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“All stories must come to an end someday.  Eventually you’d get bored if you listened forever.  Likewise, since each life is a story, each life comes to an end.  Mine will too, and soon.  You will have to understand this.”  I tell this to my grandson, all of nine years old.  It’s past time to do this.
“No way, Grandpa,” he says.  “You can’t die.  I’d get bored.”
“Dad, don’t give him such ideas.  You’ll be with us for a long time.”
That’s what they think.  I know I’m going to die soon.  I was told a long time ago when and how I’d die.  It made me a ballsy brat when I was younger, but now I wonder.  I know I wouldn’t have acted as I did when I was young if I didn’t believe it.  I look back now and remember so many things…
“Son, did I ever tell you about my first trip to Russia?” I ask.
“You mean on your honeymoon with Mom?” he replies.  “Yeah, you’ve told me.”
“No,” I say.  “I asked if I ever told you about the first time I went to Russia.”
He gives me one of his looks.  “Mom said that was your first time.”
“It was.  Our first time.  Her first time.  Not mine.”
“Are you gonna tell us a story, Grandpa?”
I chuckle.  “Yes, Ben, I am.” He gives an excited cry.  “But,” I cut in, “this is Top Secret, you hear?  I don’t want you telling Grandma.  Either of you.”
“Yes, sir,” they chime, the younger enthusiastic, the older exasperated.
“Now, this story took place a long time ago, though I don’t think I’ve ever told it.  And, like all good stories, it has to start by mentioning that.  Because it’s important.
*****
This story took place a long time ago.
In my youth, I was a wild man.  Nothing in the world could kill me, I knew it, and I was out to prove it.  Is it dangerous?  I’ll do it, just to say I did.
So I wind up in Russia.  In Nizhny Novgorod, where the Volga and the Oka join.  It’s November, 1952, and I’m an American on Russian soil.  I call it ballsy.  Everybody back home calls it suicidal.  What do they know, hey?
So I’m in Gorky—that’s what they called it then, Gorky—I’m there to cause trouble.  I know it, they know it.  And, most important, the police know it.  I say I know it, but really all I know right then is that it’s damned cold.  Too damned cold during the day, and impossibly colder at night.  I can’t figure out how in a frozen hell the Russkies can live in this cold.  But they do, so I will.  For a while.  That’s my thoughts when a couple of MVD-types approach me.  Now these boys are pre-KGB, but that doesn’t mean they’re pushovers.  They get me to the station and begin questioning me.
“Where are you from, merzavek?” I’m asked in English.
And I think, Villain, huh?  Let’s see what they say when I respond in their own damned tongue.  So that’s what I do, saying in Russian, “I’m here for a few months as a tourist.  I have blood ties to this area.”  Now, I’m lying.  But he doesn’t know that.
Long story short, he calls my bluff, so I get to spend three frigid months in Russia for free.  Not bad, as prisons go, I suppose, but still too damned cold.  I start digging an escape tunnel under my bed, but find that it’s tolerably warm in there and that stalls my escape because I’m comfortable enough.  A warm place to sleep is one of the greatest things in the world to have.
After a few months, the Russkies are satisfied with me, somehow, and I’m back out in Gorky.  I have a little more fun trying to keep warm, then decide I’d rather just get the hell out of there.  I catch a ride back down the Volga and into the Black Sea and then the Mediterranean, where I finally get the ice out of my bones.
Looking back, November to March wasn’t the best of times to traipse around the coldest lands in the world, but I was young, dumb, and invincible.  Which is probably why I wandered through Europe for months before getting home.
*****
“So that’s it then?  You were in a Russian jail for a few months and caused domestic trouble there?  That’s what you didn’t want to tell Mom?”  My son asks.
“How mad would she be at me if she knew I was in jail?” I respond.
“Oh.  Yeah.  Good point.”
“Was that really all, Grandpa?”
“No, Ben.  But it’s all of Russia I can tell you.  The rest is either forgotten or should have been.  But it was just the beginning.  Getting home is the real story.  It’s how I met Grandma, after all.”
*****
Now, it’s only been a handful of years since the second War.  I wasn’t old enough then to participate in the fighting, but just barely.  I’m an ‘adult’ when I’m in Russia, and I look it once I’ve reached Italy.  Cold weather hardens your features.  Which is why all Russkies look so damned angry.  That, and they are, usually.  Mostly at the cold.
So I’m in Italy, playing tourist.  You know, see Rome and all that.  Then I go to Crete, then on to Paris to see the Louvre.  That’s where I first see her.
The most beautiful woman in the world.
