ON THE EIGHTH DAY, GOT CREATED TRILBY RICHARDSON
Smashwords Edition
Copyright ©2012 by Douglas Kolacki
Cover photo: Luca Silvestro Santilli/Deposit Photos
Cover design: Rayne Hall
All rights reserved. This publication is for your enjoyment only. It may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means, without written permission from the author.
Any resemblance between characters portrayed and persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
—Hamlet
Prologue: The Other North Pole
December 1983
Trilby Richardson skipped past a Radio Shack display window. As she breezed by, the television screens flickered, and one of them sputtered out altogether.
"Tee! Careful!"
Martha pulled her six-year-old daughter away from the window. The screens returned to normal.
"Sorry, Mom." The girl brushed chestnut hair from her face. Her jeans and red sweater hung loosely; Martha bought everything extra big for the girl to grow into and wear a little longer.
They navigated with care the bustling armies of mall shoppers, the people hurrying to and fro with bright packages. Many of these bags were decorated with snow scenes, snowmen and snowflakes and children peltering one another with snowballs.
"Mom?"
"Yes?" Mother yanked her daughter from the path of a woman staggering under a stack of red and green boxes.
"Why doesn't it snow here on Christmas?"
There was a crash behind them. Mother and daughter looked around. The lady hadn't made it.
"Well, it's just warm all year around here. It just never gets cold enough for snow."
The girl's response was a big "Yuch!" and a scrunched-up face. "Never ever? No snow forts, no snowmen, no snowball fights or anything like that?"
"Honey, count your blessings. Snowstorms have done plenty of damage back east. And lots of retired people go to Arizona or Florida—"
"Couldn't we have just a little? The North Pole's always covered with snow." The girl moved along and seemed to glide more than walk; her tennis shoes made not a sound on the polished floor. "I've seen it in pictures all month and it's always white with snow and ice, and green with Christmas trees. Then I look outside and I think, it's Christmastime but still like summer. There's no snow or icicles or anything. And the schools never close for snowstorms."
Before her mother could answer that one, she said: "I wish just for once we had a white Christmas!"
There was a long silence. "Well, Tee...um...how about a new dress?"
"Silent Night" played over the mall sound system.
Martha thought: Well, let's see. She wants to see the North Pole. Someplace bright and cheery, where the cold nips your nose and there's music and fun...
Yes.
"Mom?" Trilby scrunched up her face. "Why are you grinning that way?"
The writer of "Deck The Halls" might have drawn his inspiration from the San Diego Olympic Arena in December. The pro shop, with frost-sprayed windows and green boughs hanging over the door, was like Santa's cottage. The uniformed men at the skate rental counter wore caps like big elves. The colorful rows of lockers where people laced up were like little boxes stacked together, and who knew what Christmas surprises they might hold? Why, to anyone with a child's imagination, the red and green rental skates themselves were like Christmas stockings that could be strapped on and taken out to play Hans Brinker. And finally, the Pole itself—the vast white wilderness of ice, an arctic desert until the graceful dancers in pretty costumes, the sportsmen waving hockey sticks, the competitive skaters spinning and jumping and spinning while jumping, and the crowd of boys and shrieking girls simply there for fun, all transformed it into a the very place of merriment, thrills and spectacular sights.
It was into this place that Martha and Joe Richardson brought their daughter the next Saturday afternoon.
"Wow!" The girl bounced on her feet as they waited in line to go in. She pressed her pixie face against the plexiglass barrier and stared at all the people teeming on the frozen lake. By the time she got her hands on her green rental skates, her excitement level had doubled.
"Mom!" Trilby pulled on her right skate—"Daddy!"—laced up her left skate, so hurriedly her fingers got tangled in the strings—"Come on! Let's go!" For her parents were still in their stocking feet.
"Just a minute." Martha fumbled with her own strange new plastic footgear (How do people ever squeeze into these things? she wondered). "Just a moment—"
The girl was gone.
"Trilby!" shrieked Martha.
The Richardsons jumped up in their untied skates and hurried, jostling through the crowd to the edge of the ice, laces trailing behind them. Then they saw their daughter. The girl was slip-sliding, wobbling, arms flailing, brown hair flying, whizzing over the ice. Two hockey players tried to scramble out of her way and went clattering head over heels. Then Trilby finally lost her balance and thudded to the ice as well; but she sat on her bottom and giggled.
