Little Fingers! Read Online Free Page B

He would just try to keep the volume down
instead. There were all these cries coming up from everywhere in
the universe - cries of happiness, of sadness, of distress, of
exultation, of agony. They were making a huge eternal booming wave
of a noise (as arrives in my head nowadays on a much smaller
scale), and God decided that they were seriously interfering with
His enjoyment of the universe.
    So He created
another human being, whom He called His son, to at least try to
sort out human beings, who were disproportionately responsible for
the distress God was suffering because they were so articulate.
Christ came down to earth and delivered his message well - “Love
God, and love your neighbour as yourself (and therefore quieten
down a little - you are making far too much noise!)”.
Unfortunately, the humans started shouting and clapping when he
announced the first two sections, and so never quite heard the
third message in brackets. Human beings have selective
hearing.
    Christ said
“God is listening to you (there is no need to shout).” They missed
the second bit out of their excitement over the first.
    Christ on the
cross cried out “Father, oh father, where art Thou now in my time
of need?”
    God said
“Human, all too human.”
    When Christ
ascended back into heaven he looked downcast and said “Father, I
have failed you. I have not stopped them, and I have started
shouting myself.”
    God said
“Catchy little so-and-sos, aren't they? Do not distress yourself.
We are all doomed to failure. It is an inevitability of the
universe. I understand that now. I shall no longer interfere in the
universe's affairs, except for fun. I am not going to have the
universe deny me some fun. I want to see the smile of children when
they are given their favourite toy. I want to rejoice with the
mother who has given birth to her child. I want to feel the
exhilaration of men who achieve great feats at the limit of their
capacities. I want to share the breathtaking beauty of landscapes,
sunsets and of all creatures. I now declare that good is everything
that is joyous and generous, and that evil is the opposite. Now all
I need to work out is how to judge it. It is an intractable
problem.”
     
    * *
*
     
     

Chapter
3
     
    My sister,
Louise, died at the age of six of leukaemia.
    I was ten at
the time, so I can remember her well.
    She was the
nicest of children, and I talk as a rival for affection. Well, less
a rival than a loser. Everyone doted over Louise because she was
blonde and pretty, and smiled easily. At the time I was dark and
plain-looking, and inclined to sulk.
    Children grow
different ways. While in my case my transformation came at the end
of a surgeon's knife, I have seen many girls (and especially those
wearing glasses) shock all those around them by seemingly overnight
switching from pug-ugly not-a-chance-in-hell-of-getting-laid types
into slinky-legged sizzling sex objects. You can always tell these
types by the startled look on their faces when it becomes obvious
that the most handsome man in the room fancies them..
    Equally, I
have seen very pretty little girls bulk out into ordinary looking
adults with four kids, a pushchair, and a best friend they moan to
as they walk along the pavement. Maybe Louise would have become one
of these, but at the time of her death she was still
beautiful.
    Beautiful but
ethereal. For two years we all fought to keep her, and the medical
profession did everything it possibly could for, or arguably
against, her. The holy hope is first of all the bone marrow match,
then the transplant. I would certainly have given my bones to help
her, even my entire body, but I was not a match. Appeals went out
around the country as her surgeon sharpened his scalpels for a spot
of heroic surgery.
    We were told
throughout that the odds were good, that most recovered from
childhood leukaemia. A match would be found, the chemo and
radiation therapy would work, and she would “soon be clambering
back on board