The Manhattan Prophet

by Jake Packard

  Pranan seemed possessed. He jammed the gas pedal to the floor and the little car picked up speed. He made a quick right, swerving into the ditch by the side of the road to avoid hitting the heavy open wagon topped with stone. As they passed, Bullmoose looked up at the driver’s seat and lo and behold he saw the old man Durga himself, and his lovely daughter. Both saw him. They had equally odd expressions on their faces for different reasons that he could well understand. Confronted by the imploring look in the little Gypsy’s eyes and the unbelievable panic in his own heart, he knew through this irrefutable demonstration of the count-on-able rules, that he, in his brash insignificance, had toyed with the immutable laws of the universe.

  “Step on it!” he shouted over the din of the antiquated engine. Pranan for some inscrutable reason laughed like a maniac as he steered the brittle car out of the ditch and back onto the road, emerging in front of the statue wagon. He began shouting to Allah about how great he is and how amazing it all was, and the Ambassador took off down the hill, leaving the stunned wagon in the lurch. The little bumpy car leveled out at the bottom and with a bounce disappeared around another curve.

  The wagon fell out of sight behind them and the road ahead looked good to go. But number three; one never knows what is going to happen next.

  Just around the next bend came the awful and unthinkable. The little tinny Ambassador started quivering and shaking and then came a stomach-sickening pop of metal snapping. They turned around just in time to see through the rear window as an indiscernible piece of hardware bounced out from under the car and onto the road behind them. Pranan braked hard and the wounded vehicle screeched to a stop. He jumped out and sprinted back to retrieve the disjointed automotive part. Recovering it, he ran back and dove under the car, muttering that they would kill him now also, and why did he have to help this infidel idiot white man in the first place? Bullmoose waited with anxiety, his hands in his pockets guarding his balls, realizing that he left town without wearing shoes and that it would be a mighty long walk back to Madras bare foot, and bare balls.

  “Holy shit!” Pranan screamed and climbed back out from under the stricken Ambassador. “It’s the damn lock to the driveshaft, man. It split in two. There is nothing to hold it to the wheel box.” He flung open the trunk of the car and started rummaging frantically about for something he could fix it with, throwing things onto the side of the road that he didn’t need. A stack of unused egg cartons, four long skinny bags filled with Styrofoam coffee cups, greasy mechanics gloves, but nothing that would hold two rotating pieces of metal together.

  In the meantime, the ox cart ascended the hill behind them and pulled around the bend into view. In that instant Durga recognized that he had almost caught up to them. He screamed loudly for his oxen to go faster, as a score of skinny little statue builders jumped out from the back of the wagon and started running downhill towards the stricken vehicle with weapon-size statues in hand. Bullmoose quivered when he envisioned the stone image of Vishnu embedded into the place where his little brain used to be.

  “American, where are you going to run now?” shouted old man Durga, holding up a menacing iron contraption that looked like two small shovels welded together at their handles. “Do you know what this is, American dog? I use this to geld the weak rams in my flock that are not worthy to breed with my ewes. I put these in the fire and when they become red hot I use them to burn off their balls. Do you see this, American? It’s for you. It’s for you. It’s for you!”

  What did he say? Where did Bullmoose hear that before?

  “It’s for you. It’s for you. It’s for you!” Durga shouted again.

  Then it struck him.

  He dove under the car and immediately located the dangling drive shaft and the lonely wheel box. He slipped off the ring the orange man gave him that fateful day when they first met on the beach when he goy swindled for fifty rupees. Bullmoose slid it over and onto the separated bolt of the primitive transmission. Not only did it fit exactly over the beveled edges, but it locked perfectly into place. He scrambled out from under the car, and Pranan, looking frightened and bewildered, jumped into the driver’s seat and turned the key. The doughty little putt-putt fired back up.

  Bullmoose dove into the passenger seat just as the first wave of statue assassins struck, smashing the windows of the vehicle with their little holy idols. The Ambassador, spewing sprays of broken glass and black diesel smoke, sped off just in the nick of time and just fast enough to keep ahead of the wave of Durga’s little guerillas. The legion of lethal child sculptors raced behind them in their dust and exhaust, as Durga shouted after him, “It’s for you, American. It’s for you!”

  They didn’t stop until they got to the Madras airport, where they left the Ambassador at the sidewalk of the passenger drop off, the same spot where, many weeks earlier, Bullmoose had staved off blitzkriegs from squadrons of giant mosquitoes and vanguards of cannibalistic supplicants.

  Pranan dove under the chassis and retrieved Bullmoose’s magic ring. As the doors began to close, they both marched barefoot onto an airliner bound for Boston. And just like that, Bullmoose departed India, Mahabalipuram, his love goddess incarnate, and his paradise on earth, gladly calling it a fair trade to leave with nothing but his guitar, a new best friend and, most importantly, his balls.

  Half way back over the continent of Europe on his seventh tiny bottle of expensive vodka that this cute divorcee from Manhattan kept buying in appreciation of his I’m-so-cute-and-don’t-you-know-we-can-make-room-for-two-in-the-bathroom routine, when he realized he had been having regular sex with an underage child and most likely fathered her baby.