She doesn’t see me, so I follow her around Paris for the rest of the day, just out of sight.  I find out she’s American too, and decide to go home.
It’s time, anyway, and I have to find a way to make that angel mine.  I learn a bit about her, then leave her and head back to the States.  There’re a few friends of mine from a couple of my less…mentionable excursions who I use to get further info on her.
Turns out her father’s this big businessman.  They say I won’t have much luck reaching her without some sort of plan.  So I make a plan so crazy I’m the only one who thinks it might actually work.
*****
“What did you do?” my Ben asks me.
“Well, settle down, and I’ll tell you.  We have a little time, let’s not rush it, hey?”
“Okay, Grandpa.”
“You’re dragging this out on purpose, aren’t you, Dad?”
I chuckle.  “Yes, Kyle, I am.  And if you don’t mind, I’ll drag it out a bit more, and you can be done with me.  Sound good?”
He sighs.  “Well, when you put it that way.”
*****
The plan is risky.  The boys have a pot on for if I can pull this off.  Twenty-eight to one odds against my success.  They say even if I live through this, I can’t get the girl anyway.  I’m betting for my success.  I’m probably alone there.
Tonight’s the night and I’m pretty nervous.  A real virgin, as the French say.  Then it’s go time, and I drop into a shell of adrenaline and calculation.  We’re up pretty high, flying over her house.  I’ve practiced the jump a thousand times in my head.  The wings are a nice effect, and they’ll last through the drop, courtesy of a good friend of mine.  I know where I’m supposed to land, right in front of her window.  We’ve made sure she’s home tonight and everything.
I jump out of the plane, freefall for a little way as the plane gets clear, then ready the parachute.  It opens up and things are going smooth.  I get to about forty feet above ground and dump the ’chute and pack.  Crazy, I know, but I can’t let the ’chute show up nearby, and the wind’ll pull it far enough away from that height.  The wings’ll have to slow the fall enough to make the landing do-able.
They work, for the most part.  I start coasting down, a raven-winged intruder gliding to her window.  I land on the ground right in front of her window, not ten feet away.  Perfect landing.  Except I touch down on a rock just big enough to throw my balance, and I roll forward and break my right wing.  Not expected, but it’ll have to do.
The noise is enough to get her to come to the window, which she opens to see what’s up at ten at night in her backyard.  Which is me, sprawled out like a bird that just hit a wall.  I know I just blew my big chance at making a good first impression.  I wish right about there that the fall’d killed me.  I’d have been less embarrassed.
She laughs, a tinkling note that I love more every time I hear it.  “And what is my angel doing out here like this tonight?” she asks cheerily.
My carefully rehearsed speech is flung into the wind.  I have to improvise.
“Well, I was flying through the neighborhood, when I heard from a little bird that it’d seen another angel around.  It told me the angel lived here, so I thought I’d stop by and see if it was anyone I know.  But a plane went by and clipped me.  I’m fine, but my wing’s in a bad way.”  I turn and look her up and down as I stand.
“Huh,” I say, “I can see why it made the mistake.  You may not be an angel, Miss Mary Rose, but you sure look the part.”
“How do you know my name?” she asks, laughing as I wipe the dust from myself.
“Everything beautiful on earth is recorded in Heaven,” I reply, shrugging.  “It’s no real surprise that I should know it.  You’re written in twice, after all.”  I kick myself as I say it, knowing how ridiculous I must sound.
“Well,” she says, “Mr. Angel, I must apologize.  It is late, and the rest of my dreams are calling me on to morning.  Perhaps I might dream of you again, someday?”
“As you wish, my lady.  I have to get this wing tended to, so why don’t you just go back to bed and I’ll be off.”  I don’t want her to go, but I don’t want to push this either.
She reaches to close the window.  “Good night, then.  Another time, Mr. Angel.”
“Ah, Raven, actually,” I say quickly.  “And I’m sure you’ll forget my name if I don’t do something about that.  What to do…” I ponder, looking as if I’m thinking hard.  “Aha!” I stretch out my left wing and pull out two pinion feathers from the tip.  “I won’t be needing these–for a while, anyway–so you take them.  Next time we meet, my wings will be intact, and I’ll give you a pair from the other wing.”
She takes them curiously, probably actually believing this to be a dream.  I can’t really blame her.  No one would really do this sort of thing in real life, you know?  She goes inside, and I walk off kicking myself.  So I have to make up another plan to woo her.
*****
“Dad, this is crazy.  What idiots would help you with this sort of thing?  It had to be illegal,” Kyle says.
“Oh, it probably was.  But we could get away with it back then.  And I was immortal, so I really didn’t care.”
“Why were you immortal?”
