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“Nobody ever believes me when I say I’ve met an angel.”
It’s a complaint that’s left his lips every single day for the past week, so Nikolai’s not feeling so upset about it anymore. Come to think of it, it’s not like he’s ever felt that upset about it to begin with. After all, there’s a certain charm to the thought of being the only one who can see this apparition in front of him.
Surrounded by white in every direction, to the point that even the angel’s ebony locks are dusted by the snowflakes that pour steadily from the sky. To the point that the winter has stolen the blood right out of the other’s lips, making them look chapped and pale.
The angel opens his eyes and reveals amethyst eyes. As though he’s simply waking up from a long, comfortable dream, his voice is soft, cadence slow as he observes, “You are here again.”
“Yup! I told you I’ll come by every day, right?” His legs ache a bit, so he crouches down on the snow and parks his backside on the ground. In front of him, the angel remains lying down half-buried on the snow. “I like you, so I’ll keep my promise!”
“Which means to say that the sincerity of your promise depends on arbitrary factors such as ‘liking me’?”
He scrunches his nose at that. Really, he isn’t stupid like what every person and every animal’s been telling him, but he does feel a little bit stupid whenever he hears this angel talk to him. The kind of stupid that brings with it a campfire-like warmth in his belly, similar to when he manages to eat the occasional warm meal. Russia is almost unbearably cold, and underfunded orphanages at the edge of derelict rural towns have very little in supply of warmth. He gulps down air and tries to cover up his almost-demure uncertainty with a resolute, “I like you so I’ll keep my promises to you!”
“Is that so,” the angel responds, blinking up at the grey skies. Disinterested isn’t accurate in describing his expression. It’s not like the angel doesn’t look like he isn’t listening to him at all. It’s more like, the angel seems to have predicted his words and actions anyway, and he’s simply confirming it.
That kind of wisdom is interesting. He’s never bothered to want to predict what will happen an hour ahead, much less thirteen hours, forty-three weeks or anything further into the future. Things happen as they happen, the world he’s in entrapping him to a certain set of events and opportunities. Sometimes, he elects to try to do something jarring to bring fireworks-burst of chaos into his surroundings, but his enjoyment fades eventually, until he’s left wanting again.
“You’re always here,” Nikolai points out, as he piles misshapen snowballs along the outline of the angel. “Is there anything interesting in the sky above? Are you actually an angel that fell from heaven, and you want to return there? Is that why you’re always staring up?”
For a week now, he’s seen this angel here, surrounded by snow, purple eyes focused on the skies that look plain in its bleakness. The angel’s never deigned to tilt his head to catch sight of his face, even as they trade words. He’s the more talkative one, as he tends to be, but the angel doesn’t actually tell him to shut up or anything like that. He responds, however briefly-worded, and that matters a lot.
“I am waiting,” the angel says, soft and patient, and doesn’t elaborate.
He doesn’t press for more details, and instead talks about one of the orphanage’s caretakers stealing catfish, potatoes and broth from the kitchens. Telling on the caretaker has only merited Nikolai a beating to his legs. Thankfully, it’s not so bad that he can’t make his way to this clearing. If he curls his legs just-so, the mere act of seating down can even be not that painful.
“An unfair punishment,” the angel intones with the weight of a gavel, before adding, “if they thought you dishonest, they should have punished your tongue instead.”
He ends up bursting into laughter at that.
-
The laughter warms him up much better and for much longer compared to the single lukewarm meal for the day. In fact, he’s in such a pleasant mood that he doesn’t even bother fighting back against the grown-ups who spit on his food and who gives him another round of punishment for sneaking out of the orphanage and whatever chores they’ve piled up on him.
It’s all so repetitive and boring, but it’s that same repetitiveness that brings the angel by that abandoned, snow-filled clearing on a daily basis. So it can’t be that bad, right? The thought of the angel brings a joyous grin to his lips—and the grown-ups murmur “crazy” and “insane” as though he can’t hear them.
Still, he’s in a good mood, so he doesn’t silence them for disturbing his reminiscence of the angel’s face with their unwelcome mutterings.
-
And so, in the next day and the next and the next, he escapes to the clearing to the find the angel who never smiles. Just like the day before and the day before and the day before, the angel doesn’t look at him directly, but doesn’t chase him away either.
Not even when he shapes elaborate designs on the complicated mermaid tail made of snow that he piles up over the other’s legs. Not even when he whispers terrible things such as wanting to steal the tongues and pluck the fingernails of everyone else in the orphanage. Not even when he offers a live demonstration of the magical coat that has been with him ever since he can remember, throwing it towards a snow-white rabbit that has skittishly approached the unmoving angel. Not even when his magic trick has resulted in the rabbit being sliced in an uneven half, its beady eyes dull moments after it’s been eviscerated.
No, the angel doesn’t even deign him with a curious tilt of his head. But he doesn’t ignore him, as the angel asks with enviable serenity, as beetles start their song to welcome the moonrise: “Is it not past the time that you are expected to return to your orphanage?”
