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Victor wasn’t a pious man. He did not pray on Sundays, did not skimp on minor misdeeds, and did not set foot in the House of God since he was but a kid hiding behind his mother, glancing nervously at the solemn and sorrowful church decorations. With each passing day, the glorious churches and small chapels seemed less like reproachful shadows of the past and more like insignificant details in the overall picture of his worldview.
Over the years, the picture faded, the paint cracked, and the gold tarnished. Time rushed, stopped, tripped over itself, but inevitably moved forward. The angel that once sat on Victor’s shoulder probably choked on cigarette smoke or drowned in blood shed for the greater good. The Lord, about whom Victor’s father used to speak with reverence, could never forgive Victor for all his mistakes, much less for all his right choices.
But there was a thing his father was right about: all people strived for God. Victor's efforts to wander further and hide from Lord’s eyes always led him to a barbed-wire-lined staircase to Heaven. The more Victor distanced himself from the signs of the past, the more those prayers, so carefully forgotten, came to mind. His parents gave up trying to bring Victor to reason before his thirteenth birthday. Ten years later, even the saints ran out of patience.
Since then, it took another half a decade and a personal second coming to set Victor on the right path.
Victor's God endured in spirit those inhuman torments that the shell of flesh and blood could not live through. Imprisoned, held against His will in a cold chamber under an empire of lies, He came back to life. Betrayed by the whole world, He sought refuge in His most faithful follower. Victor was happy to offer his God every bit of himself: his will, his body, his memory. And every gift was accepted with gratitude.
Victor's God was rightfully jealous and fairly vengeful. He was infallible in His words, for He was the truth. As befits the Lord, the true God punished the false one. The man who thought himself to be a deity was deservedly and justly defeated, and in his place, bound to do so by people’s weaknesses and lust for power, came the actual God.
Victor's God left behind all but one of the burdens the ordinary man carried to take the throne that had been stained with pride, the throne of a tyrant. He worked tirelessly and never let His brilliant mind get distracted by some miniscule details. He barely needed sleep and had no use for food. His purpose was to ensure the human world was as beautiful and just as Heavens. Or at least aspired to be so. Order and purity required attention to filth, impurities, and dark corners, and He knew it.
With deep sorrow for the unfortunates doomed to remain in pain for eternity by that unholy liar, God could not find the strength to continue their agony. No soul deserved to live in sin, to live in suffering against their will, especially when the suffering was akin to what made even God Himself struggle, what distracted Him from His mission.
His communion was the opposite of purity, and in that fact lay its rightness. Only Victor was allowed to share it with Him, as there wasn’t another person worthy of such a divine revelation – the sacrament of flesh and blood dripping from their fingers and chins into a dark puddle. Perhaps Victor's faith was not strong enough, for he hadn’t yet learned to take this ritual with a steadfastness worthy of his God. One day, he would last until the end of the ceremony, and the sacred "Amen," hidden in the quiet "thank you," would finally feel deserved. Until then, he should be more thorough while preparing the room which only one man and his God had the right to enter.
Victor's God was all-seeing and all-powerful. It was a sin to hide something from Him, because He would know anyway. Honest people had nothing to hide, certainly not from the Lord Himself. His abilities were only limited by the excessively constraining physicality of His vessel. He had told Victor a
few times that He dreamt of being freed from the unwanted prison that was the body built for Him by someone’s dirty hands, but He knew that leaving the world to petty people would be a sin much greater than any sin in the Bible. Victor listened and reproached himself for his wrong thoughts; he had no right to desire for his God to stay with him. The fact that God spoke to him was already the highest reward, for God was laconic with those who trusted in him. Everything that came out of His mouth was more powerful than any monologue known to man. Victor knew, because God quoted some scholars and their writings when he found their thoughts fit his own judgments.
Serving God was the best thing Victor was good for. He was rebuilt by the Lord in order to carry out His commands perfectly. His hands were suitable for any job, never stained with neither blood nor sin, for they were a testimony of God's will; they were tireless. He was blinded by the Lord in order to see clearly. His eyes were sharp and attentive, perfect to direct God's wrath against those who were not faithful to Him. Victor found his happiness in praise – forgiveness for the ugly, disgusting things he had done. If God knew they were necessary, Victor only required His orders.
Mistakes happened, too. But God was merciful; He gave Victor chance after chance, generously granted him opportunities to repent. Victor, as the most faithful of His servants, prayed for his sins with an enviable but, as it always felt, insufficient passion. The Lord understood his suffering. Victor was just a human being in front of Him, and He never asked for anything beyond Victor’s abilities. And every time God forgave him right when he was at his limit, after he uttered the first "God, please!" Then the shadow of a smile appeared on God’s face, and He bestowed upon His faithful follower the soothing, purest blessing the world had ever seen.
The mansion Victor shared with his God became his church. However, God was never there, for He had more things to worry about than some sentimental attachments and longing nostalgia. It got harder to open those doors each time. If there was no one to sing the prayers in the church, the church would become uncomfortably empty. Therefore, Victor tried to visit the House of God as often as he could, and sometimes he managed to find an extra hour or two to get his church in order. It was important to wipe the patterns of stains from the windows, even if rarely so.
