Bulletproof (Healer) (31 page)

             
“She’s working on a way to kill him, Cassie. I’m going to stay with her until we figure out a way. She’s calling in more favours, finding more witches that might know the right energy to tap into or something like that. It’s all very complicated but she knows what she’s talking about.”

             
“That’s really good, Rose,” I say. It is great to hear that there might be a way of disabling Maurice and the path of destruction he creates but I can’t feel happy. Not now.

             
“Meanwhile, we’ll just keep tabs on him. See what move he makes. Arrow reckons that your blood will only suffice for a week or so then he’ll be slightly more vulnerable,” Rose is speaking so calmly, it disturbs me. Gabe is dying. He’s floating away from me before I even held him in my arms. I can’t think about Maurice right now. “And I’ll keep in touch, Cass.”

             
“Good,” is all I say. I know I’m being rude. Rose is trying her best. She is exceeding what I could ever expected from her. She should run. Find her true love and live a long, happy life but I know I have found a loyal friend in Rose. She will never abandon me now. She’ll always look out for me. “Thanks Rose.”

             
“It’s my pleasure, Cassie. Anyway I need to do something to keep my mind off Gabe,” she sighs.

             
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I snap.

             
“Not now you don’t but I’ll call you in a few days, a week maybe and we’ll talk it out,” she says meekly.  A few days, a week, not enough time. My heart will still be aching in years over losing the love I never had and Rose knows that. “Talk soon, Cassie.” Then she’s gone. She’s probably about to say her last goodbye to Gabe. She’s fortunate she has the chance to hold his hand, kiss his skin, look into his endless eyes. She is lucky to bid him farewell in person where she can feel him, be with him. A phone call seems so cold, allowing no room for closure.

             
I feel lonely and empty now. Gabe is gone. I won’t see Rose for months, if I ever see her again. Dad and Shannon are preoccupied with baby talk. I have gone round in circles, looking for the meaning in life and returning to the same dismal existence that I had before.

             
I empty my bags which have a slapdash collection of my belongings from my time in Toulouse, mostly the clothes Rose bought me in Manchester. Expensive jeans and blouses that I will never wear again. There’s the necklace that Maurice bought me stuffed between a pair of socks and it turns my stomach. Luckily, whoever packed my bag left out most of his gifts. A laptop and phone would be difficult to throw out the window, watching it shatter on the ground but I have no problem getting rid of this distasteful necklace. I hurl it out of my window and watch the jewels dismantle as it hits the concrete. A waste but I couldn’t bear to look at it. I imagine it wrapped around my neck, tightening until it suffocates me and I choke. It was just another piece in Maurice’s game, a pawn he had to move in order to capture the king.

             
I’m almost finished when I come across a leathery wallet that certainly doesn’t belong to me. I should toss it in the trash. It’s probably Justin or Channing’s, and I’ll never see them again. I’m sure they won’t miss it but something makes my fingers twitch and I open it up. It’s not Channing or Justin’s. This lost wallet belongs to Gabe.

             
There’s a five pound note tucked behind the flight ticket from Manchester to Paris. And there’s a photograph. I start to cry again. He’s smiling. His smile was such a rare occurrence, I’m so glad I have the moment captured forever. His hair is shorter, scruffy and soft looking. It is from a younger, happier time and he’s with a skinny, tall blonde girl. It must be Claire. She’s not what I expected. She’s gangly and goofy looking, her eyes half-shut in the photograph and her arms positioned awkwardly. She is pretty though and Gabe looks like he loves her a lot.

             
I hold the photo close to my chest, clutching the wallet in a fist and I pretend Gabe is with me and I know that, now, he really is always with me. I fold the photograph to hide Claire and place it neatly in my photo album - filled with scraps from Summers with dad, Shannon, Bruce and Jana in the garden. Whenever I miss him or the sadness is too much to endure, I will look at this photo and be reminded of the light inside of me. Sadness and loss are just a part of being human and humanity is the most beautiful thing on the planet.

             
I spend the rest of the afternoon with dad on the couch watching reruns of films from the nineteen eighties and I’m content. Of course, the future is worrying. I have to think about Maurice’s intentions and wondering where Gabe is in the world and the arrival of the new baby in a house that’s already bursting at the seams. The past haunts me too. What happened to my mother? What could I have done to change my fate? But I can’t think like that, I have my whole life ahead of me and I’m finally going to start living it.

             
After all I am bulletproof.