FicWad

So so so sorry for the wait, internet is sparse in the valley of the dead that is my grandpa’s house. In fact there’s none at all.

So I’ve been thinking (I know, amazing, right?!) and I’ve come up with two different endings I could use. Dilemma. One is my original plan, and the other is totally random and will piss you guys off because it’s completely irritating and ends on a cliff hanger. I’ve always wanted to write one of those cliff hanger endings...just to annoy people. (Muahahahahahaaa)

Well, enjoy while I contemplate the pros and cons of both endings :P

Light.

I was surrounded by light. Bright, white and dazzling. As soon as I had opened my eyes I wished I hadn’t but I couldn’t bring myself to squeeze them shut again. Where am I?

I sat up. I felt...weightless, in a way. Like I wasn’t there or something; I was just air. I held my hand out in front of my face. The pink of my skin was a vibrant contrast to the sea of empty white light. What happened?

It was a struggle to stand up but I managed to stumble a few steps forward.

“H-hello?” My voice echoed around the blinding abyss but wasn’t answered. The panic of being completely alone in this strange place, let alone the lack of memory of how I’d gotten there in the first place, rose up my throat like bile.

So I ran. Ran and ran and ran. I didn’t know how long for, but I wasn’t going anywhere. The light was never ending and I just found myself in what looked like the same place. But that wasn’t really saying anything because it all looked the same. After what could have been years, hours or merely seconds I stopped, panting, and stared for someone. Something. Anything.

“Hello?” I called again, expecting no answer.

“Hey, Lee.”

My stomach lurched as I heard the voice and whirled around wildly to find nothing there except me. “Where are you?” I muttered.

“Here, doofus.”

I spun around again and almost jumped three paces back out of fright as I saw him. Sitting crossed legged on what would’ve been the ground, the kid couldn’t have been more than eleven or twelve. An oversized New Jersey Spartans football shirt and blue striped pyjama pants enveloped his skinny frame and lanky limbs, making him seem even smaller. A mop of dirty blond hair stopped just past his ears, untamed and uncared for, and his golden bangs fell into a familiar pair of dark hazel eyes that were shielded by a pair of specs that rested nearly on the end of his pointy nose. And despite my current situation, he was kind of adorable.

“Do you know why you’re here?” he asked; his smile warm and friendly.

“Where is here?” I replied. My voice sounded disconnected, like it didn’t belong to me but to someone on the other side of a brick wall separating us.

“Do you not remember what happened?”

I frowned and looked at him for inspiration. His eyes twinkled momentarily and suddenly the memories came crashing down. The tree. Frank on his knees. Gerard. The kiss. And then...nothing. Black.

The boy smiled knowingly at, I guessed, the look of realisation on my face as the penny dropped and the light bulb above my head flickered on.

I swallowed. “This isn’t purgatory.”

The boy shook his head. “No, it’s not. We’re in a little place beyond all that. A safe place. Kind of...in between.”

“I thought purgatory is ‘in between’.”

He sighed. “He obviously told you the simple version of it. And I can bet,” he added with a raised eyebrow, “that this isn’t the first time he’s lied and gotten you in sticky positions. Well, not as sticky as this.”

I returned the sigh, becoming aggravated and impatient. “Look, no offense, but I’d appreciate it if you stopped with the interrogation and just told me in plain English what the hell is going on.”

The kid nodded somewhat apologetically and stood up. His eyes searched mine, taking in my appearance before smiling contently, turning on his heel and walking away.

“You’re definitely his type,” he called over his shoulder.

I frowned as he walked away into the distance, becoming a small black dot in a surprisingly short space of time. “Mikey?” I whispered.

“Yeah?”

I spun around again and damn well near jumped out of my skin to find him behind me.

“How the fuck did you get there?!” I breathed.

“I walked,” he replied innocently.

I frowned. “How can you walk away from something only to come back to it?”

Mikey paused and pushed his glasses back up his nose. “Walk around the world.”

“Small world,” I muttered. “Why are you talking to me? Why here? Why now?”

He smiled that knowing smile again as we began to walk around the world. “It’s kinda my job. Y’see, this place is like...life therapy if you like. And I’m you’re shrink. It’s a place to reflect on what happened and what happens next.”

“What do you mean?”

“My job is to show you what really happened. I do it to everyone in your position. But, it helps if I take the form of someone familiar to them who’s passed.”

“Who are you then, if you keep changing?” I asked.

He blinked behind his glasses. “I’m Mikey.”

I raised my eyebrow but let it pass. I figured there really wasn’t any point in arguing with an angel about his ‘job’. We walked on in silence until he finally stopped and looked around expectantly. I looked around to face him.

“What?” Mikey nodded to something in front of me. I turned back around and jumped again, letting out a yelp to see myself staring back at me. It didn’t take me long afterwards to realise that I was looking at mine and Mikey’s reflection through a large oval mirror with intricately patterned sides floating in mid-air.

“Will you please stop doing that?” I snapped angrily.

“Sorry,” Mikey giggled. “The look on your face never gets old!” He walked over to the mirror and peered at the smooth glass. “What do you see, Lee?”

“I see me,” I replied simply. “I look like hell.”

