Plague Journal (Children of the Last Days) by Michael O'Brien

Author:Michael O'Brien [O'Brien, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
ISBN: 9780898709810
Publisher: Ignatius Press
Published: 2009-06-02T06:00:00+00:00

Five

January 19—6 P.M.

We have found temporary refuge with the Thu family in their boat on the shore of Canoe Lake. How grateful I am for this wonderful family. Matthew has gone off to town in his mobile wreckage. He has the night shift at the restaurant. The Thu boys are showing Tyler their vast hockey card collection. Zöe is reading aloud from The Lord of the Rings to the Thu girls. I doubt they understand much of it, but they are sitting beside her on the couch, their black eyes wide with rapture.

I called my father earlier today, but he doesn’t believe my side of the story. I thought that he of all people would give me the benefit of the doubt. But I guess he couldn’t bring himself to escape from the liberal ghetto. This is a source of real pain. I don’t know what we’re going to do next.

* * *

“You look sad, Natano”, says Anthony.

I put my pen down and nod. “Yes, I guess I am sad.”

“Because of your friend on phone?”

“Yes.”

“He no believe you?”

“He no believe me.”

How does a seventeen-year-old understand things so well? He’s not an especially brilliant boy, though he is perceptive. The whole family is that way. Are we large, crude, open books easily read by these people?

He gives me a sympathetic look but says no more.

After supper Tyler and Zöe and I wash up the dishes in a galvanized tub. The littlest Thus are getting into pyjamas in the stern cabin. Grandma went off with the baby to the forward cabin a few minutes ago and is just now returning. The baby, we hope, is asleep for the night. Jeanne is issuing commands, and even the biggest boys humbly obey her. She wants the main room spruced up after the day’s mayhem.

Then we’re commanded to kneel around the kitchen table—all of us. The family immediately obeys as if this is perfectly normal. It’s quite a culture shock for us to be on our knees in a crowd of Oriental Christians. Tyler and Zöe look at me, I nod, and we obey. We do pray at home—usually at Christmas and Easter and funerals—but nothing like this, for we’re lazy sprawlers, late Western Catholics. Now, to our surprise, we are immersed in stillness. It enwraps everyone except the youngest girls. They wiggle a little, as any children would, but there is a basic attention.

Grandma begins to pray with closed eyes. The words are Vietnamese, but the fervor has a universal quality, remarkably similar to the tone and expression of faces I’ve seen in Rome, in a basement in Kiev, at a Coptic church in Egypt, at a shrine in Portugal, and at a secret jungle Mass in Central America. I’ve been all over the world in the course of my work as a journalist. I’ve been to many beautiful places and witnessed fabulous ceremonies. Never before have I experienced what is happening here.

The old woman falls silent, then she flips open a book and passes it to Anthony.

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