Impressions

    It was a dove, more than a pigeon anyways. Or something to that effect, Rosshalde knew, opening the little shoebox where the soft grey bird had been placed. The cheaply-made cardboard, emblazoned with the garish tones of some sport sandal line, and declaring, to any who saw fit to notice, the shoes inside to be US size eights, red, hardly seemed fitting for the delicate creature she’d found sitting under a park bench on the south side of the Marienplatz. It was either injured, excessively tame or an exceptional idiot, even by pigeon standards, because Rosshalde had been able to walk right up to it; touch it even, and it had just sat there like a knot on a log. The first day, she'd thrown some bread at it in a reciprocal gesture of solidarity, and thought no more. Three days later, after leaving classes, she'd returned to the park, seeking the relative peace of the shade under the trees to study, and had seen it again, still damp and bedraggled from yesterday’s cloudburst. Finally taking pity on it; she picked it up and it bonelessly slumped in her hand; limply accepting residence in the little newspaper-filled shoebox, under a heated lamp and next to a bowl of water. The pigeon as a statistic might be a nuisance, but as an individual, even devoid of a name or even much movement, it extracts a certain amount of sympathy from even the hardest-hearted of humans.

    At any rate, Rosshalde only ever assumed that she would have the animal for a couple of days, a week at most. A quiet area to recover and build up strength, in the close confines of her apartment, or a peaceful, warm place to die, which, all things considered, seemed the more likely of the two options. It was then to her surprise that the pigeon seemed after the first day in her meager care more lively, the jagged lines of its unkempt or missing feathers smoothing out, rounded figure filling in. Its eyes brightened, it tottered about in its confines and stuck its slender grey beak out of the haphazardly cut ventilation holes, cooing and rustling its feathers. It seemed to make good noises when its box was placed on Rosshalde’s desk, where she spent most of her time in study, and it looked happier, for all that she could discern avian emotions, when she took the top off the box and allowed it to hop around the desk, settling inevitably beside her overheating computer, and eventually nesting in several odd socks and a threadbare washrag placed at length for this exact purpose.

    It became a pet. A slightly illegal one, as the drafty, one-room apartment explicitly forbade animals in the contract, but a quiet, unnoticeable, low-maintenance one that still came in to roost at her bedside by night, even after Rosshalde had opened the window and tried to set it free. It was then not to her surprise that, returning home from a night class, her pigeon was seated comfortably on the bed awaiting her return. The form it had taken, however, was.

    Walking inside, carelessly throwing the lights and attempting to flop down into her chair, Rosshalde was only able to accomplish the first two of the sequence, met instead with the eager eyes of a stranger on her bed.

    “Ah, so you’ve returned. I was wondering when you would.” It carefully dog-eared the corner of a the book it had been perusing, placed it on the floor, and looked brightly up at Rosshalde. “You’re normally here half an hour ago.”

    Rosshalde stared for a moment, dumbstruck. The figure was long-limbed and muscular, draped in an ill-fitted and rumpled white dress shirt and green pants of a similar condition. Its prominent, acutely jointed fingers clasped pensively together in its lap, and a mad scientist’s shock of short, curly hair, in what was either a very dark blonde or a very light brown, framed a sharp, beaky nose and bemused grey eyes.

    These minor details, however, would not be noticed until later. The slight matter of a pair of enormous wings hanging off the stranger’s shoulders sort of had a way of drawing attention to itself.

    At length, Rosshalde regained the powers of speech and movement. “Who are you. Why are you in my apartment. What is happening.” She said flatly, walking into her dingy kitchenette, throwing her book bag on the counter and refusing the acknowledge the absurdity of the situation. Denial was an unhealthy coping mechanism, but it was a coping mechanism regardless. Perhaps this hallucinatory stress-induced phantasm/costumed maniac would get the hint and fuck back to wherever it came from if she could just ignore it for a while. Or at least, she could have a moment to recoup and find a more substantial method of dealing with it.

    Her old bedsprings creaked and a rustle of linen, followed by solid, friendly footsteps made their way to Rosshalde’s side as she pointedly emptied and began to prepare the contents of the book bag for tomorrow’s labor. She did this because she was responsible, and took care of herself, and did well in school, and oh God turning around abruptly was a bad idea.

    Her hallucinatory home invader (Or creepy stalker; the public transit system here never lacked in the insane, a voice pensively intoned, before Rosshalde’s brain could give the go-ahead to strangle that line of thought.) was standing right behind her, arms clasped behind its back; smiling pleasantly, and not at all like it was going to trap her in a corner and rip her throat out with its teeth, a’la several very specific genres of horror and one regrettable porn film. Rosshalde switched from denial to self-distraction with astounding versatility. She would be proud of herself later.

    “You picked me up a while ago, remember?” A slightly sheepish expression was coming over the figure’s face. “Took me home, gave me some food,” A slender hand carded through the figure’s curly hair. “and uh,” Both of those giant, impossible, slate-grey wings moved in a sort of shrug. “fixed up my feathers, yes?” At Rosshalde’s continued expression of shock, anxiety and unrecognition, the figure seemed to shrink into itself, happiness fading into nervousness and apparent contrition. “You, um, you used to call me Birdie? That’s not really my name, but…” It trailed off, a hesitant question. “Wait, shit.” It frowned. “I did this wrong.” Against her will, Rosshalde felt an eyelid begin to twitch, fear suddenly charring into flickery annoyance. The world waits for no man, and she has some shit she needs to get done tonight. This is not helpful.

    “Be not afraid,” The figure straightened up, drawing up to its full height and spreading its wings. “For I am an angel of the LORD.” This would have been very awe-inspiring, and Rosshalde probably could’ve been convinced to take this display seriously. Except, flapping around giant feathery wings looks really cool when there’s ample space to do so, and much less so when her precariously-balanced coffeepot falls to the floor and shatters, spilling cold coffee and glass shards all over the angel’s pants and bare feet. They both stared at it for a moment.

    Rosshalde looked pointedly up at the figure. “It’s too goddamn late for this.” She muscled past the dismayed creature, grabbing her backpack and shucking off her shoes. “I,” she threw the backpack somewhat more viciously than was actually necessary at the couch and grabbed a pair of pajamas off the floor. “Am going to go to bed. If whatever is happening right now is still happening in the morning, I will deal with it then.”

    She slammed the bathroom door, changed in record time, and flicked out all the lights, flopping straight into bed and trying to ignore the shape still standing dejectedly in her kitchenette.

    Thus went the events of Rosshalde’s first night with her new roommate. Hijinks would inevitably ensue.

2: Introductions

Introductions

 

    In due time, Rosshalde awoke. The sunlight was weakly streaming in through the cracks in her curtains, but she held herself still for a moment, enjoying the hazy state between sleep and wakefullness. Her thoughts massed and flocked placidly, like sheep, and she seemed to remember a distressing sort of visitor last night, but it was all very peaceful right now, wasn’t it? She slowly turned in her sheets, catching sight of her pigeon in its sock-nest atop her desk. It was watching her. Intently. Or, at least as intently as a pigeon really could watch. Their faces aren’t the most expressive of the animals. 

    Smiling and sufficiently balmed against the worrying thoughts she’d been having, Rosshalde slowly rolled out the bed, intent upon breakfast and the bathroom. She hadn’t had any dinner the night before. Why, exactly, had she done that, again? Bit silly, really.

    The pigeon continued to stare right until Rosshalde closed the bathroom door.

    Ten minutes later, eggs and cheese were frying on the stovetop and Rosshalde was consulting her choices of condiments in the mini-fridge when she heard it.

    “I repaired your coffeepot, if you’re looking for alternate ways to prepare the beverage.”

    Shit. That actually had happened. The angel was holding the aforementioned coffeepot by its side like a peace offering, looking at it with an odd distaste, as if blaming it for having broken. The glass was seamlessly fixed and utterly pristine, cleaner, Rosshalde noticed blankly, even than when she had bought the thing. The angel placed it back upon her counter and stepped wordlessly over to the stovetop, looming over Rosshalde as it looked in her pan.

    “I’m not sure that would be a good way to prepare the coffee.” It said with grave seriousness, staring at the slowly-burning egg-and-cheese mixture. “The grounds wouldn’t be evenly distributed through the mixture and would possibly stick to the bottom.” It looked Rosshalde dead in the eyes. “I’d recommend the coffeepot.”

    So. This was still happening. Great. Rosshalde threw up her hands and flicked the heat off on the stove, taking a step away from the angel, who was still looking expectantly at her. Jesus fucking Christ, she did need some coffee to deal with this.

