I slip out of bathroom and see that Cole is still lying in the bed. He had been staring up at the ceiling but looks at me and smiles when I step out.
“My turn?”
“Yep,” I answer.
He flops out of bed and walks into the bathroom. I hurry up to get dressed and ready before he comes out of the shower and then I straighten up his bed before lying back onto it. Staring up at the ceiling as he had while he waited for me. I start mouthing the words to Snow Patrol’s ‘Chasing Cars’ because it seems so fitting as I wonder what the future holds now. What will change after Cole and I’s conversation? Not us, I’m determined about that. But what path will it lead us down?
Cole steps out of the bathroom looking more glorious in a towel than he did the day I came to his house and he answered the door wearing a similar towel. I smile at the memory as I watch him move around his room and get dressed.
I envy men. They are so much more sure of their bodies than women are. I know he saw all of me last night but I was still really relieved when he went into the bathroom so I could get dressed privately. Maybe I’m just not ready for that kind of intimacy yet. I’ll have to ask the girls what they think about that. Maybe it’s just me but I don’t think so.
“Are you hungry?” Cole breaks me out of my thoughts.
“Starving,” I answer.
“What do you want to eat?”
I have to think about it. I want to ask if he has cereal but my tummy is too tightly wound up and that might not settle well. “I’m good with just toast, if you have some?”
He gives me a skeptical look. “That’s it?”
“Yeah.” I put my hand on my stomach, hoping to soothe it from the outside. “Maybe, I’ll want something more after that.”
I think he guesses at the butterflies fluttering about in my stomach because he comes over and moves my hand away from my tummy. “You know the worse, Lexi. You don’t have to be nervous about today.” He was right about the nerves but he’s not right about it being because of our long overdue conversation. It’s because I’m nervous about this new step in our relationship. It’s because I just slept at his house, took a shower over here and am now embarking on eating breakfast with him. Just like we are living together.
I know I sound so silly but I can’t help my body’s reactions to all this unfamiliarity. It still too new, too unknown. Even if I tell my mind that it’s okay, be rational. It’s just Cole. My body still shouts, I don’t like this change! My body needs to shut up and get over it. I am not going through another anxiety attack before breakfast.
I give in to my body because the butterflies are getting more active. They feel like they are now tangled up with each other and are frantically trying to get untangled. “I’ll be down in a minute,” I tell Cole. He gives me a concerned look and then walks out the door, looking back to watch me pick up my bag.
When the door clicks shut I run into the bathroom and shut and lock the door. My mind is freaking out now as I realize what I did last night and what the consequences might be. Something I thought of when I placed my hand over my stomach.
How could I be so stupid? So irresponsible? So careless? So eager to throw my life away? Why didn’t I think my plan through, more thoroughly? Oh, no! We didn’t use any protection! The thought had never even crossed my mind! I’m the biggest idiot in the world.
I look in the mirror and notice my face looks composed on the outside, except for my eyes. My eyes are angry and screaming ‘fool!’ at me. The depths of them show a hint of fear. I slowly watch myself take deep breathes. I watch the flow of blood sink back out of my flushed face as I consider my options. Number one will be that I’m popping that first pill as soon as possible. And number two…I don’t know what to do after that.
Do I tell Cole? Yes, I have to so it doesn’t happen again. But I won’t let him know my panic. I would feel foolish if nothing came from it and I had us both freaking out. But then I stop and wonder if he can have kids. Of course he can. How else would I and Alex be here? Or maybe I’m wrong about that. I’ll have to ask him. I mentally add that to my checklist.
Now, do I tell my parents? Hell, no. I would so be grounded. My parents gave me birth control so long ago. They would never trust me again if they know I’ve made this huge mistake. Panic streaks across my face and I shake my head in an attempt to shake it away.
“Relax, Lexi,” I tell myself. I plant a fake smile on my face and walk downstairs.
*
“Where do you want to start?” Cole asks me as we sit on his couch together. We are both leaning in towards the other. If someone walked in and saw us they would think we are two lovesick teenagers, telling each other our secrets. Which we kind of are. On the outside.
