Rose Garden: Chapter 11

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He worried whether he could collapse convincingly. Aware of the gaze on his back, Kyle first let the watering can slip from his hand. Because he released it gently, it didn’t shatter just rolled across the floor, spilling water slowly at his feet. He dropped to his knees, hesitating for a moment before lowering himself into the cold puddle.

“Kyle?”

He made sure to keep his face from getting wet, lifting it just slightly. Footsteps approached. Rough hands grabbed his shoulders and pulled him upright.

“What’s wrong?”

He kept his eyes closed as his body was shaken. Then, with a slight furrow between his brows, he slowly opened them. The demon’s face, looming before him, seemed unusually pale.

“I felt dizzy, all of a sudden...”

He murmured. The next thing he knew, he was being lifted and laid down on a quilt tucked into the corner of the greenhouse. His wet clothes were stripped off carelessly by the demon’s hands and replaced with dry ones.

“I wasn’t feeling great since I woke up this morning.”

The demon pulled the blanket up to Kyle’s chest as he lay on his back.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t notice at all.”

The demon looked at him with eyes so sorrowful it hurt to be seen that way. Fingers in human form gently brushed his cheek.

“I’ll sleep a little. I’m sure I’ll feel better after that.”

Kyle gave a faint smile, then closed his eyes.

“Is there anything you want?”

The demon’s voice asked. Kyle weakly shook his head, playing the part.

“I’d like to be alone and rest.”

The demon quietly left the room. Once the footsteps faded, Kyle slipped out of bed, took a poetry book from the table, and crawled back under the blanket. It was the first day of the act just spending half the day like this would be enough.

Around noon, perhaps to check on him, the demon returned to the greenhouse. Kyle got up from the blanket and told him he was feeling better. The demon exhaled in relief. Kyle had grown tired of pretending to sleep anyway, so he tried to stand only to be told not to push himself, and promptly scooped up into the demon’s arms and placed in a rocking chair. Even when he tried to tend to the flowers, he wasn’t allowed to get up. Everything he usually did watering the roses, plucking the dead leaves was done by the demon now.

Doing nothing at all was easier than he thought, Kyle mused absentmindedly, watching the demon’s back. Even sitting in the chair, he dozed off again. As evening approached, though his appetite had waned in recent days, even he began to feel hungry. Gently waving off the demon who hovered with concern, Kyle approached the roses. I’m sorry, he apologized silently, taking small sips of life force from the vibrant flowers. His stomach full, satisfied, he turned back only to flinch when he met the demon’s piercing gaze.

“Are you eating enough?”

There was something probing in the demon’s tone. Kyle swallowed hard, worried that the truth about his wings and restored strength might have been discovered.

“It’s the same as always.”

He forced himself to stay calm, but the demon didn’t look convinced. With long strides, he closed the distance and touched Kyle’s cheek with his fingertips.

“Doesn’t look like it. The flowers aren’t wilting at all.”

Kyle’s heart pounded like a drum, his clenched fingers trembling ever so slightly.

“I told you before, didn’t I? With living flowers, I don’t need to take as much as I would from cut ones. There are so many here, so if I just take a little from each, none of them will wither.”

“But still... it’s strange. Before, there was more...”

The way the demon pressed him made Kyle uneasy. What if I can’t talk my way out of this? He placed a hand on his forehead. Change the subject  But nothing came to mind. Then, an idea struck. He exaggerated a sway in his body and collapsed onto the floor.

“Kyle!”

He melted limply into the demon’s strong arms as they lifted him.

“My head is spinning...”

As though handling something fragile, the demon gently laid him back down on the quilt and settled closely beside him.

“What on earth is going on with you today?”

Kyle shook his head weakly, looking the very picture of someone unwell.

“I don’t know.”

“This hasn’t happened before.”

