“Whoa.”
“Without realizing it, I pictured myself as spiritually elite,” he explained. “Even when it came to the elders and deacons, I always had the last word. I couldn’t receive anything from them. Why? Because I was deceived into thinking I was better, more spiritual, closer to God.”
I had never heard anything like this and was thoroughly immersed in Jacob’s story.
“Then, one day, it happened.” He stared off. “Karen was fifteen. She and her mother came into my study at our old house after dinner. In utter fear, they explained to me that Karen was pregnant. It shattered my world. My world, you see! It was all about me, and what people thought of me.”
“I can’t believe that,” I murmured, thinking of my own self-centeredness. “What happened?”
Jacob sat on the very edge of the loveseat now with his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped together. Karen and Sarah were out of sight.
“I drove Karen to get an abortion.”
Chills engulfed my whole body.
Tears came to Jacob’s eyes.
“The night after the…operation, in my study, I had an encounter with God. It was the first time. I had never actually known God before that moment. But that night, He met me. For hours I cried, there on the floor, my door locked. And Christ came and showed me, through that awful experience, what kind of person I was.”
My poor Karen.
“But by His mercy, that’s when everything began to change,” he said quietly. “I asked Karen’s forgiveness, and Sarah’s, and God’s. They were each merciful. I repented and prayed for God to change me, and He began to, that very night. And when I changed, there was a glorious change in Karen and in Sarah. I stepped down from the pastorate. In fact, we gradually left the church and found another one, where we worship today.”
“Have you ever gotten back into leadership…in the church?”
“No,” he said, smiling. “I never will, either. I have no titles, and I don’t want any. I simply serve my Savior, quietly. I just try to love, like He did. Thank God it turned out the way it did, for Karen’s sake, and Sarah’s.”
“And mine…”
It was well after midnight by the time the flames went out in Jacob and Sarah’s fireplace. As the embers glowed orange and the remnants of a few charred logs flamed out, Karen’s parents insisted we stay as their guests for the night. I figured I could fly out first thing in the morning.
Karen, of course, slept in her old bedroom, which she showed me after we crept up the hardwood stairs, leaving her mom and dad to their quarters below. Karen’s room was soft pink, with frilly white curtains, pillows, and a twin bed. There was a pretty, white corner cabinet filled with her favorite childhood books, some old framed photographs of Karen and her parents and relatives, and several shelves filled with memorabilia and knickknacks.
Sitting on her bed together by the soft, golden glow of a bedside lamp, we went through page after page of her childhood scrapbooks, photo albums, and yearbooks. They made us both want to howl, but we tried our best to suppress the laughter so Jacob and Sarah could sleep.
Karen had been voted “Most Friendly” in her high school graduating class. As I reviewed the yearbook and all of the faces and signatures, I wondered which boy she had been with…and what the circumstances had been.
When she was about ready to show me to the guest room, she whispered, “Oh, wait a minute! Wait a minute. You’ve got to see this!” She opened the cabinets in the bottom half of the bookcase and pulled out a large brown book; it was three inches thick with papers and pictures overflowing from its yellowed pages.
“This is the scrapbook,” she said as she miled and plopped down next to me, “where I kept all of my DeathStroke stuff.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said, anxious to see inside.
She opened the cover to reveal a large, color magazine photograph of me flying through the air onstage; the caption said it was taken in Chicago. I did not remember that moment, nor most of the others Karen had captured in her heavy memory book.
“It all seems like a lifetime ago.” I turned from one page to the next, reading bits and pieces of the stories, feeling dirty about some of the antics highlighted in the clippings.
“Why did you do this?” I asked, still not grasping the freedom of her unconditional love.
She smiled shyly. “I don’t know. I guess I knew, someday, you would be different; I knew. And I kept this so I could remember what God did in your life.”
“Thank you.” I stroked her cheek and rounded her silky hair behind her ear. “Thank you.”
I gathered her head against my chest. “You are the most precious person I have ever met, Karen Bayliss,” I whispered, with tears just behind my eyes. “Your God put an evil, renegade rock star in your heart…and you believed in Him enough to dream a very big dream. And now it’s come true. How do you like that?”
She reached up and fiddled with a button on my shirt. “I like it very much,” she said quietly. “And I’m going to keep dreaming big dreams for you, Everett Lester. Big dreams in which God’s the star…”
27
NEVER BEFORE HAD I felt like I did that brisk November morning in Topeka, Kansas. The smell of pancakes and sausage filled Jacob and Sarah’s warm home. Karen and I met outside her room and sauntered downstairs together, joining her mom and dad at the candlelit kitchen table for coffee.
We were like a family that morning—eating, talking, laughing, and sharing more stories. Being among those three people, I felt clean and new. No hangover, no need for drugs or booze. I had truly begun anew.
Amid the joy and camaraderie, however, two problems still loomed: Endora’s murder investigation and the people still stalking Karen.
I broke away to call Brian Boone in the living room after breakfast and told him I wasn’t back in Miami.
“Everett, you said one day! These investigators think you’re in town,” he hissed. “They’re going to want you down at the precinct at the drop of a hat, probably today. Are you on your way?”
