by R. A. Nelson
The sheriff says he’s sorry and leaves.
Miss Wanda Joy gets up from the table. “Get your things, Ronald Earl,” she says.
“Where’s Momma?” I say.
“You’re coming to live with me,” Miss Wanda Joy says.
She gets my clothes and lets me bring some of my other things in a box she gives me. It’s a box that some shoes came in.
I know without even looking, most of the women in the congregation are already crying. Now it’s time to tell them. Tell them about the day of my anointing.
The day I found my name.
San Angelo, Texas.
Now I’m ten years old, sitting at a picnic table with Sugar Tom and Certain Certain.
I can see a sun-blinded lake, bass boats racing by a gray wooden dock. We’re here to bring the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ to the World-Famous Lake Nasworthy Lamblast and Chili Cook-off.
I’ve spent the morning earning my keep, helping Certain Certain, running errands, setting up folding chairs, hauling water. This is the first chance I’ve had to sit down all day.
“You know why Lake Nasworthy is world famous?” Sugar Tom is saying. He taps a skinny paperback book laying on the table with a bony finger. “I’ve read about it right here in Stories of the Strange. In the 1960s a boy jumped off that very dock and came up covered in water moccasins.”
A chill runs all through me.
“Sounds like a damn fool,” Certain Certain says. “Jump in Lake Nastywater. You ever seen water so brown?”
“Matthew, chapter five, verse twenty-two,” Sugar Tom says. He’s talking about the verse in the Bible that says you will go to hell for calling someone a fool. He takes a mouthful of chili. “Lord, that is good. But I swan it’s incinerating my gullet!”
“Exodus, chapter twenty, verse seven,” Certain Certain says. “‘Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.’”
These two have done this long as I can remember— battled back and forth with holy scripture.
Sugar Tom gulps sweet tea. A mariachi band is booming over the loudspeakers. There’s hot food, folks are dancing, and even the air smells like something you want to bite.
But later in the evening when Sugar Tom begins his sermon, a huge storm comes up. Long thunder bumpers roll in off the lake, one after another. Even Miss Wanda Joy’s hair can’t stand up to the squall.
Right in the middle of the sermon, one of the tent poles comes loose, and me and Certain Certain rush over to fix it. We struggle with the pole while the canvas flaps around our ears, making a snapping sound. I’m too little to do much of anything but hang on tight and watch the sky flash. That’s when I see the boy.
He’s a couple years older than me, standing a few yards away. His long hair is sticking straight up all over his head, like seeds on a dandelion. It’s the strangest sight I’ve ever seen.
The boy is grinning, saying over and over, “Look at this! Look at this!”
But everybody is paying too much attention to Sugar Tom and the storm. It’s like that boy is there just for me. My skin prickles all over watching his crazy smile and floating hair. I can feel it; something awful is about to happen.
My whole world goes white. A white so pure it’s what I figure it would be like staring into the face of the Lord. My eyes are knocked clean back in my head. The same instant there comes an almighty boom, and everything disappears.
When I come back into myself, my ears are clapping like bells and I’m not in the tent anymore. I’m sitting outside in the rain feeling cold, muddy water leaking into my pants. The colors of the trees on the shore look reversed.
Sugar Tom has stopped speaking—everything stands still for a heartbeat or two, then somebody screams.
But where is Certain Certain? I can’t see him anywhere. Then I see his legs wrapped in a piece of tent. I crawl over and pull the canvas loose.
Certain Certain is sprawled facedown in a mud puddle. I tug hard and roll him over. His hair is stained with red clay. His eyes are closed, and his chest isn’t rising.
People are hollering and praying all over. They push up a circle around me, almost like they are too scared to touch him.
I start to cry.
I go down on my knees next to Certain Certain and lay my hands on his chest. Instantly his whole body jumps. It’s not really much more than a twitch, but to me it feels like he hopped six inches off the ground.
“Oh, my sweet Jesus,” a woman says behind me.
“Praise the Lord!” somebody else hollers.
