It started when someone gave me a little angel figurine that could fit in my hand. I sat at my desk, looked at the angel and said, “So what would happen if you were real?” The angel said nothing, but my imagination was speaking. It was past Christmas and Valentine hearts were everywhere.
“So, what would happen if you weren’t an angel…but a cupid…the kind who granted wishes…?”
And my second novel, Thwonk, was born…
A weirdness wound its way like smoke into the night. It was creepy, crawly. The wind picked up outside. Stieglitz howled like a wolf in the wilderness.
“What is it boy?”
Stieglitz scratched at the door in a fury, taking off paint, trying to shove it open.
“Everything,” I screamed, “is all right!”
My hand clutched the doorknob. I took a massive breath, pushed the door open…
Stieglitz bolted through it and stopped barking.
I leaned against the doorway and froze.
The cupid!
He was standing there looking at me with fiery black eyes and little rosy cheeks, standing there breathing!
The cupid shook his legs and arms like an aerobics instructor.
He fluttered his clear, thin wings.
He rolled his head back and forth and did a couple of quick karate chops on his muscled legs.
I looked madly around to see if I was dreaming…
The cupid put his minuscule hands on his equally teeny waist and peered at me.
I clutched my throat and sank to my knees.
“Are you”—I gasped—“are you…real?”
A slight smile flickered across his face. He lifted two feet in the air, spun like a twirling top, and landed on my still-life pedestal.
I started hyperventilating.
“Are you…” I struggled for words. “What are you?”
He cleared his throat. “Well now,” he said in a full-sized voice, “shall we begin?”