Paul stood above the creek looking down into the pitch. Up on that cliff the world seemed a hollow void. Nothing gave him comfort, nothing gave him happiness. The moisture trail on his face was still fresh from the tears that fell not but 20 minutes earlier. Thoughts of his parents filled his mind. Old happy times swirled like a maelstrom, teasing and tormenting him. Then the idea of going home to his overtaxed aunt and overbearing cousin pushed him into a screaming fit. He felt trapped in a life that no man deserved.
Paul wasn't always like this though. He once had a good life, the ordinary life of a modern teenager. He was never one of the goths, nor was he a jock. He did like baseball though. He never fit into the popular crowd, but wasn't a reject. He was just an ordinary young man. He had his crushes, and even his stash of magazines. Like I said, ordinary. Till the accident that changed his life. His family got off easy, it was quick for them. He was forced to endure comas, pain, broken bones and surgery. And the greatest crime, custody hearings to decide his fate. His fate that tied him to his new and unwanted family.
But standing there, his thoughts sped and sped till finally they blurred into a mesh of mental white noise. It was so loud. Too loud to take any longer, and as if controlled by outside forces he etched closer and closer to the edge of that cliff. Knowing in his head that his heart was too broken to fix. He planned to end it all. To jump and fade into the black of death. No longer a burden to his family, or himself. That was the only thing left.
"I would not do that if I were you."
The voice came from nowhere, but for some reason it wasn't enough to scare Paul. It was kind of warm. Paul turned to face the voice and saw a blur step from the shadows of the trees. He was dressed in jeans a tee shirt and a jacket. He was as normal as any other person in the midday rush. But he had a caring look. "Statistically speaking," he said. "A fall from this height wouldn't kill you, the painful internal bleeding would." He got as close as he could too the cliffs edge and looked over. "Whoa, nasty looking drop bubba, nasty." He turned his head and peered into Paul's eyes. For a brief moment there was silence. Then the man spoke again. "You got a lot of hurt in those eyes man. More than most men can handle, and more than most have the capacity to see." Paul was dumbfounded and speechless, yet he had a thousand million questions. He moved to speak but, "I know what you're thinking bubba. Who the hell is this nut and what gives him the right to interrupt my suicidal plans? You got a point, who am I anyways. But take a look down there." The stranger pointed down to the creek. There standing next to the creek was a ghastly looking man dressed in black, or was it a silhouette. It was like a man but not a man all at the same time, bright as day, yet blurry as twilight. "That there Paul, is DEATH, the Angel of death to be precise. Hi Max!" The man yelled out as he waved down to the shadowy figure.
Paul stepped back, freaked out by what the strange man just said. He looked down and he noticed that the figure had the angriest look on his face. Or at least it looked angry. Then Paul looked back at the man. "Oh, I am always pissing him off for some reason or another, but this reason is special. I have never pointed him out to a mortal before. Why do you look so freaked Paul. You were going to jump, so its only natural that death be there to take you. Well not till after the 5 hours of pain and swelling you'd endure first." The only word Paul could think of to say was "how?" The man took in a deep breath and leaned against a nearby tree. "Well, that's both easy and hard to explain. Its totally against the rules, what I am doing now. Revealing myself in this way. Talking to you, you seeing me. I'm supposed to exist in a plane of invisibility. Working in the background, doing only little things to sway you humans this way and that, as royally decreed that is... Paul, I'm an Angel. Your guardian angel to be exact, if you can believe that? Where are you going Paul." And Paul was off, running as fast as he could in who knows direction. "You are in SERIOUS trouble you know that Alex.?" Max said standing right beside him. "I know, but they've tried everything else."
Paul ran as fast as his feet could take him. He had no clue what direction he was headed, and he didn't care. That scene was absolutely the strangest singular experience he had ever faced. The idea of an "Angel." It was beyond his comprehension. Not to mention the audacity of such a being appearing now.
