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Becky first saw the man who eats angels the night of her sixth birthday. A noise like a dog crunching chicken bones woke her. She put on her nightlight and saw him squatting in the corner. He had a small angel draped across his knees, her body limp and broken. The golden hair was faded and tangled, her eyes closed and mouth open with a small reel of drool dripping from her lip. The man had a face like a toad—bulbous, dark eyes and a wide mouth with the thickest lips she ever saw. He smiled at her, all gums and no teeth. He plucked another feather off the angel and stuffed it into his mouth.

"Who are you?" she asked.

He made a sound like someone gargling water. "I'm the man who eats angels."

Becky sat up straighter. "Is that an angel?"

"Yes."

She'd known it was an angel of course, exactly like the ones painted on the church glass.

"Where did you find the angel?" she asked, and then rushed on, "I'm not frightened of you. Shouldn't I be frightened of you?"

The man gargled again. "This is your angel I'm eating. I've waited nine nights for her to show herself. You're not frightened because I'm no harm to you. Yet."

Becky frowned. "I think I'm going to call my mama."

"That would be bad," the man said. "Then I would have to hurt her, and I don't want to hurt your mama."

"Why would you hurt my mama?"

"I don't want to and, if you don't call her, I never will."

Becky bit her lip. "Do you promise you'll never hurt my mama? Never ever?"

Solemnly, he placed a hand over his heart. A feather was stuck to his lip. "Never ever. I swear it."

"Pinky swear?"

"Of course."

They pinky swore and Becky smiled. She pointed at the angel again.

"Why are you eating her? And, if she's mine, why have I never seen her before?"

"I'm eating her because I'm the man who eats angels. You never see an angel unless your hurt is deep enough. Shh, go to sleep now. In the morning, this will be just a dream and you'll have forgotten about me."

Becky frowned. She wanted to say, "But I'm not hurting," but she heard her father's heavy tread sneaking down the hall. Quickly, she shut her light off and pulled her covers up, pretending to be asleep.

Her father's footsteps stopped. For a few moments, she heard his breathing outside her door, before he moved on.

A whisper floated from the corner. "No, you're not hurting. Yet."

She fell asleep and forgot about the man who eats angels for twenty-five years.

Becky stood in the rain, alone and surrounded by a mass of familiar strangers, while she watched her mother's casket lower into the ground. Through the dull, clinging fog of her grief, she felt someone watching her. There was an uncomfortable hunger in his stare. She looked up. And saw a man smiling at her from the back of the crowd, all gums and no teeth.

His eyes shifted away from her face and he gave a small, brief nod to someone to her right. She turned and saw a pale, trembling man she had never seen before. His smooth, unlined face contrasted with his white, almost silver, hair and tired blue eyes. Shock and fear faded from his face, replaced by a dull resignation that broke her heart.

She turned back towards the man who eats angels, but he was gone.

Later, she used the rain as an excuse to dodge and run away from all the well-wishers; the weight of their sympathy was crushing her.

Becky walked through her mother's house, silent save for the grandfather clock next to the stairs ticking away the time with perennial patience. She ran a slim-fingered hand over the dusty mantel, smiling at the proud collage of photographs. Her mother had loved taking pictures; she would spend hours arranging and re-arranging them.

Becky's fingers froze on a photograph of her with her parents—she wore a blue, frilly dress with a ridiculous yellow ribbon in her ash-blonde hair. Her mother's hand laid on her shoulder, comfortable and protective, while she smiled to the world. Her father looked dapper in a white shirt and navy tie, an arm around his wife's hips and smiling down at his daughter. A perfect picture of an adoring family.

Becky shivered. A sudden lightning flash lit up the room, startling her. A lazy boom of thunder rolled on the lightning's heels.

"Still afraid of the dark, you foolish girl?" Becky muttered. She made herself a scotch on the rocks, double and plenty of ice. The same way her mother always took it.

"I'll stay in my mom's house tonight," she had told the people who had offered their own homes and pretended not to notice their relief when she declined their offers.

