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Sleep was overrated.
She wasn’t the best sleeper before she’d allowed John Constantine to half-drown her in a bowling alley bathtub and been possessed by the son of the Devil. Life as a detective in the LAPD wasn’t exactly a great recipe for a full eight hours, and it had left her with the ability to survive on a surprising combination of catnaps and coffee. It had never bothered her. It had been worth it.
Now, though. Now she had to be at the point of exhaustion to risk sleeping, because unless she slept hard there would be dreams. And dreams were worse than visions. Sleep made everything distorted, like opening her eyes underwater. Premonitions, or prophesies- she hadn’t thought of an accurate term to call them yet without feeling hokey- were bad enough.
John might have been helpful there, in that he might have some tips on how to get past the nightmares, whether it was with the aid of a supplement or if he’d somehow managed to block out the visions with magic. She had thought about calling him and asking.
There had been little interaction between them since the hospital. She’d been disappointed and relieved by that. She was grateful to him, of course, but there were complications. He’d lost a lot of friends because of Mammon and Gabriel, and she’d lost Isabel. There were complications. Complications, and debts that she had to repay.
Debts that she couldn’t repay, not ever, not fully.
So her sleep suffered. She couldn’t hide from the visions- another word that made her feel like she should be on a cable-access channel- or make them go away by wishing. Alcohol was a road she wasn’t planning on going down, and so far only near-exhaustion was working. Throwing herself into her work had only made her a more effective detective so far, although it made some of her superiors raise an eyebrow. She’d been through the precinct psychologist twice, on suggestion from her lieutenant. She’d acquiesced since it had been a request, not an order, yet.
There had also been a case in San Juan that her superiors were still reviewing, and Internal Affairs was rumored to be interested in: a kidnapping case where Angela had found the missing child, alive. She had done it by herself and so exactly- going straight to the small hidden latch at the basement of the exact house in the neighborhood they’d been monitoring- that other detectives had been confused with how she’d managed it.
Confused was better than suspicious. She couldn’t exactly give them a straight answer. A vision of that child dying in that exact spot? No, they didn’t want to hear that. The child had been dehydrated, close to death, and she’d nearly drank a gallon of water once back at the office, trying to rid herself of the taste of that thirst. Her lieutenant had chalked it up to good police work and she’d been given a commendation.
A commendation. And an inquiry from IA. That had to be a first.
Constantine might have been interested in the case, but she hadn’t called him. She’d handled it. The child had been found, and she was keeping her head down now. They’d published her picture in the paper alongside the rescued girl, she’d been congratulated during a press conference, the department pleased to make a special example of her. There hadn’t exactly been any word from him.
Angela stared at the edge of the polished pew, at her folded hands. Her faith had suffered these past few months. It couldn’t really be called faith, after all, because now it wasn’t about believing. She knew. And these rituals had become like running through water: the world pressing in around her on every side as she fought to do the motions she had been taught since she was a child. She knew too much now. It should have made faith easier, knowing, to know that there was meaning behind these rituals and words and to know there was power in the masses that were announced every Sunday.
It didn’t. It made her achingly aware of how pervasive evil was, and the rituals and gestures were candles against a sea of inky blackness.
She still hadn’t called Constantine. He might understand more than anyone, but he wasn’t exactly a poster child for coping.
Her mouth formed the words of the litany, and she kissed her cross gently, feeling the reassurance of peace. The church did not keep the visions at bay, but rituals like this did. Most of the time, though, it wasn’t worth getting through the door and to the pew to take them up. Most of the time people came to church with the weight of their deeds pressing onto their soul, wearing them on their sleeve, and it made it far too easy to feel them brush against her, leave a sticky trail on her psyche that water wouldn’t wash away. She avoided their eyes, kept her head down, and had stopped sitting in the front of the church where those trying to cleanse their souls of their misdeeds or sins tended to congregate. She avoided the clumps of people and generally, tried to visit the church during the later midnight hours. It wasn't a perfect system, and it might have been easy to give this up entirely, if this wasn’t the only place that she could feel Isabel.
The presence of her twin wasn't like seeing an apparition, or even like the sensation of someone’s eyes on her back. It like phantom limb pain. She could feel Isabel’s leg brush against her own leg, feel the turn of her head like a prickle going down her spine, and sometimes when she was deep in the rosary, letting her mind blank out every thought but the litany, she could hear Isabel’s voice, a slight softer echo of her own.
That alone was worth the price of omission.
Hail Mary full of Grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed are thou among women-
Isabel's fingers brushed against hers, and after a second Angela released the rosary just a little, feeling the shift in the beads as her twin sister picked up the other end.
Holy Mary Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death-
The soft intake of breath to her right was gentle, and Angela closed her eyes tighter as she whispered, "And after," as Isabel finished with the Amen.