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Angela Ziegler had never believed in ghosts. Even as a child, she knew she would never see her parents again. Dead means dead means dead. No more cards to play. But that didn’t stop her wishing.
Angela Ziegler did not believe in ghosts but there was little other way to explain the figure...apparition...being that stood before her. The air had a definite chill and the hair on the back of her neck stood alert just like the ghost hunters swore was a sign of the paranormal on those shows she had watched almost ceasely with Fareeha in the weeks after her mother’s death. Like maybe some low budget cable star she could teach her find her mother again in the creaking of old floor boards and the sighing in the wind. Maybe she could say goodbye one last time.
Angela had never asked and Fareeha never said but her hopes were clearly written in the endless brown of her eyes. But for all of Fareeha’s childish hoping for a visitation of a ghost, if before her truly stood Gabriel’s ghost, she wasn’t sure there was was anything left of the man she knew.
Even the way he stood before her, all 6ft of him looming in the settling dust was reminiscent of Gabriel like someone had spent hours studying the way he had held himself but their best impersonation fell distinctly short.
Angela was a steadfast person, dependably calm under pressure, 20+ years of treating highly traumatic injuries had made certain of that. But this was unnerving in a way nothing in all of her years had been. Like staring into the face of someone half dead, like a ghost. No, not a ghost. She shook the thought as quickly as it had come. This was still here Gabriel, not dead. Not dead.
She wanted to tell him, “It wasn’t you who was supposed to fall. You aren’t lucifer after all.”,
but knew she shouldn’t.
She wanted to tell him, “I didn’t know this would happen. What I would turn you into.” but knew she couldn’t.
She wanted to tell him, “If I could do it again, I wouldn’t gamble against heaven again.”, but knew she wouldn’t.
Not because she wasn’t a liar but when you lose a bet you made with someone’s soul as collateral you owe what is left of them whatever semblance you have of answers. Maybe, protocol for hostile negotiations said to make empty promises if it will save your neck but Gabe always knew just how to see through her in a way nobody could these days. Whatever he wanted to know, she’d tell him the truth. She owed him that, at least.
But he wasn’t asking.
When he had first caught sight of her his shoulders had stiffened like, like somebody seeing a ghost but the tension had drained from them as he lowered his weapon. He was the first to break the silence, in a voice that was no longer quite Gabriel’s, though she couldn’t pinpoint what exactly had changed, he said,
“Funny, Angela, how you look damn near suprised to see somebody who should be dead like you haven’t spent the last 15 year playing god.”
She opened her mouth to reply but she couldn’t think of anything to say. She knew she should apologize but she was sorry perhaps this was all that was left of Gabriel Reyes, the man she knew, she was not sorry that she’d found a way to save him.
He ducked his head in a nearly imperceptible nod like this was all he had wanted or maybe expected then continued,
“You used to tell me you didn’t believe in ghosts but that can’t be true anymore, can it?”
Holstering his weapon, he turned on heel as if to leave but paused for a moment when she finally managed to blurt out,
“Please, Gabriel, let me help you. Gabe, please, ghosts aren’t real. You aren’t a ghost, never were. ”
It sounded pathetic in her ears, she couldn’t even imagine what it sounded like in his. With a gravelly chuckle, hauntingly familiar but spine tinglingly empty, he turned his masked face, excruciatingly slowly, back towards her.
“Angela, I wasn’t talking about me.”
He paused for several seconds that seemed to stretch on infinitely
“Haven’t you looked in the mirror lately, Angie?”