Tag Archives: angels

Excerpt from “Angels With Attitude”

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For #LineByLineTime : Lines to be proud of.

The angel smiled wryly. “All mortals want to live forever. But what do they spend their lives doing? Worrying about the future, regretting the past, wasting the present. They find so many other things to concentrate on instead of the important ones.”

David couldn’t resist. “Important ones? Like what? What does an angel – a grim reaper, even – know about what’s important to a human?”

“Hah! If you had my job, kid, you’d know. Life looks a whole lot different on this side. All the people I’ve escorted, listening to all their regrets, and complaints, and begging to be allowed to come back to do all the things they put off all their lives, yeesh! Makes me want to molt my wing feathers.”

“We don’t just escort people to the Pearly Gates and drop them off, you know. We have to take them to the Seat of Judgement, and listen to the Creator pointing out everything they neglected during their time on earth. Always makes me glad I’m not mortal.”

He eyed David. “The number one regret and omission? Love. So many people worry about making a living, feeling like they’ve accomplished something, sometimes just surviving. But those things don’t matter. Careers will end. Finances, education, earthly pleasures, they all end. It’s not bad to want to do well, but spending all your time on them is wasting it. Five minutes, fifty years, a hundred even; the length of life doesn’t matter.”

“I can’t tell you how long you have, David. Only the Creator knows, and He doesn’t tell anybody else. All I can tell you is make the most of what you have – every minute, every hour, and every day. Living a century won’t make a difference is you regret wasting it at the end.”

From “The Angel Tree”

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From “The Angel Tree”

Trigger warning for those who need it: This is a story about a woman contemplating suicide who gets…distracted. This excerpt begins partway through the story.

Published in the short story collection “Once Upon A Christmastime” (https://www.amazon.com/Once-Upon-Christmastime-Peggy-Perry-ebook/dp/B00KO5Y5DY/)

“There’s another bathroom in the master bedroom at the end of the hall,” Christie said automatically.  Her mind whirled as she was forced to deal with the invasion when she had been set on dying alone in peace. 

The little girl came out of the bathroom with her mother as Edith passed.  As her brothers shoved past them, elbowing each other and slamming the door, little Susanne pulled at her mother’s hand as she peered into the dark kitchen.  “I’m thirsty!”  she cried.  “I want some hot chocolate!  And cookies!”

Her mother hushed her and looked up at Christie, an apologetic smile on her face.  “That’s what we always have on Christmas Eve,” she explained.  “Susanne, honey, we’re not at home.  We’re at…”  She looked up, realizing she didn’t know her hostess’ name.

“Oh, uh, I’m Christie, Christie Wright.  And I can make some hot chocolate, but I don’t have any cookies made.  But I do have some canned food that we can probably make into a meal.”  She went into hostess mode automatically, locking onto something she could deal with.  She went into the kitchen and turned the light on.  The little girl followed her in and began exploring the cabinets she could reach, ignoring her mother’s reprimands. 

“It’s okay, those are childproofed.  My youngest son is the same – aahh!”  Her voice stopped with a gasp.  When Annabelle looked at her, frowning, she shook her head frantically and fumbled with the pan she was putting on the stove.  The little girl wandered out the door and her mother chased after her.  Christie fought for calm as she measured the ingredients with shaking hands. 

She nearly dropped everything as an arm wrapped around her waist and squeezed lightly.  “I put away the vodka and pills,” Edith whispered in her ear.  “Wouldn’t want the children to come upon them.  I put them in the closet up on the highest shelf.  That little girl looks like she might go through all your drawers if she gets away from her mama.  You don’t have a gun around anywhere, do you?”

Christie shook her head numbly.  She had disposed of her husband Rick’s guns as well.  She didn’t need them.

“That’s good.  Do you need any help here, dear?” Edith then said in a normal voice.  “Why don’t we fix something to eat?  I’m sure everybody is hungry.”  She began opening cabinet doors until she found the pantry and began pulling out cans and jars.  She looked in the refrigerator and freezer, but they were empty.  Christie had no need of fresh or frozen food before she left this world.

Edith didn’t seem bothered.  She asked Christie to introduce herself again, since she had missed it on the way to the bathroom.  When Beth came in asking if she could help, Edith put her to work opening various containers, explaining as she went what needed to be done. 

“You got no tree!” young Ricky exclaimed in the living room, outrage in his voice.   “How can you have Christmas without a tree?  You got no decorations at all!  Don’t you believe in Christmas?”

“Does that mean Santa isn’t going to stop here?”  His little sister cried over his parents’ frantic shushing noises.  “How are we going to get presents if he doesn’t stop here?”

“Children, children, he’ll leave the presents at our house, like he does every year!  We just have to wait until the storm is over, and we’ll be able to get home and get your presents.”

