Color of Angels' Souls

by Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian

  At one point, Jeremy almost fell off his chair when Marilyn Monroe came out to sing, followed by Elvis Presley. The crowd went nuts.

  “No way! The King!” Allison squealed, applauding like crazy. “I can’t believe it!”

  But other legends soon followed. Many others. Jeremy and Allison could only look on in amazement. Both had tears in their eyes when Sinatra walked on stage, young and handsome again, and sang in his angelic voice.

  They were surprised to see that the artists were rewarded for their efforts. It was quite an ingenious system. The Angels obviously had no money or gold, or anything else to exchange, but they had eventually found a solution. The funniest, most brilliant, and most talented stars were rewarded with compact pieces of Mist, mostly white or gold, that people in the audience tossed onto the stage. In this way, the artists could eat without having to find blue or red Mist for themselves. The superstars had found a new dream job: They no longer had to depend on humans for their livelihood, but only on their own talent—and on the approbation of their audience, which they literally fed off of.

  During the show, Allison was mortified when her loincloth and top suddenly disappeared. Flint was kind enough to make her a magnificent dress in different shades of blue and purple, using a chair he found nearby. Lili did the same for Jeremy, matching her own white dress with a tailored navy-blue suit that was very elegant. They even made shoes for them. Now that was real haute couture!

  It was already late in the afternoon when the final show ended.

  Lili and Flint then took the two young Angels to a Mist restaurant that a gourmet Angel had just opened, right above one of the most famous human restaurants in the city. Of course, they had to create a stairway of Mist for Allison and Jeremy, who still didn’t know how to fly, so that they could sit with the other Angels dining up in the air.

  The immaculate white Angel who greeted them was well known for his astonishing culinary inventions. After shaking his hand and locating a free table, Flint explained to his friends that the chef had been traveling around the world for centuries seeking out the rarest and tastiest Mists, which he then compressed using the special powers only known to the Great Old Ones. It enabled him to conserve the vapors for long periods of time—even for years if need be.

  Allison and Jeremy were filled with wonder as they discovered a whole new world of unknown flavors. The food was served in Mist plates, made of a crystal substance so transparent it was nearly impossible to distinguish from the table. But what emotion could be as transparent and fragile as crystal?

  Flint told them.

  It was loyalty.

  Jeremy was even more in awe of all the splendor and creativity than Allison. During his first few days in the afterlife, he hadn’t realized that Angels could be so creative.

  While they ate, the two old Angels asked Allison how she had “passed over” at such a young age. With a certain reserve (in fact, it was Jeremy who talked the most), Allison told them about the cancer-curing drug and how the two of them had both been killed by the same hit man with a katana.

  When she had finished her story, Lili placed her hand over Jeremy’s. The small contact was so sensual that he had to fight to keep from trembling.

  “You poor, poor man!” she whispered in her soft voice. “How terrifying! And both of you so young, so innocent, and with such a bright future ahead of you! I feel terrible for you.”

  “Please, don’t bother,” replied Allison, who was hardly thrilled to see Lili’s hand on top of Jeremy’s. “It wasn’t your fault. But I can tell you one thing: Ventousi has to pay for what he did, and Jeremy and I are going to make sure he does.”

  Both Lili and Flint tensed up. Allison was also relieved to see that the Angel had pulled away her hand as she sat back in her chair. Jeremy gave Allison a look of warning, and suddenly she remembered what he had said about obsessed Angels. Before she had time to explain that it wasn’t an obsession but a question of justice, Flint interceded.

  “You want to get revenge, do you? It’s a positive emotion.”

  Jeremy’s jaw dropped.

  “What? I mean: really?”

  Flint smiled enigmatically.

  “In this world, we have two enemies: obsessions, which can drive us crazy, and boredom, which can make us disappear. A nice healthy dose of revenge in order to right a wrong is a good thing—provided you obtain concrete results, of course.” He exchanged a knowing look with Lili. “And when we’re involved, there are always results. I approve of your mission; it should keep you busy.”

