Antioch in Ruins

Prologue

The sex had been good, great really, and that was why Chael Lucian sat in his recliner watching as his slashed wrists bled out onto the floor beneath him. Suicide: the resolution to great sex. It wasn’t as though he had nothing going for him, nor was it that no one loved him. He had her after all. Though technically, he didn’t have her anymore. He hadn’t had her since he’d stuck his dick in Alyce Kregger. The first night he met Alyce, she had told him that she was incapable of feeling “mortal love.” He hadn’t been looking for love then, he already had it. Her love.

“I’m the closest thing you’ll come to fucking the anti-christ,” Alyce had told him that first night, as she had slid black painted nails down his pants to feel him up in the middle of the dance floor. He had hardly noticed. Chicken Feed had a way of getting to his head, taking away that part of him that reminded him he was taken. That night, with a methamphetamine haze clouding his eyes, he hadn’t remembered about her. He could only remember the half naked girl with the hard nipples and the raging hard on that was urging him into motion.

Alyce had lured him into a spare room, occupied until she’d kicked out the kids who’d been groping each other, too afraid to do any more. She’d pushed him down onto the bed, stripped off her clothes with amazing speed and sat on his stomach, looking down at him. Her stern eyes stared at him as she had laid it down for him. “I love only one, and that is Lucifer, my God.” He remembered being slightly intrigued. Lucifer, that was a change of pace. “I won’t ever love you, but I’d still love to fuck you.”

And that was how he had met Alyce.

It had started out as nothing. Just a memory tugging at the back of his mind after a hangover. But that’s the thing with drugs, once you’ve tried it, you’re addicted. Alyce Kregger was Chael’s secret addiction. She’d given him the choice to walk away once, the second time he’d seen her. It was at the same house he always partied at. He had wondered if she would be there. She’d sought him out, through the strobe lights and the heart stopping bass of the music. She’d yelled to him over the noise, asked him if he wanted to fuck. He thought about saying no, because he had someone who loved him, but he was drawn to Alyce and her scent.

Guilt became less and less with every visit he made to Alyce. And with every visit, Alyce never ceased to intrigue him further. He learned quickly that she had a fetish for crosses. On his fourth visit, she had smeared a cross on her forehead with ash and told him that she was saying “fuck off” to God. On his seventh visit, she’d coaxed him into cutting his palms and rubbing the blood on her breasts. And through all her new ideas, Chael just sat back and let it happen. Alyce was the best fuck he ever had, no matter what she made him do.

When the woman who loved him had found out about what he had been doing behind her back, he’d lost her. They had fought over Alyce. “She worships the devil!” she had screamed. “Do you know what you’ve done? You’ve jeopardized your place in paradise!” He’d yelled that there was no paradise and there was no God. He’d screamed at her that Christianity was created by a bunch of old men sitting around a table, making up an imaginary friend because they felt lonely and lost. She had packed her things then and there. He fought with himself to not say anything. He tried to convince himself that he wanted her to go, because then there would be no guilt at all with Alyce. But he couldn’t. There was love there, love that would never be with Alyce.

“I’m not a bad person,” he’d whispered from his place in the corner of the room. He’d sunk to the floor, staring at the opposite wall, wishing that he could simply choose. But he hadn’t noticed the way his whisper had made her stop and stare at him. He hadn’t noticed the way her eyes glazed with unshed tears. He only noticed when she knelt beside him and rubbed a hand down his cheek.

“You need help,” she whispered. “Help I can’t give you. Please, Chael, for me, for yourself, for God…please just get help.”

“I don’t believe in God.”

“Do you believe in us?” He’d paused.

“Maybe some day…”

She kissed him then, lightly on the cheek, but she’d kissed him. “Get help,” she whispered in his ear before standing up and walking out of his life. He hadn’t seen her since. He hadn’t even called her until this very morning, when he’d woken up next to Alyce and his eyes had met those of the Virgin Mary who’d stared at him from across the room, where several burnt crosses had been laid at her feet. He’d stared into those porcelain eyes for an hour, feeling the defaced crucifixes boring down onto him from around the room. He felt dirty then. Dirty in a sense he’d never felt since meeting Alyce. He’d gotten up, gotten dressed, and drove back to his apartment. He’d called her, to see if she was still at her parents’ house, but he only got the answering machine. Sunday, they were at church. The machine had clicked and he realized he didn’t know what type of message to leave. So he’d just said goodbye.