He hadn’t planned to collapse twice in one day but this time, it couldn’t be helped. The demon watching him showed no doubt that Kyle was truly unwell. At this rate, perhaps it would be safe to move things along a little faster. I’ll wait another two or three days before I say it, Kyle thought, but then quietly let the words he’d already prepared slip from his lips.

“I don’t think I have much time left.”

The moment he spoke, the demon’s face drained of color.

“It’s true... I’ve been eating less and less. I didn’t say anything before because I didn’t want to worry you, but I can’t hide it anymore. When an angel’s life is nearing its end, their appetite is the first thing to fade. Then their strength begins to weaken, and before long within a matter of days they die.”

“That’s not true!”

The demon shouted, clutching his head in both hands. His outburst startled Kyle, who trembled reflexively.

“I-I’m not lying! I’ve seen many angels like that...”

Both angels and demons stop aging visibly after a certain point. Their real age can’t be discerned from appearances alone. Kyle knew that and used it to weave his lie.

“When I came to the mortal world, I was already over five hundred. I’ve spent another hundred years here since. Normally, I’d still have nearly four hundred years left... but I don’t have my wings anymore. Maybe that’s why my lifespan is shorter than other angels’.”

“No... don’t tell me it’s because of me? Because I tore off your wings and hurt you... you’re dying because of that?”

With a short, guttural cry, the demon thrashed his head, hair disheveled. He crouched down, hands still on his head, then stood again, pacing erratically around the room. The sight of him unraveling like that became more and more terrifying the longer it went on.

Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks and rushed over to Kyle.

“But there’s still a chance, right? I know someone... he’s a demon, but he’s well-versed in medicine and magic. Let me take you to him just once.”

The blood drained from Kyle’s face. If that happened, his lie would be exposed instantly.

“No. I won’t. Absolutely not.”

“Please don’t be so afraid. He may be a demon, but he won’t hurt you. There might be a price, but I’ll pay it. You don’t have to worry about anything.”

It felt like he might be dragged off that very moment. Kyle backed away across the floor.

“There’s no medicine for a dying angel. You’d bury some unknown soul inside me and command me to live? Is that what you’d do to an angel whose duty was once to carry souls?”

His fingers reached toward the demon but stopped just short of touching.

“I won’t allow that. I don’t want to see any demon but you. I don’t want anyone else... touching me.”

He felt the sting of tears welling at the corners of his eyes. Not from sadness, but from the intensity of emotion boiling over. The demon, stunned, murmured in disbelief:

“We’ve only just begun to understand each other, and now you’re going to leave me behind? You’re telling me to endure eternity... alone?”

But thinking they’d truly come to understand each other was just an illusion. It only felt that way because Kyle had chosen to compromise. Still, for the sake of deepening the illusion, he reached out gently to the demon.

“I hate the thought of leaving you alone you, who’s always so afraid of being lonely but this is beyond us. Please, try to bear it. It isn’t unfair. Even angels must face the end, eventually.”

Beside him, the demon began to wail like a child. Kyle felt a deep breath of relief he’d succeeded in making the demon believe he was dying. Yet, watching those endless tears fall, even he began to feel a weight settling in his chest.

“Don’t cry.”

No matter how softly he tried to comfort him, no matter what kind words he offered, the tears wouldn’t stop. Kyle had never imagined that he would end up holding the demon through the night.

◇:-:◆:-:◇

The demon never left Kyle’s side anymore. The moment he so much as tried to stand up and go to the garden, he was scooped up without hesitation. It seemed the demon believed that even the slightest exertion would shorten his lifespan. Kyle found himself frequently being woken from naps, too. At first, he couldn’t understand why the demon kept committing such aggravating acts, but eventually he realized the demon feared that Kyle might have died in his sleep. Every time he was woken, he had to whisper, “I’m fine,” with a smile.

At first, Kyle accepted it, he loves me, after all, he told himself. There was something almost sweet in how the demon fussed over him. But by the fourth day, the fifth… a week… Kyle began to feel stifled. That constantly tense expression, the looming presence beside him every moment of the day it was growing unbearable.

