Annika Thor - A Faraway Island

“Mamma,” she whispers to the picture. “Mamma, I want to come home.”

She hears noise from the kitchen. After a while the smell of food wafts up, but Aunt Märta doesn’t call her. Then there’s more noise, followed by silence.

Stephie hasn’t eaten anything but blackberries since breakfast. Even fish would taste good right now.

Not until several hours later does Aunt Märta bring her up a glass of milk and some bread and butter. She puts the plate down by the window. As she is leaving, she turns around.

“Vera Hedberg. What kind of company is that to keep?” Aunt Märta says. “Sloppy and trashy, just like her mother.”

She closes the door behind her so fast Stephie doesn’t have time to ask what she means. What’s wrong with Vera and her mother?

When Stephie sits down by the window to eat, she notices Aunt Märta’s bicycle leaning up against the woodshed. The chain has come off.

On a Sunday evening toward the end of September, Aunt Märta tells Stephie to put her coat on. They’re going to a “revival meeting,” she explains. Stephie doesn’t have the slightest idea what that means, but she pulls on her coat obediently and goes along. They walk into the village and toward the rectangular wooden house called the Pentecostal Church.

A big crowd is gathered outside. Some people have started to go in, others stand chatting in groups. Auntie Alma is there, too, with Nellie and the little ones.

“What kind of place is this?” Nellie asks Stephie in a whisper.

“I’m not sure,” Stephie whispers back. “Some kind of church, though.”

Inside, there is one big room with rows of wooden benches. In some ways it resembles the churches in Vienna. But in Vienna churches are old stone buildings with stained glass windows, icons, and the scent of hundreds of lit candles. Stephie’s been in churches like that with Evi and her mother.

Here, there is nothing but a great big, bare room with a raised lectern, like in a classroom. No candles cast their flickering light over mysterious aisles and stone columns. No images of saints gaze solemnly down. There’s only the glare from the electric light fixture on the ceiling. The wooden floor smells newly scrubbed.

The benches are filling up. Stephie sits between Aunt Märta and Nellie. Auntie Alma has John on her lap on the other side of Nellie, and then comes Elsa.

When everyone is seated, the revival meeting begins.

A tall, thin man stands at the lectern speaking in a monotonous voice. He holds his big hands in front of him, gesturing emphatically to stress his point. Stephie doesn’t understand everything he’s saying, but it’s about God and Jesus and sinners who ought to repent.

“Come home to Jesus,” the man says. “He will embrace you, whoever you may be.”

Sometimes he uses expressions that make Stephie sit up with a jolt. He speaks of “flaming arrows aimed at our hearts” and “the blood of the lamb.” Unusual, poetic words.

In the row behind them is a woman who can’t seem to stop mumbling to herself.

“Oh, sweet Jesus,” she says over and over again. Stephie turns around to look at her, but instantly feels Aunt Märta’s elbow nudge her in the side. Aunt Märta sits ramrod straight, her hands clasped tightly in her lap and her mouth firmly shut.

The bench is hard. On Stephie’s other side, Nellie is squirming.

Suddenly a woman at the very front gets up and begins to speak. She rambles on, babbling the same words over and over again. Stephie strains to listen but understands not a single word. It doesn’t sound like Swedish, or like any other language Stephie has ever heard.

Stephie and Nellie glance at each other. Stephie’s afraid she may burst out laughing, though she can tell from Aunt Märta’s stern profile that she mustn’t.

Now the thin man starts babbling, too. And he gesticulates as he speaks.

During the High Holy Days every autumn Stephie and Nellie would go to the synagogue with their parents. At temple you didn’t have to sit still the whole time. People came and went, stood outside the sanctuary chatting, saying hello to friends and wishing one another a happy holiday. The children would run around in the yard when they needed a break, then go back in and sit with their parents again. Up in the balcony, where Stephie and Nellie sat with Mamma looking down at Papa and the other men, ladies who smelled of perfume would pass around bags of candy.

On the tenth day, the Day of Atonement, however, everyone was solemn and silent. Last fall lots of people wept when the rabbi read the prayer for the dead. Only a few weeks later the synagogue was gone-burned down on a terrible night in November. The same night that-

She isn’t going to think about it. With effort, Stephie focuses her attention on the present. The thin man is looking out over the congregation.

“Jesus Christ,” he says. “Jesus Christ is the answer to all your questions.”

All your questions! Could Jesus explain why she had to be sent to a foreign country? Could he tell her and Nellie when they will see Mamma and Papa again?

Now the thin man steps aside. A group of young people come up to the lectern. Something about their red cheeks and bright eyes makes them look alike. They don’t seem to have a single question in the world.

They begin to sing, their voices clear. A young woman, her braids pinned up on top of her head, accompanies the choir on a guitar. This is the first music Stephie has heard since her arrival. The songs flow through her, filling her, warming her. She closes her eyes and feels pleasure course through her body. The music is so lovely, she can’t stop herself from crying.

Nellie touches her arm gently. Stephie seizes Nellie’s hand and holds it tight. Nellie begins to cry, too. They weep throughout the singing, until the final tones fade away. Aunt Märta gets up and urges the sisters ahead of her down the aisle.

At the altar, Aunt Märta falls to her knees. Stephie and Nellie follow suit, kneeling on either side of her. The thin man puts one of his large hands on Stephie’s head, the other on Nellie’s, and prays in a loud voice.

Stephie can feel everyone in the room staring at them. Has she misbehaved? Should she ask forgiveness? The floor is hard, and a splinter is piercing her stocking and poking her knee.

Take me away from here, she prays silently. She doesn’t know to whom this prayer is addressed. God? Jesus? Papa? Mamma?

“Amen,” says the thin man.

“Amen,” the congregation responds in unison.

Aunt Märta gets up. Stephie totters to her feet, too. It’s over.

Now everyone is singing. They go back to their seats. Auntie Alma gives Nellie a hug. Then she reaches over and pats Stephie on the cheek.

After the revival meeting they go back to Auntie Alma’s.

“My, my,” says Aunt Märta. “I never imagined the girls would embrace Jesus so quickly. Who would have thought it?”

“They’re only girls,” Auntie Alma replies. “There’s not a drop of evil in them. They can’t be blamed for being born outside the true faith.”

“So something good has come of it,” Aunt Märta puffs. “Their souls have found a home.”

“What did you do it for, Stephie?” Nellie asks. “What made you cry?”

“The music,” Stephie answers. “It was so beautiful. And what made you cry?”

“Your tears,” Nellie replies.

Auntie Alma turns to the girls. “How gratified you must be,” she says, “to have found Jesus and been redeemed. I’m very happy for you!”

Found Jesus? Been redeemed? Slowly Stephie begins to understand that Aunt Märta and Auntie Alma imagine it was Jesus who made her weep.

“Well,” she begins hesitantly, “the music was so beautiful…”