A Stone for Bread

She was breathing heavily, the rhythmic contractions of her diaphragm growing shallow as the interval between each breath shortened like the swelling of a majestic orchestra playing the rubato section of an emotional symphony.   Had she elected to cast her mind out of the maelstrom in which she resided and stumble about in the unfamiliar fields of lazy contemplation, she would have decided that the composer had definitely intended the rubato section to be a rousing finale.  The audience would stand and clap, applauding the composer-turned-Fate’s masterful manipulation of sound to create such a tapestry of emotion.  They would talk for hours afterward of his gall to use such dissonances in his finale, his unsettling effect achieved and made manifest in their unrest.  

Had she been there, in that metaphorical concert hall, she would have trembled at the piece, wondering when it would end.  She would strain her ears to hear what tonality the final chord would take, the sweat forming on her brow and drowning her in suspense; she would pray to her God for the sweet tones of a major chord and for a pleasing restatement of the calming opening theme.  And as the final cadence would reach her ears, the full genius of the piece would settle in, forever changing her perception of what the art form could accomplish.  Her prayers would be answered, regardless of tonality.  And she would accept and live with that answer.  She had no choice.

Choice was a luxury she couldn’t afford to lose at that moment, for it was a luxury wont to being lost in the very act of inaction.  And as she focused on her breathing, and the unwelcome bodily tremors that accompanied it, unaware of any melodious undertones cultivated in anything resembling cogitation, she thought to herself that it was awfully hard to load a shotgun with her hands shaking like that.

It hadn’t always been that way.  It hadn’t always been that her continued existence depended on every choice, every split-second decision made to keep her one step ahead of the annihilating jaws of death.

She used to be happy.

She could hear His lazy footsteps in the hall.  She had learned to discern their steady rhythm from the random pitter-patter of nearly everyone else’s.  Except for that wizened old man she had met some seventy miles from the browning, shabby hotel room where she now sat loading shells into a stolen shotgun.  He had been kind, even though he had possessed that lazy rhythmic footfall she had learned to fear.  When she asked, he had surmised that it had come from a security of being, a kind of comfort in one’s own skin, so to speak.  He didn’t really know, and had told her so himself.  His eyes had widened as she then poured her heart out to him, and he had opted to let her cap her story with a silence broken by quiet sobs before speaking his mind: “If your Pursuer possesses that quiet reassurance that I fear accompanies this steady footfall, then I wish you the best of luck, and bade you be cautious.  Make no mistakes, for your life may be dearly sold in their making.”

He had been kind to her.  But He had gotten to him.  And as she remembered the last time she saw him, face-up in a pool of his own blood, she shed a single tear for his passing.  It had been her fault, after all.  She had overstayed her welcome.  Weak in her desire for companionship and the joys of conversation, she had stayed one day too many.  She would never forget the horror at awaking to the sound of the door breaking at its hinges, and never forget how massive He had looked standing in the doorway of that small cottage.  

She slept lightly since then, willing herself awake at the slightest sound, forcing herself to find the will to live one more day.  One more day, and He would leave her be, forever until the end of time.

That was how it had been this time.  Something about the way He had opened the door to the hotel itself had jolted her awake.  At first she thought she was dreaming.  Straining her ears, she had heard the first of those mechanical, manipulative footsteps that forced her into a tired routine.  She heeded the old man’s warning and made the choice to arm herself.  Quickly, she had jumped up and had run, nay, flown across the room to where she sat now, fully dressed and back to the wall, preparing for the inevitable chase.  

Her heart began to race even faster, like a sprinter in the final stretch of a marathon, when she heard His footsteps reach her floor.  As she loaded the last few shells into her weapon of self-defense, she began to utter the Lord‘s Prayer.  It was a little trick she had learned, that if she could use the words of the following line as fuel, she could survive those near-fatal few seconds in-between lines.  She found that she could substitute God for Him in her thoughts, and it would calm her down.  She made better decisions that way and had lived longer for it.  She cocked her weapon, and sending those Biblical words up to the heavens like a plea for relief having lost all the hope once behind it, she began the quotation from Matthew.


Our Father, who art in Heaven…


She was standing with him, her Love, on a rocky precipice overlooking a small lake.  She could hear the waves crashing against the shore, endless in their vain efforts, mercilessly driven by the wind.  Her heart matched the rhythm of those waves as she felt each one wash over her soul, as a roving shadow does the ground.  And harnessing that cold darkness, she looked into his eyes that shone back the same loving questioning they always had.  They threatened to draw her in to them, like two pools of consuming warmth overtaking her very being.  Why did you bring me here? his eyes seemed to say.  Please don’t make me speak, she thought back to them, in speaking I fear I may lose what self-control I have left.  She froze her heart to keep it from melting in his gaze.  Then wrapping herself in shadow to prepare herself for the task at hand, she took a deep breath of that cool, murky lake air.

