by Aya DeAniege
If she were a fallen angel, she wouldn’t have been there. Even after the events of almost four years previous.
We didn’t actively hunt fallen angels, and they gave us a wide berth. I don’t think either side knew what to do with the fallen angels. They had followed Samael into Hell and chosen to stay. Unlike the four of us, a fallen angel had done terrible things which caused their wings to rot away. They couldn’t get back into Heaven if they wanted to.
Following that example, I had been very, very careful. The others might do whatever they please and claim their wings were fine, but I swore I saw a dimming in the feathers, and I did not want to become a fallen angel.
Even if the dancer was a fallen angel, I doubted that her wings would look like that.
“No, don’t do anything stupid,” Lilly said in the long silence that followed.
I stood and left the table, headed toward the back. At the door leading into the dressing room, I was stopped by a man. I knew he was there to keep the perverts out of the back, but I had also witnessed several men leaving the floor by that route. I also assumed that the strip club offered other services, and that those men were seeking those services.
“Mike Angelica,” I said, sticking out my hand to the man who stopped me.
The man was tall and broad, with muscles that were threatening to rip through the thin fabric of his t-shirt. Except, I knew the shirt was too small for him, he was wearing platformed shoes to make him seem taller, and even the lighting had been changed a little so that he looked more looming.
He eyed the hand suspiciously, which I understood.
“You know the Angelicas, don’t you?” I asked.
“You’re the ones who donated the money for that building to be rebuilt after a meteor struck it,” he said. “Own a bunch of businesses and such.”
His tone of voice told me that he was thoroughly unimpressed with my pedigree. The other men who had gone through the door hadn’t looked any better off than me, though they may have greased his hands a little. I was hoping I could get in without having to part with any money, as I assumed I would need it on the other side of the door.
“Yes, that would be us,” I said, dropping my hand. “I’m just wondering if the services of the dancers might be purchased. Specifically, the one who was just on stage.”
“Seraphina doesn’t do private shows for nobodies.”
“Which is why I introduced myself as Mike Angelica,” I said, holding up a hand to stop him when he opened his mouth.
I reached into my back pocket and pulled out my identification, handing it to him. He looked at the card, then frowned over it at me. He still seemed thoroughly unimpressed.
I gave a little shrug.
“You know my brother’s getting married in a few days,” I said. “I need a date. And I might only be a younger brother, but there are lots of men for her to introduce herself to at the wedding, which I’m sure she’d enjoy.”
The man considered me for a long moment, then stepped to the side.
“She’ll hit you if you’re a fool.”
“Got it,” I said, slipping past him.
Behind the door was a dressing room for the strippers. It was one large room with several makeup mirrors and counters. There were bags on the counters, the makeup clearly claimed and orderly. There were racks of clothing sitting along the edges of the room. Several dancers were in various states of undress, talking over costumes and makeup like they were gossiping around the water cooler.
Several of the dancers paused in what they were doing, smiling at me knowingly.
I looked around the room, searching for Seraphina among the faces. Brushing past a rather bold dancer who tried to press up against me, I slipped deeper into the room. I spotted her in the far corner, reapplying lipstick in one of the makeup mirrors.
More than an arm’s length away, I stopped. I waited in silence as her focus shifted from her lips to me. To her credit, she didn’t jump in surprise.
Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me through the reflection of the mirror.
“Michael Angelica, to what do I owe this meeting to?” she asked, turning in her chair to look me up and down. “You’re the one who gardens, right?”
“I am, yes,” I said. “I also run the club two days a week, and am responsible for all hiring for the club.”
“Are you looking for a special dance for the groom?” she asked.
She asked it a bit like I was stupid, or annoying her. Like I should have known the answer to that question or that others in bachelor parties had asked that question once too often in the past.
“No,” I said with a shake of my head. “I’m the only one without a date for the wedding. I’m wondering if I might be able to purchase your services for that night. Whatever you need in price, I can do it.”
“What you’re saying is that, despite being a younger brother, you’re still loaded?” she asked.
“Very much,” I said. “Sam may be the face of our company, but that’s because others don’t respect a business with more than one face.”
“How do you decide things?” she asked.
“We vote.”
“But what if there’s a tie?”
“It never is,” I said.
She made a little sound and turned back to the mirror, looking over her makeup. She removed her hair. It took a moment for me to realize that it had been a very good wig. The wig had been an auburn colour. Seraphina’s natural hair was long and black. Her hair spilled down her back as her fingers worked their way through those silken locks.
The smell of artificial cherry blossom reached my nose, sending a little shudder down my back.
She turned as I leaned in close, for a better smell.
“You haven’t paid yet,” she said, her tone cutting me to my core. “That means you don’t get to touch the goods.”
“Sorry,” I said, cramming my hands into my pockets. “Your smell caught me off guard, that’s all.”
She studied me through the mirror again. I think she was considering whether she would take the job. I knew that she would take it, but that it was the consideration of how much to charge me, and if it’d be worth it.
