Hello, dear readers :)
Thank you for 1 review and 1 fave.
Here is the second part of the short story.
In addition, you will meet Sam in first-person perspective and in the present tense, too.
Here is the link to that song-cover that I had in the ears while writing : watch?v=0dYlvdLdK9w
Have Fun with Reading:
He is here.
It's just a feeling - but my feelings rarely mistaken. And this feeling tells me that he is here, here in this house. At home.
I am faced with the facade of the house, Lucifer and I bought about four months and 13 days ago and push my hands into my pockets. The demons and ghosts seem to fear to show themselves lately - at least they show up less and less, so I have finally decided to build me a… nest, as Bobby would have said. While it is frankly a miserable nest, no ostentatious villa and certainly not a governmental palace for the uncrowned king of Hell, but Lucifer has quite a bit of sheared to the interior - His only question acted upon where the bedroom was and if the bed would be big enough for two people. (It was not, so I went into a furniture store to order a suitable double bed)
Other customs, other priorities, I would think ... angels are not necessarily straightforward creatures. And Archangels may be a lot worse.
A reddish line of bloody glow fringes the horizon and devours the last piece of the solar disk for the following night. Only after a dull pain penetrates my jaw, I realize how firmly I actually bite my teeth. I should have come here tomorrow. Tomorrow, in the early afternoon, at best. I have never feared darkness - only what lurked in it. And Lucifer is not a demon, not a monster under my bed but damn, it's never a good idea to meet him when the moon moves across his skin and his features carve softer. This is a diabolical (in the truest sense of the word), temptation and I'm an idiot, that I even put myself into the lion's den voluntarily. A lion, whose claws shine sharper in the shadows and grab me anytime they want. To unpack me and tear apart ... I swallow hard. No. No, I cannot turn back now. I said to Gabriel that I would end this charade for once and for all and by God, I'll do it. I'll really do. It has to stop. This, us - whatever it was.
When Metatron was too powerful, and we knew no way out, it had started. When Dean mutated into a demon and Castiel almost lost his angelic mind in despair and suddenly I was all alone. At that time ... I was out of my mind. And I broke seals. 66 seals. For I was burned out and no other solution than suicide was left (before our enemies finished their job to kill us). I thought it could not get any worse, so I fulfilled the tasks, drew the intricate pentagram in blood, herbs and guts on hallowed ground. I even prayed.
Then ... he was here. In our world. I can still remember exactly how he stood there that day. As he picked flakes of ash from his shoulders without taking his eyes off of me, how he almost seemed hypnotized by my face and the expression of relief and terror I presented him. I remember the puny flame stove flickering on the lapel of his right pants leg, and he ? He did not care at all. He had forgotten how it was to feel pain from burning. And of course, I also remember Michael. Michael, who was standing a few meters away from Lucifer, an arm wrapped around Adam's waist supportively, who was barely able to stand on his own legs. In contrast to the archangels his body was a seriously battered wreck and Michael was the only thing standing between him and the smooth sanded hardwood. They clung so close together ... sometimes I still think about how much that irritated me, even though my thoughts should have been concerned about a much larger problem at this time. But I did not understand it easily. I did not understand at all...
But when I inevitably met Lucifer's cold gaze anew, a tiny spark of knowledge sprouted in my heart like a seed that lies under two meters of dry earth and is finally allowed to feed on a drop of water.
And I swear, I have never felt so scared in my life as in that fateful moment.
And now when I go through that door, when I enter this house and if I want to go to my room and he leans against the wall, watching me from the shadows with these cursed eyes of ice, which melt like magma into my soul - what then? Yes, what will happen then?
I have beaten him. Right in the face. I heard the crack of a cheekbone, which is not his, because angels have no cheekbones. They are light. They are made of glistening light and I have poured a strong dash of red in this light. Well, he, who is without sin cast the first stone.
But what if ... he wants to kill me? Not only because of the slap in his face, but also because of ... Gabriel? He is quite capable of such action, has always been - but he has never done it. He never hurt me, not physically. No matter how many times we argued in this half year, he already spends on earth. And heaven knows how many times we argued. Many, many times, sometimes about trivial things, and sometimes about things that cut deeper into the meat than usual. But we have always tolerated each other again, in one way or another. Sure, we fought, most likely even more with ourselves than each other. Tried to defeat our pride to and it often held the balance, who went to whom after hours of fruitless silence saying a flippant comment so that we learned to talk again. Well, it has never been set right constantly between Lucifer and me anyway.
