Faith

"There's my life caught up in this labyrinth", I thought, complaining about my job and the town I stayed in. I was driving along a black highway, with rain tinkering away on the dust embossed car. The distinct rhythm of the windshield wipers was now a cliché, for rains were not rare these days. They waved in unison, dropping down with a little thud and rising together, trailing away the so-it-would-seem tears of the sky on the windshield.  

The tires echoed the screams of the gravel, the rain flawlessly preventing the dust from rising. The trees cast eerie shadows, now holding the rain only to let them drip in huge drops pounding on the car roof. There was nervousness in the air, the chill rising and fogging the view forward. Something appeared ahead of the windshield, I slammed the brakes as hard as I could. The airbag echoed like a mini explosion, louder than the bang that the car made against the road divider. Shreds of glass emanated  from the windshield as the rest of it formed a sort of clouded web, preventing them from falling. The engine came into a muffled & abrupt stop. I sat back for a few moments, aching at the chest and wiping blood off my brow, trying to steady myself. 

The car was wrecked and wouldn't start again, the engine shuddering off each time I cranked it. Stepping out into the rain, I looked ahead. The house was just a mile away. The 'Garners' lived there, years ago, until they all died mysteriously in a fire one night, much like this one. Grabbing my camera, a flashlight, voice recorder and a little notebook, I walked on close to the divider to avoid any oncoming traffic, but no one would probably come around here at this time of night. I punched in a message to my editor, who had wanted me to write this story of the Garners. This case was the first of its kind in my 3 year career as a reporter and I wasn't very willing but it would earn me the much needed reputation at this point. My cell phone returned an error saying "Unable to send text message", which was no surprise because there was no reception in this part of town. I felt a strong sense of foreboding, that this lone walk through the woods was probably going to be just one way... 

The Garners home was magnificent. The structure was still standing despite it being made of wood and the fire had eaten away most of it before the firefighters shun it down. I struggled to climb onto the compound wall which held lose stones, only to see the gate collapse off its hinges. The house still smelled of soot, suffocating, a sudden sense of fatigue coming over me. I walked on, almost falling over a giant log that crumbled under my weight, wild rats chasing away at the sound. The ironically dead 'living' room was cluttered. Partially burnt furniture, broken pieces of window glass and logs from the collapsed ceiling added to the decor. What would I find here? What story was I going to write? I wondered. What had happened here? I had to switch to the facts. The police had reported two bodies that were retrieved from the site, one of a man probably in mid 40's and that of an old lady in her 80's. They were identified as Mrs. Garners and Mr. Anton Garners, her son. 

Mr. Garners had died several years ago in a car accident a little away from the house. The fire in the house was notified by a neighbor who later left the place 2 weeks after the incident. There was no clue about his whereabouts. Not many lived in this part of town and the Garners' incident had discouraged real estate to these parts recently. I walked up the staircase, holding on the feeble hand railing to support my weight on the stairs. Some of the stairs broke sinking my leg into them. Slowly, I managed to climb to the first floor somehow. 

The first room had the whole ceiling fallen in. The rain outside had not stopped, but the fresh air and moonlight were a welcome relief. Something was gleaming on the blackened wall as I pointed my flashlight at it. Gingerly, I wiped the soot off it to find a mirror. Suddenly, I flinched and took a few steps back as I found someone looking at me from the mirror. Almost tripping over the clutter, I looked again to find that there was a picture of a girl right across the room, opposite to the mirror. Catching my breath, I walked closer to the portrait. Surprisingly, the portrait had not sustained any damage. It was a picture of a girl in her mid-twenties, her hair dropping onto her shoulders and her eyes with a sense of pain in them, like they had something to say to me. There was a small sign below it that said "Happy Birthday to me, Sarah". Sarah? Who was she? There was no police record of finding her body. A hundred questions popped up in my mind. I recorded a description of the house, the room and about Sarah on my voice recorder. I decided that she would be the character of my story, I would tell this story through her. 

I searched her room for anything that said about who she was. I pulled out logs and roof tiles to find an iron box under her bed. Wrenching it out of the debris with all my might, I opened it to find clothes, a make-up set and a hand mirror in it. There was a little diary at the bottom that had "Faith" etched over it. There was a miniature portrait of her that had her signature "Sarah Sanders" behind it. She was beautiful. The pages in the diary only had her writing as "I was beaten today. I have no one to tell", which was repeated again on most of the days. Some pages were blank and some were bloodied, probably because she was hurt. I needed to know who she was and who was doing this to her. Could it be the inmates of the house? I clicked photos of what I could see. Searching the rest of the rooms had not revealed anything relevant. 

I sat down at my office table the next day, tired, trying to figure out what had happened. I played my tape several times to go through the facts again but that seemed futile. My voice seemed to have gone dull in some points of the recording and replaced by some kind of buzzing sound. I could not figure out what the noise was, probably an issue with the recorder. The police records on a girl named Sarah Sanders turned out to be null. I did background checks on Anton and Mrs. Garners but that returned nothing except that they were into farming and they occasionally visited the town hospital for Mrs. Garners' arthritis. Mr. Garners' accident several years ago happened at the same divider that I had collided against last night. The car I was in was wrecked pretty bad. I was simply lucky to be alive. 