“We need to talk,” she said, hating how dumb her voice sounded within that hopeless rhythm.

“I know,” he said, stepping forward, unintentionally timing that step in the interval between the coming of those waves, her shadow and her strength, “you told me already when you begged me to come out here.”

She retreated from his advance, unable to take her eyes off those globes of warmth, threatening to break her built up shroud of darkness.

“I…” she looked down at the ground.  It was naturally oblivious to the waves crashing upon it, completely and utterly negating their efforts to escape the confines of the water.  “I asked you to come here because…”

He motioned to put his arms around her, but she shunned his touch, looking back up into his eyes, filled with a new kind of questioning bewilderment.

“I’m leaving you,” she said quickly as he opened his mouth to speak, no doubt to ask why she was avoiding him.  His demeanor changed, as if hit by a wave, and a hurt unique to the abandoned shown on his loving, gentile face.  

“Why?” he asked pleadingly.

“I don’t know,” she said.  The waves strengthened her.  “I need…” she let the sentence taper off into the beats of silence surrounding them.  Him? some part of her suggested timidly.  Of course not, she snapped back in her mind, I need to be on my own, I need… She didn’t know what she needed.  

Her Love spoke before she could complete her thought, “Is there anything I can…”

“No.  Just…no,” said, shaking her head.  “I…need…” she couldn’t find the words.

“I see,” he said calmly, “Do what you will.”

She turned her back to avoid showing him her tears, and began to walk away.  At the sound of his voice, her walk turned to a run, and her tears became the first of many painful aching sobs, “If you decide to come back, I’ll be waiting for you.”  She ran, ran from that warmth that threatened to break down her strength.  It would invade her heart and replace strength with…with what?

It wasn’t until she got home and curled up into a ball on her living room floor, sobbing all the while, that she realized her self control, her shadow, and her strength had only amounted to weakness.


…hallowed be Thy name…


She had to leave.  Now.  Her hotel room was much too high up to jump out the window.  They had not allowed her to request a ground-floor room, and she had consented because this was the only hotel for miles, and she had been exhausted.

Now that she was more rested, she wished she had contested the issue.

She counted to five to steady her nerves and, knowing that His rhythmic footfalls sounded louder than they actually were, opened her door quickly.  She pointed her shotgun down both ends of the hall.  Aware that He would turn the corner to her wing anytime, she rushed out of the pretend protection of her room and made a break for the stairs, thankful that at least one aspect of her room had facilitated easy escape.

She reached the stairway door uneventfully.  As she opened the door, she stole a backwards glance in the direction the footsteps were coming from, only to be greeted with a sight that nearly stopped her in her tracks.  

She saw Him plant his foot around the corner.  And that was all she saw of Him, that black boot sticking out from around the corner of the hallway, ready to propel its wearer along on its murderous rampage of death.

She froze.

Or would have, about a year ago.  But freezing was the only word applicable to that feeling He generated, that intense beacon of control that seemed to immobilize everyone around Him.  She would stop where she was.  She would turn around and face Him.  She would give in to Him.  She would love Him, and embrace Him, allowing Him to own her, body and soul.  And He would destroy her, utterly and totally.

She was genuinely frightened now.  He wouldn’t check her room for her first.  He would see the stairway door swinging shut as it closed.  She wouldn’t have the head start she needed.  So she ran down the stairs as fast as possible, heart dropping as she heard the door at her floor open and close a second time.  

When she reached the ground floor landing she looked up the middle of that angular spiral and could see, from below, His hand on the railing, the person attached to it moving faster than she had.

Not a person, but a demon, and one she had to break herself away from the sight of.

So she burst through the door, the image of that hand still behind her eyes, that hand that could love her, caress her, and destroy her, all in on fell swoop.


…Thy kingdom come…


“Oh, excuse me,” she said, not paying attention to who she had bumped into.

“It’s no problem,” said the male voice from somewhere to her right.

She stopped.  Turning her head to get a better look at the person behind the voice, she could see that he had stopped as well.  She was staring into the two warmest pits of kindness she had ever seen.

“It’s been a while,” her Love said, raising his eyebrows.

“Yeah…” she said lamely, her tongue stuck in her throat.

“How’ve you been?”

“Alright,” she lied.

“Walk with me,” he said, grinning.  He motioned for her to follow, “Let’s talk.”

She mutely obeyed, staring down at the street avoiding his eyes.

