Almost Alive
Page 23
“We can save her, just like you’re saving me.” It was a serious risk, and I had my opinion, but Julian was the most important person in the world to me at the time. I would fight with everything that I had to save his soul. “It’s your choice.”
Chapter Fourteen
I lazily opened my eyes. I was so uncomfortable lying in a little hospital bed. I felt fine and I was too worried to sleep through the night. I kept checking my phone to see if my parents would respond to my texts, but they were ignoring me. Well, I hoped they were ignoring me. To think about the alternative was just too depressing.
Julian knocked in my doorframe and walked inside with a sheepish smile. “How are you doing?”
I sat up and grinned. He was the only person who was there to see if I was okay, and that was just fine. I wanted Julian to get checked out, but he said he felt alright. His bones had popped into place after the transformation, but I had still lost a lot of blood. I felt alright myself, but Julian was concerned. “The doctors said that I’m perfectly healthy, which is surprising.”
His eyes widened a little bit. “God is a miracle worker.”
“I’ve noticed.” I was really conflicted. It was amazing what had happened to me and I was grateful that I somehow survived. I couldn’t deny God, and maybe I still had some bitterness about hell, but I knew that I was starting a new chapter in my life, and I couldn’t go back. “I think the reason why I’ve been so reluctant to pray and do all the stuff you’ve been telling me to do is because I never believed that there was anything out there. I felt too far away from anything to believe that there was some entity up there watching me or loving me. When I came back, I had the demon’s bitterness mixed in with my own. I didn’t understand the price of my sins, even though there was a painful and immediate payment for mine.”
“And now?”
“Look at how I hurt people like Liz. Michael really likes me, and I’ve done nothing but lead him on. Now when I tell him that I don’t wanna be with him, he’s gonna think it’s because of his accident.” I had to force myself not to cry when I thought about how he was never going to walk again. It was Maria who hurt him, but I put him in her crossfire. He didn’t deserve to pay for my mistakes.
“My parents have hurt me so much, and I hurt them in return. It’s awful. The demon almost had me because it promised to help me feel and freedom to express myself. In reality, all it did was temporarily remove my conscious. I don’t wanna live like that.”
“God loves you, Michelle. He’s just…” He squint his eyes as he searched for the right words to say. “Complicated.”
“Complicated?” I laughed short and hysterically, because I couldn’t deal with anymore complications. “If it’s alright with you, I’m just gonna simplify things. I wanna fight evil and do good. I wanna be good.”
If I didn’t know any better, I would think that Julian was proud of me when he started to smile. “That’s a start.”
I actually started to get really excited about it. “I also wanna learn how to do some of that awesome knife fighting. That was pretty cool.”
“Okay.” I was glad that I had started to cheer him up. He looked really cute when he wasn’t all doom and gloom. “We will start on that tomorrow if you feel up to it.”
“I do!” I was a different person. Yeah, I felt miserable for all of my misdeeds, but I needed that shame. I needed to be godly sorry in order to repent. That was the only way to be forgiven and start on my new journey. “I know I can do this now. I have to.”
“Julian?” said the voice of a woman. We both followed the voice to the doorway and there was a pretty brunette doctor in her mid-thirties standing there.
“Yeah, that’s me.”
She smiled. “Your sister is doing fine.”
Julian was happy to hear that, but still a little unnerved. “Thank you, but what happened to her doctor?”
“Let’s just say I have a special interest in her.” Then I realized that her eyes were the same as Julian’s when he was overcome by the demon, and she possessed that same creepy smile. “It’s good to finally have you here, my lord.”
I took a hold of Julian’s hand. The demon recognized my fear and left out of the room chuckling manically. “Julian, how many demons inhabit human bodies?”
“I don’t know…” He was fearful himself, but enough of him was intrigued to the point where I found it disturbing. “This is bad.”
He was someone who was struggling with wanting too much power. Besides wrestling with the temptation of having access to real magic, he had to fight the urge to call upon only God knows how many loyal servants to fulfill his desires. It was a lot for him to take, so I squeezed his hand tight and tried to remind him that I was there to steady him if he ever forgot that the person who he was, was already enough.
Julian didn’t want to keep Maria there in the hospital, but they wouldn’t let her leave. They said she needed to be observed for at least twenty-four hours. Julian and I did some good with that time, and we raided Maria’s room and cleaned out of all of her witch stuff. We boxed up every candle, every charm, and every book. Julian was afraid to touch her most powerful and favorite spell book. He said he could feel the evil on it, so I had to be the brave one and bring it outside to our raging bon fire.
I honestly didn’t know how much good it would do. Julian certainly didn’t need a spell book when Balthazar started destroying my insides. I didn’t know if Maria could be stopped. She was going to be our enemy, and I would have to do everything in my power to make sure Julian didn’t fall prey to the seduction of the dark side.
“When you kept telling me to stay away from Maria, why didn’t you just tell me that she was a witch?” I asked him.
“Because I’m ashamed of what she is and that it’s my fault.” He hated himself for turning her into something that dark. I understood that rage he felt with himself, but I didn’t want it to transform into something else. “I didn’t want you to ask questions and get curious about it. You weren’t freaked out enough. If I wasn’t on you so much, you’d probably be a practicing witch right now.”
He was absolutely right about that. Now things were different. I was sure I could return to Cynthia and get Zariel out of me. “Do you feel Balthazar?”
“A little bit, but I’m gonna be okay, Michelle.” He smiled, but I wasn’t sure if he was going to lose a piece of his soul for intentionally lying or if he was just that delusional that God let it slide. He was petrified. Julian was just great at hiding it.
I, however, knew that we were gonna both make it out alive. “You know that we actually do love each other?”
He nodded and kept his eyes focused in on the flames as they rose up into the night sky. Just like his old life was cleansed away by hellfire, he hoped he could save his sister and himself in a similar manner. “Now isn’t a good time for us.”
“I know.” I tried to take his hand, but he pulled away as soon as his fingers felt my own. I tried not to take his rejection too personally. I knew how he felt, and I knew that we had an important mission ahead of us. I couldn’t save him just by loving him. I had to guide him into saving himself. “I’m gonna get free, and then we’ll find a way to free you too.”
“This is bigger than freeing our souls, Michelle.”
“I know.” I certainly had become a different person. I had seen the face of evil. I had danced with it, compromised, and made love to it. Nothing good came out of it. My rebirth had crumbled apart, and all I had left was the rubble to build with. But God was a miracle worker, and I was stubborn. I had a war to win. “I’m ready to fight.”
Julian smirked with the same confidence and passion he had for fighting when I first met him, and then I knew that I had somehow inspired him to believe once more. “Then let us begin.”
About the Author
Christina L. Barr has been a serious composer as far back as twelve years old. As a daughter of an evangelist, Christina has had the opportunity to sing her songs around the wo
rld to thousands of people.
Christina graduated from Holly High School number nine in her class and attended College for Creative Studies. Her talents as a film maker increased and she used her skills for television production, started a popular website called The Gorgeous Geeks with her sisters, and was even featured on Times Magazine’s website for some of her work.
Christina’s true passion for writing emerged when she was eighteen and she started on her first novel. Almost Alive was the eighth book that Christina completed, but the third to be published. Her other published titles are Superkid, Sunrise Sunset, and The Light Book: Awakening.
Some of her personal goals are to complete thirty novels by the time she herself is that age, to see her books translated into film, to one day win The Celebrity Apprentice, and to be like one of her idols—Stan Lee—and create many iconic characters that span generation after generation through multiple franchises.
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