The next few days, I did my best to avoid Gabe and Caroline. Caroline kept calling and texting, saying she was worried about me, and she wanted to talk. I considered ditching Big Box altogether. But if I couldn’t blend in there, where could I go?
Gabe’s words bothered me. He was right, I was at Big Box for myself. But Pastor Nate’s control over people in the church was wrong. Maybe he had no idea what was happening in the congregation, but people like Caroline were doing everything he wanted, like some sort of automatons. I wanted to skip choir practice, I couldn’t, not if I wanted to do the show. Tonight was dress rehearsal. Pastor Nate sent word through Caroline that he hoped I would come an hour early because he wanted to meet with me.
I arrived at the church campus and Caroline came bouncing out of the main building and met me at my car. She couldn’t believe I was getting a meeting with Pastor Nate. Or, as she called it, an audience. “It’s a big honor,” she said. “Between writing his books and preparing his sermons and talking to CNN and running the various pastor’s coalitions he’s a part of, he doesn’t usually have any time to meet with anyone from the church.” She grabbed my arms in excitement. “We’re so lucky to have him to take care of us!”
She led me through the main doors, monstrous glass things like gates, and then up a long stairwell. We stopped in a hallway on the third floor, where there were pictures of the church in the early days. It used to be a little place, a chapel with a spire in a field. I studied a picture of Nate, young and grinning, his wife in a modest dress and hat, the two of them looking like the Kennedys. A little scrap of paper was held in glass beside that picture. A note in a spidery hand on yellowed paper said, “Nathan. We are so proud of you and the choice you have made to serve the Lord. I know the church you are taking is small and there is precious little money in it, but God will bless you if you serve him well. Love, your mother.”
A few years later, there was a long article about how Nate had convinced the church to start a ministry to the homeless, which had revolutionized the local homeless problem and eventually spun off to become its own rescue mission. A newspaper article talked about a tsunami in a foreign country, and how Big Box was the first responder and received a commendation from the president of that country. Big Box had put off a building project so they could send that money to those who had lost their homes. It went on and on, starting in the 1970s and going up through the very late 90s: service project after service project, a new building, a rally that brought in more people than any other event in the city’s history.
Around about the 90’s the history souvenirs started to change. There were pictures of Nate preaching on a well-appointed stage. Covers from Nate’s books. Pictures of him with the President. Then another President. Senators. A couple of movie stars. Nate on a morning show somewhere. It was really impressive.
At the end of that hall, we came to a wide oak door, with Pastor Nate’s name carved in it. Caroline knocked on it three times, hard, and we waited. The door opened and Pastor Nate stood on the other side. He took Caroline’s hand and thanked her, and I thought that Caroline might faint from excitement. I walked into his office, which was larger than the choir room and had a giant desk, a sitting area, a large private bathroom and walls of books nestled around a fireplace.
After Caroline left, Pastor Nate gestured to the sitting area, and I sat down. He shrugged out of his suit coat and took a leather chair across from me. “Tell me your story,” he said.
“Uh. Okay. My name is Lara. I live over on the west side, and I’ve been going to church there for a while. But I wanted to try something different, so I started coming here a few weeks ago and met a couple people. I like the people. I joined the choir.”
Pastor Nate nodded, distracted. “The west side. There’s a Big Box satellite church over there. It’s exactly the same as this church, otherwise we wouldn’t let it have the brand name. You could go there, save yourself a drive. I still preach, via satellite.”
I nodded. “I know. Some people like that. I prefer to be in the same room as the preacher.”
He laughed. “I understand.” He picked some lint from his shirt. “I hear you’ve been asking questions in the choir, Lara. Questions about me and how I make decisions. You’re new here, and it’s natural that you are trying to figure some things out, so I thought we could have a chat.”
His voice was smooth and calm, but I sensed an underlying threat. I couldn’t figure out what it could possibly be. Kicking me out of the church? Fine. Go ahead. I didn’t know how he would even be able to tell if I came to the church on any given Sunday. “You seem controlling,” I said.
“Not one for subtlety, Lara?”
“No. I don’t know you well. Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems like you do whatever you want. You bully people into your plans. Like the Halloween Cantata. You ignored the elder board, you threatened the choir director. You know that half the sopranos actually left Big Box, right?”
He shrugged. “Ten thousand people attend here. What’s a few dozen here or there? The cantata alone will bring in eight or nine times that in new members, I’m sure.”
“But it’s wrong for you to force everyone to do what you want.”
He looked at his nails. “Why are you here, Lara?”
“You invited me.”
“What I mean is, why are you at my church?”
I thought about it. Might as well tell the truth. “I wanted a place I could be anonymous, somewhere I could blend in. I felt like people at my last church knew me a little too well and sometimes they seemed judgmental about my issues.”
