Thunderstruck

by Laura DeLuca

  Tara pressed her fingers against her eyes again, so hard they watered, and she started to see colored spots, but that didn’t make the strange image vanish. Her heart began to hammer. Her hand inched toward her pillow. So much for the nice guy vibe she thought she was reading. Apparently this guy was the certifiable-stalker type.

  “Tara.”

  Tara saw his lips move to form her name, even though the only light came from the fluorescent glow of her alarm clock and that which leaked from his skin. When he spoke, she felt a strange vibration. Around her, the room started to rumble and quake. A mirror fell from the wall. Despite the chaos around her, the feeling reminded her of the steady beat of the bass when she went to clubs and the music was very loud. Even though she couldn’t hear the music, she could feel the thump of the notes resonate through her body. Tara had been completely deaf since birth, and neither hearing aids nor surgeries could improve it or reverse it. Yet when Taran moved his lips, though he had claimed to be unable to speak at all, she swore she almost heard the sound of his voice even though that should have been impossible.

  “Tara,” he repeated. “You’ve known me as Taran, but my true name is Taranis. I am the Celtic God of Thunder. I’ve come to make you mine for all eternity.”

  Again, Tara was sure she heard his words, as well as reading them on his lips, which again made her think she must be dreaming. That possibility didn’t stop her from freaking out. Dream or not, no crazy-stalker dude was going to make Tara anything for all eternity. Fuck that. Plus, he still glowed. Why the hell was he shining like an oversized nightlight? This was one fucked-up dream.

  Tara reached a little farther under her pillow until finally her fingers brushed against cold metal. Without giving it a second thought, she pulled out her weapon and aimed it at his chest. Taran’s eyes widened with surprise when he saw the pistol. However, there was no sign of fear. Tara was sure he seemed slightly impressed, but also incredibly amused. Tara didn’t let his sudden smile dull her resolve, no matter how cute it was. He must be even crazier than she originally thought if he wasn’t afraid of bullets.

  “God my ass,” Tara told him. “Now get the fuck out of my apartment.”

  “I won’t leave until you’re mine.”

  Tara pulled back the hammer. “Then you’ll be leaving in a body bag.”

  Instead of running for his life as she had hoped, Taran reached out one of his glow-in-the-dark hands to touch her cheek. He even had the audacity to laugh. He threw back his head and guffawed. Suddenly, Tara had to hold on to the headboard as the whole room started to shake. In fact, the whole building was trembling. She knew it wasn’t just her imagination, because pictures fell from the walls and statues tumbled from the dresser.

  Tara tried to adjust her aim while fighting the tremors that rattled her bed, but she had trouble keeping her hand steady. She was used to the occasional rumble after living in San Francisco for four years, but this was a little too much for her to handle, especially when there was a lunatic at the foot of her bed claiming to be a god. This earthquake had to register at least a 3.0 on the Richter scale. She wondered if any of her neighbors felt the shocks. She saw lights blinking through her bedroom window, but if anyone was screaming, she wouldn’t be able to hear it.

  “Do you think that weapon can harm me?” Taran asked, continuing his obnoxious belly laugh. “No mortal weapon can touch a god.”

  Oh fuck, Tara thought. He’s really gonna make me do this. He’s fucking whacked in the head and he’s gonna make me shoot his ass.

  Tara didn’t just have the gun for show. Her father was a cop. He’d given it her and made sure she knew how to use it. Of course, that didn’t mean she wanted to. She had never fired at anything aside from the target at the shooting range, but she also never missed her mark. Tara adjusted her aim so her shot wouldn’t kill him if she were forced to fire, but she’d be goddamned if she was going to allow the bastard to lay a hand on her. No man fucked with Tara Chevrestt.

  “Last chance, buddy,” she warned.

  Taran acted as though he were the one who was deaf. He continued to move forward, still laughing like a crazed lunatic. The walls of the apartment were still quaking, but that didn’t stop Tara from doing what she had to do. She fought to maintain her grip on her weapon despite the trembling earth beneath her. He kept inching closer and closer to her with that silly smile plastered on his face. She knew she was running out of time, so she made the only decision she could.

