Angel

by Arty

(with additional text by Alienor)

Chapter 5

2001

"How are things at university?"

"The same as they were the last time that you asked, which was," Susan looked at her watch, "all of 20 minutes ago."

"Sorry, I never know what to say. I'm so pleased to see you, I just can't say. It's so good to see a friendly face."

"There's been no let up, then?"

"It's not just Angela's mother any more. In fact, my mum says she seems to have toned down her comments now."

"What are you going to do?"

"What I'm doing now, keeping my head down, keeping my nose clean, keeping away from Angela." As I said this, I could feel a distinct sense of unease. I'd become familiar with this sensation over the last ten years, and it could only mean one thing. I shivered and pushed the sensation away.

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah, someone walked over my grave, that's all."

Susan laughed and looked at her watch. "Time to go, I'm afraid. I said I'd meet my mum and yours in twenty minutes. We have some serious shopping to get in."

I shuddered in mock horror as we pushed back our seats and made our way out of the food court. The place was seething and a couple sat down at our table almost before we'd stood up. We pushed our way through the throng into an oasis of sudden calm and started to walk towards the place were Susan and our mothers were due to meet. I listened with half an ear to something that Susan was saying about life at university. Up ahead of us, there was a knot of people. I could hear shouting; my sense of foreboding grew deeper and, ignoring Susan, I slipped through the press of people and made my way to the front of the throng.

The shouts were coming from the building society. For some reason, only people approaching from my direction were aware of something going on. I looked in through the windows and could see why; the window displays hid the action if you came from the other way. Some sort of robbery was in progress; it seemed to be going wrong, badly wrong. I looked up to see what I'd dreaded: Angela and her friends approaching, oblivious to what was going on around them; chatting and laughing and looking simply gorgeous.

There was a bang as the door to the branch was smashed open by one of the robbers; he was clearly deranged with fear. Suddenly, Angela was caught in the glare of one of the spotlights that were used for illumination in this part of the shopping centre. For a long moment, she glowed, and I knew at once that it was that time again. Heedless I rushed forward and saw the danger. The robber pointed his gun at Angela and screamed at her incoherently.

For the first time Angela and her friends were aware of the danger. One of them screamed. Angela froze as she caught sight of the barrel of the pistol. Some sort of .22 target gun, I noted absently. I could see his finger curl round the trigger as he took up the slack in it. I half dived in front of him, putting myself between the gun and Angela and pushed her away and to the side with all of my strength. I could see her go down and heard the bang of the pistol almost simultaneously. Angela seemed to fall in slow motion and the crack of the gun seemed insignificant, something like the sound that a toy might make.

I felt a tap on my back near my shoulder. It was almost as if the robber was trying to get my attention so I would get out of the way. For an instant, I thought he hadn't shot me, but then I felt a strange weakness and, all of a sudden, I was falling myself, my legs unable to sustain my weight. The sounds that had seemed muted returned with full vigour and my head reverberated with the screams and cries of shocked shoppers. I felt a pair of hands holding my face and I opened my eyes to see Angela's eyes very close to mine and filled with tears.

"Mark? Oh God, Mark! What has he done to you?"

I wondered why I couldn't feel any pain, and then I could, and I screamed as the wound in my back made itself felt. I could hear Angela shouting that I wasn't to be moved and then slowly, ever so slowly, the scene before me faded to blackness…

The shock of the bullet hitting me was still fresh in my mind as I popped through the last bubble. I thought I knew what was going on now; at least I didn't think there was anything else for me to experience. Even though I was certain that I knew what was coming, I felt strangely calm, which may have been something to do with the inevitability of the process, or maybe it was just inherent in the situation. Either way I was grateful, whatever was going to happen next it was better to be calm than to be panicking and incoherent.

It seemed that I wasn't ever going to re-experience the barely remembered thrill of the first time that I held a girl's bare breast, licked a nipple or saw a pussy. The most feeling that I could dredge up was a mild disgruntlement. I let my mind wander over the last decade or so and I felt content. I'd made a difference. How many people could say that about themselves? Without my intervention Angela would have been dead, disfigured, raped or with a criminal record. I let myself wallow in the good feeling.

Still it would have been nice to remember that time with…

I noticed for the first time that the blackness was looking distinctly grey with overtones of pink. Then I saw a shaft of bright light, at the same time I could hear the sound of someone calling my name. Mentally, I squared my shoulders, and moved towards the light…

Now

"Mark. Wake up Mark." I opened my eyes and blinked, blinded by the strong light that a blurry shape was shining into them.

"He's awake!" The voice sounded strangely familiar. I tried to turn my head towards the voice but nothing happened, so I moved my eyes instead. Another blurry figure swam into view. "Thank God he's woken up!" I blinked rapidly and suddenly my eyesight cleared. It was Susan! Another figure appeared, my Mother!