But just as now, it was never before. And that's my fault. Yes, I admit it - it's all my fault. Everything. (How could it be otherwise?)
Taking a deep breath, I step a few steps closer to the house. My heart is pounding in the leather ceiling of my chest and goosebumps are chasing each other on the skin of my forearms. Mild dizziness nestles tenderly to my senses, but I've known it a long time ago and I know it is the nervousness that speaks to me. And the fear. A unnamable, cold, clammy fear that affects my whole body like a vice. For months I have not felt so weak. Is this for the idea of what I intended to do? Or is it that doubt which still gnaws in my mind quitely whether this is all correct or not?
My saliva trickles like glue in my throat when I swallow. I don't know. But I know that there is no going back if I walk through that door. When I am in this house, packing my last belongings and wandering through the corridors that have become so terribly familiar to me within these few weeks, it's over. I'll never be able to look at Lucifer again. The guilt in his eyes would kill me in an instant.
¨ This will end bad. ¨ Gabriel had told me when I left. He held his arms crossed and his usually mischievous grin was replaced with a raised eyebrow and a pair of lips vanished into difficulties. These lips taste like chocolate and spray cream when I kiss them.
He looked rather anxious, which is not his usual style of mood.
¨ Eventually you have to stop. ¨ I then told him soothingly, trying to spread my mouth with a smile. I do not think he believed in my enthusiasm. Perhaps that was why the hug he conducted me in before I left, so strangely determined and persistent. So .. desperate. As if he thought I would not return to him, which is a ridiculous assumption. After all, I'm not cheating on anyone for no reason. And Gabriel is and remains the only reason that has been worth all this fraud. That's not an excuse, not even a justification. It's just an observation. A bitter-sweet conclusion.
Each stair creaks Welcome under my shoes and, as it almost seems like a crunching chorus to me rising with complaints and biting in my soles. Not to mention I'm walking faster. The sky is bathed in purple velvet, while I dig out the key from my pocket and insert into the lock. The harsh sound, as the bolt is snapping back and the door pushes open wildly, jumps in my ears like electric waves.
Calm down, Sam. I mutter to myself in thought insistently, Go in. Pack your bags. Get out. Just ignore him. IGNORE him.
I almost laugh hysterically at my own, half-way reasonable sounding voice while I push myself with sweaty hands and bile on my tongue in the interior of the building.
Sure - as if it had ever been easy to ignore Lucifer.
Of course he is here.
Although he is not draped against the wall, as I suspected, he has leaned a chair against it and sits. The arms are crossed over his chest in a waiting manner. Our eyes cross before I venture three steps into the house.
My heart feels as if it is about to burst. It is an oppressive feeling. But at least it loosens my tongue (well, otherwise I would have probably swallowed it ... No, that was not a joke).
¨ Weren't you supposed to... did you get the letter? ¨ I ask miserably and in the same second I scold myself for this incredibly stupid question. A delicate panning my gaze on the kitchen table and I see clouds of white paper shimmer in the dark complexion of the evening. It is hopelessly wrinkled and if I am not mistaken, torn into jagged lines at the edges. Oh great. There could be no better mirror of how Lucifer has received the written message emotionally.
Heh, why gives me this insight then just no real joy ... oh sarcasm, you even accompanied me through hell, why not here as well?
He looks at me. Does not move. Does not breathing. Has probably forget to breathe. If instinct would not have driven me, I probably had forgotten it, too.
¨ I said the maximum would be two hours ... ¨ I say, but break off, because I hear myself how ridiculous that sounds.
Another silence. Deadly flavored silence. Silent as a graveyard. My body shivers, though its's early June.
I feel a slight hint of trouble. A sign of defiance that has brought me into trouble far too often. The defiance, who advised me to turn my back on Dad and Dean getting hold of a scholarship for a high recommended college. It has become my old friend, this defiance. And my oldest enemy, too. It's funny that the circle seems to repeat.
