Born lost

In high school, Danny was a loner. He wasn't a loner by choice. He was a military brat. Because his father was so often away on tours of duty, Danny's  mother divorced him. There was a nasty custody battle, but it made little difference because Danny preferred to be with his Dad, so even if his mother got custody, Danny ran away.

The fact that his dad was routinely reassigned to new places, along with Danny's status as a runaway, led to chronic dislocation. They never settled down. Danny never had a chance to make friends. He often lived alone while his dad was on tour, and when his dad was home, he was verbally abusive to Danny. He took his pent-up frustrations out on Danny.

So Danny was torn. He was lonely. Desperately needed good friends, but afraid to make friends because he'd lose them and leave them behind when his dad was reassigned to a new place. Danny was on the football team, but standoffish.

Then a new kid showed up at school. Kevin appeared out of nowhere during midterm. Kevin was a bit mysterious. Aloof. Lived alone, like Danny. No one knew anything about his background. He was both an academic whizkid and very good at sports. Seemed to have a way of reading minds.

Despite being standoffish like Danny, Kevin made a point of reaching out to Danny. Tried to befriend him. And, indeed, they seemed to have a lot in common. But Danny was hard to get close to. 

There were caves in the area that local boys used to explore. For safety they'd usually go in groups of two, three, or more, with flashlights. It was easy to become hopelessly lost in the caves.

Danny explored the caves on his own. One time his flashlight fell through a crevice. He was instantly plunged into pitch darkness. 

Fear immediately swept over him and grew on him. He was lost. Really lost. There wouldn't be a search team to rescue him because no one knew that he was exploring the cave. He told no one. 

So the sense of fear enveloped him, like the enveloping darkness. Smothering, suffocating despair. He was used to being a loner. Used to being lonely. Now he was lost. With nothing but his thoughts. Waiting to die. No one missed him. No one looking for him. He was more alone than ever. He couldn't be more alone. Danny rarely cried, but now he began to cry.

Then he heard footsteps, but he didn't see a flashlight. The footsteps came closer. He shuddered in fear. 

Then a familiar voice spoke to him: it was Kevin. Kevin spoke softly so as not to startle him unduly, but his voice echoed in the caves. Kevin put his hand on Danny's head and stroked his hair a few times to reassure him. Danny was still trembling in fear. He got up. Kevin hugged him until Danny stopped trembling. Then Kevin took him by the hand and led him out of the cave. It was night, with only starlight to see by. 

Denny had no idea how Kevin could find him in the dark. How did Kevin know he was there? How could Kevin navigate the cave without a flashlight? 

Danny was afraid to be alone that night, so he spent the night at Kevin's place. Indeed, he stayed with Kevin for several weeks to rebuild his shattered sense of security. 

They talked about the cave. Kevin said everyone is born lost, as if they were born in a cave. They don't know the way out, and some of them are so used to living in the cave that they're afraid of leaving the cave for the outside world. They refuse to escape even if given a chance. They fear the light. 

After a few weeks, Danny moved back into his dad's house. But he didn't see Kevin at school. So he went to Kevin's house, but it was deserted. Bare, except for a Bible Kevin left behind.

So Danny began to read Kevin's Bible. Kevin was gone. No one ever saw him again. He left as abruptly as he came. 

Who was he? What was he? Maybe he was an angel. 

Bridge over hell

Jeremy was raised in a run-of-the-mill evangelical church. Nothing out of the ordinary ever happened. Average sermons. Average music. No sensational miracles. No sensational scandals. 

When he turned 16, he discovered atheism. Surfing the web, he was confronted by slew of objections to Christianity. And since his own faith was just hereditary and intellectually rootless, he became an atheist overnight. 

Then he had a dream. In his dream there was a bridge across a canyon. Far below the bridge, at the bottom of the canyon flowed a river of fire, like molten lava. There was no way around the canyon. It ranged on either side as far as eye could see. 

Flames shot up from the river, licking the bottom of the bridge and flaring above it in sheets of fire. Almost like lanterns on the the rails of the bridge. It was dusk, but fire made the walls of the canyon gleam with flickering light. 

Across the canyon, he could dimly see a meadow with a stream, and verdant foothills above and beyond. But behind him all was rocky and dry. 