"Oh Mark…" I could see tears streaming down both their faces. I tried to say their names but all I could manage was a strangled croak. Someone stuck a tube between my lips and squeezed a sip of water into my mouth. It seemed to disappear before it reached my throat.

"More?" I tried to nod and was rewarded by the feel of my head moving. Another squirt, and some of it reached my throat. I nodded again and received a further squirt for my trouble. Eventually, I reached the point where my mouth felt like it would work and I shook my head slightly. The tube was withdrawn. I tried to speak. Again the words sounded strangled and weak to my ears, but the two women smiled and cried as if I'd made them the happiest people in the world. After several attempts I managed to say what I wanted to say.

"Mum, Susan, what happened?"

Before they could answer the first voice interrupted. "We'd rather you remembered as much as you can before we tell you anything, what's the last thing that you recall?"

With much croaking and a few more sips of water I managed to answer his question.

"I was trying to push Angela out of the way of some madman with a gun. I remember someone screaming and feeling like I'd been punched in the back, and then it was just black."

"You were shot. You lost a lot of blood, but you were very lucky, your shoulder blade stopped the bullet from entering your lung, though it did quite a bit of damage in the process. I think we managed to repair most of it. You seem to have healed very well indeed, however you've been in a coma for almost a year. I was beginning to think you were never coming out of it. But these ladies persevered and here you are." The doctor smiled at Susan and my Mother.

Susan spoke first, "You're a bloody hero!"

I shook my head in irritation. "Was Angela all right?"

"Of course. She probably saved your life in return by stopping them from moving you until the paramedics arrived. The surgeon said that moving you in the wrong way might have allowed the bullet to end up somewhere dangerous."

I grunted at that. "I don't see how even Mrs Peters could blame me this time."

There was a half-gasp from the other side of the room. I turned my head and focused on the source of the noise. It was Angela's mother! "Sorry." I wasn't sorry at all actually, but one had to obey the forms, "I didn't see you there."

"Before you say anything that you might regret I think you should know that Angela and her mother have been helping us with our vigil." I nodded; there wasn't a lot I could say. I felt my eyelids drooping. The image of a string of pearls floated into my mind. Oddly they seemed familiar, but even as I tried to concentrate on them they faded from view. The last thing I remember hearing as sleep took me was the doctor shooing everyone away.

"I think that's enough for now; he needs some rest."

I'd been out of my coma for a couple of weeks and today was the day that I would get to sit up on my own. The last fortnight had been a continual round of physiotherapy. Yesterday, they removed the last drip; it was a relief to be able to move both of my arms freely without worrying about dislodging anything. All of the monitoring equipment had been removed. The room looked pretty much like any private hospital room. The door opened and Susan came in, she looked worried.

"Is everything all right?"

"Mark I have to show you something." She took a deep breath, "If it makes you cross, I'm sorry, but at the time I felt I needed to put right some wrongs, and the doctors were worried that you would never regain consciousness, so I wrote an article about you."

"What kind of article?"

She held a folded newspaper out to me, "This kind."

I opened the paper and started to read.

Guardian Angel in our Midst?

"Jesus, Susan! What possessed you to write this?" I could feel the blush spreading across my face. "How will I ever be able to face people again?" I moaned as I imagined everyone staring at me and whispering. I almost preferred being a pariah!

"Proudly, I hope." The sound of my mother's voice made me turn towards her. Her eyes were bright with unshed tears. "I can't tell you how proud I was when I read Susan's article. Why didn't you say something?"

"I don't know, it didn't matter what I did, I seemed to get in the shit for it, eventually I gave up trying. The worst of it was that you were disappointed in me, and there was nothing I could do about it." I sighed. "Susan knowing kept me sane, but once she left to go to college…"

My mother came close and hugged me fiercely. "I'm so proud of you I could burst." I felt her tears on my cheek and then she sat up and dabbed at her eyes.

I turned to Susan, "How did you persuade your editor to publish it?"

"It was a quiet news day. I'd already written it, so I just asked him if there was room for a human-interest story. It's not my best piece, but it's the first thing I wrote that has my by-line, and I can't tell you how pleased I am that I wrote it about you - my surrogate little brother."

I woke to see that I was not alone; Susan and Angela were sitting, talking quietly to one another. I felt uneasy and I could not work out why I had woken when I did. I looked about to see if I could see the see the reason why. Then I noticed that Angela was, once more, surround by a pale glow. Something tugged at my memory and then I remembered. Oh shit, Angela was in some sort of danger!

"Angela, are you all right?"