  Tara pulled the trigger.

  Finally the insane laughter died on Taran’s lips, and he looked at her with wonder before landing on the edge of her bed.

  * * *

  Taranis was filled with a giddy joy that was quite ungodly. He realized he had spoken to Tara, and she was not only still breathing, but also raging with that fire that had always called to him like a beacon in the night. Tara heard his voice. He had spoken to a mortal, and she wasn’t dead. However, the laughter died on his lips once the gun was actually fired. He sat down on the edge of her bed, startled to silence. He finally remembered that he wasn’t dealing with a fourteenth-century maiden who worshiped a pantheon of pagan gods. Even the few who still followed the old ways would never expect a god to show up in their bedroom unannounced. Not to mention the fact that his juvenile behavior had very nearly brought the walls down upon them. Outside, at least a dozen car alarms were going off, and through the thin walls he heard someone urging their family to get to the relative safety of a doorway.

  Tara must have been terrified. Taranis was ashamed by his over exuberance, but at least the sound of his laughter had covered up the crack of the gunfire. No police would be showing up on her doorstep ruining the moment he had been awaiting for thousands of years. Despite the fact that she had just tried to kill him, Taranis was elated. He was also excited to see that, while Tara had certainly paled with shock after he deflected her bullet with only his bare chest, she hadn’t lost her faculties.

  “Fuck,” she said. “I didn’t miss. I know I didn’t miss.”

  “No, you didn’t miss,” Taranis assured her.

  The walls were beginning to stop shaking, so as much as he longed to speak in words after decades of silence, he reverted back to the sign language they had both grown accustomed to. Taranis showed her where his shirt bore the hole from the blast. Underneath the material, his skin was unmarred. He bent down to retrieve the ruined bullet whose casing looked as though it had slammed into a solid metal. With a small smile, Taranis shrugged and laid it on her nightstand.

  “Fuck,” Tara repeated. “Fuck me.”

  I wish, Taranis thought.

  He found her casual use of profanity endearing. It made her even more colorful and unique. And even as he thought of color, he noticed another tattoo peeking out from underneath her rumpled pajama top. There was a sunburst painted around her bellybutton and a dangling piercing that looked like a teardrop falling from the heart of the sun. The sight made him burn with a longing even a god couldn’t control. He hoped the sudden protrusion wasn’t obvious to Tara.

  “Ho-how did you stop that bullet?” Tara stuttered.

  “I told you. I’m the God of Thunder. You can’t kill me.”

  “Horse shit.” Tara spoke instead of signing—maybe because her hands were shaking so badly. But despite her disbelief, she still dropped her useless weapon onto the mattress. “You’re some crazy whack-job who wants to kill me in my sleep.”

  “I would never hurt you. I love you.”

  Taranis hoped the gentle movements of his hands would somehow prove the depth of his feelings. Could Tara read his sincere emotions in his eyes as well as in his gestured words? Did she know how much he loved her? So much that he would sacrifice his immortality and all his godly powers if it meant just one night by her side.

  When she made no reply, Taranis withdrew his true form, which he knew was intimidating to humans, and resumed his mortal disguise. He had the same physical characteristics, but the translucent glow and the powe
r that made him seem to tower above her faded. He was just the guy from the coffee house again. When she finally met his gaze, he wasn’t sure what he saw there. Perhaps a touch of fear or a hint of passion, but when she spoke, he heard only confusion.

  “What do you want from me?”

  He gently tilted her head up. This time she didn’t shy away from his touch. “I’d like to ask you out on a date.”

  She laughed. The sound was like music to his ears. It made him sad that she had no idea how lovely her voice was. “You could have asked me out like a normal person without all this drama.”