"Trilby!" Martha grabbed her head with both hands. "You get..."
The girl, back on her feet, waved. "Come on!"
And she raced off again, flailing and stumbling but somehow staying on her feet. In moments she was out of sight.
Martha gaped. Joe's lips moved in silent prayer. Then they bent down, laced up as fast as they could, and stepped onto the slippery ice, clutching the hockey boards for dear life.
Martha heard a giggle, snapped her head around. There was Trilby, her face flushed red, more alive than she had ever been in her short life, perfectly balanced on her blades.
"Haven't you gotten it yet?"
"Ohhhh!" When we get home...
Something happened then. Trilby slid to the center, where the competitive skaters practiced tricks, and started scraping ice with her left blade.
"Trilby?" Joe and Martha caught up to her, slipping and sliding.
"Snowman. Maybe a real small one, but—could we have one? Please?" She smiled so sweetly at them.
"Honey," said Martha. "I don't think you're allowed to do that here..."
Something caught her attention. People were stopping. Racing hockey boys came to sudden halts in white sprays. "Snowman," someone said.
"Snowman?" A nearby skater in blue sweats scratched her head.
A pack of boys shouted assent, and proceeded to flay the surface with their blades. White fountains sprayed up everywhere; people stopped, tumbled to the ice, fell on their behinds or oofed on their stomachs, and gathered the snow, giggling, faces red, smiles Christmas-cheery. Soon the skating ceased altogether and everyone crowded into the center of the ice, packing together their waist-high snowman.
Someone stuck two quarters in for eyes. Someone else stuck his glasses in over the coins. Another person wrapped a plaid scarf about its neck, someone else threw in a ballcap, and still another participant came slip-sliding up with a flattened coke can from the recycle bin; this became the comical nose.
Finally, as the crowning touch, a teenager pulled off his orange rental skates and stuck them at the bottom, proclaiming him "Frosty the Champion!"
Then everyone stood in a circle around the snowman, regarding their lumpy creation. As if led by a common impulse, they joined hands in a big circle, and began to sing:
It came upon a midnight clear, that glorious song of old
From angels bending near the earth, to touch their harps of gold.
Peace on the Earth, good will toward men, from heaven's gracious King;
The world in solemn stillness lay to hear the angels sing.
Before Martha knew it, the public session ended. The attendants shooed everyone off the ice and the Zamboni rolled out to get the surface ready for hockey practice. In the locker area the players were suiting up, donning pads and helmets, taping sticks.
Five minutes later, Martha shuffled into the pro shop, leading her daughter by the hand. Joe walked behind her. Bells above the door jangled their arrival.
A girl with yellow hair and a face full of freckles stood behind the counter. Martha approached her with fear and trembling. "Miss?"
The girl waited.
"About that whole thing out there? It was...well...our daughter who started it. We don't really have any excuses."
Joe said, "But we can assure you—"
The door bells jangled again. The Richardsons turned and saw, shuffling through the glass entryway, a polar bear of a woman with a white mop of hair, white tennis shoes, white slacks, white jacket and an enormous girth ready to burst the whole outfit at any moment.
"Folks," the girl behind the counter finally said, "this is Mrs. Grinch. Her husband owns the rink."
Mrs. Grinch inched her bulk forward. Her belly jiggled as she moved. Her eyes were fixed on some point straight ahead. Suddenly Martha realized it was her daughter the woman was staring at, and from the moment this woman entered she had taken no notice of anything else. And now the behemoth zeroed in on little Trilby, scrunching down to scrutinize the girl who returned her look with innocent curiosity.
"What's your name, little skater?"
"Trilby."
Mrs. Grinch lifted a tentative right hand. "Trilll-by. Well I'm pleased to meet you, miss Trilby. Very pleased indeed."
"Mrs. Grinch," said Marth. "We really are very sorry about what happened, and whatever we can do—"
"Forget about that!" the woman snapped at her. "I'm not worried about that, can't you tell?"
Mr. and Mrs. Richardson jumped back. The little girl stood where she was, holding her mother's hand, regarding this massive woman with curious eyes.
"Now," said Mrs. Grinch sweetly. "Might I ask...your daughter—did she come to you—in the usual way?"
The parents bristled. "She's our daughter," said Joe firmly, "and nobody else's but ours."
Mrs. Grinch seemed to ponder something. Her eyes searched the air, as if she might find there what she wanted to say. "The way she moves...her very presence..." An expression came over her face, a wondering, excited look, and she said no more.
