Miracle (boyxboy)

Chapter Thirty-One

Ezra kept asking about school, but I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want to lie and say it had been great. Brides of Heaven was still a safer place for me than here at the apartment, and it wasn't like it was unbearable there. I didn't want him worrying about me all day when he needed to work.

First thing he'd done when we got home was change my bandages, and scold me for all the cracks I'd put into the healing skin. He had me take more painkillers and proceeded to apply extra ointment over every inch of my back, then carefully bandaged me up again.

"I'll make you some food," he said, and because of the state of my back he wouldn't allow me to help. So I sat on the sofa and watched him boil water for ramen—which he did just by holding the handle of the pot, without even turning the stove on.

All I could hear in the back of my mind was Jordan bragging about what a good cook she was. I must have been sulking, because when he set the bowls of steaming noodles on the coffee table, he gave me a concerned look.

"Did you want something different? I could—"

"No, this is good," I said quickly, and reached for the dish in front of me. He stood there watching uncertainly, like he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do to cheer me up. Gah, I'd been feeling awkward and out of place all day, and it wasn't fair to be making him feel that way too, especially in his own house.

I pointed at his computer monitor. "Can that play movies?"

"Yeah."

"Let's watch one together. Can we?"

He sat down next to me on the sofa, and the monitor blinked to life in response to his thoughts. "What do you want to see?"

"Do you have Star Wars?" It was my go-to when I was feeling down.

He put it on, and the moment the classic theme song started playing my mood improved. We ate our noodles through the opening scenes.

When we got to the part where Obi-Wan delivered his iconic These aren't the droids you're looking for line, I was struck with a thought. "The Force is a lot like what you guys can do, huh? I wonder if George Lucas ever met a Nephilim."

"What if I told you he's one of us?"

I nearly leapt off the sofa in excitement. "No way! Are you serious?!" I turned to see Ezra's eyes twinkling at me a bit, in spite of his deadpan expression. At the same moment I realized that was impossible. George Lucas was a genius storyteller, but even in Hollywood, people would have noticed if he'd failed to age like a normal human. "Are you teasing me right now?"

Ezra just put noodles in his mouth innocently. But then one of his eyebrows bobbed up and down. I burst out laughing and pushed him. "Hey!"

He swallowed and set his bowl down. "You're smiling again."

I was, wasn't I? But more than that, I was struck by the knowledge that he'd wanted to make me smile. That warmed me all the way to my toes, and now I couldn't stop grinning.

Ezra nodded at the computer monitor. "A Jedi has more power than a Nephilim. More like an angel."

"Speaking of which, in Elioud Studies Ms. Alorel said angels are capable of somnial psychogenic fertilization. Can they really do that?"

"Mm. Angels aren't bound by flesh and bone, so the laws of Creation—physics, biology—don't apply to them. They can possess a living creature's body and do just about anything they want to it. Heal it, curse it, wear it like a suit. They can make it pregnant if it has a female reproductive system. Though because of the delicate processes involved, it only works if the creature is human, and unconscious."