Forgive Me, Father

            My feet splashed through the rain puddles as I hurried down the city street. People of all different varieties ignored me, determined to get to their own destinations. “Excuse me,” I said as I plowed through a man and woman whose hands were interlocked. They scoffed and looked annoyed for a moment, but then continued on with their own lives and problems. That’s the thing about humans, we spend the majority of our time thinking about ourselves.

            I crossed quickly at the intersection, relieved to see the church in sight. My black dress was soaked from the rain. There was no hope for appearing presentable. Before I could stop myself, I thought of what my mother would say if she was there. It would most definitely start with an exasperated sigh, followed by the use of “Alexandra.” If there was a soundtrack of my life it would consist of my mother’s frustration.

            I felt a hot, searing pain in my ankles as I trudged up the stone steps of the old, Catholic church. My black dress shoes were too small. In hindsight, I probably should have gotten a new pair of shoes. It had been a long time since I was in a church, and I had forgotten that you had to look nice, especially for funerals.

            I entered through the old church doors, yanking with all my might as I remembered having to do when I was young. The door gave more easily than I expected and I was thrown a little off balance. As soon as I stepped inside my distant relatives swarmed me, gushing over how well I was keeping myself together. They were running their fingers through my rain-dampened hair, squeezing my shoulders. To be quite honest they were making me uncomfortable. The sight was overwhelming. They were all dressed in black and wearing sunglasses. They didn’t know anything about me and I really needed to get out of there.

            We proceeded inside the vaguely familiar church. My great aunt had ushered me to the first row, pulling me along with her bony, wrinkled hands. I turned my neck slightly so I could see all the people filing in. There must have been hundreds of people filing in through the doors, keeping the noise level on a respectable mute. Their whispers echoed against the church walls, making it seem as if the place was haunted.

Out of nowhere a small black bird zoomed into the church, its wings fluttering loudly. I was surprised to find that I was the only one to notice. It spurred around for a few seconds and then landed on a ceiling beam. Its neck twitched a bit, and then his beady eyes landed on me. I immediately felt myself cringe in response. He knew.

            The priest entered from the back door along with two boys a little younger than me. I vaguely recalled that they were altar servers. The old man began to talk, and he immediately addressed me as the sole relative, trying to lock eyes with mine. I slowly lifted my head to meet his, and then quickly turned away. My great aunt put her hand on my knee, thinking that human contact would be soothing. It wasn’t.

           I had avoided the priest because I had committed a sin. I didn’t believe in him. I didn’t believe in the communions, confirmations, marriages, last rites, or any of the other sacraments. I certainly didn’t believe in heaven and hell. But most importantly, I didn’t believe in an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent super- being that puts humans through hard times for reasons only he knows.

            I knew it was a horrible thought in the time of death, but what if life was just life? People were born just like all the other organisms on this planet. They were created to mature to adulthood, reproduce, and die. There doesn’t have to be some place to go after death where everyone can bask in eternity if you made some good choices in your life. Dead friends and relatives weren’t watching from above, guiding others down on earth.

            The truth was that heaven is an incentive. If someone could get through the rollercoaster of life without throwing up on the guy next to them, they could go to heaven. That made hell the punishment for that unfortunate soul who got nauseous on the cork-screw and felt the need to “toss his cookies.”

Of course there were exceptions. There were always those guys who rock the cart, or the ones that knowingly eat a corndog with extra mustard right before. Those people were just asking for it.

            The idea that really made me question God was those oblivious people who got on the ride. They thought that rollercoasters went up, down, and did a few turns here and there. They didn’t have a clue about the motion sickness or whiplash. They certainly didn’t know about the fear. It wasn’t their fault that they threw up.

            The fact was that whether they threw up or not, they still get off the ride in the end. Both good and bad people die. The guy pushing the start button doesn’t really have that much power because once he pushes it, the rest is up to the riders and the path they are on. If there was a God out there, the riders weren’t his responsibility.

            I had thought about all of this while the very old priest was reading some very old words written in a very old book that told stories about some very old people. I looked around and saw that the people that were supposedly my relatives were shedding tears. My great aunt had kept her hand on my knee, creating a clammy warmness. The black bird was still there, its eyes fixed on me. With more inspection I noticed that his black wings were speckled with grey while his beak was sharp and shiny.  He let out a single, high-pitched chirp.

            My neck began to sweat, the drops slowly accumulating underneath my dark hair. Even though I knew what I believed in, I felt guilty about the lie. I was sitting there with all those people, pretending to believe that my mother was in a better place. But she wasn’t. Her ride was done, the safety bar was lifted up, and she had gotten off.

            “And now, I think Alexandra would like to say a few words,” the priest said somberly, gesturing to me.

            I got up slowly, legs shaking a little. I reached into a small pocket in my dress and felt my hands enclose on the wrinkled piece of paper which supposedly described who my mother was and the life that she had led. It felt like hours before I reached the priest, slowly putting one cramped foot in front of the other. He patted me on the back and gave me an empathetic smile.

            I turned to face the people who knew my mother or knew people who knew my mother. I looked down at my paper, ready to speak, when the black bird began chirping. The sound was piercing and repetitive, yet no one seemed to notice.

            The priest gave me a nod of encouragement. I cleared my throat and opened my mouth again, the words on the tip of my tongue. Suddenly the black bird flew right to my head. Its talons scraped my shoulder and I let out a scream.

            My scream echoed against the walls and was amplified by the high ceiling. People in the audience jumped, and a few even ran towards me.

            “It’s okay, honey, it’s okay. God only knows what you’re going through,” a woman that I didn’t recognize said. They all began saying similar things, some ushering me back to my seat. It suddenly occurred to me that none of them were talking about the bird. Surely they must have seen it. As they pulled me forward, I glanced around looking for where it flew off to. It was nowhere in sight.

            I glanced down at my shoulder where I had felt the hot pain of flesh tearing open. There were no marks there at all.