They were walking along the sidewalk of a busy street.  She had been on her way to something important, but the sight of her Love had driven the thought from her mind.  The street was in the downtown district of a large city, filled with people and cars and streetlights and shops and more cars.  Why couldn’t he have bumped into someone else?  The way he is, he’d give a kind word and a pleasant conversation to a street lamp.  Why couldn’t he have stopped someone else?  I don’t have time for this.  

She was about to duck into a store when he started talking.  Saying something about how nice the weather was.  Please let him have a new girlfriend, she thought, realizing how juvenile the thought sounded, please.  She didn’t want to seem rude so she allowed him to talk, nodding every sentence or two or when he reached a pause.  

She keyed into the noise of the cars for a ground, something to keep her on her feet.  Anything to keep her from loving him again.  He had reached a pause.  Something about his family…

She spoke awkwardly, “So…got a new girlfriend yet?”  She felt like a teenager back in high school, and that drove rebellious thoughts into her skull.

“No,” he said, sighing, “What about you?  Got a new beau?”

“Me?” she grinned half-heartedly, “No, no, not yet.”

“I’m sure you will,” he said stopping to look her in the eyes while she avoided his.  “Hey,” he began as if struck by a brilliant idea, “Let’s stop in this coffee shop a while.  I hear it’s one of the best in the area.”

She didn’t want to.  “Okay.”  She forced a smile.

They picked a table and sat down, him still looking at her, and she still looking at everything but him.  They, or rather, he, started up the conversation.  She could hear the cars driving to and fro from the inside of the store.  There was a rhythm to it if you listened hard enough.  A rhythm in chaos.  Or what is chaos in rhythm?  She couldn’t tell, but whatever it was kept her from having to totally give herself to him.  As they drove by randomly she thought back to the waves.  They at least had a discernable rhythm to them.  With this it was different.  Harder to use for strength.  It was less like a rhythm and more like a swell.  She tried to use it like she had the waves, to somehow guard her heart against him, but all she could muster was a feeble brick wall and the mortar didn’t seem to have enough time to dry.  It was too warm, he was too warm for her to freeze her heart yet again.  He had invited her in here with the implicit purpose of winning her back.  She could tell, with his failed attempts at subtlety coming closer and closer to what she know would be the eventual statement: I love you, and I want you back.

No.

She almost said it.  She would have said it too, if he hadn’t taken a second to look at his watch.  Leaping up in surprise he gasped, “My lunch break is almost over.  I’m gonna be late for work!”  He scrambled to get his things in order, then turned to look at her, his comical rush drawing a timid smile from her as she felt that wall quiver and quake.  “Same time next week?” he asked, ginning that stupid grin of victory.

No.  Say no, stupid.  

“Yes.”

“See you then.”  He turned around again and left the shop.

She watched him go, finding the side without eyes much easier to bore into.  She couldn’t take him back.  She wouldn’t, she was too stubborn for that.  But at the same time, she couldn’t talk to him.  She couldn’t tell her Love how lonely she was.  How she frequented the bars so much to look for a man, any man to fill that void that he had left behind.  How she cried every night when no one even gave her a second look.  How she lived from day to day, sitting at home when not out because she had lost her job.  Something about lacking initiative.  She hadn’t been paying attention at the time.  She was aching, aching as she didn’t know she could, constantly feeling pain radiate from that hole in her heart that he left behind.

No, she realized as the swelling back and forth of the cars beat against her soul with the force of a battering ram, you made this hole.

She suppressed a sob as she stood up.  She did not go to a bar.  She went home and sat down in her living room.  An hour later, wet tears settling into those well worn lines on her face, she fell fast asleep curled up in her own arms.


…Thy will be done…


She couldn’t believe her eyes.  They were dead, all of them, dead.  It was the old man all over again, a hundred times over.  The lobby was strewn with their bodies.  The dust hadn’t even settled from the chaos as she ran through it, trying not to look yet unable to remove her eyes from the carnage.  This is your fault.  If only you hadn’t stayed at this hotel…if only you were faster…if only you could fight Him off…if only…  But if onlys wouldn’t erase the present.  

A vase was teetering back and forth on an end table.  It fell over as she passed it, and she screamed with fright at the loud crash, turning her body just enough to see Him.  

He seemed to cover the entire back wall of the hotel.  Why?  She turned to run.  Why is He following me?  If she had been looking, she would have seen Him raise his arms.  Didn’t I make myself perfectly clear?  He took His time loading his revolver.  Why didn’t you hear the shots?  It would only take one.  Please God, just let Him leave me alone.  He took aim.  Let Him die.  He pulled the trigger.  Why me?

Her only answer was a shot concealing a whisper from the depths of heaven.