"She's always been that way," said Martha, perhaps a little too loudly.
"Really?" The abominable snowwoman (that's how Martha was starting to think of her) tilted her head, and her brow creased. For a moment she maintained this expression.
Finally she transferred her attention to the girl behind the counter. "Katie, would you give these people a pass for their next visit? They're not to be charged for admission or skate rental."
"Thank you!" Trilby shrieked and laughed and jumped about. "Thank you Mrs. Grinch!"
The parents burst out, "Now Mrs. Grinch wait a minute you don't have to—"
"It's okay." Mrs. Grinch spoke quietly. "Believe me."
She turned and waddled out.
The Richardsons exchanged glances. "What was that all about?" asked Martha.
Chapter One
December 1995
Pacific Coast Sectional Figure Skating Championships, San Diego, California—Senior Ladies Free Skate
The young woman flew across the ice. She raced backwards and around, scissoring her legs, as the mighty overture from Die Zauberflöte boomed from the arena loudspeakers; then she leaped into the air and whirled, touching the ice again with her right foot, arms spread, eyes dancing. Her blue dress sparkled, her boots and mirror-blades propelled her through a wonderland of dancing, spins, and gymnastics. Flashbulbs popped around the stands, the cold air surged in and out of her lungs as the music thundered on. When she jumped she soared, spinning forever in midair it seemed, and eased down so gently she barely left a tracing in the glassy surface. And in between the aerodynamic magic tricks she performed her expert choreography, translating every Mozart note into beautiful form—her gestures, the blazing blue in her eyes, the shining of her face, all combining like the notes in the overture, or Da Vinci brush strokes, to work magic in a thousand enthralled hearts!
The anthem finally crashed to a close, the girl crowning her long program with a fast upright spin, whirling into a blue and chestnut blur with arms raised over her head and finally, reluctantly, stopping.
The arena exploded with applause.
For Dylan Browning, who sat six rows from the ice, time had stopped. The judges held up their score cards; he didn't notice. She still whirled and twirled in his mind, the girl of eighteen who now stood at center ice with face and arms raised, glistening with sweat, her chest moving in and out—Trilby Richardson.
"Dylan?" A deep voice intruded. "You okay?"
He turned to see The Face. It was the father of all concerned faces, craggy like Lincoln's, with hair as white as the girl's boots.
"Yeah. Perfectly okay, Pastor."
He wasn't okay at all.
"Quick, Dylan! Move!"
Pastor Jedidiah Trumbull, all nervous energy, leaped out of his seat and hustled Dylan up the concrete steps between applauding spectators toward the exits.
Dylan got one last look at Trilby. She was smiling at the nine grim masters of her fate who sat on nine thrones judging the twelve senior girls who had honed their skills all year to perform here tonight and, with a few pencil strokes, would decide their fates.
"Dylan, come on!"
The two men pushed through doors that were like Alice's looking glass, leaving the wonderland of ice and lights, back into the black parking lot. It was warm for December in San Diego and Dylan had come to the event in shirtsleeves, shivering inside the icy cavern.
They clattered down the stone steps and stood at the bottom, looking up at the concrete monolith arena. The nearby Sports Arena Boulevard roared with busy traffic the way the crowd had roared with approval for Miss Richardson.
Dylan sighed. "Pastor, do we have to leave already?"
"Look." Jed pointed.
People were coming out the doors, flowing down the steps.
"You see that man there?" Jed's wide, alert, bespectacled eyes always darted about, searching and analyzing everything.
"I guess so."
"His face—see that? He was impressed. Awestruck, almost. And others, too. It's all over the place."
So it's not just me, thought Dylan.
But he said, "Pastor, she wasn't the only skater here—"
"Really." Jed stroked his chin and appeared to ponder this interesting statement. "Maybe this is my first skating event, but I don't think they're always packed wall to wall, standing room only! We were lucky to get seats for tonight. And did you see how wild the crowd went when she appeared?"
Indeed Dylan had. And at the Regionals last month, and again tonight, he had seen why. Her grace, remarkable even for a figure skater. Her exuberance and a joy that flashed in her eyes even as her blades flashed in the lights during her footwork and flying leaps. A presence about her that he could not explain, but very definitely feel.
"All the other gals got smatterings of polite applause, if they skated well," the pastor went on. "But when Miss Richardson appeared..."