“It’s a miracle,” a man says. “Blessed, merciful Lord.”
Certain Certain shakes all over and starts to sit up. His eyeballs flutter, then he tries getting to his feet. Some of the men catch him up under his arms when he falls.
“Somebody call an ambulance!” a man hollers out.
“Already on the way from Fort Sam,” somebody else answers.
“He died,” a woman says. “That man was stone dead. I seen it. This boy”—she points at me—“he laid hands on him and brought him back. I seen it, plain as day.” She jerks my arm up so hard, the rest of me follows. “You healed him,” the woman says. “You resurrected him.”
“I saw it, too!” somebody else yells.
“That’s the gospel truth.”
People are talking all over. There’s little moans here and there, and some of the folks begin weeping outright, praising Jesus or kneeling in prayer, right there in the mud.
What happens next is like a dream. There I am, wet to the skin, muddy, scared to pieces, and everybody is clapping me on the back like I’m a hero. They tug me up to the front, where Sugar Tom is standing.
“Pastor Tom!” one of the men hollers. “This boy has performed a miracle.”
A bunch of other folks yell “Yes” and “Amen.” Next thing I know, I feel hands all over me, rubbing my wet hair, patting my back, hoisting me up on the stage.
I look at Sugar Tom, with my eyes saying, What am I supposed to do? There’s a microphone on the pulpit. Sugar Tom turns it on and sticks it in my hand. He smiles at me, saying, “Just open your heart, son.”
The congregation claps and hollers for me to speak. I can see Miss Wanda Joy standing in the corner, eyes digging holes in my face.
I look out across the crowd and see Certain Certain sitting on a folding chair. I lock eyes with him. And he smiles. Then he nods and says something that looks like “Yes.”
That’s all I need.
Ten years old, and the Holy Ghost comes up inside me for the very first time. I can feel it burning the soles of my feet, plowing its way up and filling every empty space. At first the feeling is frightening, and I’m light-headed, like I’m leaving my body behind.
I don’t remember one single solitary word of what I say. But they are still clapping and hollering an hour later.
Little Ronald Earl Pettway, of Covington, Georgia. Born in Texas.
Little Texas.
After I get done telling about the day of my anointing, the Holy Spirit comes up in me so strong, it’s like somebody opened the top of my head and poured in liquid fire. I am wide open, taking it in. The Spirit is the only thing protecting me now.
Then I’m not even here anymore. I am not anywhere but inside their eyes, the girls’ eyes, and it all begins again. I put my mouth against the microphone. It tastes like a metal flower.
“The Lord is a-coming, ah!” I say, but it’s not really me saying it.
Something has me by the shoulders, lifting me clean off the earth.
“He’s a house afire, ah! He’s a freight train, ah! He’s a wrecking ball, ah! He is eternal, ah! Watchful over the sanctified, ah! He’s driving the tides of resurrection in your souls, ah!”
I don’t know where the words come from. They aren’t mine. On and on, gushing from my mouth like a raging flood. At the same time this big, blistering whiteness fills my stomach, rushes up my throat plumb to my eyeballs. Begins to carry me off.
“I say now, put you
r hand in the hand of Jesus, ah! Make yourself ready, ah! Because in my Father’s house there are many mansions, ah! He prepareth a place for the bridegroom to take your hand in marriage, ah! In the final days the clouds will roll back, ah! with a blasting of trumpets, ah! and the graves of the righteous will burst open, ah! and those who believeth on His name, ah! The dead in Christ shall rise, ah! Take His hand, ah! No man knoweth when his time cometh, ah! I say no man knoweth, ah! And those who do not repent, ah! shall be cast into the lake of everlasting fire, ah!”
My eyes roll back and flutter. I can’t feel the Bible in my hands anymore. The Holy Spirit is lifting me up, floating me away; everything is floating, someone is screaming, then ten thousand voices are screaming, and my soul comes flooding out my temples, pouring down the sides of my head like molten light.
It’s like I’ve swallowed the world.
