Into Captivity They Will Go

by Milligan, Noah;

  A knock came at their door. Caleb’s mom jumped, eyes turned metal. She’d been nervous since arriving at the community a week before. The community had been welcoming and gracious, but she feared Caleb’s father would track them down, get the law involved, force her to return with him where Caleb would be subjected to his blasphemous ways. Caleb feared this, too. He still loved his father and his brother, but he understood they were lost now, pawns under the will of the Antichrist whether they realized it or not, and there was nothing Caleb could do to save them.

  “You know who that is?” his mom whispered.

  “No,” Caleb said so softly he couldn’t even hear it.

  Another knock.

  Caleb’s mother went to the door. It didn’t have a peephole, so she couldn’t see who was on the other side. Caleb couldn’t help but think it might be his father and brother. He imagined that after he and his mother had left, his father hired a private investigator to find them. Caleb had no idea how the PI could’ve tracked them down. They paid cash wherever they went. All the utilities and phone and everything were in Sam’s name, not his mother’s. He hadn’t enrolled in school. Like his mother had said, they were living off the grid, but Caleb still worried, and he hoped. He hoped even though he knew he shouldn’t, but he still desperately wanted it to be them, standing there on the doorstep, realizing they’d forsworn God and pleading for forgiveness, but it wasn’t. Standing on the other side of the screen was a young couple, two kids in tow. The man held a hat in front of him. It was new looking, emblazoned on the front with the University of Oklahoma’s familiar logo. The woman held a pan wrapped in a tea towel. It had a plastic cover, and Caleb couldn’t tell what was inside. All he knew was that it was warm, and his mouth filled with saliva. The two kids hung back. They were younger than Caleb, maybe four or five years old. They looked to be twins, and they busied themselves with a couple of rocks they found at their feet.

  “We hope we aren’t intruding,” the man said after an uncomfortable silence. He had a slender build, but he looked strong. Big hands, tan despite the weather just now turning warm, fingernails lined with dirt.

  Caleb’s mom didn’t say anything.

  “We’ve meant to come sooner,” the man said, scratching his head. “Well, Pat and I saw you at church the other day, and we thought it was just the Christianly thing to do.”

  Pat, presumably the man’s wife, held up the pan for Caleb’s mom to take, which she did almost as if by instinct.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Would you like to come in?”

  Both the man and his wife smiled, corralled the two kids with a touch on their shoulders, and headed inside. Caleb’s mom put the dish on the makeshift table. It was a casserole. Noodles, hamburger, onions, green pepper, and it smelled delicious. It smelled as good as a miracle, and even though it was breakfast time, his mother grabbed plastic forks and paper plates and made a plate for everyone. Caleb dug in. It was the first really good meal he’d had in weeks, and he devoured it.

  The man’s name was Frank Goldsby. He’d been a banker in another life, living in Oklahoma City with his wife, Pat, who’d been in medical billing.

  “But the world just seemed so empty, you know?” he said, taking a sip from his coffee—black, as there was no sugar or cream to offer him. “There was just this feeling. It’s hard to explain. We had good jobs, and the kids were healthy. Doing all right in school, but there was just something missing. It’s like when you were a kid and the teachers kept telling you not to stare at the sun, but you did anyway and when you looked back at the world there was this black hole where the sun had once been. That’s how we lived. There was just this black hole in the middle of everything, sucking up all the joy and happiness until we just felt numb. Does that make sense?”

  “Yes,” Caleb’s mother said.

  “We sold everything,” Pat said, laughing. “The house. My car. All of our stuff. Our books and TVs, most of our clothes. It was a crazy thing to do. Quit our jobs. Pulled Devon and Luke out of school.” The kids were playing on the floor. They didn’t have any toys, so they’d brought the rocks inside with them, pretending they were cars, smashing them into one another and making explosion noises when they collided. “Then we just hit the road.”

  “Bounced around a few places,” Frank said. “Kansas City. Omaha. Chicago.”

