THE DOORS HAD BEEN OPENED, and Don was secretly thrilled—and relieved—at the orderliness of the crowd as they entered and found seats.
After twenty minutes every seat was occupied, and those who had waited along the sidewalk now filled the standing-room-only area around the small stage, the table heavy with books. The event space hit capacity and still they came, packing aisles, sitting in rows against walls that were out-of-sight of the stage, but where they could still hear the boy speak.
Don inspected the line of registers. He had four employees working the checkout counter, massive stacks of the book both on the countertop and lining the shelves behind. Don figured twenty minutes for the kid to talk, another twenty for Q&A, then the boy would take a break while they sold books and formed a signing line. Don hoped the kid signed fast, because the line was gonna snake the length of the store, and he didn’t have the manpower to make sure people didn’t try and cut in.
He looked back toward the entrance, the doors wedged open despite the cold, and was thankful the flow of Lake’s disciples had dwindled to a trickle, these last folks seemed less enthused, less passionate. Just regular old customers, Don thought. Remember them? Remember the good old days?
He also saw two of New York City’s finest hanging out on the sidewalk, chatting, and standing by in case trouble broke out. There was even a squad car parked in the red zone at the curb. Good. Once again, Don found himself wishing the event were already over, that these overzealous sycophants were out of his store, and Lake Divine and his pastor-father were long gone, heading to a sister store in Boston, or Los Angeles.
Anywhere but New York.
He imagined them gone—out of his store, his life—and smiled. He was ready for things to get back to normal. He’d heard J.K. Rowling had a new book on the horizon, and for the first time in his life he was eager to see kids (and adults) dressed as warlocks and witches, swinging fake magic wands and shouting spells.
Normalcy.
A current of gasps and a rising murmur of excited whispers flowed like a fast river through the crowd. From the rear of the store, Sue was winding her way toward the stage. Don saw the top of an ink-black head bobbing along behind her, and the pale, tight-lipped smile of Pastor Joseph Divine in tow, his dark suit and tie a somber outfit for what was supposed to be a festive day, his white hair and mustache trimmed and smooth, like a banker who would smile while declining your request for a loan.
Don forced himself to take a relaxing breath, then checked his watch.
Showtime, he thought, and made his way toward the stage, where he would announce the boy’s arrival to the salivating mob.
LAKE ADDRESSED THE RAPT AUDIENCE for just over thirty minutes.
He spoke lightly of the world in which he traveled while his brain and heart were stopped. He spoke of impossible towers, of a moon and stars like on Earth, but the moon had a golden ring of gods, and the stars spoke, called themselves angels. There were forests filled with strange creatures, some terrifying, some magnificent. There was an overwhelming feeling of great joy, of peace. Almost reluctantly, or so it seemed to Don, Lake spoke of his interactions with Jesus Christ, and the secrets that Jesus told him about the end of the world as we know it, about the great devourer of souls, Satan, and about the future of mankind in this new realm of light and peace.
“You can all go there,” he said, his voice high-pitched and steady. “The time will be very soon. But you must read the book first!” Lake said this loudly, and with a smile, and there was a general agreement of uneasy laughter throughout the crowd. Nervous anticipation, Don thought, and felt himself wanting to read the book again, to the very end this time, despite the strange experience—hallucinations, or nerves—he’d so recently encountered.
At one point, while Lake had been speaking of brilliant creatures that soared through the sky, there had been a loud snicker that broke the rapt attention of the audience. Heads turned in unison, like predators smelling prey, toward the intrusive sound. Don, horrified, also searched out the source of the disruption and found Tom, a hand over his face in faux embarrassment. That’s that, Don thought, a surprising fury coursing through him. That’s the last fucking straw. Hope you’ve enjoyed your last day, Tom. He followed the thought with a hateful look that caught Tom’s attention, who dropped the hand from his mouth and meekly disappeared into the shelves, likely knowing he’d gone too far, even for him.
Later, when the boy was finished, Don gave a small nod to Sue (who had apparently become the child’s unofficial handler, much to Don’s approval and relief) to move things along.
“Thank you everyone! Lake will be back in a bit, and you can now buy books for him to sign!” she announced as she led the boy off the stage amongst wild applause, hoots, and euphoric yells. She gave Don a tight wave from across the room and he returned it, then made his way to the stage, directing the attendees to the sales counters as Lake, Joseph, and Sue vanished behind the curtain.
PASTOR JOSEPH DISAPPEARED HALFWAY THROUGH the signing.
Don hovered anxiously behind the table as the boy greeted each patron. The stacks on the table were long-gone, and the piles at the registers and on the shelves behind the counter were also sold-through. Don had Tom and George, a sixteen-year-old kid working a few hours a week after school, bring out all the boxes from the back, the cashiers ripping them open at a frantic pace to keep the lines moving steadily.
Two hours in, and Lake showed no signs of slowing. The kid’s an absolute machine, Don thought as he watched the boy shake every offered hand and casually sign each book, inscribing easily when asked, laughing along with the awkward humor of the acolytes, nodding at their own stories of near-death, of dreams, of visions, of heaven. Don hadn’t noticed the boy’s father leaving. He’d been bouncing between the counter and the signing table, checking the front door and the storage area. He’d been busy.
