Chapter 27

PAZ

– The Marriage of Yod and He. The common Tibetan Symbol. The Seer identifies himself with it.1 –

“And, even surrounded by despair, the joy that fills me inflates my being and feeds my life ...

However, I know all too well that reality is quite different, and that what I now feel are nothing but cruel,

passing illusions of a life pulled away from its Destiny.”

"What are you doing there, sitting on the floor?”

I raised my head and blinked, not knowing if I was dreaming or awake. Gabriel was right in front of me, sitting on my bed, as if he’d been watching me for quite some time. His face was an indecipherable mask, his velvet tone sounding dry and restrained.

I wondered how long he’d been sitting there. I had the feeling I’d fallen asleep. I looked out the window in search of a time reference, but the day outside was still bright.

I shrugged, answering his questions. I didn’t want to talk, or think, certain that the sound of my own voice would bring everything back, breaking the quietness and stillness inside me. If I could stay like this, I felt I could pretend I still had my eyes closed, forgetting myself so I wouldn’t be able to feel.

“Until when are you planing to stay there?” he insisted and I watched him in silence.

Although his expression seemed serene and indifferent, something in his eyes and in the way he spoke told me otherwise.

My lack of response seemed to worsen his bad mood, and a small frown marked the perfect skin of his forehead.

“You still smell like him!” he accused me, dryly, and the wave of pain that washed over me, together with how ridiculous everything really was, left me on the brink of despair; and so I laughed, knowing I could never cry.

Gabriel sat in silence, watching me with his serious expression until my laughter started to die out. My throat hurt, as though I’d been screaming for hours, and I faced him, running a cold, moist hand over my scalding face.

“Did you know he told me the exact same thing?” I asked and my voice sounded harsh and broken. I smiled sarcastically and rested my head on my hand. “He also told me I smelled like you, and searched for you like a mad man, as if you could be hiding in my shadow.” Gabriel seemed to try to control his bad temper and closed his hands into tight fists over his legs.

“Sigweardiel told me what happened,” he confessed.

“And?” He looked away and frowned.

“That pain that consumes you ... annoys me!” I smiled briefly at his comment, lost between pain, and sadness, and happiness. “Seeing you there, because of him, makes me want to do something drastic, something that would replace him inside you.”

“You want even my pain to be because of you? I thought you wanted me to smile,” I argued and he seemed to struggle with the idea.

“And I do. But if that’s not possible, then I’d rather that even in pain you’ll think only of me,” he told me roughly.

“Michael is important to me,” I declared in a small voice and saw him clench his teeth. “He’s the reason why you’re here.”

“That means ...” His voice broke, hesitantly, and I forced myself to stop being a coward, at least in front of him.

“That I love him, yes,” I completed and the air around us became heavier, showing just how much those words had enraged him. “It hurts me to know that I hurt him. I feel sad, knowing that I’m the reason of his sadness. He used to be so bright, and now ... and I feel like it was me, who stole his light.”

“Then is it because of the Contract? Is that the reason why you’re here, and not there? With him?” he asked in an icy murmur, refusing to look at me, and that sharp pain pierced my chest again.

“No, not anymore,” I whispered, but it looked like he didn’t hear me.

“If you want to be with him, just go!” he told me, raising his voice, and the glass of the windows shook as if about to break.

Gabriel took a deep breath, resting his forehead on the tips of his fingers and seemed to focus on controlling the intensity of his presence that, even from where he sat, already had me shivering.

The shadow his bent body had become left a bitter taste in my mouth. I felt him alone again, and that idea was like a dagger piercing my heart. Because, in the end, he was always alone, even when surrounded by those who knew him, like Lea and Alexander. Constantly restraining himself, constantly tying himself up from the inside out, in a dark place where no one could ever reach him, for hundreds of years.

I stood up, using the wall behind me for support, and went to him in slow steps, waiting, at any moment, for a more brusque reaction. And yet he didn’t even move, and I couldn’t help thinking how much he looked like a Human on the brink of despair.

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I recalled other moments when I’d wished I could hug him and comfort him. Back then I couldn’t even get close to him, my own existence rejecting his. But now everything had changed.

I slid my fingers between his soft, dark hair and he seemed even quieter. Although I couldn’t stop trembling, I pulled him close, until his head was against my stomach, surprised at how easily he allowed my hand to guide him, and took a deep breath.

“I’m exactly where I want to be,” I said without a shadow of a doubt, and that certainty actually made me feel more relaxed. “And the Contract ... the Contract is the only thing that binds us together, and the reason why you’re here. And if I don’t want it to be fulfilled, it’s because you would probably leave afterwards,” I added, drawing small, soft circles with the tips of my fingers on his head.

“And what if you had to choose?” he asked, his velvet voice sounding muffled, and I was instantly frozen in place.

It wasn’t as if I hadn’t asked myself that same question, certain that he would end up asking it, but until that point, I was yet to reach an acceptable answer.

“That is impossible for me,” I confessed openly.

“Because I’m not Human?

I thought about it for a moment. I couldn’t deny the weight that that had, and how much the differences between us pulled us apart. But I still wasn’t sure it would be any easier to choose if he were just another one of my classmates.

