Driving Sera home, I was furious. I had lied to Toby, to stop it from getting entirely out of hand, but I had known. It was impossible to ignore those wings, even if he kept them so close to his back.
Michael had spied on me.
Not just on me, but on us, together. Sera, Toby, and I sharing a very private moment. Whether or not Mike had taken Sera to the wedding, didn’t dictate who went to bed with her. Sera was a woman with a mind of her own. She had every right to go to bed with whomever she pleased. And considering he wasn’t going to do that anytime soon, I had every right to accept her offer for sex.
But we didn’t spy on one another when we were having sex. It was like that code that men of the modern age followed on and off. You don’t spy on your guy friends having sex, even if they’re having sex with your date. That was like staring at a urinal. You just don’t do it.
It was like the rules just didn’t matter any longer. Like Mike could do whatever he wanted, and Sam would just let him get away with it because he found Sera first so therefore…
Therefore nothing. Just because Mike found Sera first didn’t mean that she automatically belonged to him. He wouldn’t even know what to do with her.
“Raphael?” she said.
“Hm?” I asked.
I turned toward her, catching back up with reality as she smiled just slightly at me. She turned her attention to the road.
“The light is green,” she said, pointing out the windshield.
“Right, sorry.”
I pulled through the intersection as I realized that there had been an awkward silence hanging over the car for some time. Since leaving the estate, we had both been silent. I had been brooding over Mike, she had found my answers short at best if they had been presented at all.
“Did I do something to upset you?” she asked.
“What?” I asked, glancing at her, then back at the road. “No, you didn’t.”
I could have thrown Mike under a bus, as the saying went. Told Sera about him spying, but that would have required a streak of pettiness that I just didn’t have in me. Sam had made it clear that none of us were allowed to be petty in our reactions to the others, he wouldn’t stand for it, and I was already ‘in trouble’ for stealing Michael’s date away.
“I left the curtain open a crack accidentally and swore I saw a camera flash,” I said instead. “Sam will deal with it, it’ll never make the papers, but who does that?”
That was the sort of excuse that a human might accept. Sera might not care if someone snagged a picture of her, but I could play it up as having a stalker. That would give a perfect excuse for my sullen silence. Concerned and disturbed always led to silence and crankiness.
“You know, I thought I saw a flash too,” Sera said. “I just assumed it was headlights from a car.”
That’s impossible.
That Sera saw Michael leave? Yes, it had to be impossible. The chances of her being one of the few humans who actually noticed the astral plane were astronomically low. Her having that ability might explain why Mike was paying so much attention to her, and why she was behaving strangely. Usually, humans who saw the astral plane acted either absolutely crazy, talking about demons and such, or were a little more subdued than the average human, like they were caught in a cloud.
“We built the estate to prevent that kind of thing. The front windows, yes, but the guest rooms on the front of the estate are there for people we hate. Noise travels really well. The hot water never seems to work properly. You know, little things that scare guests off.”
“Because guests just invite themselves over when you’re rich.”
I loved that she was filling in the story for herself. Sometimes it was difficult to keep track of our lies, and it was a fantastic turn of events that Sera would speak for me. Like she thought I might be embarrassed about the entire thing and by speaking up, I might be saved my feelings.
“They do,” I said.
All I had to do was work in a comment about a possible stalker, and we’d be covered for the little problem in the guest room. Then I could deal with Mike out of sight.
I might have been a healer, but that didn’t mean I cringed at beating on one of them when they upset me.
“I thought it was just family that did that.”
“Uh, no, our family lives far away. They almost never visit.”
Except for Toby, but I couldn’t very well tell her that he counted as family, that might get the wrong ideas going in her head. She might also think we’re all incestuous. While she could tell we weren’t brothers—what mortal couldn’t, really?—Toby might be mistaken as related to me.
Could humans tell each other apart based on genetics still? Or was that something one learned through several lifetimes worth of interaction? I could no longer remember.
Could always ask Grace.
I tried to make a mental note to ask Grace when I returned to the estate, but the second I tried to do that, I felt it trickle away. I’d never remember.
“Not that I’d recognize your family,” she said. “None of you look the same.”
“All adopted,” I said.
“Pretty generous of your father.”
