An Angel Living

Tw: explicit mention of suicide and death

She moved like a faerie. She shined like a star. She was unreal. 

I can’t believe I found her here. In the cold onslaught of winter I found an angel of peace and serenity in a castle of luxury. She beckoned me in like a succubus of innocence. She warmed me and set out my clothes. She drew me a bath and made me a feast. I couldn’t believe my eyes. 

“Angel, you look like death.” she said.

“I’m aware,” I returned, “who are you?”

“Venus, but you already knew that.”

“What?” 

“Nevermind, get dressed.” she giggled. 

She left me. I didn’t want to but I knew who she was. I pushed it away. I had too. I put on an elegant gown she had picked out of the beautiful closet. It didn’t suit me. I dug until I found something appropriate in our current state. I couldn’t believe she was still here. She looked the same, maybe better. I walked through the estate with an overwhelming sense of nostalgia. It’s been too long. Six years, I think. 

I had lived here before. I had loved her before. In those days, I was just a servant. She was savvy. She had a mind like I’d never seen. She loved me. She loved me like I’d never been loved. Too much. She saved me. It was like nothing we’d ever seen, the end of times. The subduing of the rampant illness caused an all time high in worldwide birth rates. The economy was struggling but it was nothing yet. Something happens when children are born, others want to have them. Two consecutive baby booms, each worse than the first. The farming industry couldn’t keep up. Prices skyrocketed, the poor died. The middle class now had too many children to feed and many of them died of starvation or suicide. The rest stripped fields of their resources until they resorted to cannibalism. Eventually the rich became the hungry. They ate the remaining of the middle class, then their servants, and finally, themselves. Those left tried to farm but died of poor food preparation techniques. The ultra rich ultimately went insane from isolation and succumbed. It was a massacre. Venus took me to the seaside and told me to take the boat out and just survive. She stuffed it with food and edible greenery. Things were already so far gone. I wouldn’t go without her. She promised to meet me at the beach two years from now. The poor had gone, the middle class were going. She promised she was going into hiding. I wanted to stay but she begged. I went. I went and it was miserable.

I lived for two years in a desolate, rich man’s boat house. I had a cat to keep me sane. She was easy to take care of. I stopped on small, deserted islands some days to let her roam and restock freshwater. She was perfect. We ruled the seas, lonely and afraid. I read to her and she slept with me. I drew her often. I took polaroids with her on my journey. I still have all of them. She was my best friend. When the two years had gone by, I stopped on a bigger island to test the waters. I combed the island and not one person stood. We spotted a cat, though. He was perfectly healthy. I stayed there for days. My kitten loved him. I let her stay there. She was growing old in age and I didn’t want to watch her die. I made a little home for them and painted for their home. It was beautiful. I didn’t want to say goodbye, but I needed to. 

I came here in the fall. I don’t remember a day. I drank all the time. I only remember taking a necklace she wore. I was devastated. I left to travel Europe in hopes of finding something. I found beauty. I saw the cleanest seas and the barest plains. I found sadness. I walked through streets of skeletons. I found hope. I witnessed the births of the very few surviving organisms. I never ate them, I couldn’t bring myself to. I played records of her favorite songs and danced alone. I made her favorite foods and made an extra plate for her every time. I gave up. I wandered with many different animals. I left directions to go to northern Italy in the larger cities I went to. I knew I’d go back.

I wandered back just before winter. I was cold and tired. I walked over the hill and saw her. After six years, I saw her dancing in the garden. I screamed for her and ran to the tree she stood under. She told me to just lie down, and so I did. I woke up in the night and walked to her bed and went to sleep next to her. 

Now I walk, it feels sad but good. She’s at the table now, just drinking a glass of red. I’ve never seen someone so ethereal. She smiled at me.

“Now I knew you wouldn’t like it but I couldn’t have even caught a glimpse?” She laughed and walked over to me. I saw her kiss me but I couldn’t feel it. 

“Go grab something to eat from the cans you brought last time. You look starved.” 

“I want to talk to you,” I whispered, she heard it from across the room and I tried to forget why, “I missed you.”

She gestured outside.

“I’ll sit under the tree and you can do some gardening. We can talk all day.”

I walked out and began to work. We talked about books and moons and impossible futures like nothing had changed. We went to bed quietly. We had the same routine everyday. She’d sit under the tree and I’d work, sometimes I’d sit with her. It didn’t matter if it was raining or snowing. She started to make me laugh again and at some point I was ok again. She and I had a perfect life. 

In the summers I’d garden and cook on the fire and she’d tell a joke I’d heard before but I wasn’t bothered. We could lay out in the stars and talk about funny things people used to do. Sometimes I cried, she never did. She comforted me but I couldn’t shake the irony of it. I cried a lot in the summer. I’d left in the summer. I apologized everyday. She just looked at me with a sad smile. “It hurt you longer.” she’d say to ease me. It didn’t help. I sang to her. I cried through all of our favorite songs. I tried to teach her the languages I’d learned in my travels. She loved it when I spoke in a language she didn’t understand. Now, she knew them, too, without me even teaching her. I kept teaching, the way I would’ve liked to before. She didn’t mind. I told her I would’ve married her and she assured me she knew but I doubted it. I went to her closet to remember. She always wore pretty dresses with flowers or silk or laces. Now she wears the same gown she wore the last night we danced together. It’s beautiful, but it feels like a stab in the heart. She wears a necklace I used to wear. I left it when I took the one she wore.

I avoided mirrors when I was with Venus. I tried so desperately. I wanted to break them all. But what is man if not vain? She wanted to help me put her necklace on myself and walked me to the mirror. She put it on with a smile but the mirror showed only me, putting her necklace on. I started to cry. She sat on the floor as I remembered taking her necklace off of her body and putting mine on her before burying her. She always told me she wanted to be buried under that tree. I found her holding an old photo of me and a note reading:

I didn’t want it to come to you or me. It has to be you. Please don’t forget me. I love you, and I know you love me. I didn’t mean to lie. I hope you’ll forgive me. When you go, come to the garden, and once again we’ll dance. 

What a fool, to think I could forget. Venus told me to hang on for her. I will. I could do anything for her. I’ll find someone living someday, just to tell them how much she meant, to let someone know that she was an angel, even when living.