Page 3 of An Unexpected Ascension (A War Between Worlds #1)

The Angel

It’s a habit; counting the days as they go by.

Just as breathing is and the desire to stuff my face full of food.

Occasional hunger pangs wring my stomach, like a phantom limb sometimes aches. But now I tell myself I no longer need to eat. Eating has become an unnecessary luxury. Though, the yearning for something flavorful to fill my mouth or to fuel my belly full of nourishment hasn’t quite lost me.

So, I fill my time by trying to sort through my memories. Each one fuzzier than the last. Sometimes my mother’s face will appear on my wall. Other times, I watch myself jeté under a single spotlight on an empty stage. Those moments leave as fast as they appear, no matter how hard I try to master the art of getting them to stay.

When the last of my good recollections fizzle out, I decide to skim through the rule book again. Couldn’t hurt to familiarize myself with the lay of the land to avoid accidentally adding to my already long list.

I’ve really only read through the first 20 pages so far, which is just the table of contents, but anything and everything you can think of is in here.

Adultery

Arrogance

Apathy

Bearing False Witness

Bitterness

Blasphemy

Cheating

Complaining

Contempt

The list doesn’t seem to end. There’s categories and subcategories that branch off into different explanations and consequences. It’s no wonder my rap sheet is a mile long. Who can keep up with any of this?

Suddenly, I want to know how the Saints did it.

Growing increasingly bored, I decide to shut the book and venture around the neighborhood instead. I step out onto my front porch, which is really just a cement slab and follow the pathway down to the sidewalk. All the houses look like God had just copy and pasted each one. His creativity must have been at an all-time low or perhaps, it was all on purpose.

In the corner of my eye, I notice the curtains shifting behind the window of my next-door neighbor’s house. I wave, but the man only shuts his shades and disappears from view. I’ve only met a few of the folks around here.

Sarah May, the chatty, Georgian blonde woman with a pixie cut that acts like that one judgy aunt you try to avoid during the holiday get-togethers.

Anthony Hampton, the college baseball star who’s handsome and never fails to see the bright side.

John Billings, Heaven’s crankiest old guy. How he even got to Heaven is beside me because that man can’t be nice to save his life.

At one point or another, they’ve welcomed me to eternity, sharing helpful tips in processing death or telling me who to avoid if I don’t want my ear chewed out.

The only folks I haven’t met are the two people on either side of me. According to Sarah May, the woman on my left is Betty Blackwell, Heaven’s nutcase. She’s never left her bed, let alone her house, even when Sarah May visited to finally introduce herself.

Then there’s the man hiding behind his curtain, Marty O’Connel. Some folks say he used to be quite pleasant, then over time, he retreated into his house and hasn’t left since. I think he’s just quiet and reserved, but John calls him a dingbat who’s too stubborn for his own good.

I eye his house again and find a shadow behind a crack in his curtains. He watches me as I watch him, and a light chill washes over me. His lingering stare leaves me uneasy, so I avert my eyes and pick up the pace.

As I do, my shoulder knocks into someone else’s.

“Oops! So sorry,”

I mumble, my hands trying to right myself on the other person’s biceps.

Hard, hard biceps.

My gaze lands on firm pecs pressed against a black shirt, the top just one too many buttons undone to reveal dark ink swirling and twisting around a muscular neck like a tattooed noose. I find a devilish smirk waiting for me, shadowed by dark scruff short enough to showcase the defined lines of a sharp jaw and then midnight eyes under thick, quirked brows.

“Oh, hey,”

I say, finally realizing it’s the man I met at the gates when I first arrived.

“Hey?”

he shoots back like I was supposed to say anything else but that.

I shrug.

“Yeah, hey.”

A brutish chuckle rumbles in his chest while his eyes trail the length of me. I might have called him out if I weren’t the first to do the exact same to him just a second ago.

Before I have the chance to say anything else, he’s removing himself from my hold and brushing past me.

“Um, okay. Bye?”

I call out after him.

He tosses an amused look over his shoulder at me and winks... winks!

I can’t stop the laugh that barrels out of me. His audacity to be flirty and downright rude astonishes me. Despite my belly coiling tightly, my mind shuffles through all the ways I can tell him off without having to pay for it. So far, nothing solid sticks.

With each passing minute, my stroll turns into a frantic sprint desperate to flush these ramped thoughts crowding my mind. Except, all it does is make me feel like a hamster on a wheel. I shortly realize that as I run block after block, it’s all the same. I pass the same grey house, with the same single tree in the front yard, the same crack in the cement.

It’s almost dizzying.

I slow down, not out of exhaustion or overexertion, but because this run was entirely unhelpful at clearing my head. Trotting back down my street, I see a petite blonde in my peripheral.

“Yoohoo! Briar!”

Sarah May stands on her porch, waving me over.

Sighing heavily, I push myself towards her house and wonder how long this will take. Scratch that, who cares? I literally have eternity.

“Hi, Sarah May.”

“Briar, I have some excellent news!”

she gushes, trying to fight the smile breaking free on her face.

I stay silent, waiting for her to tell me, but then it becomes obvious she wants me to ask.

“What’s going on?”

“I’ve finished my penance! I’ll be moving into a new house. You know, those cute little homes right behind Saint’s Rowe. Oh, I can barely contain my excitement!”

