The man on the CD played a low, melodic tune. James tried to relax and allow the calmness of the music to seep into his spirit, but not even the peaceful sounds of Norman Brown could break through the torment he was carrying around. James needed some relief. He needed to end this pain. But he had to talk to Joan first.
Out of his rearview mirror, he saw flashing lights and heard a siren. His heart started to race as he quickly changed lanes. Did they decide to come after him, after all? When the police cruiser proceeded right past him, it occurred to him that he wasn’t on the freeway.
James looked left, then right. “What was I thinking?”
When he looked up at the street signs and saw he was on Almeda Road, and still en route to Joan’s house via a longer route, he was really confused. He didn’t remember thinking about the drive to Joan’s house. He didn’t remember deciding to take the scenic route versus the faster route. Yet, he was only a few short turns away from Joan’s condo.
Sweat started to appear on his forehead. Small blotches at first, but then they got bigger and started to drip down his face. James looked around. He wondered if there was anywhere he could buy a bottle of something or even stop for a drink. He remained hopeful until he passed a church with a full parking lot and remembered that liquor stores were closed on Sundays and bars wouldn’t be open until evening.
What happens when you die? The question jumped into James’s head so fast, it startled him. It could be peaceful and freeing—something like what people call heaven. Maybe nothing happened. Maybe people just died. James could deal with both of these, but then there was the other.
Several years ago, Miles had run into this real paranoid chick. She was beautiful and had a body to match, which was why Miles had put up with her craziness for the two weeks he did. She was a Christian on steroids who needed to be restrained. She was always handing out Gospel tracts to people that could care less. On the weekends and after work, she would go to the malls and parks and hand them out, telling people her story. She said that when she was a teenager, she was addicted to heroin. She had been on the stuff for six months when, she claimed, she overdosed, died, and went to hell. She said she had never been religious and had never been to any type of place of worship, but that experience changed her life.
She said that during her trip to hell, she was falling into darkness for what seemed like hours. Each moment she fell, it got darker and darker; the blackest black she had ever seen. As she dropped, the smell got worse and worse, like flesh decaying. The entire time, she was yelling, with everything that she had, to be saved. Eventually she reached the bottom and felt a force trying to suck her into what she instantly knew was hell.
She knew that once she went in, she would not be able to get out. She was crawling and begging not to go, but she couldn’t fight against the force. Just when she was about to be sucked in, Jesus appeared. Then the devil appeared. The two of them started to argue over her soul. The devil claimed she was his, but Jesus insisted He was going to give her another chance because of the prayers of her aunt. Jesus won.
She woke up in her bedroom and never touched heroin again. She didn’t need to go to rehab or anything. She was cured instantly, or “delivered,” as she put it. She went on to dedicate her life to telling people the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Of course, Miles thought she was like all the other churchgoing women he knew, full of hot air—a Christian on Sunday, but a sexual freak the rest of the week. But despite his efforts, he never was able to get to first base. He kicked her to the curb, but James never forgot her story.
James pulled up to the light on Allum Street. He was the first car waiting at the red light. He heard a car behind him screech on his breaks in an attempt to stop. Before he knew it, the speeding car had pushed him into oncoming traffic. James looked up and saw an eighteen-wheeler racing toward him. There was nothing he could do. The eighteen-wheeler was coming too close and coming too fast. James was about to die. He cried out, “Jesus, help me!” The 18-wheeler stopped inches from his car.
When James realized he was alive, he dropped his head to the steering wheel and began to cry. He only stopped sobbing when the truck driver started banging on his car window. James looked up and rolled down the window.
“Young man, I don’t know what God has planned for you, but it must be something big.” He had tears in his eyes. His entire body was shaking and big drops of sweat were on his forehead. “I can’t explain how I was able to stop. It was like somebody else started driving. I just knew you were dead! I knew you were dead! I just knew it!”
Dozens of people were outside their cars, shaking their heads and talking hysterically into their cell phones. None of the crowd could believe what they had just seen. James knew it was only a matter of time before the police showed up. The truck driver was still in the middle of the street, pacing back and forth. James pushed on his gas pedal and drove off. Joan and the answers he needed were only a few blocks away.
Chapter 22
Joan opened the door and immediately gasped. She expected him to look bad, but not dead. He stepped through the door, and past her. Each step seemed more painful than the last.
She had a flashback of the last time she had seen him in her condo. He was lively and confident. This man before her now was heavy with pain; it seemed like it was consuming him more and more each minute. He put his hands on his face. Joan quietly walked closer to him. She hadn’t seen him cry before. If he was crying now, she wanted to see it up close.
During the time she had been with James, he hardly showed any emotion. The angrier she got, the quieter he became. She shouted and cursed, and he calmly spoke. Even in the midst of unexpected circumstances, James never seemed to sweat. She hated him for it. She felt so misunderstood. James thought she was an overworked drama queen that needed to chill, and she thought he was a zombie that needed to react.
