Angels Before Man

by Rafael Nicolás

“You make a good trophy display,” Michael teased, grinning. “Now, kiss my cheeks for good luck. I’ll need it for this other round.”

Michael, the archangel of strength — something about that strength made Lucifer unsettle, made him flush. This little need, overbrimming — to pull the prince just a bit closer, to feel at home in his warmth, to press his cheek to that chest and coo, like an angel singing to the mounts.

“For you, I wouldn’t mind a little pain.”

The archangel was smiling, almost goofily, giddy, and Lucifer had this realization that he was liked. He loved, and he was loved.

Lucifer said, quietly, “I’m still learning to love myself. Will you be patient with me?” Michael said that he would, and that maybe this is the little pain he’d love to put up with for infinity.

Lucifer, quietly, had asked if angels were also made in pairs. “Angels are perfect,” He’d replied, “they are whole, and they are eternal.” There was no need for them to devote themselves to anyone but their Father.

“It makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? The most beautiful angel in Heaven and the strongest; don’t you think they complement each other? Like the two halves of an apple. Sometimes Michael comes over, and I see the way they finish each other’s sentences and how they do everything as if they’re one. It’s interesting.”

Lucifer reached for Michael’s hair and tousled the curls, as the other had done to him; he wished to braid it. Longing churned his stomach. He wanted to sit there with him, he wanted to hold him, he wanted to wrap his arms around the other until they were so close, he’d struggle to know where his body ended and Michael’s began.

This, this here, could be worship. ‘This—’ Lucifer pressed an innocent kiss to the prince’s sweet, divine mouth. This could be religion. Michael smiled at him, rare timidity in his eyes. All was as it should be, and they were happy.

In Lucifer’s hand, there’d be the stem of a pink rose flower, that he plucked from sweetly, asking in a whisper, “Will he?” before the breeze captured the petal, tossed and danced with it. “Or—” the angel, slow, pulling another — the final petal, “won’t he?”

“I daydream of you, of loving you.” “How do you love me?” “Like this.” Yearning mouth — it’d press soft to the smooth of his tunic. “Like a flower, like a symphony, trapped in my throat, like you’re an eternity, and I need you in my veins.”

‘Complete, He said, but I don’t want to be complete; I’d rather be split and become full with you.’

‘There is another Eden, within me. I have it nestled between the heat of love. This is love.’

Gathering their clothes, taking each other’s hands, and laughing, they’d run away from Him, as fast they could. So that He doesn’t see, doesn’t notice. Two angels creating love, creating.

He liked being kissed, liked this strange affection. This queer liking, between them.

“He wouldn’t allow you to get hurt so badly. Even if He did, we could piece you back together — any part of you.” “Even my heart?” “If you’re so nervous, you can leave it with me, and I’ll keep it safe.” “Tuck it in with you whenever you rest.”

“I’ve taught you this song. Don’t make any mistakes.” “Of course, beloved Lucifer.”

Suddenly, all Lucifer was thinking — ‘I wish I had another eternity, so that I could spend it dancing with you, Michael.’

He sighed, soft, finding Michael’s closeness happily suffocating.

“What do you plan to do with such an angel?” “I’d like to keep him.” Lucifer felt so much fever rush his body he nearly squirmed, but Michael’s grip on him was sturdy. “Right here, attached to me like jewelry.”

“I’ve become so dependent on you. What would I do without my beloved?” “Beloved?” Lucifer, smiling and scoffing, moved to the bed, settled down at the edge, right at the side of Michael. “Your beloved what, exactly? Beloved friend? Brother?” “Simply my beloved.” Michael smiled back, grand but sleepy, before he swung up to sit again. He shuffled closer to Lucifer and chuckled warm, perhaps at the confusion on the other’s irises and brows and mouth. “My beloved Lucifer.”

Michael was staring at his lips, eyes dazed with lingering drunkenness. His tongue darting out, licking his own mouth, as if he were dry and needed to drink, drink Lucifer.

