When he looked up at her she was watching him. “How are you doing, Holly?”
“Better than I was outside this place.”
“Uh huh,” he said. He ate some more of the meat. She’d put a slab of cornbread on the side and it dripped with butter. He picked that up and ate it too.
“I like to watch a man eat,” she said.
“Well, I like to watch a woman from time to time too,” he said.
She smiled at him. “You’re still a charmer, Will. But old as you are I doubt you got much left in the tank for me.”
He smiled back at her then picked up his glass and drank it halfway empty. She was nearly thirty years younger than him and for a time she’d been his closest neighbor. But her husband had beat on her and Will had gone over there almost weekly just to check on her and see that she was okay. After Will’s wife and daughter died he had not seen much of Holly for four or five years, then one day she just showed up at the gates of the church saying her husband had disappeared, but Will had always thought Holly had been the one to make him disappear.
“John said maybe we’d be seeing more of you now that Lonny’s gone,” Holly said.
Will coughed and put a hand to his mouth, almost choking on the meat. “Word travels fast,” Will said.
“John just told me. He said Lonny had himself an accident. I can’t say I mind that he is gone. He was an asshole to begin with. Always trying to fuck every single one of us.”
“That right?” Will asked.
“That’s right,” she said. “So you think you’ll start to come around more often? I’ve got to tell you it’s starting to get a little weird.”
“Weird?”
“Yeah,” she said, lowering her voice a little. She leaned in now and looked him in the eye. “I fuck John from time to time and he tells me shit. He tells me shit I shouldn’t hear. I don’t have a fucking clue about half of it, but the other half is fucking out there. The Father and his scripture and all this shit about the prophet and the coming fire of Hell. Sinners and saints. Salvation and damnation.”
“That’s nothing new,” Will said. He finished off his plate of food then pushed the tray a little way across the table. “That’s just what passes for conversation around these parts.”
“You’re a hardened old cowboy,” Holly said. “I always liked that about you. But just be careful you don’t become an old fool like so many other fool men I’ve known.”
He looked at her and she didn’t say a thing. After a while, he said, “Tell it to me then.”
Holly looked behind at the door she had come out of. Then she turned and sat a bit straighter in her seat. “Where to start,” she said. “Guns, weapons, most of these kids my age and even younger on this shit they’re calling Bliss. They suck it up their noses. It helps them do the things they have to do I guess.”
“What kinds of things?”
“Most of them would kill their mothers if it meant they could get another hit. But the shit they’re pulling on these farmers out here, on people we used to know, it’s shameful,” she said. “It’s not the kind of scripture either of us remember from back in town. They’ll find your weakness and then they’ll start to push. They push and push and they keep adding on the weight. Eventually one thing has got to give.”
He looked at her and waited on her to tell him more. “You still a believer?” he asked.
She laughed. “You are asking me? You? The one who would rather spend three weeks out of every month alone in the woods trapping rabbits and hunting bucks than sit here and have a conversation with another human being.”
“We all serve our purpose.”
“Yes, we do,” she said, smiling at him. “Yes, we do at that. I believe in The Father. I believe in what he sees. In his words and what is coming. But sometimes—” She stopped. Behind, heard through the kitchen door were footsteps. She stood and took the tray up and as she turned Will saw John step through, then pass her by.
“You want anything else, Will?”
Will raised up his hand. “I’m done,” he said.
“Good,” John said. “You’re going to need your strength, The Father asked to see you alone in his church. He wants to put his hands upon you and thank you personally for all you’ve done.”
MARY MAY SHOWERED. WHEN SHE WAS DONE SHE DRESSED herself in the clothes her brother had left for her and she came out into the small living room where Drew was waiting.
He stood when she came in.
“I’m glad you found me,” she said.
“I’m glad I found you, too.”
She looked around. It was a small place, the living room and kitchen all one room.
“You ready?” he asked.
“I don’t want to,” she said. “I think we should just get out of here. Go home.”
“You’re a guest here, Mary May. Our parents always taught us not to be rude.” He looked her over like he was waiting for her to say more. Then he said, “Don’t be rude.”
“MERCY HAS BEEN GIVEN TO MANY ONLY AFTER THEY WERE MADE to suffer. It was their lot to suffer. It was a choice. A conscious decision. Into this chasm they walked and the darkness closed in about them and only through their faith did they find salvation, walking forth from that chasm unharmed.”
Will opened his eyes as soon as he felt The Father’s hands leave his shoulders. He had been led into the church by John and then told to kneel. Alone he had waited there, looking about the place. The symbol of the church seen in every window and a large American flag hanging down the front of the church with the cross and rays of Eden’s Gate there at its center amid the stars.
The Father had come in shortly after, his steps sounding on the wooden floor before he came and stood in front of Will. He wore jeans and a shirt buttoned all the way to the collar. Like all the rest of his congregation he was bearded, and though he looked much like his brother, John, he was a little taller and a little wider through the chest and shoulders. His hair was pulled back behind his head and his eyes met Will’s and held him while he talked.
“Life has tested you, Will. You must believe that now. You must believe that you’re here for a reason. Chosen for the good of our kind. There are dark times ahead. Dark times to come and we shall be like a light in those dark times.”
“Yes,” Will said.
“When your wife and child were taken, you were tested. You were tested once more today.” The Father dropped down in front of Will, elbows on knees and his face so close that Will could feel the spit on his skin and smell the man’s breath when he spoke. “The time is coming—the end of days. The air itself will be afire. And I will call my people closer. I will call them all to me and I will ask them to make ready. For we, like the pioneers who came to this country before us, will have a journey. And now I ask you, will you be ready for this journey?”
“Yes,” Will said.
He rose and looked down at Will. “You have helped us, but we will need you even more. We will need the eye that looks down upon the people through the scope. We will need the hand that holds and swings the knife. We will need the finger that pulls the trigger. Do you understand, Will? Do you understand all that I am asking you to do?”
Will hesitated. He looked up at The Father.
“Many times in humankind’s long history have we not trusted in our faith. And many times that faith has been tested. And so it was for all who have made the choice to undertake this journey. A journey of salvation, but a journey also of necessity—for if you are unwilling to take this journey you will perish. And now, Will, that time has come and I am asking you again, as I asked you in that long-ago time when you first came to us, are you ready to do what it takes to find salvation?”