Brave (Healer)

by April Smyth

  ‘Good, you haven’t run off with any past lovers?’ he makes a playful jibe. He’s in a good mood. I can gather that much even with hundreds of miles separating us. His envy over Gabe has subsided and hopefully his strange, unnecessarily pensive mood has gone with it.

  ‘Nope,’ I am finding it difficult to curb my grin. His voice just makes me so happy. I wish he would let me enjoy all the other parts of him that make me happy but instead he has put an ocean between us. ‘There’s only one guy for me.’

  Truthfully, I haven’t thought about Gabe much today. He and Claire haven’t been spotted since the incident with the vampires last night. I hope Claire doesn’t hate me too much. I have this strange longing for her approval; it’s hard not to admire her after all she’s accomplished with Gabe. I wonder what Gabe thinks of me. Does he worry that I’m still hung up over him? It certainly came across that way when I drew blood for him.

  ‘How are things in the States then?’ he asks. I imagine him lying back on his bed, relaxing, stretching an arm above his head in that way which makes his shirt pull up at the bottom and shows off the hairy flesh above his jeans. He might move that arm and scratch his beard thoughtfully with his big, veiny hands. He might chew on his cracked lips or run a hand up and down his brawny arm and I feel a pang of longing to be by his side so I could be the one tracing the curves of his muscles with my fingertips.

  ‘They had a meeting,’ I say and I explain in brief what happened. I shouldn’t worry him by telling him that I don’t exactly know what it is the witches plan to do but I hate lying to him. ‘But the thing is I kind of didn’t hear what it was they want to do...’

  I expect him to hit the roof with panic. Oliver’s main priority is looking after me. He may want me to be able to fend for myself but that will never stop him worrying about me. In the same way, I want to protect him even though I’m so feeble and helpless compared to him. If you love someone, the thought of them hurting puts you in a state of excruciating pain.

  However, Oliver stays calm. There is a silence which leaves only the sound of his heavy breathing. ‘Why didn’t you ask them?’

  ‘I don’t know, Oliver,’ I realise how stupid I sound. Rose made me feel bad enough with her wary expression and lectures about the danger of spells but Oliver’s disapproval is emanating in his cool voice. I think I would rather he blew up over this but, even though I can tell he is irked with my irrationality, he is still my Oliver and he is still the person I can talk to about anything with ease. ‘I guess it scares me. I’d rather not know. I just want this all to be over. I want to be at home for Christmas without worrying about vampires hurting me or my family and I want to be able to kiss you when the bells ring out for New Year without having the fear of being kidnapped lurking at the back of my mind. I don’t care how.’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ Oliver says. His disapproval has lessened as he hears how frantic my voice is but Oliver isn’t one to shy away from the problem. He won’t say what comforts me just to avoid making me feel worse. ‘You’re being incredibly...’

  ‘Incredibly what?’ I ask. I want him to say it out loud because maybe if he tells me that I’m being stupid or self-absorbed and I hear it coming out of his mouth, instead of living inside my head, then I can take it seriously.

  ‘Incredibly you,’ I can almost hear him roll his eyes and it makes me laugh. He chuckles lowly for a minute before he says, ‘Stop laughing, Cassie, this is serious. I know you hate that I don’t talk to you about why I hate being a werewolf and about my parents but I know you know what happened to them. The world of supernaturals is so dangerous and one blind move could cost you your life.’

  ‘I know,’ I reply meekly. I’m ashamed of myself.

  ‘I trust Arrow and Rose to keep you safe but sometimes magic has a way of getting out of hand,’ he says. ‘I want you to know what you’re getting into at least so you can make a sensible decision.’

  ‘I’m trying,’ I sigh.

  The problem is that I have spent my whole life living by other people’s rules. Before this year, my father wrapped me up in cotton wool and made all my choices for me. He was terrified of vampires getting a hold of me so he didn’t let me have any freedom and then Maurice took me away. He made me feel free for a while. I felt special being carted around Paris with Gabe at my side but ultimately I had no more freedom than I had had at home because then it was just Maurice calling the shots. My whole life has been dictated by what other people want for me and when somebody finally gives me the power to make or break my life I have no idea what to do.