“Ben, don’t listen to him.  He just means he was cocky.”
“Yes, to an extent.  But a young gypsy woman told me I was immortal, along with a couple other things that happened to make me believe her.  But that’s not important now.  It’s another story for another time.  The story I was telling you continues.”
*****
It’s a couple of months later, and her birthday’s coming up.  Her father’s throwing his baby girl a big party that I decide to crash.  It’s a simple plan.  But I have to do it without getting arrested.  Or killed by her father.  That’s the real challenge, after all: pulling this off without him hating me.
So the reception’s in the backyard and I get the guys to fly me over and drop me again.  The drop goes fine.  Nobody even notices until I’ve been falling for a few minutes.  I blame the clouds, thank God for cover.  Then it’s time, and I dump the ‘chute.
Johnny, the wing maker, fixed the new wings up so they’d actually let me glide on them like some ugly albatross or something.  They retract on a few hidden cables and look real fine.
I circle down and find my landing zone, an area cleared by surprised onlookers who point and stare and wonder what the hell is going on.  My landing this time is perfect. I blame the new wings, and mentally hug Johnny for the bang-up job he did of making me look good.
I’m greeted by that tinkling laugh I love so much.  “Why, my dear Mr. Raven.  I didn’t think I’d see you again.”
“My dear,” I reply with more bravado than I feel under the gaze of so many, “I was hoping you hadn’t forgotten me.  Now that the wing is healed, I’ve come to give what I promised you last time.”  I reach up and remove the pair of pinion feathers on my right wing.  A little bit of blood drips out, courtesy of Johnny’s twisted sense of humor.
“Thank you,” she says as she takes them.  “I’ll go put these two with the others.”  And she runs off, leaving me entrenched in the rabid dogs with their champagne.
“Well, then.  I guess I’ll just go,” I say, hoping that’ll be it.  I turn around and step into the chest of the biggest man I’ve ever even thought about seeing.  He dwarfs me, and the look he’s giving me gives me a new idea.  I’m going to die.  I don’t know why I feel like my fated death can be changed by this brobdingnagian creature before me, but…
*****
“Grandpa, what’s brobdi… brobdimb…  What’s it mean?” Ben asks me.
“Brobdingnagian is a word meaning very, very big.  I didn’t know the word when it happened, but I had to find a word to describe him afterwards.  It took me a while to find the one word that really fit.  That was it.  May I continue?”
*****
Thank you.  As I was saying, I don’t know why, but I get the feeling this behemoth could kill me against my fate.  Probably because I can tell he doesn’t believe in fate.  He believes in crushing people’s skulls between his thumb and forefinger, like pimples.
“Um,” I say, because it’s all I can think to, “ah, could I, uh, get by?  My escape is that way.”  I try to sound cocky, but most of my bravado is eaten away by this feeling that’s fairly new to me.  Genuine fear.  For my life, no less.
“No can do, kid,” he rumbles.  “The boss is gonna wanna see ya after that.  Some stunt ya pulled.  Ballsy.”
“Thanks, that’s what I was going for.  I’m pretty glad my wings held out.  It’s my first flight since I broke the right one.”  It was true, too.  I hadn’t flown since that night, and I dumped the ’chute at over a hundred feet in the air.  The fall would’ve killed me.  Maybe.  It definitely wouldn’t have looked good.  But talking to her dad is not a thing I really want to do just now.  I want to get the hell out of here, fast.
“So… can I maybe get a rain check on that meeting, maybe?  I have to go test my wings out a bit more.  Make sure they’ll get me back out next time.  They’re not quite at a hundred, if you get me.”  I try to get out, but know it’s hopeless.
“No can do.  C’mon.  If ya walk, I don’t have to drag ya.  Wouldn’t be pretty, I wind up breaking them wings.”  So I follow him up and into the house, the party goes on behind us, and I steel myself for the upcoming meeting.  I’m immortal.  I say to myself like a mantra, trying to make those constant words feel true.  It doesn’t help.
Neither does walking into the boss’s office.  You might remember it, Kyle.  Big room, high ceiling, and heads of all sorts of animals roam the walls.  We’re talking big game heads, some illegal to hunt now.  Some illegal to hunt then.  There’s also a couple of life-size statues of people.  Most look pretty run-of-the-mill, but a couple look suspect.
Ironically, the picture behind the boss’s seat shows a crusader pinning a black winged, small horned, very human-looking demon to the ground with his spear.  I can’t help but feel a bit of kinship at that moment.
“So.  You’re the ‘angel’ she saw, are you?” the boss asks.  He looks meaner than that crusader, and I wish I was in the demon’s place.  “You don’t look like an angel.”
