Intended for Harm

by C. S. Lakin

  His glance caught on the large numbers on the wall calendar. July 6. His birthday. Today he was fifty, a round number, half a century. He felt way older than his years. Worn out, exhausted, dried up. Nearly a month had passed since Joseph’s disappearance. A month. He kept trying to wring sense out of the situation, had wrung every possible explanation dry, with nothing to show for it. The police were just as puzzled. They’d scoured every street and alley in Westwood Village, even used dogs to see if they could find some trace of where Joseph might have been taken, starting at the place the boys said they’d found his jacket. Nothing. No one had seen anything—all those people out on a Saturday night, walking around town, coming out of the movies, the clubs, the restaurants. How was it that no one saw?

  When Reuben had called late that night, sometime close to three a.m., the phone jolting Jake out of a deep sleep, and he only heard gibberish through the line. Something about Joseph having gone outside to get some fresh air, and Reuben following shortly after, the sidewalks crowded and Reuben claiming there was no danger, no way Joseph could have been mugged or kidnapped, but surely he wouldn’t have wandered far or gotten into a car with a stranger. Jake heard through Reuben’s choked voice how they searched around, found Joseph’s jacket, wet with blood six blocks away in some alley, as if he’d been mugged. But why would muggers take his body and leave his jacket—and where would they take him? It made no sense then and still made no sense now.

  For days Jake had called every hospital around the greater Los Angeles area, and the police had an APB out on his son, every local news channel showing his photo and Jake unable to watch, seeing his son’s smiling face, so innocent and angelic, staring out at him, pleading for him to find him, and the only thing he could do was scream at the TV, shut it off.

  Dinah kept trying to get him to eat, cooking him meals, but food tasted like sawdust in his mouth, made him gag. He hadn’t been back to work, put his life on hold, although it was more likely over. Now, today, this day of all days, the police were shutting the case. Chalking it up as an unsolved crime, not designated a homicide, the police oh so reassuring that since no body had been found there was still hope. Right—hope for what? That Joseph would just walk through his front door, like he’d been away on vacation and forgot to tell someone? That whoever had kidnapped him, beaten or cut him so that he bled all over his jacket, had taken him in, then decided just to let him go free after he got well? Just what in the world did they hope would happen that would give this a happy ending?

  “Sorry about that,” the detective said, referring to the interrupting phone call—Detective Johnson, the one who handled his case from the start. His face softened. “I wish I had something better to tell you. It’s like your son has just disappeared off the face of the earth. But I want to assure you that just because we’ve officially ceased investigations, your case will always remain open, unsolved, and if we get any tips or leads, we’ll jump on them. Like we told you at the outset, it’s not common but it does happen sometimes that gangs from outside areas cruise the Village. The other precincts are well aware of your son’s disappearance and will continue inquiring through their networks. At some point someone may talk.”

  Jake nodded; words strangled in his throat but he forced out a “thank you” and stood. He shook hands, walked out the front doors and down the steps, saw Dinah waiting for him by the car. She had insisted on driving him, still. He wondered if she would ever trust him behind the wheel again after he’d crashed into the stop sign right by their house in the middle of the day, his tears blurring his sight and his thoughts back over the hill, stuck there in that alley since that night.

  He’d gone back many times to that spot, picturing Joseph lying there, someone yanking his jacket off, throwing it behind a couple of trash cans. How come there was no blood on the pavement, only on the jacket? The police speculated maybe he’d been lying on something—cloth, plastic—that his attackers took and perhaps discarded. He tried to talk to Reuben, grilled him over and over, hoping Reuben would remember something else about the alley, the position of the jacket, but his son only grew more and more upset, refusing to talk, finally even yelling and now staying away from the house, not talking to him. Jake knew in time Reuben would come back around, but he couldn’t blame him. He had a wife and a new baby, needed to get on with his life and not wallow in Jake’s.

