Fifth Saturday Fiction

Forget about it
(a short story)

By Bob Boldt

Midway through a late Sunday morning shower, my singularly resonant baritone rendition of “Toreador” from Bizet’s Carmen was interrupted by a loud trumpet blast from somewhere inside the house. Stunned, I instinctively punched off the hot stream and reached for a towel. My brain frantically raced through a half dozen or more desperate explanations to frame the outrageous stimulus within some rational or not so rational context. Car horn? Smoke alarm? TV? Radio? Sweepstakes winner fanfare? Musical burglar? Satchmo’s ghost?
    Water streamed down my legs, pooled in my footprints as I crossed the bathroom tiles. I stepped gingerly out onto the second floor hallway carpet. Pausing, I tried to figure out where the sound had come from. Marge and the kids had called from Mother’s in Detroit earlier that morning, so I knew no family member had unexpectedly returned. The house was locked up tight, empty and quiet, except for the slow, somber tick-tock of the grandfather clock in its niche on the stairway landing.
    When the sudden second blast shook the house, I nearly jumped out of my skin. It sounded like it came from the living room downstairs. Checking the security of the towel’s fit around my waist, I carefully descended one stealthy step at a time to the first floor. I was dismayed to find the living room unoccupied. There seemed to be an unusual glow emanating from the kitchen doorway, however.
    I swiftly made my way across the living room and peeked around the corner. My eyes could not believe it. There in the middle of my kitchen, with the pots and pans and the dirty dishes all round about, was a white-robed angel who looked as if he had just stepped off a Hallmark Christmas card, complete with huge wings, radiant nimbus, a trumpet in one hand, and a beer in the other. Closing my eyes with a grimace that wrenched my whole face into a tight expression that I hoped would somehow clear this mad vision from my sight, I shook my head in denial. Upon opening my eyes again, I found the face of the angel staring directly into mine, with a big, disarmingly guileless grin.
    “I suppose the customary greeting under these circumstances is, ‘Behold! I bring you good tidings!’” His voice was of a higher pitch than one might expect. His face reminded me of Jim Belushi, and I thought I detected a slight Yiddish accent under the mock formality.
    “I…I don’t believe in angels.” Immediately I realized how stupid that sounded and followed it with, “I don’t even believe in God.” That probably sounded even more stupid. I was saying it as much to myself as to the apparition. I was hoping my confession might somehow dispel this first shocking symptom of what I was sure had to be an impending mental illness.
    The angel made a kind of preening gesture toward his right wing with the bell of the trumpet. He smiled, “Belief is not required, my friend, only that you listen.”
    “Sorry.” I realized he was not going to dissolve away.
    “No need, no need.” He held up the beer he had just pilfered from the fridge and questioned, “I hope you don’t mind?”
    “Sure. You know it’s non-alcoholic.” I informed him. “I’ve been on the wagon for over a year.”
    “I know, I know. I’m so proud of you. Besides, we’re not allowed alcohol either. Upsets our equilibrium. This flying business isn’t as easy as it looks.”
    “I wouldn’t know,” I said, wonder beginning to yield to mild impatience. I couldn’t believe this hallucination came all this way just to trade small talk with a non-believer.
    “I have to warn you, I know exactly what you’re thinking already, so you better look out.”
    “You do?”
    He stood his trumpet next to the blender on the counter top. “So down to business,” he said, apparently not needing to further explain the subject of angelic telepathy. “You want a robe or something?”
    I shook my head “no” and went over to check the coffee machine that had just clicked on and was automatically dribbling into the filter containing the French roast I had ground the night before. Normally I would have been cold, still being wet from the shower, but the angel’s nimbus seemed to be emanating a quite pleasant warmth. Not waiting for the pot to fill, I cheated half a cup from the drip and moved to a seat at the table. I really needed that cup of strong, black coffee.
    “Gabriel’s the name, annunciation’s the game,” he said, fumbling through his robe as if looking for a business card. He moved toward one of the kitchen chairs as if he might sit. Thinking better of it because of the wings, he put the beer on the table and kind of hunkered down to be at a level a little closer to my line of sight.
    “Now, I want you to understand I’m not here to disturb your faith or, in your case, your lack of faith. Since you don’t believe in me anyway, it won’t be a problem after I’m gone that you will have no memory of my visit.” His voice rapidly recited these lines in the pro forma style similar to that of one delivering an obligatory Miranda reading.
    “Sometimes believers claim to have seen us. Don’t you believe it. No one’s ever supposed to remember us. Those who claim to have seen us are either crazy as bedbugs or bunco artists. What I’m here for is to give you a job, a mission of sorts. People think we are powerful messengers of God. Well, we’re messengers all right, but maybe not so powerful. The only power we have is through the actions of the people who carry out our instructions. You following me?”
    I nodded over my cup.
    “You have been selected by the Heavenly Host to perform a special errand. We want you to go about your life as usual. All we ask is – all He asks….” Gabriel’s eyes reverently darted upwards. “All He asks is that you stop using His name in vain so much. Now I don’t want you to think that we’re picking on non-believers. Not so!”
    His countenance darkened. “The real goal of our campaign is those hypocrites in the big churches and the grifters on the television who pretend they can talk directly with Him. And the politicians who act like He’s on their side instead of the other way around. These are the ones who really take His name in vain big time. Now your job is not so great. Just let up with the – excuse the expression – ‘God damned’ and such. Pick on another god, like Zeus or Thor. We know our demographics. Guys like you get around. If you start cursing some of the other gods instead of Him, we figure it’ll catch on.”
    I stared at him in incomprehension. “That’s the big mission you want me to perform for God or whoever?”
    Gabriel smiled broadly. “That’s it. Any problem with it?”
    “Hell, no…er, No, sir.” I blushed. “It doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s mostly habit.”
    “‘Hell’ is OK. We don’t care how you deal with things...Where do you think it is?” He paused. “Down there?” He straightened up and made a wiping movement with his wing on the side of his head similar to the way I had seen pigeons in the park do it.
    “Well, that’s it. Go back upstairs, get on with what you were doing. I’ll finish my beer and be on my way. There are a lot like you in these parts, and Sunday’s our big day with the non-believers. I’ve got my work cut out for myself. It’s been great.”
    I went back upstairs, finished my shower, and forgot all about it. Stepping out of the stall, I stubbed my big toe and involuntarily screamed, “Oh, fuck Zeus!”
    In the distance came the faintly muffled sound of a trumpet. Probably somebody’s kid practicing in a house a block away.

Copyright © 2015 by Bob Boldt