67. Action

Ever since Jocelyn showed me the group of people meeting in the woods under Marsh Falls that one day, I’ve been curious about them. I’ve thought they were some kind of weird cult that meets and passes around a bowl and mutters strange things to each other.

But that’s when I let my imagination run wild. Because the group meeting is nothing like that. They’re just people getting together to sing and share and listen to somebody give a message. Just like any other church.

Church isn’t about the building, Chris.

Dad once told me that. I’m sure I heard it from someone else too.

I do my best that morning to make sure nobody is watching me when I’m in downtown Solitary. I park my bike and then go into the Corner Nook as I’ve been doing lately to see if there’s anything different or weird that I can spot. Just like always, there’s nothing strange about the bookstore and coffee shop. I order an iced tea, since I’m not a coffee fan, and then casually walk across the street.

Nobody sees me, and nobody follows.

I’m walking down the tracks, remembering that this is where I saw that haunted creepy boxcar. But it’s not there.

Did I ever see it to begin with?

I don’t know how this works. I really don’t. Seeing something one minute and not seeing it the next.

What are the rules and logic to how this “gift” works?

Rules? Logic? Yeah right.

I get to the point where I stop and go into the woods, still checking behind me every few minutes to see if anybody is watching. The barn is there like always, an old and abandoned building at the end of a dirt road.

Just a few cars are parked there. Maybe the people carpool to this hidden church in the woods.

Mr. Meiners greets me when I enter the barn. It’s light enough outside that there’s no need for lights inside the barn. It’s shadowy, but we can see decently enough.

Over the next ten or fifteen minutes, I’m introduced to half a dozen people.

There’s an elderly couple with the last name of Franklin, who supposedly have lived here for years. I wonder what kind of stories they could tell. Then there’s a woman named Tracy who’s older and heavyset and very nervous-looking.

Then someone calls me by name.

“Hi, Chris.”

The dark-haired guy looks familiar and says his name is Jim, but that doesn’t mean anything.

“Mr. Charleton,” he says, adding, “from summer school.”

“Oh yeah,” I say. “Breakfast Club guy.”

He laughs. He seems the same—upbeat and friendly and totally positive.

Of course someone like that is going to show up here. Instead of, say, Mr. Taggart.

“Glad to see you here.”

The last couple I meet turn out to be Oli’s parents.

Oli, or as Sheriff Wells told me last summer, Oliver Mateja. His father is Hispanic and greets me with an accent, but his mother doesn’t appear to be. She’s dark-haired but looks more Italian. They both seem to know me and even seem to be expecting me. Mrs. Mateja gives me a hug and leaves me smelling like her perfume.

I suddenly wish I hadn’t come.

I feel guilty being around Oli’s parents. I know I didn’t cause his death, but still I feel somehow like it had something to do with me.

We meet in the open area at the back of the barn. There are some folding chairs in a circle. Mr. Meiners starts off with a prayer, and then we sing some songs. It’s very casual—a bit too much so. I feel stupid during the singing since I don’t know any of the songs.

“I want to thank Chris for coming today,” Mr. Meiners says after the singing is over. “Chris—this is usually the time we share what’s going on with our lives and things we can be praying about.”

“Okay,” I say in a hushed voice.

They wait to hear what my prayer requests are.

It’s odd to think that I can share concerns or whatever with complete strangers.

Will the prayers even be heard? Will they carry more weight? Are they going to make me pray for them?

“I guess just, uh, prayer for my mom. She’s had a rough time since coming back here. And yeah—prayer for me. Just cause, uh, I can sure use it.”

Understatement of the century.

During the prayer something happens. These strangers all share something that is going on in their lives. But when Mr. Mateja prays, in his thick accent where it’s hard to make out the words, something inside me just snaps.

I feel tears coming to my eyes. But it’s not because of the grief that he’s sharing, about their sad days of missing their son.

No.

It’s because Mr. Mateja is praising Jesus and thanking Him for life and for breath and for health. He’s thankful.

He’s not asking for anything; he’s thanking God for all He’s done.

And it makes me feel awful and joyous at the same time.

Awful because I’m so not that way, but joyous because someone is like that.

Someone who lost his son.

But doesn’t God get that? Doesn’t He understand that?

I wipe my tears and stare at the ground below me to try and comprehend what’s happening inside of me.

I feel better. Safer.

I feel like I belong.

And for the first time since praying to God on that train and giving my life over to Him in the flawed way that I probably did, I feel like I get it.

These people around me seem to get it, and they’re showing me.

After prayers, Mr. Meiners starts talking again.

He talks about the prodigal son. He reads a bit of the Bible and then talks about a father loving and wanting the best for his son, even when he does dumb things.

I’m listening, but then I seem to jerk when Mr. Meiners says my name.

“And, Chris, this is something that we know, but that I thought I’d share since you’re here. I hope you don’t mind.”

I shake my head.

Is he going to use me as an example?

“I got to know Oli during his sophomore year. I was his guidance counselor, and that was the year when he was getting into a lot of trouble. His parents know all of this, but I wanted to share it with you. There were some run-ins with the law. He got busted for having drugs. He was involved in a fight and arrested after he beat up a kid.”

Beat up a kid.

That kid could have been me.

“I started to get to know him, and God worked in his heart that year. He was much like that son we were just talking about. He gave his life to Christ and began to mend his ways. I was fortunate to help him, and to help the Matejas, too, in their faith.”

I still remember Oli sticking up for Kelsey and me when Gus confronted us in the art room.

“He was trying to learn what to do with that faith and how to live by it,” Mr. Meiners said. “It wasn’t always easy for him. He still had his friends, and he couldn’t figure out how to tell them. At least at first. But eventually he did.”

I wait for more, but Mr. Meiners doesn’t say anything more about Oli.

So is that why he died? He found faith, and Gus and his father didn’t like it?

“Real, authentic faith isn’t welcome around here, Chris. But it is alive. It is real. And Jesus said, ‘For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.’ God is with us, right here in this barn. It doesn’t matter what point you’re at in life. God wants you to serve Him no matter what. Oliver did this—he was starting to do it before he died. But as we all know—even though we have grieved his loss—he is in a better place right now.”

I can’t help thinking of Jocelyn.

Same could be said of her, too. Right?

“Faith isn’t just believing in something, but it’s putting that faith in action.”

I nod and get what he’s saying.

Never in a million years did I ever imagine myself nodding at something like this in a deserted barn in the middle of a creepy Southern town.

I guess God had to bring me here in order for me to finally believe.

Now I wonder how exactly I’m supposed to show that faith in action.

Maybe I can do so with a sword and a spear. A literal sword and spear.

Because something tells me that Marsh and the others aren’t going to be happy knowing about this faith thing of mine. It’s real and it’s there and I can do something with it.