She drained three more glasses and smiled, recalling her varsity roommate crinkling her nose whenever she ordered a whiskey.

"How can you drink that stuff? It's totally disgusting," Linda said.

Becky laughed. "You get used to it. It's an acquired taste."

Linda rolled her eyes and shook her head while Becky laughed. Scotch didn't smell like her father's warm rum breath; it made your insides numb and slowed your brain without the sickening fugue most heavy alcohol brought.

Becky filled her glass again and swirled the scotch, watching with a fogged fascination as the amber liquid shot up, down and over the ice cubes.

"You're an acquired taste, like me," she told the scotch before draining the glass.

A sound outside her window, like a dog crunching chicken bones, woke her. Pulling on an old T-shirt, she opened the window and looked out. The man who eats angels squatted near her windowsill. Spread on the ground before him lay the same angel she had seen at the funeral.

"I thought you might come," Becky said.

The man looked up, a hand sticking from his mouth and blood dribbling down his chin. He made a swallowing motion, the skin of his neck bulged and the hand disappeared down his gullet.

"Good evening, little Becky."

Becky hopped through the window. He shifted aside and she sat down on the grass across from him. The moisture from the rains still clinging to the grass wet her thighs and calves instantly. She ignored it and studied the man.

"You haven't changed," she said.

He gargled. "I never change, not since the moment I opened my eyes and heard hunger growling in my belly."

"What are you?"

"I'm the man who eats angels."

She shook her head. "No, you said that's who you are. But, what are you?"

He plucked a feather off the angel and swallowed it. "With me, it is the same thing, little Becky."

"Are you going to eat me too, one day?"

He smiled. "No, but I will hurt you. Before you die, I will bring you grief."

She was nine again, cuddled on her bed with her teddy bear while she listened to her father's bellows and the smack of his heavy hand on her mother's cheek. Later, she counted his slow steps creeping closer down the hall. Twenty-three steps before the door softly squeaked open. A warm, spicy wave of rum preceded his caress . . .

Becky shook her head, willing the memories down. "There's nothing you can do to me, no greater grief you can give me."

He sat and ate, quietly, for a while. "I can. Wait and see."

She snorted. "Oh, really? What possible harm can you do that . . ." She bit her lip, "father" stuck in her throat.

The man ripped off one of the angel's ears and lapped at it with his tongue. "Wait and see."

Becky sat and waited for him to say more, but he only ate the angel. Slowly, she pulled her T-shirt off. The cold raised goosebumps on her arms and tautened her nipples.

"Do you want to fuck me?" she asked.

He gargled. "Does little Becky think she's all grown up then?"

"Was I ever a child?" she countered.

"Fair enough." He stood and unbuckled his belt.

She turned away from him; arms stretched in front of her and face so close to the ground she felt the tips of the grass blades tickle her nose. She drew her legs up, spreading them wide and leaned back on her haunches.

His penis was short but thick, almost too thick. He lay his weight down on her, his large, clammy hands kneading her small breasts. He rested his chin on top of her head. He was much bigger and heavier than she had thought; Becky felt dwarfed beneath him. She shut her eyes, slow tears trailing down her cheeks while she panted with the pain of his thrusts. She nestled in the warmth of his embrace, seeking comfort to the void her mother had left.

A lazy drizzle of rain pattered down, clean and fresh, gradually soaking them. He fucked her in silence, for longer than she had imagined possible, a counter-tempo to the whisper-soft crash of raindrops. She turned away from his warm, spicy breath and sought the clean cold of the dirt.

The night greyed and dawn's light snuck over the fence before he finished—he slammed into her with a rapid series of short, sharp thrusts, rocking her forwards while his hands cramped around her breasts. He made a gurgling noise low in his throat and his body shuddered. She lifted her hips, pressing back against him. Becky buried her face in the grass and screamed.

She lay still for a long time after he climbed off her. The crunch of chicken bones started up again. Becky stood, wincing and jelly-kneed.

"You may as well come and eat inside," she said.

He mulled it over. "All right, then."

He lifted her through the window, handing her T-shirt up but declined her help with the angel.

