The Caleb Collection Page 26

  Thompson looked out the window. “If God were to open our eyes the way he did Elijah’s servant, it might just fry our minds. You ever wonder what a chariot of fire really looks like? Hmm? Or how about tongues of fire, floating over someone’s head? Both have happened, you know.” He faced them. “But then that’s another matter altogether.”

  “We’ll take him,” Leiah said.

  “You’ll do no such thing,” Nikolous said, standing.

  “It’s a church, Father,” Thompson said. “Surely you wouldn’t prohibit the boy from attending a church.”

  “He lives at a church! My church.”

  “Which is why he cannot attend your service. Your own congregation would ignore you for the boy. He would upstage you in your own church. But surely no caring shepherd would deny a child of God the right to attend worship.”

  Thompson was no idiot.

  “I will give it some thought,” Nikolous said. “But now we have to go. Thank you for your time, Dr. Thompson. I’m sorry the boy was not able to perform.” The Greek dipped his head, headed for the door, and stepped out.

  “I’ll pray that he opens your eyes, Jason,” Thompson said. “From where I’m looking, life could not be better. It would be a pleasure to meet you again on the other side.” He flashed a mischievous grin and tossed two pills in his mouth.

  Jason thanked him and left the house, trying his best to ignore a bad headache.

  25

  Day 29

  COASTVIEW FELLOWSHIP WAS BURIED in a warehouse district five miles from Huntington Harbor, an hour south of Pasadena off the 405 freeway. It had been four weeks to the day since Jason and Leiah had first taken Caleb to the Orthodox church. They had lost the boy that day, to Nikolous and his machinery. But today represented a reunion of sorts. Because today there was no Nikolous or Martha or even the Mercedes, for that matter. It hadn’t been a pleasant task, but they’d finally persuaded Nikolous to allow them to take the boy without him, on the one condition that they hang sheets on the inside of the Bronco to protect him. They had agreed.

  Jason pulled onto the freeway and smiled at Leiah beside him. She winked and peeked over the sheet they’d wrapped between the front seats to keep little Caleb from seeing out the front.

  “So Caleb,” Jason said, eyeing the boy in the rearview mirror, “what do you say this beautiful morning?”

  “I say that I have a monster gut-ache and it’s the pits!” he said.

  At first Jason wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. It’s the pits? He caught Leiah’s raised brow.

  “It’s the pits?” she said. “Where did you hear that, Caleb?”

  He shrugged and fingered the pink sheets in an attempt to see out. “On the television.”

  The television? They had asked Martha to remove it once when the boy first complained, and she had humphed off. Caleb hadn’t mentioned it since. But now the matter was plain: he was watching television in his room.

  “What do you see on television, Caleb?” Jason asked.

  The boy looked forward and grinned. “The drawings that move and talk. They are very funny.”

  Cartoons.

  “I see other things too, but I like the drawings mostly.”

  The boy had found some entertainment under their noses. He was spending his days locked in the room with a television, and Jason doubted that Nikolous was even aware of it. And by the sounds of it, he was getting a bit of an education.

  Jason grinned at the thought. “You’re learning some things on the television, are you?”

  “Yes. Very much.”

  “Do you really think that’s the best thing for him?” Leiah asked.

  “Why not? They can’t hide the world from him forever. He’s been confined to either the room or the Mercedes for four weeks now. Except the Old Theater. And yet he has a window to the world right there in his room. Nikolous would have a fit!”

  Behind them Caleb chuckled. “Father Nikolous would drop dead.”

  Jason looked over at Leiah, unable to hide his smile. “Yes, he would. Nikolous would drop dead.” The boy was a quick study. Cartoon talk had expanded his vocabulary.

  “What else have you seen on the television?”

  “I saw the man who spoke in the park and I had a vision.”

  Crandal? Caleb’s comments two nights earlier about Crandal being a bad person had raised some interesting discussion, but the media spun it as a sort of right-wing reaction to Crandal’s NSA affiliations. Jason had asked him about the comment that night, and Caleb had only repeated himself.

