The new house was gorgeous. Built on stately lines, it still maintained a lovely Southwestern feel with the stucco and judicious use of mosaic tiles. The entry was done in terracotta and cream, warm without being busy. Chuch’s personality shone in the various frogs displayed at prominent positions in the front room; he’d lost his entire collection in the fire, but he had been busy replacing them. I remembered him telling me frogs were good luck, and that was why he liked them.
Maybe that’s my problem. Lack of frogs.
Eva came running down the hall, already slim again. This woman was incredibly beautiful with golden skin, shining black hair, and darkly liquid eyes. She greeted me with a huge hug, which I returned with a touch of desperation. We exchanged greetings, and then she hugged Booke too. Unlike Chuch, she didn’t react to his age or his frail appearance. Kel got a friendly wave, not that I blamed her. He was rather imposing, not the sort of male you touched without an invitation. I could hardly believe I’d slept with him, in fact, or that he’d chosen to console me.
“Are you hungry?” she asked. “I have tamales in the fridge. It will only take a minute to heat them.”
“Please.” My stomach felt fine at the moment.
“Is Cami asleep?” Chuch wanted to know.
“Just got her down. She’ll meet everyone in the morning.” Eva got busy in the kitchen, dishing up green sauce and cream to go with the tamales.
I sat down on a pretty stool near the bar. “Thank you for this. You’ll never know what it means to have somebody who’s just always here for me, no questions asked.”
“Oh, there will be questions,” she said, aiming a wooden spoon at me. “Believe that. But food first. Then we’ll talk.”
Truth & Consequences
I actually told the story over our late supper, with Booke filling in where I faltered. It was a little awkward repeating his story, but by the time they had the gist, Chuch and Eva were exchanging significant glances. Then she drew me aside.
“You brought him here to die?”
“What else could I do?” I asked. “It was his last request.”
“I don’t know . . . fix it. Isn’t that kind of your thing? Finding solutions when anybody else would give it up as a lost cause?”
I closed my eyes. “I don’t have the fight in me anymore, Eva. Chance died. Do you get that? I just can’t throw myself at monsters anymore. If”—here, my voice broke, and tears threatened—“he’s really gone, then I can’t make his sacrifice worth nothing. I have to live for him. He made me promise.”
“Oh, nena, I’m sorry.” She pulled me to her in a tight hug, and I worked not to lose it on her shoulder. After a minute, I tapped her arm to let her know I had it under control, then she stepped back.
“Don’t blame Corine,” Booke said then. “My hearing is perfectly adequate. It’s my joints that seem to be seizing up.”
“We should all get some sleep,” Chuch put in. “We won’t solve this in the middle of the night.”
From his expression, he still hadn’t given up on the idea of saving our mutual friend . . . and that was fine with me. If Chuch could fix it, fine. Let one of his hundred cousins sort out the problem. I just . . . I couldn’t. My tank was empty; I had nothing left to give.
Eva settled Booke and I in the two guest bedrooms; Kel volunteered to sleep on the couch. I couldn’t think anymore about Booke’s problems, or what Kel’s archangel wanted from me, or what would come to pass if I held firm in my refusal. Grim, muddled thoughts occupied my mind as I brushed my teeth. Given my general misery, I expected to toss and turn, but exhaustion claimed me as soon as I hit the bed.
Overhead, the sun shone like molten gold, beaming down on a verdant field dotted with yellow flowers. Jonquils, I thought, though I lacked my mother’s affinity for such things. In the distance, a smooth gray lake lapped up against a rocky shore, and across the span of the water, a trio of mountains rose in stately majesty. Pale mist wreathed their peaks, cloaking the tops from view. I spun in a slow circle, wondering where I was, but the landscape gave no clue. I had no memory of leaving the bed, no clue how I’d gotten here, but the grass felt real and crisp beneath my bare feet, lightly damp with morning dew. Despite the sweetness of the honeyed air, I had to be asleep; Booke had no reason to contact me this way anymore. Nor did I feel the familiar tingle of a lucid dream. Which meant this hyper-vivid dream was something else.
Movement through the yellow flowers caught my eye. Perhaps I should’ve been afraid, but I stepped forward with more curiosity than I’d felt since returning to the real world. My pace quickened until I was running, and then I saw him.
Chance.
Here, he was whole and uninjured, as he had been before the dagger, before the blood. Before he died for me. Clad in white, his black hair gleamed with a hint of blue beneath the sunlight, and his tawny skin contrasted beautifully with the loose white clothing he wore. His smile widened as he drew closer; I realized belatedly that I was wearing a T-shirt and panties, exactly what I’d had on when I fell asleep. No wonder he looked so amused.
“This isn’t real,” I said, expecting disbelief to pop the dream like a soap bubble.
“I’ve learned a great deal,” he answered. “So I will simply say that reality is subjective.”
It was so hard to look at him, knowing when I woke he would still be gone. I’d still be alone. We’d finally made the pieces fit in Sheol, and then I lost him. The hurt went through me like a barbed blade, leaving bloody rents in my heart all over again. I didn’t know if I could bear waking.