Angel of Justice

A Father's Gift

Angel sighed, sitting in the rocking chair on her father's front porch, looking out over the heavily wooded area. A glass of sweet tea in hand enjoying the peaceful solitude.

She didn't have a lot of peace in her life. Only here, in the small rural community she grew up in did she feel peace.

The forty acres her father bought a year after her mother left. The simple two bedroom two bath cabin he had built for them was cozy and quiet. Her father had spent years turning the old tree farm into a wooded wildlife preserve. He researched and studied the native plants, ground coverings, and trees. Brought it all back for the barren over worked land it had been. He planted food forests near the house, only using an acre for their home and needs. The rest he carefully restored to what it had been before man's greed and destruction.

He'd even managed to deal with all the red tape and bureaucracy and gotten the state to declare it a private wildlife preserve. It soothed Angel whenever she came home, to sit and just be with the nature around her.

Paul joined his daughter on the porch. Sitting in the other rocking chair he watched her .

"I can tell you haven't gone earthing in a while" He broke the silence. "You need to reconnect with the Earth, with nature."

Angel shrugged, "I don't like walking on grounds so full of pesticides and fertilizers." She looked over at him with a sad smile, "I can feel the pain of those 'cultured' lands. I can see what it once was, what the Earth longs to be again."

"Go down to the stream, walk the banks, share energy with the plants and other living things." Paul sighed, "But first" he grinned and pushed a slip of paper toward her.

Angel picked up the paper and laughed "A lottery ticket, really?"

Paul shrugged again "Who knows maybe you'll win enough to keep your butt home for a time" He looked over the land," You work too hard babygirl, you need to be here, the land it needs it's Earth Witch here. Connecting, sharing energy, helping heal it."

Angel sighed, he was right she knew, her gram had told her much the same before she passed. But being here, staying here meant interacting with other people, meant she might run into them. "But Jesse and Kay are here. What they did, what I saw." She shook her head, "I don't know if I'll ever be ready to see them again knowing what they had planned."

Paul reached his hand for hers, " But you saw their intent, you escaped what they planned." he squeezed her fingers, Kay's in jail, she got caught in one of her schemes. Some kind of fraud plot she had working, and Jesse, he left her for greener pastures. He's got himself a family now. He and that red head girl they've got a pair of twins on the way. He won't be bothering you."

Knowing what she did of Kay, Angel wasn't all that surprised to hear she ended up in jail. But Jesse with Brea, since she was the only red head in their age group, was a shock. "Jesse and Brea?" she gasped. Brea had despised Jesse since elementary school. He was the only son of one of the wealthiest families in Nassau County and he loved nothing more than to lord it over everyone and look down on people like Brea, whose family struggled just to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table.

Flashback

Angel fought to keep herself still, fought to remember what Gram and Dad said about shielding herself, not to feel what others were feeling, not to see their intentions, not to know.

But Brea's anger was white hot, her feeling of betrayal deep as she grabbed Angel's arm "What do you mean you agreed to go out with that douche nozzle?" she yelled. "Just today he threw a twenty dollar bill at me and offered to buy my V card" Her pain and embarrassment threatened to drown Angel in the other's emotions. "How could you? Why would you?" Brea demanded

"It's just the homecoming dance" Angel shrugged "I don't get to go to school functions like that." She couldn't, she had already graduated, had her M.Ed. even though she was only 16. She just wanted to be normal, like other teenagers, so when Jesse had asked she'd agreed. "Besides when I told him I wouldn't, because of the way he treats you, he promised if I went with him, he'd be nicer to you."

Brea looked at her in disgust, then snorted "And you, the real deal genius believed that load of crap?" Brea let go of her arm and turned away, "For someone so damn smart you really are stupid."

Later that night, when she met up with Jesse, Kay was with him. Angel didn't care much for Kay. A girl whose family gave her everything she asked for, but would steal just for the fun of it. She had once dosed a classmate with some kind of drug then locked her in the boys locker room. Her excuse? She was just helping the shy girl get with the boy she had a crush on. Her parents agreed to pay the girls medical bill and get Kay counseling, but from where Angel stood it hadn't worked. She could literally feel Kay's bad intentions. Then when Jesse took her hand she saw, she knew what they had planned. To drug her, to use her, to take her. Ripping her hand from his, Angel did what her Gram's warned her to never do, she pushed, "Tell me" she demanded and just like that he did.

"We're going to dose the punch at the dance, then I'll get to tell everyone that I got your and Brea's V card on the same night." He grinned like it was a great idea. Taking what wasn't freely offered. "Why?" she pushed again. Kay gets off watching me f*ck other girls" he shrugged, "Then she'll give me a hell of a BJ while I still have that chicks juices all over me." Angel fought the nausea that threatened before turning to leave she said" Thanks," holding up her phone"I'll just send this recording to the police and the principal."

She hadn't recorded it, but they didn't need to know that. They believed her and neither showed up for the dance.

End Flashback