by Bryan, JL
She’d never said it again, but he’d never forgotten it.
Kieran had taken the pamphlet home and found that it spoke to him. He also knew he wanted to see Matt and Deena again. After a few days, he’d worked up the courage to text YES to the phone number stamped on the back.
Matt had answered and invited him to “come down to the mission.”
Now, Kieran was riding the bus south through the city, ditching his friends to go and see what else Matt and Deena might say to him. It was almost nine p.m. and the sun was down, so the lights of the city were glowing to life all around him.
Kieran transferred to a second bus before stepping off near his final destination. He was on Cheshire Bridge Road, an area with a number of bars as well as blacked-out storefronts offering “Lingerie Models” and “Live Nude Girls.” He supposed dead girls would be less of an attraction.
He smiled to himself as he walked past shops selling porn, sex toys, and recreational drug accessories. He was more than a little curious to see what the “Live Nude Girls” were up to behind the black windows, but he was sure he had to be eighteen to go inside, and it was probably expensive. He only had about three dollars with him.
He unfolded the pamphlet again. It was crumpled and damp where he’d been twisting it in his sweaty hands on the bus, but he could still read the address Matt had given him on the phone. Kieran had scribbled it on the back of the pamphlet. This seemed like an unusual neighborhood for a church, though.
The address took him to a shabby three-story cinderblock building hidden behind a newer strip mall. It was an ugly, bland place with most of its windows dark and only a few cars in the parking lot, though that was probably normal for an office building on a Friday night.
Kieran approached the dark building over its warped and cracked parking lot, double-checking the address on the peeling numbers above the narrow, barred-glass front entrance. It was locked, but there was an intercom speaker with a red button in the wall beside it. He pressed the button.
“Hello?” a woman’s voice crackled. He thought it sounded like Deena, but he wasn’t sure.
“Hi, it’s Kieran. I talked to Matt on the phone earlier. He invited me.” Kieran noticed the security camera mounted a few feet above the door, watching him, and he waved.
“I remember you! Come on up.”
The door buzzed and unlocked. Kieran’s shoes echoed on the dingy tile floor of the empty glass lobby. Nobody sat at the front desk. Across from it, a mesh gate was lowered over an empty concrete hole with a long counter that might have once housed a coffee shop or newsstand. The broad space of the lobby was illuminated by a single fluorescent bar over the front door, so the dim space only grew darker as he walked inside.
He trudged through the empty lobby, not sure where to go until the elevator dinged and opened, flooding the place with a rectangle of bright light.
Come on up, she’d said, so Kieran stepped inside the wood-paneled elevator car. The panels and carpeting looked worn and old. There were buttons for four floors: B, Lobby, 2, and 3. He picked the second floor.
He emerged into a fluorescent-lit area with more threadbare carpeting. To his right there was a closed pair of double doors flanked by darkened windows, with an empty nameplate by the door—that office space looked unoccupied.
To his left, though, the double doors were propped open, and some kind of baroque classical-type music flowed out from a softly lit, deeply carpeted area. Deena sat behind a curved front desk, already rising to greet Kieran with a smile as he approached.
“Hi! I’m so glad you came,” Deena said. She hugged him without asking, but he didn’t particularly mind. “I know it’s in kind of a weird spot, but the rent’s so cheap! Come on inside. I told Matt you’re here.”
“Great,” Kieran replied, not sure what else to say. A large black plaque with a golden-spiral logo hung on the wall behind the desk, identifying the place as:
CHURCH OF
FIRST LIGHT
Youth Outreach Mission
“What does that mean?” Kieran pointed to the sign. Deena had gone on ahead to open the single, solid door that led deeper into the office space. She hesitated with the knob in her hand.
“Which part?” Deena asked.
“Any of it, really.”
Deena laughed and clapped him on the arm. He was picking up that Deena was a toucher, the kind of person who was always putting her hands on you when she spoke to you. He’d known a couple of other girls like that, and wished he knew more.