“Not really,” I responded as I pulled to a stop in front of her apartment. “Don’t get me wrong, I love the guy and would do anything for him, but he took us on as workers first, children second. Loyalty and obedience were not options. We didn’t even learn the words until…”
Until humans were made.
Despite the mythos surrounding Heaven and Father, it had been Michael, not Samael, who had wanted to end the humans and start again. It had been Michael who had been jealous of the attention that Father’s new creation had. Samael had been smitten with them, just as Father had been. Perhaps more so, what with the whole Lillith incident where he fell from grace because he couldn’t order her to become the mother of all humans.
Except I couldn’t tell Sera that either. I struggled for a moment because we had long ago laid out our stories for those moments.
Sam might not have appreciated our bitter selves, but he knew that it was bound to come out sometimes. Even he had slipped up a time or two. Because of that, he had helped us prepare to deal with humans when we divulged too much information.
Admittedly, I had to use the story more often than the others.
“School,” I finished with a wince.
“That was a really long pause. You know that, right?” Sera asked.
I gave my head a little hake and looked out the windshield. There was no way I could continue down that line of conversation without digging myself into a hole.
We had talked a little with Grace about our pasts, but for the most part, no one knew. We didn’t talk about the smiting, or fire falling from the sky, or how Father had been that vengeful god just as much as He had been the kind, generous god that other humans told stories about.
It was like each religion had taken one small part of Father and focused on that. If they all came together and understood they were all talking about the same being, maybe the world would be a better place.
Still can’t tell her that.
I tried not to groan as my nose twitched. Instead, I looked out the passenger side window at the building.
“So this is a place with a lot of character.”
Sera laughed just a little.
“You’re bad at lying.”
“I never said I was good at it,” I said as I looked around us.
Sera lived in an area that was overpopulated and under-patrolled by the local police. It was a relatively cliche neighbourhood that I might have expected to see in a movie or something. Yes, I knew those places existed, I wasn’t overly surprised to know that there was such a neighbourhood in my relatively large city.
I was, however, surprised that Sera was living in one. She seemed like a bright young woman, who didn’t lack in funds. She might have been selling views of her naked body, and her evenings, but I saw it as little more than what any other human did. Except she made a great deal more money for selling her time.
I didn’t understand why she was living there, instead of in a nicer neighbourhood. She probably could have lived downtown on that artsy street that was cute and old looking with all the lovely old people who wanted to hear stories.
But I knew that was where I wanted her to live, and I had no right to tell her to move. All I could do was look around and make certain no one was going to carjack me, even as I felt guilty for thinking that. During the day, I wouldn’t even think about it, but looking out the windshield, I saw suspicious activity all down the street.
Several shady looking men were standing on the corner doing some kind of drug deal. I say that because I witnessed the baggy of drugs pass hands. They were sly about it, yes, but I knew what that little ‘handshake’ was about.
Behind us, in the rear-view mirror, I spotted a prostitute working a corner. She was far too thin and wearing too little given the chill to the night air.
“The apartment is really quite nice,” Sera said. “The neighbourhood is so colourful that I got it at quite a cheap price. And since I pay in cash and always on time the landlord is very eager to do repairs and keep me happy.”
Colourful was not how I might have described the area.
“Is it the rent on time, or possibly catching you showering that gets him in there so often?” I asked.
“He’s married and gay,” she said. “I don’t like landlords who expect sex instead of rent, so I shop around. I moved in here three years ago, and the apartment has only gotten better, the rent has never gone up. It’s great, so don’t you be looking around all pitiful-like.”
“Is it safe for you to walk around in that dress in this neighbourhood?” I asked.
“They know me,” she said.
“From… please tell me it’s from some kind of martial arts class.”
“Something like that.”
She gave me a quirk-lipped smile but didn’t divulge what it was that she meant. I kept my mouth shut because I didn’t want her to end up spilling more secrets to me unless she meant to. When I got irritable or anxious, it just came out.
“Well then, I will say nothing other than your neighbourhood has a great deal of character,” I said. “Bit like you, although you aren’t quite so dark.”
Her eyebrows raised. I watched them lift and focused on her skin colour. A flush of embarrassment came over me, and I knew a blush raised in my cheeks as I looked away quickly.
“Not what I meant,” I said in a strangled sort of voice.
