#cause its HALLOWEEEEEEEEN

[raineandsky]

#74

The priest was never one for romance, not really. He’d never really understood how people could get so entangled in other people’s lives. He hadn’t understood, at least, until he’d found someone to get caught up in.

He’s spent the last two years slowly understanding it. Oh, yes, he thinks every so often, between the moments of bliss and joy, I get it now.

Life since then has been a whirlwind of his lover’s making, dragging him along for the ride in a flurry of laughter and kindness. No one’s shown him kindness like this before. He’s come to understand how it’s so easy to trip and fall into love. He’s tripped a fair few times by now, and he’s stopped trying to catch himself.

His days have been stretching out at the church, to both of their dismay. So he knows that his arrival home, three hours earlier than usual, will be a much needed surprise for his lover and a much needed evening off for himself.

He lets the front door announce his return, a grin already stretching across his face. “I got off early!” he tells the entrance hall. “Gosh, we can actually spend some time together.”

The sound of ceramics smashing from the living room. The priest jolts, his blood suddenly running cold. His feet are moving before he can think of what to do, carrying him to the living room doorway and unable to hold back the horrified gasp at what he finds.

His hands fumble for the cross hanging at his neck. The thing in his living room is scrambling for the window. Wings beat the air erratically, claw marks sinking into the wood of the windowsill. Ashen skin drapes over the demon’s body. The priest holds the cross out like a lifeline, his hands shaking. It feels like his entire life has led up to eradicating one of these things.

“T–The power of Christ compels you!” he cries at it, and it’s only when the thing snaps its head towards him that his heart truly stops.

This thing, this demon, is wearing the face of his lover.

His grip is white-knuckled on his cross. It sank slightly in the horror of the moment, but he straightens it back out at the demon when he realises. The demon hasn’t moved from his spot at the window. Not running away, not trying to pounce. Just watching him quietly. “The power of Christ—”

“Darling,” he says in his lover’s voice, and something of a choked sob escapes the priest’s throat.

“The– The power—”

“Darling,” he says with more emphasis. He turns from the window and the priest takes an unconscious step back. “Don’t be like this.”

His mind is on a single-track right now. “The power of Christ—”

“That won’t work on me, darling.”

The priest pauses at that. He’s vaguely aware of the warm trails of tears on his face, of how this thing is purposely affecting him, but it doesn’t matter. He can worry about crying later. “W–What?”

“I’m not a demon.”

The priest almost laughs at that. He pushes the cross towards the demon for emphasis, and the other’s gaze turns to it lazily, almost bored.

“Go on,” he urges, “try again.”

It doesn’t feel right for the demon to be beckoning him into it, but he has no other choice. “The power of Christ compels you!”

Nothing happens. The demon’s face—his lover’s face—twists into a smirk, though it’s not as evil as the priest expected it to look. It’s the same look his lover always gives him when he’s feeling smug about something. “Crazy,” is all he says.

The priest turns his gaze onto his traitorous cross. It’s in one piece, pristine because he cleaned it last night. Why isn’t it working? Did he say it wrong?

“I’m not a demon, my love,” the thing continues after a moment. “I know I look horrifying to your little human mind, but just because I’m less handsome like this doesn’t mean I’m a demon, jeez.”

The priest can barely force the question past the lump in his throat. “What– What are you?”

“I’m exactly who I’ve always been,” the thing says with something of a grim smile. “Angels aren’t all golden halos and white gowns, you know.” He laughs when the priest’s head snaps to him. “I know. Sorry to disappoint you, darling. I didn’t mean for you to find out like this.”

The priest still isn’t convinced, frankly, but better to play it safe. He drops to his knees, painfully against the hardwood floor, and the thing—no, his lover, always his lover—raises an eyebrow at him.

“What are you doing?” he asks bluntly.

“O, servant of God,” the priest starts slowly. He bends down into an awkward bow, thankful for an excuse to not look at what his lover has become. What he’s always been. “Please, forgive me, I—”

“Eugh,” is the very unangelic sound that comes out of the other. The priest glances up at him, unsure if it was him who made it. “They train you well in that church, don’t they? I’m not a servant to anyone, darling, ‘specially not when you’re down on your knees like that.”

The priest flushes, stumbling to his feet a little too quickly. His lover watches with a hint of glee in his eye.

“I came here looking like a human because I wanted to be treated like one,” he says once the priest is back up. “You acting like that is exactly why I hid myself.”

Something twinges in the priest’s chest despite everything. “You– You didn’t trust me.”

“I couldn’t trust anyone.” His lover, this angel, shrugs idly. “Being an angel doesn’t let you reveal yourself to anyone, not even those you love the most.”

The cross twitches in his hand. “And now you know,” the angel—his angel, why couldn’t he see it before?—continues. “I’m sorry.”

The angel turns to the window again. “Darling, I—” The priest stops short, and the angel pauses for a moment, waiting.

The silence is thick. “I’m sorry,” his lover repeats, and in one smooth move he’s out of the window and into the darkness.

The priest almost trips over the rug in his haste to look outside. His fingers get splinters from the claw marks in the wood, but he doesn’t care. The street is empty.

His lover, an angel, disappeared into the night. All because he wanted to be the one with the surprise. Ironic.