About Heavenly Delays

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It Didn’t Happen: A Novel

Chapter One: The Man Upstairs

            “They’re all waiting for me down there.”

            “Maybe it’s best to give it more time. You never said it would be first thing in the morning.”          

            “I know. One assumes.”

            “Sure. We all did.”

            A few more uncomfortable breaths. The converted barn that had been their home for the last six months was shrinking. There was an ominous cloud cover, probably something akin to the fog that hovered over the folks inside the Bastille or the Alamo, just before those places became more than just crappy old buildings.

            Something impending, pushing down and slowly making the air a little harder to breathe.

            But not the thing he predicted.

            Just as he was about to hazard another peek through the curtains, she put her arms around his waist, rubbing his stomach and offering a pensive kiss on his neck. She was just as concerned. Maybe even more so. “Have you heard a message? Anything would be helpful.”

            He almost pulled away in frustration, but thought better of it. He was beyond exhausted. It was supposed to be over, but there they were. He couldn’t run from the fortitude of her arms. They were holding him up, physically and spiritually. Holding him together with implacable love and faith. Perhaps, also, a helping of frustration.  

            “You know what’s funny?” he asked, tilting his head back take in more of her smell.

            “I’m surprised you’re finding anything funny just now.”

            “I’m hungry.”

            “Got to say, not the funniest thing I’ve ever heard.”

            “You know what I mean. Never expected to be hungry again. Thought that was a worry relegated to the dustbin.”

            “It’s still early,” she said, looking at her watch as an alternative to looking outside. It was becoming her only line of defense, and the more she said it, the more she could sense her own desperation coming to the fore.

            Down below, they could hear the door slowly opening and closing. The deliberate nature of the entry made it obvious who was coming.

            “Are you up here, Paulson? Lydia? Did you go in the Storm?”

            She could feel his shoulders slump. He patted her hands and freed himself from her grasp, turning to face the stairs that led up to the loft. “Still here, Chet.”

            “Are y’all decent?”

            “C’mon up, little brother.”

            Chet plodded up the stairs and into their living space. There was no door to the loft; hence Chet’s apprehension. He’d walked in on Lydia in a state of undress some months back. It scared her half dead and managed to add a new trauma to his already severely scarred psyche. “Boy, I don’t know,” Chet said, mumbling with his hands burrowed somewhere between his shirt and overalls. “The Storm not coming’s got most everyone nervous as all hell.”

            “It’s still early,” Lydia snapped. Chet’s face went flush and he closed his eyes, shaking his head. Paulson tried not to avoiding flashing a chastising look at his wife.    He walked over to his brother and rubbed his golden buzz cut, kissing the spot where hair would never again grow. “Everything’s going to be all right, buddy. I’ll go out and talk to them. Say something reassuring.”

            “Boy, I don’t know,” Chet whispered, tears in his eyes. He was still smarting from Lydia’s hot tone.

            “Hey, pal,” Paulson said, holding Chet’s head level with both his hands. “Give me a sit-rep. Cut the bullshit, yeah soldier?”

            “Okay.”

            “Davis and his family?”

            “Stirred up. Confused but not crazy. Probably need watching.”

            “What about Ida Jean?”

            “Didn’t get eyes on. Everyone else is out there, save her. Maybe in her cabin, or maybe the Storm took her.”

            Chet’s report was delivered evenly. Given a thing to do, he was his old sturdy self. The one that had followed Paulson to Afghanistan to fight for code and country.

            “What about Elson?”

            “Normal, I’d say. Smoking his pipe like always when I walked by just now. Muttering things. He’s hard to read on a normal day.”

            “I understand. How about the Hood’s?”

            ‘They didn’t look happy.”

            Paulson turned momentarily and sighed at Lydia, still holding his brother’s face. “Those two are some bitter pills.”

            “I know. But more than the usual.”

            “Thanks Chet,” Paulson said, offering another quick hug. “Proud of you. You’re a good man.”

            “What are you going to—”  

            “Go on down. Say I’ll be out there in a few. Don’t worry. Things are gonna be just fine, pal.”

            It was obvious that Chet wanted to throw out another Boy I don’t know, but one last look at Lydia had him scooting for the stairs, tongue on lockdown.

            Paulson walked over to the bed and grabbed a flannel shirt hanging off the footboard. Lydia was standing rigidly in the center of the room, hands atop her head, ready to burst. If her state of mind was any sort of barometer for what he was going to have to face, things weren’t looking good.

            As much as he wanted to fight it, he knew it was coming the second his left eye started to twitch. He snapped his shirt almost to the top and wrestled his feet inside his boots, desperate to avoid looking at his wife. When he collapsed onto his back, she almost didn’t notice. There wasn’t the usual violent crash associated with one of his spells. No knocked over lamps or cracked knees. Just a soft landing and a few muted convulsions underneath a light poof of dust.

