This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/dlschindler on 2024-10-10 16:15:22+00:00.
Bars have a lot of unwritten rules, unspoken rules, that are good to know. You might feel a little tense walking in, like you’re being scrutinized or that you don’t know what’s happening. That’s because you’re in a kind of church - and that is what the feeling is like.
They’ll simplify it for you, and say: “Don’t talk about religion or politics.” which seems obvious enough, but there’s a longer list of things you don’t discuss in bars. You shouldn’t talk about finances, relationships or family affairs either. In fact, the less you say, the better.
Nobody is impressed by anything you say, when you’re in a bar. You make friends by listening while other people talk, and you’ll soon find out you don’t really want to hear what they have to say. That’s how they feel about what you might want to discuss.
You are boring, you are offensive or you are self-absorbed. The worst is when you are nosy, too interested in what someone else has said. If you don’t speak at all, everyone presumes there is something wrong with you, being quiet and not talking is pretty rude.
Then there is that guy who comes up next to you and says something that gets your attention, but then you realize you’re being had for a pick-up line. Will you be offended if he thinks he can have you for the price of a drink? If you don’t care about yourself enough to be offended, you aren’t worth his time, although he might be done hunting for the night and go for an easy kill.
Being hard to kill just brings on bigger and meaner hunters. They will flatter you and convince you they are Mr. Right, except you’re just the one who is left. It’s just you, you’re the only girl who hasn’t gone home to sell herself for free to another drunken John. To the men in the bar, every woman there is for sale, and they are just haggling over a price. Some men have too much pride and don’t want a free kill.
Serial killers, all of them. Don’t fall for the guy who seems innocent, he’s the worst of them all.
I’m sipping my drink slowly. Bars aren’t where I go to find a new body for my closet. I’m not that kind of girl. No, my momma raised a prudent and wise woman, and I am here to learn.
Gosh, I sure have learned a lot, and it breaks my heart to see how the game gets played. It’s a little sickening, actually, but sometimes I think I am alone in that nauseating feeling. It’s not that I don’t enjoy intimacy, it’s just that I prefer it has some kind of romantic meaning, some kind of expression of affection. Maybe even doing it for procreation instead of just casual recreation.
Even dogs have more purpose when they get it on and show more affection than these one-night couples who don’t remember each other the next time they meet, somewhere along the way, months or years later. I’m not a dog, although I get called the B word a lot by guys I resort to scorning when they are too persistent.
I don’t meet my lovers in bars. No, I am better than that. At least I was, until I met Merial.
I couldn’t tell if Merial was a man at-all. He was so effeminate I actually thought “This is a lesbian.”
But Merial was very patient, and quite different. He wanted something different from me, and it wasn’t like he was trolling the bar, it was more like he was doing what I was doing, just people watching. I just want to know what I am, as I am a person too. I just don’t understand people, and bars have become a kind of school, a kind of temple, where I see it all on display.
In a church people just act like sheep, following the flock, pretending they are holy and charitable and faithful or whatever they really are not. They are surrounded by a congregation all wearing the same face devoid of real emotions, playing nice for God and for their Sunday crew. I see the same people in the bar, on occasion, and that’s their real face.
In a church they wear a mask and they think God is judging them for their honesty when they confess, their sincerity when they sing or their kindness when they tithe. God doesn’t need our honesty, God knows what we are doing and why. God doesn’t need our sincerity, we were made to rebel and to get lost. If God wanted obedience, there would be obedience. Do you really think God wants your money?
I found more of God’s countenance in the bars, despite my disgust. I was actually an atheist, when I was dragged into churches by my family. It wasn’t until I saw the real side of humanity that I realized that God is real.
We don’t discuss religion or politics in the bar, because the bar is a place for truth. Nothing about religion or politics is honest. I looked over and saw the look on Merial’s face, and I knew he understood me.
“May I speak with you?” He was asking, without words. I nodded and he walked over to me like we had agreed to talk. He just sat beside me and it felt nice, to have someone next to me who knew what I was doing there.