To make matters worse, the demon had not taken his monstrous form at night for the past two days. Kyle no longer needed to draw vitality from the roses in the greenhouse he didn’t feel hunger at all. His strength had fully returned. His wings, too, must have grown enough to fly him home to the heavens. But with the demon constantly clinging to him, he hadn’t been able to test it.

How could he get the demon to leave his side...?

After thinking it over, he tried asking, “I’d like to eat a rose again, it’s been so long. Not one from the greenhouse, he said, but a different rose, one from somewhere else.”

The moment he said it, the demon bolted from the greenhouse.

Through the glass windows, Kyle watched him pass through the gates. Once he was sure the demon was gone, he stretched his body bored stiff from all the sleeping and spread his wings wide. He beat them once, and his body lifted cleanly into the air, strong and effortless. It felt exactly as it had in the old days, when he still had wings.

The time has come. He could return to the heavens now, whenever he chose.

Now all that remained was to convince the demon that he had died. He needed to act sicker... but as he turned the idea over in his mind, he noticed the roses watching him. All of them were staring intently at his pure white wings. Kyle let out a soft chuckle and, right there in front of them, proudly displayed his beautiful wings. He spun gracefully, dancing between the rose-pots with light steps.

But then he froze. A black silhouette pushed open the iron gate.

He hurried to hide his wings, breaking into a run between the rows of rose-pots. Just as he neared the door, it flew open with a loud bang. He had thought the demon wouldn’t return until evening. But in an instant, there he was again.

“Kyle!”

The red rose in the demon’s hand fell and scattered across the floor at the door.

With heavy, determined steps, the demon strode toward him and swept him into his arms.

“Why were you walking around?”

“I just felt good enough to get up...”

The demon clutched him tightly with trembling fingers, then gently laid him down on the patchwork quilt in the corner of the room. He gathered the fallen petals from the floor, disappeared for a moment, and returned quickly with a plate piled high with roses.

He offered the plate to Kyle. But as the dying cries of the cut flowers echoed in his ears, Kyle felt truly ill not just as part of the act and whispered faintly, asking the demon to take the plate away.

“Didn’t you say you wanted to eat them?”

When Kyle muttered that he’d lost his appetite, the demon scolded him in a sharp tone:

“It’s because you walked around!”

Why was he being yelled at? The unfairness of it bit at Kyle, but he said nothing, simply looked down in silence.

After his burst of anger, the demon spoke in a low voice.

“I still can’t believe it.”

A finger bearing a small scratch brushed Kyle’s cheek. Perhaps it was from a rose’s thorn.

“Your cheeks are still so beautiful like rose petals. I can’t believe they’ll vanish soon.”

Then, as if collapsing, the demon dropped to his knees in front of Kyle and clasped his hands as if in prayer.

“Kyle… Kyle. I love you. Please, don’t leave me.”

Tears spilled in heavy drops from those black eyes. The demon clenched his trembling fingertips into a fist and murmured in a voice that came in fits and starts.

“If life could be divided and given away, I’d offer all of mine to you.”

Even knowing it was a selfless, devoted declaration, the sheer horror of it made Kyle’s skin crawl. He had never heard of an angel surviving on a demon’s life force. Even if he truly were on the verge of death, even if he took a piece of the demon’s soul and somehow made it back to Heaven, there was no way God, or Lady Agatha, would ever accept such a disgrace.

“If there’s anything you want, say it. Whatever it is, I’ll make it happen.”

Anything… the demon said. A mean little thought stirred in Kyle’s head. He didn’t mean it seriously, but he mumbled, just to test him:

“I want to go back to Heaven…”

Even though he’d claimed he would grant any wish, the demon fell silent with a troubled look.

“I want to see Lady Agatha one more time.”

Knowing full well that no wish made to a demon could possibly be granted, Kyle repeated it anyway.

