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I stared at my stalker for a few seconds, wondering whether or not he was joking.
“What do you mean, Jacob isn’t Jacob anymore?” I asked as he took his hand from my mouth and let my arms down.
“He hasn’t been Jacob for a while. Is there somewhere else we could go to discuss this? Talking about this out in the open, especially so close to your apartment… It’s dangerous,” he whispered back to me. He looked nervous, his head on a swivel watching both exits from the alley way he pulled me in.
“I’m not going anywhere with you. I mean, you’ve been stalking me for months, maybe longer. How do I know this isn’t some freaky elaborate ploy to get me to go somewhere alone with you? Why should I trust you at all?”
Weirdly enough, he looked offended by my lack of trust in him, as if he didn’t give me every reason to be weary of his existence. A normal person wouldn’t drag someone into an empty alley to warn them about their boyfriend. Curiosity got the better of me, though, and I decided to let my guard down.
“I’ll go with you to talk, but only in public. We can go to that coffee shop on 16th.” He shook his head in agreement, still double checking the alley exits to make sure we were still alone.
About a minute into our walk towards the coffee shop, I finally gathered some courage to ask him a question.
“What’s your name?”
“Uh, my name’s Chris. Why do you need to know that?”
“Well I figured since you knew mine that it would only be fair to ask yours.”
“Oh yea, fair enough.” After that, we walked the rest of the five minute walk in silence. He seemed uncomfortable and jumpy, like he was expecting someone to pop out from the shadows and drag him away.
When we finally arrived at the shop, I ordered my iced chai, and him an americano. For some reason, this didn’t really surprise me. Jacob had a fondness for americanos too. Maybe it’s a guy thing.
“So,” I started as we found two rusty chairs to sit outside. “Why do you think there’s something wrong with my boyfriend?” He sighed and took a sip of his americano.
“I don’t think,” he responded as he poured some half and half into his drink. “I know. Have you heard of whitelighters?”
“Um, yea. The supernatural healers from that witch show? What does that have to do with any of this?” I asked, skeptical of where this was going.
“Yes, they are supernatural healers, like guardian angels,” he paused, taking another sip of his americano. “Do you believe in guardian angels, Lily?”
“I mean, I guess. I’m a pretty firm believer in the supernatural so I don’t know why I wouldn’t believe in them.” No way is this man about to insinuate that my boyfriend is a guardian angel, I thought to myself.
“Good. Your boyfriend, Jacob, was one. He was yours, up until about two months ago, when you first met me.” I stared at him over the top of my iced chai, expecting him to start laughing or give some sort of sign that he was just messing with me. He didn’t.
“Jacob is my guardian angel. That’s what you’re trying to tell me?”
“No, not is. Was. Do you see this scar on my neck?” he asked as he pointed to the jagged mark under his jaw line. I nodded as I took a sip of my own drink.
“Lily, do you know what a darklighter is?”
“Uh, I would assume the opposite of a whitelighter,” I guessed.
“You would be right. Darklighters are like demonic stalkers, both on regular humans like yourself and on whitelighters. Their main goal is to take out whitelighters like myself, which is why I have this scar.” Although I was listening, I could barely believe what I was hearing.
“Jacob was your whitelighter at first. He was sent to protect you, and the best way he could do that was to be by your side, by being your boyfriend. But being a guardian angel creates a big target on one’s back.”
“Wait a second,” I said as I snapped back into reality. “You really want me to believe that my boyfriend was a guardian angel, and that you are a guardian angel?” I had to stifle a laugh as he shook his head, staring me down with a serious intensity in his eyes.
“Lily, have you noticed Jacob acting weird? Any new scars or bruises or bumps on his skin? Late nights out with some odd explanations?”
Honestly, I had noticed that Jacob had been acting odd recently, ever since I told him about the first time I saw Chris. He never got angry with me, but he’d get increasingly stressed when I went places without him, I assumed out of worry for my safety. But what if that wasn’t what he was worried about?
“I guess I have, ever since I first noticed you…”
“Exactly. Your boyfriend is the reason I have this fucked up scar on my neck in the first place.” I noticed a twinge of anger in his statement, and I really couldn’t blame him. I’d be angry if someone scarred me too.
“So, why did he attack you then?” I asked. My skepticism was still strong, but for some reason I had a feeling I could trust Chris, seeing his scar and now noticing Jacob’s weird behavioral patterns in the last couple of months.
“I’ll explain it to you in the simplest way I can. Like I said earlier, guardian angels have huge targets on their backs for darklighters. Some of them want whitelighters killed, plain and simple. Others,” he looked over his shoulder, lowering his volume to barely a whisper. “Others see what some whitelighters have to offer. When they’re turned to the dark side, however they get them to turn, they use those strengths that whitelighters have for their own reasons. Basically, it’s good versus evil. Your boyfriend just couldn’t defeat whatever darklighter targeted him, and I guess Jacob had some redeeming qualities, otherwise he’d be dead. You wouldn’t be far away from him.”
“So, basically this whole time, you’ve been stalking me to make sure Jacob didn’t… kill me?”
“No. We’ve been stalking Jacob. Sometimes I would make sure that you were safe on your own, yes, but the main focus is him. He’s… corrupted, but he doesn’t have to stay that way. To be honest, we weren’t even sure if you guys were still dating when we found out he turned.”
“Is that why you asked me for my number that day, to see whether or not we were still together?”
“Yep, basically. We didn’t want to follow you around unnecessarily, and because he was no longer a whitelighter, we had no way to track him. You were kind of our connection back to him.”
Everything I was being told started to hit at once, and I could tell that Chris noticed I was overwhelmed. It sounded ridiculous and basically unbelievable, but something in me believed Chris. I had every reason to doubt him and tell him to fuck off, that my boyfriend wasn’t some supernatural evil being, but how could I believe in that stuff and not believe that my boyfriend could be a part of it?
My brain was on overload and I tried to process everything, one thing at a time, but it was brought to a halt when my phone started dinging. Chris stared at me, waiting for me to see who was texting. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and felt my chest tighten.
“It’s Jacob.”
Are you with someone? It’s been half an hour.
Don’t ignore me. I know where you are.
I can find you whenever I want.
NoSleepAutoBot t1_is4hur2 wrote
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