  “Never found anything that stuck, though,” Pat said. “It was the same everywhere. Same people. Same problems. Same monotonous life. Everything was rushed. Everything in motion. Work never done. Anxieties never quelled. The whole world stunk of desperation and despair. There was no joy in anything.”

  “So, we decided to come back. When I was a kid, my family used to go to Grand Lake in the summers. We’d rent a boat and a cabin and have a long weekend fishing and tubing. It was the last time I ever remembered being carefree.”

  “I took a job at a marina,” Pat said. “Didn’t pay much, but we had enough in savings to last us. I filled up boats with gas and sold beer and ice. It wasn’t a bad job, but there was still something missing.”

  “That’s when we met Sam.”

  “Yes. Sam. He took us into his home, and he taught us how to love. He taught us about God.”

  “Sam tells us he knew you as a kid,” Frank said.

  “Yes, he did,” Caleb’s mother said. “He was friends with my stepfather.”

  “William, yes,” Pat said. “He’s told us a lot about William. He saved Sam’s life.”

  “You know about Papa?” Caleb asked.

  Pat smiled. She had eyes like emeralds. “Of course. He told us about you, too.”

  “What did he say about me?”

  Pat smiled at Caleb, and Frank took the last bite of his casserole, his plate and coffee cup empty in front of him.

  “That was delicious, Pat,” Frank said.

  “Yes,” Caleb’s mother agreed. “Delicious.”

  “Well, we’ll leave you to your day. Again, welcome to the neighborhood.”

  “If you two need anything, anything at all,” Pat said. “Don’t hesitate.”

  Pat grabbed one of the twins, Frank the other. They bid Caleb and his mother goodbye, promised they’d be by again soon, and then they were gone just as quickly as they’d arrived.

  CALEB FOUND A HOME IN the community. If a family had an extra loaf of cornbread, they shared it with their neighbor. If they noticed a stranded motorist, they stopped to give her a ride into town, or offered to change a flat tire, or even helped push a stuck sedan out of the mud. They were gracious and grateful, quick to give thanks for what they did have, even quicker to lend a helping hand to a stranger in need. Caleb found this heartening. Despite his mother’s dire warnings of the end of the world, he found hope in this congregation—there were still good people out there, leading good lives, and he was lucky enough to be among them.

  Sam owned the land and worked at the retirement home and led the church. He spoke softly and touched his listener when he did, a reassuring hand on a shoulder or a knee, his voice the sound of warm fudge melting over ice cream. He had the habit of eating sunflower seeds, and often Caleb could hear the crack of the shell, followed by a satisfying spit. When Caleb was in his presence, he felt at ease, welcomed, appreciated for all his virtues, forgiven for all his faults. It was something Caleb had never felt before—complete acceptance—and he couldn’t help but smile until his cheeks hurt.

  Weeks passed, and Caleb and his mother continued to attend Sunday service. Each time, Caleb spoke in tongues, and the congregation grew riled and energetic. They’d lift him up on their shoulders and carry him around the tent, each of them reaching their hands out toward him, and Sam and his mother would look on proudly, and Caleb felt so strong, so good, so big, filled up like a balloon ready to take flight. Soon, Caleb garnered attention. The congregation smiled when they saw him and shook his hand and asked how he was doing. After service, Sam often retired to his home, opting for the cool of a window air conditioning unit instead of convening
with the families for lunch and juice. No one seemed to mind Sam’s reclusiveness—it was something accepted and understood, and so Caleb and his mother didn’t question it. He was, after all, the pastor. One morning after service, though, Sam didn’t automatically retire, instead sticking around to ask after sick relatives and growing nephews, and it was while Caleb was drinking an ice-cold Coca-Cola that Sam first approached him, a packet of David sunflower seeds outstretched.

  “Want some?” he asked.

  Caleb thanked him and chucked a handful into his mouth. The salt soon dried out his cheeks and tongue.

  “I’ve always thought sunflower seeds a superior snack,” Sam said. “Don’t have the fat of potato chips. Don’t have the sugar of cookies. They’re good for your heart. Doctor says I need to cut down on my sodium intake, but they’re just so the salt of the earth. Know what I mean?”

