by Jake Bible
Bethany and the Zombie Jesus
&
11 Other Tales of Horror & Grotesquery
Jake Bible
Published by Samannah Media
All content copyright 2010, 2011 Jake Bible
Through the Last WH originally published in “Dark Journeys: A Charity Anthology” 7/17/2010
Let Old friends be Forgot… originally published in “Farrago: The Michael Bekemeyer Project” 10/27/2010
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. All characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
B ethany and the Zombie Jesus
“Father, hear me now,” I began, as always, when I knelt in front of the tiny altar in our tiny church. With the Lord Jesus Christ lookin’ down on me from his cross, His sufferin’ makin’ me feel even worse. “I have sinned, but I ain’t no wicked person. I try to be good, to be of the Faith, but it be so hard. So hard to be righteous.”
“Tell me about it,” a voice croaked, raspy and full of phlegm.
I stopped prayin' and looked about me, not so much startled as surprised. Why would anyone be here on Christmas Eve, knowing that the Rev Jones had been in the hospital for the past two weeks recoverin’ from heart surgery? I’d just come to make sure no pipes had busted and to water the few plants in the Rev Jones's office. He trusted me to take care of things. He kept tryin’ to tell me to do somethin’ else, like there was more important tasks, but every time he’d lean close and start to tells me what those might be, folks would be comin’ into his hospital room and he’d shut up like a venus fly trap.
“Um, hello?” I called out. “Who there?”
Silence. Quiet as the dead.
I shrugged and continued. “I stole three dollas from Mama’s purse. She didn’t notice none, but I feel bad about it. I just wanted it for Cokes.”
“That shit’ll rot your teeth,” the voice said again.
This time I jumped up from the ground and spun about, lookin’ for the lurker.
“I know you’s in here!” I shouted. “Come out now, or I’ll call the Sheriff.”
“Sheriff ain’t gonna help you.” The voice laughed. “He’s drunker than Peter right now!”
I froze. The voice seemed to be comin’ from everywhere at once. Dang acoustics. Always was why our tiny choir sounded like a huge chorus. The way sounds be bouncin’ off the ceilin’ and walls.
I reached out and grabbed a gold candlestick from the altar. “You best be leavin’ now!” I hollered. “Or I swear I’ll brain you somethin’ fierce!”
The voice cackled and I bent down, tryin’ to peer under the six short pews. Nothin’. No legs or feet stickin’ down. Maybe the person was layin’ in one a them.
I slowly, oh so carefully, walked down the aisle, my head dartin’ back and forth, side to side, ready for whatever was gonna jump out at me.
Weren’t nothin’ there.
The voice kept chucklin’. “Brain me. Hehehe. That’s rich.”
Where was it comin’ from? “What you want?!? Huh? You gonna rape me?!? That it? You want to take my purity?”
“Purity? You stole three dollas for Cokes. You be wicked!” the voice mocked my accent.
“Ain’t no need to get mean, you know,” I said, my fear goin’ away and my anger risin’. “I ain’t ignorant. Just from ‘round here and this is how we’s talk.”
“Don’t I fucking know it!” the voice boomed. “I’ve been listening to you yokels for decades! All you’re ‘I’s’ and ‘you’ins’ and ‘we’s be’. Damn, do any of you know proper English?”
“Don’t swear in here! This is the Lord’s house!” I shouted.
“Who do you think is talking, Bethany?” the voice asked quietly and this time I knew where it was comin’ from.
I turned around slowly and faced the altar, ready to whip back the cover and find the intruder underneath. But, that wasn’t what I saw. No, sir. I saw Him. I saw the Lord Jesus Christ starin’ back at me. His eyes red and angry. His mouth open and wet. His teeth sharp, oh so sharp. His wounds drippin’ blood from where he was nailed to his cross. His skin, which shoulda been all marble like, was cracked and oozin’, like he’d been painted in layer after layer of paint and it was tearin’ his skin right off.