“No?  What should I do to look more like one then?”
“Ah,” he says.  “A wise guy, eh? You like your tongue?”
“I didn’t at first, but I’ve become somewhat attached to it in recent years.”
“Keep talking like that, and you won’t have to worry about being attached.
“Now,” he glares, “I don’t much like you.  You’re crazy.  I don’t like guys crashing into my baby’s life.”  For a moment, I can’t help but see him as a doting father.  Then I remember the three hundred pounds of ‘doting’ standing behind me.
“The first time, I did crash in, and I apologize.  But I really do think my landing this time was pretty good.”
“It was, boss,” says the colossus.
“Shut up, both of you.”  He slams his hands on the desk in front of him as he stands.  “Not another word until I tell you to talk.  And then you’ll tell me only what I want to hear.  Got it?”  There’s a moment of silence.  “Good.  Now, Mr. …Raven,” he smirks, “since I can’t have you flying in like this again, I’m going to do something that’ll kill two birds with one stone,”  I flinch at the reference,  “so to speak.
“My daughter needs a bodyguard.  She plans to go to Europe this summer, and her last bodyguard is… no longer with us.  She seems to like you.  You’ll take the job.  You’ll be protecting her with your life.  Your life.  If she gets hurt, you hurt more, got it?
“She doesn’t want a bodyguard, though.  So you have to convince her.  She’s stubborn, like her mother, rest her soul.  So you have to trick her.  You’re going to be her boyfriend.  Got it?”
He pauses for a moment.  We say nothing.
“I said do you got that?”
“Oh, uh, yes sir.”  I didn’t.
“Good.  Now I’m sure you want to know where her room is.  Daniel, the big man behind you, will escort you there.  She should be there or in the yard.  You’d better go quick, you’re on the job now.”
We walk out, and the big man puts his hand on my shoulder.  “Well, kid, you’re alive.  Surprised?”
I half laugh, as I look at the bear paw on me.  “Not as surprised as I could be about that.  I think that got glazed over by getting permission to be with Mary Rose.”
His laugh is as bear-like as his paw.  “Well, you’ll be marrying her soon enough at this rate.  Welcome to the family.  I’ll be your uncle.”
*****
“And that’s the end of the story,” I finish.
Our conversation continues for a little while, then it’s bedtime for Kyle and for me.  I’m old, and don’t stay up like I used to.  So I head to bed.
I don’t see her until I lay down.  I don’t know that I’m surprised by her being there, just that I didn’t notice sooner.  But she stands there, my young gypsy girl, looking the same now as seventy years ago.
“So you’ve come to see me off?” I ask, knowing the answer.
“Of course.  I told you this would happen.”  She looks at me with too-deep eyes, pools of eternity.  “What did you expect?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I reply, trying to be casual.  “Maybe the Grim Reaper?”
“Him?  He only comes for the folks who we know are going to put up a fight.  You’ll come quietly enough.”
“And if I resist?”
“You won’t.  You knew it was coming.  Your namesake will continue in name alone after his ninth cycle.  I’d say that’s pretty specific.  I’m usually more vague.”
“I believe you.  But you’re right, it’s time I go.  They don’t need me anymore.  Not like this.  My last story is told.  I’m tired, and it really is time.”
“Glad you feel the same.  It really is a bother when you resist.”
“One question, though:  will they be all right without me?”
“Didn’t you just say they didn’t need you?”
“It’s not the same as wanting me, you know.”
“I do.  But if I had to wait until they didn’t want you, you’d never die.”
“I was immortal once before.”
“For a time, yes.  And you put us all through hell.  That’s over now.  A lot of folks on the other side want to meet you.  Are you ready?”
“Will this hurt?”
She grins.  “Well, there’s only one way to find out.”  She reaches out and grabs my hand.  It feels warm, like a summer dream, the warmth of a good blanket in a Russian winter.  I close my eyes, and feel her kiss each one.  So I die.
*****
When I open my eyes again, my son is coming into the room.
“Dad,” he says, “I know you don’t mean anything by it, but don’t scare Ben with talk of you dying.  He’s too young to…  Oh my God!
“Mooom!  Karen, get in here! It’s Dad!  He’s…”
I watch him run out of the room–try to follow–but a soft hand rests on my shoulder, holding me back.
“I have to go to him.  He still needs me!” I cry.
I turn around and see her again.
“You can’t help him now.  They are all going to need some time to see it, but you’re still with them.  In your stories and their stories of you.  You’ve loved, and now that allows you to live on.  That old shell?  It’s gone, dead.
“But you–you’re something else.  You’re immortal.”