…on Earth as it is in Heaven…


She had begun to depend on those lunch breaks.  It seemed as though every week gave her the strength she needed to go on.  And not the feeble strength she still took from the varying rhythms around her.  This was real strength, strength borne of love.  She knew this, but she couldn’t stop coming.  She couldn’t just leave his boyish grin alone.  She couldn’t stand the thought of those corners turning down in dejection like they had out by that lake.

She was falling back in love with him.

At first she had resisted.  She had even showed up late to their first meeting, just to show her Love that she was different and no longer loved him.  But she had showed up, and that was enough to rattle that wall.  Slowly she let her guard down and those weekly meetings became almost the mirror image of their love those years ago.  So she had started to come earlier and earlier, waiting in hopeful anticipation for him to walk through that door and melt her heart into a pool of warmth.  And then she started coming on other days, foolishly hoping he would show up.  Some days he did, some days he didn’t.  But she discovered that too many days a week made her lose interest.  All that warmth quickly turned that puddle into a uncomfortable boiling mass, and made it hard for her to look at him.  She wanted him back now, but stubbornness wouldn’t let her make the first move.  He was right, and she was wrong, but she hated to admit it.

Her indecision hadn’t stopped her from getting a job at that coffee shop, however.  The staff had noticed her becoming a regular and, upon getting to know her, offered her a job.  She was glad to accept.  Her bank account had begun to run a little dry, as she could only survive on what little she could buy monthly for so long.  Plus she was glad to get away from the house, where she had acquired a stalker.

He stood outside her window, from dusk ‘til dawn it seemed.  She kept her doors locked and began to sleep with a baseball bat curled under her arm, just in case.  The last time she had looked out the window for Him it had been night.  She had only seen a black form, close enough to grab her if it wasn’t for the pane of glass between them, with two sullen eyes staring out from where the face on a normal human would be.  She had begun to get genuinely frightened.

Meeting her Love again couldn’t come fast enough.

So that was the attitude she held in her heart as she walked into the coffee shop on one of her days off, half an hour before their decided time.  She took her usual seat and fixed her eyes upon the spot his would occupy in a few short minutes.  Her heart beat faster and faster as the time approached.  She was eager to tell him about her stalker and ask for his advice.  

The time arrived.  Five minutes passed.  Ten minutes passed.  Fifteen minutes passed.  She couldn’t see him anywhere.  She was confused.  Where once her Love had been last week, he was no longer.  Did she do something different?  Did she do something wrong?

Did he love her anymore?

She waited until the exact time he had left the first time, in that half-crazed rush that still brought her a little giggle every time she thought about it.  She still couldn’t see him.

I can’t have done something wrong, she thought to herself, so he just thinks it’s okay to leave me here, when I need him most?

She stormed out of the shop near tears, drowning her sorrow in rage, and headed for the nearest bar, hoping to drown another part of her soul somehow.

Had she been more observant, she would have seen him, sitting in that coffee shop, staring at her dejectedly, wondering why she couldn’t see him.  Had she put aside her need to talk and listened for his voice, she would have heard her name whispered softly over the crowd.

She would not know for a long time how close she had been to avoiding hell.


…give us this day our daily bread…


The ground was flying backward under her as the she felt the long blades of grass brush against her bare arms.  No, that wasn’t right, she didn’t feel the blades of grass.  In fact, she couldn’t feel much of anything.  She suspected she was still in shock from getting shot in the leg.  As she noticed the fact that she was limping, she started to feel the grass at last.  But only a little, and as if from far away.  

She stole a glace backward and saw Him from not too far off, although just far enough away to be out of range.  She looked down at her left leg, which had some sort of strange red fluid leaking out of it.

Blood.

She felt pain shoot through her leg as feeling returned suddenly, at a most unwelcome time, forcing her to stifle a cry of pain as each beat of her heart sent a stabbing jolt through the night air to her brain.  She heard a shot, but knew it went astray.  She frantically looked around, hoping for someplace, anyplace to hide from Him.

Maybe He would pass by and not find her, if only she could find some place to lay low…

As she continued to look, she began to think of her Love.  It had been almost a year since that day she hadn't seen him.  And she had forgiven him long before that year had ended.  If anything, she had realized that he had not in fact abandoned her, but instead she had made the exact same mistake she did at the lake.  She wished she had been more observant at the coffee shop.  Maybe things would have…

What she wouldn’t give to have his goofy grin before her right now, even if it was right before her demise.  At least then there would be something good, something positive in this horrible chase that never seemed to end.  She longed to put her ear to his chest and hear his heartbeat, rhythmic and steady.  Even if she couldn’t kill this pursuer, she could at least take real strength from that heart.  Not the strength of the waves or the automobiles, but the strength she could use to fight Him off.  Yes, that was the strength she needed.  And as she allowed the image of her Love’s face and the sound of his steady heartbeat to warm her frozen heart, she spied the faint outline of a barn, silhouetted against the night sky.

