15 For 15 Entries ~ January 2011

Jan. 13 ~ RUIN

Oh God, please. Please don’t let this happen. Magdeline’s lips moved as the plea replayed for the hundredth time in her mind. She shivered inside the bolt-lengths of scratchy lace and tulle wound round her, cinched at all the places she hoped to have curves, one day.

Sounds from inside the cathedral reached her unwilling ears. A man with a mouse-like face appeared at the doors, a sudden gust of wind lifting his toupee and the hem of Magdeline’s dress.

“It’s time. Your groom awaits.”

No!

Magdeline turned her face away, towards the snowcapped mountain peaks surrounding the church. I’ll do anything, she whispered again, anything. Please God…

She felt a tug at her arm. The mouse man had a knarled hand on her. She stumbled forward, regained her posture, and entered the church to the tremor of organ music.

No father would walk her down the aisle. No mother had dressed her today. Her wretched benefactor stood in the first pew facing the alter, facing her future husband. And he, Antoine, a man old enough to be her father, smiled at him with smug satisfaction. He nodded, then his steely gaze moved down the aisle to Magdeline.

There was a rumble, barely audible above the music, that grew with each passing second. The ground trembled beneath Magdeline’s feet, and she stopped, just feet from the church’s rear doors. With the violence of an explosion, the church shook. Women screamed. Men shielded their families with their bodies. And the vaulted ceiling beams gave way. Within minutes, an eery silence reigned.

Magdeline stared in horror at the rubble before her. She jumped at a voice behind her.

“Shall we go?”

A man with an angular face and perfect moustache extended his hand to her. Instincts pulled her back, toward the rubble. He laughed at her, a sound that chilled her blood.

“You got what you wanted, my dear. And now I will too.”

She stared at him, uncomprehending.

“ ' Oh please, God, please. I ‘ll do anything…' ” He seemed to be enjoying himself.

“You…?” Magdeline stammered. “You, I – I wasn't praying to you.” Her heart slammed in her chest.

“You said ‘God’ but you never specified.” His voice was melted butter, gone rancid.

Magdeline shivered. “No. No, I don’t believe you.”

He looked past her, and then a muffled groan sounded from underneath the rubble. He smiled at her. “As you wish.”

The thought crossed her mind before she could stop it, an image of Antoine broken, injured, an invalid, in her care for the rest of her life. And she didn’t want that. He, the man in front of her, began to laugh again. He raised his hand and a ceiling beam that dangled from the roof fell to the pile below it. The groan was extinguished.

He put out his hand. she hesitated, and then a tear raced down Magdeline’s cheek as she placed her hand in his. Searing heat scorched her skin, and she began to scream.