Chapter 21

21

I was fidgeting as Stefan and I made our way up the elevator, a drink carrier that included Abby's tea and several bags of food in hand. We'd traveled to the office with Stan and Gabe, but the moment we arrived, they said they'd meet us upstairs so they'd have a chance to get a little work done before the meeting.

Yeah, they were workaholics, but who was I to judge if they were happy that way?

"Nervous?" Stefan asked, breaking the silence.

"Kind of," I answered, my voice cracking a little. With that, my face was once again a shining beacon.

Stefan chuckled. "You don't have to worry," he said, leaning against me. I took comfort in his warmth. "You know neither Stan nor Gabe would let anyone near you if they thought there was even a remote chance you'd get hurt. Even the gods should fear those two where you're involved."

"They're not that overprotective," I said, then snorted at Stefan's look of complete disbelief. "Okay, maybe they are."

"For good reason," Stefan said, "but yes, they're overprotective. How often have I had to backtrack when suggesting you're cute? How often have I had to make it sound like I'm not actually flirting with you just to keep your brother from gutting me?"

I stared at him, bewildered, as his words sunk in. "Wait, did you mean it when you were flirting?"

Stefan gave me a wicked grin, and the elevator chimed as it came to a halt. The doors slid open to reveal Gabe at his desk, preventing me from getting a satisfactory answer. "That was fast," my brother said as he looked up to ensure it was us and not someone he had to put on his business face for.

"The line was short," I told him, putting the drink carrier on the counter in front of his desk to pull out one of the cups. "Here, your chocolate malt shake."

My brother practically leaped from his feet, nearly tripping on Tempest, and grabbed at the cup. "You're the best," he told me before grabbing a straw, shoving it into place, and taking a healthy swallow. "How are you feeling?"

"Nervous," I admitted. "I wish you could tell me who this meeting was with."

"You won't have long to wait," he promised me, taking another swallow of his shake like it was the only thing keeping him going.

"Rough morning?" I asked.

"Kind of. Today's the day for this month I get an update from Roman Tartarus about how things are going, if my ex is still buried in a pit, and if Pluto is behaving. It's not the reminder I wanted. I mean, I don't give a shit about either of them beyond knowing they'll never get near me again, but I don't like being reminded about some of the things that happened. Does that make sense?"

"The end product was a relationship with Stan, but you'd rather not relive what it was like to have your heart ripped out continuously for weeks?" I suggested.

He took another gulp of his malt. "Yeah. That."

"Well," Stefan said, "you'll be pleased to know that we also brought food. I made sure we stopped by that one bakery for cookies, scones, and sourdough baguettes."

"And the good butter?" Gabe asked hopefully.

"And the good better," Stefan promised with a nod.

It occurred to me then that Stefan had to have known Gabe would have a rough morning. I gave him a warm smile, and he smiled back curiously. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing," I said. "I was just thinking that you're a really good friend."

"He's okay, and I'm moderately fond of him," Gabe said.

"Right," I said with a smirk before lifting my share of the bags. "Can we go set these down in Stan's office or something? They're getting kind of heavy."

Luckily for me, one end of Stan's expansive office was a seating area complete with a couch, some chairs, and a large coffee table. Luckier still, the table was large enough to hold all the food as we pulled containers out of the bags and sorted everything. Stan was extremely grateful that we'd thought to bring food with us, and I suspected neither he nor my brother had bothered with breakfast before knocking on Stefan's door that morning. No one said a word about Stefan being in Stan's office, and I had a hunch they'd already assumed he'd crash the meeting.

Once we'd managed to get everything set up and brought in plates and cutlery from the break room, I looked at the clock. "When are our grandfather and Abby supposed to be here?" I asked.

"Any time now," Stan told me. "We may as well sit and eat while we wait."

Yeah, they hadn't eaten breakfast. I'd have to guard Abby's chewy tea to make sure no one absconded with it at the rate they were likely to dig in.

"Here, try this," Gabe said, his mouth full, as he waved a piece of bread in front of my face.

I took it and bit in. My eyes widened, and I looked at him in confusion. "What is this?" I asked him.

"You've never had sourdough?"

I gave him a look. "Do you honestly think our mother would keep anything but plain white bread in the house? Maybe she kept some hidden away for herself, but do you think I had access to it if she did? And what is this on the bread?"

He was looking concerned and a little heartbroken. "It's butter."

"Liar," I said, stuffing the rest into my mouth. "Butter is greasy and kind of meh and comes in a tub." I paused. "On second thought, that was according to my mother, who assured me butter was just like the margarine she buys."

Gabe calmly set what he was eating down, put his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. "Oh dear god," he said, his voice muffled. "She's been feeding you cheap margarine." He looked up and sighed. "Okay, first, cheap margarine isn't anything like butter. It's an oil-based abomination. What we've got here is an extremely high quality butter that the bakery keeps feeding me and is probably addictive."

"That last part is a joke," Stan said quickly.

