Ian got a C-. The ethics professor explained the assignment had been Build an Argument.
This is an argument, Ian said.
As an ethics professor, she was accustomed to debate and readjusting her opinions. For what, she said.
He said, Let me think about that.
…
In winter of our sophomore year, the administration of Vanilla University, helmed by Father Frank, opted to disband WCVU, the university’s small radio station, and reassign its budget to a fledging campus group, the Young Republicans. The Wafer quoted Father Frank as saying, Music lovers can continue to enjoy music from any of the city-based radio stations. WCVU is how we kept in touch with the members of R.E.M. and the freaks from other schools. It was a barking chain of indie music through late-night radio wires. Its disbandment was the final affront for Corrina: the church would have to go.
Temporarily, she said, to prove a point.
Van, she said, take notes.
They had been practicing every day and their powers were growing. Maybe one day, Marigold said, he could transport something not just through space but through time, like a dead person from the afterlife. Maybe one day Ian could not only control birds but other animals, like rabbits or horses. Corrina had been wondering if she could make something really big disappear and said now was our chance to find out.
That is how we came to be standing on Nietzsche Field near dawn on December 15, the week before Christmas break, squinting up at the immense porcelain structure of Saint Vanilla Cathedral. Our breath puffed out before us. We each wore a crocheted hat from a box Marigold’s mother had sent the week before.
Concentrate, said Corrina.
We bowed our heads. One moment the church was there and the next it wasn’t. That’s how it seemed to me, though I hadn’t been part of the training session when Corrina told the guys to picture their mind as a chute, a way of getting intention from here to there. This was the way to transport an idea to the physical manifestation of the idea, she said. If they could all do it at the same time.
One moment it was there and the next it wasn’t. With it, the objects inside vanished.
We did it, Marigold said.
Holy hell, I said.
Corrina said, Mary Mother of Fuck, I didn’t think we could do it.
Ian’s eyes were scared. I don’t know about this.
It’s still there; it’s just cloaked. Corrina walked to where it had been. She extended her arm and knocked twice — two loud thumps.
We could see the ground underneath the cathedral. Fuzzed-out dirt and twigs. We could see through it to the drab buildings on the other side of the field, above it the night sky.
Better view of the stars now, Corrina said.
We walked to the office of the Wafer. Marigold used a bobby pin to jimmy the door open. Corrina slipped an envelope into a box labeled Letters to the Editor. Then we walked across campus to my room. Ian was nervous and kept looking behind us.
Look, Marigold said, pointing to the sun coming up over south campus. We stopped and passed a cigarette around.
When we reached my room we startled Sara, who was leaving for class. You guys look like you’ve been up all night. She left, and we shut the blinds and lay four in my bed.
Marigold said, What do you think Michael Stipe is doing right now?
Eating a sandwich, I said and Ian said, Helping a dragonfly get out of a spiderweb.
Shut up, Corrina said, her eyes closed. I’m wrecked.
We had been sleeping for only a few hours when we were awakened by a siren that seemed to come from the core of the world.
Outside, other sleepy Vanillans rubbed their eyes and asked each other what the emergency was. Something is wrong with the church, a girl in pink pajamas said. We walked with the crowd to Nietzsche Field where the church had been deleted. People gasped. We were silent. Ian squeezed my hand.
A group of priests and faculty stared up at what wasn’t there. One of the teachers walked directly into an unseen wall. She clutched her nose, glared, then walked into it again. Jesus! She moved a few steps back and then, to our disbelief, did it again.
How many times do you think she’ll do that before she catches on? Corrina said.
Vanilla police arrived. The baffled teacher and the other faculty members were ushered away to stand with us. The officers used police tape to cordon off their best estimate of the church’s location. One of the cops felt along the exterior wall until he halted with a bleat of discovery.
I found a door, he cried.
Two other cops joined him as he turned an invisible doorknob and pushed. The door creaked. His fellow officers drew their guns, covering him as he felt along the interior of what must have been the vestibule. He stopped. The lights! he said. He flipped an unseen switch on and off.
Does he think he can turn the church back on? said Marigold.
The officer climbed a flight of disappeared stairs. We watched as he rose in the air until he was several feet above the ground. He looked back at us and seemed to get scared.
Don’t look down! one of his buddies yelled.
He inched into the main chamber of the cathedral, diminishing in size as he got farther in.
I can feel the pews, he yelled, but I can’t see them!
A whistle went through the crowd. What the fuck, someone said, is this?
The other two officers began their own explorations. One ascended what seemed like a steep side staircase to the choir loft. His counterpart followed, taking each step one by one, gun drawn, eyes wide. In front of us, a tableau of three officers, suspended in air. There was a multitonal blast as the officer in the choir loft found the organ.
At the base of the church, Father Frank led those of us who had gathered in prayer. Finishing up, he said amen into a microphone that had been placed under his bowed head by a Wafer reporter. At the edge of the crowd, Sara scribbled into a notebook.
The next day she had her first cover story: Vanilla Vanishing! In it she espoused theories as varied as climate change and chemical reaction to the church’s recent paint job. Farther back in the paper, an anonymous letter to the editor contained a different theory. Perhaps if the church didn’t treat women, gays, and music lovers like they were invisible, this wouldn’t have happened. The letter was signed, A concerned sophomore.
Then it was time to go home for Christmas break. We stood in the main parking lot and said good-bye. We wore variations on tweed and yarn. Marigold got on a bus that would take him to a plane to California. Corrina’s parents picked her up in a Volvo station wagon. They got out and rushed her, petting her hair while they shook our hands.