She stirred her coffee. “You saved my life, Steve.”
“No,” said Curran. “I didn’t.”
“Then who did?”
The way she was looking at him, she had an answer in mind already. She wanted him to say it. He actually smiled. “Not really a who. More of a what.”
“Yes?”
“I guess it was faith.” He took a sip of coffee and decided the answer was one he could live with after all.
“Your faith is back?”
“Well, honestly, I don’t think I’ll be a gung-ho church-going cop anytime soon. And I certainly won’t be embracing every new age religion that I hear about.”
“But?”
“But, yeah. Yeah, I think it’s back. When I was trying to get you to wake up, I could see you. But you were different. You were all happy and warm and so incredibly beautiful. I couldn’t do anything but try to reach out to you.”
“You brought me back from wherever Darius had hidden my spirit away. It was your faith — your belief that you actually could get to me — that did it. Not me.”
“I don’t know if I want to take all of the credit for what happened there tonight.”
“Maybe God deserves some of the credit.”
“Maybe. Maybe goodness is its own divine power.”
Curran sighed and thought about Kwon. About how much he owed his best friend. Lauren reached out and touched his arm.
“He’s at peace, Steve.”
“Yeah, I know. I just wonder how long it’ll be before I am.”
“We’re all destined to die, you know. It’s what we do with the time between when we’re born and when our personal destiny comes true that counts.”
“I guess so.”
She fixed him with a stare. “After everything that’s happened — after what you witnessed — there’s no doubt left in you is there?”
“Not a speck.”
“Did he speak to you?”
Curran nodded. “He wanted me to leave Darius alone to suffer rather than shoot him. I’d never heard anything that emanated so much evil. I’d never heard anything that scared me so absolutely. And I hope to God I never hear anything like it again.”
Lauren took another sip and regarded him. “Do you think your last bullet put him out of his misery?”
“I don’t think that was the point. I think…he…wanted to see if he could get me to be evil.”
“But you didn’t give in to the temptation. Even after everything that Darius put you through. After everything he said.”
Curran shrugged. “I guess I just didn’t think he deserved to die like that. He was an evil being, yes. But not like that. I didn’t think of it as doing him a favor. I just wanted to do it.”
“A selfless act. And not at all a gray decision.”
“Guess so.” Curran sighed and stayed quiet for a few minutes while he drank some coffee. “We came pretty close to dying ourselves, huh?”
“Yes. We did.”
Outside the window, the late night city inhabitants crept past. Some dressed for a night on the town, others looking for a warm place to huddle for the night. “Will it happen again?”
“Undoubtedly.”
Curran drank some more. “That’s not exactly the answer I wanted to hear.”
“I know. No one wants to hear that. But one thing Darius said was true. Good and evil can’t exist without the other. And even though good won this battle, there’s still a war being fought. All the time. On many fronts. Sometimes we win.”
“Sometimes we lose?”
“Yes.”
“What do you think happened to Darius?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. Perhaps he died, but I tend to doubt it. I rather think he’s back in Hell with his master. Who is probably not very pleased with him right now.”
“Will the Soul Eater be back?”
“Hard to say. Part of me thinks he will. Knowing especially that Satan is so determined to break through to this plane. Yes, he’ll probably be back.”
“Thanks goodness there’s some good folks like us around, huh?”
Lauren looked uncomfortable. “Yes.”
Curran eyed her. “You okay?”
She started to nod but then stopped and looked up at him instead. “Steve. We need to talk.”
Curran’s stomach dropped. “Something tells me this isn’t going to go down on my list of all-time favorite conversations.”
She smiled weakly. “After everything we’ve been through. After everything that…happened. Now more than ever…I need to continue on with my plans.”
“You mean entering the Church.”
“Yes.”
“I feel like some love struck fool.” Curran sighed. “What about us?”
“Steve,” she held his hand. “What happened between us was probably the single greatest event of my life. Your love for me was the most sincere display that any man has ever demonstrated. I didn’t think that was possible. I didn’t think I could ever love a man. Not after what happened in my life.”
She squeezed his hand. “But you showed me that I could.”
“You fell in love with me?”
“Absolutely.”
“But you’re still going to become a nun.”
“Steve. I know this won’t be easy for you to understand. But there’s more to this world than just the two of us.”
“Two of us seems a pretty good place to start, Lauren.”
She nodded. “But we wouldn’t stay that way. Don’t you see? You’re a cop, Steve. A good cop. And you won’t put your badge down. I wouldn’t ask you to. You’re needed on the streets. You’re needed to go after the bad and evil people out there breaking the law. You help restore justice in this world.”
“And what would you do?”
“I can help fight evil, too, Steve. But in my own way. I can’t do it by being your girlfriend or even your wife. I can’t do it out here. I can’t help the cause of goodness out in the world as an ordinary citizen. But I can do it in the service of the Church. As a nun, I can help fight evil in a spiritual sense.”
“Darius told me you were one of the most benevolent souls in the world.”
Lauren smiled. “I’m not that presumptuous.”
“But it’s true.”
“Maybe it is. That’s not for me to say.”
Curran looked around the room, suddenly aware of the growing lump in his throat. “I don’t want to let you go, Lauren. You brought my life a sense of happiness I haven’t felt in a long time.”
“And you helped restore my life, Steve. But we have a chance to take that goodness and spread it around to other people now. If we kept it for just ourselves, it wouldn’t be right.”
“Feels like it would be.”
“It’s wishful thinking, Steve. We’d get bored after a while. Each of us would be too busy trying to make the other one feel better that we’d lose our focus. We each have a path to take. Mine is in the service of the Church. I need to go follow that path now.”
“You love me, though. And…I love you.”
She nodded. “And nothing will ever change how I feel about you, Steve. I’ll always love you. But I can’t live my life beside you. I have to live it in spite of you.”
Curran’s face felt hot. He looked at her. “I don’t know if I’ll ever stop loving you.”
She smiled and squeezed his hand. “I have to go now.”
He started to stand, but she stopped him. “Don’t. Just let me go. It will be easier this way.”
“No,” he said. “It won’t.”
She looked at him for a long time. “No. Probably not.” She stood, leaned over him and kissed him lightly on the lips. “I’ll always love you, too, Steve. Never forget that.”
And then she was gone.
He watched her leave and then waited five minutes.
Outside, the rain was gone. He looked up at the night sky and saw a few bright stars stand out among the brilliant haze of the city lights. Was it worth it to make a wish on one of them?
He almost grinned. Why not?
Maybe some day he and Lauren would get together after all. All he needed was a little faith.
A breeze swept over him.
But Steve Curran no longer shivered.