“That’s our church,” Deena said, “Which is exactly what Matt wants to talk to you about, if you’re willing to listen. Now come on!”
She led him through the door, down a gray-carpeted hallway. Pictures on the wall showed sites and people he didn’t recognize, like weird stone circles and the ruins of rock towers, and a painting of some bearded guy in a robe who might have been Moses or Jesus or pretty much anybody from the Bible.
“Our mini-sanctuary’s through there,” Deena said, pointing to a door on her left as she passed it. It was open to a dark room, and Kieran glimpsed a few narrow benches inside.
“Snack room.” Deena pointed to a narrow, doorless room with a refrigerator, sink, and microwave. “And here’s the activity room, where everybody hangs out. Deena stopped at an open door, and he looked in over her shoulder.
Old couches, futons, and chairs were pulled into a rough circle around two card tables pushed together. More than a dozen teenagers were there, chatting and laughing as they folded and stamped pamphlets like the one crumpled in Kieran’s pocket. Half of them were girls around his own age, and Kieran’s interest in the place rose by several notches.
“Hey, everybody, this is Kieran. It’s his first time here,” Deena announced.
“Hi, Kieran!” everybody actually said at once, like it was a second-grade class or an AA meeting. They waved at him, and one of the girls even blew him a kiss. Kieran turned instantly red, embarrassed and delighted at the same moment, and could only respond by ducking out of sight.
“Come on.” Deena patted his shoulder. “Matt’s office is down at the end.” They passed a few more doors, which Deena did not identify.
Matt’s office was large and cluttered. Half of the room resembled a teacher’s office with overflowing bookshelves, while the other half looked like it belonged to the manager of a fast-food franchise, heaps of cardboard boxes filled with posters and other materials stamped with the golden-spiral church logo.
Deena invited Kieran to sit in one of the chairs in front of Matt’s desk, which was oddly uncluttered, holding only a sleek black laptop and some assorted stones.
There was a wooden door at the back of Matt’s office by an overflowing file cabinet. It opened and Matt emerged smiling, and Kieran glimpsed steep stairs leading up and away before Matt closed the door.
“Welcome, Kieran.” Matt gave him a friendly smile and a handshake. He sank into the swiveling leather chair across from Kieran. Deena sat at the side of the desk, between the two of them. “It’s great to see you. How are things at home?”
“Fine,” Kieran said, feeling embarrassed at how much he’d told them about his life.
“Your mom doing well? Your sister?” Matt asked. “How’s she?”
“They’re good. So what’s your church about?”
Matt laughed, and Deena smiled and nodded happily.
“Right to the point,” Matt said. “I told you, Deena, he’s a smart kid. So you filled out the questions?”
“Yeah.” Kieran pulled out the crumpled, folded brochure.
“Can I see?” Matt accepted it from him and studied the questions and answers with his brow furrowed, as though Kieran had done anything more complicated than circling YES seven times. Matt finally looked up and spoke to Deena: “He said yes to all seven.”
“All seven? Wow.” Deena touched the back of Kieran’s hand for a moment and acted impressed with him.
“So you’re looking for some messiah guy?” Kieran
asked.
Matt studied him for several seconds before leaning back in his chair and sighing. “Let’s start at the beginning, Kieran. In the beginning, there was the creator.”
“You mean God?” Kieran asked.
“We prefer ‘creator.’ The creator creates and moves on. He does not stick around and govern. He’s an artist, you understand, he’s moving on to other things. Celestial beings rule over creation in his wake. Most ancient mythologies agree. Most primal cultures make a huge distinction between the gods who create the universe and those who rule it afterward.”
“Okay.” Kieran shrugged.
“Let’s say a conflict arose between two groups of these celestial beings—call them gods or angels or what you like. We call them celestials for clarity, angels when we’re in public.” Matt flashed a grin, like he was letting Kieran in on a deep secret. “The disagreement was over us.”
“Us?” Kieran asked.
“People,” Deena said. “Humans.”