So she looked back, unwilling to believe her eyes when she saw no sight of Him anywhere.  Maybe it was just the darkness limiting her field of vision, but she thanked Heaven for small miracles.  So she set her eyes on that barn and focused her thoughts on her Love, unable to feel the pain from her leg for the time being.


…and forgive us our trespasses…


She had been looking to the left for sometime now, accepting the mild haze around her vision with a kind of amused indifference, when a man walked into her line of sight and seated himself on the vacant barstool to her left.  She couldn’t make out most of his features, but that didn’t really matter.  He had an attractive enough face nearly covered by matted black hair and one of those smiles that put you off just a little, as if they were hiding something mischievous underneath that grin.

“I used to see you in here all the time, sitting on that stool all alone, but you haven’t been in a while.  What’s made you sulk to our unholy halls once again…?”

She completely ignored his pause for her to fill in her name and answered darkly, “If these halls are unholy, then sign me up to drink the kool-aid.”  She capped the statement off with a twirl of her glass, enjoying the sound it made sliding against the bar top.

“Well, someone sounds a little…lonely.”  He gave the last word an almost cruel edge, raising his eyebrows and letting out a little chuckle.

“Well if I was lonely, I certainly wouldn’t fill my life with lowlife, bar-hopping scumbags like you,” she said angrily, swiveling around in her stool to get up and leave.

“Wait,” he said, putting his hand on her shoulder, seeing he had touched a nerve, “Stay a while.  I don’t bite.”

She turned around and sized him up.  “Alright,” she conceded.

“So,” he began as he scooted his stool a little closer, watching her ease back into hers, “What’s a pretty young thing like you doing in a place like this?”

“My…”  What was he to her, anyway?  “A…friend…”  That didn’t sound right either.  “Someone dear to me left me today, when I needed him most,” she decided.

“That’s too bad,” he said, putting a note of genuine concern in his voice, “I’ll never leave you if you want.”

“I’m touched, but you’re drunk,” she said, laughing.

“You don’t look so sober yourself,” he shot back, grinning.

“I happen to hold my liquor very well,” she said with fake poise.

“Everyone has their limits, it’s just a matter of finding them,” he stared at her.

What are you doing, having a conversation with this strange man?  You can’t be that desperate?  She ignored the thought and smiled at him lightly.

“You really are beautiful,” he said.

“Why thank you,” she said, and then, struck by the insanity of the moment, added, “And I’d like to take you up on that offer.”  She winked at him and ran her finger over the top of his hand to drive the point home.

“Kiss me,” he said suddenly, his face changing.

“What?” she said in surprise.

“I’m testing your limits,” he said seriously, “This is a bar, no one cares.  Now do it.”

She would never know what made her lean forward, directing her eyes to his lips, unsavory in any other light but that cast by isolation, and press hers to his.  She supposed it was the need to feel someone close to her, close enough to melt into her and transform her heart into a paradise.  While this didn’t quite cut it, it did make up for a few hours previous.  Almost.  

She closed her eyes, allowing him to direct her in that action.  The kiss seemed to continue on forever.  She was faintly aware of some avant-garde jazz music coming from the jukebox, whose time signature kept shifting so as to disguise the slow, irregular beat.  She felt it faintly poke at her heart, as if trying to gain entry.  She shut the door on it and continued kissing this man that she didn’t even know.

Suddenly she thought of her Love.  He would be devastated, even if they weren’t truly one as they had been prior.  She began to feel as though some dirty film were covering her body, emanating from the lips.  So this is what adultery felt like.  At least if she really loved him again like she thought she did.  Or maybe it was just part of the alcohol and the strangeness of the situation.  She definitely didn’t love this man, after all.

And then she opened her eyes and looked into his, as she suspected he had never closed his.

What she saw froze her heart.

She broke off the kiss, still aware of the music.  The rhythm had all but stopped, as the song came to its trolling finale, absent of any melody or form, amounting to silence punctuated by random discordant lines forming sounds that called to the darkest depths of the soul.  And as she stared into his eyes, the song ended, the final note ringing with all the clarity and finality of the Last Judgment.

“What is it?” he asked, confused.

“It’s not right,” she said quickly, gathering her things.

“A little late to care about that, eh little lady?” he asked grinning.

She was too busy looking at his eyes, “I really must go.”  Without saying anything else. she turned and practically ran out of that bar.

He clenched his fists, then turned and left the opposite way.

She hailed a cab, frozen heart racing.  Getting in as quickly as possible, she slammed the door shut and breathlessly blurted out the address of her house.  She wanted her Love there, and she wanted him now.  For what she had seen when she opened her eyes had frightened her to the core.  She was his, and he knew it, and she knew it too.  

