Some people are prone to making unusual first impressions. It's not a bad thing, really. It just makes it harder to forget them. It's funny. I almost called the cops on him, but anyway, you want to hear what I remember . . .
I was the only worker left in the restaurant, La Fresca. It's a small Mexican eatery a few blocks from the college campus. Nothing about it is too special, except I guess its smallness, so we don't have too many customers late at night – which only makes things scarier whenever the stillness is broken.
You see, I was used to the relative quietness of the street - small apartments interspersed among a few restaurants, cars passing by, people walking with their friends - like any block of a town that's not quite downtown but pretty close. So, everything seemed normal at first. That is until I took out the trash. I grabbed a sack of food scraps and used napkins, as usual, and opened the back door, which leads to a small alley where the dumpster is. On both sides is a mix of red brick buildings and pastel-painted wood ones. A regular alley – smelly, narrow, small puddles of unidentified liquids everywhere. Sometimes I see pigeons pecking at scraps or the neighborhood cats going about their shady cat business. Other than that, there isn't much to see, so nothing crazy ever happened to me while working there, so I didn't suspect anything extraordinary that night.
Now put yourself in those shoes and imagine walking over to the dumpster (remember, it was nighttime) and throwing a heap of trash into it, shaking the dumpster and making loud crashing noises. That was when, completely out of the blue, a man screamed out about five feet away from me and scrambled up onto his feet. He had been sleeping on the other side of the dumpster so I didn't see him at first. We stared at each other and both of us immediately backed away. I think I might've stepped on some spilled soda in the process (I hope it wasn't anything worse), but I forget. It isn't important.
Anyway, I stood my ground. "What do you want?!" I demanded. My hand was on my pepper spray just in case anything serious happened.
"Please," he began, his voice sounding disturbingly desperate. "Please be quiet. I don't have anywhere to go, I just want a place to rest and get away."
It then occurred to me he was probably homeless. I felt a bit rude for exploding on him, especially since he didn't look so threatening anymore. He did wear a large tan overcoat and a crooked tie, but a tiny frown was forming. His hands hung down his sides, and he just stood there, before retreating back down beside the dumpster. It was pathetic. "Thank you," he said.
"For what?" I asked in confusion.
"For understanding. That I need a quiet place to rest – to escape things." God, he looked and sounded broken, his voice gruff but hushed, like someone trying to apologize but having a hard time saying the words aloud. Strange homeless man or not, I figured it couldn't hurt to help him.
"Look, Sir. I can call the homeless shelter. I'm sure they can help you." He looked up at me and sighed.
"No, that won't be necessary. And I'm not exactly homeless." He seemed to struggle with those last words, like there was so much he was trying to hold back. He folded his hands and stared at the dark sky.
"Hey, why don't I get you a cup of water and some tortilla chips or something? I get to keep the leftover food after the place closes for the day." I smiled at him, and he smiled back.
"I would like that, a lot. Thank you, you are very generous." I honestly wasn't sure what I was getting myself into – somewhere in the back of my mind, a part of me was twisting this situation into a Criminal Minds episode – if he killed me, I would never forgive him. I forced myself to shake away those thoughts, and went back inside.I quickly brought out a small bowl of chips and some water and handed them to him. He took the bowl and peered inside it, mesmerized like someone looking through a microscope for the first time.
"What's wrong? You do know what tortilla chips are, right? They're not, like, made of unwanted animal bits or anything," I asked, curious about his curiosity.
"Oh, no, it's fine. I was just pondering how one could possibly find God on this chip."
"Um . . . what?" I could tell it was going to be a long night.
"I was told one might possibly locate God on a tortilla." His head was tilted inquisitively. Wow, he was actually serious. I had to think a while before I realized he was talking about that Jesus-on-a-bacon-strip stuff.
"Well, I did see the Virgin Mary on a steak once, I think." He looked pleased at what I said, and I felt a little proud of myself for humoring him.
"Interesting. The human imagination is truly amazing. Pure and divine. One of God's greatest gifts he ever gave to any race."
"Yeah, um, I guess you can say that. You must really love God a lot."
"I consider him the ultimate power, the great creator. Even when he's absent." There was a hint of bitterness in his tone, or maybe it was longing. I noticed he already finished all the chips. Somehow, he was starting to grow on me in an I-just-met-you friendly way, and I invited him to sit with me on the steps by the back door, away from the stench of the dumpster.
