Scars

by Patience Prence

  “Why did you hide a Bible from us? You knew it was against the law. Rebekah, what were you thinking?”

  Becky didn’t answer as the dam of thoughts broke through the floodgates and emptied into her mind. Did those men take Daddy and David away because of my

  Bible? But how did they know I even had a Bible? Wouldn’t they want to question me about the Bible? It didn’t make sense. And why did they take David? He’s just a small boy.

  Her mother’s rigid grip on her shoulders gave way to a gentle caress as she broke down into tears again. Becky held her tightly and rocked back and forth, stroking her hair.

  Becky felt as if someone had snatched part of her soul away—it felt like what she imagined it would feel like when someone you loved died. But this feeling was different from when Grandma Silver died. This feeling was real. She felt real physical and emotional pain. She felt a hollow void in her chest.

  Becky tried to convince herself it was probably a big misunderstanding. Daddy and David would return home soon. It was a case of mistaken identity, and they probably were after someone else.

  The house was eerily quiet, and she became aware of the absent noises: the beeps and explosions of her brother’s video games, the thudding sounds of her father’s hammer as he tinkered on his latest project at his tool bench in the garage.

  Her father was always the strong one in the family. He always knew what to do. He’d fixed every problem she’d ever had. Now Becky trembled at the thought of having to figure out what to do next without him. She searched her memory for someone to call, a relative, a neighbor, someone who could help her find out where her father and brother had gone. But she could think of no one.

  For hours she lay next to her mother. The sunlight crawled through the window and turned soft pink in the late afternoon. Her mother shook as she sobbed. Then she grew quiet, and finally Becky heard her heavy, regular breathing as she slept.

  As the house grew dark, Becky began to feel numb. Everything she loved had disappeared in one night: her father, her brother, her Bible.

  The sun would come up in the morning, and she would have to continue her life without any of it. As she began to drift off to sleep she told herself to be thankful—at least she still had Momma.

  The following days wreaked havoc on Becky’s nerves. She prayed and waited anxiously while her mother called one government agency after the other trying to locate her father and her little brother. Momma spent hours on the telephone, repeating the same information over and over again when she was transferred from one department to the next.

  Becky sat quietly and studied her mother’s expressions looking for any sign of news. When Momma hung up the telephone, her face was always shrouded with disappointment.

  “They said they had no information and to file a Missing Persons report.”

  Becky rode with her mother to the police station and helped her fill out all the paperwork for the report. The police officer was very courteous and assured them they would call if they received any news about her father and David. After that, whenever the telephone rang Becky held her breath but was soon disappointed when she learned it was only a solicitor or a wrong number. Her hopes faded as weeks turned into months and still no word about Dad and David. . . .

  5

  Betrayed

  A deep, angry guttural sound rumbles from inside Becky’s stomach. It growls in protest as she turns over and tries to take her mind off her hunger. By the position of the sun outside her cell window she knows it will be another hour or more before the guard will bring her evening meal.

  The comforting, clock-like regularity of her meals was the one luxury of her incarceration that she truly appreciated.

  After those men took Dad and David away, the money became very tight for Becky and her mother. Momma struggled to pay the bills and provide food. She became desperate and resorted to stealing food from the hospital and bringing it home in her purse.

  Still, Becky considered herself lucky compared to the millions who had lost their jobs and were forced from their homes when the global financial crisis plunged the economy into another Great Depression.

  Becky and her mother sat in silence at their kitchen table eating scraps of stale bread and fruit her mother had brought home from work. The room was lit by a single candle to save on the electric bill. Only months earlier the house had been filled with the smells of roasted chicken, corn on the cob and freshly baked dinner rolls. The elegant chandelier hanging over the table glowed warmly. She and David would laugh until milk ran out of their noses at Dad’s funny stories about his childhood. Momma would admonish him to “stop getting the kids so worked up,” even though she was laughing too. Then she would scold Becky and her brother to finish their salads which were piled high with fresh tomatoes, mushrooms, olives and cucumber slices. It was hard to accept that so much had changed in so little time.

  Becky pushes the memories from her mind as she again rolls over. Her eyes focus on a round yellow water stain on the ceiling. She tries hard to think of anything other than food.

  Food—cheerleading—boys. Those had been the only elements of her universe. Life was simple and secure. She can still hear T.J.’s high-pitched shout: “GIVE ME AN R!”

  “R!” Becky would reply at the top of her lungs.

  “Give me an E!”

  “E!”

  They bounced up and down throwing their arms wildly in the air until they spelled out their high school team’s name: R-E-B-E-L-S.

  They spent hours jumping and kicking. It was their way of keeping in shape and hoping the boys would notice.

  Now the only boys to impress are the smelly guards. Becky grimaces at the thought of being touched by one of those Neanderthals.

  Fighting back tears, she closes her eyes and lets out a helpless sigh. Who cares what I look like now? It’s not like I have a boyfriend or ever will have a boyfriend for that matter. I’ll never be a professional cheerleader. I’ll never meet Blake Collins—how depressing. I’m still a

  virgin and will die a virgin. I’ll never get married and never have children. . . .