  “But I’m not a normal person,” he argued. “I’m a—”

  She stopped him from completing the sentence by putting a finger to his lips. Even that simple touch sent a surge of electricity coursing through his body, and for him the earth moved with a greater force than when he spoke.

  “I know.” She sighed as though resigned to the thought. “You’re a god—a god who can stop bullets and who knows sign language because the sound of his voice causes earthquakes. I get it.”

  “So?” Taranis spread his palms in a question.

  “So…my mother always did tell me I had really shitty taste in men.”

  * * *

  Tara knew she was insane to even contemplate going out with Taran. It would have been stupid enough to date him after she found him lurking over her bed like a deranged nut-job. The possibility of him being some supernatural being only made it even more ridiculous to consider. But damn it, freaky glowing and stalker qualities aside, something in her gut told her this was the real deal. So she agreed to give him a chance. She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but he didn’t carry around a giant hammer and he didn’t fly her away to some crystal fortress in the center of Antarctica. Yet he still managed to sweep her off her feet with his old-world charm, even if he didn’t do it literally. They’d gone out several times and things were going well. There was only one thing that concerned her.

  Tara chewed her lower lip thoughtfully as she thought about their last few dates. Each time he arrived with a bouquet of roses. Her apartment was starting to look like a florist shop. He had taken her to one of the fanciest restaurants in San Francisco. They’d strolled hand-in-hand through the state’s most beautiful wine vineyard and conversed over their favorite pieces at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. But after three perfect dates that had offered just the right doses of sweet romance and intelligent conversation, he did nothing more than brush her lips at the end of the evening. He completely discarded the standard three-date rule.

  Tara found it hard to believe that someone who had lived for so many centuries could be a prude. She was starting to worry perhaps deities weren’t built with the same parts as mere mortals. Internet searches revealed Aphrodite was born out of a seashell, and many other gods came from the wombs of virgins. Facts like those didn’t help to dispel her fears of impotency. Tara liked the guy, but she had needs, and it would be nice if eventually those needs were satisfied by something that didn’t require a pair of triple-A batteries. She was a little relieved when further research indicated most of the Celtic gods were pretty virile, but then she started to worry if maybe the problem lay with her. What if Taran wasn’t attracted to her after all? Tara knew she was a good-looking woman, but she wasn’t sure how she was supposed to compete with glorious goddesses who were perfectly proportioned and who would never have to worry about the wrinkles or sagging breasts that came with the aging process.

  Screw this, Tara thought as she waited for Taran to arrive for their fourth date. Tonight things were going to end differently. She was going to get a piece of that sexy, Irish ass if it killed her.

  The thought made her shiver for reasons she couldn’t explain, but Tara was interrupted from her reverie when the lamp on her end table started to flash, signaling someone was at the door. Tara was embarrassed at how quickly she jumped up to answer it. Along the way she checked her reflection in the full-length mirror. Her short, black hair was stylishly spiked, and she had adorned her tightest skinny jeans along with a black T-shirt that read Strong is Sexy. She looked pretty damn hot, if she did say so herself. Of course, when she pulled open the door and saw masculine perfection standing in front of her, she lost a little of that confidence. She found the whole situation frustrating in more ways than one. She never had a hard time making the first move, but when she greeted Taran, the best she could manage was standing on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek when what she really wanted to do was tear his clothes off.

  “So what are the plans for the night?” she asked him.

  “How about dinner and a movie?” he signed.

  She hadn’t heard him use his god-voice since the night he appeared in her bedroom. In fact, he hadn’t acted anything but normal. Maybe it was because he didn’t want to start anymore earthquakes, but sometimes Tara wondered if the whole thing had been some crazy dream after all.

  Tara crinkled her nose. “I don’t like the movie theaters. They rarely have open captions and it’s hard to read lips on the screen. And those cup-holder devices suck.”

  His forehead creased in thought. “What do you want to do?”

  “I want to do the God of Thunder.” As the words tumbled out of her mouth, Tara’s cheeks warmed. She couldn’t believe she had actually said that out loud. It was humiliating, especially because they both knew she was only half teasing.

