Fallen Rebel

by C. G. Blaine

  The lights flip on, and a nurse walks in. She gives me the evil eye for being on my phone despite the numerous signs telling me to shut it off. I’m the rebel too. I resume my post, waiting for Hannah, and switch to the Angelic language to avoid blabbing about demons in front of people. They throw out seventy-two-hour holds far too easily these days.

  “There’s a blood moon next week,” I tell him. “If it’s ritual-related, the threat will pass.”

  “So, keep our charges close?”

  “I think it’s our best option for now. Your five are all in one house. Chaz’s two live in the same city. And last I knew, Samy was racing me to the finish line with one. He’s missing, by the way.”

  “I figured.” He pauses as a cry comes through the speaker. “Triplets are waking up from their nap.”

  “What are you, the nanny?” I chuckle at my joke, but when he doesn’t, I stop. “Oh Jesus, Ros, you’re the nanny?”

  “Screw you, Kasdaye. Not everyone gets to follow a hot chick around, pretending she’s such a fucking burden.”

  “She is,” I say. “I saved her from the demon, so she could slip in a puddle and knock herself out. She’s getting checked over right now, so I’ll know how long I need to worry about her remembering that I lit up like a Christmas tree.”

  He laughs. “You do look pretty when you glow.”

  The cry becomes a chorus, so we agree he’ll clue Chaz in on the plan, and then he goes to change a diaper or something.

  It takes another twenty minutes for the door next to me to open. The same woman who took Hannah in for her scan walks across the hall. Once she disappears, I slip into the room.

  I round the corner to find Hannah changing in front of a locker, facing the other way. She doesn’t notice me, so I wait until she hooks her bra and step behind her.

  “Do you have a concussion?”

  She gasps and covers her chest with her shirt as she spins around. “What the hell, Cass?”

  I smile and walk away, having scored my fix. Really, it’s the least she can do, considering my trouble.

  She huffs and turns back around to finish getting dressed. “You couldn’t wait outside?”

  Ignoring her, I flip through her chart that the lab tech carelessly left lying about. She has a mild concussion with no evidence of bleeding or swelling. Which means I should wait at least a week before messing with her mind. More to be safe. According to what Hannah told them, she doesn’t remember anything leading up to her fall or immediately following. So as long as those memories stay dormant, she and I shouldn’t have any problems.

  Hannah.

  She bends over to put on her boots. I toss the clipboard down and rush over. I catch her arm as she brings a hand to her forehead, and a second later, I catch the rest of her. I haul her back to her feet and guide her to the bench.

  “Sorry,” she says, her eyes staying closed a few more seconds. “Dizzy.”

  “Comes with a brain injury.” I kneel in front of her, sliding her other boot on. After I zip them, I hand her my leather jacket from the chair.

  “Let me guess. You’re driving me back to the dorms whether I like it or not?”

  I shrug. “Unless you prefer they call your emergency contact.”

  She looks away, not wanting to admit she left the spot blank on her forms. I consider the issue settled and help her to her feet. The crystal ball clinks against my lighter in the inside pocket when she pulls on my jacket, but she doesn’t seem to notice.

  By the time we walk through the large glass sliding doors, it’s dark and cold. I check on her a few times during the drive, making sure she doesn’t go to sleep. The exact opposite of what I usually want.

  At the dorms, she doesn’t wait for me to climb out of the car—her stubbornness on full display. I follow her inside and upstairs to her dorm room. When she stops at the door and turns around, I realize this is as far as I’m expected to go.

  “Thank you for your help today.” She pushes it open to a dark and empty room.

  “No roommate?” I ask, already knowing Terra’s in Rhode Island.

  She shakes her head and looks at the floor. “Everyone already left for Thanksgiving break.”

  I snatch her discharge instructions out of her hand and read, “During the first night, ask a friend or family member to wake you every two to three hours.”

  She rips the paper back from me. “I’ll set an alarm.”