  ‘I wish I was there with you,’ he says.

  ‘I know but you’re right, I need to do this on my own,’ I swallow. Of course, I desperately wish he was by my side. Everything seems less intense when he is holding my hand but I need to be brave for him, for my family, for me. I need to learn to make my own decisions even if they turn out to be stupid ones. If I can’t make my own mistakes, I’ll never be my own person.

  ‘I’m proud of you,’ he says and the words pinch at my chest.

  ‘I want to make you proud,’ I reply.

  I squeeze my eyes shut tightly knowing that I’m going to have to end this conversation soon and do the right thing. I need to find out what it is that the witches have planned for me. If it’s too risky then I’ll tell them we have to rethink but I’m not promising anybody, not Oliver or Rose, that I won’t face a little danger to escape a lot of it.

  ‘I should go,’ I say wistfully.

  ‘Will you talk to Arrow?’ he asks.

  ‘Yeah, I know I should’ve asked straight away before I agreed to anything but just the thought of being free from all of this... it blows my mind,’ I reply.

  He tells me he loves me and I tell him I love him too. There is a small pause before I hang up where I just listen to the sound of his breathing. It’s going to be tough sleeping without him tonight. He is my permanent dream catcher; he keeps the nightmares away and I’m scared that without him the lurid images of Maurice will return.

  I compose my thoughts for a while before returning to Rose to find out what my fate is.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  ‘They’re what?’

  ‘They want to stop you being a Healer.’

  ‘How cant they do that?’

  ‘They think they can come up with a spell and a potion combination that would rid your blood of its healing qualities. If they can stop Gabe from being a vampire, they can surely stop you from being a Healer.’

  ‘What?’

  My heart feels like it is going to stop. Rose explains plainly that Arrow and her group of witches are planning to take away the very essence of me. Being a Healer has shaped me and my life. Everything has happened because of the blood that runs through my veins. Without it, I would never have met these people: Maurice, Rose, Gabe, Oliver. I would be like Kate and Lucy, I would be dating Jonathan for real, my life would be totally different. I feel like the wind is being knocked out of my lungs just thinking about it.

  Would I still be me? The blood drains out of my face and as it leaves me feeling pale I feel it drain not only away from my cheeks but out of my veins and onto the luxurious carpet. I see the red juice leak and stain and leave large puddles around me. Without my blood, I am fully human and normal. How could I relate to Rose, a witch, and Oliver, a werewolf, when I would be so plain?

  It makes sense though. Fundamentally, all the vampires want to kidnap me and drain me of my blood because I am a Healer. Without my unique life source, I would be a futile endeavour for them therefore they wouldn’t want anything to do with me. The vampires in America are busy. They have business projects and political campaigns to deal with day in and out. Volunteers are sent to their doors who, with supervision, give them blood every day so there is no reason for them to hunt my blood simply for their daily hunger. Without my blood, there would be no reason for a vampire to ever hunt me again.

  ‘I told you that you ought to know what they were planning,’ Rose tilts her head to
the side and I wonder if she is trying to figure out if she would still like me the same if I wasn’t a Healer. The thought of her starting to lose interest in me because I was no longer an enigma, because I was no longer troubled and weird, makes me feel even more sick. She wouldn’t ever say that. Rose isn’t the kind of woman who shuns people or makes them feel uncomfortable. She radiates light and makes friends wherever she goes but I can’t help but worry that our bond, the feeling of a kindred spirit in one another, would be broken.

  My friends might throw me away. Oliver might not like me anymore. Yes, these things are possibilities although it sickens me that I would ever doubt their allegiance to me. Yes, it could be dangerous too and I might be risking my life to stop these vampires chasing me. Yes, there are downfalls to losing my Healer nature but there are positives to take into account too.

