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“My God had a name and Her name was Alessa.”
In only robes as black as the midnight sky above, Claudia set barefoot on the path of enlightenment, which happened to be the path to the burned shell of the Gillespie house. With only a candlelight and her memories to guide her, she eventually arrived at the mouth of the ruins, which could barely be considered a house anymore, the scent of smoke and rotten wood filling her nostrils. She inhaled.
Kneeling on the ground and setting her candle aside, she scratched the Seal of Metatron into mud, muttering religious verses that were never meant to be uttered. Claudia soon rose to full height, dirt and grime accumulating underneath her fingernails, as she pressed her palms together and closed her eyes tight.
This ritual was not to summon God. It was to summon Alessa. Why? To speak with her one more time.
Fragmented prayers spill out into the night. The scorched floorboards leave nasty burns on the soles of her feet, but she's too enamoured to care, let alone feel it when there's nothing to feel anymore.
“They never deserved you,” Claudia whispers between a religious phrase, before continuing her frenzy of the thousands of prayers she knows.
Claudia recalls the beginning of their friendship. Friendship. Such a futile, fleeting thing in this world, but with Alessa, that friendship meant everything.
The first moment they had ever become acquainted with each other was when Claudia had saved Alessa from the wrath of a priest, instead taking the beating herself. It had to be over something ridiculous, something so simple in the grand scheme of The Order’s plans, but it was all but forgotten once the beatings began.
They may as well have never ended. The scars lingered on Claudia’s body to this very day, however she didn't mind. They were a reminder of the past and the pain she had endured, but also a reminder of Alessa, and Claudia’s undying loyalty. She never fully understood why she did what she did. Perhaps it was a natural instinct to protect Alessa, to save the saviour. Things tend to happen in the most unexpected ways for the most unexplainable people.
“My light, my warmth,” Claudia whispered in the middle of yet another prayer, the lines between prayers and pleads blurring.
The second time they met was when they began to embrace each other's love. It was an unspoken thing and they were merely children, just yearning to survive the cruel world they had been thrust into, but the love they shared overpowered the hatred they felt for everything else.
The girls sat underneath stained-glass windows, conversing about the mundane. Still, they talked for hours, piecing together one another's lives while simultaneously pretending to be someone they weren't. To be vulnerable is a terrible feeling, especially when they haven't experienced safety since their mother's wombs.
Eventually, Alessa presented the question of why she protected her against the priest. Claudia answered that she had no control over what happened. Neither of them knew what that meant.
“Alessa, oh, Alessa,” Claudia murmured.
Years had passed and the girl's love for each other only grew. They were truly the only thing either of them had.
One night, Claudia had noticed that when Alessa’s hair was down, she looked like a completely different person. The way her rich chestnut hair fell just below her chest made her look so irresistibly beautiful. She reached out and took a strand in between her fingers to place a kiss on it. Alessa, puzzled, laughed and questioned what she was doing. Claudia simply shrugged.
Claudia snuck into Alessa’s room in the early morning, knowing she’d still be sleeping. With a dagger in one hand and a lock of Alessa’s hair in the other, she sliced it off, slipped away and successfully stole it without anyone ever knowing.
“They could never have understood you, not in the way I did.”
During another night in Alessa’s room, the most unexpected thing had occurred. Alessa, the beautiful and soft Alessa, had kissed Claudia, the wretched and hungry Claudia, who kissed back.
It was the most terrifying out of body experience they had ever suffered and yet it left them with a craving they couldn't control. It was the closeness as well as the intimacy, things that the two had never felt in their lives.
The rest of that night was spent guiltily praying away their sins.
But the next night, they had done it again, and thus began the cycle of sin and punishment.
Thus began the sinner's dance. A kiss, a twist, a promise.
Tears fell down from Claudia’s shut eyes, lower lip quivering in anticipation as the ritual came to an end. Although nothing was certain, she was still holding onto the image of Alessa appearing before her, taking her hand into hers and dragging her down to whatever Hell they deserved.
So long as it was with Alessa, Claudia loved the idea of it.
“Claudia.”
Claudia’s eyes shot open.
There, just out of reach, stood Alessa: not young, not old, not dead, not alive, or maybe all of those things at the same time. She wore these white robes that were more similar to a hospital gown than anything.
“Alessa,” Claudia whispered, exasperated. “Oh, how I have missed you. Where have you been?”
Alessa smiled. There was something hidden, lingering behind the faux happiness, but Claudia didn't pretend to be concerned about it.
“Delusional, fragile little girl. I am no different than you,” Alessa replied, extending an arm to her but not daring to touch.
“What?” Claudia questioned. “You were always different. Brighter. Warmer. I saw it, even as a child, I didn't doubt it.” She paused, maybe expecting an answer, but none came, so she continued. “I– I used to think — no, I knew — that you were chosen. A holy vessel. The world could never touch you.”
When Alessa next spoke, her voice echoed, almost as though she was standing everywhere. “You talk like you knew me, like you loved me. But you left me there, in that fire, in that bed.”
Claudia stammered, her entire body shaking. “I— was a child, Alessa. They told us your pain had meaning, that it was salvation. Please. I wanted to believe that you were strong enough to carry it, that God was real because you were real.”
“No,” Alessa tilted her head to the side. “We were children. Mere girls. You wanted a sister and I wanted a friend. We could have had that.”
She whimpered like a wounded dog. “What should I have done? Tell me. Tell me how to undo it.”
Silence stretches out between them. Claudia kneels down and bows her head, one final gesture of love and respect.
“Please… stay. Just a little longer,” Claudia begged between sniffles, tears spilling from her eyes.
“And now you're talking to the idea of me, the one who makes you feel clean.
Although barely audible, Claudia whispered, “I'm sorry.”
She didn't have to lift her head to know Alessa was smiling.
“Then let go.”
The figure of Alessa flickered and dissolved into the night, leaving Claudia drenched in dying candlelight. One by one, the candles fizzled out, surrounding her in the darkness she once feared so much as a child.
Her God had a name and Her name was Alessa.