  Jake knew Dinah and Ben were suffering, but he was incapable of even addressing their pain, and they seemed to find solace in each other, spending all their time together and now Ben getting sick again, as if Joseph’s death—yes, death, Jake telling himself to get used to the truth—made Ben deathly ill, his kidney problems almost returning overnight, much worse than before.

  “I called Levi. We’re going to meet him for lunch,” Dinah said to him, taking his arm and opening the car door for him.

  “We should just go home,” Jake said.

  “No, it’s your birthday. And I know you don’t feel like celebrating, but I made a cake and I don’t want to sit around at home and mope.”

  “So we can mope at a restaurant.”

  “Right. Fine. Ben feels up to going, so I think we should.”

  Jake nodded. It was a good day for Ben if he could get outside, get out of bed. Levi was home watching Ben, not that he needed watching but just in case. Jake wished his boys had been watching Joseph better that night, hadn’t let him out of their sight. Joseph’s death had inspired a profound change in Levi, who instantly shed his arrogant attitude and, to Jake’s shock, became helpful and compliant, even polite, doing chores around the house and helping Dinah with the grocery shopping. Jake wished Simon had been stricken with a similar change of heart, but Jake knew better than to wish anything where Simon was concerned.

  Just as with Rachel’s death, he had first felt anger, the need to blame his sons for what had happened, for their stupidity or carelessness. But when he saw their faces, so full of shame and remorse, how could he hold on to that anger? They were all suffering, once more, this never-ending roller coaster of pain and loss—first Leah up and leaving, then Rachel dying, and now Joseph gone, gone. His precious, sweet son, his gift from Rachel, from God, the boy with a dream and a purpose for his life.

  Whatever tiny ounce of faith Jake had grasped over the long years of pain and disappointment was now snuffed out. He didn’t even bother to wrestle with God now, not anymore. What was the point? He’d thought by wrestling with God he might somehow come out the victor, his refusing to let go until God blessed him, righted all the wrongs he’d been made to suffer. But now?

  Jake huffed and closed his eyes as Dinah drove, Jake knowing this would be the last time he’d step foot in the police station. Surely the last time he’d ever drive into Westwood. He could scream at the top of his lungs but the verdict was in. The heavens were silent, closed up, inaccessible. God was absent, dead, deaf, gone. Maybe upon seeing all the evil perpetrated decade after decade, century after century, God had had enough. Jake couldn’t blame him. If he were God, he wouldn’t have stuck around either. Let sinful mankind go their evil ways until they destroyed their planet and each other. Maybe that was God’s plan after all—his way of eradicating evil from the universe, just stepping back and letting humans do it for him.

  It was time Jake faced the truth—about Joseph, about God, about his own life. There was no point to any of it; trying to place meaning where none existed was as futile as trying to grab the stars and put them in your pocket.

  They would only burn a hole right through you and leave nothing but cinders.

  Mosey liked to darn his socks by candlelight. It not only saved on the electric, it had a feel of comfort, reminding him of his mama, the way she used to rock in the old rickety rocker by that monster of a wood stove, humming some Spiritual as she stitched, the pile of clothes in the wicker basket by her side, never getting to the bottom of the old pile. He pushed his bifocals up his nose and tilted his head so they wouldn’t slip down before he got a good look at the kn
ot his knobby fingers were making. Well, it would hold, maybe longer than the threadbare sock, and he could hear his granddaughter complaining about his frugal ways, the next time dumping out a plastic Wal-Mart bag full of bright, new, white socks into his lap and just not understanding the peaceful occupation of a man’s hands doing simple tasks like that.

  He listened, cocked his head. Could never be sure just what he was hearing, sometimes thinking a body was at the door and turned out it was just the old fridge rattling its bones. Or the entire apartment building shuddering when some heavy truck rumbled across the 10 overpass. This time, though, he heard it clearly and he threw down the sock and thread and got situated on his feet. By the time he shuffled into the back room, the fella on the bed had his eyes partway open.

  “Oh, praise Jesus! He’s done woke up.”