“Do not cry. Reveal your face. You are above the other stars; you are the morning, and your blessings are innumerable. You will rise to a throne even higher than that of the archangels.”

“All will be well,” Michael said. “I’ll protect you, Lucifer, from anything. Like I did from that beast on Earth.” A shaky, nervous laugh; it made Lucifer want to shriek for the third time. “I’ll save you. I’ll always be here to save you.”

Michael loved to take in his body, to watch, to stare, to even put his hands all over him, as if he were going to mold him as wet clay. But he looked at him differently, calling for him always differently, uttering his name fearlessly, taking and grabbing Lucifer in a way no other angel had the pride to do.

‘You do not desire me.’ A pleased smile on Lucifer’s lips, as he lifted a tender gaze to his beloved, stern archangel’s face. ‘Because you know I am already yours.’

Breathing in, Lucifer’s eyes found Michael’s lips. He stared at them, considered they looked soft, softer than the pillows, softer than the petals of a cardinal.

‘Michael, Michael, Michael,’ ‘I want to say it forever,’ ‘I can’t stop, it’s sweeter than honey on my tongue.’

‘Devour me like a pomegranate and stain your tongue.’

“I feel drunk,” Michael murmured against him, then shuddered. “Your mouth— When you were created, your lips must have been laced with liquor.”

Like this, they found their bodies moving on each other, following the lead of their mouths, rubbing like palms together, trying to create heat.

If only the prince could enter him, could spread his very skin, move inside, so that their souls would kiss how lips do.

They melted against one another, bodies pressed close and fitting so snug Lucifer thought they must have been fashioned for each other, no matter what Father said about wholeness.

‘In vain, I love you; in vain, the dawn streaming onto you, beside me; in vain, I want to be yours, your angel. Angel of love, angel of Michael.’

“Is Father good because He is good, or because He says He is good?”

‘Michael will help me. Michael will protect me. Michael is the only angel who understands me and will always be at my side, even if all the skies collapse. He’s my beloved, I adore him, and I want him to hold me, so that I forget everything. Everything but him. The angel of strength. I want to make you feel good, Michael. I want you to help me forget.’

‘Do you know? Do you know I obsess over you so much it’s starting to burn this chest, with all these stuffy poppies inside, so many I can’t breathe? It hurts. You’re hurting me, but I want your lips never to leave me. I see ambition in you, Michael. Please, let’s harvest it together.’

‘I can see everything there, in those eyes. We could have it all if we wanted. Let’s take it together, let’s gather the seeds in our hands and run away as fast as we can past the gates of Heaven.’

‘All I ever wanted was to be loved, and now you’ve shown me that to be loved is to be broken. What is inside me?’

Could it be he was made up of both beautiful and horrible things?

‘i waited for your touch to save me’

“Don’t make me say such embarrassing, affectionate things, beloved Lucifer.” Michael’s tittering, sweet smile had Lucifer’s chest ache wonderfully. “But, let me say that — before I saw you on the street, dancing and singing, I was never very joyous. I was content with serving Father, I felt I had no room to complain, but then you arrived. And being around you, I had so much joy I became irrational, and now— now, it’s all spilling out. You make my heart swell and rise, like smoke.”

I’m questioning everything, asking myself if this is really paradise or if you are paradise.” Falter. “I— I don’t know what I’m saying.”

‘You’re paradise to me, Michael. And you’re not like the others.’

Haven’t you ever wondered why Father is so strict about our subservience? It’s because disobedience is creation,” a shivering breath, “create with me, Michael, and let’s call it sin.”

‘I’m having so much fun creating and inventing. Just yesterday, I thought up a few new words: cock and cunt and fucking.’ He smiled, then laughed again, blithely.

Why would Father make something that feels good wrong?’

“Michael.” ‘Bend me over the Throne and desecrate it with me.’

i say there is just me now in my heaven just this singing lucifer walking toward the morning a tiny star, lovelier than his father.’

‘I overthrow God, or I immolate myself until I become as close to death as death. Creation at last — the death of an angel.’