by Paul Jones
"Why don't I come with you," he said suggestively.
"Stay away from me, you weirdo," she had spat back flecks of spittle landing against his face. "Stay away." Her face contorted by fear, not by rage, by fear. She backed away, and then disappeared into the gloom of the bar. Byron stood up, trying to look as much like a disgruntled boyfriend as he could.
"Women," he said with an exaggerated sigh to the bartender, as if this single word could sum up the full complexity and confusion that was the fairer sex. He slapped down a five-dollar tip on the bar and made his way slowly out of the dive.
He was lucky that night, watched over by the one who had set him the task, who had taught him this, his most valuable lesson. But for weeks after leaving Las Vegas, he expected to be pulled over every time he saw a highway patrol officer or a Deputy, and he had been afraid. That was a first for him.
He did not understand what had happened that night, and spent hours going over the scenes in his head, looking at himself through her eyes, analyzing the situation. It had come to him eventually, a simple realization; on some lower level, she had detected his intentions. During that moment of indiscretion as he had teased himself with the pleasure to come, he emanated some kind of psychic energy that she had picked up on: his aura is how he thought of it.
Since then he was careful always to wear his psychic-mask when hunting. Slipping it on when he stepped out of his cab, not letting any part of the real Byron Portia ooze out of the cracks. Byron thought of it as locking himself away in a little room inside his head. Like one of those rooms on the old cop shows with one-way glass where he could look out and see them, but all that the person in the room would see was a reflection of themselves staring back at them.
It had worked. No more whores causing commotions in bars. Simple and efficient.
And so, here he was years later, heading south on I-15 towards Los Angeles. Still undiscovered. Protected. With much work behind him but far more still to come.
It was New Years Eve and there would be an awful lot of people out celebrating. That was just fine by him. He could lose himself easily in a crowd, walking among those he had been given the task of watching over. Watching for those that he hunted. And tonight he felt the pull, the need, the powerful imperative that flowed through his blood when the calling was upon him.
His truck hurtled along the highway, surrounded on either side by desert and the sun a liquid ball shimmering on the far horizon. He was just a couple of hours outside of LA, if everything remained copasetic he would find somewhere near Burbank airport and park up for the night, with enough time to clean himself up and go see-what-he-could-see.
Tonight he would hunt.
* * *
Three
Saint Bartholomew's Church - West Hills, Los Angeles.
Monsignor Jacob Pike pushed the great oaken doors into place, drew the two huge metal bolts, fastened the locks, and sealed off the outside world from Saint Bartholomew's Church for the night.
With the final lock securely in place, the priest’s face seemed to lose all strength, dragged as though by some sudden pulse of gravity towards the cold slab floor, leaving in its wake a hollow shell of the man he had imitated for the past twelve hours.
Through sheer force of will he had managed to preserve his façade of normalcy; it was the least he could do for his audience, he supposed. To maintain the pretense he was what he claimed to be, this final selfless act of a lost soul.
His face now drawn and haggard, his viridian green eyes dull and jejune, Monsignor Pike took one painful step after the next, making his way along the aisle between the rows of lemon-oiled pews, the fragrance of incense still clinging to the air. He shuffled towards the chancel, the echo of each footfall his only escort through the now empty church.
Not bothering to genuflect as he reached the communion table, he paused instead to stand at the head of the aisle, his eyes drifting upwards, before settling finally on the life-sized crucifix that was the centerpiece of the sanctuary area.
During the day, the natural light of the huge stained-glass window that stretched from the floor to the ceiling nearly fifty feet above, would light this emblem of Christianity. The window reproduced the fourteen Stations of the Cross, images that symbolized scenes of suffering in each of the successive stages of Christ's passion. A design created to instill a sense of awe in all who entered the church, to humble the proud and spark joy in the hearts of the downtrodden.
* * *
The colorful mosaic of painted glass lent an otherworldly etherealness to the church, sunshine pouring like wine through the beautifully colored scenes, but at night, without the sun’s illumination, the window was black and lifeless.
Soulless.
The aged priest understood the dichotomy.
To compensate for the loss of light; once the sun set, hidden blue and red spotlights sparked into life, tastefully highlighting the effigy of the suffering Christ hanging from the cross, his face a mask of suffering. The sculptor had captured perfectly Christ's torment; a vicious crown of thorns digging into his head, a spear wound in his side bleeding water and blood down over his hip. His agony was so obvious; his suffering so profound, that no one looking upon the scene could fail to be moved by the enormity of this God-man's sacrifice.
That was not what the Monsignor saw.
He saw an icon of deception, a promise to the human race that would never be fulfilled, could never be fulfilled. An empty vessel of a lie as hollow and dead as the very tomb that the crucified man was finally laid to rest in.
As empty as he now felt.
Like a cancer, his own despair had eaten through him, coring him out like termites devouring the foundation of his spiritual house, until finally, with nothing left to support it his belief had collapsed in on itself. And, for the past three years, Monsignor Jacob Pike had been faithless.
