Angels on Fire (16 page)

Lucy blushed and smiled. “I’m glad to hear that, Ez—so when do you think you can bring him over?”

“Look out your window.”

She frowned, wondering exactly what the old wizard meant, and glanced up—at Joth, crouched on the fire escape outside her bedroom window.

Chapter Fifteen

Lucy hurried over to the window and unlatched the burglar bars and raised the window, motioning frantically for the angel to come inside. “Quick! Get in before someone sees you! The last thing I need is someone calling the cops about a nude man on the fire escape!”

Joth folded its wings and bowed its head and began to climb through the window into Lucy’s bedroom, then pulled back and looked over its shoulder. Lucy frowned and leaned forward, craning her head to see whatever it was that the angel might be looking at. Without any warning, Joth grabbed Lucy under the armpits and pulled her through the window and onto the fire escape.

“Joth! Put me down!” she shrieked. “What are you doing? Are you out of your mind?!?” She attempted to push herself away from the angel, but there was little room to maneuver without toppling over the railing. As she struggled to extricate herself, she caught sight of the angel’s wings—and what she saw was enough to make her freeze.

At least half of Joth’s underpinning was gone. Lucy brushed the exposed area with her finger tip. It felt soft and supple, like quality unborn-calf’s leather. She didn’t need Ezrael to explain to her that Joth’s wings were turning from that of a bird into those of a bat. She wondered how long before it started sprouting a tail, cloven hooves and horns to go along with them. She lifted her eyes to the angel’s face and bit her lower lip at the sight of the dark blobs floating in what had previously been crystal-clear eyes.

She took a deep breath and steadied herself, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. “Joth—why don’t we go back inside now?”

“I want to show you something,” Joth said.

“What?”

By way of reply, the angel scooped her up in its arms. She was so astonished by its strength and speed, she couldn’t find the breath to protest. Despite how little the angel actually weighed—after all, she had carried it, single-handed, from the roof— it held her as if she weighed no more than a puppy.

Joth hopped onto the narrow rail of the fire-escape as easily as a robin perching on a window sill, balancing on the balls of its feet. Lucy stopped struggling, going rigid with fear as she stared down at the street a hundred feet below.

“J-joth? What do you think you’re doing—? Put me
down,
Joth—!” The only response she received was the sound of wings snapping open.
“Joth!”

The angel leapt off the fire-escape as easily as an Olympic diver going off the high board. As the top of the dry cleaner’s street-level awning filled her vision, Lucy screamed and turned her head away, burying her face in Joth’s shoulder. There was a sudden rush of wind and the feeling of uplift, as if they were a leaf caught on a gust of wind. Lucy lifted her head from the hollow of Joth’s collarbone and risked a peek. To her surprise she found herself staring down at the head of a man with male pattern baldness. The balding man was watering a roof-top garden.

They were two hundred feet and climbing over New York’s Lower East Side. Joth’s wings were beating so fast they were invisible, humming in her ears like a wildly spinning top. She marveled at how something as lightweight as she knew Joth to be could carry her and still be airborne—no doubt it was yet another one of the myriad miracles that came with being an angel. In any case, she decided not to question how they were being kept aloft and simply enjoy the view.

She had lived in Manhattan for years, but her perception of the city was, by default, that of one of the human ants that dwelt in its concrete canyons. Now she was being presented with a genuine bird’s-eye view of her adopted home as Joth flew through the crowded streets, adroitly surfing the updrafts created by the artificial mountains of steel and concrete that flanked the major avenues.

They zipped past executives in office buildings busy talking on the phone, holding meetings and putting golf balls into coffee cups. Lucy spotted a mother rocking her baby to sleep while gazing out her eighth-floor apartment’s window. She was surprised by the number of high-rise window boxes full of flowers—riots of color otherwise invisible from the street. She blushed at the sight of teen-aged lovers indulging their passion on what they imagined was the relative privacy of a rooftop. But, most of all, she was amazed how no one on the street or in the various buildings they soared past seemed to notice them. Maybe they were genuinely invisible, or perhaps since no one
expected
to see a winged man carrying a woman flying through the concrete canyons of Manhattan no one was looking for them.

