The Jesus Cow

by Michael Perry

  Harley looked back at the old tower now and thought of all the Jamboree Days it had presided over since it was raised in the 1950s, and his ever-burbling sentimentality kicked in. He felt himself longing for a time he never knew, that futile sweetness of the deep yearn. He wondered for a moment if this was why all his relationships wrecked; perhaps he was better at longing than belonging.

  This train of thought led him to consider the state of his life only seven months ago, how it compared with the present. Everything a guy might dream of in the bank account, but his heart and—by all standard measures—his soul overdrawn. He suddenly found himself resenting the villagers on the other side of the fence. It struck him that while people from all over the world had come to see that calf, most of the interest from his fellow hometown citizens was limited to how they might peel off a few bucks for themselves and, failing that, how to shut the whole works down. He looked over at the park again, and instead of a small-town celebration, he saw a drunken family reunion of vaguely irritating in-laws.

  Those people, thought Harley, even as he recoiled at the phrase. Those people care more about fireworks, softball, and beer than a vision of the Christ they claim to follow. Take a poll and they’ll rate themselves 97 percent Christian. But how many of them actually show up for church on Sunday? And of those who do, how many of them really mean it? How many trouble themselves with any thought of why they’re even in the pews? Jesus Cow? For most a’ them, it ain’t nothin’ but Harley Jackson’s weird damn steer.

  He heard the first of the fireworks go then, the first pop and bang. The band stopped playing, and the crowd went quiet as they turned to watch. Someone killed all but a single softball light, and Harley could see everyone standing in shadow, beers in hand, the ballplayers with their fingers hooked in the backstop fence, batting gloves hanging off their butts as they spit and gazed at the sky. At first there was just a boom or two, a flower and a flare. Some nice rooster tails, some silver bursts, a green spatter. Then came the first fine, orange slips of light as the larger charges rose, followed by the concussive whomp and blistering sizzle as the coppery sparks strewed themselves against the black. Scooter Eckstrom had never before operated with a budget that allowed him such pyrotechnic power and was in his glory, running from spot to spot in a crouch, punk stick in hand, touching off fuses in no apparent order and reveling in the ooohs and aaahs that followed. It was in this spirit of undertrained enthusiasm that he prematurely lit the 100-SHOT FAST-FINALE-IN-A-BOX INCLUDING 20 TITANIUM-SALUTE ENDING, which in his haste he had placed at a bit of an angle atop a molehill, thus releasing a stroboscopic thunderstorm on a trajectory just clearing Harley Jackson’s farmhouse. Those are coming in kinda low, thought Harley as sparks and ash dropped around him, and he caught the scent of burned powder.

  IT’S TOUGH TO maintain an existential grump beneath a skyful of fireworks, and Harley was back to enjoying them like everyone else when he noticed a flicker atop the water tower. A small, wavering orange flame was showing at the cap.

  At first Harley was dumbfounded. Flames? Shooting out of a water tower? Then he saw a rectangle of light as Carolyn Sawchuck threw open the door of the pump house. Framed in the light, she tipped her head back. The flame was stiffening and straightening, like a horsetail blown by the wind.

  Oh my God! thought Carolyn, irrespective of her disbelief. The vent cap! The day I put the flag up. I never shut the vent cap!

  She dashed back inside. Fueled by volatile fumes, the flame was now about ten feet tall and issuing a jetting sound audible between the screech and thud of the fireworks. From over on the softball field Harley heard a murmur as people began to notice the flame. Harley was reaching for his phone to dial 911 when he heard pagers going off all over the Jamboree Days grounds. Carolyn must have beat him to it.

  Harley knew the volunteers would be running for the trucks parked around the edges of the softball field, as they always were during Jamboree Days. Sprinting to the nearest security fence gate, Harley punched in the combination and threw it open. Chief Knutson roared through on the Argo, lights flashing, siren screaming, all the trucks following him.

  The fireworks had ceased. Through the open gate Harley could see that everyone was standing agape, staring at the water tower. The hiss of the flame was now a roar, and the cap of the water tower was beginning to glow. The American flag was aflame.

  “BLEVVY!!!!” hollered the chief. “She’s gonna BLEVVY!!!!”

