Short Story / The Third Revelation
Roger had a short life. He was mildly loved and he will be missed slightly. He died aged 33 in a car crash with his wife. She did not die, she is in a coma. They had no children. They liked each other enough to get married.
Roger was an average man. He had never scored high grades at school, his personality wasn’t particularly interesting and he wore socks with sandals. When he died something remarkable was discovered.
He was the messiah.
This was discovered purely by accident, when two days following his death he was seen eating a bacon sandwich in the park. He had ordered it from a restaurant two miles away from his grave. The slogan printed above the door was: “The last supper you’ll ever need!” Roger might have felt an affinity with this statement.
After he had finished his sandwich three angels had descended from the sky and carried Roger into heaven. He turned a duck pond into wine first. This was all witnessed by a woman named Eileen. She was 83 at the time. In an interview with The Sun she said that it was “the happiest moment of her life.”
Eileen died two years later. She had spent the two years following Roger’s ascension into heaven repenting and preaching the good word on the internet. She told fantastic stories about Roger’s endeavours. She told people stories about miracles that had never happened. They believed her, they even wrote another testament for the bible. It is called “The Third Revelation”.
None of the information in it is at all true.
Roger had always known that he was the son of God. From the age of five he was able to understand the world and what was wrong with it. It wasn’t hard; Roger grew up during the cold war.
He had tried preaching to his classmates. He had talked on a great variety of subjects: war, famine, theft and greed to name but a few. Very few records of Roger’s early speeches were ever made. The only one that still survives today is only a sentence in length. It forms the doctrine for “The Third Revelation”.
This is it:
“BE NICE TO EACH OTHER, FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE!”
Roger had elaborated on this at the time. However, the record of this speech was made on a detention slip. Detail wasn’t that important. The only other information that can be ascertained from the document is that Roger made the speech whilst standing on a bench.
He spent an hour in detention for that.
Roger performed the miracle of the school lunch in 1981, he was eight. There had not been enough chips to feed the entire school. To prevent an argument between two of his friends, one who had chips and one who didn’t, Roger made more.
He did so using magic; another detention slip claims that he stole them.
Roger left school with grades good enough to get him into Greenwich University. There he studied politics and attended regular debates. Records of these speeches are plentiful, if hard to find. The most famous of these is a short anecdote about Roger’s father. In “The Third Revelation” it is phrased thus:
“My father was a carpet salesman. He would travel from door to door showing samples to potential customers. When I was very young he once told me about when he had started his work, during the great depression. It was difficult to be hired by anybody then and my father’s pay was entirely reliant on how many carpets he sold. At first he tried to sell them to rich people, supposing that they would have money for such trinkets. He had no luck; they turned him away with laughter. He was just a member of the poverty stricken masses. His carpets would probably be sub-standard. Then he tried to sell carpets to the middle classes, thinking that they might have enough money to pay in instalments. Debt was all the rage then. He still had no luck; they turned him away with scorn. Buying carpets from door-to-door salesmen was not what the upper classes would do. Everyone who is middle class wants to move up in the world. Finally, my father returned home feeling defeated. My mother persuaded him to take the carpets to sell in the neighbourhood. He told me that he had doubted whether this would work; no-one had enough money. He was wrong, by selling to his friend’s and neighbours he found nothing but luck. They would buy carpets from my father even when they didn’t need them and in return he would use local shops to purchase all his necessities. That was how communities worked then. I find it strange that now, when the bombs could fly at any minute, there are no more communities. There is no-one for a man to lean on, save the people closest to him.”
It isn’t a very powerful speech. No-one in attendance will remember it clearly. It mixes anecdote and present fact-of-matter to an unremarkable effect. The message isn’t very clear either. Although, I believe it is summarised in an earlier quote:
“BE NICE TO EACH OTHER, FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE!”
Roger finished university with a first in politics. He never used his degree, instead opting to become a house husband. His wife worked in accounting; she made more money than Roger ever would have.
The biblical reaction to Roger’s wife has been less than kind. In the artwork that has been made depicting Roger’s marriage she is often dressed in a dress made of snake skin. She isn’t mentioned as any more than a temptation in “The Third Revelation”. The life Roger leads in that book has been fabricated.
He doesn’t get married.
Roger’s father died in 1991, on New Year’s Eve. At the funeral Roger had only this to say: “This is a bit shit really.”
In “The Third Revelation” he is depicted given a speech full of beautiful imagery. In a rare glimpse of truth the book accurately records Roger’s mother’s response to the event. She thanked God for her son.
This is seen in a dogmatic light.
The pope has condemned Roger since his death. He has said that a true messiah must change the world in some way. He has neglected that Roger, like Jesus, was still a human. On “The Third Revelation” the pope has been reported to say that the book is a filthy lie that gives hope to the masses.
It is strange how so many people miss the point.
The man driving the car which killed Roger is largely seen as the antichrist. This is a falsehood. The antichrist is a mechanic catering exclusively to four by fours.
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Comments: This was a very interesting story. I must applaud you on your opening. It jarred me and drew me in. Not many stories, except one grant you, has the “he is the messiah” angle. Your description of that old lady preaching was so hilarious and stung with truth. I like how you point out that every amazing story must have a much more down to Earth version.
Suggestions. In some parts I was a little bit confused. Such as when you have the Angels take him into heaven, and he turns a duck pond into wine. Does she see him do this? Does he actually do this? Is this an exaggeration. I couldn’t tell, and I read it several times. I also didn’t get the meaning of the “Bit shit really.” Maybe leave with a more direct line and then have reinterpretation or the rephrasing of it. The ending line with the four by fours threw me off as well. It could be because I don’t have the remote idea about anything about cars, so if that has to do with a car thing, ignore my ignorance :)
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