Soul Corrupted (16 page)

Josh

Mr. Griffith paces in front of
me as I sit on a bar stool in front of our usual pool table. He’s been quiet
since I spilled my guts. I told him everything, right up to Lucy being thrilled
about “killing” Alvarez. I imagine steam shooting out his ears, but instead of
being funny, it makes me squirm on my stool like a worm waiting to be stuck on
a fisherman’s hook.

I have no idea how long I wait before Mr. Griffith
stops and turns to face me, rolling his shoulders back, face blank but stern,
eyes fathomless orbs of obsidian that somehow still manage to convey kindness.
And, worst of all, disappointment.

“I figured I didn’t really belong up here,” I say. It
isn’t a challenge. I’m just on a roll, telling the truth.

Mr. Griffith shakes his head slowly and my stomach
sinks. Here it comes. I might have expected it, but it still hurts.

“You doubt my judgment?” he asks in a deep voice that
resonates down to my bones.

What? “No. Of course not.”

“But I am the one who welcomed you and offered you the
position as Angel, Mr. Gaynes.”

“But I screwed up pretty royally.”

“Yes. That you have.” He smiles.

“How can you be smiling?” I ask. “I lost Grace. I made
a deal with Lucifer, which I’m pretty sure has to be a criminal offense, and I
helped a soul commit murder.”

Mr. Griffith sits on a stool right in front of me. I’m
pretty sure he conjured it as he sat and I wonder how long I’d have to be here
to do that without checking first to make sure it’s actually there. Guess I’ll
never get to find out.

“You did not lose Grace, though you hurt her badly.
You made a deal with the Devil, but did it to save someone you love and not in
exchange for your soul, and you indeed helped that young lady attempt to murder
Irma—however,” he pauses, repositioning himself on the chair, “I may have
similar urges myself when it comes to Irma Alvarez.”

I allow a small smile. I can’t believe what I’m
hearing.

“But you are right, you were never supposed to go down
to Lucy in the first place. You were supposed to watch the potential Antichrists
with Grace. It was when you saw Irma that you decided to intervene. Is that
correct?”

“Yes, Sir.”

Mr. Griffith nods. “And you let Lucy try to kill Irma
because…?”

“Because I had this insane idea that when she did it,
the reality would hit her and she’d regret her choices—kind of a scared-straight
type of deal. And I knew she couldn’t really kill Alvarez.”

“So, aside from attempting to intervene without permission,
you didn’t really do anything wrong,” Mr. Griffith concludes. “Could you have
made better choices? Could you have come to me sooner? Yes. But you’ve made
inroads with Lucy and she’s at quite a delicate point.”

I stare at the man before me. When I messed up in the
slightest on Earth, my dad would beat me to a pulp, or at the very least make
me feel like slime. But Mr. Griffith didn’t even raise his voice. He cared
about what I had to say and talked it out.

“I trust you, Mr. Griffith,” I say. “What can I do
now?”

“You mean you don’t think you should be thrown from
Heaven?” He smiles when he sees me balk. “Good.”

Mr. Griffith stands as the room around us flickers in
and out of existence only to be replaced by an outdoor restaurant on a sunny
street somewhere with cobblestone walkways and lots of little shops. And a
shitload of birds.

I’m in a chair at the table, but I never felt the
barstool shrink.

“Come in,” calls Mr. Griffith and the sky on the
horizon opens in a rectangular shaped hole to reveal Grace.

Our eyes meet as she walks toward us. Hers are red
like she’s been crying and the ends of her hair look clumped like she’s been twisting
and chewing them.

I stand, scattering the birds that have been milling
around at my feet. “Grace,” her name feels so good to say. Like a relief from
all the stress I’ve been accumulating.

“We have a problem,” she says in a hoarse voice. “I’ve
found the Antichrist.”

Grace

Josh is here, right in front
of me, watching me with unmistakable longing—and I’m furious. Furious
that he can simply hang out with Mr. Griffith while the world falls apart
around me. Furious that he took it upon himself to solve my problems and
“protect” me from the truth once again. But I can’t get into it with him now. I
have to tell Mr. Griffith everything Keira told me about Noah.

Mr. Griffith nods the whole time, folding and
unfolding his napkin, taking it all in. I finish with, “So I don’t know how
much to believe, but I’m scared.”

“Please sit, Grace.” A chair slides out next to Josh and
I slip into it, perched on the edge. I don’t look at Josh’s face.

“You were banned from Antichrist duty, Grace.”

“I didn’t go looking for it! It was Josh I wanted to
find and Keira happened to be there.” I stop short of giving Shona away.

“I do believe the young lady—Keira, you say?—believes
she is in love with Noah.”

“Did you know about this? About Noah?” I ask. I have
to know. If he did…

“No,” he answers, clearly and quickly. “It makes no
sense. He would have appeared in the screen as a potential.” Mr. Griffith rises
from the table.

“Oh crap.” Josh’s mouth opens in shock. “He
did
.
I thought he only showed up because Grace was thinking about him, but we had
just asked to see potential Antichrists.”

Mr. Griffith sits again, composure at least mostly
maintained, but he can’t stop his eyes from widening.

“I should’ve gotten it,” Josh continues. “I’m so
sorry, Grace. I should’ve understood that Noah was on the screen because he
was
one of the potential souls we were looking for, not because you wanted to see him.”

“I assumed it was me conjuring him there, too,” I say.

“That’s where I saw him with the Bo—I mean,
Lucifer. That’s when I went to find out what was happening.” He slips his hand
over mine and I nearly moan from the electric warmth that travels up my arm,
but I still can’t forgive him. Not yet.

