Blameless in Abaddon

Blameless in Abaddon by James Morrow Page A

Book: Blameless in Abaddon by James Morrow Read Free Book Online
Authors: James Morrow
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction
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disintegrating, despite the efforts of His keepers and their Lockheed 7000. Jerusalem’s walls are crumbling, Eden’s trees are dying, the Euphrates has become a sewer, the maggots shall inherit His meat. Luckily, our Creator constructed reality with an eye to His ultimate departure. He filled the universe with self-sustaining miracles. Long after He and I are gone, the great geophysical processes will continue yielding earthquakes and volcanoes, the vicissitudes of biology will bring forth multiple sclerosis and cancer, and the perversities of human nature will keep rape and murder in the headlines.
    The one person to whom I have difficulty lying is myself, and in all candor I must admit I became obsolete long before I became mortal. Oh, how I long for that era when my Creator wasn’t comatose and people consulted me as frequently as they now see psychiatrists, Mafia godfathers, and other members of the helping professions; that golden age when Madame de Montespan, Louis XIV’s mistress, implored me to render the queen sterile so the king’s attentions might be wholly fixed on her; that bygone time when the nuns of Loudon hired me to help them release their pent-up sexual frustrations. I don’t want your sympathy, friends. I don’t want your understanding. I merely want to be taken as seriously by you as Santa Claus is taken by your children.
    Â 
    â€œStation three: the Cooling Chamber,” said Kimberly as the tram reached the end of the Corridor of the Cured. “Please watch your step.”
    The tour guide led Group C through a terminal decorated with a facsimile of Donatello’s bronze
David
and a reproduction of Leonardo’s
Last Supper
, then into a passenger elevator so roomy it accommodated the entire party, wheelchairs and all.
    â€œTwo thousand and eighty-four feet from here to the top,” said Kimberly, pushing a button. The door whooshed closed. Vibrating gently, the car shot heavenward. Three minutes later, it stopped. “All out, please.”
    Disembarking, Martin found himself atop a transparent Lucite plain. A larger-than-life facsimile of Michelangelo’s marble
Pietà
loomed over the pilgrims. Beyond the
Pietà
stretched a meandering footpath bordered by flower boxes abloom with daffodils and hyacinths. Every six feet, a neon arrow lay embedded in the polymer, blinking bright red as it pointed the visitor toward the next checkpoint on his trek across the Main Attraction.
    â€œAs befits a journey so intimate, your meeting with the Godform will be entirely self-directed,” said Kimberly. “Allow forty minutes for the complete circuit. Seven private chapels, three rest rooms, and a dozen snapshot opportunities are located along the way.” She glanced at her Twelve Disciples wristwatch. “I’ll expect you back at this statue no later than five-thirty.”
    Sneaking up behind him, Corinne seized Martin’s hand, entwining their fingers in a fleshy knot. “You’d better follow this path alone, darling,” she said. “A pagan’s presence might annoy Him.”
    â€œYou think so?” he asked, reverently brushing the marble Madonna’s left knee.
    â€œLet’s not take any chances. You never know.”
    â€œYou never know.”
    He started away, walking west across the Main Attraction’s left nipple, then north along His sternum. There wasn’t much to see. Pausing atop the frosted polymer, he directed his gaze through a hundred feet of sub-zero air and focused on the divine chest, a hairy landscape rolling a thousand yards in all directions: compelling vistas, but their therapeutic value seemed nil. He kept moving north. Reaching the mouth, he discovered to his astonishment that God, like everyone else on the staff of Celestial City USA, was smiling. The fifty-yard rictus stretched ear to ear, pulpy lips pulled back to reveal teeth as white as Ivory soap, each the size of a refrigerator

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