Everlong: (Book One of the Everlong Trilogy)

by Nikki Morgan

  When we got home, the lights were still off, so I pulled him through the side gate to the back door. I felt his cold body pressing down on me as I fiddled with the lock and I knew I had to save him.

  Somehow I managed to quietly drag him up the stairs. When I got to my room I let him fall onto the bed. I collapsed next to him, completely exhausted, but I knew I had work to do, so I hauled myself back up. Before I left, I pulled the duvet over him, and then went to see what damage I'd caused downstairs.

  It didn't appear to be that bad. I mopped the kitchen floor, shoved the dirty towels straight into the washing machine and went to clean myself up in the shower. For the first time in my life, I hoped that when Cassie came down in the morning she'd be too loved up to notice if I'd left any mess.

  It was two-thirty in the morning before I managed to crawl back to my room, half expecting him to be gone, just a figment of my crazy imagination.

  He was still there, curled into a ball, trembling under the duvet. I climbed onto the bed and curled up next to him, on top of the covers, like it was the most natural thing in the world, like we weren't strangers, like I'd known him forever. I should've gone to the spare room, should've slept there, but something inside me craved to be close to him, needed to pretend, if only for one night.

  It was stupid and reckless - bringing him home, sharing a bed with him - but I didn't care.

  I didn't even know his name, and yet I was lying next to him, sharing my body warmth, my sacred space. It felt good to be so close to someone.

  I wish I could tell you that saving him was the most un-selfish thing I have ever done, but the truth was the complete opposite. Everything I did that night was for me. I was saving myself. I just didn't know it.

  Evie

  He had to go.

  I was being needy.

  I was being stupid.

  I was being Cassie.

  And, I couldn't be Cassie, jumping straight from one guy to the next, and that's what it felt like in the cold light of the morning. It scared me how easy I had fallen into the trap. Dexter didn't want me, so what did I do? Go and bring home the first stranger. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

  As he showered, I lay on the bed, listening to the silence, punctuated only by the sound of running water. There was an empty space beside me, the dirt and blood smears the only evidence that the night had been real, that it hadn't been a dream.

  But now it was over.

  I got up and switched the television on, a distraction from thinking and to hide our voices from Cassie. I turned as he walked back into the room. My eyes caught his. My heart stopped. I couldn't breathe.

  I finally managed to look away. He turned to close the door and my eyes were drawn back to him. Water was dripping from his hair, running like tears down his skin and over the intricate tattoo wings that swept down his back, the tips of which were lost below the towel he was clutching at his waist. I suddenly felt hot, my skin flushed. I tore my eyes away, too scared to look, even though I wanted to.

  My body was on fire, my emotions loudly screaming at me, pulling me in different directions.

  I saw him turn around out of the corner of my eye. 'I'm sorry,' he said.

  'For what?' I said, looking up, my eyes captured by the sight of another intricate tattoo carved onto his chest which I had missed the night before, when it was caked with mud. It was another pair of wings, but this time with a skull at the centre of the design, with a silver dagger behind it. What was it with this guy and wings?

  'For everything.'

  'I'll get you some clothes.' I needed to get him out of the house. There was some kind of witchcraft in the air, it was pulling me in, enchanting me. I had to ignore the feelings bubbling up inside me, making my skin tingle, my breath quicken.

  Those eyes were goddamn killing me. Why couldn't I be in close proximity to a guy and not want to kiss him? Kiss him? I instinctively looked at his lips. God, I was feeling really hot.

  'Thanks.'

  I grabbed my dressing gown and slipped it on. I moved towards the door, then stopped. 'You'll have to leave when it's safe,' I said, not daring to look back at him. 'They can't find you here.' I couldn't leap from one guy straight to another.

  'Ok,' he said. I thought my heart was going to break. Stupid, needy Evie! What the hell was wrong with me?

  Downstairs Cassie was sitting on the sofa, her hands curled around a mug of coffee, her hair pulled high in a messy pony-tail. Dan was next to her, messing with a stray bit of her hair at the back of her neck.