"Oh, I think I'll manage," he said.

Becky nodded. "I'll be in the shower if . . ." She couldn't think why he would want to know where she was.

"If what, little Becky?" He gargled at her, his broad lips opening wide. She could see his tongue, thick and red, wagging inside his cavern-like mouth. He reminded her of Kermit the Fog. She headed for the shower. His gargling followed her, the non-malicious amusement digging deep. She wanted a bath; she wanted soap, water and choking heat; she wanted her blood and his semen off her thighs. Becky savored the fire in her vagina. Slowly, she felt it burn her insides dead.

She'd taken a week off, to set her mother's affairs to rights. Predictably, her father couldn't be bothered; he stayed in the clinic.

The man who eats angels stayed the week, climbing on top of her every night and squatting in a corner during the day. They seldom spoke, usually only right before and after he fucked her.

"Why do you eat angels?" she asked.

"They're high in nutritional value," he answered. "A rarer delicacy you would be hard pressed to find."

"Why do the angels come to me?"

"Your grief calls them; they drink pain, dilute it till it becomes livable."

"And you devour them?"

"Yes."

"What does that make you then? The keeper of my pain?"

"Many people's, but yours most of all. You're Roland's horn, summoning them to their doom. How does that make you feel?"

She thought it over. "I feel nothing. Do you want to fuck me again?"

"Why not?"

The last morning, after he finished, she turned around and confronted him. "You're a parasite, aren't you? I'm your bait."

He chuckled, pulling his pants over his shriveled penis. "Yes. You're my flame calling the tasty moths. Do you hate me now?"

She ran a hand over her belly, her fingers trailing the scar there. The signature of a surgeon nervously fumbling his way, frozen on her flesh.

"I feel nothing," she said.

For a while, after she was married, Becky tolerated her husband's touch, endured his weight on top of her until she conceived. Relief briefly flared within her, when she saw his delight at their child. After all, most men wanted sons.

"Girls are the future, lads," Mark, her husband, told his friends, while they laughed and puffed on their cigars. "All your boys will be lining up on my door one day, and I'll get to pick the best of them!"

The men thought it hilarious; Becky understood only the shivers the joke caused her.

After that, she turned away from his fumbling. The unspoken questions hung in the air between them, night after night.

"Babe, we need to talk," he'd say some mornings.

Becky put the toast and coffee Nina had made earlier down in front of him, picked up her handbag and keys. "I'm running late. Drop Nina off, will you?"

Becky bent down, Mark lifted his head and she froze half-an-inch from his cheek. Every time, a wall rose that her lips would not cross.

Now and then, when his insisting became too much, Becky lay and let him have his way. She didn't mind, he was a pinprick in her flesh against the man who eats angels. What she found intolerable was his explosions of guilt afterwards. Mark brought her flowers, jewelry, took her to expensive restaurants, cried and apologized. Insisted they talk.

Becky found the solution in the Yellow Pages. She gave the card to Mark.

He frowned, turning it over in his hands. "What's this?"

"A prostitute," she said. "She's a good listener, and cheap too."

For almost a year, Mark avoided her, especially in bed. Then he tried again.

Becky smelled the beer and heard his heavy breathing long before the door softly squeaked open.

"No," she whispered when he tore the blankets off her.

"Bitch," he snarled, grabbing her knees and flipping her on her stomach.

"No," she said.

He climbed on top of her; she heard him fumbling with his belt. "Kind of frigid fucking woman are you?"

"No!"

She spun, her hand flashing out. His head whipped back and Becky felt his skin tear beneath her nails. She kneed him in the groin, hard. Mark squealed and collapsed on the floor, curled into a ball.

Becky pulled the covers back up. "No."

Mark's response was more sob than moan. Eventually, he crawled downstairs.

The morning of Nina's sixteenth birthday, Becky finally allowed herself to see what had been right in front of her all the time -- the looks and smiles, the hugs and whispers, a guarded secretiveness when she walked into the room, looking for her scotch.

