Come Friday evening, The Family gathered in The Upper Room. Dusk lingered in purple, blue, and magenta. Everyone lounged, exhausted. The Comforter opened with prayer, which others only half-heard, then said, “We cannot give up now, children. Our time is almost nigh.”
“It’s sure taking a while!” Legion mumbled sarcastically. Elisha and Cinderella nodded.
“The bail has been set,” The Comforter said. “They’re asking for two hundred thousand dollars.”
“What? Damn! That’s crazy!” Legion said.
Elisha exhaled and collapsed backward upon Lazarus’s bed. Cinderella, sitting next to him, closed her eyes for several seconds to keep from crying.
“This whole situation’s fucked up!” Legion shouted, pounding es right fist into es left palm. “How you just take a man off the streets and blame him for murder? Huh? How you do that?”
No one responded.
“Then you ask him to come up with money to be free again? That shit is crazy!”
“Don’t make yourself upset, Legion,” Cinderella said. “We gotta keep cool.”
“I been upset! From the beginning of this bullshit I was upset, and I’m gon’ stay upset till Lazarus comes home!” E stomped a short distance away, then, with es back to the family, stopped abruptly. Within seconds e had returned.
“Stay on the battlefield, soldiers,” The Comforter encouraged. “We shall not lose this war.”
“I’m just tired,” Cinderella confessed. “Every day, marching and shouting and hoping it matters. I guess you can never know.”
Elisha leaned up and whispered, “We always know. Love always matters.” His enormous hand rubbed the center of her back and provided masculine comfort she’d almost forgotten.
Vehicles zoomed above, causing the freeway to bounce like a trampoline. Drivers never knew that, just a realm beneath them, mere inches under their feet, angels huddled in uncertainty. Tired, frustrated, homeless angels who, today, contemplated the surrender of their wings.
“Something’s gotta happen,” Cinderella said.
The Comforter lifted her hands. “It will. It will! If we faint not.”
Each looked in a different direction. Faith sat among them, weary and worn, yet full of expectation.
The Comforter sang, “Go down, Moses, way down in Egypt land! Tell ole Pharaoh to let my people go!” Wind bursts came from the east. She gathered the shawl about her shoulders. The others watched as the universe answered her beckoning: “When Israel was in Egypt’s land,” the others responded, in three different keys, “Let my people go! Oppressed so hard they could not stand, let my people go!”
Thunder growled in the distance. Lightning flashed across the sky. Then came the rain. It fell suddenly, in heavenly torrents, as if pouring from a rushing fountain. Slowly, subconsciously, The Family inched closer together until, like a band of fugitive slaves, they sat clustered upon Lazarus’s blue comforter. All except The Comforter. She stood several feet away, white garments waving in the wind, with her hands moving back and forth before her. If The Family hadn’t known better, they might’ve believed she governed the wind and rain itself. Sheltered beneath the overpass, she paced carefully, like one gliding across water, and continued singing about a man named Moses who was sent to set a people free. By the end of the song, she was an octave higher than she’d begun, and rain sheets fell so thick and heavy Legion glared into the sky. The Upper Room remained dry in the midst of the storm, except for a few stray droplets that seeped through cracks and crevices from above. Otherwise, the place was an arid sanctuary, impenetrable by the elements, a gift to Lazarus and his people who simply wanted to live and love freely.
“Let my people go! Let my people go!” The Comforter repeated the refrain, softer and softer, until the melody faded away. Step by microscopic step, she moved and joined the huddle as lightning cracked dusky skies. It must have been an hour before she exhaled deeply and dark clouds retreated. The Family lifted their heads as if having been in prayer.
“We need to get him home,” Legion huffed. “Now.”
Elisha stood. “I’ll get him home. I know what to do.” He began to walk away.
“Where are you going?” they asked in chorus.
Over his shoulder, he said softly, “To get what someone owes me.”
* * *
Blades of grass appear identical until examined closely. Each actually has its own shape, size, and color, distinguishable only by the observant eye. Elisha felt stupid for having not noticed this before. He sat at the rotunda in Piedmont Park, playing with leaves of grass he’d exhumed along the way, trying to be certain of what he was about to do. Of course Lazarus was worth it. That wasn’t the issue. But this would cost Elisha everything. Everything! His future, his past, his dreams. Everything. There would be no modeling career after this, no headstone for his mother’s grave, no house into which The Family could move and be spared scrutinizing eyes. Nothing. He’d be right back where he started. Yet Lazarus would be free, and that’s what Elisha wanted most.