“Believe it or not, what I’m doing here is important,” I said, trying to calm him. “I can be back there in two or three hours, whenever you say.”
He said nothing.
“Besides, the way you make it sound, they may make me stay in Miami, because of all the questioning and stuff. Is that right?”
“They may, yes!” he stammered. “And it’s not going to look good if they find out you’ve skipped town.”
“This is something I have to do,” I said. “I’m staying today. If they want me for questioning, call my cell phone. I’ll be on a jet in no time.”
“I wish you wouldn’t do this.”
“I have to, Brian. This is probably the most important thing I’ve ever done. Trust me. I’ll come back pronto the second you need me.”
“You keep that phone with you and turned on at all times!”
“Yes, sir!”
After Karen called her boss and got permission to take the day off, she and her folks and I went for a long walk in their neighborhood. The air was cold, but the sun warmed my face and hands.
Around a sharp curve on Jacob and Sarah’s peaceful street, there was a community park with a shimmering, dark blue lake. A flock of geese had gathered along its grassy edge. As we strolled on a black cinder path around the lake, Karen’s hand slipped around my arm and rested at the crease of my elbow.
Is this really happening?
That morning nothing more was said among us about the truck that had catapulted out of the dark toward Karen and me the previous night. But I was remembering and even found myself turning around several times to look behind us. Was Karen worried? She seemed a bit tentative.
Soon, Jacob announced that he had to get back to make some business calls. He ran a small insurance agency from his home office. Karen told me he was a well-respected community leader. Her mother didn’t work outside the home but enjoyed gardening, housekeeping, reading, and various wome
n’s ministries at their church.
Once we drove Jacob and Sarah back to their house in Karen’s Honda, we swung by her new place, just to make sure everything was okay after the previous night’s activities. As we went inside we found things were fine, and I tried to convince myself that Karen was safe now, that we had seen the last of fires and menacing black pickup trucks.
Karen tossed together some delicious chicken salad sandwiches with chips and carrots, which she served on wooden plates. We sat at her small kitchen table, overlooking the backyard, and watched the many different birds feast at her feeders. The house was so quiet. I wasn’t used to such tranquility.
“You make a mean sandwich.”
“When will you go back?” she asked, seeming preoccupied.
“Tonight, or I may take your folks up on their offer to stay one more night and leave early tomorrow.”
“Why don’t you stay? It’ll be fun. I’ll be there with you.”
I peered into her gray-green eyes, thinking how gorgeous she was.
“Well, that sounds like a pretty good invitation. We’ll see…”
Karen insisted we buzz downtown next, so she could show me the city she had grown to love so much. She parked the white Honda near some kind of government building where we threw pennies in the Fountain of Justice. I didn’t know what Karen wished when she splashed hers in, but my wish was that we could be together like this the rest of our lives.
Topeka was a small but busy city, with a surprising amount of traffic buzzing by as we stopped to admire the state capitol, a marvelous white stone structure with mighty columns, a wide expanse of steps, and a slightly tarnished light green dome.
I was enjoying immensely the fact that hardly anyone recognized me. And those who did weren’t quite sure where they had seen me before. Very nice.
It proved to be a fantastic afternoon, as we wandered by the local Performing Arts Center, the Kansas Museum of History, and on down the boulevard to one of Karen’s favorite spots—the First Presbyterian Church.
“This is special.” She tugged my hand. “C’mon.”
We entered the large stone structure through an arched doorway at the bottom of a huge bell tower. The vestibule was dark, dry, creaky, and smelled like mothballs.
“My dad and I used to walk through here all the time when I was a girl. And after…when he stepped down as pastor, he came here a lot to think and pray.”
We walked through another set of heavy wooden doors, and as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I began to see the old, cushioned pews.
“Look up, silly.” She laughed, pulling me along. “The windows. Look at the windows! They’re all stained glass. One of the only sanctuaries in the country with all its windows done in Tiffany.”
Many shades of light and brilliant colors poured through the intricately fashioned glass, and my heart soared with joy and wonder. Those feelings came not only from viewing the stained glass, but from the sheer honor of knowing this special young lady before me.
“Each window is a sermon, and a prayer, and a treasured work of art.” She looked at them again herself. “Isn’t it cool?” Her love for God—for everything that had to do with God—was contagious.
“Yes…it is.” I enjoyed watching her as she admired the handcrafted Favrile glass, just like she used to do as a girl.
When we crossed the street to head back to Karen’s car, we strolled past Topeka High School, where she graduated more than a decade ago. She shared a few memories and pointed out several familiar spots on campus. Then she got quiet.
“Where to next?”
“I thought I was in love.” She turned her back to me and stopped. “I just want you to know…I thought I loved him—the boy who…”
“Shh, shhhh,” I said with finger to my lips. “I understand, Karen. You don’t have to explain.”
“I want to!” she said, suppressing tears. “I was hurting. Confused. Dad was double-minded—a hypocrite. You wouldn’t have recognized him. He would quote Scripture in every other sentence, but there was no…gentleness. He didn’t forgive. There was no real love.”
