Jimmy Mitchell stood in front of the bathroom mirror, turning his head to the left and then to the right, his face inches from his reflection, scrutinizing his complexion. Using his two index fingers, he squeezed blackheads until his skin became red and blotchy.

With every flaw, real or imagined eliminated, he lifted each nostril, checking for any stray hairs. After a few moments, satisfied with his self-grooming ritual, he stood happy in the fact that he was now pimple and nose hair free, taking a step back to admire his full-length image. With one last pull on his cuffs, he spotted a cluster of small red dots on his shoes.

“Shit, this is rental,” he said aloud to himself.

Pulling a fistful of hand towels from the dispenser and wetting them, he put one foot at a time on the sink, wiping them clean then buffing them with a dry towel to bring up the shine.

With one last glance at his reflection, he threw the wet paper towels in the garbage, picked up the  leaning against the sink, and exited the church’s bathroom.

Taking the stairs that lead to the front entrance two at a time, he began to whistle the wedding march. Off key and weak, he cringed at his lack of ability to carry a tune. But without the benefit of an organist, he had no choice but to improvise.

Reaching the top of the stairs, he stopped to check his pocket one last time before to make sure he hadn’t lost the rings. The feeling of the box in his hands soothed his nerves. Each gold band nestled on a soft bed of red velvet. Engraved on the insides were their odes to each other, “My love, my friend, my soul mate”. Putting the rings back, Jimmy resumed his awful rendition of the wedding march and started down the aisle.

Ahead of him, his bride, Lisa, stood waiting his arrival.

As he made his way down the aisle, he glanced throughout the pews to where their friends and neighbors sat in observance. It had taken him all morning to make sure everyone sat in the right seats. Bride’s friends and family placed on the left, grooms to the right. The people he didn’t know, well, he just sat them on his side. His family was small anyway and they could always use the company. He didn’t hear anyone complaining.

To his left he saw Sister Michelle Ann, the parish nun who taught Sunday school to the grammar school kids while their parents attended services. He regretted having to kill her, but she had attacked them as they made their way inside the church, hidden inside the confessional. Despite that, he harbored no anger towards her. He smiled at her, giving her a slight wave but she didn’t return his smile, her eyes staring blankly back at him, the top of her head missing. The remainders were the rest of the poor souls who had sought refuge in the in the house of God during the end of days.

God appeared to be out of town though.

Reaching the end of the aisle he kneeled at the statue of the crucified Jesus mounted over the altar and began to pray. Blood dripped from the crown of thorns.

“Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. I ask for your divine forgiveness and your blessing on this day”

Finishing his prayers with a sign of the cross, he walked up to the altar where Father O’Malley, the parish priest stood tied and gagged.

The old priest’s eyes widened as Jimmy approached, his gaze fixated on the rifle in his hands.

Father O’Malley, a pudgy older man who blamed his weight on an unforgiving sweet tooth had a gentle face, a full head of white hair and beard highlighted by streaks of the fiery red of his youth, people often telling him he bore a resemblance to a certain jolly old fat man. So much so, that the kids often referred to him as Father Santa Claus. After thirty years of serving as the parish priest, he knew all his parishioners by name, even baptized Jimmy as a baby.

When the world had turned upside down, he kept the church open despite the warnings. If there was ever a time people needed God he thought, it was now. Hour after hour, he prayed with them for an intervention or at least some understanding of His plans. Jimmy and Lisa had been one of those refugees. On their wedding day, the dead had overrun them attacking Lisa in the process. Jimmy refused to leave her, carrying her dying body six blocks to the church in his tuxedo.

When they arrived, scared and full of redemption, they all came with the same questions.

Why is this happening? Why is God doing this to us?

His faith never faltered, God works in mysterious ways, and even though we do not understand his ways, He has his reasons, and one day we will understand them, he would answer. It was his faith where he found the courage to try to make sense of what made no sense. If he didn’t have faith in His plans, how could he convince someone else to?

But his faith in God, much like man’s time, was dwindling. He tried to hold onto to it, like a lighthouse beacon in a perfect storm. He prayed for a sign, but no sign came, making it increasingly difficult to sustain. Now life consisted of living minute-by-minute and in the thirty plus years of serving God, he seriously began to question His plans. Maybe God had just had enough of dealing with the worlds bullshit and thought ‘you think you’re so smart, figure your way around this’. He knew it would only be a matter of time for him as well, he hoped it would be sooner rather than later.

