19. The Wizard of Oz

I’m here because of Kelsey.

And, I guess, because this is the first step to the final page. The big thing that’s supposed to be on the horizon. The thing that’s supposed to happen that I’m a part of—that I’m needed for—that all this fuss has been about.

So I’m starting at the doorway to New Beginnings Church. I walk inside, hoping that Pastor Marsh sees me. I want him to think that I’m going along with the plan. And that as long as I do what they tell me to do, they’ll leave my mom and Kelsey and anybody else I care for alone.

That’s the plan.

I remember that storage room downstairs and still want to know what’s up with that coffin. And the mannequin I saw.

This makes me think of chapstick guy from the other afternoon. The man who claimed to be into “dark arts,” Mr. Mannequin himself.

Maybe I don’t need to know any more about those things.

“Christopher.”

Anytime someone calls me that, I want to run and hide. My father used to say that when he had to discipline me. Every teacher who announced that I was new called me that.

Pastor Marsh stands there by the doorway to the sanctuary as if he wants to give me a hug.

“Good to see you.”

I nod as I walk by and shake his hand.

Even his hand feels weak and dirty.

“Stick around so I can talk with you after the service,” he says. Then he smiles and adds, “Please.”

Well, fine, now that you said please and happen to be keeping my mom in some loony bin.

I nod again and find a seat.

I don’t want to be here.

My slogan for the last sixteen months.

There is nothing strange that Pastor Marsh says during his nice little sermon. At no point does he raise up his hands and say “Slay the beast!” or something weird like that.

No.

But I’ve been to churches before so I know. This message really isn’t much of a sermon. It’s more like some self-help session about feeling good and believing in yourself.

Newsflash, Marsh: I tried to do that, and it doesn’t work.

He’d tell me that I don’t know a thing because I’m only a teenager.

But deep down inside I feel like I do know a few things. And here, in this seat, I realize that this is just a building with people in it. It’s no more of a church than our high school or my cabin or that place with the creepy stones where Jocelyn died.

Pastor Marsh never reads a Bible verse. He refers to a verse here and there—a psalm or something like that—but he never talks about the Bible. And he never, ever mentions Jesus Christ.

I think a bomb would go off if he did.

Even the prayers are strange, because he prays them with his eyes open. I guess mine are open too, since I spot him looking out. But it’s like the president’s speech on national television that’s annoying because it’s interrupting Survivor. It’s well spoken, but I wonder if there’s any kind of meaning behind it.

“I remember your uncle riding that motorcycle around town,” Marsh says to me in a way that looks as if he just swallowed a worm.

We’re sitting in Brennan’s with drinks in front of us waiting for our lunch. I did as he asked and waited for him after the service. Then I did as he asked and followed him into town, and he led me in here.

I get the idea that he’s trying to remind me of Mom. That he’s rubbing it in my face. I haven’t brought her up, but then again I don’t need to. She’s one of those elephants in the room. Like Jocelyn. Like Marsh Falls. Like everything.

“You haven’t seen Robert lately, have you?”

I shake my head and try my best to act casual. I don’t think Marsh can read minds, but I know he’s smart enough to be able to detect teens who haven’t mastered lying yet.

“He really thought he was something, in the beginning. When he came back and started snooping around, not having a clue. I have to admit—you both share the same DNA. Getting involved with the wrong lady at the wrong time. Only for your uncle it was a bit more serious, since that particular lady was married.”

I don’t want to say anything like I know or ask him how he found out. I can feel myself blushing for some reason.

“I really wanted to make him pay,” Marsh says in a distant sort of way that seems like someone telling a story around a campfire. “But I couldn’t. They wouldn’t let me. In the end it didn’t matter. You both share the same DNA, except for one thing, Chris. You are a brave soul. Your uncle is a coward. A wife-stealer and a coward.”

I sip my Coke. Is this what he wanted to talk to me about?

Did they hear Uncle Robert at the cabin? Do they care that he’s back?

“Those two deserve each other, if you want to be honest. You’ve seen The Wizard of Oz, haven’t you? Your uncle is the lion looking for courage. Heidi—well, she’s the tin man looking for a heart.”

He smiles, then reaches over and grabs my wrist and holds it firmly.

Too bad Mom’s not around to come here and see this and take a spatula to his face.

“So, Chris, listen to me. Okay? You listening good?”

I nod as he lets my hand go.

“Are you going to be the scarecrow who’s looking for a brain? I really hope not, because I know you’re smart. So you listen. It doesn’t really matter whether you’re falling for another pretty little girl who doesn’t belong in your life. You have to learn the hard way. Maybe it will be easy because she’ll move off and leave you, and it will be for the better. It doesn’t matter if your uncle is around or not. What matters is that you do exactly as you’re told from here on out.”

“I know. Staunch made that clear.”

“I’m just here to help,” Marsh tells me for the one hundredth time.