    “Okay, so, you’re my pigeon, right? You sleep on the computer?”

    The angel looked slightly confused at the change of subject, but nodded affirmatively. “Yes, I’m Birdie. I would watch out for you from atop the computer there.” It looked suddenly pensive. “Mostly it was while you slept. You don’t spend very much time here, really.” Rosshalde was unsure if this thing knew how creepy it was sounding, but the light of day wasn’t making it any less terrifying right now. “But honestly, about the coffee-“

    “Yes, thank you for repairing my coffeepot.” Rosshalde quickly cut in. “I’m probably going to need some of it before the hour is out.” She paused. “Do you… drink coffee? You said you were…”

    “An angel of the LORD.” The angel nodded, grayish wings making a slight shiver, as if they wanted to spread, but would prefer not to fix any more appliances. They really did look like the pigeon’s wings, now that Rosshalde was looking a bit more closely. “I am Arael-who-is-the-wings-of-God, angel of birds (Here defined as all organisms extant and extinct which possess or were possessed of feathers and a left aortic arch, it quickly rattled off, in the same manner as the drug commercials listing their possible side effects.), Heaven’s resident ornithologist and cherub of the fourth heaven.” A slight pause. “I do not drink coffee.”

    Rosshalde stared, slightly uncomfortable. “Ariel? As in, The Little Mermaid?”

    “Ariel-who-is-the-lion-and-hearth-of-God was my coworker.” Arael looked blankly at her. “He was banished to hell some time after the fall of the Grigori. We did excellent work together in the study of the European Lammergeier and the creation of a secondary Chamber of Guf.” A confused wrinkle came across its brow. “He was not connected with mermaids.”

    Rosshalde now looked confused. “No, that wasn’t… You know what, never mind. Um…” She cast around, gesturing to a barstool and motioning for Arael to sit, before pulling one out herself. Breakfast, her stomach bemoaned, would have to wait. The angel gingerly moved onto one, agile toes gripping the wood of its legs. Its pants and overshirt were still covered in coffee stains.

    A long moment passed before she picked her sentence back up. “So, it’s great that you’re an angel and all; although my church is going to have a couple of questions to answer, but why are you here? I mean, I gave you plenty of time to leave after you healed up, and it’s not like a birdcage would even really keep an angel in anyways.” She looked skeptically at Arael. “Would it?”

    “I’m here because I wanted to be here.” It answered cryptically. Rosshalde motioned for elaboration. The angel sighed slightly. “I’m here on a study grant. About the interactions between various species of Columbiformes and humans with particular regard for identifying strategies by which they exist with such cosmopolitan distribution, as to facilitate the reintroduction of imperiled birds to human-populated areas.” 

    Rosshalde looked at it blankly.

    “I’m here because my superiors don’t give a shit about what I do in my spare time, so long as it gets me out of their hair.” It paused momentarily. “You taking me in and letting me stay at your house is your consent, and allows me to stay here for the duration of the study, so long as you don’t object to my presence.” Ariel eyed her, a trace of nervousness in its eyes. “You don’t, do you? Object to my presence, I mean.”

    Rosshalde took a sip from a cup of coffee that she could’ve sworn hadn’t been in her hands thirty seconds ago. She mulled the idea over, carefully. The coffee was reprehensibly sweet and creamy, and seemed to have been very slightly burnt.

    “Honestly,” She offered, after a moment, figuring that, angelic or not, someone’s eyes bugging out with impatience like that couldn’t have been a good thing. “I’m still just really confused and somewhat overwhelmed by this situation. No offense, but I didn’t believe you guys were real.”

    Arael looked very slightly affronted, but Rosshalde plowed onwards. “That, and I’m kind of a broke college student living on a budget in this dump, and I’m not sure that I really need to be hosting a holy anything in my apartment.” She elected not to mention that the creepy stalker vibe that she was picking up was also a significant contributing factor.

    “But if those were of no objection, I could stay? As I did when I was a pigeon?”

    Rosshalde heard herself say something in vague, noncommittal agreement and took another sip of her magically-created coffee. It was still terrible.

    “That’s good then.” It sounded relieved, and apparently, anything other than a no counts as a yes to Heaven. “I don’t take up very much space, and I can help to defray any living expenses you might incur by my living here. Additionally, I can observe behaviors from your window, so everything all works out in my favor as well.” Rosshalde believed that this was meant to have a reassuring tone, but it was still just a bit off. (Well,) she thought, vaguely resignedly, (Already apparently consented to it. What’s the worst that could happen?)

    “Just-“ She said, haltingly, in a last-ditch effort for caution. “Please don’t…” Break anything else. Tell everyone I’ve got an angel in my apartment. Smite me for my heathen ways. “It’s the 21st century, I mean, we’re all kind of… The neighbors already think I’m a bit odd, just please don’t… show everyone.” She finished lamely, gesturing at the wings with a coffee-free hand.

    Arael laid a hand on her shoulder, smiling just a bit too widely to be comforting. “I won’t smite anything while you’re gone. I’m just like the pigeon; your neighbors don’t even have to know.”

    Rosshalde left for classes like she would any other Friday.

3: Interactions

Interactions

    “You were painting today, right?”

    The snow had been falling heavy and thick, and Rosshalde was hanging up her coat and placing her boots at the door. The rouladens had been let all the way down and the heater was on full blast, giving the sparse, industrial flat a homey feeling. Something reminiscent of cinnamon and mulling spices was bubbling away on the stove, and Rosshalde took a moment to appreciate it all. It was nice to have somewhere warm and cozy to come back to. “Yeah. We’re moving into oils; thankfully, I don’t have to buy the paint.”

    Arael had been tented up in a big feathery ball up in a corner of the room; apparently reading though one of her music theory textbooks, if the size of the book was any indication. Carefully unfolding into a recognizably human shape, it moved its lanky limbs to a standing position and loped over to grab Rosshalde’s backpack with the slight clumsiness that she had come to expect. The movements were rough, unnatural to her eyes, akin perhaps to how one’s second or third language sounds to a native speaker. Serviceable, but recognizably off.

    “What are you painting?” A slight head tilt from across the room, throwing the backpack on the bed, waiting for Rosshalde to finish with the shoes.

    “People, mostly.” Rosshalde is proud of her paintings. She can see one clear as day in the bathroom mirror; a slender, dark-haired girl with brown eyes and a pianist’s fingers; life seeping through the cracks of her flesh. Her reflection grins back at her, slightly wolfish. “We’ve got models that come in every so often; it’s good practice to learn how to paint quickly.” She flashes Arael a sly look. “You ask me this every time. Art really must be fascinating to you, huh?”  The angel tilted its head, looking slightly confused. “Or, maybe,” she smirked slightly, “It’s just me, huh?”

    Arael reacted viscerally, jerking stock still and eyes widening to an alarming degree, feathers rigidly puffing out, gibbering something to the contrary. After a week or so, Rosshalde was beginning to enjoy needling the supernatural being, now that she knew she probably wasn't going to thrown to Hell for her insolence. Besides, Arael doesn’t really talk to anyone else, what’s the harm in some playful ribbing? It’s adaptation, she figures, for the human world.

    “Hey, look, it’s fine, I’m hot, I know.” She patted its shoulder gently and Arael gave an uncomfortable, too-tense smile, as though it wasn’t quite sure what to do in the situation. “I get it, you want to help, you want to stare, you want to kill time until the birds start being interesting again.” (Arael had bemoaned the first snows, as apparently the pigeons were less lively in the cold. Rosshalde had never noticed a difference, but hey, she had also never been divinely entrusted with the mission to study stuff like that.) She rolled her eyes. “But, if you’re really interested in art, I might have something you can help me with.”

    “…I am indebted to you for your hospitality…” It answered hesitantly, voice with equal parts foreboding and hope. “Do you need me to acquire new brushes, or paint, or violin strings, or-“

    “You already do that without me asking.” Rosshalde answered flatly. Arael gave her an indignant look, and opened its mouth to say something, before it was abruptly cut off. “Don’t give me that shit; they keep showing up around the apartment, and I’m sure as hell not buying any. They’re expensive.” A thought, not for the first time, occurs to her. (God, please don’t be stealing them. Or at least please have been discreet. I like Idee; I want to be able to go back in there.) “No,” She said instead, pulling a wooden stool from the kitchenette into a relatively clear space by the bookshelf. “I’m, uh, sort of behind on a couple of assignments, and I need just a couple of quick life sketches.” She looked at Arael critically. “Charcoal, I think, would capture your lines quite well.”