  “Is that so?” He smiled, but she didn’t miss that his cheeks were just as red as hers.

  Tara shrugged and cleared her throat. “Or we could go get a drink. I suddenly feel the need for a glass of wine.”

  “I think I have a better idea. I’d like to show you my home, though we will have to travel there by somewhat unconventional means if we are going to visit this evening.” After the last signed word, he lifted his hand to touch her cheek, sending a totally different type of fire coursing through her. He then mouthed, Do you trust me?

  Tara’s heart started to beat a little faster, but it wasn’t from fear. It was from excitement. She thought she was finally going to see some godly action. “I trust you,” she said in what she hoped was a seductive whisper.

  Taran nodded. Tara thought perhaps this was the moment he would whip out his cape and carry her off to his secret hideout. She wasn’t exactly sure what to expect when all he did was wrap his arms around her. Even though she relished the feel of his solid torso against her chest, it seemed a little anticlimactic. However, she didn’t get to enjoy his muscles for long. Suddenly, the world started to spin and tilt as if she’d had way too much to drink. Wild colors danced across her peripheral vision. The feeling of vertigo was so intense she thought her legs might give out on her. Unfortunately, neither closing her eyes nor his strong arms supporting her weight did anything to still the dizziness that consumed her. Tara clung to Taran, buried her head against his chest, and hoped she wouldn’t make a complete fool of herself by vomiting all over his designer shoes.

  As unnerving as it was, the sensation only lasted for about thirty seconds. Then the strange feeling of movement came to a screeching halt that would have knocked Tara off her feet if Taran wasn’t clutching her waist. It took her a moment to regain her equilibrium, but when she finally managed to open her eyes, she gasped. Her apartment was gone. All of San Francisco had vanished. Tara found herself in a meadow ripe with wildlife and laced with the scent of morning dew. On the edge of the clearing was a lake complete with a flowing waterfall. The grass, the towering trees, and even the moss-covered stones were all a vivid hue of green unlike anything she had witnessed on the West Coast. It was all too perfect and untouched.

  “Wh-where are we?” Tara stuttered, still slightly awed by the stunning beauty almost as much as the instant transportation.

  “This is my home, as it was once yours. This is Ireland.”

  Taran spoke in his true voice for the first time since that night in her bedroom, but he still maintained his mortal image. Again, the earth seemed to quiver in
response. The trees around them shook, and leaves rained down on their heads. Even the water started to ripple with the force of his words. Tara should have been intimidated by such power, yet she felt no fear. The tremor of his voice reminded her of when her mother would put her hand against her throat so she could feel the vibrations. That was one of the reasons she had learned to speak so clearly despite her deafness. With Taran, she felt his words without even having to touch him. It filled her with the same sense of love and security, but there was also something much more primal. Whenever he parted his lips, his words reverberated through Tara’s entire body instead of just her fingertips. It left her with a tingling sensation that caused her to feel weak in the knees and moist in places just a little higher up.

  Tara cleared her throat and tried to admire the view instead of his physique. He wasn’t exactly glowing again, but he emanated a radiance that made it hard for her to keep her eyes off him. At least she knew now that their last supernatural encounter hadn’t been a dream.

  “This place...it’s beautiful,” Tara whispered. “And…familiar somehow.”

  “That only makes sense. It was here that we knew each other last,” Taran revealed. “Here that our souls met in another lifetime. I lost you then, but this time things will be different. This time we will be one.”

  If anyone other than her God of Thunder had made such ridiculous claims, Tara probably would have tasered them in the nuts. But despite the fact that Tara had never been overly spiritual and had never even briefly considered the idea of reincarnation, his words rang true. Even back in the coffee house, before she knew anything other than his name and class rank, he had always seemed familiar to her. In his true form, though it had startled her at first, she felt an even deeper connection. That was why she had been able to accept the odd circumstances so easily. She knew him, had always known him, maybe even loved him sometime before.