  'Oh, hi Hun.'

  'Hi. How are things with you guys?' I asked, trying not to look guilty. I shouldn't have bothered; Cassie was always more happy talking about herself.

  'Well,' she said, reaching over to put her mug down on the coffee table before she grabbed Dan's hand. 'As you know, things, well, we kind of got off track there for a bit, but everything's good now.' She turned to look at Dan, her eyes brimming over with love, and for a moment I was overtaken by how much I despised her. 'We're going away for a bit, to Dan's parents in Cornwall, see if we can find any good wedding venues.'

  'Oh.'

  Eventually she prised her eyes away from him. 'I know we haven't been back long Hun, but we want to get married as soon as possible. We want to bring the wedding forward...to be married now.'

  'Ok.'

  'No more misunderstandings,' she said, her eyes fixed back on Dan.

  'When are you off?' I asked, my emotions all battling it out for supremacy; relief, hatred, jealousy, sadness. I didn't know what I was supposed to feel; I just wasn't used to it. But my guilt at having a strange guy in my bedroom evaporated under the strain of everything else I was feeling.

  'Next weekend. We're going for a week so you'll be on your own over half-term, unless you want to come with us?'

  'Who me?' I said. I never usually got invited. Why ask this time?

  'Well you are going to be bridesmaid.'

  'No, I'll stay here. You don't want me cramping your style. We can do the girly stuff when you get back.'

  'Ok Hun, if you're sure. See Dan, told you she'd be fine with it. She's a good girl.'

  Those words stabbed me through the heart.

  She's a good girl.

  How would you know Cassie, how could you possibly know? I stood up, 'I'm going back up to my room, I've got a lot of work to do.'

  'Ok Hun,' she said, not taking her eyes off Dan.

  Evie

  I grabbed angrily at Dan's clothes in the utility room - pulling out his favourite denim jeans and Ben Sherman jumper - before I stomped back upstairs. My anger was festering inside me. I was a good girl. A good girl! That woman made me want to scream. Or worse!

  I yanked open the door to my room, my anger set to unleash on my mysterious stranger, but I stopped as my eyes caught sight of him, lying awkwardly across the bed, asleep. He wasn't supposed to fall asleep, he was supposed to be leaving.

  But he looked so worn out, so broken and oh so beautiful, that my anger evaporated. A calmness had swept over my room, like when you're on holiday, sitting by the sea on a hot summer's day, with the breeze rolling in off the ocean, keeping you cool and calm and there isn't a single cloud in the azure sky. That's how I felt looking at him, his chest rising and falling like the ebb and flow of the tide and his sun-kissed skin like the sand at my feet.

  I dropped Dan's clothes on the floor and went to the airing cupboard, pulling out a blanket to drape over him.

  I went for a shower to cool off, and to distract myself, but it didn't work, knowing that he (temptation? because that's how it felt) was just the other side of the wall.

  I went back to my room, sat at my desk, flicking a pencil to and fro in my hand. I fetched out my English essay, but I couldn't concentrate; the sound of his breathing, delicate though it was, invaded my thoughts and made me picture the ocean, made me want to walk in the gently lapping water. I put the essay to one side and started a sketch for our new art project (An Angelic Journey through time: the changing
face of angels) but found myself stealing glimpses of him, until, in the end I gave up, with barely a pencil mark drawn on the paper.

  I swung my chair around, put my feet on the bed, my head resting on my hands, and just watched the rise and fall of his chest, let my breathing synch with his, let his tranquillity wash over me.

  I don't know how long I sat there for - time had simply ceased to exist - entranced by his face, by the shape of his nose, the curve of his chin. When he rolled over, the blanket fell away slightly, revealing the magnificent tattoo on his back, I couldn't stop tracing the delicate strokes of the design with my eyes. How I longed to trace my fingers over it, feel the softness of his skin under my fingers, let my hands sweep down his back to the tips of his wings, lost just below the top of the blanket.

  He was like an angel. Never mind all the pictures of angels in my art books, his face was the most beautiful of all.

