CUPID'S POV

"Cupid, we just got our assignments. Put on some pants. Now!"

Imagine being bossed around by a six-foot maniac who thinks my lower-half fashion choices are the latest global crisis. 

"Do we need wine?" I ask her, but my question just hung in the air like a failed peace offering. 

Everyone in the city can hear the clicking of her hot pink Mary Jane platform heels across my rose-tinted floor. Judging by the enthusiasm she walked on them, I can imagine that she had gotten her hands on them quite recently.

Her 79th pair of heels.

The room had the strongest odour of coconut and cocoa butter. Amoria must have bathed in the ethereal aroma before visiting my room.

Or maybe it's just me and my cool personality blessing my own surroundings, therefore radiating the fragrance.

I should really stop talking to myself.

"No, I need wine, sir. You need to put your pants back on." 

Amoria is usually right about most things in general, but not today. I think my legs look absolutely fabulous and I feel liberated. She is my best friend and my left-hand person. I'd say she is my right hand man but that isn't my dominant hand, so it does not make sense to me.

"But life is so freeing without them," I remind her. Surely a woman would love to wear a lose gown than go to bed with tight jeans and a bra?

She looked at me like I was a peculiar creature she had encountered on her evening walk. "Pants On. Now." How can she not understand my point?

PaNtS oN nOw.

I don't like being dead. It's not cool. Did I mention I was dead earlier? My apologies, I get distracted a lot. I am dead. You have to keep reading if you need answers.

I do not like the idea of doing anything at the moment either. I just want to sit on this chair and think about why I keep having anxiety levels like I am being hunted for sport. 

"Cupid, you better hurry!"

There she goes running in my carmine-glittered shirt, trying to fix her hair and making stupid faces at me. My usual day.

As I was in the process of massaging my temples, I let out a puff of baby-pink breath as I exhaled, hoping she could see I was really tired.

Even though I did absolutely nothing other than take a nap for eleven hours.

"Whose love life have I been assigned to anyway?"

She floated seductively in the air with her majestic scarlet wings. She arched her back like a creature with no bones and gave me a sly look. Her life might not be perfect but her eyeliner is.

"It's a girl. Someone's elder daughter."

She tossed a book at me; the words 'Eros Passion Patrol' embroidered with tiny red crystals shone brightly on the cover. A fancy bookmark hung around the corner.

The ruby-red crystals shone so brightly, I almost felt like I got stuck in the astral realm. Girls should honestly drop the crystal facade and pick up a glock or a knife instead. Let your man feel the energy properly.

I carefully turned the fragile pages of the book by carefully placing my middle finger on the bookmark and nearly died again.

No, that's an exaggeration.

I nearly reincarnated.

" I am being assigned -" I stole a quick glance at the page again and looked at her, "to an Aries mortal?"

She burst into laughter and I watched garnet sparks burst all around the room. "Good luck with that one, Cupid. I know you'll be an absolute legend."

This is ridiculous. I am going to be an absolute hoe wingman, I know that for sure. I do not support birthday racism, mind you, but sometimes I am a little racist, I admit. 

"Amoria, Aries are a different breed of mortals. They are fast. They get bored too quickly. Too strong for their own good. She's..."

It felt like my vocabulary had been exhausted by just trying to think of how hard it is going to be to find the one and only King charming for her.

"Oh come on Cupid, look on the bright side. She's still in high school. An Asian too! Her mom doesn't let her to the back end of the grocery store, so I am pretty sure she can't see other boys either," she concluded.

There is absolutely no joy when someone tries to show a positive side when I am trying to be a hater. Please respect my hating tendencies if you want to be on my good side.

Stabbing the parchment paper with my Royal quill that I just pulled out from my curls, I just stare at the most insane angel on the planet in front of me. "Stricter the parents, hornier the child."

"Did you just whine, brother?"

Some people just need to keep their mouths sealed for eternity.

