When Death Loved an Angel (6 page)

Chapter Ten

ANGEL

Nyra watched almost patiently as the nurse checked Gregan’s vitals, but her mind was on his brother. She
felt as though she betrayed the man on the bed because she wanted to rush out after his brother who had been so distraught at her confession of love that he left without a word. She had some explaining to do, but she didn’t know where to start.

She shouldn’t love Gregan. She knew that. She looked down at his still face as the nurse moved about the room, humming something that sounded like death metal, quite an ironic choice given ever
ything that had been happening. She found herself wishing that she knew the words so she could sing along.

“What is wrong with
me?” she asked aloud.

Nobody answered. That was the problem with being an angel. If you weren’t giving promptings you were just speaking to yourself.

She glanced at the bed to see if there was a chance Gregan was listening. Nope. She was crazy.

Nyra put a hand to her head. It was almost time for the Accounting bell. She could feel it like a gentle hum through her body, rising in time with the nurse’s words as he gave up humming enti
rely and began to sing out loud, “Believe, it’s a simple phrase. Eyes that remain ever open. It’s your eyes that cannot lie.”

The nurse did a few air
guitar motions, then continued in a whispered scream, “Clarity rain down on me, sit beside me, walk with me, open the doors to sanity, walk with me.”

He leaned close to the heart monitor and jotted a few notes in Gregan’s chart as he sang, “As I came down from h
eaven, the future’s brighter, but the past still calls. The choices are before me and I face the darkness with only a flame.”

He threw the chart on the floor and put a foot on the window seal. With his head closed and air guitar in his hands, he shouted, “
And who said it’s easy when you’re surrounded by all this fear? I’m trusting in something that I’ve never seen. Push as they pull, you played the fool, it’s been too long. You must stand strong.”

The door flew open. Nyra put a hand to her face to hide a smile at the irate expression on the head nurse’s face.

“What is going on in here?” she demanded.

The male nurse’s face turned red. He noticed the chart on the floor and dropped to his knees to gather the spilled contents. “I, uh, I. . . .” He looked up at her sheepishly, pushing a strand of dark brown hair from his eyes. “I’ll never do it again?”

She grimaced but couldn’t stay mad at his pleading smile. “I better not hear that kind of music in this hospital ever again,” she warned.

“You won’t,” he replied. He stood and handed her the chart.

She took it from his hands with a huff, slid it into the pocket by the door, and left the room.

As soon as she was gone, the male nurse sang in a quieter voice, “
Believe, it’s a simple phrase. Eyes that remain ever open. It’s your eyes that cannot lie.”

He fell into humming again, leaving the last phrase
sounding over and over again in the room. One of the monitors gave a beep. The nurse glanced at it, then took the chart from the door and jotted down a note. “Well, at least Mr. Parker likes my singing,” he said. “Catch ya later, dude.” He slipped the chart back into the holder and left through the door.

Nyra hurried over to the chart. She wanted more than anything to see what the nurse had written. The numbers on the mon
itors meant nothing to her, but after another failed Accounting session, she returned and watched them long into the night, hoping to hear the beep again.

Chapter Eleven

DEATH

Death opened his eyes to a new set of names. Gregan Parker’s glared back at him, bold and angry at the top of the list. Death ignored it and began his work, freeing souls methodically as he made his way through the names.

Near the middle of the list, he read Julia Mills. The name quivered as he
walked through one of the nicer areas of the city. He found a mother and daughter strolling through a mall together. The mother, Julia, held a bag of popcorn and the daughter, who couldn’t be older than five, snuck kernels when she thought her mom wasn’t looking.

Death watched them, taken by the happy scene. He was puzzled as to the cause of Julia’s death.
She appeared healthy and young, an active mother enjoying her daughter’s company.

Death was about to turn away
when a rumble filled the mall. People screamed as the ground began to shake. It was a city unused to earthquakes, and no one knew what to do. Glass storefronts shattered, mannequins in expensive clothing toppled to the ground, the skylights of the mall shifted and broke, sending glass and wooden beams raining down on the rushing crowds. Screams and cries for help filled the air.

