“Do you need any help or you got this by yourself?” Tim asked her as she jogged past him. She didn't hear it. She ran up to the angel and bowed down before it. She became a silhouette against the rising sun.
“Hey, Tim,” Barney exclaimed in a sharp whisper.
Heather was kneeling before the structure, saying something to herself. Tim's attention snapped to Barney. “What?” he asked in a normal talking voice.
“Is this something that happens a lot?” Barney asked. “Are there many visitors?”
“Well, ever since the news story,” Tim explained.
Barney expressed his interest with a stroke of his chin. “See, I'm kind of having an idea here. Stop me if it's absurd.”
“And what's that?”
“You could turn this ranch into an attraction,” Barney said, his words articulated with care. “A tourist business of sorts.”
A short moment of silence passed where Tim stared at the man with an expression that waited for more to be said. When nothing was, he quivered his head in confusion. “How do you mean?” he asked.
“You know, build a gate, build a booth. Fenced in right, you could charge a modest admission for everyone that wants to have their picture taken with it or pray at it, man.” Barney gestured to Heather. “She's not going to be the last.”
“Mr. Slechta – ”
“Barney, Tim, I've told you.”
“Barney, that's just an,” Tim shrugged as he searched for the words, “impractical idea. I mean, no offense, but this excitement about the 'miracle' doesn't guarantee a market. I'm no entertainer. All I've ever done is tend the land and raise cattle. It's a large investment for such a loose hunch.”
Barney nodded in pretend agreement. “Tim, your story was featured in Time,” he told the rancher. “Today's issue.”
“Time?” Tim asked.
“It hasn't been a good year, you know,” Barney said with a tone of bargaining. “People want something feel-good. Something that tells them, 'God is still watching us.' Because,” his eyes ran over to the angel and the woman praying in front of it, “in these days, I'm still not convinced.”
Barney was right. Heather was not the last of the religious pilgrims and curious scholars to pay the Simacean Ranch a visit. They came almost in crowds, most not prearranged. At first Tim greeted them with warmth and asked nothing of them. The volume of people wore in though, his responses and conclusions all on a scripted replay. He had to start telling them not to touch things. Started to have to keep an eye on them. Make sure that they all respected him and his property.
He got into contact with Barney the next day after Heather's visit. Barney showed up in the late afternoon with three other men, all of them in dark sunglasses. Tim pondered to himself whether or not they purchased them together or if it wasn't even prearranged and all of them thought it was too bright outside by coincidence. On an overcast day.
“Timmy,” Barney greeted, then waved his arms back at his companions. “This is my crew. All these guys are tough mothers and very capable at a range of work. Construction composes a majority of our labor, actually.”
“You don't say?” Tim said with a tone of boredom, though he wasn't uninterested.
“Insurance claims are slow in this part of the state,” Barney said. He snickered. “My girlfriend doesn't wanna move. Got involved with a theater group.” Barney peered into nothing for a second. “Anyway, let me introduce you.”
Barney gestured to the first guy, a black man with a groomed goatee and a pile of hair that was not graced with the same care. He was shorter than Tim but he looked at the rancher in a way that symbolized sternness but respect. Tim liked him already. “I'm Chase,” he said, offering a handshake.
“Nice to meet you,” the rancher accepted.
The second worker was a tall blond guy with skin that tanned a pinkish hue. He wore shorts big enough to be pants and an undone button up shirt. He grinned a lot but seemed to struggle with keeping eye contact. Tim thought that he seemed nice enough, but for some reason he felt mild distrust as the man's pupils scampered around, avoiding Tim's own. “Frank,” he said, then gave a sharp, quick hand squeeze.
The third one was just as tall as Frank but at least three times as wide. He resembled an ogre in Tim's mind. A big bald cretin. “My name's Gus, pleased to meet you,” he said as eloquently as grunts can be said.