  Herbie’s father hated that part of the story, because he knew he might have a half Hindu brother whom Bullmoose would always pay more attention to in his mind than he would ever give to him. Grandma tut-tutted her son, Henry, and told him to mind his manners, because with the unbounded glory of the grace of God his father could return to them with his most precious of possessions, without which Henry himself would never have been born.

  Bullmoose always just smiled at the end of the story and looked quite cocksure of himself, as he explained that nothing stays the same, which could be similar to saying things ain’t always what they seem, and that everything is interconnected, even though in ways vast and mysterious, and that you never know what’s going to happen next or, for that matter, you never know which part of the puzzle is the going to end up being the key.

  # # #

  With that latest Bullmoose reverie fresh in his mind, Herbie swiped his ID card and entered the editing suite; the blackness of the room matched his mood. The dark computer screen meant the the audio animation he started the night before had finished rendering. He threw his jacket over the back of the chair as he pushed the mouse an imperceptible tinge of an inch in order to wake the monitor up. Herbie pounced on the waiting playback controls.

  He fast-forwarded through the first few minutes until he saw the doors to the prison start to open, the white light beginning to pour out. He reverted to the original point of view and the image on the main screen popped up as the scar-faced man with many tattoos emerged out of the white light and approached the waiting government officials. Herbie played with the audio controls and, suddenly, sounds of chaos spewed out of the speakers. He heard shouts and screams, which came from the parking lot, that drowned out everything else. He toyed with the program’s concentric locator and moved its position onto the podium. Instantly the crowd sounds diminished and the muffled voices from the dignitaries on stage became audible. Herbie raised their volume.

  “Congratulations on your freedom and we welcome you to New York, Mr. Salem Jones. I admit you look a lot older than twenty-one.”

  The scar-faced man looked amused, and then spoke. “Older? Older than who? Today is your birthday, my friend. Mine too. We are all the same age. We are all as old as life. Happy Birthday.”

  The notables on stage became tongue-tied, discombobulated. High-pitched sounds b
roke into the audio track. Herbie knew that they were the initial outcries from the crowd in the parking lot in reaction to the first big push by Pellet’s Pythons, his riot control units. They began to tighten their grip around the spectators like rodents they had been trained to exterminate.

  The scar-faced man peered into the crowd with a mixture of curiosity and compassion, and then back to the civil servant on stage. “Of course, sir, you must know that I am not Salem Jones. I’m not even worthy to untie his shoes. You see my friend, today your society set him free from this prison. But you should have known, he has always been free. And so, he has already moved on.”

  Herbie pounced on the video directional and immediately reversed the point of view to see what the scar-faced man saw. The officials on stage looked confused and helpless. He raised the computer’s eyeline to look past the podium and out into the riot now pitched on the parking field below. There, off in the distance in the animation he saw the golden fog that he’d been watching since the night before, the one now perched over the skies of Shantypark.

  Up in the audio landscape pulsing out from his computer, amongst the shrieks and caterwauls, lilting along the sky, confounding yet confirming all that challenged Herbie from within, he heard the same hypnotic melody he could not get out of his head since yesterday

  A distinct celestial soprano sang a single note, then jumped an octave then down a fifth, and up another octave . . . and over again, and over again, and over again . . .

  * * * * *

  Gang Council

  The tent walls ruffled, some scuffling sounds came from outside, and then a shout of “You can’t do that.” Within an instant Gregor and Ibrahim burst through the flap into the inner sanctuary, brandishing their automatics. All the men in the room jumped to their feet grabbing their weapons. For the second time in a few hours, Shantypark saw Marcus and Gregor enter into a stare-down; a miscalculated blink could sentence war.

  “You trespass in here, Gregor. One more step and I will separate your ugly head from your blasphemous body.”

  “Empty threats, Marcus. This is a Council meeting where we swear not to shoot each other.” He smirked and put his weapon down by his feet. Ibrahim did the same. “So little shitface, why the fuck wasn’t I summoned? You know there is no Gang Council in Shantypark without me.”

  “You didn’t seem like you wanted to talk the last time we had the pleasure of seeing you.” Titters ran around the room, most people too afraid of Gregor to laugh out loud.

  Gregor ignored the sarcasm. “That’s because your boy over there hypnotized everybody with his magic tricks.”

  “Strong magic, I’d say. It kept your sorry ass frozen for sure.”

  “I didn’t see or hear too much out of you as a great leader of men, Marcus. But here your coward ass is now. You can’t beat ’em, so you join ’em.”

  “The difference between me and you is that I believe Salem is bringing good for all of us locked up in Shantypark. For that I will gladly give myself up to him for redemption.”

  “And what’s with this fucking holy born-again routine, Marcus. You’re a killer and a thief, not some fucking disciple of new-age horseshit.”

  “That’s old news, Gregor.”

  “Listen, fuckface, you need me, so get that through your stupid head, otherwise we would have killed each other a long time ago.”

  “This is good, for in your own way you two have begun your search for peace.” At this all the people in the tent of the Council laughed and looked towards Salem as he spoke. He sat in repose, legs crossed upon the ground.

