Gods & Monsters

I chuckle, kissing his nose. “Because God made me for you and he knew you’d probably be an idiot sometimes.”

“Yeah.” His answering chuckle is so sweet. So, so sweet and sexy. “I love you so much.”

“I love you.”

“And I love her.”

She kicks in my stomach. “I do, too.”

We breathe each other in for a few seconds before Abel moves away, smiling. It is so carefree and playful — a grin, really — that I can’t help but smile back. He walks around the counter and before I can question him, he gathers me in his arms and carries me to our bed. The bed only I’ve been sleeping in for the past few weeks; he always took the couch.

“Abel! Oh my God, put me down. I’m a whale.”

“You’re the mother of my child.”

“I’m heavy.”

“Nah. You’re exactly right.”

He lays me down on the cream-colored bedsheet, hovering over me, his silver cross swinging back and forth, as he places a soft kiss on my forehead.

“What are you doing? What about the camera? The pictures?”

He gets on the bed and crawls over, and drags me to his side, putting his hand on my swollen belly. “Eh, we have time for that later. Right now, I wanna be with my wife and my daughter.”

I smile, happiness blooming in my chest. Happiness and contentment. The kind that can only come from sinking into Abel’s chest and his apple scent. “We still don’t know if it’s a girl.”

“It is. I know it.” He rubs my stomach, as if lulling our daughter to sleep.

The movements of his hand are soothing and gentle, and something occurs to me.

“Hey, you know, the day you came into the town and I saw you? Out in the fields? I’d just gotten my first period. I woke up and saw all that blood. I thought I was going to die.”

“You’re not gonna die, Pixie.”

“What?”

“Yeah. And neither am I.”

“Okay.” I roll my eyes.

“Because legends don’t die. Our story’s gonna live forever. Abel and his Pixie.”

“You’re crazy.” I can barely contain my smile.

He grins and closes his eyes. “Only for you.”

Sighing, I marvel about the mysteries of life. I met him when I was on the verge of womanhood. Everything was changing, and I didn’t even know it. And now I’m here, with him, on this bed. Things are changing once again. I’m on the verge of something new. Motherhood.

There’s poetry in nature.

I close my lids, as well and imagine a little girl who looks like Abel. I never wanted to change the world, except for a little while there, when I was angry and hurting. I don’t know if a girl like me is even capable of making a difference, but I can do my part.

I can teach my daughter to be forgiving and kind. I can teach her to never go to sleep without doing at least one good deed for someone else. I can teach her to have faith in herself. I can teach her to be strong, to feel, to love, to hurt, and to love again.

And I can tell her a story about a golden-haired boy. People called him the monster but a blue-eyed girl thought he was her god. He was neither. He was only a boy, who drew, who wanted friends, and whose favorite fruit was an apple.

But most of all, he was a boy who felt things deeply. He was a boy who loved, with everything that he was.

THE END