The Gate: Chapter 3
A/N: Caution: If you don't like twists on Christianity. -- DON'T READ. I'm sorry, I couldn't think of any other story! I have no experience in boy\girlfriend fights. This story is as fluffy as a down pillow. Otherwise, the tell-all segment.
New York
Jason was furious. He didn't see Rachel at school. He could only think about how she was cheating on him. He had worked up a scheme of how she had run away and married some jerk. In his opinion he was God. Everybody had to bow down to him, especially his girlfriend. Everyone at school feared Jason. Everyone thought it was natural that Jason and Rachel should pair up. They were the two grungiest people in that school. He thought so too.
When school let out Jason went straight to Rachel's. He broke the door open and found Naomi, back toward him, crying. He roughly grabbed her shoulders and twisted her around.
"WHERE IS SHE?!" Jason's voice sounded almost inhuman. His eyes bulged out. The veins in his neck were about to break through the skin.
She screamed.
He casually slapped her, knocking her out. She slumped to the floor. Jason kicked her aside and reached for the phone. There wasn't a caller ID on it, so he couldn't tell if Rachel had called. He kicked her again. He thought, and reached down and pulled Naomi up, trying to wake her. He was not successful. Then Jason heard a kettle whistle. It was on the stove. Jason threw Naomi on the floor and reached for the kettle. He smiled.
"Time for tea." He said. Jason poured it on Naomi. She awoke. Jason jumped on her and straddled her. He grabbed her throat and squeezed.
"Where is Rachel?" He said through clenched teeth.
Defiantly she said, "I'm not telling." He removed one hand from her throat and touched the top of her jeans. He squeezed harder with the other hand. She didn't want that to happen again.
"Seeeaaatttllleee." She squeezed out. Jason bent down and kissed Naomi very affectionately.
"Thank you." He whispered
With his face an inch away from hers, and his hand unzipping her jeans he said, "Too old." She tried to scream but she couldn't. He didn't go any further.
Jason saw a newspaper in a trashcan. It had a picture of Alan Fangor on it, but all he saw was the word "Seattle" and somewhere in his mind he thought she must be staying with him.
Rachel
Loren wasn't doing so hot. They stuck her in ICU for the night. Mr. Fangor, Tobias, and I hopped into a brand-new car. It was a hybrid car, the kind I have only read about. Mr. Fangor turned on the car, and it ran beautifully. Mr. Fangor floored it and we headed to his place at 50 mph through a residential area. In the backseat, I yawned. The clock in the front of the car said 5:30.
When they got home I was gone. I was a rock. They had been shaking me for five minutes before I awoke.
"Thank God, I thought you were dead." Tobias smiled at me. I stepped out and walked through a large garage. The hybrid was the only car in it. The car looked rather lonely. When I was finally outside, I saw a pool and a little cottage. Then there was the back of the house. Somehow they had managed to put every flower imaginable on the back wall of their house. I didn't know flowers could grow that way.
Tobias whispered in my ear, "really hard soil." I laughed. His breath in my ear made me want to dance. All I let out was a small grin. Mr. Fangor walked ahead to the door. He took out his keys and then noticed that the door was unlocked.
"Huh, I must have forgot to lock it." He said. I thought then that if he hadn't forgotten to lock the door Loren could be dead. The thought gave me a chill, but shrugged it off. We walked down a short hallway and I found myself in the kitchen.
"Well, I guess I'll have to cook something for dinner." I gave Tobias a look. I had never heard of a good male cook.
"Don't worry; he's better than the maid. But don't tell her that." He said.
I looked at him and asked, "You have a maid?"
He laughed. "Come on, I'll give you the grand tour." He took my hand and led me up a beautiful staircase into a magnificent corridor with lots of rooms.
"This is the maid's room to the right here. She's not there because it's her night off and she's with her mother." He pointed. He explained the whole thing. His parents' room was in the center and across from that was the nursery. His room was at the end of the hall far away from the kid's room. Each bedroom had its own bathroom and that's what the other doors were for. It seemed pretty simple to me. I leaned against the wall and yawned. I was so tired. I could've slept standing against the wall for a hundred years. Tobias looked at me but didn't say anything. I realized that he didn't know. Oh no, what would I tell him. He would be so heartbroken. Would he believe that I was raped?
I reached for a door handle right beside me. I struggled to turn it, but it wouldn't budge. I slid to the floor and cried. I couldn't hold it in.
Tobias
"What's wrong?" I asked. She had been acting weird ever since I saw her. I didn't understand why she cried every time she saw me. When I saw her I could barely contain my deepest impulses. That sounded poetic, huh? My mom can't understand why I hate English so much. She says everything I do is poetic and if I just put it to paper I would have my own riches. Whatever.