Mark dropped his spoon into his cereal. "You're fucking mad!"

Becky drained her glass. "Come on, Mark, be a man and 'fess. You're screwing your daughter."

"Don't you mean our daughter?"

"Whatever." Becky filled up her glass; she needed more ice but that couldn't be helped. "I know, Mark. I've seen the two of you always huddling and whispering and the looks you give me when I walk into the room."

"Because you're always drunk. We never know what you're going to say or do."

"Admit it, you've touched her."

"Of course I've touched her. She's my daughter. But to even . . ." The three white lines beneath his eye stood out brighter as his face reddened. He slumped in his chair. "What's wrong with you, Becky?"

Becky swirled the scotch in her glass and leaned over Mark. She lifted her shirt, tapped the scars on her belly. "See that? Guy who took my baby didn't have a license anymore. Dad knew he could count on him to be . . . discreet."

Mark's eyes widened. "I asked you so many times, why tell me now?"

He reached for her and she turned away. "None of your business."

"None . . . ? You're my wife!"

"Yes!" She spun around, raising her hand. He flinched. Becky smiled. "I'm your wife, not Nina." Lightly, she trailed her nails over his scars; he trembled beneath her touch. "Remember that the next time you think of sticking it in your daughter."

"I'm not . . ."

She slapped him. The sound reverberated around the kitchen, wet and echoless. A thrill raced through her body when she saw the fear in his eyes. So, this is how it feels; this is power.

"Can you even get it up, still?" Her voice dripped with mockery. She lifted her dress and moved in front of him, wiggling her bum. "Come on, fuck me now and show me you're still a man."

He stood, picked up his briefcase. At the door, he turned back. "Listen to yourself. You accuse me of molesting our daughter, and now you claim I can't get an erection even. And no, I can't get it up anymore . . ." He fingered the scars and left.

Becky snorted, took his seat and filled her glass again. She saw Nina, standing quietly in the doorway.

Becky lowered the glass and forced a smile on her face. "Happy birthday, sweetheart."

Nina's smile was thin and quick. "Thanks."

An urgent hand shook her awake. Becky lifted her head; she was groggy and a pool of drool had begun to form on the pillow.

The man who eats angels squatted beside her, eyes twinkling. "Wake up, little Becky."

"What do you want?" She realized she was naked, except for a pair of cotton panties. She sat up and took the robe he offered her.

He was more excited than she had ever seen him. "Come, come. It's time I made good on my promise."

Becky frowned and opened her mouth. He planted a finger on her lips.

"Shh! Follow me," he said.

She followed, her feet noiseless on the carpet, to the guest room, where Mark slept. He pressed his ear against the door, made a shushing motion and then pushed. The door swung inwards, noiseless, and Becky saw them.

Nina straddled Mark, her legs clamped around his waist, hips rotating in an unmistakable motion. His hands ran up and down her sweaty body, and his face was buried between her breasts.

"Becky," he moaned.

"Yes, I'll be Becky for you," Nina whispered and tilted his head, kissing him long and deep.

Becky walked back to her room in a daze, the man who eats angels on her heels.

"I was right," she said.

He gargled. "No, you were wrong; but you made yourself right."

She shook her head but he only gargled at her.

"Nina heard you. She knows her father needs a wife and she starts thinking, who's been the wife around this house?"

"I am," Becky said.

"Oh? Who cooks dinner, and cleans the house and does the dishes? Who pays attention to Mark, sits with him and talks to him?" His dark eyes glistened. "Who notices Nina? Who takes care of her?"

Becky had no answer; her life since Nina came was a long, thick fog.

The man rubbed his hands. "What a find you are! Ninety-nine angels, an entire banquet, you've given me. And now," he moaned, "the black angel itself will come! A once in a lifetime treat."

"But I feel nothing," Becky said.

The man crowed. "And after tonight, you never will again."

A slight breeze riffled the window curtains and Becky saw a tall, slim man step into the room. His wings stretched from corner to corner and his skin was pure ebony. His eyes were the deepest blue, and most passionless, she had ever seen.