“They had differing philosophies,” Matt said. “One group thought intelligent animals were nothing special, that men weren’t that far above rats or dogs. They wanted to leave us to our own wild-animal existence. The second group had different ideas. They wanted to intervene directly, to teach and educate humanity.
“So they start doing that, which leads the first group to start intervening to undo their work. One side tries to give us knowledge and power, the other tries to push us back into ignorance and fear. They want us to become stupid animals again.”
“I’d say it looks like the stupid-animal side is winning,” Kieran said, which brought laughter from both of them.
“This conflict has been twisted over time,” Matt said. “Made to seem like something it isn’t—that’s all part of the war between the groups, the warring philosophies. The group that wants to suppress us, push us back into darkness, is led by Uriel, who we might call a kind of archangel. The other side, the ones who wish to give us knowledge and lead us onward, is led by the archangel Lucifer.”
Kieran looked between them. Matt and Deena waited calmly for his reaction.
“So you’re Satan worshipers?” he asked. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but he was definitely feeling confused. “That’s what you’re saying?”
“We don’t use that word,” Deena said, and she glowered for a moment, and he realized that she could be sexy. “It’s used to besmirch the Undying, to portray him as what he is not.”
“He is not the devil,” Matt said. “He is not at war with the creator—neither side is. He has not been defeated, though his influence has been driven back by those who wish to return us all to blind ignorance and sheepish obedience. The forces of Uriel have long been ascendant. You see the results in the world around you, famine and wars, the rapid sense of decay.”
“Haven’t you ever felt the world isn’t how it’s supposed to be?” Deena asked. “That things are far off course?”
“Definitely,” Kieran nodded.
“The Undying—Lucifer, though he has many other names, too—has a plan to open all the eyes of humanity. He has sent us a messiah. The messiah will drive back the forces of Uriel by making the unseen world seen to all people. He will bring an age of enlightenment, knowledge, and for his disciples, immense power,” Matt told him, sounding very casual about it. “And from our talks with you, Kieran, we think you might be the messiah, or one of his disciples.”
“Seriously?” Kieran wasn’t sure what to make of that.
“It’s just a feeling.” Deena took Kieran’s hand and squeezed it.
“Is this what you tell everyone?” Kieran asked.
“Our private conversations stay private,” Deena said.
“This is, like, a lot of stuff to think about,” Kieran said. His head was starting to ache. “How am I supposed to believe it, anyway? This is where you tell me to have faith or something?”
“No.” Matt smiled. “We don’t expect you to believe anything on faith. You can observe with your own eyes.”
“Observe what?” Kieran asked.
“Are you going to show him?” Deena whispered to Matt, her tone excited.
“I’ll show him.” Matt leaned back in his seat. He scratched his goatee, closed his eyes, and held out one hand, palm down. He took a few long, deep breaths through his nose.
Kieran threw a questioning look at Deena, but she was staring at Matt, her eyes rapt, taking short breaths through her mouth and leaning forward on the edge of her seat. It occurred to Kieran that she suddenly looked really, really horny.
Matt’s mouth opened and a strange sound buzzed out of it, like a thousand insect wings humming inside an echoing well. Kieran felt something like a cold ripple pass through the room.
The cardboard boxes full of pamphlets and stickers shuddered and rose from the floor. They continued rising, shifting unsteadily, until they levitated at eye level.
“What the fuck?” Kieran hopped out of his chair and walked around the levitating boxes, waving his arm. Nothing was holding them up. They turned and spun in the current from the air conditioner.
“You see?” Matt had opened his eyes. “It’s a small trick, but I think you get the point. Discipleship brings power, Kieran.”
“Power,” Deena breathed. She’d risen and moved to stand over her husband, brushing his face with her fingertips and staring down at him as though in awe or in love. The floating-the-boxes-in-the-air trick really turned her on, apparently.
“Do you believe us now?” Matt asked, while Deena’s finger touched his lips.
“Yeah,” Kieran said. “You’ve got something serious going here.”
