Last night my buddy Rich saved the day. What had been a decent day at work was followed by packing for an upcoming trip. The sun had long since set and it promised to be as uneventful a night as the ones before it, but in gallops Rich, riding high on a winged creature, heralding some unexpected and exciting news. It came at almost literally the eleventh hour. The annual Victoria’s Secret fashion show would be on at 10, Channel 2. To have missed it would have been awful; not actively so, but in the omission. The fact that I’d only ever seen one previous show years ago that I can’t remember, and never bothered to plan for future ones, is beside the point because now I’m friends with Victoria’s Secret Oracle, Rich.

One of my favorite parts of the hour-long winged prophecy and unveiling, came with the performance of A Great Big World’s “Say Something”. I had never heard it before, but I am listening to it as I pen these words of gratitude; yet, foreboding. The pianist and singer’s voice was appropriately angelic, his words filled with melancholy and longing. Perhaps ironically, though perhaps not at all, he poured his bruised heart out as some of the world’s most famous models strut and swiveled their scarcely concealed bodies and glee. Perhaps it was a joi de vivre that is painted and pinned on, but it’s convincing enough at the moment. The thought that it would have to be fabricated and attached, makes this sorrowful song bird begging her to “say something” lest he give up entirely, all the more pitiable. If even she is sad, what could she possibly want? What could possibly be done, and by a guy like him? How much greater the gulf
between his longing and his dismal reality? I got a glimpse of this at the end of the show backstage when a brunette model seems to have forgotten her smile onstage, and that the cameras were still rolling. That look, followed by her startled realization and the camera cutting away, was the Nephilim bridging heaven and earth.

This song served as an amazing contrast between the worlds. A reference to “stumbling and falling” in the song was punctuated by the certainty with which the models moved. It was a figurative slap across the face, with clicking heels softened only by flapping wings. The wings sometimes seemed more substantial than the angels themselves, giving the illusion of lightening their load. The crooner soldiered on as the angels glided unabated along the sliver of runway, through heaven’s gates with all the confidence of belonging, hardly paying attention to him at all. As if to acknowledge his and the world’s longing, one model ran her fingers across the top of the piano, emphasizing her fleeting presence and unattainability. His eyes cast down upon feet and ivory, perhaps blurry with wet emotion, he could not have been expected to notice. I don’t know that any song or scene could have been more perfect. Winners and losers, their bridges and broken bonds, were thoroughly and lastingly represented by those with wings and without.