  He emphasized his words by performing a ceremonious bow, passing right through the table and plates of Mist.

  “You can count on us. Of course, I don’t know if we’ll be of much help to you, my dear Allison, but this Bentousi—”

  “Ventousi.”

  “Ah yes, Ventousi, will regret having done you such harm, my friends. Even if, as far as I’m concerned, I’m delighted that he sent us such a charming Angel.”

  Lili smiled suggestively. Allison didn’t know how to react to all of Flint’s excessive flattery.

  “Should we have him killed?” the red-haired beauty asked.

  Jeremy and Allison both stared at her, speechless.

  “B-but … how?” Allison managed to ask.

  “Oh, that’s easy,” Lili smiled nonchalantly. “The wrong person at the wrong time, the junky looking for a fix finds a gun or a knife, and that’s that!”

  “But … but you’re Blues!”

  “We prefer to call ourselves Angels, my dear, and just because we feed off positive emotions doesn’t mean we’re saints,” Flint gently admonished her. “We still have our faults. And this Ventousi character probably feeds whole hordes of red Angels. Getting rid of him would, in many ways, be a good deed. Just think about it: We would be depriving all those revolting Angels of their junk food. What do you think?”

  Allison looked into Jeremy’s eyes and saw that he shared her qualms.

  “No,” she finally said. “Killing him isn’t the solution.”

  “But why not?”

  “Because if Ventousi dies, the formula for his miracle drug will disappear along with him, and thousands of sick people wouldn’t be cured.”

  Lili nodded at her words. Without thinking, she suddenly became very familiar with Allison.

  “You’re absolutely right, honey! I hadn’t thought of that. Flint, old chum, we’ll just have to find another solution.”

  Flint swallowed a bit of Mist with aplomb before adding cheerfully: “I’m hardly worried, my dear Lili. I know firsthand that there are no limits to your fertile imagination!”

  The two old Angels both laughed, and began sharing funny anecdotes about some of the latest tricks they had played on the Reds. Apparently, the Angels staved off boredom by sabotaging the work of the enemy camp. The two Blues seemed to be quite talented at this sort of subterfuge, and Jeremy and Allison both realized how lucky they were to be on the same side.

  As the white Angel placed some fresh and delicious Mist on the table, Jeremy began looking around at the other diners. He hadn’t noticed them at first. Floating in the air was still such a novelty for him that he had been concentrating all his efforts on remaining in his seat, but now he realized that the colors of the other diners were nothing like those he’d seen before.

  He saw all different shades of blue and red, much deeper and more magnificent than any he had ever seen before. Many of the diners had wings, and were seated in chairs that apparently had been specially designed to accommodate them.

  Jeremy saw that Allison was also fascinated by the Angels’ wings. There was every size and every sort imaginable: most with feathers, but also ones that looked like butterfly wings with every color in the rainbow, and slender, transparent wings more like a dragonfly’s. The red Angels seemed to prefer more leathery wings, like a pterodactyl’s. The more flamboyant diners seemed to prefer wings with red feathers.

  Considered all together, it made for a magnificen
t, multicolored spectacle.

  His gaze met the twinkling eyes of Flint, and it was then that he realized they were dining with the upper crust of the New York scene. These were the oldest Angels, the ones who had found a way to fight off boredom, slumber, idleness, decline, and madness. They were the most powerful, the toughest of the lot.

  Hundreds of years old. Even thousands.

  “They’re pretty, aren’t they?” Lili said softly to Allison. She was clearly amused by the childlike look of wonder in the girl’s eyes. “In a few years, you’ll be able to make some for yourself if you want.”

  Allison was dying to ask her something.

  “And you?” she finally asked timidly. “Don’t you have any?”

  Lili smiled.

  “I don’t need wings to fly. But I can make them whenever I want. Look.”