She had seen it all in His sullen eyes.


…as we forgive those who trespass against us…


She was pushing against the barn door with all her might, but it wouldn’t budge.  It seemed held down by the weight of a thousand sins.  She finally gave up and scrambled around the sides of the barn, looking for another way in.  She found it in a small hole made by time in the back right corner of the building.  She crawled in, almost crying out in pain at the return of feeling in her leg.  Now that she was slowing down, so was her endocrine system, and it was becoming hard to move normally.  She stood up in the bottom of that barn, turning her attention upward at the loft.  If she could just get up there, she would have a higher vantage point, and possibly be able to ambush Him on the off chance he look for her in the barn.  

More like on the certainty.  She had to get ready.

She started to look all around the barn for pieces of wood, something she could use to construct a bunker of some sort.  She quietly pushed them up to the loft, taking care not to make too much noise.  Only once she had a good amount, of varying lengths and thickness, did she start looking for a ladder.  There was one propped up on the right side of the barn, hard to see in the light, but it was there.  She began to climb it, pain shooting through her leg as she forgot about her injury.  She took a minute to catch her breath, then tore off a piece of her sleeve, wadded it up into a small ball, and put it in her mouth.  She bit down against the pain and slowly climbed the ladder.  

Once she got to the top, she leaned against one of the ceiling support beams and tore the shirt wad from her mouth, tossing it aside, panting all the while.  She was nearly covered in sweat now, and it was getting hard to muster the energy to do much of anything.  

She began to think about death.  It would be easiest, she supposed, to just give in and let Him have his way with her.  Everything she had heard told her that it would be painless.  Funny that the only people who ever told her anything about death were those still shackled to this world.  She couldn’t, at least for her Love.  He would hate to hear that she had just given up.  Even if he wasn’t here.

God, she missed him.

An owl let out a haunting cry that broke her out of her reverie.  She stood up, a little bit too quickly, and began arranging her makeshift bunker.  Once she had everything in place, she looked out from the loft at the surrounding landscape.  She could barely see Him in the distance, lazily walking towards the barn.  Looking past Him, she saw the faint glow of the hotel in the distance.  If she squinted she could make out the flashing red and blue lights of police cars and ambulances.  They were too late.  She suppressed a sob as she thought of all those people that had died for her, without even knowing she existed.  She had hurt them, and all because of a stupid impulse in a bar.  She was so ashamed.  She almost wished He was already there, so she could be forced into action and not have to see their faces, staring blankly at the horror of a quick death.

They were staring at her asking why and she had no answer.  Not for them, not for Him, and not even for herself.  She was lost, a ship without a port, flirting with the uncharted seas of desolation and isolation, every second just one second closer to that fatal rupture of her outer defenses.   She would sink to the bottom of that unholy sea, and stare jealously at the faint light of the rest of the world filtering through the turbulent waves.  It would form perverse refractions and patterns that would encompass her as she would curse the world with her final breath.  She couldn’t take much more of this, not with that end in sight.

Why her, anyhow?

So as she closed her eyes and let out a deep breath, forming silent prayers and questions on her lips, she knotted her brow in confusion.  She could have sworn she heard a baby crying.


…and lead us not into temptation…


She exited the cab in a rush, almost forgetting her purse in her haste to get to somewhere safe.  She practically ran up the front steps of her house, almost jammed her key in the lock, and slammed her door shut behind her.  Turning her key in the lock, she leaned her head against the door, breathing heavily to ease her fear.  She was still shaking, remembering the complete possession she saw in her stalker’s eyes.  She had no doubts that He would be back, with more vigor than ever before.  So she just had to be ready, right?

But she wasn’t ready for what she saw when she turned around.

“It isn’t nice to leave like that without explaining yourself,” He said, any and all pretense of compassion and pleasantry gone.

Her hand flew to her mouth as she stifled a scream.  “How…?”

“I shouldn’t have to ask you.  But I will because you haven’t known me long.  Why did you leave so rudely?”

“How did you get in here?” she asked, finding the words.

He shook His head at her.  “When I ask a question,” He rushed at her, grabbing her by the hair at the top of her head before she could get away, “you answer me.”

“Please…let me go…” she said, gasping.

“I will do with you what I please,” He said, grinning evilly as His eyes shone with the coldest hate she had ever seen, “You are mine.  You said so yourself.”

“I did no such…”

He pulled her head backwards and down sharply, forcing her to cut off her statement with a sharp cry as His voice adopted a cruel imitation of hers, “And I’d like to take you up on that offer.”  At the word offer He ran His free hand along the upper side of her neck.  She eyed His hand nervously, breathing faster and faster as His face moved uncomfortably close to hers.  

