Lessons on Destroying the World

by Gant, Gene

  His quiet yearning for death called to me. I resisted it at first, still stinging from the shame of having botched Willie Freeman’s resurrection. This man’s suffering tore at my heart, however. His name was Amos Jones. He had put himself through college working part-time jobs in fast-food joints and then started a career as a newspaper reporter. Four years ago, he had purchased the midtown bungalow in front of which he now tottered. He should have been getting on with his life, falling in love, furthering his career, pursuing his desire to mentor African-American youth who faced the same odds and temptations he had overcome.

  I went down, and my body materialized on the walkway behind him. He took a step and lost his balance. I caught him around the chest. He clutched my left arm with fingers that were weak and bony. His body sagged against mine.

  “Can you help me to the porch?” he whispered.

  “Come on, man. I got ya.” My skinny arms held him easily. I led him to the porch and eased him down onto the steps. When I started to pull away, he grabbed desperately at my arm, burying his face against my shoulder.

  “I’m so tired,” he said, crying now in breathless sobs.

  I sat down next to him, pulled him close, and cried a little myself. “I know.” I knew his every pain and his every regret for the eleven years he had been infected with the lethal virus. He was so sick and distraught that he felt no shame in seeking comfort from a stranger. “But it’s okay now,” I whispered to him. “You’re okay.”

  He stopped crying, sensing the change as it swept through his body. He drew away and looked at me in wonder. The deadly virus disappeared from his body in an instant. The texture of his skin returned to its normal, pecan-brown smoothness, his lungs grew vital again, and his limbs swelled with muscle.

  “My God….”

  I got up and walked away. He sat there, intoxicated by the energies swirling within him. By the time he stood up and called out for me, I was miles away, a cloud of atoms flying on the wind.

  12

  MONICA ISOM called my house seven times while I lay dead in the abandoned loading bay. She called for an eighth time after leaving the afternoon service at Christ Missionary Center, a church with so large a membership that it worshipped in shifts. It excited me that she called at all. Hey, everybody wants to be loved, or at least lusted after.

  Monica drove down Madison Avenue in her parents’ late-model champagne-colored Toyota Camry. The sunroof was open, the windows were down, and gospel music blared from the speakers, praising the grace of God. Monica spotted me standing in front of a stately French restaurant where I had discreetly materialized out of sight of the passersby. I pretended to study the menu posted on the wall beside the door. As if I could have afforded this place in my former life.

  Monica pulled over to the curb, giving her horn a honk. I stepped up to her car and bent down to peer through the window. She turned off her radio.

  “Well, hey there, Micah. This is a nice coincidence.”

  Nice, yes. Coincidence, no. “Hi, Monica.” Guilt ate at me. Since I’d healed the man named Amos Jones of the disease that was killing him, I had crisscrossed the city for almost four hours, making healthy people who were suffering from cancers, strokes, paralysis, and heart attacks. There were so many more people out there stricken with all kinds of disease and injury that I should be helping. But I really wanted to see Monica, and I figured it wouldn’t hurt anybody if I took an hour for that.

  “What’re you up to?”

  I shrugged. “Just hanging out.”

  “You are a hard guy to catch up with. I’ve called you about a hundred times, never did get an answer.”

  “I was out.”

  She gasped with exaggerated shock. “Really?” she said sarcastically. “I had no idea.”

  “So what’re you up to?”

  “I just came from church. I was thinking about stopping somewhere for dinner. Want to join me?”

  I opened the door and hopped in.

  She grinned at me. “I guess that means ‘yes.’”

  Monica continued smiling as she drove off. I found myself pulling at her thoughts despite my efforts to stay out of her head. She was a little nervous—after all, she didn’t know me—but she was genuinely attracted to me. I also learned from her memories and thoughts that if she ever got to know the real me, she would walk away for good. I didn’t want to think about that. I wanted her to like me. I wanted to get to know her, but in that wonderful, conventional way known as conversation. Mentally, I took a brick and bashed my heightened senses into submission.