“First of all,” I start, “I want you to admit you can control other people’s actions.” I look at him indignantly, daring him to refute.
“Sometimes,” he admits with a little grin on his face. He looks guilty for not telling me sooner.
My mouth drops open in awe. “I knew I wasn’t imagining it. How? Can I do that?” I jump into a subject I don’t want to hit yet.
“I don’t know how. We all have our own unique ‘talents’, as I like to call it. You can’t do it. You have your own ability.”
“I do?”
“Of all the things you figured out, you never questioned something extraordinary that you do every day?” I look at him with a blank face. Unable to think of anything cool like ‘willpower control,’ or whatever he calls it. After staring at my blank face he tries to give me a clue to urge my awareness, “Something you are ashamed to talk about, share with people…”
“My art? My music?” I’m a little disappointed that that’s all I can do.
“I think it’s more than that,” he smiles like he knows a big secret and is going to burst. “I think you can do anything, learn anything. Like… what else are you extremely better at than everyone else in…volleyball, swimming…”
“I’m a fast runner and when I was a kid I took gymnastics, dance and ballet, and played a lot of sports, but I was bored with them all,” I say dismissively.
“Were you any good?”
“Yeah,” I shrug, not wanting to admit to all the rewards hiding in the chest in my room. He gives me a knowing look. He knows how self-conscious I am about sharing talents that come so easy to me. I quickly get the subject off of me. “What about Alex?”
Cole shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t know. I haven’t been around him enough to pick up anything unusual. You’re his sister,” he points out, “have you seen him do anything extraordinary that isn’t the norm?”
I think back through all of our childhood. He was good at sports but never really showed the capabilities I had. He was always more of a book worm, constantly finding new things to learn about, entering science fairs and going to the library for fun. “He’s really, really smart,” I answer Cole.
Cole shakes his head. “It wouldn’t be that. We,” he indicates ‘our kind’, “are bred with knowledge. Learning is easy for us because everything just seems logical, it’s all common sense.” He pauses before asking, “Do you think he can do something that he’s been hiding from you? Would he hide something from you?”
I have to admit, “Yeah. I kept us from him at first and he was really mad at me for not telling him. I can see him hiding something from me in retaliation. Before that incident though, we always told each other everything.” I pause as I come to a realization. “If he can do something that defies science, he would not tell anyone about it. He would be ashamed that he can’t find a logical explanation for it. He wouldn’t admit it to me. He wouldn’t admit it to himself.”
I feel really depressed all of a sudden, realizing that Alex might have been going through something he can’t talk about and for the past couple of weeks I’ve put the pieces together and not shared it with him. But, still, it’s Alex. He wouldn’t believe any of it anyways.
“I think you have the ability to just know how
to do anything.” He says reading the sadness on my face. “You will know how to share this with your brother.” His face gets animated as he speaks faster, thinking out loud, “You could probably climb a mountain faster than anyone, fight better, you already said you can run fast, swim fast…”
I cut him off by bringing up another subject, “fly?” I raise my eyebrow.
“I don’t know about that,” his face sinks down. Does he look sad? Or hurt?
“Why couldn’t I?” I touch my hand to the necklace he gave me. His wings.
His face looks so heartbroken as his hand comes up to touch the wings too. His face stares at it longingly. I can imagine he misses them. They were a part of him. And someone ripped them off! I think as anger boils up inside of me. I want to kill Ollie!
“It wasn’t Samson,” Cole informs me.
“Can you read my mind too?” I accuse him. His face lights back up in a wicked grin. “You can, can’t you?”
He continues to grin for several more seconds, making me worry about all the thoughts he could have heard. My cheeks start to flush and then he tells me, “No. I don’t have that gift. But I’m glad to know I can read your thoughts on your face so well,” he teases.
I give him a playful shove before I get serious again. “Then who did it?” My temper flares up picturing someone with a masked face hurting Cole.