◇:-:◆:-:◇

The next day, the demon left the house early in the morning. He said nothing about where he was going and simply disappeared. Kyle had assumed he would be back soon, but even past midday, there was no sign of him. The demon was gone. Could this be the perfect opportunity?

Kyle stirred beneath the blanket and sat up, then stepped outside the greenhouse. For the past few days, he hadn't even dared approach the entrance, but now he walked all the way to the front door. The moment he pushed it open, a gentle scent of flowers enveloped him. The air outside was even warmer and kinder than that inside the greenhouse, where the fireplace had been lit. A soft breeze blew, new buds sprouted throughout the garden, and countless small flowers were in bloom.

Winter had come to an end.

Standing at the center of the garden, he let out a slow breath. With a soft whoosh, the wings on his back unfurled. He raised both arms to the sky, and a single, radiant beam of light stretched down straight toward him.

The path to the heavens had opened.

God must be waiting for his return. Now was the time to go back. Kyle spread his wings wide and prepared to soar.

“Kyle!”

A voice called out his name, just as the iron gate creaked open unexpectedly. He hurriedly folded his wings and turned around and saw a familiar face he hadn’t seen in a while.

“Ah, Snair.”

Kyle opened his arms wide, and the child, as adorable as a little puppy, ran straight into his chest with a thump.

“Kyle! Kyle!”

“Sweet Snair. I’m so glad you came. You hadn’t visited recently I was starting to think you’d forgotten all about me.”

Snair cast his brown eyes downward.

“There were rumors going around... they said a demon tried to kidnap a child, so I wasn’t allowed to go outside. But now it’s spring, and everyone’s busy sowing seeds, so they said kids could help out and finally let me out. I was helping Grandma in the fields, but I snuck away for a bit.”

“That must’ve been tough, Snair.”

Kyle gently patted the child’s head. Snair’s brown eyes gazed up at him intently, and his small hands clutched the hem of Kyle’s coat tightly.

“I… I thought you might have already gone back to heaven.”

Kyle shrugged and gave a small laugh.

“I was just about to. But I heard your voice and stopped myself from flying. Perfect timing, really. I’d been hoping to see you one last time before I left.”

Immediately, tears welled up in Snair’s eyes and spilled over.

“I finally found you again, and now it’s goodbye already?”

“That’s right. It’s sad… but that’s how it is.”

As the child clung to him, Kyle’s chest ached with sorrow. But it couldn’t be helped. Snair looked up, his tear-filled brown eyes scanning the garden.

“Where’s Warren?”

Kyle shook his head.

“I don’t know. He left this morning and hasn’t come back since.”

Snair gripped Kyle’s hand tightly.

“You’re not going to say goodbye to Warren?”

“Of course not. He’d only try to stop me.”

Leaning down to whisper in the child’s ear, Kyle lowered his voice.

“Truth is, I told the demon a lie that I only have a little time left to live. That way, even if I suddenly disappear, he won’t question it.”

“You lied to him…”

The child’s voice was quietly reproachful. Kyle hurried to defend himself.

“I had no choice, really.”

The iron gate let out a loud, creaking groan. Kyle spun around, cursing silently. Damn it. It had been the perfect chance to return to heaven, but in the time he'd spent talking with Snair, the demon had come back.

As the demon stepped through the gate, Kyle immediately sensed something off. Except for when he was weakened, the demon had always maintained a human form but now, he wasn’t using that magic. And even his true form seemed somehow… different. The fangs were sharp, the clawed fingers unmistakable nothing seemed overtly wrong, and yet Kyle couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t right.

“What are you doing, Kyle?”

The demon dropped whatever he was holding and rushed over. His outstretched hands grazed Kyle’s skin with sharp claws, leaving shallow cuts.

“Ow!”

Kyle cried out softly, but the demon paid no mind and pulled him into a tight embrace. The stench of the demon was stronger than ever mixed now with another, unfamiliar scent. Though faint, the new scent was so overpowering it made Kyle feel dizzy.

“You’re out in the garden in that condition? Are you out of your mind? What recklessness. Please, take better care of yourself.”