  Caleb nodded even though he hadn’t any idea.

  “I’ve always wanted to roast my own. Plant a field full of sunflowers and harvest them. I could sell them at football games and such. Give them out before service. I daydream about it. Being out in the field. I have this fantasy where a group of people are out there. Families. Great-grandparents and grandparents and moms and dads and brothers and sisters and babies. A whole legion of people. They’re lost and confused and hungry. And so I feed them. I feed them the salt of the earth and then they lay down their things and take root right then and there. And it’s like they sprout. They sprout and they grow and it’s like I can watch them thrive as I nurture them. I am the nurturer of lost souls. You understand?”

  Caleb did. It made sense. It wasn’t so much the words Sam said, but how he said them. The way he made Caleb fill up with warmth and dirt and kind thoughts.

  “Your mom still here?” He looked around the gathering.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “She tells me your father is out of the picture. Is that so?”

  Caleb didn’t respond.

  “No reason to be embarrassed, son,” he said. “Speak.”

  “We don’t live with them anymore. My father and my brother.”

  “You still talk to them?”

  “No, sir. We’re separated.”

  “Separated, huh?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That’s a funny way of putting it, isn’t it?”

  “I’m sorry, sir?”

  “Separated. It’s like there was some sort of inhuman fissure that broke your family apart. Something no one had control of. Not your mom. Not your dad. Not you or your brother.”

  “I suppose that’s right.”

  “Is it?”

  Caleb didn’t say anything, tried not to have any reaction at all.

  “They believe in God?” Sam asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “They belong to a church?”

  “Yes, sir. First Baptist in Bartlesville. At least they did.”

  “You don’t know now?”

  “No, sir.”

  He nodded as if he had thought as much.

  “We don’t seem to fit in most places,” Caleb said, thinking back to when they’d been exiled from First Baptist. “My mother, actually. They asked us not to come back. Said we caused problems.”

  “I hear that more than you would believe,” he said. “It’s a shame every time I do.”

  “But we like it here. My mom and me.”

  “We like having you.”

  Sam spat and palmed another handful of sunflower seeds. On his teeth were the dark remnants of shells.

  “I’ve been watching you,” Sam said. “You have a way about you. It’s hard to put my finger on it.”

  Caleb smiled.

  “It’s something special, I think. An old soul. Natural leader. I believe God has something very special in store for you.”

  “You think?”

  He shrugged. “I do.”

  “My mom thinks so, too.”

  “Is that right?” Sam asked, now peering over Caleb’s head at his mother. “You know, she’s told me an awful lot about you. So did your Papa.”

  Caleb didn’t say anything, his mother’s warnings coming back to him not to say too much, that the devil could send demons to hunt them. He trusted Sam, he did, but he also couldn’t trust himself sometimes. His mother had always told him he too often wanted people to be good, to be faithful, to be loving and warm and trustworthy, but oftentimes that wasn’t the case. In reality, most people would leave him to die rather than raise a helping hand.

  “She tells me you’re special. She tells me you have a very important task ahead of you.”

  Caleb’s stomach turned, and his chest constricted. He found it hard to breathe, and Sam leaned in close.

  “Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me.”

  Caleb’s mother approached, and she had an eager look about her, wide eyes bouncing from Sam to Caleb.

  “And what are you two talking about?” she asked. She smiled a smile Caleb had never seen on her before. Used to, when they’d be at church in Bartlesville, his mom would smile, but it was a practiced smile. It was a smile full of pretense—like she was merely revealing her teeth rather than showing genuine warmth to her fellow congregants. This, however, was different. She glowed like a lightning bug. The act itself seemed spontaneous, the result of a subconscious yearning she couldn’t—even if she wanted to—help.

  “Caleb tells me you think him special.”

  “Of course,” she said, wrapping her arm around Caleb’s shoulders. She pulled him in tight, so tight it almost hurt. “He’s my son.”

