Come to Dust

by Bracken MacLeod

  Liana sighed and Mitch looked over at her. She straightened her back the way she’d done when she was trying to motivate him to do something he didn’t want to do—get out of bed, get showered, find a grief counseling group. This time, her standing tall wasn’t something she was doing for his benefit. She squared her shoulders, took a deep breath and said, “Let’s give it a couple of days, and... I’ll try to get used to things. We’ll figure it out together.”

  “You sure?”

  She shook her head. “Don’t ask me if I’m sure, because I’m not yet. But I’m willing to try.”

  He smiled and stood. Sophie kept a hold of his neck and wrapped her legs around his waist as he lifted her. Behind him, a puppet on the screen shouted, “Amplify!” and he felt a surge of contentment that made him shiver even harder.

  “We can make it work,” he whispered.

  18

  The child’s tiny feet made no sound on the creaky hardwood floors as she tiptoed through the darkened apartment from the living room into the hallway that led to Mitch and Liana’s bedroom. Her uncle had closed all the curtains before they went to sleep so the light from the street lamps in the parking lot outside wouldn’t bleed into the apartment and disturb them. But she didn’t need the light to see. Everything was easy for her to see, and the dark didn’t frighten her any more.

  Mitch had set her up to rest on the sofa, but she never stayed there. In the middle of the night when she could hear their breathing go deep and rhythmic, she would get up and wander into the bedroom and crawl in under the covers with him. She was always freezing cold. He would wrap his arms around her, lending her his warmth.

  She didn’t like this place. It was too small and none of her toys were here. Not even a set of crayons. Mitch promised they’d go get her stuff and bring it back, but she didn’t want to go get anything. She just wanted to be there. She wanted to go home.

  Pushing open the door, Sophie padded over to where her uncle and his girlfriend slept. It was a tall bed, too tall to climb into herself, so she had to wake him to get help up. He was more than willing to scoop her up and let her nestle in the crook of his arm, her head under his chin and cold feet pressed against the cozy warmth of his pajama-covered legs. He’d scooted into the middle of the bed to make room for her instead of letting her sleep in between him and the girlfriend. Sophie wanted the middle, but she settled for the edge of the bed, if that’s where Mitch wanted her to sleep.

  But she didn’t sleep. She closed her eyes and pretended, so if he got up to go to the bathroom, he wouldn’t be worried or try to take her back to the sofa. Sophie would climb in bed with him and keep her eyes closed until she could hear his breathing go slow again. Sometimes he’d snore. When that happened, she’d open her eyes and look around the room. She’d try to get a glimpse of the girlfriend, but her uncle’s body blocked her view. Except tonight.

  Tonight she wasn’t going to wake him to help her climb under the covers. Instead, she stood on the opposite side of the bed looking at the girlfriend. She was so nice when they first met. She seemed happy then when she sat down to play. Sophie had liked her. Now, she was different. Now, she was frightened. When she thought Sophie and her uncle weren’t looking, she’d whisper things to people who weren’t there. She talked to a Gran that Sophie couldn’t see, asking her for help. For patience. And courage. Gran never answered and she was still afraid.

  Sophie stood and stared at the girlfriend. She slept with her lips parted slightly, breathing slow like Mitch, but not snoring. Sophie wanted to be pretty like her. She wanted to have warm skin and bouncy tight hair and dark, pretty lips like the girlfriend put on before she went to work. But instead, her hair was limp and her lips were pale and she was cold. Everything was cold. Except Mitch and his girlfriend.

  Reaching up, she held a finger near Liana’s mouth trying to feel her breath. It was warm and moist on her tiny fingers. She wanted to lean in and try to inhale a little of that breath. Just have a taste of its sweetness and feel some of the heat of it in her mouth and her lungs. It sounded so good, and deep in her belly she could feel the ache of wanting it. She stepped forward and got up on her tip toes, but no matter how hard she stretched, she couldn’t get her mouth close enough to breathe any in.

  Sophie took a step back. She watched the girlfriend sleep some more, the woman’s chest rising and falling with each soft breath.

  After an hour, she slipped out of the bedroom and came back with the small step stool Liana used in the kitchen to reach things in high cabinets. It was heavy and hard to carry, but Sophie wanted to get close. She wanted just a little taste.

  She wanted that warmth inside her.

  Interlude: Scenes from a Revival

  19

  From the seats surrounding the amphitheater stage he heard a few murmured “amens” and “hallelujahs,” but for the most part his parishioners were frightened and looking to him for guidance. The preacher stood in front of his congregation with his microphone at his hip, staring forward into the distance for effect, letting his last words sink in. It was taking less work than usual to rile up the crowd, but more than he liked to get them going in the direction he wanted. He took a moment to straighten his custom-tailored Savile Row suit and check his Omega watch, like he was pressed for time, before returning the microphone to his lips. A hush settled over the chapel theater as he raised his free hand above his head for them to be quiet and listen.