The two of them turned to look at me, startled. I was surprised to see tears running down Angela's cheeks. She saw the concern in my expression and, for some reason, she cried harder.

"Susan, what's wrong? Angela's in danger!"

"How do you know?"

I struggled to think of a way of explaining things and then I gave up. I didn't have time for fancy explanations, and I was in no fit state to help Angela this time!

"When I was in the coma I relived all of the times I helped Angela. After a while I noticed that each time, a short time before I would see the danger to Angela, a sort of glow would surround her. Not long afterwards, I would need to take some action to save her. I have to tell you she's surrounded by the same glow now, and I don't see how I'm going to be able to do anything useful when the time comes."

Susan nodded in understanding while she cradled a crying Angela in her arms. Then she smiled a beatific smile at me. "I think this time the threat is emotional and not physical. I think you'll be able to help her just fine." With that she guided Angela, who was still sobbing abjectly, from her seat in front of the window and into the chair by the bed. She shook the crying girl gently and spoke firmly to her.

"You have to tell him, tell him everything."

"How can I?"

"You just have to. One way or another, you owe him that much." Angela nodded as the words registered. She took a deep, shuddery breath and spoke more firmly.

"All right I will."

"I'll leave you to it then. Don't worry; you'll be all right. You'll see." And with these cryptic, but reassuring remarks on her lips, Susan left the room.

"What do you have to tell me?"

"I don't know where to begin." She groaned, "It's all such a mess!"

"Start at the beginning, pretend you're talking to a stranger. I practically am anyway; even though we live next door to each other, I hardly know you."

"Yeah well, my mum…" I smiled and nodded to show that I understood and that it wasn't her fault. She sat silent for a while, trying to work out where she should start. I waited, trying to look encouraging. She gave me a small smile and started speaking.

"Ever since I was little, I've felt like someone was watching me, not all the time, just when I was in real trouble, and not in a bad way. Just, y'know, comforting. I used to tell my mum that I had a guardian angel. Mum never liked you. I don't think it was you exactly; it was just because you were a boy. I guess she never got over the way that Dad had treated her." Her voice broke slightly and she calmed herself with a deep breath. "Most of the time, I knew that you had saved me, but mum always blamed you. When I tried to explain later, she would never listen. In the end, I gave up trying. I'm sorry. When I saw the article… when I saw everything written down in a long list like that, I realised that…" She stopped unable to continue. I put out my hand and held hers; she gripped it strongly. It felt so right for me to be holding her hand, so when she carried on I didn't let go. She must have felt the same thing because neither did she.

"When you saved me from being shot, it was so public I thought 'this time it will be all right, no one can say that this didn't happen'. And within a couple of months I heard my mother being derogatory about you. I was just devastated. You were in hospital, in intensive care and she wouldn't recognise what you did! Then Susan wrote the article. It was just the ammunition I needed. I made her read it and then told her all the things I remembered about you; about us; about the times you saved me. At first she said it was all a lie, but this time I wouldn't let her get away with it. I realised that she had to deny it all; otherwise, it would mean admitting to herself that she'd made a mistake, probably the biggest mistake she'd ever made, and that she'd been making it for over a decade." Angela had started to cry again, her tears rolling unheeded down her perfect cheeks. I stared at her, entranced by the sheer perfection of her face. I watched her lips as she spoke and I wondered what it would be like to kiss them. It was quite a while before I became aware that she had stopped talking.

"Sorry, I was daydreaming." I blushed darkly at being caught out like that. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and smiled crookedly.

"Oh? What about?" I blushed some more and stammered out my reply.

"Y… you."

"What about me?" She was enjoying this, I could see. She grinned as she spoke, shy and challenging at the same time.

"I was…" I took a deep breath, "I was wondering what it would be like to kiss you."

It was her turn to blush and then miraculously, she leant forward and kissed me. It was chaste and promising, intense and teasing, and totally wonderful. After an eternity we broke apart. "Wow!" we spoke simultaneously and then giggled as we realised that we had done so.

"So now you don't have to wonder do you?" She smiled again, "So now that I've satisfied your curiosity can I get on with what I was saying?"

I blushed again and stammered another apology, "S… Sorry."

"You're so cute when you blush." And she kissed me again!

"Now where was I? Oh yes, the row. I left my mum staring at the paper with the article in it and went round to your house. I was feeling so guilty; there I was, wallowing in self-pity and your mum was coping almost on her own. Not knowing if you were ever going to wake up again. When she came to the door I saw that she had been crying, and she was holding the paper too. We hugged and I babbled on and on about how sorry I was and how I wished that I'd been shot instead of you. Then she got cross with me, 'Mark didn't spend eleven years keeping you alive and blameless just so some maniac could shoot you!' I asked her why she didn't hate me, knowing all the time that your bad reputation was totally unjustified? And she said she always knew that her son was good. But the article was a shock to her too. I heard a gasp and I turned to see my mum standing behind me. She told me she was sorry and she told your mum she was sorry too."