The rancher stood back and looked at the lot of them. Barney stared at him on his right. “So,” Tim started, “I hear you're all solid with construction. Is that right?”
They all nodded in their own manner.
“Okay, so what we want to do is, so far, without any real blueprint or plan – ”
“Barney showed us the layout in the car,” Frank interrupted.
Tim turned to Barney with cocked eyebrows.
Barney sighed. “Yeah, well, when I came home last night I couldn't get to sleep and I was thinking about your whole angel thing, and so,” Barney explained, pulling out the plan he had drawn, “I made this up. You know, on the off-chance you would reconsider.”
Humming as he read, Tim was impressed. He looked up at Barney in surprise.
“Took to drafting. Anyway, what do you think? Do you like how the fence is laid out? It encompasses your house and yard so that you're always on the inside of this place.”
“I like it,” Tim replied.
“Let's get started then, shall we?” Barney proposed.
Many pilgrims came and went during the construction process. Tim had set up a rudimentary booth that he took charge of while Barney and his crew worked away. In no time at all, they finished most of the inner wall that prevented people from touching the angel. It was small and low but it encircled the crash. There was a modest five dollar charge that Tim asked for under the guise of a donation. He set up the system to play off of his loss and make his visitors feel compelled to contribute. Another great plus that Tim soon found was that sometimes people would exceed the suggested donation. The money piled up during the day and was collected at night and used to pay the men and purchase more materials and tools.
A proper ticket booth and office were built, as was a decorative stone pathway that lead from the driveway and up through the large gate that now stood between the world and its miracle.
Soon, they were having entire waves of people showing up to see the angel. A good portion of them were not religious at all, rather just curious tourists. Some of them treated it like an attraction, and this seemed to irritate some of the pilgrims who came to marvel. They all paid, though. It was proving to be lucrative. Whenever he wasn't working on the large wall that was to encircle the entire property, Tim liked to have Gus stand around the ticket booth and keep an eye on everything. The large man's brutish appearance seemed to calm people down. It made the younger ones act more mellow and respectful, and in the long run stopped many bad scenes from starting. Until one time when Gus was working far from the booth.
A crowd of eight showed up, consisting of two separate groups of two and six. The first two thanked Tim as he let them pass through toward the compound. The first man of the six behind them started walking through as well.
“Excuse me?” Tim addressed the man, stretching his arm out to stop him. “You need to pay to get in.”
“Are you serious?” the man asked. He was young, just barely not a teenager anymore. He had acne on his neck and a smallish head for his square and rigid body.
“Yes, sir, I am,” Tim said. “I know you're excited to get to see the miracle but you have to pay a donation just like everyone else.”
“Sounds like a fee,” the young man had raised his voice. “A donation is having to fork over my cash to you?”
“Danny...” one of his female friends started, reaching out to touch him. He dodged her touch, eyes locked on Tim.
“Son, I lost a whole lot having this angel fall to the earth,” Tim started, but the young man's mouth had already begun flapping.
“Yeah, I've seen the story,” Danny the kid spit at him. “Boohoo! You know what 'God's will' even means? You don't need to use His miracle to extort His followers. He wouldn't want that.” He scoffed and snorted a mock laugh as he looked back at his friends, who had been staring at Tim with scorn on their faces.
“How exactly am I supposed to pay for all of this?” Tim started, tossing in some stank to his own dialogue. “How am I going to eat and stay alive? Pray that the angel make all of my bills disappear?”
There was shock and plain bitterness on young Danny's face. “How can you host a miracle of God if you mock him?” he asked Tim. “I'm not paying for your bullshit.” Danny started walking past the ticket booth.
“Hey!” Tim called after him, reaching past the counter and snagging the intruder by his collar. As soon as young Danny felt the tension pull him back, he spun around and slugged the rancher as hard as he could in the forehead. Tim fell down clutching his head, groaning in surprise and pain. And a lot of anger. He could hear the gasps and commotion of everyone's shock to the punch. Tim stood himself up and snapped his head past the counter and watched as young Danny ran straight into Gus. The giant had just shown up next to Barney. The two of them had noticed the aggression and stopped their work in order to intervene.
