It happened so suddenly. One moment everyone was going about their business as usual. Normal people doing normal things. Adelaide Jones was in the freezer section of Tesco trying to decide between beef and mushroom or steak and kidney pie for dinner. Her husband Bill loved a bit of kidney but she wasn’t fond of it herself. The thought of where those things had been and what they’d done put her off. Sometimes Bill would bring fresh kidneys home from the butchers and the tangy smell of piss that floated up from the wrapping always made her feel ill. Adelaide decided on the beef and mushroom pie.
Jim Wilson was walking his dog in the park. The little terrier was excited, yapping and bouncing, trying to chase everything and anything that was in his eyeline. Some kids on skateboards passed by and the dog strained at the end of his leash chasing after the rattling wheels.
Terry Ryan was making himself a cup of tea in the office kitchen. He was very particular about every step of the process. Ideally he would have made a full of pot of tea and let it stew for a while, but in this place he was lucky to find a clean mug after 9 in the morning.
Adelaide Jones had moved down to the ready meals section when she noticed a carton of eggs floating past her trolley. She stopped for a moment, struck dumb. Then she looked quickly around for a hidden camera. It must be a joke, had to be… her thought process froze as the eggs were followed by a string of sausages and a frozen turkey.
Terry Ryan felt a strange tugging in his shoes. ‘What the…’ he thought and then found himself bumping his head gently against the ceiling. The tea things were scattered in the air below him. ‘What a strange thing.’ He thought as a tea bag gently caressed his face.
Jim Wilson saw the kids go up first, they floated around on their skateboards, swooping and flying. Screaming with joy and a little fear. ‘How high can you go?’ they chanted. Jim noticed the leash in his hand had become slack. He looked up and saw the little terrier treading air, floating up, up and away. Somehow the dog had loosed itself from the harness. Jim watched him paddle around for a bit and then with a sudden jerk realised his feet were no longer on the ground. He windmilled and back-pedalled trying to reach the earth that slowly, slowly fell away under his feet.
Below, he saw men and women struggling vainly to stay close to the ground. One young couple held tightly to the trunk of a tree. A man in a suit tugged at a park bench which itself was slowly lifting into the sky. All around him people and things were rising slowly into the heavens.
‘This is what it feels like to fly’ thought Jim, and then he turned away from the earth. The city fell with him, up and up into the vast blue.
————————————-
Inspired by To all the dancers in the sky By Flickr user Dejon. Check out the rest of the flicktioneers: The Gurrier, Chris, Linus, Tadmack, TeaandCakes, LittleGoat, Aquafortis, Valsha and Neil.

The question is, does Bill Jones get his steak and kidney pie or does the rapture leave him behind, forced to make his dinner on his own?
Comment by Chris — December 31, 2006 @ 12:54 pm
Cool, very nicely done. I do love extraordinary events filtered through the mundane of the everyday.
Really like the last line.
Comment by Donal — January 1, 2007 @ 5:04 pm
Now THAT is lovely. Such a sense of hope and lightness of being, outside of whatever gibberish theologically that could come. And I do love the fact that some people are desperately clutching at things to hold them down. And the kids are just seeing how high they can go. It’s so portenteous and laden with …well, vast blueness. Really nice details, especially the tea bag caressing his face. I love this.
Comment by TadMack — January 1, 2007 @ 9:09 pm
… and then Kirk Cameron came by and spoiled it all by telling everyone they were evil.
Comment by David — January 1, 2007 @ 10:03 pm
What does Kirk Cameron have to do with it? er…
Comment by elimare — January 2, 2007 @ 11:07 am
I love the last line, and, like TadMack, the different ways that people reacted. Really lovely piece.
Comment by Isobel — January 2, 2007 @ 7:34 pm
Kirk Cameron is a big fan of the rapture.
Comment by Donal — January 3, 2007 @ 11:22 pm
Hopelessly late, but just wanted to say this is great!
Comment by Valsha — January 6, 2007 @ 12:20 am
What a striking piece! It just sort of builds, with the concrete details making the extraordinary happenings that much more amazing, and the scene kind of zooming out into a big-picture view of everything. I love the last line, too.
Comment by Sarah — January 6, 2007 @ 9:38 pm