"Only sort of," Gabe shot back before heaving another sigh. "We've got to make sure you and Abby eat right from now on. I'll have to get together with our grandfather and make a list of what to keep the kitchen stocked with."

"Why are you supervising my kitchen?"

I yelped and quickly turned to see Beelzebub and Abby standing nearby with another vaguely familiar person. "When did you get here?" I asked, shocked. Shouldn't there have been a glowing portal or something?

"Just now," he said, grabbing a cookie from the table and sitting.

Abby followed suit, sitting beside me on the couch and leaning against me."Oh my god, it's the office that time forgot," she said as she looked around.

Our grandfather barked a laugh, and both Gabe and Stan glared at him.

I tried to diffuse the situation by handing her the milk tea I'd bought her, and she laughed. "You remembered!"

"Well, I did promise," I pointed out as I snuck another glance at the newcomer. He settled into one of the chairs, smiling beatifically at all of us. He had dark skin, curly salt and pepper hair, a mustache, and kind laugh lines at the corners of his eyes. I still couldn't place him until it occurred to me that he reminded me of one of the characters in the series Stefan had started me on the night before. Not identical or anything, but there was a strong resemblance, as if they were related.

"Currently, he looks kind of like Ron Glass. Firefly era, not Barney Miller."

Gabe's words came back to me, and I could feel all the blood drain from my face. It must have been obvious to everyone else in the room, because Stan leaned toward me, concern all over his face. "Zeke? Are you okay?"

"You're..." I whispered to the stranger.

"Oh, you figured it out," God chirped. "I wondered if they'd told you what I look like."

"Please forgive me, Heavenly Father," I said immediately, stumbled over my words. "I?—"

He held up one hand, his smile still kind, and I closed my mouth. "There's absolutely nothing to apologize for," He told me. "Besides, aren't we friends? I've been having a marvelous time with the conversations we've been having."

My brain went a thousand miles an hour in a million different directions. I shook my head slowly. "I... don't understand."

He held up a hand again, this time plucking something seemingly out of thin air, and a moment later, he was holding a very familiar-looking journal. The only difference from the one I'd first seen in my dream was a difference in the cover's color. "Believe me when I tell you that you've been an absolute joy to exchange notes with," He assured me.

I was going to black out. I could feel it coming as my vision started to go grey and kind of wobbly. I had Stefan on one side of me and Abby on the other, though, so maybe one of them would catch me before I ended up passed out on the floor.

"Oh, now, none of that," God said as He stood and reached over to put a warm hand against my forehead. My vision immediately cleared, and I blinked in surprise. "I apologize," God said. "I'd wanted to surprise you but hadn't meant to traumatize you. If I'd known you'd have this sort of reaction, I might have had Stan or your brother warn you."

"It's...okay," I said hesitantly.

"Also, none of that Heavenly Father business. Call me by name, child."

"Which one?" Gabe asked with a snort. "You seem to forget that you've had several."

"Hmm, true," He agreed with a nod. "I use Yahweh most often, so let's go with that, shall we?"

"I look forward to seeing heads explode when I tell people I'm on a first-name basis with God," Abby said with a smirk.

"Abby," I admonished, horrified.

Yahweh waved a dismissive hand and chuckled. "Considering the horrors you and your sister have both been through because of people who claim to know my will, I'd say that's a perfectly reasonable response," He told me. His expression turned serious, and he leaned forward to pluck a shortbread cookie from the table. "That's part of what we need to discuss today. Due to what you've been through with your parents, we've been cut a little slack for the bending and breaking of rules we did to help you. I realize it may not feel like we helped much, but?—"

"You're the one who put that house in Zeke's dreams, right?" Abby guessed. "You knew you'd reach a point where you could give him the physical thing."

Yahweh beamed at her. "You're a bright girl," He said cheerfully. "Though they weren't necessarily dreams in the purest sense. Zeke's skills lie more in astral projection, so his dreams are more real than a normal person's, or even a normal incubus'."

"That's how I was able to clean the conservatory," I realized, my eyes going wide. "So I was, what, half-there in real life?"

"I'd say more like thirty percent," Yahweh mused. "You'll get far better at it with practice, though. When you did it five years ago, it was because you were so malnourished. That put you closer to the afterlife than you are now, in a mortality-based sense."

I narrowed my eyes. "How do you know about that?"

"He's God," Abby whispered loud enough so everyone else could hear. "Omniscience is kind of his thing."

Yahweh laughed and reached over to pat Abby's arm. "I like you," He said. "You've got spirit. But, no, I knew about it because I'm the one who made sure it happened."

"Okay, not that I'm not thrilled to have met Zeke back then, but why?" Stefan asked. "What did baking a cake with me do for him?"

"It taught him important things about himself," Yahweh said, thankfully not expanding on that. I could feel my face trying to go red when I realized He was probably talking about me figuring out I like guys. "As far as why you specifically... That, I'm afraid, is confidential information. I will say that it worked out as well as I'd hoped, though."

"If I may ask," I said respectfully, "what does this have to do with broken rules?"

