His Dark Ways (13 page)

I keep a head turned down as I walk through the sea of bodies—they brush by my shoulders. Their touch forces me to exhibit my detestable animal ill mannerisms. I sniff the air, so many doubters. Savanna’s tongue grows moist and her mouth begins to water. I clench onto the straps of a backpack and try to contain myself. After taking a life already I need to lay low.

Amy rushes up from behind and grabs my arm. She’s out of breath. “Hey.” She’s startled by my appearance. “What happened to your face?”

“That’s not a very nice way to greet someone.”

“Okay,” she says taking down her voice, “are you all right?”

“Fine,” I say sharply.

She’s suddenly hesitant to speak with me, but still rambles on. “Lucky was transferred this morning.”

I already know the reason, but keep it cool and pretend to care. “Really? Why?”

“She needs heavier antibiotics, her body is rejecting them and her wounds are getting worse,” she stammers and bites onto her lip to keep tears from falling, “Mom won’t let me take her car to Reno because it’s fresh out of the shop. Maybe your Dad won’t mind if we skip school tomorrow and take your truck to go see Lucky for the day.”

A laugh erupts from my core, I can’t help it. I always do such a good job when it comes to my assignments. I look up, shit, Amy’s pissed off. “Why is it so funny? It’s not funny.”

The bell rang already—I’ve never been one to be late. I fix my face. “It’s not going to happen.”

She doesn’t budge and shouts out before I open the door to Mr. Stevens’s class. “What the fuck ever, Savanna, glad to know you don’t give a shit.” I turn back as I stand in the slit of the door and give her a slight smile.

The veins in her eyes grow red and she stomps out of the building. Guess someone’s going to have a hard time graduating this year. I’ve seen her skip a lot of classes. But I can tell she’s never really been smart anyway.

There’s a seat open in the back. As I sit down, I squint against the sun and look out the wall of windows and scan the desert for the same spot I stood to watch Savanna. Being on this side of the window is more fitting. I straighten my posture when I notice Krystal, a believer, observing me from behind. It’s curious, because if she followed through with what the Bible teaches and had been kind to Savanna, I may not be where I am today. I turn around, rest my chin over my shoulder, and crease cheeks up into a smile to show my appreciation.

Her flat frown and crinkled face confirms how unappreciative humans can be.

Mr. Stevens chats to the class while drawing little pictures on the chalkboard. “This is an atmospheric phenomenon that displays a diffuse glow in the sky in the northern hemisphere. It is caused by charged particles from the sun as they interact with the Earth's magnetic field—” he pauses as he sketches strange doodles I can barely identify. He’s doing them wrong. 

I easily grow bored because this isn’t complicated. I want to hear him talk about what he “thinks” he knows, so I can prove him wrong. Anyone can figure out what the northern lights are. Hasn’t the man ever wondered why he’s only seen stars die but not be reborn? If I brought it up he’d probably vaguely respond with how stars are formed from dust in space—mass attracts mass and becomes a ball compressed together so hot and so dense it ignites hydrogen gas and you end up with fusion. Then he would try to tell me that when stars die they burst (what they see) and new ones are slowing forming and that’s why we can’t witness it. But he’s wrong; it’s a bigger explosion when a fusion first forms in the sky—baby stars are nearly blinding. And these humans haven’t seen one because the Father of Light placed them there. Don’t they read anything? It’s in the first page of their beloved bestselling book. Just another reason they don’t deserve grace—they’re dense.

Class empties quickly after the bell rings and I wait until everyone’s almost cleared out before I leave—having their flesh brush against mine is building up an unquenchable appetite. Mr. Stevens stops me with words. “Ms. Christy, how’s the essay coming?”

He tucks hands further into pant pockets—he’s suddenly uncomfortable with my presence as I turn to answer. I twirl out another smile. Maybe this human will be appeased by the gesture. “Beautifully,” I respond.

Fear’s been brewing up in the man ever since he heard about Lucky this morning. He knows Lucky and Savanna were close. “Were,” I say snickering to myself.

He tilts his head and wants to ask what I said, but doesn’t, “Great, best of luck with it.”

