Our Lady of the Forest by David Guterson

Author:David Guterson
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Religion, Fiction.Contemporary, Spirituality
ISBN: 9781400041862
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 2003-09-30T00:00:00+00:00

At the prison Sunday night Tom Cross drew shit watch; he sat on a chair in the medical unit hallway and stared through an observation window, waiting for a naked prisoner to pass a balloon full of crack cocaine. The prisoner wore his hair in greasy cornrows and slept on the floor with his back to Tom, and whenever he rearranged his limbs, which was often, he reminded Tom of a zoo animal, almost no trace left of pride in his movements, a languid choreography of animal defeat, a slack heavy lifer in his thirties or early forties with raised gray burn scars on his back and shoulders and silver psoriatic elbows. The job of watching his restless sleep grew boring in the most obvious and inevitable manner, so that Tom sat literally twiddling his thumbs, nodding off sporadically, checking his watch absentmindedly—and forgetting what it said immediately—massaging his neck, staring at nothing, thinking of Eleanor and of Tammy from the Big Bottom, thinking of the impossible depth of his debt and of the way Jabari scrubbed the toilet bowl, her chocolate-brown arms and yellow rubber gloves, the long-haired girl in the booth at the campground bent so that her breasts came to rest against her ranger shirt, the woman with her mouth full of fancy trail mix, her fat legs sheathed in black spandex. For a while he mulled Lee Ann Bridges’ skull, her hair barrette, green-hued thigh bone, and shreds of nylon rain gear. Ann of Oregon’s brief oration, darkness falling across the world, the greedy, the selfish, the true believers, the woman whose warts had disappeared and who felt no need for cigarettes now, his own capricious petition. Ann of Oregon clutching her bullhorn, Ann canted forward improbably on her knees, Ann in ecstasy.

Dullness and ennui. Guilt and sorrow. Tom pulled out the Gideon’s pocket Bible he’d borrowed surreptitiously from the nursing station desk and perused its tripartite indexing system: WHERE TO FIND HELP—When Afraid, Anxious, Backsliding, et cetera; TEACHINGS ABOUT SOME OF LIFE’S PROBLEMS—Adultery, Adversity, Anger, Anxiety; CHRISTIAN VIRTUES AND CHARACTER—Abundant Life, Citizenship, Cleanliness, Consecration, Contentment, Courage, Diligence. He turned with curiosity to Facing a Crisis, which took him first to Psalm 121, I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence my help will come, and then to Matthew 6:28, Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin.

Lilies of the field? What? thought Tom. He tried Adversity: Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? Divorce: What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. Worried: Take therefore no thought for the morrow. In Trouble: The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places. Disaster Threatens: He shall cover thee with his feathers. Defeated: For thy sake are we killed all the day long. The prisoner defecated and Tom barged in with rubber gloves, a plastic probe stick, a nose plug, and a surgeon’s mask. There was no balloon and he said to

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