Part 1

Sam, Monica and Kelly observed through the window pan of the hospital room the frantic movements of doctors and nurses working over someone's bed, someone they couldn't see. On the opposite corner, crying quite desperately there was a middle aged woman. Her hands were joined as if she was praying, but by the look in her face it was obvious she was far from being able to even think.

"She's Alexandra Miller. That's your assignment, Kelly," Monica started to explain. "The boy on the bed is her son, Frederic. He's just 15 and he won't make it to be 16…"

"Pretty well, Monica," Sam interrupted. "Tess' right. You'll barely need me…"

Monica smiled with the compliment and turned her attention back to her charge.

Kelly asked then. "Do I have to ask why I am assigned to her?"

"Not really…" the Irish angel placed a hand on her shoulder. "You know how it is like to lose a child, you'll know how to help her…" Monica saw how tears were shinning on Kelly's eyes. "God wants you to let her know she will see her son again even if his time on Earth is coming to an end".

"Are you ready?" Monica asked Kelly right before they got into Frederic's room. The little angel could easily say how hard the assignment would be for her charge.

Kelly nodded. "It's just that I can't help but feel all this so fresh…"

"I know. That's why Alexandra needs you." When they got into the room they were properly dressed as a doctor and as a nurse. "Mrs. Miller?" the woman turned to see them. "I'm Monica and this is Kelly. We'll be with you and Frederic from now on, and…"

"Fred is not making it, is he?" Alexandra asked Monica directly. She had been told a specialist would be meeting her, someone that knew how to treat people with relatives that were dying.

"No. He is not," Monica replied honestly. "But we'll be helping you all the way till the end."

"It's so hard to let him go…" the woman said swiping her tears away.

"I know," Kelly said softly, placing a hand on the woman's shoulder. "Believe me, I know it first hand…"

Monica was later standing by the nurses station, checking on some notes when she saw Kelly walking slowly, her spirits obviously by the floor. "I can't do it, Monica…" she declared. "I see Alex and I see myself on that day when Jesse died…"

Monica circled her charge's shoulders and walked her to the waiting room. "But you do know that Jesse lives forever now… and Alex needs to know that too."

"Yes, but I'm finding it so hard to let her see that without actually telling her I am an angel!" Kelly was pacing from side to side and then turned to face her supervisor. "I guess I had forgotten casework was so hard…"

Monica smiled at Kelly's expression and a minute later they were both laughing openly. "Some cases are just harder than others, but you'll do it just fine…"

"That was my line some years ago!" a male voice said and they turned to find Adam coming to meet them. "Is this my lucky day or why do I get to find an angel I hadn't seen in months?" He hugged Monica. "How are you doing, sweetie?"

"Adam, long time no seeing! I'm just fine!"

"Fine?" he said observing her from head to toe.

"Just fine!" Monica assured him.

"You got your promotion and you're back in business, right?"

"Yes! Adam, this is Kelly, my charge," she introduced them.

"Nice to meet you, Kelly!" Adam shook hands with her. "And where's Tess? And Andrew?"

"Tess is in the choir now… She got a promotion too…" the Irish angel explained.

"And my pal? I haven't seen him in a long time either!"

Monica felt a knot forming in her stomach, a deep sadness getting hold of her heart at the mere mention of the blond angel. "I don't know, Adam… I haven't seen him… I thought that maybe you…"

"Nope… You know? I've been assigned to this hospital almost entirely for the last five months… I haven't seen many friends lately…"

This piece of news gave Monica more of that sadness she had come to associate to the angel of Death's memory, knowing that the minimal hope she had of Andrew being the one handling Kelly's assignment had now diminished. "Then I guess we know who will be the angel by Fred's bed, Kelly…"

Monica knocked softly on Fred's door that day late in the night and got in when she had no reply. Alexandra was leaning over her son's bed, carefully refreshing his face while the poor boy's lips trembled with the fever.

"It's because of the last chemo," Monica offered gently, checking on the boy's IV. "Kelly told me she gave him some paracetamol. That will help…"

Alex let herself fall on the chair by the bed, replacing the piece of white clothe on a bowl with water. "Is he in much pain?" she asked taking her son's hand.

"I'm afraid so, Alex…" Monica said placing the back of her hand on the boy's forehead. "At this stage of his illness, the body is trying to fight the sick cells with all its systems and that causes the pain and the fever…"

"I don't want him to suffer…" she said, big tears starting to cross her cheeks. "But a part of me just wants him here for as long as possible!"

"I know…"

"Do you have kids, Monica? Are you married?" Alex met the angel's brown eyes and the despair in her voice caught the new supervisor off guard.

"I-I… No, I'm not married… nor I have kids…"

"Isn't there someone you love so much that you are afraid of not seeing him anymore?" Monica's sharp intake told Alex she did have someone. The Irish angel held the woman's gaze for a minute until she softly accepted. "Yes…" She was in fact thinking about a special someone she was afraid of not seeing anymore.

"I just don't know how I am supposed to spend the days without seeing Fred anymore! Without his laughter, or his jokes, or his comfort… or even his loud music…" Alex was now swiping at her tears. "When his father died, ten years ago, he became my reason for living, and now…"

Monica walked and pulled the woman into the hug she so needed. And Alex's sobs broke the angel's heart and she cried. She cried for the woman that was about to lose what was the most important part of her life, but she cried for herself too, for the emptiness she felt in her heart at that time, when someone was missing in her own life.