“It’s five thousand for the night, half up front, half at the end,” she said.
“I can do that, of course.”
“Do you want a story?” she asked. When I gave her a confused look, she sighed and turned back to me. “What are you going to tell your family about me?”
The truth, then I was going to tell Sam and Grace about the wings and swear them to secrecy so that it was a surprise for Gabe and Raphael. I couldn’t tell her that, though. She might find it strange that I was describing her in detail to the groom. Or that I had chosen to ask her out because of the wings alone.
“That I met you at the strip club,” I said with a shrug. “My family isn’t judgemental about that at all. It’s no one else’s concern how we met.”
“Then why have a date at all?”
“Because we’re supposed to have dates for a wedding,” I said. “And preferably dates that make fools of us, Grace says, because the brothers of the groom almost always have dates that make a mess of things unless they’re in a long-term relationship, which none of us are in.”
“I’m sorry, are you hoping I’ll cause a fuss?” she asked. “I’m not that kind of girl.”
“Oh, no, Ralph has one that will cause a drunken scene. An actress of some sort that is looking to get some free publicity and likes an open bar. We have that covered. I just meant that I need a date, but no one is expecting you to act a certain way. And, of course, there’s an open bar. No drugs, though from the look of you that wouldn’t be a problem.”
“No, I don’t do drugs, or smoke, rarely drink alcohol.”
“You like this life?”
“It pays well,” she said with a shrug. Then she glanced at me. “What, are you going to offer me a new job?”
“That’s not my place,” I said.
�
�Is there something shameful about taking my clothes off for money?”
“Not if you enjoy it,” I countered. “History just teaches us that women typically don’t enjoy this line of work and just do it out of necessity, or because they are forced into it, so my response is almost always to offer a way out. However, it’s not my place to do so.”
She made a sound and stood, pushing in her chair before she turned her full attention to me.
“You’ll need to provide the address, and if there’s something specific that you want me to wear, you’ll have to send the dress to my place. Are there any other requests?”
“I’d like to be able to see your face, maybe more subtle makeup,” I said. “I will send you a dress. I’d very much like to show off your tattoo. It’s gorgeous work and shouldn’t be hidden.”
She glanced over her shoulder, then back to me, an eyebrow quirking upward. “Fair enough. My name is Sera.”
“Sera, nice to meet you,” I said, offering my hand.
Sera took my hand and shook it once. “Hey, I thought the younger brother had an accent.”
I flushed with embarrassment, having not brought the accent back before stepping into the dressing room. It had gone completely from my mind as I scrambled for an explanation as to why I would have suddenly been speaking in a different way.
“Uh, we get a lot of questions about it,” I said. “We decided the best way to deal with that was if we worked with some speech coaches to speak the so-called proper accent.”
It sounded like a bullshit answer because it was one. I just hoped she wouldn’t press any further than that.
“That’s a silly thing,” Sera said.
“I know it is, but it keeps people from asking questions, which is what we want to avoid.”
“People asking too many questions?”
“Yes.”
“Yet, you’re going to take a stripper to your brother’s wedding?”
“Yup, because among the rich, somehow that’s expected. But I don’t think anyone is going to look at you and think stripper. Not unless you tell them you are one.”
“And if I did?”
I shrugged.
“Have at it. I just need to tell you some rules about the wedding, like it is Grace’s day and you can’t ruin the cake or the toasts or the first dance. Don’t hit on Sam, everyone else, besides Grace is free game. You want to start an orgy in a side room, by all means.”
“Wow, this is starting to sound like a pretty wicked party. Don’t brides usually want to control every little aspect?”
“Not Grace. There are no children attending. She said because of that pretty well anything can go as long as it's in side rooms and such. Anyone who crosses her will be removed by security.”
“Okay, this is starting to sound like fun. I can honestly say that I might enjoy this job.”
“Great, just let me get you those details you need, and you can give me an address to ship the dress to.”
The ceremony for Sam and Grace’s wedding went off without a single problem. Which was helped along by the fact that we had a Heavenly Host in the crowd who could manipulate time to make sure everything worked out just how Grace wanted it to be.
I understood why Grace wanted everything to be perfect, but I had never seen Sam so insistent with perfection. He knew things went wrong, that’s what happened when you did things around humans or on the Earthly plane. After the ceremony, which took place in the gardens that Michael coaxed into beauty just for them, the reception happened in the estate in the large ballroom.
And they laughed at me when I told them we should build a ballroom into the estate. Doing that had saved us a ton of money on the wedding.
“Being a guardian angel is harder work than I thought it would be, Ralph,” Toby said as he sat down.
He flitted away and back, then sighed and sipped his drink.
A human wouldn’t have noticed that motion. Even to my eyes, it merely looked like Toby phased out of existence for a second or so, then back again. When he popped back in, he looked weary and mildly annoyed.