He couldn’t help but think of himself as selfish for hesitating. After all, shouldn’t he just do it and never look back? Wasn’t that what people did for those they love? Give everything and never look back?
He’d ask Harriet to help him. She’d know what to do. It was funny, he thought, that just when things were looking up something happened to destroy his hope. He’d imagined exactly what he’d do with the house. He’d fix it up, with money from a small portion of the land, and move The Family in. There were three bedrooms, if he remembered correctly, and although that was rather small, they could easily add on. In the front yard there’d be a small flower garden, which would greet visitors upon arrival, and on the porch there’d be a lovers’ swing for lounging evenings away. The living room would be plastered with pictures of each of them and, perhaps, even a family portrait might hang in the center of the main wall. Instead of soiled-brown-paper-bag dinners, they’d have home-cooked meals with real vegetables and fresh meat that no one else had bitten. Of course Legion’s occasional meals came fresh and untouched, but they didn’t come often. At the new house, which was his old house, they’d eat like human beings. They’d work and contribute to the maintenance of the house because then, with an address, they could secure real jobs and stop wondering where their next meal would come from. This had been the plan. Elisha hadn’t shared it with the others yet, though. He’d wanted to surprise them after all renovations were complete and five brand-new keys made. But now there would be no surprise. No house, no land, no family portrait. No need for keys. Nothing.
Leaning over the edge of the round pavilion, Elisha tossed pebbles into the green, murky water and watched his vision fade. He’d wanted it more for them than himself. He knew how to live in his dreams, to construct a whole universe in the top of his head, then live there as long as he needed. He’d done it since he was a kid. But the others deserved a real life of comfort, he thought, in exchange for what they’d been through. Legion should know the joy of a room all his own, one with his name above the door, where no one could enter without his permission. Cinderella’s love and sweetness had earned her the right to beautify a home, then live in it. She could put her sparkling red shoes in a real closet, where they belonged, and buy a few more if she wanted. Like other men, Lazarus deserved a porch—a rocking chair, too!—where, on bright Sunday mornings, he could read the The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The New Yorker, and whatever books he desired. After all, he was the king, the Great Lazarus, as far as Elisha was concerned, and he should be rewarded for loving and protecting each member of The Family. Exactly what had happened with his first family Elisha didn’t know, but they would be welcomed, too, if they cared to come. Of course The Comforter had no earthly home, but at least she could enjoy a resting station where her spirit had no boundaries and her flesh could rejuvenate. She and Lazarus could sit together on the porch, sniffing fragrances in springtime, and talking and laughing about the wonders of a gracious God Who was simply waiting to see how far people would go to fix the world before He/She finished the job. It would be marvelous—the house and the people in it. Or, rather, now, it would have been.
Darkness came quickly. Sex-starved men lurked behind trees and bushes, waiting for another desperate soul to meet their need. Elisha usually had no interest in such an exchange, although he knew desperation intimately, but that night, after deciding to sacrifice everything he’d ever hoped for, he needed to be touched, held, caressed, assured that he was doing the right thing. Anyone would do. He wasn’t attracted to men, but in the midst of need what difference did that make? If there were a woman somewhere in the shadows, he’d take her and they could have their way. But he didn’t see any women. It didn’t matter anyway. He didn’t want a person; he wanted a body, a human form that could massage his vulnerability and restore his confidence before the sun rose again. So he left the pavilion and walked deeper into the park, where thick clusters of trees forbade the penetration of light, and followed moving shadows and figures beckoning him onward. Faces were indistinguishable, but motives were obvious as distant grunts and moans confirmed that someone had found what he was looking for. Elisha plowed deeper, deeper still, into the forest, feeling his way with outstretched hands, praying that wild things had been frightened away. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, a touch. He froze and turned. A form, almost his height, stood before him. He should’ve been afraid, but curiosity curtailed fear. The man said nothing. He reached and touched Elisha’s chest sensually, lovingly, and Elisha placed his own hand over the man’s hand as if to thank him for his willing gesture. Elisha had never done this before, in a black hole in the thickets of Piedmont Park, but he didn’t want to stop. With his free hand, Elisha touched the man, too: first the side of his face, then his neck, chest, arms, stomach, until his belt blocked lower movement. With both hands, the man unbuttoned Elisha’s shirt and kissed his nipples with the tenderness of newborn babes. Elisha’s breath became unstable. He looked around to make sure they were alone. When the man’s tongue blazed a trail of warm saliva from the center of Elisha’s chest to his navel, Elisha clutched the sides of the man’s head and pushed it away. “No,” he whispered. The man rose and returned to Elisha’s exposed chest as if the place of touch were inconsequential. When their lips met, Elisha jerked away slightly, more from shock than disgust, then yielded and let the man’s lips engulf his own. The taste of smoke and beer lingered in the man’s mouth, but the easy movement of his tongue allowed Elisha to tolerate an otherwise disgusting flavor. However, it was the man’s full embrace that melted Elisha, the enclosure of his strong arms around Elisha’s slender frame. He returned the embrace and together they stood, topless and erect, in the womb of the forest, extracting from each other’s flesh the needs of the heart. Each man grabbed his own extension and agitated it until his need burst forth. Then, the shadow man took from his pocket wrinkled napkins, one of which he offered Elisha, and after they cleaned themselves he nodded and touched Elisha’s shoulder graciously. Within two steps, he vanished.