And where the hell is Sue? Don felt anger rising in his chest, in his neck. Their biggest event of the year and he couldn’t see any of his people on the floor. The line was still over a hundred people long, and those that had their signed copies, Don noticed, weren’t leaving. They were camping out in nooks and crannies of the store’s main floor, their books open on their knees, clutched in sweaty palms, their eyes wide, devouring. As Don scanned some of these people where they huddled in clusters, his vision of the room darkened, as if clouds were thickening outside, blocking the sun. These people look drugged, he thought. Their mouths were slack, eyes glassy, empty. He saw one guy, in a white rumpled suit and disheveled hair, drool as he turned the pages, his chin wet with it, a silver string connecting his face to the words.
He looked back to check on the kid, who had the energy and savvy to meet his eyes with a grin and a wink as he signed the book of a young woman wearing a short, bright-red dress and five-inch heels. As Don watched, she kneeled over the table, pressed her palms beneath her breasts and pushed her cleavage forward. The boy just smiled and raised his ass from the chair, pushed the pen across her tits like a Big Ten quarterback after winning a championship game.
“Hey!” Don said and took a step toward the table. The woman just giggled and grabbed her book, stepped off the dais and into the crowd. Don turned to the boy.
“You shouldn’t do that,” he said, half-heartedly and with all the authority of a substitute teacher. “It’s not right.”
“Sorry, Don,” Lake said, but his blue eyes danced as he greeted the next person in line.
Don dropped to a knee beside the boy’s chair, lowered his voice. “Where’s your father?” he asked, but Lake ignored him, laughing along at some stupidity with the middle-aged woman he was signing for. Don watched another minute, feeling suddenly and inexplicably like an outsider. He stood up, wanting to pace, his anxiety and frustration quickening his blood, tightening his neck and shoulders. A sharp headache pierced his temple and he rubbed at it.
“Fuck this,” Don mumbled and, figuring the kid could hold his own for a few minutes, stalked toward the rear of the store to find his missing employees and the good god-damned Pastor Joseph Divine.
DON PUSHED THROUGH THE DOOR marked “Employees Only” and walked briskly past the small managerial offices toward the storage room—essentially a small warehouse with a rolling door for deliveries, scattered stacks of pallets and a wall of Post-It flagged books set to be shelved or returned. He threw open the metal door, ready to cut loose on whoever was idling back there while he was sweating out the biggest event of the season by himself.
To his surprise (and slight concern), the warehouse was empty. He saw a few empty pallets where the extra copies of Meet Me In Heaven had been stored, but no employees—lazy or otherwise—were in sight.
Anger tilting toward confusion, he turned and walked back into the hallway, made a left toward the employee entrance and the small break room… and stopped.
The door to the break room was closed. Don had never seen this door closed, didn’t realize the room even had a door. It had always been wide open, the room well-lit for employees who dipped in to eat a sack lunch, buy a soda from one of the vending machines, or a cup of coffee from the constantly replenished brewing station. Confusion turned into caution as he approached slowly, gripped the handle.
A pulse from the metal handle sizzled his brain like a jolt of electricity. The air thrummed and his vision flickered, reality jagged and stuttered like film caught in a projector; a bass-heavy buzz filled his ears. He mumbled a curse, shook his head, pinched the bridge of his nose, and shoved the door inward.
The first thing Don noticed was Pastor Joseph, leaning back against a white Formica counter, head bowed as if in prayer. The second thing he noticed was the pastor’s ghost-white legs, followed immediately by the realization that the man’s black suit pants had fallen to his ankles, fabric spilled over his shoes onto the linoleum floor. Before him, on her knees—her head tucked into his crotch and animated with an eager, voracious bobbing motion—was Sue. Her dress had been torn, or opened, and pushed down past her thick waist. Her bra lay on the floor near the upturned soles of her dingy black shoes. Her bare back was pink and fleshy, and jiggled like a Jell-O mold as her head and mouth did their sordid business on the pastor.
“Sue?”
The pastor looked up and saw Don across the room. Don looked away from those shining eyes and back to Sue. She grunted and smacked like a pig neck-deep in a trough. A fat line of blood slid down the pastor’s leg, slipping from beneath Sue’s chin and splitting his white thigh from groin to kneecap. To Don’s astonishment, the pastor was grinning broadly, not in the least concerned about what was happening to him, nor Don’s awareness, his violation, of their act. For her part, Sue didn’t even flinch at the sound of her name and carried on with the same veracity as before.
Don felt the world grow heavy and spin. The ceiling of the break room—white fluorescents and stained foam tiles—glowed bright, a pale yellow that stretched upwards for miles. A stark blue sky swirled like smoke within the walls, giving the space a temporary appearance, as of something in transition from one dimension to another. Don groaned and held fast to the door he’d pushed through for support, for solidity.
Seeing Don’s stupefied expression must have tickled the pastor, for Joseph began to laugh—a deep, throaty cackle that permeated the small room like dusty explosions. His eyes widened as he glared at Don with insane glee, the whites swallowed by a sparkling black, glittering like a night sky filled with a single star. They spiraled inside his pale face, adding to the illusory dissipation of reality, and Don didn’t know whether to scream in anger, or horror, or fear. Or madness, a part of his mind screamed, but he pushed the thought away, forced himself back to the moment.