“But the lady here won’t get any presents!” their oldest boy Jody complained.  “Why didn’t she get ready for Santa?” 

Christie came out of the kitchen to meet the children’s accusing faces.  She fumbled for an explanation.  “I, uh, I just got here.  I didn’t have time to put anything up.”

Tim peered out the window around the blinds.  “I’d volunteer to go get a tree, but not in that storm!”

Mack looked out the other window.  “Yep,” he agreed with a nod.  “Just going to have to make do this year kids, till we can get home.  If we did have a tree we could make popcorn strings and our own decorations, but looks like that’s a bust.”

Beth came out of the kitchen, holding a tray of cups.  “I remember sharing my first apartment with four other girls.  There was no room for even a tiny tree, and we wound up hanging a paper tree on the wall, and stringing yarn to hang paper ornaments.  It wasn’t half bad.”   She offered everyone a cup of hot chocolate before returning the tray to the kitchen.  She and Edith came out holding their own cups and finding seats on the big roomy couches and chairs in the living room.

“The food should be ready in a few minutes,” Edith told them, and sighed with satisfaction as she sipped her cocoa.  “Hot cocoa and a fireplace and a comfortable seat.  Just what we need on a night like this.”

The children weren’t satisfied.  “We need to make a paper tree,” Jody decided.  “That wall there doesn’t have anything on it.  We can hang a big one there.  You got any paper, lady?”

Christie almost told them there was no way they were going to mess up her good wall with tape and tacks, until she realized how stupid it was to care about her wall when she was planning to kill herself.  “Why don’t you just draw a tree on the wall?  That way we can save the paper I’ve got for ornaments.”  The adults protested, but Christie waved her hand dismissively.  “Let me find the kids’ – I mean, some pencils and coloring pens or something.”

She ignored the looks the adults gave each other as she hurried to her children’s bedrooms.  She had to stop inside the boys’ door to pull herself together.  She had not been able to come in here since that night a year ago, and everything was unbearably familiar.  Hurrying to the desk against the wall, she grabbed the trashcan and put all the drawing and coloring utensils she could see into it.  She found some paper and tacks and tape and put those in as well.  Her little girl’s room had glue and glitter and all sorts of stickers.  She found yarn and beads and other craft materials and threw them in.

Taking the can back to the living room, she handed it to the children.  “See what you can do with this.  Don’t worry about making a mess, it will clean up. Excuse me; I have to check on the food.”  She headed for the kitchen.  The sight of the children digging through the materials just like her children always had tore at her heart.

Conversations With God

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I had an interesting conversation with God the other day.  No, not a prayer.  I have conversations – you know, the kind where I say something, He says something, I say something…

People often give me a funny look when I say God talks to me, as if they expect me to start waving a sign saying stuff like “Prepare to meet thy Doom!” or something.  Nah.  The folks at my small church gave me that look when I first joined them, but since I’m a cheerful sort and often have humorous conversations with God that I remark on, they’ve relaxed.

I’ve had these conversations for as long as I can remember.  My parents, bless their hearts, just nodded and said stuff like, “How interesting.”  They were used to my storytelling, which started about the same time, and they might have thought that was just another story.  But it’s not fiction to me.  To me, God’s voice is as real as my mother’s, more trustworthy than anybody I know, and I never have to ask Him to speak up, stop mumbling, or clarify whether something He said was sarcasm or a joke.

A little girl, hearing me say God told me something, asked what God sounded like.  “Ever had a friend stand behind you and say something over your shoulder?” I asked her.  “He sounds just like that.  You don’t see Him, but you can hear him clearly.  You know His voice because you hear Him all the time. That’s what He sounds like.”

Some people say God speaks to them through the Bible, others say they have visions.  That happens to me, too, but I also get the audio version, which is better for me, since I can ask questions and get immediate answers.  I don’t always LIKE the answers, and sometimes He tells me my brain doesn’t have the words to understand the answer.  Like calculus, I guess.  I still don’t get that, either.  Algebra barely got through.

The conversation I had the other day was fairly typical.  He’s never really been able to get me to learn two things: self discipline and patience.  Especially patience.  Ever heard that old joke?  “Give me patience, NOW!”  That’s me.  My sister and I were cleaning all the Christmas decorations out of the house and putting them back into storage for another year.  We got the storage bins out of the storage building outside, filled them up, opened the door to take them back to the storage, and discovered a downpour occurring.

“Come on, God, give us a break!” I complained.  “Cut the rain off for just half an hour, can’t You?  Just give us enough time to get these boxes back into the storage building and You can let it rain all the rest of the day!  What do You say?” No response, and the rain just seemed to come down harder.  A couple of minutes passed, and finally my sister and I both shrugged.  We’re not sweet enough to melt in the rain, after all.

