Wiley Cash - A Land More Kind Than Home

I rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling again, and then I closed my eyes as tight as I could and tried to say my prayers, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t help wondering if that pink, burned-up hand had touched my mama.

BUT NOW PASTOR CHAMBLISS HELD HIS BIBLE IN THAT BURNED-UP hand inside the church, and I remembered what Mama’d said about him being on fire for the Holy Spirit, and I thought about him bursting into flames and giving off all kinds of heat, and how that air conditioner might just be pulling it out of the church and blowing it right onto me and Joe Bill.

The air conditioner and that piano were going too loud for me to hear what Pastor Chambliss was saying, but it looked like he must’ve been preaching into the microphone because he had his Bible in his hand and he raised it and pointed it at everybody. He walked back and forth, and for a few seconds I couldn’t see him, but then he came back to where I could watch him and when he did he had a woman on the stage with him; I knew it was Mama before I even saw her face. I raised myself up a little higher to get a better look, and when I did I saw Stump standing right there beside her. I felt something tugging on the back of my shirt, and I realized it was Joe Bill. He’d come around under the air conditioner and was standing beside me.

“I just saw Stump,” he said. He tugged on my shirt again, and I balanced myself on one of my tiptoes and kicked at his hand to get him to stop. “Hey,” he whispered up at me.

“I see him too,” I said.

“Why is he down front?”

“I don’t know,” I said. He let go of my blue jeans and ducked under to the other side of the air conditioner again.

I couldn’t see anything except the back of Stump’s head, but I could tell he was looking all around the church at all those people and I saw that now most of them had their eyes open and they were looking right back at him. Pastor Chambliss held his Bible with his bad hand, and he stepped around and got in between Mama and Stump and reached out his other hand and put it on top of Stump’s head. Mama reached across Pastor Chambliss and touched Stump on the shoulder and it looked like they were all praying, but after they stood like that for a second Stump started jerking around like he wanted to get away from them. Pastor Chambliss got up behind him and held his Bible and wrapped that ugly arm over Stump’s shoulder like he was giving him a bear hug. He reached out with his left arm to keep Mama away from Stump, and she took her hand off his shoulder and backed away until I couldn’t see her. I couldn’t stand seeing Pastor Chambliss wrap his arm around Stump, and I couldn’t help but be mad at Mama for letting him do it.

Pastor Chambliss just held Stump and held him and it looked like he was hugging him from behind and he wasn’t ever going to let him go, even though Stump was trying to get away because he hadn’t ever liked folks touching him and holding him like that. All the people in there held their hands up in the air, and then they started singing again after somebody got to banging away on the piano, but I couldn’t hardly hear nothing except that air conditioner right up against my head. My arms were getting so sore and tired that I was afraid I was going to fall. I couldn’t find Mama’s face, but I saw her hand reach out and take Stump’s, and he was fighting so hard with Pastor Chambliss that Mama could just barely hold on to it. Pastor Chambliss had both arms around Stump now, and he was holding on to him real tight with his Bible pressed right up against his chest, and they rocked back and forth like they couldn’t stand up, and all of a sudden they just fell over and I couldn’t see them at all no more because they were laying out on the floor.

Mama reached down and tried to get Stump to stand up, and it looked like she was pulling on his hand, but Pastor Chambliss wouldn’t let him go and Mama cried and looked like she was hollering for him to turn Stump loose. I felt Joe Bill tugging on my jeans so hard that I was scared he was going to yank me out of that window and I wouldn’t be able to see a thing.

“What are they doing to him?” Joe Bill said, but his voice was just barely a whisper and it sounded like he was running out of breath and he had to force out the words. “Jess,” he said. “What’s he doing to him?” I just kept watching Mama, and I didn’t say nothing to Joe Bill because seeing her cry got me crying too and I didn’t want Joe Bill seeing me do that.

Another man came up on the stage and kneeled down, and I figured he was helping Pastor Chambliss hold Stump still, but I couldn’t see nothing except Mama crying and trying to hold on to Stump’s hand. It looked like she was still hollering for them to get up and leave him alone.

“Jess, we better go,” Joe Bill said. I felt him behind me pulling on my shirt, but I didn’t turn around and I didn’t get off my tiptoes.

“They shouldn’t be doing that to him,” I said.

“Jess,” he said. His voice sounded like he was about to cry. “We got to go. He’s all right.” He didn’t say nothing after that, and I turned my head to ask him to put his hands under my feet to boost me up so I could see Stump, but Joe Bill was gone. When I looked across the field, I saw him hightailing it toward the woods, and I watched him run through the high grass with his untucked shirttail flapping out behind him.

I looked in the church again and saw Mr. Gene Thompson standing right up on stage too, and he had his arms locked around Mama and she was crying and fighting with him, but he wouldn’t let her go. I still couldn’t see Stump or Pastor Chambliss either, and I looked around and around but it was only a little crack and I couldn’t see everything in there. I dropped down and ducked under the air conditioner to the other side where Joe Bill had been standing and I got up on my tiptoes and raised myself up onto my elbows so I could look in again, and when I did I saw Stump laying on the stage and Pastor Chambliss and that other man laying on top of him. Stump’s feet were kicking like he was trying to get away and a couple other men left their chairs and walked up on the stage and put their hands on him and touched him and somebody was just banging away on the piano and just about all of them had their eyes closed except Mama and Mr. Thompson. She was staring at them where they were laying on Stump and holding him down and touching him and she was crying and hollering for them to stop. Stump kicked his legs around like he was trying to run sideways on the floor, and Mama screamed so loud that I could hear it over that piano and I could hear it over the air conditioner and all those people singing.

For a second I forgot where I was and I hollered out, “Mama!,” and when I did she jerked one of her hands up over her head and busted Mr. Thompson right on the lip. He let her go and raised his hand and touched his mouth to see if there was blood coming out. Mama got down on her knees and started pulling all them people off Stump, and he sat up as quick as he could and she hugged him to her and rocked him back and forth and all those men just sat there on the floor and stared at Mama and Stump like they didn’t know what to think. Mr. Thompson looked down at Mama, and then he whipped his head around and his big, yellow eyeballs looked right through that little crack like he was staring straight at me.

I figured everybody in the church’d heard me holler out for Mama, and when I leaned back to drop myself down I felt somebody behind me and they put their hand over my mouth and pulled me backward out of the window. I reached out for the window ledge, and I felt a chunk of that old wood break off in my hand. Whoever it was behind me tackled me, and we fell back into the high grass. The sun hit me right in the eyes, and I couldn’t see and I was crying and I couldn’t catch my breath because somebody’d put their hand over my mouth and it was keeping out all the air. Then it felt like something heavy was resting on my chest. I closed my eyes and tried to scream, but then, when I opened them, I saw it was Joe Bill sitting on top of me.