"We're lucky people are okay with us," I said, chewing my pencil. Lilli, Caleb, and I were sprawled out on the quad under the pretext of studying, our papers scattered about us like so many molted feathers.
"Weird," yawned Caleb.
"Shut up. I just mean, things could be a lot worse. People could be a lot worse to us."
"I guess," Lilli mumbled into the grass. "We could be quadriplegics or starving or something."
I did not have the energy to hone my point and try again. Basking does that to a person. My body slackened for the sun and my thoughts strayed, as they are prone when prone, to visions of warmth and fire and then burning, burning at the stake. I flipped through the holy trials of the Book as I would a catalogue: flagellation, quartering, drowning, crucifixion right-side up and upside down. There were more, of course, and we had invented new ones for our new age, but they were all just capers to the judgments of men.
YOU ARE READING
Transfiguration
Short StoryA mysterious boy who never takes off his jacket. A temple where men talk directly to angels. An extremely boring college economics course. Curiosity gives way to confusion as our nameless, genderless narrator learns the reason behind their classmate...
