“The Lord is calling Brother Maynard home,” he said. “We need to pray together. Bring your guitar.”
Before he joined our church, Brother Maynard belonged to the same snake-handling and mountain-magic congregation as Lady Crawford. I saw him once without his corduroy jacket, shirtsleeves rolled up to expose the knotted scar tissue from several bites. He terrified me. If copperheads and timber rattlers couldn’t kill him, I doubted any illness would manage to finish the job. I didn’t want to go but knew I couldn’t refuse my father.
Brother Maynard lived behind the baseball field near Bradshaw Elementary. The diamond wasn’t quite regulation size. The distance from the pitcher’s mound to home plate was noticeably shorter than standard requirements and center field wasn’t wide enough to warrant its third outfielder. Despite these shortcomings, it entertained kids and adults a few nights each week. Since it was a rare source of distraction, the school paid Brother Maynard a small sum to work as groundskeeper. He did a decent job with the upkeep, paying special attention to the grass, but the diamond looked rough that day. Right field was a barren patch. The remaining crabgrass blighted until the ground was mostly mud. Rain had washed away the chalk lines. Even the signs that covered the outfield fence and advertised for local businesses peeled paint. Only CARVER MUSIC, with the new addition of a golden saxophone spilling musical notes from its mouth, looked fresh.
The Reverend parked the truck in front of the one-story house and climbed out carrying my guitar. I followed down the concrete walkway, past a broken dog chain that wrapped around the trunk of an elm. Its rusted links lay coiled atop the tree’s surfacing roots. I thought I heard an animal howling in the distance, but once the smells of sickness met us at the front door, I realized the sounds were coming from Brother Maynard.
Lady Crawford stood in the hall with her mouth hidden behind a painter’s mask. She pulled it down under her chin and offered a smile.
“How is he?” The Reverend asked.
“Worse. I think the Lord will call him soon.”
During the ride, The Reverend explained that Brother Maynard had been suffering from agonizing headaches. He finally took himself to the hospital after weeks of praying, but by that time the mass was already the size of a boiled egg. Other small specks surrounded the margins of the X-ray like gnats in a swarm. Since then, Brother Maynard had refused all medical intervention including painkillers. Occasionally, he spoke in a madman’s yattering. Fantasy mixed with half-remembered moments of his youth. He begged for water, but Lady Crawford said even a drop made him gag.
I covered my face with a mask as she ushered us inside. The congregation surrounded the sickbed like sentries. Every member wore white clothing that seemed to glow in the dark room.
“Play him something,” The Reverend said, as he handed me the guitar. “Something to ease his suffering.”
I watched Brother Maynard tremble and sweat until his pillow was saturated. I worried the bright sound of a guitar might feel like hot needles in his brain. Nothing I could offer would make his passage easier. What he needed was a morphine drip and eternal sleep, but I obeyed my father and made the first chord. I don’t remember the song, just that I tried to play a soft progression. Brother Maynard didn’t dive into convulsions, but his eyes opened wide before going distant. I’ve thought about that over the years. At the time, I believed it was the look that accompanied any death. Now I wonder if my music hurt the dying man so severely he couldn’t even scream. I tried to stop after the first song, but my father made me play “Amazing Grace” while Lady Crawford took up the vocals.
My palms moistened until I almost dropped the guitar. Everything inside wanted to bolt as the congregation joined in the crooning. I held firm, finished the song and stood aside while they began another hymn. My father expected me to keep playing, but I stumbled outside with The Reverend calling after me.
The chain-link fence surrounding the ballfield was unlocked, so I crossed the faded chalk line into the visitors dugout. Inside, a bench had been formed by a slab of concrete poured against the back wall. I stretched out across it with the guitar forgotten at my feet. I knew my father would beat me when he finished with Brother Maynard. A good strapping to ensure that next time I’d be too afraid to run, but the coming punishment didn’t bother me. I just didn’t want to lend my music to the Lord. He’d already taken up so much of my life, I’d decided that this one thing would be mine.
It started to rain. I closed my eyes and listened as the fat drops pelted the roof. I wanted to play along to the rhythm but was afraid my father would be searching for me. I’d just gained the nerve to form a chord when Angela Carver appeared at the entrance of the dugout. Her red hair lay matted to her neck in wet curls. The elaborate eyeliner and mascara she wore the first time I saw her were gone. Absent any makeup, I could see the constellation of freckles that covered her cheeks. I remember thinking she looked more like a woman that day. Less a child painted with false maturity.
“I didn’t expect to see you again,” she said, approaching like the dugout might be booby-trapped. Her canvas sneakers squished with each step.
I had no clue what to say. What would a girl like her want to hear? As much as I desired having her close, the proximity only reminded me how twisted I looked lying on the cold slab. In another time, young women would’ve been kept from the presence of boys like me. Their husbands would’ve paid to see my deformities through the safety of a freak show cage, and they’d come home describing the shock of such a horror, assuring curious wives that even a glance at something so sinister could atrophy unborn children in the womb.
“What are you doing here?” I asked. It came out sounding like she was a trespasser. Angela just shrugged.
“I walk the diamond sometimes to clear my head. So, are you going to tell me what’s up?” she asked.
“My father brought me to play for Brother Maynard.”
“I hear he’s a pretty weird guy.”
“He’s a member of our congregation.”
“Yeah, sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“It’s all right. We’re all weird.” It was self-deprecation I hoped she would argue against, but she didn’t say anything.
“Do you like your church?” she asked.
I’d been instructed to tell outsiders our congregation was the same as any other. Some of the parishioners might have even considered themselves normal, but a normal congregation doesn’t need to train its young members to lie. Maybe it was the recent flight from the sickbed, but I wanted to finally tell somebody the truth.
“I hate the church,” I said. “Sometimes I think I’m beginning to hate everything. Except playing.”
Angela picked up the guitar and laid it across her lap.
“You played really well,” she said. “Especially to just be learning. I know your dad bought some books. How’s it coming?”