  Carolyn, thought Harley.

  KLUTE SORENSEN WAS parked in the darkest corner of Clover Blossom Estates.

  It was over. He had seen the paperwork, and within the week, Clover Blossom Estates would belong to Solid Savings Bank. He thought of his father and his grandfather before him, and his great-grandfather before him, and the big hulking mill that still stood where they built it, and then he looked at the sad distribution of houses dotting the mostly empty lots, and he felt generations of disapproval pressing down on him. Every effort to provide parking, lodging, or transportation for the Jesus Cow tourists had failed. Each time Vance filed the paperwork, it was rejected on some obscure technicality. And how ashamed his immediate paternal ancestors would have been about the giant food pantry check: When that one bounced, Klute knew there was no pulling this thing from the fire. You can’t hide when you bounce a four-by-six-foot check.

  The giant house too would soon be gone. Bankruptcy laws would allow him to keep it, but he couldn’t imagine living there anymore. The very size of it was a monument—a hollow, unfurnished, empty monument—to the scope of his failure.

  And Mary Magdalene Jankowski? He’d never know. In the face of all his failure, he simply couldn’t face her now. Of all Klute’s grand goals, his attempt to court Meg was the first to grow directly from his heart. He had no idea what to do with the remaining ache.

  He started the Hummer. That too was bound for the bank. He figured he’d be driving some miniature tin can on wheels soon, so he might as well enjoy it. He turned the key. His old favorite, Set Sale!, came through the speakers, but he couldn’t face the upbeat hoo-hah and switched it off.

  He pulled out of Clover Blossom Estates and headed for the overpass. Across the interstate fireworks splashed across the sky. Klute thought of all the people laughing and drinking and enjoying the show and realized . . . he wouldn’t even know how to act with those people if he didn’t have his Hummer and his big ideas to hide behind.

  He was about to enter the on-ramp when he saw another light, bigger than any fireworks, and pulsing against the near horizon above Harley Jackson’s place. And then, a ball of fire, rolling to the sky.

  He accelerated past the on-ramp and across the overpass toward Main Street.

  “SHE’S GONNA BLEVVY!!!!” hollered the chief again.

  And it did.

  From Harley’s perspective, the explosion was apocalyptic. A ball of flame rolled upward, spinning into the night sky, illuminating everything all around. The water tower peeled open like a soda can blown up by teenage boys with a cherry bomb. For a split second the scrolling LED sign relit at SEE THE JESUS then melted into darkness. As the first flame ball expired, a second belched skyward, and now gouts of liquid fire were pouring from the tower, splashing to the ground, raining down on Carolyn’s Subaru, and flowing downhill toward Harley’s buildings. Harley saw Carolyn appear at the door of the pump house again, then yank it shut, unable to get past her burning car, let alone unlock the gate. Harley screamed at the firefighters running all around him, trying to get their attention, but no one seemed to hear him. I’ll have to get her myself, he thought, and ran to the nearest fire truck, where he grabbed a helmet and spare jacket.

  CAROLYN WAS PREPARED to die. Not ready to die, not wanting to die, but in the moment it took to see that her only exit was blocked by her flaming Subaru, she was surprised at the calmness with which she accepted the fact that this was it. Brought it on myself, she thought. Always trying to save the world, but really trying to save my pride. She looked across the r
oom at her short stack of books, soon to be nothing but ash. How little we—

  She never got to complete the thought, because outside there was a mighty sound of squealing wire and rending steel followed by a horrific crash, the sound of twin air horns, and a man’s voice, hollering.

  “CAROLYN! RUN! NOW! RUN!”

  Carolyn cracked the pump house door. Klute Sorensen was in his Hummer, gesturing wildly through the passenger door, which he had flung open. The chain-link fence was draped over his windshield and her crumpled Subaru was wedged and flaming in the bars of his chromium-plated brush buster.

  “JUMP IN!” hollered Klute, and Carolyn did. Klute roared through the wall of flame and went skidding up to the nearest pumper, where Swivel’s finest buried the Subaru, the Hummer, and, for that matter, the heretofore unfriendly couple in a mountain of fire-retardant foam.