“Aren’t you going to say something?” I asked him, after a few minutes of mutual silence.
“My name is Merial. I’m just observing people. I saw you are doing that too.” He said plainly.
I started smiling, I was right about him. It felt really good. If he’d asked me to leave with him I would have gone out the door with him, it felt weird, but I liked being able to let go of myself and feel safe, feeling that way.
“I’m Catherine. I can’t believe you noticed me.” I said awkwardly. It didn’t matter, he seemed impressed.
I’m trying to remember the rest of the conversation, it was deep and flattering. I felt really connected to him and the hours just flew by. When the bar started to close, I couldn’t believe how long we had sat there talking. I didn’t want it to end, so I said:
“Are you going to ask me to come home with you?” I must have sounded desperate, but he didn’t shut me down, he just said:
“It isn’t your time yet.” Rather strangely and confidently. “But you have a good heart, and I won’t let you out of my sight. I’m starved for a heart like yours.”
“Okay.” I stood up, embarrassed and feeling rejected. I wasn’t sure if he’d shut me down, but it felt like he had, so I said, hearing myself:
“So that’s a no, then?”
“Let’s just take this slow. We’ll see each other again.” He promised. I watched him get up and leave, without another word. We hadn’t exchanged phone numbers, so it felt like he was just saying that. I am ashamed that I was a little bit drunk or emotional or something I can’t even say, and I said as he left:
“No, we won’t. Goodbye Merial.” Like I was having a little tantrum. That’s another rule about bars, don’t take things personally. I’d somehow forgotten that one, which is weird considering how many guys I’ve asked to leave me alone, and laughed at their immature reactions.
But I did see him again. I came back to that same bar night after night and I started to actually drink. The cost of the alcohol added up and I’d let guys buy drinks for me. That went on for awhile, and I would get pretty buzzed, trying to forget Merial.
Then one night, when I was actually considering going home with this seemingly nice guy, I saw Merial again. He was just watching me. It felt creepy and rude, and I glared at him and then ignored him.
The guy was with saw how I was reacting to Merial, and somehow ended up talking to him. Merial seemed weak and timorous, but insisted on staring at me. The two of them ended up in a fight, and when the guy I was with got hit by Merial, the guy fell down.
“Catherine, I just wanted to check on you. I can see I’ve caused you some kind of harm. You’ve changed, haven’t you? I don’t want to wait. Will you come with me? I am starved for your heart.”
“Sure.” I heard myself say. I walked out with him and found myself teetering in his arms.
“I am going to eat your heart.” He said, staring into my eyes. I almost laughed, but it felt like he was saying he was literally going to eat my heart.
“Seriously?” I asked, feeling sudden dread. There was this grotesque look to him, this hungry sort of look, like a starved dog emerging from the darkness of an alleyway, baring its fangs - his smile. His eyes glinted too, in the dark we stood in. I shoved him away from me but he grabbed me and held me with supernatural strength.
“I can’t let you go. You are too rare, and it’s too hard to find someone with a pure heart.” Merial was holding me with one hand and with the other he reached towards my breast, like he was going to do that thing from Indiana Jones when the priest reaches into the guy’s chest and pulls out his heart.
I screamed in terror and fought him off of me, surprising him so that he suddenly let go of me. I took off running from him. I looked back and he was gone.
Then there was a shadow over me, blocking the streetlight I was under. I looked up and there was a blur of white feathers, like a giant seagull or something - except it was him, it was Merial. He landed before me, blocking my escape up the street, folding his enormous white wings behind him and then those same wings vanished.
“What are you, some kind of vampire or something?” I asked, my voice high-pitched, trembling with fear. I was terrified, but the look on his face was conversational, and in a confused way, I was speaking to him instead of shrieking in outright terror.
“I’m an angel, Catherine. I’m your angel, sent by God. I have a message for this world that I give to the pure of heart. Something changed when I met you, I remembered how hungry I am. I must feed. I need your sacrifice, I need to eat your heart.” Merial spoke calmly, h…
Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/1g0mjmy/an_angel_wants_to_eat_my_heart/