Margaret's Ark

The mechanic bit his lip for a moment, let it flip free, and said simply, “Yep. Pretty much every day.” He looked at him then. “I just like to see how they're doing.”

“Hmm.” Suresh nodded and looked at Johnson. The tall man looked up from his clipboard, waved to them; then to Suresh's surprise, gave the clipboard to the woman and began walking in their direction.

“Oh, Man,” Bill said, “here were go. He keeps trying to convince me to join his little band of merry nut- heads.”

But you still come , Suresh thought, every day. Craig Johnson was stopped by a teenaged boy who obviously needed an immediate answer to something.

Someone yelled from further down in the crowd, “Hey, Sid, you moron!” The teenager looked up, his face flushing red; then he mouthed a curse and stormed back up the ramp.

Craig Johnson whispered something, apparently to the speaker in the crowd, and looked back towards Bill.

No , Suresh thought. He's looking at me. Why is he looking at me? Not once did Suresh consider that his dark Indian skin might stand out among the predominantly winter-pale Irish and Italian faces. Or perhaps it was something else; the way Johnson held his gaze a moment, a flicker of recognition. But that was absurd. Suresh wouldn’t have spotted him if Bill hadn't pointed him out. Would he?

Johnson walked the final steps towards the fence. Bill muttered, “Hey, Craig.”

Craig turned, as if having forgotten the man was there. “Hi.” Recognition smoothed his expression. “Bill, right? Nice to see you. How does it look? Care to see the inside?”

“No,” Bill said, a little too loudly. Still, he stayed where he was. Johnson turned to Suresh. “Nice to meet you. My name's Craig.” He extended a hand.

“Crazy whack jobs.” It was the voice who'd spoken to “Sid” a moment before, calling out from the crowd. “All of you. Friggin’ sick loons!”

Johnson's hand was still extended. Suresh took a step back and muttered, “I need to get back to work.”  He looked at the mechanic. “It was nice talking with you, Bill. Good luck. You should go with them. It's the only way you will live.”

The mechanic looked confused. Suresh began to work his way back through the crowd. He knew that if he didn’t leave then, Bill would have been obliged to offer some retort to save face within the faceless crowd.

When he looked back, through the bobbing heads moving in the direction he'd just come, he caught Johnson's gaze a moment, before the man turned and spoke with the red-haired mechanic.

A bottle sailed into the air, probably from the invisible speaker. Something spilled from the open top, curving in on itself as the bottle spun and bounced off the side of the ark.

Suresh moved away as fast as possible against the flow of people. He heard Johnson bellow with rage, the rattle of the chain link fence. Was he climbing over, going after the person who'd thrown the bottle? Was he coming after Suresh, seeing him as one of the “chosen?” Maybe that man’s angel had known he was going to be coming today. Wanting to stop him from choosing his own path.

Suresh wanted to scream, wanted to run down the road, past his car, down into the throes of Route 3A, propel himself into traffic and let it all end. Shouts from behind him, a fight breaking out.

The world will fall apart before the first water falls from heaven , he thought.

The crowd thinned as he turned onto Macomb. When no one grabbed his shoulder from behind, Suresh began to calm. He thought of his wife's face.

Neha . A goddess's face in a world of mortals. He thought of her smiling - smiling at him. He would think of Neha for the next forty-three days, and no one else. Nothing else. Nothing but Neha.

41

Jack had not returned to the wharf since the incident with the boy and girl. Each time he considered going back, a deep sadness filled him. Already, he had trouble remembering what the girl looked like. Sometimes her face was a lustrous pale, at other times a smooth chocolate under the nighttime shadows. Details of those moments became fuzzy, indistinct. He tried to hold onto them, not wanting the image of her to slip away like the rest of his life. But it did. It always did.

Other things came back, sharp jagged pieces of the past. These lingered longer. Jack wondered if someday he would remember everything. He hoped not. He would make sure of it, dive into the sea of God’s word and die when the time came. Die and leave the intrusive memories behind forever.

The coat had been a blessing from the Almighty. He wore it, always, and for a while the next day he smelled the girl, felt her love and warmth surround him. Holy Mary, Mother of God, who had come to him in a vision made flesh. Come to clothe the naked and feed the hungry. Amen, amen.

It wasn’t Mary who had come to him later that night, though. The angel Michael found him, lost in the upper corner of an overpass. Michael who'd chased the lingering rats away, led him along dark streets to the doorstep of the Back Street Shelter. The man who'd answered the door knew Jack's name, so it must have been the right place. He'd been here before. The bearded man asked nothing else.

Jack would return to the wharf tomorrow. His mandatory chores at the shelter were done. The men’s bathroom was clean, at least cleaner than he'd found it. After Jack had dished out the mashed potatoes for dinner, not touching any until everyone else had been fed, he found a place at one of the tables in the open hall and ate his own meal. Warm, good food. Clothe the naked and feed the hungry. Amen.

Jack stood outside, now. The night sky was clear, from what he could see in the open rectangle above the alley. It was warm tonight, but it was always warm now that he had Mary's coat. When he was taking a nap that afternoon, on the cot he'd been assigned, Michael visited him in that long ago dream place and reminded him of his duty, of the sign God promised to the world.

The power of God had been temporarily doused away by whatever had happened to him these past few days, but now the inferno raged. As soon as he'd finished his dinner, Jack had stood upon the bench and told his new congregation God's plan.

“Tomorrow, the rains will begin! Tomorrow is fourteen days until God's judge-”

“Forty days,” the old man beside him corrected, between spoonfuls of corn.

Jack did pause then. That correction was important. He continued, “Forty days until God's judgment!” He did not look down as the old man with the corn giggled. “Behold the rains as they fall! Behold the Power of God!”

He'd managed a few more lines before the man who ran the place, Rick, his name is Rick, gently escorted him off the bench and explained that he was to refrain from preaching inside Back Street.

“Save it for the wharf, Jack.”

Jack had been shocked at the statement. “You... you know of my ministry?”

Rick laughed and led him outside, to the alley where, per house rules, folks had to go to cool off. He lingered outside with him and said, “Jack, the whole city knows who you are. You're actually kind of famous.”

“Famous?” The word felt like glue in his mouth, vile and putrid in its connotation. “I've done nothing but preach - “

“Preach God's word; yes, I know. You don't think the news folks were visiting you just for kicks, did you? I saw you once myself, on Channel Five news.”

The fire in Jack's soul ignited. “Praise God.”

Jack didn't know how long he stood in the alley after Rick nodded and went back inside, but now his legs were stiff.

A flame flared across the alley. A face Jack recognized behind a cigarette which licked the fire and burned red at its tip. The face was pale, hidden in the shadows and behind greasy strands of hair, eyes staring across the short distance.

The kid from the hospital. Jack had forgotten him, as he'd forgotten most everything. Except for Michael, taking him down in the elevator. Not flying out the window as he'd hoped.

“I hear it’s gonna rain tomorrow,” the kid said. White smoke burst from the shadows and drifted lazily