I looked around to see Cruciux suddenly appear along with a glass of wine floating around him. I glanced worriedly at Amoria and she blinked at me in reassurance. Some people just have an uncanny ability to steal the happy aura in any environment.

"Everything will be fine," she mouthed. 

"Goddess Hygieia wouldn't be pleased with the way your room is, brother. Try cleaning it sometimes, eh?" He slid his finger over my table and blew the dust towards me.

Maybe Cruciux should try cleaning his face.

My room was just as magical as I had always imagined it when I was younger. My mother, Aphrodite and my father, Ares were stuck in a tiny rosewood photo frame that floated a little above my table. My bows and arrows hung on all four of my burgundy-coloured walls; my physical projectiles were blessed with enough power to cause affection.

I could feel heat bubbling inside me. Every time I experience an emotion, it feels like the acid in my stomach decided to burn my abdomen and my lungs too. Maybe I deserved to feel mortal emotions after my previous failed assignments. 

"He just got assigned to an Aries mortal," Amoria informed him and moved close to me to ruffle my hair.

Mentally, I noted to wash my shirt. I absolutely hate it when my shirt smells like her; like strawberries and depression entangled with whatever coconut butter smoothie she used.

"Let me see her," Cruiciux ordered and I flung the file at him.

He was wearing the darkest shade of black I could ever lay my eyes on. No amount of sunlight, or moonlight, or all of the street lights on earth combined can touch it; keeping it in the eternal dark; just like his soul.

Why do I talk like a dramatic person? I am going to blame this on Amoria, it had to be her influence.

"Drashelle Scarsberry. A beautiful name," he mentioned, letting his tongue roll a little longer when he pronounced the r's in her name.

"I can take care of her. Give her to me," he demanded and took a sip of his wine like it was the sweetest drink. I noticed that he had a small stitch on his cheek that seemed like a pretty recent injury. Amoria looked at him in surprise after his statement and turned her head towards me and raised her brows.

I felt dead caterpillars settling in my stomach. "Why do you have an interest in her?" I asked.

Cruciux placed a polaroid of her on his blackboard that he summoned from thin air. He sipped his wine again and took out the little images that were attached to the file. "Watch."

I looked at the burst of red smoke that spiralled into skulls and bones as soon as Cruciux blew onto his collage. Slowly, the bones arranged themselves in a horrific demonic fashion; redbones interlocking each other with a metallic chain ring and melting into glitter dust, forming an angelic pink and silver aesthetic.

Cruciux always had a thing for aesthetics. It's always a marvel to watch him arrange their lives in order and take away someone's soul by just peeling off a picture from his collage.

"I do not choose healing. I choose self-destruction instead, hoping that I'll learn what it's like to have wounds again. And like any bad woman, I only love the beginning of things," it read.

"She should be under me Amoria, you know this." He rolled his eyes at her, and for the hundredth time, I wished that I could smash his head with the empty wine glass.

Amoria folded her hands and furiously flapped her wings as everything disappear in a matter of seconds. "She's only 16, Cruciux. Do not take her."

He moved at a speed that almost made him look invisible and took his stance next to her. "Everybody's life goes to doom as soon as they turn 12 or 13 anyway."

Not wanting any harm to Amoria, I placed the collage back in the file. "Well maybe if you didn't jinx every 8th grader to go through the same ritual, it would be really cool, Cruciux."

"Could you do me a favour, please?" she pleaded.

I absolutely hate it when she pleads with other men.

"I am not going to kill anyone if that's what you are asking," he replied calmly.

Lunging forward, I tried to kick him in the shin but instead, I found myself pushed back to my chair with an invisible force. For the 18th time today. This is the kind of man that should be taking anger management classes.

"Cruciux come on, leave him alone." Amoria suddenly looked at her knees as soon as she finished her statement. It took one look from him and I watched her legs give up on her when she tried to restrain his strength as he narrowed his eyes to her knees. 

