Marylin's Revenge

I sat quietly in the pew of the broken-down church, listening to the priest fresh out of college preach yet another cult like sermon. It’d been almost a year since the end of the world had gone into full swing, and many months of Jeremiah manipulating his flock since Father Clayton’s death.

Jeremiah had been Clayton’s protégé of sorts, taking over the church for Clayton in his stead, his son not willing to carry the torch. Before Jeremiah had become drunk with power, the church had been a safe space to hide. Four walls, heavy doors, lots of supplies, and everyone was accepted. It’d seemed like a mini oasis in a world gone to shit…or as close to one as any of us were going to get.

"Do you see what happens when we do not listen to the words of God?" Jeremiah howled into the mostly empty church. There were only eight of us left to endure his babbling, as he strutted around in blood smattered clothes. "God came for the devout,” he continued, “and those who were not were shredded before our very eyes. Our fathers, our mothers...our children." His cold blue eyes wandered over to me as I clutched Marilyn's blood smeared heart shaped locket in my fist, gritting my teeth in anger as I anticipated his next words. "The unholy."

"And what would that make you, Jeremiah?" I asked, my insides vibrating with unbridled fury. "If you are so much better than the rest of us, how come you're still here?"

"Well, that's simple, Charlotte." Jeremiah smiled smugly as he slowly strolled up to me, our noses nearly touching. "I'm here to lead all the lost lambs back to God."

"Oh really? You think you're some messiah for us?" I could feel the venom threatening to burst through me like a canon. I wasn’t going to let this minister of deception continue to blind the good people left around me. He was an imposter, an embarrassment to the cloth and most of all an abomination…worse than the flesh thirsty ghouls who had taken over the land.

"Well, I'm not some homosexual like you, am I? The only reason you're still here is because you're a doctor.” Jeremiah chuckled, and I wanted so desperately to reach right out with my bare hands and choke the man. He stood up there as if he was some gift to us, some fearless leader, when he was just as scared as we were.

The invasion had provided him, however, with a way to hone his charismatic demeanor. It was easy to sway those who were pious, and he’d proclaimed certain folks were attracting the once human monsters to the church. He’d command them to push the ‘beacons’ out in the fray to be slaughtered, like sacrifices to appease the monsters outside. Anytime I closed my eyes, their cries still echoed in my ears as they were ripped apart, fodder for the beasts in the name of alleged salvation.

I wasn't about to let him shit on Marilyn's memory, nor insinuate I was some abhorrent leper left to toil until I suddenly forgot how to be gay. He had murdered innocent folks by proxy, getting easily duped folks to do his bidding. Plus, the man had had his own skeletons in his closet- and not just the apparent ones. The hypocritical, disgusting filth that lied deep beneath his fingernails he could never wash clean… and I had the proof in my other hand.

After the argument the night before on whether or not homosexuality was a sin, he’d argued against me, wanting to throw me outside like he had all the others who challenged him. Thankfully the remaining church members seemed to see through him and had stood their ground against him. I’d tried to look through his bible to prove my claim that there was nothing in there condemning homosexuality, and he snatched the book from my hands.

What he hadn’t noticed was the polaroid that had floated to the floor in the struggle.

"It couldn't be that you were luring teenage boys into the church, only to take advantage of them, would it?" I spat, his face turning to a gray pallor matching the dust that covered the altar behind him.

"It's not true, is it?" Henrietta Flashbarn asked, the librarian in our once sleepy town of Orchid.

"I- I would never do such a thing," he proclaimed indignantly. “I have only helped ya’ll walk your way back to God!”

"Just like you helped Marilyn?" I rebutted, "or maybe Matthew Hellman, Samantha Corrigan, Gwennie Farrow...and Elijah Cambridge." As the name Elijah was uttered, he looked around the room, the faces that once hung on his every word now full of uncertainty. Elijah had been one of the people to be cast out, a supposed 'mega sinner' that was a ‘beacon’ for the demons to return to us and feed.

"This lesbian is a diabolical presence trying to lead you away from me!" Jeremiah insisted. "I am your salvation, your key to finding God now so when you finally leave this mortal coil, you achieve eternal life! Not some wretch who openly denies God everyday with her lifestyle!"

"Then explain this," I snapped, holding the polaroid in my hand of Elijah-Jonah's son- being abused. I held it up high so everyone could see, and the people of the church began to murmur and gasp in horror.

"That's simply not true! That's not me!" Jeremiah argued, his voice prickled with fear.

"You ain't God, Jeremiah Jessop, but you sure as hell convinced enough people you were someone to follow," old man Jonah Cambridge yelled. He spit his chaw into a nearby trashcan, his boot spurs jingling as he approached Jeremiah who quaked in panic. "That's why you pushed my Elijah out the door, isn't it? That's why you killed my boy, hiding your abuse! Is it the same for Marylin, Matt, Gwen and Sammy?!" His eyes welled up with tears as his brain made the connection, the realization overwhelming him. "He tried to tell us, but you convinced everyone else he was possessed...then you threw him out to the zom-"

"He was in with the demons as well, that was not a lie Mister Cambridge. He was a beacon for these creatures to keep coming back here!"