  “How come you don’t have your air conditioner on, hot as it is out here?” I asked. I obviously still lacked a silver tongue.

  “The air conditioner was going full blast at church. It felt as if I was sitting in a freezer. I’m just thawing out. But if it’s hot to you….” She reached down to turn on the air conditioner.

  “No, that’s okay. I’m fine.”

  Monica nodded. She wore a sleeveless sky-blue dress, navy stockings, and navy pumps, her outfit tastefully accented with star-shaped gold earrings and a gold bracelet, from which dangled a tiny gold cross that looked like it was made out of tin. Her hair was loose, blowing in the hot breezes that came through the sunroof and open windows. I wanted to run my fingers through her hair and kiss her.

  “You look very nice today,” I said.

  “Well, that’s kind of you to say, especially since you were so mean to me the other night at the club.”

  “Was I mean?” I asked, surprised.

  “I’d even say you were downright nasty.”

  I gave her an awkward smile. “Well… I thought you were undercover.”

  “Police? Me? That’s a crazy thing for you to think.”

  I shrugged, letting her know that I did not disagree.

  “Okay, psycho, what do you want to eat?”

  “You choose. I’m not picky.”

  She made a right on McLean, drove over to Poplar, and turned left. A minute later, she pulled in to the parking lot of Taco Bell.

  “Is this okay?” she asked.

  “You bet.”

  We got out of the car and crossed the parking lot. She reached the door first and, being a lady, waited for me to open it, which I did happily. We stepped inside, and I realized how hungry I was. The smell of Tex-Mex was absolutely heavenly. Monica ordered two regular tacos and a lemonade. I ordered six tacos, two chicken burritos, three chalupas, a side of nachos, and a pitcher of iced water.

  The cashier rang up the order, looked at me, and announced the total. “That’ll be $19.74.”

  I reached for my wallet, felt my empty back pocket, and realized that I had no money. My eyes got round in panic for a moment before I remembered that I could make one of the twenty dollar bills I’d left hidden in my house three days ago materialize in my hand.

  Before I could do anything, however, Monica said, “No, this is on me.” She opened her little blue purse and paid the cashier. “I invited you to dinner, Micah. Remember?”

  This was my kind of woman.

  We seated ourselves at a table in front of the plate glass windows facing Poplar. Monica bowed her head briefly to invoke the blessing on our meal and then watched in amusement as I started inhaling my food.

  “So, your parents didn’t come to church with you today?” I asked between bites.

  “My dad’s out of town, and my mom had to work today,” she replied. “Mom’s a paramedic. I didn’t want to miss service, so I drove myself. But my parents and I belong to the same church, if that was what you were wondering.”

  I would have said something in response, but my mouth was full of taco. I nodded at her.

  Monica smiled, amused at my predicament. When I swallowed, she quickly put her hand over mine to stop me from taking another bite. “What school do you go to?” she asked.

  “I don’t,” I replied. “I’ve got a nine-to-five. I’m a cook at Bebe’s Bar-B-Que over on Third.”

  “Bebe’s Bar-B-Que. N
ever heard of it.”

  “I’m not surprised. It’s just a hole in the wall, the kind of place where you have to check the chairs for splinters before you sit down. The owner’s a son of a bitch, but I kinda like it there.”

  “Good. It’s a blessing to have a job you like.” She let go of my hand and looked at me skeptically. “You know, you don’t look old enough to have graduated.”

  “I’m not, and I didn’t.” My openness with her surprised me. “I hated school, but my mom wanted to see me graduate more than anything. She was the only reason I stayed in school as long as I did. After she died, I gave up and dropped out.”

  Monica froze with a taco halfway to her mouth. “Your mom’s dead? Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.”

  “Thanks.”

  “But, Micah, you shouldn’t have dropped out. You go to school for yourself, not your parents or anybody else.”

  “I know. But I never would’ve graduated anyway. I’m not exactly smart.”

  “You’re probably a lot smarter than you think. And you sure have a healthy appetite.” That observation came after she saw me bite a hapless burrito in two. “How do you stay so slim?”

