“Mom?”
“First you align the pages. It’s got to be perfect. Perfect! Straight and even like it’s a block of wood. Then you lock it into place. Got it?”
“Mom? What are you talking about?” I looked to the guards for clues, but they offered none. They just stared at my mother, ready to intervene should she make some unwanted, sudden move.
“Like this,” she said, and she tried to raise her hands. They were open, her fingers arched like she was holding a basketball, but they were empty. Before she could get them to shoulder level, however, the chain reached its end length, and her hands snapped back into place on the table. The guards didn’t move.
“I’m sorry, Mom. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Once you get it locked, that’s when you scrape the edges. That’s when you make your cuts. Every quarter inch. Got me?”
I didn’t say anything. I knew she wasn’t speaking to me. She was speaking to someone else, someone only she could see.
“Then you glue. Just a thin layer. Don’t goop it in, and you got maybe thirty seconds tops to bind the twine. Thirty seconds. That’s all. You understand?”
It was then that it hit me—she was describing how to bind a book. We’d learned together when I was about ten or eleven years old. I’d written a book, or at least tried to, an eighty- or ninety-page monstrosity about werewolves and gold and a young boy who would save the world and all the things a prepubescent boy can think of. After reading it, my mother decided it needed to be published, sent off to family members along with our Christmas cards, and I, desperate for attention and praise and to be told what I did mattered, wholeheartedly agreed, and so we taught ourselves how to bind books. It wasn’t as easy as we thought it would be. The equipment we found was all way too expensive, and so we had to build our own press from scratch. We bought lumber from Ace Hardware and borrowed my father’s electric drill and saw. We put on goggles and measured and measured and then cut, our hands shaking from the vibration of the table saw. We cut four boards big enough to make a breadbox, sanded them down, and then drilled them together. The top was open, and we mounted an adjustable clamp. But it wasn’t easy. We cut the boards too short and had to start over. We drilled our holes too deep, splitting the wood. The slide on the clamp was uneven, and we couldn’t get it to remain parallel. Finally, after several days of work, we had a usable press, but it came at a cost: cut fingers and a box of Band-Aids and two tubes of A&D Ointment, Tylenol and callouses and nails pulled back away from our skin. We were bruised and hurt and sore, but we did it. Eventually, we were able to start on what we aimed to do, bind a book I had written. This was what Mom was reliving, the sight of me somehow rekindling this moment as if I were a kid again, and she was hot and tired and aggravated.
“That’s too much! Too much! What did I say? Just a little bit of glue! Jesus Christ. Now we have to start over.”
“Mom, listen to me. We’re not binding books. Do you know where you’re at?”
“Just let me do it. Here. Give it to me.”
Mom tried to stand. She leaned forward and reached her hands up, but the guards behind her grabbed her by her shoulder and shoved her hard back down into her seat. It scared me a bit, and I jumped. Mom blinked up at them and then returned to me.
“Fine. You do it. But do it right.”
It was hard seeing her like this. She didn’t even look like the same person anymore. She was a crazy, psychotic shell of her former self, her mind eaten away by solitude and lack of empathy. I wanted nothing more than to reach out and hold her, tell her everything would be all right; I was there. I would be back every day if I could, until the end; I would be there, and I would never, ever give up on her.
“You always mess everything up,” she said. “You always have to ruin everything.”
Instead, though, I didn’t say a word.
I VISITED HER EVERY WEEK after that. There were some good days, though most were bad. She oftentimes didn’t recognize me. Sometimes she mistook me for Jonah or sometimes my father. She’d reach for my hand during those times, or ask to kiss me, and she’d rise up and the guards would push her back down, tell her, “No touching, inmate. No touching.” This, I think, was the hardest. She seemed so hurt when she was rebuked, unable to hold or be held by the man she loved and missed and whom she’d hurt. When I didn’t go to her, she often cried. Her sobs violent, her chest heaving, her back arching, and she’d wail and plead, please, please, please God just let him stay, let him stay, let him stay, but I couldn’t. The guards would usher me out of the room, and she’d be dragged down the hallway in chains to be locked away in solitary confinement and medicated until all she did was drool on herself.