As he stood there, at one end of the bridge, a trickle of people–his age or older–came up from behind and passed him by. He watched them cross the bridge. 

But there was a troll at the other end of the bridge. A troll with malignant fiery eyes, who blocked their way. When they tried to force their way through, he picked them up and pitched them over the side of the bridge. They caught fire on the way down, so intense was the blazing river below. 

Jeremy was becoming thirstier by the minute. A raging, unbearable, overpowering thirst. More than anything he wanted to cross the bridge and drink from the stream, but he dare not contend with the troll. 

Then another man came from behind and passed him by. A bearded man in a robe with a nimbic aura. When he came to the troll, the man stretched out his hand, making the troll levitate and fall over the side of the bridge. 

He then motioned Jeremy to come. The bridge was hot underfoot, causing Jeremy to quicken his pace. After crossing over, he drank from the stream. The meadow was fragrant with scented wildflowers. He began to climb a footpath leading up the foothill, curious to see what was on the other side, when he awoke. 

He was back in bed, in his oh-so familiar bedroom. Indeed, he never left. Everything was ordinary again.

He washed and got dressed. As he pulled on his shirt, it had an usual fragrance, like wildflowers. 

After that, he started reading the Bible again. He read about Jesus, with his nimbic aura at the Transfiguration, and again, when Jesus appeared to John on Patmos. 

He shared his dream–if it was a dream–with people at church. And his classmates. 

Hell's back door

Logan and Liam were hellraisers long before they died and went to hell. When they were still alive, they thought hell was a big joke. Even so, they quipped about how, if hell was real, they'd rather end up there because it was way more fun than heaven and all their friends would be in hell. The wisecracking was enjoyable until they died together in a car wreck. 

For some newcomers, hell was initially exhilarating. They were finally in their natural element. However, it didn't take long for the rush to wear off. 

To their everlasting consternation, hell had no women. Or, for all they new, hell had women, but hell was sexually segregated. 

In addition, hell consisted of roving, marauding goon squads who periodically captured and tortured members of opposing goon squads. They'd skin you alive or pull your teeth out or bury you up to your neck, pour honey over head, then empty a jar of fireants on your head. Fun stuff like that. And the damned rejuvenated, so the cycle continued ad infinitum. Maybe all of hell wasn't that bad, but for hellraisers like Logan and Liam, that's what they experienced.

Demons were the prison guards. Damned humans made deals with the fiendish guards. Hell was the ultimate place where everyone had his price. 

A basic job of demons is turning humans to the dark side. New arrivals in hell had intel on the living, intel on their classmates, coworkers, and other suchlike. In exchange for demonic favors, newcomers would debrief demons on the vulnerabilities of their classmates, coworkers, and the like, giving the demons an opening. 

Newcomers demanded different things in exchange. If, say, you were killed by a rival gangbanger and wanted to exact revenge, you could have a demon arrange a freak accident. Soon you assailant found himself in hell with you, and you had the element of surprise. 

There was an ancient, immemorial rumor that hell had a back door. That it was possible to escape if you could find the back door. 

Some of the damned had long memories because they'd been in hell for so long. The quest for the back door to hell, if it existed, was a diversion and preoccupation of the damned. Was it just a legend to give the damned a perverse sense of false hope? Only the demons knew for sure, but demons were notorious liars. 

In hell, the only disincentive to lying is that if you wanted to make a deal, you had to keep up your end of the bargain. If you had a reputation for reneging on a deal, you couldn't be trusted to do a favor in exchange for a favor. 

According to one rumor, the back door to hell was hard to find because it moved around. It might be in one place one week and another place another week. 

By calling in a lot of chips from gambling debts, Logan and Liam finally got an up-to-date map to hell's back door, drawn in demon blood. When they got there, at the end of a dimly-lit tunnel, sure enough there was a door. But was it the door out of hell? 

Using a one-time key, they unlocked the door and went through it. The door closed and locked behind them. 

It looked like they are back on earth, above ground. Indeed, it was a trail through the woods, on the edge of the small down where Logan and Liam grew up. They made it!