“I think we’ve made our point.” Matt clapped his hands, and the boxes crashed to the floor. “Any questions?”
“I, uh...” Kieran shook his head. He could barely think. Had that really just happened?
“I’m sure he’ll think of a few.” Deena approached Kieran, who was still looking down at the crashed boxes, and took his arm. “Want to hang out with the other kids in the activity room for a while? The girls were talking about ordering pizza. Does that sound fun to you?”
“It does,” Kieran said, still in awe. Then he thought about the chestnut-haired girl who’d blown him a kiss. “It definitely does.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cassidy arrived early at the restaurant on Friday night because she didn’t want Reese to watch her hobble into the place on her crutches. She’d had her final physical therapy appointment during the afternoon, and her leg was in pain. She hoped it was getting stronger and more flexible, but it certainly didn’t feel that way.
The Imperial Garden was lit mostly by hurricane lamps glowing softly on the individual tables. It was dark and serene despite being crowded, an atmosphere created by low lights, carefully placed paper screens, soft woodwind and string music, and a few electric-powered rock waterfalls that seemed to absorb sound.
She’d called ahead to reserve a booth, but it wasn’t available yet, so she walked to the bar, leaned against one of two enormous dragon statues that served as support columns for the bar’s upper racks, and ordered a shot of baijiu, Chinese liquor made from fermented sorghum. The warm, sweet drink helped steel her nerves.
Luckily, she was already at the booth table, crutches stashed and broken leg hidden out of sight, when Reese arrived. Reese wore a professional black suit with matching heels and a white shirt, and her missing blue eye was replaced with a glass one.
Cassidy had taken extra time with her makeup and hair tonight, and had selected the best-looking blouse she had. She didn’t want Reese looking at her with condescension or pity.
“Cassidy!” Reese announced and waved as she walked over. She hugged Cassidy around the shoulders. “It’s so good to see you.”
“Hi, Reese,” Cassidy replied.
“I love this place. It’s so pretty.” A waiter appeared and asked for Reese’s drink order while he served her a tall glass of iced water. “Um, what are you drinking,
Cassidy?”
“Baijiu.”
Reese snickered. “And that is...?”
“Chinese whiskey.”
“Ooh. Do you guys have like a virgin daiquiri?” she asked the waiter. “Like a strawberry one?”
“We have black tea,” he replied.
“Ooh, perfect. That with a teensy pinch of sugar. Thanks!” Reese slapped both hands on the table and leaned forward at Cassidy as the waiter left. “So! Cassidy! What have you been up to for six years?”
“Just working, hanging out.” Cassidy was much more interested in the menu than in conversation with Reese. She looked down the list of dim sum offerings—shrimp dumplings, rice noodle rolls, the char siu baau buns with barbecued pork stuffing. Her mouth watered.
“What kind of work?” Reese asked.
“I’m a tattoo artist.”
“Aw, that’s so perfect for you! You were always drawing and stuff. I could never draw, I’m just not creative like that.”
“So what have you been up to?” Cassidy asked, sipping her drink. “Besides fucking my boyfriend, obviously.”
“Hey, that’s not fair!” Reese pouted. “We haven’t done that, or anything close to that. He’s got broken ribs, anyway, so he couldn’t. But he hasn’t tried. And sure, if I knew he was your boyfriend, I would have acted a little differently. But really I was just trying to help him. The important thing is that all of this brought you and me back together again!”
“Why? How do you know him?”
“I met him in the hospital when I was doing church outreach.”
Cassidy stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing. The waiter arrived with tea for Reese, more liquor for Cassidy.
“What’s so funny?” Reese asked.
“Good luck with that. He’s the most die-hard ‘scientific materialist determinist atheist’ you’ll ever meet. And I want to order dim sum, it’s awesome here. We’ll take the phoenix claws and fried octopus tentacles,” Cassidy told the waiter. She didn’t like creepy seafood herself, but the grossed-out look on Reese’s face was completely worth it.