  Or was he the moon, and I the sea, his gravitational pull too strong for me to ignore?

  I was going crazy.

  Without thinking, I carefully moved forward onto the bed. I reached out to touch the marks on his back. There was something about them, something about the way they seemed to almost ripple under his skin as though the wings were waiting to hatch. I just wanted to make sure they weren't real. And then my heart stopped, my hand mid-air, as he turned over.

  His eyes were still closed, his black hair swept across his face and he looked more like a marble statue than a guy (I thought of the God Apollo, or Perseus that I'd studied for Classics. Or was it Michelangelo's David?).

  My eyes wandered to the tattoo on his chest, another set of wings with a skull and dagger. I extended my fingers to touch; I couldn't help it. I let my them fall onto his soft skin - even though I knew I shouldn't - and began to trace it. The lines of the tattoo surprised me, they were ice cold to the touch unlike the rest of his burning skin, and they too seemed to ripple with an energy, almost like they were alive. My fingers lingered as I reached the skull, intricately cut into the skin above his heart. I could feel his heart pounding beneath my fingers.

  And then he clasped my wrist with his burning hand and my whole body burst into life. My heart stopped, my eyes sought his, and they startled me with their brilliance.

  'I...I'm sorry,' I said, moving my hand from his chest, his fingers still wrapped around my wrist. Our hands hovered mid-air, neither one of us wanting to pull away. I was electric; I could feel every single nerve, every single sensation in my body. His touch penetrated deep inside me, shocking me awake, pulling me out from the shadows, re-awakening abstract feelings and memories deep within me that I couldn't quite remember but I knew they were there, still buried waiting for me to discover them.

  But I remembered his name; Josh. The name was made for me. It fitted my lips perfectly.

  I was on fire.

  We hovered in that moment, the air around us alive with anticipation. There was something building between us, something drawing us together in this small space, this obscure un-real situation.

  And I knew - from that one moment that seemed to last for an eternity - that he felt the same way.

  I wanted to kiss him.

  I knew he wanted to kiss me.

  But his closeness, my lack of control, scared me. I wasn't going to be weak. I couldn't give in. I was not Cassie. I wasn't ready for this.

  I pulled away. 'You need food and painkillers,' I said, tearing my eyes away from his.

  Cassie and Dan were back in bed, so I went downstairs and made a huge pile of toast, a pot of coffee and stuffed them onto a tray with two mugs, sugar, milk and a box of ibuprofen. I took a deep breath and entered my bedroom, trying desperately not to look at those eyes.

  'Bugger,' I said, to myself as my eyes met his. I took a sharp intake of breath and my heart rolled in my chest. I was out of control, my body not listening to anything I was telling it to do.

  He was sitting on the bed, propped up against the headboard. He'd pulled on Dan's jeans which seemed to be too short for him, the towel discarded on the floor at the side of the bed. Suddenly I felt really hot again.

  I walked to the bed and dropped the tray down, trying to hide my face so he didn't see me blushing. Butterflies were flying around my stomach and I noticed my hands were trembling.

  'I thought I'd make you some breakfast, even though it's more like afternoon now. Didn't know what you like so I did a pot of coffee and toast, because everyone likes coffee and toast. Don't they?' I looked up and caught him looking at me; my body tingled under his gaze.

  'I'd love a coffee,' he said.

  'Grab some toast and I'll pour you a cup.'

  'Thanks,' he said leaning over to get a slice. Every time he moved there seemed to be a ripple effect in the air that sent waves of longing through me.

  I left his coffee on the tray, picked up mine and a triangle of toast, and sat on the chair by my desk, placing my feet on the edge of the bed. I couldn't trust myself to sit by him. I needed to exercise some self-restraint.

  Maybe I was more like Cassie than I thought?

  'You can stay here tonight,' I said, 'but you'll have to leave tomorrow, once I've gone to school, when Dan and Cassie are out.' What was I saying? He was supposed to be leaving! It was like my head and my heart had split in two and were fighting each other for supremacy.

