Her gossamer wings glittered against the glaring sun. When I saw her from afar, I couldn’t help but feel sympathy. There were kids surrounding her, picking and pushing, pricking and poking at her.
Making fun of her. I thought she was beautiful. She was new. Or at least I hadn’t seen her before. It looked as if she had sewn the wings to the back of her iridescent glittery Tinkerbell T-shirt. I hope it was a strong stitch, cause if all that prodding and pulling continued, they’d rip off. I, in all my
frightening presence, walked over to the bench where she was sitting, trying quietly to erase them all from her mind. Ignoring the giggling and gawking. I stopped short of the bench, placed my hands on my hips, and looked up at them. When they noticed me, they all scattered like cockroaches. I nodded my head in satisfaction, sat down next to her and non-chalantly initiated conversation.
 “Kids at this school can be real assholes. Were they bothering you?”
 “No, I’m okay”
 “You sure?”
 “yea, I’m fine”
 She finally lifted her head to look at me. As if she was surprised by the fact that I wasn’t poking and prodding.
 “so…are you new here?”
 “obviously”
 So, maybe she wasn’t a talker. But that wasn’t going to stop me. She was just distant and unresponsive because she’s used to being disrupted and dissected. Well, that wasn’t why I was there.
 “Nice wings” I said. They shimmered iridescently as the afternoon sun reflected off of the
strategically placed rhinestones.
 “Thanks…”
 She lifted her head again and I could see her beginning to open up to me. Her blond ponytail seemed to match her wings in all their glory. She was “cute”, in every essence of the word. The type of quiet individual who seemed like they could get so wrapped up in something that the rest of the world stopped spinning. You could marvel at her simple complexity…or complex simplicity.
Whichever you prefer.
 “What’s your name?” She asked me. The first initiative she had taken so far. I guess the fear of being dissected had been subdued. I was glad to see her prompting something, so I quickly answered, warmly and tenderly, before the porthole (the one that allowed me to get in) closed up for good.
“Ruby. And you?” I inquired.
“Enid. I like your nail-polish” she said with a smile.
I guess she was looking down enough to notice something with such minute importance. And of course, she picked out the most glitterlicious thing on my body.  And yes, I did notice the fact that her name was Enid, but what was I to do with it? I thought It was rather odd, but then again, from the looks of things, so was she. My perfect specimen. “Specimen?” you say? Yes. Specimen. No, I am not a mad scientist or a deranged brain surgeon. I’m a writer. I want to write plays. For the stage, the live audience. I had been looking for inspiration in the wrong places. Autobiographies weren’t working for me. Motivation wasn’t bursting from the peep-holes in the cracks of my
neighbor’s window curtains. Illumination lacked in my brainstorming. So where else was I to try but school?
 “Thanks. So, where are you from?” I asked.
 “San Francisco. I moved last week.”
 “oh really, why’d you move…and why here?”
 “My parents got divorced and I came to live with my mom…she’s a lawyer, and she just got a job here”.
 “Yea, divorce sucks. I never went through it though, my mom just left me and my dad”
Streaming bits of juicy light came through the trees in twisted bursts, like water through a pinhole as she began to feel more and more comfortable with me. I had found my inspiration.
 “So, Enid, what kind of music do you like?”
 “Oh, I like anything really. I listen to whatever I like. But, my favorite is Barenaked Ladies”.
She said this to her own lap, only sporadically looking up at me. She became entranced with a small cardboard glitter star that she pulled off of her backpack. She slipped into another universe with it, gazing intently, touching each one of it’s five points in a seemingly nonsensical pattern. And she
continued…
“I went to their concert over the summer, and they were great. I had so much fun. Anyway, I grew up listening to oldies, cause of my parents, then, my dad was into red hot chili peppers and guns and roses and all that stuff. as I got older, I picked up rock, rap, country, metal, industrial, folk, and anything else I forgot. So really, its up for grabs now.”
And she looked up at me, for the first time with a steady stare, as if she had just given a speech and was waiting for an applause.
When I didn’t say anything for a short pause, she drooped her head down and slid back into the cardboard star galaxy.
 “Enid” I said. “Would you like to get something to eat with me after chool?”
 I guess I surprised her, as she was preparing herself for yet another disappointment. But she popped up immediately and smiled at me, she had been smiling before, but not really. Not real smiles.
