Book of Joel

*Draft - Currently being professionally edited.

Chapter 1

Joel Emerson Haines searched for God in the brown-haired woman prostrating herself before his mother. Even the soft glow of the crucifix hanging over the woman’s wrenched body stirred nothing in his heart; he despaired. He may as well not have existed for their sense of his presence in the room. The woman wailed. It was similar to a scream, but Joel thought it different in that a wail was a full-body event. Screams could happen from someone standing in the corner, but for a wail — that was special. Nothing drove home the message of repentance like a good wail, or so his mother told him.

And that’s what this woman did. The woman and his mother were nearly the same age if he had to guess — in their mid-thirties, or twenty-nine as went the white lie that his mother said wouldn’t send her to Hell. Sweat trickled down his back between his shoulder blades as he played witness to the scene before him. The woman’s wails cut through the air and pierced his ears, working their way into his nerves. 

He knew better than to interrupt.

“Get up, Caitlyn, the Lord sees you.” 

The way Evie Haines, Joel’s mother, smiled down at parishioners, especially wailing ones, made her seem like Mother Theresa crossed with the Mona Lisa. The thick black hair was pulled up into a tight bun because she was always presentable. Her dark walnut-colored skin and ebony irises set into those big white eyes expressed so much warmth and compassion that Joel almost believed there could be some left for him.

Caitlyn, shorter than his mother by an inch and with hair that was so white it shimmered blue, pushed herself to her knees while his mother hooked an arm underneath one of the woman’s arms. A quick glance told Joel that he needed to get up and help and that he wasn’t as invisible as he thought. Without hesitating, Joel rushed over the thick carpet to support the woman’s other arm and the two lifted her into a nearby chair.

“I don’t know what to do, Evie. I’ve been giving to the Lord. I come to church. I even come to Bible study every week. Why would He do this to me?”

“The Lord has a place for you, Caitlyn. There’s a meaning here, you just have to trust.”

“The cancer is back. I pray and pray, but it doesn’t make a difference. The doctor says it’s metastasizing, and the only treatment is the nanites. What does the Lord even think about those disgusting little creatures flowing through my blood, eating pieces of my body?”

Joel let go of the woman’s arm and stepped back behind her, trying his best to blend into the wall in that cramped office.

“Caitlyn, what do I always say?”

“Keep giving, and the Lord will provide?”

“Exactly. Get the treatment or don’t get it. The Lord works how the Lord will. But the Lord needs what’s his.”

“The treatment — it’s one hundred and forty thousand dollars. That’s all of our savings, Evie. I mean, it’ll be one or the other, I’m sure.”

“The Lord takes care of his own, Caitlyn. If you just make sure the Lord gets his share, then he’ll do what’s right.”

Every weekend, Joel personally witnessed over two-thousand people give the Lord his share in the form of checks, or cash, though more usually cash-coins of varying denominations. The digital currency was like a bearer bond and tracked how much was left on it at any given time. The largest denomination he’d ever cashed in for the church was twenty-thousand on one coin.

“Well, Caitlyn, I can’t tell you what to do. Only the Lord can. But I can tell you what I would do. I would make sure the Lord got his share and I would trust the Lord to look after me. Just ask in your heart, Caitlyn. Ask your heart what the Lord would want.”

The woman closed her eyes and raised her hands, feeling out for something Joel had never felt - the touch of the Lord. One second. Then two. Then she lowered her arms to her armrests. She blew out a thin breath.

“You’re right, of course, Evie. You’re always right. This is a test of faith. That’s what it is. The Lord is testing me.”

Joel’s stomach churned with an unfamiliar feeling, and he felt sweat collecting on his palms as his hands clenched into fists. One thing he knew not to do was correct his mother. That was in the Bible — obey your parents.

“What happens if I die, though, Evie? You know how Ethan feels about how much I give. He’ll stop, you know he will.”

His mother looked at the woman with eyes furrowed in deep concern.

“I thought you’d willed it all to the Church? And the Lord loves you for it.”

“He said he’ll fight it. He said I need to get the treatment, or he’ll put you in court for years to come.”

He saw the glint of anger that his mother then managed to hide in less than a millisecond.

“Caitlyn, the Lord getting His helps Ethan, whether Ethan wants to admit it or not. The Lord is looking out for you and yours.”

“I know. What can I do though?”

“Why wait? Bring the money on Sunday, and once the Lord has it, Ethan can do whatever he likes. And we’ll all pray for you. A thousand people, Caitlyn, all asking the Lord for your recovery.”

The woman nodded, bobbing her head up and down on a neck that seemed too thin to support it.

“Good, Caitlyn. The Lord provides. Bring the money and the Lord will do as the Lord wills. Bless you, child.” With another glance, his mother sent the clear message that it was time for Caitlyn to leave. Joel swooped in to grab the woman’s arm and lift her to her feet before escorting her through the door, closing it behind her. He turned to his mother, whose eyes beamed. A smile stretched across to her face.