  She closed her eyes and, suddenly, two immense, golden wings extended majestically from her back. In answer, two silver wings appeared on Flint’s back, and the restaurant suddenly went quiet. All the other Angels nodded respectfully at their table, and then went back to their discussions. Jeremy and Allison could only stare wide-eyed at their hosts, trying as best they could not to let their jaws drop in admiration. They were magnificent. Incredible. In fact, each wing was partially lined with gold or silver, with a pristine white center pulsing beneath, underscored by broad gold and silver streaks forming intricate patterns.

  Allison couldn’t resist: She reached out her hand toward Flint’s silver wings, and he bent one in her direction so she could touch it.

  “I … I thought it would be cold and metallic,” she whispered. “But it’s soft! Even softer than a bird’s wing!”

  She turned back toward Jeremy, who noticed a hint of irritation in Flint’s gray eyes.

  “Touch it, Jeremy; it’s so soft!”

  Lili lowered one of her golden wings and lightly brushed Jeremy’s face, making him tremble. Oh yes, it was soft. Awfully and voluptuously soft. For half a second, he imagined himself making love with Lili, surrounded by such incredible softness. But then quickly got ahold of himself. He had seen firsthand how the Ancients treated the Cherubs. They weren’t always so tender. She would never be interested in him.

  And yet, the young girl’s emerald eyes were filled with kindness as she smiled at him.

  It was disconcerting: She was probably more than a thousand years old, but looked younger than Allison. It bothered Jeremy. His reason kept telling him one thing while his eyes were telling him something else.

  He had to find some way of breaking her spell.

  “Why do the red Angels want to declare war on the blue Angels?” he finally managed to blurt out.

  The two Ancients exchanged a worried look and closed their wings, to Allison’s great disappointment.

  “Did Einstein tell you that?” Flint asked.

  “Yes. I’m still a young Angel”—he couldn’t help it: He would rather die (hardy har har!) than use the term Cherub—“and I haven’t quite figured out all the fine points of angelic politics yet, but from what I’ve gathered, the world of the living tends toward good or evil, based on cycles, but that this time the Reds want the trend to continue definitively toward evil.”

  Flint demonstrated his unflappable angelic patience once again when he didn’t even bat an eye, like a human may have. But thanks to his hypersensitivity, Jeremy could tell that he hadn’t liked his question.

  “Actually, it’s not really a question of good and evil,” Lili said soothingly, as her wings disappeared for good this time. “Red Angels feed on extreme emotions, and it’s much more difficult to find these extreme sensations in Blue food. They are ineluctably drawn to the most … violent and ‘spicy’ emotions, you might say.”

  She bent over the table and grabbed a crystal glass made of red Mist. She broke it into pieces with a piece of silverware and handed a piece each to Jeremy and Allison.

  “Try a piece, and you’ll see what I mean.”

  Jeremy frowned at the pieces of scarlet glass.

  “Isn’t it dangerous?”

  “No. You would have to eat a lot of it to turn red. It’s perfectly safe.”

  Not fully convinced, the two young Angels each picked up a piece of glass and slowly put it in their mouths. Jeremy was startled by the intensity of the emotions that overcame him.

  He was stunned at first to feel the same ecstasy as when he ate blue Mist: the same feelings of happiness, fulfillment, and joy, even though he knew full well that he was eating Mist produced by anger. But in some ways, the sensations were more violent, more powerful than those he’d felt before. It was as if harsh, negative emotions added some spice to the vapor. Oh yes, he was beginning to understand why the red Angels were so fond of their Mist. And why they would want large quantities of it to be produced. The feelings of ecstasy were, quite simply, indescribable. And dangerously addictive.

  “The Blues are going to have to rein in the Reds’ activities if they want to keep feeding themselves correctly,” Lili sighed, amused by the glassy look in the eyes of the two new Angels after their little taste test.

  “Except that the Reds are becoming more and more powerful,” Flint smiled sadly.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Lili said, waving away his concern. “We can’t do much about it anyway. That’s something for you and the other members of the Grand Council to take care of, not me! And they won’t be meeting in Washington for another two weeks.”