A shy one he is. No wonder he’s never moved on from this town and up in the bigger world of science.

Before I’m able to make it into physics ahead of everyone else, I get the urge to use the restroom—disgusting. The only place these bodies belong is back in the dirt from where they were made.

As I scuffle along in a stall to loosen a clasp that sits just under a belly button, there’s a sudden sharp ring in my ears and it’s not the devil—someone’s praying for Savanna, fasting for her even, it’s the Do-gooder. I tighten a hand into a fist and bang the stall, “Stop it!”

The volume in the bathroom is taken down as a few stragglers leave—they’re no longer comfortable being in the same room with agony. I grit my jaw closed like a bull dog and stare down at a floor scattered in toilet paper as I wait for the praying to end. 

An entire night’s rest wasted.

Any energy this body had is being stripped away. The Do-gooder is getting in my way—he suspects possession.

Lack of rest makes Savanna’s eyes feel like they’ve been dowsed in kerosene and lit with a match. I get the urge to rip them out of their sockets, but refuse to give in. Once rest has commenced, I can go about my business. I press an index finger and thumb hard over eyelids—I’m practically blind and scuffle out of the bathroom. Light splashes over me and I detest it because it means I’m exposed—out of the shadows.

The truck’s fabric seats bring comfort as I crouch into a weak fetal position on top of them. I pull the sweater half way off and up over my head to detour the daylight casting on my face. Fingers want to fidget. Sleep becomes complicated when you haven’t experienced it for as long as I have.

As rest finally begins to settle into my chest and breaths grow steady, I’m awakened by a vibrating phone. When I see the name flashing across the screen, I get the urge to shatter the windshield with it. The Do-gooder wants me home.

To keep suspicions low, I try to pry open eyes cracked with red, and start the engine. “Home” isn’t far. I keep it together to please the man so I can lie upon a bed and gather the strength I need.

Chapter 18

Escape

~Savanna~

I’m torn.

Daniel was beautiful.

Evil came to me clothed in beauty and I let it swallow me whole.

A sheet of ice now covers the ground and as I run my hand over its surface, it slips. Hell is liquefying its layers. The beacon of light has faded and the only one that’s left is the glow of the underworld smoldering beneath me.

I’m becoming a flickering illusion, like Daniel was, but I have no one to hold onto to help make me real again.

I’m fading, my sight is too, or the colors are—I’m not sure which. Grey is all I seem to know.

A wilted flower unfolds back into its splendor on one of the dry weeping branches that sits close to my right shoulder. It’s vibrant. My eyes open, wide. First it’s green, then fades to turquoise, and explodes at the tips with purple velvet. I touch it, pluck into the palm of my hand, and breathe in its perfumes. Its scent is bitter and reminds me of the time I pricked my finger and licked the wound dry. I watch as it changes again to the purest of white and the tips bleed out with red. The aroma’s suddenly sweet like strawberries.

I brush peddles against my cheek.

“Redemption,” I say faintly. It’s all I’m left to hold onto—the idea that I’ll be rescued and this ice will stop melting and I won’t really fall through and land into the cindery ashes of hell.

For a time, when I was small, a still voice inside me told me I was created, I was God’s child. But the idea slithered into a hole of quick sand. Once it left, I didn’t feel so ignorant anymore—it was fantasy. Mom and Dad told me everyone doubts their faith and it will come around, but it never did. I still read the pamphlets and Bible they gave me to please them, but it all felt wasted without the faith they spoke so fondly of.

My lips quiver from the cold. I scoot closer to the thickness of the tree so I can reach out for a branch and hold on if the ice breaks beneath me. The shiver causing my body to quake comforts me. It reassures me that the layers above hell are still thick. I tuck knees close into my chest, bow my head, and pray.

“I’m sorry, please forgive me, I’m sorry.” —words, I say the same ones on repeat.

Chapter 19

Look At Your Folly

“But if I say, ‘I will not remember Him Or speak anymore in His name,’ Then in my heart it becomes like a burning fire Shut up in my bones; And I am weary of holding it in, And I cannot endure it.” ~ Jeremiah 20:9

~Daniel~

When I walk through the door the man waits for me with an open Bible on top of the kitchen table. Shouldn’t he be working to recruit his “soldiers” for the “kingdom”? The thought irritates me as I walk past him. He stops me halfway down the hall. “Savanna? What’s wrong?”