She squeals, playing with the diamond on her necklace.

“Congrats!”

She pulls me in for a hug and jostles me around a bit before holding me at arm's length.

“Pretty soon, my dear, we’ll be neighbors again. I can just feel it! We'll have to meet at the Market. Oh, and I can have you over. I’m sure you’d like to see where you’ll be moving to. Geraldine, you know the one that owns that jewelry stand, she once had me over for a day of chatting and?—”

And... she’s gone.

Sarah May is gone. Vanished. Disappeared before my very eyes.

I wonder if that’s how it works. One minute your home is here in the greylands, and the next, you’re standing in a new one.

I don’t get very long to ponder on that thought before the very same thing happens to me. One second, I’m standing on Sarah May’s porch, and the next, I’m watching the commotion of angels in the Market.

There’s a buzzing in the air, as if all the hushed voices have come together to create a loud static. Someone bumps into my shoulder as they pass by, almost knocking me over. The worry in her eyes as she shoots me an apologetic look stops me from scowling at her.

Another woman with grey hair grabs her by the hand and tugs her through the crowd.

Before I follow, a hand grips my shoulder.

Spinning, I find Will with a solemn look on his face.

“Hey, what’s going on?” I ask.

“Remember that demon I told you about earlier? The only one who’s allowed to walk through Heaven?”

“Yeah.”

He nods his head towards the cluster of bodies before us. Slowly, we begin to follow the crowd.

“Well.”

He doesn’t bother finishing his thought because as we approach what appears to be a marble dais in the center of the Market, I find what he has left unsaid.

That stranger from the gates.

My mouth drops open as I stare at the man that’s stolen every thought inside my head for the last hour. He’s here, standing up on the dais in the middle of the Market, holding my neighbor by the collar of his plaid, button down shirt.

He’s a demon...

“That’s Herm—”

Will’s hand darts out, covering my mouth before I can finish my question.

He winces.

“Sorry. Just don’t say his name. Don’t call attention to yourself.”

I nod, zipping my lips.

The young woman who bumped into me earlier is just a few feet ahead of me. I can hear her whispering to her friend, or perhaps her mother – who’s to say?

“He didn’t finish his penance, poor Marty.”

“Then it’s his own fault.”

The young girl rears her head as if she’s offended.

The man behind me scoffs. I don’t bother turning around to face him, but I hear every word he grumbles.

“Serves him right. Lazy, lazy man. I heard he had three whole years and wasted nearly half of that.”

Finally, I bring my eyes to Marty’s; his blue and paled with age, sitting in a bed of soft, pillowy wrinkles. He can’t be older than fifty though, with hair that’s not yet fully grey. It’s the first time I’ve laid eyes on him and really took him in. The man looks frail as though life had a way of wearing him down right until the very end.

I suddenly feel sorry for him.

As Marty drops to his knees in prayer, Sarah May appears beside me.

“There you are! Did you see? It’s Marty, that’s the man I was telling you about the other day, the one that doesn’t leave his house anymore. I bet it’s because he knew this day was coming.”

She shakes her head and crosses her arms.

“What do you mean this day was coming?” I ask.

Over all the whispers shared between friends and family in the crowd, I can hear Marty begging and pleading with God to grant him just one more chance, another day.

My stomach sinks because I have a feeling I know what Sarah May meant.

The demon threads his hand through Marty’s hair, yanking back.

Gasps burst from the audience and the rest of the noise fades to silence.

“Marty Vincent O’Connel, it’s been 1,098 days since you were assigned your penance and as of today, your time has expired. You did not repent for your sins; therefore, you are no longer welcome in Heaven. Your God no longer accepts you as an angel in his house. You are hereby banished to Hell for all eternity. Any last words?”

“No, please. I’m begging you! You can’t do this. I was so close to finishing my penance!”

“I don’t make the rules. Your God does. Beg him.”

“I-I tried!”

“Yet, he’s not here to save you, is he?”

I watch horrified at the sheer panic in Marty’s terrified gaze as he realizes no one is going to help him.

“What of my wife when she passes? She’ll never find me. She’ll be all alone here in Heaven!”

he stammers.

“My-my children?”

My neighbor pleads with the demon to sympathize with him, to take pity on him and his family, but the more he cries, the less patience the demon seems to have.

I find myself grabbing hold of Will’s forearm, squeezing as hard as the grip around my heart for a man I barely knew.

That little movement seems to catch the demon’s attention, his eyes snapping directly to me.

I want to hide, to shove Will in front of me and use him as a human shield.

Whatever flutters that man gave me earlier have turned into a roiling sickness in the pit of my stomach.

He scares me, and as I watch this scene unfold further, I begin to hate him.

It’s like the demon can read my very thoughts just by the look on my face because he smirks as if to taunt me.

Then, without breaking his stare, he grips the sides of Marty’s head and twists with brutal force before a bout of flames engulf them both, dragging them down to Hell.

He leaves us with a loud snap dancing in the wind.

I hear it as if Marty’s bones popped right before my ears.

It lingers there, that sound, haunting me just the way the demon wanted.

“Oh my Lord.”

Sarah May gasps, clutching her chest.

“I hate these things!”

“Mmm,”

that’s all Will says.

I can’t bring myself to look away from the dais.