Waking Up with Wings

Maria tossed and turned in bed, trying to get comfortable, but she just couldn’t. She groaned and massaged the space on either side of her spine with her knuckles. It barely did anything for the aching, but it was better than doing nothing, she guessed.

For whatever reason, her back had been aching a lot lately, even to the point of hurting sometimes. It wasn’t like she had big boobs or had her period or anything like that. It just started aching at random times of the day. Every now and then, she’d feel jolts of pain, too. She felt like she had bones in her back that just weren’t there before. Or maybe they had always been there. Wouldn’t that make the most sense? Bones didn’t just appear out of nowhere.

She had no idea what the hell was happening to her and it wasn’t like she could trust anybody to give her any answers. She thought about maybe telling Sister Olivia, but she decided not to. As cool as Sister Olivia was, Maria didn’t trust her or anyone else at this stupid boarding school to figure out what was going on. These were the same people who threw holy water at her on the first day she got here because they thought she was a demon. This pretty much went without saying, but these people were crazy.

After some time, she managed to fall asleep. As she slept, she began to feel something tear through the skin on both sides of her spine. The pain was excruciating. She wanted to scream, but she just couldn’t. All of her screams were trapped inside of her, roaring inside of her head. Her face twisted in agony as tears leaked from her eyes. Through the blinding pain, it was brief, but she could feel someone’s fingertips brush against her shoulder.

Then, the pain was finally gone, leaving her sore and exhausted. Slowly, she opened her eyes and squinted at the sudden brightness of the room, her vision adjusting to the light. She saw Elisha and Sister Olivia at her bedside, dressed in their pajamas. It was strange to see Sister Olivia in anything other than her nun outfit. Maria could see her wavy brown hair and how well it framed her face and brought out her hazel eyes. She was really pretty. Compared to Elisha, though, her pajamas were less relaxed, more formal.

“Maria?” Elisha asked, softly. “You with us, girl?”

She nodded. “Y-yeah.” Her throat was dry.

As if on cue, Sister Olivia took a cup of water off the nightstand and handed it to her. Feeling weak, Maria shakily propped herself up onto her elbow and took the cup, gulping down all of the water before she gave it back and lowered herself back down onto her side.

“How are you feeling?” She asked.

Maria sighed, her eyes heavy with fatigue. “Tired.”

“I can imagine,” Sister Olivia sympathized. “Your body just underwent a massive change.”

Whatever that massive change was, Maria was too tired to care.

“You should go back to sleep,” Sister Olivia advised, gently. “We’ll talk in the morning.”

She didn’t need to tell her twice. Maria let her eyes to close, falling into a dreamless sleep.

The next time she woke up, her eyes trailed to the bed across the room to see that it was already made, then she looked to the alarm to see that it was a little past noon. Given what happened last night, Elisha must’ve let her sleep in. Speaking of, she sat up in bed, feeling like she had more weight on her back than she did yesterday.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see something white. She turned her head to see a wing covered in white feathers. Wait, a wing? That meant... She turned her head the other way to see another wing. She gaped at the sight. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Did she seriously grow wings overnight?

Maria reached back to poke one. She couldn’t only feel the softness of the feathers, but she could feel it flinch, as if it were extension of her, like an arm or a leg. These were her wings.

She rose to her feet and walked towards the mirror attached to the back of the door. She turned to see that her wings had torn two huge holes in the back of her baggy shirt, grimacing at the damage. Great. How the hell was she going to wear any of her shirts now? Was she going to have to cut holes in them?

The key turned in the lock, the sudden sound startling her, and the door opened to reveal Elisha then Sister Olivia, who followed her inside. “Oh, hey.” Elisha looked at her, wide-eyed. Probably because of her wings. “You’re up.”

“Well, yeah.” Maria rolled her eyes. “Way to point out the obvious, Eli.”

“You sure you should be up already?” Elisha asked, worriedly, ignoring the comment. “You were in a lot of pain before.”

Now that she thought about it, Elisha must’ve woken up in the middle of the night and found her in pain. She must’ve been at a loss of what to do and left their dorm room in order to get Sister Olivia. She didn’t just ignore her and go back to sleep. Elisha actively sought out help. Although they didn’t do anything to help with the pain, they did enough in just being there for her, and that was more than she could say about most people.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Maria replied. “Thanks. I just...you know, grew these overnight.” She drew in her wings and spread them open again.

“Do you know what this means, Maria?” Sister Olivia asked.

“Uh, no.” Maria shook her head. “I’m guessing you do?”

“Yes.” Sister Olivia smiled with a hint of amusement. “This means that the priests have greatly misjudged your character. You haven’t fallen at all. You are, in fact, an angel.”