We lugged the plastic bins out of the house and into the storage building, getting incredibly soaked in the process, and no, we didn’t melt.  But just as I shut the storage building door and locked it, the rain stopped.  Perfectly timed.  I shook my fist at the sky.  “God, that’s not funny!” I shouted.  My sister just shook her head and laughed.  But God replied quite clearly.

“No, it’s not funny,” He agreed, sounding annoyed.  “If you had shown enough faith to wait a mere ten minutes, you would have been completely dry, wouldn’t you?”

I hate it when He makes a point so true I can’t argue.

A lot of the writing I do is at His order.  For instance, I’ve never been much into angels.  I just never paid much attention to the subject, other than the mentions of them in Bible stories.  But when I started writing a Christmas story for the Sunday School teachers in my church every year (I’m the Sunday School director) I discovered there were angels in every story, and so when I published the first collection of Christmas stories “Once Upon A Christmastime” I put an angel on the cover.  “Standing Next To A Miracle”, my second collection of short stories, is about the people who were friends and family of the people in Bible stories of miracles, but my third collection, coming out shortly (I’m planning, anyway) is all about angels.  “Angels With Attitude” it will be called.

I wasn’t planning on writing anything like any of these short stories.  I was planning to be a novelist, and already had a long list of novels I was planning to write as soon as I retired and finally got the time to sit back and pound the keyboard.  But when I finally do, what comes out?  Short stories about angels and Bible characters.  Huh.  I never know what will emerge.  I’m quite often surprised.  I usually can’t remember them, so I have to go back and reread them for myself.  I only half-jokingly remarked to my church members that I was ghostwriting for God.

This past Christmas was a hard one for our church.  Our church treasurer and a dear friend to many died of illness.  At her funeral we discovered a young man who had grown up in our church had died in an accident on his way back to his parents’ home the night before.  It was during his funeral a few days later that God spoke to me.  I never know until just before Christmas what the gift story will be about.   I always just wait for inspiration to strike, find stuff to go into gift bags that goes with the story, and type like mad when it hits.  But this time I got it during the funeral, and I was appalled.

You see, there was a story I had been planning to write for the “Angels With Attitude” collection, but I hadn’t got it on my computer yet.  God told me this story would be my Christmas gift.  I didn’t want to put it in a Christmas gift.  It’s a good story (I believe) but horribly inappropriate for any member of my church at Christmastime during our grief.  I was even more appalled when I discovered a short while later that the husband of one of the Sunday School teachers had just been diagnosed with a nasty form of cancer.

The story, you see, is about an angel of death (yeah, not THE angel of death – he explains it in the story) appearing to a young cancer patient.  I argued fiercely with God.  Okay, not argued; protested is really the correct word, since argument is a two way arrangement.  God doesn’t bother to argue.  You do it His way, or face the consequences.  What happens to me is I am placed under unction.  I heard that phrase once and thought it sounded appropriate, since that’s the sound I make: “Unnnn!”  Essentially, that means since I agreed a long time ago to do what He tells me to do, He’s going to keep nagging me until I do it.  In the Bible they called it anointing.  Wonder if any of those anointed folk felt like going “Unnn!”

He got His way, of course, but I added a letter outside the story to tell the teachers not to blame me for the story.  Apparently, God thought it was necessary for SOMEBODY to read it, so there it went.  I haven’t heard from any of them yet.  Maybe I’ll put an excerpt on my website and see what everybody else thinks of it.  Buy the book to read the whole thing.  Or look up one of the teachers I gave it to.  They might let you borrow it.  But I’d rather you buy the book.  You’ll like the other stories, too.  God said so.

Update: Just heard from a relative of the young man whose funeral I attended.  She said the story helped break her from her deep well of grief and begin to live again.  Whew!  Never try to second guess God.  I’ve learned to just ask to see the results of acting on His orders once in a while.  Got to get this third book published.

 

Complete Short Story

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This is the latest Christmas story I wrote for the church ladies.  God is telling me to put it here instead of waiting to put it in my next book of Christmas stories.  Maybe somebody needs to read it.

TWINKLE, TWINKLE
By Peggy Perry @ 2014

“Wow, he looks…different,” the blond angel murmured as the next soul moved up to the front of the line.

His companion looked up from the book of newcomers to Heaven. It wrote itself as each new soul appeared at the Pearly Gates. “Apparently his soul was as tired as his body,” he replied. “According to the book, he has lived in a very chaotic time and place. He barely managed to hold onto his faith in the Creator.”