  “Why was I even born?” A groan escapes her lips. Dad and David are gone, Momma hates me, and now I’m in prison waiting to be executed.

  Becky buries her head in her pillow as a barrier of tears unleashes their fury.

  “Why, God? Why?” she wails hopelessly.

  Realizing she is feeling sorry for herself, she quietly prays, “Please help me, God. . .I need you. Please help me to be strong.”

  Her favorite scripture pops into her head, and she says it aloud. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” The sound of her own voice bouncing off the block walls seems foreign to her.

  She lifts her legs over the side of her bed and stands up and wipes the moisture away from her eyes. She takes a deep breath and stomps her foot against the warm floor in a gesture of determination and walks to the window.

  The sky has turned dark brown as the smoke thickens. She feels so alone. She wishes she had someone to talk to. She misses Daddy, David and the “old” mom.

  She leans against the wall and buries her face in her hands as her resolve melts away and another flood of tears washes over her cheeks.

  * * * * *

  After Dad and David were gone, with no hope of finding them, Momma became cold and indifferent toward Becky. She would leave the house for work before Becky had awakened. When she returned in the evenings she went straight to her room without saying a word.

  On her days off, Momma sat on the couch in her nightgown and watched the world news. She obsessed over every development, every breaking story.

  Maitreyas was made the top advisor to the World Union which had adopted his ideas for strengthening the world economy through a new monetary policy that worked like a barter system.

  The ten unions were linked together under one financial system managed by the World Un
ion Bank. Paper currency and coins were made obsolete.

  Units of electronic debits and credits were distributed to all people worldwide. This electronic information was stored in a microchip placed on a plastic card or bracelet with a global positioning device.

  This card system and the new “cashless society” were hailed as revolutionary and the beginning of a new age. It was the answer to everything from tax evasion, drug use and crime to poverty and illness. People were encouraged to use their cards for more than just financial data but also for their personal history, health and ID.

  With the adoption of this system the familiar Amero became useless. Becky could still remember going to the bank with her father to exchange the family’s American dollars for the new, brightly colored Ameros.

  The global financial crisis had rendered the once-mighty American dollar worthless. An emergency session of Congress was called, and the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America Act was passed. Overnight the borders between Mexico, Canada and the United States were erased, and the North American Union was born. Everyone hoped the new government and the new currency, the Amero, would help restore stability and prosperity.

  Dad stashed a few Abraham Lincoln and George Washington dollar bills away for keepsakes. He said he thought they might be worth something someday. Now the Amero was just as worthless as the old, green American dollars.

  Peter Roma’s power reached far beyond reshaping the churches into one universal church. His voice was very loud in politics. He claimed the card system did not do enough to solve humanity’s problems. He said people could lose or misplace their cards while criminals could rob and steal the card and wipe out a person’s bank account. His solution was to have the chip implanted under the skin. With the insertion of the chip they could also track criminals and locate lost children. He pushed hard for lawmakers to create this legislation. Only weeks before this bill was to be brought to a vote before the World

  Union, Israel shocked the world by obliterating the city of Damascus with a bomb. The oldest city in the world was reduced to a “heap of rubble.”14 This was a major blow to the nation of Islam, and the world waited for certain retaliation.

  But Maitreyas threw all of his political power and influence behind a truce between the nation of Islam and Israel. To everyone’s amazement, the nation of Islam agreed. Maitreyas drafted a seven-year peace covenant. Under this “peace treaty” Israel would give the Palestinians land it acquired during the 1967 war and the mountainous southern part of Israel, Judea and Samaria, and in return the Palestinians would allow Israel to rebuild their third temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The future third temple would be rebuilt on the same site as the former second temple, to the north of the Islamic dome, in direct alignment with the Eastern Gate. This would allow them to “share” the Temple Mount. There would be a 150-foot easement between the two buildings.

  While the vast majority of the world praised Maitreyas as the “bringer of peace” and welcomed the treaty between the two bitter rivals with celebrations, some Jewish men protested the covenant involving their sovereign and holy land of Eretz Israel and denounced Maitreyas as the Antichrist—the son of the devil.

  They preached that Peter Roma was the false prophet of Revelation and that Yeshua, Jesus of Nazareth, was the one and only Christ and sits in heaven at the right hand of God.

  But the media did not pay much attention to these protests. When they were featured on the evening newscasts they were portrayed as hate-filled racists who would never be happy under any peaceful settlement.

  It seemed as though every time she turned on the television Becky found some incredible new story playing out in some part of the world. So many things were happening, and so much of it did not make any sense. At times she was overwhelmed with confusion. She would walk up the stairs to her bedroom and pull open the drawer on her nightstand before she remembered her Bible had been taken away by the same men who took her dad and brother. She sat on her bed and longed to hold the comforting words in her hands again.

