Little excerpt from one of my darkest AU ideas yet that is totally not inspired by my own religious trauma, not even kind of, why would you say that?…
In the distance, a whippoorwill call echoes through the trees. The tall pines of Tennessee sway in the wind, their long needles brushing in a cacophony that sounded like the waves of the ocean had somehow found their way to the landlocked mountainside. The sunset encroached on the horizon, clouds in shades of orange, yellow, red, and pink swirling like flames dancing on the grass of Appalachia’s tallest hills.
Hidden away, deep in the wood, rests an old church. The old walls creak and groan with the spring wind, like the voices of the ancestors whispering through the gale. In the center of it all, rested in a church pew, sat a man. Not much older than a boy, he rested with his quivering hands clenched in prayer, his knuckles turning white as tears dripped from his wide brown eyes and stained his blue jeans.
“Daddy, you’ve gotta help me,” he pleads with a man who can’t answer, “Father, I need your strength.” He doesn’t know which father he’s speaking to.
“By your grace, Lord, please give me the will to preach your word and guide these people to your light so they will know the warmth of your light,” he whispers, his voice hoarse and war-torn, “Please show me the warmth of your light, Lord.”
“Lord, be my shepherd and reveal to me the path you’ve chosen for me, for every man has a purpose, Lord, and a destiny you’ve chosen for them,” he shakes as he pleads, the words of his mother’s last whispered prayers echoing around his head as he pleads with a God who has never answered, “Carve out the sin and cast the devil from my heart, let your love fill my soul and let me be bathed in the blood of Jesus, Lord, for I am devoting my life to you.”
Over top of his Momma’s bible, notes written in the margins, his father’s gold crucifix hanging from his neck, he breaks open with one final whispered plea, “Please tell me you can hear me, God.” And with that, he descends into a chorus of sobs.
