Brave (Healer)

by April Smyth

  ‘I’m sure,’ I gulp. This has to be the right thing to do. I won’t live my life in fear. I have to be brave and face the risk of things going wrong because it’ll all work out, right?

  My dad says nothing else and his silence tells me more than words could; I just don’t know what the message is. What is he telling me by saying nothing at all? My dad hasn’t always been good at communicating how he feels. When I was younger he frustrated me by telling me what to do but not telling me why but hasn’t he always been trying to protect me? Haven’t his actions always spoken louder than his words? This time is his silence doing all the talking. I feel shaky.

  ‘Well, I wanted to tell you because I’ll be quite different when I get home,’ I say, trying to desperately get rid of the discomfort. I even found myself using Oliver’s phrase: ‘quite different.’ I don’t even know what that’s supposed to mean and why did I say it?

  ‘I understand,’ he says.

  There is another five minutes of silence which makes me chew at my lips nervously. I look at Oliver who raises his thick eyebrows expectantly. This isn’t going like I imagined. I had been nervous to tell my dad but I didn’t think he would act so bizarrely.

  ‘Well, you know I’ll love you no matter what you do or what you are,’ he says but it feels like a tagalong, like he is obliged to say. He means it, yes, he is my dad and he will love me no matter what happens but what isn’t he telling me? Will he be less proud of me for making this rash decision? I don’t know. I need more time to figure out what I want but I don’t have that time. The change is going to happen tonight.

  ‘I love you too, dad,’ I whisper and he hangs up.

  TWENTY-SIX

  The night arrives, as much as I wish it wouldn’t, and we walk for almost an hour to end up in a barren park in the outskirts of New York. It looks like a haunted scene from a horror movie with the creaky swings and the rusty slide. It’s the perfect place to perform a magic ritual with witches, werewolves and vampires.

  Arrow’s friends have promised a young, wealthy vampire a meeting with a real Healer and he is set to show up in twenty minutes. I am holding on to Oliver like he is a crutch; since my phone call with my dad I’ve been unable to stop shaking. ‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ Oliver whispers in my ear as we stand around in the freezing cold and watch Arrow and Garrett light candles.

  There are five other witches standing nearby chanting unknown words which give this ghost town an equally eerie soundtrack. Rose and Gabe are chatting, like old friends do, as if nothing is amiss. I supposed years of working for Maurice and being surrounded by myths and the supernatural must give you a thick skin to these sort of scenes.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I bark at Oliver but feel instantly guilty about my aggressive tone. It’s not his fault. I wish I could shake this uncertainty away but it seems to be sticking to me and even though it is the coldest day I’ve ever experienced the sensation feels like hot tar all over my body.

  ‘He’ll be here in a few minutes,’ Arrow says and hugs me. ‘Everything is going to be fine.’

  Her words unhinge me. The worst thing anyone can say to me is that everything will be fine. I bite my tongue so hard and I realise that by tomorrow I won’t be able to pierce my gums with my teeth like this without cutting myself. I’ll be quite different.

  I swallow my shaky feelings and smile at her before she turns to help the other witches with their chanting. When the vampire comes, he might fight or flee so we have to be quick. They will have to stop him, get his blood and kill him and once I have his blood I need to take the blood of the others’ in a fast procession. There can’t be big gaps between each intake which means this whole thing is going to be rushed and there will be huge room for error.

  ‘He’s here,’ Arrow says. We all turn round and see the pale vampire approach us. We see his face fall from calm, self-assurance to fear very quickly as he sees the strange crowd and candles.

  Time to go.

  The witches begin to chant and I cling to Oliver’s arm tightly as I watch the vampire fall to his knees and freeze like he is being encapsulated in the ice that covers the ground. Two witches move to his side and thrust a stake into his marble skin to reveal his black blood.

  Things happen very quickly. Garrett pulls Oliver away from me and pushes me into the circle of candles so I’m left alone. Fear kicks in. Am I doing the right thing? Then I watch as Oliver, Gabe and Rose are staked and their blood is collected. The chanting gets louder. A witch moves towards me with the stake with dripping vampire blood and thrusts it towards me, ‘Drink!’