Other times she’d relive watching my brother wrestle at regionals in middle school, and she’d cheer him on and ask me if I saw that single leg or half nelson and she’d beam like a proud mother and chant his name as if watching him take home the championship. When she was happy like this, I couldn’t help but partake in her delusion, cheering alongside her, wishing Jonah the best as he squared off against some imaginary wrestler in Mom’s memory. We’d clap and whistle and the guards would roll their eyes, but I didn’t care. If she could be happy, if only for a moment, then so be it.
Notably absent were flashbacks to when we’d been part of the church, what had happened that caused her to be incarcerated and facing her imminent execution. She didn’t relive sermons or preach about the Seven Seals or the coming apocalypse or speak in tongues. She didn’t relive moments telling my younger self I’d one day usher in the end of the world and save mankind. When I tried to broach the subject, if she remembered the worship hall, Sam, Scoot, the raid, any of it, turning the gun on so many people, she’d shake her head like she was trying to jar loose a memory, and then she’d change the subject, ask me about work or Atchley or if that cute weatherman was still on the news, the one with the hair and the eyes and the broad, broad shoulders. I supposed even when suffering from mental illness, her mind subconsciously repressed these memories, them being too painful to face. When I tried to talk about her case, she changed the subject, even going so far as defending her sentence and impending death, justifying her decision to end the appeals process.
“My attorneys are incompetent,” Mom said. “All they would have done was stall the inevitable. Cost the taxpayers more money. Stealing from the survivors any notion of closure. Making everyone rehash what happened, analyze it, cast blame and guilt and all that nonsense. It’s just better this way.”
“But there’s still a chance, isn’t there? I mean, there is religious freedom in this country. There was no notion of mens rea. No premeditation. You believed you were doing good. They all thought they were going to die. They knew what was going to happen. That has to mean something, right? It can’t be a capital offense for second-degree murder, can it?”
“It’s a black eye on the community. People need someone to blame. And I’m to blame. Sixteen people died. And they want retribution. An eye for an eye. Can’t blame them for that.”
“But the rule of law. That’s not how the law is written.”
“Doesn’t matter. The judge writes the law. The court of public opinion. And they’ve ruled.”
“But there’s still the Federal Court of Appeals. The State Supreme Court. Hell, even the US Supreme Court. You still have options.”
“That’s enough, Caleb.”
“Do you want to die? Is that it? Do you think there’s some sort of bravery in that? Some sort of atonement?”
“It just is what it is.”
“It is what it is?”
“It is what it is.”
“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, Mom.”
“Maybe so, but it’s my choice.”
“And it’s a selfish one.”
“Selfish?”
“Yes. Selfish. Haven’t you thought what your death will mean to people? Haven’t you thought of the consequences?”
“You mean
for you?”
“Yes, for me.”
“Yes.” she said. “Yes, of course. How could I not?”
Mom made a clicking noise like she was trying to alleviate an itch in the back of her throat. While in prison, she accumulated habits she hadn’t had before. She sniffed constantly, like she suffered from terrible allergies or maybe had a coke problem. When she spoke, she upturned her lip as if snarling. She curled her wrists, perhaps the result of constantly being handcuffed, when chaperoned to breakfast, back to her cell, to the infirmary for her annual health checks. She was as hardened and resolute and stubborn as she’d always been, but now instead of the underlying assumption that she was right, now she just seemed a delusional old fool, too set in her ways to admit she may have done some things wrong along the way.
“It doesn’t seem right,” I said. “To just give up like this. What happened to fight-or-flight? Why don’t you want to save your life?”
“What kind of life would I be saving?” she asked. “You think they would ever let me out of here?”
