up in the balcony, a kind of hollow anger around him. In the pews, a few individuals sat in prayer, wrestling with hope and hopelessness in equal measure. And there, by the devotional altar, was a couple lighting one of the many candles that waited there.
“Tell me about them,” I whispered in Stavros’ ear.
“Those two? Uhhh, that’s Heather McCann and Jeff Byrne. She comes twice a week to light a candle for her mother and he comes with her,” Stavros answered with a shrug. “They got together this past year. Her dad isn’t a fan. Probably a lot of the town isn’t a fan.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“I guess it’s because he’s about her dad’s age. They think he’s taking advantage.”
“Do you?”
“I dunno… It’s a gap, isn’t it? And she was always fighting with her dad.”
“He loves her,” I said. “He loves her so much it terrifies him. And she loves him too, but in a steadier way. She feels safe and secure and calm with him. They feel more connected to the world around them when they’re together. And they just give off love, constantly, unconsciously. Most people love in specific moments, little instances where it strikes them, and they string it all together and call it being in love, but actually it’s just small bursts. These two? They love one another.”
Stavros’ hand slid up my back, and I revelled between the love of the couple standing with their backs to us, and Stavros’ own brief burst of emotion for me.
“Watch,” I said, closing my eyes.
The glow was there, warm and rich, pulsing like a heartbeat on the other side of the chapel, just shedding light on the world without asking for anything in return. I pushed at it, taking the perfect beautiful web of emotion and wrapping it back around the couple rather than feeding off it for myself.
Stav’s breath hitched and I opened my eyes, smiling at the almost-imperceptible glow surrounding the young woman and the older man. They turned to one another and the space between them was full and vibrant and aching, their eyes gratefully soaking each other up, remembering and savoring their own depth of feeling. Jeff Byrne bent and kissed Heather McCann’s forehead, taking her weight as she leaned into his chest as the rest of the occupants of the room watched, all of us just a little more aware that this still existed, there was still so much love left in the world. My eyes drifted up to the balcony and found Azariah leaning over the edge, watching the couple with all of an angel’s serenity.
I turned to Stavros, soaking up the waves of awe and gratitude, and then I broke the spell. “That was what I was made for. But that was not how it was used in Hell. I can take pain, despair, self-loathing, endless agony, and I can force it back into a soul over and over again. It’s horrible, Stavros. It’s unforgivable.”
Stavros’ lips pressed thin as he stared back at me. Maybe I’d only said that in the hopes that he would absolve me. Or maybe I was self sabotaging and trying to scare him off.
Stav leaned in and pressed his lips to my forehead, the bridge of my nose, grazing against my top lip. In the chapel, someone gasped, but Stavros didn’t even flinch.
“I’m glad you made it here, Deyva,” Stavros said, drawing me to his chest.
I was pretending to nap, because despite Stavros’ claims, his bed was an exquisite luxury, when there was a knock on the door.
Guilt, nervousness, reluctance, shame.
“Come in, Zach,” I called.
The door cracked open and Zach’s face appeared, a little nervous twitch of his eyes as he caught me stretched out on the bed. I resisted the urge to spread myself out in invitation just to tease him, and pushed myself upright, swinging my feet down to rest on the floor.
“Hey, I didn’t mean to bother you,” Zach said, leaning in the doorway, not committing to actually joining me in Stavros’ bedroom as his eyes shied away from mine and landed anywhere else.
“You’re not bothering me. I was just avoiding Kais and his grumpy pants downstairs,” I said. Since the man couldn’t fucking take a kiss in a nice way, apparently, and I was trying not to be really sullen about it.
“He just needs to sleep. He’ll crash tonight,” Zach said, shrugging. He looked at me, away again, swallowed, and then back to me. I did my best to offer him a welcoming