They went inside the local bar to rustle up some beer and broads. But no one was there. Just the jukebox wailing and echoing in the abandoned tavern. The whole town was deserted. Every house was empty. A ghost town. And the sun never rose. Just the glaring street lights. And a howling, dusty, bitter wind. 

They were still in hell. The backdoor as an ambush. A trap. 

Waiting in vain

Weston was Dora's only son. A teenager. She became increasingly dependent on him for companionship, protection, and help around the farm after she was widowed. But war was looming. She dreaded the prospect that he'd be conscripted to fight. Dreaded that she might be left alone to fend for herself. Dreaded for his own sake that he might die in battle. 

She prayed that they'd be spared, but no amount of dread or prayer kept the day from coming when she watched him ride away to war, leaving her behind and bereft. As she watched him turn his back and start up the road, watched his receding figure, watched him passing out of her life, she didn't know when, or if, she'd see him again. Didn't know when, or if, he'd ever come home.

Days wore into weeks, then into months, then into years. She prayed day and night for his return. She struggled to manage the farm by herself. Sometimes the parson could spare a bit of food. She watched neighbors move away and childhood friends succumb to illness and malnutrition. 

One day, as she was sitting on the porch, she saw a familiar figure limping towards the house. She leaped out of her chair and ran to him as best she could. They embraced. And then she woke up. It was only a dream.

Another day, as she was peering through the kitchen window, she saw a familiar figure riding towards the house. She rushed out of the house to greet him. She was overjoyed to see him and he was overjoyed to see her. It almost seemed too good to be true. And then she woke up. Alone in bed. Alone in the chilly darkness. Another fickle, tantalizing dream.

Finally the war ended. Her side lost. But she continued to hope, wait, and pray for his return. Yet as the weeks wore into months, he didn't return. She never received official confirmation that he died, but had he survived, he should have come back by now. It was too late to hold out hope.

So she painfully reconciled herself to the fact that all that time she was hoping in vain, praying in vain, waiting in vain–for a reunion that never was to be.

Yet if she had it to do all over again, she'd do the same thing. Even though she waited in vain, he was still worth waiting for. She had nothing better to look forward to. 

She refused to say good-bye. She couldn't go forward or backward. So she just wandered in circles. 

Then she herself sickened. Struggling for every breath. She was nearly bedridden. Then she saw him come through the door. She must be dreaming again. Indeed, she was dreaming. She was dying in her sleep.

But this time it seemed different. Weston was different. Radiant. Healthier than when he left for war, so long ago.

It was a dream, but more than a dream. The waking world was fading like a dream as the dreamworld became a bridge to heaven. He had died on the battlefield, years before. Now he came from heaven to bring her back. He took her by the hand. As she rose from her deathbed, she was young again. Then they walked into the light, as the world behind them went dark. 

Rounded with a sleep

Fernando was quarterback at Naples High. A popular, dashing, but reclusive, mysterious student. He seemed to live alone. No one ever met his parents or siblings–assuming he had any siblings. 

Miranda, she of the shimmering hair and flashing eyes, was his girlfriend  Although Caliban played on the same team, as wide receiver, he was jealous of Fernando. At first resenting the fact that he was the quarterback, making Fernando the titular star player.

To make matters worse, Fernando and Caliban were both in love with Miranda. When Miranda became Fernando's girlfriend, that fueled the jealousy, but he concealed his ire.   

Fernando's home lay at the foot of a woodsy trail, with a brick gateway. The estate was enclosed by a high brick wall. Once inside, a footpath led to a log cabin on a hillside. The cabin had a balcony with a sweeping a view of the lake below. Sloping down and out from the hillside was a sprawling mossy front yard with fruit trees. On one side was a forest. On the other side a ravine with a brook that emptied into the lake. 

The estate seemed to have its own climate, impervious to seasonal fluctuations in temperature. Although the foliage underwent summery or autumnal variations in color, with the occasional dusting of snow in winter, the deciduous foliage was never denuded. Fruit trees bloomed year around while songbirds warbled year round. 

Fernando and Miranda used to walk home together after school, hand-in-hand. They hung out at his place. Before dark, he'd escort her back to her own home. One time Caliban followed them, shadowing them at a distance, to keep out of sight. Standing behind a tree, he watched them pass through the gate. After a few moments, to approach it undetected, he resumed. But when he went to the gate, it was locked. Through the grillwork he could see a footpath on the other side, but the view was cuff-off by a bend in the trail. And the walls were too smooth and high to scale.  

