#fridayflash: Lucky Strike?

The bolt of lightning pierced the sky and, in a blinding flash, struck the church steeple. Father O'Leary was watching from his bedroom window. For some time now, he had known this moment was inevitable but nevertheless, the sheer force of the bolt as it hit the building made him gasp in horror.

"Holy Mary, Mother of Jesus!" he whimpered as he crossed himself, sinking to his knees and clutching his rosary beads tightly in his hands. He uttered a low moan as the spire began to crumble. Only seconds after being hit, it was collapsing like a bad soufflé, taking the remainder of the church with it, and all he could do was look on in anguish.

He wasn't surprised at the tragic event playing out before his eyes. Only three months before, he had had a vision whilst he slept; he had been forewarned by his Maker, the Great God Almighty, that his dear beloved church was not going to stand the next winter, and that its days were numbered. He hadn't known exactly when it was going to happen. He had seen the ruins of it in his sleep and only knew that it would take place in darkness. Since that prophetic night, he had moved all his evening masses to the small chapel on the opposite side of the village green, on the premise that it was quicker and cheaper to warm up. The parishioners hadn't grumbled and had been glad in fact, as the old church had become very draughty recently and they always left the priest's long masses chilled to the core. Anywhere warmer than that old place was fine by them.

So finally this revered House of God was no more. Gone, in an instant. Father O'Leary gazed through the pane, down at the mound of rubble and started to cry. He wept over the demise of the fragile edifice that he had worshipped and loved for the last 50 years. He also wept for another reason, as he had done on the night he had first had the vision; he shed a tear, amazed and honoured that his God had proved himself true. The power of the priest's faith had finally realised itself.
∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞

Eoghan Fitzpatrick was also watching the effect of the raging storm that night. He too witnessed the spear of lightening strike the steeple and destroy the loathsome church in a few minutes.

"You'll never guess what. Aoifa," he called over his shoulder to his wife who was reading in bed. "That feckin' church has just been torn down by the storm."

"About bloody time," he added under his breath.

Eoghan heaved a huge sigh of relief. The church had been the bane of his life ever since he had moved here. Not only did the enormous steeple shadow his front garden, inhibiting the growth of his wife's precious daffodils, but the bells were an endless source of misery to him. He had inherited the property from his parents and, having very little money at the time, had had little choice but to take it on. It had seemed perfect at first: a pretty, little cottage on the village green next to a quaint and picturesque church. It hadn't, however, taken long for the novelty to wear off and for the wretched building to start grinding on his nerves.

He had been here for four years now and for the last three had been plotting a resolution to this problem. He had been keeping his plans from his wife and was sure she had absolutely no idea that for the last six months, conscious of the approaching winter and more determined than ever to down the steeple, he had been stealing away at night, armed with his hand-drill, to execute his plan. Aoifa thought his midnight excursions were due to insomnia and that he was simply pacing around the green. She would have stopped him there and then if she had known the truth.

So, as the steeple toppled with a resounding crash, Eoghan merely commented on how atrocious the weather was and what a shame it was that the old place was gone. He never once let on that the collapse had been a combination of the forces of nature and some very strategically-placed holes in the steeple's mortar.