Description
“All stories must come to an end someday.  Eventually you’d get bored if you listened forever.  Likewise, since each life is a story, each life comes to an end.  Mine will too, and soon.  You will have to understand this.”  I tell this to my grandson, all of nine years old.  It’s past time to do this.
“No way, Grandpa,” he says.  “You can’t die.  I’d get bored.”
“Dad, don’t give him such ideas.  You’ll be with us for a long time.”
That’s what they think.  I know I’m going to die soon.  I was told a long time ago when and how I’d die.  It made me a ballsy brat when I was younger, but now I wonder.  I know I wouldn’t have acted as I did when I was young if I didn’t believe it.  I look back now and remember so many things…
“Son, did I ever tell you about my first trip to Russia?” I ask.
“You mean on your honeymoon with Mom?” he replies.  “Yeah, you’ve told me.”
“No,” I say.  “I asked if I ever told you about the first time I went to Russia.”
He gives me one of his looks.  “Mom said that was your first time.”
“It was.  Our first time.  Her first time.  Not mine.”
“Are you gonna tell us a story, Grandpa?”
I chuckle.  “Yes, Ben, I am.” He gives an excited cry.  “But,” I cut in, “this is Top Secret, you hear?  I don’t want you telling Grandma.  Either of you.”
“Yes, sir,” they chime, the younger enthusiastic, the older exasperated.
“Now, this story took place a long time ago, though I don’t think I’ve ever told it.  And, like all good stories, it has to start by mentioning that.  Because it’s important.
*****
This story took place a long time ago.
In my youth, I was a wild man.  Nothing in the world could kill me, I knew it, and I was out to prove it.  Is it dangerous?  I’ll do it, just to say I did.
So I wind up in Russia.  In Nizhny Novgorod, where the Volga and the Oka join.  It’s November, 1952, and I’m an American on Russian soil.  I call it ballsy.  Everybody back home calls it suicidal.  What do they know, hey?
So I’m in Gorky—that’s what they called it then, Gorky—I’m there to cause trouble.  I know it, they know it.  And, most important, the police know it.  I say I know it, but really all I know right then is that it’s damned cold.  Too damned cold during the day, and impossibly colder at night.  I can’t figure out how in a frozen hell the Russkies can live in this cold.  But they do, so I will.  For a while.  That’s my thoughts when a couple of MVD-types approach me.  Now these boys are pre-KGB, but that doesn’t mean they’re pushovers.  They get me to the station and begin questioning me.
“Where are you from, merzavek?” I’m asked in English.
And I think, Villain, huh?  Let’s see what they say when I respond in their own damned tongue.  So that’s what I do, saying in Russian, “I’m here for a few months as a tourist.  I have blood ties to this area.”  Now, I’m lying.  But he doesn’t know that.
Long story short, he calls my bluff, so I get to spend three frigid months in Russia for free.  Not bad, as prisons go, I suppose, but still too damned cold.  I start digging an escape tunnel under my bed, but find that it’s tolerably warm in there and that stalls my escape because I’m comfortable enough.  A warm place to sleep is one of the greatest things in the world to have.
After a few months, the Russkies are satisfied with me, somehow, and I’m back out in Gorky.  I have a little more fun trying to keep warm, then decide I’d rather just get the hell out of there.  I catch a ride back down the Volga and into the Black Sea and then the Mediterranean, where I finally get the ice out of my bones.
Looking back, November to March wasn’t the best of times to traipse around the coldest lands in the world, but I was young, dumb, and invincible.  Which is probably why I wandered through Europe for months before getting home.
*****
“So that’s it then?  You were in a Russian jail for a few months and caused domestic trouble there?  That’s what you didn’t want to tell Mom?”  My son asks.
“How mad would she be at me if she knew I was in jail?” I respond.
“Oh.  Yeah.  Good point.”
“Was that really all, Grandpa?”
“No, Ben.  But it’s all of Russia I can tell you.  The rest is either forgotten or should have been.  But it was just the beginning.  Getting home is the real story.  It’s how I met Grandma, after all.”
*****
Now, it’s only been a handful of years since the second War.  I wasn’t old enough then to participate in the fighting, but just barely.  I’m an ‘adult’ when I’m in Russia, and I look it once I’ve reached Italy.  Cold weather hardens your features.  Which is why all Russkies look so damned angry.  That, and they are, usually.  Mostly at the cold.
So I’m in Italy, playing tourist.  You know, see Rome and all that.  Then I go to Crete, then on to Paris to see the Louvre.  That’s where I first see her.
The most beautiful woman in the world.