I couldn't stand to see her cry. It tore my heart open. I sat down beside her. I put my arm around her shoulders. She rested her head on my shoulder. I begged her to tell me what was wrong. She kept saying that she was just in a mental state of shock. She tried to tell me nothing was wrong.
I sat there for a few minutes. She wouldn't budge. I realized that she was asleep. I couldn't wake her. I stood up. I stretched out my shoulders and arms. I put one arm under her knees and the other under her arms and picked her up. I don't know how I did it. She didn't look like it, but she had stuff under that skin.
I dragged myself to my room. I set her on my bed. She must have had some day. I was a little tired myself but then I heard the call for dinner through the intercom. I pulled some blankets over Rachel and went downstairs.
Dad had made steak. It figured. It's the one thing he could live on for the rest of his life. When he is in a nursing home, they will grind up steak and put it in his feeding tube.
"Where is our guest?" He asked
"Asleep." I answered.
"I figured. She'll probably want something in the morning"
"What do you mean?" I asked. He gave me a weird look then he just laughed. I thought he was crazy. He took away the extra plate and set it in the refrigerator. We said a prayer for Rachel. The steak tasted okay, but it was a little bland. I felt like I was waiting for something. I swallowed up my dinner and headed back upstairs.
I couldn't believe how much Rachel looked like my mother. They had the same build, the same personality, the same crystal water eyes, and the same roaring blond hair. I headed toward my room. I opened the door and saw her moving violently on the bed. I ran to her side and tried to wake her. I nearly missed getting slapped by her flailing hands.
After a few minutes of hassling, I decided to do something really daring. I stood up and stared into her eyes. I brought my head down closer and closer and kissed her. The second time today, I would never get used to the feeling.
She woke with a jump and hugged me.
"I saw them, the monsters, the lawn-mower monsters. They kept coming; there were hundreds of them. They kept cutting. . ." She cried onto my shoulders. It was all babble until she mentioned "the blue guy." The blue guy with one blade unlike the other. Was it possible that she was dreaming the same thing as me?
"Did he have a look in his eye, like, like, like a monster?"
"Yeah." She looked up from her sobbing. "And the other monsters?" She asked
"Are called Taxxons, aren't they," I said.
"Don't tell me we've been having the same dreams," she said.
"Well, I don't know. Did you have a dream about us turning into birds and flying away?" I asked her
"Yes." She sounded excited. I could almost see her coming back to life inside. "What do you think it means?" She asked
"I know." A feminine voice said. I looked over my shoulders and saw Cassandra. Something was always strange about her appearance. She had really short hair, a black, bare midriff tank top, and big cargo jeans. It didn't seem right.
She continued, "Your minds are still plagued by the thoughts and fears of your former existence."
Rachel and I looked at each other and said at the same time, "Do you know her?"
Consequently, she laughed. "Yes, she knows me, Tobias. Well, hey everybody knows me in some shape or form. In the former world I am Cassie, and will always be Cassie, the nurturing little brat who will one day unwillingly be a traitor to the human race by her good graces." She stood silent for a minute or two staring at us.
"What do you want?" Rachel asked.
"I want you to ask about me. I am your humble servant." She made a slight bow, barely holding in laughter. She's really high on herself, I thought.
Rachel turned to me and asked, "What do we ask?"
"What are you?" I asked. I knew it was a pointless question.
"Well the best analogy I can give you is that of an angel, a guardian angel perhaps. I give life to people's dreams. I set fire to the wicked ways and banish all evil from this divine place."
"Why is this place divine? I've found it a regular hell so far." Rachel said. I had no idea what she was talking about.
"It was what you wanted in the former world. You must accept the consequences." Cassandra stated. "That's what this place is about. Making people dreams come true. I merely assist them."
"You said you were a guardian angel of sorts. Then, who is god?" I asked. My curiosity was spilling over the edge. I had so many questions. Somehow, I was so sure I would get an answer. I didn't know where this was coming from.
"He doesn't have a name. He sits up there somewhere and does the head manager job. As I told you Tobias, even I didn't have a name. Nobody cares. We only care about making sure everybody here is safe, and the sad news is you aren't. You are not supposed to be here. You still belong in the former world of your recent dreams. Where you Tobias are a bird, and you Rachel are his keeper."
"Ugh! You mean he's my pet! My brain and nerves have been drained because of a bird!"
She laughed, "No, He's not a bird in the normal sense - Oh, here." Exasperated, she moved toward us and lightly brushed the side of our cheeks. "You won't like this."
Suddenly, I remembered. I had a whole other life out in the universe, and for some reason, I wanted to go back. I don't know why. I loved it here. I didn't remember everything, but I knew why we were birds. It was for a special cause, a war. Then I thought of the ultimate question.