I had meant dark as in a gothic or evil or dreary sense, not in that way at all. For crying out loud, the prostitute was a white woman, the dealers on the corner looked like they were also white.
The whole world kind of did a spin as I realized that I had no idea how to back peddle from what sounded like a racist comment.
“Okay then, Mr. Whiter-than-a-ghost. I’ve got your number. I’ll give you a call tomorrow or the next day.”
“Sure, are you also calling Mike?”
“We never discussed that I would be something,” Sera said. “We had fun tonight, and I hope to have fun again.”
“I know, I get that,” I said. “But, I mean, uh.”
“You two fight over everything,” Sera said, she gave me a little smile and then a shrug. “Maybe it’s time you learn to share.”
That caused me to bristle. I knew how to share. It was Mike who always threw the fit, lit the whole village on fire because he couldn’t get his way, and then dragged me down with him when Sam demanded to know whose fault this war was.
“I can share,” I said. “I just worry he might try to make you choose. But, you can handle that.”
“Are you really going to throw me under a bus?” she asked.
“No, there’s no bus. There’s no throwing either. We talked a little at a wedding and had sex. He and I, on the other hand, have been fighting since we were born. And Sam says no.”
“Just… Sam says no?”
“Yeah.”
“Like he’s God or something?”
I paused because I could hardly keep from laughing at the comparison. In the end, all I could do was swallow the lump in my throat and force myself to relax.
“In a way, that is, I suppose, what it is. Sam says we can’t argue over things. He says we aren’t allowed to be petty or bitter. If a fight happened, he would decide the outcome. You wouldn’t even realize that the decision had been made and it probably wouldn’t matter what you wanted in the end because Sam says so.”
“He kind of is like God, then.”
“Kind of.”
“But why do you listen to him? If he’s making bad choices for you, then he shouldn’t be allowed to make those decisions anymore. Just say no.”
“He’s not making bad decisions. He’s right. We shouldn’t fight about it. We shouldn’t do the things that he’s told us not to do. This all would have escalated if he hadn’t said something. And yes, it’s super controlling and creepy and so Sam. He is a controlling, crazy sort of guy. Which is why I didn’t marry him.”
That sounds weird.
I had meant that as something else, I think. I did, I swear. It just came out wrong, like I couldn’t say the right thing in front of Sera. She made me nervous and stupid, and that was a dangerous thing for a man to be.
“Would you have, really?”
“No, I’m the only one who hasn’t slept with him.”
“Wait, what?” Sera asked. “It-it-what? No, you know what, let’s ignore the whole thing and go straight for what affects me. I thought Mike was a virgin.”
“No, he’s had plenty of sex.”
And I had just divulged something that I shouldn’t have said.
In Heaven, it had been me and not Michael who had kept to himself. I hadn’t bedded anyone, I didn’t know what sexual pleasure in my native plane of existence felt like because I had been too afraid to take that step. We might have been able to do something like that on Earth, in the astral plane, but none of us were willing to take the risk.
We weren’t confident that we could un-fuse after the event. We might be permanently joined into a new creature and none of us was sure what kind of a creature that might be.
Or whether or not Father had been a result of such a joining. We weren’t about to try it, was the point.
So… in the angelic sense, I was still a virgin.
“Can still be virgin if you’ve been forced into sex,” Sera said with a shrug. “I should head up, though. Expensive car, you could get jacked out here.”
“I have insurance,” I said, glancing around the car nonetheless. “One more question and then I’ll let you go.”
“Oh?” Sera said.
“Your tattoo, where’d you get it done?”
I had to know, because of all the detail. That was not random, and not something just any human could pull off. I had seen our wings on the physical plane before, I knew what they looked like, just like the others did.
And those were angel wings on Sera’s back.
“Why? You want one like it?”
“Something like that. Not exactly like that, but I’d love a little set of wings myself. It’s some really nice work. Great details, clean lines. Hard to find a tattooist with that kind of skill.”
“She said she was an apprentice,” Sera said, sending a tingle down my spine. “I got it done for free. I wanted a back tattoo that I could show off that would be a tip grabber. This is what she did for me. Let me tell you. It was a long, painful session, but so worth it.”
“Have you had any other tattoos done?”
“Yes, I’ve got four others. She wanted to see them before we proceeded,” Sera said as she raised her hands, making a motion with her fingers.