She doesn’t see me, so I follow her around Paris for the rest of the day, just out of sight.  I find out she’s American too, and decide to go home.
It’s time, anyway, and I have to find a way to make that angel mine.  I learn a bit about her, then leave her and head back to the States.  There’re a few friends of mine from a couple of my less…mentionable excursions who I use to get further info on her.
Turns out her father’s this big businessman.  They say I won’t have much luck reaching her without some sort of plan.  So I make a plan so crazy I’m the only one who thinks it might actually work.
*****
“What did you do?” my Ben asks me.
“Well, settle down, and I’ll tell you.  We have a little time, let’s not rush it, hey?”
“Okay, Grandpa.”
“You’re dragging this out on purpose, aren’t you, Dad?”
I chuckle.  “Yes, Kyle, I am.  And if you don’t mind, I’ll drag it out a bit more, and you can be done with me.  Sound good?”
He sighs.  “Well, when you put it that way.”
*****
The plan is risky.  The boys have a pot on for if I can pull this off.  Twenty-eight to one odds against my success.  They say even if I live through this, I can’t get the girl anyway.  I’m betting for my success.  I’m probably alone there.
Tonight’s the night and I’m pretty nervous.  A real virgin, as the French say.  Then it’s go time, and I drop into a shell of adrenaline and calculation.  We’re up pretty high, flying over her house.  I’ve practiced the jump a thousand times in my head.  The wings are a nice effect, and they’ll last through the drop, courtesy of a good friend of mine.  I know where I’m supposed to land, right in front of her window.  We’ve made sure she’s home tonight and everything.
I jump out of the plane, freefall for a little way as the plane gets clear, then ready the parachute.  It opens up and things are going smooth.  I get to about forty feet above ground and dump the ’chute and pack.  Crazy, I know, but I can’t let the ’chute show up nearby, and the wind’ll pull it far enough away from that height.  The wings’ll have to slow the fall enough to make the landing do-able.
They work, for the most part.  I start coasting down, a raven-winged intruder gliding to her window.  I land on the ground right in front of her window, not ten feet away.  Perfect landing.  Except I touch down on a rock just big enough to throw my balance, and I roll forward and break my right wing.  Not expected, but it’ll have to do.
The noise is enough to get her to come to the window, which she opens to see what’s up at ten at night in her backyard.  Which is me, sprawled out like a bird that just hit a wall.  I know I just blew my big chance at making a good first impression.  I wish right about there that the fall’d killed me.  I’d have been less embarrassed.
She laughs, a tinkling note that I love more every time I hear it.  “And what is my angel doing out here like this tonight?” she asks cheerily.
My carefully rehearsed speech is flung into the wind.  I have to improvise.
“Well, I was flying through the neighborhood, when I heard from a little bird that it’d seen another angel around.  It told me the angel lived here, so I thought I’d stop by and see if it was anyone I know.  But a plane went by and clipped me.  I’m fine, but my wing’s in a bad way.”  I turn and look her up and down as I stand.
“Huh,” I say, “I can see why it made the mistake.  You may not be an angel, Miss Mary Rose, but you sure look the part.”
“How do you know my name?” she asks, laughing as I wipe the dust from myself.
“Everything beautiful on earth is recorded in Heaven,” I reply, shrugging.  “It’s no real surprise that I should know it.  You’re written in twice, after all.”  I kick myself as I say it, knowing how ridiculous I must sound.
“Well,” she says, “Mr. Angel, I must apologize.  It is late, and the rest of my dreams are calling me on to morning.  Perhaps I might dream of you again, someday?”
“As you wish, my lady.  I have to get this wing tended to, so why don’t you just go back to bed and I’ll be off.”  I don’t want her to go, but I don’t want to push this either.
She reaches to close the window.  “Good night, then.  Another time, Mr. Angel.”
“Ah, Raven, actually,” I say quickly.  “And I’m sure you’ll forget my name if I don’t do something about that.  What to do…” I ponder, looking as if I’m thinking hard.  “Aha!” I stretch out my left wing and pull out two pinion feathers from the tip.  “I won’t be needing these–for a while, anyway–so you take them.  Next time we meet, my wings will be intact, and I’ll give you a pair from the other wing.”
She takes them curiously, probably actually believing this to be a dream.  I can’t really blame her.  No one would really do this sort of thing in real life, you know?  She goes inside, and I walk off kicking myself.  So I have to make up another plan to woo her.
*****
“Dad, this is crazy.  What idiots would help you with this sort of thing?  It had to be illegal,” Kyle says.
“Oh, it probably was.  But we could get away with it back then.  And I was immortal, so I really didn’t care.”
“Why were you immortal?”