In any case, whatever kept the human occupants of the city from noticing their passage did not extend to Manhattan’s other inhabitants, as flocks of pigeons scattered whenever Joth swooped past, apparently mistaking the angel for one of the peregrine falcons that made their aeries in the older skyscrapers. As they approached Midtown, a brilliant-white German shepherd lazing on the patio of a lofty penthouse apartment jumped to its feet, barking furiously at the passing angel. The dog’s owner, an older man, came out to see what was aggravating his pet. Although he stared right at Joth and Lucy, he showed no sign of actually seeing them.

The Chrysler Building rose before them like an art deco syringe, its stainless steel cladding sparkling in the sun. Lucy had seen the skyscraper from a distance virtually every day for several years, but never from such a height. From their angle of approach it looked less like an office building than a temple to some ancient sun god. As Joth climbed higher and higher on the updrafts created by the buildings lining East Forty-Second, Lucy marveled at the detailing on the exterior of the building, which had gone unseen, save by pigeons and window- washers, since that day, long decades years ago, when the high-steel workers capped the tower with its triple sunburst spire.

Joth settled onto the broad, flat skull of one of the mammoth eagles that peered out over the city nearly eight hundred feet above the street and gently lowered her atop the gargoyle’s head. The wind was so strong her clothes flapped against her like flags, threatening to yank her into space. She clutched the angel’s arm with both hands, terrified of losing her balance and slipping off her perch. It was all she could do to fight the instinctive urge to fall to her belly and cling to the platinum-like surface.

“Joth—what are you
doing? Why
did you bring me here?” she said through chattering teeth.

“To show you what I see. You have shown me this world through your eyes—now I want you to see it through mine.”

“Joth,
please
—I’m
afraid
—!” The furiously blowing wind threatened to push her own breath back inside her lungs. Her hair was whipping across her face so strongly it was impossible to raise her head, leaving no other choice but to stare at the dizzying drop directly beneath her feet. They were so high up the din of the street-level traffic was swallowed whole by the rushing of the wind.

If Joth heard her pleas, it gave no sign. Instead, it touched her chin and lifted her head, enabling her to stare out over the cityscape. “See through
my
eyes, Lucy. See as
I
see,” the angel said, its words filling her mind like a voice in a dream.

The paralyzing vertigo that had gripped her a moment before was suddenly replaced by a sense of awe. The wonder washed over her like an ocean wave, subsuming her within itself. At first there was fear—the fear of being consumed by the immensity of what she was experiencing—but some instinct buried inside her told her not to fight it. There was a feeling deep within her like that of a key turning in a lock, and, if only for the briefest moment, she looked out over the city through the eyes of an angel.

Before her were spread the landmarks of East Forty-Second—the Graybar Building, the Chanin Building, the Daily News, 500 Fifth Avenue. Seen from on high, the ugliness, hatred, and cruelty that she knew thrived within the city was invisible. In place of people there was a pattern of lights, zipping back and forth, leaving smeared tracers in their wake, like the headlights of cars filmed with time-lapse photography. Some of the lights were bright, others dim, and some even seemed to burn darkly, like ultraviolet lights. There were more colors than she had ever thought imaginable—multitudes of reds, blues, greens, yellows, and every possible shade in between.

The pinpricks of gaily colored light zipped back and forth, like fireflies dancing on a summer night. At first it seemed as if their frantic maneuvering was without rhyme or reason, but the longer she looked, patterns began to emerge. It was as if she were watching a tapestry being woven by blind happenstance, yet it somehow incorporated designs of breath-taking skill and complexity. But just as she was about to grasp the meaning behind the design, suddenly, like Penelope’s wedding shawl, it would unravel and begin re-weaving itself into another, equally grandiose pattern. She was reminded of a photograph she had once seen of Picasso tracing the outline of the Minotaur with a pen-light. The naked human eye could not have possibly grasped what had been drawn, but the camera did. So did it exist? And if it did exist, which was the true work of art? The firefly minotaur or the photograph itself? Or were they twins? One living for the span of a heartbeat, the other for eternity?