Most souls were bright and shining, joyful to be free of their bodies and earthly trials. This soul was almost gray, his eyes dull, his shoulders slumped, and his feet shuffling. He looked exhausted, hopeless, and uncaring of whatever might happen next. He was a shocking change to the other souls before and behind him.

“It will be interesting to see where he winds up in Heaven. Let’s get him into the Room of Choice.” The blond angel came to the soul and gently took his arm. “This way,” he said with a wave of his hand. The soul trudged beside him silently, head down, looking as if he still inhabited an exhausted body, just waiting to fall down.

The angel took him into the Room of Choice. The room was the entrance to Heaven just behind the Pearly Gates. It was a very plain white room with only a few objects on pedestals, a tall desk with a high stool, and a large door on the other side, currently closed. “This is the Room of Choice,” the angel began his usual speech. “Whatever you are drawn to will indicate your first assignment in Heaven. Some souls stay with that assignment, some move on to others, but this will determine where you go first. Now, what are you drawn to?”

He began to lead the still uninterested soul around the room. “These wings symbolize the position of messenger. The messengers fly to Earth and deliver messages from our Lord to mortal men. It used to be more common for humans to receive these messages through prayer, but men have lately been losing their ability to hear Him. He created messengers, and they stay busy. Do they look interesting to you?”

The soul seemed to be ignoring him, still looking at the floor. A tiny wrinkle appeared between the angel’s eyebrows. He had never had that occur, but he was beginning to be concerned. “The harp signifies music,” he continued, towing the soul to the next pedestal. “It can mean playing an instrument or singing. You will just be making music to glorify the Lord and make a joyful noise to add to the happiness of everyone in Heaven. What do you think?”

The soul made an unattractive grunting noise. The wrinkle on the angel’s forehead became a crease. He hurried the soul along. “The sword is for those who become the warriors of Heaven, fighting evil throughout Creation. Do you – ?” The soul recoiled from the sword with a horrified sound, and the angel recalled how the soul had been released from his body. It should not have mattered, though. Many who had died violently had become warriors protecting the innocent from the evil that had killed them.

The angel looked around. There weren’t too many other pedestals left. Some held cleaning tools. Heaven did not get dirty, but there were actually many souls who enjoyed keeping their area neat and tidy. They happily spent millennia polishing and straightening everything in Heaven. This soul really didn’t look the type for that, and he was not looking at the tools. The angel raised his eyebrows as he followed the soul’s gaze.

He followed as the soul moved slowly toward the desk. “Um, that’s not actually one of the choices. That’s just the desk we sometimes sit at while waiting to take our shift at the Gates…” He trailed off as the soul climbed onto the stool, wiggled a bit as he got comfortable, and placed his hands on the desk.

The soul finally raised his face and stared at the angel. “This is it. This is what I want. This is my assignment.  It says so right here.”

Bewildered, the angel went to look over his shoulder. There had never been anything on the desktop before. Now it held a book just like the one on the desk at the Gates, except this one had different wording. Instead of a brief description of the souls arriving in Heaven, it held notes of their assignments. The latest read: “Finn Morgan. Assignment Supervisor. Job description – Aid newly arrived souls in choosing their assignments and calling the correct escort to take them to their assigned area.” A small hand bell sat beside the book.

“But…” The angel was interrupted as his fellow angel from the Gates led another soul into the room.

“Hasn’t he chosen yet? It’s time for the next soul to make their choice.”

Finn held up his hand. “I’ll take over now. This is my job from now on.”

Both angels stared at him. “But you’re not even really in Heaven here. Don’t you want to go in?” the blond one demanded.

“No. Now go away and let me do my job.” Finn pointed at the new soul, a woman who was stroking the harp. “You like that harp?” She nodded, and he continued, “Good. Go over to the door and wait for your escort to the Hall of Music. They will instruct you from there.” He picked up the bell and rang it, and the door opened silently to reveal a smiling angel who took the hand of the soul and led her away.

Finn looked at the two astonished angels. “Don’t you two have a job to do? Who is welcoming the new souls?” He flapped his hands at them, shooing them out. “Go. Leave me to my assignment.”

Without the passage of time in Heaven, there was no telling how long Finn spent behind the desk. He loved his job. He didn’t even have to leave his stool. With no demands of a human body, he didn’t have to eat, drink, sleep, or even go to the bathroom. He didn’t have to come into personal contact with the souls, either. He just directed them around the room, explained what each object meant, and rang the bell when they made a choice. He didn’t have to talk to the angels, even though they looked in on him occasionally.

He did the same thing over and over. It was such a wonderful change from the chaos of his life on earth. He didn’t have to worry about someone attacking him. He didn’t have to worry about loving someone and having him or her suddenly die of plague or accident or attack. He felt calm and comfortable for the first time in his existence. He didn’t want to go through the door into the main area of Heaven. He had looked through the door and shuddered at how many people and angels were dashing around in there, moving, always moving. It was too close to what he had left behind.

