He was short-tempered for hours after Hamilton’s departure. Tristan wouldn’t say it, but I was certain the state of his home was unpleasant. 

Seeing the disarray remain a constant, I decided it was time that I contributed something to the person who had otherwise saved me. 

I waited until Tristan went to bed. By that time, the sun hadn’t set. It took hours of scrubbing, washing, sweeping, and mopping to clear enough counter and floor space to resemble a home rather than a waste depository. I had worked myself into and through the night. However, I was glad to do it. My assumption was that my demon would feel better once he saw the finished result, but to my surprise, it was the opposite reaction.

“Why?” Trisal asked. 

In the middle of the night, midnight, I must have woken him. Tristan had slept for more than 12 hours, but his eyes were red. That empty glare held irritation, but drowsiness was just as present. How much rest did a demon need? 

I told him, “You were never going to do it yourself,” while I continued to sort his collection of dirty laundry. 

There was a large sum of underwear, many of which couldn’t have been Tristan’s. It was reasonable to assume he had a healthy, perhaps gluttonous, sex life. Several stains I had scrubbed from the carpet and walls supported my thoughts, but I hadn’t seen him with a sexual partner since my initial arrival. Was he limiting his lust for me or because of me? 

“I might have... eventually,” he said, following me around the living room into the kitchen before asking, “Where did you put everything?”

“I burned most of it,” I answered and opened the oven door to reveal all that I had stuffed inside the machine. 

He chuckled. But the oven was my only option. There were too many bags of garbage and plastic to carry out of the apartment, down several flights of steps, and around the corner to the nearest dumpster. Smoke was a small inconvenience compared to the hours of back and forth I had avoided. 

As smoke spilled out, I tossed an arm full of dirty laundry into the burning box before closing it shut again. 

“That’s what I was smelling? I thought someone had found me,” Trisal said with a cough. 

Suddenly, it made sense why his eyes were red. Angels were accustomed to extreme heat. Smoke was nothing special to me. Demons, however, were native to the Underlands, a cold and often dark place. Though he wouldn’t die from the fumes, my choice of trash disposal must have been toxic. 

“Who?” I questioned.

“It doesn’t matter.”

With a yawn, he took his marble out from the pocket of his pajama pants. I thought he meant to do away with the smoke, but in a flash, all the work I had done to clean his home was swiftly undone. Everything from sticky spots on the floor to torn bags of outdated moldy food was put back, as if I hadn’t moved a single bit of mess. 

“Why?” I asked, bewildered by the show of near malicious resistance. 

“I told you, I’ll do it.”

“How long will that take?” 

He shook his head and inevitably turned his back to me.

“I get it now. Angels have no patience.”

“If you were going to fix this place, you would have done it before I came,” I reasoned, but he wouldn’t turn back.

“I needed, I still need time. You were tossed out of the Overlands, out of your homeland. Can’t you understand how hard it is?” 

“Difficult or not, we shouldn’t wallow,” I said. 

He looked over his shoulder and softly said, “Don’t clean my place again. You’re a guest here, Arron.”

Tired as he was, Tristan began sorting through his mess. I could only stand speechless, watching him go about the task as though I had forced him to do it. Perhaps I had. 

“He thinks he needs us, but he’ll figure something out. People can save themselves if you give them a chance,” Trisal spoke and broke what had been a brief yet tense moment of silence.

Grabbing a broom and dustpan, he turned his eyes on me and reiterated, “Hamilton can save himself with time.”

We hadn’t discussed the librarian since he left. I believed it was better not to bring up the librarian while Tristan was in his earlier mood, but I was also preoccupied with my own activities once he went to bed. 

“And what if these things are too big for any one person? When is it right to help someone if not when they ask for it or when they’re fighting the impossible?” 

“I don’t have all the answers, but if you save them before they have an honest chance to save themselves, you’ll only hurt them in the long run.”

“Do you mean Hamilton or yourself?” I said. 

Before I could utter another word, another syllable, he shouted, “I would have cleaned this place eventually.”

His voice sent me stumbling backward till I fell over a pile of half empty water bottles in the kitchen. Tristan’s outburst thankfully didn’t last long. The moment he saw me fall to the grime covered floor, he rushed over to help me stand. Still, in a softer, slower tone, he told me, “I’m helping you. I’m saving you. Can you acknowledge that for once? Instead of worrying about everyone else, don’t you see I betrayed the demon way for you? We can’t abandon the way that we were raised, not overnight. So please, give me time.”

Angels believed people were as they would always be, whether in strength or in weakness. People never changed. 

Demons believed nothing was forever, and given time, a person would always change in some way. 

“Let me help Hamilton.” 

“Arron.” 

“You don’t want Hamilton to suffer in the future, but I don’t want his sister to suffer now.”

“I don’t care if Hamilton suffers. He’s not my friend.”

“Trisal.”

He hadn’t let me go yet. His arms held mine, and neither he nor I could look away from one another. I watched his lips begin to part, only to bite back his first thought, then his second and third. Only after he let me go, Trisal finally said, “If you want to help Hamilton, go ahead. But you won’t get far without a conduit.”