Chapter 5

“ ... Thank God... for unanswered prayers ..."

Ava Miller awoke, glaring at her radio alarm clock.  As she sat up, she grabbed her head.  Hissing as she laid back down.  

“What did Azrael give me?”

“Whatever it was,” stated a sharp sounding voice.  “I don’t think it was enough.”

Ava opened her eyes to look at the spirit in her room; sighing, “What did I do that got you to be like this?”

Grandmother Willow glared, “Oh I don’t know?  Leaving the house knowing that there are creatures of the night that could kill you.”  Her eyes scanned towards the bite that was visible on Ava’s neck.  “On other thoughts, you’re lucky to be alive.”

The young woman on the bed glanced towards the clock and groaned.  “Great, Dustin will be here in ten minutes, and I’m not even dressed yet.”

“You should call in sick today.  You don’t have the energy to go through your learning.”

“I know that you have a good point,” stated Ava with worry in her voice.  She crawled out of bed and turned her radio off.  “But I have to keep up with appearances if I don’t want people to believe that nothing has changed about me.”

The native ghost shook her head.  “You’re right.”  She saw Ava go into her bathroom to get ready.  “I just wish that things were different for you, child.  For I have a feeling that this is only the beginning.”  

It took Ava a few minutes to shower and get dressed.  She was in the middle of brushing her hair when she heard the front door knock.  She knew then it was Dustin, who showed up at her door.  

She grabbed her backpack and walked through the house until she reached the front door.  Where she opened it and saw Dustin standing on the porch, with his arms folded over his chest.  He looked intimidating, standing there looking at her like she was prey.

“Stop it,” Ava hissed to him.

“What did I do,” he asked as he raised his hands up.  “Other than standing here, waiting for you.”

She shook her head, as she turned towards the door and locked it.  Ava walked off the porch, allowing Dustin to follow her.  “You look like you’re up to no good.”

A deep soft laugh was her answer before more words followed.  “I’m sorry if you think that, but most guys are up to no good.”  When the two had climbed into his car, he turned the key.  “I, on the other hand. I know that you’re in pain.”

Ava looked out the window, seeing that they were making out of her driveway.  On their way towards high school.  When she heard him talking about her pain, she did not even act on the fact that she was listening to him.  Ava did not want anyone else to know about her added training.  Not until she was good enough to even tell Mavis.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ava turned towards him with a questionable look.  “Are you sure that you haven’t been into your horror movies a bit much?”

“Ha-ha.”  He gave her a glance before turning his eyes towards the road again.  “Whatever you say, but I can tell that you’re in pain.  Did something happen last night?”

“Nothing that needs to concern you, Dustin.”  She turned towards the window again, leaning her head against the cold window.  “I just have a lot on the mind lately.”

The rest of the ride was quiet, which made Ava feel pleased.  She was not in the mood to lie as much as she felt comfortable with.  Once they had reached the school.  She opened her door and bee lined, towards the breakfast room, where she sat down next to Mavis.

The southerner glanced towards her with a surprised look.  “How did you get to school, early?”

“Dustin drove me.”

“Oh.”   Mavis glanced towards the door and saw Dustin making his way to where the food was.  Where he started grabbing things.  “Did something happen between the two of you?”

“None that I know of,” stated Ava with worry in her voice.  “He just dropped me off this morning.  He had a look in his eyes that I had never seen before.”  Her eyes traveled to where Dustin was.  “And I’m not liking it.”

Mavis gave a worried look towards Ava, before glancing at Dustin again.  “He has been looking at you with different eyes lately.  Like he is a different person or something.  I don’t know, but there is something off about him.”  She leaned into Ava and whispered, “His soul seems darker.”

Ava closed her eyes and sighed, “From what I have found out last night.  This is not good.”  She opened her eyes, seeing that Dustin was making his way over to them.  “We should talk, later.”

“Agreed.”

When Dustin came and sat down next to the two girls.  He passed Ava some fruit that he had placed on his tray.  “You need to eat something.”  He also gave her a carton of milk as well.  “Don’t worry,” he brought a hand up and raked it through her hair.  “I’ll take care of you.”

Mavis whispered harshly, “Why doesn’t he just try to marry you?”

Dustin glanced towards the southern girl, “What was that Mavis?  I almost didn’t hear you.”  He smirked, as his eyes sparkled with an idea.  “But it is an idea, I should think about the future.”  He took a bite from what food he had gotten himself.

