Tim Pratt - Sympathy for the Devil

“No that’s not true,” his partner Vito piped in. “Remember when we saw the man and woman standing next to a pile up on Lail Avenue, arguing? They were really fighting! Arms flying, pointing fingers at each other. It was like one had thrown the other outta the house with all their stuff, but you couldn’t tell who’d thrown who.”

“Just furniture? Nothing else? No moving vans there or anything? No people guarding the stuff?”

“Nope, that’s the weird part. These piles of furniture and boxes, like whole households, stacked up and no one around. Go figure.”

The four of us sat there drinking coffee, thinking it over. Then Dennis said, “We saw another pile coming over here today. Remember that nice blue leather couch and TV I pointed to? Jeez, stuff looked brand-new. Big screen TV… Just sitting out in the rain getting drenched.

“Times are tough. Maybe it’s coincidence, but I hear a lotta people are being thrown out of their houses by the banks.”

“All at the same time? I don’t think so, partner,” Vito said sarcastically to him and winked at me.

Dennis straightened up and threw him a black look. “You got a better explanation, genius?”

“Nope. Just that it’s weird. Never in my life have I seen stuff that nice left out alone on the street unguarded. And so many times. In the rain? Makes the whole town look like a big yard sale.”

Right then Chapter Two began but none of us knew it yet. Before anyone had a chance to say more, the doorbell rang. I looked at Rae to see if she was expecting someone. She shook her head. Who now?

I got up to answer it. A second after opening that door I wished I hadn’t. Standing on my porch were two guys looking like wet seals. One glimpse and you wanted to say, “No thanks to whatever you’ve got,” slam the door in their faces and run for cover.

Naturally they were smiling. But you know the kind-totally fake. No one smiles like that without putting too much face into it. Or they got a gun stuck in their back. These guys were wearing identical brown suits freckled dark all over with rain. Bright yellow plastic nametags were pinned on their breast pockets. White shirts with the top button buttoned but no ties. Both had bowl haircuts that made them look like monks or The Beatles gone bad. And they smelled. I’m sorry to have to say that, but they did. They smelled like they’d lived in their buttoned-up rayon shirts way too long.

“Good morning, sir! I’m Brother Brooks and this is Brother Zin Zan.”

“Brother who? You want to say all that again?” I stood back and gave them a lot of room, just in case they exploded and their crazy went all over my porch.

“Brooks and Zin Zan. Would you have a few moments to spare? It may just change your life!”

I knew where this was leading and was just about to adios them, but a thunderclap shook the house and rain came down like a tidal wave. What could I do, shove them back out in that flood? Really unhappily I asked, “You want to come in a minute?

Their faces lit up like Yankee Stadium for a night game. “We certainly would. Thank you very much.”

In for a penny, in for a pound. “Want some coffee? Looks like you could use it.”

“No thank you, sir. But it’s certainly kind of you to offer.”

“Well, come on in.” They stepped into the hall and I closed the door. They both wore black basketball sneakers with a brand name written in white on the side that I couldn’t make out. I thought it was kind of strange that Bible guys would be wearing sneakers. Much less underneath a suit.

“Bill, who was it?” Rae called out.

“Brooks Brothers and Sen Sen.” I couldn’t resist saying. And you know what? Brooks started laughing.

“That’s very funny, sir. People always make that mistake. But actually, it’s Brother Brooks. And Brother Zin Zan. He’s from New Zealand.”

“ New Zealand. Is that right? You’re pretty far from home. Sorry for the mistake. Come on in.”

I went first to see what would happen. When Rae and the delivery guys caught a view of who was following me, they got exactly the same look on their faces-Whaaat?

“Everybody, this is Brother Brooks and Brother Zin Zan. They say they can change our lives.” I said it like I was introducing an act in Las Vegas.

Picking right up on it Dennis said, “Sounds good to me. Anything to stop delivering refrigerators!”

Rae stared at me like I’d gone nuts. Both of us hate door-to-door preachers with their ridiculous speeches and too many teeth. Her face asked, why had I let these guys in? Suddenly our house was like the dog pound-every stray in town under one roof, dripping on her carpets. I sat down but the Brothers kept standing. To my surprise, Zin Zan started talking. He had a strong accent. Then I remembered he was from New Zealand. The whole time he spoke, Brooks gave him an all-attention smile that looked as phony as a tinfoil Christmas tree.

“We represent a brotherhood called The Heidelberg Cylinder. Our avatar is a man named Beeflow.”

“Beef-low?” Dennis looked at his partner and me, then wiggled his eyebrows and O’d his mouth.

“No, sir, Bee-flow. We believe we are entering the Second Diaspora. It will formally begin with the Millennium and continue for another 16,312 years.”

“Sixteen thousand, you say? With or without intermission?”

My sweet wife tried to smooth that one over. “Would you two like some juice?”

“Thank you, Ma’am, but we don’t drink anything but water. Beeflow says-”

“Who’s this Beeflow?”

“Our spiritual master. Chosen avatar by-”

“What’s an avatar? Sounds like that new model Honda.”

Brother Brooks liked that one too. He smiled and for the first time it looked real. “No sir, an avatar is an incarnation of a deity. A kind of God in human form, you could say.”

“What did your Mr. Beeflow do before he became God?”

Maybe it was the way Rae said it, so respectful and serious. Or maybe because Dennis and I were watching each other when she spoke. Whatever, as soon as my wife asked her question so gently, the three of us guys cracked up. I mean big time. We laughed so hard we choked.

“He was a travel agent.”

“Good career move!” I said, which brought down the house again. Except for Rae. She FedExed me her stone face and I knew what that meant. I shut up fast.

“So what do you guys believe in? I mean, like a quick wrap-up of your religion?”

“We believe in rent control, a river view when possible, and forced air heating.”

The living room got silent fast. Real silent.

“Say that again?”

“Room, sir. We believe in the just and proper distribution of room. Human space. Apartments, houses, it makes no difference. A civilized place to live.”

“Geodesic domes,” Zin Zan added, nodding.

“What the Hell are you talking about? I’m not following you here, Brother Brooks.”

“Well sir, have you noticed all the furniture out on the streets of the city recently? Piles of it, looking like it’s waiting to be picked up?”

“We were just talking about that!”

“It’s the first sign of the beginning of the Diaspora.”

“What’s that?”

“A Diaspora is the breaking up and scattering of a people. The forced settling of people far from their ancestral homelands.”

“You mean they’re being moved out?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“By who? Who’s moving them?”

“Satan.”

I cleared my throat and snatched a quick glimpse of Rae. She gave me a look that said, “Don’t make trouble with these guys.” So instead of cracking wise about the Satanic Moving Company, I looked at the others to see if they were going to snap at the bait.

“All those piles of stuff out on the streets are there because the Devil’s throwing people out of their houses? Why’s he doin’ that?”