by Sam Clemens
She accepted the money. “Whose rules?” she asked. “Yours?”
In the driver’s seat, Laird shrugged. “Does it matter?” He put the car in gear. “We’ll be watching.”
Sadie exited the car and walked into the bar.
Forty
The cult continued on without Sadie, one of its original members. Rumors about her departure swirled about the compound, but eventually, people forgot. There were too many exciting things happening.
After the board-breaking success, Cosmo wanted to continue the challenges. “There were so many breakthroughs made,” he said. The way he talked, Laird wondered if the leader wasn’t starting to take himself seriously, but the lieutenant soldiered along. He organized a second board breaking—with beefier hunks of wood, though they were still sawed to break easily—that was a rousing success. There was a trust fall in the woods, and a mass dip in a cold river that, due to the time of year, caused a handful of hypothermia scares. Cosmo considered this challenge the biggest triumph of all.
“The further people get pushed,” he said, “the more they grow.”
No one had heard from Max Schmidtmann since the board-breaking. Truthfully, most members of the congregation hadn’t even noticed he’d been there in the first place. Taylor and Jordan did ask Laird about it once, but Laird simply told them he didn’t recall a Max Schmidtmann. In reality, he was back in Boulder working at REI. After his breakdown, Roy had walked him to a main road and stuck out his thumb until a traveler—construction worker in a beat-up pickup, returning home after a weekend shift—pulled over. Roy told him that Max had wandered into their campsite and begun talking nonsense. That he was certainly delusional and probably on drugs. He wondered if the kind man might drop him off at a hospital?
Schmidtmann, it seemed, had recovered just fine. If reports were accurate, he was close to taking Taylor’s old position of manager.
Taylor seemed to be doing well at the compound. He had that millennial Fabio look, with long wavy hair and a sharp jaw, and Laird noticed the ladies taking a shine to him. Somewhere along the line, the congregation of Cosmography had become rife with hookups; it was never intentional, but only natural, with so many single, persuadable zealots cohabiting in a place removed from the real world. Like a retirement home without the need for Viagra, and with perkier breasts.
Anyway, Taylor cleaned up. A steady wave of leg made its way into his quarters. Good for him, Laird figured; he’d always been a nice guy.
Fall gave way to winter. Cosmo developed group activities that were suitable for cold weather—they built igloos and spent a night in them, and miraculously everyone avoided frostbite. There was a sled race that was rigged in favor of the emancipator. An ill-fated attempt at ice fishing that sent six to the hospital after the pond ice gave way. No major losses, and the congregation did its best to laugh the incident off, but Laird couldn’t help his creeping terror about the increasingly dangerous activities.
Sermons were still intense but membership leveled off. Laird ran the numbers, and in fact they were down a couple since summer, with the departures of Sadie and Max Schmidtmann. The thought comforted him. Perhaps they were on the downslide of this bizarre little happenstance, and one day it would all just dissolve away.
Forty-One
One night in December, Laird met Cosmo in the leader’s home to discuss an issue that had been troubling him.
“Sir,” he said, “I’ll come right out and say it: I’m not sure the sweat lodge is a good idea.”
They were in the living room, seated on a grandiose dark leather couch. The windows gave a view of the starry night sky.
The emancipator reclined on the far end of the couch. He gently shook his lowball glass, rattling the ice in his bourbon. “How did I know it would be that?” he said.
Laird wrung his hands. “It’s just too dangerous. I know you don’t want to hear it, okay? I know. I get what you think of me these days.”
“You have been uncharacteristically negative,” Cosmo said, demeanor still congenial.
“I just—the way I see it, one of my jobs is to reign you in if you need it.”
“Reign me in?”
Laird put his hands out. “I don’t mean that in a bad way. We all need that type of thing sometimes. You wouldn’t want a yes man, right?”
Cosmo shrugged. “A yes every now and then wouldn’t be terrible.” He took a drink of bourbon.