 “Sure!” she exclaimed. The bell rang.
 “Okay, meet me right here after school, alright?”
 “Okay! Right there! Bye!” she yelled as she hurried off to her next class. She was hugging her books tightly up to her chest, and her blond ponytail bounced along with her lively pace.
As I watched her walk away, she stopped, twisted her torso back and re-applied her cardboard star back where it belonged. She then picked up her books, and proceeded to bounce to class. I, too bounced off to class and thought about the stage, and what this might mean for it. The velvet curtains,
the sparkling strands of luscious light that erupt from gaps in the catwalks.

             ? ? ?

we must have looked like heaven and hell as we strolled side by side down the busy streets of the big apple. Me, in all my black glory, and Enid, in, well…all her iridescent glitter. It reminded me of that fairy tale, Rose red and Rose white. She walked on her toes with her eyes (and her mouth) wide open and looking up (her eyes of course, not her mouth). I was amazed at the fact that with all that up-looking she was doing she didn’t trip over something. She might as well have been walking around foaming at the mouth with her tongue hanging out. She also might as well have been a toddler in a room full of adults. I didn’t know one’s eyelids could peel back so far. I, on the other,
(non-enthusiastic) hand walked rather normally, looking down at her feet, ready to warn her of any upcoming obstructions in her way. She told me about moving from San Francisco. Having never been to New York this must have been quite a culture shock. After all, there aren’t many hippies in
New York. I asked her what she liked and I got more than my share. A long,
stream-of-consciousness type of list of everything she liked. And boy, were there a lot of things she liked. Glitter nighttime stars romance sushi faeries music autumn summer at night spring in the day winter in the snow (so maybe she was indecisive) Steel drums baths books concerts the high feeling
you get when you’re in love --She seemed so damn innocent I couldn’t imagine she knew what she was talking about when she mentioned love—colors creativity her room funk (as if that had a definitive definition) good memories happiness fulfillment psychology vintage clothes humor astrology (yes, I also inquired about that. It turns out that her birthday is December 20th—3 days before mine—which makes her a Sagittarius with Capricorn tendencies [From what I’ve seen, not many].
Mine, being December 23rd, makes me a Capricorn with Sagittarius tendencies. [I haven’t counted yet] How frikkin’ weird is that?!)…the list continued until I asked her if there was anything she didn’t like—which was also a mistake. You can only imagine what sort of things didn’t please her.
I figured it was sort of a special occasion and the normal deli or hot dog stand stop off would not suffice. So we went to the Zen palate. Of course, she gazed intently at the high-vault ceilings for most of the meal. You could tell she was easily impressed. She told me about San Francisco and faeries (the real kind, of course. A race of suppressed beautiful winged creatures of which our very own Enid was a descendant. Hey, I believe it) what she wanted to be when she grew up and her ex boyfriend (when she was 15, she dated a 19 year old guy who apparently promised her the moon and then broke her heart. Bastard. She never got over it.). I told her about everything else. (how I wanted to write plays and she could be in them. She admired the fact that I wanted to write
plays…I’m not sure why. Maybe because she admired everything.)
After a refreshing meal, we piddled around the city for a bit. I took her to some funky vintage shops. We tried on clothes and came out with a 1970’s white, wispy disco dress for her, and a 1950’s black (duh) sequined short dress for me, in  obedient accordance to our self-declared angel-devil motif.
We went back to my apartment, overlooking the city. She, once again, was in awe at the view. At least this time she wouldn’t have to look up. Once I peeled her away from my window, we made our way to my room. I thought it would appeal to her (As if there was anything that didn’t). Opposite
from my wardrobe, it was quite colorful. And, If you will, full of “funk”. She immediately approved and asked me if I would help her decorate her room too. I had no choice but to agree. She was so damn cute. We were sitting on the floor painting our nails chosen colors (mine, deep red, perhaps in
accordance with my name, and hers a pale sparkly blue) when the phone rang. I picked up the phone and smeared my index finger.
“damnit” I whispered
“Hello?” said a perky voice on the other end
“uh, yea, umm…Hello? Who is this?” I managed to get that much out in all my nail-smearing confusion.
“Ruby? Hi, it’s Violet. I was just calling to see if you knew about Robbie’s party tonight. It’s a bit of a drive, but he says it’ll be worth it. He asked me to call you. You coming?”
