With a rod of iron a par.., p.45
With a Rod of Iron: A Parable, page 45
Well, wait until the plagues! They’d learn real quick when they were dying just how real it was. Death was a wonderful motivator.
They stumbled across the parking lot, moving slowly because she kept dropping her end. But Ovid never let her give up, and by the time they reached the apartment, she could not help but be overjoyed that it was on the first floor and not upstairs.
“Why do you think I chose this apartment? I remember what it’s like to move with you!”
He twisted the knob and let the door swing wide; then he backed into the room.
“Hello,” the voice was familiar; it belonged to Jocasta.
“Hi Jocasta!” Cassandra responded cheerfully, with excitement.
Jocasta was standing in the kitchen doorway, a crumpled newspaper in one hand and a mixing bowl in the other. Boxes lay scattered around the floor, mixed with newspapers and hastily arranged furniture.
“We don’t need another couch,” said Jocasta.
“Where are we going to put this then?”
Jocasta shrugged. “You have your two bedrooms—but you can see that the rest of the house is plenty stocked.”
Her two children raced from the back hallway, shouting. They bumped against the couch, knocking it from Cassandra’s grip so that it landed on the floor with a crash. Ovid let his end down more gently.
“This is a better couch, I think,” said Ovid, glancing at the flowered monstrosity that already hulked against the long wall of the living room.
“Well, maybe,” said Jocasta, giving their brown tufted creation a glance. “But it won’t go with the decor.”
“I could say the same thing about your stuff,” responded Cassandra quickly.
Ovid’s eyes went round. “That’s okay,” he said quickly. “If you’d rather use your furniture in the living room, then we’ll just get rid of our stuff. Save having to move it.”
Cassandra started to protest, but Ovid gave her such a look that she sealed her mouth. All their living room furniture was already in the rented trailer. What did he mean, they wouldn’t have to move it?
“Well, that’s good,” said Jocasta backing into the kitchen. “I’ve taken care of decorating the bathrooms and the kitchen and dining room, too. All you need to bring is your own stuff for your bedrooms. I wanted to make it as easy for you as possible.”
“Easy!” started Cassandra, but again Ovid gave her a look. She seethed, but closed her mouth.
“We’ll take the couch back out,” he announced. Jocasta’s reply was unclear, and Cassandra just growled. But she obeyed her husband and hefted her end with a grunt.
* * *
“Who does she think she is!?” roared Cassandra when they were back at the trailer.
“She’s just trying to be helpful,” suggested Ovid.
“Helpful my eye! She’s taking over, that’s what she’s doing. Why do we have to use just her furniture and her things. Maybe we’d like to use some of our stuff? Did that ever occur to her?”
“She’s got nice furniture,” said Ovid. “It’s not like it’s junk or something.”
“I know—but I like our furniture.”
“So do I—but remember, Jesus is coming back soon. All this is only temporary. And it will save us a lot of work if all we have to move is the bedroom stuff. We can sell the rest—it shouldn’t be that hard—and what we don’t sell,” he shrugged. “It goes with the house, I guess.” He paused. “You were wanting new stuff, anyhow, weren’t you?”
“Yeah,” she admitted, but reluctantly. Now that she was over the shock of Jocasta’s offensive, she was beginning to look at it more clearly; to her disgust, she could feel acceptance coming. “Do you think those people who came by last week will buy the house?”
He shrugged.
“I feel funny selling it to them—like we’re doing something wrong handing it over to the wicked.”
“As long as they’ll let us buy and sell stuff, we need to keep on buying and selling. Sooner or later the Mark of the Beast is going to come and then we won’t be able to do anything. We’ve got to be self-sufficient by then. That’s why we planted all those extra acres with corn and other vegetables.” He pointed. “And why we have those chickens and some cows. We’ve got to be ready. It’s only going to get worse.”
