I knelt in front of the alter, my hands fisted, one over the other, in front of me.  My mouth and nose rested against them and instead of closing my eyes, I stared with blood-shot eyes openly at the red cloth leading to the alter, and beyond to the large stained glass window which held the image of Christ.  It was hours past midnight, but the image was clear, illuminated by clever lights hidden behind it.

The church had been my home for several hours, the alter my resting place for more than a few of them.  The guests had long since left, my family departing two hours behind them.  My priest, the last of them, eventually retired to his offices, and later, onto bed.  It was only through trust that I was given access to this sanctuary, he had known me, helped raise me, as a child.

I heard their arguments clearly in my head, repeated over and over in the dark hours following their abandonment.  I, for my part, listened and still did what I did.  I walked calmly over to the alter and knelt down, my fingers clasped and prayed.  Eventually, in the face of my stubbornness, they left.

She wasn’t coming.  I knew that, but couldn’t find it in me to walk out, even hours later, behind them.  It wasn’t that I was praying now, no, I had figured out that God didn’t listen to me decades ago.  I simply sought an understanding.  Knowledge.

When my knees began to ache, I would sit back against the rail and look back over the pews, still decorated with white ribbons and lilies, hundreds of lilies.   Their smell was  haunting and I knew, without saying anything out loud, or even in my head, that I would always associate the smell with her.   I wondered if I would ever forget any detail of the church as it was then, with its silent and quiet beauty, and the smell of her mingled with wood polish and ash.

Tears welled and then later, streaked down my cheeks.  I did this to myself.  I had not called the florist, nor the guests, nor the priest to tell them what had happened.  I couldn’t bring myself to make the phone calls and I couldn’t give anyone else the knowledge without it breaking me in two.  I was so fragile yesterday when the doctor had told me and even the simple movement of sharing the burden was too much for me to handle.  Her mother was no stronger, nor her father then, but they managed to start.  Somehow.

I walked into the church not dressed for a wedding, not as a happy groom, but faithless, God-less.  What guests there were then, said nothing to me and only saw me collapse in the same place where I was to swear my undying love and loyalty only an hour later.   If she had been able to appear.

I sobbed and it echoed loudly.   My hands covered my face, and my palms were soaked in the hot wetness of my tears.  I struggled to find some scrap of calm, but it was useless.  Raging hate for him filled my body.  I pushed from the floor and my fingers tore at my shirt, ripping it open, buttons clattering somewhere in the distance, the nails on my hands leaving blood red trails on my skin.

‘I HATE YOU!’  I screamed at the mocking image of him, peaceful, illuminated.  ‘I HATE YOU!  YOU TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME!’  I raced up the steps and tore the red cloth off the alter, toppling the heavy brass crucifix above it.  It scored the wood and cut my arm as it fell over with a thud.  I flung the cloth to the floor.  Blood ran down my arm, wet the carpet on the floor.

‘I hate you.’  I said flatly then, and reached for and snapped the chain around my neck that held, ironically, the gift she’d given me days before she died; Before she died, the day before our wedding.  She loved my faith, she told me when she had pressed the cross into my palm.  She loved how I knew how to make everything right.

I watched beads of blood snake down the chain and finally drip from the cross itself before I tossed it onto the pile of cloth and cross.  I didn’t care.  Everything was gone.  Taken.  Ruined.

Those steps, removing me from the light of that colored glass image, removing me from the scent of lilies, wood polish and ash, were the last I’d ever take inside a church, I’d sworn then.  A century later, in the shadow of St. Catherine’s, I saw her again.