And it came to pass that the veteran sat in his chair as upon a throne of ruin, and the medals upon his wall gleamed like false idols in a temple of dust. The house groaned as though it bore witness, its beams crying out, its wallpaper peeling like a scroll unsealed.
There was the wife, walking in garments of smoke and perfume. She was taken in the arms of the handyman, whose tools clattered like the chains of Babylon. Yet she too bore the burden of knowledge, for she had answered the calls of her husband’s lovers—voices crying from the wilderness of night. Husband and wife became as Jezebel and Ahab, bound not by covenant but by the covenant of betrayal. They were each other’s flying monkeys, wings of deceit, claws of desire.
And behold, there was the daughter. She pressed her face into her father’s garments as though to draw breath from them, as Israel once clung to the hem of prophets. At two‑and‑twenty years, her devotion was a fire that consumed without light. Whether she loved her father or was in love with him, the question rose like incense in a desecrated sanctuary—thick, choking, never answered, never absolved.
The veteran spoke not, for his silence was as law. And the household obeyed as though he were a prophet of old, though his gospel was ruin. The wife with her lips painted red as blood, the handyman with hands hardened as stone, the daughter with eyes hollow as empty tombs—each became his ministering spirit, his flying monkey, carrying forth his will.
The neighbors beheld only shadows: the wife’s laughter at the market, the handyman’s truck idling in the drive, the daughter’s pale face at the window like a watchman in the night. But within, the house was a tabernacle of corruption, a carnival of devotion turned to ash.
And lo, the farmhouse sagged against the wind as a temple brought low. The rafters trembled, the pipes moaned, and shadows of wings passed across the ceiling though no bird flew therein. In the end, it was not the war that defined the veteran, but the dominion he wrought at home—a false Zion, a Mississippi Oz, where all bore wings yet none could ascend.
This piece is an allegory. It is not a literal account of any real person, family, or event. Instead, it uses Southern Gothic symbolism—haunted houses, false prophets, corrupted devotion—to explore the emotional truth of generational dysfunction and the way power can twist a household into myth. The characters are archetypes, not individuals; the setting is metaphor, not memory. This is fiction written in the language of revelation.
© Jaime Pearson 2025. All rights reserved. Please do not copy, reproduce, or share without permission.
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