  Some folk would have chided him, and surely his daughter would, had he let her come over to check on him. Only two people knew the secret Mosey kept in his bedroom: his upstairs neighbor, Roland—the young, strong deacon from his church who looked after him at the insistence of his daughter, God bless her heart—and God above. The former being the one that hefted the poor boy that night and placed him on Mosey’s bed. The latter being the One who told him in no uncertain terms, the way the Holy Spirit was apt to do, that the boy needed his tending and his alone, which Mosey was inclined to argue about upon seeing the messed-up condition of that boy’s face, most of his bones crushed and him barely able to breathe. But he knew better than to question what the good Lord placed before him, which in this instance, on last month, was a young white boy who had fallen from the sky and landed just nearly on his front stoop.

  Roland had done his bit of complaining, insisting on calling an ambulance and getting him treated proper, not to mention laying out warnings of all the trouble Mosey was drawing his way, what with the boy’s family no doubt rich—easy to tell by the fancy clothes he’d been wearing—looking frantically for their lost son. Day after day, Roland reported to Mosey what he saw and heard on the news, the odd misinformation that placed the boy’s leather varsity jacket—the one they’d stripped off him to get a better grip on him, to bring him inside—in some other part of the city, way far away. It puzzled Mosey since he just couldn’t figure it—how when they went back outside after cleaning up the boy as best as they could to fetch the jacket, why, it had been taken. Nothing strange about that in this neighborhood. You let your grocery bag down for a second to take a breather and the next thing you knew, it’d been snatched out from under you. But strange the way Roland said the news reported the jacket found elsewhere and the boy’s brothers saying Joseph—that was the poor boy’s name—must have been walking around that part of town when he got jumped by some gang or other.

  Mosey humphed, heard stories like that his whole long life and knew a lie when he heard one. Those brothers were probably the ones that dumped Joseph off the freeway, Mosey having seen just about every kind of meanness in his day, knowing folk could just be plain heartless through and through. He thanked God he had such a loving family, that no kin of his had intention of tossing him off some overpass.

  Mosey sat in the small kitchen chair he’d placed next to the bed, where he’d been tending to this boy, with him coming in and out of consciousness, not muttering more than a word or two, sometimes Mosey getting him to sip some water, drink a little soup. But then he drifted back unconscious these last two days, Mosey praying hard over him, anointing him with oil, and asking God, humbly but insistently, if maybe he should get the boy to a doctor after all. Still the Holy Spirit checked his hand, told him to wait, wait. Mosey knew better than to press God; his job was to be obedient and trust. God had his reasons, and surely if this boy’s brothers intended harm, then maybe Joey was safer in his apartment, a place no one on earth would think to look for a rich white boy. Regardless, God had given this boy into his safekeeping, and for nearly a month now Mosey had barely left his side.

  The small window fan did little to cool the room on this hot summer evening, despite his keeping the shades down over all the windows and having Roland bring blocks of ice to set on the tray in front of the fan. Mosey picked up the damp cloth and dabbed Joseph’s sweaty forehead. He studied the boy’s face, the fairly straight nose that finally looked almost normal, the swelling and bruising at first uglier than sin, then turning blue, then green, injury the likes of which Mosey hadn’t seen since his stint as a medic in the Korean War. But he knew ways of stabilizing breaks, including cheeks and noses, and even Roland had commented on the proper job he’d done, although Mosey gave all the glory to God, who kept his hands steady and his resolve strong.

  “You . . .” Joseph’s voice came out dry and raspy.

  “Here, sip some of this. Some nice cold pop.” He helped Joseph, propped him up on the pillows, Mosey glad the boy hadn’t broken his back, awfully surprised he hadn’t. In fact, it was no less than a miracle the boy hadn’t died from that fall, landing on the hard street like he had. Why his face alone had been shattered, only God knew. But Mosey had seen, right then when he’d heard the loud smack and came hobbling out as fast as he could to the boy’s side, a divine light surrounding him, like a cocoon cradling his body, wrapping it in golden light, making Mosey about turn and scan the heavens for a band of holy angels, not seeing them but knowing they were there, watching over the boy.

