A Shimmer of Angels by Lisa M. Basso

it looked exactly like Allison’s painting. Even his face was obscured by the lighting.
    His hold around me constricted. “Relax.” The dark-winged man’s voice was low and gruff, but somehow smoother than I’d expected—for a creature with black-freaking-wings.
    Trepidation slithered up my spine, and I kicked for dear life. “Let me go!”
    Several heart-stopping moments passed until I swore he’d hike me over his shoulder and fly away. I’d never be seen again. Never found. Just another girl on a lost poster stapled to a telephone pole. My squirming made no difference.
    After half an eternity, he lowered me.
    The moment the toe of my Converse touched the ground, I scrambled from his arms, drawing back until my spine matched up against the tree trunk.
    “You don’t make that escape very often, do you?” he asked. “Your landing could use some work.” His dark eyes were the only visible part of his face. A bar of light slanted right across them. Everything else remained cast in shadows.
    My feet itched to move, to run. But I forced myself to stay calm. “I don’t typically need saving, but today doesn’t seem to be my day.”
    Maybe Cam wasn’t the winged creature I should be worried about.
    “Something the matter?” His words were slow and measured, the pace and tone of a man who never needed to speak up to be heard. He inhaled deeply. The sound set me on edge, like he was savoring my scent.
    “No,” I said too quickly. Shivers racked my body.
    The shadows covering his face lightened just enough to reveal one corner of his mouth, drawn up in a daunting curve. It wasn’t a smile, more a show of teeth. It was nothing like Cam’s smile.
    Fear twisted my insides, but I wouldn’t scream. I wouldn’t scream. I wouldn’t—
    I gasped and sat up in my bed. My pulse thrummed. Sweat tacked my hair to my face. Daylight trickled in through my lilac-colored sheers. I pushed my hair back and looked at my hand. Not even a scratch marred my skin. It should have been bloody from the broken tree limb. My escape, my fall, the black-winged man, it was all a dream.
    I fought the sweaty sheets down. Books were strewn around the bed. I must have fallen asleep doing history homework.
    The bedside clock read eight thirty-four. Still shaken, I scrambled out of bed, rushed through a shower, and packed my book bag on my way out the door.
    I crept through the back door ten minutes into second period, only to be met by a slew of teary-eyed faces. An unfamiliar man handed out neon-green leaflets. He scribbled an eight hundred number on the chalkboard behind him, followed by the words “suicide hotline.”
    As I slid into my seat, the man at the front of class with Mr. Ratchor started discussing the signs of suicidal thoughts. Since I could probably write a book on that particular subject, I tuned him out.
    Guilt clawed at me, again, for the third day in a row. I should have recognized some of the signs in Allison, but I’d never seen any. She’d always seemed so happy.
    Except for that painting. Was it what I remembered seeing, or was I imagining wings where there were none?
    I looked around, making sure no one was paying attention to me. More tears; nobody cared about what I was doing. Maybe they had been in shock yesterday and were in a better position to mourn her loss today.
    I pulled my secret notebook and a set of colored pencils from my backpack and sketched the dark-winged figure I saw in this morning’s nightmare.
    When I was done, I almost closed the notebook, but stopped myself. I flipped to the sketch I drew in Art class yesterday. Then I folded the pages between it and today’s drawing, so I could see the two side by side. The same dark wings stared back at me from both pages.
    Black wings. I’d never seen one with black wings before, only annoyingly bright ones like Cam’s. Maybe I could ask Cam what was up with this dark-winged guy. He seemed intent on talking to me; maybe we could go for another walk