Eden's Angel

I could hear things, but I didn’t know what they were. It was a very high pitched sound, and it came over and over again. It didn’t hurt my ears, and just knowing it was an earthly sound made me love it even more. My hands were touching something; it felt prickly, little pieces of something sticking me in my palms. Actually, those little prickles were all over my body, or at least only on the front part of my body. I took a deep breath, and after noticing that I had my eyes closed tightly, I slowly slid them open.

I wasn’t sure what I was looking at, but it was absolutely beautiful. There was green and brown all around me. There was so much green on the ground; the little prickly things touching me were green, I guessed it was the grass. The brown things were long and very tall, and all the way at the top there was green there too. I think I had heard an angel talk about these once, he called them trees. I liked how trees looked.

I pushed myself up off of the ground where I was laying, and I looked around me more. There were trees everywhere, some big, some little. I looked up, and it was amazing to see clouds above me rather than under my feet. They were pretty from far away, one could appreciate them from far away.

Just then a slight pressure pushed against me, not painfully, just enough to move my hair out of my face, and send a slight chill down my spine. The trees moved with it too, they were pushed slightly and the grass wavered. My ears heard that sound again, and instinctively I looked towards what made the high pitched sound. There was something blue sitting in the tree; it was very small, and had an odd body shape. It looked like it had wings—it did have wings—and a sharp mouth. I stared at it without knowing what it was, but completely mystified and captivated by it.

As I stared at it, my expression slowly turned from awestruck wonder to worry. While I watched this creature, and watched the way it moved and lived, the realization dawned on me that I didn’t know the first thing about living on earth. I hardly knew anything about it. Perhaps I should have asked Lucifer about how to survive on earth before I asked to be zapped there. I didn’t even know where I was. I was around a lot of trees and grass, but I know that a lot of the planet has that. I didn’t know where to go, what to do. I didn’t even know where the people where. What if they couldn’t understand me? What if they spoke a language I didn’t even know?

Panic started to settle in my bones. I made a terrible mistake, a mistake that my father, the angels, or even God himself will ever forgive. I’ve cast myself out of the only home I’ve ever know. They’ll never let me back in when they hear of what I’ve done. I’ve disgraced the heavenly name, and all the heavenly hosts. Especially my father. My father, I can’t even imagine the look on his face. I’m now more of a disappointment to him than I ever have been.

And the worst part, I was completely alone.

I felt my eyes begin to sting and my breathing started to feel weird; a feeling I had never had before. It almost felt like I couldn’t control myself, my body started to heave, and weird gasping sounds burst out of my lips. I could feel my face scrunch together and my eyes and cheeks began to feel wet, but I was near no water. I couldn’t get control of myself no matter how hard I tried. Am I dying? Is this what dying feels like?

Just then, in my hysteria, I began to hear more sounds. But not the sounds like the winged creature made, or when the pressure pushed against the trees, it was a rustling sound from the beyond them. I turned quickly towards it, though my vision was skewed by the water in my eyes. I wiped them clear, attempted to calm my breathing, and focused on the sound that now had a vague image with it. Something was out there moving, and it kept getting bigger and bigger. Then it disappeared right before my eyes.

I stared in the now empty space, my eyes in a frenzy looking all over for whatever was just out there, but I came up with no answers. Was this something normal on earth? Maybe I just wasn’t fit for this place, maybe I belong in hiding. I felt the sting and wetness begin to return to my eyes.

“Looks like you’re having a rough day.”

I swung my body around instinctively towards the voice, water still on my face. It was a person, I think. I rubbed my eyes clear of the wetness again, and blinked a few times for clarity. I saw arms and legs just like mine, a head and body. It looked like a boy, a human boy.

I stared at him, I couldn’t look away. I knew humans were supposed to look just the same as angels, but they didn’t, not really. Angels were pale as ice, and they all had golden white hair. This boy, he was the opposite. His skin was light, but looked darker than mine. And his hair was dark and so different from mine that it was beautiful. It was brown, or maybe black, and it had a little bit of red in there somewhere. I couldn’t look away, and the sting in my eyes slowly disappeared.

But then I took notice that he was staring at me, but not at my face, at my body. I furrowed my brows a little at him, confused. “What?”

His eyebrows rose in shock, but I thought I caught the smallest glimpse of playfulness in his eyes. “Seriously? What?” He extended an arm and motioned towards my body. I looked down at myself, and I felt my cheeks get very hot very quickly.

I was naked.

I didn’t know much about humans, but I did know they took nudity very offensively, for whatever reason. I quickly threw my hands over my chest and hips, trying to cover myself as quickly as possible. I kept looking down, too ashamed to look back up at the boy.

“The first time I meet a human, and I’m naked. Great.” I sighed pathetically. This whole first day on earth thing isn’t going so well. He chuckled above me, a sound I above all else didn’t expect to hear.