* * *
They hauled the living room stuff back, dumped it in place, and loaded up again, this time emptying their bedroom and the children’s bedroom. The children, while they’d been gone, had actually made progress in preparing themselves for the move. Their clothes were all put away in drawers or hung on hangers; their beds had been stripped, the linens washed, and placed in appropriate boxes. Even their toys were put away in the toy box, making it simple for Ovid to pick it up and load it aboard.
“You’ll be coming with us this time. Mark and Jocasta are already in our new home, and so are their children. That’ll give you someone to play with.”
“We’re not sleeping here tonight, are we?” Chiffon looked around her mostly denuded bedroom.
Cassandra shook her head. “No—we’ll be in our new home.”
“How long are we going to be there?”
“Until Jesus comes back. I’ve told you before.”
“How long will that be?”
“Pastor says it should only be about five more years. But he’s not certain; he says no one knows the day or hour when Jesus will come back, so it might still be awhile, or he might come back tomorrow. All we know is that the Antichrist has taken his throne in Jerusalem, so that proves that Jesus has to come back real soon.”
“Then will we come back here?” she asked.
Cassandra smiled and gave Chiffon a hug. “We’ll be with Jesus forever, and you can do anything you want.”
“I’d like to come back here.”
“Okay,” said Cassandra. “I’m sure you can.”
Now was not the time to talk to her daughter about how the world would be incinerated and left a pile of smoldering ashes. There wouldn’t be two sticks left to rub together—the planet itself would disappear. But by then, Chiffon would understand—understand what a twelve year old girl on the verge of puberty just now could not.
* * *
It was ten o’clock that night before they closed the front door of their new apartment and locked it, not intending to go outside again until morning. Ovid informed Cassandra that he needed to go back to work again tomorrow, but with so few things left to haul over, surely she and Jocasta could take care of them? Jocasta seemed agreeable and she’d even started voicing her plans for the next day’s schedule—most of which involved getting the last things out of Jocasta’s home.
“You’ve got everything out of your bedrooms, didn’t you? There can’t be that much left to worry about. But I’ve still got a lot of kitchen supplies and other little odds and ends.”
But Cassandra decided she didn’t mind. Jesus was coming back soon, and so nothing else mattered.
She left Ovid and Jocasta talking in the living room; in the bathroom, as she stared at herself in the mirror, she decided a shower was just the thing. It was late, she was tired, and frankly, she was ready to settle in for the night.
Cassandra turned on the shower, stuck her hand in, then left the bathroom.
Darting across the hall to her bedroom, she found the box with her nightgown. There was still so much unpacking left to do, but at least the bed was made, and the clothes were accessible. She could live with the mess a little while, she kept telling herself. Ovid, on the other hand, could live like this forever.
He was such the slob. Thankfully Jocasta and Mark were both neat people, so Cassandra wouldn’t be alone in trying to keep his slobbish tendencies under control.
Returning to the bathroom, she undressed quickly, grabbed a washcloth from the linen closet and hopped into the shower.
She let out a scream and hopped back out.
The water was ice.
Shivering, she fiddled with the knobs, trying to find the one that would turn on the heat. But neither the one with the H on it nor the one with the C seemed to have any effect. At last, tossing her robe loosely around herself, she stomped into the living room.
“There’s no hot water!” she complained.
All three faces turned to her; not one looked either surprised or concerned.
“Well of course not; the hot water heaters haven’t been turned on yet,” said Ovid.
“What?!” she roared.
“The gas people haven’t been out yet to turn on the gas. We’ve got to wait until they make their final inspection and turn it on. It shouldn’t be more than a day or two.”
“What are we going to do about showers until then?”
Ovid shrugged. “Just use the cold water—or go without.”
Jocasta and Mark nodded.
“I can’t take a shower without hot water!”
“Well, you’ve got no choice.” Ovid looked harshly at her.
“Why didn’t you tell me we wouldn’t have any hot water?”
“You never asked.”
