wind.
“I didn’t want it to come to this, Bethany,” he crooned. “But sometimes we are left with no choice.”
“What are you doing to him?” I sobbed as Xavier convulsed on the ground. “Let him go.”
“I’m only doing what I should have done a long time ago,” Jake snarled. “Don’t worry, it will be painless. After all, he’s half dead already. ..”
With a flick of his wrist he hauled Xavier upright and pushed him toward the edge of the cliff. Xavier would have defeated Jake in an instant had they engaged in a physical fight, but he couldn’t compete with supernatural powers.
“Sweet dreams, pretty boy,” said Jake just as Xavier’s feet slipped from the edge of the cliff.
My screams were swallowed up by the night.
The next few days passed in a blur. I didn’t feel as though I was really living, but just observing life from the sidelines. I didn’t go to school, and Ivy and Gabriel didn’t try to make me. I didn’t eat much; I didn’t leave the house; in fact, I hardly did anything except sleep. Sleep was the only way I could escape the pain of longing for Xavier.
Phantom was my only source of consolation. He seemed to sense my distress and spent all of his time with me, making me smile with his antics. He took underwear out of my open drawers and spread them around my room; he got tangled up in Ivy’s knitting and I had to set him free; and he carried an entire packet of Meaty Treats up to my room in the hope of being rewarded with one. These little tricks offered me small reprieves from the interminable silence and emptiness that stretched before me, but once they were over I fell heavily back into my coma of emptiness.
Ivy and Gabriel became more worried by the day. I had become the ghost of a person and an angel; I no longer contributed anything to the household.
“This can’t go on,” said Gabriel one afternoon when he got back from school. “This is no way to live.”
“I’m sorry,” I said flatly. “I’ll try harder.”
“No,” he said. “Ivy and I are going to deal with this tonight.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
“You’ll see,” he replied and refused to disclose anything else.
After dinner he and Ivy left the house together, while I lay on my bed, staring up at the ceiling. I didn’t think there was anything they could do to solve the problem, although I appreciated them trying.
I dragged myself up and went to look at my reflection in the bathroom mirror. I certainly looked different. Even in my baggy pajamas I could see I’d lost weight in a matter of days, my face was sallow, and my shoulder blades protruded. My hair hung limply and looked dull, just like my eyes, which were wide, dark, and sad. Instead of standing straight, I stooped as if I could hardly support my own weight, and my face seemed shadowed. I wondered if I would ever be able to put together the pieces of my life on earth that had been blown apart when Xavier had left me. It occurred to me momentarily that he hadn’t actually declared the relationship over, but that was what he’d meant. I had seen the expression on his face; we were through. I shuffled back to my bed and curled up under the comforter.
About an hour later there was a knock at my door, but I hardly heard it through the miasma that had enveloped me. The knock came again, louder this time. I heard the door open and someone come into the room. I covered my head with my pillow; I didn’t want to be coaxed downstairs.
“Jesus, Beth,” said Xavier’s voice from the doorway. “What are you doing to yourself?”
I lay still, not daring to believe that it was actually him. I held my breath, sure that when I lifted my head the room would be empty. But then he spoke again.
“Beth? Gabriel explained everything… what Jake did and how he threatened you. Oh God, I’m so sorry.”
I sat up. There he was in a loose white T-shirt and faded jeans, tall and beautiful, just as I remembered. His face was paler than usual, and there were faint circles under his eyes — the only signs of distress. I saw him flinch when he saw how haggard and exhausted I looked.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” I whispered, looking him up and down, proving to myself that he was real and that he had come to see me.
Xavier came over to the bed and took my hand, pressing it against his chest. I shivered at his touch and looked into his sapphire gaze, so filled with concern that I couldn’t stop the tears from pouring down my face.
“I’m here,” he whispered. “Don’t cry, I’m here, I’m here.” He repeated those words again and again, and I let him gather me into his arms and hold me. “I should never have let you leave like that,” he said. “I was just upset. I thought… well, you know what I thought.”
“Yes,” I said. “I just wish you’d trusted me enough to let me explain.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I love you, and I should have known you were telling the truth. I can’t believe I was so stupid.”
“I thought you were gone forever,” I whispered, tears leaking from beneath my eyelids. “I thought you’d walked away from everything, because I failed, because I destroyed the only thing that ever mattered to me. I waited for you to come, but you didn’t.”
“I’m so sorry.” I heard Xavier’s voice break. He swallowed hard and looked at his hands. “I’ll do whatever it takes to make it up to you, I’ll—”
I silenced him with a finger against his lips. “It’s over now,” I said. “I want to forget that it ever happened.”
“Of course,” he said, “whatever you want.”
We lay in silence on my bed for a little while, just happy to be back in each other’s company. I kept a tight hold on his shirt, as if afraid that he might disappear if I let go. He told me that Gabriel and Ivy had gone into town to give us some space to sort things out.
“You know,” Xavier said, “not speaking to you for a few days was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
“I know what you mean,” I said softly. “I just wanted to die.”
He let go of me quickly. “Never think that, Beth,” he said. “No matter what. I’m not worth that.”
“I think you are,” I said and he sighed.
“I can’t say I don’t know what you mean,” he admitted. “It feels like the end of the world, doesn’t it?”
“Like the end of all happiness,” I agreed. “Of everything you’ve ever known. That’s what happens when you make one person your reason for living.”
Xavier smiled. “I guess we weren’t too smart then. But I wouldn’t change it.”
“Neither would I.” I was quiet for a few minutes, and then I nudged his fingers with the tip of my nose. “Xav…”
“Yes?” He bowed his head and nudged me back.
“If a few days apart nearly killed us, what happens when…?”
“Not now,” he cut in. “I only just got you back; I don’t want to think about losing you again. I won’t let that happen.”
“You won’t be able to stop it,” I said. “Just because you’re a rugby player doesn’t mean you can take on the forces of Heaven. There’s nothing I want more than to stay with you, but I’m so scared.”
“A man in love can do extraordinary things,” Xavier said. “I don’t care if you’re an angel, you’re my angel, and I won’t let you go.”
“But what if they give us no warning?” I asked desperately. “What if one morning, I wake up, and I’m back where I came from? Have you thought of that?”
Xavier narrowed his eyes. “What do you think my greatest fear is, Beth? Don’t you know how much it scares me that one day I might go to school and you won’t be there? That I’ll come here looking for you, but nobody will answer the door. Nobody in town will know where you’ve gone except me, and I’ll know it’s a place where I can’t go to get you back. So don’t ask me if I’ve thought of that, because the answer is yes, every day.”
He lay back and stared angrily at the ceiling fan, as if it were to blame for the whole situation.
As I watched him, I realized that my whole world was right in front of me, just over six feet tall and lying on my bed. I realized at the same moment that I could never leave him. I could never go back to my home, because now,