No, he was quite happy to sit alone behind his desk and avoid talking to anyone but the occasional soul and angel for eternity. He was content. Too bad it wouldn’t last.

Finn looked up from his book as an angelic hand rapped noisily on the desk. Glancing around, he saw no new soul wandering among the pedestals. “What is it?” The book was blank, too, not mentioning any new souls to supervise in their choice.

“You have a, ah, a, well, I guess you could say special soul to supervise. She’s going to need some help.”

“Well, where is she? Why does she need help?”

The angel looked down at his side before bending over and lifting. Finn heard a grunting noise he was sure the angel didn’t make, then a pair of small pudgy hands grabbed the top of his desk and a small head popped into view.

Finn’s mouth dropped open. He recognized the moon shaped face, the almond shaped eyes, the flat wide nose, and the thick lips with the thick tongue partially protruding. Several souls with the same appearance had come through, but they were always glowing with joy and happiness, with huge billowing wings and a bright halo. One of the angels processing them had told him they had wings and a halo already because they had been messengers of God’s love on earth already. Most chose another area and went to learn something new, often musical.

In his time on earth, such children usually died early, unable to thrive and care for themselves, and the parents had no time or energy to care for them. Sometimes they left the children in the wild for predators, removing the problem from the parents’ mind.

This child looked as if she were about ten years old, and her wings were stunted and unmoving. Her dull halo sat crookedly on her head instead of hovering above her like the others’. Her white robe was actually almost grimy and looked like she had been wiping her hands on it. She was a mess.

He looked up at the angel. “What happened to her? She looks terrible! Why does she need help?” He slapped at the pudgy fingers reaching for the bell. “Don’t touch that!” He scowled as she ignored him and reached for the bell again. She grunted and frowned as he held it out of her reach. She began working her way around the desk holding on to the edge, heading for the shiny bell.

The angel shook his head. “Her wings don’t work. She can’t fly, and for some odd reason her feet don’t touch the ground. If you don’t tow her around, she just sort of hovers. Why she looks like that, I don’t know. All I know is, she doesn’t talk, doesn’t seem to be able to hear, or if she can, doesn’t understand, and she can’t move around on her own.”

Finn scowled and moved the bell back to the other side of the desk just as the little girl reached for it again. “Whatever, just take her around to the pedestals and let her make her choice and get her out of here! Hey! Stop that!” He swatted at her hand again as she turned her attention to the book and grabbed at the pages. Some of them started to tear before he worked her fingers loose.

He looked up to see the angel heading back for the Gates. “Where are you going? Get back here and help her make a choice!”

The angel looked over his shoulder and past his wings. “No, no, you’re the supervisor of choices. This is your job. I’ve done mine.” He skipped out the door and it closed firmly behind him.

Exasperated, Finn slipped reluctantly from his stool and towed the little girl behind him. Shreds of the pages were still gripped tight in her hands. He pulled her over to the harp. “Here! You like music, don’t you? All the others like it.” He remembered she couldn’t lift herself and raised her up to get a good view of the harp.

Her eyes went wide and her mouth opened further. She grunted rapidly and reached toward the instrument. Satisfied and relieved at the quick solution, Finn headed back to the desk to ring the bell. There was a nasty twanging noise behind him and he spun around. To his horror, she had broken several strings and was making happy noises as she ripped more strings loose. He leaped for the bell on his desk and shook it fiercely. He stopped and stared at it as he realized it was silent. Upending it, he discovered the clapper was gone.

He hurried back to the cheerful little vandal and towed her back to the front door. As he reached automatically reached for the handle, he discovered it was gone. “What? How? Why?” he sputtered, wondering if he were somehow having a nightmare. He pulled the little girl partway to his desk, then remembering, left her hanging in midair as he moved swiftly to look at the book to see if anything had been written about her.

The book was to the point. “No souls may go back through the front door. Processed souls may not leave the presence of the Supervisor of Choices until an assignment has been made.” Finn grabbed his head and groaned.

Setting his jaw, he went back to the child and towed her to the pedestal holding the sword. “You’re destructive enough to be a warrior,” he muttered to her. “Look, it’s nice and shiny! You like shiny things, right?” She certainly did. Unfortunately, when she reached for the shining object, she only managed to knock it off the pedestal and it landed across Finn’s foot. Without a body, it didn’t hurt, but he was startled into knocking the pedestal over and could only watch helplessly as the pedestal broke into several pieces.

His mouth worked, but no noise came out. He hastily pulled her back as she tried to reach for the sword and pulled her to the wings. He made a helpless sound as she swung past him as he stopped and sank the fingers of her free hand into the white feathers of the enormous wings. Of course, they came loose in her hand, leaving a gaping hole in one.