No, they wouldn’t. She’d be a lifer. Sooner or later, she’d die in prison. They’d more than likely keep her away from the general population, forcing her to spend most of her days in solitary confinement. They’d justify it as a means of protection, claiming the other inmates would shank her if they got a chance—too many people were affected by her crimes. An aunt or maybe a sister of one of the victims would find her in the shower, stick a toothbrush laced with a razor up underneath her ribcage, pack her mouth with a sock to keep her quiet as she bled out. Maybe they’d be right, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t get some twisted satisfaction out of it, watching her mind slowly deteriorate from the lack of any human connection, from any comforting touch or a nice word from a friend.
“It’s okay,” she said. “It is. I’ve made my peace with it. I’m ready to die.”
“But I’m not ready, Mom. I’m not. You understand? I still need you.”
“Oh, honey,” she said. “Oh baby, oh sweetie, oh child. You don’t.”
Her last meal consisted of a sirloin steak cooked well, roasted potatoes, a cup of coffee, and a slice of key lime pie. The warden allowed me to eat with her, and it was the only time I saw her without her shackles. She seemed in good spirits despite the circumstances, chewing her food with gusto, savoring the flavors before swallowing. She talked quickly, food stuffed into her cheeks as we discussed various things, small talk about the weather and an unseasonal tornado that had touched down and killed eight people a few weeks before.
“A tornado,” she said. “In November. Have you ever heard of such a thing?”
“It’s strange,” I said. “The news said it was the first time it had happened in over a hundred years.”
“It’s a sign,” Mom said. “God’s angry. He’s angry, and he’s punishing the people of this state.”
It was difficult for me to consider that this would be the last time I’d ever speak with my mother. The thought was more abstract to me, like rocket propulsion or Descartes’ demons. I knew the end was imminent, but there wasn’t something to really mark the somberness of the situation. It was as if I expected the weather to turn severe, a thunderstorm to approach or perhaps an ice storm, for me to hear the crack of thunder or hail pounding the roof, but there wasn’t. It was just me and Mom in a quiet, fluorescent-lit room, a guard on either side of her like always, like it had been for the weeks I’d been coming to see her. It was almost an affront in a way, the only marker for the act of my mother’s death a piece of overcooked steak and coffee so weak I could see the bottom of the cup.
“You really think it’s a sign, Mom?”
“You don’t?”
“It just seems like a freak occurrence. That’s all. A once-in-a-generation-type storm.”
She peered at me with incredulity. “You really believe in coincidence? I thought I raised you better than that.”
“Doesn’t it seem more likely?”
She took a bite of steak and chewed the tough meat. It was difficult to swallow, and she washed it down with her now-cold coffee. “Let me tell you something,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of time in here. A lot of time. And I’ve read, and I’ve thought, and I’ve come to some conclusions. I’ve read some of them science books that a lot of people claim disprove God. You ever hear about this quantum theory they got? Well, basically, we’re all made up of these tiny, miniscule little atoms. Electrons and quarks and bosons and whatnot. I’m sure you’ve heard of this. And these things, they act in very strange ways. They appear to be in two different places at once. They seem to travel through every conceivable path. They disappear and reappear without warning, and they measure this phenomenon by what’s called a probability wave. They can only know with certainty a single attribute of a quantum element. They can know its direction, say, but not its velocity. They can know its location but not its spin. You understand? They act in very bizarre ways; however, if you pinpoint one. If you look at just one little electron or one little boson, the probability wave collapses, and the electron is located in the most probable location in space-time, which just happens to be where we’re observing. So, logically speaking, since we’re all made of these quantum elements, we’re all just in the most probable location. I’m in jail because it is the most probable location for me. You’re here visiting me because it is the most probable location for you. That tornado hit and killed all them people because it was the most probable location for it. And if everything is in its most probable state, doesn’t that probability insinuate premeditation? Does it not imply some sort of plan? Could that not be God? Could that not be his divine plan in action?”