Cruciux stretched out his arms as if he was about to give a very grand speech. "Murder is not on my agenda today and I am pretty sure I have nothing until next Thursday. Also, stop talking for everyone's sake, it's bad enough to look at your ugly unpleasant face every single day," he stated. 

I didn't fancy the electric shock that buzzed every time I tried to stand so I tried to stay still as much as I could.

"Oh please, you are the ugly one in this room. You look like you were created using the non-dominant hand of the creator."

When girls roast, it's not even funny. Straight-up horror.

"Cruciux, leave Amoria out of this."

Her glow began to dull and she looked dangerously pale. I knew this was an illusion. Amoria was the most beautiful girl in the universe. Even death would never paint her that terrible. I wished I listened to my father when he tried to teach me to see through spells but I never mastered it. I couldn't bear to watch her die again for the second time even if it wasn't real.

"You can have her, Cruciux. You don't have to act like an imbecile or resort to violence every two minutes to get what you need." 

I hate giving up so easily. It had to be the most disgusting quality I had in me.

"See that wasn't so bad."

I gasped for the fresh air as I felt his spell disappear.

"I noticed other mortals also being assigned to you. You and Amoria can split between them."

Walking quickly towards Amoria, I checked her pulse to see if it was actually an illusion I saw moments ago. Her wings, however, still seemed to be frozen. She looked at me with so much hatred that I could almost see my death in her eyes.

"He wasn't really hurting me Cupid, why do you have to be so stupid?" Amoria questioned.

I wish I knew.

It was too late before I realised that Cruciux hurled a few more collages at me that sliced my back; five ugly slashes of tiny papercuts on my gorgeous sculpted figure.

Gently lifting Amoria to her feet, I pick up the collages, and sure enough, the collages cleared themselves in the same horrible fashion and lay with general information.

Cruciux stared at me and I could feel the familiar dread settling in my stomach again. Quickly, I scanned over the files. There were a lot of men on those files but there were  three that caught my attention. One of them even looked better than me. The other one looked like a third year Computer Science student on the verge of giving up. And the one that remained looked like he had never felt the touch of a woman. 

"Cruciux-"

"Shut up, Cupid. The world is not going to end. You have my word that I won't kill her." 

"You want me to believe something like this after -" 

I shut up immediately. I do not want to argue with dumb people. You cannot win an argument against dumb people. You just have to move with an intelligent crowd. He muttered something that I couldn't catch up on and vanished into thin air. The only proof that he was there in the room a few seconds ago was the trail of red smoke around the room. 

Amoria's wings were slowly coming back to life. Strange that she called them wings. I always assumed wings would be made of feathers but hers were made of scales. She crossed her eyebrows and muttered a series of curses in a language I never heard of. Pissed Amoria is never good.

"Well, that's just perfect. I think I have enough nightmare fuel tonight." She took in a deep breath and pulled all the hair back away from her face. "Do you trust him?" she asked without much of a glance towards me.

She walked towards me and gathered the remaining collages of mortals we were assigned to. Smacking the files on my head, she asked me again, " I am waiting for an answer, Cupid."

I am pretty sure I imagined the crack in her voice when she spoke.

"There has never been a moment where he did not bring his words into action."

Not convinced by my answer, she showed an unpleasant hand gesture at me and placed the files on the table; collages of four high school students that we had to watch over.

Leaning her head on my shoulder, she tried to stop her tears from falling. "I wasn't really dying, you know. But my wings hurt a little."

I remained silent.

"Trust your gut, Cupid. We need to be alive again. Just sprinkle some love and rest."

Alive. A funny joke.

"My gut keeps telling me to abort the mission, Amoria. It keeps telling me to abort the mission."

"Do you not want to be alive and love like a normal immortal, Cupid?"

Maybe Amoria never understood nor will she ever understand.

Falling in love is always death by Cupid's bow.

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Damn, since I am editing the stories, I feel like taking all my author notes out of the book but a part of me still loves to keep them here. Maybe you might find some cringe notes removed, or maybe not.

Thank you for being alive and pushing through, I know it's hard. But please stay.

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