“Why should I have to ask about something like that? Why’d we move in if there’s no hot water yet? Would it have hurt to wait a day or two until this place was really ready? What are you doing to me? First I can’t bring my own furniture and now I can’t even have a decent shower. What kind of husband are you?!”
Without waiting for a reply, she stomped back down the hall. She slammed the bathroom door behind her, but it didn’t make a satisfying bang. It was too light and fit the door frame too tightly; it didn’t even click, but stopped just before latching. She had to push it hard to shut the rest of the way.
The urge to curse was strong, but instead she just pounded the bathroom sink with her fists.
The initial adrenaline rush released, she paused to listen, wondering if Ovid was going to be checking on her, but a careful ear at the door simply revealed the renewed conversations of her husband and friends. Probably talking about her; but no one was concerned enough to come follow up on her.
She stared at the shower where the water was still tumbling and rolling down the drain. She’d sweat today, and she needed a shower. So, clenching her teeth, she leapt, got wet all over and shut off the water. Shivering, she rubbed the soapy wash cloth over her body, scrubbing hard in the hopes of getting some warmth from the friction.
She rinsed just as quickly, wet her hair, and shut the water off again. Then she added shampoo.
It took an awfully long time for the shampoo to rinse out in the cold water. By the time she felt no more suds, she was shivering uncontrollably. Teeth chattering, she clambered out and grabbed the towel, rubbing her body feverishly.
Once dry, she felt a little better, and pulled on her nightgown. At last, came what small thing she had left to look forward to. She plugged the hair blower in the socket and turned it on. The warm air pulsing from the nozzle gradually lessened her chill. By the time her hair was dry, she almost felt good.
Some people, she thought, might call what she’d just been through invigorating. She still wanted to call it a living Hell—except she thought that sounded like blasphemy—though right now, a little Hell didn’t sound half-bad.
Pulling the robe tightly around herself, she marched across the hall to the bedroom and crawled between the sheets. She shivered until she finally fell asleep.
She hadn’t said good night to anyone.
Chapter Twenty-one
Cassandra stared numbly at the checker as she passed the boxed and plastic-wrapped items one by one across the scanner, listening to the repetitious announcement by a disembodied voice as to item and price. At the end, following the lead of the disembodied voice, the checker told her the total. Cassandra handed over a small bundle of cash that the checker, without comment, thumbed through. With a smile, the checker returned the receipt and change and wished her a nice day.
“Nothing’s different,” she told Jocasta when she got home and began unloading the groceries, stacking them neatly into the already crowded shelves. In reality, they had far more food than they needed—probably enough canned and dry food to last them a full seven years. But they hadn’t even touched the tribulation supplies yet, because everyone preferred eating fresh fruit and fresh vegetables and fresh meat. The canned equivalents were not nearly so appetizing.
And since they could still get the good stuff, why suffer?
Jocasta tilted her head at her sometime friend and housemate. “Do you mean like Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, that there’s ‘nothing new under the sun’?”
Cassandra felt a surge of irritation, but kept her mouth in check. “No,” she said evenly. “I mean, the world’s doing just fine, thank you very much. In fact, everything’s really nice. Too nice.”
Jocasta nodded. “Like...where are the famines, the plagues, the suffering and dying?”
“Precisely.” Cassandra stuffed the cabbages into the vegetable crisper. “From what I can see, there’s plenty of food and the prices have declined over the past three years. Even the price of gasoline has gone down, what with everyone mostly using these Devil Gates.” She sneered. “I hear talk that there’s some sort of wonderful new battery that’ll finally make electric vehicles a worthwhile alternative.”
“The Antichrist is supposed to make the world a miserable place?” asked Jocasta, shoving a box of macaroni into a corner where it didn’t really belong. Cassandra made a mental note of it—but wouldn’t retrieve it until later. She didn’t feel like getting into another argument with Jocasta.
