Winging It

by Annie Dalton

  I’ll admit this idea did make me go very slightly weak at the knees. Then I mentally replayed what Lola had just said.

  ”Accept us? You mean we have to take a test?”

  “No need,” she pointed out. “They know everything about us already.”

  “That sounds really sinister. You mean the Agency like, runs the school as well?”

  Lola sighed. “It’s just common sense. The Agency is in the angel business. Hey, it IS the angel business!” she grinned. “Though we’re supposed to call them agents these days.”

  I nodded, just to show I was keeping up.

  “Ultimately, if we get through our training, some of us just MIGHT work for the Agency when we leave,” Lola explained. “And naturally, the Agency likes to keep an eye on its future employees.”

  I’d always imagined angels as just hanging around, being effortlessly holy. I’d never thought of them having to WORK at it. Suddenly I had a worrying thought. “And these Agency guys can tell if we’re, you know, for real?”

  Lola laughed. “Talk about nowhere to run! When they look at you, it’s like a total soul-scan!”

  “Lola Sanchez?” called a bored voice.

  “Totally luminous! They opened another queue,” shrieked Lola. “See you outside, Mel!”

  This was my cue to make a speedy getaway. But before I could run for it, an Agency official conferred with his invisible ear-piece and beckoned me to the front.

  I couldn’t believe my bad luck. He must have peeked at my soul when I wasn’t looking. Oh-oh, I panicked. I’m going to be exposed as a bogus angel in front of everyone!

  “I can explain,” I stuttered. “There was like, a complete mix-up. And—”

  “Ah yes, Melanie,” he said smoothly. “Perhaps you’d like to tell me why you want to join the school history club?”

  And with a terrifying WHOOSH, I was watching myself in flashback - sound, vision, everything.

  I was seven years old and a total elf. Mousy hair scraped into bunches, eyes way too big for my face and a pointy little chin. At this point, Mum still dressed me in sweatshirts with cartoon characters on them. But that was OK, because secretly I was a time-traveller.

  Whenever I got bored or lonely, I’d whizz off fearlessly to all the times and places which had the coolest costumes, and have imaginary adventures.

  Unfortunately, once or twice I made the mistake of shifting into time-travel mode when I was at school. “Control to Melanie,” my teacher would sneer. “Feel free to return to Earth at any time.”

  Pretty soon I learned that I wasn’t time-travelling at all, just daydreaming, which everyone knew was a total waste of time…

  I came back to the angel library with a jolt.

  “Yep,” the Agency guy said into his collar. “No, you were right, Mike. She’s a natural. I’ll tell her.” He glanced up. “Michael says congratulations,” he said. “We’ll be in touch.”

  I stumbled out through the revolving doors. Lola was waiting on the steps. When she saw my expression, her face lit up. “You’re in! That is SO cool!”

  “Lola,” I croaked. “Did you ever hear of a person who was an angel and didn’t even know it?”

  She gave my shoulder a comforting pat. “Come on. We’ll go back to our dorm. It’ll be a dump. It always is. But I’ll make you some of my granny’s special hot chocolate. What do you say?”

  I took a long look at Lola Sanchez, the soul-mate I’d somehow known for ever. And I got the definite feeling my Houdini days were over.

  “Sure,” I said, as if she’d asked a different question entirely. “Why not?”

  Chapter Five

  Lola was right. Our dormitory was a total let-down. My room was more like a cupboard. As for the bed, I’ve seen cosier ironing boards.

  Lola’s hot chocolate was sinfully delicious, however. It was so frothy it was like drinking through a fluffy chocolate-flavoured cloud.

  “I can’t believe you can get this stuff in heaven,” I burbled. “It has to be about a zillion times more wonderful than the Earth kind.”

  Lola pulled a face. “Actually, it is Earth chocolate. It’s my grandmother’s secret recipe.”

  I grinned. “That’s OK! Where I come from, twenty-second-century hot chocolate would be considered unbelievably cool! How come you can get it here?”

  “Didn’t you know?” said Lola. “We’re allowed anything from our own time period which is totally essential to our well-being.”

