Flash Fiction | Guaridan Angel and Demon

You always hear about guardian angels looking out for you, and if you’ve ever wondered if they were real, I’m here to tell you they are. I’m not sure if I have one now, but I for sure had one fifteen years ago. 

I was just a kid, out in the neighborhood doing what kids do, and there was this creepy house on our street that was set further back than everyone else’s. It was dilapidated, had only the branches that fell from the large trees strewn about the yard as landscaping, and the shingles pulled from the roof. The rumor between the kids was that it was a haunted house, and a serial killer lived there. We never saw anyone come and go from the house, so there was no way to prove the rumor wrong; keeping us from spinning wild tales. 

It scared us enough that we avoided it entirely. We held our breath while we sprinted past it walking to and from school so the ghosts couldn’t enter our body. If we could cross the street to avoid the cooler air that seemed to swirl around it, we did. 

One day as we were trying to catch frogs in the creek that ran behind our row of houses, my friend Matthew had an idea. 

“We should check out the haunted house,” he said waving his frog net around, “Find out once and for all if it’s haunted. Look inside the windows and see what we can find.” 

“No,” the rest of us said in unison. 

“Aww, some on, guys!” Matthew cajoled, “It’ll only take a minute. We sneak over, look in a window, and go.” 

“Yeah, but what if we see a ghost, or we get murdered?” I asked. 

“We’d only be there a minute. Can’t kill all of us in a minute. And if they tried, we would call the cops and have them arrested. We could be heroes!” Matthew answered with a large amount of bravado in his voice. Murmurs of agreement sounded through our group. 

“Ok,” I said, “But we’re only going to look into a window and go.” 

Matthew smiled, “Exactly!” 

We set down our nets, jumped on our bikes, and headed toward the house. Again, it was either the large trees that encircled the house or the bad vibes, but it was much colder there than it was at the creek. I shivered as I laid my bike on the sidewalk. 

Matthew made the signal for us to be quiet, and we all crouched down and tiptoed up the driveway to the house. There was a bay window that looked out into the backyard we could easily steal a look into unnoticed. We went up the steps of the back deck, our feet causing the rotting gray boards to creak. As we began to cup our hands around our eyes, to peer into the dusty glass, we were startled by a man kicking the back door open and firing a shotgun into the air above our heads. 

“Trespassing is a crime, and I have the right to shoot any and all trespassers!” A balding man wearing a dirty undershirt and work pants shouted. Matthew and the rest of the gang took off running, but I was snatched up by the man before I could get my feet under me. 

“Ah! Look what we have here!” He shouted again through tobacco stained teeth, “Looks like you’re about to learn a lesson for the rest of your friends!” 

As he began to drag me into the house while I kicked and screamed, I saw a black flash that looked like a cannonball out of the corner of my eye. Before I knew it, the man let me go. I watched him soar through the air before landing on the ground with a wet thump in a position he couldn’t possibly walk away from. I screamed, but no sound came out of me. 

From behind a tree I saw a winged figure that looked like an angel, but I had never seen one in person before, so I wasn’t sure. When I blinked, they were next to me. I looked into their crystalline blue eyes, and all of my fear evaporated. 

“Go home,” they whispered. 

I immediately ran toward my bike, and as I picked it up to race home, I took one last look. The man was still laying on the ground with limbs akimbo, but I also saw the angel being dragged off by what looked like another angel. Their hands and feet were bound, and their expression was forlorn. Were they being punished for helping me or hurting the man? 

I didn’t stick around to find out. I peddled home like my life depended on it, and by the time I got there, our parents were outside and had already called the police. I told them what happened, but I don’t think anyone believed me. Instead they said I killed him in self defense. You can imagine what that does to a kid. 

Fifteen years after that day, life had not been kind to me. My life wasn’t that much different than the guy I supposedly killed. My wife had left me, I lost my job, I was living in a rundown shack on the wrong side of the tracks, and I was up to my eyeballs in debt. If desperate had a picture in the dictionary, it would be mine. 

I was about six beers deep when I looked out into the gnarled weeds I called a yard, and said, “If the devil is real, I will happily sell my soul to get out of this mess. I’m serious.” 

For the first time since that fateful day, I saw the same black cannonball flash. It startled me so much I wound up spilling beer down the front of my shirt. I stumbled back into my folding lawn chair trying to catch my breath. Was I having a flashback? 

I leaned over reaching into the cooler to replace the beer I had spilled when the same figure I saw that day appeared in the lawn chair beside me. I gasped, and again, like last time, no sound came out of my mouth. 

The figure smiled and took the beer out of my hand, then took a long pull of the bottle. 

“We meet again,” they said. 

“Wh-h-h-o-o-o are you?” I stammered. 

“I am Vergktor. Once upon a time I was your guardian angel, and since I did my job a little too well that day, I am now your guardian demon here to collect your soul. We’ll get down to business as soon as I finish my beer.”