"Oh, yes, we got sidetracked, didn't we? Well, I suppose one has to do with the other." Yahweh grabbed another cookie and then leaned back in His chair. "You have a choice to make, Zeke. You can stay in Hell, or you can go back to the living world until the end of your natural life. If you opt to leave Hell, your ability to visit the afterlife in person will be revoked until your death, eighty-four years after returning to the living world. If you stay in Hell, the opposite is true, and you will not be able to visit the living world until after what would have been your lifespan. This doesn't apply to dreams, so you'd still be able to visit your sister that way, but those visits would also be limited. The penalty is similar if you opt to return to the living world. I've managed to talk the powers that be into letting you stay here until the Autumnal equinox. Or, should you decide to attend college, you can stay here until your first day of class. Again, you could visit in dreams, but that would be limited. I've managed to secure you one night a week for a visitor of your choice." He sighed and looked from me to Stefan and back. "I got you as much time as possible for the two of you to discuss this. I tried for more, but..."

I frowned in confusion. "The two of us? You mean Gabe and I?"

Yahweh frowned in return, looking from me to Stefan and back again before letting out an exasperated sigh. "Really?" He asked. "You still haven't told him about the big fat crush you've had on him for the past five years?"

"Yahweh!" I protested loudly. Predictably, my face once again felt like it was on fire. I hoped I'd outgrow that at some point.

He ignored me and turned to Stefan. "You could at least admit the same and stop making him think you just flirt with everyone the way you flirt with him. I realize he's seventeen and technically underage, but he's so close to eighteen he could reach out and touch his birthday if he tried hard enough. For fuck's sake, just keep it PG until he's of age and you're both ready for that kind of intimacy, but quit making him second-guess himself."

Gabe lurched to his feet, fists clenched and looking like he was going to beat someone to a pulp as he glared at us. "What the fuck?" he demanded.

"Shut it," Yahweh firmly said, glaring back at him. "Is Stefan your best friend, or isn't he? Do you trust him, or don't you? I realize Zeke's your little brother, and you want to keep him from being hurt any more than he already has, but there's such a thing as going overboard, Gabe."

Gabe dropped back down into his chair, but he still looked unhappy. Yahweh rolled His eyes, then turned His attention back to me. "So, you have a decision to make," He told me, His tone far more gentle than it had been with my brother. "You have all summer to decide what you're going to do, so I advise you to think about it and discuss it with the people who are important to you." He gave Stefan a pointed look.

"Am I going to be able to go back and forth during the summer? It's not like I want to attend my graduation or anything, but I did want to spend time with Abby and my grandfather, cleaning up that house. You know, while I was awake for once."

A smile bloomed on Yahweh's face, and suddenly, the room seemed about twenty percent brighter. "Yes, you'll be able to do that. That's part of your decision-making process."

I nodded, then gave Stefan a quick glance before asking, "Do vampires really turn to ash in the sun?"

Whatever Yahweh was expecting, it probably hadn't been that, if the surprise on His face half a second before He burst into laughter was any indication. "Really? Where did that come from?"

Stefan shrugged, looking sheepish. "Not sure, it's just a belief that's come up with us. So we're all wary of going into sunny areas."

Yahweh shook His head, still chuckling. "The human man who raised your father for me upon his creation had a severe case of Polymorphous Light Eruption when he was still alive. He probably took that trauma with him to his afterlife despite medical issues being gone after death, and that probably influenced your father."

"Poly..." He'd lost me. I had no idea what He'd just said.

"A sun allergy," Yahweh explained. "Blisters and chills and nausea and areas of bleeding under the skin. That sort of thing. I understand it's very unpleasant to live with." He looked at Stefan as if considering something, then smiled again. "I don't recommend you go to the living world during the day simply because you've been living under Hell's black void sky for centuries, and full sun could prove too overwhelming for your senses even if it wouldn't do harm. However, if you were to, say, go to an area of Hell where the sunlight finds a way to shine down, I think you'd be just fine. You could think of it as training, in a way. In fact, it could prove to be beneficial for you." He took yet another cookie—oatmeal this time—and looked around at all assembled. "Are there any other questions?"

"If you didn't create us, does this mean we aren't your children?" Abby asked. The question brought me up short. I hadn't even considered the possibility, but now that she'd said it, I had to wonder the same thing.

"Humanity is one of the results of millions of years of primordial soup stewing on Earth," Yahweh acknowledged gravely. "So, no, I did not technically create mankind in my image. The truth is that I was created in your image. However, the fact that I adopted my children instead of creating them doesn't make them any less my children." He smiled kindly at Abby, then looked at me once more. "Whatever you decide, when you've come to the afterlife for good, I'd like you to consider working for me. We could use a person like you with a good heart and a strong sense of justice. That's another thing for you to keep in mind throughout the summer." He reached toward the cookies again, selecting half a dozen before standing. He looked at Stefan and smirked. "You should ask him why he calls you Stefan and never Stef."

Then he disappeared.