    “You want me to model for you.” The tone was disbelieving, vaguely scandalized.

    “With only the purest of intentions.” Paper from the table, a portable easel stuffed between the fridge and ceiling, extracted and readied. “I just need about five minute- oh.”

    Holding a pile of folded clothes, Arael was shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, entirely and unexpected naked. Okay. Naked angel in the living room. Not weird at all.

    “Um.” Her mouth unexpectedly dry, Rosshalde considered how to approach this. Because this was somewhat unexpected, for a number of different reasons. “That was really, unexpectedly fast, I could’ve also done this with the clothes on, this seems very slightly blasphemous.”

    “You did say that your intentions were pure.” Arael pointed out, toes digging at the carpet nervously. Toes were safe to look at here. “And modeling usually goes with the clothes off, yes? The pigeons have told me as much.”

    “No, yeah, that sort of is, I guess, but, angel, and all…” She trailed off, making a vague hand gesture. “Maybe there can be an exception somewhere…?” She gave a short, forced bark of laughter. “Pro tip, try not to take advice from pigeons when it comes to artistic nudes.”

    “They live right beside you. They’ve adapted their morphology and behavioral patterns to suit your schedules. You can learn a lot from pigeons.” She paused awkwardly. Oh yes, definitely a she. That was abundantly clear right now, clearer than Rosshalde had ever really wanted it to be.  “Also, they are both aesthetically pleasing and perpetually naked.”

    Naked. Yeah. Except Rosshalde was pretty sure that even the most sparsely feathered pigeons probably weren’t running around with their vag hanging out. Did pigeons even have one of those? Shit, was that even what that thing was? Not that she was focusing unnecessarily on the crotch. Toes and eyes are safe. And the hands. The freaky, overlarge, long-fingered hands.

    “Not…” Rosshalde sighed, giving up the point as lost. “Not the same thing.”

    Arael gave a distinct sort of head-tilt which Rosshalde was pretty sure was her way of expressing confusion as to why she insisted on adhering to such arbitrary and non-bird-centric logics without outright calling her a moron. She chose to ignore this. “Anyways, you’re going to need to pose. I was thinking a sort of kneeling…? No, not like that.” Arael had immediately dropped to both knees, hands folded over her thighs and steepled in prayer in the middle, looking up at her with wild, wide, vaguely fearful eyes. Her long wings draped at odd angles across the floor, slightly pursed mouth, and the semi-permanent sex hair poofing out in all directions was presenting a very interesting picture of debauchery. Which, for someone with sideburns that freakishly long, was actually an impressive accomplishment.

    But not impressive enough to get away with putting an Angel of the LORD on her knees in an almost-sexy-this-is-probably-what-a-blowjob-looks-like-not-devout-at-all manner. “Here, just let me.” Rosshalde’s hands hovered over the angel for a moment, and she made momentary eye contact. “Permission to touch?”

    She jerkily nodded consent, body like a live wire, a spring under pressure. Rosshalde then palmed the broad plane of her hip, encouraging her to rise to a single knee, powerful muscles contracting just under the skin. One hand was left lax upon her thigh, but Rosshalde moved the second to hang at her side, a surprisingly intimate movement. She set the slope of her wide shoulders and carefully took ahold of her chin to angle it forward, looking intently into the mid-distance. She considered the wings, oddly reluctant to touch. 

    “Could you raise them a little bit?”

Arael’s eyes flickered momentarily to meet hers, and the great pennaceous vanes lifted and spread, arcing towards the ceiling. With slight amusement, Rosshalde noted the care being taken to avoid any household furnishings this time, before frowning slightly.

    “Is there any way that you can sort of hold them at half-mast? Like, fold at the elbow joint and bring the last bit,”

    “Distal segment.” Arael automatically corrected.

     “Yes, that,” Seriously? Rosshalde went into the arts to avoid having to learn all the perfect Latin names for things. “in a little?” She demonstrated, only slightly ridiculously, she thought, with her own arm, a drawing pencil supplementing her meager wingspan. “They’re beautiful,” (A tiny smile might have flitted across the angel’s face.) “but there’s also a lot of wing in relation to your body; it’s just a little overpowering in the composition.”

    “Is this better?” She asked, once again determinately staring into the mid-distance. They’d been drawn in to her sides, feathers cleverly sliding over each other like a well-engineered Chinese fan, compressed but raised and spread enough to give the impression of present movement. A steely glint was present in her gaze and the long lines of her thighs and abdomen were taut with muscle. If you could ignore the afro hair and nudity, she actually looked like a proper Dorè angel for once; vaguely androgynous warrior of God and all that.

    “Loads better, thanks.”

    A dark wash spilled over the paper, dyeing the white a muted grey color. With just a few efficient movements of her elegant, finely-boned hand, Rosshalde defined the space of the room, delineated its corners and recorded the set of her subject’s hips, jaw and shoulders. She curved the few definite shadows of the sparsely-lit apartment around rounded forms and a few familiar pieces of furniture, before demarcating the darker lines of small folds in skin and variations in the concrete floor and in a second, thinner pencil. The model’s face came alive in a mess of sharp angles, where her eyes hung like fiery lamps under her handiwork. A sharp, black pen gave edges to the clouded charcoal, drew the vanes into feathers, the suggestion of nap into the rough carpet, the frayed edges of a stray book on the floor.

    Blowing away the last couple crumbs of eraser, Rosshalde surveyed her work. It was rough, maybe a little rushed; shadows perhaps too dark and highlights perhaps more pure than they ought to be. But the oddly sloping form of the subject, filled with a sort of stormy purpose, seemed to have been captured to her satisfaction. Her can of fixative (Really just hairspray, to be blunt, but then, the actual stuff is expensive, and why break the bank when the second best works almost as well?) rattled as she shook it, and the drawing received a thin layer of the acrid material. 

    Into her portfolio the finished drawing went, and when she turned around, Rosshalde was almost unsurprised to see Arael standing, shabbily androgynous once more, watching her intently.

    “Was that helpful?” Her voice is a sort of low, hoarse croak, and Rosshalde is unsure exactly why.

    “Yeah.” She smiles sincerely. “Thanks; you really pulled me out of the fire there.”

    “I’m glad.” The expression on her face is inscrutable, but for the rest of the night, the apartment, with its cold floors and brick walls, has a warmer feel to it, and even as Rosshalde burrows into her covers, the little grey pigeon coos contently into its sock-nest and a lonely place feels just a little more like home again.

4: Research

Research

    The Staatlichen Akademie der Bildenden Künste was manifestly not a school of divinity, the sciences or even really the humanities. Any one of those things might’ve been helpful in improving their library’s selection of texts, but no, art college.

    “You’re borrowing the complete works of Albrecht Dürer and Gustave Dorè, a sample set of medieval tapestries and frescoes, prints of several Islamic calligraphic texts from the same time period, a set of plates from the Book of Kells and,” the on-duty librarian gave me a pleased look from behind her horn-rimmed spectacles, before laboriously beginning to scan and bag each one of the intimidatingly massive, hardbound tomes. “Renaissance Frescoes of Rome and Florence.” The last book slaps onto the pile, thumping satisfyingly, and Rosshalde internally groans to see that, yes, the pile is taller than she is. Admittedly, to put it in the kindest possible terms, she’s a little to the left of that particular bell curve, and they have the advantage of the service desk, but… “Can’t wait to see what you’re making with this, but try not to throw your back out carrying it all.”

    She grates out some sort of laughter and lugs the pile to the floor, imagining a lion swatting an angry wildebeest to the ground, and then frowns slightly, because her actual action was significantly less satisfying. “You’ll be the first person I call if I do.” 

    The receptionist laughs, and Rosshalde scoots awkwardly over to the side to allow other people to access the service desk while she plays a rousing round of backpack Tetris. The Islamic calligraphy just refuses to fit no matter which way she turns it, so with a resigned grunt, she crouches, pulls the backpack on and just makes sure to clamp the spine of the battered book hard enough for the pages not to fall out.

    A good Samaritan Rosshalde doesn’t really recognize notices her coming up behind him; holds the door open and she nods politely as she darts through it, bent just a little under the weight. She’d intended the public library as her next stop, but that wasn’t really going to happen at this point. (Apartment first. Can hit the library afterwards.)

