Demons and Magic

CHAPTER 15: You’re Just Jealous

Alastair woke up with a start.

She’d had a strange dream that night. And by strange, she meant it was totally erratic that she even had a dream. Celestial beings like her do not have dreams.

But she was sure that she did. And it was about that bastard, Castiel. In her dreams, he looked more human than she had ever seen him before. They even had a conversation but it was almost like a blur.

Surely, that can’t be true, right?

“Oh, I’m glad you’re awake,” Nathan said with a blank look on his face, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Your friend has been looking for you. He was saying something along the lines of him being my guardian angel? What the hell was that?”

“Oh, f*ck,” Alastair cursed and immediately sprung out of her bed, sprinting down the narrow hallway towards the room next to theirs.

Without a second’s hesitation, she kicked open the door and was amused to see that Castiel was already waiting in the middle of the empty room like some kind of psychopath. He flailed his robes around and smiled at her, his golden head still as bright as ever.

“Are you human?” she asked, disbelief riddling her voice. “No way.”

“Yes way.”

“No f*cking way.”

“Will you stop cursing?”

“Only if you stop existing.”

Castiel laughed, his voice deep and melodic, like he’s in some kind of a church choir. Damn him and his perfect face. “Unfortunately for you, my dear friend—”

“Nope, not friends.”

“—that wish is unlikely to come true. I’m here to stay. And unless you have any plans of getting the boy to go with you and find Lucifer, I will not be going anywhere soon.”

“Oh, f*ck you!”

“Profanities, Alastair,” he scolded like an old mother. “You already have too much sins as it is. Don’t make it worse by cursing a servant of God, you sot.”

“Oh, shut up, Goldilocks. No one asked you for your opinion, you luxurious mountain goat.”

Castiel’s mouth hung in incredulity, his eyes wide as he tried to comprehend how Alastair could manage to disrespect him like that. “You cockroach! How dare you call me a goat? Have you no shame?”

“None whatsoever.”

“I’ll have your head for that!”

“You sound like a tyrant.”

“Stop infuriating me, you clapped cretin!”

Alastair jumped and covered her mouth with her hands dramatically. “Woah, what the hell was that?” she said and pointed at something from beside Castiel, her eyes wide in horror. “That was scary.”

When he finally realized what she was pointing at, Castiel simply gritted his teeth. “That was my reflection, dumbass.”

Alastair chortled, her face red with laughter as she clutched her stomach. “You should’ve seen your face.” And she laughed again. “Priceless.”

“You know what? Remind me to come to your room and shred your shoes.”

“Hello? Dears?” Mrs. Pratchett called from the hallway and they both turned towards the door, only then realizing that they’ve got an audience. “What was that? I heard thumping.”

“Thumping? Maybe it was just his brain thinking for once,” Alastair immediately quipped and he attempted to grab her by the collar of her shirt, probably to toss her out the window.

“Oh, dear. You two are fighting?” Mrs. Pratchett asked, her face marred with concern. “But wait … Castiel, why is your room so empty? Did the moving van forget to send your things?”

Castiel’s face, as though there was a switch somewhere, turned from fury and irritation to straight up being angelic again with his innocent face and friendly smile. “I’ll take care of it, Mrs. Pratchett. You don’t have to worry about it.”

“Well, then how did you sleep? You should’ve just told me. I still have a spare mattress up in the attic. The floor isn’t very comfortable, you see. It might give you some back problems.”

Castiel crossed the room and took the old lady’s hand as though he were about to baptize the unsuspecting woman and smiled brightly again. “It’s okay, Mrs. Pratchett. That’s too kind of you. May God bless your soul.”

And with the last sentence, Mrs. Pratchett inhaled a good amount of air that Alastair was concerned she might float around like a balloon. But as she exhaled again, her facial features were much brighter, lighter in fact that she almost looked a few years younger.

It was as if all of her worries were lifted.

“Easy there, Rasputin. People might think you’re The Savior. Wouldn’t want that to happen, now, would you? After all, if you get that idea stuck up your abnormally big head, you might just end up like my old man.”

···

“I heard that the rain makes people more beautiful,” Castiel said in a dreamy voice and glanced out the window where the raindrops fell.

Classes had been suspended after finding out that a violent typhoon was going to hit the state. Luckily for Alastair, she had no plans of leaving the house now that the bed seemed like a really cozy place to stay.

“Really?” she said in a rather dismissive tone, and Castiel smiled at her, nodding. “In that case, then, you’re probably gonna need a storm.”

His smile instantly vanished. “You know what? This. This is the very reason why I don’t like you. I tried befriending you and you still are a prick.”

“Oh, don’t whine.”