Oh. Violet. Great. A girl I’d known since about 5th grade. The perkiest damn girl I’d ever met. Can certainly get on your nerves. I put up with her. At least she’s optimistic. Besides she was basically the only person who kept by my side during that whole suicidal bout. We’ll get into that later.
Anyway, It being a Friday, me being free, I figured I’d take Enid on the town, if you will.
“Enid, there’s a party tonight. Are you interested?” I covered the phone and yelled in her direction.
“ummm…I guess so, Ruby” Alright. That seemed decisive enough to me.
“Ruby? Ruby, who are you talking to?” Violet eagerly awaited my reply.
“Yea, Violet, We’re coming, call later and give me directions. Gotta go. Bye.”
“We? Who’s we? Ruby? Hey!” she shouted as I hung up the phone.
“Don’t worry Enid. It’ll be fun. This guy Robbie, he’s a cutie. Maybe we could get your mind off of that 19 year old scum…If ya know what I mean…” I gave her a snicker. Actually, this guy Robbie used to be in love with me. Sent me letters and wrote me songs. It was cute. We went on a couple of dates and then I went crazy. Literally. I guess this is where I tell you about that little suicidal fact I slipped in earlier. A couple years ago, I guess it was in my freshman year, I had a little bout with depression and gained notoriety because I slit up the insides of my arms.
Ha. No big deal. I try to take it lightly…otherwise I might do it again. My dad didn’t quite know what to do with me so after I got out of the hospital I started seeing a psychiatrist. I’ve been going ever since. Robbie and I sorta umm…fell apart after that, you can imagine. But, he’s a nice kid, and
we’re friends.
Enid plopped down in the middle of my floor and whipped out glitter pens and cardboard. She asked me if I had scissors. Of course I do. I’m suicidal. Just kidding…got ya. Anyway, she proceeded to cut one big star and several small stars out of the cardboard. When she was done, she outlined their points in glitter glue. I didn’t ask what they were for or what she intended to do with
them, so while they dried in the middle of my floor, we did girly things. I got her to let her hair down and we sprinkled glitter onto it. She didn’t wear much makeup, if any, as far as I could tell. So she watched me as I explained the science of it all. Her mom’s a lawyer so she probably never had time
to teach her important girly things. I made her up. Not dramatic, but as the innocent angel-faery I saw her as. Iridescent glitter on her eyelids, of course, a bit of blush, clear gloss, and an extra douse of faery dust all over to finish. She slid into her disco dress and frowned at her feet. We had forgotten shoes. I dug way into the back of my closet and found the perfect thing. Vintage 1940’s silver sparkly heels. I think I wore them to some homecoming or something. She slipped them on and I wouldn’t let her leave without her wings. So we snipped them off of her T-shirt, and I neatly pinned
them to her dress. I swear a light from heaven busted through my roof and shone on her. She obviously had no idea she was beautiful. Clinging to the heaven-hell motif, I slicked my hair down and lined my eyes in dusty red, I even let her put a little red glitter on me. I admit, it was quite nice. I polished my lips with a glossy ruby color, and slid into my glamazon movie star dress. I tied a sheer black scarf around my neck, stepped into my simple black heels, and plunked onto my bed. Enid, In
all her angelic glory sat on the floor blowing on her stars as if to actually help the drying process. She removed a red glitter pen from her bag and wrote “Ruby” across the big star. I smiled from behind her back. She took some tape off of my desk and stuck it to the inside of my door. She seemed pleased and sat back on the floor with the rest of the stars, waiting for their individual assignments. They all ended up safety-pinned to her backpack.

   ? ? ?

The wind played with our hair as our velocity, I’m sure, caused a trail of glitter to follow us. We raced through the streets in my prized possession, a 1965 corvette, black, of course. It took us about 45 minutes to get there. We could hear the music a mile away as we drove closer. Robbie lived in an old Spanish mansion called Casa de Luna (“House of the Moon” I thought Enid would appreciate that). We parked across the street as cars were already overflowing from the driveway. People we crowded outside, smoking (don’t ask me what). We rang the bell and Robbie opened the door.
“Ruby! Hey babe, I’m glad you came” he kissed my cheek and he noticed Enid.
“And who’s this?” he inquired
“Robbie, this is Enid, she just moved from San Francisco” I introduced.