The tears that filled her eyes were not brought by the stinging of the wind. She turned her head and pressed her face into Joth’s naked chest, cinching her arms tightly around its narrow waist. The angel gingerly returned her embrace, pulling its wings forward to shelter her. She lifted her head and looked into Joth’s perfect face. In the shadow cast by its wings, the darkness in Joth’s eyes made them look almost human. As she stared into their depths, she trembled yet again, but not for fear of falling or from the chill of the wind.

“I’ve seen enough,” she whispered. “Take me home.”

Lucy remained silent the entire flight back. There was no need to say anything. She felt that she understood Joth far better than she ever had before. She was ashamed for having dismissed the angel as a fool simply because it was ignorant of the physical world she operated in. Now that she had glimpsed, however briefly, Joth’s perception of things, she wondered if this was what the Shinto priests felt when they looked at Mount Fuji and saw the face of their god.

As they came within sight of the apartment building, she experienced a twinge of sadness. She wasn’t sure if it was because her ride was at its end, or because Joth would no longer need to hold her. She had forgotten how it felt to be cradled in the arms of someone she trusted without question. The last time she had been held so securely was when her father was alive.

The phone was ringing as she crawled back through the window into her bedroom. She snatched up the receiver just before the voice mail could pick up the call.

“Where were you?” demanded Nevin by way of a hello.

“Oh—hi,” she said, the smile melting from her face. Normally, hearing her lover’s voice was the high point of her day, but now it made the pit of her stomach fill with lead.

“What’s going on—why are you out of breath?”

“I was—out—for a little while. I just got back in.” She glanced over at Joth, who was sitting inside the window, legs dangling over the sill, its head tilted to one side as it watched her.

“Out?” Nevin’s voice was petulant. “Who were you with?”

“I was with Joth.”

“Oh.
Him.
” Nevin’s displeasure was clear in his voice. “I thought you got rid of that fruitcake?”

“I did. But he’s back for a little while.”

“You mean he’s
still
there?”

“It’s only for a
little
while, sweetie.” Lucy said, cringing at the sound of her own voice. She decided it would be better all around if she changed the subject. “Where are you calling from—?”

“Avenue A. I wanted to see if you had any plans for tonight—I thought we’d have a romantic dinner for two,” he said. “A little candlelight, a little wine...”

“That sounds
wonderful!”
she replied, brightening instantly.

“Good! I’ll be over in ten minutes.”

Lucy hung up the phone, and then looked up at Joth. “Nevin’s coming over.”

“You want me to go away again,” Joth replied flatly.

“No, I
don’t
want you to leave,” she said, putting aside the phone with a sigh. She stood up and took Joth’s hand in hers. “I
want
you to stay. But you have to
promise
me you’ll keep out of Nevin’s way.”

The angel looked down at Lucy’s hand, folded about its own, and then nodded its head in agreement. “I shall do whatever you wish me to do, Lucy.”

She stood for a long moment, gently squeezing the angel’s hands. Then, as if startled from a daydream, she blushed and let go. “Okay! Now that we’ve got the ground rules settled, I’d better find you some more clothes before Nevin gets here. If he sees you running around the house buck naked, he’ll throw a fit!”

Nevin arrived roughly fifteen minutes later with a large bag of Chinese take-out in one hand and a bottle of plum wine in the other.

“I thought we were going out?” Lucy said, trying her best to hide her disappointment.

“Well, actually, I thought we could stay in—after all, dinner by candlelight can be even
more
romantic at home, if you know what I mean...”

“You’re right about that,” she smiled. “You can open the wine while I set the table...”

“You don’t want to eat in the kitchen, do you?” he said disapprovingly.

“Oh—?” Lucy shut the pantry door and turned to look at him. She tried to keep her discomfort from registering on her face. “Where
do
you propose we eat dinner, then?”

“I thought it’d be really romantic if, you know, we had dinner in bed.”

“I don’t know if I’d call it ‘romantic’—it sounds more like ‘convenient’ to me.”

Nevin frowned. “What do you mean by that?”

“Nothing,” she sighed.

He frowned again and nodded in the direction of the living room. Joth was standing by the window, dressed in a pair of her old jeans and a loose T-shirt, watching the setting sun. “What’s
he
still doing here?” he said pointedly.