t want to become what . . . HE wants me to be?” I asked. “What if all I ever wanted was to be happy with my family? Why was that plan not good enough?”
Donovan sat beside me on the bed. I expected to feel the movement as his weight sank into the mattress, but I didn’t.
“Sometimes it’s not about what we want. It’s about having faith that His plans for us are better than our own, even if we don’t understand them, or in your case, even if they seem cruel. There’s a bigger picture to everything. You don’t have to see it to believe in it.”
My anger was beginning to deflate, the weight of so many years easing with every word from him. Even if I didn’t understand everything he was saying, I could feel that he understood me. After being alone for so long, that was enough.
“So, it all comes down to faith again, huh?”
Donovan smiled. “Everything does.”
“So, what exactly it the plan then? If there IS a murderer coming back here . . .”
Donovan’s smile vanished. “He’s already here.”
“What?” I asked, startled. “What do we do?”
“I keep you safe,” he said placing his hand over mine once more.
Again I felt the slightest tingling heat. I looked down to where his hand should be and saw nothing. Would I ever get used to this?
A rumble from outside made me jump. The storm was here.
“How can you be sure he’s here, that he’s after me? You don’t know who it is. It’s been fifteen years, what could he possibly want from me now? Hasn’t he done enough?”
“It’s like I said before, I can sense it. I felt it as soon and you arrived in Saluda. It’s been growing stronger each day.” The concern on his face made his words all the more frightening.
“I can’t leave now though. I just got Gram back, and Sulley,” I said. “And this is where I feel closest to her . . . this is where she wanted us to be.”
“I wasn’t suggesting that you leave. In fact, I think you are meant to stay. You have to see this thing through, even if I don’t like it.”
“Then what are you suggesting?”
“That no matter what happens, you have faith. Have faith that you can overcome this evil, have faith that there is a greater plan at work, and have faith in me. I won’t let anything happen to you,” he said holding my gaze and I knew, looking into his earnest face, that he would do anything to protect me. That he always had.
A crack of thunder erupted and seconds later a flash of light illuminated the darkened sky. I jumped and shut my eyes tight.
“Can you make this storm go away? I hate storms.”
“Sadly no,” he answered with a laugh. “But I can promise that it will not hurt you.”
“Well what kind of guardian angel are you?” I teased, trying to mask my fear with humor. “I mean, you don’t even have any wings.”
Donovan laughed again. I thought I could listen to that warm laugh forever, it was the sound of happiness. “Well I have you to thank for that I suppose.”
“Me?”
“I don’t think your mind could handle them. I guess for you, the wings were too much,” he said.
“Wait,” I struggled to understand as rain began to pelt against the window. “You’re saying that you don’t have wings because I don’t want you to?”
“I am saying that your mind accepts me better without. I cannot see your soul, but it doesn’t mean it’s not there.”
“You are great at givin
g confusing answers. Seriously, it’s a talent. You should give up this whole Guardian thing and go into politics.”
“And you are great at over-thinking questions and deflecting serious situations with humor. Perhaps you could be my campaign analyst?”
I chuckled and rubbed my temples where a steady ache was beginning to form. I knew that soon it would be a painful throbbing, but I didn’t care.
“Great, I got the angel with a sense of humor.”
Donovan got up from the bed. “You, me . . . we are all created alike. I laugh, I cry . . . I love.”
Our eyes met again through the glass reflection. I watched the emotion welling up inside him though he fought to keep it from his face. How I wished I knew what he was hiding behind those kind but penetrating features. He walked to the head of the bed and motioned for me to follow.
“And I can also tell when you’ve had enough for one day. You need to get some rest. I’ve kept you up too long. Please, come lie down.”
“I’m not tired,” I lied.
I didn’t want the conversation to end, there were so many questions still unanswered. I doubted sleep would be possible with the storm raging outside like some kind of ominous warning of things to come.
