Bleating Off - 6. Good Mood Gone Bad

He sat in a smoking charred heap, wrapped in a blanket. Reverend Pat Graham wiped at his face with a ragged end of the blanket. He'd wrapped in the blanket in an attempt to cover his shame, grossly bloated belly above the narrow ribbon straps of the red thong he wore, but was unsuccessful.

Debris from his office was strewn across the snowdrifts on the bald prairie.

He noticed the necklace belonging to the latest young man who'd come to him for counseling. The chain of gold held a rainbow cross and lay inches from where the front door to the worship hall had been. At least remembering the boy's ministrations were a pleasant diversion from the pastor's present misery.

He was one of those who'd cried out that God was punishing the east coast with hurricane Sandy, because of all the homosexuals....

He ruffled what hair he retained from the savage attack, to brush off accumulated snow. This combined with dust from soot, and that little dab of styling gel he always used, gave the concoction in his hair the texture of ranch salad dressing.

He sat shaking his head in misery. Just a few days ago, as that storm still lay offshore, he was positive the sun could shine no brighter on him. His television ratings were through the roof. If contributions had continued to rise, he could have easily afforded that lodge outside of Casper.

Well then, what had taken place here?

~•~

Right before 6:00 the phone had rung.

"Church of the Sacred Three in One. Patrick Graham speaking." The preacher sat behind a formidable gold trimmed turn of the 19^th century mahogany writing desk, with the reproduction empire style telephone nestled between his abundant jowl, and shoulder.

"Mr. Graham. You definitely don't know me, yet you have been telling everyone how I am responsible for that hurricane."

'Who was this guy.’

"All I have said, over and over is ‘The Lord remembers his beloved, and those that continue to turn from the right path shall perish’. If you live on the east coast, you are feeling the wrath of god, because you continue to provide a safe haven for gays and lesbians.”

“I guess ‘time’s up then, hmm?” The caller asked.

“Huh,” was all the reverend could muster before the room around him filled with a blinding light, and the sound of fearsome trumpets. The sounds and brightness magnified. Patrick clinched shut his eyes and pressed hands over his ears to no avail. It seemed the sound and light was inside him as well.

The floor beneath the reverend began to vibrate, whether from the sound or from some outside attack the preacher was unsure. Above the cacophony of the trumpets Patrick heard as well as felt the rending of stone and timber. Through the blinding, almost searing brightness the man watched as first the roof mushroom upward in its destruction, followed rapidly with the pixilation of the building’s stone walls.

The room’s furnishings: the desk, chairs and even the wood plank floors evaporated dumping Patrick Graham onto cold gritty concrete.

“Oh mighty god and savior,” the man was shaken to his core. “Deliver me from the horror which is afflicting me.

Help me to recover that which has been taken from me, and I ask that you smite those who have caused my torment.

Amen!”

He eked open one eyelid. The light and sound had ceased. Snow was accumulating on the concrete slab around him, and onto the smoke grey sharkskin blazer he wore. His fox and ermine great coat lay in a heap on the slab where the brass and mahogany coat rack had stood. He attempted to sit up in order to fetch it.

Thunder boomers sounded in the distance. The falling snow obscured the man’s vision. He couldn’t see them, but lightening strikes loomed closer. He saw brightness to his left, then his right, followed in quick succession by sizzles and the great booms of eminent thunder.

There was a blinding flash, then blackness.

~•~

He seemed to have blacked out.

He awoke to spinning blue lights. He was laid out on a stretcher. Two men loaded him into the back of an ambulance.

“Looks like the end of the world back there.” The one man said as he climbed in beside the reverend.

“Would not want to have been there an hour ago.” The other man said before he shut the rear doors.

The first man took the exposed wrist and began to check the patient’s blood pressure. He glanced at the nearly naked figure on the stretcher beside him and said:

“The lord really does work in mysterious ways,” and snickered.