    The boulevard’s bright in the mid-afternoon sun, and Jesus, Rosshalde wasn’t sure she’d remembered it being quite so long, or there being quite so many steps. With a sudden rush of despair, she remembers that, hey, the apartment’s still another couple of miles away, the trains don’t really stop anywhere convenient for her, and, oh yeah, the library’s on the exact other side of town. “Great.” She mutters under her breath, staggering past a set of students eating lunch, students who could afford to sit around and eat lunch with friends. She knows a couple of their faces, from her music theory classes mostly, but it’s difficult to get to personally know people if you never see them outside of class. “If I’d wanted to ruck march, I would’ve joined the goddamn military.”

    A flock of pigeons fight over a discarded piece of sandwich bread and the trappings thereof, complete with a small piece of lunch meat. Rosshalde passes them without caring too terribly much, sparing a moment’s thought that maybe Arael might’ve been interested in looking at them all. She’d probably get down on one knee and like, whistle at them or something, and they’d line up in reverence and offer their up paltry bit of sandwich in sacrifice to their lord and savior, the freaky bird angel. She’d probably eat it too. “Just to be polite,” She’d say, looking very earnestly up at Rosshalde. “Politeness is very important to pigeons. They’re very interesting, aren’t they?”

    Rosshalde huffs a bit of laughter and, ignoring how the movement make the straps cut painfully into her body shoulders, cranes over to spare the flock another glance. Because her life is apparently overdue for weird shit happening to her, every single bird is staring creepily at her, and making those little vibrating noises that she thinks Arael said were greeting calls or something. Greeting or mating; couldn’t remember which.

    A little boy walking past tugs at his mother’s sleeve and points gleefully at the birds’ odd behavior, but thankfully, either no one else notices, or does, but just doesn't care. Her little circle of weird is apparently mostly airtight, which she can’t really bring herself to be too upset about. Movement originates within the flock, and with an muffled sort of ‘churr’; noise, her pigeon pushes its way through the rank and file, clutching the bread triumphantly in its beak and tottering towards her as quickly as its stubby legs could carry it.

    Rosshalde rolls her eyes and turns off into an alleyway, thankfully deserted at this time of day. Shelter from any further prying eyes is found under a nearby awning behind a concrete outcrop; the delivery door for a restaurant, if the bright orange sign emblazoned ‘Vegi Voodoo King’ was to be trusted. (At least, I hope that’s a restaurant?)

    Another insistent ‘churr’ draws Rosshalde’s attention away from the ambiguously named business, up to the pigeon sitting atop the concrete block, throat bulging at it swallows down the last of its ill-gotten prize. 

    “That’s disgusting, I really hope you know that.” Quipped Rosshalde, and the animal made a noise that might’ve been laughter, but could’ve just as easily been a choking/hacking noise with the amount of chewing that hadn’t been going on. It then flapped lightly off the block and sort of, unfolds, in midair, misting Rosshalde with little bits of feather and leaving her pocket angel crouching at her feet. Clothed, thankfully, this time.

    “Those birds just cemented their place in the afterlife by my side; raising up a sacrifice to glorify and strengthen their most profound champion.” The angel swells with pride, pulling herself to her feet and unnecessarily dusting off her pants. “So much did they care about their brethren, for I represent even those birds which prey upon their own kind.” She absentmindedly pulls a couple of stray feathers out of her ‘fro. “Also, that sandwich was only about five minutes old. Still warm and everything.”

    Rosshalde sighs, just a little exasperatedly. (She’s consistent, I’ll give her that.) “Yeah, I figured you were just playing up the whole hobo aesthetic.”

    Arael frowned, and tilted her head in a puzzled sort of way. “I’m not a hobo, and I looked like a pigeon at the time. That was entirely normal and justified behavior for both a bird and an angel.” She sounded vaguely offended at the suggestion.

    “Yeah, well, you’re wearing a hobo coat.” Sensing that this is probably going to be a long and headache-inducing conversation, Rosshalde slips off the backpack and begins to rub some feeling back into her shoulders. “Where did you even get that thing?”

    “The lost-and-found bin of a local church.” She answers, very matter-of-factly, oblivious to Rosshalde’s vaguely horrified expression. “I intend to give it back, but my last coat is gone and I don’t wish to reveal my true nature in public.”

    “Oh. Yeah, that’s probably a good idea.” Rosshalde pushes down a couple of pressing questions, including but not limited to ‘Why do angels suddenly have license to steal from churches?’, and takes a quick scan of her profile. The massive, stiff-shouldered, green oilcloth trench nearly enveloped the angel, hanging voluminously even off her comparatively robust frame. Most hints of anything unusual were effectively snuffed out in the layers, although to Rosshalde’s eye, a slight hump existed around the shoulders where she knew the wings were raised and flexed to prevent the tips from skimming the ground. Not a terrible solution, but, seriously? That’s the best Heaven’s got?

    “You do realize that still looks really weird though, right? It’s seventy degrees out, and you’re dressed for ten below.”

    Arael frowns in annoyance, apparently sore over the continued criticism of her unconventional attire. “Heat’s not a problem for me. Temperature shifts on Earth are pansy little things.”

    “Yeah, that’s great and all,” Rosshalde leans casually up against the cement wall, rummaging around in her pocket for some gum. This probably wasn’t going to be over anytime soon; might as well get comfortable. “but, it’s still really unusual for a person, you know, one of the things you’re masquerading as, to wear something like that on a sunny autumn afternoon.”

    Arael gives her a scandalized, disappointed look. “It would be unethical to change the weather for my own purposes. People, animals, plants, they assume that one thing’s coming and prepare for it, and it’d be rude to alter that.” She scoffs. “I’ve existed here for a very long time. I generally just tell people nowadays that I enjoy the weight of a large coat, and that it affords me an extra barrier against the outside world.”

    Rosshalde remains unconvinced. “And they believe that…?”

    “Mostly they just assume I’m mentally unwell. Particularly in the tropics.”

    An brief silence follows, as Arael looms over her, staring with laser-focus, and Rosshalde reflects that the various peoples of the world, the tropics and poles alike, may have had a point in their assumptions. The gum’s not particularly great; already lost its flavor, but she snaps a bubble anyways, leaning against the wall and coolly watching Arael watch her. (This probably looks a bit like a mugging from the outside in.) She reflects.

    “Okay, so we can work on the coat thing later.” She huffs a little bit at that, clearly still put-out. “Any chance you can teleport or anything?”

    Apparently the question is a bit of a non-sequitur, judging from the quizzical head-tilt and abrupt dropping of the annoyed act. “Not right now. Why?”

    Rosshalde shrugged casually, somewhat reluctant to tell her what she’d been doing. Not that she distrusted her, necessarily, but it just seemed a little prudent to seek information from a number of different sources. “I have books right now, and I don’t want to have a crick in my back in the morning. I’m checking around for something particular, and if I don’t have to drag these all the way back to the apartment,” It didn’t seem quite right to call it solely her apartment now, but our had felt like just a little much. “I can go and check the library and a couple of the bookstores for it.”

    “Oh.” It was a very flat oh. Just an acknowledgement of hearing.

    “It’d be very helpful of you.” Rosshalde was fighting a little dirty here, and she knew it. For all her oddities, Arael really did just seem to want to be helpful, and tried fairly earnestly at anything she did. The whole modeling incident was proof enough of that. She figured it was probably just a sort of angel thing, some sort of instinct to serve, but there really wasn’t enough information about any of this to prove it one way or another. That was sort of the purpose of the research to begin with, after all, to learn a bit more about exactly what she’d invited to live with her. “I’d appreciate it a lot.” She looks straight into Arael’s eyes, reaches up to lay a hand on her shoulder. She stiffens, predictably, and breaks gaze to stare awkwardly at the ground.

    “I could take them back to your apartment.” She fidgets uncomfortably, and Rosshalde removes her hand. Maybe that was just a little much? “But if it’s a specific book you need, I can probably get it for you.”

    “Hey, no, it’s fine,” Rosshalde is backpedaling a little bit, unsure of exactly why. After all, her choices weren’t particularly subtle; and what did it matter, really, if Arael knew she was researching angels? “They’ll probably have it at the bookstore; I just really don’t have any more space in my backpack. Here,” She carefully picks up the set of calligraphy plates, hands it off to her, and her eyes brighten a little.

    “Oh,” and it was significantly happier this time. “You picked up some good stuff.” She tucked the book into the crease of her arm, and haphazardly flipped through the leaves, eventually coming to a couple of the few brightly colored plates. “It’s got Iblis, and the peacock, and the garden, and,” She’s staring intently at the text, a beatific smile on her face. “It’s in the original Arabic.” She snaps it shut, and looks at Rosshalde like this was Christmas and her birthday and Easter all wrapped up in one big bow. “I can translate it for you, if you want.”