“Get OUT of my way!” the intruder cried without looking up, flailing his arms up at the behemoth. Gus grasped Danny's wrists and spun the kid around, pinning his arms behind his back. Barney walked around Gus and stood before the struggling boy. He leaned in.
“You and your friends need to leave,” Barney said to Danny in a sharp slithering whisper that Tim was certain no one else could hear.
“Fuck you!” Danny spit at Barney.
Barney stood back a second with extreme displeasure on his face. Tim cocked his head, squinting his eyes as he watched. Barney rammed his fist into Danny's stomach. Gus let the kid drop to the ground to fold over himself and cough in the dirt. Barney leaned back over the squirming intruder.
“You run off back home now,” Barney hissed. “Do it, or I'll make you find out exactly what your own genitalia taste like.”
Gus and Barney lifted the form off of the ground and shoved him toward his friends. The crowd looked back for just a second before running back to their car.
Everyone's head faced the vehicle until it zoomed off around the corner. Then all of the shocked and astonished faces turned back to Tim, Gus, and Barney. The two construction workers both had distant, threatening gazes as they peered after the vehicle. Tim was more surprised than anything. He looked from all the expressions of disgust to Barney's, who looked over at the rancher and his face dropped into a mild apology.
Tim nodded back at him approvingly.
-Chapter Seventeen-
Proposition
Even though Tim was certain that that particular crowd would never going to give him business again, business still came. Lines of people showed up and dropped their bills and coins into Tim's cash drawer. Almost all of them were respectful, even grateful to Tim and the ranch. In his free time, Tim had been rereading the New Testament to not alienate himself from his customer base. It almost seemed to revitalize him. This read through, the words meant something when he read them. He bothered to put his personal interpretation into it and, to put it simply, enjoyed the Bible.
It wasn't even just suburban Christians coming around anymore. A triad of Orthodox rabbis stopped by and praised the angel as well. Tim found that his facility was welcoming and comfortable for all shades of men. Nothing about his services implied a belief one way or another. But, just as important, it doesn't deny it either.
Tim was just a friend of God.
One morning, the old rancher woke up with a cold. His body ached and his sinuses throbbed, so when Barney's crew showed up for the day's work, he asked his friend for the favor of watching over the booth. Barney claimed over and over that he would have no idea what he was doing, but he left the house agreeing. He told Tim to get better soon.
The old man wrapped himself in a blanket and kicked up his recliner. He was a little grateful for his sickness today. It allowed him to finally take a day off, take a breath and step back from all of the activity. He was worried that with his current momentum, he could lose sight of himself and decide on key issues before he had the right mind to do so. Mindlessly, the images on the television danced before him. He sipped on his tea and glanced out the window. People continued to flow as the men worked hard through the morning.
Tim noticed the sound of an engine driving up as much as he noticed the rustling leaves on a windy day. The only thing that drew his attention to the outside world was Barney standing outside the booth, talking with interest to two men in casual suits. One carried a briefcase, the other hand used for shaking Barney's. Together, they all started to walk toward the house. There was a knock on the door.
Groaning as he stood up, the rancher shuffled over and opened the door for Barney. “Hey man,” Barney started. “So there's a couple guys here that wanted to talk to you. Can't say for certain, but it sounds like something of property interest.”
Tim furrowed his brow in confusion.
“They want to buy your ranch,” Barney stated. Tim's eyebrows shot to the top of his head. “I think you ought to come out here and talk to them.”
“Tell them I'm not interested,” the rancher said. “I'm not selling the ranch.”
“What about the angel?” Barney asked.
“Sell the angel?” Tim echoed.
“They're talking really big numbers,” Barney replied. “Like, I may have heard the world 'million' used.”