I stumbled backwards, my hand droppin’ the candlestick, the sound of the metal echoin’ inside our tiny church. “Dear Lord. This cain’t be…”
“Oh, it can be, Bethany,” Jesus said. “It certainly can be. And it is.”
“How… How you know my name?” I stammered.
Jesus’s head rocked back and that laugh came again. “I’ve known you since before you were born, Bethany! And I’ve watched you grow up here in the church. Watched you get baptized. Watched you singing with the choir since you were just a little, tiny girl. Trust me, Bethany, I know you.”
“This ain’t real,” I said. “I must be dreamin’.”
Jesus licked his lips. His tongue was a swollen, blue mess and it flicked about the edges of his mouth like a snake.
“You’re the Devil come to trick me outta my soul!” I screamed and ran for the door.
“How old do you think the Reverend Jones is?” Jesus called after me, my hand nearly on the door handle.
“What kinda question is that?” I asked, pressin’ my back up against the door, ready to bolt. “He’s in his sixties. Maybe older.”
Jesus grinned wide. “Guess again.”
I knew this had to be the Devil. I knew it had to be. But, if I stayed right by the door, stayed vigilant for his tricks, then he couldn’t harm me. That’s what I thought.
“What you mean?” I asked. The Devil Jesus fixed me with his eyes. His evil, blood-red eyes.
“You ever see Rev Jones age? You ever see his hair get any greyer than it is? His beard get all grizzled like your Grandfather’s?”
I had to stop and think. I mean, Rev Jones had always just been Rev Jones. But, bein’ young, only in my twenties, I had to admit I didn’t pay that much attention to the old. They were, well, just old.
Then I remembered that this was the Devil talkin’ to me. “You’re the Serpent!” I spat. “The Liar and trickster! I cain’t believe nothin’ you say!”
“I haven’t said anything, Bethany. I’ve just asked you a question: do you know how old Rev Jones is?”
“Why? Why does it matter?”
“It doesn’t, not to me, but to him, well, it matters a lot,” the Devil Jesus said. “You see, Rev Jones and I have a deal, had a deal, I should say. I have given him Power and Glory. Let him have his dreams and riches, but he pissed it all away on sin. Drinking, women, gambling…murder.”
I shook my head. That wasn’t the Rev Jones I knew. Rev Jones was kind and righteous and full of God’s message, ready to smite evil and ready to help us sinners get to the great afterlife that waited for us in heaven. “No. No, you’s tryin’ to trick me with your serpent tongue.”
“Serpent tongues are forked, Bethany. Does this look forked?” He stuck out the swollen abomination that he called a tongue. I could see the sores and pus oozin’ from those sores. I could see the wet, slick skin wiggle and squirm underneath like there were a million other tongues fightin’ to get out.
I put my hand to my mouth, strugglin’ to keep from bein’ sick. “No,” I said, but it was so weak I could barely hear it.
“Don’t yo
u want to know the deal I made with Rev Jones, Bethany?”
I shook my head.
“Are you sure, Bethany? Are you really sure? What’s the harm in knowing?”
“’Cause it’s just tricks,” I whispered. “Tricks to keep me from being called Home when the Glory comes to earth. When the Rapture happens.”
Devil Jesus exploded with laughter, pink spittle flyin’ from his lips, sprayin’ and defilin’ the altar. “The Rapture? The Rapture? Bethany, the Rapture already happened!” His bound and nailed hands gestured wildly. “I came back, Bethany! Don’t you see! What is left here on earth, the people, their descendants, you are all what God didn’t want! You are the left behind! The unworthy! You are the children and grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren of the doomed!”
I couldn’t take no more, I grabbed at the handle and pushed the church door open, runnin’ from the tiny church and from the Devil Jesus.
***
The night air was chilly, but I worked up a sweat as I ran and ran all the way to the little house I shared with Mama, not stoppin’ once. I burst through the back door, slammed it shut and locked it tight, peakin’ out the curtain, seein’ if the Devil Jesus was on my heels, but weren’t nothin’ out there but the moonless night.
“Bethany?” Mama called out from the parlor and I near jumped outta my skin.
