The Chair

by James L. Rubart

  “No.”

  Corin rolled his eyes. “Doesn’t anyone read the news anymore?”

  “I don’t have time.”

  Corin gave Travis the Reader’s Digest version.

  “So even if the chair wasn’t the thing that healed him—”

  “If the dating of the chair thing gets out, combined with the insinuation that it healed the kid, it’ll have the religious nutcases storming my store like it’s the Bastille.”

  “I hope it’s no longer in your store.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “I gotta get going.” Travis pointed over Corin’s shoulder at the parking lot and they walked toward it. “If it’s genuine it could also be worth a lot of money.”

  “If it’s real it’s priceless.”

  “How is your store doing these days?”

  “I could use the money.” Use? Had to have was more accurate. For the store. For Shasta. For any hope of a future.

  “So why not sell it for everything you can?”

  “It’s a serious consideration.”

  “You should.”

  “Why?”

  “A lot of potential money mixed with religious zealots often means people winding up dead.”

  “I’ve thought of that too.” Corin glanced around the parking lot, not sure what he was looking for.

  “And if the chair really does have power to heal people—you’re in over your head.”

  “So far it’s just an idea. No proof.” Unless you counted the kid, which Corin was willing to do, but coincidences were a part of life, maybe even more than miracles.

  “For your sake I hope it stays just a legend.”

  Corin’s cell phone vibrated. Text message. From A. C.

  WE NEED TO TALK. I’M FINE, JUST A LITTLE WEIRDED OUT. CALL ME IF YOU’RE STILL AWAKE.

  A wave of heat passed through Corin’s body. He turned to Travis. “I’m sure that’s all it’ll end up being.”

  They reached their cars.

  “Then how do you explain the results I got at the lab?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Keep me posted on this thing, Corin.”

  “Absolutely.”

  Corin drove out of the parking lot and hit one of the new favorite numbers on his cell phone.

  “Hello there, Tesser, everyone’s favorite professor.”

  “You need to get a new line. That one’s wearing so thin it’s translucent.”

  “The better to see me with, my dear.” Tesser coughed. “How are you, Corin? How is the quest going?”

  “Getting weirder.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Good?”

  “When you’re ninety-two you’ll hope for weird things to make life interesting just like I do. What’s the latest?”

  “The age of the chair.”

  “You want to know how old it is?”

  “Since you know all about this chair, how old do you think it is?”

  “If it’s genuine, we know how old it is. At least within a few years.”

  “So you’re saying my having it carbon dated was a waste of time?”

  “No, you didn’t take a piece off the chair. Tell me you didn’t. Not smart. Not wise. Foolish to the fifth! To the ninth. To the googolplex.”

  “It was a small piece, Tesser.”

  “How small?”

  “It’s just wood.”

  “If it’s the real McCoy, you’ve just desecrated a chair made by the Son of God. What idiot told you to have it carbon dated?”

  “Me.”

  “Ffffffffhhh.” The sound coming through the phone sounded like the air had been let out of a tractor tire. “Aren’t you far enough down this path to realize it could very likely be much more than just a chunk-a-hunk of wood?”

  “No. One minute I think it’s real, the next moment I’m not sure.”

  “Oh, for crying in my ice cream Sunday with a gallon of Hershey’s syrup on top. Yes, you are.”

  Corin sighed. “Do you want to know what the carbon dating says?”

  “I don’t need to.”

  “Why, because if Jesus made the chair the carbon dating will show that it’s two thousand years old?”

  “Precisely.”

  “The year Jesus was born.”

  “Most competent historians place the birth of Christ around 4 or 5 BC, not the year AD 1. When the church decided to assimilate one of the pagan holidays, they moved—”

  “Tesser, I love your history lessons, but can we focus on the chair?”

  “Yes, yes, of course.”

  “So does this mean it’s real?”

  “The evidence is building. I’m not saying it has healing powers, but I’m certainly saying you might have a genuine religious artifact that was made by the historical figure known as Jesus Christ.”

  Corin’s cell phone buzzed again. He glanced down. A. C. again.

  GOING TO BED. WILL BE AT YOUR STORE FIRST THING IN THE MORNING. I HAVE TO TALK TO YOU. PLEASE BE THERE.

  “Tesser, I gotta go, I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Corin hung up and called A. C. No answer. Must have turned his ringer off as soon as he sent the text.

  A. C. wasn’t easily bothered, but he was bothered about something now.

  And Corin would be there first thing to find out what it was.

  CHAPTER 28

  You all right? Your face is acting like a split personality,” Corin said as he approached his store.

  A. C. stood at the front door, the expression on his face shifting from bewilderment to joy back to confusion every few seconds.

  “Fine. I’m good.” A. C. shifted his weight from one leg to the other and rubbed his shoulder.

  “Then why’d you say you were freaked yesterday and why do you want to talk first thing this morning?” Corin opened the front door and they walked inside.

  “Something has happened.”

  “To you?”

  “Yeah.” The alternating emotions on A. C.’s face morphed into an all-out grin.

