THE EMPRESS OF MYSTH 8: ANGEL’S HOME: (An Alpha Alien Sci-fi Romance & Fallen Angel Paranormal Series)

by Meg Xuemei X

  No matter how I change the angle in the hope of capturing one merit of my features in the mirror, I fail miserably. I see only a pair of dark, ancient eyes dominating a heart-shaped, pale face. The irony is, I’m not a predator but prey—prey with wolf-like cold eyes.

  THE TOUCH OF FIRE

  As its coldness pierces me, I flinch back from my reflection. I was once a cheerful kid, but all I have now is a cold shell, with a colder heart. I put down the mirror, telling myself what I’ve become now doesn’t matter. In two more years, I’ll go away to college and leave this dump. In between, I want no complications.

  Only the boy has put himself in my path.

  I don’t believe he has come here for my mother. In my opinion, she’s even uglier than me, even though the townspeople say she’s fetching. Kai should have better sense than common folks. The woman is old enough to be his mother.

  But would he come for me? I shake my head. It isn’t like I haven’t seen those pretty girls filing in and out of his studio, flirting with him. Two girls, who are lean and tall with dark curly hair, particularly stand out. They’re the famous Sha Sha and Ta Sha, the identical twin daughters of the deputy mayor. I’ve noticed when they’re in his room, other girls are less likely to make a pass at Kai.

  The neighbors talk about the twins all the time. And I’ve learned that Sha Sha wants Kai to go exclusive with her. She’s called the “angel twin.” Ta Sha, the “devil twin,” is protective of the angel.

  I can’t tell them apart, but I notice Kai isn’t as smitten with them as other boys are. In fact, I haven’t seen him pay them any special attention. He treats every girl with the same politeness and apathy. I’ve been able to hear the boys’ conversations by reading their lips. Kai placed a bet with them that he’d never fall for any girl.

  It makes the girls want to catch him with their long, sexy claws all the more. I’m mildly interested in watching this battle of the sexes.

  Something tingles in my head. My sixth sense flares. I know that he’s standing by his window now, his eyes trained on me. My mind orders me not to move, reminding me, Haven’t you said you don’t want complications? But my feet run to my window. I need to confirm the accuracy of my sixth sense.

  Indeed! He leans against the windowsill. Spotting me, his eyes light up, and a broad smile breaks out across his face. I catch my breath just in time. The boy is undeniably striking! He runs his fingers through his thick hair, as if trying to be more presentable.

  I pull the windows back and close them, shutting out the music and laughter from his studio. That doesn’t belong to me.

  Through the edge of the curtain, I see his grin fade and his jaw drop. But I’m unmoved. I watch him dash away from the window and return with his guitar, plucking the strings with grace. The chords vibrate, responding to each other. Lovely combinations of sounds invade my room through the splinter opening of the window frames.

  Setting his eyes on my window, he sings, “Once upon a time, there was a strange girl . . . she’s like the little cloud sending the rain down on me . . . when I asked why, she then sent the hailstorm . . . Rain or hail, it’s always a sunny day to me . . .”

  I close my eyes, feeling the spring rain of the music spattering on my face. The rain gets inside me. I let it happen. In the end, whatever I feel will be fleeting like the shadow of the wings, and I’ll be left alone again in my cold existence. But in this moment, I want to indulge in the flow of the music and the illusion of its magic.

  Hearing my mother’s footsteps heading toward my room, I jump away from the window and settle on a hard chair. I grab my English textbook from the desk, open it to a random page, and read like it’s the most important thing in the world.

  My mother stops at the doorway. “Should I invite you to the table, Your Highness?”

  I’d give anything for her to shut up for a minute.

  But she never does.

  “The new boy was very polite. He knows how to introduce himself to me properly.” She strikes a conversation with my father at the dinner table.

  My father, who is indifferent to almost all things, doesn’t show any interest in Kai. He probably doesn’t know which boy my mother is referring to.

  Pretending to have a deaf ear as usual, though my pulse quickens at the mention of Kai, I manage to breathe slowly and evenly, so my mother can’t detect any emotion in me.