            Paulson James. How are things in Crazytown, Texas?

            “Where are we?”

            Complicated question, but you know that. Anyway—where does it look like?

            “Looks like the mountains,” James chattered, feeling a chill on his arms, wondering if the place or the sensation was really real. As many times as this happened, it was always the first thing he thought. “What’s with the fishing poles?” he asked, teeth still clattering against each other.

            I thought you might want to catch something. It’s like spiritual virtual reality. Add something more physically interactive, I thought. Just an idea. You used to like a little angling, I was told. I could see. I can see, actually. Let’s not get bogged down in space and time.

            Paulson glanced at his interlocutor with a disdainful smirk before scanning his surroundings. His feet were dangling off an old wooden bridge. There were snowcapped peaks on either side. Underneath an icy stream rushed steady, singing out a consistent low note. “You told me today was the day, Levi. What are we doing here?” Paulson figured on seeing his Messenger again, but not like this. Somewhere in the great beyond, burdens gone. Maybe God at the end of the table, doing a toast only God could come up with. A few of the saints and martyrs, sharing war stories.

            Don’t let your line run too far out.

            “Levi? Seriously. And what’s with the accent?”

            Biloxi, Mississippi. 1930s. Figured I’d try it out. Sort of a redneck musicality to it.

            “So weird.”

            Why? Because of the face? I’ll have you know that this is a composite of fourteen different Japanese action stars. Whipped it up myself. All very handsome men.

            “Not saying otherwise.” Paulson rubbed his eyes with his free hand, feeling a headache coming on that was real in that world or any other.

            Look, there’s been a delay. This kind of stuff happens. Things you need to do yet.

            “Nobody’s going to listen to me back home. You can only predict the last day of the world once. People tend to lose faith after strike one.”

            Levi scratched his perfectly managed gray goatee and moved his pole around like a paintbrush, attempting to goad a fish toward the lure. He was dressed as he always was. A corduroy sport jacket and board shorts. On his feet he wore military combat boots with no socks and no laces. He was the homeless guy who all other homeless guys felt sorry for.

            You get more than one strike, Mr. James. Consult a history book. People have a capacity for gullibility that you fail to grasp.

            Paulson braced at the sound Levi using the word gullibility. It made him feel like the charlatan he promised his people he wasn’t—the nutjob he prayed he hadn’t become.

            You’re getting mad. Easy. Integral or expendable as you are, I still have a pretty big checkmark in the seniority column.

            “What am I supposed to do? Is it ever going to actually happen? What do I say to those people?”

            Levi threw his rod into the river and turned squarely to Paulson.

            Just once. Just once I’d like for you to consider my feelings.

            “I’m supposed to feel sorry for a Messenger of God? You have powers. You get to hang out in Heaven. All the secrets are at your fingertips.”

            I can see in your soul. We’ve been over this. It’s almost automatic, but it’s not an automatic blessing, if you can follow. Just now—I had a good look. Dark. You are a classic narcissist. Projection. Deflection. It’s dawning on me—kind of a jerk, Paulson.

            “I don’t even know if you have feelings to hurt.”

            See that right there. You think because we operate on separate metaphysical planes of existence, you get to treat me like the “other.”

            “Enough, Levi. Tell me what I’m supposed to do.”

            No idea.

            Paulson’s face remained unchanged. Like he was waiting for the actual answer.

            I’m serious. You have to go back. That’s all I was told. Probably some unfinished business you need tending. Or not. Could just be a scheduling thing.

            Paulson took a swing at Levi. He hadn’t made an aggressive move since coming home from the war. Now here he was, fishing in an ontologically iffy setting, having a go at a heavenly emissary.

            I’m gonna let you have that one.

            Levi had disappeared and then reformed on Paulson’s other side, quick as Biblical Mercury.

            You need to get your emotions in check.

            “Sorry.” The apology came quick and humble. Levi’s little show of otherworldly power wasn’t done as an idle boast. Crazy as the thrift store ambassador was, he was also packing serious fire and brimstone. “Please. Just give me something I can tell them.”

            We’re gonna let you work it out for the next little bit. It’ll be good for your character. Little advice. Get things on track with Lydia. Happy wife, happy life. Little simplistic, but can’t hurt.

            Levi smiled and lit up a cigarette. After an overemphasized drag, he blew the smoke straight up and gave his charge a playful look, slicking back his greasy black hair.

            Paulson hands went stiff, like a person’s hands just before they start strangling someone. He shook them out and did his best not to roll his eyes. “Okay. I just wish—”

            It was warm in his ear. He could feel his eye still twitching but couldn’t see anything. Not long and he realized Lydia was whispering something soothing to him as he struggled between states. He hated that she had to watch. No matter how many times she tried to reassure him, he imagined it was like viewing a bad actor being possessed in some movie about closet exorcisms.

