“Magick has always been an irrefutable truth in my life, unlike other things…
Seven hundred forty three years ago, on the seventy seventh day, I cradled the new babe, tickling her chubby little belly, when the most serene expression captured her face. Tapping her nose, I urged her wide violet eyes back to mine, but soon she’d looked away again. Behind me. A joyous giggle rolled through her and she began to gurgle in that adorable nonsensical way of infants, as if chattering in a secret language, known only to the new. Her enthusiasm ignited my own nervous chuckle. But when her arm rose, tiny finger pointed in the direction of her stare, behind me, I stilled. Even before I slowly craned my head around, I knew what I would find. Nothing. My eyes saw…nothing. But the magick in my blood burned with the presence of another. A power, so pure and vast it challenged my veins to contain the touch of it. From that moment on, I believed what the child, fresh and untainted, already knew as her irrefutable truth.”
-Kaiya Kincaid: Master Mage, Supreme Maven of H.O.M.
Based on a true story…
Hannah sat at the lunch table, relieved she was alone.
She didn’t want any of her coworkers to see her crying. She’d considered having
her meltdown in the bathroom, but that just seemed icky, unsanitary, the solitude…unpredictable.
Here, at least, the schedule advised who was due for lunch and the tables were
clean. Pretty much.
She’d been so foolish. Everyone back home had warned her against relocating to Las Vegas. Bad idea. And it wasn’t for the obvious reasons. They’d actually thought the whole Sin City thing was cool, adventurous. Suburbanite awe. The problem? They frowned upon the distant cousins, the ones she’d agreed to move in with. No one really knew them, never saw them…not even on holidays, never a phone call. Ever. They weren’t even on social media. The horror! They’d been ghost relatives…until Hannah received that fateful text. An invitation to Sin City.
It had been excruciating to leave her close-knit
community, but it was time to spread her wings. Besides, Hannah’s defense of
her cousins was solid. Thirteen years prior, before they’d become ‘those who are not one of us’, her
parents allowed her to vacation with them, and it had been unbelievable! The sun, the desert, the hours of playing with her
two cousins! She’d survived then, been perfectly fine. And nine.
This morning, she’d found out that all of them had been right. Humiliating. Hannah had honestly thought that Brinna was more than her cousin, her friend. Their birthdates were only separated by three days, for goodness sake. From almost the moment of Hannah’s arrival, they’d set a plan into motion, stayed committed to it for over a year. Working hard, double shifts sometimes, to move out of Brinna’s parents’ house and rent a cute little apartment of their own, hopefully, with a functioning AC. And they’d done it! Both of them had managed to save four thousand dollars each. So…this morning when Brinna approached her with Alice and Dan, her mom and dad, Hannah naturally assumed it was to inform them of their departure. Together. Tears burned her cheeks. She could still hear Brinna’s awful words.
“Mom and dad need our money. We have to give it to them
or they will lose the house.”
Hannah couldn’t believe her ears. Since when was the
house in jeopardy? No one had said anything to her about this before.
“What? I thought we were getting our own place.” Hannah
looked to the adults. They were staring at her, daring her to refuse them. “How
much do you need?”
“All of it,” Dan replied harshly.
Shocked, Hannah just sat there, mute. She could feel her
heart sinking to her feet and knew she needed to get out of there. She needed
space to think. Call her mamma. When she turned to leave, Alice grabbed her arm.
Hard.
“Where do you think you’re going? Give us the money. Now.”
“I can’t. It’s all in the bank.”
“Then we go after you two get off from work today. You be
home by three. That bank closes at four.”
Hannah looked to Brinna. Her expression was hard, eyes
cold, and Hannah knew she’d betrayed her. Pretended to want a new life with
her, encouraged her to kill herself at work, just so she and her family could
rob her. Cautiously, Hannah pulled her arm from Alice and left, sprinting
toward the bus stop. When she finally reached the bench, she called home.
“Absolutely not. You will not throw good money after bad. You get your stuff and come home. I
knew those folks were bad news.”