“I get it.” Laird bobbed his head. “But man, it’s just too dangerous. We’ve been lucky to avoid disaster with these last few activities. You gotta admit the pond thing was scary.”
“The ice shouldn’t have broken.”
“I know,” Laird said, “but it did. We have a responsibility here, dude. A whole lot of people that will do whatever you tell them. And with this sweat lodge thing—man, I’ve been doing some reading. It’s really easy for it to get away from you. People have died.”
It was Cosmo’s grand plan for the New Year celebration. A classic Native American sweat lodge for the entire congregation. The extreme heat was said to foster bonding, healing, and—in Cosmo’s words—a “transition to the next frontier.” The followers had already begun construction on a large domed structure of spruce and animal skins. The buzz around the compound was palpable—the Cosmographers knew they were approaching the most ambitious exercise yet.
Cosmo stood and began to pace. “It’s the same as a sauna, Laird. Are you afraid of saunas?”
“No, but with saunas it’s easier to regulate the temperature. With these things, man, unless you really know what you’re doing, it can get really hot really quickly and dangerous before anyone even realizes it. Not to mention the smoke. There’s a bunch of articles about it.”
Cosmo Hendricks walked to the window. He looked out at the night, and the softly lit buildings below. “That’s your problem, Laird. You build your worldview around things you read on the internet.”
Laird considered it. He shook his head and said, “I mean, I try to take in as much information as possible—”
“Exactly,” Cosmo said. “Noise. You take in so much noise, you forget what’s important.”
“Okay. And that is?”
Cosmo spoke quietly. “Faith.”
Laird looked at him. He stood up and took a step in Cosmo’s direction. “Faith in what, Coz?”
Cosmo didn’t answer.
“Faith in what, dude?” Laird repeated, walking toward him. “In this fake religion?”
The emancipator turned back to him. There was a look on his face. “You will address me as ‘sir.’” The comment landed awkwardly, but with considerable weight.
Laird recoiled. “What?”
“You will not address me as ‘dude’ or ‘man’—”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Laird squinted at him. “Are you fucking high right now?”
“I’m not the one who’s out of line.”
“DUDE,” Laird said, “don’t tell me you’re actually serious.”
“You be very careful, now.”
Laird took another step forward, standing straight in front of him. He lowered his voice into a biting, skeptical tone. “Who do you think you are?”
Cosmo turned back to the window. He aggressively drank his bourbon. “I’m the leader of this group.”
“Which is what I made you,” Laird yelled. “Hey. Hey, look at me. You realize that, don’t you?”
Cosmo shook his head and smirked. “Always taking credit.”
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” Laird continued. “We built this on a lie. A bunch of lies. And now you’re believing it?”
“Laird, I believe I’ve heard enough for tonight. Thank you for your council.”
Laird stared at him.
“Thank you,” Cosmo repeated. “That’ll be all.”
“I’m your lieutenant,” Laird said. “Your hatchet guy. Do you understand the things I’ve done to put you where you are?”
Cosmo faced away from him and nodded
. “You’ve served a significant role. And perhaps it’s run its course.”
Laird scoffed loudly and slammed the door on his way out.
Forty-Two
By Christmas the sweat lodge was finished. It stood ominously in the meadow, covered in pine bows and deer pelts purchased in bulk from eBay. The minions split wood to heat it, and stacked the logs in a pile that got bigger by the day. Each time Laird looked at the growing stack, he felt a creeping sense of dread.
Cosmo’s sermons built steadily toward the sweat ceremony. Transcendence, he said, would be achieved together. He spoke with reverence of the ethereal quest that would occur in the lodge. Emancipation from worldly bondage, passage to a new realm, the things they’d been seeking for so long. Attendance was mandatory.
On the Sunday following Christmas, two weeks after their argument in Cosmo’s living room, Laird went to the staging area before the sermon. Ping pong always cleared his mind.