  I managed to grin without putting half-chewed food on display. “Just lucky, I guess.”

  “You have such a nice smile,” Monica remarked.

  Oh my God.

  “You’re blushing!” Monica giggled. “That is so sweet.”

  “Can we talk about something else before I turn diabetic?”

  Over the next thirty minutes, I learned a lot about Miss Monica Isom. Some of the information came from accidental brain taps. Her favorite color was sky blue. She could not cook a thing. She was jealous of her cousin Helene, whose hair grew full-bodied and naturally straight, unlike Monica’s. The rest of it came through good old-fashioned conversation. Monica liked old horror movies, An American Werewolf in London being her absolute favorite. (It was one of my favorite movies too; I thought Jenny Agutter was absolutely hot.) Monica was a fast-food junkie. She had a twenty-three-year-old sister who was playing housewife to a Nigerian-born dentist in Troy, Michigan. Monica planned to be on hand next month for the birth of her sister’s first child.

  And the more we talked, the more I liked her. I liked her eyes and her smile. Several times I had to stop myself from leaning across the table and kissing her.

  “What church do you belong to?” Monica asked, shifting to a new topic.

  “I’m kind of between churches right now.”

  “Meaning you don’t believe in God?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Just because I don’t go to church doesn’t make me an atheist.”

  “If you believed, you’d want to go to church, Micah. God has been the single biggest influence in my life. I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for him. I wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for him. I have to praise him for that. I couldn’t stay out of church if I tried. I have to tell people how good God is….” A shudder ran through the girl so sharply it appeared her inner organs had twanged. Joy exploded in her eyes, and she giddily wrapped her arms around herself. “Let me stop,” she said, smiling broadly. “I’m about to start praising him right here.”

  I found myself shifting in my chair. Religious discussions always made me nervous. In my experience, Bible-believing, praying, worshiping people are absolutely convinced their view of the world is the only truth. Contradicting their beliefs in any way would brand you a hell-bound idiot in desperate need of enlightenment—which was, of course, their duty to arrange. Trust me, it’s hard to put your flirt on a girl who’s trying to save your soul.

  Hoping to head off Monica’s battle for my place in eternity, I laughed and said, “So you’re one of those girls who sin in the clubs on Saturday night and make up for it on Sunday morning.”

  “I do not ‘sin’ in clubs. I went to Cotton’s Lounge Friday night just to hang out with my girlfriends. And that’s all we did. Now, getting back to the subject of you and church—”

  I sighed. “Monica….”

  “What? You did say you believe in God, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then you should show him your love and your gratitude.”

  “I can do that anytime, anywhere.”

  “And I hope you do. That doesn’t relieve you of the obligation to worship him in church.”

  That sent me rolling my eyes again. I couldn’t help it.

  Monica smiled, which didn’t hide her annoyance. “Would you stop that?”

  “I gotta go,” I said abruptly. It wasn’t that I wanted to get away from her. I actually wanted more time for us to get to know each other, but the urge to get back to my agenda of helping people with my new power started pulling at me again.

  Monica frowned, looking disappointed. “I was going to treat you to a sundae at Baskin-Robbins.”

  “I’ll have to pass. I’ve got some things I need to take care of.”

  “Okay.” She picked up her purse and her keys. “I’ll drop you off.”

  “And I appreciate the offer, but I can make it on my own.”

  I escorted her back to her car. She thumbed a button on her key ring. Her car chirped in response and popped its driver’s side lock. What magic, thought the bus rider. I opened the door for her.

  My curiosity chose that moment to peak, and suddenly I couldn’t resist asking, “Why’d you come up to me in the club?”

  She hesitated, guiltily it seemed to me. “What?”

  “Come on, Monica. You know what I mean. I’m little, I’m funny looking. Girls aren’t exactly lining up at my door.”

  “You just looked so… sad sitting there, as if you’d lost your best friend or something.”