Sarah became an obsession with me all day. I found myself thinking of her and searching on the internet to read about her. Later that night, I lay in bed, only to feel faint bruises on the sides of my arm below the shoulder. I got up to check myself in the mirror and was shocked to find hand imprints! I recounted the events of the previous night. I had a faint remembrance of being held tightly from the sides during my accident, as if someone was in my car behind me at that time. No! This didn't make any sense! I just had to be imagining things!

 Sleep was instant, my body drifted off as if in a dream. When I woke it was still late at night but I felt fresh. Sitting at the table, I checked the scars on my arms but they were gone. Ha! I was imagining. I tried to relax, listened to music but that didn't get my mind off Sarah. I plugged in a pair of earphones to listen to my recording of the previous night and along with that flipped the photographs that I took, one by one from each room. The buzzing sound that I heard was there again. I increased the volume to concentrate on it. "Chur" I suddenly heard a voice say. I plugged out the earphones to make sure I was alone. The more I listened to it, the more I heard the word, "Chur" and a slight whistle at the end of it... I didn't believe in ghosts or spirits. But I'm sure someone was saying something to me while I was there. 

I went back to the dilapidated remains of the Garners. The sky was clear from her room. I stood by the window, looking into the nothingness ahead. A gleam of light glistened somewhere far. It was strange. I did not know there were anyone who lived in the vicinity. I walked towards the light. The street was empty and dark but the light grew brighter. 'Chur'... I kept turning it my mind to think what this could be. The bitter cold sent occasional chill down my spine, my legs numbing... 

 Finally! The voice was trying to say "Church". Though I was trying hard to catch my breath, I couldn't help smiling as I looked up at the light from the church. The Church had been old with an adjacent graveyard. I was surprised how this didn't show up in any of the records. I walked in to see the father. The door creaked as if it wasn't opened in a long time. Large lamps overhead cast shadows from the benches below. "Father" I called out as my voice echoed throughout the church. The Father was silent and walked to the center of the hall, where I stood. "Yes, my child. I know why you have come". His deep voice echoing along the hallway. 

It didn't seem intelligible to me to ask him how he knew. This whole incident felt like it was being string pulled from heaven. The father led me to a grave stone, that said, "SARAH SANDERS" 1973 - 1999. She was married to Anton Garner, in this very same Parish. The father recounted, her daily confessions to him of being beaten and abused by her husband, the bruises on her hands from being tied up and assaulted. The husband believed "she was a sin and must be kept in chains".

We walked back to the Garner's house where the father revealed a chamber in the basement which had not taken any damage. There were beds with sheets covered in blood and shackles that were there to hold the victim. There were blood stained tools that could inflict pain. I felt I could hear Sarah's screams. I felt weak. "Why didn't you tell the cops or someone?" The father was silent. He walked into another chamber as I followed him. I felt something hard against the back of my head and fell to the ground. I could see blood trailing as he dragged me out of the chamber. The father removed his Cassock, revealing himself to be Anton Garners. "I inherited this when I killed father Gonzalez. She kept telling him everything. It had to be done. " he said, referring to the Cassock. ” Then I set the house on fire with him and mother in it" he said, chuckling in a half wheeze. 

Trying frantically to get up, I threw a pair of shackles at him. Grunting, he lunged at me but a chandelier hanging off the roof fell upon him. I gathered all my might to crawl to the door, which shut itself as I got out. I could hear him banging at the door as I tried to get as far from the house as possible. There was the sound of something crashing and I remembered no more.

I woke up in the morning, flinching on finding someone near me. "Relax. It's a paramedic" my editor said from beside me. "What happened?" He asked. I was too dazed to think. "You were lucky. The floor collapsed into a hidden underground chamber which we did not see before." Said a police officer. "Besides, what were you doing here? We got a call from someone late at night saying there was something goin' on here" 

A week later, I visited Sarah's grave. I lay a few flowers on her grave along with her diary she named "Faith". Later that day, I typed the first draft of the story that I wanted to name as "Sarah". It was more of a revelation than a story. This was no longer something I was doing for my reputation. It was a tribute to Sarah for the pain and hardships she endured in her life. I reflected on how Sarah changed the person I was. I never believed in souls, or the afterlife but more than anything I knew she had saved my life. I had realized later on, there was a presence that night in the car wreck. It could have been her... Maybe she chose me to tell her story...

"May Sarah rest in peace and be gifted a better life after reincarnation." I stopped typing, closing my eyes, wishing I could get to see her someday. Someone knocked at the door. Stretching and yawning in the chair, I got up to get the door. The late afternoon sun gleamed outside the house. There was no sign of anyone in the near vicinity. Considering that I would have just imagined it after all the ordeal I had been through, I walked back to my room and to the computer.

I was freaked and couldn't believe my eyes when I looked at the screen. I looked around the room frantically but found no one. There, below the conclusion of my story, someone had typed in: 

"Some things you just have to take on faith"