“Fair enough,” I shrug. “And... Stell? If it helps, whenever I'm here and you don't need me to go save the world or train, you can talk to me about anything you want. I won't mind.”
“That's sweet, Wes,” Stell said with a smile. “And also something we won't have much time for. But thank you.”
That was pretty much it for today. I had to sit through a tearful apology from Breena who said she would 'super make it up to me someday.' She also gave me the exact same explanation Stell gave about me scaring everyone by running into threats they thought extinct and solving them in ways that should have killed me permanently by using powers I shouldn't have yet, all while hearing voices about long-dead gods, and pretty much turning triangles into squares wherever I went. Then she apologized again and explained that she wouldn't resort to risks involving unnecessary mutilations, because she got most of the data she needed while I was in were-badger hell. Next mission we'd work on wearing armor. She got frustrated when she asked if I wanted armor that focused on mobility or heavy defense, and I just said 'yes.'
Also, she said that she would be training my base abilities, but the Charisma training was going to be delayed for a while. The tiny woman refused to elaborate when I asked why, and I was too weirded out to investigate further.
I called it a day and tried to see if I could pull myself back to my own world on my own again.
It worked. That reminded me that I could now enter Avalon almost at will, and that I had also gotten stronger again. That good news was enough for me to feel happy about my time there, castrating were-badgers notwithstanding.
Chapter 20: Stand Tall
That's right, I told myself as the pastor kept preaching. This was why I don't like church anymore.
Well, that and the way everyone here still looked at me.
Different people have had different experiences with church. I knew that, even though I spent most of my life in a small suburb that pretended it wasn't connected to a larger city whenever it felt like it. I knew that some people have had frankly shitty experiences with organized religion and had perfectly good reasons to be suspicious about it.
I used to not be one of those people. Church used to be a really good place for me. I'd go and hear about how God loved me and how he wanted me to love others. I'd meet people who weren't perfect but were mostly trying their best at being loving and good. We'd have a good time together, and we would all get together about twice a month to try and do something meaningful, like bring food to homeless people and try to help them find housing, or partner with businesses to raise money for charities. Or we’d find struggling families in the community to see what we could help them with. When we started running out of homeless people to find housing for and families that still needed assistance, we expanded our projects to include nearby cities and towns. There would be stories about what we did in several papers, in several different towns.
That was then. This was now.
Now, most of the people who took part in those projects moved out of town for one reason or another. My parents never talked about why. I do know we stayed because my parents' jobs wouldn't really let them move.
When we had that mass exodus of people, a lot of the fun stuff in church stopped happening. Nobody had any desire to organize anything else but Dad, and his projects ended for good after his death.
Right before he died, the old pastor left as well. I never found out why, just that it was abrupt and that a lot of the people left in church were excited about his replacement.
After hearing the new pastor preach one sermon, I would never think highly of those people again.
The old pastor kept most of his sermons short, simple, and relevant. Love God, love other people. Make them feel loved. Pray and care for the sick, help those in poverty where you can, stand up whenever you see someone being mistreated. Every sermon of his I could remember was either about that, or where the Bible talked about doing that, or constructive ways on how to do that. He made helping someone else seem less scary, made it easier to get out my comfort zone and make a difference.
The remaining people in church got excited when that pastor was replaced, and they weren't shy about showing it. I thought that was kind of rude at the time, but I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe the new guy would be phenomenal, I thought. Maybe he would really encourage us to love each other and our neighbors, keep the church a place where new people like Himari and Andre would still feel comfortable visiting.
Nope.
His first sermon was to beware of the Devil dragging us all straight to hell. And that would happen if we didn't pay more attention in politics, especially national politics, or the politics in communities other than our own, and that we needed to protect God's church from outside threats by never letting them in so that they could corrupt and damn the rest of us.
He wouldn't elaborate what those threats were, but he specified that they always came from elsewhere- never within- to corrupt “God's people.” Again, no clarity provided. No idea on who these people were, what they said, where they came from or who they looked like. Just that 'we'd know who they were.'
The one time he got close to specifying was after my Dad's suicide. He didn't mention my father by name, but he stated several times that our 'current trials' were proof that the Devil was already among us, and that we needed to make sure he wasn't still there.
He had looked straight at my family when he said that.
He may have been looking straight at me.
Except for that one specification, people took that term to mean whatever they wanted. Everyone got nastier with each other, new people were no longer welcome, and it pretty much became one of those churches I had always had trouble believing existed. I had no idea why Christina and Davelon kept going but I could tell they weren't thrilled about the place now either.
