Strange Animals (6 page)

He said, “Fair enough. It's a kind of an obscure and old term. It basically means that you're consecrated, made holy, made sacred in the eyes of God, and that's what I want to do with all of you tonight.” Pastor Preston went to a cupboard at the back of the room and removed a small vial of oil. He said, “In the olden times, Christian priests would pray over soldiers before battle and ask God to grant them strength to crush their enemies and drive Satan out of this world. They would also anoint the soldiers and their weapons to make them invincible. And to do this, they'd invoke the spirit of Christ into oil, and then they'd rub the oil on
the soldiers and their swords and their shields and their armor. It would bond them together in the name of Christ, and it would make them impervious to any enemy attacks. Tonight I'd like to anoint every one of us, which is going to be very beneficial for the things I have planned for this group.”

James looked around at the other people gathered there that night. Some were clearly uncomfortable with this idea. Brad specifically looked like he was thinking about objecting, but after looking around himself and finding no real perceived support for his objection, he remained silent along with everyone else.

Pastor Preston went to each member of the group, dipped his fingers in the oil, and made the sign of the cross on each person's forehead. James closed his eyes as he received his anointing, and tried to listen for God's voice as he felt the oil drip down his forehead onto his nose. He heard nothing, but it seemed as though he felt something deep within him stir and move in a way he had never felt before. He hoped this was the Holy Spirit moving within him and reasoned that it couldn't be anything else.

Once all were anointed, Pastor Preston moved back to the front of the group and said, “Dear Lord, I ask that you watch over these anointed few and guide them safely through their trials so that no harm may come to them while they are in your service. I ask that you use them as you use me, to do your bidding, and allow us to vanquish the dark forces that Satan would use against us and against your glorious kingdom. Amen.”

They all repeated “Amen” and Pastor Preston continued, “Okay, I know what you're thinking: ‘I got some oil on my head. Now what?'” They all laughed, some clearly happy to have a lightening of mood and a moment to acknowledge collectively, passively, that this was a little out of the ordinary compared to any other kind of church group they had ever joined. He said, “The reason I wanted to anoint you guys tonight—sorry, guys
and
gals—is that I feel we are truly at war with dark-side forces that are threatening our way of life. The dark one has been and
always will be trying to destroy this world and all human souls that reside on it, but I feel we are living very near to the end times, which is when he is at his greatest power, and it's up to us to stay strong and fight with all our might against everything he set in motion. So why did I anoint you tonight? Because you are now soldiers of Christ Jesus, and you are in a war.”

James looked around and saw that Brad and some others were getting a little uncomfortable again, but he wasn't at all. This made sense to him in a way that nothing he'd ever thought or felt about Christ had. He began to think that perhaps the reason he'd never heard God's voice before was that he'd been doing the wrong thing. He'd been living a life so far from God's plan, so far from his calling, that God didn't even know how to talk to him. He was a soldier, a warrior for God, not a floor sweeper. Maybe he had been too humble in his life, while God had planned for him to be brazen, to stand in the face of evil and fight against it in Christ's name. Thinking of himself in this way, James began to feel a new sense of purpose, and he knew that, just as Pastor Preston had said, his presence in that meeting was part of God's plan.

Pastor Preston said, “Come on, now, you're all soldiers! Getting anointed is a heck of a lot better than having to go through boot camp, isn't it? Can I get a hallelujah?”

A few of the attendees, James included, said, “Hallelujah.”

Pastor Preston said, “That's it? God can't hear you all the way up in heaven. Shout it out.
Hallelujah!
”

This time everyone joined in. Pastor Preston said, “That's it. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Soldiers of Christ, hallelujah!”

Soon everyone in the room was chanting “hallelujah” at a high volume. It gave James a new sense of power and pride. Pastor Preston said, “And now, my soldiers, it's time for our first mission, which is obviously completely voluntary, but I think it'll be fun for everyone. It'll be in a few weeks and we'll have doughnuts. It'll just be a good time.

“So here's what it is. As I'm sure you're all aware, one of Satan's most successful military campaigns in recent years has been his attack on the sanctity of marriage. Thank Almighty God that our glorious state hasn't fallen. But, as you know, our neighboring state can't say the same. Now, this doesn't mean that we can't take up the fight for our Christian brothers and sisters who live only a few hundred miles away. We have to be willing to go to where the fight is, instead of waiting for it to come to us, because by that time it might be too late. And on top of that, we're soldiers. Soldiers get deployed to wherever they're needed most. So we're deploying in two weeks, and then we're going to march.”