Mikey laughed as the glass fogged over and all I could see in the surface was mist. I frowned at Mikey for an explanation but he gave me a ‘just go with it’ look and continued to stare intently at the glass. Eventually the mist parted, revealing a grassy hill with a drooping, withered cherry tree on top. I gasped sharply as the scene zoomed in to show Frank sobbing and cradling my limp body in his arms. The fat tears were flooding down his cheeks faster than I’ve ever seen, dropping into the grass and onto my pale, almost blue cheeks.

Gerard was there too but he wasn’t crying. He was screaming. Screaming and yelling up at the
night sky like the stars had done him wrong. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but it was definitely something.

“The fuck is he doing?” I cried. Mikey scratched his chin in thought, giving the impression of a mad scientist complete with wild hair and glasses. His said specs had slid right to the end of his nose again, but instead of pushing them back up he tipped his head back and looked down his nose instead to stop them from falling off. What a weird kid.

“He’s...saving your life,” he concluded.

I stared wide eyed at the glass in horror. “What?”

Mikey gestured at the glass. “Well, y’see, you and my brother were planning to put you in purgatory so you could be together, right?”

“Sure.”

“Right and it would’ve worked - you’d be stuck in his position and as he has to do something really nice or give up something to leave, he couldn’t leave because putting someone in eternal pain and suffering is, y’know, unthinkable. So anyway, it would’ve worked, but it didn’t because you can’t put someone into purgatory and you were just being stupid.”

“...What?”

“You. Can’t. Put. Someone. Into. Purgatory,” he said slowly. “It’s impossible, an error in the whole balance of life, death and the inbetweeners as I call them. It ruins the system.”

Okay, what? Was he telling me, this little spirit guardian therapist kid was telling me that I had just died for nothing? As in, I would be dead, Gerard would go to hell and Frank would be suicidal nothing?

“...You mean I’ve just died for no reason whatsoever.”

“...Um...yeah.”

The fuck!

“Well, no.”

“No?” I glared. Mikey awkwardly looked at the ground and back at the mirror. I followed his gaze to see Frank now charging towards Gerard with his fists raised. My eyes widened to the size as dinner plates as I watched them tackle each other to the floor, screaming insults and threats as they made attempts to pound and kick one another. In any other situation I would
have found their kind of bar fighting technique to beat each other up awesome to watch but gathering my current situation of being a half-angel I mentally begged them to stop.

“You don’t need to see that,” Mikey said in sympathy and the mirror glass fogged over to reveal the reflections of an uncomfortable twelve year old angel and an even more uncomfortable half-angel once again.

“What do you mean ‘no’, Mikey?” I said again.

Mikey looked back at me from the mirror and my stomach tensed in worry at the sheepish look in his eyes. “He knew all along,” he replied quietly.

The knot in my stomach tightened until if felt like I was being choked from the inside. “What?”

“Gerard knew that this plan wouldn’t have worked. He knew you can’t put someone into purgatory, he knew you would die and he knew that he’d have to give himself up in return for you.”

“...He was using me. Again,” I said bitterly.

“No! No no no no no. Well yes, but not in a bad way. He had to trade his life for yours. The only way he could do that is to put your life at risk. And so he did, at the tree. What we saw in the mirror, when he was screaming, he was asking, begging to trade his life in return for yours. In Latin. Sure, he used you again. Only this time it was for your own good. And this time he’ll finally get what he wanted.”

I grimaced as the words hit me like daggers, the choking feeling rising like vomit again as my tongue fumbled around for the right words to ask the question I already knew the answer to. “What did he want?”

“To leave.”

I let out a slightly pathetic wail-ish gasp and fell to my knees. The tears ran thick and fast down my cheeks. Mikey’s lip quivered, looking like a kid again, as he realised he’d made me cry. He hunkered down beside me and slung his small skinny arms around me until my sobs turned to snivels.

“I’m so sorry, Lee,” he hushed. “But he’s leaving. He’s leaving and he’s never coming back. We can’t change that.”

“Not even you?” I whispered.

Mikey smiled sadly and shook his head. “Not even me.”

I sighed and wiped my eyes. He stood up and held out his hand to me. I took it and stumbled to my feet.

“Come on,” he said. “It’s time to go home.”

“Home?”

“Home,” Mikey nodded. “I have nothing else to tell you.”

“But what happens next?” I frowned. “What, do I just keep on living like nothing’s happened? Just forget?”

He shrugged. “You have to decide whether you’ll get on with your life or turn into a mad cat lady who dwells on what could’ve been. But I doubt you’ll forget.”

I couldn’t help but giggle, although my eyes were still wet. “What about you?”

“I’m gonna see my brother after two years,” he grinned. “And besides, I have loads of dead people to see. I’m pretty busy.”

I laughed again and pulled him into a hug. “Thank you, Mikey.”

He pulled away and fumbled inside his pocket. Smiling, he brought out a small model warplane. “Do you like airplanes? Me and Gerard made it a long time ago. It’s a spitfire.”

I smiled and took it from his small hand, twiddling it around in my fingers a bit before pocketing it. “Guess I’ll see you around, then.”

The kid nodded. “Enjoy the rest of your life. Who knows, maybe we’ll see each other again someday.”

I gasped a bit as I felt some invisible force pull me away and waved to the black dot Mikey had quickly become.

“I’ll see you in heaven!” he called.

Just read it through. This is so fucking stupid.

Sniff. Last chapter coming up soon ;_;