  “He must have seen a political commercial,” Leiah said.

  “What was the vision?” Jason asked.

  “A big bird flew out of the sky and attacked a woman. The bird could breathe fire. And I also saw babies and people dying.”

  “And that’s why you think Crandal is a bad man?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does the vision mean?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “But it’s bad?”

  “Yes.”

  The threat Jason had connected to Crandal had faded over the past week. The INS was no longer breathing down Caleb’s neck; there was no mention of the NSA. But what if the threat really was still there? What if this vision of Caleb’s really meant something about Crandal?

  He glanced in the mirror. “What do you say we pull those sheets off the window, Caleb?”

  “Yes?”

  Leiah looked from one to the other and then nodded. “Why not? Why not?” She jumped into the back, cracked the windows, and tore the pink sheets down. Light flooded the cab.

  Caleb immediately pressed himself up against his window and stared at the world for the first time in nearly a month.

  They pulled into the church’s parking lot at a quarter past ten. Without specific instructions they never would have found the square converted warehouse with the words Coastview Fellowship splashed above wide white doors.

  “Here we go,” Jason said, stepping up to the door. “I hate these places.” He pulled the door open and followed them in.

  Jason had been in two churches in the last seven years: Greater Life Community, where his son had been practically prayed to death, and the Greek Orthodox church that had stolen Caleb.

  Coastview Fellowship was patently different from either.

  The service had started, evident by the team of musicians on the stage, singing and playing with their faces lifted to the ceiling and their eyes closed. A thousand or so men, women, and children of all dress and stripes sang in unison.

  You are mighty,

  You are holy,

  You are awesome in your power.

  They stepped into a row of folding seats. Although the open ceiling was somewhat reminiscent of a warehouse with its large hanging lights, nothing else about the interior of the building was. Hundreds of flags hung from the rafters; maybe every flag of the world. Large twin screens flashed the words of the song they were singing from a huge console above the stage. A twenty-member choir sang behind the song leader.

  You are mighty,

  You are holy,

  You are awesome in your power.

  So many people, ordinary people, giving themselves to this God of theirs. The air felt thick and a chill ran down Jason’s back.

  Beside them a woman stood with her chin raised, her face aglow as she sang. Directly in front of them, a family stood with hands folded and heads bowed. On all sides the people looked as though they had really stepped into a king’s courtyard. Jason had never seen anything quite like it. An odd concoction of reverence and open expression. At least there were no charismatic elements hopping and shouting or any such obnoxious thing, Jason thought. It was all quite orderly.

  The worship leader suddenly sank to his knees and continued to sing with one hand raised. Jason glanced down at Caleb in the aisle seat. The boy stared ahead, slack-jawed. He’d undoubtedly never seen anything like it either. Jason looked ahead and studied the words on the screens as they thunder
ed their song.

  You have risen,

  You have conquered,

  You have beaten the power of death.

  A tightness suddenly gripped his throat. And what if that were really true? What if the boy wasn’t speaking only from his own past, but from the truth? What if Dr. Paul Thompson really was headed for a better place? Thompson hadn’t pretended to understand it all. Instead he assumed something as simple as having one’s eyes opened would settle the matter.

  So what did these simple people presume that having one’s eyes opened felt like?

  The tightness spread to Jason’s chest. There was something here that seemed to be touching him. So many people together with one mind, like at a Hitler rally—maybe that was it. Group consciousness.

  Jason wanted to cry. The impulse terrified him. He should get out, go to the bathroom maybe. Beside him Leiah sniffed. He glanced over. Dear God, she was starting to cry!

  A slice of panic slipped through Jason’s mind. He really didn’t belong here. He really should . . .

  Movement to his left caught his eye and he turned.

  Caleb’s seat was empty. The boy was five feet up the aisle. This time he was running.

