Александра Адорнетто - Halo

The water was lapping around my waist by the time Ivy and Gabriel found me. I was shivering, but I hardly noticed. I didn’t move or speak, not even when Gabriel lifted me out of the water and carried me back to our house. Ivy helped me into the shower, and came to help me out half an hour later when I’d forgotten where I was and just stood under the pounding water.

Gabriel brought me some dinner, but I couldn’t eat it. I sat on my bed, staring into space and doing nothing but thinking of Xavier and trying not to think of him at the same time. The separation made me realize just how safe I felt with him. I craved his touch, his smell, even the awareness that he was nearby. But now he felt miles away, and I couldn’t reach him, and that knowledge made me feel ready to crumble, to cease to exist.

When sleep finally came, it was a blissful relief, even though I knew that in the morning it would start all over again. But I was haunted even in my dreams. That night they took a darker turn.

I dreamed I was outside the lighthouse on Shipwreck Coast. It was dark and I could hardly see through the fog, but there was a figure crumpled on the ground. When he moaned and rolled over, I instantly recognized Xavier’s face. I cried out and tried to run to him, but a dozen pairs of clammy hands reached out and held me back. Jake Thorn strode out from the lighthouse, his eyes as bright and sharp as broken glass. His dark hair was slicked away from his face, and he was dressed in a long black leather coat with the collar turned up against the 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.