He stopped a passing senior citizen. "Excuse me, sir! What did you think of that last skater?" Bright, disarming smile.
Drawing up his smallish frame, the man said: "If Nietzsche had been here to see Trilby Richardson, he would have changed his mind about God being dead."
He walked away.
The Pastor turned a triumphant grin upon Dylan.
"Come on." He strode to the battered van. "There's something you need to know."
"Huh?" Dylan looked startled.
Chapter Two
Jed's vehicle was a monument to the great preacherly clan of the Trumbulls—a dusty attic detached from a house and fitted with wheels. Pictures, taped on the windows and tacked to the carpet on the ceiling, faded black and white shots of ancient relatives in overcoats and top hats, toothless and white-haired; scattered tracts, piles of pamphlets, and a thick unpublished manuscript scrawled by Jed's late father. This manuscript was the elder Trumbull's legacy to his son, along with the church he had founded, and Jed went nowhere without it. The van also contained the frayed, yellowed wedding dress of Jed's dear departed mother who, he often said, had "never failed" to intercede for him; it swung on a wire hanger in the back. The van smelled of old books and years, and Jed said he often went out into it at night to pray.
The Pastor looked straight ahead as he drove. "Good to get out, isn't it, Dylan? Really, you shouldn't spend so much time by yourself, hiding in that apartment...things will change once we get you moved in...you know, Gracie spent all last weekend working on your room?"
Dylan gazed out the window. He heard Jed only vaguely, as from far away.
"You're doing an excellent job leading the singing, Dylan. I just thought I should tell you that. People come up to me after almost every service and ask, 'Where did you get that fine guitarist—that promising young man?' You're making quite a mark in our church. And when you move in—! Well," he wheeled the van around a corner, "did God answer our prayers for a young, strong musician or what?" He beamed with all the brilliance of the Bethlehem Star.
"What did you want to tell me, pastor?"
Jed paused. "What do you think of that girl yourself?"
"Well..."
Dylan fell silent. He sat and stared out the window, thinking: She's beautiful. Very beautiful. But it's not just her eyes, or her form, or her chocolate river of hair, or even the way she made the other skaters all look like they had lead feet. He held the memory close in his mind, the shining girl and her magical choreography that brought Die Zauberflöte to life in a way that Mozart, if only he could have seen it, would have appreciated. She was a person, but more than a person; a skater, and this was only natural, for such a creature could do only something that expresses beauty.
"She's rather striking," he said.
Jed laughed. "Striking? You don't know the half of it. Check this out!"
He plunged a hand into the back and pulled out a newspaper clipping. The rear seat was barely visible for all the attic-clutter, yet he always seemed to know exactly where in this incredible jumble to find what he needed at the moment.
"This," he slapped it on Dylan's lap, "appeared on page five of the San Diego Union, ten years ago." He wheeled the van around a corner.
Dylan read...
"Mom, let's go!"
Little Trilby bounced by the door. Her pink skate bag was clutched firmly in her hand, her white boots were inside, her blades newly sharpened, and all that stood between her and her Xanadu-cave of ice was a mother spying out the window. Her brown ponytail jiggled as she pleaded, pestered and cajoled in her squeaky eight-year-old's voice.
"Dear, we have to wait a minute. He's out there."
Martha could see him parked at the curb just to the left of the Richardson driveway. The car, a rusty brown hatchback, seemed crouched there, waiting to pounce; and the old man hunched at the wheel like a personification of the all the predatory instincts that drove sharks.
"Is it that crazy man?"
Crazy man, indeed. Sixty-year-old road rager, curser of passersby, relentless tailgater of anyone who dared to drive down his street, terrorizer of his old neighborhood across town until they drove him out. Two weeks ago he had moved into an apartment down the street from the Richardsons. Six days ago he chased an elderly couple's old Ford in his car, practically ramming them from behind, and they could see his enraged face in their rear view mirror, shouting words best unheard.
"Why isn't this man in a hospital?" Martha wondered aloud. "Doesn't he have any relatives?"
And now he lurked outside her house. Twenty minutes earlier he had pulled up to the curb—he had a habit of parking at various places along the street and just sitting there for long periods of time—and now appeared to be waiting. For what? Someone to harass? Martha's face flushed with anger.
Suddenly she noticed that the door was hanging ajar, and her daughter was nowhere in sight.
"Trilby Anne!"
