Calamity

“You must make an equal offering,” Sasha’s mother said. “If not, you will suffer irrevocable trauma.”

What did that mean? Hadn’t he already endured enough pain? He tried to pull free again but he couldn’t do it unless he used his other hand to pry off her fingers. Or punch her in the face.

Sasha stepped right next to him. Her breasts pushed through the cloak and pressed against him. Her eyes had softened considerably. They were the eyes of a waiting lover, a young woman who wanted only to please her man. She took his hand gently and her mother let go. She brought it to her neck and then slowly dragged it over her breast. His hand opened; her nipple teased his palm. His crotch relaxed. He squeezed her breast gently. She moaned so slightly and delicately that he wanted to pounce on her and get her to make that innocent yet sexually loaded noise again and again.

The flickering light reflected off her snaggletooth—like a sabertooth tiger in the moonlight.

Sasha pulled his hand away and sliced open his palm so quickly that he didn’t fully register what had happened until his blood was joining Sasha’s in the chalice.

He back-pedaled rapidly, pulling free of Sasha’s grip. He stumbled and fell. He broke his fall with his hands and his freshly re-injured hand throbbed with hot pain. She had cut a mouth out of his palm. The skin curled back from the wound and bright red blood sluiced out. It was a gushing vagina or the mouth of a Satanic priest after eating of the animal sacrifice.

Sasha’s mother swirled the cup in front of her. “Now the blood is joined, now the sacrifice can be made. This I do for the blessing of the love child you have created.”

She brought the chalice to her mouth and took one long gulp.

He expected her to fall over immediately. All the drugs he had ground up in the Snapple were enough to knock out an elephant. That was wishful thinking, of course. The medicine needed to be absorbed into the blood stream; it would take a few minutes.

A few minutes. His head was ready to pop off his shoulders and float away. His muscles could barely keep him propped off the floor. The damn apple juice and the aspirin. She had drugged him. Her mother probably had a small pharmacy of her own.

Or witchcraft potions.

Sasha’s mother nodded to her daughter and then turned to the altar. She set the cup on the table and slowly got to her knees like an old woman. She was deceptive—slow and heavy one moment, fast and strong the next.

“Now, dear lover,” Sasha said, “It’s time for the real sacrifice.”

She came at him with the knife before her, blade wet with his blood.

5

Anthony double-parked outside of the First Church of Jesus Christ the Empowered. The cops were too busy with drug dealers and gang violence to care about an illegally parked vehicle on Broadway. Newburgh could be a scary place at night, and particularly bad for a white guy who happened to get lost in the wrong area. This is what God wants.

Anthony got out of the car with the rip-claw hammer. It’s black leather grip clung to his skin and its 20oz weight felt good—solid and powerful. The straight claw on the back was ideal for reaching into tight spaces or driving into people’s skulls.

Only if necessary.

The closed beauty shop next door—Nailed Nails—held a new irony that made Anthony laugh. It sounded like the cackle of someone who wasn’t all there.

Light emanated from behind two large posters of Jesus on the cross bordering the door in the giant glass windows. The glass door had been blacked out. Anthony knocked. The metal grate rattled above him with each knock. These people were awfully trusting to stay open after sunset.

A police siren’s warble echoed from somewhere.

The door opened slightly. A woman with curly brown hair and heavy eyeliner peered out from the crack.

“Yes?” she said.

He hadn’t known what he was going to say to gain entrance—figured he might just hold up the hammer and tell whoever opened the door to back off—but words came to him suddenly and with total clarity.

“In today’s day and age when every organized religion is claiming the rightful path, it can be confusing to know which direction is correct. In fact, it can be disheartening. It can be easy to lose faith.”

The woman’s brow scrunched. “Excuse me?”

“But Jesus doesn’t care if you follow this faith or that faith,” Anthony continued. “Jesus wants you to be empowered, to feel His grace and bask in His glory. He scarified Himself for all humanity as proof of heavenly empowerment.”

The woman turned behind her, called for help.

“With Jesus as our teacher, we can learn how to tackle our problems and choose the right path to glory. And, most importantly, we can be empowered with God’s love. No matter the pain from which you suffer …”

The woman turned back to him, realization dawning. “You’re Mr. Williams, aren’t you?”

Anthony didn’t let this stop him. The words were flowing from somewhere in his brain where the flier Ellis and Dwayne had given him so long ago permanently lived. “ … the difficulties against which you struggle …”

“Ellis!” she called again, more frantically.

“… Jesus wants to help. At The First Church of Jesus Christ the Empowered, we seek the fulfillment of God’s will through an honest acceptance of our faults and a faithful inquiry into the magical workings of Jesus.” He waited for her to say something but she simply stared, wide-eyed and shit-scared. She had no idea what “scared” meant. Not yet. “Are you ready for the magical workings of Jesus?”

Anthony raised the hammer.

She screamed, more of a startled shout than a scream of fear, but it was enough to take this moment to Step Two. He shoved hard against the door and the woman fell back, stepping several feet before her legs tangled and she smacked the tile floor on her hip. She started to yell for Ellis again but there wasn’t any need. Ellis stood in the middle of the room.

“Anthony,” he said, “I was expecting a call.”

He had taken off his suit jacket but still wore the black pants, white dress shirt, and black tie, though he had loosened the knot and undone the top button. His hair was poofed as if he had run his hand through it several times. The king without his diadem, Anthony thought, thinking of some Emily Dickinson poem he’d read years ago.

Anthony walked toward him in slow, deliberate steps. He patted the head of the hammer in his palm with each step. Three or four other people stood against the walls, eyes wide, mouths agape. The other worshippers were probably in The Temple, bowing before a giant fake god. Anthony would love to barge into that room and smash the Giant Jesus to pieces. It would feel so wonderful to destroy that thing. That statue could have been his salvation; instead, it dragged him deeper into Hell. The hammer grew lighter. This is what the Devil wants.

“I was going to call,” Anthony said in an equally slow and methodical voice, “but it suddenly occurred to me that you had single-handedly destroyed my life.”

Ellis was shaking his head. “No, no, no. We have done nothing but try to help you. God is mysterious and His ways cannot be questioned. We only sought to help you, empower you.”

Anthony held up the hammer. “I’m empowered now.”

Ellis started to back up. “What are you going to do? Kill me? Beat me to death? You’ll never get away with it.”

Anthony paused. “Why would I want to get away with it? I’ve already killed a man today, what does it matter if I kill another?”

None of the people against the walls moved. So much for empowerment. Ellis began to back-pedal quickly, heading for The Temple.

“I told you what you had to do. You can still have a beautiful life with Brendan.”

“Don’t you dare say his name!” Anthony launched into a sprint and collided into Ellis before the man could even turn to run.

They crashed onto the floor. Ellis’s hands groped Anthony’s face and arms in spastic bursts, rapidly moving