The Savior Rises Read Free

lady from upstairs screamed when she saw Stefani sitting on the kitchen floor, staring vacantly at her mother’s lifeless corpse. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. What the heck did that mean, anyway? Was it supposed to be a consoling thought, understanding her mother was now nothing more than decaying flesh and bones?
    Her life took a bizarre twist that evening. It was only a few hours after she watched her mother die that she learned her grandmother had been murdered, as well. She had been sitting in the police station, draped in an oversized man’s coat, clutching her Raggedy Ann doll. She didn’t even shed a tear when the officer told her about her last living relative’s death.  Her insides were used up at that point. Even at her present age, she was nothing more than a hollow shell of a human being.
    With no place to go and nobody to take care of her, she fell into the California system for homeless children. She was quickly placed with a foster family, and somehow, she was forced to start using their last name. She never really understood this; but once they adopted her, the name stuck. Now and forever more, she was Stefani Hernandez. She laughed out loud at that. Blonde hair, blue eyes, and she was legally Hispanic. In some ways the oddity fit her life perfectly.
    “Bbbbbbbbbbbbbblllllllllllllllllaaaaaaaaaaagggggggggghhhhhhhhhh,” she heard the gurgling noise come out of her mouth as she threw up again for the third time that day. Had she not been getting progressively sicker for the past few months, she might have thought the nausea was in response to her violent memories. At some point, she knew she really should go to the doctor, but she also knew she never would. She didn’t trust doctors. She didn’t trust anyone, really.
    Her foster family had been fine for the most part. They provided her a bed and food to eat. She had never warmed up to them, though; and, in some ways, they had not to her, either. They treated her like part of their family, but she knew she would never fit. She was a freak of nature. The kid whose mother was butchered, and nobody ever discovered why or by whom. What did it matter, anyway?
    On the day of her graduation, her entire foster family had been gunned down in a drive-by shooting. They were on their way to see her ceremony. The police said it was some kind of gang-related initiation. But they never found out who pulled the trigger.
    Everyone Stefani had ever known or been associated with had died. She resigned herself long ago to believing she would always be alone.
    When her foster family was killed, Stefani made the decision to forego college. She moved to the city and settled in a small apartment in San Francisco. She held down a job waitressing during the day and occupied herself as a dancer at night. The pay was good, and unlike most of the girls, she didn’t participate in any of the extracurricular activities with the male clientele. A guy tried something with her once, and he left with his arm bent back like a pretzel. She could still hear him scream as she snapped his forearm as if it were a mere twig. Her strength was freaky.
    She didn’t have any friends. She barely even knew the three girls with whom she shared an apartment. She waved hello to them or said goodbye on her way out, but they never spent any real time together. How many people wander through their fleeting existences with no hope, no dreams, and no real ambition? She considered killing herself on several occasions. But she knew that wasn’t an option, at least not before her task was complete.
    The only time she came close to death was when she fell three stories from an open window. She’d been leaning on the ledge, sitting on the window sill, trying to catch a glimpse of the night sky. She loved the night air. It was odd how she felt more peaceful during a full moon, when the stars shone and everyone else was fast asleep. She fell headfirst out the window and somehow landed on her feet. She hadn’t