Hannah listened to her mama rant and rave, then finally
hung up, feeling worse than she did before calling. Her eyes looked left then
right, and when they found no others, she fixed them upon the heavens. And
prayed.
Now…she was here, sobbing like a baby, her head pressed
against a pretty much clean lunch table. When she heard footsteps approaching,
she jumped from her chair, quickly wiped her eyes, and jogged past the new guy,
Mark. Apparently, he hadn’t learned how to read his schedule yet. Hannah did
not slow until she approached the pizza joint in the food court. Standing in line,
trying to find her composure, she felt a hand on her forearm. Turning around, her
gaze met two kind brown eyes. He was much shorter than she, balding a bit on
top, and easily two decades older, but his smile was delightful. She smiled
back at him.
For the ten minutes they waited in line, Hannah thought
they were just small talking, but by the time they’d finished their pizza at the
wobbly greasy table, she realized he probably knew her entire life’s story. She
liked the way Andel seemed to hang on her every word and how she hung on his.
Perhaps it was his thick accent, but he was so easy to talk to, so easy that
she found herself sharing the sad saga of her cousins with him.
“If you’d like, I could retrieve you from work later and
drive you home. You can get your things and I will take you somewhere safe.”
Hannah was stunned. She’d only met this man half an hour
ago, and she was actually considering his offer. Mama would be so mad, but… The last thing she wanted to do was spend
another night in her cousins’ home, especially when she had no intentions of
handing over her money. But to just up and trust a complete stranger? He could
be some serial killer or something. Lord
knows, he had enough information to view her as a prime target. Young, vulnerable,
alone in Sin City.
“Ok.”
When the two of them arrived at the house at 3pm sharp,
her cousins, all four of them, mom, dad, and the two sisters were waiting for
her in the yard. Great.
“I’m just here to get my things,” Hannah said, stepping
out of the car.
“Unless you’re going to get that money, you can forget
about any things,” Alice replied with
a nasty sneer, arms crossed in front of her.
Hannah meant to issue a counter but could only gasp when Brinna launched at her, yanking at her hair, yelling all sorts of profanities. Completely caught off guard, she ducked under her arms, not wanting to engage in the craziness, plus she had no idea how to fight. Never believed, a single solitary moment of her life, that she would ever have to. Thankfully, it lasted only a few seconds before Andel was able to rescue her, securing her back in the car. As soon as he’d approached them, Brinna backed off. It seemed she only felt comfortable attacking girls who refuse to swing back. The others had never moved.
“Are you alright?” Andel asked as they drove away.
“Nothing hurt but my pride,” Hannah replied, rather pathetically. “I seriously can’t believe that just happened. I have nothing. They stole my clothes. My toothbrush. I’m such an idiot for trusting them.”
Andel laughed, and though Hannah should have been annoyed
that he would find amusement in her lowest moment, it made her smile. He had
the nicest laugh. There was a strange magick in it.
“Do not let it sadden you. It is just the way.” Huh?
Before Hannah could get uncomfortable, Andel announced,
“I have a surprise for you!”
Hannah liked surprises. Maybe. She’d never received one
from a stranger. Again, she was beginning to question if she’d made another lousy
decision, when they pulled into a driveway, right next to a shiny blue sedan. Her
gaze immediately settled upon the house, the sweetest little thing she’d ever
seen. It even had a green patch of grass, running the entire length of the long
porch. With flowers! And there was a swing, just like back home!
“Is this your house?” Excitement…then the dread. “Oh,
Andel. I hope you don’t think… I just couldn’t. I’m not that kind of…”
Andel’s laughter filled the car, his hand going to his
ample belly. As usual, Hannah could only smile. She really loved his laugh and,
if she thought about it, she really trusted him. After only a few hours. Not
really smart, but she couldn’t help it.
“Come on. Let’s take a look,” he said.
This time, Hannah exited the car without any fear. When
they reached the door, Andel shoved his hand into the front pocket of his jeans,
retrieved a key and handed it to her. Confused, she just stared at it, sitting
in her palm, glistening in the hot sun.
“I don’t understand,” she muttered.
“How to use a key?”