“That’s right.” Cassandra frowned, tugging on a grapefruit. “All I can see around town is peace and light. The newspapers at the checkout stand go on and on about how no one ever gets sick, and how the old people are growing younger instead of older—how their wrinkles are melting off...” She patted her skull. “The hair’s growing back on bald heads...all the lame are walking, the blind are seeing...”
“So you think that maybe the Antichrist isn’t so bad?”
“Well...don’t you ever wonder?”
Jocasta shook her head. “No.” She sat down on the kitchen table, crossed her legs and released a sigh. Cassandra recognized it as the opening to an extended dissertation, but this time she welcomed it. She’d been feeling bad for some months now, unable to voice her...what were they—doubts? Now, they were out, she was ready to endure the inevitable blast.
“The Antichrist is sneaky,” explained Jocasta. “You know that; you also know that the Bible suggests, that for the first three and a half years of his rule, things will go pretty smoothly for him. At least that’s the story he’s letting out. But do you really trust those newspapers in the supermarket? Get real! They lie all the time, they always have, they always will. The Antichrist controls every word of print, every sound bite on TV.”
“But Holiness Television...”
“That’s the one place the Antichrist won’t ever be able to touch.”
“But how?”
“God’s in control and he’s watching out for us. It’s like the children of Israel, during the ten plagues against Egypt. The Egyptians were scratching boils and swatting billions of flies and burying rotten cattle carcasses, but the Israelites didn’t have any of those problems. When Egypt was in darkness, the sun was shining bright where the Israelites lived. When the Egyptians were dodging falling hailstones the size of Volkswagens, the Israelites were relaxing on the beach. When the Egyptians had blood for water, the Israelites were drinking Perrier.” Jocasta spread her hands. “The Evil One can’t touch us, no matter how hard he tries. And you can bet he’s going to try—especially as it gets closer to the end. When the time comes, you’ll stand firm and the darts of the wicked will never come near you.”
Jocasta’s eyes were almost glowing.
Cassandra nodded, putting the last of the food into its appropriate cupboard. “Most of the time I know that.” She let her shoulders droop. “Sometimes it just gets to me.”
“Just like the Israelites again,” said Jocasta, shaking her head. “They surely were wondering ‘how long, Lord, before you take us out of here?’ They waited four hundred years in slavery. We only have three and a half more to go.”
“Assuming we got that part of the prophecy right.”
Jocasta gave her a funny look. “Well of course we got it right,” she said. “We’re the people of God.”
* * *
Cassandra awakened suddenly.
The house was silent. Even the heater wasn’t running at the moment. Her dark-adapted eyes scanned the bedroom, but found nothing out of the ordinary. Her husband snored softly beside her, while the open window let in a ray of shadowy light.
Hugging her knees, she let her breath out slowly, trying to calm herself, although her heart was not racing.
She just felt panicky.
Like everything was crashing in on her and nothing was right or ever could be right. With a spastic jerk, she flipped on the light above the headboard, illuminating the room in a familiar glow.
Her husband stirred, opened an eye, squinted at the clock, then peered back at her.
“What’s the matter?” he murmured.
“Oh, nothing,” she said.
“It’s two in the morning.”
“I know.”
“But nothing’s wrong?”
“Nope.” She kept hugging her knees, feeling the edges of panic creeping, like a slowly advancing tide.
“You want to tell me about it?”
“I had a dream.”
“Ah...a nightmare.”
“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “I don’t know how I’d describe it. I...I didn’t wake up screaming.”
“I’m grateful.”
“But it’s left me feeling scared.”
“So, tell me about it.”
She began...
* * *
Paisley rugs had never been in fashion, so far as she knew, and the hanging lamps, covered with dark brown fabric that shunted most of the light straight down were hardly of a sort that she would ever have picked. Yet, clearly this was her apartment, and clearly these were her things.
The carpet felt soft and spongy beneath her feet; she tramped across it delicately. Meanwhile, her friends sat in a small half-circle on the floor, laughing and playing a card game that involved a lot of shouting.