The girl, with her catlike motion, had tripped the doorlatch and slipped out, leaving her skate bag. It was not entirely unexpected. Once the girl had learned to walk, Martha was always running here and there, pulling her out of closets or away from the refrigerator, and once off the street where she almost got run over by a horn-blasting truck.
"Trilby!"
Mother dashed out the door. Trilby was halfway across the green yard, heading straight for the car. She did not skip, or simply walk, but appeared to breeze over the lawn in a smooth motion that barely disturbed the grass. Martha ran, thinking What is she doing! Get back here!
Finally the man noticed Trilby. She spoke something, and he looked at her as if finding this girl rather curious. Then, as if stricken by a grand mal seizure, he convulsed in his seat.
"Tril-beee!" Martha lunged for her daughter.
The man's eyes were fixed not on the girl, but on a point above her and to her left. Martha saw nothing at all there. But the man must have, because he shouted something and flailed about, all arms and hands, and as Martha grabbed her daughter the engine started with a roar and the car shot off with a loud screech of tires.
Martha's voice thundered louder than the car. "Trilby! I never want you going up to strangers again do you hear me—"
A crash cut her off. The car had careened over the curb and plowed into a telephone pole. Steam billowed up from under the crumpled hood. As for the man, he must not have been hurt, for he got out and went babbling down the street as fast as his pudgy legs could take him.
Martha clutched her daughter's arms. The girl hung her head and put a finger to her mouth.
"Young lady." Martha released her. "If you ever do that again..."
She stopped. Trilby had such innocent eyes. "I won't, Mom," she said with a voice just as innocent. "I'm sorry I scared you. Can we go now?" Her face brightened.
"Uh...sure, honey." Martha was just glad it was over.
But as Trilby breezed back to the house for her skate bag, Martha examined the spot above the sidewalk where her daughter had stood.
"Tee? What did that man see? Right before he took off?"
"God."
God. Is it because we go to church and pray and have family Bible studies that she's making an imaginary friend out of God?
If it keeps happening, we'll have to have a talk with her. Martha went inside.
Someone called the police. They came and made their report. They also searched for the mad driver, but he was nowhere to be found.
Finally they had his car towed away. Then someone showed up at his shoebox apartment and claimed his belongings, and the place was rented to new tenants. No one ever saw the man again.
"How do you like that?" Jed lurched to a stop in front of the white Spanish building where Dylan lived.
"Interesting."
Jed looked at him for a minute. "Dylan. Are you aware—"
"I know she was adopted. Her parents couldn't have kids."
"Yes, everyone knows that. But I dug a bit deeper. Do you know how they found her? Through an agency? No. She was abandoned—in a downtown alley! The Richardsons passed by one night and heard the little newborn crying. To this day, no one knows who her real parents are."
Dylan had in fact heard this, but pretty much dismissed it as urban legend.
"She was in perfect health, when they pulled her out." The pastor seemed as if warming to the subject. "No bruises, no scuffs, no bites from bugs or rats. She was wearing red and green striped baby pajamas designed for toddlers, and a diaper under that. The diaper was even clean."
Dylan had heard about this, too. "They found her right after she was abandoned. Someone was bound to, if she was crying."
"Yes, yes, but where did she come from? Just consider for a moment. When was the last time you heard of an eight-year-old girl chasing off a demon? An eight-year-old girl! And that demon—I figure it for a LIS2. I've banished forty-three of those in my career, and it never took less than three hours—three hours of firing Scriptures at the thing, discerning its rights, sometimes getting kicked in the stomach and bashed in the head by it. When it was over I always felt like I had fought all of World War Two in one day. And she sends it packing just like that!"
"Yes."
"Can you imagine what she might be capable of by now? Dylan, we need this person!"
Silence as the implications sank in. "You mean...bring her into our church?"
Trilby Richardson in the same house with Dylan? Under the same roof? The same room?
"Yes. I'm not getting any younger. Every deliverance takes more out of me. And with all the increasing demonic movies, music, literature, we need a helper."
"Pastor, this happened ten years ago. That might have been her only—"
"Bull. You know it as well as I. That's an anointing straight from God."
Dylan wondered if, with all the time and work and everything else skating involved, she even had time for their church; but he did not mention this to Jed.
"So just what do you think she is, pastor?"