Tim's eyes widened. “Go ahead and have them come into the house,” Tim said. “Tell them I'll be right with them.”
The rancher showered in a hasty flurry and got into some clean clothes, doing his best to ignore his sickness. His age was apparent as he looked into the mirror. The men were drinking water and chatting in low tones when he entered the living room again. The talking ceased and the men looked to him.
“Ah, Mr. Simacean,” the one without the suitcase greeted. He was older than the other but still younger than Tim, somewhere in his fifties. His bald head shone as he stood up to shake the rancher's hand. “My name is Matthias Jordan.” The younger one with the briefcase emulated him.
“Tom King. How are you?” he asked as he shook his hand. His hair was slicked back, which seemed unnatural on the man.
“Eh, sick as a dog,” Tim replied to sympathetic looks. “But not so bad.”
“Terribly sorry to hear that,” the young one said. The two visitors sat back down around the coffee table. Tim took his seat in the empty recliner, looking over the men. Barney seemed to seek his gaze. When it was given, his eyes were questioning. Tim had no answer for him.
“So, we came down here to take a look at the angel on your property,” Mr. Jordan explained.
“Oh yes?” Tim mused.
“Yes, and it's exactly as we thought it would be,” the business man started. “We want to buy it.”
“You two do?” the rancher asked, pointing between the two visitors.
The young man giggled a little bit. Mr. Jordan chuckled as he replied. “No, not us specifically, but our church does. We've set aside a large amount of money to secure it,” he explained. With an air of showmanship, Mr. King set the briefcase up on the coffee table, turned it around, and opened it. From within the container he retrieved a stack of papers.
“We want to offer you one million dollars for the statue,” Mr. King said, smirking.
“A million dollars?” Tim asked, the interest thick in his tone. “Why?”
“Why?” Mr. Jordan echoed. “Because it would be a crucial part of our church's worship. A lot of our members have turned their attention to things like your angel. This style of art intrigues us.”
Tim looked over at his friend. Barney stared back at with excited eyes. Why is he so enthusiastic? Tim wondered.
“Tell me a little bit about your church,” Tim asked. He took a sip of his own water.
“Well, we represent the Heaven's Crusade church,” Mr. King started after a reassuring gesture from his partner. “Our members are very devout, most of them live at our site. It's sort of like a monastery, if you can imagine.” The man grinned.
“In fact,” the older one said, “the campus is built around a crucifix constructed exactly like the angel.”
“Really?” Tim asked, intrigued.
“Oh yes,” Mr. Jordan ensured. “Like we said, things like this are crucial to our congregation.”
“What do you think, Mr. Simacean?” Mr. King asked.
The rancher sat back in his recliner. He looked at the men almost from the bottom of his eyes, along his nose. They seemed so disconnected. So false. As Tim thought about it, forcing his processing to run faster than it liked to, he did not favor the idea. Who were these people that stood around dilapidated forms of religion? What were these forms themselves? Did the crucifix fall from the heaven as his own miracle had? There was silence for a long string of seconds while the men watched Tim think.
“Gentlemen,” Tim started, his voice so tired from his cold and his responsibility, “I don't think that I can sell you the angel.”
“Why not?” Mr. King asked, surprised.
“Well, you see, I'm a man of beliefs, too,” Tim explained. Barney watched him, eager to hear what Tim had to say. “I believe that I cannot run away from my purpose. That I can't just cut my losses and flee the scene because of misfortune.”
Barney's eyes darted in confusion. The older man's brow furrowed. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean that I was chosen for something,” Tim said. Did he really sound so crazy to them? “I believe that this angel is my responsibility. I plan to maintain that.”
“What would you say to one and a half million dollars?” Mr. Jordan asked. His eyebrows were raised in an expecting way. The way one chess player waits for the other to realize he was checkmated. Tim's expression wavered none.
A Guardian Angel Page 12
