Near Death (36 page)

A circular drive in front of the farmhouse was packed with cars and people were milling around the porch wearing heavy coats in the early morning chill. A middle-aged man started waving at the van and running toward them.

“I bet that’s him! I bet that’s Alex! Hey, Alex, I’m Erik. I’m Erik Bolz!”

Sam braked and Steve jumped out the passenger side, a semiautomatic pistol in hand.

“We’re being followed!” he shouted at Erik.

“No, you’re not!” Erik called back. “That’s a friend of mine in that Jeep. That’s Ken Donovan. And behind him is Gus French. They’re here to meet you.”

“How’d they know we were coming?” Steve asked.

“I may have told a couple of folks,” Erik said. “But
don’t worry. They’re all Bliss people. They’re all with you. Tell Alex Weller he can come on out. He’s safe here. You’re all safe.”

Fifty

7 DAYS

The sun rose splendidly over the featureless horizon and slowly began to warm the clumped sandy soil.

The Bolz corn farm was four hundred acres, a typical size for these parts. In the morning light, Alex walked the land with Erik. A thirty-acre field north of the house, neatly laid out in furrows, was already strip-tilled and spiky with the stubble from the previous harvest.

“I tilled this field out of habit,” Erik said. He was a clean-shaven, earnest Lutheran who worshipped in town, a pillar of the community. “Not going to be planting it, though,” he explained. He waved his hand to the north and the west. “Not going to plant any of it. Don’t really see the point. All my needs, all my wife’s needs, are being satisfied by Bliss.” He kicked at a furrow. “Down here it’s godless and barren. Up there, it’s a different kettle of fish. You changed our lives, Alex. Our only son died by drowning. We visit with him once or twice a day now.”

“I’m happy for you, Erik, and I’m grateful to you for
letting us come here. Our time is short but with your help, we’ll be able to do great things.”

“Your clock’s at seven days,” Erik remarked. “We’re excited to see what happens on Day Zero.”

Alex wasn’t sure if he was being probed for information; still, he replied, “I’m excited too. Day Zero will be beyond description.”

Erik insisted that Alex and his people take the farmhouse while he and his wife move into their RV out back. They wouldn’t be alone. Friends of theirs were setting up camp beside them, a dozen vehicles, campers and tents. Alex accepted the house with a certain noblesse oblige, aware of his unique position as head of this ersatz community. In the master bedroom, behind lace curtains that billowed in the wind, he patted the newly made bed and sank into its softness, pulling Jessie on top of him. “These people think I’m special,” he said.

She kissed him. “You are.”

Downstairs in the living room, Sam slouched on a lumpy floral couch with his shoes on the coffee table inches from the Bolz family photos. With his laptop propped on a cushion he typed away, dutifully following Alex’s instructions to the letter, attaching his message and the GPS coordinates of the farm. When he was finished he
climbed the stairs, found his assigned room and collapsed on the bed. The sound of Steve’s snoring coming through the wall didn’t stop him from falling right to sleep.

Alex slept the daylight away and awoke in a dark bedroom, disoriented, until he felt Jessie beside him and remembered where he was.

Noises were coming through the open bedroom windows: the sounds of motors, people talking, laughing, radios; he got out of bed naked and padded across the floorboards to see.

The front windows provided a view up the drive to the state road. From both east and west, there was an endless stream of headlights converging on the farm.

“Jesus,” Alex whispered. “Prove it and they will come.”

The Butler County sheriff was in meltdown mode. He didn’t know the governor, didn’t much like him, and sure as hell hadn’t voted for him, but now the man was calling him every hour. The sheriff took the call on his mobile, his car parked in the middle of the state road a mile to the east of the Bolz farm. A row of deputy sheriffs’ cars completely blocked both lanes. He had a second roadblock in
place a mile or so west of the farm. He’d caused a traffic jam, the likes of which he’d never seen.

“Yes, sir, I understand the importance of controlling the situation, but there’s not a lot we can do about folks just pulling off the road and driving through the damn fields to get to Bolz’s farm.”

He massaged the back of his aching neck with one hand while listening to the governor yell at him.

“Yes, sir, I understand that people can’t drive across private property but I’ve only got so many deputies down here.”