Jed thought carefully before answering. "I'm not jumping to any conclusions, mind you. But here's something else you might find interesting. Her coach—Mrs. Grinch by name—is a near-death survivor. She flatlined in a hospital during a heart attack, claims to have seen heaven and the 'beings' of heaven. I read about it in the papers. She said that our skater reminds her of them—her grace, her radiance, everything!"
Wow. Dylan's pulse raced with a new excitement.
"Anyway"—Jed slapped some photocopied handwritten legal pages on Dylan's lap. "Your homework for tonight. One of Pa's most memorable exploits!"
Dylan himself had attended none of Jed's deliverances. He "wasn't far enough along" yet, but the pastor kept promising him this would change if Dylan kept "studying to show himself approved." He took the rustling papers and glanced over them. "Thanks, pastor! And thanks for coming tonight."
He climbed out of the van. Its engine knocked slightly as it idled. The building sat on a slope and Dylan could see the blue bay with its array of white sailboats far downhill, and Point Loma far off in the distance.
"No problem! Goodnight Dylan."
He hurried inside.
Chapter Three
Each week Jed ran off a copy of his father's great manuscript for Dylan to take home and study. Over the years Jed had divided it into chapters and verses for easy reference, much like the Bible, and Dylan was, convinced that had the Good Book been penned in modern times, it would have read just like this masterpiece of Abraham Trumbull's.
He kicked off his shoes and lay down on the couch, reading...
CHAPTER XXVII
1 I remember that Halloween night well. Up until now I, my beloved wife and son would huddle in the living room and pray; but this night, feeling the Lord's hand heavy upon me to do more, I resolved to take my most loyal and noble parishioners, and go do battle hand-to-hand. As to the target of our holy assault, there could be no doubt: The Manor.
2 The Manor—a more grossly misnamed, misplaced and mis-built sewer of a community could scarce be found. In an area that might have been a children's playground, with a black asphalt drive circling it 'round like a tar-pit moat, it rose up against the heavens like jagged towers of Babel blackened with factory smoke, and littered with garbage from battered, overflowing bins—it was said that the garbage men rarely stopped to collect the trash, so afraid they were of this place; for the oppression hung heavy and menacing in the air there.
3 In my commutes to and from my place of employment, I often beheld the dirty children splashing in the mud puddles, and felt the most forceful attacks upon my spirit by the ever-present and invisible foes infesting this place. And so, on Halloween night—the time when the evil beings reach their peak of unholy revelry—I resolved to confront them directly.
4 Leaving my wife and son at home to provide prayer support, I struck out at seven o'clock with my two most trusted parishioners, Jake and Raymond. Four blocks from the Manor we encountered a drunk, staggering along with a half-full bottle of liquor; the rotgut sloshed as he waved the bottle at us.
5 "Get away from here!" he shouted, his skeleton-frame shaking, and so thin that I did not know how it held up his grimy trousers, and his eyes two flames of fire. Discerning a spirit, we rebuked it and the man tottered away from us. Thus encouraged, we continued our advance.
CHAPTER XXVIII
1 We found our goal at building six, apartment sixty-six. A sign nailed to the door said M. BAMBINO, MANAGER. The sign was an inverted wooden cross! And the oppression buzzing in the air made it plain what dwelled with Mr. Bambino behind that door.
2 My men were sweating and shaking, and Raymond gasped his wish to leave; I grabbed his arm and prayed, strengthened him. "Brace yourselves, brothers!" I said, and raised my fist to knock. But someone—or something—was expecting us.
3 The door crashed open while my hand was yet raised, and there he stood—a man like a sumo wrestler, his bloated shirtless belly overlapping his belt, with a black beard and a curly mane of hair, leering at us with a contempt he made no attempt to disguise.
4 "You guys got a death wish or sumpin'?" he snarled through his beard. His breath stank of liquor and onions. "Intruding where you ain't welcome?"
5 At once I knew that the demon in charge of the whole Manor possessed this unfortunate man. I raised myself up and spake as the Lord led: "Spirit! God hath numbered thy days here and put an end to them. Thou wast weighed on the scales and found deficient when thou joined in the unholy rebellion of Lucifer and his foul minions. Thy place here will be given to Christians, to ministers, to the faithful of this city, forevermore!"
6 Immediately the spirit seized the man and dashed him to the floor, where he writhed and twisted in a manner not to be believed. His eyes rolled back into his head, he foamed at the mouth; but my brave companions and I fell on him and held him down.