  “What good does that do if you’re unresponsive?” I pull my phone out of my pocket. “Give me your number.”

  Women rarely have a problem with giving me their number, but she hesitates before rattling it off. Since I already have it stored, I pretend to enter it. “I’ll kick this door in if you don’t answer.”

  She hands me back my jacket, and without another word, I leave her in the hallway. I’m in for a long night, camped outside her building on my bike. Maybe I shouldn’t have given Rosdan such shit for being a nanny. Because that’s essentially what I’ve become.

  The first time the shrill ringtone goes off, it confuses me. Mostly because I haven’t taken my phone off vibrate since high school. I check the blinding screen, not recognizing the number. It takes me a few seconds to remember why my head throbs. Everything that happened since the alley is a fog mixed with a dream. Pieces slowly come back, and I answer.

  “What day is it?” Cass asks.

  I let out a sigh and rub the sore spot on the back of my skull. At this point, he probably thinks I’m completely helpless. A damsel constantly in need of saving. And at this point, maybe I am.

  “Hannah,” he says, irritated I haven’t answered.

  “If it’s after midnight, then it’s Wednesday. The day before Thanksgiving.”

  “I’ll call back in a few hours.”

  That’s how it goes all night without fail, only with different quizzes each time. When I wake a few minutes to eight, I switch my ringer off and wait for him. But at eight sharp, rather than my phone vibrating, someone knocks.

  Cass shoulders past me and sets a bag of groceries down on Terra’s bed, pulling out a container of yogurt. “You didn’t eat yesterday.”

  The gesture catches me off guard, and I almost ask if he bumped his head. I shut the door and sit on the bed, taking my yogurt with me. Before I can ask how I’m supposed to eat it, he brings over a plastic spoon. His fingers brush mine as he hands it to me, and unlike the other times, he’s cold. Freezing, actually.

  “Why are you so cold?”

  “Because it’s cold outside.” He returns to the bag and shows me what else he brought. Magazines, snacks, food for my mini fridge. “This should last you at least a few days, so you can rest while everyone’s gone.”

  “Why would you think I don’t have plans for Thanksgiving?”

  He stops sorting through the bag. “Do you?”

  It sounds more like a challenge than a question.

  He looks over for my answer. The way his intense gaze locks on mine feels oddly familiar. But the memory stays cloudy around the edges, not giving me anything other than his face and a shiver down my spine.

  “No,” I finally say. “I don’t.”

  His attention drops to the container on my lap. “Eat.”

  I roll my eyes, but when he steps toward me, I pop the spoon in my mouth before he tries to force-feed me.

  He almost cracks a smile. “Good girl.”

  We don’t talk anymore while I eat my breakfast, and he finishes putting things away. He watches with a cautious eye as I throw the container away across the room. On my way back, I dig cash out of my purse.

  “Here.” I stop in front of him, holding it out.

  He stares down at my hand, eyebrows drawn together. “What’s that for?”

  “For the supplies. It’s the least I can do, considering all you’ve done for me, Cass.”

  We stand there for what feels like forever until he looks at me, his expression unreadable. It looks like
he might say something, but then he shakes his head and walks out. I sigh as the door slams. I wonder if everyone’s knight in leather jacket is as temperamental as mine.

  It’s not until I stick the cash back in my purse that I remember my shopping bags from yesterday. My stomach sinks as I think about someone selling everything inside them for a quick buck. I peek out the window and wait for Cass’s motorcycle to pull away from the curb. Once the roar fades away, I pull a sweatshirt from the closet and grab my purse, needing to know for sure if they’re gone.

  My parents’ life insurance policies both paid out double for accidental deaths. One of the lawyers told me how lucky I was, and if I invested a little, I could live a cushy life well into my forties. I guess he and I have different ways of looking at the world because any time I spend money on something unnecessary, I don’t feel lucky. I feel guilty.