Pastor Preston carried on, giving the details of the march, which he had planned to lead to the steps of a city hall in their neighboring state, where several gay marriages were to be officiated by the mayor. He urged every newly anointed soldier of Christ to act as a general for Christ as well and recruit as many people as they could to join them in this march, in this protest, in this fight to save marriage from the clutches of Satan himself.

Once the plan was outlined, Pastor Preston directed everyone to a sign-up sheet he had posted in the back of the room. James indicated that he would attend. He found this to be one of the most exciting moments of his life.

As he left the meeting, James overheard Brad and Gail discussing their uncertainty about what they had witnessed that night. They claimed to be Christian, but this was a little too much for them. James didn't engage with them. He couldn't understand how anyone could ever question anything done in Christ's name. Jesus had suffered and died for every sin man would ever commit, and all that was being asked in that moment was to drive a few hundred miles and stand in front of a building holding signs that championed the plan God had for us all. He knew in that moment that these people were hypocrites, and he dismissed them, knowing that God would deal with them in the end.

Before he went to sleep, James read the following, and he felt at peace:
Corinthians 11:13–15: For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds.

Karen woke up
after sleeping through her alarm for fifteen minutes. In the past few weeks, her fatigue had become more chronic and more severe. As she sat up in bed, she was immediately nauseated. She could smell the grease from the eggs that Paul had obviously made for himself before leaving for work. As she stood up, she noticed that her underwear was wet.

Once in the bathroom she removed it and noticed a discharge coating the inside lining. She inspected it and found it was thicker than anything she'd ever seen, and without even bringing it to her nose she could smell that it was salty and metallic. Karen's disgust, mixed with the nausea she was already feeling, forced her to vomit in the toilet.

She drew a bath and stood naked in front of the mirror. Her breasts had definitely grown. Her stomach was now visibly betraying her secret pregnancy, and she could start to see a small
line forming down the center of her stomach, from her belly button to her vagina.

In the bathtub, she felt her stomach and tried to imagine what exactly was happening inside it. She knew the facts. She knew there was a grouping of cells that had begun to specialize. She knew there were different organs and limbs and fingernails and hair and things that she considered to be human growing inside her. Despite her adamant stance that abortion was a perfectly viable means to end a pregnancy, she found herself wondering what this child would look like if it lived into adulthood. She allowed herself to think about it in detail.

Karen imagined that it was a boy. She imagined him having dark hair like her and Paul. She imagined him growing up to be of average height and build, wearing glasses. She thought he might have longish hair, curly, that would suggest a sense of happiness, a carefree attitude. And it was as this thought, about the psychological well-being of her unborn child, crept into her mind that she forced herself to stop thinking about it. She could let herself indulge in the idea of what this child might look like, but once she started imagining what type of adult he would become, she felt she was treading on dangerous ground. Instead, she ran some more hot water in the bathtub and convinced herself that her idea for the website was sound, that it was something the world needed, that it was quite possibly the most important thing she would ever do in her life.

She knew, however, that she wouldn't be able to keep the pregnancy secret for much longer. She knew she would have to tell the most important people in her life. She didn't know how her parents would react. She assumed they'd be confused, but that they'd help her if she needed them. Her parents were supportive of everything she did, and she saw no reason for that to stop based on the nature of the project she was undertaking. It was Paul who caused her the most concern.

She got out of the bathtub, toweled off, and went into the
kitchen for a glass of orange juice. As she drank it and thought about how best to tell Paul what exactly was going on, she noticed he left the creamer out on the counter. On an impulse, she poured some into her orange juice and found that it was delicious. She knew this was a side effect of the pregnancy.

Karen sat at the kitchen table, opened her laptop, and plugged in her USB device. As she sipped on her orange-juice-and-creamer mixture, she read over the web page she had made, trying to convince herself that she shouldn't make it live. She knew it would enrage people, but that's what she hoped for. In fact, the outcome she most desired was the kind of outrage that would lead to a public debate, that would force rational people to stop ignoring the religious right as inconsequential, that could shift the public toward a greater skepticism of religion.

