Lesson 1:

Nothing had felt right for a while.
Nina was grieving, not a person but a life. The life she could have lived if only she had been lucky enough.
Nina had spent her youth on the struggle bus, working menial jobs and painting every spare moment in between.
She wanted to defy the odds. She wanted to actually make a living from her art. But now, on the cusp of turning 30, nothing could be farther from the truth.
She had 800 dollars in her bank account, and she was due to ask her parents for another loan, something that felt nearly as soul-sucking as her dead end waitress job at the local dive bar, where men would hoot and holler at her, occasionally clutching her wrist and pulling her into them.
She dreamed of owning her own gallery. Of being respected. Of not being asked to wear thigh high boots and a tight skirt that barely covered her bottom.
It was a cold and lonely night the day she met the man in the black hat.
He had coarse grey hair and eyes as bright as moonbeams. He smelled of gin and some sort of peppermint aftershave or cologne. There were wrinkles around his mouth, deep as welts. He had the gaunt, chiseled features of a lifetimes smoker, and black rings around his eyes that would suggest sleepless nights of drugs and debauchery. He wore a long black coat, and a chunky silver ring on his left index finger, which sparkled beneath the dim lights, donning the carved insignia of a rooster.
“Are you Nina?” he said, walking up to her where she stood wiping down the bar counter.
“Yes,” she said, a little irked that the stranger knew her name.
“My name is Devas. I heard about your paintings. I heard that they’re set to change the world. I heard about your dreams and how they’re not coming true. I heard the desperate, repressed rage that screams silently inside you. And I am here to say I understand. I am here to say it’s over now. All the awful want. The tears spilled onto your pillow in the dead of night. I want to buy all your paintings. Set your price, Nina. I am prepared to offer millions. I am prepared to save you from your terrible fate. I am here to put an end to your plight.”
Nina’s mouth fell open into a little round o. She tried to speak, but found no words.
“Take me to your paintings,” Devas said. “And I will write you a check.”
Nina felt someone gently shake her shoulder. She was startled awake by her manager. She had fallen asleep in the bar kitchen, her head in her hands, her hands on a table and her body in a plastic chair.
“Sorry,” Nina said, wiping drool from her lips.
“Your break ended five minutes ago,” her manager said. “Get to work.”
Nina stood up. Her soul was shattered – no, pulverized – by the realization that Devas and the money hadn’t been real. She was still here, in the sad, seedy bar with its hollow-eyed patrons and their incessant desire for more liquor. She was still broke and tired and beat down and miserable. She was still Nina, with an ache in her heart and flecks of paint in her hair and holes in her socks.
Before she exited the kitchen, something out the window caught her eye. She peered out into the city and saw Devas walking down the road beneath a sliver of moonlight, his coat brushing his legs with each step.
“Wait,” she said.
He turned to look at her. “Jump,” he said with a wide and leering smile.
Nina’s brow furrowed. It was a four story leap, one she would surely never survive, or at least would wish she never survived. “Are you crazy?”
“You have wings now,” he said.
Sure enough, Nina looked to either side of her and saw beautiful white wings sprouting from her shoulder blades. They were soft and feathered and steadfast. They spanned the entire kitchen, scraping up against the plaster walls.
Without another thought, the wings drew backward and allowed for her to spring out the window. As she began her rapid descent, the wings recoiled into her shoulder blades, and she was struck with sudden and everlasting death.
Her body lay in a heap on the rain-soaked cement. Devas inspected her. He felt for a pulse but there was none. And without a pulse, there was no life, and without life, there was no hope, and without hope, there was no suffering. Only peace.
Devas thrust his hands into his coat pockets, and whistled as he walked on into the night.