"Maybe he's there a lot more often than you think. You said he's the 'great creator', after all. If that's the case, then everything around you is kind of like a piece of him, right? Or at least a sign of him. Anyhow, that's my opinion about it. And even if he's not there directly, he still always cares about you." His eyebrows furrowed a little; I had his full attention. "That's why he made all this, isn't it? So you're bound to find something or someone you love?" I was starting to experience that feeling of getting into a deep conservation, not knowing where you're headed but finding it surprisingly comfortable. I studied his face; he was contemplating, and I could tell he did have a special someone out there, who kept him from giving up.
"You know what? I don't even know your name yet. What is it, if you don't mind?"
"My name is Castiel."
"Odd name, no offense."
"It's an – angel's name." He sounded disheartened, for whatever reason. I patted him on the shoulder, and that seemed to lift his spirits a bit.
"Hey, I didn't mean it in any bad way. It's a cool name! I'm Alma."
"The Spanish word for 'soul'."
"Yeah, you like it?"
"It's beautiful. Your name as well as the human soul itself. The soul is subtle, but a lot more powerful than you think. It . . . It's something to be cherished. Everything about the human soul should be treasured – the resilience, the capacity for love . . ." he trailed off.
The clouds that were covering the moon drifted enough for the moonlight to shine through. From what I could see, his eyes were a shiny blue, set handsomely between his dark hair and short stubble. His eyes reminded me of a book I read: "Sometimes the thought of how all her world was made, filled the complex, desiring Melanctha with despair. She wondered, often, how she could go on living when she was so blue . . ." But he had a different 'blueness' about him – his eyes weren't the color of despair but rather, they captured within them all his sincerity, showing you everything that drove him in life: devotion, redemption, will, love.
"Whoever it is, Castiel, I hope they know exactly how much you care about them." So I'm a romantic. We're not as pointless as people think. I mean, you're still paying attention to my story, right? Right.
He smiled to himself, running his hands across the sleeves of his overcoat. It was pretty worn out but still in one piece; I guess that's why he still wore it. "I hope so too. We've been through quite a lot. But our connection, it's hard to put into exact words. I just know that we try to be there when we need each other, although nothing turns out absolutely perfect. But I would do anything for him. I believe that means something."
"It means everything. He sounds like an angel," I told him with confidence. He stopped smiling.
"You have an inflated sense of the kindness of angels. He's no angel. He's a good, loving man."
Now I really, really didn't get it. A neglectful God, and now he hates angels? He was obviously a weird guy. But I guess an interesting kind of weird, the kind that keeps the conversation alive, the kind where you can't help but want to find out more.
"I apologize, Alma. I'm rambling about things you don't understand." He stopped talking and continued staring at the sky above the alley. A police siren rang out a couple blocks away. It began to feel more like the regular nights, but now, I had someone to share the almost-stillness with. I turned my eyes toward what he was looking at. It was a moth, fluttering erratically around the streetlamp. A gray blur against the hazy orange glow. He gazed upon it with a frown, and his eyes started to water. He suddenly looked puzzled, as though surprised by his own tears. At that moment, I knew.
"Castiel, are you lost?" He paused, then nodded. His eyes, his whole face – everything – was like a wall holding back all his crowded, troubling thoughts. A man put up against too much crap, he and his shadows seemed to fit perfectly with the smoky clouds and the collage of brown and gray buildings in the background. I think he truly belonged there, in that time and place. I know that's a strange thing to say about a person who's going through rough times, but I don't even know how to start imagining what would've happened if we never met. Maybe where a person belongs is wherever it seems unreal without them there. Or maybe a person belongs exactly where their past has taken them, whatever that means. I'm not an expert in deep hypothetical stuff. So, I'll get back to the topic . . .
"Is there a story behind it, Castiel? Why you're 'lost'?" The clouds shifted and covered the moon again. He nodded again. It had grown pretty late by then, but everything around us remained the same – the occasional car, cat, pigeon, person. Nothing left to explore except his journey. He was someone with so much on his mind, and he couldn't cope with it very well, at least not by himself, so I thought it best to persuade him to share. "Well, I'm all ears, so you can tell me."
He looked up toward the streetlamp again, but the moth was gone. We were still sitting on the outside steps. They were cement, but not too uncomfortable. He scooted closer to me, careful not to sit on a dark wet patch of what looked like water, and began.
"It all started when I raised a man named Dean Winchester out of Hell."