I pull my hand away and into my lap where I interlace
my fingers. “What matters is what we do now.”

“There is nothing for you to do now, I’m afraid,” says
Mr. Griffith.

“What do you mean, nothing?” I snap. “We can’t just
let this happen.”

“It’s done. Noah has decided and is no longer our
concern.” Mr. Griffith slams his hand down on the table, making me jump. “The
End Times are upon us and we have to prepare. Heaven must be ready to
accommodate more souls at once than ever before.”

I won’t look into his eyes. I can’t. “He is and always
will be my concern.”

“Even so,” Griffith says, sounding a bit softer, more
like himself, “the rules are clear. We can no longer interfere even if we want
to.”

My chest burns with anger. “Screw all your rules. Lucifer
had his chance to corrupt him. We deserve a shot with him, too.” I stand up,
daring either of them to disagree.

“Grace, you need to take some time to calm down,” Josh
says, also standing.

“Calm down? You don’t get to tell me to calm down. You
could’ve come to
me
instead of rushing out on your white horse. If you’d
told me before, I could’ve done something to help.”

Josh’s face loses all color.

“It wouldn’t have changed the situation because of
who
you are
, Grace,” Mr. Griffith’s infuriatingly reasonable voice cuts in. “This
happened when you disobeyed and interfered. You’ve been told to rest. You’ve
already done otherwise. Don’t force my hand by refusing to listen yet again.”

“Force your hand? By trying to save my brother when
everyone else has given up on him?” I ask, hysterical. I back toward the exit.
“If you’d taken the slightest interest in saving his soul, you would have
known!”

“Grace!” Josh tries to grab for me, but I dart out of
reach.

“I will save him,” I say. “With or without your help.”
And I leave them there.

I’m shaking. I’ve never lost it like that.

But I meant every word.

*
* *

Resting my hand on Tommy Two’s
warm body comforts me, but doesn’t entirely stop the trembling. I will not
accept that my brother is the Antichrist. Just the thought is insane. A new
bout of tears swells behind my eyes when Josh appears in the doorway.

His shoulders drop in relief as I glare at him from
the corner of the leather couch. “Thank Heaven, Grace, you’re here.”

“Where the Hell else would I be?” I snap. “I have to
figure out a way to save Noah. At least over here I have tools at my disposal.”

I focus on the screen I’ve called up before me as he
sits near me, but not too close. At least he’s using good judgment for once.
“Show me Noah,” I say, and the screen obliges by zooming in on my house. It’s a
lot better location than my imagination would’ve picked.

He’s in my old room. But why? My chest squeezes,
forming a lump in my throat. “See? He does miss me,” I say.

“I never doubted it,” Josh answers, reaching for my
hand, but retracting it when I ball mine into a fist.

“Can we get sound on this thing?” I ask.

Noah’s voice surrounds us. “I knew you’d be in Heaven,
Grace, but an Angel? Shit. I shouldn’t be surprised. Everyone you ever met
thinks you walk on water. Now you probably do.”

I stare at my baby brother, willing him to say it. Say
how much he loves and misses me. And then I’ll know that him killing someone
and becoming the Antichrist is just a stupid story cooked up by that she-devil,
Keira. I believed her when she said she had feelings for Noah, but maybe she
was trying to hurt me. Maybe I’m still just the same, old, naïve Grace. I’m
okay with being naïve if it means she was lying. I reach for the shell still on
the chain around my neck and rub it between my fingers.

Noah rummages through my drawers, scanning and tossing
clothes and papers onto the floor until the room looks more like his. “There’s
got to be something here, something to prove you were human. That you made
fucking mistakes like the rest of us.”

I try to swallow down the lump in my throat, but it’s
lodged tight.

“It doesn’t matter.” Noah straightens and brushes the
wild hair from his face. “I’m going to come out on top this time. They might
all be here because of you, Grace, but I’m going to make it about me for once.
Hear me? I’m something special now. I always was, but you just didn’t notice.
Keira!”

I sit up straight when he shouts her name like he’s
summoning a—well, a Demon. But she doesn’t appear. Instead, a black rose
pops onto my old desk with a yellowed scroll attached. Noah unwraps it,
furrowing his brow, and reads.

“Show me,” I whisper, willing the screen to zoom in,
and it does.

I can’t read Noah’s face. He sits staring at the
paper, trembling slightly, but I can’t tell if it’s with rage, love, or
fatigue. Then he crumples it and tosses it into the mess on the ground.

“So,” he sits on my bed, knocking off the pillows and
stuffed animals, “you waved your Angel wand and now I can’t have what I want. Is
that it, Grace? You found a way to take away my connection to Keira. I bet you
feel like the hero who saved me, don’t you?” He laughs, and I cringe at the lack
of humor in it.

Josh reaches over and his hand tightens around my
fist, feeding me strength.

“Well fuck you very much, Grace. Now I know what’s out
there, so I’m going to get what I want no matter what you do. Hear that? I’m
going to harness the power of Hell. Shit, I’ll take over Lucifer’s throne if I
have to. I will have everything in spite of you.”

“Off,” Josh orders the screen. He turns toward me,
kneeling by my side, but the room is spinning and I don’t know if it will ever
right itself again. “Grace?” he asks, gently.

I jump to my feet, the shell and chain falling to the
carpet, my hand ripped from his grasp. He still has a lot of explaining to do
before I can think about trusting him again, but while I can blame Josh for
many things, I can’t blame him for this.

It’s crystal clear that Mr. Griffith was right. This
is all my fault.