aici<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Last night, just before drifting off into sleep\u2014that twilight time, I witnessed a most incredible thing:\u00a0 twinkling, sparkling light began coming through my bedroom wall!<\/p>\n
It was so real, that I knew that it couldn\u2019t be dream, so I lay there wondering what would happen.\u00a0 I finally panicked, fumbled around for something to swat the sparkling spot with, and fell back suddenly exhausted.<\/p>\n
Suddenly, the twinkling, sparkling lights disappeared and there stood an angel–I fell out of bed, or, I should have because I understood instinctively that this was my guardian angel\u2014that sometimes hidden, often unnoticed presence in my life ever since my childhood.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat the\u2026!\u201d\u00a0 I yelled.<\/p>\n
As if to make sure that I understood that he was very real and, apparently, very powerful, he turned the stick that I had found to poke the sparkling, twinkling light on my wall into ashes, which floated to my blue rug.\u00a0 I\u2019d received that tiny rug from ____ (mother, girlfriend, foreign dignitary, etc.), and I gazed at the pile of ashes that were going to be a mess to clean up.<\/p>\n
\u201cWould you get up?\u201d\u00a0 He smiled pleasantly, motioning toward a sofa.<\/p>\n
I did,–shakily, and we moved across the room to my white corduroy sofa, which I had recently purchased.<\/p>\n
Noticing that it already had a small smudge on it, I sat and he remained standing in the middle of my bedroom.<\/p>\n
\u201cOk\u201d I said, a bit less nervously, but still on guard–it\u2019s not every day that you get a visit from an angel.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have some bad news for you.\u201d\u00a0 He said, adjusting and pulling at his angel garments, which were<\/em> robes, but obviously inexpensive ones; I know thrift-store clothes when I see them.<\/p>\n\u201cI can\u2019t be your guardian angel anymore; your contract has expired\u2014you\u2019ve proven over time that you are quite able to fend for yourself. Presently, there is a shortage of competent angels, and God has been forced to cut back on all but emergency cases. You are no longer an emergency case, so my news is bad, but, then, when you think about it, it\u2019s really good news!\u201d\u00a0 My angel in the slightly used robes said. \u00a0I looked at him as if he were a lunatic.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t understand any of this.\u00a0 Why are you here?\u201d \u00a0I asked him, not nervous now, but, rather, a bit peeved. He doused my mounting impatience with what he said next.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou need to sign a new contract, because, of course, you died.\u201d\u00a0 He again smiled; as if verbally slugging me in the gut was great fun, and he was enjoying the fact that he had shut me up so efficiently.<\/p>\n
I died?\u201d\u00a0 I stammered.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, and because of a mix-up, you are no longer covered, but luckily for you, you can play a game of chess to decide whether you are proceeding to Heaven or Hell, and, between you and me, I would think carefully as to where you choose to spend eternity. You do play chess, don\u2019t you?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI do, but I\u2019m not all that good.\u00a0 Am I alright<\/em>?\u00a0<\/p>\n\u201cOh, certainly; you\u2019re fine, and are in good hands.\u00a0 If I do honk my own horn, I am the all around chess champion of both Heaven and Hell, so I will make sure that your moves are first rate\u2014appropriate so to speak.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0 Again, he smiled, this time rubbing his bald head, which I noticed had bumps.\u00a0 If he were wearing second-hand robes, then, theoretically, \u00a0might be homeless from time to time, so could he have gotten mugged or something? \u00a0Can angels get mugged?<\/p>\n
I dismissed the thought, but did notice that, perhaps it was only my imagination, but it seemed that his warm smile had become less so.\u00a0 Waking up with an angel in my room had obviously effected my perceptions, because anyone who played chess so competently must be a refined person– shouldn\u2019t they?<\/p>\n
Again, he smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, let\u2019s say that you\u2019re playing me.\u00a0 Would you like to be white or\u2026black?\u201d<\/p>\n
Suddenly a card table with a chess board appeared.\u00a0 There wasn\u2019t anything special about it, except that the white squares looked as if they were quicksand and the dark squares looked as if they might be made of rhinoceros hyde.<\/p>\n
We played and played.\u00a0 He was quite good, naturally, but made a few surprisingly silly mistakes.\u00a0 He gave up his queen in the second move one time!\u00a0 Amazing.<\/p>\n
Finally, he jumped up in disgust.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am unfit to play today!\u00a0 I do not know where<\/em> my mind is.\u201d<\/p>\nHe looked at me, and declared:<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s call it a draw.\u00a0 No one wins, but, luckily, nothing is decided. Now, back to business\u2026.<\/p>\n
Have you thought of where you might like to go?\u201d\u00a0 He smiled yet again, but this time, I noticed that he simply must be homeless from time to time, because his teeth were filthy-all yellowed and, my Heavens, long.\u00a0 Obviously, poor dental care there.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo I need to decide so quickly?\u201d\u00a0 I looked at my guardian angel, who, began making as if he heard something.\u00a0 He closed his eyes briefly as if listening.<\/p>\n
I cocked my ear, because there was a sound\u2014far off, but, no, no, it was getting closer.\u00a0 It was voices; that\u2019s what the sound was\u2014voices.<\/p>\n
\u201cGet me the paddles; he\u2019s crashing.\u00a0 Give me adrenalin, push everything.\u00a0 We\u2019re loosing him.\u00a0 Come on, people!\u201d<\/p>\n
I looked at him, but all I remember was that he was smiling.\u00a0 His teeth were really long and his eyes were red.\u00a0<\/p>\n
With guardian angels\u00a0 like him, who needed enemies?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Marius Surleac\u00a0(Romania) edited by Robert Fenhagen pentru versiunea rom\u00e2n\u0103 click aici \u00a0 Last night, just before drifting off into sleep\u2014that twilight time, I witnessed a most incredible thing:\u00a0 twinkling, sparkling light began coming through my bedroom wall! It was so real, that I knew that it couldn\u2019t be dream, so I lay there wondering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[507,22],"tags":[1147,81,1116],"class_list":["post-3690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-egophobia-26","category-short-story","tag-egophobia-26","tag-marius-surleac","tag-short-story"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6DakB-Xw","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3690"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4326,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3690\/revisions\/4326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}