To the Ends of the Earth

Chapter 1

*

Maria

I looked around me with a distaste that I, to be fair, had no right to feel. It's not that the peeling grayish paint, the molded plastic chairs, the dated STD awareness posters adorning the walls, and the general air of despair weren't things to despise... but I was here for a reason. Squeak, squeak, lurch. The littlest movement had the hideous maroon chair I was sitting in groaning in protest. The noise brought a memory unbidden to my stressed brain.

Squeak, squeak, squeak. The rocking frame of Gabriel's 1975 Chevy Caprice echoed around us in the cab of the car while I rode his lap. I knew the minute Gabe walked up to me in school that his offhanded "Hey, so what are you doing later?" would lead to this exact moment. I couldn't have been happier. After all, Gabriel was a senior and he was hot as hell. I knew I only had one chance with him and I wasn't going to waste it.

The leather seats had been soft against my knees, I remember thinking of all things, and the steering wheel had dug painfully into my back. But I didn't complain; Gabriel was picky about which girls he gave a ride in his "Mother Mary" as he had named his car. I could only imagine his pride and joy had been named because of the religious devotion he paid to it. Honestly, I secretly thought it was a piece of shit.

In that moment, having been raised a devout catholic, I couldn't help but think of the actual Mary, mother of God. I remembered thinking that maybe I was making a mistake, maybe losing your virginity is supposed to feel like something else, maybe I should have waited...

What went through Mary's head when she found out she was pregnant? I knew it could be nothing like how I felt; the fear might be the same, but having the honor of giving birth to Jesus wasn't anything like carrying the bastard child of Gabriel the man slut. He ran around with Jessie now, a giggly senior with big tits, and had no idea that I carried his child. At least, for the moment I did.

    It had taken a little bit of research to find a free clinic that would give abortions without parental consent, as long as you were at least 16. Thank God I just made the cut. I asked for forgiveness for the thousandth time for what I was about to do, but even the threat of hell wasn't enough to stop me. I'd rather be damned than end up like my mother or half the girls at school. I have plans, I'm going to be the first in my family to go to college and make something of myself. I won't let what Gabe and I did ruin that for me.

    My head jerked up out of my depressing thoughts as a woman in medical scrubs opened a tall wooden door at the other end of the room and called my name.

"Maria Cavareas?"

I rose automatically. With a sense of doom slowly creeping through my insides, I prayed very hard.

*

God listened. He heard the sounds of the world like an orchestra, each instrument adding to the sum of the whole. Maria's prayers were a cello; sad, soulful, defiant, impassioned, lost, and lonely. He cocked his head and saw the life she was about to sever. It's not as if he didn't know this would happen (omniscience was funny that way) but he couldn't help Knowing the entire lifespan of the child inside her, had she let it live.

    Again God questioned himself, as the only one able to do so, and the direction the world was heading. Such a heartbreaking experiment, creating the world, yet it often brought him a joy unfathomable to the human mind. However, in this moment, it brought him otherworldly pain as he watched Maria recovering below. Her son. He would have grown to be a good man one day, had he been given the chance. 

    God sighed, disappointed again by his own children, though loving them no less. They were constantly killing themselves from the inside out, such a small fraction with the will and desire to turn to Him. He had so much to give and less and less of the population to give to. And what of the boy? He'd never had a chance to call on Him but like all children who die would be returned to his Father's open arms.