Chapter 6: Heartbreak

The buzzer inside of the cramped apartment rang, and Maren didn’t have to use her powers to figure out who the guests were. Keona and Cameron. She exchanged a nervous glance with Shantay, and sighed. The last thing that Maren wanted to deal with right now was those two. Heck, she’d rather take on a Dark-Lighter. Or maybe not.

Shantay raised an eyebrow at Maren’s disgusted look. “Do you want me to shoo them?” she asked, “Just tell me who to shoo and I’ll shoo.”

Maren shook her head, smiling weakly. She walked over to the buzzer and pressed the button to allow her friends in. Shantay rested a hand on Maren’s shoulder. “You’re going with the ‘fall down’ story, right?”
“Yeah.”

“I’ll pretend to be the witness of the accident,” Shantay proposed, “don’t worry.”

Maren managed a small grin. “You’re a great liar, thanks.” She sighed, taking a moment to inspect the dirt underneath her fingernails. She stank of ash and blood; hopefully her smell would not be questioned. However, knowing Shantay, she’d probably counter any questioning by saying that it’s the latest perfume by Ralph Lauren.

The door of the apartment flung open, and Cameron and Keona burst in through the narrow entrance. “Maren!” they exclaimed in unison.

“Hey guys,” Maren greeted as though everything was normal. She topped off the greeting with a grin filled to the brim with cheese.

Keona sniffed the air. “What’s that smell?”

“My cooking,” Shantay admitted apologetically, “I was trying to fry rice but ended up burning it completely. Guess the smell’s still lurking in the air, eh?”

Keona appeared wary, but Cameron seemed to care less about the smell. He placed his hands on Maren’s shoulder, a concerned look in his eyes. “Are you alright? I called your boss to see if you were at work, he said you fell…”

Maren shook her head. “I’m fine, just took a tumble down the stairs.”

“It wasn’t pretty,” Shantay added, “I almost called an ambulance, but Maren’s a tough cookie.”

Keona glared at Shantay. “So, are you two best buds now? You’ve known each other a couple of days and now you’re roommates?”

“Keona, please…” Maren protested.

Tears were brimming in her friend’s deep brown eyes. Shaking her head, she replied, “I just lost my fiancé. And now I’m losing my best friend to some stranger.” With that, she turned on her heel and stamped out of the apartment.

Avoiding Maren’s gaze, Shantay winced as she walked over to the bathroom, shutting the door quietly behind her.

Cameron’s gaze wavered to the door. Maren sighed, trying to keep her tears at bay. “You’re not going to leave me too, are you?”

He turned back to face her, his eyes sad. As he wrapped his arms around her, his hand grazed Maren’s wound, causing her to flinch. “I’m sorry,” he said immediately, “is that where it hurts?”
Maren collapsed her head on Cameron’s chest, sobbing. “Everywhere hurts.”

Stroking her hair, Cameron replied softly, “It doesn’t have to be that way. You’ve been so far away, lately, and I…I’ve missed you so much.” He kissed the top of her forehead lightly. “If things could only be the way they were again, then everything wouldn’t hurt anymore. I know they never can be, but that doesn’t mean that our lives are over.”

Cameron let his arms part from Maren’s body, sighing as he did. “I love you, Maren, but if it seems to you that everyone is leaving, keeping mind that it was you who left first.”

He left the apartment, but Maren didn’t try to follow him for she had frozen at the truth of his words. Everything that Cameron had said was right. But now that she was a servant of Satan, she knew even more than he did that nothing would ever be the same.

Shantay came out of the bathroom moments later, a tentative expression on her face. “Are they gone?”

Maren stood still, unable to nod in response. Shantay came closer and rested a comforting hand on her friend’s shoulder. “Look, if it’s my staying here that’s troubling you, I can leave. I can stay with some friends up in Boston.”

“No!” Maren protested as she wiped the tears from her face, “If you weren’t here to help me cover up my lies, I’d be in an even deeper hell-hole.”

Shantay shook her head. “If I weren’t here, then the demons wouldn’t be after you, seeing as you got in their way of killing me. You wouldn’t be hurt, and…”

“If you weren’t here, then you’d be dead!” Maren exclaimed, “You wouldn’t have escaped like you have all those other times!” She took a deep breath, sighing. “Shantay, I know. I saw it in a premonition, and that’s why I saved you. I probably had the vision for a reason. I was meant to save you.”

Small tears formed in Shantay’s eyes, the first Maren had ever seen come from her new friend. “I…I can’t keep cheating death like this,” she said softly, her voice quivering.