“Joel, did you see the devotion in that woman? The Lord will be so pleased. I can feel His presence in the room right now.”

Joel felt only indigestion and embarrassment, but forced a grin that he didn’t feel, and nodded to confirm a presence that he couldn’t sense. Two lies in the matter of a minute. The list of reasons Joel would eventually wind up in Hell just kept growing.

When Saturday came, Joel’s feelings about the incident hadn’t improved. His ineffectual morning prayers didn’t fill the emptiness that consumed him. Joel arose from his knees to tend to the multitude of events that brought the church to life.

The church building seemed huge when it was empty. Joel looked out over the pews where he knew screaming worshippers would congregate in just a few hours. The seats fanned out away from the stage at a slight incline, just enough so that people could see without having to stand — though most members chose to rise to their feet during the lengthy sermons. Terraced steps led up to the stage, with walkways bifurcating on either side to disappear into the preparation areas on the left and right. Behind the stage and elevated was a holographic projector. This he flicked on from his control panel in the back to project a replica of the lectern where his mother stood. With a dial and a few entries in a keypad, he brought up the statistics from the previous Sunday.

In addition to the hundreds who filled the auditorium each weekend, almost a million people signed into the virtual projection of it. Up from the week before by almost ten percent. He flicked the stats and holograph back off and then moved to test the audio.

“Joel?”

Joel glanced up to see his mother approaching him, already wearing a crisp suit. She exuded concern as she slowed just three feet away from him.

“Test, one, two, three,” he said, ignoring her for the moment. The speakers boomed his voice across the room causing her to jump. Joel bit his lip to keep from laughing. He knew better than to let a laugh escape in his mother’s presence.

“Are you almost done setting up? There are people outside.”

“What time is it?”

There were no clocks in the main room because the Lord didn’t like distractions.

“Eight o’clock already. It’s time to open.”

“This is the last bit, Mom. I’m just finishing up.”

He didn’t look up at her directly, afraid that she would see the absence of God in his eyes.

“What’s the matter, baby?”

“Nothing.”

“If there is, you know you can talk to me, right? I’m your mother before anything else.”

Joel fought the temptation to accept her invitation, however genuine she made the offer sound.

“I’m okay, Mom.”

Another lie. Add that one to the list.

“I’m just asking.” She paused for a moment and turned to face the doors again, a movement he saw from the corner of his eyes. Then she marched off toward her ready room.

He focused without moving his head to see in the same direction that had caught her attention. He saw the bodies then, pressed against the translucent windows like zombies in the holovids his mother didn’t know he watched. She marched off with crisp steps back toward the ready room, where he knew she would spend the next ten minutes either praying or drinking coffee and reading up on the information they’d collected about the parishioners. Probably Caitlyn would be among those she read up on.

Finishing the soundcheck five minutes later, he made his way from the stage just as the loud metallic clank announced the opening of the doors. His mother had always been impatient, and people flooded in quickly like ants filing toward an abandoned cookie. Joel watched for a minute, mesmerized by how they just kept coming, and then by the thought of the ten times more than watched her virtually. 

Even in her weakened state, Caitlyn had managed to push to the front and took her seat just before the stage. As soon as the pews behind her filled, Joel flipped the switch to start the opening music so that the people wouldn’t need to sit for long in boredom. That was also the signal to his mother to come out and start. Right on cue, she emerged from the ready room to booming applause, all smiles and raised hands.

“Welcome, welcome friends,” she began as the music and applause died down. “We’re here today to learn and further the cause of the Lord. Does anybody remember what we talked about last week?”

Almost a hundred hands shot into the air, and Joel reached for his microphone. When she pointed, he darted from his sound booth down into the crowd to deliver the microphone to a skinny man with dark, bushy eyebrows.

“We talked about Satan, and we talked about models - and how the models were created in man’s image.”

“Good, Jim Kent, that’s really good. You do remember. Do you recall how the Lord feels about that?”

“They are abominations unto the Lord. These are the sons and daughters of Ham, who witnessed his father naked, to be cursed for all time.”

Joel didn’t see that connection, since genetically-altered clones called models were made in something like ceramic pods, and couldn’t possibly be descendants from anyone. But the idea seemed to resonate with the laypeople, and his mother kept pushing it, so he guessed that he was wrong about that just like he was wrong about everything else. He smiled at the man and reached for the microphone back, but the man didn’t relinquish it at first. He had more to say.

“They are unclean. They fill the brothels and bring sin to the good people, engineered for temptation. They work in the refuse and filth, as they should. They are incapable of any real emotion, as the name would suggest. They model people, like shadows of humans. Don’t be tempted to believe that they are real.”

