The following story was inspired by watching Ah Megami-sama, Video
Girl Ai, and Maison Ikkoku back to back.  If nothing else can warp
your mind, I guess that can.  Oh, and the title was inspired by
Harlan Ellison, but that's something else entirely.

I wrote this at 1:30 in the morning, while listening to Tori Amos's
"Twinkle" off of the "Boys for Pele" album, on continuous replay.

     Christ as a Can of Chiseled Spam in an Automotive Accident

        I used to think if you fell from grace it was more likely
than not to happen so gradually that you don't lose your stomach
or hurt yourself in the landing.  I hadn't learned that it can
happen as the result of one stupendous error, or else an unfortunate
accident.  You feel the motion impact you suddenly.  I've fond that
it takes only one second to alter the course of a life.  You're
slapped in the face with reality, and there you are at the bottom of
the heap.

        The spirit of Jennie looked down at the car, mangled beyond
belief.  She knew that the next moments would be the most important,
that even in her death that she must help the living go on with their
lives.  She knew him too well.  The hatred in his heart would boil
over like a witch's cauldron, and would destroy his life and everything
he held dear, now that he was unfettered  by the restraint of his love
for her.

        I sat in the car, stunned at the ridiculous ease with which
the life next to mine had been ended.  The brutal shock of talking
to someone one second, and then the next second, through blood-stained
vision,  seeing the remains of something that might have been human,
was too much for me to bear.  I wished that I had been the one in
that seat, that I had been the one who had died.

        Jennie floated down to the car, which was trapped beneath
the truck that had ended her life but seconds ago.  With the eyes
of someone freshly dead, she could see the dark rage begin to pour
across her beloved's face, a face which had never had anything less
than an optimistic look for her.  She knew then that if he let this
anger loose, let it come to control him, that every thing he had
ever lived for, had ever dreamed of, would be wiped out in that next
instant.  The caring gentle soul, with so much to offer to this
world of pain, would be destroyed, never to be seen by anyone again.

        My last words to her had been my confession of my love for
her.  I had known Jennie for three years, had helped her through a
succession of abusive boyfriends, had watched as she desperately
hunted for the affection that she had not received in her family.
I would hear her voice on the phone, as she cried about the latest
jerk who had treated her roughly, and then those words which burned
so deeply inside of me, "I wish that my boyfriend was more like you." 
Finally, I had gotten together my courage, had overcome my fears, had
gotten together enough self-confidence to tell her how I felt.
Finally she had someone who loved her for who she was, and then this
had to happen.

        Jennie reached into the car and rested her spectral fingers on
his arm.  She tried to tell him that in the final moments of her life,
that she had been happy, that he mustn't let this destroy his vision of
life, that it was his pure, unrestrained love that had finally set her
free of the chains she had lived her life in.  That a spirit that kind
shouldn't be allowed to die, that he should continue on with his life.

        I was a coward, a fool, an idiot without guidance, and I had
squandered the few moments we spent together.  Finally I was able to
tell her how I felt, and then THIS HAPPENED!  THERE AIN'T NO JUSTICE!
I forced open the car door and stepped out of it into the street.  I
left everything that was good about me in that car, in that mangled
pile of flesh that had been Jennie.  I stalked over to the driver's
door of the truck, pulled it open, watched as the half empty bottle of
whiskey fell to the ground in front of my feet and shattered, spraying
poison across my feet, listened to the slurred speech of the driver,
smelt the alcohol on his breath, and violently pulled him from the cab.
I threw myself on his prone body like a wolf on the kill,
ready to extract vengeance on his form, ready to extract vengance for
all the wrong done this night.

        Given the circumstances, Jennie saw, it was normal for him to
feel some anger towards the trucker, towards life, towards the universe.
She also saw, that if he continued on this path of wanton destruction,
that it would destroy everything that had made him what she loved.
She floated to him, and whispered in his ear, "I love you."

        When I heard her voice, I thought I had gone mad.  Momentarily,
I was paralyzed by my sense of loss, by the destruction of  an innocent
life.  I was pulled back to the last moments with her, when we stopped
at a stoplight, when I said those three words, when she replied that
her feelings were a mirror of mine, how I leaned towards her as she
leaned towards me, how we held each other briefly, our seatbelts holding
us apart, the sudden, passionate kiss, then how we both sat back in our
seats, waiting for the light to change, for this realization to start
the rest of our lives.

        Jennie could see the sudden change in his mood, by the way his
hand, raised high above the prone form of the trucker, unclenched,
relaxed, and fell to his side.  He stood up turned towards the wreck,
and for one instant he could see everything.

        I saw my beloved Jennie standing by the car wreck, speaking to
me.  "Don't be afraid to love again," she said.  "Don't be afraid to
live again.  If you let die what I loved most about you, I'll be very
angry when I see you again..."  With those words, she faded from my
sight, forever lost to my vision.

        That's how they found me when the police came.  I was standing,
facing the wreck, next to the prone body of the trucker, tears streaming
down my face, but with a smile of someone who knew that he was loved.





Coming soon!  Tonari-no Totoro II: The UnHentai Fanfic!

Fnord.
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* Founder of the Church of the One Righteous Spatula!                       *
*                                                                           *
* "Life's tough, then you die, then they put you in a hole in the ground,   *
* then they throw dirt in your face, then the worms eat you.  Be glad it    *
* happens in that order." - Solomon Short                                   *
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* inThane@oz.net - inThane O'Neill Walkup, Spearman                         *
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