    Rosshalde could read between the lines. “I don’t mind if you read them. I need to have them returned by the end of the week though.”

    “Yes, yes, of course.” She’d slipped the book into one of her more voluminous side pockets, and quickly shouldered the backpack, wincing just a little and fidgeting with the straps.

    “Something wrong?” True, it was around fifty pounds, but she was awfully strong, and had over a foot on her in height; this shouldn’t be a problem.

    “It’s…” Arael sucked in her lip and worried it a little, and the coat shifted oddly around the shoulders. “Digging into them, just a little. Would you mind-“

    “No, it’s fine.”

    “I’m pretty sure I can fit a couple more of them into my pockets.”

    Rosshalde massaged her temples. “You’re never going to let the coat thing go, will you?”

    “Probably not.” Arael answered, completely seriously.

    Several minutes later, Arael briskly walked back into the street, Renaissance Frescoes of Rome and Italy clutched under one arm and coat suspiciously nonmotile where the inner pockets, the outer pockets, and Rosshalde was fairly certain even the lining had been stuffed full of heavy art books. Rosshalde left in the opposite direction, stride strong and purposeful, backpack empty of all but a wallet and a pack of gum.

    Unfortunately it wasn’t just art colleges that lacked practical information on supernatural being as a whole. The library had been a bust; anything remotely related to her subject matter pertaining primarily to faith and church life, which, okay, better than nothing, but not exactly what she wanted. The local bookstore had been a little better; with a couple of texts regarding Hebrew and Aramaic lore written primarily from a scholarly perspective. The origins of popular depictions had been interesting there, (Gryphons are protoceratops fossils. That’s just a little bit disappointing.) but generally lacking in the sort of hard information she wanted. Rosshalde snapped the book shut, and threw it, not vehemently, but something similar to it, back onto the shelf, because, really, what was she looking for? A magic bullet in the fiction section, because she didn’t want to ask the person she was looking up herself.

    She checked her watch. 6:53. (The little used bookstore closes in about five minutes.) She thought, glumly. (Not like they were going to have anything useful anyways.) With a polite nod to the shopkeeper, a thin, prematurely-balding man who seemed a bit miffed that she’d read just about everything the shop had to offer and wasn’t going to buy anything, she exited the shop, striding quickly into the brisk night air; coat wrapped tightly around her as a ward against the cold. A clocktower, whichever one it was; there was certainly no shortage, began to toll out the hour. Rosshalde paused for a moment, contemplative. (I’m standing on the Feuersee, so I suppose it’d have to be the Johanneskirche bells…) A thought drifted lightly into her mind, and she nearly doubled over in weak laughter, an odd mixture of frustration and hilarity washing over her. (Church. Obviously. There’s books of divinity for the Catholics, and Pastor Fritz can point me in the right direction. God, I’m an idiot.) With that, she continued onward with a weight lifted from her shoulders, boarding a fortuitous train and damn near skipping the rest of the way back home.

    Her feet were sore by the time she got in, but her high spirits were infectious, and between the sandwich already set out for her, the pleasant smell of burning incense, the elegant, handwritten, indexed calligraphy translations and the actual excitement for next week’s church attendance, life seemed like it really couldn’t get any better.

5: Excursions

Excursions

    The wind was bitingly cold out on the main street, but the Markthalle’s stone awning and pillars offered some shelter from the elements. Still, Rosshalde was glad that she was dressed warmly, with the unfortunate exception of her fingers. She did have gloves, right in her pocket actually, thank you very much, but playing anything decent on a violin is just about impossible when your fingers are swaddled in fabric.

    Rosshalde really does enjoy playing, honestly. She can lose herself in the music, play her heart out, watch the people vaguely going by, and earn a pretty penny at the same time. Litzt probably would’ve winced to hear her interpretation of Liebestraum; a piece certainly never meant for the violin, but his Hungarian Rhapsody sets nicely matched her instrument and skill level.The passersby seemed appreciative of the ambiance, and by the end of the hour, she’d ended up with around 30 Euro in change and paltry bills in her case, as well as some good, solid practice and, oddly enough, what appeared to be a large package of Magenbrot. 

    The night and chill were setting in by then, and Rosshalde decided to call it quits for the night, partially due to the reduced volume of people, but primarily because of her hands’ growing uncooperativeness and the unlikely, but not impossible, possibilities of permanent damage in the probably-subzero temperatures. The Markthalle was warm and inviting, though also closing, and she dragged her case and instrument into the atrium, collecting her earnings and packing with all the dexterity she could muster. Her instrument and money secure, Rosshalde considers the Magenbrot. It’s in one of the paper cones you could buy from a street vendor, and still folded at the top, inviting and friendly and probably somewhat overpriced. She’s flattered. Genuinely. Someone thought enough of her playing to go out, pick up a Tüte from a nearby vendor or something, and then come back to leave it with her, just dropped it without a remark, and she hadn’t even noticed. (That’s not exactly surprising, you know. You get awfully into playing.)

    In a slightly better mood, she looks at her watch, decides she’s got nowhere else she needs to be, sits up against one of the stone walls and opens up the package, the paper crisp in her hands. The pieces of gingerbread within are large and perfectly whole, glossy with glaze and still, somehow, slightly warm to touch. She picks one up, examines it carefully. It smells nice; like molasses and nutmeg.

    “They go really well with… whatever this is.” Rosshalde doesn’t have to turn her head to know who it is. “Like, schnapps, and cocoa, and coffee, I think.” She says, contemplatively, and Rosshalde hears the sloshing of a drink cup as Arael flops down beside her. “Try it, really.” She proffers a large, steaming mug of something warm and chocolatey, which is blissfully warm on Rosshalde’s fingers. The steam wafts up in luscious curls, and it also smells really nice.

    She takes a tentative sip, and yep, right on the money there. Cocoa and coffee, with just a little bit of milk and peppermint schnapps added. It was good. Really good.

    “So you like it?” Arael is waiting expectantly for her to pass judgment, like it just might be the most important thing in the world right now. “Dip one of the Magenbrot into there; it’s better like that.”

    This also turns out to be a good suggestion. The pastry absorbs the concoction, nutmeg and ginger and chocolate and peppermint-flavored alcohol all meeting on her palate with a pleasantly springy texture. “Thanks.” She mumbles through a mouth of crumbs. She swallows, forms a slightly more dignified reply. “You get this for me?”

    Arael nods, seeming to almost bloom under her approval. “I like the paper cones. Everything should be served like this.” She says it so simply, with a sort of matter-of-factness that Rosshalde suddenly finds unbearably funny. She snorts a little, giggling madly and pats Arael’s shoulder consolingly in response to her confused, head-tilty expression.

    “Here, would you like one?” She proffers the cone up to the angel, still holding fast to the heavenly warmth of the coffee mug. Arael seems to accept the peaceful intent of the gesture, though still appearing slightly confused as to the purpose of the outburst of laughter.

    “No thank you, but I appreciate it. Those are yours.” She says, once again in the ‘simple and sensible’ sort of voice. “Besides,” She suddenly straightened up, began rooting around in the pockets of her stolen overcoat. “I’ve, ah, there we go.” A second Tüte was extracted, slightly more battered than the first. “The vendor gave me a second one free when I told him it was for you. He seemed quite taken with us.” She whispered conspiratorially.

    Rosshalde rolled her eyes, but not with any particular malice. Free food was getting to be pretty awesome. “Never would’ve taken you to be a flirt. Good for you though; you’re learning about people.”

    Arael once again looked puzzled. “We weren’t flirting. He just seemed to find it cute that I wanted to get something for you.” She paused, pensively. “I believe he thought we were courting.”

    Rosshalde nearly choked on a bit of pastry, but quickly took a sip of her drink anyways to buy a moment of time to speak. She was unsure what she thought of this comment, innocuous as it probably was. On one level, with her height and layers heavy, loose clothing, Arael did seem rather ambiguously gendered, and could be taken as just a particularly pretty boy. Maybe the vendor just had a weakness for young love, found it cute or something. On the other hand though, to put it gently, Arael was still an ingenue in the subtle arts of understanding anything not meant completely literally, Jesus Fuck. Therefore, nearly everything said to her by others was filtered through a fairly bizarre set of translations endemic to her head, with the net effect of making most things her opinion. To whit, this perhaps meant that the ‘courting’ quip came more from Arael’s idea of their current relationship, as opposed to whatever the vendor may have meant in his gift of free Magenbrot. Except, he’d still given her something, which meant that this was an outside opinion.