  I think of my dad. He will probably be sitting at home in front of the telly surrounded by his loving, normal family. I try to imagine how much easier he would sleep at night if I was to be ordinary like Bruce, Jana and Lily. He would finally get the chance to treat me like any father can treat his daughter. He wouldn’t have to look at me with wary eyes and toss and turn at night thinking of ways to stop the vampires coming after me. He would never again have to face the grief of coming home from work one evening and realising I’ve been taken again. I would stop being an outsider in my own family; we could be whole. I could give my dad the greatest gift by agreeing to have my Healing powers removed.

  I think about Kate, Lucy and Jonathan. Wonderful, bright people who have came into my life and received no credit. For the six months that I was at home, they took me into their lives and made me feel accepted. My eyes glazed over and my thoughts were always elsewhere but they didn’t care. They dismissed by oddities and loved me for who I was. I could finally repay their kindness and be a real friend to them. I could stop worrying about supernatural problems and really relish the things that most eighteen year old girls do. I could go shopping and dancing in clubs with Kate and Lucy. I could hold Jonathan’s hand without feeling a strange detachment. I don’t think any amount of human blood would make me turn away from Oliver and into the arms of Jonathan but I could at least be a good friend to him.

  My mind flickers to Oliver. No, I don’t believe that he would ever desert me. He isn’t like Maurice who only had interest in me because of my gift. To a certain extent the only reason I captured Gabe’s interest is because of my powers, because of my likeness to Claire, but Oliver wasn’t like that. He knew my differences, my peculiarities, but that wasn’t why he loved me. When he looked at me with love in his big, brown eyes, when we laughed, when we made love, when he got mad with me. These weren’t because I was a Healer. He held me at night and protected me from what I feared because he thought I was worthy, not that he could gain something from it, not because he thought I was weird.

  I don’t doubt that his love is unfaltering but I do wonder how he would feel about me becoming Cassie Mueller, the human. I wonder if it would make him happy to be able to care for me in a different way. He could nurse me when I got the cold and stay in and watch movies with me if I tripped and broke my ankle. A part of him is an archaic man who wants to protect the fragile woman, I think he would like to have me human but then again I don’t think it matters to him how breakable I am.

  The next person in the queue of thoughts in my frazzled brain is my mother, Lucinda Mueller. I never knew her but I miss her almost every day and I wonder if I lost my Healing abilities then I would lose the closeness I feel to her. One of the few, if only, things I know about my mum is that she was a Healer like me and died at the hands of Maurice and if I am no longer like her, I won’t feel any connection to her anymore.

  It’s amusing that when faced with the possibility of my entire life shifting, I spend most of my time wondering how other people will react. The last thing that comes to my mind is how I would feel about not being a Healer. For eighteen years I’ve never bled for more than a few seconds, never watched a purple bruise form on my hip when I accidentally walk into the kitchen counter, never seen the silver scars like wiggling worms appear on my thighs or stomach as they bloat with time, never had a runny nose or tickling cough during a cold winter, never thrown up violently through the night. For my whole life I have been untouchable, give or take a few hungry vampires, and I’ve grown accustomed to that safety net. My anxieties always existed in the realms of emotional sickness and not physical but, if I agreed to this, I would have to learn to contend with both. Could I?

  ‘What do I do?’ I ask Rose and my mouth feels dry as the words come out. I care less about the danger of the spell they’re going to cast and more about what will happen if it really does work.

  My life has been built around the idea that I can never be harmed and I don’t know what it would be like for that to just disappear. I always thought of it as a burden to me because being a Healer prevented me from doing the things I wanted to do but in many ways not having it would hinder me. My dad might be more frightened and revert to his old ways of rarely letting me leave the house. I had planned to take up the offer to take part in medical research over in Russia but that opportunity would be lost too. I would miss out on the chance to travel without worrying about how I’ll pay for it or where I’ll stay and more importantly I’ll miss the chance to really help people. I saved Shannon’s life. I could be the cure for the horrible diseases in this world. If they could figure out what makes me a Healer, what is so special about my blood, then thousands of lives could be saved and I’m willing to throw that away for my peace of mind. Surely that is more selfish than anything else I could do.

