6:15. Mid October. Cold days and even colder nights. Ten years ago, well, 9 years and 7 months. I was 7. It was raining.
6:20 was when we heard the knocks on the door. 6:25 was when 3 people died.
I had been in my room that night. I should have been in the living room, with my mother and father, but a chill had ran through our house, causing me to have retreated early for the warmth of my bed and the softness of my several cuddly toys. I should have left the door open, wide open, but I had shut that, too, trying to keep the cold from getting in. It was only open a small crack.
There was then 3 sharp knocks on our front door; I’d jumped a little at the noise. We didn’t usually get visitors. It was always us who went out to visit others – friends, neighbours. Not other members of the family. There wasn’t any of those. It was just me, and a mummy, and a daddy.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Again, louder, faster. I approached my almost closed door and knelt next to the one inch slit allowing me to peer through curiously. Through the glass pane on our front door I could make out shadows, figures standing, waiting. My father emerged from the living room, my mother not far behind…
But as I looked closer, there was already somebody in our house. A somebody nobody else could see.
He was stood outside my very own white, flowery door, and my head was about the height of his knees from where I sat. I wanted to make noise upon seeing him – but nothing escaped from my lips, not a sound.
I couldn’t see his face, but I was certain it was a man for some unknown reason. He was dressed in an all-black coat, long enough to drag on the floor. One of his feet were exposed – black leather boots almost up to the knees.
I looked higher up. The coat had a large hood that went over his head, but it didn’t draw my attention; both hands were loosely holding a long pole, either very dark brown or black ebony, with strange patterns and a foreign language, possibly Latin, finely pressed into its surface, winding up and up, until my eyes reached the top. I held back a gasp. I blade, longer than I was, arced over the top of my door frame, like some silver rainbow. A scythe. Recognised from a children’s story book, a weapon that belonged to a bad man.
Maybe there was a skeleton under that hood. Maybe. But I could see his hands. The right hand was human – long pale fingers, thin, but not skeletal. The left hand was inside a strange glove, made from intricately moulded, fashioned silver. It had the appearance of metal ivy, winding its way around his fingers, ending with a point.
Then, something twitched close to my face. I noticed there was something else on the back of the cloak. Feathers. Colossal, inky black flight feathers.
Out of this man’s shoulders grew two wings, that of an angel’s, but darker than the night outside in the open air. They remained folder, pressed tight to his back. The peaks stood at the height of his head, and the tips fell right at my eye level, only a couple of feet away from the green carpeted floor. Wings that must have been larger than my bed if they had been outstretched.
He barely made a sound as he breathed. He didn’t move apart from the occasional subtle flick of a feather.
I felt myself let out a small whimper.
The head turned noiselessly, a little to the left. His face was still covered but I saw the tip of a white, straight nose. The right, glove-less hand let go of the scythe. He touched an index finger to his lips. A signal to remain quiet.
He dropped his hand to his side as I heard my father unlock the door, and I turned my attention to whoever was there.
The deathly silence broke.
There were three of them. Men. Wearing black jackets, balaclavas showing only a sliver of skin and their small eyes. The first of them carried a baseball bat – he saw my father and let out a tremendous roar – my mother then screamed as the bat was rammed into his face with a dull thud. The second had a knife – which was swiped at mum’s face, and the third produced a gun, a black automatic, with a wooden handle.
The thing in front of my door didn’t move.
Shouting, bellowing, shrieks – I would have joined in too but something wouldn’t let me – the trio moved very fast, threatening my parents with their weapons – knife man had a hold of my dad, pinning him to a wall strongly – baseball bat man had my mum on her knees, sobbing, bat wrapped around her neck – gun man ran around the house, into rooms, knocking things over, growling under his breath about something not being there. He sprang back into the middle room, looked at my door, through the winged man he could not see.
He chose not to open it.
Before he could turn around, Dad managed to kick knife man – he grabbed at the weapon and got it – there was a small flash of silver, and another one from the bigger, arced blade…
The giant wings unfolded and threw the hooded man from my door. He leaped, scythe raised, and brought it down at speed. As the knife my feather held plunged into the owner’s neck; the sharp curved edge passed straight through his stomach. It would have sliced the man in half, but it left no mark.
Nobody else had seen that. Nobody but me.
There was a bright splurge of red blood from the neck – he immediately crumpled to a pile of nothing on the floor. Every remaining habitant but me and the winged creature let out an ear splitting scream, and the scythe was lifted once again…
And earth shattering bang ripped through the air – my father’s chest jerked – the big blade fell and so did he - the hem of the black cloak flew outwards as the creature twirled around the face my mother….
Another gun crack, piercing the air, and then he cut down my mother. For a second, everything fell silent apart from the ringing in my ears…then a thud as her head hit the floor.
Police sirens echoed in the distance. The two men left started bickering loudly over the bodies, over the lack of something, how they may have been the wrong people, over their fallen comrade. The sirens came closer and eventually they bolted from the room out the open front door, in the rain, out of sight.
The Angel of Death, the monster, the murderer, was left in the middle of the three bodies, head bowed, still, scythe lowered. He turned and slowly followed the two men out of the door. Suddenly my voice locked and I gave a wail of despair – the black wings spread, rain pelting off the feathers, and a second later, he was gone too.
6:25. Three people were dead. And the other was all alone, curled up on a cold bedroom floor, crying.
