Roses
A terrible sickness can be beautiful.
The priest sits opposite of me in basket below the hot
air balloon and mutters prayers under his breath.
“It’s too late for us, Father,” I say as I reach to
scratch my neck. “I know that now.”
“The Lord may yet show mercy on your village. He is a God
of healing.”
He is also a God of death, I think. I’ve seen
it.
I stand and squint to look
beyond the mountains to the east. The night sky is beginning to give way to the
day, but my village is still shrouded in darkness. I open the blast valve to
lift the balloon higher in the air where a wind current catches us and sweeps
us along.
“This sickness…” the priest says. “You told me the
afflicted want flowers…”
“Roses, Father. They ask for roses.”
“But why roses?”
“I don’t know, Father. I prayed for answers, but the Lord
was silent.”
When it started, I couldn’t smell the roses, but I do
now, even though they’re far away. Old man Fogarty was the first to change. I
remember when he stepped out of his cottage two weeks ago, with the black
eschar running down his arm. “Roses,” he said as he hobbled toward Bunyan’s
farm. “The roses are near.”
It wasn’t until the next morning when they found him covered
in blood in the hen house eating the chickens raw. He clawed at us with his
wiry limbs when we pulled him away. The eschar had now taken his right cheek
and crept toward his eye. “Roses!” he screamed. “Give them to me!”
There was no doctor for miles, so we locked him in his
cottage and argued about what to do. Two of the strong men held him down as
Bunyan’s wife applied a salve to his skin, but Fogarty broke free and scratched
her face. They locked him inside the cottage again, and for the next three days
he pounded on the door and the walls and cried out for roses until suddenly he
was silent.
“Child, you look unwell.”
The priest is huddled in the corner of the basket,
wrapped tightly in a blanket to protect himself from the cool spring night. He
holds the vial of olive oil tightly in his hand. I scratch my neck then look
away into the darkness.
“Father, you would not be well either if you’d seen what
I’ve seen.”
“I’ve known many illnesses in my time, and no matter how
horrible they seem, they all pass. The Lord is greater than any sickness. He
has conquered death.”
Yes, but death still conquers us.
Our balloon is now drifting over the mountains, and I
know my village is not far away. As we’ve gotten closer, the current has caught
us and is not letting go. It’s almost as if we’re being pulled there by some
incredible force, as if we’re being sucked into a vortex from which there is no
escape.
And the roses are near.
Bunyan’s wife grew ill next then two more soon followed.
When Bunyan himself changed, we watched him stumble into the woods, his neck
and chin covered in a scaly black. We found him two days later feasting on the
carcass of a deer.
“Roses,” he croaked as he slurped blood from creature’s
chest. “I’ve found the roses.”
The mayor called me into his house that night.
“We need help,” he said.
“There’s no doctor near,” I told him. “And who would risk
treating an illness like this.”
“Do not seek a doctor,” he said. “This is no natural
disease. We need a priest. This is something evil that only the power of God
can overcome.”
“The nearest priest is beyond the mountains,” I said.
“The snows haven’t melted, and the ride will take more than a week.”
“Our only hope is through the air,” the mayor said. “Take
the balloon, and I will pray for the winds to be true.”
“Son, we grow close,” the priest says. “The mountains are
behind us.”
“Yes, Father.”
I scratch my neck again. The roses are overwhelming. I
can smell them, their beautiful scent rising from the earth and filling the air
in its entirety. The priest looks up at me and his eyes grow wide as he sees me
in the early morning light.
“Son… your skin… it’s…”
“Yes, Father. I told you it was too late.”
“No, I pray that it is not.”
The priest fumbles for his vial of olive oil then uncorks
the lid. He struggles to his feet and pours the oil over my head.
“Through this holy anointing, may the Lord pardon you
whatever sins you have committed by sight…”
“I have not sinned, Father.”
The roses are all around me.
“Through this holy anointing, may the Lord pardon you
whatever sins you have committed by hearing, by smell….”
“I am blameless, Father.”
They are so close now. Their voices are calling to me,
their smell is intoxicating.
“May the Lord pardon whatever sins you have committed by
taste and touch….”
I grab him by his arms. I can feel the roses crawling
over me, their thorns piercing my neck and their petals reaching for my mouth.
“Let us in,” they whisper. “We are yours.”
The priest is screaming, but I cannot make out his words.
His mouth opens and all I hear is the voices of roses. I hold him tighter and I
can feel them growing within him, tunneling inside his body with their sweet
smells and their thorns and their beauty. “He is not a priest,” they whisper.
“He is only our vessel. He served only to bring us to you.”
I hold him closer, and I can almost taste them. They are
all I want, they are all I’ve ever wanted. I know that now. Somewhere far away,
there is a voice crying, pleading, but the voice is changing along with the
rest of the world. Transforming into a new and better world.
A world of roses.
