Ethan charged out of his house; blowing out air like a bull he circled several times on the lawn and then flopped into the snow. The door was slightly ajar and from inside he could hear the shouting, the hitting. He knew he had to get out, but his brain was fuzzy and he didn't know how to plan his next move. He squeezed his eyes shut and prayed to God for someone to help him.

A loud crash came from inside, followed by a horrible wail. Ethan bolted upright and took off down the street, away he went from all the pain and ridicule. He stopped when he came to a park bench, he sat and pulled his knees up to his chest. Hugging them tightly he began to rock back and forth. A long moan escaped his chapped lips. While he rocked he noticed a sudden change it temperature. Before he had been comfortably warm, but now he noticed that his skin was cool and he had begun to shiver. Looking down at himself he was shocked to find that he had run out of the house in nothing but boxers, and t-shirt. His feet were bare.

Ethan's teeth clacked together, creating a monotonous sound that reverberated loudly in the silence of the late evening. The sound annoyed him and he whimpered several times, punctuating every click that his teeth made. The cold air, and fear was enough to bother Ethan, and now the infuriating sound of his chattering teeth made him want to tear at his skin. But he knew better. He wished his mother was here to restrain his shaking hands and talk him through it, but he was alone.

His body convulsed violently as he began to sob. Snow began to drift gently down from the sky, but to Ethan it seemed as if the world had suddenly been spun upside down. He wanted to go home but he had forgotten the direction and now he was stuck in the snow with no clothing. He stared down at the skin on his arm and let out another wail at the beet red colour. He probed at himself with stiff fingers but could no longer feel anything. He screamed loudly and then ran.

He no longer knew which direction he was going but he felt that if he ran he could outrun time. As he ran he felt as though the top layer of skin was being stripped off, he felt his life being shed off. He was becoming new and whole again. Going to a place where no one would call him a retard, and people wouldn't stare at him when he had a nervous breakdown because he couldn't do a simple math equation. Ethan felt his lungs constricting and he collapsed on someone's lawn in a pile of snow. His vision was fading now; black dots spotting the pure white snow. Ethan thought he saw a pink dot as well. He wrinkled his brow, this spot was moving. It drifted closer, and as it did it grew bigger.

Ethan weakly lifted his arm towards this spot and tried to call out, but his throat was scratched and raw. The dot wavered in and out, slowly becoming... a girl. She was very young, around ten years of age. Her hair was a pretty, honey blonde colour and she was wearing a puffy, pink jacket and blue jeans. She came up to Ethan and stood above him, her face was smooth and devoid of emotion.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

Ethan struggled to form a sentence. "I....I...can..ca.."

"You can't talk?" she guessed, reaching out a soft hand to touch his face. Ethan closed his eyes and nodded.

"Do you need a friend?" she asked sweetly, a bright smile lighting her face. Ethan nodded again, a friend! No one had ever wanted to be his friend. Especially no one this pretty, or kind.

The girl layed down beside him in the snow and gripped both of his hands tightly in hers. For a few moments Ethan and the girl stared into each others eyes, but soon Ethan's eyes began closing against his will.

"It's okay" she whispered to Ethan "Go to sleep now"

Grateful, Ethan closed his eyes and drifted off. As he slipped into sleep, the little girl gently stroked his face with fingers.

"Sleep well Ethan, may you rest in peace" she whispered.

The next morning after a frantic phone call from Ethan's mother to the police, Ethan's body was found several blocks away in a pile of snow on someone's lawn. The police had no suspicions as to his cause of death, after speaking to Ethan's mother they had determined that he was mentally unstable, and although it was a terrible tragedy, no one was accused or blamed for being the cause of Ethan running away. But there was one thing no one could understand. Indented in the snow beside Ethan's body was the shape of an angel. It was the outline of a small person, curled up onto their side, from the back of this figure, the soft form of feathered wings was imprinted in the snow. The crowd that had gathered stared in awe at what could only be labeled as a miracle.