What Would Satan Do_ - Anthony Miller [109]
Festus sighed and slowly spun around, taking in his surroundings. Clothes, props, desk, telephone – what to do? What he wanted to do was just to leave; to get the hell out of here. But he didn’t think he had much of a shot at getting out of the church, let alone past all the soldiers surrounding the building. He figured he should probably stay put, and wait for the cavalry to arrive. But – he thumbed through the costumes, lifting the sleeve of a coarse brown cassock, rubbing the fabric between his fingers – he had zero confidence that his message would actually get from Raju to Liam.
He lifted the sleeve of the cassock and looked closer at it. It was made of a rough material, its edges worn and frayed. Jesus would have worn something like this, he thought. He stopped, and let the sleeve fall from his hand. Festus now knew exactly what he should do – what he had to do. He tore the cassock off its hanger, and put it on.
Back in the auditorium, Cadmon had gone, replaced by a man and woman decked out in shiny silver, tassels, and topaz. The man had a guitar, and the couple stood in front of a microphone, swaying with the stilted, awkward rhythm of two white people who – culturally and politically – were as far from the streets of Motown as it is possible to be. They sang a duet with disturbing overtones about the woman being married to the Lord.
The militia men milled about the bowl. Jimmy and Wayne were hunched over in a conspiratorial huddle at the back of the group.
“What the hell are we gonna do?” said Wayne.
“What do you mean, ‘What are we gonna do?’ We ain’t gonna do shit,” said Jimmy.
“We can’t just let that hippie run around the church!”
“The hell we can’t.”
“We gotta stop him!”
“You go stop him. I’m fixin’ to go listen to this song.” Jimmy straightened himself and headed toward the stage. He stopped, mid-step, when he heard one of the other men yell out.
“Holy shit! It’s Jesus!” said the man.
“What?” said the soldier beside him as he spun to face the stage.
“It’s Jesus!” said the first man. (For those non-Texan speakers of Her Majesty’s English, “Jesus” is pronounced “Jay-zuhss.”; “What?” sounds like “Wut?”; and “Apotheosis” – n., def. “elevation to divine status; deification” – also sounds like “Wut?”)
The music stopped. One hundred and fifty rednecks and a handful of soldiers, most of whom wore gas masks, turned to face Festus. “Ooh!” said some. “Ahh,” said others. There were also one ‘oh hell yes,’ two more ‘holy shit’s and at least one ‘fuck yeah.’ The musicians, looking confused and a little disappointed, left the stage.
In the years since he’d left the seminary, Festus had, for the most part, allowed himself to be pretty nutty. But he’d always held something back. He’d danced and skipped his way right up to the line, but had never quite crossed over into full-blown insanity. There were, of course, a lot of folks at local churches – and in the City of Austin generally – who would disagree, but so what? Fuck them.
Whatever those church bastards thought, he’d figured he’d always had a ways to go before he reached the stage of certifiable. Of course, he’d always known – or at least suspected – that the day would come when he’d take that last step, and cross over all the way. Today, he thought, might very well be that day.
“My people!” Festus held his hands up in the air, fingers pressed together in the stiff, karate-chop pseudo-wave that royalty and dictators use to acknowledge those who occupy the lower social strata. He said it again, apparently having forgotten that he was impersonating the Son of God, rather than a Latin American dictator.
“Oooh!” said the audience.
“Behold!” said Festus, trying to think of something for his people to behold. Nothing came to mind, so he said it again. “Behold!” He spread his arms out wider, looking at the mix of surprise, wonder, and mild suspicion on the faces of the militia men. “I,” he said, “am here now.” And he let his arms fall.
That