"Mine," panted the man who eats angels and straightened, "all mine!"

"No." The word leapt from her mouth without conscious thought. The man froze and slowly turned his head towards her; the angel never moved, his gaze locked on hers.

"What?" the man asked.

Becky walked to the angel. "Give it back."

Behind her, the man hissed. The angel tilted his head slightly.

"Give me back the pain you took," Becky told the angel.

The angel cupped her chin, with a touch soft and light as a moonbeam, and kissed her. Then he blew his breath into her mouth. At first, the air was warm, like mulled cider, then it scalded and seared her throat and finally it cooled, until it burned on her tongue like dry ice.

The angel released her and Becky collapsed. Tears rolled down her cheeks, silent and unstoppable. Her temples throbbed and a deep, bottomless hunger opened in her belly. A tightness constricted her chest, choking her thoughts. She gasped for air; sobs broke from her throat.

They rolled over her in one massive tsunami—pain, humiliation, shame, despair, and loneliness. Loathing. Anger. Love, and its yearning.

Becky curled into a fetal ball, biting down on her knuckles to stifle the moans tearing her body apart.

A gentle hand brushed her hair. She looked into the depthless blue of the angel's eyes.

"Forgive me," she said.

The angel smiled and kissed her forehead. Then he was gone. Slowly, Becky stood and faced the man who eats angels. His hands clenched and unclenched, fury blazing in his eyes.

Without a word, she left him, pulled the gun from Mark's drawer and went to look for her family. Her hand paused on the door, and she watched them through the opened crack.

Mark sat hunched on the edge of the bed, head in hands. Nina, blouse half-buttoned, reached for him. He flinched when her fingers touched him.

"No, no," he moaned. "This has to stop."

Nina's voice trembled, a girl lonely and lost. "Dad?"

Mark wouldn't look at her. "Just be my daughter. Please."

Nina stood. Becky stepped back, deeper into the shadows. Nina, head-bowed, stumbled from the room, cheeks shining. She inhaled, long and slow. Confusion mixed with relief sighed from her breath. Becky watched her daughter stumble off, never seeing her standing off to the side. She couldn't help but wonder if this is how Nina felt about her.

Becky waited until Nina had gone and peered through the door once more.

Mark trembled, fists clenching his hair.

"What have we done to our little girl?" he whispered.

Becky leaned her head against the door, breathing hard. What chance could Nina have with her? Less than she did with Mark.

Becky left them and went to find her father.

She pounded on the doors until an irate, bedraggled nurse finally opened. "Mrs. Hicks?"

"Where's my father?" Becky demanded.

The nurse scowled. "Do you know what time it is?"

"Family emergency." Becky brushed past the nurse.

"Mrs. Hicks! Your father is in bed!"

"He'll be awake." He's always awake at this time.

He sat in a chair by his desk, paging through a car magazine. Becky slammed the door behind her and jammed a chair in front of it. Her father's presence permeated the room, making it hard to breathe.

"You." His glare withered her resolve; she was six again. "What do you want?"

"I need to ask you something." She took a deep breath and lifted her shirt. Her scar ached in the cold air. "Remember this?"

His eyes flickered down and he shifted in his chair. "Course I do, cost me a fortune."

Becky closed her eyes. Her voice came out a whisper. "Did you ever love me?"

"What? Look at me, dammit! Just like your cow mother, can't look a man in the eyes."

Becky's eyes snapped open. "Did you ever love me, or was it just the screwing you liked?"

Behind her, people pounded on the door and yelled. In front, her father sat still. A slow smile spread across his broad face. "So, that's why you came. To get a little more loving from the old man, eh?" His chuckle spilled over her like dirty bathwater. "Always knew your husband wouldn't shape up."

Becky swallowed. "I love you, Daddy," she said, took out the gun and pulled the trigger four times. His head popped apart like a rotten tomato; behind her, the door splintered. Becky put the gun in her mouth.

"No!" someone screamed.

Becky pulled the trigger. The hammer fell into deafening silence.

The man who eats angels sat in the corner and gargled.