Excerpt from Chasing God's River. http://ping.fm/aDt80
Katie Jones shook her head, ever so slightly, coming out of the bruises of a crystal clear dream. Next to her, Wade was sound asleep, his head buried face down in a pillow. She looked at the quartz bedside clock. Three a.m.
Another angel dream.
A messenger this time. She laid her head back on the pillow, savoring the dream, hoping to find meaning. The angelic messenger was a young man, handsome and strong. His skin was a pale white marble. He had a sad innocent smile on his lips. She was standing by his side on a riverbank near the bottom of a tall waterfall facing up together.
“Here he comes,” the angel said.
The bow of a long kayak made of whalebone, driftwood, and sea lion skins appeared at the top of the waterfall and hung there.
Katie couldn't see who was in it.
The angel extended his left arm, palm up and open, as if holding the kayak in place.
“What is your wish for the passenger?”
“To find his way,” Katie responded.
“Then he must fall,” the angel said. The angel dropped his hand.
Katie watched as the kayak shot out from the waterfall, nose down in free fall. Wade was in the boat, dressed in animal skins, his eyes alert that real death was at hand. A powerful arm of evil water reached out from the base of the waterfall, grabbed the boat like a child's toy and sucked the kayak into a deep pool of wet death.
And Wade was gone.
Startled, Katie sat up in bed. “Why?”
In the darkened room, she heard the messenger's whisper. “Men are supposed to die.”
She felt the angel leave the room, like the soft evaporated whist of a breath withdrawn. Katie laid next to her sleeping husband, smothering him with the spooning warmth of her frenzied body, her hands reaching out, clutching his.
“Be safe, my love.” She kissed him on his cheek and he smiled in his sleep.