  I felt a little rush of relief. “You mean we can still listen to all our favourite music?”

  She giggled. “Well, I couldn’t survive without music, could you?”

  “No way,” I agreed happily.

  After Lola had gone off to her own cupboard for the night, I stayed up, gazing out of my window at the city lights.

  The air in Heaven has this fabulous champagne fizz, giving the impression that there’s always some wonderful nonstop party going on. But that night, it felt depressingly like a party I hadn’t been invited to.

  I’d never been totally on my own before, not without the TV nattering in the background. I wasn’t sure if I’d cope. How would I sleep without Jade’s heavy, snuffly breathing for company?

  Of course, as an angel, I didn’t technically need to sleep at all. We do get tired, incidentally. But it’s not like human tiredness. It’s more like your spiritual batteries have run out of juice, what Lola calls ‘angel electricity’.

  However, sleeping, like eating and shopping, is a habit I’m in no major hurry to give up! So I eventually washed my face, brushed my teeth, put on the baggy T-shirt I’d borrowed from Lola and plonked down on my economy-size mattress.

  I lay in the dark, telling myself that I now had a completely amazing new life and wasn’t in the least homesick.

  Gradually, it dawned on me that I could hear something. It was my cosmic music, those beautiful throbbing sounds which had pulled me out into space, all the way to the gates of the Angel Academy.

  And the longer I lay listening, the less I felt like a tiny ball-bearing in a divine game of pinball, and the more I felt I had truly come home.

  I must have dropped off, because next thing I knew, someone was having a coughing fit outside my door.

  I unpeeled my eyelids with difficulty. It was still pitch dark.

  “What do you think you’re up to, Lola Sanchez!” hissed a voice on the other side of my door.

  That’s Amber, I thought in surprise.

  “You minx, Lolly!” whispered a third voice. “You’ll ruin everything!”

  BAM! My door flew open. Eight or nine girls charged in. As well as Lola and Amber, I recognised Flora and the giggly girls from my class.

  “Hey!” I said.

  “I’m SO sorry, Mel!” wailed Lola.

  “Up you get!” said Flora sweetly.

  “Are you going to make me?” I said, clinging on grimly to my sheet.

  Peachy little Flora was stronger than she looked. She yanked my arm so hard, that she totally pulled me out of bed.

  “It’s an old school tradition!” Lola was saying in a pleading voice. “It’s not like, personal.”

  “It feels pretty personal to me!” I snarled.

  The girls bundled me, kicking and struggling, down several flights of stairs, out into the grey light of dawn. We seemed to be heading for the beach.

  “Now what?” I panted, as we scrunched over pebbles and bits of shell. “Are you going to drown me?”

  “Will you just relax!” Flora snapped. “Or we just might have to drop you!”

  “Mel, I’m so jealous!” Amber was burbling. “Didn’t you ADORE your initiation ceremony, Lollie? I would love to have mine all over again.”

  “Be my guest!” I growled.

  I noticed that Lola was carefully avoiding my eyes. I got the impression she was totally feeling for me.

  About half-way down the seashore, the other trainees dumped me down on the wet sand. We eyed each other uneasily.

  “Is
that it?” I demanded. “Can I go back to bed now?”

  “No chance,” said Flora in a spooky voice. “It’s just begun!”

  And they joined hands and began to circle self-consciously around me on the sand, like kids playing “Jenny is a-weeping”. They were giggling at first. Then they sobered up and started chanting some eerie little rhyme.

  At the end of each chorus, they edged a little closer, moving me with them further and further down the beach, until everyone was ankle-deep in sea foam.

  Finally Flora and Amber exchanged meaningful glances. And next minute, those sadistic trainee angels lifted me up and dunked me right down in the sea.

  I scrambled up, gasping and spluttering, and trying to wring some of the salt water out of my T-shirt. “Oh ha ha! How totally hilarious!” I yelled. “How old are you guys, exactly?”

  But my tormentors had melted away without a sound.

  And then I saw why.