He feels his heart squeeze. The confirmation that the other does pay attention to him and his routine, that the other is not like those boring people who’d shriek upon witnessing the spray of blood—it’s making him want to do things. Flashier things. It makes him think about seeing a different expression on the angel’s face, a minute twitch on his placid calm, a smile that’s bound to look beautiful in its rarity.
“You don’t need to be worried about me, angel!” He says as he dusts off the snowflakes that have settled over his knees. “But I find that I really, really like the feeling of you worrying about me, so if you really want to do so, I won’t stop you! Will you be going back home to heaven once I leave?”
The angel closes his eyes as though to ignore him.
But he hears it, just as he’s picking up his coat that’s tinged with the rabbit’s blood and guts—a silent whisper of, “I am not an angel, Kolya”, that whistles along with the blustery winter gale.
“I’ll see you tomorrow!” He says with glee, keeping that whisper close to his heart. He’s always been accused of simply imagining the things he hears, but this one, he’s a hundred percent certain is reality.
-
It is also a reality that in the next day, he’s blocked off by one of the caretakers, just as he’s about to wiggle out of the hole in the iron fences boxing the orphanage’s perimeter. There is palpable rage warring with distasteful superiority on the grown-up’s face. It’s familiar, even if this appears more potent than usual.
“I’m going to be late, you know?” He whines, because the angel may not say it, but he can sense that the other is a stickler for punctuality. Never mind the fact that he never even tilts his head to directly meet his greedy stares. It’s okay, he understands. They always say to never stare madness in the eye, after all. But the caretaker doesn’t budge, simply makes cracking sounds with his knuckles. So he whines some more. “My angel is waiting for me!”
The caretaker’s face sours like three-weeks-old milk, curdled and unpleasant. The words “crazy” and “insane” trickle out of the man’s mouth, and his callused hands reach out to drag him by his coat. The coat that still has the blood splatters from yesterday. The coat that has witnessed the moment he’s spent in the angel’s company.
The thought that this undeserving entity can touch it, can touch something that’s part of a sacred instance—it awakens something inside him. A beast so hungry from all the days where getting to eat one full meal is asking for too much. A beast so feverish from all the nights where getting to blanket oneself from the unforgiving winter is asking for the impossible. A beast, plain and simple.
“Do you want to witness a magic show?”
As he asks his rhetorical question of his current audience, he takes a jaunty half-step back, a crescent moon dawning over his mouth. His coat flutters around him, alive and hungry, and he is ready to feel even more alive.
-
By the time that he skips away from the makeshift bonfire that he’s made out of the crumbling remains of the orphanage tucked in the middle of a forest, it’s already near sunset. He’s had too much fun testing the limits of his coat’s abilities and he’s lost sight of his priority to kill them all so they’ll stop making it difficult for him to sneak out and meet the angel.
But it turns out that his angel really does pay attention to him.
Amethyst eyes are bright when their gazes meet.
“You’re here!” He finds himself exclaiming unnecessarily. He finds himself leaping to close the distance between them, landing nimbly on his right foot despite the ache still lingering there. He finds himself clutching at the other’s elbows to regain his balance, the other’s clothes thick and warm. He finds himself blinking into the other’s face, finds himself helpless but to repeat in wonder: “You’re here!”
“That is an impressive display,” the angel says, nodding slightly at the bonfire that burns and burns, the scent of the burning flesh starting to overpower the earthy smell of the woodland, the clinical smell of winter.
His grin stretches. “I did well, didn’t I?”
“Mm,” the angel allows, just as he allows him to continue clinging for a few moments more. “Let us go – it will be difficult to travel without sunlight.”
“Oh!” He peers at the angel’s body – and finds that he can’t see any wings. Ah, so this angel is just like him, with no wings to speak of. Still… “Are you taking me to heaven with you?”
A sigh. “…Kolya.”
He perks into attention, intrigued by the fact that this angel not only knows of his name, but has also given him a nickname. “Yes, angel?”
Another sigh. “I have mentioned this beforehand: I am not an angel.”
“Then, maybe you should tell me your name so I’ll know what to call you!” Rather smooth of him, if he must say so.
“My name is Fyodor Dostoevsky.” The angel introduces himself, but doesn’t offer a hand to shake. So he lets his own hands travel down the other’s arms so he can clasp the gloved hands in his. The angel continues, “I will bring you to a place where everyone will be free and be free of their sins.”
Freedom.
Having known nothing but the orphanage lined with fences, guarded with caretakers, gilded with strange laboratory contraptions, filled with records about human experiments: the concept of freedom is alien on him.
Above them, a vulture circles the area, scenting the carrion.
He squeezes the other’s hand and agrees, “Okay, Dos-kun.”
Amethyst eyes glitter and a soft, terrifying smile is on the angel’s face. He finds himself returning it with a much wider grin and the world suddenly feels so wide, so bright, that even the coldest of blizzards can only feel so warm. His only thought is that he’s found himself an interesting angel indeed, an angel that can appreciate a great many things, even decay and madness.
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