Despite what he’d just endured for the sake of their shared company these past months, he still raised a shaking hand to call Reevah. She was the only person he could call. Because regardless of all his community work, regardless of his cheerful disposition and how his congregation adored him, Camniel didn’t have any friends. Not really. He knew too well the dangers of getting attached to humans and he tried to avoid it, to not make the same mistake twice.
But he’d made it again, perhaps even worse. And that was why they’d come for him.
Camniel’s excellent service and devotion had saved him last time. They took pity- as much pity as Heaven could in affairs that higher angels didn’t truly understand- and gave him a stern warning. Their advice had been to move and resettle away from such a silly misdemeanor. The slate had been wiped clean and he’d worked dutifully ever since, loving and guiding humans while keeping them at arms length.
He’d never thought, never even suspected that a demon would slip past his defenses so spectacularly. But Heaven noticed his regular association with one and they were not happy. Camniel’s pleas fell on deaf ears as his fellow archangels landed their blows with fists and blades, all the while telling him how lucky he was not to be stripped of his rank or his wings. The Almighty preached forgiveness, after all, so they said. But a strong example still had to be made. After which he would be expected to return to his post and prepare for the coming Armageddon.
Crumpled on the floor and leaning heavily against the sofa, he’d simply stared into space after calling Reevah, not even sure what he’d said to her. He couldn’t remember. He might not have said more than her name, but that alone was enough. She would know.
Yet he winced at the sound of her voice, as sharply as he did at the bleeding wounds that covered him. Because despite the comfort of her presence- fancy that becoming something he took comfort from- he knew that this…this was a warning for her too. A wake up call.
The angel forced himself to turn around, letting his exhausted gaze meet hers as he tilted his head back against the sofa. Lips twitched into a weak smile, a pale shadow of his usual bright expression. His voice was just as subdued, the cheerful bounce gone from his words. Though for now, he only uttered one.
A lot could be said about the act of falling, especially coming from the likes of her. Falling, in any sort of situation, has a moment where you just know things won’t be the same, in a while, or ever again. You fall from a great height, you break a bone, a couple of months pass before you walk like you used to. You imagine that one last step in the staircase, you will feel insecure until the lights are on and the knot in your gut disappears. Or you could fall for someone—and by God, don’t we all know the kind of consequences there is for such an act? Perhaps, perhaps you don’t. But between the slip and the full acknowledgment of the damage there’s a gradient there that sometimes goes too fast to be noticed, a dawning of what the falling means that concentrated such an array of experiences, of emotions, of a POTENTIAL kind of pain that isn’t comparable from one case to another. From one moment to the next.
From what was happening to her now and every experience she had ever gone through in her entire, turbulent existence.
Reevah was greeted by him and it was like the waves receding before a catastrophe. Silent. Hollow—a little cold, perhaps. Tickling in the edges and numbing above all else. Making it hard to breathe, harder by the minute. Harder when everything in her, those spaces that shock emptied just like that, suddenly got filled with rage, and heat, and the deadliest of intentions. With what she would do to anyone, ANYONE, whoever dared to lay a hand on him, what she fantasized of doing to the ones that already did. The ones who—GOD. She knew it. She could feel it in her, how sparks burned in her eyes, how tears tarnished her face and how her trembling limbs threatened with action; with running, with revenge. How a bit of that impulse reaches the surface when she turns to the door, stopping halfway, knowing that she did things like that most of the time, doing before even thinking. But not now. Not right now. Not with him in that state, no, just no—
“I—I need… fuck, I—give me a second, I…” Fuck. Fuck it, fuck. The guilt she felt and the pure state of her rage demanded so many things from her in that minute. To punch a wall, scream. To beat up someone and cry, really cry. Lost yourself in crying. But—could she be that selfish? Was she going to focus on herself when that angel was right there, struggling with the state of his body, could she—? When he had called her for God knows why, for fear or in need of a little help? No, she didn’t want to be that person anymore. She didn’t want to keep running or give in to the primal urges of her nature. She wanted to help, not knowing how just yet, but she wanted to. And while hard, Reevah kept her promise and only took a few more seconds to calm herself down; hand pressured against her mouth and deep breaths with closed eyes. Thinking of him. Simply thinking of him, as hard as she could.
“How could they...?” She mutters, when she is ready. When she turned her eyes to him and he got a chance to catch all the fear she has in her. A step, then another. She goes to him and kneels by his side, her hands carefully reaching for him, looking for all the bruises and cuts that such injustice had left on his skin. On his face, when her thumb traced his cheek and went down the side of his neck. His shoulders, his arms. When she took both of his hands, imagined what his clothes hid concerning his wounds. How many of them had been? How much could she repair without getting in trouble?
Did she even care if she did?
“Ok. Ok, uh—I can work on a few of these, okay? I can, you’ll feel so much better after that, but you’ll—you’ll have to tell me if there’s more. Anything. You hear me, Cam? You are—heh, way too hot to be given another body anyway, you know that right? Yeah, so—we are not getting there. We are not, okay? We are not.” A faint laugh manages to light up her features and she tries to muster a bit of hope for him. Whatever much she has in her. Although worried, deadly worried for him, if there’s anything she wishes she had learned from him after all this time hanging around, looking at him, mocking yet watching, was how easily he managed to make her believe that there could be some good waiting just around the corner.
And right now. Right now—she needed him to believe that, at least for a little while.
“Cam, you are listening, right? Hey… hey, hey, hey, I’m right here. I’m right here, okay? Hey…”
