"Why are you here?" I reply.
"I'm bringing you a Christmas Present," she explains spitting a logy down the kitchen sink ... it's a long slow drip of phlegm that has a glow to it and smells like incense.
"What present? I fire with suspicion.
"It's on Sarah's car. I don't trust you with it."
Cassidy, Sarah's 8 year old, rushes out like Kramer on Seinfeld, wrapped in a pink blanket, hair askew from her pillow, wanting me to pick her up.
My Guardian Angel disappears.
I pick Cass up, she kisses my cheek, wants her Mom's I-Pad and for me to carry her back to her bed ... which I do.
"That was sweet," my Angel says taking a long drag from her cigarette ... then does a shot of bourbon ... followed by a long draw from her Tall Boy Pabst Blue Ribbon.
"You look terrible," I reply.
She does ... stained white robe ... tattered blue stole ... oily black hair ... skin as white as paste ... dirt under her fingernails ... right breast almost falling out of her covering ...
Tipping the PBR my way she burbs in response.
"STOP THAT!" I admonish, "you're going to wake the others up."
Flashing her Angelic grin she explains, "I got the girls covered."
"Gimmie a beer," I demand and one magically appears in my hand.
"What do you really want?" I ask while taking a sip.
"You need to be a little more thankful," she belches.
"What are you talking about?"
Scratching her stomach with one hand while pointing her lit cigarette towards me with the other, she answers, "You've had a good year. Look at everything you got. For Christ's sake you got Sarah, the girls, the kids, your Mom and" ... she burbs again ... "PLUS you haven't fucked up Bar Church yet."
"Touché," I say and we tap Tall Boy PBR's together.
"Anyway," she says pulling the dirty robe over her shoulders, "Merry Christmas!"
"Aw," I answer, "that is so sweet."
"God told me to tell you," she snaps. "I'm ready for vacation in the Caribbean ... I wouldn't be working today except ... well ... nobody's quit as an Angel since Satan ... and he's gone to Hell."
"That is so sweet," I lie and give her a hug.
"Sarah will find yawl's present," she slurs drowning the last of the PBR.
There's that awkward moment when nobody knows what to say ... and as a people pleaser ... maybe I'm really an Angel pleaser ... I say, "Hey Kristen's coming for Christmas Eve dinner. Why don't you join us?"
"Are you kidding," she jerks while throwing the empty on the kitchen floor, "I still gotta go to Jimmy Cochran's house."
Then she's gone.
"What's for breakfast Micheal?" Cass asks, suddenly making a Kramer like Epiphany still wrapped in the pink blanket with hair askew from her pillow.
"Whatever you want," I smile ...counting my Christmas blessings.
