Searching For Angels

Delaney Pipon

At ten years old, all I know are narrow hallways that smell vaguely of melted butter and

popcorn. I walk, or sometimes skip, between walls of finger-painted guardian angels, colors

smeared and smudged to concoct a golden-brown halo atop a head of cascading hair. Paper

chain-link Advent calendars hang from the ceiling and rock in rhythm with the air ventilation.

I’m criss-cross applesauce on a baby blue carpet embellished with clouds, and Ms. T is

talking about death. Her voice, a delicate croon, hushes the classroom.

“I see my sister with the angels,” Ms. T remarks with a soft, knowing smile, “Every

Thursday mass, when I gaze up at the ceiling,” She pauses, dangling the prospect in front of our

wide eyes, “They sing with us.”

There’s a heaviness to her words. Her eyes are tired, as if she knows that we, too, will

have to wait sixty years to see the chorus in the sky.

At ten years old, I begin to wonder when God will trust me enough to show me his

angels.

At fourteen years old, religion becomes habitual. Memorizing the Nicene Creed is treated

with the same validity as learning geometric formulas. Each Thursday morning mass, as I prop

myself upwards against the church kneeler, I devise a calculated plan to disassociate during the

Liturgy of the Eucharist. As the priest rattles off his prayers, my brain reduces his words to

mush, and the mush scatters and pulsates until it’s nothing but white noise. I practice absolute

stillness until the cushion eats away at my kneecaps, raw and sticky with sweat.

I’m sitting in a rickety, baby blue chair. The backrest is sloped so aggressively that it is

impossible for me to carve my spine into it. The room is damp, chalk-white, and full of girls my age.  No one dares say a word.

Mrs. O has the waistband of a tan, pleated skirt cautiously gripped in between her pointer

finger and her thumb, as if the promiscuity of its length might catch and spread like the flu.

“This skirt,” She proclaims curtly, “is inappropriate, and unacceptable.” She pauses,

dangling the creased fabric in front of our wide eyes. “Can anyone tell me why?”

The correct response hangs in the air above us, a chorus of angels crying chants of purity, chastity, and “one inch above the knee.”

Yet, we sit in unified silence.

There’s a certain unanimity between twelve girls wearing the same collared navy blue

polo shirts; twelve girls mentally measuring the distance between the end of their skirt and the

beginning of their kneecap; twelve girls searching for Ms. T’s angels.

“You girls...,” Mrs. O trails off with an exasperated sigh, “In God’s eyes, it is much more

important to be pure, than to be attractive.” Her eyes scan our bare legs, “Kneel on the floor. If

the ends of your skirts don’t touch the carpet, it’s an infraction.”

And as the carpet chafes my kneecaps until they are red and tender, once again, my brain

mashes Mrs. O’s lecture into a smooth puree, nothing but a gentle frequency.

At fourteen years old, I begin to wonder if I would even enjoy the angels’ company.

At twenty years old, I sit in Heinz Memorial Chapel, simply because I love the

architecture. I sit, and sometimes I think, but mostly I just observe. I observe the swooping

carves in the rusted pillars. I observe the soft pink hue that seeps through the stained glass

windows and pours onto the pews in front of it. I observe women with crinkly, trembling hands

clasped in their laps, heads outstretched toward the ceiling, gazing. 

And although I resented the angels’ chorus for many years, I must admit, I still always

listen for it.

Edited by Bella Emmanouilides & Elisabeth Kay