Back at the rotunda, Elisha hated himself for what he’d done. Only nasty, vile people do things like that, he thought. But still, he couldn’t forget the man’s touch. It was light and easy, like the hairs of a feather, and Elisha wondered if he’d ever see him again. Again? He chuckled. He hadn’t seen him at all! Even if Elisha did, he wouldn’t recognize him. Elisha knew the man was black from the texture of his hair, but that’s all he knew for sure. He could see him tomorrow on the street and never know it was him. But if they touched, Elisha believed, he’d know. Most men’s hands were rough and calloused, but the shadow man’s were soft and spongy, like thick terry cloth. Perhaps they’d been looking for the same thing—a human touch—and, once achieved, he, like Elisha, would return to a life of physical neglect. If Elisha was lucky, he thought, they’d one day meet again.
By week’s end, his inheritance had been liquidated. The land, somewhere in South Georgia, had been sold to the county for a little over $60,000 and the plot on which the dilapidated house stood brought $56,500. The sale was quick and easy. A developer had bought the other abandoned houses, so he was eager to make the purchase. It would take a few days for the paperwork to be filed and checks cut, but it was a done deal. Elisha hadn’t mentioned his plan to The Family for fear they’d try to dissuade him, but now there was no turning back. He’d signed the appropriate papers and cried his last tears. It was finished.
At the next family gathering in The Upper Room, he laid bricks of cash upon Lazarus’s bed. The others stared. Only The Comforter knew what Elisha had done.
Cinderella covered her mouth. “Oh my! Where’d you get all that money from?”
Legion thumbed several bundles. “Who you done robbed, man?”
“I sold what my mother left me. Everything. All of it.”
They halted. Each knew his love for Sorrow, and now they felt the pain of his emptiness.
“It’s enough to pay his bail and lawyer fees, too, I hope. It should be. It’s all I have.” He turned to hide his tears.
The Comforter declared, “‘What you’ve done unto the least of these, you’ve done unto me.’” Elisha sighed. “Your day of abundance shall come.” She nodded as if it already had. “Only when you’ve given everything have you given at all. God honors only those who give all.”
Elisha wanted to explain that he wasn’t upset or regretful; he simply hoped his mother understood what he’d done and why. She’d provided an inheritance and now he’d surrendered it to someone else. But it was right. It felt right. And Elisha had no doubt Lazarus would’ve done the same for him. Actually, Lazarus already had.
Cinderella reported that the protest seemed to be working. Her eyes beamed fluorescent green. Media presence had leveled but not decreased, so she and the others were encouraged. Every day people from one of the TV stations camped out at the protest site, talking to both picketers and bystanders, keeping Lazarus’s name visible and his case alive in viewers’ minds. Legion’s sporadic lunches undergirded their strength, she acknowledged gratefully, and come what may, she would never forget es support. Never.
“You’re an incredible person,” she told Legion. “People really don’t know who you are. I suppose they never will. But you’ve saved my life. I thank God for you.”
E play-punched her shoulder and said, “Whatever, girl! You know I got you. I got all of y’all. Don’t ever question that.”
They thanked Legion. E went on to say that e’d secured a lawyer for Lazarus—a real, bona fide lawyer—one of the best in the city.