She started thinking through how the conversation with Paul might go. She knew he never wanted to have a child, but thought that if she ever accidentally became pregnant and wanted to keep it, he would be supportive. But she knew this situation wasn't quite the same. To her knowledge, nothing like the situation she was about to create had ever existed. There was no blueprint, no tested strategy for how to break this exact news to this exact involved party. She resigned herself to this fact and tried to remain calm throughout the day as she ran some errands, ate lunch, and finally waited for Paul to come home from work.

When Paul came
in, Karen was sitting on the couch with her laptop open and her website on the screen. She still hadn't made the site live and had planned to do so from a public computer, but as it appeared on Karen's screen, the site gave every impression that it was indeed live. Karen decided to show Paul the site and pretend for a moment that it wasn't her idea, that it was a real website made by some other girl. She said, “Hey, babe. You have to check this out.”

Paul made his way to the couch, sat down next to Karen, kissed her on the cheek, and looked at her computer screen. He read the text that Karen had written and said, “Holy shit. That's pretty hard-core. Has this hit the news yet?”

“No, not yet. What do you think, though?”

“It's ballsy as fuck. I mean, fuck. It's really pretty nuts.”

“Obviously, but on a philosophical level, do you agree with what she's doing? Do you find it cool at all?”

“Jesus. I thought I was going to walk in the door, grab a beer, and watch
Jeopardy!
I didn't realize I was going to be subjected to a philosophical debate as soon as I got home.”

“Sorry. I just think it's really interesting, and I want to know what you think about it.”

“It is really interesting—especially the part about not keeping any of the money and putting it in a trust fund for the kid, if she has it. That's the part that makes me think it's a real social experiment, not just some crazy person. I guess it's one of the smartest ways I've seen anyone use the Internet.” He paused a moment. “Fuck. It's so good conceptually. Can you imagine having to go through that, though? She has to get shut down. I mean, is it even legal?”

Karen had not thought about this at all. She knew of no specific laws she would be breaking if she made the site live, but Paul's question gave her pause. She said, “Yeah. I mean, why wouldn't it be legal?”

“Shit, I don't know. Even if it's not, I'm sure as soon as this thing hits mainstream news outlets there'll be some kind of law passed or something—or, fuck, maybe whatever state she's in will ban abortion. You know how crazy those right-wing fuckers are.”

“I'd love to see them try to ban abortion. I think that type of reaction is exactly what she's looking for, you know, something that forces the country to really dig in and say ‘Abortion has been legal for a long fucking time, the argument is over, so shut the fuck up already.'”

“Well, if it's not a hoax, I think that's what might happen.”

“It's not a hoax.”

“How do you know?”

Karen lifted up her shirt to expose her belly.

Paul said, “Are you fucking shitting me right now, Karen?”

“No.”

“What the fuck?”

“I know. It's a lot to take in.”

“You're pregnant right now? Karen, you're having a baby? And this”—he pointed at her computer—“this is
you
?”

“Paul, please just stay calm and let's talk about this rationally.”

“Talk about—wait, you're asking
me
to be rational? What about you? I mean, why are you waiting to tell me about this now?”

“I was just going to get an abortion, so I didn't tell you.”

“Why wouldn't you fucking tell me you were going to get an abortion? I would have taken you and helped you. You know that.”

“I know. I just . . . I didn't think it was worth worrying you about if I was just going to take care of it anyway.”

“Holy shit, Karen. That's fucking crazy. But this is
way
more fucking crazy. So you obviously didn't get the abortion. Have you gotten any response about it? Do people know it's you, yet? Jesus fucking Christ.”

“It's not live yet.”

“Oh fuck. Okay. Fuck. I thought it was out there in the world already.” He took a deep breath. “When did you come up with this?”

“I was on the way to Planned Parenthood, and it just kind of came to me. I thought I could do this for my dissertation.”

“Your dissertation? Karen, you're fucking around with a life here.”

“No, I'm not. It's not a life. It's just a thing in my uterus. It's not a life until it comes out.”

“Don't fuck around with semantics—not with me. You know what I mean. I mean,
fuck
, Karen. And beyond whatever desig
nation you want to give to the fetus you're now carrying inside you, you're fucking with your life and my life and—wait, is that timeline on the site accurate?”