Biting her lip, Maren said nothing. Maybe she wasn’t meant to save everybody who faced death. That’s why she wouldn’t have been able to save Will. Fate was a dangerous thing to fight against, and it seemed now that Maren was on the losing side.

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After a long nap and a bowl of Mac and Cheese, Maren returned to Hell with a knife in her belt just in case she was attacked again. But after Lucifer’s display of anger towards the Dark-Lighter, she figured that most demons would be too afraid to try to kill her again. Shantay had gone out, supposedly to buy some coffee, but Maren wasn’t quite sure she believed that, and feared for her friend’s safety. The entire afternoon following the visit of Keona and Cameron, Shantay had been strangely quiet.

For the first time since her employment under Satan, Maren felt a sense of relief when her feet met the ash covered ground of Hell. Here, nothing was supposed to make sense, and that feeling was comforting. She shivered as the coldness and evil of her surroundings engulfed her, but by now, she was getting used to it.

Hearing footsteps behind her, Maren whirled around, withdrawing her knife from her belt as she did. The steps belonged to none other than Lucifer himself. He smirked at the knife in Maren’s hand. “Somehow, I don’t thin, that that knife would wound me.”

Maren sighed and put the blade back in her belt. “It seemed to do away with the demon that attacked Shantay just fine.”

“Am I an ordinary demon?” he asked, even though they both knew that it was a stupid question. After a short moment of silence, Lucifer beckoned to her with a wave of his hand, leading her towards his office. As they walked, he added, “When your powers are more atoned, you will always know who is coming up behind you, even in Hell, where everything is a mystery. Come, today, I will teach you about the seeing waters.”

Maren followed him into his office silently, sitting down in the chair that he offered to her. He pulled a silk cover off of the small table near Maren’s chair. “Voila!” he exclaimed, “The seeing waters!”

The seeing waters, in Maren’s opinion, looked much like a bird bath with gothic embossing on its dark stone, and the water appeared like it had come straight from a bottle of Aquafina. She nodded at it without saying a word.

Lucifer was perplexed. “You’re not yourself. Normally you’re pestering me with question after question. What’s troubling you?”

“Don’t pretend to be so innocent,” Maren accused sharply, “You probably know exactly what’s troubling me. In fact, you most likely listened in on my entire day.”

Lucifer was silent. Leaning back in her chair with a triumphant look on her face, Maren said, “That’s what I thought.”

“My comprehension of human pain is extensive, but not of human emotion. I have listened to your quarrels, but I have not understood,” Lucifer explained as he sat down in another nearby chair.

“Bull shit! You were human once, were you not? Do you not remember anything about love or sadness?” Maren cried.

“That was a long time ago,” he replied quietly.

The two were both silent for a while. Finally, Maren looked directly at his covered face, trying to meet his shadowed eyes. Sighing, she said, “I wish your eyes weren’t hidden by that damned mask. That way I could tell if you’re really bluffing or not.”

“Can eyes really tell that much about a person?” Lucifer asked.

Maren shrugged. “Your eyes speak what your heart cannot say and what your words cannot hide.”

Nodding in understanding, Lucifer replied, “Eyes are the window to the soul, right? Something like that?”

“You were bullshitting me. You know exactly what I’m talking about, yet you play dumb.” Maren knew it wasn’t wise to insult the devil, but she couldn’t care less about being polite at the current moment.

Lucifer reached his hand back to scratch at his hair. “Do you…do you love this Cameron?”

Now that was out of the blue. “Way to change the subject, Lucifer. Do you enjoy being random? Is this your new favourite pastime?” Maren asked sarcastically.

He shook his head. “It’s not like you to act this way. You’re trying to be tough, and its not hiding the tears forming at the back of your eyes.”

Maren gulped down a sob in her throat, but her cracking voice betrayed her. “Oh, what do you know?”

“I know that he supposedly loves you. But do you…do you love him?”
Covering her face with her hands, Maren managed to say through her tears, “Of course I do!”

“Is that what you’re just trying to tell yourself, or is it really true?” Lucifer pried.

“Dammit, can we please just get on with the lesson? When I need a therapist, I’ll know who to call. Not.”

“If you are sure,” Lucifer replied warily, “Then I will continue.” He rested his gloved hands on the rim of the pool. “It doesn’t matter if you use my water or water from your tap at home, and that water can be placed inside any basin of your choosing. You could even use your toilet if you wished; why you would though remains to be seen.

“You cannot, however, use holy water, since it will not work. Being able to see into the future is considered to be a blasphemy by the church and, in a word, ‘unholy’. If anything, the holy water will work against you.”

Maren nodded with interest and understanding. “Do the waters allow me to see the present and past as well?”

Lucifer chuckled. “If your desire was to see a famous celebrity naked in their shower, then you could.”