  I put the edge of the stake into my mouth and taste the sickly sweet flavour of the blood. As I gulp and swallow I see the vampire crumble into ash and my friends look at me with frightened eyes. Gabe’s mouth lies open, my heart pounds as I watch him staring at me. Rose’s eyes are filling with tears. She is right in the middle of a magic spell, just like the time her parents died and her brother was injured, the same brother who is dying right now. How can I have put her through this? I see Oliver look at me with those puppy dog eyes, they’re filled with love and fear and my mouth goes dry.

  Everything is moving so fast. It’s a blur. I can’t handle it. I can’t. I can’t do this. I’m a Healer. That’s who I am. This doesn’t feel right.

  ‘Stop!’ I scream as a witch comes towards me with Gabe’s blood on a wooden pallet. ‘Stop!’

  Oliver runs towards me, knocking over some candles, the witches start to shout that the whole spell is ruined now. Oliver has his arms wrapped around me and is whispering that I’m okay but my head is so woozy that his face starts to lose its shape and his voice becomes distant.

  My dad’s silence becomes clear to me. He doesn’t want this for me. He doesn’t want me to be normal. He wouldn’t swap me for anyone in the world and I realise that’s what I was trying to do. I was trying to make my mother proud, I was trying to make everyone proud of me but I should’ve realised that they are so proud of me just as I am.

  The witches are angry. I’ve messed with their spell and therefore their witchy energy. Oliver holds me, he sways and I close my eyes and let the world around me blur. I forget the angry witches and the pile of ashes. I feel Rose’s presence like a light shining on me. Her hand settles on my back while Oliver holds me and then there is another hand, one that is a stranger to me in many ways but familiar in others. Gabe, who has always found it so difficult to touch me, places both of his hands on my shoulder and I’m surrounded by the three people who have shaped, broken and reshaped me time and time again.

  For a moment, with these people surrounding me, everything is clear. Going through with this spell, I wanted to change who I was. I wanted to be someone else for these people but they’re holding me and I haven’t changed one bit. I didn’t need to change who I was, who I am.

  Then everything goes black.

  I wake up and I am on my bed in the guest room in Arrow’s apartment. My eyes are foggy at first but once they adjust I see that Oliver is lying beside me and Rose is perched on the end of the bed. ‘She’s awake,’ Oliver gasps.

  I wonder if I’m dead. I wonder if my interference with the magic had messed everything up and killed me. Had it killed Oliver and Rose too? Is that why they are here with me? Is this heaven? I reach out my hand and rest it on Oliver’s chest. His heartbeat feels real.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Rose jumps up and is by my side, kissing my forehead, her eyes are brimming with tears. ‘I was so scared, Cassie, don’t you ever do that to me again.’

  I’ve put her through hell. She thought she’d lost yet another person she loved to the perils of magic. How could I do that to her? I look at Oliver and see the worry written plainly all over his face. How could I do that to him? He has nobody but June at home and I was about to push the man I love back into a life of loneliness.

  ‘I want to kill you,’ Rose says, her tears spilling off as she starts to cry and laugh at the same time.

  ‘That would be ironic,’ I croak.
/>   ‘Don’t be smart. I’m so angry with you,’ Rose pouts.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I put a hand on her soft face which is moist with her tears. There aren’t enough days in the year, enough years in my life, to give me enough time to apologise to Rose and Oliver for what I’ve put them through. Not just last night but over this whole year.

  Rose leaves Oliver and I to have a private moment.

  ‘Why did you do it?’ Oliver asks me after giving me one long kiss. ‘Why didn’t you go through with it?’

  There isn’t one reason why I stopped the spell from going ahead. I felt freedom at my fingertips. I could be everything I’d ever wanted and I could be rid of the vampires for good but something stopped me. Was it the expressions on my friend’s faces as they gave their blood for me? Was it the ominous sounds of the chanting? Had I made up my mind when I’d called my dad and heard his silence? Did I make my mind up a long time before that? I realise I could never not be a Healer, just as I could never stop being stubborn, selfish at times, crazy and wildly passionate about the people I care about.