The door to the green room was locked.
“The fuck?” Laird muttered. He tried the handle a second time, and it didn’t budge. Finally he knocked.
Laird fidgeted impatiently in the hallway. The door was never supposed to be locked. Someone was going to get a tongue-lashing.
The door opened. It was Roy.
“Oh,” Laird said. He squinted. “Roy. What’s going on?”
Roy smiled. “Not much. What’s up with you, sir?”
Laird shook his head. “No, I mean what’s going on? Why is the door locked?” He went to walk pass Roy, but the deputy didn’t budge. Laird looked up at him. “Is something wrong?” he asked.
“The emancipator has asked for privacy tonight. I’m sure you understand.”
“What?” Laird said. He tried to look into the green room behind Roy, but the larger man’s shoulders blocked his view. “Roy, step aside. You know those instructions don’t apply to me.”
Roy winced. “I’m afraid in this instance, they do.”
Laird took a step back and relaxed his face. He tilted his chin forward in understanding. It fell into place then, what was happening, and the anger bubbled up in his gut. “Listen here you deep-dish-making fuck,” Laird snapped, “you’ll move aside and let me into that room, and that is a direct order.”
“Sir,” Roy said, “I’m sure you understand that when I have conflicting orders, rank must play a factor.”
“Rank?” Laird asked, exasperated. “Roy, move the fuck out of the way and let me talk to Cosmo.”
Roy stood still, filling the door frame.
Laird pushed forward, trying to muscle his way in, but he was greatly overpowered by the beefier man. “Coz!” Laird yelled into the room. “Coz, this asshole’s trying to box me out!”
Gently, Roy lifted Laird off the ground and set him down in the hallway. He leaned down. “Like I said, sir, my instructions are clear. You can see the emancipator with everyone else when he comes out for the sermon.” He walked back into the green room and closed the door behind him.
Laird did not see the emancipator at sermon time, because he did not attend. There weren’t any explicit rules that required members to be present at Sunday evening meetings, though it was extremely expected; the meetings were the bedrock of Cosmography. Laird couldn’t remember a time when a follower openly decided to skip. What he was doing wasn’t against the rules, but it was certainly out of the ordinary.
Fuck it, though. The bastard had frozen him out—Laird wasn’t about to sit around and listen to a fraudulent sermon with all those cretins.
The nerve of that guy! Laird had bent over backward to put Cosmo on his throne as the sham wizard. He’d committed felonies. Sure, most of it—well, all of it, if he was being honest—had been enjoyable to carry out, and had allowed Laird to finally self-actualize in his true calling of hatchet mandom, but that wasn’t the point. The point was, that fucker would be nowhere without him.
And Roy. The absolute piece of shit. He was taking orders, and this was clearly the driving force behind his towering insubordination, but was that an excuse? Could the SS officers use “taking orders” as a plea for their war crimes? They could not. Laird thought of his large, blocky face filling the doorway. He would not forget this transgression. He should’ve fired him after the deep dish incident.
After the confrontation, Laird angrily pushed out of the great hall doors and jammed his hands in his pockets. A cool winter wind blew through the compound. Rows of cabins, the community fishing pond, the snow-covered green that had housed many games of frisbee in the summer—everywhere he looked, there were reminders of the empire he’d built. Laird put his head down and charged toward his residence. He needed to get the Prius. He needed to get out of there.
Laird left the property and drove to Nederland, the scorned narrative running through his mind. He thought about calling Cosmo and leaving an angry message, but it wouldn’t be much use. The guy hardly used a phone anymore.
Downtown Nederland amounted to a single three-block stretch. Laird parked on the street and found the one bar that was open, a place called Doc Holliday’s. It looked the part—worn wood booths and a long maple bar, with old-timey western decor hanging off the walls. On the interior door, there was a black-and-white “Wanted” poster featuring mustachioed gangsters of lore.