“Mama?” I asked once I could catch my breath. “What you doin’ home? Thought you had the Holiday shift?”
“Conveyor done broke,” Mama said, comin’ into the kitchen, her cup of coffee in hand. Mama never went anywhere without her black coffee. “They shut the line down, but said we’d all get paid. Merry Christmas, darlin’.”
She crossed the kitchen and gave me a big hug. “Sweet Lord, child! Why you all sweaty like that?”
“I ran home,” I blurted out. Mama fixed me with her eyes, lookin’ me up and down.
“You been with that Mitchell boy?” she asked, her voice goin’ all cold. “I ain’t ready for no grandbabies yet, girl.”
“No, Mama,” I laughed, strippin’ my coat off and hangin’ it on the back of the door. “I was at the…” I couldn’t say it.
“You’s at the what?” Mama asked, suspicion creepin’ into her voice.
I had to be very careful what I said to Mama. She could smell a lie five miles away, covered in horse manure and buried ten feet in the ground.
“I’s at the church makin’ sure everythin’ was all locked tight.”
She watched me for a moment then nodded and crossed to the stove. “You want some coffee, darlin’?”
“No, thank ya, Mama,” I said, fakin’ a yawn. “Think I’ll just turn in. Love ya. Merry Christmas.” I gave her a quick kiss on the cheek then hurried myself off to bed. I prayed to the real Jesus to let me sleep. I prayed real hard.
***
“I thought you said you locked everythin’ up?” Mama said to me as we stepped past the crowd gathered at the doors to the church.
“I did,” I answered, my eyes not believin’ what I saw.
Inside the church was a mess, not just after a Sunday social mess, but with the pews overturned and Bible pages torn out and spread around. The walls and windows were smeared with what looked like blood, but smelled like, well, excrement. The altar was smashed, the candlesticks bent and broken. I just stood there lookin’ at everythin’, but not seein’ the most important part.
“They took Jesus!” I heard someone yell and all eyes and heads whipped about to the front of our tiny church. People gasped and some of the older women swooned at the sight of the empty cross with the bloody nails still stuck in the wood.
“Who would do such a thing?” Mama asked aloud, as did many others.
But, I couldn’t answer. My voice was taken. Taken by the sight of the bloody footprints, very faint, but there if you were lookin’, walkin’ straight down the aisle and out the door.
“Excuse me,” I said quickly, pushin’ past the others and out the door after the footprints. “I need some air.”
“She always was a bit squeamish,” I could hear Mama sayin’ as I burst into the Christmas mornin’ light.
I followed the footprints down the church steps and along the cement walk. Once they got to the gravel parkin’ lot though, I lost them amongst the oil stains and spots of rust from years of old cars comin’ and goin’.
“Whatchya lookin’ at, child?” a voice said, startlin’ me, and I had to squeeze hard to keep my bladder from loosin’.
I turned my head to find Deacon Lawrence standin’ behind me. He was a nice old man, been with the church as long as Rev Jones from what I heard.
As long as Rev Jones…
“Nothin’, Deacon,” I said, tryin’ to smile, but by the look on the Deacon’s face, I musta failed miserably.
“You sure ‘bout that?” the Deacon asked. “You looks like you done seen a ghast or somethin’.”
“Ain’t no ghasts on Christmas,” I answered. “’Cept the Holy Ghast.”
Deacon Lawrence smiled at my little joke and patted me on the shoulder, and then he walked back to the crowd that was growin’ larger as the Christmas Day service was supposed to begin.
“Don’t be long, child,” he called back. “I’m still givin’ the sermon today. Ain’t no hooligan takin’ Christmas away.”
I just stood there, starin’ past the cars, past Route 18 and wonderin’ what I should do. Should I tell someone? Should I say I saw the Devil? That Devil Jesus did that to our church? I kept starin’, wonderin’ what to do when I saw the eyes. The blood-red eyes starin’ back at me from the pines across Route 18.
I lost the battle with my bladder.