On one rare occasion, Fernando invited the entire team over for a post-season BBQ. They trooped down together from the high school to his house, with Fernando and Miranda in the lead. The party continued into the evening hours, with a bonfire down on the beach. Then everyone went home. 

A few days later, Caliban skipped school. He wore a backpack with a rope, grappling hook, and accelerants. He was planning to set fire to Fernando's house. But as he made his way down the trail, there was no gate. The trail continued down to the lake. No cabin, fruit trees, or songbirds. Just a narrow footpath in the forest. And the air had a frigid edge. 

Was he on the wrong trail? But how could that be? He distinctly remembered the trail. And there was no other trail. 

A few days later he skipped school again, renting a little motorboat to find the estate from the other side. But the entire shoreline was forested. No cabin on a hilltop, with a sprawling front yard. 

On graduation day, when festivities were over, Fernando and Miranda walked down to his house. That's the last time anyone ever saw them. 

Caliban was baffled. Did the estate not exist in our world? Was the gate a portal to a parallel world? Or did the estate only exist in the imagination? A phantasmagorical projection onto a real spot in space and time? 

Bound for the Promised Land

Brian woke up in the E.R. He didn't remember how he got there or why he was there. He did have a headache. 

Turned out he suffered a concussion at the football game. This was the first time he regained consciousness since the accident. Other than the headache he was quite lucid. 

His parents and younger brother Bobby were at his bedside, relieved to see him come to. Yet they weren't as happy as he expected them to be. They seemed to be hiding something.

A few minutes later the neurologist came in. He began by telling Brian that the concussion probably did no permanent damage. But Brian sensed another shoe was waiting to drop. 

The brain scan revealed an unsuspected aneurism. It may have been there for years. And the location made it inoperable. 

Brian was confused. At first he didn't register the significance of the finding. So the neurologist explained to him as gently as he could that this meant Brian could die at anytime. He was very unlikely to have a normal lifespan. He'd probably die sooner rather than later. 

It's like the hospital room suddenly went dark. The news robbed Brian of his future. All his youthful dreams snatched away. 

He counted on having a normal life. Marry his high school sweetheart. Have kids. Coach football.

But now he couldn't plan long term. How could he risk having kids if he wouldn't live to see them to adulthood? How was that fair to them? 

He didn't tell Coach about the aneurism. That enabled him to finish out the football season. Playing football with the brain aneurism was risky, but what did he have to lose? He was going to die young, anyway. 

But after that he dropped out of school. Became increasingly bitter, angry, and alienated. He had nothing to live for. Nothing to look forward to. He was just waiting for the time-bomb in his head to detonate. 

He was sullen with his parents and his kid brother. He broke off old friendships. Broke up with his girlfriend. Spent hours a day walking alone on wooded trails, brooding. Or sitting by the pond, brooding. 

He had a therapist for counseling, but the therapist could do nothing to change the situation. He didn't need happy talk bromides.

But after months of feeling sorry for himself, and not without justification, he decided that was a dumb way to spend his remaining time. If he was doomed, shouldn't he make the most of whatever time he had left rather than squandering it? Rage was pointless. 

But even though he knew what he was doing was a waste of time, he had no constructive alternative. Then he remembered the Bible a girl at school had given him. She was always witnessing to other students. Everyone made fun of her behind her back or to her face. She took it bravely, but it hurt.

He had tossed the Bible in his locker, buried under muddy sneakers. Now he took it home and began to read. And read. And read. He drank it in. He warmed up to his kid brother, which was timely because since Bobby was going through a really rough stretch and desperately needed Brian's support. 

And watching Brian engrossed in the Bible, as they sat side-by-side on the bed, made Bobby curious, since he was into whatever his big brother was into. So he started reading the Bible, too. 

Their parents were irreligious and didn't quite approve of Brian getting religion, or infecting Bobby with the virus. But they preferred Brian this way to the sullen, disaffected Brian. 