  “And the cause of your apparent happiness?” Corin flicked the switch on the coffee maker behind his sales counter.

  “You,” A. C.’s eyes fixed on Corin, “and the chair.”

  Corin sucked in a quick breath. “Talk to me. What happened?”

  “It worked.”

  A chill played rugby up and down Corin’s back as he studied A. C.’s eyes. Was his friend trying to be funny? Hardly, it wasn’t A. C.’s style. It wasn’t a joke; A. C. was serious.

  “You’re saying you’re healed.”

  “Yep.”

  “You’re no longer scared of public speaking?”

  “Yes.” A. C. rubbed his left ear, his eyes full of laughter.

  “Yes what? You’re still scared? Or you’re not scared?”

  “I’m still not a fan of getting up in front of a crowd of more than one person.”

  Corin’s heart rate settled back to normal. “I’m not following you. I thought you said the chair healed you and you’re ready to go out on the speaking circuit.”

  “Not exactly.” A. C. ambled to the vault at the back of the store and glanced inside. “Where is the chair?”

  “I took it home and locked it up.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “You need to keep it in a safe place.” A. C. walked back to Corin and settled into a Hepplewhite dining chair from the early 1900s. “I’ve never been a religious person, but if God were to come down out of the sky and fill me up with Himself, sitting in that chair is what I think it would feel like.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “As soon as you left me alone the other day, the chair started giving off this electrical charge or something—I felt like I was wrapped up in this ocean of warmth and peace. Wow, it felt good. Then this light sweeps around the room—yeah, I know light doesn’t sweep a room like that; I’m just telling you what I saw.”

  A. C. closed his eyes “It was like a
merry-go-round made of light, and I was in the middle slowly spinning as the outside of the ride whipped by like cars at the Indianapolis 500.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

  “Because I didn’t know if I’d imagined it or not.” He laughed. “And I didn’t want you to ask what kind of mushrooms I had on my omelet that morning.”

  Corin poured himself a cup of coffee into his Thor coffee cup and offered A. C. some as well.

  A. C. shifted in his chair. “You know why I didn’t end up playing pro ball, right?”

  “You blew out something, your knee if I remember correctly.”

  “Shoulder.” A. C. squeezed his left shoulder and stared at Corin. “It never healed right and I couldn’t hit like I used to. Cortisone shots, physical therapy, three operations. Nothing helped. I couldn’t get used to the pain shooting through my shoulder every time I crunched a running back. I missed my window.” He pushed on his shoulder with his fingers and gave tiny shakes of his head.

  Where was A. C. going with this? That’s why A. C. was freaked out? Because he got some spiritual buzz? Because his brain played a few tricks on him while he sat in the chair? Corin opened the blinds and let the October sun stream in and light up the dust particles swirling through air. “I need to change the air filter again.”

  “Listen to me, Cor.”

  He turned toward A. C., then back to the blinds. “I’m listening.”

  “No, look at me.”

  Corin faced him and gazed into eyes more intense than he’d ever seen in A. C.

  “In all the years I’ve worked concrete or helped you haul furniture back and forth, I’ve never lifted anything without a dull ache reminding me of that shoulder injury.”

  Corin sat and took a drink of his coffee as he realized what his friend was about to tell him. Tesser’s words reverberated in his mind: “Healing power.”

  A. C. stood and grabbed a Sheraton Revival mahogany coffee table with his left hand and hoisted it over his head. “No ache.”

  Corin stared at his friend.

  A. C. set the table down and grasped his shoulder again. “I went to the gym this morning and benched 350 pounds. No pain, not even a shadow.”

  “You’re telling me—”

  “It’s healed.”

  “You’re serious.”

  “You’ve got something in your house,” A. C. jerked his thumb to the north, “that’s out of control.”

  Heat surged through Corin’s body. It worked; it had healed again.

  And this time it wasn’t some kid he didn’t know.

  He needed to find Nicole. He needed answers. And he needed them now.

  CHAPTER 29

  Corin sent Nicole three e-mail messages before he closed the store and another just before leaving to meet Tori for dinner at Dale Street Bistro Café.

  No response to the first three. Probably not to the fourth either. On the way he called Tesser.

  “It healed your friend?” Tesser’s breathing quickened through the phone. “Are you sure?”

  “If A. C. says his shoulder is healed, it’s healed.”

  Tesser let out a long, low whistle. “You need to get that chair in a safe spot.” Tesser coughed. “You should bring it to my house.”

  “Don’t worry, it’s safe.

  “Good, good.”

  “What do I do now?”

  Corin could hear Tesser clicking his pen like a metronome set on high speed. “You should contact the lady.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “I’m headed out of town for a few days, but we need to meet again as soon as I’m back.”

  “Agreed.”

  “And, Corin?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Trust no one. I mean that.”

  Corin hung up and weaved through traffic as the image of his brother kept pounding through his brain. A chair of healing. Since it had healed A. C., it could heal Shasta. Couldn’t it? But the chair didn’t heal A. C. of public speaking; it chose to heal something else. The thing seemed to have written its own agenda. It wasn’t a comforting thought because that agenda might contain items he would want sent to the paper shredder.