It has been almost ten years when I strangled the eternal dispute with my father and stepped out into a cool october night, a bag with a few belongings weighing on my waste, praised with the ability to crack foreign cars. I left without looking back again. I went into an uncertain distance and I did not care. I had no fear of the future, had forgotten that loneliness existed and that it would haunt me more often than planned. It only found an end when I saw Jess' beautiful face. I was happy at that time. Just happy ... and now? What about now? Will I be happy after I finally leave this house? Will I also feel so outrageous? As if I could embrace the world?
... I dont know. But I'll find out soon enough.
And hey, at least I do not regret anything. I… at least I think so.
I think it's just frightening, when some things from past and present require to move towards each other. Is this normal? I don't know…
¨ Aren't you going to say anything? ¨ I grab eventually, because I hate to play games with Lucifer. I admit that my voice drops kind of helpless at the end, but that is irrelevant.
Oh, a breakthrough. Lucifer moves. Leisurely he rises from the chair, thumbs hooked in the waistband of his jeans. Although he leans his head to the side demonstratively his attitude is bent in my direction dominantly. Dead light of sun, bedded to rest shines in the pale dust on his olive-green shirt. The sea blue fabric of his trousers is rumpled in several places, but not torn. The dark blonde hair stretches out in all directions, a few fringes show up vertically to the ceiling. It is a well-known image. I never thought that this sight would give me this type of suffering one day. But of course you also do not think about car accidents or plane crashes or earthquakes or rape before they occur. Why should you? Why penetrating oneself with gruesome horror scenarios when there is love and joy and satisfaction, where you can feed on? Why wasting your attention on ugly illusions, when reality is so much more beautiful?
I think I've made my own reality broken. More than once. And me with it.
¨ Lucifer? Lucifer, isn't there anything you want to say? ¨
I sound awfully whiny. Maybe because really feel terribly whiny now and I have no appreciable desire to conceal this state. Who has ever said you had to mimic the strong man in a breakup? Who made the rule that cheaters should not be the first to shed a few tears?
Although the part with the tears still remains hidden in my eyes, but I do not know if I can get through this urge forever. Or the next two hours, in which Lucifer roams through the rooms. within reach. Like a black panther on the prowl. And I am the carrion that he will spurn on his way. Then I am not more than spoiled, rotten meat.
Lucifer takes his time until he turns his head vaguely to me again. One half of his face is hidden, so I can not see the look in his eyes in the darkness.
¨ No. ¨ he says, it's just a word, a measly syllable, but it is hidden behind a pulse. A dull, dull, hissing grief. ¨ You have made me ... speechless. ¨.
PENG. Directly into the stomach. My heart flutteres in the speed of hummingbird wings, leaching into my knees. I almost succumb to the need to hold my chest like an old, senile man who suffers a heart attack - at the last moment I can stop me. My hands remain close to my hips. Free and limp and disoriented.
Lucifer seems to have said everything he wanted to say, because he wraps himself in silence and fixing a vague point on the ground. It is this newly-found hobby that leaves me almost stoic. I drop my shoulders. Breathe deeply. My lung burns like Egyptian desert sand.
¨ I ... am going to go to my room and pack then. ¨ I mutter. Perhaps the rate of Lucifer was determined, perhaps for myself, I do not know it myself completely.
Anyway, it gives me the metaphorical kick in the butt that drags me through the living room and up the stairs on the first floor. The following procedure is a matter of habit. I have always stored a particularly large bag under the bed to get away in the midst of the darkest night in case of emergency. To take the most important things with me, if an attack or similar chaos announces. I grew up with this behaviour, no wonder that it has become second nature to me in flesh and bone. I almost feel like a little boy again, opening the closets and stashing shirts, pants, various personal treasures in, the usual stuff. Only there is a formative difference - 20 years ago I found it much easier to dispel my room and relocate together with my brother and my father in foreign climes. It took me almost 30 minutes to complete. I already had to learn at an early age, not to lose my heart too much on my ever-changing environment. Now, in the presence this act is much more difficult and it takes much longer. Each shirt plops with the weight of an iron bar in my pocket, and when I remove my toothbrush out of the bathroom I actually feel like crying. By that I mean no male howling, but real howling. Howling, while curved in a corner and the body is shaken by the crown to toe. Howling with agonizing pleasure, with joy, with grein the volume, intensity. The type of howl that seems almost brutal, vulgar because of its licentiousness.