But somehow I’m weightless. There is no roof to the tent anymore; I’m moving into the open sky. I can see myself down there, no bigger than a hickory nut.
I’ve left my body behind. I’m outside. Outside with her.
The girl from my dreams.
When I’m done testifying, the spirit that has toted me up to heaven slowly hauls me back down from the clouds. I become aware of things around me again—people standing, screaming, waving, clapping their hands. The girls, especially the girls.
They are reaching their arms out like they could touch me from twenty feet away. Some of them are weeping.
Sugar Tom’s Bible is heavy on my wrist now. I hand it to him. He takes it with both hands, saying “Amen,” and I watch Certain Certain put it back in the prayer box.
I turn my eyes from the congregation to look for Miss Wanda Joy. Her black eyes push their way into my head. She raises her arms and says the same thing she says after every sermon.
“If you believe in the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, if you are ready to offer up your soul in hope of eternal salvation through the blood of the Lamb, come forward. Come kneel at the Calvary Rail.”
The Calvary Rail runs along the edge of the stage. It’s nearly twenty foot long, made of heavy white oak varnished dark brown. The idea is, there’s room for all the Apostles.
But far more than twelve people come forward. Those that can, squeeze in, with the rest of them left standing. Miss Wanda Joy directs them to kneel, their fingers twined, heads bowed.
Miss Wanda Joy keeps her fingernails short for a reason; she goes down the line tapping each person on the head, repeating words I know by heart in one long string:
“AreyoureadytoacceptJesusChristasyourLordandpersonal-Savior?”
Each sinner nods, and Miss Wanda Joy goes to work, praying over them. Some of them shout. Some raise their hands as if drawn up by a heavenly magnet.
A woman with a purple shawl starts speaking in tongues, saying something like “Radda daddaa tat a ta!” and flops on the floor like a catfish. She lays there kicking and hollering awhile, then a couple of men get her up and help her back to her seat. Gradually the rest of the kneelers stand up and go sit back down again.
I turn my attention to a line of folks that has formed up beside the stage. Certain Certain is waiting with the first woman. She comes forward careful, like she’s scared her legs are going to fold up under her. Certain Certain takes her by the elbow, holding her arm so ginger, you’d think the woman was made of spun sugar.
“It’s my hip, praise Jesus,” she says. “But I just know you can help me, Little Texas.”
She starts to pull up her white dress, lifting it up to show her veiny blue leg, but Certain Certain puts his hand on top of her hand, saying, “That’s all right, sister, that’s all right. We understand.”
“The doctor tells me I need hip replacement surgery,” the woman says, voice cracking. She looks at me. “And I’m so afraid. Praise Jesus, I am afraid.”
“Bring the sister forward,” I say to Certain Certain.
As Certain Certain guides her closer, I catch the cloggy scent of some fancy perfume. I take her hand; her skin is loose, cold, and her jowls are saggy. But that’s the outside. Sugar Tom always says for a healing to do its business, it’s more important what’s on the inside.
“Welcome, sister,” I say. “Now, tell me. Just how long have you been burdened with this affliction?”
She gives a sad little smile, and her eyes nearly disappear in wrinkles.
“Well, it started after my husband—his name was James—after he passed on. Four years ago this March. James was a big man. He helped me so much. There are just so many things a small woman can’t do for herself—”
“And have you been to many doctors to help you with your pain?”
“Oh yes, Little Texas.” She brings up her tiny hands. “Nashville, Atlanta, Birmingham. All over. They all tell me the same thing. What I’ve got—it’s degenerative. They can’t fix me without putting in a replacement hip. I’m so afraid.” She turns to face the congregation like she is speaking to them now. “I don’t like hospitals. I don’t even like visiting people in hospitals.”
“I understand,” I say. “Now, would you like to have this burden lifted from you today? This very minute?”
“I would! I would!”
“And do you declare Jesus Christ to be your personal Savior and Redeemer?”
“I do! Praise Jesus, I love Him so much, of course I do!”