  “I think you’re right. You have a magnificent child here in Caleb. I’ve been watching him during our sermons. He’s wondrous. Enrapturing even. Spellbinding. Truly. You must be so proud.”

  “He’s my golden child.”

  “I can tell,” Sam said. “Tell me, Caleb, what do you think about what your mother has told you?”

  Caleb turned to his mother, expecting her to have a pensive look, casting a warning glance over the rim of her glasses, but she didn’t. Instead, she looked expectant, prodding him on.

  “I don’t know.”

  “It’s okay, Caleb. You’re among friends. Tell me why you think you’re here.”

  “We’re waiting for something.”

  “Good. What are you waiting for?”

  “The end of the world?” Caleb didn’t mean for it to sound so much like a question, but it did, his voice wavering and inflecting up as if in doubt.

  Sam smiled, and he nodded, pleased and resolute. He paused for a moment and then quoted from Revelation, “I was on the island of Patmos, exiled there for preaching the Word of God, and for telling what I knew about Jesus Christ. It was the Lord’s Day and I was worshiping when suddenly I heard a loud voice behind me, a voice that sounded like a trumpet blast saying ‘I am A and Z, the First and Last’ and then I heard him say ‘Write down everything you see and send your letter to the seven churches in Turkey: to the church in Ephesus, the one in Smyrna, and those in Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.’ When I turned to see who was speaking, there behind me were seven candlesticks of gold. And standing among them was one who looked like Jesus who called himself the Son of Man, wearing a long robe circled with a golden band across his chest. His hair was white as wool or snow, and his eyes penetrated like flames of fire. His feet gleamed like burnished bronze, and his voice thundered like waves against the shore. He held seven stars in his right hand and a sharp, double-bladed sword in his mouth, and his face shone like the power of the sun in unclouded brilliance. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead; but he laid his right hand on me and said, ‘Don’t be afraid. Though I am the First and Last, the Living One who died, who is now alive forevermore, who has the keys of hell and death—don’t be afraid.’”

  Sam cracked a sunflower shell in his teeth and spit out the remnants. Behind him, a few children erupted into laughter, running around in a game of frenzied tag, their parents looking on, sipping from p
lastic cups, their faces pink from the sun. They all looked so happy. Caleb felt himself embracing it, his whole body wrapped up in the warmest of blankets and the softest of pillows, the whole place enveloping him in rapturous joy.

  “You are the First and the Last, Caleb,” Sam continued. “And for the first time in a long time, I’m no longer afraid.”

  CHAPTER 4

  CALEB SPENT MOST OF HIS TIME WITH SCOOT, Brandon, and Catherine. They fished and swam and played The Legend of Zelda at their place. Their parents, Buster and Ruth, would make them pizza rolls and Sunny D and tell them about the time Buster had raced cars back in the seventies all through Alabama and Georgia and Arkansas, winning enough cash for gas and beer money to make it to the next race. Ruth showed them how to spot the constellations in the night sky, Orion and the Big Dipper and the signs of the zodiac, and told them how people long ago used the constellations as their calendars so that they knew when to plant crops and to harvest them, even used them as navigation tools when they ventured far from home.

  “You see that there,” she said, “that’s Virgo.” She pointed it out with her fingers, tracing the stars in the shape of a woman extending her hand as if reaching for God himself. “A lot of people think it’s just a woman holding a spike of grain, but I don’t think so.”

  “It’s the Virgin Mary,” Catherine said.

  They lay on their backs in the middle of the park, near a communal fire pit the congregation would gather around on the weekends. They’d grill cheeseburgers and drink iced tea. Some would play guitars and sing. Everyone would be there. Sam and the Goldsbys, Mr. and Mrs. Atler, Barbara Eggleston, and Peyton Wouk, all of them. They’d gather around and laugh and sing hymnals and pray. It was a party, really, something Caleb looked forward to every single week.

  “That’s right. And over there?” Ruth pointed a little to the left and down.

  “That’s Libra,” Scoot said. “The scales. Sins that must be paid for.”

  “Correct,” Ruth said.

  “How do you guys know all this stuff?” Caleb asked.