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Annunciation

     
I looked up from my book to find he had entered through the window, no more disruptive than the sun that slipped in with him. He wasn’t even a shadow on the page, and yet the room was altered by his being there.
            His hair was light, plaited. His eyes so large they occupied one quarter of his face. Wings, more like feathered muscles, arched from his shouders, massive and detailed, and sprouted from his neck and ankles in iridescent flicks.
            Hail, favoured one! The Lord is with you.
            His voice was a mellow surprise, so deep it should have traveled through a richer, wider body.
            Do not be afraid for you have found favor with God.
            His feet were so small they could not have borne his weight, which is why he floated on a vanilla-scented breeze, and why his socks, wrinkled and black, were fringed with safety pins that dug into his angel flesh. 
            The power of the Most High will overshadow you.  
            I could see all this was meant as a promotion, but my belly did not swell in anticipation. The sun did not tug at my navel. His wings covered me in warm draughts of feathery applause, but nothing leapt within me. Before him, as intended, I felt unfinished: that to be human was to be blurred, without edges. Perfection, it seems, is paper-thin and sharp, a blade sliced right through my will, my world, my womb.
            I was to give birth to the Son of God who would redeem mankind from sin. After death, He would ascend into Heaven to sit with his Heavenly Father at His right hand.
           And what will become of me, I did not ask, but something in my face must have prompted him to add that, after death, I would be assumed into Heaven. I nodded, knowing little of such matters, but thought even then that it is always better to ascend than to be assumed.
            There was a little more, a few tips on diet, a trick he did with an orange and his wings, nothing worth recording. I heard him out as I would a weather report, a fair enough exam result, a compliment I hadn’t earned. There seemed nothing to debate although I was sure there were arguments to be made, difficulties to overcome, neighbours to fool, a husband. Instead, as nothing is impossible for God, I merely said, Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord, but, really, I was thinking about those socks, those safety pins, and the book I had been reading, which he had so rudely interrupted.