Lady Of The Church

Preachin' To The Choir

It was the morning of October twenty-eighth, a little before nine in the morning. Jill was surprised the date came around so fast. She had just barely learned all the songs and hymns for the church choir concert. Also, today was the last day for sign-ups for the Lady Of The Church pageant.

Claire had called Jill last night and told her how she didn't really want to enter in it all of a sudden.

"Why not?" Jill had asked. "I thought that was the only reason you were coming to this insane asylum we call a church."

"Well, I'm not going there anymore either," Claire had told her. "I'm sick of it. The service is boring, the reverend's corrupt! Jasmine told me the minister made Kaylee Thorn 'do things' for the crown last year!"

"Yeah, figured. She wasn't even good at anything and barely even went to church..." Jill rambled on.

"Dude!" Claire tried to get her friend back on track. "I'm a virgin and I don't want my first anything with some perverted pastor for a pathetic pageant! So...I'm not signing up."

Jill was surprised at this. She could've sworn she already told Claire about the reverend's rumored dirty habits. Guess Claire just did some research on the topic aside from Jill's vague comments and decided after all the pageant was just not for her.

Meanwhile, Jill was building up her resume for it. She signed the papers this morning and handed them into Reverend Goody himself.

"Thank you, Jill," he said. Smiling, he added, "Why don't you go hang out with Sherman? He looks lonely by himself."

In the back of the church, all the hard core choir folks were onto practicing that "Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, La, Ti, Do". On the other hand, Jill had found Sherman and they were readying the cookies and refreshments outside the chapel doors.

"Jill, can you organize those cookies for me? The ones with the pecans on them? I would but I'm afraid to touch them. I'm really allergic to pecans," Sherman told her. "I'm tearing up right now, actually."

"Oh my gosh, what kind of reaction do you get?" asked Jill as she fixed the pecan cookies to look presentable to the public.

"Oh, it's an anaphylactic reaction."

"What does that mean?" Jill asked.

"Sometimes I get a rash if I touch a pecan and if I eat it, I'd probably die since I won't be able to breathe," said Sherman.

"Then I should probably go wash my hands off in the bathroom."

"You do that while I pour some punch into these cups!" Sherman cheerily said.

After a long, treacherous odyssey, Jill found the womens' restroom and washed off her hands. It was a very nice bathroom. Everything was silver and elegant and all fancy and such. Except for an old sign above the toilet that said "Watch Out For The Muffin Man".

"That really is a stupid sign," said a female voice from within the restroom.

Jill turned around startled to see Elizabeth Ramsey was also in the bathroom with her. That quiet, creeping freak.

Elizabeth continued,"I thought you were looking at it." Was she talking about the sign?

"I was." Again, Jill wondered, what made Elizabeth even think she could talk to her?

"It was some stupid killer from Victoria County. Police thought he could come up through toilets and be, like, reborn or something. Even though the guy already killed himself. Remember that a few years back?" asked Elizabeth. She was laughing about the stupid tale, making Jill only more uncomfortable around her.