Passion

by Jacob Coughlan

I'd never seen a crucifixion before, or at least not a real one. I once saw a statue of Jesus, in a church, that looked real enough to my frightened nine-year-old eyes. Now, looking at the horror before me, I knew that that pallid figurine, with plaster blood frozen mid-drip, came nowhere near the truth of it. Here and now, the real bodily fluids ran in sticky rivulets down the wooden post; not just blood, but excrement and stuff I couldn't even identify. They were calling it a hate crime, as the teen aged boy that dangled, lifeless, from the cross-beam had recently come out of the closet. The scarecrow, which had been upon that wood till yesterday, lay on the ground in a crumpled heap.

6S

Jacob Coughlan lives in Melbourne, Australia and writes when - and if - he gets around to it. His life's ambition is to win second prize in a beauty contest, but he'll settle for a bank error in his favour. (Click here to make a donation to Jacob, half of which will support 6S.)