When God was in the mansion, it felt almost impossible to suppress Victor’s blameworthy feelings. He had no right to ask for more, and wishing for more was a crime. Somewhere amidst hundreds of thick, tall candles, a new one, so small that it was invisible among the flames of faith and loyalty, lit up. It wasn’t burning in honour of the Lord's name, and it burnt out as quickly as people consumed by their desires do. A drop of wax that rolled down from the candle of unconditional obedience extinguished it even faster.
Doubt was the worst sin that Victor Blake was capable of. The most terrible and unwavering one, unaffected by any amount of self-persuasion. Doubt was dispelled when God was nearby. Victor clung to Him, sat beside Him at every opportunity he had, and breathed in the same air as Him. It used to help him see the truth again.
The love of Victor’s God was not unconditional. It had to be earned through hard work and complete trust. Victor, as modestly as he could, prided himself on the closeness he had with God. Pride led sinners to false thoughts, such as them being equals to God. Victor knew what happened to the last idol. God was the absolute truth. Liars, on the other hand, did not have His sagacity, His veracity, and therefore deserved to be one thing: silent, without a single breath in their deceitful mouths.
It was understandable why God was both feared and admired: there was indeed something otherworldly, inexplicable, ethereal about Him. Anyone who dared to question His gospel met their destiny soon – the one He prepared for them. There were things that God did not share with anyone, and the fate of these people was one of such mysteries. Was it fair that God thought some stranger – not Victor! – was worthy of defending His name? If the Lord had decreed so, then it was the only way. Having such doubts was wrong. Victor knew the punishment would be worse than anything he could imagine.
His God was the writer of history. He did what He pleased, for only He knew how things were supposed to be. God was above fate and above those who believed in it. People who took their lives for granted were just as sinful as those guilty of sloth. Moreover, they tended to believe others unconditionally and were therefore vulnerable to arrogant liars. What was the use of them?
God had many enemies and no friends. He had allies, subordinates, servants. He also had Victor. But there was no friendship with God, for affection was for mortals and fools, and so were the feelings that overwhelmed them. His all-seeing gaze could not be clouded by unnecessary anxiety, and His mind had to remain balanced and calm at all times. The Lord's allies often got too close to His enemies, and then the Divine Judgement took place; in the end, God was always right. At each procession, there was a place for Victor. He was given the right to speak and even to talk to God in private. Trying to convince Him was a bad idea, as He was the truth, but sometimes Blake hoped to plant a seed of doubt in God’s genius mind. Still, He was unyielding. He was the justice.
Often, Victor found himself small and exiguous, looking at God with his head thrown back. God looked down on him like Jesus from the crucifix, and His gaze said more than any words could convey. Occasionally, a halo of light got tangled in God's raven hair. Once in a while, it came from a table lamp, and almost never from the sun’s shine. His skin appeared greenish at times, and Victor was not sure if it made Him closer to saints from the old paintings or if the forgotten, almost nonexistent humanity of God’s body was peeking through.
When God found a few hours to rest, Victor was there with Him in His bedroom. The curtains were always drawn, the door had a dozen locks on it. Neither mortals nor the rays of the sun were allowed to see His personal world. It was always pitch black, and Victor was always shivering. The confusion in his thoughts was stronger than his desire to understand whether it was his undying devotion or whether the room was just freezing cold.
Victor helped God wash His face. Each time, He became more distorted by fatigue and pain. Water ran down His beautiful features, and at some point, God stopped caring if it stained the collar of His shirt.
God was as demanding of Himself as He was of others. He barely slept, was always busy, always on edge. He whispered to Victor once that He thought He hadn’t got much time left. Gods were immortal, unlike their fragile forms. Victor clung to His hand and begged Him not to say such things because people – Victor – needed Him desperately. After a moment's sincerity, God had to leave: people with good and bad news awaited him, as they did every day. However, “day” was too vague of a concept in the never-sleeping Lord’s world. Counting time became useless after the dormitory near the former asylum of sin – the current residence of God – was built.
Victor cautiously laid down next to his God and covered Him with a blanket. He didn’t mind sleeping on the floor if he had to, but God trusted him to watch His back. It was the highest honour and the most difficult test. The rules of such duty were never discussed, but Victor felt that he had no right to close his eyes when he was entrusted with God’s life.
Something subtle, faint – maybe the smell of cologne or the sound of a ticking clock? – made Victor yearn for something long gone. He should not be comforted by distant memories, but they were as unstoppable as the waters of the sacred Jordan River. They diligently eroded his firm faith, and every now and then a small piece of it crumbled, slipped away like sand through his fingers, left gray ashes on the white snow. Victor inevitably fell asleep, lulled by a dream too sweet. A dream in which he did not have to think about the righteousness of his feelings and did not justify unforgivable sins. A dream in which he had a home and a few friends. A dream in which the dearest person to him was around, he could feel the heat from a cup of tea burning his skin, and a cat purred on his lap, curled up in a fuzzy, warm ball. A dream in which his God still had a name.
A dream in which Vincent Edgeworth was alive.