  Jason froze. Leiah still had her eyes closed, trying not to lose control of herself. And the boy was running for the stage as if this were a fifty-yard dash instead of a church service. The music was so loud that yelling for him would be pointless.

  He nudged Leiah, and when she opened her eyes he nodded forward. She looked.

  Caleb reached the front row and threw himself at the foot of a wood altar that ran across the front. He literally left the ground parallel to it and landed prone. Nobody seemed to mind. The prospect of a single small child racing to the front and throwing himself prone was evidently not unheard of here. The singing swelled.

  Jason swallowed hard. His throat muscles felt as if they were choking him.

  For a few seconds Caleb just lay still. And then he rolled on his back and covered his face with both hands and his crying rose with the song. It was the weepy wailing sound so common in African countries.

  The kneeling worship leader, a young man with short-cropped sandy hair, lowered his mike. His shoulders began to shake. The choir softened behind him, but they sang on. Now Caleb’s voice rose above them all, crying in Ge’ez. Jason had no idea what was going on—nothing spectacular, no rushing wind, no earthquakes—but his heart was hammering and his head was throbbing. Beside him Leiah was crying.

  Slowly, ever so slowly, the music quieted. The percussion faded, the singing stopped, and only the keyboard played on, a soft organ tone. Sniffles and soft sobs rippled through the auditorium. The worship leader dropped the mike, lifted both hands to the sky, sat back on his haunches, and wept openly. Behind him several members of the choir had dropped to their knees. The rest stood swaying slightly. It was suddenly all very quiet except for the crying.

  And above it all Caleb wailed.

  He writhed on the floor, turning from one side to the other, and he brought his knees up to his chin. The keyboard player removed his hands from the keys, covered his face, and began to cry.

  Whispers of “Thank you, Lord” and “Touch him, Lord” carried through the crowd. No one seemed to know what to do. A boy running up to the altar and crying might not be unheard of, but this display had them at an absolute standstill. Jason doubted if any of them knew who the prone boy in the front of their church was. A few in the front row might have seen enough to recognize him, but if they did, they didn’t show any signs.

  A blond man of medium build wearing a sharp blue suit walked from a side row, paused to look at Caleb, and then took the two steps up to the platform. He put one hand in his pocket, the other on the podium, and looked out at the congregation.

  Caleb stopped his crying and lay facedown.

  “God is here,” the leader said by the podium. He looked as if he wanted to say something else. But then he lowered his head and stood very still. His shoulders began to shake. The air in the auditorium did not move. The man Jason assumed to be the pastor just stood there with one hand in his pocket and the other on the podium, shaking with silent sobs. Then he released the pulpit and sank to his knees.

  Jason felt hot, wet trails leak down his cheek, and he quickly wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.

  The worship leader behind the pastor suddenly began to groan aloud in indistinguishable words. Then his voice grew, and Jason heard his cry.

  “Forgive me. Oh, God, forgive me . . . Forgive me!”

  The sentiment swept across the stage. Now the pastor was groaning the same. “Forgive me. Father, forgive me . . .”

  Half of the choir members and four of the five band members, including the drummer, fell to the ground begging for forgiveness.

  But it didn’t stop there. The groaning that Caleb had started spread into the audience, as if carried on a wave beginning at the front row and sweeping backward. Back toward where Jason stood, slowly unraveling. He watched through watery eyes as they fell to their knees and cried out for forgiveness. Repentance had seized the place.

  It wasn’t a rational argument, it wasn’t carbon-dated, and it really made no sense at all. But it was plain, and it was obvious, and the evidence of its truth swept up through Jason’s throat like a burning iron. He had rejected God, and for the first time in his life he knew the terrible sin of it.

  Whoever said that a straightened hand was more dramatic than a healed heart anyway? Dr. Thompson had asked. You need your eyes opened, Jason.

  Maybe this was how it felt to have your eyes opened. The eyes of the heart.

  An older woman with a yellow hat three rows in front of him suddenly cried out and sat back heavily. “Oh, God, forgive me.” All around her, people slumped to their knees.