“Malachi.” Of course. The supposed brother of Ollie. No wonder Cole asked Ollie about him with that infliction in his voice when he asked him about his brother.
“Ollie’s brother? No wonder Ollie told us the story about his brother working for the church. He doesn’t research miracles and exorcism does he? He fights evil.” My eyes widen in surprise at what I just said. I automatically feel immersed in guilt. “I’m sorry. I don’t think you’re evil. There’s no way.”
Cole ignores my apology and takes my hand to assure me he isn’t offended. “I wouldn’t say he fights evil. I would say he is misinformed and is fighting against something that he refuses to believe in or is ignorant to.” Cole’s eyes shrink in anger and frustration.
“What is it?”
His face comes out of his dark scowl and he looks at me apologetically. “That’s not my story to tell. I can’t tell you everything, but when you’re ready someone else will.”
“Who? Edmund?”
He nods his head.
I want to verify something but decide not to say it yet. Instead I ask, “Who tore off his wings?” Cole looks at me bewildered. He didn’t know I knew about that. Maybe I’m wrong. “Alex did some research for me on Edmund. He said there was only one man with that name and he was a painter. He found a painting depicting an angel’s wings being torn from his body and compressed into a silver mould that was shaped into a crescent moon.” I realize that I said angel for the first time. “You are an angel, aren’t you? Not a demon?”
Cole starts laughing uncontrollable. Am I wrong? I feel so embarrassed, I get angry. “Don’t laugh at me!” I yell at him and yank my hand out of his grip, scooting away from him on the couch, looking the other way as he tries to compose himself. “So sorry I asked,” I mumble.
“I’m sorry.” He scoots closer to me and tries to take me in his arms but I cross my arms over my chest and won’t budge. He’s not laughing anymore but his face still shows signs of bursting into laughter at any minute. “Lexi, really, I wasn’t laughing at you. I’m just shocked at how easy it is to talk to you about this. You aren’t scared or angry, you are so eager and excited…”
I cut him off, “I’m angry now!”
“Lexi, please don’t. You don’t know how happy I am to be able to finally tell you everything and you not hate me.” He pauses to look me in the eye. “You want me to verify it for you, then yes. I was an angel but I don’t know what I am now. Now that I don’t have my wings.”
“When did you lose them?” I start to cool off, thinking about the pain he must have been in when he lost them. I almost asked, when were they ripped out of you? But that would have been a little harsh.
“A long time ago.” I give him a look that says I’m not playing this guessing game with you. He looks up to think, “Umm…about the time of….William the first. About 1000 AD,” he clarifies.
My mouth opens up and I mouth the word WOW. “That was a long time ago. So how old are you?”
“Well if you believe the story of creation you can get an idea.” He stops and I’m about to ask something else but he admits, “But that’s not true.” I look at him confused. “Not all of us were created at the same time and we do not go all the way back to ‘creation’. When I was created, men already populated the Earth. I think it was around the time Homer wrote his epics and Romulus founded Rome…”
“About 750 BC,” I whisper. I’m so caught up in my thoughts of everything he has seen. So many answers he can give me about historical events. I want to start now. But, not yet. We have to finish this conversation. “Well, at least you’re not as old as I thought you were.” I shrug and he burst out laughing again. He quickly looks at me to see if I’m going to get mad at him this time but I’m smiling at him.
“So how is the story of creation different? I thought angels came first?”
“I’ll have to leave that part for Edmund to share.”
“He’s my brother too, isn’t he?” I feel relieved to finally say it out loud. He has to be my brother; he looks so much like Alex. Unless…
“He’s not your brother, Lexi,” Cole looks sad.
“He’s my dad!” I scream at him, jumping off the couch. “Oh, my God!” I never thought about it. He looks only ten years older than Alex and I. Not old enough to be our father. But it hit me that Cole is almost three thousand years old and he doesn’t look a day over twenty. What an idiot. I can’t stop pacing around the room, worrying my hands. Cole comes over to comfort me but I walk past him.