“Thanks, Mavis.”  Ava gave a strained looking smile, kicking her friend's chair.  “Don’t be so helpful.  My goal is to live through high school and then get into college.”

“What are you going to college for,” asked Mavis, who was trying to act like a normal day.

Ava shook her head, “There are a lot of options.  I just feel lost.”

Dustin chuckled, “I’m going to become a politician.  I want to make great changes for our country.”  He turned towards Ava with a smile on his lips.  “The kind of country that my wife would be happy to live in.”

“Hold it right there,” Ava glared at him with heat.  “I’m not going to think about marriage for at least a couple of years.  I want to at least graduate college before a ring reaches my finger.”

He raised his hands and covered his heart.  “I have been shot!”  Causing many within the room to look towards their table.  “Why would you prevent this man to love you!”

Ava pushed herself away from the table, grabbing her bag and glared at him.  “I can name a few things!”  Before she turned and walked out of the room.  Making her way through the halls to her locker, where she took out her books and made her way to her first class.  “Good thing I have choir.”

Just as she was about a few feet from the classroom door that she needed to go, a hand reached out and stopped her in the hall.  Making her turn towards a group of troublesome boys.  The ones that bullied her non-stop.  She was not in the mood for them that day.

“I see that Romeo had overstepped his boundaries with you today.  Care to share with us,” asked the ringleader of the group.  A boy that she had once thought was handsome and he was, but not his attitude.

“Don’t you guys have better things to do, than come after me?  I mean you guys are mostly farmers and ranchers.  Shouldn’t you have other things to do?”

“Point taken.”  The leader lets go of her neck, allowing her to step away from him.  But his eyes held her in place.  His bright blue eyes had that effect on her.  “Why did Dustin make a fool of himself?”

Ava shrugged her shoulders, which she wished she had not done that.  A shooting pain shot through her system, causing her a struggle to show that nothing was the matter.  “I really don’t know; Dustin is known to be dramatic at times.”

“Not like this,” stated another boy behind the first.  “He seems different today, did you cast a spell on him or something?”

Ava laughed, “Oh that is rich.  Why would I have magic, when some of your friends pick on me for reading a Bible?!”

“She has a point,” growled out the blue-eyed leader to one his friends.  “Why would a witch carry a Bible, when all it would do is harm them.”  He turned his eyes back to her.  “Do you think he would be an issue if I hurt you in front of him?”

“Don’t know,” Ava answered calmly.  “You’re going to have to test that out another time.  Class will begin in a couple of minutes.”

He smirked, which could be a sin of knowing who he was.  His silk straw hair: he pulled back, allowing his blue eyes to look at her.  Holding her in her spot.  He then glanced at his surrounded posse of six teenage boys, “Time to go.”

As Ava saw the group of seven boys had left her.  Tension had left her shoulders.  Allowing herself to relax, knowing that they were not going to strike anytime soon.  "Can I lose weight from diverting a bully with words?"  She made her way into her classroom before the bell rang and found her seat on the riser.  Knowing that they were practicing for a concert at the end of the month.  

The teacher came out of his office, “Today is going to be a study hall day.  I am allowing your voices to have a day of rest.  So please use this time productively.”  He moved back into his office but left the door open slightly.

Ava sat in her spot for a moment before dragging a notebook out of her bag.  It was when a few people had moved around and felt someone sit beside her.  She was not surprised to see Mavis sitting next to her.

“So, going to tell me what’s going on with the Range Boys?”  

Ava smiled, she knew it was their inner joke about the group of boys who were made up of farmers and ranchers.  She was surprised that those said boys would want to be the school’s gathering bullies.  “They just wanted to know what caused the big change in Dustin.”

Mavis sighed, “Yeah.”  She looked around the room at the other students within.  “It’s getting around on the questions, even Davion Jones was giving you the eye today.”

Ava could not help herself but tried to keep her laughs under control.  “Good one Mavis, the day that his blue eyes follow me across the school is the day that everyone realizes that I’m an angel.”  She shook her head, “No.  I think the vampire bite had caused some pheromones to affect some of the males in the school.”

“What vampire bite,” hissed Mavis harshly.  

Ava glanced around and saw that everyone was doing their own thing.  She reached up and pulled the side of her shirt from the left side of her neck.  Allowing Mavis to see the bite that she had gotten from the night before.

“Ouch,” the southern girl hissed softly.  “How did you walk away?”