  “Look to Revelation 11:13. The teaching of scripture is that ‘thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto them that fear thy name.’” He gave another pause for call and response before interpreting his selection. “Now, good people, is the time of the dead. You see it. They are rising from the grave as we speak. And they herald the wrath of the Lord!” A shudder of mumbled noise rose from the crowd. He felt a tinge of satisfaction in their discomfort. He would whip their growing unease into righteous revelatory ecstasy and stand bathed in it.

  “The dead are rising and coming to be among us for the judgment of the Lord in these final days. But do they bring His love and grace? Nossir! No ma’am! I say, they do not. I tell you they are a mockery of His word, His son’s work, and of the Holy Spirit. ‘Behold a pale horse, and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed!’ These so-called ‘children’ are the minions of Death and the stink of Hell is on them. They are risen by the Prince of Lies to tempt us with their small bodies and innocent faces, but they are the souls of the damned given pleasing shape to tempt us to take them into our homes and divert our attention away from the Lord and his plan. I tell you, that God has warned us of this and promised to protect us from evil.

  “Harken to Revelation 3:10. ‘Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.’” He raised a hand and pranced to stage right to give a little love to the cheap seats while the paraphrased scripture sank in. “We are being tempted by the children of the grave. Tempted by the least among us, those whom we loved and lost to the Lord in his wisdom. God has a plan! He took those children for His own reasons, according to His plan. And now the Devil returns them to Earth filled with demons and lies to tempt us with promises he cannot keep, and a desire to frustrate the works of the Lord, our God! But shall we allow ourselves to be tempted?”

  “No,” the crowd replied.

  His cadence and volume was starting to work. They were following his train right out of the station and soon he’d be able to lead them out the front door, into the streets, and begin to exact God’s plan. It would only take a little more goading for the sheep to rise up. “I said, shall we allow ourselves to be tempted?”

  “NO!”

  “That’s right! Because we are strong in the power of the Lord. And he has promised to keep the faithful free from temptation in these final days. So what is to be done with these ghouls and the… the deadophiles wh
o cling to them? What are we servants of the Lord to do?” He didn’t wait for a response. There was nothing in it for him to let them ponder the question themselves. “We are called to stand and do His work.”

  The crowd simmered at the edge of a roiling boil, and then he applied the heat. “Deuteronomy says, ‘There shall not be found among you a witch, or a necromancer!’ One who can summon the dead. ‘For all these things are an abomination unto the Lord.’”

  “AMEN!”

  “And what shall we do when the witches and necromancers call forth Hell to spew its filth up onto the Earth? When they raise the dead army of the Devil? Shall we stand back and allow corruption and sin to overtake us?”

  “NO!”

  “HELL no! Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live! Shall we instead send these demons back to their unholy master? And their deadophile slaves with them?” The cry that rose up pleased Pastor Roper. It filled him with a satisfaction that he could only find on the stage in this theater.

  “God hates deadophiles!” the ebullient crowd cheered.

  • • •

  He looked at her. He strode to the edge of the stage and looked right at her. For a moment, she felt completely alone in the assembly as he gazed down from above and that smile of his opened wide, as if she was exactly who he’d been hoping to see. Of course, he didn’t know her, but his intense blue eyes and perfect, gleaming smile said that he knew her heart—her soul. While she sat transfixed by his gaze, he lifted his microphone and said, “You are the hope that God’s work will be done!” Her heart quickened and she felt out of breath. A fog descended around her consciousness and the noise of the hall dimmed until all she could hear was his voice echoing in her head.

  And then he stepped to his left, pointed at another parishioner a couple of rows farther back, and repeated himself. “You are the hope...” And again.

  The crowd roared back to life in her ears and she felt Junior’s hand slapping her thigh as he shouted hosannas. In the couple of months that she’d been coming to the New Life Church, people boasted that they saw crowds of up to five thousand on Christmas and Easter. There had to be at least that many in the hall today; the place was packed and it wasn’t even a holiday. People stood in the aisles and the doorways in violation of the fire code. Still, with the memory of Pastor Roper’s eyes upon her, she felt fireproof.

  The rest of the sermon was a blur as she watched Roper walk from one end of the stage to the other, wishing he’d stop and recognize her again. She crossed and uncrossed her legs, trying to hold her excitement at bay until she could have a private moment to release the tension in her belly, between her legs. She dropped her hand into her lap and let her thumb brush against the front of her jeans below her zipper. An electric charge shot up the small of her back. She thought about doing it again. Instead, she kept herself under control. Her ears slowly came back to life and she called out as Roper asked for “amens” and “hallelujahs,” but nothing felt as rich as that moment he looked down and declared his faith in her. The sermon gave way to another song from Roper’s wife at the piano, the choir backing her, and then a video on the massive central screen updating the congregation on their investment in the Jamaican orphanage and ministry. The faces of the children always made Violette sad. They made her miss Sophie.

  The decision to leave her child behind had been hastily made and for all the wrong reasons, but it had led her here. To a reunion with Junior—her daughter’s father—to the New Life Church, and Pastor Roper’s ministry, and salvation. She was better for having left. And now that she was healed, it was time to go back and reclaim her daughter. Sophie would be better off with her than her uncle. It was the end of times, and her girl needed a mother. She needed a family and the Lord and Violette and Junior would ensure when the stars fell from Heaven, Sophie was not burned. She had to make certain her family was fireproof.