So she thought of her Love.  And a small fire awoke inside her.  She spat in His face, forcing Him to let go of her and take a step backward.  

She quickly cast her eyes about for something to hit Him with.

But it wasn’t fast enough.

She felt the back of His hand strike her face as she was slightly lifted off her feet and thrown aside to her left.  He wiped her spit off His face slowly, face contorted in anger.

“I won’t be so nice next time.  You should be grateful.”

She rubbed her cheek and thought of her Love yet again.  She wanted him here so badly it hurt.  Yet through the silence, she could only hear her own failure, looped endlessly against the pure gleam of a blank slate.  Why did she give in to Him?  There didn’t seem to be anything she could do about it now.  She reached about for something a second time, but He stepped on her hand, causing her to cry out in pain.

“Looking for something?” He asked, smirking.

Her heart froze.  “No,” she answered, praying for Him to move his foot.  He nodded His approval and allowed her to stand up.

“See, if you do as I say, everything will be alright.  Now, why did you leave?”

“Because,” she began, her eyes full of hot tears, “You aren’t right for me.”

“That’s a lie and you know it,” He said snappily, “You and I both know that I’m perfect for you.”  He took a step forward to run his finger down her arm, “You deserve every touch.”

She recoiled from his advance, shaking profusely now.  

He contorted his face into one of rage, “If you do that again, so help me…”  And when she looked down she saw Him pull a revolver out of His pocket.  Pointing it square at her chest He said slowly, “Now, do exactly as I say.  Stay there, and come when I call you.”  She breathed a sigh of relief as the sick pervert made His way to her bedroom, back to her for now.  She watched Him with baited breath, hoping He would not turn around long enough for her to do what she needed to.  Without turning around, she began to work her key in the lock, trying to put herself in the best possible escape position.

“Come,” He said loudly from her room after some time.

“No, I don’t think I will,” she said defiantly.

“Alright,” He began, “Then I guess I’ll just have to kill you.”

He began to count to five.  She was out the door by two.  She heard one, two, three shots whiz by, missing her completely.  She ran as fast as her legs would allow until she could run no more.  She leaned against the side of a building, still in shock.  She supposed she could steal or use her cunning to get what she needed, but she wasn’t ready to live life on the run.  

She shivered because she was cold.  But that was not the only reason she shook.  She had taken the first dip in that sea of desolation, and her heart despaired to think of the life in store for her now.  The coldness enveloped her like a shroud, and beat a harsh monotone of pain into her as she began to walk away from her former life.  

As much as she wanted her Love, she could not think of trying to find him.  He would certainly be upset with her for leaving the coffee shop.  In fact, he would tell her this was her fault.  That she had made a stupid mistake.  Yes.  And he wouldn’t help her.  He would run from her like the plague, because she was infected.  Her stalker had corrupted her, and her Love would never want her back.  Ever.

She gave the crowded streets one last longing look, then set out in the direction of the setting sun, as the last lights of evening faded into the impenetrable blackness of eternal night.


…but deliver us from evil.


She had searched for about five minutes, but she had finally found the source of the crying.  It was coming from a grain bin at the right side of the barn.  She opened the lid, and found an abandoned baby, bawling its eyes out.  Judging from its appearance, it had only been abandoned that day.  She picked it up and cradled it in her arms, rocking it slowly back and forth to ease its tears.  At first, the baby resisted her comfort, but soon began to quiet down, at least being content to stare up into her eyes for the time being.  She almost forgot herself in her motherly instincts, but another bird call startled her into looking out the loft yet again.  He was closer now.

She gently laid the child down next to her and kneeled behind her barricade, pointing her shotgun over the top at the barn door, fully expecting Him to be capable of opening the door, as only kin can.  She waited…

She was flying across the sky, seeing everything all at once.  In one direction she saw the events of the past, and in the other, she saw naught but unfulfilled blackness, the opacity of potential.  To her left and right, she saw, dreamlike and vivid, strange and unspeakable images.  She could only attach face and meaning to one of them.  Her stalker was standing there, in between her and her Love.  Love made a motion to come to her, but He prevented it.  Twice more this happened, as He started to strike her Love, marking him as a thorn would a careless florist.  After the third time, her Love did not get back up.  She cried out to him , but He clapped His hand over her mouth, motioning for her to submit to Him.  She backed away, crying tears of deep sorrow.  He made to lunge for her, but could not.  Looking down, they both saw the hand of her Love keeping His leg from stepping forward.  And as her Love rose up to His level, he whispered something into His ear.  He screamed and slunk back into the receding shadows, gone for now, but never completely invisible.  She took her eyes off of Him and gazed upon her Love, bathed in light as he walked forward, moving to embrace her.  She felt her heart melt as he leaned his face in towards hers…

She was jarred awake by a loud knocking sound.

