Celestial Heartbeat (Book One) COMPLETE

Chapter Twelve - Fate

Ren wouldn't admit it, but he wanted my help. No, he needed it.

This was what fate was.

It was like when I had happened to wake up too early the morning that Ren required help. That was fate. Like the prince stumbling upon Sleeping Beauty. Even though I was sure Ren would be sick of that analogy. Now that his curse was going to be the death of him, I was discovering powers that could potentially help him. Sylvie had said there might be dark magic that could help. What were the odds?

I wondered if dark magic could really take a big toll as she claimed.

I didn't plan on using it. Not really. But it was something to look into. Especially if it meant saving someone's life.

I was beginning to like Ren. When you got him to shake off his tough guy act he could actually be nice and genuine, caring even. The guilt would consume me if his curse got to him and there was something I could have done to help him. Even if I couldn't help him with magic, I could help him by being a friend. Someone to vent to, though I doubted he'd do that.

I could be his distraction.

I guess that's why Ren kissed me. A distraction. A form of intimacy he wouldn't get much before... Well before his curse claimed him.

I think I'd kiss people a lot in that situation, too. To show them I cared. To make an impact.

I decided that that's why I kissed him back. I don't know why we insisted on making things awkward between us though. Our relationship was already messed up without adding kissing into the equation. Up until a few days ago I had shuddered at the thought of spending time with Ren, his moods and his stares.

Now, though, it wasn't a bad thought.

Even when we were being jerks to each other, it was amusing to hear his come backs and words.

I hadn't had a new friend in such a long time. Vi was my only true friend and I knew her too well to be surprised or overly amused by her words. There was nothing wrong with this. In fact, in most ways me and Vi’s bond was a blessing. But even I could not deny the allure of something new and shiny dangled in front of me.

I didn’t know what Ren really thought of me, but I had started to see him as a friend. And because of this, I had to do what I could to help Ren.

**

I had to wait for my mum to have a night shift at the hospital before I could go for a hunt through dad’s old things. Mum refused to touch most of his things, especially the piles of journals and books that he kept. She hated it if I so much as looked at most of his things. Dad had a love of books. To an almost unhealthy degree. He worked and pretty much single-handedly ran the city library in town and many people would swear that he'd read every single book in there at least once. I used to believe that, too, until I realized how impossible it was. Whatever time he wasn't spending at the library he spent reading and writing amazing stories. Stories that I was now beginning to question the truth of. 
I still believed that dad hadn't seemed magical. Hell, the man could barely boil an egg without burning it, and he used to blame his farts on our old cat, the one that he'd named Officer Chubs. He was no good with numbers either. But his stories... His stories were sort of the sort of magic that could never be real. He would write about fairies and trolls, witches and goblins, curses and spells. He would write about the wolves in our town too, after I showed interest in them. I couldn't remember them that well, since it'd been ten years since I'd heard any of them read to me, but I was beginning to think that words like ‘Caster’ had been carefully side stepped in my father’s writing and for good reason.

I'd wanted to read them again. I wanted to read them every day that went by without his return. Everything about them held dads voice tucked deeply inside of them, like a part of his soul resided in his carefully crafted words. Mum held me back from them. She'd been too scared to delve into dads things, and she refused to let me do it myself. I'd resented her for it at first. But she needed to heal too, so wanting to help her, I'd left it alone, pushing the thoughts to the back of my mind.