There are no tears. Just a dry cough sobbing. My flooded eyes fall randomly on my reflection and I feel like screaming I HATE YOU! in this face that belongs to me and is dug by furrows of shame and exhaustion. Had I possessed the guts, I would have smashed the reflecting surface with my fist. How it's done in those film dramas usually, right? In slow motion and with a background music that puts ice chips under the viewers' skin. But this is not a movie you can simply switch off if the action is too lengthy or obtrusive. This is my life. My messed up, miserable, monstrous life. And below, barely one floor away stands a messed up, miserable, monstrous archangel who laid his non-existent heart to my feet and pushed me against the wall when I tried to give it back to him. He accepted no No. He never did. Until today. Until today ...
Why? Why doesn't he defend himself? Why doesn't he freak out, turns into a male fury! Why ... why is he suddenly so tame and disgustingly result? Did he just sort of come to terms with my loss? Am I not worth enough to bring the house to collapse in anger? He accepts my decision without protest? That has never been before.
I sound very paradoxical, even for my standards. I mean, what normal thinking person who cheated in his partner expects him to show a little more outrage? Expects him to do anything?
Oh ... that is entirely his fault. I have written him to disappear for a maximum of two hours,I told him to leave this house and let me organize my packing in peace. His presence makes me quite confused in the brain. Worse than any alcoholic brand that Dean has ever held to my nose. I really don't need migrain, but now it insists perking in my temples and even makes somersaults behind my skull.
You can tell me whatever you want - headaches always have a shitty timing.
I forget to look at the clock while I pack and when I'm done I fall from the clouds, as the pointer on the wall shows eight clock in the evening. A total of three hours have passed since my arrival. Fuck. 'Gabriel is going to kill me.' I think, however, I reject this theory again immediately. Gabriel is not resentful in this sense, but horribly curious. He will ask me holes in the stomach when I come back to the bunker. Perhaps he will also say nothing. I do not know which of these possibilities is the more tolerable one.
The bulging bag shouldered over my right arm I leave the first floor and stumble with cautious steps down the stairs, for safety's sake continuously clutching the fingertips of my left hand on the railing. However, the sky has turned out entirely black and the electric light, which blinks in the hallway and downstairs tells me that even Lucifer is blind in the dark.
I want to set foot on the last step, as I remain in the midst of movement. Wasn't there a little sound? A voice? Lucifer? I listen intently.
... something, I'm giving up on you
I'll be the one, if you want me to
Anywhere, I would've followed you
Say something, I'm giving up on you
The bones in my legs are changing abruptly to jelly and I do my best to support me on the wall. It is a small wonder that the very heavy bag gently glides to the ground without making great noise..
And I am feeling so small
It was over in my head
I knew nothing at all
And I will stumble and fall
I'm still learning to love
Just starting to crawl
My teeth pierce like thorns in my tongue, but I care surprisingly little about that. I know this song. I have it constantly humming to myself when we moved into this house. It was a few months ago, the Number One in 20 states and it ran in a loop on the radio. At first I hated it for some reason I couldn't name. But then, as it often happens with exactly the songs you can not stand, it became my earwig, an annoying, stubborn companion. And I started to like it. True, honest, uncompromising liking. I speak from experience when I say that such songs expect a possibly longer life on the iPod playlists than those you have heard in the elevator once and danced to it. This is probably due to psychological illness. We have fought against something that we do not even wanted to leave in our vicinity. But this thing has not given up, has hung on our skirts, and has pulled us by the hair until we had to give it some attention at last. And then, only then we started to love it. To defend it, when someone tired to threaten or insult it. It snuggled to our heart at night , stopped the trembling in our dreams. We assured it, mumbling about security which has become unspeakable rare in this world and that it can have confidence in us because we will never leave.
And this hard won love is much stronger and more ductile than the usually frivolous version. Because we have struggled to accept it. Fought and lost. The admitting defeat here is the most important thing. The cruelest. The most beautiful.
Say something, I'm giving up on you
I'm sorry that I could not get to you
Lucifer sings slowly, almost supporting. Melancholic yet tender. It reminds me of a monk chant in a gigantic cathedral, built with stone and mortar, sweat, blood and tears. His baritone is unmistakable, has a very unique tone. Warm and cool. Smooth and rough. Hard and then yielding in flowing finish again. A swirl. A storm. Chaos in its purest form.
