Blood and Angels

The Truth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IY8rOSyR5Rw (Song to go with the part) Little Talks- Of Monsters And Men

"I didn't think..." Alex began between kisses, but Damian cut her off.

"Shh," he said, "you don't need to."

They continued like that until Damian suddenly stopped. He backed away. "Alex, I have to tell you something. I should've told you before, but I guess I didn't know how."

"Okay?" She said, sitting alone on the counter top. Damian avoided her eyes.

"I'll just be blunt with it. Do you remember the day that I found you in the alley?"

"Yes." She said, recalling the day.

"I didn't find you. You found me, and I just came and got you." He vaguely explained.

"Damian, you're not making any sense. What's going on?"

Damian ran a hand through his dark hair and sighed. "There's only one way to say this. I'm not who you think I am. Do you... do you remember Samuel?"

Alex was taken aback. How did he know about Samuel? Surely she hadn't told him about him, had she? She hadn't told anyone about the short period of time during which she thought she was going crazy. "How do you know about him?"

"He was an angel, right? Consoled you and talked to you, but you said you could never love him because he was just a voice in your head. You asked him to get a physical form." Damian said.

Alex was shocked nearly into silence. "I've never told anyone about that- how could you possibly know about Samuel?"

"Alex, that's not the point. I want you to think about this. Who sees angels? What sane person sees angels?" Damian said quickly, clearly sincere. Alex didn't know how to react.

"They don't! No sane person can see and talk to angels, which is why I never told anyone about him!" She shouted. Once she realized she was shouting, she took a deep breath and quieted down.

"Wrong answer. One type of person sees angels, and it's an obvious answer once you hear it." Damian informed her. She looked at him skeptically.

"What type of person is that?"

"A dying one." He said. Alex blinked. What was he saying? Was she dying? How did he know about all of this? "Alex, the reason you could see Samuel is because you were dying. When you're dying, you can see angels- just a little taste of what comes afterwards. That day in the alley... you died, Alex. You took that knife to your throat."

Alex couldn't breathe. What was he talking about? She was dead? But that wasn't possible- she was here, in his apartment, wasn't she? She'd gone back to her father's house, and he was still alive. "No, I'm not. Look at this, I'm here, in your apartment! I'm living, I'm breathing, and I've been doing so for seventeen years!"

"Alex," Damian said soothingly, "feel your pulse."

Reluctantly, Alex raised a hand to her throat, where she searched for the beating of her heart. Nothing. She tried her wrist. Nothing. She even put a hand to her heart to see if she could feel it there, but there was nothing. So he was right.

"Then why are you here? If I'm dead, then how did you get here? Why do you know about Samuel?" She asked. Damian didn't answer. Instead, he took her hands in his and lifted her face to his. Suddenly, he didn't look like Damian anymore. He didn't have his shaggy, clean-cut black hair and dark eyes, nor did he have his moonlight pale skin or tired face. Standing before her was a boy with uncut brown hair and eyes the color of the forest, with skin turned nearly brown by the sun, broad-shouldered and lean, wearing a suede jacket and dirt-clad blue jeans. Samuel.

Alex blinked. No, this isn't possible, she thought. Samuel was a voice inside her head, a face in the mirror, a figment of her imagination that she had unintentionally shut out months ago. Damian was real, Damian was the boy that had stopped her from committing suicide and cared for her for weeks on end with no arguments or oppositions. This? This was all a dream. She'd wake up on Damian's couch, wearing his too-big-for-her shirt, wrapped up in a blanket he'd given her, the sunlight shining through the window, marking the dawn of a new day. Damian would be cooking breakfast in the kitchen and she would tell him about a crazy dream she'd had.

No. This was reality. Damian never existed. It was all Samuel. Samuel, who hadn't saved her. Samuel, who hadn't even told her she was going to kill herself. Samuel, who had had her so confused for so long, and informed her that there was a little bit of Hell even in Heaven. He had no idea.

"Why didn't you tell me?" She demanded, pulling her hands out of his.

"I didn't want you to be hurt." Samuel said. Even his voice was different from Damian's- lower, yet softer. "I didn't want you to go through more pain than you already have."

"And you think I wouldn't have found out eventually?" Alex demanded, but who was she kidding? She never would have found out. "Why didn't you tell me I was dying? Why didn't you try to stop me?"

"I..." Samuel tried to muster the words, but he couldn't seem to find them. "Oh, what the heck. I love you, Alex, I couldn't find the nerve to tell you you were dying."

"But you could just let me kill myself? What kind of a messed up person are you? To tell me you love me, but not do anything to deserve it returned?"

"I kept you happy. I didn't make you leave. I let you believe that you had another shot, and cared for you, and consoled you, and kept you company in your dying months. Is there something else you wanted me to do, because you didn't spend much time thinking about how you were going to die." Samuel informed her.

"I didn't ask for you to get into my head and screw with my thoughts until I died. I didn't ask for your help."

"Yeah, but I was going to give it to you anyways. You know why? Because it was my job! I was supposed to guide you to Heaven and get you all settled in, and I am breaking way too many laws to be lectured right now! I impersonated someone. I fell in love with you, and I let you return to your home for just a moment, because you wanted to!"

"You think I wanted to be beaten bloody? You think I wanted to be tricked like this?"

"I told you," he said more calmly than before, "there's a little bit of Hell even in Heaven."

"There's no such thing as Heaven, alright?" She shouted angrily. "If there was then maybe I would've been saved a long time ago! If God existed, I would have had a better life, would I not?"

"I told you, I don't believe in God. I just work for Heaven."

"That doesn't make any sense!" She began to cry again. Alex had a feeling she'd pass out from lack of water soon enough. "I can't be dead. That's not possible- I never took that knife to my throat- Damian stopped me!"

"Alex," Samuel dialed down his tone so that it was more of a comforting whisper as he came forward to hug her, "this is Heaven. We don't let you remember your death here. That would be too cruel."

Samuel's comforting grasp was the same as Damian's. She felt safe in his arms like she was being protected. Watched over. Maybe Samuel was a nice person. Beyond looks, he was still Damian. And she trusted Damian, so why not Samuel?

Over time, she came to terms with her death and realized that Samuel was Damian after all. She came to love Samuel in the same way that she loved Damian, and lived out a decent life in Heaven. Samuel had explained that her personal Heaven was a stranger's apartment because it was a place that she could start over- a place that she could get away from it all and begin a new life. That was what she'd wanted most when she was alive, so that's what she got in death. She was happy where she ended up and she was happy where she'd be forever more, in the arms of the angel that had tried to save her.

The arms of Samuel the Blind.