“You can’t lie to me Alexandra. Now please, I asked you to trust me. You’re going to need your rest,” he pleaded.
I was reluctant, but not wanting to let Donovan down, I climbed into bed and laid my head on the pillow. Immediately the pain in my temples lessened and I realized I was much more tired than I had thought. Still, I couldn’t let him out of my sight. I didn’t trust myself enough to be able to see him in the morning.
When I looked back into the mirror Donovan was sitting at the foot of my bed. He smiled at me, but I thought I saw concern in the depth of his eyes.
“You’ll need to turn off the light if you expect to sleep,” he said.
“But if I turn off the light I won’t be able to see you anymore.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m not here.”
With a sigh I reached up and switched off the light. I focused on the strumming sound that I knew was him. It filled the space between the growling thunder and kept me from panicking despite the storm and Donovan’s warnings. My mother’s murderer was close, and that thought made me tremble in the darkness. A loud clap of thunder like the cracking of a whip sent my pulse racing. I clutched at the corners of my pillow.
“Donovan?” I called out into the dark.
“Yes?”
“Do you ever get scared?”
“Yes,” he answered. “Sometimes.”
For some reason it made me feel better to know that he too had fears.
“Of what?”
For a long breadth he didn’t answer.
When the answer came, it was a whisper.
“That I will fail.”
I sighed and closed my eyes again. The answer should have scared me and made me doubt, but it didn’t. I felt better knowing that I would not be the only one forced to face their fears. Somehow, not being alone in that too steadied me.
Not being alone was everything. Donovan understood me and my fears, and in that moment as the sky exploded and growled, nothing else mattered. Soon my breathing fell into a steady rhythm with the gentle strumming beside me and my mind drifted closer to sleep.
“Donovan,” I whispered.
“Yes?”
“Stay with me. Please . . . all night.”
I felt his touch, like warm static, on my hand and my fingers eased around my pillow. The warmth stayed there as I followed the strumming into the peace of deep sleep. But before I was lost, I heard him whisper.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Chapter 8
“Alexandra, wake up!”
I heard him call to me in the distance of the dreamless expanse where my mind drifted.
“Alexandra, I need you to get up now!” His voice called to me again, the urgency jarring me back to consciousness.
I opened my eyes to a dark, quiet room. The storm had passed. Donovan was still there.
“Alexandra, you need to get up. There is someone in the house,” he pleaded.
My mind whirled and I noticed his warmth on my face as I considered his words. I shot up in the bed, my pulse quickening, when the weight of them finally registered.
“What?” I gasped.
“Ssshhh,” he whispered, “be very quiet and listen carefully to what I say. You are the only one who can hear me. I’ll guide you through this. You stay quiet and follow my voice. We need to get you out of the house. Can you do that for me?”
I nodded my head and stood as quietly as I could trying to control my breathing. Is this really happening?
“Good, now you need to open the door as silently as possible. Stay as close to my voice as you can.” His tone was calm, steady.
I crept to the door. The only light for which to navigate came from the moonlight that seeped in between the slats of the closed blinds. I turned the knob as slowly as I could with shaking hands and opened the door. I prayed that it would not squeak. When it didn’t, I mouthed a silent “thank you” and waited for Donovan’s instructions.
“Good, now wait right there until I tell you to come out into the hallway,” his voice sounded from the hall in front of me.
I stood frozen in the doorway. The darkness beyond was thick and oppressive. My hearing became heightened by the lack of sight and I searched the darkened house for sounds of movement. That’s when I heard it. A slight shuffling came from down the hall. I couldn’t tell where exactly it was coming from. I stifled a scream and willed my heart to stop pounding, the sound of its rapid thumping was sure to give me away.
Slow, heavy footsteps came into the hallway from one of the rooms and just as quickly disappeared into another. The intruder was either in the hallway bathroom or in my old room. I couldn’t tell which. Were they looking for me? The thought made my legs tremble. I couldn’t breathe.