I clench a hand into a hot fist, force a smile, and glance in his direction. “Fine, just going to bed.”

He stands to his feet while pulling reading glasses free from his face. “Can we talk a minute?”

As I walk back out into the living room Red stands to his feet and growls. I roll my eyes. “Like your rest, did you?” I grab him by the collar and pretend to be nice. “Just a minute, let me put him in my room a sec.”

Do-gooder is perplexed when I make it back out. Is it not enough for him that I’ve listened? His voice is somber. “They found Elsie this morning.”

“What?”

“She was murdered.”

What a shame, blah, blah, blah...I peek down the hall. A bed awaits me.

He scoots out the chair next to his. “Come sit with me a second.”

For what? To pray? This man is making all the wrong moves; he should let me sleep so I’ll be more dignified to be around come morning. I slip off the backpack strapped in tight over my back and place it against a kitchen cupboard as I take a seat.

The generally silent one starts to spill his guts—a lot of them. “I’ve always tried not to live in fear, but I’ve been doing it a lot lately. It’s such a messy world out there and I can’t help it. You are my daughter and I love you.” He begins to stammer, “If there is anything you want to tell me or need help with, you can tell me. You can talk to me about anything.”

I don’t respond. I tap fingers on top of bouncing knees from underneath the table and attempt to focus on anything but the butcher knife sitting in the wooden block next to the toaster.

He grasps onto my hand from under the table. “You know I love you, right?”

I nod and stop shaking to settle things down—to calm the fiery starting to awaken within me. Lack of rest is slowly unleashing the monster that I am.

Bewilderment overtakes me.

Pages that are no longer crisp are all I seem to hear. I try to tune them out, act like they aren’t bothering me, but they are. The man stops on Psalms. He’s struggling with the cuts on my face, but is too much of a coward to say anything. His lack of strength burns at me and I struggle not to dig nails into the table—dig up flakes of wood, and leave a deep indentation in the crappy carpentry work. His words rev up again, like an ear piercing maggot. “I know you’re tired, honey, but I just want to read this to you to help bring some comfort to our home right now. It’ll just take a second.”

I’m shaking my head no, but he’s too stupid to pull his eyes off the page to see his own folly. Over and over again in my head, I tell myself it’ll just take a second; it’ll just take a second. Rest is almost here, but he carries on. “The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside quiet waters, He refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.”

I knew this verse before he was even born—his lips are silenced every time he says the Father of Light’s name and as he keeps reading I start to fidget again—sway. I want to shut him up. Agony is a five letter word I want reprieve from, that’s why I’m in this body. The Do-gooder’s rambling only translates back to my eternal suffering that the author of his book gave me.

“Savanna,” he says, trying to gain my attention again, but failing Psalms 23 cycles into my thoughts again and again. I repeat part of the verse, “He leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul—”

Strength, I’m losing it. When I look up the man’s filthy paws lay on top of my wrist—his eyes are closed, he’s praying. The energy moving from his hot hands are trying to warm my cold heart. I estimate how many feet away I am from the butcher block, about four. Before his faith brings back more angels, I quickly slip my wrist out from under his, jump to my feet, draw the knife out of the block, and pierce his side. I make sure to twist it through the rib cavity to puncture the exact spot I want it to—the heart and lungs. Ventricles seize, and I listen as his pericardial sack fills with blood and bleeds out as I swipe the blade clean from his chest.

I take a seat and dab the blade against my tongue. Just what I thought, he tastes sweet. He reaches for my face with one hand, and quickly presses the other on the wound. Fluid is seizing the alveoli in his lungs now—he can barely speak. “Why?” he says with drowned out confusion.      

   “Because you mock me. That man you talk of in that book of yours pried salvation from me and didn’t give me another chance. But you, I know how many mistakes you’ve made, more than I ever did. Go enjoy your salvation, Do-gooder.”