What would you trade your soul for?
The answer is simple for Jessa: nothing. Life isn't perfect, but it's pretty good with her best friend Taylor at her side.
But everything changes when the Devil--disguised as an attractive high school girl--comes...
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James and I walked for a while in a pensive silence only accompanied by the sound of my sneakers crunching on pine needles and fallen leaves.
Slowly, the trees began to thin out, and without me entirely realizing it, we were out of those strange woods and back in the flatlands of the Underworld.
I turned around, wanting to take one last look at the trees, only to see that the woods were no longer there. There were only plains of hills and grass behind us. I wasn't even surprised at this point.
However, the fickle woods seemed to have gotten us back on course. Although we still hadn't found the path, the city was right in front of us. The only thing separating us was a lazy river spanned by a wide wooden footbridge.
I stared at the skyscrapers across the way, seeing lights flickering in the thousands of windows. I wondered if Lana was up in one of them, peering down at me.
Shaking my head, I started across the bridge, but I paused halfway across, my mind swirling with thoughts. I rested my elbows on the ledge and stared down at the water rippling beneath us. It looked a bit like an oil slick: the water itself was jet black, yet its darkness was broken up by swirls of purple and turquoise and glimmering sparkles that I could have sworn were diamonds. And further down in the river, a few skinny trees sprouted from the muck, brandishing purple leaves that looked like feathers.
I wonder if Gretchen made those trees, I thought, still miffed that she had abandoned me with Cornelius and Elizabeth. She had seemed nice at first... but she had abandoned me when I needed her most. She was just another façade, along with the trees and those woods and the people on their little farms.
I ran a finger along the wooden railing. "Nothing is real," I murmured, thinking back to the weeks before, to everything that had happened before the dance: Lana's gradual change from brusque and selfish to something that had actually resembled care. It was all a façade, all a lie, but it hurt to think about that, so my brain flipped to another topic, one that was a bit more pleasant, but just as painful.
Taylor.
I still couldn't get the image of her in that white dress out of my mind. My lips still tingled when I thought back to our kiss. And the look in her eyes when I told her I hadn't wanted to leave her...
I knew the Taylor in the lake wasn't the real Taylor; she was back on Earth, and I was in the Underworld. We were worlds apart. And yet the feelings it had dredged up were genuine.
"James," I said, looking down at the bear balanced on the railing, "can I ask you something?"
The angel nodded. "Of course."
"Lana told me that there are no genders in Heaven. Or that genders are irrelevant and... and basically it doesn't matter who you love. So being gay is fine, because at the core of it all, we're all the same. Was she telling the truth?"