"What about the picture, father?" Jonah asked.

"That picture is not me, but a malevolent spirit taking my form!"

"Cut the shit," I replied, shaking my head in disgust. "The only monster in this room is you!"

"Is that so?" he said, approaching me from his perch on the lengthy, white altar he leaned against. "I'm not a non-believer like you, Charlotte. I follow the words of Christ..."

"You're a pedophile, which in my eyes makes you the devil in the room. You can preach all you want that being gay is a sin, but Jesus wouldn’t have cared. He was a loving and caring being, not some maniac who made himself judge, jury and executioner amidst a crisis.” As I walked closer to the quivering worm, adrenaline thundered through my veins. I wasn’t about to back down from the monster before me, letting this post-apocalyptic David Koresh wannabe fill my remaining neighbors’ heads with bullshit. And I certainly wasn't going to let Marilyn's death be in vain. Another ‘beacon’, so he claimed. Enticing me to abandon the lord and indulge in my impure thoughts.

"She's got a point, Jeremy," Maddox spoke up, Pastor Clayton’s son. He was smoking his last cigarette as he leaned in the corner, staring out the window. "Way I sees it, you're a false prophet. A wannabe demagogue wanting us to believe your horseshit…and we did for a spell. My father never turned anyone away for any reason, never judged nobody. Unlike you he was a good man, and so were the people you fed to the beasts. Now that I think about it, it’s kind of convenient you’re here and he’s not…”

Jeremiah sunk away from us all, backing towards the marble altar as the three of us closed in on him.

"Stay back!" he yelled, grabbing a golden candle holder from behind him, waving wildly in our faces. Jonah shook his head and ripped the sconce out of his hand, throwing it across the room. The metal clattering as it skittered across the concrete floor.

"What should we do with him, Jonah?" Maddox asked as we loomed over him.

"Well, it's getting dark, isn't it?" Jonah said picking Jeremiah up by his collar. "I reckon we put him outside where he belongs.”

"NOOOOO!" Jeremiah wailed in protest as we dragged him kicking and screeching towards the boarded up double doors of the church. Jonah took his bolo tie off and hog tied the priests’ hands so he couldn't fight back, his ranch training coming in handy.

"Please! That woman is a she-devil!” Jeremiah screamed as he wept, “she fabricated that photo out of thin air!"

Our trio ignored his outlandish claims, grunting and groaning as we pried the boards off the doors. Jeremiah wailed woefully as Jonah lugged him onto his shoulder as he opened the door, the moon shining bright on the yard outside.

"The lord will condemn you all to the fiery pits of hell if you put me out there," Jeremiah insisted. "You are all fools entertaining this nonsense!"

"Quiet you," Jonah said as he lost his patience, throwing Jeremiah off the porch and onto the cold dirt below. "You think those beasts are bad? Come back in here and deal with me, boy. I’ll make you wish these mongrels had torn you limb from limb…” Maddox came up behind him as we all stared at the fallen father before us in disgust.

"He's not worth it," Maddox murmured, glaring at Jeremiah. "If there is a God, he will go where he belongs after the hellhounds turn him into Alpo. You wouldn't want that blood on your hands, Jonah."

“There’s plenty of blood on our hands already, Maddox,” Jonah replied, sniffling as he shuffled back inside.

"Please don't do this..." he pleaded, his eyes on me as I hadn’t moved from the porch. "I'll do anything you want," he murmured to me quietly.

"Can you bring Marilyn back, Jessop?" I snarled. "Can you?!"

Jeremiah's eyes went wide as the howls began behind him, the roaring growls just beyond the tree line. As I watched, I saw a familiar figure speed towards him , and he shuffled to his feet and ran like hell. Howling like a banshee, her fiery hair trailing behind her, she darted after him into the night. It was like I was watching a real-life horror movie, and for a moment, I felt like I couldn’t breathe as the suspense of the hit caused me to tense. But his screams brought me peace, the sounds of ripping and tearing like a crimson splashed symphony to my ears.

I may have been a ‘she-devil’, ‘a bed wife of Satan’, ‘a lying harlot’...

But Marilyn had gotten her revenge.

I took Marilyn's locket and fastened it around my neck, opening the blood splattered heart to find pictures of us kissing inside. I knew Jeremiah getting his just desserts wasn't going to bring her back, but I hoped that maybe, just maybe using my scientific knowledge...I could.

"You did the right thing, Doc," Jonah whispered into my ear. "Let's get back on in here, it won't you do any good to watch." I nodded, following him in, as Maddox slammed the door shut. He began reboarding the entrance as we all stood there quietly for a moment, until someone broke the silence.

"So where do we go from here, Charlotte?" Sasha asked, holding her newborn baby in her arms. I realized they were all looking at me now, waiting for an answer.

“I’m not sure,” I replied, a smile on my face. “But tomorrow is a new day.”