“Well then. Do you believe He can heal you, sister?”
“Oh yes. All things and more He can do. I believe that, Little Texas. With all my heart.”
“And can you feel the power of your belief deep down in your soul?” I say, readying my other hand.
“Why, yes, I do!”
Her eyes get wider and wider—she has a look I’ve come to know so well. Sugar Tom calls it the “house afire look.” Eyes wild, staring. Just about crazy with hope. But mostly the look says this: Deliverance.
“We are delivering them from their sickness, their burdens,” Sugar Tom says.
The time is right. I snap my hand out and holler, “Praise Jesus!” At the same time popping the heel of my palm against the woman’s forehead, hard.
There is a moment, an instant truly, where I feel something like a heat hot as orange coals in my hand, and the fire rams the woman straight upside the head, and she tumbles over backward into Certain Certain’s big hands—I hear a whoosh come out of her. Then she’s soft as tallow dripping down a candle and flops over into his arms.
The healed woman’s eyes are closed, and she is smiling. Smiling all over, as if Jesus Himself had just laid hands on her. Certain Certain gently drags her to the other end of the stage—one of her flat little shoes comes off, and Miss Wanda Joy picks it up and hands it into the congregation.
Then the next one comes, and the next and the next and the next. And each time there is that feeling of the fire leaping, something jumping from me to them, and that smile. That everlasting smile.
Healing all these folks, it’s like—it’s like passing into a cloud, one of those kinds that goes straight up like a triple-scoop ice cream cone. Coming out the other side, full of mist and sunshine.
I think maybe it’s like love.
Like love is coming out the tips of my fingers and straight into their bodies. The love runs back and forth between us. Everything else falls away. When I’m in it, there is nothing else for me.
And I’m okay again. I’m all right for a little while. Till the fear starts all over again.
Sometimes I’m so drained after a service, I can sleep ten hours. Tonight I wish I could jump down from the stage and run straight to the motor home to my bed. But there are always people wanting to talk about the sermon, needing a prayer, or just wanting to touch me, shake my hand.
Miss Wanda Joy says meeting folks after a service is the second-most-important part of a ministry. Certain Certain calls it “ginning up repeat business.” I’m so used to it, I almost don’t have to listen.
“Lord bless you, Little Texas!”
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“Praise Jesus for bringing you to us!”
“I was hoping you could pray for my boy overseas in Iraq.…”
Tugging my arms, pulling at my suit coat, touching my face. I move through them quick as I can, but it feels like walking through a car wash without the car.
I’m not who they think I am. I’m not who they think I am. I’m not…
Finally the last of them go, and the road leading back to the highway looks like a ribbon of red taillights. I can already taste supper without even knowing what it’s going to be.
Then, as I’m about to leave, a small woman comes rushing up out of the shadows and grabs my hand. Her light, curly hair is a wreck, and her eyes are shiny with tears.
“It’s my daughter,” she says, blowing it all out in one terrified breath.
A tall man comes hustling up behind her carrying a girl. Oh Lord. This girl is blond-headed and wearing a blue dress that comes about to her knees. Her skinny arms and legs are dangling, head lolling. Her mouth is open and her eyes are closed.
“My baby girl…,” the man says, so choked up the words come out in pieces. “We’ve been—everything was fine—she was fine—Lucy—please, please, Little Texas. Help her. Please.”
The man goes to lay the girl flat on the stage, but Certain Certain brings some blankets to make a pallet. I look at the girl. Her face is red, skin wet, soft pink lips turning bluish.
“What is it?” I say, mouth going dry.
“She got—we were on vacation—she got sick coming up from Pell City,” the man says. He is crying now. His wife is clutching his hand so tight, the blood is draining out of it.
“Anything, we’ll give you anything, just help my baby girl….” His voice chokes off again.
“I—I don’t know,” I say. “This looks to be an emergency. Regular doctors might could handle it better….”
The woman’s eyes cut me off. Pleading. She turns the man loose and clutches my arm.