7 Then the unclean spirit left the man indeed—and appeared before our astonished eyes! It roared, it swore, it threatened. And a monstrous thing it was, like a squashed-down hippopotamus, legs like tree trunks, blazing eyes of yellow and its mouth a perfect "O." The poor man who had vomited up this spirit passed out and lay sprawled on the carpet, drooling from the corners of his mouth. I discerned the need for a holy helper.
8 "Lord! Christ once said Thou couldst send legions of angels in time of need, if that is Thy will! God, send them now, I pray!"
9 Just then a holy brilliance illuminated every corner of the apartment, and I knew that my petition had been answered. Shining angels appeared with a great chain, and they whirled around the horrible being, wrapping it up. The creature thrashed, roared; but in moments they had the thing bound fast, heads all tied together, and led it away on its leash.
10 Angels and chained demon walked not out the door but towards a wall, and though they never touched the wall they appeared to get further and further away. The demon's head revolved completely around to face us, and it bellowed the most vulgar threats; but far from trembling with fear, we rejoiced inside at this great victory that God hath sent his messengers to help us win.
11 We spake the gospel unto him, and God mercifully opened his eyes; he prayed with us and rejoiced, weeping now with joy, the foul spirits banished forever from his life and from The Manor.
Dylan put aside the papers. Dylan considered.
God did special things for the Trumbulls. He used them in mighty and glorious ways. This Halloween story resembled the fantastic tales Jed told of deliverances, front-line battles that most Christians only read about in the Gospels and Acts. Yes, they were somewhat...bizarre...but the pastor always told them so earnestly, so casually, and painted such vivid word-pictures that Dylan could not help but be caught up in the thrill of the story.
The mega-churches didn't have anything like this. The ministers who televised themselves into living rooms every Sunday morning, though sincere, didn't have it. Only the Trumbulls had it.
He crawled into his sleeper couch, pulled the covers up to his chin and listened to two laughing voices out in the hallway, one male, one female. He knew their voices, but not their names.
Trilby Richardson in our church! She and Jed and Dylan, all fighting on the front lines together. Could it be?
Dylan jout of bed, grabbed his guitar, and wrote a song, scribbling the lyrics on the back of the xeroxed Halloween story just because this gave him a kick.
Our great pastor Trumbull has got him a vision
to gloriously fulfill his great heavenly mission
of winning our city completely for Christ,
and only complete victory will suffice!
We welcome this beautiful one to our fold,
who's valuable to our good fight as fine gold,
she'll knock all the stuffing right out of them demons,
twist their arms till they're all bawlin' and screamin'!
I'd like to see Satan try anything now,
Our helper and us, we'll take aim and go "pow!"
God sent her in answer to Jed's holy prayers,
to catch our accuser and foe unawares,
to run him right out of our town on a rail,
and right in between his two legs goes his tail!
Dylan held up his masterpiece. He rejoiced in it, he delighted in it, he read it over and over. Maybe strike the "beautiful?" Could be a bit forward...
No. the pastor had told him more than once to get over his shyness, that a soldier in Christ could not afford such a luxury. All right, then!
"Perfect!"
He couldn't wait for Trilby Richardson to hear it.
Chapter Four
The next day Jed and Dylan lunched out in the van, as always. The pastor brought a newspaper.
"She won!" Jed flapped the paper in triumph. "She's going to the Nationals in Providence, Rhode Island."
Trilby Richardson had earned high technical marks and higher "presentation" marks, even 6.0's from two of the enthroned judges (isn't that, like, a perfect score? thought Dylan). On her long program she wobbled on a combination spin—Dylan hadn't noticed—and put a hand down on the ice when landing her "triple Lutz," but otherwise skated cleanly and brilliantly.
"Pastor?"
"Yes?" Jed chewed and swallowed as though his sandwich could go stale at any moment.
"I wrote something." He presented the song.
Jed took it and read it, chewing noisily. His eyes lit up.
"Ha, ha!" He pumped Dylan's hand. "You never told me you wrote songs! How wonderful, my boy! She ought to love that." Dylan shone as if just awarded the Congressional Medal Of Honor.
"And she will come, Dylan, rest assured. I've been praying, Gracie's been praying nonstop since last night—and I know when and where to approach her."