¨ Sam, my heart breaks for you. ¨ he once said to me, that bastard. On that day, when we met face to face. ¨ My heart breaks for you. ¨
Now he breaks my heart. With a song. That's funny, somehow. I could probably laugh about it if I do not have just the punch line would be omitted.
As in a trance I hangle myself along the corridor wall until I rest in the doorway of the kitchen, quiet as a mouse, and see how Lucifer is sitting at the dining table. Electric light radiates through the room and bathes the figure of the devil in a pale glow. His elbows are on the table and hands wedged firmly together. It almost seems as if he would pray but this is… well, for too unrealistic, I guess.
Anywhere, I would have followed you
Say something, I'm giving up on –
He breaks off demonstratively when he notices my presence. For reasons that I cannot name, that I WILL NOT name because they are too sad, I take up the thread of the song with a self-evidence that even shockes myself.
And I will swallow my pride
You're the one that I love
And I'm saying goodbye
The verses crumble as decrepit mortar from my lips. I'm not a great singer. I never was. I'm talentless. But it is enough for the shower. And for Lucifer. Lucifer has always wanted, what I have given him. After the Apocalypse had failed, he just wanted me to compensate. And he got me. All of me. Every inch.
But nothing is meant to last forever. And what has previously been sufficient all the time, will soon no longer be enough.
I stand on short legs, waiting for that Lucifer takes the next part of the song.
Actually, now t the refrain takes place. With fervor. With tearful finale. Only he can sing it that way that blurs my vision. Only he can bring me to tears with his voice and at the same moment to laugh.
But he does not. He prevents to sing again. Not for me. His pride forbides it.
¨ I'm sorry. ¨
The excuse flies like a fired grenade out of my throat, but the explosion does not occur.
Lucifer snorts, rigorously avoids eye contact.
¨ You don't need to lie, Sam. I'm used to be betrayed from those who I love. ¨
I reply nothing to it. What shall I answer? His words involve a finality, which I do not want to compare myself and can. Nevertheless, of course it hurts. Unbearable pain. If I could only tell him why. If I could tell him the truth, then ... no. He would not understand the truth. Would accuse me to use it only as a loophole to escape him.
... I hate myself.
My unsteady glance rushes aimlessly around the room, stays at the kitchen table hanging. There is a plate. Fork and knife are thoughtlessly thrown into the middle of the smooth porcelain. I would never have bought a fine china service myself, as I know only too well how easy it could break in Lucifer's presence. It belonged to the previous owners, a retired couple. They had no children and apparently no friends to whom they wanted to inherit it, so it was kept it in the house like all the other items which once counted to their belongings. Just as it seemed the native spouses had been sleeping in separate single beds later. The master bedroom was on the first floor, the other actually had to fulfill the purpose of a guest room and rested in a far corner of the ground floor. The realtor told me, they had grown apart, but couldn't bear the thought of spending the rest of their miserable existence in solitude, which is why they decided to interact as two lodgers same apartment community despite their eternal dispute. How they were able to continue this for years, the man knew as little as I do. He had known them well, he told me just before he batted with the house keys in front of my nose. They would have been good people. Sincere people. Nice people. Sad people. Dependent people.
Depending on their own fear. Co-dependent.
Had I been thinking at that moment about if Lucifer and I would ever face the same fate? No, of course not. I was, as it would be put in today's youth, stepping on cloud Nine and the rest didn't really matter to me. The name Winchester implies the birthright to have all sorts of worries and risks. Till the end of my life I'll always consider a half-full glass as half empty but you know what? I was happy at that time. Really, truly happy. I know I've said this before but I can not say this enough, because it still sounds so abstrusely amazing in my own ears. As a dream, soaked in opium.
Lucifer had clearly explained to me a few weeks ago, what bloody (very detailed described) consequences those ones would have to bear, who tried to lay a finger on me. And how he'd hung them on their feet, when they touched my ass (because he is convinced that it would be his all alone prerogative), and, and ... It was not the Lucifer, who drove me almost to madness in my infernal illusions, the one who had badgered me to the utmost. It was the only real Lucifer, who spoke to me. And maybe I just needed this fact to kiss him ultimately when he wanted to me convince what benefits I would get while having him, a Son of God, as my beloved partner. Put it this way ... he had not to be asked long to return the kiss.