There was more yelling as he watched hundreds of red taillights moving at speed through the dry cornfield.

“Hell yes, Governor. Send the state patrol in. Send everyone you’ve got. This is way over my pay grade.”

Alex woke Jessie, Sam, and Steve. Erik was waiting for them on the porch. The night air carried sweet hints of spring. His wife, LuAnn, offered food and drink but Alex had something else he wanted to do. Erik led him and the others out back where the small camp from the morning had morphed into something altogether different.

It was no longer possible to see where back yard ended and tilled field began because hundreds of stationary
headlights and taillights were there, fanning out into the darkness, merging into one huge glowing dome.

Steve tried to persuade him to hold back but Alex insisted. “They want to see me and I want to see them.”

He waded into this makeshift campground where he was recognized immediately.

Men and women poured out of their cars, trucks, campers, and RVs to see him, talk to him, touch his sleeve, tell him about the way Bliss had changed everything. People waved sticks of Bliss at him, laughing, crying. Surrounded by the adoring masses, Alex turned to Jessie with tears in his eyes. “I called them … and they came.”

Alex sat around the farmhouse kitchen table with Sam, Jessie, and Steve. They were giddy about the explosion of people around them and after a hearty supper they were in high spirits.

“It’s time,” Alex said suddenly, leaning his chair back on two legs.

“Time for what?” Jessie asked.

“The clock stands at seven days. I want to tape two messages: one to be played tonight, the other to be played on Day Zero, just in case I’m not here to do it myself.”

“What are you going to say?” Steve asked.

“Ah.” Alex sighed. “What am I going to say? It’s time I told you, my loyal kitchen cabinet.” He smiled, waving at the pots and pans. “You’ve earned the right to know my intentions.”

The others put their silverware down, kept themselves still.

He stood. It seemed appropriate to be proudly upright. “Today, I’m going to tell people we have seven days left to contemplate the world with all its flaws, its warts, its meanness and cruelty. I’ll tell them that Bliss has shown us a new path to inner peace and enlightenment: that this world of ours is transitory and base; that the afterlife is permanent and glorious. I will tell them that in six days a new era will begin, the Inner Peace Era, and that this era will change everything we know—for the better.”

He gazed out the window. In the evening light rose a cloud of dust from the continuous cascade of cars busting the blockades and coming in over dried-out fields.

He turned back to the kitchen table. “The bible says that God created the world in seven days. It’s laughably primitive, but it’s evocative, isn’t it? Let’s turn it on its head. We started the clock twenty-three days ago. Since then Bliss has literally exploded. Who knows how many
people have used it! Millions? Tens of millions? Its impact has been enormous: spiritually, socially, economically … the pump is well-primed. Today, let’s reverse that biblical seven days. Let’s begin the last phase of the countdown. In seven days, we’re going to start again and return to God.”

“What’s going to happen, Alex?” Jessie asked in a dry, hushed voice.

“In seven days, I’m going to tell people that their day has come: that their wait is over. That it’s time for them to cross over forever and join their fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, children, friends—all the dearly departed ones waiting for them. I’ll tell them how much Bliss they need to take. I’ll tell them to fly off buildings, use gas, open veins, string a rope, use any means of their choice to leave this world and enter the next. For good.” His eyes danced. His voice rose. “And think of it! If ten million people or more act, if it’s only a fraction of that, the world will never be the same again. It’ll be a post-Bliss society where those who choose to stay won’t live for a single hour without thinking about those who chose to leave. Many will turn to Bliss, perhaps trying it for the first time, and more will choose to cross over. The tide will have turned. Mankind will be focused on its spiritual future rather than its mired past. The world
won’t look the same or be the same. It will be a new golden age. It will be glorious.”

No one spoke.

The evening wind carried the sounds of children playing in the nearby field.

Finally, Jessie asked, “Will we leave too?”

“It’ll be your choice, everyone’s choice; but I’ll be going. My father’s waiting.”

Jessie’s voice sounded like the chirping of a little bird. “If I go too, will you be there?”

“I’m sure of it,” Alex promised. “I’ll be there for you.”