  Part Three: Sophie’s Afterlife

  20

  Mitch awoke alone in bed, well-rested for the first time in days. The first couple of nights in Liana’s apartment were rough on everyone; it took a while to adjust to the new way things were. Sophie didn’t want to be apart from her uncle for longer than it took to let him have a shower or fix a meal, and even then she’d sit on the floor just clear of what he was doing and wait. The rest of the time, she clung to him. Mitch had tried to revivify his routine as best he could. But no matter how much he wanted to pretend otherwise, he couldn’t deny things were not as they’d been. Without a job, he couldn’t afford to take Sophie back to day care, and he wasn’t even sure Khadija would allow her in once she saw what had happened. Of course, he couldn’t go on job interviews with her in tow, and he couldn’t leave her home alone either. Being together in close quarters was already straining his relationship. Leaving Sophie with Liana while he went out would be the weight that broke it. He was descending in a downward spiral of “couldn’ts” that were standing in the way of fully getting their lives back on track.

  Liana tried to hide it from Mitch, but he could see their constant closeness was clearly getting under her skin too. Their duo had become a trio. Although she put forward an effort, her fear of his niece wasn’t fading. The reality of rescuing the child from the morgue weighed heavily on her. At first, she’d tried to engage Sophie like she had the night of their first date, but the girl didn’t demand pyramids or drawings or any kind of cooperative play anymore. She sat. She observed. And she cleaved to Mitch. Liana was becoming increasingly aloof and defensive of her personal space. She had even banished herself to the far edge of the bed at night; they hadn’t made love since returning from the morgue.

  Liana sat him down after the second night and asked that he not let Sophie into bed with them. It was their space. Her space. She wasn’t ready for a “family bed.” So, he explained to Sophie as best he could that she needed to sleep in her own bed all night long. He’d expected an argument. Toddlers were little lawyers, and he paused, giving her the opportunity to point out the difference between her bed and a couch with a pillow and a few blankets on it. But she hadn’t. She didn’t say anything at all. When he was done explaining things, she just held her arms up and made the sound that meant she wanted to hold on to him. But last night, she hadn’t risen from her temporary bed on the sofa. That was progress. Right?

  He rubbed sleep from his eyes with the backs of his hands and lay there for a moment, listening. On a normal weekday morning, the sounds of Liana getting ready for work carried through the apartment. She was considerate, but was also used to living alone, and not having to worry about waking other people up. He loved it. It was like waking to the sound of life every day. Sophie used to be the same way. When she awoke, it was time for the whole house to rise. She’d call out to Mitch to come get her. She’d sing songs and talk to her stuffed animals and play. She used to do all those things. Since he’d brought her home, she hadn’t said more than a word or two at a time, or eaten a thing. It made him wonder what she’d been through in the month she was gone. Whatever it had been like, she wasn’t now who she had been before. She didn’t play. She didn’t laugh. She moved only enough to stay close to Mitch, mewling quietly when she wanted him to pick her up. He decided he didn’t want to contemplate, if she had been someplace else, what that place was like, banishing his Catholic grandmother’s ideas of Purgatory and Limbo from his thoughts.

  Of course it’ll take time for her to be her old self. She’s been through... everybody needs time to recover after being sick. So does she.

  That Sophie hadn’t come into the room that night filled him with a sudden dread. Since she’d returned, he’d lived with a steady foreboding that took the form of wondering how long she’d stay. What if she hadn’t come in to sleep because she was… fully dead again. He sat upright, stomach clenched, and took a deep breath trying to convince himself to calm down. Everything was fine. Sophie was fine. It’s just a quiet moment. Maybe Liana is being extra quiet because Sophie is still asleep on the couch for a change and she doesn’t
want to wake her.

  He slipped out of bed and pulled on the previous day’s jeans and T-shirt. In the living room, he found Sophie sitting cross-legged on the sofa staring at the television. It was tuned to the news. He walked over and gave his niece a hug before changing the channel to PBS. When she saw her favorite characters on the program, she turned and smiled before returning her attention to the cartoon. A smile! Her cheeks had a hint of rose color in them, and her milky eyes seemed clearer. His heart beat faster.

  It’s happening. She’s getting better.

  He found Liana in the kitchen sitting at the table warming her hands around a cup of coffee. She was still wearing her pajamas and didn’t have that strong-scented body wash fragrance she always wore after her morning shower. He poured himself a cup. “Did you see Sophie?” he asked. Excited by a step in the direction of “normal kid appearance.” It wasn’t until he sat down at the table with Liana that he noticed, despite the midsummer morning warmth that would soon turn to humid afternoon heat, she was shivering. And her new gray hair.

  It wasn’t collected at her temples or in a patch adding a dramatic flair to her curly black and fuchsia hair; white strands spread here and there throughout. Salt and pepper. The small wrinkles at the edges of her eyes seemed deepener, and the bags underneath emphasized how tired she looked. She’s just tired. Sophie’s midnight wanderings kept both of them up. But the combination of wrinkles and gray made her look years older.