Notes: A soul contemplates the color red and what it represents to her while resting in the world beyond life. Probably the shortest YWT fic I've ever written.^_^

All standard disclaimers apply, you know the drill.

The color of a fragrant rose. The color of blood. The color of fury. The color of love. This just might be the color with the greatest amount of connotations. But red reminds me of something else I’ll bet most living people won’t think of—not that it’s their fault, of course.

Red is the color of that angel’s eyes.

I don’t think he really is an angel in the truest sense of the word, but mom had always said angels were beings who helped others, and he helped me, so I think of him as an angel. It’s a private whim of mine to pretend he is my guardian angel, though I know better than that. I know he takes care of more than the one puny little soul that is me.

I think most people who are afraid of him insist—if they ever lived long enough to insist—that his eyes are a blood red, glittering malevolently in his ghostly pale face. They say those red eyes are signs of his cruelty. At least, that’s what I’ve heard from some of the voices around me; the angry and bitter whispers of the guilty.

For my part, I can never see what they claim. For to me his eyes are like rubies, or perhaps two deep crimson stars that twinkle in the sable night sky, deep and inscrutable and awesome. But that is most likely because I’m not guilty. I’m one of the many he’s helped, and whose lives were changed for the better because I met him.

The others who fear him, sprinkled here and there around me. . . they had been thrwarted by him, despite whatever guiles and cunning they used in their lives. They hate him and fear him, and his crimson gaze had bore into their hearts like daggers, piercing through their evils and their false innocence.

No wonder they insist his eyes are the color of blood.

But unlike those people, he does not frighten me. My memory of him. . .dimmed, except for his vivid ruby-red eyes. . .remains a beautiful one. How strange that, despite meeting him for an incredibly short amount of time, I felt as if he were the one person who really tried to understand what I was saying. And yet I never got a chance to thank him. It had been too bewildering, too strange, for me to say much but what he asked me to say.

Now that I have plenty of time to think about my encounter with him, I realize that there were so many things I wanted to ask, so many questions he might’ve answered. But I’ve lost my chance. After all, I suppose souls can only talk to him once, and I’d hate to bother him, since I’m sure he has lots of work to do.

It’s all thanks to him that I can now rest in peace. My life, now that I look back on it, was very satisfying. I can’t say I was overjoyed to see it end, but at least someone was there to make it bearable. . .someone was there to listen, and help set everything right again.

I know you can’t hear me all the way in that room, but I want to say thank you. That’s really not enough, after all you’ve done for me. . . But thank you, the boy with the ruby-red eyes.