“Yeah, give or take a week, I think.”

“So you're two months pregnant and you never told me? I mean, I'm a fucking dad. Holy shit. What the fuck? I can't stop saying
What the fuck?
because I don't even know what else to fucking say. This is insane. I don't even know how to process any of this right now.”

“I know it seems crazy, but I'm telling you now, before I make the site live, because I want you to know what I'm doing and I want you to be here with me through it.”

“So this isn't a discussion, then? This isn't us figuring out together if you should do this or not? This is just you telling me that you're ransoming our unborn child on the Internet to prove some point about how fucked-up Christians are?”

“I wouldn't have put it quite like that, but, basically, yeah.”

“Holy fucking shit. What am I supposed to do here? I mean, what reaction were you hoping for?”

“I hoped you'd think it was a really great idea and be supportive.”

“Karen, it's a fantastic idea. It's a fucking once-in-a-generation cultural-rallying-point type of idea. A moment-that-changed-everything kind of idea. But you're making the idea real. There are so many other factors that come into play when it's more than an idea. Have you really thought this through?”

“I think so.”

“The shit I was talking about earlier is the tip of the iceberg. I mean, abortion being outlawed is just one possibility. You could go to fucking prison.”

“For what? I'm not doing anything illegal.”

“They'll find something, Karen. They'll make a new law. Abortion really pisses people off, in a way almost nothing else does, and that can make people do all kinds of shit.”

“But isn't that why it has to be done?”

“To piss people off?”

“To make people understand how absurd the pissed-off people are.”

“I think you're going to piss off more than just the Christian wackos.”

“So are you saying you don't think I should do this?”

Paul put his hand on hers and said, “You know I'd never ever tell you what to do. You've always been someone who thinks in ways that most people never understand. It's one of my favorite things about you. So if you feel like you have to do this, then you have to do this. It's your decision, obviously.”

“Yeah, I know, but I'm not asking for your obligatory feminist support here. I want to know what you think.”

“Well, beyond the potential fallout if you get discovered, what about the fact that if you get the money and have the baby . . . we'd have a kid out there in the world? What if I wanted to keep the baby and raise him or her?”

“Would you want to?”

“I don't know. Probably not. I mean, we've talked about how we never wanted kids, ever. I'm still of that mind. But this puts things in a different perspective for sure. They always say the moment you see your baby being born changes how you feel about all of that shit. What if you have the kid, and it changes the way you feel about it?”

“I don't think it will. I've thought about it a lot, and I'm committed to the idea. If I got the money I'd have to give it up for adoption, or it would go against the premise I'm setting up for my dissertation.”

“And you don't think people are going to find that attitude a little cold? A little heartless?”

“Fuck what other people are going to think. I want to know what you think.”

“Honestly, I think it's a really fucking brilliant idea, if I'm
being objective here. But I can't really be objective. I mean, I just can't be. I wish someone else in the world was doing this, but not you, not us.”

“But no one else
is
doing it.”

“Couldn't you just write about the idea in your dissertation and come up with some theories about how the world might react or something?”

“I could, but that would be a pile-of-shit dissertation. It might get me my PhD, but it wouldn't get out in the world. It wouldn't change the way anyone thought.”

They sat in silence for a minute or so. Paul's mind was racing. He had thought many times about what would happen if Karen accidentally got pregnant. He had prepared himself to drive her to a doctor or to Planned Parenthood. He had prepared himself to pay for an abortion. He had prepared himself to bring Karen home and care for her as she recovered physically and psychologically. He knew that would be a terrible ordeal to endure as a couple, but he thought he would be able to handle it if it happened. This, however, was something far more traumatic. Even the best-case scenario—which, in his mind, would be that the monetary goal was met, and then Karen would have the baby and give it up for adoption—was terrible. There was, in Paul's mind, no good outcome where he and Karen were concerned.

She said, “When you saw the site before you knew it was me, you thought it was as good as I did when I first came up with the idea. This could be the most important thing I do in my life. I want you to be in it with me. One of the reasons I love you as much as I do is that for as long as we've known each other, we've seen the world pretty much the same. And it might not seem like that's so rare, but it is. Every person has access to the same information about the world and the universe and reality, and almost none of them come to the same conclusions about the nature of any of it. But we always have. If anyone can get what I'm doing, I know it's you.”