“What!” Cinderella shrieked. “How?”
“Don’t you worry about that. Just know I got him to take the case.”
Everyone looked at Legion with suspicious gratitude.
Cinderella pressed the matter. “What’s it gonna cost? A real lawyer’s an arm and a leg!”
Legion’s pursed lips confirmed her thinking. “He’s doing it as a favor”—e paused—“but still it ain’t free. I gotta give him something.”
Elisha clutched the moneybag. “How much?”
Legion’s head shook. “I don’t know, but he guessed it might be somewhere around fifty thousand dollars.”
“Wooo!” “Geesh!” “Seriously?” they mumbled.
“And that’s cheap.”
The Comforter replied, “Where there’s a will, there’s a way. We’ll make it happen.”
Elisha handed the bag to Legion and said, “Take what you need. That’s what it’s for.”
“We need only ten thousand right now. For the retainer.”
“Just take it!” Elisha said. “I’d feel better about it.”
Legion confessed, “I don’t have anywhere to keep that amount of money.”
The Comforter intervened. “Give it here. I’ll keep it safe for us.”
She went on to report that Lazarus’s son, the fourth Lazarus, paid him a visit. The others were shocked and surprised.
“He heard his father needed him, so he went to see about him.”
“How’d it go? Do you know?” Cinderella asked.
“Of course she knows,” Legion teased. “Come on!”
The Comforter said, “There are things Lazarus needs to repair. It won’t be easy, but it must be done—if he’s to be free. The lambs have spoken.”
“What does he need to do?” Legion asked.
The Comforter thought how to answer without saying too much. “He must align those who’ve come before him with those who’ve come after.”
No one understood.
The Comforter tried again: “He must reorder the steps of his fathers and reset the steps of his sons. Only then will God hear his cry.”
They still didn’t understand, but they nodded anyway. At least the part about fathers and sons made sense, so they looked satisfied. Somehow, The Comforter was orchestrating all of this. They knew that much for sure.
“Isn’t bail usually a tenth of the set amount?” Cinderella asked.
“I think so,” Legion said. “If you go through a bondsman.”
The Comforter offered, “Let me see what I can do tomorrow.”
Anticipation mounted. It had been a while since Lazarus was among them, and now they sat in The Upper Room like a lost tribe of vagabonds. Waiting. Everyone felt the void. Like a body with a hole in the chest. No heart at all. Present, but not alive; functional, but not living. They’d gotten so used to having him that his absence felt personal, disrespectful even, as if someone had taken their God away. The atmosphere around them had changed, they believed. Wind began to blow the day of Lazarus’s arrest and it never quite settled. In the evenings, it carried a sharp, chilly edge that usually didn’t come until autumn. Cinderella kept a red tattered sweater—the same color of her shoes—nearby at night to keep the nip away. And practically every afternoon, regardless of the forecast, a shower popped up, without prelude of dark clouds, and dashed away within minutes. The Family read these signs as God’s displeasure, His abysmal discontent with human beings. The Comforter had explained this. She said the activities in the skies were always relative to God’s assessment of universal harmony and balance. All one had to do, to know the mind of God, was pay attention to the weather. It spoke daily.
With the rising of a full moon, Legion told a story so fantastic even The Comforter winced. Yet e swore it was true.
“This happened just last week. I was walking over by Atlantic Station, near Ikea, when suddenly I fell into a deep pit.”
“What!” Cinderella shouted. “Did you hurt yourself?”
“It’s a wonder I didn’t! The crater must’ve been thirty or forty feet deep and just as wide. The top closed up like a black hole in space. I couldn’t see nothin’, and I mean nothin’! In any direction. I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face.”
“Was construction work going on or something?” Cinderella interrupted again.
“Girl, I don’t know!” Legion shot her a look of frustration. “But it had to be something more than that. The hole was as big as a house. And I’m telling you … it was pitch-black. And hot as fire! I thought I was in a damn sauna. I could hardly breathe. Since I couldn’t see, I was scared to move, but after a few moments I stuck my hands out and tried to feel my way around. I reached a wall that was slick as glass and hot as a burning woodstove, so I backed away. I screamed, but no one heard me. My voice echoed off the walls. I’ve never been so scared in all my life.”
The Family frowned as they listened.
“I couldn’t climb out. There was nothing to grab hold of. And even if there was, it would’ve been too hot to touch. Sweat poured all over me.”