  TORI WAS ALREADY seated at a table when he arrived. “Don’t worry, you’re not late. I was early.”

  Corin sat and pulled his napkin off the table. “How were your classes today?”

  “Same as always.”

  “You’re bored?”

  “A little. The gold is wearing off this adventure a little bit.”

  “Then come join mine. It’s getting more intense every day.”

  “No thanks.” Her eyes told him she knew exactly what adventure he was talking about and she didn’t want any part of it.

  After their waitress came and took their order, Corin said, “I think there’s something to this chair thing, Tori.”

  “What makes you say that?” She slumped back in her seat.

  “A. C.”

  “What, he got healed or something?”

  Corin nodded.

  “Come on, you’re not serious.” She shoved her knife toward him and scowled.

  “He walked into the store this morning and laid the whole thing out. He sits in the chair, starts feeling all warm and fuzzy. A few hours later the pain in his shoulder from an old football injury? Claims it’s gone.”

  “And you believe him?”

  “He lifted a hundred pound coffee table over his head with his bad shoulder, no pain.”

  “And you believe he did it without hurting?”

  “He’s lying to me?”

  “No, I think he’s convinced himself the pain doesn’t exist.” Tori tore off a piece of sourdough bread from the loaf in the middle of the table and dipped it in a mixture of oil and balsamic vinegar. “What was it you told me about A. C.’s wife? That she was dead set against him doing UFC because of his old shoulder injury?”

  “So?”

  “So? So?” Tori smirked. “Haven’t you heard of cortisone? He tells his wife about his best friend’s magical chair, then a few days later gets a cortisone shot in his shoulder, then goes home and shows his wife how he’s been healed so now he can fight.”

  “Why would he lie to me?”

  “A secret is kept by one.”

  “A. C. wouldn’t lie to me.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What about Tesser and his verification of a legendary chair being passed down since the time of Christ?”

  “Who is Tesser?”

  Right. He hadn’t told her. Corin explained who Tesser was and what he’d revealed about the chair. “There’s enough evidence piling up here that I have to be open to it being real. First the kid with the asthma, now A. C. I’m supposed to ignore that?”

  The waitress brought their order and they ate in silence. Tori would fight him all the way on this thing and he still didn’t know why. Sure, she decided to leave the church because she was tired of Christians being hypocrites. But there had to be more to it than that. She wasn’t indifferent. Under the surface she was hostile. What happened to her?

  He stabbed a baby red potato with the tip of his steak knife. “If this chair contains genuine healing power, then it’s hard not to conclude God is real.”

  Tori averted her eyes and sliced off another piece of her halibut. “Can we for once talk about something other than that chair of yours?” She dropped her fork and it clanged against her plate. “I have to use the restroom. When I get back I’m sure we’re going to talk about something else.”

  So be it. It wasn’t his goal to tear off whatever scab covered her abhorrence of God, but at some point the time would be right. If he was going to have a future with Tori, he needed to know what it was.

  After Tori returned, her usual brightness had reemerged, and she smiled at him, any hint of animosity had vanished. “Let’s talk about this professor of yours. You’ve never told me about him.”

  “I haven’t seen him for eons.”

  “He had a major impact on
you.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I can see it here when you talk about him.” Tori reached across the table and wiggled her finger in front of his eyes. “Admiration. Respect. Fondness.”

  “Yeah, I liked the guy. Still like him.”

  “I think it’s deeper than that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I’m using my college degree at the moment.”

  “Psychology.”

  “You had dad issues, didn’t you?” She winked at him.

  “What?”

  “You know, dad issues. He wasn’t there or was there and was always drunk or didn’t pay attention to you or beat you up verbally or physically.”

  Corin shook his head.

  “Every man has dad issues.” Tori took a long drink of her water.

  “I didn’t have a father for very long. He died when I was twelve.” Corin offered a weak grin. “So no issues here.”

  “Classic!” Tori smacked the table with both hands. “You have the ol’ didn’t-have-a-dad-as-a-teenager-on-up syndrome so you looked for father figures most of your life, and none of them could measure up to your romanticized fueled-by-the-movies image of what a father would be . . . until you met Tesser. And since you were mature enough by that point to realize no man could be the perfect father, Tesser became the dad you always wanted even with his faults, and you and he lived happily ever after.”

  “Do you enjoy psychoanalyzing people?”

  “Thoroughly.”

  “Fun hobby.” Corin finished his steak and pushed his plate back.

  “Am I right? Did you look for father figures?”

  She was dead right. Tesser was the closest thing he’d had to a dad, and he’d be loyal to the old professor forever because of it.

  “We only spent five or six years really hanging out, but yeah, it was good.”

  “During and after college?”

  Corin nodded.

  “Why’d it stop? What happened?”

  “Nothing happened. We saw each other three or four times a year after I graduated, but then I stopped calling as much or he did, and we gradually wound up just talking on the phone every few years. Then it sort of trailed off.”