The man had strayed from the teachings, and Joel’s mother interrupted to bring the point back. As she did, Joel reached again for the microphone and this time grabbed it away from the man.

“Praise be to Jesus, Jim. Praise be. But the Lord gave them a place in His mercy, didn’t he? He made them the laborers, the toilers, that they may work their way to His redemption. Amen.”

The entire crowd echoed an eerie Amen in response, that lingered for a moment before she began again.

“Let’s talk about that some more. Now, I know that some of you,” she said as she scanned the crowd, seated in silence and awe. “Some of you have been going to those rallies, haven’t you? You’ve been coming in here, and listening to His word but not hearing it. You’ve been lying to us, and lying to the Lord.”

She glared at first, horrible in Joel’s vision, as she cut through the crowd. A lady with purple hair in the front row visibly winced, a look that his mother homed in on instantly.

“Kelly Mandrake,” she said, pointing to the woman, who tried to push back into the row behind but was blocked by her seat. “Come up here please.”

The woman’s eyes went glassy and she shook her head. Anonymous hands pushed her forward and guided her in an irresistible wave toward the front. Joel had been in that wave before. Once it caught you up, there was no way out of it. She stopped at the edge of the terraced steps just below where his mother stood.

“It’s okay, baby, come up to me. Confess to the Lord - the Lord forgives.”

The woman took one shaky step up onto the first tier, then another, and finally, shoulders slumped in defeat, pushed her way up the rest. Tears streamed down her face.

“Kelly, the Lord loves you, but the Lord sees all, and He wants to know why you abandoned Him.”

“I didn’t abandon the Lord, I swear. Just… those poor people. Did you hear about the one who got crushed under a box of nails at the construction plant? His arm was smashed and useless, and they sent him to be destroyed. They killed him for it.”

“That’s their lot, Kelly. The Lord has made it so.”

“I -I know, it’s just so hard, Evie. I don’t understand how the Lord can…”

“That’s because you don’t believe,” his mother’s words stung with accusation. “You don’t have the faith that it takes to be here, do you? Will you trust the Lord in His almighty judgment? Will you open yourself to Him, and believe what He tells you?”

The woman staggered backward as though his mother had struck her with a knife.

“I do believe,” she protested, but since she didn’t have a microphone and the crowd had already begun to boo, Joel only barely made out her words. She mouthed them again while staring out with teary eyes over the crowd of her friends and relatives and one-time confidants.

“Repent!” Joel’s mother held up her Bible hand and Joel quickly flipped the lights to subtly shine up from beneath her, giving her an otherworldly glow. “Repent and be forgiven.”

“I don’t under…”

“Repent before the Lord!”

The woman looked up and then back out at the crowd, and then fell to her knees.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. Lord, please forgive me.”

His mother brought the Bible down again and the most genuine-looking smile that Joel had ever seen, born of his mother’s mastery, replaced the hellfire and damnation on her face.

“You are forgiven, dear.”

The woman had been reduced to a proper wailing on the floor, and the crowd began to applause. One man near the front leapt over the steps to assist the woman back to her seat.

“Let’s pray for her soul.”

The crowd joined together for a moment of silence while Joel’s mother led them in prayer. Once complete, she turned her ferocious eyes toward Caitlyn.

“There’s one more we need to pray for today.”

That’s when Joel noticed the man beside Caitlyn. As his mother rattled off about Caitlyn’s disease, a story he already knew, the man next to Caitlyn focused all of his energy on the stage. At first, Joel thought it was him the man’s gaze was locked to. Then he realized that his mother was just beyond him from the man’s vantage point. The man stared unblinking at her, nodding along, transfixed by her words. In his heart, Joel felt jealousy growing, as he longed for the security of such a deep faith and devotion. There, amidst the crowd of believers, this man with reddish-brown hair, light blue eyes, and a scraggly beard, dressed in an uncomplicated t-shirt and jeans, held more faith the Joel. When Joel’s mother got to the part about the recurrence of cancer, the man’s eyes filled with tears as though he channeled the woman’s pain.

“But she has made the decision to give everything to the Lord and to trust Him with her life. Over a hundred thousand dollars of her hard-earned money, money that she struggled her entire life to build, has come to the church this morning.”

Joel turned his attention back toward Caitlyn. A man on her other side of her bore a look of shock, with furrowed angry eyes stabbing at his mother. That one wasn’t a regular, and Joel guessed he’d come precisely to prevent something like that from happening, but Caitlyn had managed anyway. The man turned and worked his way back through the crowd.

“Let’s pray for her, everyone. Let’s heal Caitlyn Parker.”

The crowd began to chant the mantra of healing, taken from a spattering of scriptures. Joel chanted them under his breath by reflex. The red-headed man screamed the words, eyes bright with hope and joy.