  THE SWIVEL VOLUNTEER Fire Department had not retreated. Under Chief Knutson’s direction, one team had hosed down Harley’s house and the JCOW command center with foam. Another team lay down swathes of the foam on the ground between the buildings to serve as a buffer. But there was no arresting the fire itself as it skidded downhill from the water tower in a hellish rolling tide, igniting souvenir booths as it went, leaped the driveway, and splashed against the side of the barn.

  Immediately, flames fingered their way up the siding, and in moments the barn was ablaze. Nearly unnoticed, one thin rivulet split off from the main to follow one of the channels worn in the gravel driveway over the years. In a flickering trickle, it meandered its way out to the road, where it came to a storm drain and flowed out of sight. Shortly thereafter Main Street exploded, splitting right down the middle, unzipping the asphalt all the way to the Buck Rub Bar. Barney Parsons would later say the force of the explosion lifted him right off the men’s room toilet, causing him to spill his beer.

  THE FOOD PANTRY was blown to smithereens.

  HARLEY’S BARN BURNED to the ground, and Tina Turner and the Jesus Cow with it.

  CHAPTER 32

  It was such a mess. There was so much to sort. Klute served up a fresh lawsuit, as did the village and any number of terrified citizens. There were endless meetings with Sloan and the International Talent Management team. Lloyd’s of London took depositions for days, and it was not entirely clear that everything—or anything—would be covered. There was hope that the natural disaster clause might be circumnavigated, as this was clearly a disaster of the most unnatural sort, but there was also some concern that payment would still be withheld because the village had transferred ownership of the water tower to Harley and thus the illegal storage of toxic (to say nothing of profoundly flammable) materials was technically his responsibility and violated numerous clauses.

  After Sloan released him from the final meeting, Harley went straight to the Kwik Pump, bought one of those dollar-off Old Milwaukee twenty-four-packs, returned to his kitchen, and started drinking. He couldn’t even find it in himself to summon Billy. He was lonely. He was devastated. He couldn’t see his way forward. He had gone against his better judgment, sought revenge, and the thing had swallowed him whole.

  And failed at love.

  Again.

  He was becoming bleary, and the beer wasn’t numbing the pain but rather deepening it. He was feeling sorry for himself, maudlin over his own state, and for the first time in his life he didn’t care to go on. His phone kept ringing. He dropped it on the floor and stomped it with his heel. He wanted only to escape.

  Taking the box of beer from the refrigerator he went to the Silverado, spared from the flames along with his house and garage. At first it wouldn’t start, but he wiggled the battery terminals and then it took. Leaving the truck to idle, he went back into the house, up to his bedroom, and deep into the back of his closet, where from beneath a pile of socks he withdrew his Bible case, hand-tooled by his mother and given him—with the crackling new Bible in it—for his fifth birthday as a reward for learning how to read. Dropping the Bible case on the seat he wove his way out through the blackened yard and around the remains of merchandise booths. When he got out to County Road M, he drove up past the twisted wreckage of the water tower, out across the overpass, beneath which the traffic flew back and forth with all disregard. There was no sign of activity in Clover Blossom Estates. Klute’s Hummer was nowhere to be seen, and the empty houses looked even more forlorn now, decorated as they were with all those sagging banners advertising services Klute had never been allowed to provide.

  The gate to Meg’s junkyard was closed, and the boom of the crane was motionless. Even in his fogginess, Harley knew where Meg was—down at St. Jude’s with Carolyn and Mindy, setting up a temporary food pantry in a shipping container on the parking lot. He felt another wave of despair and took another suck on his Old Milwaukee.

  He drove on, silent and forlorn, until he came to the old abandoned farmhouse where he had gone to Sunday-morning meetings as a boy. Harley pulled the truck over to the shoulder, pulled his Bible from its case, walked through the rank grass to the building, and stared in through the window. The plaster ceilings were sagging. He could see mildew on the walls and porcupine poop on the curled linoleum. He could also see himself in a straight-backed chair, singing the meaningful hymns, bowing his head in prayer, rereading his chosen Bible verses for the week, readying himself to give testimony, his shoes polished and shining.