Ava pulled her shirt back in place.  She gave her friend a glance, “I was saved.”  With dark brown eyes glaring at her, she knew that she had to give an answer.  “Azrael, the Angel of Death came and saved me.  He even healed me up and took me home.”

“Wow, I had thought he didn’t give a damn about people’s lives?”

“Only for those that aren’t on his list,” whispered Ava.  She brought out a pen to write a few things down on the open page of her notebook.  “But I’m starting to feel something for him.”  She shook her head, allowing her hair to wave over her shoulders and back.  “And I don’t know if it’s because of the gratitude that I have for him.”

Mavis sighed, leaning back slightly.  “It’s called a Hero’s Crush.  In all purposes of argument, he saved you from an ordeal and now you believe you have feelings for him.  But you know as much as I do, it’s forbidden for him to love you.”  She shook her head sadly towards her friend.  “Only God can give him the permission for the two of you or things will end badly for the two of you.”

A hand came to Ava’s right shoulder.  “But you might be right about the pheromones causing the male population to take notice of you.”  She tapped her shoulder to get her to look up.  “Even some of the guys in class keep glancing your way.  More so now than normal.”

“Great,” Ava groaned in low tones.  “It’s the last thing I needed right now.”  She glanced towards the girls of the room and noticed that none of them cared that their guys were looking at her.  “I hate high school.”

“Just look it this way, we only have three and half more months of it.”  Mavis spoke with cheerfulness in her voice, it sounded too sugary for Ava to tolerate.  “But on other matters, what are your goals for college?”

“I don’t know,” she sighed.  “I’m leaning on becoming a history teacher or an archaeologist.  Either one of those sounds exciting to me.”

“Okay, they didn’t sound bad but why didn’t you say anything earlier?”

Ava smiled softly, “I guess I didn’t want Dustin to find out.”  She shook her head.  “I didn’t want him to follow me because of him liking me or something.”  She wrote a few notes that she remembered from a class from the day before.

Mavis smirked, “So are you going to see Azrael again?”

“Only you would think about guys,” she chuckled softly.  “But to answer your question, yes, I am.  He wants to teach me how to protect myself.  I think he said something about a sword.”

“Did he say anything else, because I see you’re holding something back.”

Ava closed her eyes for a moment before turning to her friend and whispered.  “He said something about me being a unicorn from another world.  Who is sent here to learn something about a black dragon named Blackie.”  Ava’s eyes became sad.  “I think he’s here.”

“Here at the school?”

“That I don’t know,” Ava’s eyes shot towards the door, where she saw Dustin Andrews standing at the other side of the door.  Seeing him through a small window.  “But he is close by from what I can understand.”

“This is not going to be easy, is it?”

“No,” Ava shook her head.  Wishing that the class would not end anytime soon.  “I’m not looking forward to English class, I have it with Dustin.  Luckily, he doesn’t sit anywhere near me.”

The choir teacher left his office and called out, “You may leave, but be ready to sing tomorrow.”

Everyone had grabbed their stuff and started heading towards the door.  Where Dustin walked in and made his way to the two girls, who were still gathering their stuff together.

“Hey, why didn’t you sing today?”

“Mr. Allen gave us the day of rest,” Ava smiled.  “I guess we have been working too hard for him not to.”

“But I like it when you guys sing,” he whimpered with his lips quivering slightly for effect.  

Mavis huffed, “You really are laying on it thick, aren’t you?”  She pushed Dustin towards the door with a glare in her eyes.  “Don’t you know anything; most girls don’t need to be chased that hard.”

“What are you talking about, Mavis?  Ava is a good friend,” he smiled warmly.

“Then stop giving everyone the hippies about your over exaggerated emotions.”  Her eyes flashed with anger.  “Everyone thinks that you have strong feelings for Ava.  Which she is getting mixed emotions about.  So, get your act together or I’ll do it for you!”

“Understood,” he gulped.

Knowing Mavis as much as Ava did, she knew that she could count on her word.  As she walked past Mavis and Dustin in the hall, she made it to her next call, which happened to be down the hall.  She found her seat and sat down.  When Dustin came in, he did not look at her again.

Mrs. Bryson was on board when the bell rang for the start of class.  “Good morning, everyone, today I would like to have you do a free write.  I want you to come up with a story that comes to mind.  Anything at all and you have ten minutes to come up with a full page.  Now... begin.”

Ava smiled; it was something that she was good at.  She brought out a piece of paper and started on her story.  About Azrael, the guardian of the wood.