Over the next few years, Brian coached younger boys from fatherless homes. And it gave him a chance to share his discovery with them. Some weren't ready for it, but he was sowing seed.

One day Bobby went over to Brian's apartment. Went inside. It was silent. Went into the bedroom to find Brian's lifeless body upright on the bed, with a Bible in his lap. Brian dead at 23. 

Can I get a witness?

Dillion Achord Sr. had a dramatic conversion experience as a teenager when his best friend took him to a revival. After that he become more zealous than the friend who took him to the revival. 

He became a Baptist lay preacher. Spent lots of time witnessing. Some people figured it was just a phase, but he remained fervent–until the wheels started falling off his life. 

Despite his zeal, he never wanted to become a pastor. His dream was be a high school football coach. After that, he rarely went by "Dillon". Everybody called him "Coach". He liked that.  

Mentoring the next generation, that was his goal post–more than the goal post on the field. Mind you, he had a passion for football. He knew what was going on in the lives of his players. He prayed with them and for them. He had voluntary home Bible studies for players. The football field was his mission field. They respected and revered him. He was a role model of manliness. For many, he was the only father-figure they had to look up to.  

Then his wife left him for another man, abandoning their teenage son. Life without a wife was a physical and emotional hardship. 

His son might have been a huge consolation were it not for the fact that Dillion Jr., or "Junior", as he was always called, was hard into teenage rebellion. That originated in rage over his mother's desertion. Made worse because Junior started hanging out with juvenile delinquents. So he started getting into trouble with the law.

As a result, his father's grief over the breakup of the marriage was compounded by grief over the stormy relationship with his son. With just the two of them living together, it was an ideal time for them for father and son to deepen their bond, but instead, forces were tearing them apart. 

Coach used to go to the football field to pray, walking round and round the track after school when the field was deserted. His prayer life use to be full of praise, contrition, and thanksgiving, but now he was yelling at God. 

After he picked up his son at the police station for–he lost count–they got into a shouting match at home, and Junior ran away from home. That led to more yelling at God.

To make matters worse, he lost his job. Although he loved the players and they loved him, the town loving winning, and the team lost more games than it won. 

That's in part because Coach didn't always pick the best players. He didn't pick boys from well-to-do families. He picked working-class guys. Many came from troubled homes. Football was his ministry. He recruited boys who desperately needed someone to befriend them. Coach cared about sinners, not winners. They put their heart and soul into the game because they adored their coach, but they never had the talent to beat the best teams. Most parents didn't appreciate his priorities. They wanted winners, not losers. 

When he was fired, the team was furious. It was a tearful farewell. But turnover is rapid in intramural football. 

After that he yelled less at God because he prayed less. He lost his wife, his son, and his dream job. 

He took a job at the local used car dealership. In a small town he had to be nice to customers who got him fired. 

A few months later he began to feel stabbing abdominal pain and back pain. He went to the doctor. After a battery of tests, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. The prognosis was dire. 

At that point Coach dropped out of church. And his prayer life, already at low ebb, dried up entirely. He might as well die. He had nothing left to live for. 

A few weeks later, his estranged son found out through the grapevine that his dad was dying of cancer. At first, Junior was dumbfounded by the news. Then he drove back to his dad. All that time, Junior was living just one town up the road. He wept all the way back. 

When Coach came to the door, Junior was shocked to see how gaunt he was. He dad was always buff. But now he was wasted. 

Junior moved back in. Fixed all the meals. Bathed his father. Helped him use the bathroom. Gave him morphine injections. 

As Coach became increasingly bed-ridden, he asked his son to read the Bible to him. Mainly from the Psalms and the Gospel of John. 

One evening, Junior cradled his dad in his arms while recounted happy memories of stuff they used to do together when he was younger. Hiking, hunting, rafting, horseback riding. His dad would nod or smile at each anecdote. It all came flooding back in Junior's mind's eye–which is why he didn't notice when Coach became unresponsive. He craned his neck around and saw that Coach's pupils were dilated. His dad died in his arms. Junior got out of bed, closed his father's eyes, kissed him good-bye, and pulled the sheet over his face.

Junior used to visit his father's grave every day, weather-permitting. Later he brought his little boy along. Then he drove to high school football practice. His son played around the bleachers while Junior coached the team.