Ever since I could remember I've always been different from everyone else. Not that it was as obvious to others as it was to myself. It seemed only those in my household knew something was odd, and that's how I wanted it to stay.
I remember a lot from when I was little. Momma says I am blessed with a good memory. One of my earliest memories is of an old man who lived across the street from us. I must've been 'round four years old at the time. He was the kindest man I would ever know and often babysat us kids when Momma and Poppa were out doing stuff with the church.
That stopped one day however. I never understood why back then. But now...
One day when the family was out front of the house, sun bathing and playing in the sprinklers, the old man, Samuel, got a visitor while he was tending to his rose bushes. It was another old man, just a few years older than our dear neighbor. They we talking quietly and Samuel wore a fond face with the slightest of sorrow-filled gazed for this man.
The part that made my parents resent Samuel however wasn't the reminiscent way he looked at this stranger. No, it was the tender, lingering, farewell kiss he and the stranger shared. And then the black pea coat clad man was walking down the sidewalk never to return.
After that Momma and Poppa never let us talk to Samuel again. Not that my siblings actually cared. That was the problem with religion though. Anyone different was immediately outcasted.
But the saddest part was, if my family could see what I had seen that day I don't know if it would have made the situation with Samuel better or worse. Samuels large,white, powerful wings, and the strangers burned, blackened ones accompanied by a razor sharp, spear-tipped tail.