  ‘I can’t tell you what to do,’ Rose says quietly.

  ‘I need some time,’ I press the palms of my hands to my forehead. If I was capable of getting a headache then now would be the time. Then I realise that in a matter of weeks I would get to experience that pain. I would feel the burning, the throbbing, the aches and pains.

  Rose puts a hand on my shoulder, ‘You have time. It’ll take a while for everyone to work out the kinks of the spell so you can change your mind whenever you want. It is a serious step...’

  A serious step, yes, but it could be in the right direction or I could lose my balance and fall down with nobody to pick me back up. I decide to drop the subject for the night. Somehow through all this mess I had managed to have a nice day so far. I’d spoken with my dad and Oliver and Rose and I had had fun. I’d managed to settle an unhappy voice inside of me and I wasn’t prepared to wake it back up; that could wait for tomorrow.

  At around ten o’clock when Arrow and Garrett return, I excuse myself to go to bed. The sheets are losing Oliver’s smell and the large kingsize bed feels vast and empty without him lying beside me. I try to envision what Oliver’s advice would be but I’m at a loss. There is no amount of comforting words from my boyfriend that would help ease the stress of this situation. How would he react if someone could take away his obligation to turn into a wolf at the full moon? He hates who he is because it killed his parents but it is who he is and would he be willing to change that. I don’t know if anybody would flippantly toss away a part of their make up just because they might view it as a fault because it’s very likely that somewhere inside you know that your faults are almost as valuable as the good things about you.

  Would Rose want to stop being a witch? She might dislike the potency of her powers but haven’t they also saved the lives of a lot of people including me. Haven’t my powers done the same thing? Gabe and Shannon might not be alive if my blood couldn’t heal them. Maybe I wouldn’t either.

  Falling asleep isn’t easy. It’s almost impossible. Eventually, in the middle of the night I go back into the kitchen to get some water and find Rose is making herself a slice of toast. ‘You’re up late,’ she notes and looks at me beneath her preened eyebrows.

  ‘Couldn’t sleep,’ I mutter.

  ‘Me either,’ she replies and scrapes a thick layer of butter over he
r toast.

  ‘It feels never ending, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ she shrugs. ‘I promised myself when my parents died and Michael ended up in hospital that I wouldn’t get mixed up in all these supernatural dilemmas again but then I went and got a job with Maurice. After I lost Dan, I made myself the same promise but what did I do? I kept going back for more. I’m sure though that after all this I won’t be so easy to forgive the supernatural world again. It tears people apart.’

  ‘It brings people together too,’ I say defensively. It brought me Gabe, Rose and Oliver. Rose is right though. It also took away my mother and was the reason Gabe and I could never be together. Could I forgive this world?

  Rose gives me a pitying look as if she is waiting for me to catch up with her and get onto the same page. She is years and many traumas ahead of me when it comes to her relationship with the supernatural world. It must pain her to see me be so naive.

  ‘What will you do though?’ I ask, trying to change the topic.

  ‘I don’t know. Channing wants to move to Los Angeles and kickstart his career in acting. I could go with him and open a boutique,’ she says dreamily. I can’t imagine Rose living a life that doesn’t involve vampires, witches or werewolves. She has been more immersed into this universe than me and it seems out of place for her not to be in it.

  ‘What about Michael?’ I ask. She kept her home in Manchester when she was working for Maurice so she could be close to her brother who was left severely disabled after an altercation with magic. I can’t imagine her leaving him out of her life.

  A single tear rolls down Rose’s freshly washed cheek and her voice is strangled as she says, ‘He’s really not doing well, Cassie, the doctors says he’s only got a couple of months left.’