Startled Angels (620 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.83 on 14 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Ballare (View user info) at 2007-08-05 05:51:59 EDT
From the west, for the most part unseen by the sleeping spinning planet, flies a flock of angels. They are radiant and marvellous to behold, their wings are wide and strong and pristine white, and they are fierce and powerful and handsome.
"Where's he at?"
His voice, her father's voice, is harsh and rasping. It is too loud, too hoarse, as though he'd swallowed too much gravel, and Marilynn pushes herself up against the window ledge and wraps the frayed comforter tighter around her shoulders. She presses her head against the chilled glass, nudging away the cheap heavy drapes, so that she couldn't see the rectangle of light from under her door, only the cool darkness without.
"I said, where's he at?"
Her mother's voice in return was a soft hooting whisper, a mumble of words that fell out of her as though he'd shaken her too hard - as if she were a tattered, beaten jewellery box, dropped too many times on the floor, casually mistreated. She doesn't know, she doesn't know, he's gone, he's gone. Her son's gone somewhere now where he can't touch him.
There is a noise, fist against flesh; several noises, glass against wood.
For Marilynn, there is nothing but the wide black sky. Spattered across the night, carelessly thrown by a flicked paintbrush, lay the bright pulsing stars, her carefree nightly attendants. She smiles at them, and they throb back, and she is unaware that this is caused by their light refracting against the turbulent atmosphere, but does not care.
From the west comes a pale light. It may have be the dawn, but it is still too early. It may have been the light of a distant town, but there is none in that direction for miles and miles and miles. Marilynn, silent and ignorant, disregards the glow. She is fascinated by the stars, by their everlasting presence, as she has always been, and with her thin fingers she traces spidery constellations against the glass and watches as the condensation from her breath materializes and slowly fades.
There is a gentle murmured sob from beyond her closed door, but Marilynn pays no attention.
Marilynn's father, who felt he was himself an upstanding and proper god-fearing man, wipes red wetness from his hand, steps over his wife, and goes to the kitchen, where he pours himself half a tumbler of whiskey. He leans on the filthy counter, propping his elbow in toast crumbs and butter, and gazes out the window. Naturally, he is already drunk, and perhaps this is why he stares unsteadily for a long moment to the west, his watery blue eyes fixed on some distant object.
The light at the corner of her eye has grown so bright now that Marilynn cannot ignore it. She turns her somnolent gaze toward the glow, and she begins to distinguish form and figure; huge beating feathered wings and bare human shapes. It is a flock of angels. They are radiant and marvellous to behold, their wings are wide and strong and pristine white, and they are fierce and powerful and handsome.
Now, she hears a strangled cry from the kitchen, and the screen door bangs noisily, startling her so that she gasps. She becomes vaguely conscious that her father is screaming, shouting, roaring at the sky, and she closes her eyes to picture him, head thrown back, cursing and spitting, hands tight about his gun, perhaps. His anger is hot and burning and Marilynn flattens her palms over her ears and buries herself under her blankets, shielding herself from his wrath.
She does not hear the wild explosions of noise that startle the angels so that they flare their wings and lose drifting feathers to the gentle wind and wheel around and have only seconds to see the man and open their arms in a sign of peace until they are cursed by him and shotgunned from the sky.
And she does not see the broken bodies drifting toward the ground, spilling golden light from their ragged wounds, their beautiful corpses fractured and twisted and their wings shattered and bent.
And she does not feel the pain of her father, who has fallen to his knees, his hands clutching blindly at the stained grass, as he sobs his pitiful broken heart out with the grief of a lost soul.
User Reviews
Submitted by Progr3ss (user info) at 2007-08-09 04:59:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
BEST TRILOGY OF ALL TIME!!!!!
Why?
Cause there's five books in the series.
I read them once a year.
Submitted by messmind (user info) at 2007-08-07 16:56:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Ballare (user info) at 2007-08-06 13:29:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Director (user info) at 2007-08-05 11:55:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Holy Shooting Angels From The Sky, Batman!
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The irony in this is that I spent all morning watching Batman reruns. There's a marathon on until 4 o'clock tomorrow morning..
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2007-08-06 12:41:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Director (user info) at 2007-08-05 11:55:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Holy Shooting Angels From The Sky, Batman!
Submitted by monkeyswithguns (user info) at 2007-08-06 09:10:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by DirtyHarry (user info) at 2007-08-06 05:36:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
auto-shotty ftw
Submitted by DCWoody (user info) at 2007-08-06 05:29:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
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Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2007-08-05 12:20:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
In my world there are no angels. But if there were, they wouldn't be vulnerable to shotguns.
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Submitted by freebie (user info) at 2007-08-05 20:19:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thats a lot of words Im not gonna read. +2 for the effort
Submitted by sir_cowman (user info) at 2007-08-05 15:36:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I liked it, but not as much as usual.
Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2007-08-05 12:20:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
In my world there are no angels. But if there were, they wouldn't be vulnerable to shotguns.
Submitted by Director (user info) at 2007-08-05 11:55:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Holy Shooting Angels From The Sky, Batman!
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2007-08-05 10:35:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2007-08-05 10:25:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I've had "Boys of Summer" stuck in my head for the last few days.
I swear, once that thing gets in there, it's slow in coming out.
The Don Henley version, by the way.
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2007-08-05 10:24:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Needs more domestic vio...
Oh, nevermind.
Very good.