Today though, as I watched him from the pulpit, he was actually talking about something specific. Instead of just saying 'be afraid' or 'be wary,' he was actually arguing for a real position. Our church needed to do more politically, he said, because the changes in the country were putting all of our souls in danger. Pretty soon God and the Bible would be thrown straight out of America. If we didn't want to get kicked out of our own country as well we needed to start fighting for the Bible's right to exist, and the only way to do that was to campaign for the ten commandments to be posted in every government building, in every town.
If we didn't do that, he said, America as we knew it would be finished.
I tried to tune him out at that point. In the past I had wanted to argue with him, tell him he was giving the rest of us a bad name, and quote a dozen or so passages from the Bible that said to be the exact opposite of paranoid. I wanted to point out that his refusing to articulate what we were supposed to be wary of was just making sure we'd be afraid of everything. But Dad's suicide and the testimony of those three girls pretty much ruined any credibility I had left in church, and my injury the next year made it a lot harder for me to call up facts in a discussion. That and I was still just a kid in many people's eyes.
Still, I thought as I watched him rant, maybe I should try anyway. Dad's suicide was years ago. And maybe people weren't as suspicious of me as I thought they were. After all, I was practically crippled, Avalon notwithstanding- not yet- and it was ridiculous to think I was even capable of hurting anyone, even if they were a child.
It wouldn't hurt to talk to him, I decided. My mind was working better now, it was much easier to recall facts. And maybe he wasn't like this on purpose, I thought. Maybe he'd hear me out and it would give him something to think about. Or maybe not. But shouldn't someone try anyway? Shouldn't someone at least make the effort? Sure I was really young, but that hadn't stopped me from saving lives here or in Avalon. Why let it stop me now?
After the service, I resolved. I'd at least ask him to make more sense of his position, ask who we're supposed to be afraid of, and why, because after talking about the ten commandments
for a bit he went right back to talking about fear and vigilance. I'd see if having to articulate his position would at least make him more reasonable.
And if he didn't get more reasonable, I figured I owed it to the last bit of my own faith to try to stand up to him.
While I was planning that, I kept doing my best to ignore the two women sitting some distance behind me.
“Did you see who's come back,” one whispered.
“In the flesh itself,” the other whispered.
“Why do you think he came back?”
“Probably to try and get right with God.”
“Took him a long time to want to do so,” the other woman muttered. “Hasn't it been over a year?”
“Well, sometimes it take tragedy and illness to bring a person back,” the other woman said sadly. Sort of sadly that is.
“Probably hoping to get better by doing so, the poor thing.”
“Well, you never know...”
Tune them out, I told myself. It's nothing you haven't heard before. And it's not like you only run into them at church.
The service ended. I waited for a moment for people to get up, then I got up myself.
The pastor was still at the pulpit. I took another look at him. He didn't seem that old, mid-thirties to early forties would be my guess. Head full of black hair, plain black suit.
But enough distractions, I told myself. Just walk up and talk to him. I grabbed my cane and pulled myself out of the aisle.
“Buddy Wes! Buddy Wes!”
A small voice several aisles ahead of me had started shouting. I barely had time to look down before a tiny black-haired shape slammed into my knees.
Ow, I thought. Right. Small children have no brakes or air bags.
“You're finally back! We missed you!”
“Hi little Gabby,” I replied, seeing everything spin painfully, but thankfully at least this time I was able to brace and keep my head from hitting anything. My body was still improving. “How are you?”
“I'm gud, buddy Wes!” the little girl said, smiling up at me. Gabriella was one of the few Hispanic girls that still went to our church. I think she turned eight this year, but she was still smaller than most kids a grade behind her. She was bilingual, but young enough that she still didn't form her words properly, giving an adorable quality to her accented English and Spanish. She was clinging to my knees tightly, the way she used to when she would beg me to carry her on my shoulders so that she could feel tall for a while.
I felt the whole service room go tense, and I didn't even dare to smile at her.
“Buddy Wes, are you coming to see us at vacashiyon bible school this year?”
“I'm sorry, Little Gabby,” I said, trying not to even be seen moving toward the little girl, which was probably impossible because she was still hugging and pulling on my legs. “I don't know if I'll be better this summer.” She had barely grown at all in two years, I realized. I had always wondered if little Gabby was one of those kids that were destined to be short and adorable for their whole lives. And I wanted to tell her I missed her too. But I didn't dare right now.