“Hi Enid, I’m glad to have you here. Come on in, girls. Everybody is somewhere, I mean, there are people everywhere, as you can see. Ummm…Anyway, I’ll be right back. Have fun” Robbie stumbled away.
  “See?” I said “Isn’t he cute?” Enid agreed.
We wondered our way through seas of people and smoke into an open courtyard. There were arbors adorned with red and white roses. There was a fountain in the middle flowing blood red wine, and glasses lined the border of it. I held one under a spout and handed it to Enid, who sipped it slowly. I filled one for myself and we took in the scenery. No buildings, bright lights, cars, no city noise, just loud music. I could actually see the stars. For once, I found myself looking up in awe just like Enid. The air was thick and smelled of smoke and vanilla. There was a stage with people crowded in front of it and a band was playing. I saw Violet dancing with a guy, an artist type, and I
didn’t want to bother her. She seemed to be having fun. Enid plucked a handful of white rose petals and a handful of red rose petals, which she handed to me. We danced in the courtyard. Letting the rose petals twist and swirl around us. She was illuminated by the glitter falling from her body and
kissing the light as it sparkled and danced with the petals. It was a beautiful night.
 A guy came over to us and asked Enid if she wanted to dance. She looked shy and looked to me for approval.
“Go! go! Have fun, Enid. Oh, hey, wait!” I handed her glass of wine to her. She gulped the last
drops down and went to dance. I was glad she was having a good time. I sat down on the edge of
the scarlet fountain and finished my wine. As I lit up a cigarette, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned around, it was Robbie.
 “Hey babe. Having fun yet?”
 “Yea, I am. Enid went off to dance with some guy. I should be protecting her, after all, she is new here”
 “Ruby, she’ll be fine. These are all really cool people. You wanna go for a walk?”
 “Umm...alright” It sounded like a good enough idea, It was a beautiful night.
 I signaled to Enid, filled up my glass one more time and off we went. We talked about everything.
My suicide, why we fell apart, God, love, luck, Enid, the fact that he still loves me. What?!
 “What?!” I squealed. “You still love me? That was 3 years ago, Robbie.”
 I sat down on a stone bench in front of a lake. Red and white roses bloomed all around it. I hoped that Rose white was having a better time than I was.
 “I know, Ruby, and it’s been too long. I’m sorry about what happened, and I’m sorry we fell apart, but I’m not sorry that I still love you”
Woah. Talk about out of the blue. I was not ready for that one. Okay…I can handle this. Deep breaths.
 “Robbie, are you sure?” I wanted confirmation.
 “As sure as I’ll ever be, Ruby.” His eyes glistened as he got that sad puppy look on his face. “I love you”
 “Robbie, you’re like my brother, though” I shivered as the thought of him actually being my brother crossed my mind. Ugh. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings.
 “That’s because I wanted to stay close to you. But I don’t know what it is. I can’t take it anymore.
Do you love me, Ruby?” he looked hopeful.
 “No, Robbie” hey, I’m not a liar. I tried not to hurt his feelings. I did. You can give me that much.
He leaned over and kissed me. “Robbie!” I pushed him away.
“C’mon, Ruby! Damnit! I love you!” he leaned closer to me.
 “No, Robbie, you don’t. You just can’t get over it” I tried for a way out.
 “Fuck! Ruby, Listen to me! I know what I’m talking about! I love you!”
He leaned closer to me and I tried to push him back.
 “Robbie! Stop it!!”
He grabbed my wrists with one hand and pushed me down onto the cold stone bench, so that I was laying down.
 “Robbie!” I screamed. I knew I was in trouble now. “Help! Someone help me!”
 “Shut up! I tried, Ruby. I really tried, but you just wouldn’t listen. Now you’ll see. I really do love you”
I screamed at the top of my lungs. I thought I would make him go deaf. At least that’s what I had hoped. I kicked and struggled. I wouldn’t go down without a fight. He straddled me, and sat on my
chest, nearly suffocating me. I wished I would just die right there, then I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of doing what he wanted to do. Every girl’s worst nightmare. He untied my scarf from my neck, and strung it across my mouth, then up to my hands, and bound them together. He knew what
he was doing, or he had done this before. He made it so the more I struggled to get my hands loose, the tighter it got around my mouth. Now all you could hear were muffled cries and screams, but I still tried.