Death lost sight of Julia and her daughter for a moment. When he spotted them, Julia was trapped under a corner of ceiling
that had fallen from the second story. She didn’t appear to be in a horrible condition until Death drew close enough to see a piece of rebar sticking straight through her stomach. His knees weakened though they shouldn’t have. He shouldn’t feel any weakness at all. It was all he could do to force himself to Julia’s side. Her daughter held her hand, pleading with her.

“Are you alright, Mommy? Someone will help you get out. You’ll be okay. Trust me, Mommy. I’ll take care of you while you get better.” She held her mother’s hand, unwilling to look at the bar through her mom’s stomach or the way
Julia’s eyes drifted past her unseeing.

Death stood above them. Julia’s name was on the list. Chaos thundered all around, but Death felt as if he and two girls were the only beings in existence. He knelt slowly next to the little girl. He was about to reach out to Julia when the little girl looked up into his face. Her bright blue eyes were filled with tears, but they hadn’t spilled over yet. Her little lip quivered, but she was being strong for her mother. She was being strong for all of them.

“Don’t take her.” The little girl’s voice was a whisper, but it carried over every other sound in the mall. Dust drifted through the air, debris lay underfoot, and the discord of a thousand distressed voices mingled in the air; all Death heard was that little voice, pleading for him to leave her mother.

“She,” he began, but his throat felt
tight and thick. He tried again. “She can’t make it, not like that.” He gestured to the rod sticking out of Julia’s stomach.

“Fix it,” the little girl pleaded. “I know you can do it.”

He shook his head and his tears spilled over the same time that hers did. “I can’t heal people. I take them away to somewhere they won’t hurt.”

“But I don’t want my mommy to go,” the girl sobbed. “I need her and she needs me. We’re a team. She says so all the time.”

Before Death could move, the little girl buried her face against his chest and wrapped her arms around him. He sat there frozen, afraid to move, afraid to touch her. His touch meant death. He was Death.  He couldn’t help her. Julia’s name was written on his arm.

Like another name
, the voice in his mind said.

The girl’s embrace had caught his sleeve, pushing it up to where the remaining names were visible
. Gregan Parker’s name sat at the top in dark black, a bold reminder of his failure.

Julia gave a little cry of pain. Her daughter left Death sitting there and knelt by her
mother. Sirens sounded outside the mall. Fire engines and ambulances had arrived. Emergency teams began to pour into the building.

Julia’s daughter wiped the tears from her mother’s face. She smoothed back the black hair that matched her own, lovingly tucking her mother’s hair behind her ear as her mother had no doubt done many times before with her daughter. Julia’s hand reached up to grasp her daughter’s. The little girl looked back at Death. Her eyes were bright and unafraid. There was no fear in them, only
pleading. “Please?” she asked in that tiny voice that rang louder than any other sound in the mall.

EMTs swarmed the little group. Death stepped back, giving them room. The little girl held his gaze with her own. When technicians turned to see what she was looking at, they saw only bare space filled with drifting dust. “Please?” the little girl asked again.

Death nodded. The name on his arm gave a sharp throb. He ignored it. EMTs worked on Julia. The little girl no longer watched Death. Convinced that her mother was safe, she did what she could to answer the medical team’s questions all the while holding her mother’s hand. A smile was on her face that seemed far out of place given the situation, but to Death, that smile held all the answers in the world.

He turned and walked from the mall, his chest filled with regret, but not regret for the uncompleted list, regret that Julia’s name had been on it in the first place. A mother of a little girl didn’t deserve to die.

***

Death walked through the closed door of the hospital and into Gregan Parker’s room. Nyra looked up as soon as he entered. “You’re ruining me,” he said in a tone that was more resigned than accusatory.

“I know you’ve given Gregan more time. It’s just not enough,” Nyra said. Her fingers twisted together, giving away her anxiety.

“It’ll never be enough,” Death said quietly.

“What was that?”
She took a step closer.

He shook his head, a faint motion of shadow amid the darkness. “I let a woman live today.”

Nyra’s hand flew to her mouth, but she kept silent, sensing he had more to tell her.

