Going Home

I paused in the doorway to my room for a moment, watching Angel as she examined my drawings, oblivious to the fact that I had returned.

I cleared my throat quietly, trying not to scare her, but she jumped anyway, a frightened look appearing on her face until she realised it was only me.

“Oh, you’re back,” she said after a moment, visibly relaxing as she span around on the desk chair to face me. “Where’d you go?”

Grimacing to myself inwardly, I walked and slumped on my bed before answering.

“I went to the hospital.” I said eventually.

Angel nodded slowly, not breaking the somewhat awkward silence that followed those words.

That telling silence echoed around us for another minute, until I finally continued talking, more quietly now.

“I had to tell Jessie what’s happened, see if she could maybe help.”

“What?” Angel’s face turned an eerily suitable ghostly white, as she started to panic. “You told her about this? About me… haunting you? What did she say? What…”

“Calm down, Angel,” I smiled a little at her hot-headedness; a smile that quickly faded as I recalled the seriousness of the situation. “I only told her about Chris, and why you’re in the hospital in the first place. There’s no way I’d tell anyone about… this - even if I could work out how to explain it.” I paused, “I just figured we could use some more help.”

“Oh,” Angel relaxed slightly, then smiled bitterly, “though I don’t know how she could help when we don’t know what we’re doing.”

“I know,” I shrugged, “but… I still think that getting you away from Chris and all your other issues at home, is somehow linked to you waking up, or going back to your body or whatever it is – and I'm hoping I'm right, because there's not a lot else I can think of to do.”
Angel looked deep in thought for a moment, seeming to be having an internal discussion – before long she sighed and appeared to brace herself against something before she spoke.

“Maybe…” she began slowly, “Jay, maybe if you know everything we can work out better what to do, and then if you need to, you can tell the whole story…”

That had to have taken guts, I mused as I turned to look at Angel in surprise, but I didn’t say anything because I had no idea what to say.

There was silence for a second, and then Angel took a deep breath and began.

“My real dad left us – me and mum – just after I turned ten. I hated him for a few years, but eventually I got over it… mum didn’t, though. She started drinking not long after he left – at the start she hid it okay, but by the time I was thirteen she had gotten worse, and I had to really look out for myself.”

She hesitated, reliving the awfulness of it all as she remembered, before continuing in an even quieter voice.

“A little while after that she met Chris… I didn’t like him even back then, but he stayed civil to the both of us – mostly, anyway – until he’d convinced mum she needed him. After that he stopped even pretending to like us. Mum learnt fast to just do whatever he said and to ask no questions, so he took to just yelling at her – but there was nothing I could do that pleased him, so he beat me and locked me up for whatever tiny reason, or no reason at all. It was him that took me out of school and forbade me from seeing anyone I knew… and that’s why he attacked me this last time – because I’d been out without permission, and I’d been talking to people…”

Angel finished in a tiny voice, for she had been getting quieter and quieter as she revealed the tragic story; but she had only stopped once, even though silent tears were snaking down her icy pale cheeks by the time she was finished.

I put my hand out to try and comfort her, but remembered just in time the metaphysical void that Angel’s ghost was – or wasn’t, as it may be.

“That was brave,” I said eventually, cringing at the cheesy understatement.

But Angel just gave small smile, albeit sadly still.

“I just hope it helps,” she said, “because I’m sick of all this – between home before, and this… this waiting for something to happen, its wearing me out…” She faltered for a moment, looking weakened by her emotions, before continuing in a defeated voice. “I just don’t even know if I want to try anymore, Jay.”

My eyes widened at the thought of Angel giving up on herself, and her chance of a life – even in the short, tumultuous time I had known her, she had become one of my few real friends; and there was also Jessie and the other people who truly cared for her that were never going to let Chris win.

I repeated these thoughts aloud to Angel, and this time she smiled for real, looking a little surprised as she remembered how many friends she actually had in this life.

I never got to hear what she was thinking, though, because just as she started to say something, we were interrupted by a knock on my bedroom door.

I jumped, looking around at the door – which had, thankfully, been closed on what would have looked like me talking to myself – then looking back at where Angel was… or had been, anyway.

She had disappeared again, either with newfound command of her previously unpredictable teleporting, or a rather useful coincidence of timing.

The knock came again, and this time I shook off my thoughts and opened the door.

Mrs. James was standing in the doorway, her usually friendly features overlayed with a concerned and determined look.

“Jay,” she said quickly, “I need to talk to you, can I come in?”

I nodded and stepped back, steeling myself for the conversation to come as I guessed what she had heard from Jessie.

I was right, of course.

“Jessie told me that you don’t think Angie’s… ‘incident’ was an accident,” Mrs. James began bluntly, perched on the edge of the desk chair where Angel had been moments before. “And now I need you tell me everything you know about it, for her sake.”

So I told Mrs. James – almost – everything I knew, from Angel’s mother’s alcoholism to her stepfather’s abuse, right down to the main parts of the incident that had left Angel in hospital – telling her, of course, that Angel had told me all this when I had confronted her days ago by the creek.

When I had finished, Mrs. James sighed and shook her head, looking sad and somewhat ashamed that she hadn’t figured it out.

“I wonder why she didn’t tell anyone before this?” she thought aloud, but answered her own question, “she was probably scared… I guess I would be too – I didn’t like the look of that man when he first brought her in.”

Mrs. James finally turned to me and smiled grimly, looking determined.

“Thanks you for this, Jay – this information could be Angie’s only hope, if she wakes up… anyway, I’m going to have to let my superiors know, and when I do that it’s most likely the police will get involved.”

She rose from the chair, looking concerned for a moment as she thought of something.

“Now, Jay, when that happens, things could get dangerous – you already know what it’s like dealing with people like this – all I’m asking is that you keep an eye on Jessie, would you do that for me?”

I nodded mutely, realising now that others could get hurt if we weren’t careful, and at the same time vowing not to let Angel see that – if she knew her friends might be put in danger trying to help her, she might stop trying.

“Now, I have to go call some people,” Mrs. James finished, pausing at the door as she left, “and don’t worry too much about all of this – I’m sure there’ll be enough evidence, and your testimony, if it comes to that – that this will all be worked out quickly. Then all Angie will have to do is get better.”