Bodhi sat up on the bed, his arms resting on his thighs, his brown eyes swirling mystically again.“Because I know what you were feeling when you first touched her,” he said, sounding serious enough to make me almost believe him.“When you first met, she’d been just another colleague, no one special.Despite how attractive you’d found her, crossing that line hadn’t even occurred to you because your professionalism meant everything to you at the time.”
How in the fuck did he know so much?
“However, as the signs all began to finally show themselves, you were put in her path again, only this time, in a different capacity,” he went on.“Everything had been aligned perfectly to ensure that the match would happen, and when you finally got her back to that hotel room and first touched her, it shook the heavens, Lazarus.It shook the heavens, and I know for a fact that you felt it all the way to your bones, and that was just from one touch.You and Elisheva experienced something that only a few people in the eons of history have ever experienced, and you know it.”
“After all that work, then how could you guys just let me fuck it up?”I snapped, suddenly feeling like something significant had been kept from me all these months.“Why didn’t you make her forgive me?Why did you keep her from me?”
Bodhi cocked his head, a smirk playing on his lips.“Because you have free will, Lazarus.Because you have free will, and God will not allow us to take that from you.No matter the situation, the free will that has been bestowed upon you will never be undone, which is why Elisheva has to come into this voluntarily.”
“And if she doesn’t?”I asked.“What happens if she doesn’t buy into all this?”
“Then Hell will be unleashed, and you will have only yourselves to thank for that,” he answered.“Free will and all.”
“Meaning?”I snapped, frustrated with his riddles.
“Are you not familiar with Hell?”he questioned, his head cocking to the side.“Perhaps, you should brush up on the teachings of The Bible, Lazarus.”
I shook my head, trying to clear my mind of his cryptic ramblings.“Hell is not a tangible thing that you experience in human form,” I said.“Same as Heaven.They’re not real places of substance until you die, and that’s when your soul is assigned its home based on your worth.”
Bodhi’s eyes began swirling again, and I really wished that they’d stop.It was unnerving as fuck, and every time that it happened, it got harder and harder not to believe that he was Ramiel, and as a man with my academic background, I realized how crazy I was beginning to sound.
“That is where you are wrong,” he replied evenly, eyeing me like I was a bug under a microscope.“Hell is already here, Lazarus.It’s always been here, and the same could be said for Heaven.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You don’t consider drug addiction a form of Hell?”he asked.“You don’t consider human trafficking a form of Hell?You don’t consider child abuse a form of Hell?How about cancer?How about poverty?How about neglect?Rape?Starvation?Homelessness?”Bodhi straightened, and it was clear that I was out of my depth here.“Because I guarantee you that every person that has ever had to experience any of those tragedies believed that they were in Hell.”
Giving him that point, I said, “But you also mentioned that Heaven was here, too.”
“Heaven is a purity that you can experience with the birth of a child, caring for an animal, giving to your neighbor...things like that,” he replied, caring enough not to be a dick about it.“Good and evil have always walked the earth, Lazarus.Only we’re getting to a point where evil is winning, and God will stand back for only so long before He’s forced to step in to save you all.”
“Why doesn’t he just let us suffer the repercussions of our choices?”
“Because you are still His children, and like most parents, He’s not just going to let you destroy yourselves if He can help it,” he answered simply.
“And Lissa?”
“Elisheva is your last hope.”
“Why?”I bit out, needing to understand why she’d been singled out.“Why her?”
“Because Elisheva doesn’t just believe blindly,” he replied mercifully, having to know that I was beyond confused.“Everyone else, they believe because they’ve been raised to believe.They believe because they feel like they need to believe in something more.They believe because they need faith to get them through the hard times.People believe for all kinds of reasons that are endless.”
“And Lissa?”
“Elisheva doesn’t just believe because she’d been raised to believe.She has spent her entire life trying to understand where it all comes from and what it all means,” he said.“She doesn’t just accept that God exists, she seeks answers towhyHe exists.Her mind is opened in a way that we’d been able to reach her when she’d been just a child, and it’s her that Hell wants to possess.”
“Meaning that they’re coming for her,” I surmised.
Bodhi nodded.“Elisheva is powerful enough to have a direct line to God, and they know it.They’ve always known it.”
“Why come for her now?”I asked.“Why not come for her when she’d been a vulnerable child?”
That smirk of his was back.“They did.However, you were there to stop them.”
I shook my head again.“This isn’t real.”
“This is as real as it gets, Lazarus,” he assured me.“And if you do not convince Elisheva to accept what is her fate, then you will lose her forever.”