Do you think it will matter? a voice said inside me, and I winced in pain as it spoke. Do you think it will matter what you dare to do?
“But when are you coming baaaack?” she asked in a drawn-out plea. “We miss you!”
Her big brown eyes were shining and watering. I almost caved in to giving her a hug, concussion and poor balance be damned. Or at least a pat on the head. She loved those too.
But then I heard them again.
“Tsk, tsk.”
“So that's why he's back.”
“Poor girl. She doesn't even realize.”
“Is her mother even watching her right now?”
I hate it when fear doesn't lie.
“She lives with her aunt now.”
“Her aunt always was too trusting.”
“Doesn't she know it's genetic? The poor boy probably can't even help himself.”
“I know. His father probably couldn't help it either. Look, he's sweating.”
“Buddy Wes?” Little Gabby repeated her plea.
“I,” I started to say, then realized I couldn't finish the sentence. I'm sorry? I can't see you anymore? I have to be careful or people will think I'm like Dad?
Aren't you like your dad? Pain whispered again inside of me. Don't you look like him, talk like him?
My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth, and I couldn't say another word to the little girl I had once read Bible stories to every Sunday. Her dark little face was starting to crumple, and she bit her lip.
“Now, Gabriella,” A male voice said from in front of me. “Wes can't be with you little ones anymore. He's very sick.”
The pastor was walking steadily towards me now. His voice sounded gentle, and firm. But I swore that I could see the relish in his eyes when he called me ‘sick.’
“But when will he get better, Pastor Barnes?”
“He may never get better, Gabriella,” Pastor Barnes said solemnly. “We just have to pray.”
“But I pray for him all the time!” the little girl wailed. Her face was really scrunched up now, and she looked seconds away from crying. “Why doesn't he get better?”
“Gabby, don't question God,” Pastor Barnes said firmly. “Now go see your grandmother.”
“Bye, buddy Wes,” the little girl sniffled, before she lowered her head and stomped off.
Pastor Barnes moved his head to look back at me. He was about my height, I realized, which actually made him tall. Other than that, he was neither wide nor skinny nor muscular. Just the normal mix of fat and muscle most men had at his age.
“Good afternoon, Wes,” the man said in a neutral voice. “Welcome back.”
In a small town church, someone would not just tell you, “welcome back,” if you were actually welcome. You got pulled over for a hug, or at least a handshake, and the person asked how you were doing, and if you had been well. If they knew about your family, they would ask about your family. They would invite you over some time for dinner, or some other event.
They definitely would not stand in front of you with their hands in their pockets, with no trace of a smile on their face.
Unless they wanted to put on a show in front of their whole congregation, I realized. To make sure everyone knew they could stand up to the ‘Devil's’ people.
I heard some more whispering, but I was tired of it, and I was finally able to ignore it completely
“Hello, Pastor Barnes,” I replied calmly, to my surprise. “How has everyone been?”
A frown flashed his face. Was he not expecting a reply at all? Was he really just expecting me to just slink away? With my tail between my legs? As if I actually had something left to lose?
“Everyone's been well,” he replied. “It's a shame you have been gone,” his voice was still neutral. “These last few years have been some of the church's best.”
That last line was actually said meaningfully. I couldn't tell if he was just trying to let me know I wasn't welcome or actually trying impress me with the church's status.
I reminded myself that I had gotten up to speak to him.
“Are you sure, Pastor Barnes?” I asked frankly. “Everyone seems so tense now. Not just at me, but at each other too. Like we're all on edge, instead of working with each other. And I haven't seen us do anything in the community like we used to. I'm just worried, Pastor Barnes.”
Outrage flushed all over the man's face. I heard gasps behind me, and some more muttering.
“I'm sure it would seem that way to you,” Pastor Barnes said, regaining control at some point near the end of that sentence. “But the facts say otherwise. Attendance in this congregation has doubled every year. Along with tithes and offerings. You don't see us out in the community because we bring the community here, son. The same with projects. People contribute by bringing their money here, directly to God.”
More muttering behind me. This time it
had a vindicated note to it.
“I wouldn't know anything about your numbers, Pastor Barnes,” I replied carefully. My conscience had insisted I say my piece but this conversation was becoming increasingly meaningless. “And maybe I came on a lower turnout day, so I'm not seeing the whole picture. But there are so many people I know that used to come here, that still live in this town. I saw none of them here today, and that worries me.”
Downfall And Rise (Challenger's Call Book 1) Page 38