Elisha whispered, “What did you do?”
“Nothing. What could I do? I just stood there, trembling, burning up.”
Elisha marveled, not at the story but at Legion’s masterful performance. This child ought to be onstage, Elisha thought. For every description Legion had an accompanying antic that brought the tale to life.
“After a few minutes, my clothes were wet, but still I couldn’t see anything. So I breathed a little easier and sat down right in the middle of the floor. It was hot, too, but not like the walls.”
With pierced eyes, The Comforter stared at Legion, not for the story’s details, but for God’s lesson in it.
Cinderella voiced what others were thinking: “Was anyone else there? Had someone maybe fallen into the hole before you?”
“I don’t think so. When I called out, no one answered. And I didn’t hear anyone scampering around.”
“It was just you, down in this inferno, all by yourself? With no light?”
“That’s right. Nobody but me. I thought maybe I was in the middle of a nightmare, but I wasn’t. It was real. The sidewalk just opened up and swallowed me.”
“Oh, Legion! You’re such a storyteller!”
E frowned, pissed. “This ain’t no story, girl! This is real. It actually happened.” E looked to Elisha for support, but Elisha had none to give. Of course The Comforter was in another world. “All I could do was sit there and wish to be rescued. Everything I’ve ever said or done flashed across my mind. It was like I was living my life over again, but this time I was watching it unfold.”
“Yes,” The Comforter said. “Yes.”
The others waited for elaboration, but it never came. The Comforter nodded in silence. There was something she understood, that only she understood.
“After a while, the strangest feeling came over me. It was like I knew the place. There was something familiar about it. I calmed down and tried to figure it out, but I couldn’t. Even the sweaty, stuffy odor was recognizable, but I couldn’t figure out how. I walked around the walls of the structure until I knew I’d made a complete circle. That’s how I knew the size of the hole. Then, once again, I backed away and sat on the floor. I’m telling you … I knew this place. I don’t know how, but I did. Maybe in another lifetime or something, but I’ve definitely been there before.”
The Comforter smiled.
“What is it?” Legion asked her.
She laughed and said, “Every heart knows home.”
Huh? The others frowned. They would’ve probed further, but they’d learned better. With The Comforter, they’d discovered that if you don’t get it the first time, simply wait for the revelation.
“How did you get out?” Cinderella asked.
Legion squirmed and said, “That’s the crazy part! I was sitting there when, all of a sudden, I felt something brush against my face. It scared me at first, so I fought against it, until I realized it was a rope.”
“A rope,” Elisha said.
“I know this sounds crazy, but I’m telling you the truth. It just dropped out of nowhere. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it, dangling midair.”
Cinderella’s eyes rolled. She’d heard more than enough.
“Listen to me! I wouldn’t make this up. I know I tell stories all the time, but this one’s true!”
The urgent sincerity in Legion’s voice captured Cinderella and returned her to the moment. She stared into Legion’s anxious eyes.
“I grabbed the rope and began to climb. It was hard, but eventually I got to the top. There was no opening, though. Just a ceiling with the rope hanging from it. But when I pushed on the ceiling, it gave a little, so I pushed harder until I broke through.”
“Oh, Legion, stop it!” Cinderella cried. “You can’t expect anyone to believe that!”
With mouth agape and eyes bulged wide, e said, “I’m telling you! This is what happened! I fought my way through the top like a baby coming out of a womb. There was no one around. When I finally crawled out of the hole and looked down, there was nothing but solid concrete.”
“You gotta be kidding,” Elisha said.
“No, I’m not. It’s like nothing ever happened. I looked around and everything looked normal. I even touched myself to make sure I was real.”
The Comforter gazed at him. “You can’t go back. Not to stay. You’ve been delivered.”
“From what?” e asked.
She clutched es hands lovingly. “Your past.”
Elisha and Cinderella murmured interpretive possibilities, but even then they didn’t understand. Legion tossed es hands and stopped trying. All e knew was that it was real, it had definitely happened, and something about the place felt eerily familiar. That was the extent of es knowing.
“Every life goes backward, at times, in order to move forward,” she added. “Growth extends in both directions.”
No one comprehended her meaning. She sighed deeply and sauntered down the slope and into the known world. The other three talked about lighter things and slept together, spoon fashion, on Lazarus’s bed in the middle of The Upper Room.