05-29-2022, 01:57 AM
While Fletcher's tracking talents were almost purely limited to wooded areas, when he set out to find a church it wasn't a great feat of ingenuity to do so. He had been in Whitby only a few weeks doing some repairs and odd jobs around the McKenna estate and the old cottage in the woods on their land, coming into town proper only for supplies when absolutely necessary. Crowds were disquieting at the best of times, and being the latest stranger in a small town wasn't a position he found particularly enviable. Alas, were there a Catholic church tucked away in a wooded hollow he would have attended that instead, but what he needed could only be found in town.
It was midmorning on a Tuesday, a time he picked specifically to avoid as many prying eyes as possible, and hummed thoughtfully to himself when he slipped silently through the doors and found the hallowed space largely empty. Fletcher shuffled awkwardly into one of the rear-most pews and stared up at the windows and into the painted spaces between the buttressing of the distant space above his head. He had always been fond of church though never the service. He found it more helpful to ponder God and eternity in the quiet comfort of his own head when not surrounded by a symphony of old men clearing their throats, off-tone singing, busybodies of every variety, and conducted to the tune of fire and brimstone by a man who had likely transgressed more than the entire town combined, if the stench of Saturday night's ale coming off him was any indicator.
Childhood memories momentarily got the better of him, but Fletcher returned to the stillness of this place like plunging his head underwater, where everything moved slowly and quietly as if floating serenely into infinity. Perhaps antithesis then to his entire state of being, as he knelt on the bench on the pew in front of him, he purposely shifted it in a way that made the wood groan and squeak only slightly against the stone floor that echoed into what felt like a cacophony above.
He desperately desired to speak with the local priest, but he disliked being a bother and should the father be otherwise engaged Fetcher would simply leave as he had come. But he had hoped the noise would draw the man out.
It was midmorning on a Tuesday, a time he picked specifically to avoid as many prying eyes as possible, and hummed thoughtfully to himself when he slipped silently through the doors and found the hallowed space largely empty. Fletcher shuffled awkwardly into one of the rear-most pews and stared up at the windows and into the painted spaces between the buttressing of the distant space above his head. He had always been fond of church though never the service. He found it more helpful to ponder God and eternity in the quiet comfort of his own head when not surrounded by a symphony of old men clearing their throats, off-tone singing, busybodies of every variety, and conducted to the tune of fire and brimstone by a man who had likely transgressed more than the entire town combined, if the stench of Saturday night's ale coming off him was any indicator.
Childhood memories momentarily got the better of him, but Fletcher returned to the stillness of this place like plunging his head underwater, where everything moved slowly and quietly as if floating serenely into infinity. Perhaps antithesis then to his entire state of being, as he knelt on the bench on the pew in front of him, he purposely shifted it in a way that made the wood groan and squeak only slightly against the stone floor that echoed into what felt like a cacophony above.
He desperately desired to speak with the local priest, but he disliked being a bother and should the father be otherwise engaged Fetcher would simply leave as he had come. But he had hoped the noise would draw the man out.