  'I'll go-'

  'In your state? Don't be stupid. Stay here,' I said, quickly adding, 'Just for a bit.'

  Being in this room, being so close, it was starting to chip away at my resolve. There was something in the air, something I could almost reach out and touch, that was luring me in, like following the devil through pits of fire just for a moment's pleasure.

  I think my heart had the edge.

  I didn't know if I was strong enough to resist.

  We both sat watching the television. Something terrible, a freak storm or something, had wiped out an entire village down south.

  Josh made a strangled sound. I looked up at him, his face had turned ashen. 'Are you okay?' I asked.

  'I'm fine,' he said. But the way he said it made my heart heavy, it was like how I imagined the angels mourned the dead.

  I went over to him and sat on the edge of the bed. I leant over and placed my palm on his forehead. I was very aware that our bodies were almost touching. I felt his heart beating, the electricity leaping through what little space there was between us.

  'You're really hot,' I said, blushing as I realised what I had said. I looked away, before adding, 'You need painkillers.'

  What the hell was I doing?

  Josh

  I had once heard someone say that life was like playing a game of chess with Death, that it was down to us as to how well we played and how long it would last.

  What a crock of shit.

  We're in check mate from the moment we're born.

  Only the ignorant and idiots believe anything different.

  Death cradled me in Her arms for what had seemed like an eternity; an everlasting darkness that robbed me of everything but my pain, and then, when She was ready, She had relinquished me, let me fall to earth and into Evie's arms. She'd done it on purpose, leaving me on the river bank - broken and as close to death as was possible - for Evie to find; the only person, Death knew, that could make me want to live, and make me want to fight Hyperion.

  When I finally awoke, I didn't even need to open my eyes to know Evie was there; the pain, like walking over the blades of a thousand swords, coursed through me, to the thrumming of her heart beat. Bitter yet sweet.

  I wanted to run.

  I should've run.

  But my body was wrecked. The pain of being close to Evie, and the pain in my muscles, deep in my shoulder blade where Hyperion had torn off my wing, was burning as brightly as it had ever been, but I knew, somehow, I had to find the strength to fight it.

  I grabbed a piece of toast and looked up at the television, something had drawn my attention, the mention of a storm, of a village decimated by an
unusually high tidal surge that had sent huge waves crashing down upon it, wiping out everything in existence. I stopped, toast at my lips, as I recognised the place. I watched the screen, transfixed as my fellow Angels of Death reaped the dead, their celestial melodies playing, only to my ears, as a backdrop to the news report. The dead sang too, lamenting the loss of their own lives, their Souls shimmering in the sky, only a rainbow to the human eye.

  I watched as Arielle, dressed in a gown of black silk, prepared the soul of an old man whose turquoise aura was beating brightly despite his old age. Kazuo - a handsome angel with ice blue eyes - washed the golden brown soul of a seventeen year-old girl, whose pitiful song was of regret and things left un-done, and things never to be done.

  The female news reporter, in full make-up and a perfectly coiffured bob, stood in front of what was left of a hotel, the sun's rays penetrating through the cloud, like gigantic fingers of gold around her.

  'Three-hundred and thirty-three people have known to have died in the freak storm, over one-hundred are still missing. Experts are still baffled as to how the storm appeared out of nowhere and caught the Met office off-guard.'

  'Are you ok?' asked Evie, breaking my fixation with the news.

  'I'm fine,' I lied. What else could I say? I caused all of that, all that death and destruction...oh, and by the way, I love you. I took the painkillers she offered me and gulped them down with mouthfuls of dark sweet coffee.

  There was a long stretch of silence, filled only by the murmurs of the never-ending experts and reporters on the television. it wasn't an uncomfortable silence; it was loud, filling the air with things thought but not said, feelings that were screaming at us, trying to get us to acknowledge them.

  'What happened to you?' she asked, finally cutting through the silence.

  The question took me by surprise. 'What?'

  'On the river bank, what happened? Do I need to be worried? Some scary gangster isn't going to come after me for helping you?' she asked, only half joking.