  “He wants to do a picture of me,” she continues.

  My father still doesn’t look up. His mind stays with his chicken breast.

  “I’m talking to you!” she says.

  “Will the picture have colors?” he asks.

  “Of course! It’s called oil painting!” she says.

  “Colors are good,” he says.

  “Do you know who the boy’s parents are?” she asks.

  He blinks.

  “His father is a mongrel, mixed blood of Russian and Mongolian. The man used to be a military pilot before he retired here in XiangChun,” she says in a bragging tone.

  “Are you sure he has foreign origin?” he asks.

  “Everyone says so,” she says. She works in a Chinese government-run recycling center that purchases junk. I visited the center when I was younger. The place is like an enormous burial ground. And like the recycling center, my mother’s second passion in life is to recycle gossip and then redistribute it. She shares her first love, gambling, with my father.

  She holds her chopsticks in the air and stops chewing for a minute. “If you look at the boy’s eyes, you can tell he’s got bastard blood too.”

  Kai’s eye color, which falls between the shades of copper and gold, is distinctive from that of pure Asian. Maybe that’s why the girls are fascinated with him. Even my middle-aged mother seems unable to contain herself. My father, however, isn’t into the boy’s eye color, so he’s silent again.

  “Do you know who his mother is?” she asks, pointing one of her chopsticks at him to get his attention. Its tip almost makes a connection with his flat nose.

  “Is she a mixed breed too?” he asks, throwing his head a bit further from the chopstick, faking curiosity.

  “She’s Han, a pure Chinese, like us. But my point is: she’s the Director of Women’s Affairs! But even she can’t control the boy. They just let him do whatever he wants.”

  “So all women have to answer to her, but not the boy.” My father gives a dull chuckle.

  “He insists on being a painter. His whole family hotly opposes his choice. When they asked how he was going to make a living, he said, ‘By applying my brush and palette knife to the canvas. I have good hands and excellent eyes.’” My mother giggled. Ever since she turned forty last year, she’s started acting like a teenage girl, especially in front of men.

  “He does have good hands,” she continues. “I’ll give him that. I wonder what he does with those hands to all the girls in his room. I heard even the deputy mayor’s twins are like bitch dogs in heat when they’re around him.” She ponders for a second or two. “But he wants me to be his model. He came here, specially requesting to do a portrait for me. And he insisted on setting up here to do it. ‘No distractions,’ that’s what he said. He doesn’t want anyone else around when he paints me.”

  I wolf down the fried rice and tofu from my plate. Before I completely swallow them, I excuse myself from the table. I don’t want to hear any more of this. And if I point out to my mother that the boy isn’t just a piece of fresh meat, she’ll slap me.

  * * *

  The next day, I come home right after school. Normally, I come home as late as I’m allowed. Usually, I make for the forest a few miles away. The forest’s colors and pungent aroma and the symphony from the trees, birds, and the breeze solace me. It’s a home I don’t have.

  But today, I decide not to linger in the forest. I have a hunch Kai will be at my door. I run back home before my mother arrives.

  The minute I close the door of my apartment, I hear a knock. I know at once it’s him. Even with the door between
us, I can sense him. My heart leaps and the blood rushes to my face.

  I grab the knob, turn it, and jerk open the door. With indifference, I stare at him, waiting for him to deliver an opening.

  “Hi,” Kai says softly. “May I come in?”

  “She isn’t home yet,” I say. But I ease the door open.

  He saunters in, and I step back, putting some distance between us, as if he were a dangerous species. His intense eyes study me. It’s a challenge to hold onto a hot gaze like that, but I don’t flinch.

  He breaks the silence again. “I didn’t come for your mother. I had to find an excuse to see you.”

  Eagerness and apprehension rise in my throat at the same time. Before I come to my wits, he moves closer. His scent assails me first, a young male’s pheromones mixed with fresh mint and a strong tang of oil paints. The paints, turpentine, linseed and copal oil smell so exotic and intoxicating. I hold my breath to resist its pull, but then I desire to inhale more. For a moment, my mind shuts down. I look up at the boy like an idiot in a dream.

