It begins with a headache.
No -it begins with a lot of headaches, enough so that they start to interfere with her life, and that isn't acceptable to Layla Rourke. Her life doesn't allow for interruptions. It's planned and organized, rooted in faith and family, with a job at the library and school part-time structured upon it.
Her mother notices the empty Advil containers dropped into the trash bin, and Layla is honest about pain. They don't lie to each other -life is too short for lies; her father's death from a heart attack when she was 18 proved that.
"Stress?" she asks, sympathetic.
"Probably," Layla replies, although something tells her that no, maybe this isn't right. She's passing her classes, she's happy at home, and, unlike most of her old high school friends, she has a job that she genuinely loves. Stress isn't part of the carefully-painted picture.
Her mother nods, though, and for the time being the topic is dropped.
Eventually, there comes a point where the headaches, and the subsequent ringing in her ears, have become normal, like how sunshine becomes only a distant, faint sort of thing seen in dreams for a person who has spent all but their infant-hood living in some sort of underground colony. She stops bothering with the pills; her salary can be better spent.
Life moves on in a hazy trudge, and the days all blend into a smear of quiet whispers from the library mixed with the light streaming through the windows in church and the tiny print in her textbooks, until one day she collapses at work.
She doesn't remember that, despite the half-dozen accounts she heard about how she went into a sort of epileptic fit in the middle of checking out Mrs. Pier's books; about how she babbled about her mother needing to be told how much she loved her, and about how the angels were there now to bring her up to Heaven and to her father. All that Layla really recalls is how the dimmed lights above her had been blinking as the paramedics packed her up and rushed her out of the library, and how bright the sunshine outside had been, even though the day was overcast and misty when she had left the house that morning.
Light is what greets her when she wakes up as well, but this time it's fluorescent and hospital-bright, and is quickly obscured by the equally concerned faces of her mother and a woman in a pair of lemon-colored scrubs.
What follows is marked by tears, from both her eyes and her mother's, a flurry of questions and halted answers, and the unshakable sense that something is being irrevocably changed.
And when the word "tumor" is first said, Layla realizes that she was right: life isn't supposed to be divided into before the headaches and afterward. Life is divided into before, when she was ignorantly bliss, and after, now that she's painfully informed.
xXx
The first thing she sees after the surgery is the blinking lights hissing slowly above her, like a snake.
She isn't surprised to learn that it was unsuccessful.
xXx
She gives up her library job first; can't stack shelves when you're in the hospital.
College goes second. Class, books, and time aren't cheap, and she can't afford to be spending on any of them.
xXx
When her mother suggests a faith healer -even brings along the information of one in the area, a successful one who chooses his patients without regard to their money- Layla agrees without thinking. It makes sense, really, and she's surprised that she didn't think of it. Miracles and prayers and faith are all tied together, after all.
"God has sent his angels among us to do His work," her mother says solemnly, stroking her hair gently. "I think that this man is one of them."
"I believe you, mom." She rests her head back against her pillow, too tired to do much else. "When will we leave?"
"Tomorrow." A gentle kiss is left on her forehead, and the bed creaks slightly as her mother stands up from the foot of it. "Something is going to come out of this. I can feel it, Layla."
"Me too." And with those words, it solidifies in her mind, her calm determination; a blind sort of faith, but not a harmful one. There is room for her survival in the Greater Plan; she can feel it now, and she will live.
xXx
The next day they watch as a man, weeping tears of joy, walks off the stage. He'd lost all use of his legs in a car crash weeks before.
Layla's faith is made complete.
xXx
Outside, she and her mother introduce themselves to Reverend Le Grange. He's a kind, humble sort of man; the sort of person, Layla thinks, that one would expect to be doing the Lord's work.
"Will you heal her?" Mother asks bluntly, and Layla blushes.
"Mom, I'm sure… that's none of our business…"
But Reverend Le Grange just smiles and takes her hand and says, "The Lord has a plan for you, Layla, and I'll willingly help Him in any way that I can."
It's enough, for now.
xXx
Days pass, then weeks, and, before they know it, months, and Layla still hasn't been healed.
She prays every night –and not just for herself; not at this point. She also prays for the ones that she meets at the prayer sessions, the ones who need healing as much as she does, and even for the ones who have already been healed. The ones like Dean, who live in good health with everything she wants; who can't see what they have in front of them.
xXx
"We were so sorry to hear of Sue Ann's death," she says solemnly to Roy Le Grange. In the back of her mind, she's wondering if this is the last funeral that she'll be attending as a mourner instead of the deceased.
The reverend looks pale and wan, but he manages a sad sort of smile. "The Lord works in mysterious ways," he intones softly, rising up from the pew. "Layla. I'm so sorry, child."
"It isn't over yet," she replies determinedly.
"I failed you, though. I couldn't heal you." He shakes his head.
"Mysterious ways, Reverend. There was a reason." She doesn't believe the words when they leave her mouth, but he smiles at her, and so she mentally crosses herself and hopes that the small lie was justified.
xXx
Dozens of people from church are praying for her, but somehow it means the most when Dean Winchester says that he will be.
xXx
Things go downhill without stop when they come back home, and all she can think is, this is where prayer gets us?
She's bedridden and a burden at this point; hasn't been to church in weeks. The next time she's in one, she'll be lying with her arms across her chest and flowers by her side, and as much as it pains her to admit, this conviction has steadily grown more powerful than all her faith in Heaven.
xXx
Once, she decides to look Dean Winchester up online, where most of her friends talk to her these days.
There's no mention of him anywhere. She wonders what happened to him, and if he still prays.
xXx
When Layla sees the light she's certain that she's dying. It's as bold and fiery as what she saw when she used to stare straight into the sun as a child, but it feels warm against her skin, like when she stood with her hands extended to the oven as her mother baked cookies when she was a child.
A voice whispers to her, praising her faith and devotion in sweet tones; one speaker that sounds like a choir. It tells her of a coming war and how it needs the faithful to be soldiers for the angels. It asks her to give herself to the glory, to heal herself and enter unto the Lord's service for as long as He needs her, and to rest in the Heavenly plains of His kingdom forevermore.
She whispers "Yes," for what has she to lose by doing what she was born to do and giving herself over to the Almighty? For as He made her, it is only right that she should try to give back, she thinks in the moment before she feels her blood start to boil and her bones stretch, and the light is the last thing she sees as herself, and not as a part of something greater.