Her tears were back and I took the initiative and kissed them away. She sighed. "I've been dreaming of doing this with you." I stopped kissing her face and looked at her. "We decided to help your mother with the vigil that she had been keeping, so for the next few months there was one of with you at all times. We talked to you; we read to you; we played your favourite music. After a month or so I ran out of small talk and I started talking to you about the times that you saved my life and stuff. As I did I came to realise that I'd been hiding my feelings for you from myself for years and years." She started to sob, "It's all so bloody awful. How can you stand to be with me? My mum made you a pariah, and all along, you were only guilty of saving my life!"

"Would it help if I told you that I love you?" I was shocked. Where had that come from? Even as my mouth was taking on a life of its own, I recognised the truth of what I had said. But before I could think about it any further I found myself in a desperate hug with a crying girl. I tried to achieve a lighter tone, "If I knew it was going to upset you I would've kept my mouth shut."

She smiled a watery smile and punched me lightly on the arm. "I realised that I loved you, Mark."

"So why are you upset? Don't you like being in love?"

"Not when the person I'm in love with probably hates my guts."

"I hadn't noticed that I felt that way, was it something I did?"

She hugged me again. "How could you keep on doing it? Saving my life all those times and my mum always making trouble for you afterwards?" I was about to say something flippant but I stopped. It would have been the wrong thing to do. So I thought about her question and answered it seriously. I debated whether to say anything about what I had discovered about why her mother had started disliking me. It didn't seem the right time for it, but the understanding that came with the memory helped me.

"Most of the time things happened so quickly that there wasn't time to think. I mean, who wouldn't pull a child from the path of a car, f'rinstance, if they were in a position to? I must admit I didn't enjoy the things your mum said about me at the time but they were soon over and I knew what really happened. And then when Susan saw what was going on, it was comforting to know that there was at least one other person that knew the truth." I stopped and thought for a bit. "As we grew older I became aware that I always knew where you were, if you were nearby. I'd get a tingle of anticipation when I saw you. I liked watching you. So I think it was inevitable that I'd be able to help you when things happened. Just now it all clicked in to place: I love you. It seems that I always have."

Throughout my impromptu speech she remained in my arms. She felt good there and for a long while we just held each other. The sound of a throat being cleared came as a shock to both of us. We jerked apart and turned to see who it was.

"Don't mind me," Susan smirked at us. "You make a lovely couple. It's about time that you admitted what you felt for each other."

"What will mum say?" Angela groaned as she rehearsed the probable reaction of her mother, and then she snuggled closer in an effort to escape from the visions.

"She will say that it's good that at least one member of her family shows some judgement when it comes to men." Angela turned to see her mum in the doorway, smiling broadly. Both of us gaped at the matter-of-fact way that her mum seemed to accept us. "Oh, close your mouths, will you? There's a bus route nearby, they might mistake you for the Blackwall Tunnel!" We closed our mouths in unison. "Why are you so surprised? It's been obvious for months that Angela was in love with you. My only concern, once it became certain that you were going to wake up and not stay in a coma, was that you might not feel the same way." She smiled at us both, enjoying our dumbfounded expressions. "Since it's clear that you do love her too, that's that." She looked pleased with herself, it was not often that she had the satisfaction of rendering her daughter speechless with astonishment, and it was obvious that the feeling was surprisingly good. We were both still too startled to speak, and the silence lengthened. "What? I'm hardly likely to object am I? Without you, I wouldn't have a daughter at all." At this her brittle façade crumbled and she sat on the bed and sobbed quietly. "I never said… I didn't know how… Shit! I promised myself I wouldn't cry. Mark - God, this is so inadequate. Mark, I'm sorry for the way I treated you. I owe you… I owe you everything."

I relinquished her daughter and leaned forward to hold her. "There was never any question about doing what I did. You don't owe me a thing, but I'll take your daughter anyway." She stiffened a little at this, "as long as you'll have me for a son?"

"You're supposed to ask me first, Mark Connors!" I grinned at the outrage in Angela's voice but I could see that her expression belied her tone. "Even though you didn't ask me, the answer is, yes."

"I'm glad that's settled then." Susan smiled at us from the other side of the room. "It wouldn't do for our little angel to be without her guardian angel now would it?" A stray beam of sunlight broke through the clouds and struck Angela's head, turning her hair into a golden halo. It seemed that approval was universal! I lay back into my pillows and looked at my angel and was content.

-Fin-

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