By careful research, he had gathered the following intelligence: Trilby Richardson was eighteen years old and fresh out of high school. She practiced at the Olympic Arena and belonged to the skating club there. She trained six mornings a week from six to nine, but did not return in the afternoon like some of the other skaters. Nor did she work at the rink. As far as Jed knew, she had no job at all; her father worked for the cable company, fixing boxes. She seemed to have a talent for choreography and arranged the moves for all her own programs, something quite unusual. Her family and friends called her "Tee" for short.
"She usually joins the public skating on Sundays, between one o'clock and five. During the morning service we'll get everyone praying for the success of our mission. Then, off we go to the rink to fish for men! Or in this case, ice-fish for a girl." He chuckled.
Jed must have noticed the look on Dylan's face, for he quickly added: "Gracie and I, that is."
"Oh. Um...any chance I could come along?"
"Better let us handle this one. We're veterans at it. In the old days, when Pa was still pastor, we'd go out recruiting. I need you to stay home and provide prayer support. Those are your orders, soldier!" he huffed in a good-natured way.
"So she'll help us cast out demons?"
"At the very least! Remember that the Lord can do exceedingly above and beyond all we could ever ask or think."
Then the conversation turned to the lessons to be learned from the Halloween battle story. Jed pointed out the "cleansing" at the end.
"It's like peeling an onion. Bit by bit you discover layers of uncleanness in your life—things picked up along the way, things seen or read—that weaken your holy armor and let them take shots at you."
So Dylan always strove to recall these little impurities, things recent or long past, that might need purging from his life. When in doubt, he always asked his pastor.
"When I was in grade school, the teacher read us fairy stories. What do you think?"
Jed nodded. "Oh, yes. Definitely. Cleanse them away."
Dylan would later muse that he had heard the word "cleanse" more times during his year with Jed than in all his twenty-two years before then.
"Could I do it now?"
"Certainly!" They bowed their heads.
Throughout the petition, Jed remained silent with head down and hands clasped. Dylan confessed the stories he had read and the stories read to him long ago, and expressed concern about their lingering supernatural residue.
Then he said, "I cleanse myself of those things, Lord," and Jed came to life. "Yes, Lord! Oh, yes Lord!"
Jed took over, invoking all God's best on his exceptional servant Dylan Browning. His deep voice resonated in the van. When they finished, Dylan felt blessed indeed.
Jed glanced at his watch. "Time to go back to work!"
Dylan worked in a vast beehive of cubicles separated by identical green partitions, each one with a computer terminal, a headset, and a chair. He sat down and donned the headset and took calls, six to seven hundred of them a day, from people sending text messages to alpha pagers. They dictated their messages—"Meet me for lunch at twelve," "Please call home immediately," "If I don't have my money by four o'clock today I'm filing a lawsuit"—and Dylan typed them, verified them, and sent them.
The company, GiantComm by name, never slept. Operators punched in and out around the clock. Dylan marveled at how, every minute of the day and all through the night, voices beamed into the call center from every corner of the nation. The place hummed with the steady undercurrent of five hundred conversations.
Dylan, between calls now, looked down the row to see Jed at the raised supervisor platform in the midst of the beehive. He wore a headset himself, drumming his fingers on his desk, listening. Dylan grinned. Supervisors like Jed got the escalated calls—the angry callers, the callers with complaints or who just wouldn't get off the phone. Somehow the pastor calmed them down.
A blue prompt flashed up on Dylan's screen. He read: "You have reached the message center for—" a long foreign name, difficult to pronounce; he managed to stumble through it. "May I take your message please?"
A cheerful man's voice resonated over his headset. His fingers flew over the keyboard with a rapid clicking. Then he read it back.
"The message I am sending reads: 'To my best friend Harshad, happy birthday! I can never thank you enough for the blessing you have been to me. You're the absolute best-est and special-est friend a man could ever have. Somebody up there likes me!' Is that correct?"
"Yes, yes!" the caller gushed.
Dylan tapped the ENTER key twice. The message vanished from the screen. In a minute or two it would appear on the foreign man's alpha pager.
The green fabric walls of the cubicles bore red and yellow signs, that listed the required scripts ("Is the area code needed?" "I don't have that information." "This is a paging service, are you trying to page someone?").
Stations were never reserved, but still this did not stop people from tacking up snopshots of spouses, children in Halloween costumes, family outing group shots. Whenever Dylan walked through the workplace, he saw picture after picture after picture. He marveled at them. He felt as though looking through countless windows into a world strange, wonderful, and unreal; but mostly strange.