He no longer believed in the wonder, the resurrection or any of the underpinning principles that had drawn him to the Church and a life of service to God. He performed his daily duties out of habit rather than devotion. He was unworthy, he knew, to be a leader of his flock.
How could he be expected to lead when he was so lost himself?
He had so very many questions, and not one of them could he find an answer to within the pages of the book of books.
That first morning, he awakened with a feeling of disquiet and unrest in the pit of his stomach. Stumbling through the morning prayers and service, he found himself distracted and unsure of himself, something that he had never experienced before in his forty-two years as a priest.
For a while, he thought he may be sick. And in a way, he supposed he was sick, but it was a malady of the soul, not of the flesh. It would have been so much easier to deal with a life-threatening illness; instead, he was facing a much harsher future.
The feeling of disquiet only grew stronger with each passing day until, finally, today; he realized that he was empty of all feeling for the Church, for the religion ... and for life.
He had prayed every day for guidance. Beseeching the Lord God Almighty to show him the way back to the path of enlightenment, to help him find his way home, to guide him back to divinity. Every day he awaited an answer, and every day he drifted further away from his religion when no answer came.
Finally, he had stopped trying, too tired and too old to continue to bother. The Church had priests trained to help those like him but he knew that would have involved him stepping down from his position within the parish, surrendering his flock to another. The embarrassment would be too much for him. Besides, he had battled his inner demons for too long and now he was tired. No, now he was exhausted and entirely depleted.
Standing under the stone arch of the doorway that would take him from the transept to the vestry, he paused and looked back into the cavernous interior of Saint Bartholomew's, his fingers hovering over the bank of switches that controlled the multiple sets of lights within the church. Forty-five years of his life spent in service to
God in churches around the country, the last twelve years here at Saint Bartholomew's.
Looking out across the rows of pews that, until minutes earlier had seated hundreds of parishioners, the priest waited - hoped for - a flicker of some low smoldering spark of belief that might remain, hidden away deep in his heart, a final chance at redemption, a sign that he was not forgotten.
Instead, a bitter draft skulked through the doorway on frosty feet, sweeping any hope of salvation with it as it blew over him.
With a final sigh of resignation, the priest turned off the overhead globe lights and then flicked the remaining switches, extinguishing the rows of footpath lights and the spotlights beneath the crucifix, plunging the church into darkness.
A row of dove-gray filing cabinets lined one wainscoted panel-wall of the vestry. The metal cabinets contained the parish records for the last sixty-five years, all meticulously recorded by Monsignor Pike and his predecessors. A history of the priests and people who had lived, loved, and died in the parish. A rack of three simple shelves above the cabinets held various administrative supplies; reams of paper, pens and pencils, file folders and tabs, all needed for the day to day running of the church.
An ancient oak armoire, the original veneer long eroded, its dark wood scuffed and scraped through years of use, stood against the opposite wall. The squat simple dole cupboard next to it originally contained bread and other supplies that the priests would have distributed to the poor and needy of the parish, but the needy far outstripped the capacity of this simple wooden cupboard. Now it held a few blankets and a pillow for when the monsignor felt the need to spend the night.
Monsignor Pike removed his chasuble and vestment, folded them neatly one on top of the other before placing them on the second shelf of the armoire. Stepping out of his cassock, he draped it over a metal coat hanger and hung it on a hook next to the door. He pulled on a pair of black loose fitting Lee jeans, slid his arms through the sleeves of his shirt, buttoned it and then pushed his clerical collar into place. A mirror fixed to the back of the vestry door allowed him to check his dress, he straightened his collar with stiff, arthritic, fingers. Tufts of gray hair had puffed up when he pulled off his cassock and now protruded from his liver spotted pate.
"You look ridiculous," he said to his reflection as he removed the plastic comb from his shirt pocket and combed his rebellious hair back into place.
In the center of the room, he placed the chair from his study. Plastic, with a high back and lined with comfortable foam and covered in a stain-resistant cloth that had faded over the years to a dull purple instead of its original red. He had written many sermons in this chair, he thought as he ran his hand slowly over the ridge of its back. Each of its four supporting legs had a caster fixed to it, allowing the chair to roll easily.
Kneeling slowly, his knees popping in complaint, he pushed in each of the four thumb shaped plastic locks that locked the chairs casters in place and stopped it from moving.
Satisfied the chair would not move, he raised one foot up onto its seat and again tested its stability before cautiously heaving the rest of his sixty-eight year old body up. He was no longer as spry as he once was, he reminded himself, so he kept a firm grip of the armrests with both hands. The chair wobbled a little, not designed to take so much awkwardly positioned weight, and he instinctively threw out one of his arms to steady himself, while he held grimly to the other armrest, catching his balance before he toppled over.
Sure that his balance would not betray him, the priest raised himself gradually to a precarious standing position.
Earlier that morning, he had secured a length of strong hemp rope to one of the ceiling’s beams, fashioning a noose at the unsecured end. He slipped his head into it and tightened the hangman’s knot until it sat snugly against the bones of the nape of his neck before reaching a hand up to give a final tug on the rope. Satisfied it remained securely fastened to the heavy timber beam running the length of the room, he dropped his hands to his sides.