She sat on the sofa next to him. Those were tears falling from his face. James was quiet as he wept. Joan’s first reaction was to reach out to him. But then in a voice filled with torment, James said, “It was all my fault, Joan. Everything was all my fault.”
Joan’s eyes got wider and she reached in closer to James. He began to weep bitterly and his breathing became strained. Joan rushed to the bathroom and retrieved a box of tissues. When she came back, James was on the floor in a fetal position, rocking himself back and forth.
Joan rushed and knelt before him. She handed him a tissue. He took it, but he didn’t wipe his face. He was trying to say something, but he was too overcome to speak. Joan rubbed his back as he continued to cry and rock.
“Momma, I’m sorry. Momma, I’m sorry,” James began to whisper over and over again. James turned his body and was now on his back. He stopped rocking and closed his eyes tightly. Joan watched as his chest went up and down as he breathed.
He pulled Joan’s face to his. “I might as well have shot them both. I might as well have pulled the trigger. I might as well be the one in jail.” Joan didn’t move, even though the grip James had on her was tight and uncomfortable.
James took a deep breath and let her go. “Joan, I’m sick. I have been sick for a long time. I’m not right, Joan.”
Joan tried to hide her shock. James’s words matched his description.
“I got fired from my job because I was running after somebody’s wife.” James Sr. stared at the ceiling. “Maybe that’s why this all made sense to me.”
“What all made sense?” Joan asked.
“I had the kids tested. Miles had the kids tested for me. Alexis and Morris—they belong to another man.”
Joan’s mouth dropped open.
“I just found out a couple of weeks ago. I wanted Raquel to pay for what she did to me. That’s why I planned to leave her at the altar. But then all of this happened.”
James wept bitterly. Joan went to the bathroom and wet several towels with warm water. She returned and began to compress them on James’s face and neck. James looked like he was go
ing to start hyperventilating at any moment. After several minutes, his breathing returned to normal.
He took off the towel Joan had on his eyes. “I know this is going to sound funny coming from me, but I need to know what you think about something.” James hesitated for a moment. “What happens when you die?”
Joan’s eyes gravitated toward the clock. Church was over. It was just time for the after-service fellowship to begin. Joan always brought the cookies. She wondered who was bringing the cookies today.
James voiced the question he had asked Joan in his head. “Joan, am I making you uncomfortable?”
“Oh no, James, of course not.”
“I mean, you do have a lot of Bibles and other things around this place. I thought religion was important to you.”
Joan shifted back and forth. “What was the question again?”
“What happens when you die? You know, heaven and hell. Who gets to go where, and why?”
Still, Joan said nothing.
“Okay, forget it.” James’s voice dropped. “I guess there’s just not any hope for me, huh?”
“No, James. It’s just that . . . Why do you want to know?”
“I’m thinking of killing myself later on today.”
Joan laughed; then she realized James was dead serious. “Why?”
“Joan, don’t you understand? Don’t you see? I’m not fit to live, and I’m too scared to die. I need some answers, and I need them now.”
“But why do you want to die, James?”
“Let’s see. My mother and brother are dead because of me. Raquel is in jail, probably for a long time, because of me. Alexis and Morris belong to another man. I still can’t get my head around that. A few days after I found out, I started having panic attacks. Now I’m popping pills. I lost my constable job. I feel like I’m walking on eggshells and everything is caving in on me. I’m a sorry excuse for a man. I don’t want James Jr. to be anything like me. So that’s why I want to die. Everything, Joan, everything. I just don’t want to be here anymore!” James shouted.
“I just want my life to be over. I don’t want to be in this pain anymore.” James dropped to the floor again and started writhing like he was in pain. He was on all fours, rocking and crying.
Joan wanted to be somewhere else, talking to somebody else. She had never seen James like this. She had never seen anyone like this. She needed some help, but the only person she knew to call was her pastor. She was too embarrassed to call him, after the last conversation she had with his wife, Minister Makita.
James took a break from grimacing and pulled a large bottle of pills from his pocket. “I need you to tell me why I shouldn’t take these pills and kill myself right now.”
With that, Joan picked up her cell phone to dial her pastor’s personal cell phone number. She was one of the few church members to have it. Pastor Benjy gave it to her when she was working on a speaking project with him. She was careful not to pass it around or abuse it. When she needed to speak to him about most matters, she went through the church secretary, just like everybody else.
“Hello, Pastor, it’s me, Joan.”
Chapter 23
Joan sat on the bench outside her condo, twirling her house keys and reading the news on her cell phone. She was doing everything possible to look like everything was fine in her world. Pastor Benjy left church and came directly to her condo to talk to James. He was up there now. Joan wanted to be sure she was outside to meet James Jr. when the church bus dropped him off. There was no way she could risk letting her son see his father this way.
Pastor Benjy didn’t say anything the first few moments after he arrived to meet James. He simply sat on the sofa next to him, closed his eyes and bowed his head. If another man had sat this close to James, he would have been offended.