I had to admit, it could be. On some level, she made sense, and it very well could have been God’s plan. But I couldn’t bring myself to say that out loud. I couldn’t bring myself to consider she could be right, that she would ever be right again.
“I’m telling you, son. You might look out in the world and just see all this craziness. It may appear to be coincidence or accident or dumb luck or chance, but none of that really exists. It’s an illusion. It’s a smokescreen, sweetie, put there in place to make you think you actually have control of your life. Free will? The greatest lie the devil ever told mankind. You only have one choice in this world. Do you love God or don’t you? The rest is just details.”
Mom stared at her plate. The potatoes were gone, and so was her coffee. Just a bite of steak remained, one piece of carved meat, resting in a pool of grease. She stared at it for a while like a person deciding if she was too full to continue, but really, I think she was just stalling. Despite her tough talk, her certainty, she was racked with fear and doubt. She was about to die and pass on to the other side. She’d know soon enough if she’d been right or not, and there wasn’t any recourse either way. She was to the point of judgment, or nothingness, and both were frightening propositions.
“It’s time, Evelyn,” the guard said. “It’s time to go.”
Mom stood, and the guards shackled her and then escorted her out of the room. The whole time, Mom kept staring at me, unblinking, like she was trying to sear the image into her mind, and I was pleading with myself to say something, to reach out to her, to touch her one last time, tell her that I loved her and that I forgave her and that she was saved, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t bring myself to say anything. We both remained silent as she was escorted through the door, and it clicked shut behind her, locking in place.
The execution chamber was a small room with an examination table complete with leather straps to secure the condemned’s head, arms, and legs. A large window constituted one wall, and outside of it was the viewing gallery, filled with aluminum folding chairs. In the gallery were a few reporters, my mother’s attorney, the DA, the sheriff, a couple agents from the FBI, along with a handful of survivors. I recognized them from our time back in Grove, and they all leered at me as if they couldn’t believe I had the gall to show my face in public. But they restrained t
hemselves. I suppose watching the leader die was retribution enough, and so they left me be. I took a seat near the back and off to the side, close to the exit. I was surprised Sam hadn’t shown, or maybe I wasn’t. He was given five years for his role in the incident, having been given a deal by the DA since he testified against Mom. After his release, I’d heard he’d moved north and was still preaching up in Kansas. He’d always been a self-proclaimed pilgrim of God, and so when the dust settled, he’d moved on and wasn’t about to return for any reason whatsoever, even if it was to say goodbye to his protégé, to take any sort of responsibility for his role in what had occurred. I suppose his lack of courage shouldn’t have surprised me, but still it did, nagging at me like an upturned toenail, shooting pain with every step taken.
Guards escorted Mom into the chamber, and she kept her head down as they led her toward the examination table. A judge in a suit entered the room and read aloud her sentence.
“Evelyn June Gunter, for sixteen counts of murder, you have been sentenced by a jury of your peers to death. Do you have any last words?”
Mom shook her head no.
The guards unshackled Mom, had her lie upon the table, and then strapped her secure. A doctor entered, the executioner, a small case in hand, a stethoscope dangling from his neck. He laid his case down on a table next to my mother, and from it he readied three syringes. The first, I knew, was to paralyze my mother. The second was to render her unconscious. The third was to stop her heart. The doctor injected each methodically, stopping after each one to wait the prescribed two minutes before moving onto the next. Mom kept her eyes wide for as long as she could, refusing to blink, I suppose trying to bear witness to the world for as long as she could, hoping that if there was an afterlife like she believed, she’d be able to take with her as much of this life as she possibly could. I couldn’t blame her for this impulse. No matter how resolute our faith, no matter if we’ve made peace with our creator, the moment of death is a terrifying prospect, because regardless of belief, there will exist a twinge of doubt, eating at you until the very last moment, nagging at you that you might be wrong.
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