CHAPTER 1
This time when I landed, I brought
the tips of my wings together just as the last rush of wind and bellowing mist
whipped around my ankles, releasing me from the blinding beam of light that
guided me safely back to the world of the living, the world I missed, and the
life I still longed for.
Just as my feet hit the carpet below, I arched my back,
decreasing my momentum almost instantly, bending my knees upon impact. A
pleasant tingling sensation radiated from the core of my being and dissipated
slowly as I folded my wings tightly against my back and dropped my shoulders.
Ah, it feels good to be back. But did it?
I closed my eyes and pictured Cannon, his lips parted, the
deep green of his eyes reflecting the shock and fright of one who just died, a
hollow soul, confused and anxious, seeking answers, needing closure as he
begged, “Ashley, don’t leave me, please. Ashley, wait!” Those last words still
echoed in my ears just as his last kiss lingered on my lips.
“Cannon, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I told him before I was
pulled away. “I want to stay with you; you know I do, but it’s not allowed. I
can’t be your guardian angel anymore. Now, stay here in your line, and
everything will be okay,” I pleaded with him. “I promise. I love you, Cannon. I’ll
always love you, just remember that.” The space between his eyebrows wrinkled
with those words. His lower lip quivered as he blinked hard with disbelief, and
as I tried to take a breath and failed, the image of Cannon in my mind’s eye
blurred and faded away.
He knew there was nothing I could do, that I couldn’t stay
with him. My former G.A. told me it was not allowed. With my next blink, my
last memory of Cannon returned. “Ashley, your relationship with your former
assignment must be severed here,” my ex-angel said, his eyes lacking emotion,
his beard stiff and unyielding as it rubbed against his chest when he spoke.
“There is no other choice. You know that. You have a new responsibility,”
Cannon’s eyes shifted between me and the bearded angel.
Cannon opened his mouth like he was trying to take a deep breath, but he didn’t
speak. I knew exactly how Cannon felt; that was me not too long ago. He wanted
to cry, to voice his frustration and the anger that comes with dying too soon
and being yanked away from the only world you know. And, of course, I made it
worse when I, the girl he loved, suddenly turned away from him, crossed my
wings, hard, and disappeared.
Cannon, I’m so sorry. I love you so much, but I had
to leave. You must understand that by now. And by now, I was sure he’s
discovered that souls, just like angels, can’t cry, that it’s physically
impossible, but then again, there was no reason for him to even try to cry
anymore. Right now, he was getting a proper Welcoming, and with that, he’d
forget all about me. I made sure of that when I shuffled him into line number
two and turned my back to him from line number three just before I was sucked
away and sent back down to earth.
Unlike me, Cannon, the only man I’ve ever loved, would ripen
into an old soul, having spent hundreds of years observing life below, learning
all there is to know about the world and human behavior before eventually
earning his wings. And if by some miracle, some divine coincidence, we were to
ever meet again decades or even centuries from now, face to face, guardian
angel to guardian angel, he wouldn’t be the Cannon I fell in love with, the
reckless, unpredictable boy who had a surprisingly soft spot in his heart for
mentally disabled and terminally ill children.
No, in time, my Cannon would eventually transform into a
nonjudgmental, accepting being full of love for all people with every ounce of
romantic love he ever had for me squeezed out of his conscience.
A true guardian angel, he wouldn’t succumb to my need to
love him, to touch, to try to find a way for us to be together forever. Nope,
my fairy tale was over; I was doomed to spend eternity aching for a man who
would never be able to feel the same way about me even if I could find him
again a hundred years from now.
I can’t love you anymore, Cannon. I can’t. I
can’t think about you anymore. Focus on my new assignment, watch and wait –
that’s what I had to do. There was no other choice; I had to concentrate on my
new assignment, but where was my new assignment? He couldn’t be more than ten
feet away.