James couldn’t help but smell Pastor Benjy’s cologne, see his gold watch, his expensive glasses, and his freshly pressed suit. James still had on his tuxedo jacket, pants and shirt; each was badly stained. His feet were covered with flip-flops. He couldn’t remember taking off the leather loafers he had purchased especially for the wedding.
All of a sudden, James wanted to bathe, shave, change his clothes, and put a few eyedrops in each eye. That’s what his mother always said: “Look your best and nobody will suspect the hell you got buried up inside.” His mom was always good like that. She made sure she never looked like she was trapped in a loveless marriage and that Saturday nights were spent ironing her Sunday dress, rolling her hair, prepping for Sunday dinner, and wondering which woman her husband was with this time.
Pastor Benjy bolted off the sofa urgently. He looked around like he had forgotten something important. He had that protruding stomach over his belt that was common for men his age. The idea of walking around with a spare tire around his waist was what kept James in the gym five days out of the week. The chiseled six-pack of his teenage years was gone, but not by much.
“Do you want something to eat?” Pastor Benjy asked.
James started to laugh low at first, and then it hit a midway point. Before he knew it, he was chuckling and howling uncontrollably, like he was at a comedy show.
Pastor Benjy looked surprised initially, but then he reared back, grabbed his stomach, and burst out laughing too. He laughed until his stomach hurt and tears were running down his face.
After an unspecified time—James couldn’t tell how much time went by—his laughing dwindled down to silence. Pastor Benjy got the cue late and stopped laughing a few awkward moments after James.
James’s eyes aimlessly wandered around the room, trying to remember what had brought on the outburst. He was waiting for something magical or profound to come out of Pastor Benjy’s mouth, not “Do you want something to eat?” Here he was thinking Pastor Benjy was somehow going to make it okay, but nothing was ever going to be okay again. He was laughing instead of crying. He heard the pills rattling in his pocket.
“I hear your stomach growling. Let me find you something to eat.” At once, Pastor Benjy walked to Joan’s refrigerator, looked around, then started pulling out items, one by one. James watched Pastor Benjy place bread in the toaster, wait for it to brown, then layer it with mayonnaise, cheese, and smoked turkey.
Then Pastor Benjy cut the crust off the bread and sliced the sandwich in two equal parts. He handed it to James, who had left the sofa and was now seated on a bar stool in the kitchen.
James saw that he would be eating alone, since Pastor Benjy started to clean up after making only one sandwich. James still hadn’t bit into the sandwich after Pastor Benjy had put everything away. He couldn’t take his eyes off him.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” Pastor Benjy asked.
James bit into the sandwich.
Pastor Benjy looked at his watch, then said, “James, there’s a story in the Bible about a crippled man who has been sitting, waiting for healing, on the side of a pool for thirty-eight long years. Jesus asked him a question: ‘Do you want to be made well?’ The man didn’t answer him at first. He offered a lot of excuses about why he had been beside the pool for so long. The excuses may have been very valid, but Jesus didn’t want to hear any of that. He wanted an answer to his question.”
Pastor Benjy’s cell phone rang. He looked down at the screen. “Oh, I’m sorry I got to take this. It’s my son.”
He began to talk into the phone with a much softer voice. “Hey, I hate I missed your call. I called back but got your voice mail. I see. Well . . . you know how I feel about that house. I’ll support you whatever you decide. Okay, do that. Think about it for a few days. Don’t be in a rush to sign. I’ll be in prayer for you. All right, son. We’ll talk about it then. Love you. Kiss the girls and Nicole for me.”
Pastor Benjy hung up the phone. “I’m sorry. My boy is about to buy his first house. You’ve got to be careful.”
James nodded blankly and his mind wandered to the gentle way Pastor Benjy dealt with his obviously grown son. He bit into his lunch again and tried to r
emember if his father had ever made him a sandwich.
“I only talked to Joan a few moments, but I learned a lot about you. I know you despise Christians. I know that you believe that you know me and what I represent. I know that you are suicidal. I know that your brother and mother were just killed and you have a part in it. I know that you love women and sex, and both have gotten you into trouble many times. I know that you are in pain and you desperately want it to end. I know that this is the defining moment in your life. I know that the God of this universe sent me to you to ask this question.
“James, this is a ‘yes or no’ question.” Pastor Benjy paused, then continued. “It is the same question Jesus asked the man who had been sitting by that pool and waiting for healing for thirty-eight long years. It was a ‘yes or no’ question then, it is a ‘yes or no’ question now.
“Today, a team of men and I are going on a three-week-long mission trip. I have been planning this trip for months. This morning, one of my men canceled, due to a family emergency. When I realized that God was opening the door for somebody to come instead of him, I began to pray. All morning and all afternoon long, I’ve been looking for God to show me who to take. After I talked to Joan about you, hours before we are set to leave, I knew it was you.
“I’m not going to promise you that Jesus is going to come into your heart and you are going to feel all fuzzy and warm inside. I’ve been in ministry too long to lie to you like that. All I ask is that you come on this trip with me. But only if you can answer yes to this question: James, do you want to be made well?”
The Bride Experiment Page 12