“I don’t know.” He raised his head, making me release him from my touch, and I was dazed, for a moment, lost in the perfection of his face. “Are you angry? Annoyed? Sad?”

“Happy ... because you’re here.”

I smiled at his answer, and touched his face, sliding my fingers over his soft, cold skin. He closed his eyes, like I’d seen him do to feel the rain, and I traced the perfect lines of his face, as if I were the one molding that perfect statue. The complete absence of any imperfections made his skin totally inhuman and, if it weren’t for the electrical sensation that tingled in my fingers, I could have sworn that there was no life inside him.

I drew his ears, lost in their anatomical perfection, and traced the thin cords that were the muscles of his neck, detecting a light slow, beating rhythm from far away.

“Your skin ... is so strange,” I murmured, noticing that the texture was always the same, and Gabriel smiled, opening his eyes to look at me.

“Strange is the feeling of your touch.”

I immediately pulled my hands away, suddenly aware of what I’d just done, and he laughed.

“It’s only because I’ve been curious about it for a long time now!” I claimed in my defense, completely flustered. “I didn’t mean anything special!”

“But it was special ... for me. I don’t remember anyone ever touching me, unless they were trying to destroy me.” I faced him seriously, knowing that he was referring to the other Deiwos, and he smiled again. “Ah, except Lea, of course.”

“And other Humans?” I asked and immediately condemned the true source of that question, hurriedly trying to disguise it. “I mean, everyone at school, they didn’t have any problems being close to you, unlike me, who can’t stop shaking.”

“Mostly coerced cold and distant touches that want more than they’re willing to give. Yes, I’ve had plenty of those,” he said. “But, when left on their own, Humans tend to avoid me, just as much as I avoid them. They’re too frail and complicated.”

I stood silent, avoiding saying anything else for fear that I’d end up saying what I didn’t want to say.

“Before Lea came to me, there were times when I spent my days in the Human world. I was young and in search of something that could fill the emptiness inside me, something that would pose a challenge, since everyone seemed to fear me and, for that reason, avoid me. At least Humans, when properly influenced, can even treat me as their equal. And here no one knew who I was, and I could easily play with their stupidity and innocence. Two words and a smile were enough to make them forget their own primal instincts, and they would walk and talk with me, completely oblivious of my true nature. I even ended up spending a couple of Human lives here, helping ones and harming others, as if the world were no more than a huge doll house. And, obviously, I had many lovers, whom I freely manipulated according to my desires, using them as pawns in my games. However, none of the ones I allowed to touch me lasted for long.”

Once more I felt him expecting a reaction from me, as if what he’d just told me was just another test to my persistence.

“Although to them such actions could be seen as expressions of affection, I always felt as if something, somehow inferior to me, had just touched me,” he explained. “And the way they always lost themselves in my arms, always wanting more, unable to think, trying to find new ways to seduce me, it made me want to kill them, certain that afterwards I’d be able to enjoy some blessed quiet moments.”

I stood silent, my heart beating hard against my chest, and raised one hand to touch the lips that so coldly had spoken those words. The warmth from his breath touched my fingertips, contrasting with the cold of his skin. I still remembered the feeling of the gentle kiss he’d given me the night before and, even after hearing what he’d just said, I still couldn’t help wanting to feel it again.

However, the words I’d been restraining since before were still persistently tumbling around in my brain, and I hated myself even more for not being able to contain them.

“But not Steph,” I muttered and he seemed surprised for an instant, pulling away from my touch.

“You shouldn’t say things like that, Mariane. Not when I’m trying this hard to behave,” he grunted, but I wasn’t up to letting him escape my question, since I’d had been shameless enough to bring it up in the first place.

“She was different,” I insisted and Gabriel sighed.

“Of course she was. She was important to you.”

“Is that all?” I pressed on and he seemed amused.

“That’s all. In truth I never even raised a single finger to touch her. And besides, if she were an important existence to me, I wouldn’t be here with you.” My heart responded automatically to his words.

“Because I’m important to you,” I tried, looking for a confirmation, and his expression became almost grave.

“Yes.”

Inexplicably, his soft whisper brought pain to my chest, even though he’d just said what I’d been wanting to hear, and I found myself unable to believe his words.

“Prove it,” I demanded and was immediately silent. Those words, those were the same words Michael had said to me, what he had asked of me. Something, anything more concrete than mere beautiful words. Something that I’d been unable to give him.

I was pulled to a side by my blouse, which startled me and dragged me away from my bleak thoughts, and I lost my balance, ending up sitting on his leg. The cold fingers that touched my face made me jump, since I hadn’t realized how close we were. And I blinked, still trying to make sense of what had just happened.

“What did I just tell you? About the things you shouldn’t say?” he asked in a deep voice that left me completely dazed, and his crooked smile was all the warning I got before he pulled me again by my cotton blouse, making me fall backwards.

I lost my breath somewhere before hitting the soft quilt of my bed and watched in panic when he leaned over me. My hands flexed nervously and all my trembling muscles became stiff.

Gabriel smiled again, this time that amused smile of his that so many times had annoyed me in the past, and placed an elbow right beside my shoulder, resting his head on his hand to look at me.