Page 3 of Sinners Atone
I don’t have time for end-of-life hallucinations, I’ve got shit to do.
I shove myself off the tree, my boots sinking farther into the soil with every step. The Devil’s grasping at my ankles, trying to drag me home, but he can’t have me, not yet. Not until I’ve knelton the concrete steps of the church and carved my message into its doors.
The Middle starts with a honk of a horn.
Thatbastardnoise.
The first time I heard it, I made the mistake of looking out of the bedroom window.
The second time, I wished I’d never heard it at all.
And after the third, I learned the consequence of pretending I hadn’t.
The sound rips through the dark again, louder and angrier, hitting me in the back like a freight train.
Even after all these years, it still has a way of lurching me forward.
When the brush thickens and scrapes over old scars, I turn my eyes skyward and find the orange glow again.
It’s growing closer, but so is my father.
He had the dangerous combination of being a heavyset man with a light tread. I’d know the sound of his gait anywhere—in The Middle, it followed me into these woods every night for eight years. Eight fucking years of torture, games,lessons.Eight years, until he followed me up a gravel path, shoved me through iron gates, and left me to fight for my life.
The Middle was dictated by a new set of rules. And like the birthday candles, there were ten, just for me.
His whiskey-tainted breath grazes past my ear.
Rule one: You must become The Villain for your brothers to call you a hero.
I walk faster to get away from The Middle. To get away from him. The next few steps send a molten heat to my groin and buckle my knees, but I grind the pain between my teeth and keep moving.
Finally, the orange glow stretches out its hand. Space expands, branches retract, and soil turns to asphalt.
Though I slow to a stop under the streetlamp to catch what little breath I have left, my gaze goes for a walk. It sweeps over the road, and I wonder when it got so fucking wide. Then it climbs the stones of my father’s church on the other side.
That bastard building hurts to look at on my best days, but on my worst, just a glance in its direction burns.
I skim over broken windows and the crumbling spire, looking for relief where the Pacific meets the black sky behind it.
And then I realize what I’m doing, and sour amusement floods my chest.
A dying man always turns his eyes to the sky.
When I was young and invincible, I vowed I’d be the exception. That when Death finally stepped out of my shadow and tapped me on the shoulder, I wouldn’t tilt my chin and look for the God I’ve cursed for a lifetime. Yet here I am, gazing in the opposite direction to where my soul is headed, wondering if he’s really up there and if he’s taking good care of my mama.
My next inhale rattles around my chest; my next exhale paints a white streak across the night. When the wind rises over the cliffs and sweeps it sideways, I see Him.
He glances down at me and breathes a sigh of relief.
No laughing this time.
Lungs too weak now.
Legs too weak. Arms too weak.
Don’t close your eyes.
Don’t. Close. Your. Eyes.