She was staring at her old school now. I thought it best to let her share.
“I don’t know why I let it happen. He wasn’t a Christian, but he was gentle and kind. We met up at the football game that night and left in his car.” Tears raced down her white cheeks. “It was my fault…”
“Karen…Karen,” I whispered, coming close and wiping the tears away with my thumbs.
“Let me finish, please. In hindsight, I realize I was rebelling—against Dad, against his religion, I guess even against his God.”
She looked away and cried hard now.
“I want you to know,” she moaned, “there’s never been anyone, after that.”
I shook my head and gazed at Topeka High School as the cold wind whipped through the Kansas plains. “Karen,” I whispered, cupping the back of her slender neck in my hand. “Do you realize where I’ve been? What I’ve done?”
She looked up into my eyes. “I just wanted you to know.”
“If anyone has any explaining to do here, it’s me.” I smiled. “And I have no excuses. All I can tell you is I’m different now.”
“God restored my purity, Everett. He’s already done the same for you.”
At the same time, we came toward each other, hugging tightly. I turned my head sideways, resting it atop her soft blond hair, as she gently laid her head against my chest.
“What’s going to happen?” she said as we stayed like that, swaying slightly in the wind.
“I don’t know, but whatever happens…I want it to be with you.”
Saturday afternoon I sat at one of a dozen pay phones that lined a white concrete wall on the first floor of the detention center. Beneath each phone was a marred wooden desktop attached to the wall, along with a dark green plastic chair.
For the past twenty minutes, Boone and I had been discussing the comprehensive witness list I created late last night in my cell. He agreed to take an in-depth look over the weekend at four of the five people remaining on the list who might be helpful witnesses in our defense. However, Boone continued to refuse to allow me to testify in my own defense.
As I hung up the phone and headed back toward my cell, I felt dejected. Boone sounded tentative. He made me agree that if he investigated the remaining names on my potential witness list, that I would consider pleading guilty to Endora’s murder. That would assure me a spot in this can for a long, long time.
As I walked through the open atrium, past dozens of inmates in orange jumpsuits, I felt a bit uncomfortable. Looking around, I noticed inmates…watching me. Some were smiling as they whispered back and forth. Others, it seemed, hesitantly inched toward me. There were sporadic claps and calls of “Owwwww!”
As I passed two guards standing erect at their central station, I ducked into my cell and noticed two pieces of mail awaiting me on the floor. There’s nothing like getting mail when you’re incarcerated.
The first one was from my sister, Mary.
Dear Ev,
Just wanted to drop a quick note and let you know Jerry and I arrived back home safely. We’re both going to work a couple of days, make sure things are under control with our jobs, and see if we can’t get back down to Miami for more of the trial ASAP!
I still can’t believe how God has brought Jerry into my life. It’s a match made in heaven. He brings me so much joy and laughter.
Jerry and I drove over to see Olivia yesterday, and her condition is the same. Unless God intervenes, it looks as if she will remain in this semi-comatose condition, which is extremely difficult. But I believe in miracles.
Olivia’s mother, Claudia, is not doing well under the stress of it all. Jerry spends a lot of time visiting with her in person and on the phone. After Claudia’s husband got over the shock that Jerry had befriended you and fallen in love with me—Raymond has grown, how do I put it…silent.
If you will, please pray for that family.
They need God so much right now. Pray for Olivia. I know you are.
Keep your chin up and fight the good fight. We hope to be back down there with you in a few days. See you in court.
Love,
Mary
Before I left my cell to see what the growing commotion was about (much clapping and yelling), there was another letter to check out first, in a white business envelope with a Miami postmark and no return address.
Lester,
Terribly sorry I couldn’t testify at your trial.
It appears your following has begun.
That is why you must die. Karen too.
Only then will I rest.
Z
The chanting became almost thunderous.
“Les-ter…Les-ter…Les-ter…Les-ter…”
I stood, dropped Zaney’s letter on the bunk, and walked slowly to the entrance of my cell. The place exploded in one enormous ovation. I looked out to see the hallway and atrium beyond filled with orange jumpsuits, hundreds of them. Then the chanting began again, everyone in unison: “Les-ter…Les-ter…Les-ter…”
A smile broke out, and my head moved side to side in disbelief.
As I turned and disappeared into the cell to retrieve my guitar, the chanting was replaced by a deafening roar. And now I would play for them…and for Him.
After Karen finished her famous tour of downtown Topeka, we drove back to her parents’ house and both decided to take naps. By the time I woke up in the guest room, it was getting dark, and I had to check my bearings to remember where I was. The clock read 5:35 p.m.
Karen was already awake and downstairs, assisting Sarah and Jacob in the kitchen. I joined them and helped set the table.
We had an informal dinner. The homemade lasagna and garlic bread Sarah prepared from scratch were mouthwatering, as was the tossed salad that Karen sliced and diced. We told her folks what we had done the rest of the afternoon, and then we talked about Karen’s work, Topeka, their church, and Jacob’s business. I felt like the boyfriend who had come to call.
Dark Star: Confessions of a Rock Idol Page 25