Watching Them Fall

Last night, Jo and I joined our friend Ian and seven of his friends in watching the movie Taken. I have to say, I had been a little afraid to watch it but I love Liam Neesson and we decided that the movie was basically him playing Qui'gon Jin physically instead of using the Force in Star Wars. If you haven't seen this movie... it's really up to you to decide whether or not you would like it. It covers the issue of the trafficking of women, which is something I've learning in my women's health class last semester. It's a very sad movie.

After the movie, we piled all ten people into two cars and drove north to a little elementary school, where we hopped the fence and watched the meteor shower. It wasn't a bad meteor show; if I hadn't been as cold as I was, I would have liked to stay longer because the clouds were beginning to burn off (we stayed until 1:30 am). I know for sure I'm not cut out to be a crazy college student when I hop the fence of an elementary school at midnight and spent the entire time afraid that cops are going to show up and throw us in jail and wondering what my mother will say when I call her because she is 7 hours away and cant just come and get me.

My favorite meteor shower took place when I lived in Tehachapi. We had broken down on the side of the freeway while coming back home from Bakersfield after a Condor's game (hockey). The girls (my mom, my sister, and I) had to ride in the van on the back of the tow truck (which is VERY illegal, by the way) while my dad rode in the passenger seat with the driver. By the time we got home (which was around 1 in the morning), the meteors were falling at full speed and we had our faces pressed up against the glass, not able to keep up with all of them. Then, after we had gotten home, my parents pulled chairs and blankets out on the deck and we all had stayed up until 2, watching the sky. The Tehachapi sky is magnificent at night. I miss it.

Anyway, today's prompt was a little ironic because it reminded me of the movie last night. I apologize if the subject makes you all a little uncomfortable but it was the first thing that came to mind when Jo presented the prompt to me. So, here it goes:

Prompt #2: A priest is attacked for being a pedophile. He is innocent of the crime but guilty of something far worse.

There were tales that St. John’s Abby was haunted. Others just said it was cursed. It was something, indeed, for in the past year, eleven of its alter boys had disappeared. Father Bernard knew better and, when the royal guard broke into his office that fateful evening, he knew that they knew better as well.

But they were wrong.

“Pedophile!” Captain Rolf shouted, pointing an accusatory finger Bernard.

Bernard stood, a trace of a smile on his face. “My dear captain of the guard, you cannot possibly mean to say that I have done anything to my boys…”

“I want my son back!” a mother shouted from the doorway. As she pushed in, another mother appeared… and a father… another mother… They continued to pour into Bernard’s office, despite his objections.

And then they were on him, beating him, biting him, screaming how they wanted their sons back and how they would do anything in order to get them.

Rolf searched Bernard’s office, ignoring the priest’s pleas. In a drawer he found strange papers with the names of the missing boys. In another he found locations of far off places and new names that were associated with each place. He continued to search, sneaking through a door exiting Bernard’s office, a different door from that he entered. Rolf found himself in a hallway, with doors on either side. He opened one door, finding a boy dead on a bed, his face completely pale. Soon, he was running down hallways, opening doors, finding boys either dead or half alive. And, when he inspected them closely, they all had the same needle holes in their arms, the same chapped lips, the same pale faces.

Rolf came to the terrifying conclusion.

Bernard wasn’t a pedophile. Others were. Other’s who bought these boys.

Bernard ran a trafficking business behind the back of the church.

By the time that Rolf returned to Bernard’s office, the priest was dead. Even so, this did not stop him from putting a bullet in his head for each of the missing boys before assisting the broken-hearted parents with taking the children out of the secret passage.