“Ben, don’t listen to him.  He just means he was cocky.”
“Yes, to an extent.  But a young gypsy woman told me I was immortal, along with a couple other things that happened to make me believe her.  But that’s not important now.  It’s another story for another time.  The story I was telling you continues.”
*****
It’s a couple of months later, and her birthday’s coming up.  Her father’s throwing his baby girl a big party that I decide to crash.  It’s a simple plan.  But I have to do it without getting arrested.  Or killed by her father.  That’s the real challenge, after all: pulling this off without him hating me.
So the reception’s in the backyard and I get the guys to fly me over and drop me again.  The drop goes fine.  Nobody even notices until I’ve been falling for a few minutes.  I blame the clouds, thank God for cover.  Then it’s time, and I dump the ‘chute.
Johnny, the wing maker, fixed the new wings up so they’d actually let me glide on them like some ugly albatross or something.  They retract on a few hidden cables and look real fine.
I circle down and find my landing zone, an area cleared by surprised onlookers who point and stare and wonder what the hell is going on.  My landing this time is perfect. I blame the new wings, and mentally hug Johnny for the bang-up job he did of making me look good.
I’m greeted by that tinkling laugh I love so much.  “Why, my dear Mr. Raven.  I didn’t think I’d see you again.”
“My dear,” I reply with more bravado than I feel under the gaze of so many, “I was hoping you hadn’t forgotten me.  Now that the wing is healed, I’ve come to give what I promised you last time.”  I reach up and remove the pair of pinion feathers on my right wing.  A little bit of blood drips out, courtesy of Johnny’s twisted sense of humor.
“Thank you,” she says as she takes them.  “I’ll go put these two with the others.”  And she runs off, leaving me entrenched in the rabid dogs with their champagne.
“Well, then.  I guess I’ll just go,” I say, hoping that’ll be it.  I turn around and step into the chest of the biggest man I’ve ever even thought about seeing.  He dwarfs me, and the look he’s giving me gives me a new idea.  I’m going to die.  I don’t know why I feel like my fated death can be changed by this brobdingnagian creature before me, but…
*****
“Grandpa, what’s brobdi… brobdimb…  What’s it mean?” Ben asks me.
“Brobdingnagian is a word meaning very, very big.  I didn’t know the word when it happened, but I had to find a word to describe him afterwards.  It took me a while to find the one word that really fit.  That was it.  May I continue?”
*****
Thank you.  As I was saying, I don’t know why, but I get the feeling this behemoth could kill me against my fate.  Probably because I can tell he doesn’t believe in fate.  He believes in crushing people’s skulls between his thumb and forefinger, like pimples.
“Um,” I say, because it’s all I can think to, “ah, could I, uh, get by?  My escape is that way.”  I try to sound cocky, but most of my bravado is eaten away by this feeling that’s fairly new to me.  Genuine fear.  For my life, no less.
“No can do, kid,” he rumbles.  “The boss is gonna wanna see ya after that.  Some stunt ya pulled.  Ballsy.”
“Thanks, that’s what I was going for.  I’m pretty glad my wings held out.  It’s my first flight since I broke the right one.”  It was true, too.  I hadn’t flown since that night, and I dumped the ’chute at over a hundred feet in the air.  The fall would’ve killed me.  Maybe.  It definitely wouldn’t have looked good.  But talking to her dad is not a thing I really want to do just now.  I want to get the hell out of here, fast.
“So… can I maybe get a rain check on that meeting, maybe?  I have to go test my wings out a bit more.  Make sure they’ll get me back out next time.  They’re not quite at a hundred, if you get me.”  I try to get out, but know it’s hopeless.
“No can do.  C’mon.  If ya walk, I don’t have to drag ya.  Wouldn’t be pretty, I wind up breaking them wings.”  So I follow him up and into the house, the party goes on behind us, and I steel myself for the upcoming meeting.  I’m immortal.  I say to myself like a mantra, trying to make those constant words feel true.  It doesn’t help.
Neither does walking into the boss’s office.  You might remember it, Kyle.  Big room, high ceiling, and heads of all sorts of animals roam the walls.  We’re talking big game heads, some illegal to hunt now.  Some illegal to hunt then.  There’s also a couple of life-size statues of people.  Most look pretty run-of-the-mill, but a couple look suspect.
Ironically, the picture behind the boss’s seat shows a crusader pinning a black winged, small horned, very human-looking demon to the ground with his spear.  I can’t help but feel a bit of kinship at that moment.
“So.  You’re the ‘angel’ she saw, are you?” the boss asks.  He looks meaner than that crusader, and I wish I was in the demon’s place.  “You don’t look like an angel.”