            The eye went back to stasis. His vision corrected itself to seeing the here and now. “How long?” he asked, throat cracking dry.

            “Ten. Maybe twenty seconds. I barely had time to get over here.”

            “So weird.”

            His wife got off the bed and yanked him up to his sitting position. They’d gone through the routine enough times for her to be versed. She placed a hand on his crotch.

            “Damn.”

            “It’s okay,” she returned, getting up to fetch some fresh underwear. “What’d he say?”

            Paulson held out his hand for new pants. Debriefing was hard enough and being covered in piss was just a little too much. “It said that we’re going to be here a little longer. Said that everyone would understand.”

            Lydia answered by smacking her husband dead in the face with a weaponized pair of jeans.

            “Ouch.”

            “Sorry if I’m not your biggest fan at the moment. We could have a riot on our hands.”

            “It’ll—”

            “Had to scream bloody murder at your brother so he wouldn’t see you go wherever it is you go.”

            “I’m—”

            “And we get these little pieces. All that, and how many times have I really let you have it?”

            “Well—”

            “Paulson,” she said, squaring up next to the bed, arms crossed like a little drill instructor.

            “Not many,” he conceded, stepping up to put on his fresh jeans. Levi’s. It was a reminder that he couldn’t tell her everything. Those were the rules. Whatever was happening, there were rules. “Not many, babe. You’ve been strong for me. Stronger than me.” James wasn’t just telling her what she wanted to hear. It was the truth. They’d been a power couple, on the rise in Texas business and society. She’d clawed her way to prominence at a leading commercial real estate concern, managing to forge a path through an old boys club, dignity intact. He’d broken through as a motivational speaker, sought by everyone with enough money to pay for his time: high-end corporations to national high school football conferences to international sales conventions. He could work a room. Thousands would sit enthralled, listening to practical advice like it had come from a stone tablet. Now his audience was less than a hundred—they listened to spiritual advice more or less like it was what one did to better their day-to-day.

            Irony.

Chapter Two: Sentinels

            “Guess it didn’t quite work out how you wanted. That about sum it up?” Agent Jordy Phelps from the Bureau Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives hurled the  question skyward with his usual high-pitched, incendiary tone, sweating through the backside of his skin-tight Wranglers. “I mean—it’s getting damn near noon time. If I’m the Lord—Lord knows I’m not—but if I’m the Lord, I’m not waiting half the day to lift off my chosen people. Just don’t seem to compute.” Phelphs squinted at the cresting Texas sun, pulling the brim of his cowboy hat level with his overgrown black eyebrows. “You ever gonna get to talking? Hell, man. Ain’t part of you happy?”

            The subject of the agent’s criticism was a man in his fifties named Theodore. He was the one everybody at the ATF field office called “The Lookout.” The man sat or stood in a wooden tower near the gate to the compound, watching the road and the edge of the property. He never spoke, save one word: “Blessings.” Other than that, you weren’t getting anything out of old Theo. He was a sentinel. He was one of those silly soldiers standing guard outside Buckingham. He was Idris Elba from Thor—that’s what Phelps liked to call him—Hamdoll—that’s how it came out of Phelps’ lips, anyway.

            A car door slammed closed behind and Phelps turned to see his partner getting off a call. Agent Wolf Becker looked at the junior agent and then up at the tower. “Has he said anything?” Becker asked, flat and authoritatively. He was the senior man at the Fort Worth ATF office. That put this problem square in his lap, but if any fed was built for it, he was the guy. Wolf Becker had the equanimity of a cup of water, at least to the casual observer. Whatever Phelps was—Becker was the opposite.

            “No, sir. Nothing after “Blessings.”

            “Then what are you on about? I could hear you from inside the car.”

            “I was trying to establish—you know—establish a thing.”

            “Wow. It’s like you lifted it straight from the training manual.”

            Phelps pulled his hat down another inch. “Well.”

            “In half a year the man has shown no crack in his will. Not a hint. He’s microscopically impervious. What’s your reasoning for starting in today?”

            “Come on, Becker. You know.”

            “Pretend I’m stupid.”

            “Today’s the day.”

            “Keep going.”

            “Well, if any of these wackos are going to become pervious, figured on it being right about now.”

            Becker didn’t much like Phelps. He was pretty sure the younger man was a born racist that resented being under the command of a black guy with no military experience. Jealousy wasn’t uncommon. Most agents were either ex-service or former local law enforcement. Becker did a stint in academia before joining the bureau. He was a highly effective investigator and one of the most level-headed brains in the entire outfit. All that said, he didn’t wholly disagree with Phelps. If the dam was going to break, today would be one you’d probably mark on your calendar.