“I’m not a human.” My eyes flew back up, despite my embarrassment. A tiny curve was poking at the corner of his mouth.

“You’re not?”

“Nope.” The curve pulled more. I stared at him, confusion slowly making its transition over my entire face. “Well, technically I was, but that was a pretty long time ago.” He shrugged his shoulders. His very big, very pretty shoulders.

“You were? Then what are you now?” The pull gave way and his lips exploded into a full smile. He glanced around himself then back at me.

“Well, right now I’m kind of your tour guide. Ariella, right?” The confusion on my face grew deeper into my skin, and a slight pinch of caution echoed through my skeleton.

“How do you know who I am?” I asked very slowly.

“Your uncle sent me. He said you may be a little disgruntled and confused since you're a first timer. Oh, he also said you might want this.” He turned his body slightly, and reached an arm around to the back of him and pulled something out of his pocket, then tossing it at me. I grabbed it and held it up to examine it. It was a simple black dress, looking like it stopped just before the knees. It had holes in it, or rather tears it looked like, but I suppose it would be better than being naked.

“There are tears in it.”

“We don’t exactly have designer clothes down there,” he scoffed. I was about to slip the neck hole over my head when his words caught my attention.

“Down there? You mean—”

“Hell.” I stared at him.

“So that means you're a—”

“Demon.” As if I wasn’t in enough trouble already. Now I’m talking to demons. “Name’s Eden.” He sent a crooked smile my way, and I would be lying if I said it didn’t give me a funny feeling in my stomach. A good or bad feeling, I didn’t know. His smile faded ever slightly, and was replaced with a sly grin. “And as much as I would love to keep looking at your body,” he stole a quick glace between breaths, and I pulled the dress closer to me. “I would really suggest you put that thing on now. Real humans wouldn’t take kindly to a hot naked half angel running around their streets.” I blinked.

“I’m not warm.” He started to chuckle as I stood up and pulled the dress over my head. It wasn’t a perfect fit, it was a little bit loose, but it had to do for now. Eden was quiet as I dressed, and I saw out of the corner of my eye that he was looking downward, and had his hands in his pockets. He looked bored.

“So why were you crying?” he said into the quiet as I was trying to tug all the wrinkles out of the dress. I glanced up only once before focusing back on fixing myself.

“Crying?” A humorless laugh came out, and it caught my attention enough to bring my eyes back to him. Now standing, I could see his eyes better. They were dark, and had a deep red tint to them. I know they were supposed to look scary and well, demonic, but I couldn’t help but think they were kind of pretty too.

“Right, right. I forgot. Up in heaven, ‘there is no pain, there are no tears.’ It’s a paradise up there, I forgot.” A paradise to the dead maybe. He sighed in obvious annoyance. “Crying is when every single bad emotion attacks you at once; attacks you and brings you to the ground and beats you until you can’t breathe. Crying is what happens when there are no more words for the pain, when words can’t even begin to describe it.”

I knew what pain was, but I had never heard it described like that. The angels had always just talked about it as a bad thing, something that no one wants. But the way Eden described it, it sounded like torture, almost like dying without the death. And since I was crying, it only made me wonder if I was torturing myself with all those thoughts. I didn’t look at him.

I heard him shift positions in front of me, moving his weight from one leg to another. I didn’t know if demons felt emotions like angels do, if we can even feel the same ones, but by the way he was acting he was either getting annoyed with me, or just wanted to change the subject. I didn’t know which one would be the better outcome.

“So. Where do you want to go?”

“Where the humans are,” I answered without thinking. I brought myself to look up at him, and his sly look was back.

“Humans huh? Well that’s going to be a bit of a walk. You’re in the heart of a pretty dense forest. We won’t see any humans for at least an hour or two.” I looked around me. As far as I could see, there were trees everywhere. I wasn’t positive what human homes looked like, but I was pretty sure Eden was telling the truth.

“Well then,” I said sternly. “You’re the tour guide. Take me to them.” He cocked an eyebrow at my tone, but a smile rose with it as well. I tried to make an authoritative stance. “But I’m in charge. You’re a demon, and I know how sneaky you can be. No tricks.” It was painfully evident that my attempt at being stern was lost when he began to giggle. And even though it was adorable the way his whole body moved when he laughed, I tried not to notice. He was a demon. And even though he had been nice to me so far, my father always told me that they were extremely manipulative and deceptive. I needed to stay in control.

Really, now thinking about it, my father told me a lot about what I should stay away from, and I kept realizing what a poor of a job I was doing at obeying that order.

“Alright then, nephilim.” He started to walk away. I quickly followed behind. “Can I call you Neph for short?”

“Ariella works just fine.”

“Whatever you say, Ariella.”

There was a light feeling in my chest when he spoke my name, and I realized staying in control was going to be harder than I thought.