© David Stewart

Providence
by Miles H. Rost

Marsha didn’t know what to do.

Nearly everyone she knew, even clergy, attempted to exert pressure on her to kill the child she carried. The child of a megalomaniacal old man who would execute an entire generation of people over one more dime.

She knelt, weeping, in the garden prison that was the mansion in Geneva, strands of hemp rope on her palm.

*click*

The creaking of the gate caught her attention, and she saw one of her friends peek her head through.

“C’mon, Marsha. We’ll get you somewhere safe.”

Without hesitating, Marsha jumped up and ran, her providence received.