Page 41 of Ruled By Fate

Brie shook her head. “It’s my responsibility. I can do it.”

“I know you can, love. But would you let me do this one?”

The two shared a sad look.

“Only if I can sit with you while you call.”

Together, they covered Esther with a blanket and called to inform the morgue. As they left to make the fateful phone call from the nurses’ station, Brie glanced back at Cameron.

His hand was resting upon the blanket. When he caught her looking, he said quietly, “I’ll stay with her until someone comes.”

Brie nodded almost imperceptibly and followed her friend out the door.

? ? ?

By the end of her shift, Brie felt as though her day had begun three days ago. Her eyes burned with the fluorescence of the hospital lights, her stomach was churning from day-old coffee, and her feet had been crammed in her shoes so long that she was beginning to seriously question her life choices.

I could be something more relaxing. Like an air traffic controller.

As she waited for Sherry on the bench near the ambulance bay, she tilted her face up to catch the sunlight, took in a deep breath, and slowly exhaled. Before she could congratulate herself for doing Dr. Rogers’ breathing techniques one whole time, her thoughts were interrupted.

“Is this seat taken?”

She opened her eyes and squinted. Her angel was looking down on her, haloed in the sunlight. Her lips pursed, and she gestured in a circle around his head with a teasing grin. “That’s a bit on the nose, don’t you think?”

“What is?”

“Never mind.”

He sat down beside her, brimming with curiosity but wanting very much to be respectful of the current mood. “Brianna, why do you ask if the seat is taken if—”

“Cam, it’s been a long day. Could we do idioms tomorrow?”

“Of course. I understand.”

They sat silently for a moment before he threw her a sideways glance. “So, you saw my earthly purpose today — what I do.”

Brie nodded slowly. “I did.”

He hesitated, picking some nonexistent lint off his pants. “What did you think?”

“I thought… it was strangely beautiful.”

He stared for a split second, as if he was worried she might retract it. Then, he let out a breath in utter relief. When she tilted her head at him quizzically, he said, “I’ve often wondered if humans would approve of us, if they knew about us before the end.”

Brie was puzzled. “Why wouldn’t we?”

“Well,” he hesitated, “we aren’t always there in time to ease suffering, as you well know.” He watched her carefully. “And violent deaths aside, the human population growth has so far outpaced our own that there simply aren’t enough of us. It becomes ‘unfair,’ you see.” He looked at Brie with sudden intensity. “Your kind is very concerned with the concept of fairness.”

She considered this. “There’s this story we have about starfish. I think you might call it a parable.”

His eyes lit up. “I was raised on parables. Tell me.”

She took a breath. “One morning, after a great storm, an old man goes for a walk down the beach. He sees a young boy throwing things into the ocean. The man asks, ‘What are you doing?’ and the boy replies, ‘The tide is going out, and the sun is coming up. I’m throwing these starfish back into the water so they don’t die.’ The old man says, ‘You foolish boy. There are miles of beach and hundreds of starfish. You’ll never make a difference.’ The boy looks at him for a moment, then picks up another starfish and throws it into the ocean. He turns to the old man and says, ‘I made a difference to that one.’”

She turned her face to the sun again and closed her eyes, feeling its warmth on her skin. She never saw the way the angel continued to gaze at her in silence. Like she was the sunrise itself.

“Whatcha doing?”

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