by Randy Reynolds
The boys shut up and sat up straight and innocent, as everyone in the sanctuary turned to stare. I inched past them to the aisle… and that’s when something grabbed hold of me.
Maybe it was the devil. Or maybe a genetic clock going off in my head to mark the end of childhood.
I stood there for a moment, staring at my dad and then I looked the other way, toward the door.
“Brother Randy, I said come up here and sit on this first bench and don’t make me tell you again!”
I turned my back on him.
“Brother Randy, don’t you go out that door!”
Fear shot through me like a million needles, but I kept walking.
“I’ll deal with you later!” he said.
“Lord, lord,” prayed the old sister who would someday become my grandmother-in-law.
I stumbled through the door and into the parking lot where I slipped into our car and thought about my predicament, playing over each possible scenario of what would happen after church. Dad would have no choice but to come down hard on me in front of everybody because I had defied him and backed him into a corner. Like the shepherds on the first Christmas, I was sore afraid. I started hyperventilating.
I thought about crossing the highway and climbing the fence... to just walk away... through Atwood's pasture... the woods... wherever. Surely nothing that I would encounter in the dark could be as bad as what was going to happen after church.
I had a sudden urge to pee so I got out and stood beside the station wagon and relieved myself on the clam-shell-covered parking lot. I looked up into the clearest sky I had ever seen, and the brightest stars, and they seemed to get brighter still as I stared and peed...
... I awoke face-down on the shells with people hovering over me asking what happened and turning me over. Either the shells or the sinister force that had drawn me out of church left some bloody gashes like claw marks on my cheek and the people gasped at the sight of it.
Mother hurried to my side and stooped to cradle my head, moaning where only I could hear, "Ohhhhh Lordy."
My little sisters cried. Some younger boys stared.
My Dad arrived, took one look and said, “Let’s get him to the emergency room! Some of you fellas help me get him in the car.”
Dad rushed me to the hospital, ten miles away in
While the doctor worked, Dad stayed at my side and I was comforted by his presence. He told the doctor that my mother was prone to fainting spells, too. (True: She was pregnant six times in nine years in homes without air-conditioning in the hottest places in the South, so she did get the vapors occasionally and faint dead out--but I wasn't sure I had inherited this.)
The doctor cleaned me up, ran some tests and sent me home with a bandaged face.
Epilogue: Dad never mentioned the incident again. Nor did I, not wanting to remind him that he still owed me one.
