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The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness. —JOSEPH CONRAD
Blood and tears. Violence and mayhem. Love and hate. These were the rocks upon which the South was built.
If you had an occasion to ask some of the citizens of Charon, most of them would tell you those things were in the past. That they had been washed away by the river of time that flows ever forward. They might even say those things should be forgotten and left to the ages. But if you had asked Sheriff Titus Crown, he would have said that anyone who believed that was a fool or a liar.
An atrocity before a God that didn’t seem interested in forestalling the actions of his most accursed creations as they attacked his most innocent ones.
“How do you deal with having that in your head?” Carla asked. Titus put on his sunglasses. “I try not to dream,”
Scott was the type of man who complained about the world being too sensitive these days without ever acknowledging the irony of his own fragility or privilege.
“God didn’t save them. He let them die screaming in the dark,”
“I used to believe in God’s plan. I believed he would heal Mama. Even though he’d never spoken to me. He’d never answered any of my prayers, but I still believed he’d heal her. Stop her muscles from turning to bone. Touch her with his heavenly hand and take away her pain. Stop her from howling all night. But he didn’t,”
“Pop,” Titus said as he brushed past his father and went into the house, “faith broke my fucking heart.”
The words PROTECT AND SERVE were inscribed on his badge, but in moments like this, it felt like INTIMIDATE AND FRIGHTEN should replace them.
“Evil is rarely complicated. It’s just fucking bold.”
the Word was just as corrupt as the men who read it. Old Testament, New Testament, it was just words with a little w, written by zealots as PR for their new cult founded in the memory of a dead carpenter.
He was going to have to drag them into a new reality where people they knew, people they’d known all their lives, were monsters with human faces.
“Reverend, if you’ve seen the things I have, you’d realize the devil is just the name we give to the terrible things we do to each other,” Titus said.
“God loves the believer and the nonbeliever all the same.” Yeah, but I don’t love him back. I left that abusive relationship a long time ago, Titus thought. “Have a good evening, Reverend,” he said.
I wish Jesus was real so he could chase you down the aisle with a goddamn whip,” Titus said.
Whoever controlled the narrative controlled the truth.
“It’s the job. It’s what I signed up for.” “Negro, you did not sign up for no Silence of the Lambs shit. This
Do you know what hell is? It’s not lakes of fire. It’s being ignored by God.
