The church was tall and dark, its steeple piercing the sky as it had always done, like the faded memory of some gothic giant from centuries past. Eugene threw himself against the doors and they lurched open on rasping hinges. It was cooler in the shadowed interior, the sunlight slanting through the tall, stained-glass windows, the saints’ and angels’ painted faces slowly disappearing under the march of time. Sunlight fell across the pews like piano keys, but all Eugene could hear were his own footsteps echoing through the church’s bowels, and his own heartbeat thrumming moth-like behind his ribs. The vaulted ceiling was stained black and rotten, the damage reaching so wide it was beginning to make its way down the walls, in between the windows. It looked dangerous to touch.

The pulpit had been repaired since Eugene had seen the man standing there, when that crack of lightning split the wood in two. It had been replaced as if nothing had ever happened. No evidence, they said. No foul play. The confessional stood empty as a grave, and Eugene avoided it as he walked down the aisle to pass through to the courtyard, careful not to stray too near the walls where the black stain lurked.

The courtyard was overgrown to the point of being unrecognizable. The roses had dug their thorny claws into everything, dropping petals like blood to stain the ground beneath. Vines climbed the iron fence that hemmed the yard, throttling it until it became a wall of shivering greenery. Eugene picked his way through, the thorns snagging at his trousers and drawing blood from his hands as he passed. To the left of the yard, through a gate locked shut with plant matter, stood the cemetery. The gravestones were just visible above the ocean of green. Climbing the gate, the rough vines tore Eugene's palms open, but he dropped to the far side alive and whole. His parents were buried side by side five rows deep, and it was to them he went, the markers still and silent all around him.

The humming was louder in the graveyard, as if reality were worn thin. The church rested on swampland, threatening to sink into the water without a trace.

“I’m glad you don’t have to see this place now.” His words fell muffled from his lips into the thick humidity as he traced the letters of his mother's grave. “I know you never liked it here, but I’m glad you don’t have to see it disappear like this.”

The graves made no answer. The humming buzzed like an insect, drilling through the side of his skull. He could almost hear a voice in it, cutting through the haze to call his name with increasing insistence. Under his feet, the ground was sodden. The cemetery would be the first of the town to go. The floodwater would raise the coffins from their slumber; bones would drift to the surface and migrate far from their hallowed homes. It had happened in 1927 when the Mississippi flooded. The only difference was that then, people cared enough to try and stop it. Chanlarivyè was already gone.