John

So it was reported.

Already there were words spoken against this.

When we walked into Cana, I wondered why we had come back.

But we followed you, and did not ask.

The narrow curve of the street, the low white buildings giving small shade.

We walked past whispers. 'He is the one from the wedding feast. He is the one.'

I looked all in the eye. I would have struck any that spoke aloud against you. I would have drawn a knife and bled them.

So wild is love.

The band of us, the twelve, coming into Cana, into the cool of the shade. Where were we going? What was our purpose there?

The deep faith we had that it would be revealed.

And was.

We sat by steps, a sprawl of men, and drank after the long journey. There gathered a small crowd. They watched to see if a miracle would happen. They whispered among themselves. Bring water. He may make the water wine again. Quick, bring water. Bring water. He is the one. He is a magician.

We were magician's followers.

He is a teller of fortunes.

We were the fortune-teller's followers. We had left our families to follow a fortune-teller. We were no wiser than children, some laughed. No wiser than foolish children.

One brought a stone jar of water. Others water bags.

'Sir, I would have wine for my guest this evening.'

'Sir, wine. Please make this wine. Wine, sir. Wine.'

In this your gentle composure. Like water untroubled in a deep pool. Waiting.

'Master,' Peter said, after the long journey, 'eat.'

But you said, 'I have meat to eat that ye know not of. My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.'

We sat in the street shade. The Canaanites waited for their miracle. I watched the sunlight retreat on the stone wall of the house of Eli. The blue of sky with nothing in it, the eagle gone.

Patience was short.

'My water, Sir. I cannot stay here all day. I have work.'

'My water, Sir, to wine, please. It is no trouble to you.'

You answered them not, and some grew angry and muttered against you. But left the water jars in case.

They went away, all but a few. It was in the seventh hour when the nobleman came.

'My son is on the point of death, Sir.'

Peter looked to you. There stirred among us a silent anticipation. We had sat a long time by the steps attending such a moment, flies and insects moving in the shade.

'Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will not believe,' you said.

The nobleman fell to his knees. 'Sir, come down to my son ere he die.'

His old face. His love for his son.

None of us spoke, the old man kneeling so.

I watched your eyes. The pity that pooled, this love of the father.

'Go thy way; thy son lives,' you said.

And he raised his face to you, and we could see that he believed. And did not need the proof of his servants coming on the road to meet him when he went back from Cana, and they told him on the seventh hour the fever had left his son.

I believed. I believed already all things were possible to you.

I leaned and touched your robe.

Simon sits with Ioseph. They sip a brown broth offish and pulses. Simon's face is pale, his eyes running with rheum. He is nearly the age of Ioseph but of a more anxious disposition. He troubles over his health, always certain that he is ill. His pains and aches are legion; he fears clouds and rain and wind, and must temper this against his faith that God watches over them. The death of his friend Prochorus, the sight of the disease blotching his face, has filled him with dread.

'You saw it,' he says to Ioseph.

'I did.'

'He was as a leper.'

'Yes.'

Simon scratches the back of his hands. Itches are intolerable. Heat of blood, he believes, a sign of his ill health. 'But there was no warning.'

'I saw him myself the morning.'

'So it just came. It just came like that, and he was dead.'

'The Lord took him. I am saddened for you, Simon. I know Prochorus was a close companion.'

'Why? Why would the Lord not take him peacefully in his sleep? Why would he not pause his breathing and leave him on his bed mat? I have these itches in my hands since. My breath is shallow; do you think my breath shallow, Ioseph?'

'No, Simon. You are as you always are.'

'What if it is beginning? What if the itches are. .'

'Simon.' Ioseph lays his hand across his friend's. For him he feels a duty of care, a bond he cannot quite explain; but it as though he is a kind of ointment, or knows the calm of his spirit to be the salve the younger man needs. 'Simon, do not be afraid.'

'I know. I know I should not even think such things. I know I should welcome what the Lord has in store for me. But I want to live to see. I want to live to see the promised day.'

'You will,' Ioseph says. 'God willing.'

Simon scowls at the broth; in the taste is something peculiar. It takes his mind from the itching.

'Matthias went out on a boat,' Ioseph says.

'Yes. I did not go. He did not ask me. But if he did, I would not go. The sea is treacherous this time of year. A storm can come from nowhere.'

'It is late for their returning. Did they return?'

'I did not see. I do not care greatly for our brother Matthias. Do you think something in this broth sour?'

'Only the reflection of your scowl, old friend.'

Simon sips it through tight lips, as if to sieve the sourness. Into the afternoon sky sail dark clouds. There is a wordless gap, the two old men sitting on their various discomforts, then Simon asks: 'Ioseph, do you think we will see Judea again?'

'Judea?'

'Yes. Do you think we will ever walk there freely again? I do not. Only in dreams now will I visit the house of my parents.'

Ioseph does not offer consolation.

'I have this thought, Ioseph; I will confess it to you that you may chastise me and forgive me for it. It is this: what if the Apostle dies?' Simon turns his rheumy eyes toward his old friend. 'I am a fool, and the weakest among us. But I confess I am afraid. What if he dies? What if you go to the cave in the morning and discovered? And the Lord has not come?'

'We believe he will come.'

'But if he doesn't? If this plague takes the Apostle? What will become of us?'

'He has survived many plagues, been imprisoned and stoned, had burning oil poured upon him. Yet he remains. He will not die, Simon. I believe he will not die until the Lord returns.'

Simon scratches at the back of his hands. 'I had a dream. In the dream there was a great storm, and sand blew and a city was lost beneath it. A whole city. No trace of it remained. Not a trace, Ioseph. It was forgotten.' His breath is shallow, his heart is jumping unevenly. 'If he dies, I have thought. If he dies, Jesus dies again. For we will fade away here without our witness, our testament. We will be a city forgotten beneath the sand. And this thought, once come to my mind, will not leave now.'

The light is swiftly fading out of the sky, and before them the sea deepens gray to black and churns like a mind troubled.

'If he dies,' Simon says again. But the words are neither question nor answer, and hang in the darkening. He looks down at the backs of his hands, sees the scratches from which thin blood seeps.