After leaving Alex, Monica walked to the open balcony of the highest floor of the hospital. The night breeze was warm and gentle. It had rained in the afternoon and the smell of summer was all around. She closed her eyes when a soft breeze touched her cheek, the sudden sensation remembering her of her first assignment with tornados, when everything was over and only the smell of recent rain could say it had been such a long day. That time, when she had closed her eyes, a warm presence had appeared at her side, reassuring her that her assignment was over for the day…

For a brief second, she felt that presence again, that warm, comforting sense of peace, and she opened her eyes to see Kelly walking slowly towards her. "Beautiful night, isn't it?" the caseworker commented. "Makes me remember why Jesse loved the stars so much…"

"So did Andrew…" the supervisor commented. "He was always teaching me about constellations…"

Kelly looked at her, so lost in the stars and the memories of early days that she felt really sorry for her. As much as Monica was great doing her job, it was obvious she felt something was just not whole in her life. Her hazel eyes had that hint of loneliness that inspired a deep tenderness in whoever looked at them.

"Kelly…" Monica asked some time later, "I've always wondered… How did you know that Andrew was coming for Jesse that day? I mean… it seemed you knew…"

"… that he was an angel of death?" the caseworker interrupted her. Monica nodded. "Yes, I knew. I knew him. He had worked with me sometimes. He and Henry, I think you know him too. Andrew was often the angel of death assigned to my cases when needed. Until, well… I got Jesse and he was assigned almost exclusively with another angel…" she chuckled.

Monica smiled at Kelly's remark but her eyes remained fixed on a distant star. "You miss him." Kelly's words made the little angel come back to Earth.

She gulped before she could speak. When words finally came to her mouth, her eyes were shining with tears. "He was always there for me. He was my best friend, my biggest supporter. I mean, Tess was always there for me too but being my supervisor, she was supposed to be somehow strict with me. On the contrary, Andrew was always…" she took a deep breath and blinked to fight the tears, "I knew I could find peace and strength in him, deep understanding and support and comfort… I just feel so lonely without all those things."

The last words were nothing but a mere whisper, and Kelly could feel how deep her supervisor was feeling them. Monica and Andrew's relationship had almost become a legend among the angelic realm for it had not been something so deep ever before. After nine years together, it was hard to think about Monica without thinking about Andrew too, but truth was that when Monica had been promoted to supervisor, they had taken different paths, as hard as it was believing so.

Suddenly both angels heard other footsteps coming closer and they turned to see Adam meeting them. Monica turned her face slightly away to dry her eyes as tears had almost run along her cheeks. "Nice night, isn't it?" the male angel said lifting his head to watch at the stars too. "It's hard to believe this is someone's last night…"

"Fred?" Kelly asked.

"Charles J. Spencer… I've just taken him Home…" Adam explained.

The caseworker sighed in relief, yet she asked, "When is it going to happen?"

Adam met Monica's sad eyes and felt pretty uncomfortable. "I don't know, but he doesn't have much time… It can be any minute now…"

"Poor Alexandra," Monica commented.

"You better go and check on him…" the angel of Death told Kelly, who wasted no time in going back to her job.

Orion's belt was very clear on that part of the world, and a tall, blond guy stopped his walking to take a minute to look at it. The shinning line of stars seemed to have hypnotized him and had his thoughts wandering far away.

"Great job, Andrew," a voice behind him made him jump. "That girl was a difficult case…"

"Five years, Sam?" the blond angel commented with the supervisor. "Why? Such a short age…"

"She had no much of a chance, Andrew. Even if she had gotten a transplant…"

"I know," the younger angel interrupted not really being in the mood of discussing a hard assignment so recently. "It just hurts…"

Sam had understood the angel's state of mind and kept silence for some minutes, just taking the time to watch at the stars too. Then, he announced, "I know you've been working all day, but you have one more case tonight, Andrew…"

"Don't tell me…" he said. "Another kid?" Sam nodded and Andrew growled, but sighing deeply he answered, "All right. Let's go…"

Adam and Monica were still on the balcony, only the noises of the ambulances coming to the front door breaking the silence, when the angel of Death got the call. Checking on his golden watch —one just like the one Monica now possessed— he announced, "I have to go."

Monica was about to ask if it was Fred when the beeper she had gotten as a doctor started to call her. Adam had vanished when she ran to the hospital, and she found two doctors in Fred's room while Kelly just hugged the crying mother. "He has a 'Do not resuscitate' order," the angel stated calmly and the woman nodded. Hearing that the doctors that had tried to help the boy just left the room.

"This is the end, isn't it?" Alex asked quietly, her voice barely audible through the sound of the monitors and the machines.

"Yes, it is. But it is also the beginning of a new life for him, Alex. In God's presence. And he won't have more pain…"

Something in the angel's voice touched Alex's heart and she freed herself from Kelly's hold to walk to her son's bed and take his hand. "It's ok, honey," she murmured softly, "I'll miss you but I'll be fine knowing you are not sick anymore. Go Home, Freddy. Rest in peace…"

All the three, Alex, Monica and Kelly watched how the boy squeezed his mother hand one last time before the frantic beeping of the heart monitor changed into a constant sound.

And it was then when Monica and Kelly saw that hand. The hand of a blond angel caressing Fred's forehead, comforting him and helping the soul to get free of the dying body. The hand the Irish angel knew so well. Her heart started to beat faster, even before she dared to rise her eyes.

Monica covered her mouth with both hands to drawn a sob, this time her tears running out of her eyes immediately. For a second that seemed eternal for her, her eyes found a pair of green eyes that were fixed on her. There was the understanding, the peace and the love she was missing so much, and all those emotions washed her deeply. Then she saw him turn to Fred, and helping him rise, they looked at the scene by the bed one last time before they disappeared into the shinning light.