And now the man whom he had known since birth stood before him pointing a rifle at his head demanding him to commit not only a sacrilege against all his teachings, but also a sacrilege against humanity.

Jimmy removed the gag from the priest’s mouth.

“Jimmy, please, this is madness,” he said, his eyes scanning the pews.

Father O’Malley looked at what was once his beloved church, his parishioners. These same people, whom he had once guided in troubled marriages, taught their children religion, broke bread at their dinner tables were now lifeless bags of meat positioned into some mock audience.

The Bible teaches the story of how Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, but when he rose, did he rush at Jesus and try to tear his throat out?

If that was the case, the apostles had conveniently left that part out.

“Father, I told you, you won’t get hurt as long as we have an agreement as to what it is I want you to do” Jimmy said.

“Jimmy, please son, think about what you’re asking”

Jimmy’s eyes narrowed as he pointed the barrel of the gun in the priest’s face.

“I know exactly what I am asking. Now, you will either do as I say or I’m going to blow your God fearing head all over his fucking house”

Father O’Malley exhaled with a sigh looking over to the bride.

“Jimmy, that’s no longer Lisa”.

“I’m sorry Padre, but we’re done talking, let’s go”, Jimmy said loosening the ropes. The old man is really getting on my nerves, if I didn’t need him I would’ve blown his fucking head off already he thought.

The old priest prayed under his breath as Jimmy pushed him in the back with the barrel of the gun before the dead women. As he got closer to her, she lunged towards him. Her jaw snapping together so hard that he could see chips of enamel fly from her mouth. Her eyes were cloudy and hazed with no hint of humanity left behind them. The sound that emanated from her throat sounded as if it rose from the deepest depths of hell.

He watched in horror as Jimmy gently caressed her cheek, narrowly avoiding her bite before lowering the veil over face whispering in her ear.

“Okay, Father, we’re ready” Jimmy said, standing next to Lisa.

“Jimmy…please”

The stock of the gun came down on him so fast his brain barely had time to register it before he felt wetness running down his temple. His vision, a haze of red as Jimmy pulled him to his feet.

“Okay, okay. Jimmy do you take…” he said.

“No, no, Father, from the beginning”.

He looked around, then at Jimmy, “Ladies and Gentleman, we are gathered here today…”

Jimmy beamed with pride as he held his brides hand.

Father O’Malley’s words flowed easily enough from memory, as he spoke he tried to distance himself from what he was doing, instead, thinking of his brother in Kansas City. He wondered if he was still alive in all this madness.

When the time came for the exchange of the rings, he realized that as Jimmy took her hand, the ropes had loosened. With every lunge, the rope cut deeper into her wrists and her blood was causing them to slacken. It would only be a matter of time before she slipped out of them.

He looked over at Jimmy to see if he had seen what he had, but Jimmy was too deep into his own madness to take notice. Father O’Malley, a priest for thirty five years of his life, thirty of those years spent in this parish and the same man who had baptized this young man who now insisted in marrying his dead girlfriend decided right at that moment that he wouldn’t say anything either. If this was also God will, who was he to interfere?

“That’s it Jimmy, you’re officially married in the eyes of God, that’s if He still cares” he said shaking his head.

Jimmy Mitchell smiled from ear to ear, turning his attentions to his new bride, lifting her veil. As he leaned into her to kiss her cheek, the last bit of rope gave way breaking her wrists in the process. They hung limply at the end of her arms, but didn’t impede her ability to bite. She jumped onto Jimmy’s chest. The unexpected surprise attack caused him to stumble backward and trip over his own feet, landing on his back. Her teeth were into his throat before he could right himself.

Father O’Malley watched in horror, as Lisa tore her new husband’s throat open with a sound like Velcro tearing. His arterial spray shot in her face as she bit deeper, which mercifully cut off his screams. The old priest reached for the rifle before walking backwards down the aisle.

Father O’Malley, the man the neighborhood kids once referred to as Father Santa Claus, the man who had devoted his whole life to a God that had turned His back on humanity, took one last look at the place he called home for the last thirty years of his life, stepped into the cool evening air and as the words to “Kansas City” by Fats Domino came to mind, he wondered how long it would take him to make it there.