Wanted Angel - Sadie Moss Page 0,38

and the other higher-ups didn’t care about the portals? That it was fine if people on Earth died since many of them would go Upstairs anyway, and that individual lives didn’t matter so much as winning the war?

That’s not really a good or kind stance to take, is it? The demon who helped us seems to have acted more selflessly than some angels I know, putting our needs before his own life and safety.

It makes me wonder what really makes someone good or bad. Earth is full of people who are so complicated, who aren’t fully one thing or the other. A person will do something selfless and compassionate one day and then do something malicious and hurtful the next. It’s crazy.

But I know what being good is. It’s putting others before yourself, it’s doing things to help others, it’s being firm in your beliefs and having courage. Things like that. And I know what being bad is. It’s making decisions based on fear, it’s hurting others, it’s putting yourself before everything else.

But I was so certain that angels were all good and demons were all bad. And now I’m seeing it sort of flipped around. I don’t know what to do with that. My whole existence, I’ve been taught that we’re in a war and we’re on the side of good. But how can we be if we’re not acting good ourselves? What does it all mean?

The others are all settling in, deciding who will take first watch and dividing up duties to keep us safe in this hellish city overnight. I know I should sleep, but I’m too restless to lie down yet. My body feels a bit numb. I think this is some kind of shock.

I go outside, where it’s still quiet but more wide open, and I sit down on the dirt, staring up at the smoke-filled sky, my back against the building. There’s no proper sky here. Or at least it doesn’t feel like it. I feel like I’m in a massive cave, and even though I can’t see the ceiling because the smoke obscures it, I know it’s there.

That’s the opposite of Heaven. Upstairs, we’re in the sky, looking down, and sometimes it feels like there’ll be nothing to catch you if you fall.

Someone emerges from the building. With the smoke and shadow all around, it takes me a moment to realize it’s Remi.

“Hey.” He sits down next to me, our shoulders bumping up against each other. “How’re you feeling?”

I shrug. “I’m just struggling a little, I guess. With this whole idea that maybe my brethren aren’t as all-around great as I thought they were, and that corrupted can still be good at times. I thought humans were gray. Demons and angels, black and white. Simple as that. We were the opposite ends of the spectrum. Now I don’t know.”

“Nothing in creation is all one thing or all another,” he points out, his voice soft. “Not even my brothers and me.”

“I thought you were at first too,” I confess, guilt rising up in my chest. “I was ready for you all to just be your sin and nothing else. I figured you’d all enjoy corrupting people and tempting them into doing horrible things.”

Remi snorts. “That sounds like a lot more effort than any of us are willing to put into it.”

I laugh softly, in spite of myself. Remi wraps his arm around my shoulders and I lean into his chest, sighing.

“In my experience,” he says carefully, “nobody can possibly be just one thing or another. No one can live forever in those extremes. It’s not possible. Nobody’s that simple. You can be inclined more toward one thing than another. But not even animals are just one thing. That’s not how life works. It’s what I love about humans—how they’re a mix of so many different sides. Angels and demons are influenced by humans, so how could they not have some gray areas too?” He looks at me. “Does that make any sense?”

“You sound very wise,” I admit, partially teasing him but also entirely serious.

Remi shrugs. “I’ve been around for a pretty long time. You’d hope I’d pick up on a wise thing or two.”

“I think you have.”

“I know that all of this is confusing.” He smiles. “When you first walked into my restaurant, you had such a simple conviction of knowing what you wanted. Knowing what you needed to do—what was right. It was adorable. And now I can see that you’re not sure