    Fuck. Probably overthinking this. (Or maybe not. Or maybe actually so? Fuck it all.)

    “What about you?” Is what she eventually answered. “What’s your opinion on the subject?”

    “The Magenbrot?”

    “The courting.”

    “Oh.” Arael looked pensively at her for a moment, possibly sizing her up, possibly trying to read the situation. It was always a little bit hard to tell. “I enjoy being around you, certainly. Our conversations are interesting, your music is very pleasant, and I do derive no small degree of satisfaction from acting as your model.” She smiled. “I like seeing how others see me, and your drawing are very pleasing to the eye. Courtship, however, would be a bit unbalanced." She pauses, seemingly searching for a word. We’re very… different.” She finally settles on. “That, and the other thing.” She added, nearly inaudibly.

    (Okay,) Rosshalde thought. (Mild relief.) She grinned a little, and nudged her in the ribs. “So, who’s the ‘other thing’?”

    Arael flushed. Bright red. Stammered a little. “I didn’t say it was a who.”

    “Nonverbal communication. You’re…” Rosshalde gestured vaguely. “less than subtle, sometimes. Seriously though, who is it?” She was curious in spite of herself. Another angel? Was that even allowed?

    Arael mumbled something under her breath, beet-red and staring intently at her Tüte of Magenbrot like it was the most interesting thing in the world.

    “Sorry, couldn’t hear you…?”

    “Gabriel, okay?” She muttered, only barely audible this time.

    Rosshalde did a slight double take. “As in, the archangel? And the canonized saint? One of the two angels everyone actually knows about?” She snickered just a little bit, trying to cover it with her hands. This was rich. “You’ve got a celebrity crush. Wonders never cease.” She paused, snickered a little more. “What’s he like?”

    “She.” Ariel looked just a little like she was trying to compress herself into as small an area as was physically possible, even redder, if that was possible. Her eyes were screwed shut, as if not witnessing this might make the awkwardness of the conversation go away. “At least, as of the 17th century, but even before then, he was always kind of …twink-ey…”

    A gay angel. A gayngel. Okay. “Oh. Hey, um, no judgment here, it’s all cool.” A thought struck her. “So I guess this sort of settles the whole ‘God hates fags’ thing then?”

    “No, not really.” Arael shrugged. “For a number of reasons, He would prefer His follows to abstain from unfruitful couplings, and as homosexuality is by definition usually (Texas whiptail lizards aside.) unfruitful, it is considered a venial sin. No worse than adultery or masturbation, however, so it’s really not too damming in his eyes.” She eyed Rosshalde balefully, and her fluorescent blush had faded into a ruddy color over her cheeks and nose. “We’re supposed to be a little purer though, and gender’s kinda fluid when you can change your shape anyways, so the female window dressings really aren’t the main problem there.”

    She sighed, hugging her knees to her chest and managing to look completely and utterly dejected. “That’s why most of the Grigori fell, I think. They got to watch it all; see humanity in its fragile beauty, but only watch, never reach out and touch, to help, or enrich maybe. They wanted the option, feel what the others felt, be a participant in life. Share in the fruits of humanity, and share with them the arts and knowledge of Heaven.” 

    “Oh. I… um,” This had gotten a little to serious a little too quickly. Rosshalde was going to get some kind of whiplash if this kept happening. “Alright, then. Um…” She scratched her head. “They never exactly told us very much about you guys in Sunday school, you know?”

    Arael suddenly snorted, as if the very idea was amusing in the highest degree. “I don’t exactly blame them. I made it all sound pretty noble, but, I’m pretty sure most of them just wanted to get laid.” She viciously coughed something sounding suspiciously like ‘Semjaza’, and Rosshalde rolled her eyes.

    “You do realize that you don’t have to cover the name if the person you’re talking to has no idea who you’re talking about, right?” Arael flushed once again, and gave her an indignant look. 

    “I’m still in contact with him; and we’re fairly close friends. I doubt he’d appreciate me speaking so lightly of his fall.”

Rosshalde ruffled her hair indulgently, enjoying the confused response. “Well whatever, if I ever meet him, I’ll be sure not to mention it. In the meantime though, it’s late, I’m cold, and I think the apartment would be a pretty great place for me to work on grilling you for all the gory details of your blasphemous love affair. C’mon, let’s go.” She gets up, dusts off her pants, pulls Arael to her feet, and is fairly relieved when the angel hoists her (Excessively, excessively heavy) instrument case over her shoulder and walks out with her into the snowy night.

    They walk together, and Arael is disturbingly vague when it comes to saying anything else about Gabriel or the rest of Heaven; the winds seeming to bite just a little colder whenever Rosshalde pokes at the subject. They reach the apartment building, mount the six flights of stairs and enter the flat, warm as ever and by now rather elegantly furnished. The rest of the Magenbrot is consumed, a violin is inspected and given a spot cleaning, and exiting the now luxuriantly-steam-scented bathroom in her pyjamas, Rosshalde sees her grey pigeon’s eyes poking out of a deep pocket of her overcoat. It settles into its nest for the night, leaving only a slight bulge as evidence of its presence. Likewise, she hops into bed, takes out the set of translation notes, reads for a while, then puts it back and decisively clicks off the light. She falls asleep.

    Rosshalde never asks herself why Arael might be friends with a prince among fallen angels.

6: Interstellar

Interstellar

    “Oh, this is quite fascinating!” Arael is staring at everything, grinning like an idiot and looking quite like she’d like to put her hands all over the careful assemblages and shiny surfaces. I drag her along; suddenly understanding why some parents put their kids on leashes. “And you play with these people?”

    The ‘these people’ in question, the other members of my string quartet, Hannah, Jakob and Helmut, look up from the process of tuning their respective instruments, expressions ranging from surprise to mild curiosity. I mentally facepalm. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

    Helmut, our cellist, a chubby, elderly and highly pleasant (I’d stayed over at his house on the couple of occasions that rent money had fallen short. No one enjoyed eviction.) sort of man who’d been here for as long as I could remember, quirked an eyebrow at me and unnecessarily nudged Hannah in the ribs. Unnecessarily, because Hannah had put down her viola and was tracking us, approvingly, the second we walked in.

    “Rosshalde, you’ve brought a guest. How terribly surprising!” She rises and pulls me into a quick, one-arm hug, clapping me on the back, before turning on Arael. “Are you are?”

    “Sam,” She answered, at the same time as I cut in with, “My roommate.” Arael’s evenness flickered momentarily to mine, just slightly-put out. “Her roommate.” She echoed. “I’ve been curious about her music, so I wanted to accompany her and hear you all play a piece.” She paused. Jakob and Helmut had also risen, and were inspecting her closely, a gleeful grin beginning to form across Helmut’s wizened face.

    I internally groaned, beginning to regret indulging Arael’s curiosity. That particular expression never boded well for its recipient. “I finished transposing the first two movements of Holst’s The Planets, if we’d like to try those.” I offered, gamely ignoring any innuendo to the otherwise. “Might sound a little odd off of a full orchestra, but it should still be interesting.”

    “Will I be coming in second or first?” asked Jakob, straw-colored hair flopping about his face, as his gaze too, travelled from ‘Sam’ to me, and then back again. I suppose even he could put what probably looked like two and two together to get four. “I’m good with either.” He laid his violin in his lap, and politely accepted the sheet music I hand to him, looking it over. “Ah. Second.”

    “It really only matters when we get into the second movement, you know.” I take my seat and open my case; violin thankfully already tuned. Hannah follows, although Helmut remained standing out of necessity. Playing a cello isn’t easy when you’re sitting.

    Arael, predictably, remains awkwardly standing in the auditorium hall, rocking uncomfortably on the balls of her feet.

    I look at her flatly and motion for her to pull up a chair and sit. She nods politely, and takes up a cross-legged position on the floor, fastidiously arranging her coat around her body. I control the urge to slap myself, and turn back to the quartet.

    “So, Helmut, you start in with the cello, and we follow. Are we all set?” The group at large nods assent. “Okay, then let’s go.”

    Our rendition is, naturally, not quite colorful as the original. It’s very difficult to capture the sound of a full orchestral suite with only four individuals. Still, the intense, darkish character of the composition shines through, and around three minutes in, it reaches a crescendo and falls nearly silent; only Hannah eking out the last couple of notes. My hands are still, and as the last note of the cello vibrates out of existence, I look for just a moment at Arael in the momentary silence. 