Now, in the present, hearing my story is probably pretty ridiculous and blameless. But I have no need to twist these facts nor to belittle in any way (if you Satan can trivialize anything, what should be grotesque enough). It was exactly like that. Towards the end. Before, Lucifer and I were like two suspicious panthers sneaking around each other, hissing out in extended warning.
Then, one evening, I was sitting hunched in the library of the bunker studying a book when Lucifer stepped through the door and complained about boredom. He was childlike, grouching. The fact that this boredom had reached a new record showed me his striking interest in my reading (and me, personally).
As chance would have it, I read Faust. Lucifer loved Faust. Idolatrous.
Approximately three hours I discussed with him about Mephisto, even soon fell into a rage until Dean yelled at us from the next room, we should at last get a mattress and a tube of Vaseline looking to relieve frustration. Lucifer has not understood the reference (thanks to heaven!) and I had to hide my crimson stained cheeks behind printed paper and leather binding quickly.
I guess then it started… correctly. And what started? This us. The Lucifer with me. This connection which had existed before the cage and did not shake off.
It clung to me and it still clings, shakes in my flesh and my mind. It's like a blood curse. One can perform a phlebotomy every day until you fall into a swoon, but a cure will never help. It can only be weaken. Drained. Starved down to the bare skeleton of my soul.
Perhaps this uncomfortable conclusion is now one of the reasons that I am drawn to this dirty plates, cutlery dipped in butter. It dates back from the breakfast I have eaten almost two days ago. Breadcrumbs and redberry drops sprinkle the porcelain floor like brush strokes a blank easel. Lucifer has not touched anything. Not surprising. As he eats no food, he vehemently refuses to comprehend the purpose of dishwashing. No problem for me, after all I am the only one in this house with a working metabolism ... well, I was the only one.
Accordingly, it is purely routine. The bag, parked in the hallway, provisionally shoehornes into a rear corner of my memory, I head straight to the table and collect the dishes with disciplined self-evidence and want to contribute them the sink. (My hands are shaking a bit, but that does not matter...)
But the devil is in the detail, right? And if I do not pay attention to this detail I will be damned, for it is the devil, I am looking for to banish from my life.
¨ You don't have to do that. ¨
His baritone is a ball, poking through my ribs.
¨ I want it, though. You're an angel and angels do not eat. I'll do the last dish-washing. ¨ I say more harsh than I tried to but what is out, is out. The last dish-washing ... God, how that cuts into my flesh. Like a poker in a jellyfish.
Lucifer raises an eyebrow. Then a smile spreads across his face. It is a cold smile. A bitter smile. A fake smile.
¨ Your parting gift is clean dishes. ¨ he says in an indefinable tone and with him it sounds more like a statement than a question, ¨ That will not change anything. ¨ This set in turn acts almost patronizing.
And I want to scream. Inwardly, I do that too. With wonderfully grotesque extendability.
¨ I know. ¨ I say instead.
Similar to a waiter carrying a silver tray with wine glasses and sovereign, I balance the thin load on my hands, mechanically going to the sink. There are three, four meters that separate me from there. Five, at most. A way that has never appeared so long to me, and yes, I know how stupid that sounds. It is stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Step by step, breath by breath.
Only a few centimeters left, then the dishes land in the sink and when I'm done with them, I'll go. Go. Lucifer's eyes are like hot coals burning in my back. Those damn eyes.
Knife and fork clattering to the rhythm of my heart beat.
I'm already so close to the goal that I only need to stretch out my arm to touch the silvery gray kitchenette and -
Then I stumble over my own feet.
Why? I dont know.
What do I care? Nothing.
Will the impact hurt? Yes. Definitely yes.
A quieter sound, without assignment or function, formes my mouth into a lean "Oh". The soil is racing to me with inexorable speed, prevents the dishes in my hands, that I rely on the poor and the milder effects of the fall.
I can still hear Lucifer calling out my name. It doesn't even sound that angry anymore.
¨Sam? ¨
Then the clang of shattering porcelain is the only sound that roars in my ears.
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