Earth Angel

She did not believe in fairy tales. She did not believe in the light of heaven or the fire of hell. She believed in nothing at all and felt for exactly that.1

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Her heart was dour, and she was not easily forgotten. Such loathing apathy is hard to forget once you have had it touch you. 3

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She was born an angel, who knew no other angels. Not fallen, but earthbound, she wrapped her wings tightly against her racing heart, hoping that no one would notice them. She wore shreds of fabric, torn and bruised, like she was, and ate only the fruit that had fallen off of trees, trampled and bumped, soft and broken. She knew no home and knew the world as a lonely place, where people's lives did not intertwine. Rather, they briefly intermingled and then were flushed away again, because no one in this world was one. No one. 5

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She lived under the trees and the sky, on top of the mildew of wet earth and the soil of people and nature. Her wings were crippled and no good to fly-she had never seen the clouds where other angels, if they existed, must live. When spoken to, her tongue was sharp, and her teeth gnashed and gnashed and chased away all of her potential saviors. They pitied her; the poor mutated girl with the tied up wings. She knew god as herself, for she answered to no one. The devil was all of her failings, her own hatred of herself, and what she couldn't accomplish. She lived in the alleyways and sometimes drank the blood of the rats she found there. She wondered if anyone could feel their death once it had happened, or if their lives were too tiny, too infinitesimal to acknowledge. In this bitter loneliness, she asked for no help and she received none in return. 7

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There was the one man with the pixie eyes who lead her down a broken path by the moonlight. He wore clothes in tatters, far worse than she, and coughed up pieces of his soul in each lung rattling shake. She knew that by morning his soul would be gone. The little path was dirty and forgotten, so old that only those who already knew where to find it would. Some waited along the side, holding their arms and cursing the uncaring heavens. They rocked back and forth; barefoot, broken, empty, with hearts broken like they were. Minds collapsed, lungs collapsed, veins collapsed. They wore the glass eyes shinier, fresher, than this man who lead her with one gloved and crooking finger. He gave her the bee sting and he promised she would love it. 9

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She lay back and felt the pearl mist crushing through her veins, pumping and filling. Every living thing was just that-alive! Movement and sounds and faerie dust made her eyes bleed. The glass eyed people caught up her tears and put them in vials. Angel's tears were of pure sorrow and sweet anguish. They would find happiness in someone else's veins. When the dark early morning came and the glass eyed people were merely foggy eyed, she begged for more. She begged the patchwork man not to take away her piecrust dreams, her life that was so bittersweet. 11

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It's gonna cost you, he said, licking his raspy lips over and over with his sandpaper tongue.15

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I don't care, I have to know this, she whispered, knowing that she would have regretted her words if the sweet blood sugar wasn't calling her to come back.17

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With a smile he led her further down. By the time the sun raised heavy over the smoggy clouds and leaned into the building where she lay in pieces, the patchwork man was gone. His heart had given out in the hour before the morning.19

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The darkness she had found was so complete and utterly consuming that the angel was not even aware that she wanted to get out of it. She spent her days stealing to live and cursing at people who pitied her. At nights she sold her body and let her soul be chipped away. It was brittle, and she knew it. The flecks were worth more than she was offering, but her body craved the sweetness that burned at her flesh. 21

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The men changed, but always they had the pixie vision. 23

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You're a statue, one said to her25

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She shook her head, but her eyes were glowing and she did not care what he thought of her.27

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I am alive, with this I am alive, she whispered.29

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Now he shook his head.31

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This is hardly living. He said. This is where we leave our souls and let our bodies be taken up by cursin' and dyin'33

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The angel looked away. 35

This man hardly knew what it was to be cursed.36

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When the darkness started to seethe at night, she had no one left to turn to. She shook and whimpered and prayed in the balconies over the sunset that she would get one more chance to fly like a real angel. She wanted to see heaven, once, if it was there. No one would help her. She could not steal; she was too weak. She could not sell her body because the pain was too much. Too many had ravaged her fragile limbs and bruised her beyond her skin. She could barely crawl, and walking was nearly too much of a chore.38