"Why don't you tell us everything, Cassandra?"
She smiled, "Okay. –"
So here it is.
"This is the afterlife. It doesn't look magnificent, but it took vast amounts of energy to create. At the time of the big bang, there was a major energy surplus. The universe was doomed from the first minute of its birth. But! Universes are very smart things. It decided to make the first living thing, and it decided to make it immortal. That was so it would always suck off the left-over energy that would otherwise implode the universe.
This creature was allowed to do whatever he wanted. He always traveled the universe. He loved seeing the things growing and flourishing, but there was one thing he couldn't stand. Dying. No matter where he went everything died. You must understand that his sense of time was eons not days. He would go one place and watch the advancements of the local species. But just as soon as he got there they were gone.
He asked the universe why people did not appear to him long. Then the universe told him of death. All of it. War, disease, famine, egoism. All things that made sense to do at the flick of a switch like vengeance, greed, pride, envy; they were useless in the long scheme of things. All of those things eventually led to death. He decided to make a place where none of that existed. A place where dreams came true and nothing got in your way. He created this! Living creatures died and didn't notice a thing. They woke up in a bed that they probably slept in 305 of their years ago, and stood up like it was a brand-new day.
That's this place's story.
Then there is my story. I am tied to my counterpart in the real world. She has been called, by an outrageous know-it-all hyper-dimensional being, an anomaly. Only because he cannot explain why her time-line was cut in two at birth. That Ellimist, he thinks because he was sucked through a black hole on his trip through the universe-.
Anyway, you're story begins when you were on an early morning flight. Tobias saw his uncle die, and kind of bummed, you flew away and found a friendly beacon of hope up in the sky. You flew and flew and then you were brought in. That was the gate, the sucker of souls you might say. It goes around taking the bodiless souls to paradise. Living, sentient creatures see it as a storm cloud and needlessly prepare for it to hit. Sentience throws away all superstition of any afterlife. You were not sentient creatures at the moment so you saw it and fell for the universe's biggest practical joke. That puts you in a dangerous situation. Your souls are young and do not need this place. Like the stench of a nursing home, you can't stand it for long. If you don't leave soon you will ultimately and finally die. Anyway, my advice to you is to go along with what this world throws you. You can mess things up royally if you don't."
Rachel
The moment she finished, she disappeared. I was amazed. I saw who she was. Cassie would never wear that stuff. I mean, she had make-up on, totally non-Cassie, but it wasn't Cassie at all. It was Cassandra. It was confusing I had no idea that she had this power. Tobias looked at me and walked away. He didn't look happy.
"What was that about?"
"You mean Cassie?"
"No, you.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"You found out I was a bird, and you freaked out," he spat.
"I didn't mean it!" I cried.
"Yeah, whatever." He said and walked out.
"Tobias! I'm sorry! I didn't mean it!" I screamed. I leaned against the wall and brought my knees to my chin and cried until I was asleep.
"Wake up, Rachel. Come on, wake up."
I jumped up; awake. Mr. Fangor was standing over me, nudging my shoulder.
"Hey, it's 2:00 in the morning. I think you need to go to bed. You can sleep in here if you want; Tobias went to the guest rooms. He told me to tell you he was sorry. I am not sure why."
I nodded and said, "I'm kinda hungry."
"Well, we can take care of that right away," he said pointing his finger in the air. He helped me up and led me to the kitchen.
He sat me down at the table and pulled out some spaghetti from the refrigerator. He put it in the microwave for a few seconds. After that he sat down beside me. I noticed that his step was a little shaky and that when he could he held on to the edge of something. When we came here he held on to the rail of the steps to unlock the door. Strange.
"Have you known him long?" Mr. Fangor asked.
"I don't know. To tell you the truth, I woke up a few days ago, actually the morning after I was raped, and I got ready for school and saw the newspaper. There was a picture of you and your family. I looked at Tobias and knew everything about him. I knew what his favorite food was. I knew when his birthday was. I know he has a fear of water." At that he flinched.
"Uh huh, he does."
"I don't know. I kept thinking it was the drug Jason gave me. All I know is, I saw the picture of your son and I think that I felt. Oh, I don't know." I looked down at the table.
"Yes or no. Do you love him?" He looked straight into my eyes. I tried to form the word. BRRRIIINNNGGG!!!
Both the question and the microwave scared me to death. Mr. Fangor got up, a little annoyed, and put some in a bowl. He read the newspaper while I ate. I ate kind of sloppily. I have never eaten spaghetti that good in my life. In five minutes I was done. He looked sad.
"You really are pregnant are you?" He asked
"Yeah." I looked down at the table.
