The God of Endings

by Jacqueline Holland

Everything I’ve loved I’ve lost, and not generally with sweet goodbyes and tearful embraces—violently, horrifically, such that it seems that to love is to lose.

You have great power in you, lyubimaya, but you are afraid. The only unpardonable sin is sheltering another from the death of their fear. I will never commit such a sin. I will never hinder you from the death of your fear.

Tell me about myself and the world and all the obliging deities you see hiding in the groves, brooding on the high cliffs, lighting up the skies.

Gods don’t give chase, and seasons don’t bring predestined endings.

Most people, I was learning, were cowards, and most laws had nothing to do with justice. Justice was a private matter that you didn’t expect anyone to execute for you. You did it yourself, or it didn’t get done.

Now I assume that the hungry universe, after much suffering and grief, ate both her and her brother alive and screaming. For that is the way of the world, and I, at least, will not be a teller of false and soothing stories.

Nothing we have is truly ours; it can all be taken at a moment’s notice, and if you live long enough, you can be certain that it will be.