Laird sat at the bar. Behind it was a tired woman with colored tattoos and a small gut. She ambled toward him.
“What’ll you have?” she asked reluctantly.
“Can you do a lemon drop?”
The woman stared. “What do you think?”
Laird nodded. “Jameson, then.”
She left to pour the beverage.
Laird surveyed the premises. He wasn’t the only customer, but there were fewer than ten. Most were sequestered in darkened nooks, drinking on a Sunday night in private.
“Three dollars,” the woman said, and sat a neat, warm whiskey in front of him.
He handed her a credit card and told her to keep it open.
The lieutenant sat on that barstool and watched the local news on a small television mounted in the corner. He drank five Jamesons, fighting off a gag at each sip, and pondered his problem. His rage turned to rumination, which turned to desperation. They were four days away from the sweat lodge ceremony, and he was certain someone would be hurt—Laird had never felt something more strongly. Cosmo was going too far, empowered by his delusional followers and unimpeded by the close calls they’d had before. Laird’s new personal vendetta took a back seat to his concern for the congregation. If something happened, blood would be on his hands.
By the fifth Jameson, Laird’s head was spinning, but he settled on a play. He signed the fifteen-dollar bill and wrote in a tip of forty, courtesy of Cosmography Unlimited, LLC.
Forty-Three
In the moonless winter night, Laird parked his Prius a hundred yards from the great hall and killed the lights. The fellowship periods following the sermons had gradually gotten longer, and now often stretched deep into the night. With its large plate glass windows, Laird could see inside the illuminated hall, and watched cult members congregate, laugh, and eat pizza. His own stomach rumbled, but there was no time for that.
Slowly, the members trickled out into the dark. Groups of twos and threes, and the occasional single, donning coats and making the short walk to their respective cabins. Laird watched intently, waiting for a particular, plain-looking woman.
Finally, there she was. Retha left with Roy just after eleven, and the two began the walk up the hill to their chateau. Laird exited and followed on foot, his feet crunching through the snow. He kept a healthy distance.
Laird knew the intricacies of their domicile because he’d helped design it. It was a sprawling abode, far too big for two people, and their bedrooms were situated on opposite sides of the floor plan. Why they used separate bedrooms, he wasn’t sure—they were supposed to be a couple—but then again, something about those two had always been off. Maybe they were actually brother and sister, but posed as a cou
ple, like a reverse Jack and Meg White thing. They did look alike. Why they’d put on a facade like this, Laird didn’t know, and at the present time, he absolutely did not give a shit. He had a job to do. Neither of these two would be his first choice for an ally—nor his second, third, or, hell, seventeenth—but his options were tragically limited at the moment.
Laird lurked outside the chateau and waited. He knew which wing belonged to Roy, and once the light to the master bathroom went on—signifying a commencement of the evening wash-up process—he made his move. Laird crept around the pond he’d named after himself and approached the ground-floor landing. The sliding glass door was unlocked—locks hadn’t even been installed on the majority of residences, save for Cosmo’s and Laird’s. Quietly, he closed the door behind him and made his way through the dark great room. He took the stairway to the left and meandered down a long hallway toward the light. Finally he reached Retha’s personal living room, where three lamps remained illuminated. Laird saw she was sitting on the couch, paging through Mountain Living magazine. He made his final approach.
She jumped, of course, as a person would. But once she recognized who it was in her home—Laird, slightly maligned at the time, sure, but still a massively respected figure in the community—Retha relaxed.
“Mr. Laird,” she said, closing the magazine. “Is everything okay?”
“Yes, yes,” he said, moving toward her in the most genteel fashion. Laird took a seat two couch cushions down. He spoke at a normal level, because he knew the bastard Roy couldn’t hear them from the other side of the house. “I’m so sorry for visiting you at this hour,” he said. “I know it’s late.”
“What is it?” Retha asked.
Laird clasped his hands together. “Well, you see, Retha, I’ve come to ask you a favor.”