“And why did you join the choir?”
“I met Caroline and liked her.” I thought about mentioning Gabe, but instead I said, “I wanted to meet some new people.”
He nodded. “In other words, you came here to meet your own needs. Not with any thought of serving the church, but with the intention of taking from her. How is that any different than what you’re accusing me of?”
I didn’t have an answer to that. The only difference I could think of was that he was getting everything he wanted, and on a larger scale than me. He stood and said, “I have given everything to this church for the last forty years. Maybe you don’t realize who you’re dealing with. I can have the President of the United States on the phone if I want to. I know reporters in every major media outlet. People would pay to have twenty minutes alone with me, a gift you’re receiving for free.” He pounded his chest. “I saved an entire nation after a tsunami. I set up orphanages all over the world. I single-handedly saved this church from financial ruin.” He stood over me. “And you. You come in here and want what I have. You want the control, you want your needs met.”
“I want to protect the people you’re supposed to be taking care of! You’re abusing them with your authority.”
He snorted. “They can leave any time. There are a hundred other churches within walking distance.”
I stood, my head barely coming to his chest, and looked up into his face. “You’re a bully, that’s all. I don’t know why people keep coming here, but if I --”
“People keep coming here because they want someone strong who will tell them what to do. Or, like you, they come because they want something. It’s all selfishness and greed, Lara, and don’t pretend otherwise.” He grinned. “You of all people should know about selfishness.” He whipped around and grabbed something from his desk and brought it up against my breastbone. “Isn’t that the key attribute of the vampire?”
I looked down slowly. It was a stake, the point of it pressing against my skin. “Don’t,” I said.
He grinned. “Now who’s bossy? You are going to do the Halloween Cantata next week. If you behave, I will keep your secret.”
Sometimes people don’t realize how fast a vampire can be. I’ve been wrestling with my vampire nature for years, trying not to let it take control of me, but in moments like these there’s no way to be the sweet and loving “Christian” woman. I wrenched the sta
ke from his hands and heard his fingers snap. He fell backward, and I stabbed at his chest with the stake. It sunk into him without resistance, like stabbing a knife through cotton candy. He stared down at the stake in surprise, plucked it out and tossed it aside. He straightened his fingers and they cracked back into place.
“You don’t understand who I am,” he said, and his voice was low with anger. “You think a sliver of wood can stop me?” He tore at his shirt and it fell away to reveal bandages wrapped around his torso. His eyes blazed in fury.
It all fell into place. “You’re a mummy,” I said.
“I am a mighty king,” he said, and spit flew from his mouth. “My deeds are marvelous and I have written them on the walls of this place. I will never die, my fame will reach the skies and you think to cross me? You? Pitiful creature. I could replace you with a thousand others. You are nothing to me. You are insignificant.”
“I’ll tell the congregation,” I said.
He laughed so hard that he had to lean against his desk while he tore off his shirt and retied the bandages down his arms. “You think they don’t know.”
“You told them you’re a mummy?”
He shook his head. “No. An immortal king. I am wealthy beyond compare. They sing about my amazing deeds. Many of them are from decades ago, but they remember the grandeur of those days. They bring me offerings. They know I am unapproachable, unreachable. But still they come to sit in my presence. How could they not realize what I am? They serve me gladly.” He waved his hand at me, as if dismissing me. “Go. Say what you wish. It won’t make any difference.”
I balled my hands into fists. “I’m going to get you fired.”
“I control the elder board.”
“I’ll write a letter to the denominational head.”
“You aren’t even a member. You’ll be ignored.”
“I’ll reveal everything on the Internet.”
“Ha. One more angry blogger. I’m shaking in my bandages.” Pastor Nate came close to her, and she could see where the stake had broken through his bandages, revealing grey, sunken skin underneath. “You can’t stop me, Lara. You can’t remove me from this church because I am this church. If I disappeared it would go with me. All the satellite churches and the homeless programs and the money for missions. Gone. The only thing anyone would remember would be my name.”
I ground my teeth together. He was right. One person couldn’t get rid of him, not like that. I’d have to catch him doing something terrible, and do it in a way that no one could doubt what had happened. It seemed unlikely. It would take the whole church to rise up and demand his removal. “This isn’t over,” I said.
He shrugged and opened the office door. “You’ll be leaving the church soon enough. Your kind never sticks around.” Then he closed the door in my face.
I stood outside his door, my fist half raised to knock. Part of me wanted to go home, to never come back to this place and the other half wanted to stay forever as a thorn in his side. As a sort of compromise, I walked down to the choir room for practice, but I was still shaking.
The Vampire in the Church Choir Page 4