  So, when I park in the same lot as yesterday, I take a deep breath and ask the universe to give me this one. Let the bags with my entire next year’s wardrobe in them be untouched and waiting for me, no matter how unlikely the possibility.

  Someone must be listening for once because, about halfway down the alley, I spot them by a brick wall among a number of empty cardboard boxes. I laugh in disbelief and drop my head back. My eyes close, and I breathe with the sun shining down on my face, and life feels livable.

  “Hannah,” someone shouts.

  I lift my head to see Cass stalking toward me, and it’s like someone rips back a curtain in my mind. Everything rushes back. Feelings first, confusion and terror mostly, followed by images. Cass and a bright light and a man grabbing me from behind, and then Cass vanished into thin air. My gaze shoots to where he instantly reappeared. I shake my head, bringing a hand to my mouth. It’s not possible, but it all seemed so real. Sleet hitting my face, hands crushing my shoulders, the smell of sulfur, and Cass’s eyes meeting mine.

  He stops moving when I look at him again, my heart pounding out of my chest and throbbing in my face.

  “Calm down,” he says.

  “How did you know I was here?” My voice wavers, asking what seems like the least crazy of all the questions I could ask.

  He holds his hands up and eases a few steps closer. “Let’s go somewhere and talk.”

  I back away, keeping the distance between us. “Not until you tell me why you’re here.”

  He licks his lips and shrugs. “Because you’re here.”

  “What does that mean?” I ask.

  The bags catch his attention, and he bends over, gathering them up. It takes everything in me to stand there while he comes toward me, his stare as harsh as ever. But even scared, I can’t bring myself to believe he’d hurt me. Not after all the times he’s come to my rescue since we met in the haunted house. Then again, that trusting nature probably makes me the perfect victim for a serial killer.

  “Let’s go,” he commands, walking past. I stay unmoved, my mind still struggling to process, until his footsteps stop behind me. “Now, Hannah.”

  My hands tremble while my feet follow, but my mind stays at half-speed.

  Cass loads my bags in the backseat of my car and waits by the passenger side for me to hand him the keys. I shiver after we crawl in. I don’t think it has anything to do with the temperature, but he cranks the heater anyway.

  As he pulls out of the parking lot, he turns on the radio, clearly not wanting to talk. I stare out the window, searching for a logical explanation for what happened yesterday. The most likely being that I never woke up when he called last night. He kicked in my door and found me unresponsive, and now I’m in a coma at the hospital. Or he’s an alien. Or a science experiment gone wrong. Or maybe I lost it after my parents died, and he’s part of a hallucination.

  I don’t notice we’ve stopped until he opens my door. We’re back at the dorms. He gestures for me to lead the way, and I reluctantly climb out. We walk all the way in without a word, his eyes on me every time I peek back.

  At my room, he stops next to me and dangles my keys off his finger. I take them, but as I turn to unlock the door, he tugs me toward him by the sleeve. His hands cup my face, tilting my chin so I look at him. I struggle to keep my breathing even, and I swear his skin grows warmer against mine. He searches my eyes, his softer than usual.

  “How’s your head?” he asks, low and quiet, the edge gone from his tone.

  “My headache’s coming back.”

  A torn expression appears, and he lowers his head, his forehead almost touching mine. “Promise to rest at least for today, Hannah. Give your body time to recover.” He takes a deep breath and brings his gaze back up. “Do that for me, and tomorrow … I’ll explain everything.”

  I want to argue, but my head starts to spin, so I nod. “Tomorrow.”

  Cass stares at me a few seconds longer before his hands fall away. My cheeks instantly grow cold where he was just touching them. He pushes the door open for me and walks away, but I stay there, watching him until he disappears around the corner. Despite our agreement, for the first time since meeting him, I think I might never see him again.

  Even though we cleaned up the chaos, the cosmos never stopped being volatile. It just became more complex and organized in its hostile nature. Stars die, planets collide, galaxies merge and rip apart. All part of something so vast and flawlessly designed that it will carry on endlessly, never repeating. With or without us.