  When it hit Jason he thought he would explode. A fireball of bitter sorrow rolled up his chest and swelled in his mind. And in that moment he knew that he had committed an appalling crime. He had done it in front of the whole world, and he could hardly stand the shame of it all. He’d slapped the swollen face of a leper; he’d kicked a dying man and walked away; he’d spit in the face of Christ.

  He’d spit in the face of Christ.

  “Oh, God,” he muttered. His legs weakened and he sat to his seat hard. “Oh, God. Oh, dear God, forgive me . . .” Jason slid from his chair, suddenly desperate to bow to his face. It was that kind of sorrow. He was on the floor, lying in the aisle before he had time to reconsider.

  The sentiment that flooded his body was the most painful emotion he’d ever experienced. It was also the sweetest. He was dying on the floor at the back of Coastview Fellowship in Huntington Beach. And he was coming to life.

  It took a good five minutes for the sounds of repentance that filled the auditorium to soften. Jason lay with his left cheek pushed into the blue carpet. He opened his eyes and saw that Leiah was sobbing beside him. The aisle was strewn with bodies, softly repenting. A few people sat quietly in their seats, but most were either kneeling over their chairs or between them. The musicians were all on the floor; the pastor lay prone with one hand hanging limply over the edge of the stage. Not a soul stood in the entire building.

  And then one did stand.

  The boy.

  Caleb stood and looked around as though lost. Jason lifted his head. Waves of sorrow still washed through his chest, but now another sentiment joined it. The impulse to run up there and hug that boy. To beg his forgiveness.

  Jason pushed himself to his seat, crying once again.

  The boy suddenly jumped up on the stage, and Jason stared at him dumbly. Caleb spun around to face the people. He had that look Jason had come to know, that mischievous glint of delight.

  The boy whirled around, jumped over the body of the worship leader, and pulled at the arms of the drummer. The young man looked up, dazed. Caleb grabbed the drumsticks, lifted them over his head, and beat down on the tom drum with both hands.

  Boom.

  The sound ec
hoed against the walls. The drummer rolled to his knees. Caleb grinned wide and hit the drums again, this time twice, boom, boom.

  And then he began to beat the drums, out of rhythm, wearing a white-toothed smile. The people began to rise from the floor.

  The drummer stood and Caleb shoved a stick at him. He took it, looked around wearing a crooked grin, and hit the tom once with the boy. Then twice and three times.

  Caleb shoved the other stick to the drummer, gave a little hoot, and jumped out from behind the set. The musician slid onto his seat and began beating out a steady rhythm. Boom—rapatat, bada boom—rapatat.

  Caleb skipped across the stage, ecstatic, and Jason stood thinking he would join him. It was all very foolish, but somehow it felt just right. To be a child again.

  Boom—rapatat, bada boom—rapatat!

  The boy hopped over to the guitar player and pulled him up. The man needed no encouragement. He slung the instrument over his neck and began to strum. He lifted his head and began to hop up and down, and he strummed in perfect rhythm. The people began to clap now.

  Boom—rapatat, bada boom—rapatat!

  Caleb threw both fists into the air and hollered to the ceiling in Ge’ez. His voice cut across the room, and he yelled the same thing again. He’d repeated it seven or eight times before Jason managed to piece the words together.

  “The lamb who was slain is worthy! The lamb who was slain is worthy!”

  Jason wanted to jump with the boy. He wanted to shout and jump and say that same thing. He began to bob up and down back there in the aisle, and it must have looked terribly awkward, because he had never done such a thing. Leiah was climbing to her feet.

  Caleb was skipping across the stage, waving the people to their feet, beside himself with excitement. The sandy-haired worship leader needed no encouragement. He was on his feet, hopping vertically like a pogo stick. The other musicians joined in, and the music swelled to a thunder.

  The worship leader snatched the mike up to his mouth and began to sing with one hand stretched to the sky.

  You are mighty.

  Then again, this time with the choir.