“No, of course not. I know how….”
“Wonderful! Show me by opening the door, please,” Andel
exclaimed, his brown eyes sparkling.
In a daze, Hannah unlocked the door and stepped into her dream home. Fully furnished and obviously recently renovated, everything looked new and modern. Even the air conditioner worked! And then, once more, reality came crashing down on her. She was a good girl, from a good family. There was no way she could do this, Sin City or not. She’d been preached up too much, churched up too much, and believed too much to give into the temptation.
“This is your place, isn’t it Andel?” Her eyes lowered in
disappointment. She should have known. “I can’t move in with you.”
His soft chuckle brought her eyes back up to him. “I don’t expect you to. This home is yours, Hannah. I rented it for you while you were at work. It’s paid up for three years. I’m sure, by then, you will want something different. The car in the driveway is yours, too. It’s not the newest or fanciest of them, but it’s paid for. I don’t like you sitting alone at bus stops.”
What?! Hannah just could not comprehend any of it. This sort of thing did not happen in real life. At least, not to people like her.
“Uhhhh. I, I, I’m. Well, I don’t know what to say. Why
would you do all of this for me? You just met me.”
Andel sighed, absently scratching his head, then
presented to her his most extraordinary smile yet. “Because you are deserving,
Hannah. I stood in the line of that pizza place every day for six months, one
hundred eighty days, one hundred eighty new chances, and not once did anyone
care to exchange a single word with me. Until today.” Andel took both of her
hands in his and locked his gaze upon hers.
“You are beautiful, young, smart, and so full of life, had every reason to dismiss an old fat guy like me. But you did not. Instead, you were kind. Heart open. You are the believer who acts upon the promise.”
It was difficult to speak with so much emotion barreling through her. “But you were the one who was so nice to me.”
He chuckled again and released her, placing a card in her hand. “These are your landlords. Nice people. They will make sure you are taken care of. The papers to your car are its glove compartment. Everything is in your name. Use the money you’ve earned to build a good life.”
“I just don’t know. Can I think about this? It’s so
much.”
“Of course. But in the meantime, could we watch a few
movies? It’s been awhile for me. I don’t have much time to relax. Oh, and we have
pasta in the refrigerator. It just needs microwaving.”
And so, Hannah warmed up the pasta and they ate their
dinner on the sofa, watching a really goofy romantic comedy, snuggled together
under her new afghan. As Andel laughed at the screen, his body jiggling next
her, the stress from the day began to float away, until she’d fallen asleep. A
few hours later, she woke with a start. The light had turned to night,
television on mute, and she was alone. Though tempted to scour the house for
him, call out his name, she did not. She knew he was gone. And she knew she
would never see him again.
The only things her elderly landlords could tell her
about him was how charming he was, how fortunate she was to have such a friend,
and how much they loved his laugh. During all of Hannah’s conversation with Andel,
he’d never disclosed his full name, his address, his occupation, not even a
phone number, and Hannah hadn’t prodded him about it on that first day. She’d
expected them to be longtime friends. Until he left.
Several years later…
While researching a name for their first child, Hannah and her husband stumbled upon Andel’s name online. It meant God’s messenger. It had been a shock to have it spelled out in such a way, but not a surprise, for either of them. You see, she’d shared their story with Kenneth on their first date and he’d believed her, which was probably why she’d fallen so fast and so deeply for him. And he had an amazing laugh. Though she was always adamant in her discouragement of anyone behaving as recklessly as she had with Andel, Hannah spoke of him with everyone she could, every opportunity she had, no matter how many skeptical or ‘she’s nuts’ looks it earned her. He deserved it of her, to be the believer who acts upon the promise.
Leaning back, Hannah rubbed her swollen tummy, remembering. Andel, her godsend. Her somewhere safe. The man who changed her life. Lifted her up when she was falling. Drowning. Gave her everything and asked for nothing in return.
Grinning, she walked to the mirror and cradled her belly, “You know the truth, don’t you, Andel, my sweet baby? Angels are real.”
-TJ Bouvier: Author of Meridian Stone: The Transition
