I can feel Raph’s eyes studying my profile as I look out at the overcast sky above and the tumultuous waves below.
“Your painting that day in the art studio, of the beach—was that the place?” he asks.
I nod silently. Magnus had told me on that first day that Eden was in many ways a mirror of Earth and in that moment, in the face of Raph’s confession about his yearly commemoration of his mom’s death, I’m surprised to find that there are parts of his life which are a mirror of my own. It would have been impossible to believe only a few weeks ago that his perfect life could be anything like mine, but I realize that there is darkness hidden in the depths of his light. A darkness that I recognize. A loss so deep, that you need to bite the inside of your cheek just to keep from crying out.
“Hey, I guess we’re both screwed up then,” I say finally, trying to lighten the mood, because the air between us feels so thick right now, that I’m finding it difficult to breathe.
“But I still think I’ve got the worse deal—my mom being killed in a car crash, then finding out ten years later that my absentee father was, in fact, a king of an alternative realm, who recently killed himself, is pretty difficult to beat.”
Raph smirks in response and something inside me is glad that I’m able to make him smile. Even if it is that smirk that usually infuriates me.
His face grows serious then.
“Did Magnus tell you how it happened?” Raph asks. “Your father’s suicide, I mean.”
His words cause pinpricks of discomfort to race through me, because I’m not ready to talk about this.
“No,” I reply quietly.
Raph watches me for a long moment.
“Do you want to know?” he asks finally.
I shake my head in response, not trusting myself to speak. We’re both silent for a moment.
“One day, I think I might,” I say finally. My voice is hoarse, even to my own ears.
“But right now … I’m not ready.”
Raph just nods in response. He doesn’t push me, doesn’t force the subject.
We sit there next to each other for what seems like an eternity, watching the rhythmic movements of the waves below.
After a while, Raph gets up and surveys the tide. When he turns back to me, there’s a mischievous twinkle in those impossibly blue eyes which tug at my curiosity.
“The last thing my mom said to me was to live like I was alive. I didn’t know what it meant back then. But I know now.
“So, when I come here each year, I do something to remind myself of what it feels like—to be alive.”
That mischievous glint coupled by those last words, make me think that I’m not going to like what comes next, not one bit.
“What is it that you do?” I ask anyway, the hesitation clear in my voice.
Raph grins back at me, the earlier sadness fading, or just retreating back into wherever he keeps that part of himself hidden.
He holds out his hand to me.
“Do you trust me?” he asks.
There’s a million reasons why I shouldn’t, even if he has just shared something with me which he’s likely never shared with anyone else.
But I find myself taking his hand and letting him pull me up to my feet.
We’re both standing at the edge of the cliff, looking down at deadly drop, at the waves crashing against the rocks below. The height is dizzying from this angle.
“Jump with me,” Raph says simply.
Alarm and panic shoot through me because I think he must have lost his goddamn mind.
“Are you crazy?” I almost shout.
Raph just looks amused.
“No. Trust me, it’s safe,” he says.
He holds out his other hand and the waves beneath us swell higher. I can see what he’s doing, making sure the tide is high enough to break the fall. But that doesn’t mean I’m about to willingly agree to jump off this cliff with him.
He’s watching me as I freak out internally. But I don’t feel any pressure from him. I could say no and I’m certain he wouldn’t force the subject.
I’m terrified as hell at the sight of the drop. But something inside me feels the thrill of the risk, the danger.
I think I may have lost my mind, too, because I find myself nodding silently.
Raph flashes me a daredevil grin and doesn’t give me a second to chicken out, because the next thing I know, I’m hurtling off the edge of the cliff, down towards the crashing waves beneath.
My scream is lost in the wind whipping crazily at my face as I fall. I can barely register my own body parts but distantly, I can feel Raph’s hand still gripping mine. The fall is terrifying and exhilarating at the same time. Every fiber of my being buzzes with awareness and I know I’ve never felt so alive in my entire life. For the few seconds that we’re falling, my mind blanks completely and there’s no loss, no pain, no anger. There’s just the feeling of falling.
Our hands separate as we crash through the surface of the ocean beneath. The water is ice cold and my whole body feels like it’s been plunged into the Antarctic.
I panic for a second, but it’s enough for the tide to pull me under and then I’m really panicking.
Raph is there in an instant, though, grabbing my hand again as he kicks up to the surface, taking me with him.
When we finally break through the surface, I’m sputtering and coughing. Sea water is spewing from my mouth and I’m pretty sure it’s not a good look.
Raph is just laughing at me, though, and his impossibly blue eyes blaze even brighter with excitement and adrenaline. The shade is so vivid, that I find it hard to breathe for a second, although that could just be the sea water in my lungs.
“Oh, my god! You asshole. I can’t believe you talked me into doing that!” I cough out.
He laughs harder in response.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy it.”
“Urgh,” I reply in exasperation. He might be right, but I sure as hell don’t want him knowing it.
I turn and start swimming towards the shore without another word, afraid that if I had to look at that smug face a minute longer, I’d end up drowning him.
I reach the shore and if I thought I was cold in the water, the feeling of the chilly breeze against my already frozen skin, is even worse. I’m seriously thinking that I’m going to get hypothermia. Raph reaches the shore a few seconds later and although the sea is Baron’s element, Raph himself looks like some kind of ocean god as he emerges from the waves. He belongs to the elements and they belong to him—every ray of sunlight, every crashing wave, every gust of wind, within his control.
The image is swept from my mind though, when Raph opens his mouth.