It was sort of the… the… thing with the fingers moving up and down at different times, but at the same pace. The motion humans sometimes made when they were making ghost sounds or talking about scary witches in a sarcastic manner.
“Where was it?” I asked.
“You know the cafe off fifth street?” she asked, waiting as I nodded. “It’s around the corner and in the basement of the weird new age shop.”
I knew of the shop because it wasn’t a new age shop, it was a witch’s lair. A coven was registered in the shop. I knew about it, the others knew of it. They were registered with their council thing as well. For the life of me, I could not recall what the witches actually called their ruling party.
It might have been the joint.
Or all the drinks.
Thankfully for angels, that meant that I was a little fuzzy around the edges, even thinking like a human might. I wasn’t so impeded that I couldn’t drive, but I wasn’t in my usual state of mind.
That really helped my hesitance as I struggled. Sera likely thought I was thinking about what she had said, but I was really just trying to recall the phone number I would have to call if I found anything at the shop.
“With the crossed vortex spell in the window?” I asked.
“The thing that goes, like, with the and the,” Sera said as she made the vague motions in the air. “Yeah, under that one. Nice lady, though.”
Witch myth said they lived in candy houses for a reason. Though those myths were about dark witches, not actual witches. They were always kind to humans, but secretly, most of the time, they were hunting for sacrifices for their next spell.
At least I had a place to start looking, and an explanation as to what might have gone wrong.
I smiled and nodded as that tingle went to a throbbing of fear.
“Great, I’ll check that out.”
“Don’t get a set of wings though. They’re mine.”
No, they aren’t.
I took in a little breath and smiled as she bent for the door.
Suddenly she bent back and kissed me. The warmth of her lips was surprising, the flicker of her fingers across my cheek as the kiss deepened sent a spark of electricity through me. One that lit up my nerves in an all too familiar way.
When she pulled away, I couldn’t help but follow after.
It wasn’t until the door closed that I fully realized that she was gone. I pulled back and straightened in my car, muttering a curse at myself. I glanced back at Sera, at the door of her apartment building, and then dragged in a breath and slipped the car into drive, pulling away from the curb before I remembered that I had been angry.
Not a little angry, but a great deal so.
And then I remembered the why, and I hit my steering wheel, causing a ripple effect of some minor proportion in both the astral and physical planes that took a moment to settle back down.
My phone went off. Demon sign, it protested. Thank goodness that was what it protested, and not something else. Sam, Mike, and Gabe would all receive the same notification. None of them would look beyond that message.
Because ten minutes after receiving it, as I sat in an empty parking lot, I sent a message in telling them that I had handled the very tiny problem on my way home. I gave it another ten minutes before pulling out of the parking lot and heading home. By the time I was parked in the driveway, I was fuming again, but had better control over my anger.
It was a hot anger, instead of being a burning fury.
I left the car in the driveway with the keys on the seat. There was a distinct possibility that one of us would be banished from the estate and I wanted my vehicle out where it was easy to get to. Since I was the one walking in fuming, I would likely be the one tossed out the door.
Headed into the estate, the first person I saw was Gabe. His mouth opened but I was past him before the first sound could come out of his mouth.
“Ralph,” he called after me.
I didn’t even bother making a motion. I fought back the urge to tear through the estate like a tidal wave of fury. I resisted everything that screamed in me to let loose because I couldn’t risk another ripple. Mike came around the corner, his hands raised in a ‘stop’ motion.
“You!” I shouted.
And a little rumble got through.
I clamped down on everything, surprised that no one had raised up their questions about the wave of something. Why Sam was not suddenly right there, demanding answers as I stepped up to Mike, not giving way as Mike tried to back up.
Mike opened his mouth to say something, and I reached out and hit him. He came back up swinging, and I hit him again. And again, and again. I was pulled off of him by Samael, his fury riding high enough that paintings rattled on the walls.
“Calm down!” Sam shouted, throwing me onto the floor. “That is enough! We do not solve our disputes with our fists, like common humans!”
“He was there! Why were you there?” I shouted at Mike. “Why? One thing, I took one thing tonight for myself!”
“Looked like you took two,” Mike snarled. “Sullying yourself with a woman? Why? To try to embarrass me? And to involve Toby like that?”
