It was the only place I ever really felt at peace.  None in my family understood it.  They all believed that their religions lay in their hearts and not in any buildings, but for some reason I always stood out.  Maybe because in that place I didn’t have to worry about what I was going to do with my life.  I’d always believed that God would show me the way.

Sophia sighed and set her pen down on the page, pushed it into the binding crease of the journal, and closed it.  She rarely went home these days.  In a few short weeks she’d be found bleeding on one of God’s pews without any clues to guide her family, but in this moment no one could know that. 

The breeze stirred her long blond hair across her hazel eyes, features she’d inherited from her father.  For a moment, she was so lost in her thoughts that she didn’t notice it.  The journal and the church had become the staples that kept her life together especially in recent days—especially the journal.  She’d taken particular care to record events as a historian would, with as much detail as possible.  Times, places, people, people’s features, scenery, mood, feelings; it was all meticulously noted.  It was necessary because things were changing.  Not all things were simple to record.

Her fingers curled around the edge of the book, tightening; thumbnail dragged across the brown leather cover; eyes watering, narrowing; the serenity intruded on by anger.  In a rush it was flung open once more and the previous page was torn violently from within.  “It’s all wrong.”  Sophia muttered fiercely as she ripped the page into smaller pieces and threw them to the wind so that it would carry those pieces far, far from her.

How do you explain to another person—“No.”  She scratched out the line and tried again, the words gradually coming more and more easily to her. 

If I don’t figure out how to fix it soon, I’ll stop it by any means necessary.

Sophia closed the journal at that and locked it, then tucked it and the pen away into her bag.