    Her eyes are shining with a clear sort of fire, and for just a moment, the room seems to warp around her. The air’s gone, room dimming in an uncanny chill, and everything circles around her; pulled like light into a black hole and emitted as that pale gaze. She’s staring at me, hungry and utterly inhuman. It’s terrifying.

    Then, the cello sounds again, joined by the plaintive call of the viola, gradually rising and spiraling around each other, and I gratefully look away, suddenly striking out sharp, short notes on my violin, the best we had for drums; Jakob filling in forcefully for the trumpets. The piece ends grindingly slowly, and the sense of dimness and power seems to fade from the air as everyone flips to the second movement. I breathe deeply; feeling as though I’ve woken from a trance. Arael is still watching, but apologetically now, almost cautiously. Helmut says something, and it takes both of us a moment to register it.

    “Oh, no, I enjoyed it quite a bit. That was Mars, Bringer of War, if I’m not much mistaken?” She smiles blandly at Helmut.

    “You’d be correct.” He looks at me approvingly, and claps me on the back. “Got lucky on this one, did you? A roommate who’s into the same as you are.”

    “I suppose you could say that.” I hear myself say, flipping onto the next movement.

    “Will you be doing Venus next?” she asks.

    “You play, Sam?” asks Jakob, seeming vaguely perplexed. (Sam? I- oh, wait, yeah.)

    She shrugs. “No. I merely enjoy the music. It’s nice; being shacked up with a classicist. Might could try learning though.”

    “Well,” I say, still a little shaky. “I could always give you a couple of pointers later. For now though, we are doing Venus, so if everyone’s ready?” Again, a choir of assent. “Alright.”

    It’s quieter, more complex than Mars, with a shining, cloudy quality. I relax into the slow pace, as the interlude builds slowly into a more definitive thing, fading in and out of existence like a mirage, never quite physically there.

    It’s all very constant. Where Mars had a harsh crescendo, a climax and a downslope, Venus is relaxed bliss, floating on an ocean of calm. Little melodies on the villa are shot all throughout the movement, giving shape to the substance. Blue scales, gemlike, set into a rose-colored background. Intellectually, I know that it works best in the full composition; affording the viewer a break between the high-energy sets of Mars and Mercury. Here though, the quiet, peaceful quality of it is soothing, combining with the sharp mental focus of my playing to lull any hint of remaining nervousness away, into a peaceful sort of trance. Slowly, and at length, the piece ends.

    It’s quiet for a moment. “So how’d you-“ Helmut starts to the room at large, but then pauses. “Where’d Sam go?”

    I make to reprimand him for the stupid question, but fortunately look about beforehand, because, yeah, that’s actually not a bad question. The carpet’s still kind of crushed where she was sitting, but both she and her backpack have vanished entirely from the auditorium. “I’m… not sure.” I say, puzzled and very slightly cross. It’s not a big room, and she’s a stupidly big person. “I’m pretty sure we would’ve seen her if she left.”

    “Sorry, she?” Hannah cut in, vaguely worried expression shifting to confusion. She stows her viola with practiced movements, eyes not leaving mine. Helmut nods in concurrence, frowning very slightly at me. My gut twists uncomfortably.

    Jakob looks uncertainly at me, and then at the elder pair. “You guys… didn’t know that was a girl?” He quickly snaps back to me. “That was a girl, then? Right?”

    I already knew where this conversation was going, and tried not to bristle up too much. These people are my friends. I don’t need to be rude to them, but I could head the conversation off before it got started. “Sam’s my roommate.” I said, enunciating every syllable. “She’s a little weird, but it cuts the rent in half, and she’s okay with taking the couch. She likes music, and I offered to bring her over here to see you guys because we’re friends. Don’t overinterpret.” My voice, I noticed, was vaguely defensive.

    Helmut looks visibly relieved, and that should’ve made me happy. He was one of my best and oldest acquaintances, and we’d gone to the same damn church together since before my parents had to drag me into the pews and shush me when I got too loud. He helped out financially whenever I was in desperate need, and taught me a good half of what I currently knew about string instruments. Approval from people like that was usually a good thing.

    But no, it rung a bit of an odd chord, actually. Arael was good people, and beyond that, an angel. Essentially, Helmut, devout through and through, was using his faith to disapprove of a living representation of that faith, though he had no way of knowing it. The irony rankled a little, and it was just a little surprising that I cared all that much, that a perceived relationship should be cast as an aspersion upon my person.

    I didn’t really say anything though. Hannah relieved me of that particular burden of decision. “I-“ She broke off, smiling kindly at me. “We all understand completely, yes?” She cast Helmut and Jakob withering looks in turn, and the two cringed just a little, the latter nodding in appeasement. “We’re all very happy to see you with other people, and we’d still be happy even if Sam were more than just your roommate.” She clasps my hand and looks beatifically at me. I am forced to abandon my attempts at buckling my violin case.

    “Right.” I say, now feeling rather uncomfortable with where this had gone. “That’s… that’s not really going to be an issue, but I’ll keep it in mind. In the meantime, I should, you know, go and find her…?”

    “Yes.” Said Hannah, waving away an impatient Jakob. “We’ll meet again next week then. Give her our regards when you find her!”

    I leave, very quickly. My violin case is half-buckled in my arms, a painstakingly noted sheet of music clutched against its flat surface. Right off the top of my head, I can think of about two or three places Arael would be right now, so I quickly turn out of the pristine university hallway and into the little alcove for the restrooms. One of Arael’s favorite pastimes was bitching about the lack of water fountains in Europe as a whole, and more than once, I’d found her perched atop my sink, craning her head around to drink from it.

    My hunch had been correct, even if the reasoning was faulty. Sitting like some bizarre, trench coat-wearing bird of prey, and contorted into what had to be a truly uncomfortably position against the ceiling, it took me a moment to spot her.

    “Jesus, why are you-“ I mutter angrily, straddling the toilet paper dispenser and the omnipresent tiny trash can on either side of the stall to try and pull her down from where she was squatting, actually on top of the dividers, in the scant space between their tops and the ceiling. She resists, staring wild-eyed back at me. “Why the fuck did you disappear like that?”

    She scuttles rapidly back along the beam, leaping onto the divider behind her. I heave myself, as best I could, to lie on top of my divider, glaring daggers at her. “I apologize it was very nice music-“ Her voice is panicked, words rushing together, and she’s sitting, wire-taut, in the corner there, looking like she could either lash out or run like Hell. Chasing a panicked angel through a public bathroom while all my colleagues think I’m secretly gay. This is now what I signed up for when I let her into my house. At all.

    I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself. I’d never seen this before, and yes, it was highly frustrating, but it couldn’t be a good thing to upset a twitchy divine being with considerable magical powers. “It’s okay. I’m not angry, but you disappearing was really weird.” I reach out gently to try and touch her, but she flinches away. “Look, let’s get down from here, and then we can talk about it, all right?” The plastic divider is cutting uncomfortably into my stomach, and I feel a bit like I’m going to fall, not to mention the indignity of it all. Arael tries to steady herself, slowly breathing in, and out again, before staring at me, nodding, and carefully stepping down onto the bathroom floor. I follow with relief (Thank god no one was in here…), and quickly exit the stall to meet her.

    “I’m very sorry.” her voice is low, nearly inaudible, and she’s studiously examining the floor as she speaks. “It was lovely music, but the second movement became a bit distressing. I didn’t want to embarrass you in front of your group, so I discreetly took my leave.”

    “Okay, well, you might have meant to do that, but you were our only audience member.” She’s still watching the floor, refusing to meet my gaze and facing away from me. I reach out and move her face to look at mine, letting my hand fall back to my side. She looks terrified. “That wasn’t discreet. By definition, anything that you do isn’t going to be discreet.” I put a hand to my temple and lean over the sink, and she suddenly flinches at the sudden movement, trembling like a whipped dog who knows it’s screwed something up. This is… kind of pathetic, actually.

    “Look,” I mutter, still kind of exasperated and not really knowing how to help the situation. “Please, just relax or something. I just want to figure out what’s going on so we don’t have to have this situation again.” I decide that being blunt and obvious is probably the best method. “My colleagues started asking me a number of awkward questions in there when you disappeared, and it’s not exactly fun for me to have to answer all of that.” I hop up onto the counter, between a pair of sinks, and slap the space next to me a couple of times. “Come on. Let’s talk about this like we’re mature adults, instead of a stupid twenty-something, and some sort of ageless thing from beyond the dawn of time.” A sort of hiccough of laughter emanates from the thing standing in the living room, and she hesitantly sits beside me on the sink. Her feet are flat on the floor, while mine are about six inches from the ground. Stupid tall motherfucker.