  There was a golden gleam on the horizon. Walking across the water towards me, out of the sunrise, were crowds of angels.

  For a moment I forgot to breathe. The angels paid no more attention to me than a tree would, or a star.

  I couldn’t help myself. I stepped on to the silky surface of the waves and walked out to meet them. It wasn’t as weird as you’d think. It didn’t feel like I was walking on jelly or skating over glass. The sea behaved the same as always. It was me that had changed. My bare feet splashed and scuffled across the sparkling waters of the ocean, as if I was, well - paddling.

  I can’t sink, I thought. I’m as light as air!

  This thought was so incredible I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

  As I drew closer, an angel dipped his finger in the sea.

  Omigosh, I thought. I could see clear to the bottom of the ocean, fathoms below. I saw shoals of fish shimmer to and fro beneath us. I saw monster crabs scuttling across the ocean floor, like jagged giant scissors. My angel senses were so acute, I actually saw a baby pearl secretly forming inside its oyster.

  A jolt of pure happiness went through me. And for a fleeting moment I understood everything.

  Then without me moving an inch, I was back on solid ground in my sopping wet T-shirt. And the angels were nowhere to be seen.

  Lola was waiting, hugging her knees, still carefully not looking at me. “I brought you some clothes.”

  I took them without a word. I felt totally spaced and peculiar.

  Later Lola told me that I was so silent on the way back, she was convinced I really hated her! When we reached my door, she stared down at her boots. “So do you still want to go shopping or what?” she mumbled.

  I was back to normal in a flash. “Are you serious? We can really go shopping in Heaven?”

  Lola burst out laughing. “But first I’m going to buy you the best breakfast you have ever had!”

  I was amazed to discover that our school campus was only one tiny part of an incredibly vibey city.

  “What’s that yummy smell?” I said as we walked into town.

  “This is the Ambrosia district,” Lola explained. “Where all the best cafes are.”

  She took me to her favourite hang-out, a cafe called Guru. A bald waiter called Mo brought us the biggest breakfast on the menu.

  We stuffed our faces with the most delicious pancakes I have had in my entire existence. And while we ate, Lola and I had an excellent heart-to-heart. She told me about her gran, who brought up Lola and her four brothers after their mum died. I told Lola about my mum and little sister, and how our lives totally cheered up after mum got together with Des.

  “I’m scared I’ll forget about them,” I said.

  “That’s not how it works. What changes is, it stops hurting so much.”

  There was a short silence. “So how did you -er…?” I asked cautiously.

  Lola had a wicked glint in her eye. “How did I croak?”

  I felt myself turning red. “Don’t say, if you’d rather not.”

  “Hey, it’s not a problem, honestly. But it’s funny how it’s only new kids who ask that,” Lola mused. She cleared her throat. “If you really want to know, I um - got in the way of a bullet.”

  I gasped. “Someone shot you?”

  “Only by mistake,” she sighed. “It’s no biggie, carita, trust me, after you’ve been here a bit longer, none of that stuff seems so important.” She grinned. “You don’t fret about losing all those cute little baby teeth now, do you?”

  I frowned. “You’re not trying to tell me that being shot is in the same league as losing your milk teeth?”

  Lola shrugged. “There are worse ways to die in my city, I promise you.”

  I stared at her. “But you were just a kid!”

  So was I, I thought. And I suddenly felt this lonely little ache inside.

  Lola slurped up some of her smoothie, then she put her head on one side, and smiled. “It’s like this, babe. Some lives are really long and complicated. They just go on and on, like, like - I don’t know, symphonies or something.”

  I gave her a watery grin. “We listened to a couple of those in Music. There was this one that had about a gazillion endings, like durn, durn DURN! And then, blam, blam BLAM! And it still wasn’t over!”

  “Exactly,” she beamed. “But our lives, Mel, yours and mine - they just went flashing by, like songs from a car radio. You know those vibey little tunes that put you in a great mood for the rest of the day?”

  She hummed a catchy little riff, then broke off. “Do those songs need to be any longer?” she demanded. “I don’t think so, Melanie! They are perfect, just the way they are.”