  Mosey helped Joseph sip, then set down the can with the straw sticking out the hole. A clarity in the boy’s eyes encouraged him. “How’s the head? Still pounding?”

  Joseph cleared his throat. “Not . . . too bad. Where am I? I keep falling . . . asleep. Can’t remember . . .”

  “My name’s Mosey. You’ve been hurt and I’ve been tending to you.”

  Joseph turned his head in a slow arc, took in the room that Mosey kept dimly lit so as not to hurt the boy’s eyes.

  “How long . . .” Joseph gestured to the room.

  “Three weeks, give or take a day. I found you on the street, just outside my apartment. You were in some bad shape, but you’ve healed right fine. Maybe not quite the same face you started with, but . . .”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Joseph closed his eyes, exhaled.

  “What do you remember?” Mosey waited, patted the boy’s hand.

  Joseph shook his head, winced. “Can’t . . .”

  “Do you recollect your name, your family?”

  Again Joseph shook his head.

  “Your name’s Joseph. Joseph Abrams. That ring any bell?”

  “I . . . think so. Not sure.”

  Mosey patted his hand again. “Well now, memory’s a funny thing—it comes back when it wants; you can’t rush it. You just rest here and Mosey will fetch you some soup. We gotta get some meat back on those bones, get you moving around, get the blood stirring.”

  Joseph nodded, laid his head back on the pillow, and closed his eyes again.

  Mosey smiled, hummed one of his mama’s old tunes—There’s a Balm in Gilead—and took careful steps toward the kitchen. He pondered what would happen once Joseph’s memory came back, if it would. Would he remember that night or block it out? Only time would tell.

  He sang as he heated the soup in the pot on the stove:

  There is a balm in Gilead

  To make the wounded whole;

  There is a balm in Gilead

  To heal the sin-sick soul.

  Sometimes I feel discouraged,

  And think my work’s in vain,

  But then the Holy Spirit

  Revives my soul again.

  Yessir, Mosey told himself, the Lord is surely healing that boy. I’ll keep him as long as he says so, till I’m discharged from my duty.

  As he poured the soup into a bowl, he thought on how those brothers of his had probably left him for dead, hoping he had died. It made him wonder why they hated him so. Mosey could tell this was a godly boy—not just from the light he’d seen that night, but something about him, some innocence that shone from inside, from his soul, and t
he brightness of his eyes.

  Mosey chuckled. Maybe he was entertaining an angel unaware, as the Good Book put it. A fallen angel—not fallen from heaven but from a dirty freeway overpass. Still, a fall’s a fall, regardless of the distance. But a fall from grace was the farthest fall of all, and if those brothers had meant this little angel harm, then it was Mosey’s job to show the grace of God and protect Joseph—for as long as it took.

  Joseph watched the door slowly close, waited until his head stopped reeling. He took a chance and let go of the sink’s edge, found his balance, stared down at the stained white porcelain basin, not yet ready for the encounter with the mirror. He heard Mosey puttering around the kitchen, heard him start to hum they way he liked to do, heard dishes clattering as Mosey washed, rinsed, and stacked them in the dish drainer.

  Joseph felt like a truck had run over his face. Every inch of it throbbed with pain, his nose and cheeks especially tender to touch. When he’d finally made sense of his surroundings, understood he was in some old man’s apartment far from home, learned with a shock how much time had gone by since the night he went out to dinner with his family, clarity rushed into his mind like a tsunami, causing him to bolt upright in the neat little bed he found himself in.

  Mosey had said he’d suffered a concussion, but Joseph likened it more to Rip Van Winkle waking up from a deeply troubled sleep only to find the world as he knew it had vanished, replaced by a wholly unfamiliar one. The man’s gentle care comforted Joseph but couldn’t soothe the raging torrent of fire in his soul, this fiery affliction he found himself standing in the midst of, like the three young Hebrews who Nebuchadnezzar had thrown into the blazing furnace, intent on destroying them for their faithful obedience to their God, refusing to waver or compromise, just as Joseph had done.