The demon pressed his cheek against Kyle’s. The dusky skin was dry, rough like coarse fabric.

“N-No, stop it!”

Kyle knew in his head he shouldn’t resist but the stench and the texture were too much. He struggled until the demon finally let go, and he collapsed weakly to the ground.

“I forgot… you hate this form. Forgive me. I can’t take on a human shape right now.”

Kyle looked up and finally noticed. They were gone. The demon’s wings, usually massive and bat-like enough to engulf his entire body, were missing.

“Warren… what is this?”

It was Snair’s voice. The demon turned toward him.

“Was it you, Snair? Did you take Kyle outside?”

The demon’s voice brimmed with anger, and the child flinched in fear.

“Kyle’s health is fragile. He hasn’t even been getting out of bed lately. And you took him into the garden?! What were you thinking!”

“I… I didn’t…”

Snair was on the verge of tears. The sight of the child being scolded for something that wasn’t his fault was too painful to bear, and Kyle rushed to intervene.

“I…It was me. I went out on my own. I was just so bored being stuck inside all the time… Snair had nothing to do with it.”

He clung tightly to the demon’s coat hem. In response, the demon’s dark eyes, his right eye alone looked down at him with helpless sorrow, and he gently touched Kyle’s cheek with a clawed fingertip.

“If you want to go outside, wait until I can go with you. If it’s what you want, I’ll take you anywhere.”

The demon turned and bowed his head deeply to the child, who stood trembling and tearful after the harsh scolding.

“I shouldn’t have yelled, especially when you came here just to visit. Will you forgive me?”

Snair bit his lip hard and shook his head, his face still flushed red. In his small arms, he was holding a pair of large, gray wings.

“What are those…?”

When Kyle asked, the demon’s expression softened into a smile but only on the right side of his face. His left eye remained shut.

“They’re wings, Kyle. With these, you can return to Heaven.”

“Where did you even…?”

Kyle’s question was cut off.

“You don’t need to worry about that. Just attach them to your back, and they’ll carry you straight to the heavens.”

Kyle didn’t know where the demon had found them, but there was no way he could bring himself to wear something so grotesque.

“They’re not stolen, if that’s what you’re thinking. I swear that much.”

“Then how did you get them…?”

Was he implying he’d somehow created them from nothing? The demon didn’t answer. He must have something to hide there was no doubt about it. And then, a chilling thought: Why had the demon been looking at him with only his right eye this entire time?

“Warren’s back…”

Snair, who had been silent, murmured softly.

“Why doesn’t he have wings anymore…?”

The demon’s face tensed. It was something Kyle had also found strange. If he couldn't maintain a human form, his wings should have been visible too. So why were they missing?

“You don’t need to worry. I’m fine, even without wings.”

But Kyle understood everything in that moment and let out a high-pitched scream.

The wings in Snair’s arms, though carefully crafted to resemble an angel’s, were unmistakably demon wings. If he returned to Heaven wearing something like that, he would be the laughingstock of the entire celestial realm.

“I… I don’t want them!”

Kyle shouted.

“I don’t want wings like that!”

He meant it from the bottom of his heart, and yet the demon drew closer, begging.

“Don’t say that. Use them go back to Heaven, and see the one you miss.”

This had turned into something terrible. Kyle pressed his hands against his cheeks. He had to think of a way, any way to refuse those wings.

“Th-they’re not white! Those wings aren’t even white!”

The demon gave a small, pained groan. “I figured demon wings would be too hard for you to use as they were, so I had the demon I made the contract with shape them into that form. But… I just couldn’t make them pure white. I’m sorry.”

This demon had formed a contract with another demon to have the wings made. Just imagining himself wearing wings created through a pact soaked in demon’s blood made Kyle shudder. He knew full well how terrifying a demon’s contract could be, how they were made in exchange for parts of the body. The moment he put those wings on, his arms might disappear, or his legs. It wasn’t an impossibility.