“Lexi, calm down.” Cole tells me and I do. I don’t think he meant to make me this time. “Sorry,” he tells me.
“It’s okay,” I let him know. I’m calm now, so I can’t be mad at him.
I sit back on the couch and Cole leans me back into him. “So let’s get back to some of my questions from earlier. Who tore off Edmund’s wings? And why can’t I fly?”
“Cerviel. You do not want to know him,” Cole warns with loathing in his voice. “And I said I don’t know about that. Flying. I don’t know if you will get wings because you aren’t an angel. I don’t know who your mother is. I can pretty much guess, but Edmund doesn’t want me to know. I’m pretty sure she is not human…she’s something more,” he confesses the last part in a whisper, like it’s a secret and he doesn’t want to be overheard.
“Really?” I’m intrigued.
“I’m sure Edmund will tell you…in his own time. He knows you overheard some of what Ollie was saying last night. I had to tell him. I didn’t know you had heard everything and I didn’t know how much you had pieced together. Edmund can’t know I told you anything.” There is desperation in his voice that makes me turn around to look at him. His face reads a plea.
“I have to act ignorant until he’s ready to confront me?”
“It would be wise.” He nods his head. “For the both of us,” he adds.
Chapter 14
After our long discussion, I bombarded Cole with questions about everything he witnessed throughout history. It really was quite disappointing to find out so much of history has been lost or is wrong. I already knew the history we learn in school is lacking and I’ve researched a lot on my own but even the best archeologist and historians haven’t uncovered half the truths. It was a fascinating conversation, not entirely as interesting as our previous, that lasted most of the weekend while we hung out at his house.
I only left his house later Saturday evening to grab another bag of clothes and some other essentials. It wasn’t hard for Cole to convince me to stay the night with him again, though I played hard. I had to get serious with him about the “accident” the night before
. That was an embarrassing conversation.
“I have birth control,” I told him. “But I’ve never had to start taking them.” I blamed myself. “I didn’t think it through.”
He blamed himself for being so ignorant and careless too. And promised me we wouldn’t do anything again until the pills were in my system. It was a relief but also a disappointment. If I had thought through starting them when I first realized we were involved in an escalating serious relationship, then I wouldn’t be missing out on the opportunity to enjoy him! Now, I have to wait another month!
So that night we had just kissed. It was still so sweet and I loved sleeping with him even though I couldn’t enjoy all the benefits of it.
Sunday I convinced him to help me think of some theories to present to my history club for ideas to study this semester. Then, we got out of the house for awhile to see a matinee of ‘Wrath of the Titans’. Cole loves his mythological movies. And I love Sam Worthington. After that, we got dinner at a restaurant near our neighborhood. When we got back, I had to convince him I needed to go home. I was only seventeen, I couldn’t live with him. Jeesh!
That’s when I realized there was a question I had not asked him before, when we talked about everything else. We are walking up to my door, as he insisted on spending every last possible minute with me, when I turn around and blurt out, “Are Alex and I going to be immortal too?”
He doesn’t answer my question. “Will it bother you?”
“I don’t know,” I speak my thoughts out loud. “I know it will bother Alex and what about aging? What will my parents think? When will we stop getting older? When will people start noticing?” I start freaking out. My friends. My family. We couldn’t stay with them. We would have to leave in a few years. I think about how Cole can maybe pass as twenty or twenty-one. Eternally young and beautiful. And Edmund, he looks older though. Is it a choice to stop aging when you want? I wait for Cole to answer my questions.
“Knowing who your father is, if you were half human on your mother’s side, I would tell you for sure that you would not be immortal. But I don’t think that’s the case. And if I’m right about your mother, well,” he shrugs his shoulders, “even if just your father was human and you were born from your mother, you would have still been immortal.” Wow my mother must be something really special. “I’m sorry.” He looks disappointed. Disappointed in himself for having to tell me and disappointed in me for getting upset about it.
Lunangelique (The Lunangelique Series) Page 14
