The voices came in morning chimes. Filtered to her in a way she felt she could trust. Small bits easy for swallowing.
In the beginning, she listened. Later, she heard. Eventually, she trusted. Finally, she believed.
The day she put out the signs, the day she opened up her home to them was jumping from a bridge and
she
fell
her dress rising above her head in a shroud, the water coming up fast beneath her. No undoing. It had already been done. Midway between action and impact, she readied herself.
They did not come like parishioners, they came like torch bearers; unconcerned with anything to do with burning, but swollen hard with the fervor that builds within mobs intent on taking what they came for.
Still, she let them prey. Her ears to God’s with words not close to holy.
She thought of Abraham and the sloth of his knife. And as they took her, and took her, she wondered if she had acted too quickly.