“I’m the one who made the contract, so it has nothing to do with you. Use them without worry.”

That was a lie. It had to be a lie. The demon had formed a contract, and yet… aside from the wings, he hadn’t lost anything. Nothing at all. And then Kyle realized it realized what he had missed all this time.

The demon’s left eye hadn’t opened. Not once.

“Your eye…”

Kyle’s voice trembled. The demon opened his right eye wide.

“Your left eye…”

“You don’t need to worry about that.”

The closed left eye, the gray wings pressed upon him, demon wings. Kyle felt sick. It wasn’t an act this time. He collapsed right there, unable to stay on his feet. Cold sweat broke out across his forehead, and a sharp, twisting pain stabbed through his chest and wouldn’t stop.

◇:-:◆:-:◇

Soon after that, Snair left. The demon had quickly shooed him away, saying Kyle didn’t look well. Kyle lay on the quilt, lost in restless thought. The wings had fully grown. He could fly. He could go home. There was no longer any reason for him to remain here.

“Won’t you use them? If you do, your wish can come true.”

The demon crouched beside him, speaking over and over to Kyle, who lay still.

“Go and fulfill your final wish.”

“I can’t do something like that.”

He kept refusing, driven by a deep aversion to using the demon’s wings.

“I don’t want to return to the heavens so badly that I’d tear a part of your body away to do it.”

Words he didn’t truly mean fell from his lips. Lies, wrapped in kindness. And from the demon’s right eye, tears began to fall one after another.

“Kind Kyle… You don’t need to worry about me. As long as you’re all right, that’s enough for me.”

Each time he looked at the demon’s perpetually closed left eye, guilt twisted in his chest. The contract had been the demon’s doing alone. There was no need to feel responsible, Kyle told himself that again and again, lowering his gaze so he wouldn’t have to look at him.

“…Let me think a little more about the wings.”

Perhaps afraid of scratching the angel’s skin with his clawed fingers, the demon reached out gently. As his presence drew closer, Kyle felt lips brush his cheek, and fingers tilt up his chin. A kiss brushed his lips like a nibbling bite, sharp fangs grazing him and in that moment, Kyle quietly opened his eyes.

Though both of the demon’s eyes were shut, Kyle couldn’t believe there was no eye behind the left lid. He reached out and touched the closed eyelid. The demon opened his right eye in surprise.

“Does it… not hurt?”

The demon gave a pained smile and shook his head. Then he took Kyle’s wrist and kissed the back of his hand softly.

“I love you. I love you, Kyle. More than anything, more than I could ever replace.”

◇:-:◆:-:◇

At the break of dawn, Kyle awoke. The demon was still asleep beside him. Every time he looked at that closed left eyelid, guilt came rushing in like a tide. If only he had flown back to the heavens yesterday. If he had, he wouldn’t have had to know any of this. Slipping quietly out from under the blanket so as not to wake the demon, Kyle crept to the greenhouse and began to whisper secretly to the flowers.

“Please, grant me this one last favor. Until I return to the heavens, lend me a little of your strength so that this demon remains asleep. I might not be enough on my own, but with your help, I know it will work.”

With the help of his beloved roses, he cast a gentle spell on the demon wishing for him to remain asleep until Kyle was gone. Once he was sure there was no sign of the demon stirring, Kyle opened the greenhouse door, walked through the dim corridor, and stepped into the morning light.

In the center of the garden, lush with green grass, Kyle spread his wings wide. He raised both hands toward the sky, and the same pale light from the day before beamed down from the heavens and wrapped around him. Slowly, he beat his wings. That pleasant sensation of rising weightlessly overtook him as his body lifted into the air. Kyle flapped toward the blue sky toward the heavens and only once did he glance back. The shabby little house was already the size of a fingernail. The demon was nowhere in sight. The spell was working well. There was nothing to worry about. Kyle faced forward and flew straight, powerfully, toward the heavens that awaited him.

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