“Now!” Donovan called from just outside the room. “Get down the hallway as fast as you can without making a sound. Stay to the right and don’t stop. Follow my voice.”
I hesitated, unable to make my legs move forward.
“Now Alexandra. You have to trust me. Go now!”
I bolted noiselessly into the hallway, arms outstretched, and found the far wall. Making my way shakily towards the stairs, I kept my footsteps careful but fast and following Donovan’s voice.
“That’s good. Just keep moving. Quickly. You’re almost there,” he called from just ahead of me.
As I passed in front of the two rooms I heard a shuffling from within one of them. I stopped, fear nailing me to the floor where I stood. I tried to adjust my vision. A dark figure moved in the bathroom and I fixed my eyes on it and held my breath. I knew I had to keep moving, but I couldn’t find the courage to do anything but stand there, rendered immobile by panic.
“Keep moving Alexandra. No, don’t stop,” Donovan cried out.
His words jarred me to attention and I broke out into a silent run towards the stairs. But it was too late. The figure turned in the doorway and lunged after me. I screamed and dodged the hands that clutched at me.
“Run Alexandra, this way!” Donovan yelled and led me to the staircase.
At the bottom of the stairs the intruder dove at me, grasping my ankle and flinging me face- down to the floor. The pain was acute and I screamed and kicked against the hand that squeezed my ankle like a vice, but I had no impact. My attacker began to drag me back up the stairs towards him. I clawed at the carpet, frantically trying to get away.
“Donovan!” I cried out and tried desperately to grab onto something, anything.
“Kick him, Alexandra!” he yelled to me and I kicked my right leg as hard as I could.
The figure reeled back and I yanked my ankle free. The figure lunged at me again and this time grabbed onto my calf. He tried again to drag me back up towards him, but as he reached forward for my thigh he was yanked backward wit
h violent force.
When he reached again he caught me by the same ankle. I cried out in pain and flipped onto my back and kicked as hard as I could with my free leg. In the darkness I saw a head, cloaked in black, writhing as he tried to lunge for me but was held back. He reached for me with his free hand over and over, gaining a little space with each angered thrust forward. I sat up and pried at the fingers that gripped me. The hand was covered with a leather glove.
A new terror consumed me as I remembered the gloved hands that had reached for me from the front seat of our mangled car all those years ago. The same evil . . .
“Use your nails!” Donovan’s labored voice yelled from above me on the stairs.
I clawed at the arm above the gloved hand, which held steadfast like a bear trap on my leg and dug into flesh until I felt moisture beneath my fingernails. With a squeal the hand released its grip enough for me to kick free.
“Run Alexandra! Find help. I can’t hold him much longer!”
Stumbling to my feet, I raced to the front door. The breath was knocked from my lungs when I slammed into something solid and I swung my arms out, ready to defend myself. My hands gripped the piano and with relief I struggled to straighten up and get a breath. The reflection cast into its surface by a single ray of moonlight from the window made me pause. Donovan was at the top of the stairs. He was bent over, gripping the intruder’s leg with both hands, holding him back with all his might, the veins in his muscular arms popping. The black figure struggled and writhed beneath him.
“Go! I can’t hold him,” Donovan screamed to me and I turned and ran for the front door.
When I tried the knob it turned but the door did not budge. I struggled to release the deadbolt, the panic making my movements clumsy. Finally throwing the door open, I ran as fast as my legs would allow down the driveway and into the street. I looked both ways, searching for someone, anyone who could call the police. It was late enough that not one porch light remained lit and there were no signs of life anywhere.
Running down the street in the direction of town, I spotted a squad car parked under a street light. My bare feet scraped against the cold pavement as I ran towards it, not daring to look back. Please let someone be in the car, I prayed. As I got closer to the cruiser I heard footsteps running behind me. They were running towards me. Crying out on terror, I sped up, frantic to get to the cruiser. When I reached it there was no one inside.