  Her eyes, as green as the leaves in springtime, looked deep into Jeremy’s blue ones.

  “Would you like to spend some time with me, Jeremy?” she whispered. “I would like to show you some of the other wonders of this new world—while we gather some information about the man who sent the two of you here, of course.”

  As Allison watched Jeremy fall under Lili’s charms, she couldn’t help but feel jealous—which was strange, to say the least, since she hardly even knew him.

  Then Flint leaned in close to her and brushed the tips of his fingers across her cheek.

  His fingers burned like fire, but at the same time, felt delightfully soft. She trembled.

  “And you, my pretty Allison, would you like to come with me?”

  All the alarms started going off in Allison’s head: “Warning! Danger!” She would have most likely accepted Flint’s proposition if she had gone out with a lot of men when she was alive and didn’t feel uneasy in their company. But despite how magnificent and attractive the Angel may have seemed, she suddenly took him for a dangerous predator. Just like all the men who had sniffed around her when she was alive, impatient to get her in their beds. She jumped awkwardly to her feet.

  “Jeremy,” she stuttered. “I … I forgot about something. Something I have to check on. Could you come with me for … for a second?”

  The stunned look on Flint’s face might have amused her if she hadn’t been so frightened.

  “Uhh, sure,” Jeremy said, as if he were snapping out of a trance. “Of course! Do you want us to come with you?”

  “No, no, just you,” she added quickly. “Just you and me; we don’t want to bother Flint and Lili with something so … trivial! We’ll be … be right back!”

  And before Jeremy, who was still lost in Lili’s eyes, had time to react, she grabbed him by the hand and started pulling him toward the exit. They flew down the stairs of Mist that Flint had made for them and which, luckily for them, hadn’t evaporated yet. Neither Lili nor Flint lifted an eyebrow, but simply watched them speed away with the strange expression of the Ancients.

  As soon as they were on the sidewalk, Jeremy called out to Allison, who was still squeezing his hand with all her might.

  “You panicked,” he said calmly, even though he would have liked to scream at her for having torn him away from Lili. “What happened?”

  Allison looked mortified. “He … he wants … he wants to sleep with me,” she said haltingly. “And I don’t want … I can’t … I’m …”

  “… a virgin, yeah I kn
ow,” Jeremy said, only half listening. He looked back longingly at the entrance to the restaurant, cursing to see Lili wasn’t there.

  The frosty silence behind him finally reached his brain. He turned around. Allison was giving him a cold, hard look.

  “I was going to say that I’m worried,” she uttered in a voice so frigid it would have made a polar bear shudder. “But I see you already know everything about my private life!”

  Jeremy felt his face turn red. Lili’s influence over him was lifting and he could finally think straight once again. More or less. Fleeting visions of her sun-kissed skin and green eyes were still going around and around in his head.

  “Oops, I’m sorry,” he told her. “I … spoke without thinking. But I think it’s great, really great! I’m impressed by your … your tenacity; it’s tremendous!”

  She stared at him, her blue eyes the shade of icicles.

  “As I was about to say,” she continued, in a tone like freshly fallen snow. “I’m worried. Those two old Angels didn’t accept someone as brilliant as Einstein into their clique, and all of a sudden they’re infatuated with the two of us. Why? I don’t know enough about this new world yet. I need some explanations. I’m lost and I’m scared!”

  “I don’t know much more about it than you do,” Jeremy admitted, crestfallen.

  “Do you think there’s some hidden motive behind what they’re doing? Some secret they’re keeping from us? Besides just wanting to avoid dying of boredom, I mean?”

  Jeremy began to think about the surprising interest that the two old Angels had taken in them.

  “It’s possible. I have no idea!”

  “Everything went so fast,” Allison continued. “It’s … it’s hard to take it all in! But one thing is for sure: People like that always have an ulterior motive, and I can tell that the two of them are incredibly powerful!”