***
“Girl!” Mama scolded. “You’d think you were four years old, the way you been actin’! Peein’ yourself like that! Sweet Lord, didn’t I tell you to go before we left?”
“Yes, Mama,” I whispered. “I’m sorry. I just got spooked and, well, couldn’t control it.”
“Spooked? What in Heaven’s name could spook a twenty-two year old woman on Christmas mornin’ in broad daylight?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, strippin’ my skirt and underwear off and throwin’ them into the wash. “Thought I saw someone in the pines ‘cross the road.”
Mama turned to look at me. “Thought you saw someone? Who’d you think you seen that would make you wet yourself?”
I didn’t answer, just grabbed one of the swimmin’ towels from the cupboard above the dryer and wrapped it about my waist.
“Girl, I asked you a question!” Mama said sternly. “You answer me now!”
I kept my eyes toward the floor. “The Devil,” I said quietly.
“What was that? What did you say?” Mama asked, grabbin’ my chin and liftin’ my face so she could see my eyes.
“I saw the Devil. The Devil Jesus.”
***
Ever since my Daddy died, I had promised myself I wouldn’t go near another hospital. Then Rev Jones took sick in the heart and I had to go talk to him and get my instructions. After that, I said to myself ‘never again’. But, there I was, not only in the hospital, again, standin’ before Rev Jones, again, but with Mama standin’ next to me, her hands gripped about mine, thinkin’ I was struck in the head.
“You think she’s afflicted, Rev Jones?” Mama asked, tears tricklin’ down her cheeks. “Her papa wasn’t quite right, as you well know, but I always thought it had missed my Bethany.” Her body shook as she sobbed and Rev Jones handed her the small box of tissues from the bedside table.
“Now, Althea, you know Bethany isn’t afflicted,” Rev Jones soothed, his eyes never meetin’ mine. “She’s always been a righteous girl, always followed the path. Would I have chosen her to help out around the church while I’m stuck in this God forsaken place, if she was afflicted?”
Mama sniffed and blew hard into a tissue, dabbed at her eyes and wadded the paper up tight, clenchin’ it in her fist like it could save her from all evil. “No, Rev Jones, I suppose no
t.”
Rev Jones smiled, still not lookin’ at me, and reached out to Mama. Mama frantically looked about for a trash bin, tossed her soiled tissue into it and stepped to Rev Jones’s bed, lettin’ him take her hands into his.
“Althea, you have to have faith,” he said. “Sometimes the Lord shows us things that we can’t quite comprehend. Sometimes…” Now Rev Jones looked at me, no warmth in his eyes. “Sometimes he shows us things and gives us tasks that we may think we aren’t ready for, but we are, for He knows us better than we know ourselves. Understand?”
Mama nodded like she did, but I could tell she had no idea what Rev Jones was talkin’ about. “Yes, Rev, I understand. I just have to have faith.” She looked back at me. “So, my Bethany ain’t afflicted?”
Rev Jones patted Mama’s hands and let them fall away. “No, Althea, Bethany isn’t afflicted.”
Mama put a hand to her heart and took in a deep breath. “Well, praise the Lord!” she cried. She fanned at her face and took another tissue, wipin’ at her eyes, but I could see she was smilin’ and the tears weren’t comin’ back. “Thank you Rev! Your words help make a mother’s heart beat a little easier!”
Rev Jones smiled up at my mama, but his eyes continued to search mine for the truth.
“Now, Althea, I am a might thirsty,” the Rev said. “And I’m sick of apple juice and ice chips they keep givin’ me. Would you be a dear and fetch me a Coke?”
Mama’s eyes went wide. “But, Rev, that cain’t be good for your heart!”
“No, probably isn’t,” he chuckled. “But, it sure is good for my soul!”
Mama swatted at the air in front of the Rev, battin’ away his joke. “Of course, Rev,” she said. “I’ll have Bethany here run down to that vendin’ machine at the end of the hall.”
“Oh, Althea, would you mind fetching it for me?” the Rev asked, puttin’ on his best hang dog expression. “I want to ask Bethany a couple questions about the state of the church.”