Cyrus’s phone rang, muffled. He felt for it and just before it went to voice mail he found it on the floor near the bed, under Emily’s dress. It was a Saturday afternoon and he’d been sleeping.

Stanley Minot was on the line.

Cyrus listened then hit the switch on his bedside lamp. Emily emerged from under the covers with a squint and heard his end of the conversation. When he was done he tossed the phone back onto her clothes pile.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

“We’ve found Alex Weller.”

“That’s good, no?”

“Not exactly,” Cyrus said, slipping into his boxers. He got up, opened his blinds and went back to bed to slide his palm over her bare back. “Thank God you’re in my life.”

Fifty-one

6 DAYS

Who will stop the rain, who will stem the tide?

In the morning sun, Alex walked through the community he’d begun to call New Rising City, thinking about the forces of nature.

I can’t be stopped either
.

There were thousands of people.

Thousands
.

Erik’s tilled field was full and more were coming, spreading out into adjoining fields, forming neighborhoods and villages within the larger city. Responding to Alex’s message, they’d brought provisions, food, water, propane: enough to sustain themselves for a good week.

“I’m Alex,” he said to a young family cooking eggs and bacon on a propane grill beside their tent and pickup.

“We know who you are,” the woman said, holding her baby up. She wanted Alex to touch her head and he obliged, stroking the girl’s silky hair.

“I’m glad you came,” Alex said.

“Can’t think of anywhere else we’d rather be,” the man avowed. “Will you eat with us?”

“Thank you. I’ve got to visit with others. There’re so many.”

“I understand,” he said.

“Will you continue to follow me?”

“Yes, we will,” the woman affirmed, giving her breast to her baby. “We seen your new message. Six days now. We’re with you. God bless you, Alex.”

Alex puffed out his chest and proceeded to the next encamped vehicle.

Erik Bolz used his authority as landowner to attend to organization and he was good at it. He didn’t much care about his precious land anymore but he was concerned for all these souls, and as their host of sorts, he felt some responsibility for their well-being. Big Steve Mahady fell easily into place as his right-hand man. Early in the morning, the two rode a tractor into the mass of humanity in the direction of a curiously loud voice. Outside a camper covered in Bliss bumper stickers they found a fellow with a bullhorn and confiscated it for the greater good.

People were willing to help. There was no shortage of men with pistols and rifles and a militia was formed in quick order to patrol the perimeter and prevent the media
and law enforcement from coming onto private property. Steve assembled the ragtag squad of farmers, tradesmen, students, salesmen, even an accountant and a lawyer, and addressed them proudly. They were the movement’s minutemen, citizen-soldiers willing to fight and die to protect Alex Weller’s mission to bring a new age of spirituality to the world. Alex, he told them, was fearless. He knew the authorities were after him and that they’d do anything, including fabricating charges, to suppress the movement—but he was comfortable in revealing his presence at Rising City; surrounded by so many like-minded people, he felt safe and secure. So exchange mobile numbers, Steve told them. Keep in touch, keep vigilant, stay strong.

When the men dispersed to take on the perimeter of New Rising City, Erik remarked, “Impressive, Steve. You ever been in the military?”

“Close,” he replied. “I was a public school teacher.”

Erik threw himself into more prosaic tasks. He took his backhoe and chose the location for latrine pits and garbage tips. Then he and a crew of men strung hoses from the barns to make outdoor showers and watering spots.

“I don’t know if this is enough,” he declared to his wife at the end of the day, “but it’s better than nothing. Never seen anything like this.”

“It’s like Woodstock,” LuAnn said, shading her eyes to the setting sun.

“This ain’t a rock and roll crowd,” he pointed out. “Looks more like the infield at the Indy Five hundred.”

Then there was the delicate problem of suicides. People brought Bliss with them—a lot of it—and though there was a whiff of cannabis here and there and plenty of beer cans about, the predominant drug at the farm was Bliss; and with it, the inevitable few were overwhelmed by rapture and decided to overdose or take their lives in other ways, some messy, some clean.

When the first body was found that afternoon, Erik used his bullhorn to ride through the fields asking if there were any morticians or funeral directors in their midst. There was one. An older man named Jennings came forward and was proud to take responsibility for laying out the dead and burying them in a remote corner.