Maren stood, resting her palms on the pool’s rim much like Lucifer. She stared at the water in amazement. “What do I do to see anything?”

“Dip your index finger of your writing hand into the water, and think of what it is you wish to see. In the moments you have with the seeing waters, you have the entire world at your fingertips” Lucifer responded, “I cannot see what it is you see without reading your mind.”

Bewildered, Maren stared at the index finger of right hand. She could look at absolutely anything in the world. Even Cameron.

Dipping her finger into the pool, Maren closed her eyes and thought of Cameron. The water rippled for a moment, then calmed, and Maren could see him as clear as if he was standing right in front of her. There was another figure with him, a dark-haired, olive skinned woman. Keona.

“Thanks for driving me home from work,” Keona said, smiling up at the taller Cameron as she fiddled with her lock.

“No problem,” Cameron replied, “I had the day off today, and normally I’d be spending it with Maren, but…”

He didn’t need to finish his sentence; Keona knew exactly what he was talking about. “I know what you mean; Maren’s been acting funny lately.”

“Yeah,” Cameron agreed quietly. The two were silent for a moment.

“Do you want some herbal tea? I have some inside; it always helps me when I’m feeling icky,” Keona offered.

Cameron smiled. “Sure, why not?”

“Come in,” Keona beckoned, holding the door open. Cameron entered, and sat down on her flowered couch in the brightly decorated living room.

“The tea should only take a minute or two,” Keona called to him from the entryway. Cameron waited patiently on the couch for a couple of minutes until Keona brought in a small cup for him.

Cameron sipped the warm liquid, then smiled. “It’s delicious, Keona. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Keona replied with a warm smile.

Cameron finished the remainder of the drink within moments. “That was very refreshing. I needed that.”

“Yeah,” Keona said softly, “I don’t get it, you know? Maren has an amazing man at her side, supporting her through the toughest time in her life, and she just pushes you away. It’s like…it’s like she doesn’t even care.”

“She cares, she’s just grieving. She’ll come around eventually, she’s just grieving,” Cameron said.

Keona shook her head. “When I’m grieving, I want the support of others. I don’t hide away and lie about where I am all the time.”

“People deal with grief in different ways,” Cameron said, trying to sound convincing but there was a falter in his voice.

Sighing, Keona placed a hand on Cameron’s cheek. “You and I are both so open to love, and yet we do not receive it. Maren is surrounded by love, and she blocks it out. I don’t understand it!”

“Keona…”

“Oh, Cameron,” Keona sighed, “You deserve so much better.” She placed both hands on his cheek now, leaned in, closed her eyes, and kissed him. At first, Cameron was taken aback, but then he too closed his eyes and kissed her back.

In utter shock, Maren backed away from the waters, not wanting to see what would happen next. She sank to her knees, wanting to cry out, but the pain was too great. It was as if someone had taken a hammer and nail and pounded it into her heart, making the blood spurt everywhere and instantly killing all the love that her heart contained. Closing her eyes, she tried to get the image of her boyfriend and best friend kissing out of her head, but the vision would not leave. When Maren opened her eyes again, she found that she could not see; her view was blinded by salty tears.

Lucifer knelt down next to her, placing a gloved hand on Maren’s shaking shoulder. He had seen it all.

Struggling to breathe, Maren placed a hand on her chest, gasping for air. Silent screams were trapped at the back of her throat. Finally, she managed to cry out a heart wrenching moan of “No…”

The taste of betrayal was bitter in her mouth. Unable to keep her strength, Maren collapsed her chest onto her kneeling thighs, trembling and sobbing. She rolled onto her side into the fetal position, clutching her stomach. Her entire world had stopped; everything she had ever loved had stabbed in her back and nothing mattered anymore.

Feeling two gloved hands encircle around her, Maren thrashed around in the arms, not wanting to be held by anyone again and not wanting to love anymore. But the hands stayed firm around her, and soon, she lost the strength to fight back. The arms lifted her weakened body off of the cold, ashen floor of Hell onto a bed, and pulled a warm blanket across her. She felt a dark shape lie down next to her, and a comforting hand stroke her hair. Acting upon her impulses, Maren brought herself closer to the shape, allowing it to rest its head upon her shoulder and wrap its arms around her.

The tears remained and her heart still hurt, but since before Will had died, Maren had never felt this safe. She wouldn’t realize until later that the comforting figure was Satan himself.

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A/N: Ah! I haven’t updated this thing in almost a year! Wow…sorry I had a bad case of writer’s block and a lack of inspiration (I believe my muse went on holidays hahahaha). So I hope you guys are still enjoying this story, and don’t forget to review!