Angel’s Delight

The club stank of things Saniel had never encountered before. Things undeniably mortal, though he wasn’t sure how he knew. Heaven, in all its starched glory, had never felt like this. Things up there were smooth, clean, always smelling of something pleasantly mild and vague.

Now, human form clunky under his control, he could feel his feet sticking to the floor, the slight resistance tugging at his too-tight shoes with every step. It was a marvel! The sensations, the way his sock rubbed against the skin of his ankle like a wave that made him shudder. And that was but a small part of the constellation of feeling. His clothes, the sweat that pricked the back of his neck, the music that thumped so loudly his jaw bones shook.

The people danced, those little humans spinning and grinding and tasting each other’s mouths like it mattered more than anything they’d ever do. For one blasphemous moment, he wanted to join them. If he ran his hands down that woman’s back, would it feel like freedom? Would that man’s neck taste of something pure?

No, he reminded himself. He had a task. A test to prove himself, to earn more time in this almost-body.

Humans could afford to be sidetracked, but not him. If angels sinned, were they ever angels at all?

His soon-to-be-believer was sat at the bar, satin dress a little too tight, each breath making the seams strain a little further. She had no wings, no celestial glow, and her only halos were the circles under her eyes, but he knew somehow that she was potential in cheap fishnets.

They all were. Potential oozed out of all of them, pooling between their toes and under their tongues as they remained blissfully unaware. His brothers, those angels who knew how to hold their faith without shaking hands, would have called it wasted.

Saniel tried to summon that feeling, that disgust.

All he felt was giddy.

He slid onto the squeaky stool next to her. Her eyes glanced towards him and just as fast turned away. Whatever she had been hoping to find that night, it wasn’t him.

“What are you drinking?” he asked, voice drowned by a discordant melody. He raised his voice and shouted his question instead.

The girl looked at him, wary, the sort of caution that was part exhaustion and part barely-restrained anger. Humans had such good teeth, he thought as she bit her lip. Saniel was surprised they didn’t bite more often.

“Rum and coke,” she yelled back, too polite to ignore him. Or perhaps too tired to care.

He ordered two drinks and paid with a note that felt greasy between his fingers. He cradled his glass with hot palms. The condensation was slick against his skin like holy water. When he sipped and tasted the burn on his tongue, he shivered with delight.

The girl watched him, drink untouched. The men there usually had motives. Saniel could tell this girl was trying to decide whether the drink was a gift or a contract she would be forced into fulfilling.

“I don’t want anything from you,” he said, stepping closer in a way that made her sway back. “I just need you to listen to me.”

“That’s still wanting something,” she countered. This close, Saniel could see where her make up clumped in the lines by her eyes. It reminded him of the desert, the very first one, and the sand that had clumped together in the first rain. Every particle in the universe sought company. Perhaps they’d been designed that way.

Saniel smiled and noticed the stretch of his skin over his teeth. “You’re right. I suppose I do want. But only to help you make the right decision.”

The girl frowned and shifted, body tense with the need to run.

“If you take those pills tonight, you’ll miss the rest of it.”

She froze, eyes wide as she stared at him. Around them, people danced and shook but Saniel and the girl were still.

“H-how do you… are you spying…” but she couldn’t finish her sentence because Saniel had touched one of his fingers onto her wrist and let his Truth seep through her.

Once, angels hadn’t needed to convince people of their holiness. They’d come down to Earth and give instruction and the believers would obey every order, knees torn and dirty as they knelt on rocks without complaint. Cynicism and doubt had changed the game. A little holy energy seemed to do the trick, however. A bit of Truth in a world of noise, even as the energy rebounded up his arm and made his stomach turn from the feeling.

“You’re…” she started, but perhaps the word ‘angel’ was too big for her too say. Too big for her to admit.

Saniel smiled again, shaking off the tingling in his arm. “I am.”

“And you’re here for me?”

“I am.”

The girl watched him with wary eyes, as if she wasn’t sure what to think. Saniel didn’t understand why humans doubted their own senses. A life spent convinced that your body was the enemy didn’t sound like much of a life.

She lifted the glass and drank, droplets spilling down her chin and staining that satin dress. She drank until the glass was empty. She drank until the ice rubbed against her teeth. Saniel felt a thrill inside him and couldn’t figure out why.

“Why?” she asked finally, pushing the glass away.

Saniel huddled closer, licking his suddenly dry lips. “You’ve counted those pills how many times? You’ve said ‘today is the day’ for how many months? And tonight, tonight you’ve decided the waiting is finally over. One last hurrah before saying goodbye for good.”

The girl closed her eyes, breath shaky.

“What I decide to do is my decision. Not yours, not even if you’re… if you’re what you are.”

Saniel frowned, brow furrowing like the mountains he’d once helped curate, up and down and up again. “But you’ll miss it. The world, the living. There’s so much of it.”

“It’s my choice!”

Saniel stepped back, a new sensation rising in his chest. A tightness. He’d been told that human vessels allowed for all experiences, both physical and emotional, but he’d been expecting smells and tastes. Not this. Not this thing that made his jaw clench and fists open and close helplessly.

You’re failing, he thought.

“That’s not-” he started but someone bumped into him on their way to the bar and his words were cut off, body jerked sideways. When he looked back, the girl was gone.

Bile rose in his chest, his body turning frantically to find her. Where was she? Where had she gone?

A flash of crimson caught his gaze and he lurched towards it, but the woman who turned with wide eyes was not the one he was looking for. Too polished, too clean. He raised his hands in apology and backed away, chest thumping louder than the music.

He pushed his way through the crowd, stumbled out into the cold night air, spluttering from smoke and lungs that weren’t used to haste.

The street was quiet. No girl in sight.

Saniel’s back hit the cold brick wall and he crumpled to the ground, failure stinging through his skin. His eyes got blurry, his cheeks wet. When he dabbed it with his fingers, baffled, he realised that he was crying.

He stared at the drops glistening on the pads of his fingertips, how they glistened in the neon light, and almost laughed. They looked so beautiful.

Footsteps came to a stop in front of him, and he glanced up to see the girl. His heart lifted.

“Need a hand?” she said, offering her own. Saniel grabbed onto it with still-slick fingers and stumbled to his feet.

“You came back,” he said, still blinking at her like he wasn’t sure if he was dreaming. Angels didn’t dream, he reminded himself. He still squeezed her hand to check. Sweaty and hot under his palm.

“I was going to leave,” she said, taking her hand back and wiping it down her skirt. A map of fingerprints and smudges decorated the fabric. “But you looked… sad.”

Saniel swallowed, throat thick. “I thought I’d failed.”

The girl shrugged half-heartedly. “Don’t congratulate yourself too fast. I don’t let men tell me what to do, not even angelic ones.” She hesitated, and Saniel wanted to dip his fingers into her skull until he could see what she was thinking. “I’m hungry. Going to grab a bite. If you want to tag along and continue your spiel, I guess I could live with it.”

The girl and the angel sat on the beach watching the sunrise, a container of half eaten cheesy chips congealing between them. The angel felt the sand between his toes and laughed, mouth still coated in grease. When the morning light brushed over them, golden and pure, the angel looked at the girl and for a moment he could’ve sworn a halo adorned her brow.