Almost Heaven (4 page)

“Thunder didn't make it, did he, Daddy?” I said.

“I reckon he didn't, Son. But he knew there was something coming, didn't he?”

I nodded.

“He was a faithful dog to the end, but that water was too much for him. But the Lord saw us through it.”

“What happened to the people in Miss Dreama's house?” I said.

Mama looked kind of sad at me like I hadn't obeyed her, but I couldn't help it.

Daddy looked down at the covers and sort of smoothed out the sheet a little bit, and a big old tear formed in the one eye that wasn't covered. “It was just awful, Son. I don't expect I'll ever be able to take it all in. It's just tragical.”

“Did they make it?” I choked. “Those two little girls?”

He shook his head and looked at Mama. “I don't see how they could have. When we got close to the bank, I jumped down into the sludge and the mess but I couldn't hold on. The current was too strong. I never should have made it out myself, but God must have something more for me to do, I reckon.”

Mama's mouth started giving way, her chin puckering. “They found them in the creek, down past the railroad trestle. All of them together except the littlest one. They haven't found her yet.”

She put her head down on the bed, and Daddy put his bandaged arm around her and tried to pat her. There with the people on the TV laughing at something Lucy said, my mother and father had their most honest conversation I ever heard.

“I didn't mean for you to get hurt,” Mama said. “I just wanted Dreama to know. The last thing in the world I wanted to happen was to see you get hurt.”

“Arlene, you listen to me. There wasn't nothing going to stop that water once it made up its mind to come down that valley. You were looking out for your neighbors as you would yourself. I'm just glad you stayed on high ground.”

Mama looked up at me, and I knew we were going to keep our secret from him. I knew he was not in a state to hear the truth. So I kept quiet. It was some time before he heard about the car and how I was stuck in there alone. It liked to kill him when he saw how damaged it was, and it wasn't long after that we moved out of the creek.

But all of that time, from my tenth birthday until the day he died, I never told him what really happened in the car. I told Mama and Daddy what I have written here before, and that is, I just got up enough nerve to jump. But that is not the truth.

My first reaction was not to believe what happened. I was scared that I had made it up. In a little boy's mind it's possible to get the truth mixed up with the make-believe. After I decided I couldn't make up something like that, I was scared that people would think I was uppity. That they would figure I thought I was something special.

But if you want to know the truth about how I got out of that car, I'll tell you.

After Mama slipped out and I was by myself, it was like the world went into slow motion, like one of those old movies of the Kennedy assassination. The black water poured through the back window as a wave came over the car.

I cried out to my mama and to Jesus and my daddy. I had to tell myself to breathe because it was the scariest thing I've ever seen. We hit the telephone pole, and the windshield cleared enough for me to see another house coming toward me. That's when the car rose up and I fell into the backseat.

And this is where my story changes, because I did not see an open window and know this was my chance to escape. I did not pull myself up by any kind of courage or will. There was nothing that rose up in me that was greater than the floodwaters. Like the 125 others who died that day, I would have drowned or been crushed in that backseat if I had been left to my own devices. I did not jump out of that car and I certainly didn't grab my daddy's mandolin.

With the swirling waters around me, thick as a coal milk shake, I was
lifted
out of that car. By some force of nature or the supernatural. Or maybe it was love that lifted me like a helpless little baby out of that window and placed me on the ground where my mama found me. And right beside me was my daddy's mandolin.

Now that may sound far-fetched to you, and if you think I am touched in the head, you can stop all the speculating because I'm as sane as anybody. But I'm telling you, as sure as I sit here and write this, I had no hope of living and I went from the backseat of that car to being on the ground just as fast as you can blink your eyes. I was another dead body in a car about to be smashed. But by some miracle I wound up alive alongside a river of death. Me and an old mandolin. How can you make people understand a thing like that?

2

I will not divulge secrets of hidden things. If you are looking for titillating information about how many of us can dance on the head of a pin, you should look elsewhere. I am not here to aid you with insight into heavenly things, but earthly.

I suppose you will want to know my name. I understand that it aids you in your “connection” with the writer and that you must call me something. I have considered using a pseudonym such as “Clarence” because I'm aware of your films that depict bumbling angels. If you must have a name for me, simply call me Malachi, for it means “messenger,” and that is what I was created to be.

Just the telling of the story causes me no small amount of consternation, for when I think about what I am missing at other points of the battle, the assignments I might have been given, I can easily become dissatisfied. You must know at the outset that I did not want this assignment. I did not seek it or grasp for it because at heart, I am a warrior, not a scribe. I am a messenger, not an angelic detective. At times, I will admit, it seems that there is such little purpose in my being here, stuck in a back alley of the world watching the life of a man whose existence seems of less-than-grand importance on the human stage. But I know the Creator too well to let myself wander those country roads for long. In the end I simply exult in the truth that I have been given this assignment by the One who knows the end from the beginning, and so I will gladly fulfill my role.