“She had a daughter. The girl saw me; she pleaded for her mother’s life.” He bowed his head. “I just couldn’t do it.”

The angel made no sound when she crossed to him, but a warning called in the back of his mind. He looked up just as she reached for his face. He flashed to the other side of the room faster than either of them knew he could. “Don’t ever touch me!” he barked in a voice that made her jump.

Just as no one could withstand Death’s smile, his voice in anger was enough to make grown men cry. Nyra cowered by Gregan’s bed, fear bright in her green eyes.

Death rubbed the back of his neck. He took a step toward her. “Nyra, I-” When she shrank away, it stole what was left of his self-control. He let out a growl of fury that shorted out every monitor in the room. They reset just as the nurses rushed in, but Death was long gone.

Chapter Twelve

ANGEL

Nyra stared at the closed door. Fear still hammered in her ears, a remnant of Death’s angry outburst. The nurses had been baffled by the monitors; they brought in two replacements even though those that had shorted out worked just fine after Death’s departure.

Betsy came in a short while later. A nurse followed her into the room. “Dr. Stevenson said he is doing better than expected,” the nurse said with a warm smile.

Tears glittered brightly in Betsy’s eyes, but she refused to let them fall. Nyra’s heart went out to the woman. When she and Gregan had been together, Nyra couldn’t stand being around them because the woman made Gregan so much happier than she ever could. He didn’t even know Nyra existed. Yet seeing how Betsy’s heart ached and how desperately she wanted Gregan to get better, Nyra couldn’t help feeling a kinship toward the woman. The nurse’s words made them both feel relieved.

Nyra wandered down the hall to let Betsy have some time with Gregan. She figured Death wouldn’t be returning soon after his outburst.

His actions puzzled her. Death was nothing like she had imagined. He was scary for sure, and intense. He was volatile and unpredictable. Yet he was far different from the heartless cold shadow she had expected. There was something about his eyes, so deep and heartbreaking as though the lives he took ate at him inside. He said he loved what he did, but there was cynicism in his voice as though even he didn’t believe his words.

The look on his face when she had reached out to touch him was burned into her mind. He had been angry, furious, but it wasn’t directed at her. Even his words were defensive, protecting her instead of himself. He had been afraid for her when she was trying to comfort him. In the depths of his heartache and loss, the confusion of whatever he was going through, he had still been watching out for her.

Nyra stared out the hospital window to the rushing street beyond. People drove past in cars and trucks, pedaled bicycles, and walked by the hospital as though the big white building didn’t exist. Was it easier for them to not think about the pain and suffering of the individuals within the walls because there was nothing they could do about it?

A mother stood
at a stoplight waiting for it to change. She held the hand of her young son as she talked to another woman pushing a stroller. Nyra’s heart slowed when the little boy worked his hand free and took a step toward the busy intersection. The mother gestured with her hand, unaware of her son’s danger.

Nyra walked through the glass and hurried to the mother’s side. The women continued to talk, their attention on their conversation as the boy stepped down from the curb. Nyra didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t talk to the woman and there were no other angels present. A car was hurling toward the corner, intent on a right turn.

Warn her
.

The prompting felt like a gentle pressure, freeing Nyra from her insubstantial state.

“Look at your son,” Nyra whispered in the woman’s ear.

The mother’s eyes widened and she spun around, looking frantically for her boy. “Matthew!” she cried. She grabbed his arm and pulled him back just as the car rushed around the corner.

“Oh my goodness,” the mother said, checking her son over quickly. “I can’t believe I let you go.” She gathered him up in a hug. The little boy giggled, unaware of the danger he had been in.

The other mother hugged them both. “That was so scary,” she exclaimed.

“Never again,” the mother vowed. She gathered her son up in her arms and held him close as though she would never let him go again. “That was too close.”

Nyra made her way slowly back to the hospital. It felt so good to feel a prompting again, to feel like she could make a difference. Even though the prompting hadn’t been toward Gregan, she had helped someone. Even Betsy’s continued presence in Gregan’s room couldn’t make her smile fade. Nyra stood near the window and watched the empty intersection, grateful no one had been hurt.