One by J. A. Laraque

happened to you can be dealt with. It's not something you just adapt to. Even with what I saw firsthand I know the wound will never close, it will never heal, no matter what your family does. Maybe I should end this and just tell you…”
    It just stopped, what she was telling me didn’t make sense. She talked about what happened between Jonathan and me, but she should have known that I never blamed her for that. I searched her computer looking for anything to help make sense of her e-mail. After my father’s death I remember not seeing anyone for a few days, but she made it sound as if I had gone away for a long time.
    There was more now than just finding out where everyone was. I had to find out what Christine was talking about. She mentioned her parents as well as my mother asking her to stay away, mom would never do that. She often bugged me about not spending enough time with Christine so to try and keep her from me just didn’t add up. Maybe from her point of view I was too quick to accept what had happened. After she lost her grandmother Christine wasn’t the same for months. If she saw something in me based on how she thought one should grieve then perhaps that could explain some of it.
    If there was a reason for me being left alone then what Christine wrote had to be it. Nothing in her room would help me find an answer. The only thing I could do was search for the truth and pray that one answer would lead me to the other.
    In the absence of faith
    The absent of emotion can bring clarity, but one cannot understand the truth of a situation without first understanding the emotion. Christine said those words one night sitting on her bed watching zombie movies. I argued that in dire circumstances it was the irrational side effect of emotion that was the ultimate downfall of the people involved. She believed that while uncontrolled emotion could lead to panic and illogical decisions, it is also emotion, coupled with the will to live that led those who fought to survive, to survive.
    I never advocated being void of emotion, I asked for rational thoughts that would lead to rational decisions. What was the rational thought? I asked myself that as I continued searching the room. Stopping to smell the nightgown Christine wore to sleep, there was no way I could remove the emotional component from what I was experiencing.
    A world emptied of all life, it was not rational, and it was not possible. If I continued to focus on how everything around me was impossible then I would never be able to discover what Christine talked about in her letter to me.
    The best thing, I decided at that moment, was to try to find out if anyone else was left behind. Before any questions about my past could be answered I had to discover the truth of my present situation.
    I left the knife behind, left Christine’s home, and returned to my motorcycle. The air felt even colder than before and the sky seemed to darken even though it was not yet three o’clock. I looked at to the sky, I wondered if the military was monitoring Chicago from space, but that would be on the assumption that this phenomenon was localized.
    I started my motorcycle and took notice of how loud the sound of it was and how quiet my surrounding was. I decided to head back down North Avenue, east toward Clark Street. I could see the fire continuing to spread onto Wieland Street. I had my next destination in sight. Moody Memorial Church, across from the history museum it was the first and last church I ever went to. A towering monument to irrational thoughts and beliefs, if there were people left behind it would be there they would have found sanctuary.
     
     
     
     
    I climbed the steps of the church and could not help but stare at the architecture. Romanesque, I believe that is what they called it. I had a better word, extravagant. The red brick and custom stained-glass was not a monument to God’s love, but a golden calf signifying greed, vanity and false hope. I remembered