    We’re silent for a long moment. I was about to motion her onwards, hopefully jumpstart this conversation before someone came in (Although, again, I was maybe wondering if she didn’t have something to do with that not happening.) when she began to speak.

    “Holst made an interesting choice in juxtaposing those two pieces, and really, they’re probably the most worthy parts of the composition.” She’s still talking quietly and looking down again, and I know that she’s leading up to something, but it’d be nice if we could skip the art history lesson. Particularly when I have to strain to make it out. “Masculine and feminine, war and peace, Heaven and Hell, Mars and Venus. Ignoring the obvious implications of the actual planets; Mars being able to host life, Venus’ atmosphere being subject to gaseous storms of vaporized metal-“

    “Getting a little off-track there.” I say, coaxingly. I don’t know how she sees and walks, what with her shins black and blue from falling into rabbit holes.

    “Apologies.” She looks up and gives a little half-smile, shifting just enough to face me. Her wings have changed position behind her, and I can see the flash of blueish-gray feathers through the opening of the coat. “Holst perhaps didn’t intend it, but I can’t help but hear Heaven and and Hell in his works, and neither are particularly comforting when I confront them unexpectedly.”

    Huh. That’s odd. I don’t know what I was expecting to hear, but that wasn’t it. “You’re an angel though. Heaven would be a good thing for you, right? Surely you’ve got to miss it.”

    My confusion must have shown on my face- scratch that, sorry, she must have picked up on the blatant confusion I had plastered all over my face, because she did actually laugh, just a little. “I’m on Earth to get away from Heaven. It’s loud up there. Really.” She adds, noticing my disbelieving expression.

    “You lot, all the righteous souls, are all enjoying their communion and reward by seeing and finally understanding each other and the LORD, coming together in perfect love. The Heavenly waitstaff are all on the same telepathic wavelength, and it’s literally, physically impossible to have your head to yourself, and when that’s not happening, we’re physically all close together. It’s really nice sometimes, we’re all part of a flock, but I just can’t do it. Out of sync.”

    All is quiet again, as I try to go over this in my head. “That’s why you hang out on Earth, annoying college students? Got a job as a guardian angel to get away from it all?” I answer finally, still a bit unclear on how any of this related to Venus or Mars.

    “Guardian angels don’t exist.” Well, shit. “Sometimes higher-ranking guys get to do what He tells us to do on a special mission, but mostly we’re psychopomps; we guide and collect souls and then run Heaven when we bring you up there. That’s it.” She shrugs, and I suddenly realize that I’m about to get a dissertation on the afterlife, whether I like it or not. “

    If we don’t, then you either fade away, find your way to Purgatory, where you can eventually become a pure soul and be reborn, or to Hell, where you just… exist, until someone decides to chuck you back to Earth or Purgatory.” She looks at me balefully. “Hell is a bitch to get out of. It doesn’t happen without divine assistance. Admittedly, that can be a demon or angel, or the LORD himself, but apart from that, you’re stuck down there.”

    I’m struck by a thought, and it’s not exactly comforting. “You’d bring me up, right? I’m not perfect, but…”

    She gets the point, and steadily looks me over. Objectively, as if she were observing the condition of a prize horse or turnip. “No.”

    Oh shit. Oh shit oh shit oh shit. Should’ve seen this coming. Intercourse out of wedlock, snickering in choir… “Okay, so do good deeds work, or is that like trying to bribe my way in-“

    “No, no!” She’s suddenly waving her hands around everywhere and backpedaling as quickly as possible, all that pleasant intellectual calm I’d tried to cultivate gone in a flash. “No, I mean, I won’t be the one to take you up. If you were to die right now, Samandriel would do it, probably. I think it’s his beat. I’m so far off the radar I basically don’t exist, and I’d like to keep it that way.” She says, staring straight at me and nearly hissing the words through her teeth, as if afraid that the entire heavenly host would suddenly burst out of a nearby stall and spirit her away.

    “Okay.” I said, still reeling a little from my almost-condemnation to Hell and sudden ascension. “So, like witness protection?”

    “Basically, although the LORD knows where I am, for all that it matters. He hasn’t told yet, so apparently this is cool by him. I just have to stay away from everyone else.”

    “From the entire heavenly host.” Conversations I never thought I’d be having in a bathroom…

    “I have very good hiding spots.”

    “In my apartment.”

    “Yes, although if you do evict me, I have others.”

    I’ll admit it, I’m curious. “Exactly where would you go? You know, to hide from the entirety of Heaven? Thrones and cherubs, principalities and powers?” She gives me a questioning look and I brush it off as best as possible. “I’ve been doing my homework, okay?” I say, slightly defensively. She seems satisfied.

    “Spaces between atoms is a good choice. Wildebeest in migration once, inside a Russian man’s mouth, deep salt mines, really, anywhere can work. Oh, not really a good hiding place, per se, but throwing yourself into Hell works really well to shake off pursuit.” She adds offhandedly, as if it were something not really relevant, but maybe an interesting aside. I do a double take.

    “Hell.”

    “They don’t like burning their wings.”

    “Hell?”

    “Yes.” She says, deadly earnestly.

    I splutter a little bit. “And you get back out?” I snap my fingers, indignantly. “Just like that?”

    “Yeah…” She says, finally seeming a little hesitant. “You… did realize, I’m not exactly a foot soldier up there, right? You picked up on that?” I shake my head and she wilts a little. This is news to me.

    “You don’t exactly say a lot about yourself.” I offer, by way of explanation. She seems just a little disappointed. “That, and you mentioned superiors a while back. I took that to mean that you probably weren’t too high up on the totem pole.”

    She thinks for a long moment. “I don’t remember a lot of what I say, but… no, I remember. I understand your logic.” She grins just a little, as if that was the neatest thing that had happened all day. “I’m people-shaped, though. I bear the visage of the LORD’s highest creation. Not everyone gets that.”

    “Huh.” I say, having sort of reached a weirdness overload. “Interesting perspective on things. Never thought about it like that.”

    “It’s not all good, though.” She suddenly bemoans, beginning to gaze off into mid-distance, although that basically meant she was staring at a toilet. “You guys, seriously, most of you are just not attractive animals. I enjoy the conscious thought, and free will, and I’ll stand behind you ’til the death, but seriously. I’ve never seen an ugly bird.” She turns brightly, excitedly towards me.

    “You know, I vouched for maniraptorian dinosaurs to be the dominant lifeforms on earth. Everyone would have bright, shiny feathers then, and I think we’d all be happier for it.” The sincerity in her tone was perfectly true, and I almost didn’t have the heart to tell her the depth of my insulted feeling. Almost.

    “Yeah… I’m going to have the side with no. I’m a human. I like having the humans around.” She looked slightly crestfallen, but nodded nonetheless. A thought occurred to me. “And besides,” I say shrewdly, nudging her in the ribs. “You certainly seem to think Gabe’s awful pretty, and I’m about one-hundred-and-ten percent certain that she’s not a bird.”

    Arael makes an odd, full-body twitch and it momentarily looks like I’ve given her some sort of aneurism. Like she had some sort of blue screen of death moment up in that giant head of hers and is having to do a system reboot. 

    I really can’t stop it. It’s just such a bizarre juxtaposition, I have to snicker a little bit, and then the floodgates are opened. I laugh in spite of myself and clap her on the shoulder before hopping off the sink. She follows gingerly, and somewhat befuddled at my prompting and we make our way out of the bathroom, emotional catharsis complete.

    “Hey,” I say, conversationally, as we walk out into the hallway, towards the streets. “You do know I was just joking right? About your girlfriend?”

    She looks down at me, a hesitant smile once again on her face. “I did get that after you started laughing. You…” She pauses, thinks, trying to get the words right as we walk along. “Didn’t take the bit about the birds badly? Because for what it’s worth, I am glad that humanity came along.”

    I’m touched. Vaguely. Just a little. “Hey, that’s really nice-”

    “You created racing pigeons,” Yep, she’s normal again. Back to her old self.“and I like those quite a lot. And you, in particular, have a lot to be said for you with regards to aesthetics.”

    It takes me a moment to figure out exactly what she’s saying there. “Oh? So that’s where you’re coming from?” I smirk a little up at her. “So if I were a bird, what kind of bird would I be?” The smile that lights up her face even makes the lecture on the merits of the alpine chough mostly worth it.