"I always felt that part of my job on this planet was to make it better. The atrocities of humankind overwhelm me. I want to push them off this planet. I tried to take in whomever I can who needs help. It has been a wearisome line of work. I have another question to ask you. You can only respond with yes or no. Do you love Tobias?"
"Oh please, don't ask me that. I barely know him."
"I only knew Loren a week before I knew," he stated. Wow.
"How did you know?"
"She was perfect." He said with a soft smile on his face.
I looked up at the ceiling and thought about it. Was he perfect? He wasn't that bad on outward appearances. He was very smart, and he wasn't a jerk. It took me about ten minutes to answer.
"Yeah, I do."
"Then you can stay here as long as you like. You can go anywhere with him and stay with him as late as you want. If it turns out you really do love him then stay with him for as long as you live." Mr. Fangor was so poetic like his son. It was a family thing. They put rhythm to whatever they said. It was beautiful. I stood up and he hugged me.
I went back to bed. I went into the room and found Tobias there waiting for me.
"Hey! How are you doing?"
I laughed, "You just saw me a few hours ago."
"I know, but I missed you since our first fight you know," he sighed. He looked away for a little bit.
"I'm sorry I blew up at you, I don't know what I was thinking. How could you have known?"
I walked towards him and hugged and kissed him. I should have known a simple thing wouldn't turn him away from me.
"Are you going to sleep in here tonight?" He asked.
"I don't know, I thought I would."
"Well, I'll go to the guestroom, then."
"You know what, I can't let you sleep in a guestroom, and you're not going to let me sleep in a guestroom. So."
"Uh, no. Dad would have a fit."
"No, he wouldn't. He understands and trusts us."
So, anyway, that's what we did. We did it every day. I enrolled in his school, and we got the same classes. I tested for the higher-grade classes. Mrs. Langman was really mad when she saw my skills. I finally told my mother what was going on. She told me what Jason had done. I was crying for days on that one. I could only think that he was on his way over. I took some comfort thinking that he couldn't possibly know where I am. Who would believe I was living with the richest person in the world.
I never told my mother exactly where I was. I feared Jason. I couldn't imagine what he would do to Tobias.
Loren came home with a beautiful little girl named Cory LeAnn Fangor.
"Wasn't that interesting?" Tobias asked. Today we got out of history for a little talk about the dreaded topic: sex education. Although we weren't doing that, they were warning us against things we were doing together.
We sat down to lunch with Brian. I think he likes me. He's always looking at me or something. He always sits across from me.
"So, I've got two tickets to Limp Bizkit. Who wants to come?" He asked, looking at me. Tobias dropped his fork.
"What is that supposed to mean?!" He shouted.
"What do ya mean?"
"You want to go with Rachel don't you?!" He shouted. I think he figured it out. He ran from the cafeteria. Tobias sat back down and continued to eat. He didn't say a word as I stared at him.
We got home and was greeted by Dad, it just seemed right to call him that for he was now my legal guardian, and had a snack. We finished and then we took a walk. It was just in the garden behind the pool.
We were walking along a path of roses and I swear I saw a shadow behind the trees. I stopped. I looked. Nothing was there. Tobias hadn't seen anything. I felt I was being watched. I looked over my shoulder, and then I heard a footstep. I heard a small roar.
I told Tobias to stop. I definitely heard something. It was getting closer. Tobias could hear it too. We thought it might be someone trimming the trees, but we headed back immediately.
We had just got around the pool when I heard the loudest sound of my life. It was a gunshot. Tobias screamed. He was hit in the back of the shin. He fell forward on the concrete. Blood was pouring from his leg.
Needless to say, I screamed too. I knelt down by him and put pressure on the wound. I was crying uncontrollably, yelling for whomever it was to come out.
He did.
Jason.
"You get over here right now!" He said in a low, guttural voice. It was almost inhuman.
"No," I whimpered. He came over and grabbed my neck and stuck the gun in my throat. I thought it would pierce the skin. I screamed and screamed. Suddenly, Mr. Fangor came out. He lunged at Jason. Mr. Fangor kicked him in the shoulder from behind. The gun skittered across the concrete.
I went back to Tobias. He was faint. Most of his blood lay in a pool under him. He kept saying he was fine, but I knew he wasn't. Mr. Fangor was unsuccessfully pinning him down. Jason seemed to absorb everything thrown at him. Then with one punch, Mr. Fangor mustered all the strength in him and threw just one punch and Jason went down. He was out cold.
"DAD!!!!" I cried. I was sobbing so hard I didn't have any strength to hold the wound anymore. He was unconscious.
"Rachel, call 911. NOW!" He yelled.
The paramedics came and amazingly didn't recognize me. They took him to the university hospital. They stitched him up and gave him a transfusion. After a few hours they let us see him.
I ran in there and kissed him.