A gurgling noise escaped him as he pulled her back. Looking wildly around, he noticed the door handle was still present on the inner door that led into Heaven. Desperately he pulled her over to it and flung it open. The same busy crowd was hurrying by there. He had stopped thinking by now and only wanted to rid himself of the destructive guest who had introduced chaos back into his life. Grabbing her arm, he put everything he had into flinging her into the crowd intending to dash back inside and slam the door shut. Instead, he went right with her.

They crashed together against a solid body. Finn slid to the ground and then tried to protect his head against the child’s pumping feet. He looked up as he grabbed her feet and swallowed hard as the unmistakable features of an archangel met his gaze. Finn began babbling an apology, but the archangel only shook his head. Angelic arms wrapped the child up securely and prevented her from reaching for his halo, wings, or sword.

“Did you forget the rule in the book, Finn? A processed soul cannot leave your presence until she is assigned to an area. If you want her out of the Room of Choices, you have to stay with her.” He gazed down at the child, who had grown quiet and was nestled into his chest. “I suggest that if you want her to be less destructive, you keep her close to you and restrain her arms.” Before Finn could blink, the archangel transferred the child into his arms and positioned his limbs in a secure hold.
Stepping back, he snapped his fingers and another angel came up beside them. “Finn is not familiar with this side of the Gates,” he said calmly. “Guide him wherever he wants to go.”

“My pleasure!” the angel said with a beaming smile. She looked at Finn. “Where would you like to go first?”

“But what about the other souls who need to be assigned?” he wailed.

The archangel, who had started to rise as his wings began to stroke the air, paused. “There are angels to take care of that, just as before you arrived. She is now your assignment. No matter how long it takes.” With a crack of split air, he shot straight up and disappeared from sight.

Finn sagged and then straightened his shoulders as the guide looked at him inquiringly. “I guess maybe we can show her the musicians and singers. She was very, um, interested in the harp. I thought that was her choice, but I wasn’t able to call for an escort, and well, ah, shall we go?”

He wasn’t sure, but he thought he heard the angel giggle as she led them away.

The little girl absolutely loved the music. She loved one of the angel’s harps to death. Well, to destruction, maybe. Finn marveled that such a small child was so skilled in destroying such a sturdy object. The angel only laughed, and with a few motions of his hands, turned the mess of wood and strings back to a thing of beauty.

Finn sighed with relief and resolved to hold the child tighter. He was cautiously optimistic when she relaxed against him and cuddled as they listened to glorious music ring out. But after a while, just when he was feeling almost cheerful, the guide approached him and whispered in his ear.

“I’m afraid there’s a small problem, Finn. Could the two of you please come with me?”

Curious and anxious, he held the little one tighter as she tried to return to the music. When they were out of hearing range of the music (which, Finn thought later, was rather odd, since he had always been able to hear the music, even sitting at his desk), the angel shifted a bit uncomfortably. “Normally, the music director would love to have you in the audience. However, her glow is very distracting since it’s so concentrated in a small person, and the angels were starting to lose their places in the music. The director asked that you not come back until you can teach her to control her light. Is there somewhere else you would like to try?”

Finn frowned as he looked down at the child. “Glow? What glow? What are you talking about?”

The angel’s eyes widened. “You didn’t notice the way she lit up the music hall? Did you have your eyes closed?” She looked back and forth between the man and child and finally shook her head. “Why don’t we go see if she’s interested in something else?”

It was not a successful journey, although Finn grudgingly admitted later that it was very…interesting. He saw a great deal of Heaven, and observed all that went on. The child was interested, too, but Finn learned to hold her close and tight. Who knew an archangel’s sword could break? Weren’t those supposed to be even demon proof? He still wasn’t sure if even the Creator Himself could fix what she had done to several messengers’ wings when they ignored his warnings and treated her to a toss back and forth between them. And oh, my, what she had done with the cleaners’ tools…

Nobody minded. They just laughed, fixed what she broke, and patted her on the head or kissed her cheek. They started calling her Twinkle. When he asked why, several mentioned the way she glowed when she was happy. He still couldn’t see it.
He had no idea how long they wandered around Heaven, observing everyone at work, meeting numberless angels and souls. They finally found themselves back at the door into the Room of Choices, and Finn said farewell to their guide. He looked in the room cautiously, and felt relieved to see it fully restored. He wrapped up Twinkle before she could launch herself off the doorway and aim for the pedestals again. Carrying her over to the desk, he blinked as he saw the desk was wider and a second stool next to his. A smile began to stretch his face as he noticed the straps that would hold Twinkle firmly in place.

