Currently, I'm obsessing over my need for simplicity. I just want everything to go back to the way it was, but I also know that my lifestyle before was so negative for me and the world at large. It's a tough idea to grapple with, but I'm currently trying my best.
"I guess I'm thinking about war with the devil and what that might look like," he says. "Odin seems to believe that's where we're headed."
"And you believe it?" I ask, hoping he'll shake his head as a definite no.
When he doesn't, my stomach churns.
"In the car, near the rest stop, I had a vision," he says. "I was on a beach. Lucifer was there. Swaths of orange flooded my field of vision, but I couldn't sense much else. It was horrible. It was like the entire world was about to end, and I was just right there. I was... powerless."
Suddenly, he takes my hand. Everything changes. I'm thrown into a vision.
I can taste the salt of what he's describing. I can see the burning embers of the sun, shining on them both. Lucifer is laughing maniacally, much like a movie villain but so much worse because it's real. This isn't a movie; it's real fucking life. His eyes are as black as the night.
"No!"
I scream, but no sound comes from my mouth. My throat is closed, but I know that the world depends on me.
I'm sinking.
Sinking to the bottom of the ocean.
I'm losing who I once was. Everything is flooding into my lungs - the water, the sludge, the evil of the world. It is all within me.
I am dead.
"Raven, wake up," Ash says.
I blink my eyes three times. I'm not on that beach anymore. I'm with him, and he's holding me tightly, rocking me against his chest.
I stutter and catch my breath. "What - what just happened to me?"
Ash is visibly shaken, too. His face is as pale as the stock reports I used to print on a daily basis.
"I don't know," he says. "That's never happened before."
I gulp, phlegm catching against my throat. I claw my tongue against the roof of my mouth and step away from him.
"Your visions. Is that what I just witnessed?" I ask.
He nods and looks terrified. But as the moonlight floods in through the window to the backyard, he looks absolutely heroic.
He's everything that I've been looking for.
"This is why I stayed away from society. It's exactly what I was afraid of," he says. "I never wanted to involve anyone, let alone you. This is my problem, not yours."
I latch onto his shirt and pull him close to me. Our lips are practically touching, and I'm staring into his eyes. He's so close I can taste him again, and I just want this feeling to last forever.
Whatever I saw was a vision I never want to come true. He just showed me the stakes.
I need his help.
My teeth are clenched so tightly I'm afraid I might chip the edges. "Don't you dare hold back from me," I plead. "Whatever you have is a--"
He cuts me off. "Whatever I have is a curse."
And though it's not the response I want to hear, I kiss him. Our lips crush together, a perfect match.
A match made in heaven.