Men Playing God

8

For the first time ever, I am typing a blog post in a public place. I am in the school computer lab with a few other students. The mood reeks of Friday debauchery and cheap cologne.

The guy closest to me has a colorful jacket, and baby locks with a bead tied against the front most dread lock, at the forehead. He looks hangover but I’m not judging.

You see, I messed up. I misread my timetable and thought my class was at 9am instead of 11am. So when I arrived and entered my class rather casually, malignant glares were thrown my way by a bunch of old looking engineering students and their lecturer. It was awkward, to be honest.

I exited slowly wishing the ground would swallow me, and came straight to the lab to type something and pass time.

**

The theatre lights were shining brightly upon her face and she felt like she was in heaven, or the road to it. She imagined that in a few seconds, she would see the pearly gates.

She had not seen the lorry as she was overtaking on the single carriageway. It had come out of the thin air to end her life. She had tried to swerve her way out of the lorry’s path but was too late. The lorry had already rammed into her frontal.

All she had thought about in that split second of death was the life inside her. The little young thing she called Dennis. She had thought about all the dark nights she had talked alone in her room like a lunatic, talking to Dennis. How in most mornings, Dennis would kick and kick and kick like he wanted to get out and meet her. She had thought only about Dennis as she swerved.

In the distance, she heard muffled voices talking hastily and the clinking of metals. She thought that maybe, just maybe, she was in heaven and God was preparing her a meal. But God surely doesn’t invite you into heaven by saying, “Count backwards from 10 till 0.”

She couldn’t remember getting to zero; she’d barely got to five when everything went dark.

When she came to, God was there again, this time clearer, and with a white robe on. He told her that they did everything they could but the baby – Baby Dennis – could not make it; they chose to save her instead. He continued to tell her other things that really, to her, didn’t matter.

All she knew was that she couldn’t live without Dennis. She would rather have died too.

She sat up and spat on God’s face.

Quickfire is a section where we will write short, ruminative stories. Quickfire will have no more than 300 words. Quickfire articles will be posted at least once a week. Quickfire is an escape for long articles about nothing. Quickfire will not waste your time. And finally, Quickfire’s purpose is to make you think about life beyond the box. Thank you, and Happy New Year.