  “In other words, you felt sorry for me.” I nodded and then shrugged. Hey, I’ll take female attention any way I can get it. “Well, thanks for the eats, Monica. Next time, it’s on me.”

  “And when will the next time be?” she coyly asked.

  “That’s up to you. You got my number. I don’t have yours.”

  Monica, already seated behind the wheel, turned to get a pen from her purse. I shut the door and started backing away. She was so beautiful. I wanted to kiss her good-bye. She looked at me, reaching for the door handle as I hurried off.

  “Micah,” she called. I turned to wave good-bye. Her wave beckoned me to come back. I raised my right hand to my head, thumb sticking up toward my right ear, pinky extending toward my mouth. While giving her the sign to call me, I felt a hand tug at the back of my shirt.

  As I turned, my eyes met those of a short, slender, middle-aged white woman who had emerged from the Taco Bell. She looked startled, and her mouth worked soundlessly as if groping for words to explain why she had touched me. Reluctant to give Monica a chance to stop me, I didn’t invade this graying woman’s thoughts or leave her time to find her voice. I hurried like a mouse around the corner of Taco Bell’s beige-colored building and, once out of sight, scattered my molecules again upon the wind.

  IT WAS 2:57 a.m. when I finally materialized in the dark master bedroom of my little house. Without undressing or turning down the covers, I dropped across the bed and sank at once into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  13

  From the Human Histories files of the Orb:

  THE REVEREND Vaughn Titus felt there was much evil in the world. Confronting this pestilence required great strength of mind, body, and spirit. He believed the federal government’s outlawing of prayer in public schools and official recognition of same-sex marriages was proof of man’s arrogance, shortsightedness, and rampant evil. The prayer ban removed the most effective means for America’s youth to fortify their souls, and the same-sex recognition added yet another means of corrupting those souls.

  Titus held bachelor’s and master’s degrees in sociology, and for seven years he taught at Missouri State University. When the call to preach began to stir in his heart, he resigned from Missouri State and enrolled in Saint Louis University’s graduate program in theology. Th
ere he obtained a doctorate in divinity and ministry. He was now fifty-seven years old and had lived the last twenty-three in the Lord’s service. Yet he felt not even he could resist the world’s corruption were it not for the anchor of God’s love.

  He began each day with no less than a half hour on his knees in supplication. He and his wife walked three miles every morning, and on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, he lifted weights in a program designed for him by his fitness-trainer son. He studied the word of God at every available opportunity. There was a battle in progress, and at stake was nothing less than the very future of mankind.

  Titus was six feet six inches tall and extremely lean at a hundred and ninety-seven pounds. His head was balding, his face deeply lined, and his gray eyes were weighted with near-perpetual concern. He was resolute and would not rest as long as there was work to be done. He had been senior pastor of the Missionary of Christ Church in Saint Louis since he founded it eighteen years ago, overseeing a membership one thousand strong and growing. His ministry extended far beyond the walls of the modest building on Grand Avenue where his congregation worshipped. Christ went out among the people, and Titus felt it was his duty to do likewise.

  Movie and television screens were filled with perversion and violence. There was sex at every turn, between people who barely knew each other and who changed partners as if they were changing shoes. Profanity filled the airwaves, and this was called entertainment; this was called freedom of speech. Titus was outraged that society promoted foul language, promiscuity, abortion, deviance, and drug use while forbidding its teachers from leading children in morally uplifting activity such as prayer.

  He couldn’t simply stand by in the face of such idiocy and flagrant wickedness. Five years ago, he called on the strongest of his membership and went out to challenge sin with the full force of God’s word. They stood outside abortion clinics, praying for the misguided and reminding them that murder at any stage of fetal development was still murder. They prayed outside churches desecrated by the funeral services of known homosexuals and same-sex wedding ceremonies, all in violation of divine law. They picketed radio and television stations, as well as record companies and movie studios that poured out the poison being used to undermine virtue in the country. His church raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for political organizations that upheld Christian values and for private groups who fed the souls as well as the bellies of the homeless. His missionaries were vocal and visible, and the country took note of them.