He looked up and the stars twinkled like diamond glitter glued to a black velvet sky. The ebb and flow of the water swept him up and down in a calming rhythmic manner. I was the most at peace he had felt in quite a while. Thinking back to what got him running and in this situation, he realized it must of been all in his head. A minor moment of temporary insanity. The very thought of an angel coming to him made him laugh. And there he floated, laughing at the sky, the trees, the very world around him. But what he heard and seen next caused his blood to run so cold, the cool water felt as if it were boiling in comparison.
"Oh you poor little laughing fool...Did you really think you could outrun something like me"
The calm ripple of the water turned to splashed as again Paul was running for his life. Except in this case he was swimming, quite badly at that fact. So bad in fact that he swam right in front of his "Angel." Who was now standing above him at the deepest part of the lake.
"How in the fucking hell...." that's about the extent of what Paul could huff out at Alex.
Alex chuckled a little. "How the hell what?"
"How the hell are you doing that?"
"Oh, walking on water. An old friend taught me this quite a while ago. I think its spiffy, don't you."
"Really...here you are, standing on water. Being one of the bat shit craziest thing I have ever seen, and you say 'SPIFFY"
"I happen to like spiffy thank you very much. What the hell is wrong with spiffy, its a good word."
"It has to be one of the lamest words in the English language."
"Oh and drolly oozing out a unemotional "cool" or a surf-tastic "awesome" is any better."
There Paul floated and there Alex stood. One in the water and one on the water. The most bizarre spectacle ever witnessed by modern man, and no one was there to see it.
Back on the shore they sat in silence. Paul was dripping wet and cold in the night air, but he didn't really notice the cold. He was fixated on what he wanted to say first. Thousands of questions raced through his head, but none of them seemed right. He was searching for the absolute right thing to say. He didn't really know what you actually say to angels. There's not really a manual on such a thing, except maybe the bible. Then it hit him, "so this means there really is a god," he uttered aloud.
"Nope, nothing of the sort." Alex answered.
"But aren't angels like the messengers of God or something like that?"
Alex sat there for a minute thinking on the question. He looked up into the stars and around at the darkened forest around them. "My existence neither proves nor disproves the existence of God or any other god-like figure." His answer was snide and short.
"Well, IF there is a God, give him a message. HE SUCKS."
Alex let out a small laugh and shook his head. "It figures, what youth isn't mad at God for some reason or another. You know you humans are a real piece of work, you know that. Anytime anything bad happens you blame God for it, or worse, you pray that he makes it all better.Learn to stand up for a change. You have two good legs." They both sat there looking at each other.
"God took everything from me. My family is now dead, gone forever. And where was God in all that time. Where was he when I was laying in pain or through all those surgeries."
"All that was gods fault right. No, don't blame the drunk driver who slammed into you. It wasn't his fault for being wasted, God made him have those cocktails. Don't be mad at God dude."
"So there IS a God?" Paul cried out triumphantly.
"I have no idea if there is or isn't a God. Honestly I've never met him or her or whatever it is. I am told where to go and what to do and was created with the knowledge of how to do it from birth. If you can call it a birth. One day poof, bright ass light and there I was. For one hundred and two years I haven't changed, haven't grown older. I've just been. Besides, humans can't handle the truth about God even if I knew what it was. The knowledge of God existence would only hurt you. Everything would change because you humans would stop growing. Its those unanswered questions that you strive for. Faith would end, the quest for knowledge would cease to be. So don't ask me if God is real, I don't know. If you want to know so bad you find him and ask him yourself."
"Dude, you're one hundred and 2 years old."
"Yep, I was made in 1910." Alex paused to reflect on his life for a moment.
"How did you know it was a drunk driver?""Because I am your guardian angel. The moment you became my charge I knew everything about you. From conception those seconds right before I stepped out from the trees. I know you inside and out. Its kind of a freaky thing you know."
Again there was silence, but it was relaxed. Paul still had questions racing in his head, and every second just made one more pop up.