  Gregor turned towards Salem. He shouted out to the entire tent, “Can’t you all see through this bullshit? Who do you think I am? Do you think that I’m a stupid son of a Kyrgstani whore? You think I don’t know all the bullshit rumors about this Salem Jones? I am a great warlord descended from generations of mujahedin who brought honor and glory to their tribes and their homelands. I know who I am. So, answer me, who the fuck is this guy? How do you know who he really is? Anybody in this sick, rotten world can say he’s Salem Jones cause nobody ain’t ever seen a Salem Jones before. This guy could be some undercover squirrel-killer dick for all we know, probably sent by the city to infiltrate us, divide us up and cut off our nuts.”

  Marcus leaned towards Gregor. In a whisper he asked, “Why do you mock what you can’t believe, Gregor? Why does that cause fear in you?”

  “Don’t fuck with me.” Gregor pulled a sawed-off shut gun from his belt and pointed it two inches from Marcus’ head. “Give me one good reason why I should believe this is who you say he is, and I won’t have to blow your fuckin’ brains to hell.”

  All focus in the tent turned to Salem. He looked back and around into the eyes of the people who gathered unto him under the Council tent. Representatives of every gang and clan in Shantypark, every race, creed, color, and all combinations thereof.

  He stood and moved with supple grace amongst them, touching those he passed on the crown of their head or the points of their shoulders. Each person he laid a finger upon bent toward him like a fragile flower reaching for the life-giving light of the sun, gaining strength through him from some unseen transference of spirit. The room’s energy flowed towards Salem with such great dynamism that Gregor once again fell into a wordless stupor in the presence of his powerful effortlessness.

  “My brothers and sisters. So very, very long ago, there was no darkness and no light. There was only the is. Science attempts to determine exactly when the universe began, but cannot. Even the most dedicated physicists say that, according to their most extensive calculations, at that first millionth of a second of what they believe to be creation, their comfortable mathematics simply break down and become worthless. Apparently the closer we get to the beginning with these theories, the quicker they all come to an end. The question then looms so large, what existed in that millionth of a second, and what was before that?

  “Let’s assume that an instant of awesome majesty came from nowhere – where there was not one thing before, now there are billions of galaxies, with hundreds of billions of stars. And all of them burn with the glory of such amazing fuel that they blazed forth atoms across the infinity of time and the expansion of space to right here, this spot, this world, where they pulled together and became the stuff of life.

  “As the earth cooled we were formed to fit this place, and hence, our bodies were fashioned. We found ourselves in the middle of colossal forces, given sweet life and bathed by the magnificence of the heavens, yet stricken with hunger and fear in the darkness and the cold. We knew not where to turn.

  “Longing for answers, we conceived a Creator in the image of ourselves, and under the assumed protection of these primitive beliefs, civilizations of men and women began to spread over the planet. For those who did not believe, we made rivers run red with young blood, and carved huge holes in the earth to fill with the bones of their martyred sons.

  “However, if we so choose, we all can feel that one spirit of Creation, and hear that one voice. As every man and woman is a child of that spirit, those who care to live in its splendor must seek the light of its truth that comes from within.”

  As he talked he taught, and as he walked he seemed to swirl, touching each man and each woman just enough to lighten their countenance and lift them up.

  “How monumental is the torment our souls feel on earth today? Have we created so much spiritual debt that it’s too much to ever repay? Harmony envelops the entire universe, yet here in humankind we cower with fear in a world whacked out of balance.

  “The battle between the darkness and the light rages here amongst us, my brothers and sisters. Here, on this hallowed ground. The time is now at hand.”

  A great murmur rose within the tent and the astounded people looked around at one another. As Salem walked around the room he came face to face with Gregor and Ibrahim. He looked upon Ibrahim and saw the demons he possessed inside. Salem reached out his hand and placed it upon Ibrahim’s forehead a
nd squeezed, his truth bore deep into the craven eyes of the evildoer. He smiled at Ibrahim and commanded, “Get thee back, Satan.”

  Ibrahim fell to his knees with a groan and, in a rush, dark shadows streamed out from deep inside of him. Salem took him by the chin, lifted his face, and looked into his eyes. “Be of good cheer man, your sins are forgiven.”

  Ibrahim looked up at Salem in surprised relief, feeling clean for the first time in his life. He began to cry in absolution and prostrated himself before Salem like a newborn babe. The Council, giving witness to this mighty act, became overwhelmed with wonder and awe.

  “All the children of Creation have this light burning within. It is from the power to forgive that comes the source of all healing. So I put forth now to the Council, it is true healing that we in this world really need.”

  All in the tent felt a great surge of joy. With no room for opposition, the men dropped their weapons in epiphany, and all fell to their knees before Salem. Except for Gregor who, upon feeling Salem’s deep searing eyes of truth burn into his soul, fled the tent in fear.

  Jamal rose from his hiding spot behind the tent flap, scratching his ears. Blood dripped off the incensed tumors now growing larger and more furious up and down the length of his neck. He entered the great and awesome tent. The light inside glowed so dazzlingly bright, he shielded his eyes from the glare with his long-suffering and bloody little hands.