  I couldn’t help laughing. Lola certainly had a way of putting things. Though personally I’d have preferred a combo-option. A vibey, feel-good, Melanie Beeby symphony with a gazillion endings.

  “You know this morning,” I said, “when you all rushed into my room? You knew what was going to happen, didn’t you?”

  “Oh, Mel! I feel so terrible about that!”

  “Not the stupid initiation,” I said impatiently. “The angels. Are they…?” It was hard to explain what I felt. “I mean, one day will we, like, grow into them?”

  Lola shook her head. “The ones you saw perform really specialised cosmic tasks. They deal with the natural world mostly. They don’t have much to do with humans or feelings.”

  “Or shopping?” I suggested.

  Lola giggled. “OK, OK. I can take a hint!”

  On our way out of the cafe, I was interested to see that Lola didn’t hand over any money. She just flashed some kind of ID at Mo.

  “See you later, Ms Sanchez,” he grinned.

  “Hey, do I get one of those?” I asked hopefully.

  “Sure, once you get through your probationary term.”

  I was horrified. “You mean the Academy sometimes kicks people out?

  Isn’t the brain weird? Yesterday I was prepared to tunnel my way out with a teaspoon. Now suddenly I wanted to be voted Heaven’s Most Popular Angel!

  Lola shrugged. “You’d have to really screw up to get expelled. Don’t look so worried,” she said sympathetically. “It’s never going to happen. And you’ll know the instant your probation’s up, because that’s when you get your like, real angel name. Honestly, that is the coolest moment!” She went all dreamy, remembering.

  I felt a pang of jealousy. I wanted to know my angel name too. “Do you know mine?” I pleaded. “Can’t you tell me? Just a little sneak preview?”

  Lola shook her head, still dreamy. “You’re the only one who knows it. It’s like something that’s already locked inside you. And one day the key turns, and you hear it. And it’s like you always knew.”

  A vague memory stirred at the back of my mind. “That’s so weird,” I whispered. “When I was little—”

  But Lola had jumped up. “Come on, Mel! It’s time to spend spend spend!”

  My mood changed in a flash. “But I don’t have ID!” I wailed. “How am I going to pay for it?”

&n
bsp; Lola’s eyes gleamed. “Melanie Beeby,” she said. “You are SO going to love this place!”

  She was right. But several hours later, as Lola and I walked back into Guru with at least a dozen carrier bags, I still couldn’t believe it.

  The instant Lola told the salespeople who I was, they let me have everything I needed. Just like that! OK, I didn’t strictly need that sweet little grey dress with all the beading. But after Lola said how great it looked on me, I couldn’t bear to leave it behind.

  While we waited for our smoothies to arrive, I gazed around Guru, happily admiring the decor. Also, I have to admit, the boys!

  Something occurred to me. “It’s lucky everyone speaks such great English here,” I said. “I am SO useless at languages.”

  Lola looked so tickled, that I felt myself turning red. “What did I say?”

  “That’s so cute! You really think we’re talking in English!” Lola patted my arm. “Mel, you’re an angel! You understand every human language ever invented. But in this city, you speak, well - Angel. Like the rest of us.”

  I let my head fall on to the table. “AAARGH!” I growled. “This place is too angel for words! Angel this, angel that. Now you’re telling me there’s some weird angel language?”

  “Languages,” Lola corrected. “If you want to get technical.” She knocked back the rest of her smoothy. “Let’s head home and you can give me an exclusive fashion show.”

  “Now that’s my language,” I said promptly.

  We walked home, taking a different route this time. It was getting late and a soft blue twilight was falling on the streets. On the way, we passed this kind of Greek temple building, set in really beautiful gardens. They were like the most beautiful wild flower meadows you could ever imagine, only with that extra heavenly something…

  I suddenly caught my breath. Between the stone pillars, I could see shining beings, quietly moving to and fro. Each of them was surrounded by a haze of coloured light. I was too far away to see what they were doing, but it was so peaceful, it made me want to cry.