On the desk next to his book was a drawing pad, pencils, and crayons. Since time had no meaning in Heaven, these objects from a time far distant from his were not out of place. He just hoped she didn’t try to eat them. Twinkle seemed to know what to do with them. Grunting, she reached for them and was drawing all over the pad before he could get her completely strapped in.

Before he could take his seat, she tore off a colorful sheet and waved it at him. When he took it, she pointed at the white blank wall behind them and grunted some more. “You want me to hang it up there?” he asked, and blinked as light flashed in the room when she smiled. The light went back to normal as she turned back to the pad.

He looked at the colored lines and shapes but could make no sense of them. He looked up at the white wall and shrugged. The walls did look rather plain. Wondering how to attach the picture, he held it up to a likely place and dropped his hands swiftly as the art suddenly attached itself to the wall. “Heaven!” he muttered, and went back to his stool.

When a new soul entered the room from the Gates, he looked at the bell on the desk suspiciously. Sure enough, the clapper had returned. The book now showed the soul’s name. After a short trip around the room, the soul chose the harp, and Finn rang the bell with a feeling of relief. Just as he was about to direct the soul to the inner door, Twinkle ripped a page off her pad and grunted urgently, waving the paper at the soul instead of Finn.

The soul looked bewildered. “She wants you to take the picture. Is it a picture of them, Twinkle?” Finn asked. He and the new soul blinked as light flashed in the room again. When the light died down, Finn handed the paper to the soul. “Do you want her to hang the picture on the wall?” He had learned the hard way to ask very simple yes or no questions. When Twinkle smiled and bounced in her seat, the light flashed again. “Just pick a spot on the wall and hold it to it,” Finn told the soul. “It attaches itself.”

The soul smiled at the picture and picked a spot near the first. “Looks good. Go to that door now, and an escort will take you to your destination. Welcome to Heaven.” Finn waved the soul along and waved at the angel, one he had met at the music hall. After the door closed, he looked at the picture Twinkle had first done. There were two objects in the picture, unlike the second, which had only one. “Hey, is that a picture of the two of us?”

Light flashed so brightly he had to rub his eyes. “Wow. I can finally see why they had to ask us to leave the music hall. Can’t you dim that down a little?” Light flashed again, just as bright. When his vision came back, he saw that she was silently laughing. “Guess that answers that question.”

He discovered he enjoyed chatting to the new souls now, explaining the picture that Twinkle drew of each of them and helping them choose a spot on the wall. He got used to the flashing as Twinkle expressed her happiness. The room became a busy place as angels dropped in through both doors to chat with him and visit with Twinkle, and post their pictures on the wall as she drew them. The once serene, featureless room became a riot of color as Twinkle’s artwork covered the walls.
His own spotless robe became as messy as Twinkle’s when her waving hands swiped him with the colors and pencils. He just shrugged when newcomers looked at it. “I’m an artwork in progress,” he told them with a chuckle.

His cheerful new world suddenly crashed when two archangels with solemn expressions appeared in the room in the midst of a laughter-filled conversation with several angels and a new soul. “We have come for the soul called Twinkle,” one said gravely. Twinkle’s light flashed at the sound of her name, but Finn barely noticed. He didn’t like the expressions on the archangels’ faces. Was that pity?

“What do you mean, come for her? She can’t leave; she hasn’t made a choice yet! She has to stay with me!” Glancing around for support, he discovered the other angels and the soul had vanished.

“She has no ability to make a decision,” one archangel said quietly. “It has been made for her.”

Finn’s heart would have stopped if he still had one. “Made for her? Why can’t she stay here? She’s happy here! I’m happy to have her here! Why can’t that be the choice made for her? Where are you taking her? What can she possibly do?”

“She is to be a messenger.” Angelic fingers waved toward Twinkle, and her straps and stool and art supplies vanished. She floated up and toward the archangels, but Finn grabbed her robe and clutched her to him desperately.

“No! She can’t be a messenger; her wings don’t even work! All she can do is hover! And she can’t speak! How can she be a messenger?” His frantic hands suddenly held empty air, and the archangels held Twinkle’s hands between them.

“There is a purpose for the existence of all of God’s creations.” The words echoed in a suddenly empty room. Finn fell across the desk, crying out in despair. The little girl had made him finally feel alive for the first time in his existence and they had taken her away! How could he go on?

He was rubbing his hands over his face wondering where the joy of heaven everybody kept talking about had disappeared to when the door to the Gates burst open and the two angels handling the processing dashed in. They snatched him out of his seat and headed back to the door. “Come on! You have to see this! It’s fantastic!”

