When Heaven Weeps Read Online Free PDF Page B

Michael’s body jerked and he snapped his eyes open. He might have gasped—he wasn’t sure because this world with all of its soldiers and trudging women was too distant to judge accurately.
    In its place stretched a white horizon, flooded with streaming light.
    And music.
    Faint, but clear. Long, pure notes, the same as he’d heard earlier. My beloved . A song of love.
    Michael shifted his gaze to the horizon and squinted. The landscape was endless and flat like a sprawling desert, but covered with white flowers. The light streamed several hundred feet above the ground toward him from the distant horizon.
    A tiny wedge of alarm struck Michael. He was alone in this white field. Except for the light, of course. The light and the music.
    He could suddenly hear more in the music. At first he thought it might be the spring, bubbling near the courtyard. But it wasn’t water. It was a sound made by a child. It was a child’s laughter, distant, but rushing toward him from that far horizon, carried on the swelling notes of music.
    Gooseflesh rippled over Michael’s skin. He suddenly felt as thought he might be floating, swept off his feet by a deep note that resounded in his bones.
    The music grew, and with it the children’s laughter. High peals of laughter and giggles, not from one child, but from a hundred children. Maybe a thousand children, or a million, swirling around him now from every direction. Laughter of delight, as though from a small boy being mercilessly tickled by his father. Then reprieves followed by sighs of contentment as others took up the laughing.
    Michael could not help the giggle that bubbled in his own chest and slipped out in short bursts. The sound was thoroughly intoxicating. But where were the children?
    A single melody reached through the music. A man’s voice, pure and clear, with the power to melt whatever it touched. Michael stared out at the field where the sound came from.
    A man was walking his way, a shimmering figure, still only an inch tall on the horizon. The voice was his. He hummed a simple melody, but it flowed over Michael with intoxicating power. The melody started low and rose through the scale and then paused. Immediately the children’s laughter swelled, responding directly to the man’s song. He began again, and the giggles quieted a little and then swelled at the end of this simple refrain. It was like a game.
    Michael couldn’t hold back his own laughter. Oh, my God, what is happening to me? I’m losing my mind . Who was this minstrel walking toward him? And what kind of song was this that made him want to fly with all those children he could not see?
    Michael lifted his head and searched the skies. Come out, come out wherever you are, my children. Were they his children? He had no children.
    But now he craved them. These children, laughing hysterically around him. He wanted these children—to hold them, to kiss them, to run his fingers through their hair and roll on the ground, laughing with them. To sing this song to them. Come out, my dear . . .
    The flashbulb ignited again. Pop!
    The laughter evaporated. The song was gone.
    It took only a moment for Father Michael to register the simple, undeniable fact that he was once again standing on the steps of his church, facing a courtyard filled with women who slumped under heavy crosses over cold, flat concrete. His mouth lay open, and he seemed to have forgotten how to use the muscles in his jaw.
    The soldiers stood against the far wall, smirking at the women, except for the tall skinny man. He seemed awkward in his role. The commander looked on with a glint in his eyes. And Michael realized that they had not seen his awkward display of laughter then.
    Above them the dove perched on Sister Flouta’s roof, still eyeing the scene below. To Michael’s right, the elderly still sat, as though dead in their seats, unbelieving of this nightmare unfolding before them. And at his