To the untrained eye, it was a simple palm-sized marble ornament. There were thousands like it, probably made by the bucket load. Every box delivered to the same hippy dippy store, you know the type, with gentle wind chimes playing and incense exhaling from the windows.

If one were to look closer at it, they’d quickly realise it was in the shape of an angel with broad open wings.

On first sight of it, a rather sensitive atheist might suddenly squirm and run headlong in the opposite direction. Lovers of God might hold it delicately in their palms, and see it as a means to connect with their guide.

I, however, saw it as neither.

To me, it was a symbol of something else. It sounds a bit silly, really, when I say it out loud.

It was a reminder that I existed.

A few years ago, when my best friend tentatively handed me the little box, I felt surprise wash over me in fierce waves.

Was I that important to someone that they thought of me, without them needed to be prompted? Did I matter enough to her that she sought a present to make me suffer a little less?

She cared enough that she wanted to ease my pain, even if it was just a fraction.

Awkwardly I opened the box, neither of us making eye contact. Within moments, I held the angel in my palm. It was a soft grey, like the clouds gathering together. The edges of her wings were smooth, reassuring, continuous. The weight of it rested pleasantly in my hands. I could close my fingers around it.

To her, it was a gift for her best friend, whose world had turned upside down for a little while.

To me, it was something I’d hold again and again, just to remind me I was alive, worth something. Worth more than the thoughts that plagued me.

The angel held within her the hope of better things to come. The weight of it reiterated to me that I had a heart that was beating, I was still breathing.

Most of all, the angel was a symbol to me that I wasn’t alone. I would be okay.