Mrs. Pratchett simply smiled at them both, her face bright as she leaned towards Nathan, whispering to him. “They look good together, don’t they? They’re both really good-looking, too. Imagine what it would look like if they had babies—”

“Okay!” Nathan suddenly interjected and Mrs. Pratchett nearly jumped. “Let’s eat now, shall we? The food is getting cold. Wouldn’t want Mrs. Pratchett’s effort to go to waste.”

“Oh, don’t be silly, dear. If I know any better, I’d think that you’re just jealous.”

“Jealous? Who? Me? Ha!” Nathan scoffed and chuckled mirthlessly, his voice rising an octave as Alastair met his gaze. “And why would I be jealous? I already told you, Mrs. Pratchett. I don’t know her. I just agreed to let her stay with me because … because, you know … somehow, I feel that I owe her.”

Mrs. Pratchett gave him a knowing smile and nudged him teasingly with her elbow. “Is that so?”

“Of course,” he croaked, and Alastair nearly spat out her drink.

After breakfast that morning, Nathan wasted no time in dragging Alastair back to their apartment in the intention of getting her to clean up her bed while he worked on their group assignment in her behalf.

He kept insisting to himself that it was only because the room was a mess and it wasn’t because he wanted to preoccupy her to the extent that he’d forget about his golden friend.

But personally speaking, the latter was a better explanation among the lot. The room was almost spotless. How could he think it was a mess as compared to its state before Alastair had even arrived?

“Is that our assignment?” Alastair asked as she took a peek from behind Nathan to see the rather dim lighting of his beat down laptop.

“You think?” he retorted sarcastically and pulled his chair closer to his table, unable to see past the tiny cracks on the screen.

Alastair just crossed her arms and tossed away the broom that she’d been holding across the room. “That doesn’t even make sense. It looks like hieroglyphics. If I knew we were gonna learn sorcery, I should’ve just gone to Hogwarts.”

“It’s not sorcery. It’s called Math, you gormless toad. It’s short for Mathematics.”

“Math?” Alastair’s face scrunched up into a huge scowl. “Isn’t that a drug? Why are you doing drugs?”

“No! It’s not—” Nathan sighed and stood up, glancing out the door to make sure that no one took it the wrong way. “You’re talking about Meth. I’m talking about Math.”

“What’s the difference? They both drive people insane, don’t they?”

“Oh, God,” he said and slunk back on his chair. “Just clean your bed and stop messing with my work. Honestly, it’s not bad so far.”

“Yeah, but it’s not good either.”

Nathan whirled on his seat so fast that Alastair swore her head spun. “Is that an insult?”

“Yes. And I hope you’re insulted.”

“You know what? Why don’t you go be yourself somewhere else, huh? If you’re not gonna help me anyway, then you might as well just give me some peace.”

She just shrugged at him and started walking towards the door. “You’re the boss.”

“Wait. Where are you going?”

“Somewhere you’re not?”

“I’m serious.”

“I’m Alastair.”

Nathan paused as he stared at her who was still halfway from opening the door with her hand comically stuck in mid-air. He’s always known that talking to Alastair is hard. But he’s never encountered someone this hard to talk to in his life before and it was slowly driving him mad.

“You’re not going out. You still have to clean the room.”

“It’s already clean.”

“Then, clean the bathroom.”

“It’s also clean.”

“No. I checked, it wasn’t.”

“I double-checked, it was.”

“Then cook something! Jesus.”

“No.”

”What do you mean ‘no’?”

“I mean no. You wanna hear it in Spanish? Nóh.”

Nathan was about to open his mouth to say something but the door to their apartment flew open, revealing Jackson whose hair was still damp from the rain, his eyes flying towards the both of them.

“Alastair?” he asked and slowly lifted up his finger, pointing to her and then to Nathan. “Wait. Does she live here? I thought she lives next door to yours? Why—”

“She doesn’t live here!” Nathan blurted before he could even finish his sentence and lifted up a broom. “She’s just here to borrow this.”

Jackson just blinked, glancing at the apartment next door where Castiel was standing with the same outfit from the night before. “So, then … does she live there?”

“Oh, yeah. Totally.”

“Was that her boyfriend?” he whispered in an attempt to sound like he’s being all hush-hush and pointed at Castiel.

Nathan quickly shook his head. “No way. No, that’s um … that’s her … ” He glanced at Alastair and then back to Jackson. “ … that’s her cousin. The blonde one, yeah.”

“My cousin?” she asked, her face upturned as she tried thinking about them being at any point related. “No way. I look way better than that guy. And besides, he’s not an Archange—”

“Ah, hey! Jackson,” Nathan cut her off and laughed awkwardly as he crossed the distance between them, placing an arm tightly around his shoulders. “What are you doing here? Is there any problem?”

“Problem?” Jackson repeated and almost immediately, as though that was the only thing that could trigger his laments, he instantly cried.

“Are you okay?”

“Sam broke up with me!”