            “It’s not inevitable,” whispered the head agent.

            “What’s that?” Phelps asked, spitting onto the gravel road.

            Becker walked toward the gate, away from his agent, staring at the man in “The Lookout.”

            “Guess I’ll leave you with your thoughts then,” Phelps said, overemphasizing his accent and kicking rocks as he made the way back to the car. “Taxpayers don’t pay me enough to be mindreading in this heat. I’ll be enjoying the A/C while you and the freak play the silent game.

            It’s not inevitable, Becker thought, resting his arms on one of the rusty gate’s bars.

            That’s what everyone was thinking. The situation had tragedy written all over it. A big piece of private property in Texas with a herd of toe-the-line acolytes made anyone with a pulse go to one place: Waco. The head of the ATF was soiling himself on an hourly basis, afraid of another public relations catastrophe that would leave an indelible mark on the collective American conscience for all of time. The FBI was breathing down everybody’s throats. No surprise there. The Texas Rangers and local police knew the property and a lot of the people living on the compound. For the hometown badges, the investment was personal; they weren’t too keen on letting another group of folks go up in smoke. Blame would go to Becker and the federal task force, and at that point he wouldn’t be in any position to argue. He’d resign in shame and failure. A life dedicated to stopping bad things from happening would be forgotten by everyone he’d ever met, until the point where he’d forget it himself. God would be a refuge, but Dana would leave. Take the kids. Faith would dissipate. He’d start drinking. Harder this time. It was all laid out. The die was cast. It felt fated to everyone on his side of the gate.

            But not to him. He thought things might work out. Wherever his mind was, he knew he needed at least as much resolve as the man in the tower. Calm. Peace under fire. A sentinel. Easier said than done.

            The ATF man felt a vibration in his pocket and let out a sigh as he answered the call. “Hey there, Paulson,” he said, turning away from Theodore and the watchtower. “What do we do now?”

Chapter Three: Rashes and Unfulfilled Prophesies

            The membership was gathered in the mess hall. It was the largest building on the property, right in the center, with all the surrounding structures radiating around it. Paulson James was smoking behind back wall, standing alone under a thick oak. He could hear the clamor emanating from inside. The sound of discontented hearts. The sound of his Lydia trying to quell their uncertainties using a temperamental, feedback-prone PA system. A bit like a crowd that’s been waiting in the rain all day after you tell them their favorite band isn’t showing up. The change was frightening. Their member were comprised of some of the most docile and benevolent people Paulson had ever met, save a few surly outliers. Currently they sounded like the Hell’s Angels riding a particularly strong crank high.

            Understandable. Their band didn’t show up—God being the band.

            “I don’t know what to do now. This isn’t the best time, Wolf. The day’s not even over yet.” James lit up a cigarette and smoked it down like it was his last, listening to unoriginal advice. Frankly, he expected better. “How long have we known each other?” Paulson asked, turning his back from the cafeteria. His eye started twitching. Standing in front of him, going in and out of focus, was Levi the Messenger. He was wearing shorts and had swapped his combat boots for the cowboy kind. The ensemble was topped off by an oversized Hawaiian shirt. The wardrobe was almost as arresting as his presence.

            You shouldn’t be talking to him. More important things to do.

            The words sounded squelched, like they were coming through an old car radio. Paulson was frozen in place, cigarette hanging by the little wet on the inside of his lip. Before he could respond, Levi was gone. “What the shit!?”

            “What’s wrong?” Agent Becker asked, voice full of genuine worry, fearing the worst.

            “He never comes here. I always go to him.”

            “Are you seeing the guy—the emissary character—is that what you’re talking about?”

            “Yeah. He just showed up. Right here. In Texas.”

            “So he’s gone?”

            “Yeah. Came and went. I don’t understand.”

            “That’s okay, PJ. Things get a little out of hand sometimes. What’ve we been talking about lately?”

            “We’ve been talking about a lot of things lately, Wolf.” The spiritual leader was taking fretful little steps in random patterns. Little figure eights. Flattened circles. Eccentric squares.

            “Do you trust me?” the agent asked.

            James turned around and was startled once again. “Holy crap!”

            “What?” Becker asked.

            “Everything’s fine. Keep the jackboots back. I’ll call later.”

            Paulson ended the call and gathered an exasperated breath. He tried to light up a smoke, but couldn’t stop shaking.

            “I’ll get that,” said Dr. Davis Dade, taking two steps forward to grab the lighter out of James’ hand. “Seems like you’re about to burst. And you shouldn’t be smoking.”

            “Don’t know if you noticed, Doc. Things—little bit crazy around here. They’re ready to tear me to pieces. The feds could be on the march. I’m seeing things. Oh, what’s that other thing? Right. We’re not in Heaven!”