"God forgive me,” he said, kicked the chair from beneath his feet and jerked spastically at the end of the rope for over a minute until blackness finally claimed him.
* * *
Four
There was a certain gaudiness to Bourbon Street at this time of year that, while it repulsed him with its cheapness on one level, was also a strange attractor drawing Jim Baston towards it, like a priest to a potential convert.
Sitting at a street-side table of an out-of-the-way café, he waited for a waiter to fetch his drink. It was a kitschy little theme-café, with fake lampposts and piped accordion music, attempting - in vain, Jim noted - to recreate the ambience of a Parisian street cafe. But it was the only place he could find that had any space left for him to sit; all of the other restaurants and clubs were filled to brimming, and he was averse to elbowing himself through a heaving body of youngsters just for the sake of some company.
The waiter, a tall teenager with a stubbly goatee and dressed in a long white bib and apron, brought his drink; whisky and soda … on the rocks.
"May I get you anything more, Monsieur?" the teenager asked with a half-decent French accent. Jim shook his head and told the kid thanks, but this would be fine for now.
Spiraled black bars of wrought iron set firmly in a red brick base and similar surround separated the sidewalk from the table area that Jim now sat at. Perhaps that was why the cafe was less popular? People liked to be able to walk - or stagger - freely between bars in this town. Jim was glad of the space, he could sit unobserved with a clear view of the street and watch the world and its inhabitants wander by undisturbed thanks to the cage like bars.
From the breast pocket of his jacket, Jim pulled the cigar he had bought earlier at a small tobacco vendor he’d come across as he strolled along Bourbon Street. A hand rolled Churchill maduro; Cuban, clothed in a clear plastic wrapper that crackled as he rolled the cigar between his fingers. Cuban cigars had become widely available in the United States, the trade embargo finally lifted after Castro's eventual death back in 2013. The owner of the cigar store had been kind enough to give the cigar a cut and supplied him with a complimentary book of matches, the shops logo and address printed in colorful relief on its cover.
Flipping the cover open, he tore a match from the book and struck it against the safety bar on the backside. The match flared, casting shadows on the plastic-ivy lined bistro walls, the sulfurous smell of the match's ignition filled Jim's nostrils and he felt his mouth begin to salivate in expectation.
Tearing away the plastic wrapper, he placed the cigar between his lips, twisting it close to the flame of the match while taking quick deep puffs to ensure the cigar lit evenly. When he was certain the tobacco was lit, he took a long draw from the maduro and allowed the smoke to fill his mouth, exciting his senses.
He shook the match to extinction.
A billowing stream of blue-gray smoke drifted above his head as he exhaled slowly.
There were only two kinds of people in this world, Jim thought; Cigar-people and non-cigar people. It was one of those smells and tastes that you either acquired immediately or just never developed a liking for. He had never met anybody who had ever said that they didn't mind cigar smoke or that they thought cigars were okay. Invariably, on asking if his company would mind if he lit a cigar they either enthusiastically allowed him while basking in the aromatic smoke themselves or, conversely, gave a shudder of horror beyond comprehension at the very thought of being in its presence.
Strange to say, that he had always found women more accepting of cigars than men. Perhaps it was a subconscious homophobic reaction to putting something so phallic in their mouths that turned certain men off.
At a nod from Jim, the waiter brought him another drink. Jim handed the kid his empty glass, took one more long pull off the cigar and settled in to watch the old year die.
* * *
In the moments leading up to midnight it seemed to Jim that the city had found a voice as thousands co
unted down the final seconds together at the top of their lungs. Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, it exclaimed, Five, Four, Three, Two, One. Fireworks erupted into the night sky, exploding in great flourishes of color, glorious in their beautifully short life.
Raising his half-full glass to the light show high above the city, he spoke quietly to the night air; "Happy New Year, Lark," before downing his drink in one swift swig and setting the empty glass on the table.
* * *
Jim arrived back at his room just after 1 am, his head buzzing pleasantly from the three drinks and the cigar, the taste of which still lingered agreeably on his palate and in his nostrils. He dropped his raincoat over the back of a chair still dry, the threatening storm never having materialized.
Standing at the window, he looked out over the city. The city was silent now.
“Jim! You have a call from your agent in Los Angeles.”
The sudden sound of his computer’s AI voice made him jump. He was half-tempted not to take the call. He knew that Archie would be disappointed with his lack of progress but he also knew that if he did not take his agent’s call he would be pestering him until he got what he wanted.
“Put it on speaker,” he said.
There was a faint click and then the voice of Archibald Krogh filled the room.
“Hey Jim! Happy New Year.” His voice sounded nasal, he probably had a cold.
“Happy New Year to you to Archie. Don’t you have better things to do than harass your clients in the middle of the night?”
His remark was met with a chuckle that deteriorated into a coughing fit. “Good God,” Krogh said finally, “I swear this Flu is gonna’ kill me one of these days... So tell me, how’s the book coming along?”
Jim was not comfortable lying but he decided that for the sake of both his own sanity and his over stressed agent’s health he would make the exception this time.