“You’re the one who insisted on also being physical friends with her,” I countered.
If he hadn’t insisted on that, then he would have been able to remain in the astral plane, moving about as he wanted to without the pressure of returning to the physical plane. That motion of back and forth would wear even me out, and I had been making the move long enough that I could be considered an experienced planeswalker.
Toby, Lilly, and Mary had been bridespeople for Grace. She didn’t make friends easily, but those she made were strong friendships. For Sam, it had been me, Michael, and Gabe. Toby had offered to wear a dress, but I hadn’t realized he had been joking.
The Heavenly Host was sometimes blind to the current fashion. I didn’t want him making a fool of himself when a conversation on the side would solve the problem.
Away and back he went again.
He only had to do small alterations until the pair were introduced. There was security present, and they would handle almost everything, but Toby was dealing with other things. Like keeping a couple from breaking out into a fight and hitting the wedding cake. Or keeping people from groping Mike’s date, which would cause the woman to understandably hit the person and that would cause them to crash into the wedding cake.
Sam and Grace had dated three years before she had asked him if they were ever going to be married. He, of course, had only been waiting because he didn’t think she wanted to marry. He would have married her the day she told him that they were dating, but the modern world believed in the long courtship, then longer engagement and all the rest.
They had only been engaged three months because Sam and Lilly had been planning the wedding since they had started dating. Not together, they had not planned the wedding together, they had planned it separately. Sam based on what he wanted, and Lilly based on what she could get out of Grace. The wedding itself came together quite quickly once Sam, Lilly, and Grace sat down with the plans they had made and began comparing notes. The pair shared many ideas, those became the basis of the wedding, and everything else had merely been about compromise.
“It’s such a beautiful wedding,” my date said with a giggle as she reached between me for another glass of wine. “Thank you for inviting me, Ralph.”
She was a very troubled soul, who had a good career in the public eye. No possession to her, all her problems and addictions were hers, and she would struggle with them her entire life.
Those addictions, however, had been caused based on her experiences in her childhood that were fuelled by demons. In many ways, her problems were because of our inaction, and so I felt for her in a way. I felt responsible for her.
That was why I had invited her out for one last, sort of rock-bottom explosion. It would get her publicity and tomorrow morning I’d take her to a rehabilitation facility for her first stint. I hoped it would be her only stay in rehab, but I knew better than to pray for a miracle.
Heaven didn’t deal in those sorts of miracles.
“No drugs, that was the deal,” I said.
“No drugs, just lots of alcohol and maybe getting naked on the front lawn.”
“Preferably as security chases you down,” I said. “Then tomorrow morning you issue an apology and we get you into rehab.”
“Actual rehab?” she asked, making a face. “I’m not an actual alcoholic.”
She had admitted to being an alcoholic just the night before. She had been drunk at the time, that may have been the deciding factor in her revealing that to me. So far, she had been sober for the ceremony because we had been explicit with our dates. Nothing could interrupt the ceremony.
At least during the reception, fewer people would be focused on one thing. Everyone was looking all over and focused on various things.
“Fake rehab wouldn’t work,” I said pointedly. “The paparazzi would figure it out.”
“Right, fine. Drunken night, then rehab,” she grum
bled, walking away.
“How did you meet her?” Toby asked.
We shared a look as I wondered if he was being a judgemental prick. I always expected it of Heavenly Host, but I should have known better by then. Toby was trying to make conversation, not to be mean. Or, maybe, he honestly wanted to know how I had met her.
“Porn star,” I said quickly. “She wants to be taken more seriously. And she does have a drinking problem, anywho. Have you seen that woman Mike is with?”
I didn’t want Toby paying too much attention to my date. I had it under control and was not going to ask Heaven for any favours.
“Name’s Sera, she’s a paid escort.”
Toby said it in an almost bored tone and didn’t expand beyond that. It seemed to be the only information any of us had on the woman, despite the fact that Michael had introduced each of us to her before the ceremony. A few had even had a conversation with her, yet none of us had gleaned any information beyond that.
“Oh, the poor woman is going to be so confused when Mike sends her home, high and dry,” I added.
I glanced across the floor and spotted Sera.
She had a simple green dress on, nothing fancy. It was a slick cut, and smooth like it might have been satin or silk. The green was not overly bright, but it still drew my eye over and over. Maybe it wasn’t the dress. Maybe it was the shape of her, or how she kept adjusting the shawl. That shawl had been up over her shoulders the entire time, in no small part because of what appeared to be her constant struggle with it.
And Mike had watched her like a hawk.
The entire time.
He had even reached a time or two and pulled her shawl up for her. The pair would share a smile after the motion, but that was as close as Mike came to her. For him, that was practically sex. It was as far as she would get with him that evening. Adjusting her clothing might have been simple playing, but it also drew my attention to the shawl and her shoulders.
What’s under the shawl?
I stood, but as I stood, there was a little blare of music that made me sit back down.