  One day I will try to put into words what stopped me from tasting normalcy for the first time in my life but right now I just want to put my head on Oliver’s chest and feel like me. ‘Are you mad?’

  ‘Not as mad as Rose,’ he chuckles which makes his chest vibrate. ‘No, I’m not mad. I’m sort of happy. I was hoping you wouldn’t go through with it.’

  I lift my head up to look at his face, ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. I like you how you are,’ he taps the end of my nose with his finger.

  ‘What about the vampires?’ I ask.

  ‘I’ll kick their asses one at a time if I have to,’ he says.

  For the first time in my life, I made a decision all by myself and it feels great. It feels amazing. Who would have guessed I would end up here? Six months ago if somebody had told me how my life would be now I would laugh in their face. I could never have imagined being with a man that wasn’t Gabe but now the idea of giving myself to a man who loved me half heartedly, who made me feel inferior, made me dislike myself, sounds so bizarre to me. I have the most amazing people in my life now and I wouldn’t change it for the world.

  I lie with Oliver for a while and he tells me what happened after I blacked out. When I fainted, everyone immediately stopped everything and focused on helping me. They thought I’d died. They thought the magic had killed me but once they realised I was still alive, they were still worried that I’d been put into a coma. The witches prepared them that I might never wake up. I wince thinking about what that must have done to them. If someone told me Oliver, Rose and Gabe might never wake up again... I shudder. I really do have a lot of apologising to do.

  ‘But you’re fine now and that’s all that matters,’ he smiles down at me.

  I guess I should be worrying about what will happen next. We will have to come up with a new plan to combat the vampires; we’re back at square one again but I don’t care. I’m too happy to worry right now. I’m alive and so is everyone I love.

  ‘Where is Gabe?’ I ask.

  ‘He went home first thing this morning to see Claire,’ Oliver says. I don’t feel remorse for yet another missing goodbye from my old love instead I just feel warmth. He helped me when he didn’t have to and I’m sure out there somewhere he is thinking of me. ‘He left you a note.’

  Oliver reaches over to the side cabinet and pulls out a crumpled piece of paper and he hands it to me. I start to read and find my heart is melting with every word. It is the goodbye I always wanted from Gabe:

  Dear Cassie Mueller,

  I hope you wake up so you get the chance to read this. You better. I don’t think I will live with myself if you don’t. I know you and your boyfriend think I’m an asshole (I wouldn’t blame you). I’ve treated you horribly since the day we met, do you remember when we met? In the bar and I’d done like eight shots of whiskey. What a loser. It seems crazy that you ever managed to see beyond the bullshit and liked me. You might have even loved me, who knows why, but thank you for seeing that light inside of me. You gave me more to live for, more than you’ll ever know. You taught me to be good, brave, to trust my instincts and you taught me that redemption is never far away. You taught me that I didn’t have to be the puking guy on a Paris hotel room floor. I know it hurt you when I went away, when you thought I didn’t remember you and I’m sorry. I wish I could go back in time and do things better. I never wanted to hurt you. I wanted the opposite. I thought by taking myself out of your life forever then you would have a better chance of being happy. I guess I was just a coward. You might not think I love you very much or care at all but I do. I wish I’d called you, wish you didn’t have to find out about Claire the way you did because I know it must have hurt you a lot. It hurts me to see you with Oliver. It makes me so jealous to see another man hold you and kiss you but it makes me happy because I know I never could have made you happy like he does and I think you know that too. You know I would never have been good for you. I think about that first night in New York when I saw you outside and you were in your pyjamas and you looked so lost, frightened and hurt. I saw in your eyes what I did to you and it haunts me still. I broke you a little and I hate that someone else had to pick up the pieces because I was too scared to confront it. I wish I’d told you I loved you in person and been capable of giving you a proper goodbye but this is the best I can give you (which says a lot about what kind of guy I am.) Sometimes I think about that night and I wish I’d held you for longer, I wish I’d never stopped kissing you, I wish I could be the guy for you and I wish you could be the girl for me. You’re beautiful, so smart, so funny and brave. Wow. I’ve never known somebody as brave as you. I guess you get pretty brave when you’re bulletproof. I probably won’t see you again and I think that’s a good thing because it hurts us both to be near each other. I wish I could express to you how sorry I am that I hurt you and that I stole so many precious months of your life. I hope you can make up for that lost time and live your life to the fullest. I want you to know that I’m proud of you for what you did last night. You’re perfect the way you are. Don’t EVER change.