“Yeah, that really felt like helping.”

“Here’s the picture, Chris. Let me paint it to you crystal clear.”

I nod as his eyes narrow behind those glasses. He scans the room, then reaches over and takes a white napkin that my drink was supposed to be sitting on. He opens it up and then puts his palm on it.

“This is what I used to put my faith in. This was my God. White, wholesome, pure. Like the sun and the stars. That’s what I believed, or thought I believed. Did I believe in the Devil and evil and hell? No. Others around me did, but I didn’t. I studied the Bible, but many of those stories were simply fairy tales to me. I could believe in a God, but I couldn’t believe in the other stuff. Then I realized one day that it was the other way around. That from the very beginning of my miserable life all I’d ever—ever—been able to see were the darkness and the evil. I realized that the Devil was very real and that hell didn’t start when you died, but it started when you were here on earth. For some, like me, it started during the teen years.”

This is the most passionate he’s sounded all day long.

It scares me. A lot.

“I grew to realize that maybe God was there, that maybe He was all those things I once thought, but I also realized that He was long gone. If He ever was there, He’s not anymore.”

Marsh picks up the napkin and slowly rips it in half. Then rips it in half again. Then keeps doing that until he takes it and crunches it in his fist.

“And I realized what Staunch has said and what this place has proven and what history has really taught us: that evil has a power, and that power is a wonderful thing. I no longer questioned evil and its place. Nor did I have any problems believing in the supernatural. But I finally realized my place. Because I wasn’t the lion, Chris—I had the guts to admit it to myself and the rest of my world. I wasn’t the tin man, because I’ve always had a beating heart more than most. And I sure wasn’t the scarecrow. I knew exactly what I was thinking and feeling. I was smart enough to finally embrace the path before me. It’s the only path, really. That’s what you have to realize. Because as I said, you, Chris, are different. You’re special. I’m just crumbs.”

He lets go of the wadded-up ball of paper scraps.

“You can have anything you want. There are things that you’re too young to even know that you want. You will have a long life before you. And you won’t fear anything, not the sunset or the sunrise or your last breath. Because you’ll know that in the end it doesn’t really matter.”

Marsh pauses, his eyes narrowing, his face growing dim. “Nobody’s on the other line, Chris. He left a long time ago.”

The server comes with our plates of food, and I see my hamburger and suddenly feel a bit nauseous. It takes everything in me to eat, but I do it quickly because I have no idea what to say.

Marsh grins, takes one of my fries since he is having a salad, eats it, and then laughs.

“Okay, fine, I take it back. You can’t have everything. When you get to my age, you’ll have to cut back, unless you want to be packing on the pounds. But there again, you’re taller than I am. It’s just unfair, everything you’ve been given. Just completely unfair.”

He takes another fry.

I want to dump the whole plate over his head and leave.

“There will be official things coming up, Chris,” Marsh says after a long and awkward silence. “Rituals. Things that I can’t say I care for, but that have been handed down for generations. All I did was have the sense to bring them back. Not because I believe in them, not really. They’re all for show. Like a royal wedding. You saw that, right? Did you?”

“Uh, yeah,” I say.

“For a second I was wondering if you’d lost your voice. Do you know someone said that the royal wedding cost around sixty million? When people are dying from not having food and water in this world. When the economy is taking a dive and people are looking for work. But they had to do it. Why? ’Cause it was symbolic. It was all for show. And I thought—when I finally came back here after getting my education and getting some experience—I thought I’d come back here to try and make a name for myself. But I wasn’t a Kinner. I was no Chris Buckley. But I could read and discover the history of this place. So that’s what I brought.”

“The rituals?”

Marsh nods.

“Staunch, of course, does whatever Kinner wants, but I was able to convince the old man to start these again. And somehow it worked.”

He looks at me as the realization dawns on me.

This is the man who killed Jocelyn.

“All I wanted to do was follow the yellow brick road. I discovered that the old man behind the mask—well, he’s the real deal, and you don’t mess with him. But his time is short, and there needs to be someone new. Someone in the lineage. The wonderful, glorious family line.”

Marsh curses, then takes another bite of his salad.

“But when the wizard is gone, Chris, that will just leave us. Staunch, too, but—well, that story is for another day. But there’ll just be the two of us. And I can help you out. I can worry about things you won’t have to worry about. All we have to do is play their game and go through the rituals and say what we believe, and that will be all. Got it?”

I look at Jeremiah Marsh’s face, which I’ve grown to hate.

“Got it?” he asks again.

“Yeah. Got it.”

I wonder if he can read my mind now.

I’m going to kill you, buddy. This time I’m going to wound you and make sure that you die.

If he wants to know who I am, I’ll call myself Dorothy.

And I’ll call him the Wicked Witch. Either of the East or the West.

Whichever one Dorothy ends up killing.