The Wrathful Grave

            The rains fell through the night and into the early morning. The normal bright sunrise was concealed in the black clouds of the storm. The rain washed down in thick sheets as if a great damn had burst in the sky and water was cresting over its invisible ledge. The thunder rolled through the sky as lightening flickered and illuminated the evil grin of the dark clouds swirling. The rancor was enough to keep Father Jessup awake through the entirety of the storm. Although it was less the storm outside that was keeping him from sleep.

            He sat near the chapel windows, watching the rain wash through the cemetery on the grounds. He saw the wreaths and flowers and items placed on the headstones being washed away towards the road and out of town. The rains had become a river of sorrow it seemed. He wished he had been able do something about it but the rains would have carried him off as well. He wondered if anyone would notice his absence. His flock was nearly all gone except for the few huddled in the rectory, hoping the storm wouldn’t take their small shacks away. Father Jessup knew the shacks were already gone, washed away in the muddy rivers of rainwater. This town was gone. It would be smote like so many wicked cities before it.

            The morning sun couldn’t penetrate the thick dark, roiling clouds overhead and Father Jessup went around the chapel lighting candles to try and clear some of the gloom. The thunder rattled the rafters and he felt the building shake. The small flames on the candles flickered wildly and cast eerie shadows on the walls. Father Jessup swallowed hard and began to pray out of habit. He knew the chapel was well built, but even this rain was worse than the one in 1887. That storm nearly washed the chapel away; it only moved it about six feet though. Some of the townsfolk back then called it a miracle but Father Jessup knew that the stones along the west side of the chapel had turned into a break and caused the chapel to become anchored in the mud. It wasn’t a miracle, simply a stroke of luck of the contours of the landscape.

            The wind howled and rattled the small chapel and the bell in the tower started to clang in the strong gusts. It was an irregular clanging that also sounded off-key. Father Jessup hoped the bell would survive. It had come all the way from Chicago and cost the townspeople a lot. It would be such a shame to see it ruined. Father Jessup looked up toward the high chapel ceiling for any rain leaking in or areas where the shingles might have blown off but everything looked okay. There was only the creaking of the wood against the winds.

            Father Jessup crossed the short chapel aisle and kneeled before the altar as was his habit and ritual. He turned toward the opposite side to light those candles when a giant clap of thunder boomed overhead and it made Father Jessup duck between the pews. He through the roof was going to collapse on him at that moment. He thought that perhaps it should. He’d lost his flock when the gold mining stopped. He had been drinking too much and had fallen in love with the banker’s daughter, Karen. He didn’t feel much like a priest anymore and wasn’t sure he wanted to. He had become bored with the life devoted to God.

            He had a hard time with a God that didn’t seem to really care about the suffering of the hungry, the sick, the poor or the lost. He wanted something more and thought that maybe God’s plan for him involved the beautiful Karen and a life outside the confines of this biblical coffin.

            Father Jessup poked his head up from between the pews and realized the roof wasn’t coming down on him. It was still standing, sturdy and strong. He sighed and pulled himself up. He felt ashamed for his doubts but he knew something had to change. He was filled with sadness that neither bible, nor drink seemed to cure. It was no wonder his flock had left him. He wasn’t very pleasant to be around and his homilies had become very angry. He felt a sense of loyalty and duty to this chapel and the town and couldn’t bring himself to quit. Which is what he knew in his heart was what he wanted. Even if the fair Karen didn’t feel the same for him, he knew that he couldn’t go on in this way.

            He lit the last of the candles and crossed back over toward the window that faced the cemetery. He looked out and saw the rain water had caused some of the caskets to become exposed and they were beginning to float along on the river of rain. It was as if the dead were coming back to the surface, and there were so many. The flu had taken a lot of the people, the mines took more, the rich got away with murder and the poor had no chance. All of them were now exposed and free from the dirt and were sailing through the flood, following the offerings that once decorated the headstones out of town.

            “Even the dead won’t stay here,” said Father Jessup.

            Thunder rolled overhead and Father Jessup decided that if the storm passed, and the chapel still stood, he would follow his heart and resign his ordination, make Karen his wife and move somewhere special. It was his only chance at happiness amid the flood of misery that polluted this once lively town. Lightening flashed overhead and revealed the river of dead, floating out of town. A casket lid had smashed open against one of the headstones in the flash flood and flipped the casket upwards. The skeleton corpse inside the now open casket was pointing; pointing right at Father Jessup. He felt his heart in his chest leap to his throat and a wave of fear possessed him. He stepped closer to the window however, to make sure the vision was real. He pressed his face against the glass. The upright casket still stood and the withered hand still pointed outward. The lightening crackled again and the emptying graveyard was bathed in a flash. The wind swirled and howled and what seemed originally to be a pointing skeleton finger was now a beckoning call to join the macabre parade of death.

            The casket fell back over onto its side with a splintering creak and was swept away in the torrent following the rest of the washed out dead. Father Jessup sat back in a pew and knew what it meant. He was meant to follow and never return. He stood from the pew and removed his priestly collar. He kissed it and placed it on the altar. He turned from the crucifix and headed toward the chapel doors. Thunder rumbled above as Jessup opened the chapel doors and stepped out in to the rain.