Work Text:
“Bendígame, Padre,” Alma began, “I-I don’t know how to say this. But something…” Her voice trailed off.
“Dígame, Mija,” Padre Manuel said gently. He was sitting beside her in the spare room they used as a confessional. Since a church likely would not be built for at least a few months, they had to make do with the Casita’s rooms and halls.
Alma looked at the priest, her eyes filled with tears, and shame, and guilt, “Is it a sin to wish I were dead?”
The silence filled the room like thick smoke. Padre Manuel looked back at her. A month ago, before the escape, before the miracle, before the rebuilding, Padre Manuel would have said yes, emphatically declared that the person who took their own life would be damned eternally, for to destroy one of God’s creations would be tantamount to heresy.
But that was a month ago, though it may as well have been a lifetime. When Oscar, whose wife had been brutally murdered in front of him, was found lifeless, hanging from a tree, Padre Manuel had initially refused to hold a funeral. It had only been with the grief filled, half sobbing pleadings of his aged mother and Alma’s own pleas that he had decided that surely Oscar had repented the second before he expired, before retreating back into their makeshift chapel to pray for forgiveness.
When Alba had found herself pregnant with from the men to whom she had offered herself for a chance to escape with her children, and in her mad horror threatened to throw herself into the river, Padre Manuel had interceded, marrying her to Miguel Guzman, a friend of her deceased husband, who was rumored to have been in love with Alba since he first laid eyes on her. Alba tentatively agreed, and Pablo had accepted the child growing in her womb as his own.
“Almita,” Padre Manuel broke the silence, “Why ever would you want such a thing? La vida es un regalo de Dios.”
“No me diga lo que ya sé,” Alma snapped, “But some gifts are more than we can bear.” Tears started brimming in her eyes. “Gracias a Dios, I live,” she said, a hint of bitterness tingeing her voice. “But why me, Padre? Why not Pedro? Or Oscar? Or little Marta? I should be dead instead of them!” The last part came out so forcefully and unexpectedly that Alma’s eyes widened in shock. She took a deep breath.
Padre Manuel closed his eyes before opening them again. “God wanted you to live, Alma. He sent the miracle through you. You saved us.”
“I trapped you all here. I don’t know how.” Alma said despondently. She had already heard a few whispers from the few angry villagers who still had somewhere to go and never would.
Padre Manuel’s voice dropped to a whisper, “There are people here who think you a saint.”
“¿Yo, una Santa? That’s not true, Padre!” Alma cried.
“I did not say it was,” Padre Manuel said sagely, “I merely told you what the people think.”
Alma hissed, “If there is any saint here, it is Pedro. He died for us. He brought the miracle.”
“Who can know for sure the mysterious ways of God?” Padre Manuel shrugged, “He saw fit to give you the gift of life. He saw fit to use you as a vessel for His will. He saw fit to bless us with a miracle. Who are we mere mortals to question His will?”
“I may not have any right to question His will, not after everything. Yet I doubt,” Alma confessed.
“Doubt is not a sin, Almita. It is only another obstacle in the way of faith. Have faith, and I pray these doubts shall pass.” Despite the reassurance, Alma did not feel comforted. She remained lost in the swirl of thoughts spinning through her head. As Padre Manuel blessed and absolved her, the spinning continued.
God saw fit to give me these gifts? Why? What have I done for it? They all think me to be what I’m not. What should I do? Ay, Pedro, help me. Tell me what to do. Wrap your arms around me and tell me it’ll be alright.
But of course, Pedro did not answer. And neither did the God who for some unfathomable reason thought her fit to bear the burden of His miracle. Was she fit for it? Alma straightened up.
Dios, dame coraje y fuerza. God help me, I must not waste this gift. I must be worthy. I must.
She left the room without looking back.