She snapped herself to full alertness, glancing over at the child to make sure it was still safe.  Satisfied, she focused all of her attention on that door, slowly opening as He pushed against it with all of his terrible might.  That same might that would destroy her, if she let it.  But she couldn’t.  Not with thoughts of her Love still floating around in her mind.  She would live if only to see him one more time.

He squeezed His way in the barely open door and looked around the barn.  “I know you’re in here somewhere, girl.”  

She tightened her grip on her weapon.

“You can’t run forever.  I will always be here, one step behind you.  So come out and play.”

One step behind is better than you leading, she thought back, smirking.

She felt her heart grow cold as he spied the ladder that she had left down in her haste.

“I bet you’re up here, pet,” he said darkly and playfully, “Why don’t you come on out?  You know you deserve it.”

“No!” she screamed, firing once in his direction, missing by about a foot.  She ducked down quickly as He fired off two shots, both hitting the makeshift barricade.  One of the boards fell down from the loft at the force of the shots, but it was one far away from her and she was relatively safe for the time being.  

As safe as the hunted can be.

The baby was screaming now.  “You monster!” she found herself shouting at him, “Can’t you hear there’s an innocent child up here?  He has nothing to do with this!”

“After all this time you honestly think I care?” he asked, laughing out loud, “What are you going to do, ‘protect’ it?  As if that makes up for all your failures.  You are nothing.”

She raised her head slightly to hear better.  His words didn’t sting anymore, although they still had that awful freezing effect on her resolve.  She was wearing down, and she would give in before too long, she felt it.  He fired off two more shots at her newly exposed head, the first missing completely and the second hitting the wood directly in front of her, pelting her with wood chips.  The baby was red-faced now.

She fired another shot that missed almost completely.  

“You don’t have the guts,” he said, beginning to climb the ladder, “You can’t kill me.”

“I don’t have to,” she retorted back.

“I’m interested.  This I'd like to see.”

She couldn’t elaborate.  

She felt the weight of the past year on her chest as he reached the top of the loft.  She was sinking, she could feel it, and everything around her tolled the awful monotone of total failure.  She would give in to Him.  She had to, it was her lot.

She was weak.

Her love sauntered into her thoughts again and she was filled with an inexpressible warmth.  She allowed the memory of his warm steady heartbeat to strengthen her, and lift the burden of this terrible chase.  She knew what she had to do.

She picked up one of the pieces of wood and held it in front of her like a shield and charged Him down.  He acted surprised and fired once.  She knew it hit her shield, but she couldn’t feel the impact.  Her mind was filled with too many thoughts of love and peace and rest.  She flung her shield aside and brought her weapon up to bear against him, as he did the same.  Two simultaneous shots rang out through the night.

~          ~          ~

It was a long time before she felt anything.  Her arm stung from absorbing the impact of that bullet through the wood, but she was otherwise unharmed.  He was lying on the ground, blown off of the loft by the force of her shot.  He was not bleeding, so she knew He wasn’t dead, but the fall had knocked Him out cold.  She could see a bullet-proof vest through the holes in His shirt, and she knew she didn’t have much time.  She scooped up the child, rocking him gently to calm him down, and descended the ladder slowly, taking care not to put too much weight on her bad leg.  

When she passed His downed body, she considered putting her shotgun to his head and…

She knew she couldn’t.  She didn’t have it in her, and she knew that quality was not a weakness.   

For the first time in her life, she felt that ice begin to melt within her.  As she stood there, over the prone form of her stalker, her private terror, beaten for the first time, she was suddenly aware of her heartbeat.  It was not fast and panicked, but slow and steady.  It was rhythmic, and she rejoiced in its steady foundation supporting her being.  She knew it wouldn’t last forever, but she accepted it while it was present.  She left through the open door, stepping over His body on the way.  She was free, at least for a while.

So she limped towards the east, back to where she had come.  She would seek out her Love.  She would accept his strength and his efforts to woo her, entreating him for help in fending Him off when He would inevitably get up again.  She knew that he would be more than willing to forgive.  He always was, after all.  And that was why she loved him.

She stared down at the now contentedly sleeping babe in her arms, and felt a sort of understanding that she couldn’t explain.  She held him close, knowing that he was everything that she had overlooked in this chase.   He had been given his chance by her single failure.  And so she found her answer.  She was departing that concert hall, ears ringing with the comfort and warmth of a major chord.  She kissed his forehead, and silently thanked no one in particular for that chase.  

As she limped down the road the first rays of sunlight began to peek over the horizon, illuminating the truth that escapes the searching souls of men.

Amen.