  Love,

  Forever,

  Gabriel Greenall x

  A tear falls from my cheek and onto the paper. It is a better farewell than I could ever have expected from Gabe. I didn’t think he was capable of passion, of spilling out his feelings and laying his soul bear to me. I fold the letter carefully and hold it close to me. I wish I could see him again and tell him that I forgive him. I don’t want him to live with the guilt of hurting me. I’m happy now, so is he, that’s what counts. I won’t hold it against him.

  Oliver doesn’t ask what the letter says and I don’t tell him. This was a private moment, a written embrace, between Gabe and I. It wasn’t meant to be shared and I will hold it close to me for the rest of my life. This whole year I’d been waiting for Gabe to tell me how he really feels and to have it immortalised on paper makes it even more special to me.

  ‘What now?’ I ask.

  ‘Let’s go home,’ Oliver smiles back at me.

  So we do. Oliver, Rose, Channing and I catch a plane back to Scotland the next day, Christmas Eve.

  Saying goodbye to Arrow is harder than I thought. She insists she has forgiven me for ruining her spell and is just glad I didn’t get hurt. We hug. I’m going to miss her in a way. She was odd but she did a lot for me and if she ever needs a favour, I’ll be ready to help.

  My future is uncertain but nobody is trying to mould it for me anymore. Nobody talks about a plan to kill all the vampires or to stop them hunting me. We are just happy to be alive and together and that feels incredible. I will live each day as it comes. I will spend as much time as I can with my family, with Rose and, of course, Oliver. I will put this year behind me, say goodbye to the pain and embrace the New Year with a new outlook.

  When we touchdown at Glasgow airport, I let go of my last tear for a long time and it’s a very happy one.


  TWENTY-SEVEN

  ‘Merry Christmas,’ my dad holds a glass full of champagne up and smiles. We clink our glasses and tuck into our meal. I’m the last to start because I’m too busy reveling in the moment. It’s Christmas Day and I am home with my family.

  Across the table is Shannon, the picture of good health, and she is holding little Lily who is already growing up so fast. Beside Shannon is Jana and Bruce who wear matching Christmas cracker hats which are too big for their small heads and slip down their dark hair. My dad is to my left. He can’t stop looking at me, grinning. He can’t believe I’m home, I’m in one piece and I’m still me. He wept for hours when I showed up. He was so happy that I hadn’t gone through with the change. He said we could all battle the vampires if they showed up but there was no way I was changing who I was for them.

  There are even newer additions to my family than baby Lily. To my right sits my handsome boyfriend. As I anticipated, my family adore him. My dad, of course, is naturally suspicious but when we sat down and told our story of the few weeks, well, there was no way they could deny Oliver a place at the dinner table. Okay, so they don’t know he’s a werewolf yet but I figure one thing at a time. Sitting beside Oliver is Rose and Channing who my family also adore. Shannon can’t stop blushing whenever Channing speaks to her and my dad can’t stop giving him envious glances.

  There is a loud buzz of voices as we all eat, drink and talk. There is no mentions of vampires, witches, werewolves or any supernatural stuff. We tell silly jokes, reminisce of Christmases of the past and there is no scene in the world that could make me happier.

  Oliver squeezes my thigh, ‘You look beautiful, Cassie.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I blush. I can’t believe how lucky I am. I don’t care if I have to fight a dozen vampires tomorrow as long as I get to have this moment. Watching Rose play with Jana’s hair, my dad make jokes with Oliver and Channing flirt with Shannon is surreal.