My Angel

For he will command his angel concerning you to guard you in all your ways

�" Psalm 91:11

Since Aspen was being knitted together in her mother’s womb I had been assigned the task to look over her, protect her and love her. In fewer words I am Aspen Thomas’ guardian angel. I know the number of hairs on her head, I know her thoughts before she thinks them and I feel her pain and heartaches as powerfully as she does. But she cannot see me. I am invisible to all humans who look towards me.

Amongst the small amount of customers at Delights, I stood like a tower, and my blood red hair would make them stare if they could see me. My brown eyes needn’t search for Aspen Thomas, I could sense her, and so they landed on her instantly. My arching wings fluttered affectionately as she added extra marshmallows to a little boy’s hot chocolate, winking conspiratorially. She then proceeded to aid an elderly customer from her chair to the door of the café where her young son awaited with a car.

“Thank you, my child” the old woman said, smiling up at the kind waitress

Aspen bent down and kiss the older woman on one wrinkled cheek, leaving the woman flustered “It’s alright!”

“Well aren’t you a little angel!”

Aspen blushed furiously and then looked back to see the small café beginning to fill “I’m so sorry, but I have to go. Will you be alright from here?”

“Oh yes, my dear” she said cheerily “in fact her is my son now”

Her son approached them, flashing Aspen an appreciative smile, and proceeded to help his mother in the passenger seat of his car.

I cocked my head to the side knowing both that it was approaching 11 o’clock, meaning that Aspen’s shift was almost over, and that Aspen had no intention of going home if her boss, Rae Kerrington, needed help with the overflow of customers. My golden wings fluttered again, but this time with worry, as I saw the exhaustion in the eyes and the way she hunched her slender frame. I winced knowing what Aspen was going to say before it even left her lips.

“I know my shift is over, Rae” Aspen began, wearily wiping the sweat from her brow “but do you need me to stay and help until the crowd dies down?”

One of the laws of being one of the Lord’s angels is to no change the course of nature, including not interfering with a human’s free will. However, if Rae accepts Aspen’s help, Aspen could end up staying for another few hours instead of doing homework or more importantly sleeping, I will not hesitate in breaking the rules in order to protect Aspen. But is seemed that there was no need because the old lady smiled at Aspen fondly and shook her head.

“Don’t be silly, Aspen dear” her Italian accent showing as she patted Aspen’s cheek gently “go home and sleep”

“Are you sure-“

“Yes!” Rae said sternly “now go and get that lovely girl Lealia’s jumper and go home!”

Aspen nodded and gave her boss a small smile before grabbing Lealia’s jumper and politely pushing her way through the queue. My heart was crushed within my chest as I watched the child dig her shaking hands deep in her jean pockets, but that did nothing to stop her teeth from knocking together as she shivered and the colour to run from her cheeks as the cold wind set deep within her bones. Recklessly, I wished that I could subtlety change the weather while she pushed through the gale winds, but I remand well behaved as I flew a few feet above her.

Finally we reached her dark home and I smiled as I saw the colour return to her cheeks and heard the sounds of her chattering teeth cease slightly. I frowned as I saw that her father was not home. I clenched my fists angrily as vision filled the forefront of my mind; Mr Thomas sat on a wooden stool in front of a bar, several empty pints already surrounding him and yet he called for another.

Pushing the image out of my mind, I focused on his daughter, who now sat at her makeshift desk writing furiously even as she yawned hugely and her eyes began to drift close in exhaustion.

I heard a loud crash from downstairs, and my inhuman nose smelt alcohol, vomit and sweat, mixed with a daunting sense of danger, violence and anger.

"Run Aspen!" I screamed internally, though I did not know where "Run!"

But it was too late because not too long afterwards Aspen's door was slammed open and nearly ripped off its hinges. My brown eyes searched Mr Thomas’ mind and I saw the Devil's minions there, though still trapped in their mental cages. They leered at me and my helplessness, as I understood what might follow. Their small bodies were covered in tufts of fur, slimy scales or imposing spikes, but what was most frightening was their teeth. Their teeth that sat upon gums torn in places from the ferocity of their bite and covered in their prey's blood. Their teeth that were as sharp as knives, ready to make the lethal strike.

I tore my gaze from the caged monsters as Aspen's father spoke, his words slurred from alcohol.

"Lily"

The devil uses its host's weaknesses, and Mr Thomas' weakness was most certainly his strong and unfailing love for his buried wife. My heart thudded painfully in my chest as I realised the minions would use that against him, use it to hurt those closest to him. Aspen.

My hearing and vision faded as the wheels in my head turned furiously trying to figure out a way to save Aspen without breaking any of the rules. But suddenly vision and hearing returned as I heard a monstrous roar and something being slammed against a wall.  

Mr Thomas stood very close to my precious darling, his huge hand clamped tightly around her neck. I reached for Mr Thomas, preparing to wrench him away from Aspen but before I could a sad voice filled my mind

"My heart is breaking too, my angel, but now is not the time. Not yet"

Salty tears etched pathways down my freckled cheeks, as I stopped and was forced to watch as Aspen's breathing became more ragged and her hands pulled frantically at the hands clamped around her throat.

Then he retracted his hand from her throat and let Aspen fall heavily onto the timber floor. I sighed in relief and wiped my cheeks with the sleeve of my white robes, and I prayed that he would leave. Leave the room. Leave the house. Leave Aspen, leave for good. But he did not, Mr Thomas continued to stand menacingly over her cowering frame. Slowly the drunken man knelt beside his daughter and stroked her hair, with a look of almost childlike wonder on his face.

"You have Lily's hair"

I almost retched as he reached for Aspen's chin and trailed his fingers over her cheeks and lips. Oh please, dear Lord, don't let him rape her.

"You have her eyes, her nose, her lips"

"But I'm not Dadda" she cried, her lovely green eyes searching her father's face for assurance, an assurance that he won't hurt her again "Mummy's gone. She's dead"

I watched as his grip tightened on Aspen's chin, making his knuckles whiten. True sobs, that neither Aspen nor her father could hear erupted from somewhere deep within me, as I had to watch Mr Thomas' hand whip across Aspen's cheek, seeming to make her fragile neck snap with its force.

After spraying beads of salvia amongst Aspen's tears as he called her a liar he was gone, his loud footsteps moving along the hallway to the front door presumably for another drink.

My sobs mingled with Aspen's long into the night, and as she slept restlessly. I sat beside her wishing that I could stroke her blonder hair and I cradle her in my lap, rocking her as she slept. But I could not.  As I watched the purple bruises arise on Aspen's neck, jaw and cheek and her tears slowly dry, I vowed that if this was to happen again I would save her.