“Like what?” I shouted, throwing myself off the floor.
It wasn’t until I landed, inches away from Mike, that I realized that was a bad idea. We stood toe-to-toe, noses practically touching as reality began trickling back in. It offset my fury because that dreaded trickle of fear was starting to set in.
That close to Mike, and his having access to his Heavenly weapon?
It could end very poorly.
“Like what, Michael?” I demanded, using his full name because I was angry.
“Like a common slut.”
I slapped him again and was certain that I was allowed to do so because of what he had said. Sam did not raise his voice to stop me.
In the silence that followed that echoing sound of my hand striking his face, I heard the slip of feet behind me. Then a little sound and Lilly’s quick voice, probably trying to drag Grace away.
Michael grabbed me by my face and dragged me close.
Then he kissed me.
Have I died?
His tongue slipped into my mouth, gentle and probing as the flavour of him replaced that of Sera only an hour before. My entire being caught fire, flashing in brilliant little bursts of energy as the heat of him overwhelmed me.
As suddenly as it had started, it ended.
Mike pulled away, wiping his bottom lip as he did so.
“Just as I suspected,” he said as I wavered. “No better than a human. Is that what gets you wet, Raphael? My tongue in your mouth? You moaning like a mortal in heat? Really? Have you no shame?”
“Fuck you, Michael,” I said.
Then I burst into tears and ran away.
I’m not proud of it. Even as it was happening, I knew it was a very weak thing to do. Running from Mike never solved anything, all he ever understood was a blunt instrument to his skull. Even Sam had put his head into a wall or two to get the point across.
But I ran away anyhow.
I couldn’t go back to my room, but I felt restrained at the very idea of it, I needed to be free, I wanted to feel the wind beneath my wings and cruise up on high, so high that humans thought I was a shooting star.
With modern technology, that was no longer an option. Humans would spot me on their little machines, and it’d be a terrible mess.
I could have gone to my date’s room, but she was locked in for a reason. Being in the room would keep her from possibly hurting herself. She had food and water and everything she could possibly need. She would be safe and comfortable for the night, but it also meant that I wouldn’t be. I had no place else I could run to.
Halfway to my room, I realized that I was going there out of habit and that slinking to my room would only make my mood worse. It settled over me like storm clouds on a sunny day, except it was already a pretty shitty ending to my night. I turned on my heel and headed in the other direction, then stopped and huffed out an annoyed breath because my second go-to place was usually Sam’s room.
Except since Grace had been spending more time with us, that was no longer an option. She came first, and I understood why Grace came first, but I couldn’t help but feel a little jealous.
I stopped and huffed out a breath.
It had been about twenty minutes since the argument, and I was still stuck and didn’t know what to do with myself.
Lilly walked around the corner, set her weight on her hip and gave me a look as one eyebrow raised up in annoyance. Her lips pressed into a thin line as if to ask me if I were really stupid enough to let him win.
It was the same look she had given me several centuries previous, right before she had turned me into a woman and we had gone shopping.
The others could say what they pleased about that month in the female form. I had a blast.
“What’s your poison?” she asked. “Literally, we can get you actual poison.”
“In the middle of a hallway?” I snapped.
“No, silly, in the hot tub. Grace is headed that way with whatever alcohol she can carry.”
“I’m not a woman,” I said.
“Doesn’t matter, he was a dick. We can’t, I mean there aren’t… are you going to make me have this debate now, Ralph?”
“Raphael,” I snapped. “All through history, I have been Raphael, but they hear one human refer to vomiting as ralphing, and suddenly I’m Ralph. No. My name is Raphael, and I am an angel of the Lord!”
“Did… did your voice just…?”
“Just what?”
“Just do the arc-angel-fear-my-wrath thing?”
“No.”
“Really? Because it sounded like it did.”
“No, how could it? None of us is proper arc anymore,” I said.
Lilly eyed me suspiciously. She made a face that strongly implied that she didn’t believe me, then made an annoyed, but agreeing sound.
“If you’re Raphael, I want to be Lillith again. Fear my cunt, bitches.”
“All men fear your cunt. They don’t know what to do with a woman who doesn’t spread her legs for any man.”
She smiled at me. “Come on, Raphael. Grace has a lot of alcohol, and none of us has anywhere to be for a few days.”