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I want to fly! she cried out, but the clouds were overcast and her words batted against them effortlessly. With a soft failing sigh, they fluttered down to the earth, and she knew mortality, then. 40

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I am no angel, she thought, but I still have wings.44

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She untied them quickly, astonished at the speed her numb fingers moved at. The belts and restraints fell off of her. She reached her wings out gingerly. They were sore. She flapped a couple of times, practicing, needing, longing. Standing quickly, her head spun with the effort, but she started to run. She picked up speed slowly, bit by bit, and she flapped and flapped and tried to soar. She took one long leap, moving her wings as fast as she could-46

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-and fell in a heap back to the earth, crushed dreams, crushed wings, tearful pain. 49

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I've never used them, she sobbed, holding them against her. I've never tried to fly on my own before51

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She found the grimy alleyway that was lit by a stray beam of light. She tore her fingernails, dragging her broken body behind her, trailing herself to the alleyway. The knife was not new. It was dull at the blade and would not even tear her paper skin. She sharpened it against the edge of a dumpster, cradling her wings, fearing what she would do. When the knife was sharp enough, she began. The wings tore and ripped and folded back like breaking bones. She sawed and sawed and hacked and cut until they were gone, and there were two cut up spots in her back, bleeding and stuck fast with feathers. She picked them up and held the wings, crying and crying and not knowing why. She went to the front of the alleyway, and laid the bloodied wings out in front of her. People passed by her and stared, not understanding the bleeding girl with the broken wings. Some gave her money, but most gave her pity. She reviled it with the hatred of someone who has no hope.53

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Please, 55

she would cry out,56

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I have nothing left. No thing in this world to my name.58

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Take my wings and perhaps you can find some better use for them! 60

I am not human and I am not angel. Maybe this will let me die in peace-in pieces!61

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she sobbed and sobbed until the police came and took her away.63

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The jail cell was smooth and echoing, and the bandages on her back felt strange. No more blood; she had been given clean clothes and a warm meal-the first she had had in more time than she could remember. 65

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The policemen asked her questions. 67

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Where do you come from? Can we call someone?69

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No, now I can't remember. Maybe I was born to this, to this filth.71

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I am a flightless bird in a cage.73

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By the time that a couple of hours had passed another police officer came by and opened up her cell. 75

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You're free to go. Someone came to get you, he told her, nodding in the direction of the front doors. 77

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The angel was shocked. Who would save her? Surely not the people she had met along the way.79

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There was no one in the reception room. There was no one near the front desk. She was led to the lobby, where a man wearing a black trench coat stood facing away from her.81

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Who are you? she asked. Why would you save me83

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He turned then, and she saw that every part of him was light and good. His eyes were the warmth of a fire on a cold night, his hair was the curled forelock that a baby would reach up and hold for comfort, his aura was the smoothness of skin melding against skin, candle wax by the heat. She could have died then.85

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Because everyone deserves saving, he replied. 87

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When he spoke it was the voice of every love she had ever known and rejected. It was the joy of being safe and loved and remembered. He went to her then, and he held her as she wept against his body, holding her frail frame up so easily. 89

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How did you know to find me91

Why do I even deserve you?92

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she cried and cried and still could not understand. 95

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This was the other half that she had been missing. All of the qualities of life that she could not reach before. This was who she was waiting for. 97

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How can you love me now?99

I've cut off my wings100

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He smiled still and held her face up to his. 103

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I have been looking for you, he said. I have been watching and waiting for when I could go to you. 105

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And your wings will grow back, just like your heart will mend itself. I will help you.107

I will help you, he said.108

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She smiled then, and they kissed, pure and innocent, and the warmth of love blossomed there on their lips.110

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Sometimes even angels need guardians, he told her. 112

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I have been formed from the sadness of every one of your tears-each pain you have suffered, each agony, I have waited for you. I have been the dreams that you cast aside,114

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I have stored them all, waiting for when I could bring them all back116

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Before you did not want them, he told her,118

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You did not need them. You had something else-another way to soar, but not to reach heaven 120

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And now, I promise that we will reach there together.122

he told her,123

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And she believed him with all of her heart.125

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