They ignored his protests. Sullenly, he fell silent and tried to block the music swelling through the air. What was so special about beautiful music? They wouldn’t even let poor little Twinkle listen to it because they couldn’t deal with a little light. His eyes clenched shut in renewed pain, but the sudden flare of light burned through anyway, making his eyes water furiously. Everyone around him was exclaiming and cheering while rubbing at their eyes. He finally managed to get a little sight back and shaded his face as the light continued.

“What happened? What is that?” he demanded.

“It’s Twinkle, of course!” an angel nearby shouted joyfully. “Haven’t you been paying attention to anything? The Messiah has been born to man and the Star shines over Him to show the world where He lays!”

Finn stared, open-mouthed, toward the light. Very dimly, within the glare, a smiling, moon-shaped face appeared. Her arms were out wide to her sides and her almond shaped eyes were wide with excitement and joy. Finn thought he could almost hear her joyful grunts.

One of the archangels appeared beside him. “She was an obvious choice,” he murmured. “She couldn’t move except to hover, and she shines when she’s happy. Apparently she likes babies as much as music.”

The other archangel appeared on his other side. “She brings a message of happiness and hope to everyone, even you. You were never supposed to be isolated, but you chose to be alone rather than move on and mingle with the family of God. Dealing with her taught you that being around others could be a good experience, and chaos is only bad when you are alone in the midst of it.” He looked down at Finn. “Don’t waste what she gave you, Finn. Don’t go back to hiding from everybody. Twinkle won’t be there in the sky forever. Don’t make her dig you out of your hole again. Cherish what she taught you, and teach it to others. There are many others like Twinkle you can visit as well.”

Finn blinked hard several times. “Will I be allowed to keep her pictures?” he asked humbly.

Both archangels smiled. “The pictures will remain on the walls. They do brighten the place up, don’t they? Almost as much as she brightens the heavens now for humankind. Go, Finn, and spread her light to everyone you meet. Show each new soul you meet what heaven really is before they even enter in; a place where love abounds and joy and peace are a daily gift. Someday the Messiah will bring that to earth, but until then, humans will find fulfillment here. Just as Twinkle did, and I think, you finally have.”

Finn looked back at the new star shining over an earthly stable, and imagined he could already see humans being drawn to the light. He smiled at the archangels. “I probably can’t light up the Room of Choices like Twinkle, but maybe I can make it brighter for new souls.” He looked at Twinkle’s bright glow once more. “Shine on, Twinkle,” he whispered, and blinked as the light flashed.

The End

Trials, Travails, and Those Who Help Us Triumph

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Posting stuff on the Internet is always fun.  My sister was going crazy trying to change her Facebook profile photo on her smartphone, and I was trying to help her by looking mine up on my computer and changing it.  She finally discovered she was just working with a slow change, and because she tried several times, her photo was updated the same amount of times.  I was trying to start a new page on this site, and post an item on it, and boy, was it fun.  Hope it has finally settled the way I want.

I am now working on book 3, “Give Me A.I.D.! (Angelic Intervention Department).  Some people think of angels as sweet, warm, huggable beings who brighten the lives of everybody they come across.  No, not me.  Even as a child, I found the angel with the flaming sword at the gates of Eden, Jacob’s wrestling opponent, and various others of their aggressive type more fascinating, and God has given me several stories about several like them that I am dying to get written.  Fighting the good fight against evil is one of my special interests, and more will be coming down the line about that.

Do I believe in angels myself?  I not only believe, I’ve met my guardian angel several times.  He always has the same physical type, although not the same body, and always shows up exactly when I need him the most, when no human is around to help.  Once when I was broken down in the middle of nowhere, he got my vehicle running and me back to town before vanishing.  Another time he got me out of my car after it was in a head on wreck, the door was jammed and me choking on fumes inside.  He pulled me out, leaned me against my car, and vanished before I finished blinking smoke out of my eyes.  Another time a friend of mine was present, but neither of us could change a damaged tire and dark was coming on with miles to the next house and it was long before cell phones.  He showed up as a little white haired gnome of a man half both our sizes who removed the damaged tire without even tugging and replaced it without pause.

Another time he took the form of a man I actually knew already, but I could tell he was not the same man.  He dealt with a little boy who had cold evil showing in his eyes as he tried to kill another smaller child.  After his private interview with him, the little boy seemed like a normal child again, and the elderly man went back to the gruff old man I was used to.  Don’t think that was an angel?  You weren’t there.  It was like some people who can tell identical twins apart.  They may look identical, but some people have no trouble knowing which is which.

I have written about angels in my first two books, but these will be different, not least of which is because the stories are all set in the present day.  Angels are found in grimy city streets, suburban parks, a neighborhood bar and grill, and a small rural town.   But they all work for the same boss, in the Angelic Intervention Department.  Desperate for help no human can give?  Call for A.I.D.!