There was no escaping Alyce now. There was no escaping the drugs, the sex, the religion. He had sat down in his chair and realized that he was trapped. So he’d taken a razor to his wrists. It didn’t hurt that much, he had a fresh batch of crystal meth to ease the pain. It only added to the light headedness.

Chael Lucian was dying and he knew it. He thought of Alyce, wondered if she could somehow find it in her heart to miss him. He had, after all, been her fuck buddy for two months. But he knew that she would probably find someone else. She’d wait a couple days, sure, but then she’d scope out some other pathetic druggie to fuck. He thought about his parents and how, if they were alive, they’d be so ashamed of him. He thought about the people at work, and how they’d be pissed because he’d missed another shift. They wouldn’t bother calling, because he missed shifts all the time. He wondered if any of them would miss him, but he doubted it.

And then he thought about her. Through glazed eyes, he could almost make out her face. He could almost feel her hands touching the sides of his face, hands like silk. Somewhere, behind the slowing beat of his heart, he heard her voice. It was almost frantic and he wondered what had happened that would make her so upset. He tried to frown and reach out to her, but he found he couldn’t move. And then there was darkness.

He woke up once to see intervals of light passing over head of him. A face leaned over him, the mouth moving, but no sound came to his ears. Then he knew nothing again until he woke once more on a bed. His body hurt, shook uncontrollably. He felt as though his head would explode and realized that his arms were tied to the bed. He tried to struggle, but a sharp pain sent him once more into oblivion.

A voice called his name. In between awakening and the darkness, there was a flash of a place. A place barred off with gates and ivy. It was pink and blurry, but he could hear laughter, joy. A voice told him he’d never know this place, never know ultimate joy, paradise.

Then suddenly, he was awake. Chael’s blue eyes focused and he realized he was staring at a ceiling. It was painted a pale lime green. He didn’t like it. He heard a constant beeping and when he turned his head to the side, he found that it was a heart monitor. He was in a hospital. He frowned, trying to remember what had happened. He remembered Alyce, waking up beside her, covered in blood and fluids. Then he remembered Mary’s eyes, the eyes of a virgin. He suddenly felt sick.

The door to his hospital room opened and Chael peeked at the newcomer with one eye. He realized there were two newcomers and he recognized one of them. His eyes instantly snapped open as he took her in. The blonde hair, the lean frame, the pink puckered lips. He recognized her perfume, a fruity smell. She wore a blue blouse that fit her well. Their eyes met for a moment, but he didn’t get a chance to say anything.

“Well, Mr. Lucian,” the second visitor said. Chael realized it was a doctor. “You’re lucky. You’ve managed to make it through the most severe withdrawal symptoms while you were asleep. It should all be uphill from here. Do you remember what happened?” Chael shook his head slightly, wondering why he couldn‘t concentrate on what the doctor was saying. “This fine young woman found you in your apartment near death, Mr. Lucian. Suicide attempts are a serious matter. Expect another doctor to come in here and take an evaluation of your mental health. Until then, I’ll let you two visit for a few minutes, but then I think Mr. Lucian really should get some rest.”

She nodded as the doctor left the room, then slowly made her way over to the bed. He looked up at her. She had been crying, he could tell by the way her cheeks were red. He knew all too well what she looked like when she cried, he realized. “Chael…” she fought to find words to say.

He tried to say her name, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t bring himself to say anything to her. He’d let her down, he’d destroyed everything that was good in his life. He found tears coming to his eyes but he didn’t have the courage to wipe them away. He needed Alyce. That was one drug the doctor hadn’t helped him fight against.

She sat down on the bed and one of her hands wrapped around his. He tried to pull away but she held on to it. A tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m going to help you,” she whispered.

Her name bit at his tongue, urging him to spit it out. His tears welled up, threatening to spill, but they were stubborn and wouldn’t come until he said her name. But he couldn’t. After everything he’d done, the drugs, the betrayal, the sex, Alyce. After all of it, he questioned whether he was still capable of real emotions. But now she was here, stroking his hand gently, letting him know that she wasn’t leaving this time, and he began to realize that she was real. Looking into her eyes, he could only see the eyes of the statue of Mary. A virgin, watching him with sorrow, but not hating him. She could never hate him, not matter what mistakes he had made. He’d always have her love.

“Eve,” he whispered her name in such a quiet voice he could hardly hear it himself. More tears spilled from her eyes and as he said her name a second time, louder, his own tears let go of their hold on his eyes to cascade down his cheeks with a torrent of sobs. She wrapped her arms around him, cradling his head.

“I’m here,” she whispered. “I’m here.”

And she was, here to stay.