  This is where Samy would usually jump in and tell me to take a shot before I go all existential. But since he’s not here, I sit up and voluntarily take a swig of whiskey. Then I take a few more just to be safe. The bottle comes with me when I sprawl back out on the grass and resume staring at the sky. At one point in my existence, I could rattle off the exact number of stars in the universe at any given moment. By the time I finished, the number would have already changed, but it was a fun party trick. I think that’s what I miss the most—knowing.

  I crane my neck, so I can see the building behind me and up to Hannah’s window. Her light’s still on well into the middle of the night. The bottle balances against my rib cage as I pull out the crystal ball and swipe my hand over it. She’s in a pair of shorts and a baggy sweatshirt, relaxed back on her bed with her computer. Homework is not what I consider resting.

  I slap around on the ground beside me until I find my phone.

  Sleep, I text her. Or tomorrow’s off.

  She hesitates to look away from the screen, but after she glances at her phone, the chill leaves my muscles. I wonder if it’s excitement or fear. The mind of man has a difficult time with the two both causing the same biological response. It’s why people die chasing the thrill. Fear is intoxicating.

  Her teeth dig into her lip as she taps away on her phone, mine vibrating soon after.

  I thought maybe you would change your mind and disappear forever.

  I laugh once, probably loud enough that she can hear me through the closed window.

  Maybe I will if you don’t go to sleep.

  Honestly, the idea crossed my mind, and if I thought I could get away with it, I would. But if another demon attacks, it would all be over for both of us. So, the way I see it, two options give me a chance in hell of ever going home again. I risk wiping her memories before she heals or tell her the truth. I’ll try the truth first and keep the other as a backup if she freaks out. Or I’ll kidnap her, and we’ll live out the rest of her life in a remote corner of the world.

  Make that three options.

  The light in her room shuts off, and I lay the orb on my chest, watching her. The blue glow on her skin dims after the laptop closes. Lit only by her phone, she crawls under the blankets and sends back a message.

  See you tomorrow, Cass.

  Goodnight, Hannah.

  She smiles, her eyes reflecting the screen. I feel her, my temperature rising. My eyes fall closed, and I ride out the wave.

  I lied before; this is what I miss the most—being in the light.

 
; I’m still on the grass in front of Hannah’s building when the sun rises, empty whiskey bottle cradled in the crook of my arm. My eyes open long enough to realize that the blinding sun and I will not be friends for the next few hours. At least not until Hannah is up and scares herself with her own shadow or something and my powers heal me.

  My hands are cold and stiff as I roll over and force myself off the ground. Before I shove the ball in my jacket, I check to make sure Sleeping Beauty is in fact sleeping. Dark hair fans out over the pillow, and an arm covers her face. I push my bike far enough up the street so she won’t hear me leaving. The longer she sleeps, the longer I can pretend today won’t potentially end with me as a human.

  She starts texting around noon, wondering where I am and when I’ll be there. Her nerves kick in when I don’t answer. I let her fret until my hangover’s gone.

  I shower and throw on a hoodie under my leather jacket. On my way down to the parking lot, I finally text her back.

  Be ready to leave in an hour.

  Where are we going? she asks.

  Just dress warm.

  Another message buzzes through as I climb onto my bike, but I ignore her, pulling away from the curb.

  It takes more than my allotted hour to run errands and drive over to the dorms, but she’ll survive. I climb the steps to her floor, plastic bag in hand, then I shrug off my coat and knock on her door. My limbs tingle after the first thud, and for once, I have trouble distinguishing between her nerves and my own.

  She answers, and I roll my eyes. As expected, her idea of dressing warm includes skinny jeans and a low-cut sweater. I hand over my jacket and let her pull it on before I give her the goodie bag. She pulls out the earplugs and gloves and tilts her head to the side, confused.