  Becky watched in awe when the news reported from Jerusalem that two men15 with stark white hair and flowing beards stood in front of the Western Wall of King Solomon’s original temple where thousands of handwritten prayers were scribbled on pieces of paper and tucked inside the cracks of the huge blocks of quarried stone.

  Dressed in sackcloth, they held their hands up high toward heaven and prophesied, “Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea for the devil is come down unto you having great wrath because he knows that he has but a short time. . . . The Lord God has spoken, ‘Repent of your sins and turn away from the blasphemy of the Beast. . . .’ Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea, because you spill the blood of the saints you then shall drink blood.”

  The news reports treated the two men as curiosities and speculated as to why they were dressed in sackcloth weaved from goat hair. Some thought they were mourning for the Jews and Christians; others thought they were simply crazy.

  * * * * *

  Becky slammed the cupboard door and set a tall, cobalt-blue glass on the granite counter. She swung open the stainless steel door of the refrigerator and stood staring into cool, bright, misty air.

  Earlier that morning she had squeezed a bag of fresh navel oranges and added water and sugar into a pitcher of rich, delicious orange juice. She had let it chill in the fridge for a few hours and was now looking forward to a refreshing drink.

  The oranges had come from old man Miller’s grove off Highway 126. He had a crush on Momma and would bring her a fresh bag every week when he visited the hospital.

  Becky was grateful for his kindness. Since the flu pandemic she was careful about making sure she took plenty of vitamin C, and fresh fruit was very expensive these days.

  But now as she stood looking into the fridge she found not the pitcher of bright, orange liquid she had squeezed, but instead it was a dark crimson.

  “Momma! Where’s the orange juice?” Becky yelled, still staring at the strange red liquid.

  “I don’t know.” Momma walked up behind her. “It should be in the container where it always is.”

  “What’s this stuff?” Becky wrinkled her nose as she pulled out the pitcher.

  Her mother studied the container in her hand.

  Becky’s jaw dropped open. “Momma, look!” She pulled out a plastic milk container. “Everything is red, even the milk!”

  “Yuck! It must have all gone rotten.” Momma frowned. “Throw it all out before it starts to smell!”

  Becky gathered all the containers that had liquid in them and watched the red gooey stuff disappear down the drain. She turned the handle of the brushed nickel faucet. “Oh, my gosh!” she screamed. “Momma, look! It’s coming out of the faucet!”

  Momma looked in disbelief as thick, red liquid poured from the kitchen faucet and disappeared down the drain.

  “Momma. . .what’s happening? Why is all the water red?”

  “I don’t know, Rebekah. Maybe something died and got into our water system? I don’t know.”

  “But it’s in the refrigerator. . . .”

  Then a shrill noise sounded from the living room. They ran to where Momma had left the television tuned to WNN.

  The television screen was blank.

  Yellow flashing letters scrolled across the black screen in Spanish and English. “This is a union emergency. We break the scheduled program to bring you the following announcement. Please stand by. . . .”

  Suze Graham’s familiar face appeared on the screen. Her eyes were wide and her breath quick.

  “We have breaking news now. We are getting reports from Los Angeles that the water has turned into a dark-red thick substance. If you see red liquid coming out of your water faucet, please do not drink or touch it! We are unable to confirm that it is not toxic. It could be a health hazard.

  “We have reporters en route to the water department at this time. We will bring you information as we get it.r />
  “We are also being told by the CDC that they have collected samples of the red liquid and are conducting tests on it at this time. We will report to you the results of those tests as soon as they are available.

  “The police are advising everyone to stay indoors until the nature of this emergency is determined. For your safety, stay in your home or office. Do not touch or drink any red liquid.

  “Wait! This just coming in from our reporter at the CDC.” Suze Graham’s face froze in shock as she viewed the laptop screen in front of her. She looked questioningly at someone off camera, apparently needing confirmation of what she had just read. She then slowly returned her gaze to the camera.

  “The CDC has just confirmed that the red substance is”—she hesitated, struggling to form the word in her mind before pushing it out between her lips—“blood.”

  “Blood!?” Momma asked, unable to believe what she had just heard.

  “Ugh!” Becky’s lips curled, and her nose wrinkled in disgust.

  Suze Graham shuffled some papers in her hand in an attempt to regain her composure. She looked back up at the camera and continued in a calm voice. “We are now going to Brock Summers live at Malibu Beach.”

  The picture on the television quickly changed. Brock Summers stood barefoot on the hot coarse sand near the shoreline. The sun had streaked his naturally dark hair. His white khaki shorts and blue-and-white-flowered Hawaiian shirt made him appear like he was on vacation. Behind him sunbathers gathered in swim shorts and bikinis.

  “Hi, Brock, what’s going on where you are?”

  Visibly shaken, Brock spoke into the hand-held microphone masked by the large, white WNN logo. “Suze, as you can see behind me, the ocean here at Malibu Beach has also turned to blood. . . . That’s right—the Pacific Ocean has turned to blood!”

  The camera panned to Brock’s right and focused on a small crimson wave rolling in, sending splashes of red as it broke on the sand.