  My discipline kicks in the next second, and the spell that has held me snaps like a thin thread. My eyes clear and are ice again. But a flush has escaped me, filling my cheeks. I will the treacherous pink to go away, but the heat only expands.

  Kai watches me closely, his eyes sparkling, half amused and half curious, and between that, a pinch of hope.

  I won’t give him a chance to mock me. “Why not?” I say with slight viciousness. “She’s peachy! She drinks plum wine every night before she goes to bed so she can have rosy cheeks. Paint her rosy cheeks.”

  He laughs. “All of my models have pinkish cheeks. The least I’m looking for is that.”

  I want to say something impressive, but I’m rusty with words. I haven’t had a normal conversation with anyone for years. But, as a kid, I used to be sharp-tongued and initiated quite a lot of fights.

  So, with my jaw set, I stare at him.

  He fills the silence as if it were his obligation. “I’ve been waiting for you the whole day, hoping you would come home earlier, so I could talk to you alone for a moment. I sent my models off and turned my friends away.” He pauses, his gorgeous eyes searching my face. “I was worried your mother would come home before you. It’s difficult to find time to be with you alone, much more difficult than I expected.”

  “Why do you want to talk to me?” I ask in a husky voice. “I told you I wouldn’t be your model.”

  “I know that,” he sighs.

  “Then what do you want to talk about?” I ask.

  “I want to get to know you,” he says.

  “There isn’t much to know,” I say.

  “You’re wrong,” he says. “You’re different.”

  My face hardens. Does he mean I’m a freak, or a creep, as the others think I am?

  “You’re the most interesting girl I’ve met,” he continues. “There’s something in you, something about you … something that makes me want to be your friend.”

  “I don’t want a friend,” I say, but my tone softens.

  A ghostly smile touches his warm eyes, and he gazes into my cold ones with strength. “If you give it a try, you’ll like having a friend.”

  My cheeks grow hotter under his gaze. Friendship? How does it feel to have a friend you can trust, talk to, and laugh with? I’ve never had a real friend. I’ve had a rough reputation since I was in second grade.

  I was seven and half then.

  The townspeople had a routine of taking hour-long nap at noon. I took advantage of that and snuck out of my old, humid house obscured by a huge oak tree.

  At that time, I lived on the west side of town, where small, flat houses and apartments all clustered together, blocking all streams of sunlight, even at high noon. Since we all crammed together like cockroaches, all kinds of unpleasant smells mixed together, so going for a swim was an ideal escape for me.

  I ran down the uneven, asphalt streets, glad that the outdoor fish market along the way was also shut down. I ran over two miles, leaving the ghost town behind, and arrived at the Ducklings’ Nest.

  The Nest was half wilderness, characterized by the untamed river that ran endlessly east to west.

  Quickly stripping off my clothes, I lay them on the smooth cobblestones that paved the bank and jumped into the clear river. I swam nude to keep my clothes dry. If my mother learned of this extracurricular activity of mine, she’d whip me.

  I flipped in the water and surfaced with a handful of weeds. Small fish flitted by. I laughed and wiggled. Sunshine filled the river. I swore the sunshine could sing.

  Monday morning before I reached the school gate, I heard the chanting of “slut” from the playground. Puzzled, I walked across the yard, looking around. Which poor kid had become the new game? Everyone was looking back at me. Smelling trouble, I reminded myself to lay low and quickened my pace.

  A big girl, who had crooked front teeth, blocked my path before I could get into my Ping Ying spelling class. She pointed her chubby finger at me, shouting, “Slut! You swam naked in the Ducklings’ Nest!”

  I blinked at the sudden revelation. I was the game. Then, as if being controlled by a puppet master, all the students started coming my way from all directions, and soon besieged me.

  My eyes darted from one angry face to another, seeking a forgiving one. There were none. And I was still baffled by the connection between being a slut and my swimming act. I swam naked because I thought I was alone in the Nest and I needed to keep my clothes dry.

  “Someone saw you!” the crooked-teeth girl gloated.