  How clean-limbed it all seemed, that simple faith. He thought of his mother and his father and their quiet dedication to charity and humility, and the extrapolations required to go from there to a birthmarked calf worth millions and the conflagration of all he had known.

  It made his heart hurt, and he wanted another beer. He returned to the truck, twisted another bottle open, ground into third gear, and lurched forward.

  He drove until he came to Five Mile Road. He sat at the stop sign a moment before looking up and realizing he was at the old Nicolet Place. Mindy’s place. The F-250 was parked by the granary, but the Norton was gone, its tarp in a heap on the ground.

  Food pantry, he remembered. Food pantry. Helping out.

  He felt the tears rising.

  Then his emotions swung the other way. He leaned out the window. Flung the beer bottle to the asphalt, watched the shards skitter through the foam. Straightened up. Grabbed the wheel with both hands. He was done dithering. Done letting events direct him rather than the other way around. He’d drive to St. Jude’s. Lay it on the line. Give Mindy some Bad Johnny Cash. Let her know he was ready to hit life running. Split for Panama.

  Get that damn motorcycle ride.

  He turned right, and headed south, back toward Swivel. On either side the Big Swamp stretched out, a morass of cut-grass, cattails, swamp water, ooze, and bubbling methane. Harley bore down in his focus, determined to keep his truck centered on the road so as not to wind up in the swamp, which festered right up to the edge of the road on both sides. It was dusk now, the sun laying a final red line across the horizon as he approached McCracken Hill, which would take him up and away from the swamp and into the last hilly stretch toward Swivel.

  Right at the base of the hill, barely into the climb, the truck coughed and bucked, roared ahead again, then died. Harley stuffed the clutch and twisted the key. The starter wound but the engine wouldn’t fire. He turned the key off, then on again. Still nothing. Because of the grade, the truck was losing momentum rapidly, so Harley popped it out of gear, steered it quietly to the shoulder, and set the emergency brake.

  Lifting the hood, he waggled the carburetor flap, jiggled the battery cables, and tried the starter again. Nothing. Fetching the ball-peen hammer he crawled under the truck to smack the solenoid. After a few whacks, he shimmied out and tried the starter again.

  Still nothing. He’d have to call Billy, then. Tow the thing home. Foggily he fished through his pockets for his cell phone, but found nothing. He slapped his pants fore and aft, slow in his tipsy concentration. He searched the truck cab, the dash, under the seats, ran his hand in the
crack behind the seat and the backrest. He shook his head as if to clear it but couldn’t recall where he might have left the phone. Then he remembered dropping it to the floor. Smashing it.

  There would be no calling for help, then. Probably for the best, he thought. Last thing I need is the constable coming to find me out here in this kinda shape and my truck engine still warm.

  Okay, he thought. Walking.

  Leaning into the grade he imagined Mindy seeing him in this condition of drunkenness and dedication, interpreting it as a sign of the depth of his love, and relenting on the spot. He had this heroic vision then, her throwing her arms around him, drawing deeply of his scent, kissing him with tears in her eyes, and then she would kick-start that Norton, and they would ride, ride, ride.

  With sunset, strands of fog had begun to drift across the swamp, and a few threads hung over McCracken Hill and the road ahead. He was about halfway up the hill when the glow appeared, a white hint of shine, growing and growing.

  The glow waxed steadily, expanding and brightening with ethereal constance. It was a good night for the dispersion of light, the fog strands thickening in the humid evening air, the heaviness of everything serving to muffle all but Harley’s footfalls. There was no sound associating itself with the swelling light, and this heightened Harley’s susceptibility to the idea that it was more than headlights hoving. In the silence, everything seemed premonitory. Despite himself, Harley felt a surge in his chest. A little what-if ticklishness. Maybe it was the beer, but for now he was willing to turn himself over to hope and belief. In his parlous spiritual state he managed to convince himself of at least the possibility that the glow was not that of a vehicle but rather of a nimbus backlighting the genuine Son of God, that the rapture had come, that it was northbound on Five Mile Road, and that if Harley kept walking, he and Jesus would meet right at the crest of McCracken Hill. Or perhaps it was the Virgin Mary inbound. Perhaps Mary Ann Van Hoof hadn’t been the crazy one.