She dug into her purse and withdrew a CD in a plastic sleeve, placing it on the table. “He did a cover of Eels’ ‘Beautiful Freak’ that I think you need to hear. I cried for a week after I heard it.”
“Look, I appreciate that you’re concerned about fixing things between us. I really do. But some things just aren’t going to happen no matter how much we want them to.” My throat started to tighten. Emotions were welling up beneath the surface of my mind, threatening to spill out if we kept talking about him.
“Okay. I just thought you should know.” She stood up, brushing crumbs off the front of her skirt. “I’ve gotta get going. Call me tomorrow.”
“I will. G’night.” She waved and left the apartment. I sat in silence, staring at the CD at my fingertips for a long moment. My mind told me not to listen. It would only open old wounds and smear salt into them. But my hand reached out and placed the disc in the laptop.
It whirred for a few seconds, and then I heard the polite sound of applause. He had recorded this at the Devil’s Paradise, probably, during a live performance. I folded my hands over my mouth and listened to the first few lines.
His voice was heavy and had a rough texture that made shivers roll down my spine. There were some artists that had a polished, pop sound to them. Michael wasn’t one of them. When he sang, he meant every single word.
I couldn’t get through the entire thing. I stopped the recording and pressed my hands over my face, inhaling deeply. No. I wouldn’t backslide when I had come so far. He had his life and I had mine. We would be fine without each other.
No more, no less.
The next day after work, I walked into my apartment, shut the door, and turned around, only to freeze in place.
Michael was standing in my kitchen.
My throat closed up and my entire body seemed to go cold from head to toe as it tried to absorb the shock of seeing him after six months of no contact. No phone calls, no visits, nothing. Part of me wanted to race across the room and catapult into his arms, to bury my nose in his shirt and smell that familiar scent, to have him smile at me and erase any negative thoughts my mind could conjure. But that was just part of me. The rest was hollow.
“Hey, Jordan.” His voice came out soft, meaningful, and hesitant. The words seemed to jolt me out of my paralysis. I realized I’d been standing there staring at him for nearly half a minute. Lauren hadn’t been lying. There were dark smudges under his eyes and his skin had an unhealthy pallor.
I let my face go blank and slid out of the duster, walking towards the kitchen table and draping it over the back of a chair. “What are you doing here, Michael?”
It was hard to concentrate on anything in the room other than him, but I managed as I went to the refrigerator and searched for the food to get my dinner. Chicken salad. Nothing special.
I heard him take a deep breath. “I have something to tell you.”
I sat the Tupperware container of food on the counter. “And you couldn’t tell me over the phone because…?”
He sighed. “Jordan, don’t do this.”
I slammed the door shut, whirling on him. “Don’t. Don’t you tell me what to do. You can’t just waltz in here and expect me not to be upset.”
Michael shook his head. “No, that’s not what I’m talking about. You know I wouldn’t have come here if I didn’t have something important to say.”
“What makes you think I even want to hear it?”
His green eyes narrowed just barely. “Because if you didn’t, you would have thrown me out already.”
The truth of his words slapped me in the face, rendering me silent. I crossed my arms, leaning against the counter with a cold expression. “Two minutes.”
The angel set his jaw, but nodded. He turned his back on me and ran a hand through his hair—a painfully familiar gesture—then rested his large hands on the counter opposite of me as he spoke.
“Yesterday, Father called me to His side for council.”
Shock crackled through me. From what I’d heard, direct conversation with God was an extremely rare occurrence. His orders were often sent out through the Son, not the Man himself.
Michael paused to let this information absorb before continuing. “When I knelt before Him, He only asked me one thing.”
I couldn’t help myself. “What?”
“Do you love her?”
My heart rate tripled. I dug my fingers into my arms, trying to keep myself from having a panic attack. It was stupid, really. Of course He knew. He was God. But I had never in my life thought that the thing hanging between Michael and me would receive acknowledgment from on high.
Eventually, I managed to calm down enough to ask: “And…what did you say?”
His voice was a mere whisper. “Yes.”