  I blinked in panic. This must be one of my bad dreams. The whole school was out to get me! My heart hammered in my rib cage. I hoped when I woke up, the angry crowd would disappear.

  Then the puppet master pulled the string again, and all the kids pointed their fingers at me. “Slut!”

  I cringed. The kids behind me pushed me forward as my back reached them. The only option was to escape into my classroom, but it was ten yards away. As I moved forward toward my classroom, the crowd also moved in unison, stalling me. Their faces and mocking noises closed in on me.

  My mind went blank. No one would come to my rescue, not even the teachers. Everyone wanted fun at my expense in the hot, dull summer time.

  I struggled to break through the walls of flesh. Blood pounded in my ears; my breath labored. The walls proved to be impenetrable. The amplified shouting hurt my head more than my ears. Shaking and sweating, I longed for the bell to ring.

  It took forever for the bell to chime, announcing the start of class. The crowd disbanded. I saw legs scattering, hurrying toward different classrooms, dust in their wake. Alone in the vast opening, I let swirling dust fall on my face and failed to move my feet even after the bell trailed off.

  Then I was aware of numerous eyes watching me through the windows of the classrooms lining each side of the playground. I fled, dragging my wobbly legs into the classroom. My classmates greeted me with a faint singsong of “slut” until Ms. Gu, our long-nosed teacher who was in her fifties, arrived.

  Ms. Gu pretended nothing happened. Teachers usually didn’t get involved in kids’ fights, especially when the kids were from non-impressive family backgrounds.

  Throughout the whole class, I was unable to concentrate. The words on the blackboard blurred, and Ms. Gu’s voice became a monotonous drone. I brooded over my fate in the hall of shame and knew my misfortune was far from over, though my swimming day had ended.

  When I got home, bowing my head and walking with my tail between my legs, my brother and sister came up to me at once like hounds.

  “Hey slut!” my brother reminded me with a smirk, afraid that I had forgotten my newest nickname.

  “The whole school called her that.” My sister’s thin lips expanded to a beam. “That will teach her a lesson this time!” My sister and I hated to share a bed and fought at all times over the limited space.

  There was no shelter for me. And I probably had to worry ab
out my mother’s fists. What could be worse than having a slut as a daughter? I lost my appetite at dinner and went to bed in the grip of foreboding fear.

  The next day, on my way home, as soon as I realized I was being ambushed, I broke into a dead run. I ran so fast that I felt my heart was going to explode, and my whole body ached.

  A hand reached me. Another hand followed, pushing me and hitting the back of my neck. I fell facedown, my nose and mouth kissing the mud.

  There was no chance to get away. There were too many of them, so fighting back wasn’t the best idea. All I could do was minimize the damage. I immediately curled into a ball, and my hands covered my head. I knew by covering my head and body, at least I could protect my brain and my inner organs.

  “Teach her a lesson!” Crooked-teeth ordered.

  Punches and pinches fell on me as if preying birds pecked at me. Then someone kicked me hard on my behind. “Think twice next time you decide to be such a big slut!” Crooked-teeth said.

  I was about to throw insults at her. If her mom wasn’t a slut, how was she born? But I bit my tongue. It wouldn’t be wise to have a smart mouth now.

  More kicks followed. I didn’t moan or cry or beg. I was a mute, dead bug. That was my best strategy.

  “Justice is served,” a boy’s voice said. “Let’s go now. If she’s dead, we’ll get into trouble.”

  They left me in the grass and mud. When I heard the footsteps retreating to a safer distance, I turned my head and looked at my enemies through the space in my arms, memorizing them, all eleven of them.

  I raced home, hoping to be home alone so my brother and sister wouldn’t add insult to injury.

  Luckily, no one was there. The door was locked. My parents hadn’t entrusted me with a key, but I knew how to get in. There was a small, unlocked windowpane on top of the doorframe.

  I kicked off my muddy shoes. Setting one bare foot on a small dent in the middle of the doorframe, my hands bending and pressing on the façade of the door, I pulled myself up quickly. I squeezed through the top window and slithered down the back of the door.