Now, before you begin the logical leap you are probably making, let me say a word or two about the subject of “guardian angels.” As I said earlier, I will not divulge the secret things. I will simply say that there are times and seasons when a person may be required to have one or many angels surrounding him or her, just as there are seasons and times for those of us who serve in the Lord's army. We may move from battle to battle, fighting the enemy on various levels, moving back and forth and accepting different assignments, getting a wider scope and variety of the human experiment.

I believed, before this task, that I knew the whole story. I believed I understood the Creator and His ways. And I have always been able to make some sense of things from the perspective of timelessness. I know that a grain of wheat must fall into the earth and die before it can bring forth fruit.

However, observing this one life, instead of hundreds and thousands, is causing me to reevaluate my concept of The Plan and how each life is used in the grand scheme. And to this I will now turn my full attention.

I promise I will tell you all that I am allowed. The rest is up to you.

Under direct orders from my commander, I left my station and traveled quickly, by cover of night, to the Allman home. How I travel, how long it takes, and other specifics may be of interest, but they are not important here.

It is difficult to explain what happens when one like me reaches a destination given by my Creator. Standing at the battle line, seeing the array of the enemy for the first time, looking into the face of evil itself, provides a sensory experience unparalleled. To know I am exactly where I am to be, fully equipped for the war ahead, provides a feeling of contentment and joy I cannot fully convey.

However, spotting this young boy sleeping and looking into his face, I am ashamed to say that I felt such disappointment. Letdown. I expected to see a cherubic lad, the tousled hair of aristocracy, a diamond in the rough. Instead, I found an unattractive hill child sleeping soundly, his covers askew, an old mandolin on the bed next to his head. I couldn't help but stare at him and wonder. A bulbous nose, his eyes deep-set, and an almost-Neanderthal forehead. For his age, his hands seemed large and his arms and legs gangly. I know the humans grow in fits and spurts throughout their youth, but I couldn't help but wonder, why this child? Why this plain and ordinary dwelling?

The room was Spartan at best, with a few toys and books on an old shelf held up by bricks and two planks of wood. There were worn baseball cards in the corner that looked as if they had been inherited. It struck me then, and still does, that though his appearance was less than pleasant, this was not an ordinary child. There was something in the way things were arranged, a pattern that suggested order. There was also a crystal radio near the shelf that appeared to be something the child had built himself. I later learned that he and his father had put it together. At first, it didn't work. But when his father left the room, Billy corrected the crossed wires. And that was when he was six.

Do not think that we spend our time snooping into your lives. We have better things to do than mull the minutiae of humans. However, I tell you this in advance because the observations Billy has of himself are certainly, at times, askew of the full truth. Not that he is lying; he is simply humble to the point of exhaustion.

I continued invisible to the human eye as the boy awakened and took his mandolin into the kitchen and sat for a time, holding the instrument and going over the strings with his left hand in a silent song. There are times when we are allowed to take other forms for some important task or contact, but I have never had that opportunity, though it has always been my hope to someday experience the feeling.

Sensing a change, I rose above to view the entire scene. Animals walked unhindered and unaware. Having experience in military maneuvers, I have been able to anticipate attacks and assaults by the enemy, and this felt much the same.

I was relieved when the family moved to their automobile, then dismayed when the father ran to warn another family after the explosion. I rose quickly enough to see the onslaught. It reminded me of the ancient flood in Noah's time, when the waters sprang forth and engulfed the entire earth. This dam break was an isolated instance, of course, but the force with which it moved and destroyed was reminiscent of that judgment.

Once the killing force was unleashed, it was my duty to return to my charge. When I am given an assignment, unless specifically stipulated, it is at my discretion how I accomplish that task. In this case, it was clear that the “rules of engagement” were limited to Billy. For reasons I do not understand, I was told to limit my protective efforts.

But with Billy safely in the automobile, I decided to stay with the father, knowing how the child's life would be affected by the loss of his paternal figure. I am not justifying my actions; I am simply explaining the sequence of events.

I stayed with the house as it picked up speed, rumbling along on the surface of the water. The father, a courageous man in the face of the violence around him and the slim odds, held tightly to two young girls and looked for an opportunity to save them. The wall of water that lifted them continued to take the ramshackle and well-built dwellings indiscriminately. But as this home neared a washed-out bridge and debris that had piled high, I sensed something amiss and rose to see the Allmans' automobile being carried along the edge of the stream. You can only imagine the speed with which I made my way there, finding the mother outside of the car, hysterical.

The car tipped up in a sickening display of the water's power and I feared the worst. When I entered it, Billy gasped for air. He was covered with coal sludge and debris and close to death. I debated speaking peace to him but decided that might frighten him. It was time to act. I grasped his arm and the mandolin that had seemed like another appendage to him that morning and pulled them through the open window and onto the ground a safe distance away. His mother found him there and took over, cradling him in her lap and wailing.