A strange power thrums to life around him, and instantly I recognize it as magic, though it’s much different than how Katie’s felt earlier. His is a bit darker. A bit more chaotic. But still, an underlying light similar to hers exists within it. As our eyes meet this time, I couldn’t look away even if I wanted to. His power holds me in place, caressing my soul in a gentle whisper of recognition. It’s as if live wires dance between us and through us, sparking and burning me alive. I can sense my soul reaching out for him, screaming at me to remember something that seems too foreign and far away to grip onto. I feel only light and love as his gentle eyes rake over me, a look that somehow makes me whole again after so long of being broken.
The magic fades away, and with it my shattered sanity returns. I remind myself to think of Ere and his warm, golden eyes and how much he adores me and takes away the pain. Kairos is a stranger. One with magic that apparently can make me lose myself for brief moments. But now that it’s gone, I feel like myself again.
I laugh, pushing my shoulders back and pretending I felt nothing out of the ordinary. “I’m not…excited about the idea of you stalking me. But what could a mere mortal really do to stop you even if she wanted to?”
His emerald eyes swirl with specks of sapphires, the colors spinning and entrancing me to the point of no words. The motion and even the hues are reminiscent of the lake’s waves and how they steal my attention; the way they endlessly rise and fall.
Soothing magic wraps around me, brushing against my skin and my mind and I shiver at the intimate feeling of it—the feeling of him, in a way—touching me. I lower my eyes back to my drink, feeling too exposed and too vulnerable to look at him.
“You’re lying, princess,” he says, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes. “I can sense everything you feel as you feel it.” He smiles and my heart flutters. “But you’re right. There’s nothing you can do. I won’t stop. It’s not an option.”
The fact that he can sense what I’m feeling has me shifting. If his magic can sense everything, then I need to focus. I can’t let myself get lost in his eyes and let the beauty of them distract me from the important questions.
Placing my elbows on the table, I lower my voice as I lean forward. “Do you know anything about my parents’ deaths? What the hell happened to them? And also, what the hell is happening to me?”
It’s time for the important questions. The reason I wanted to meet him in the first place was to find out what he knows, and that’s all that should matter right now. I need answers.
Lowering his voice to a quiet, smooth timber, he places his hands flat on the table, leaning in closer. “Will you believe me if I tell you the truth about why I’m here, or will you believe you’ve lost your mind completely?” His voice softens and the energy radiating off him relaxes. “Maybe you’re just imagining that I’m here. Maybe I’m not even real.”
I shake my head, crossing my arms over my chest as I fume on the inside. “Unbelievable. Is my life and my mental health a joke to you?”
He sighs, guilt flashing behind his eyes. “Nothing about you is a joke to me.”
“I know you’re real. I can see you just fine.” I roll my shoulders back, narrowing my eyes. “I’ve never hallucinated anything.”
“Oh? Well, you could have fooled me. You let your therapist lock you up and throw away the key. You let your sister convince you that you’d imagined what you knew deep down was real. You’ve never believed you were truly mentally unstable at all, did you, Nora?” He relaxes, throwing his muscular, tattooed arm across the back of his booth.
“What is it you want me to say? That monsters are real…” I gesture toward him, “and that angels exist, because that’s what you are, right? You’re an angel?” A huff of laughter escapes from my trembling lips. “Something dark and evil murdered my parents whether people believe me or not. I’m not crazy. What I can’t understand is why. Why them?” I sigh, my shoulders sagging as I finally let it all out, feeling both drained and relieved by admitting the truth.
I can’t speak of these things with Dr. Cooper or Olivia. For months I’ve had to hold it all in, pretending what I saw was a figment of my imagination. A psychotic break. A trauma response to losing my parents. It feels good to have Kairos acknowledge that what I saw was real, as terrifying as it all might be.
“Sometimes there is no answer for why. What matters now is that you believe. That you trust yourself and your instincts more than anything or anyone else. What you saw is real, Nora. I see the monsters myself. I kill them myself, too, and happily so.” He tilts his head to the side, watching me carefully as he continues. “And yes. Celestials are in fact real. That’s the term we prefer.”
A glimmer of magic flashes, and briefly he allows me a glimpse of the feathery black wings spread wide behind his back. God, they’re beautiful. He is beautiful. I blink once and a veil of magic reappears, his wings replaced by shadows cast on the wall from strobe lights and dancing people behind me. I knew I hadn’t lost my mind. I knew it the night my parents died and the following months I spent at the psychiatric hospital. It was fear that kept me from admitting it to myself. Knowing the truth is one thing, but admitting the fact that monsters killed my parents out loud? It’s fucking terrifying.
“I don’t know what to believe sometimes. My whole life feels like a lie. Some days it’s… hard to breathe. To even… exist.” The last part comes out in a whisper as warmth spills from my eyes and falls down my cheeks.
Kairos clears his throat, his eyebrows scrunching together as he reaches out to me. “Nora, I’m sorry. Katie was right. You’re not ready. I’ll answer any question you have later. That’s enough for tonight.” Slowly, he reaches to brush away the tear tracing a path down my cheek, his hand hovering near my face momentarily. Then he swiftly draws back, grabbing his drink and emptying the glass.
The sound of my uneven breath fills the silence, tearing through the emptiness left in the air from him pulling away. “No, it’s fine. I’m okay.”
His concerned gaze pierces through me as if he carries the weight of my pain in his own heart, longing to ease it but not knowing how to. “You’re not, and I hate it. I wish I could heal your heartbreak and end your pain. I would take it on myself if I could.”
“Thank you. It’s getting better,” I lie, knowing it’s what everyone around me wants to hear. “Or maybe it’ll get better eventually. I’m sitting here with you now, so maybe this is the beginning of something good. My very own stalker. What a dream,” I tease, raising my eyebrows playfully and flashing him a smile.
I just want to break the tension. To push away the pain and the dark thoughts before I go tumbling into a suffocating abyss I can’t escape from.
His laughter fills the air and my heart catches. The sound sends goosebumps racing across my arms and prickling against my neck, the melody of it warming my soul and sending me into a fit of laughter of my own. Waves of peace and comfort thrum around me, wrapping me in a soothing embrace. Despite my world being flipped on its head and my life sort of being in shambles, being with him does something to me that I can’t understand.
The light within Kairos reminds me to breathe.
“I’m happy to be of service. For now, I should get you home safely. It’s getting late. Katie is going to kill me.” His eyes search mine and then subtly drift from my eyes down to my lips, a blush appearing across his chiseled jawline. The intensity of his stare tears me open, exposing every wounded, broken part of myself that I try so hard to hide.
He looks at me like if he exists somewhere in heaven, then I’m every cloud and each star and all the tiny molecules that keep him in place there, preventing him from crashing down to earth. His lopsided smile takes my breath away. God, what is it about Kairos that has me suddenly questioning everything? He’s right. I need to go.
“Witches aren’t prone to murder, are they? I’ve made her mad many times and the worst she’s ever done is force a sage cleanse and a moon water bath on me to clear my aura of any negative energy. You’ll be just fine.” My shoulders shake as I tilt my head back and laughter pours out of me.
Leaning forward, he rests his arms on the table, bringing his hands closer to mine. “I enjoy watching you laugh. It’s intoxicating.”