He unfastened his jeans. The nightmare became a reality. I cried and cried. The tears were pooling in little salty puddles at the indents in my collar bone. I kicked and arched my back up and down in hopes of knocking him off of me. He was so heavy I could barely breathe. I prayed to god for the first time in my life. I was desperate for any help I could get. I finally gained the strength to scream again. As loud as I could. I wanted to go deaf, too. He shoved my head back and I hit it against the bench-hard. I thought I was going to pass out or die. Which would have been fine with me. Maybe
then he’d leave me alone. I felt something wet and warm trickle down my neck. Blood. I wished that it really was a nightmare and that I would wake up anytime soon in a cold sweat with a startled scream. But I didn’t wake up. I stayed in the nightmare, bleeding and crying. It hurt so bad--my head, him on top of me. The thought of death seemed like a dream compared to this painful
nightmare.
Suddenly, I woke up. He got off of me and I could breathe again. I felt dizzy and sick and dazed.
 “I’m sorry, Ruby” he began to walk away. Back to his mansion party. With all the people sipping red wine from fountains, dancing in the open  courtyard.  Enid. And I was worried about her. I was worried that this would happen to her. I hoped it hadn’t. He was going to leave me there. Left alone
to die. I figured some animals would smell my blood and come pick at me until I died. I wouldn’t have the strength to fight them off. I struggled my mouth out of the scarf, brought my arms down
around my head and fought my hands free with the help of my teeth. I wiped my blood off with my scarf. I staggered to my feet. With Robbie still in sight, I picked up a rock at the foot of the blood-stained bench. I wondered how he would be able to go back to his party and play ‘good host’ after what he had just done. How would he explain to Enid where I’d gone? Or would he do it
to her, too? I prayed to god once again for her sake. Not my innocent faery. I lurked after Robbie, slowly, quietly. All of a sudden, I made a mad dash for him. I suddenly felt a surge of anger with the thought of my revenge, and for the sake of conserving Enid’s purity, I flung the scarf around his neck
from behind. I heard a gasp as I tightened it and threw the rock at his head, as hard as I could. He fell to the ground with a thump. I remembered what it felt like to be under him, pressing down with all his weight, gasping for air. His eyes shut and he didn’t move. I ran as fast as I could. I kept telling
myself to keep going and not to look back. I felt so weak, it was hard to move, but I had to do it. I heard the music and saw the lights from the mansion. When I got to the rose arbor at the edge of the courtyard, I fell through it onto my stomach and cried. Red and white petals drifted down upon me. I pushed my torso up, and supported myself with my bloody hands. I threw up. No one paid attention.
They thought I had too much to drink. Until I saw Enid. Perfection in every sense. It looked as if she had been walking around in a bubble, or on a cloud. Nothing had touched her. None of the smoke or wine or sweat had dared to go near her. With her hair and wings backlit, she was an angel. No doubt about it. She looked around nervously, for me, I suppose. I tried to yell out to her, but nothing came. Then, she saw me. Her eyes grew wide, but not in wonder this time—in horror. She rushed over to me and fell to the ground. She didn’t even ask me what happened. It was as if she already
knew. She threw her arms around me and hugged me. I began to cry, and she calmed me. She stroked my hair and hushed me. I felt so much better. I wondered if the praying I did worked. If god had actually sent me an angel. I didn’t want her angelic perfection to be ruined by my blood and sweat and tears, among other things. She pulled me up and helped me stagger to my car. She laid me into the front passenger seat and told me to stay there, and that she would be right back. I watched her wings float away.
She walked into the mansion, and found Robbie slouched over a sink, splashing his face. The sink was filled with a pale blood-water. She pushed his head down into the sink, almost effortlessly, and held it there, until he no longer fought for his life. Now he knew what it was like not to be able to
breathe. She let go of his head and he fell to the floor with a heavy thud. She scattered her white and red petals along his body.
She returned to me in the car and told me everything had been taken care of, and she placed red and white rose petals in my hand and closed it up.
I noticed that there wasn’t a drop of blood or sweat on her dress, nor a rip or a smudge anyway near her. She drove us the 45 minutes back home, and I thanked god for listening the first time I prayed. I held the petals tight all the way home and was grateful to Rose white, my angel.