“No?  What should I do to look more like one then?”
“Ah,” he says.  “A wise guy, eh? You like your tongue?”
“I didn’t at first, but I’ve become somewhat attached to it in recent years.”
“Keep talking like that, and you won’t have to worry about being attached.
“Now,” he glares, “I don’t much like you.  You’re crazy.  I don’t like guys crashing into my baby’s life.”  For a moment, I can’t help but see him as a doting father.  Then I remember the three hundred pounds of ‘doting’ standing behind me.
“The first time, I did crash in, and I apologize.  But I really do think my landing this time was pretty good.”
“It was, boss,” says the colossus.
“Shut up, both of you.”  He slams his hands on the desk in front of him as he stands.  “Not another word until I tell you to talk.  And then you’ll tell me only what I want to hear.  Got it?”  There’s a moment of silence.  “Good.  Now, Mr. …Raven,” he smirks, “since I can’t have you flying in like this again, I’m going to do something that’ll kill two birds with one stone,”  I flinch at the reference,  “so to speak.
“My daughter needs a bodyguard.  She plans to go to Europe this summer, and her last bodyguard is… no longer with us.  She seems to like you.  You’ll take the job.  You’ll be protecting her with your life.  Your life.  If she gets hurt, you hurt more, got it?
“She doesn’t want a bodyguard, though.  So you have to convince her.  She’s stubborn, like her mother, rest her soul.  So you have to trick her.  You’re going to be her boyfriend.  Got it?”
He pauses for a moment.  We say nothing.
“I said do you got that?”
“Oh, uh, yes sir.”  I didn’t.
“Good.  Now I’m sure you want to know where her room is.  Daniel, the big man behind you, will escort you there.  She should be there or in the yard.  You’d better go quick, you’re on the job now.”
We walk out, and the big man puts his hand on my shoulder.  “Well, kid, you’re alive.  Surprised?”
I half laugh, as I look at the bear paw on me.  “Not as surprised as I could be about that.  I think that got glazed over by getting permission to be with Mary Rose.”
His laugh is as bear-like as his paw.  “Well, you’ll be marrying her soon enough at this rate.  Welcome to the family.  I’ll be your uncle.”
*****
“And that’s the end of the story,” I finish.
Our conversation continues for a little while, then it’s bedtime for Kyle and for me.  I’m old, and don’t stay up like I used to.  So I head to bed.
I don’t see her until I lay down.  I don’t know that I’m surprised by her being there, just that I didn’t notice sooner.  But she stands there, my young gypsy girl, looking the same now as seventy years ago.
“So you’ve come to see me off?” I ask, knowing the answer.
“Of course.  I told you this would happen.”  She looks at me with too-deep eyes, pools of eternity.  “What did you expect?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I reply, trying to be casual.  “Maybe the Grim Reaper?”
“Him?  He only comes for the folks who we know are going to put up a fight.  You’ll come quietly enough.”
“And if I resist?”
“You won’t.  You knew it was coming.  Your namesake will continue in name alone after his ninth cycle.  I’d say that’s pretty specific.  I’m usually more vague.”
“I believe you.  But you’re right, it’s time I go.  They don’t need me anymore.  Not like this.  My last story is told.  I’m tired, and it really is time.”
“Glad you feel the same.  It really is a bother when you resist.”
“One question, though:  will they be all right without me?”
“Didn’t you just say they didn’t need you?”
“It’s not the same as wanting me, you know.”
“I do.  But if I had to wait until they didn’t want you, you’d never die.”
“I was immortal once before.”
“For a time, yes.  And you put us all through hell.  That’s over now.  A lot of folks on the other side want to meet you.  Are you ready?”
“Will this hurt?”
She grins.  “Well, there’s only one way to find out.”  She reaches out and grabs my hand.  It feels warm, like a summer dream, the warmth of a good blanket in a Russian winter.  I close my eyes, and feel her kiss each one.  So I die.
*****
When I open my eyes again, my son is coming into the room.
“Dad,” he says, “I know you don’t mean anything by it, but don’t scare Ben with talk of you dying.  He’s too young to…  Oh my God!
“Mooom!  Karen, get in here! It’s Dad!  He’s…”
I watch him run out of the room–try to follow–but a soft hand rests on my shoulder, holding me back.
“I have to go to him.  He still needs me!” I cry.
I turn around and see her again.
“You can’t help him now.  They are all going to need some time to see it, but you’re still with them.  In your stories and their stories of you.  You’ve loved, and now that allows you to live on.  That old shell?  It’s gone, dead.
“But you–you’re something else.  You’re immortal.”