[Faith-talk] Sharing a chapter from one of my unfinished novels

[Poppa Bear]

I have several unfinished writing projects and I thought I would share a
chapter from one and perhaps get a little feedback. It is a faith based
novel and I am pasting the first chapter. I am not sure if there are any
writers on here, and I hope that it isn't way off topic. I just appreciate
the thoughts of many on the list and was curious, and also because I know
that blind people have a tendency to read a lot of books.

 

 

Chapter 1

 

    Ben miller sat in an uncomfortable chair, in a cold dignified looking
office that was all too familiar to him. He looked tired and dejected as his
large shoulders sagged. His two plump hands sat on two piles of papers
spread across his lap. He wished he could just toss the papers full of
unpleasant figures and numbers into a large blazing fire. 

    His sad red rimmed St Bernard eyes looked very tired as he stared
towards a mammoth mahogany desk, and the back of a very large leather chair.
The back of the luminously high chair was too high and too wide to see any
of the figure seated in the chair, but Ben could easily imagine the rigid
posture of the occupant, his habitual scowl, and his keen dark eyes
silently staring out the window. He could hear the monotonous tapping thud
of one long narrow index finger slowly beating against the stiff shiny
leather arm of the chair. It was like the droning sound of a never ending
drip of an old leaky faucet.

    From where Ben was seated he could also see out a small portion of the
window. What he saw was an unfriendly gray October sky, looking very cold,
and prophetically foreboding, as if it secretly carried clouds full of
radioactive gloom showering the city with tiny droplets of depression and
bad news. Right now Ben seem to feel every one of those gloom saturated
drops. The somber sight outside was exactly how he was feeling inside, no
shine, no warmth or any sign of life.

    Slowly and deliberately the chair swiveled around and two narrow and
hardened eyes that were so dark, they almost looked black seemed to draw
down on him. They landed on Ben like two loaded rifles. How many times over
these three decades had those eyes seemed to burn into Ben? They were like
two fiery lasers silently stabbing into his skin, cutting away every ounce
of courage, resolution and joy.

    The man sitting in the high-back chair was Ed Long; he was the program
coordinator for the Good Sheppard Community Church and 1 of two residing
elders. Ben was the treasurer of the church and the second elder that made
up the small eldership at the Good Sheppard. 

    It had been many years since they had had more than two elders. Ed liked
the current situation. It afforded him seemingly unlimited control of the
church with no opposition from anyone especially Ben. Ed was so used to the
power that it only seemed natural at this point for him to make the most
money and have the most say. He would have turned his back in disdain on
anyone who would have questioned the arrangement.

    Even though Ed and Ben were both part of the original founding members
of the church, over the many decades Ed had come to see Ben as a spineless
excuse of a man who was easily persuaded to do about anything as long as it
had a religious stamp on the order. To Ed Ben was only a necessary face for
the church, Ben seemed to remind people of a suffering martyr the way he
dragged himself around the church, from service to service, looking as if
happiness was a Burdon that was too heavy to bear. It seemed to make people
feel that the church was very spiritual and must be vary religious if
somebody who looked like a survivor of the inquisition was one of the elders
and a founding member.

    Ed's low distinct voice cut through the quiet room. "Well Ben, I think
that it's about time for you to get a little more serious about finding a
new Pastor. We have lost 14 members in the last month. Your numbers show
that the offerings are down $3400 over the last 4 Sundays and that is just
not acceptable" 

    "Well Ed, uh, I have posted some ads and exchanged emails with a few
pastors, but really, uh." Ben hesitated before he spoke his next words,
"When I tell them what the position pays they pretty much just end the
conversation and hurry off the phone or don't send any more emails." 

A sneer slowly spread across Ed's face as he sardonically shook his head
back and forth. "All of these so called men of God, taking their ministerial
orders to preach and teach, and give their precious little lives to save the
lost until the theology of old Benjamin Franklin comes up. Oh, what a
different tune they sing then. When they find out that they can't drive a
$50000 car and live in a 3 story house." 

    Ed exhaled a long slow exasperated sigh as if he himself were a martyr
at the mercy of ruthless money grasping Pastors attempting to plunder the
church. "Now Ben, I simply refuse to pay some Pastor a king's ransom for
working what, three or four hours a week? I remember when we first started
this church, the pastor could preach two hours every Sunday, do an evening
service and throw in a Wednesday message all for $300 a month."

    Somewhere  in the recesses of Bens mind he seemed to remember some of
those Pastors, Pastors like old  Frank Jones, a big house of a man who had
been born and raised on a ranch in Texas. He was a good man, and he never
worried about the money, he didn't just preach either, he had been an
electrical engineer who had been relatively well off. This fact wasn't worth
mentioning though, how could it help to bring up something that would only
be harangued and discredited with a condescending remark. Besides, at this
point Ben was just trying to survive, and challenging Ed's infallible
statements would only bring on a barrage of slicing words that cracked
through the air like a bull whip in the hands of an ox cart driver.

    Many years ago Ben had given up attempting to reason with Ed. Ben was
passive by nature and couldn't even take pleasure in winning a point,
because to him that meant that the other person might feel bad. He mistook
the command to turn the other cheek to mean that a person didn't stand up
for anything or against anyone. He had yet to learn that bad would be
thoroughly and completely bad if good didn't stand up against its forceful
and relentless on slot that took herculean strides every second of every day
to make its place in the world look acceptable and right.

Beyond the problem of needing a new Pastor Ben had another matter to discuss
with Ed, a much bigger and much more complicated issue. Just the thought of
it made his stomach start to twist up like a thick sailors knot. The cool
office began to feel like a sauna to him, as two large beads of sweat
gathered on the back of his neck, trickling down his wide fleshy back.

    "With a weary sigh he started, "Ed, I got a notice in the mail from the
bank today and it wasn't good." At the mention of the two words "notice and
bank" in the same sentence Ed sat up a little straighter. His eyes narrowed
and he gave a little nod as if to prod the rest of the information out of
Ben, who looked quite reluctant and even more distressed than usual. 

"Um, well Ed," Ben stammered, starting to wriggle in his seat like a worm
hanging on the end of a fishing hook. "Uh, it isn't good news Ed." "I know
that Ben, you have already said that, now can you please try to compose your
nerves and tell me what the problem is this time."

    Plunging strait into the problem Ben started, "We have 90 days to pay a
$60000 balloon payment to the bank. I thought that it wasn't do for another
4 years at least! We just don't have the money Ed, it's not there."

    The more Ben talked the quicker the words tumbled from him, "You want a
new Pastor, but I am not sure we can even keep the doors open three months
from now. We might go into foreclosure. We still owe eighteen thousand for
the new sound system that you and Mike requested last fall, and it was
because of that whole deal that Howell left in the first place."

    Ed, who was already growing very angry tighten his jaw and his temples
started to bulge at Ben's last statement. It was true that their now ex
Pastor Howell disagreed with the idea to obtain new equipment; rather he
felt he should have a medical benefits package for him and his wife. 

    Now with Ben even making the slightest allusion to the decision, as if
he were questioning the choice caused Ed to sit forward in the desk and make
his presence and irritation very, very clear to Ben. On seeing Ed's raging
facial features less than a yard from his face now, Ben thought it best to
stop speaking. Ben wanted to scoot his chair back away from the look of
fiery anger dancing in Ed's eyes, but didn't dare.

In a low voice saturated with pent up anger Ed asked, "So Ben, how did
something like this happen? I thought you were an accountant, I thought you
actually were being paid to do something around here! But now you come and
tell me that we can't make a little balloon payment?

    It was true that Ben held a degree in accounting, but the toll that the
thirty plus years of constantly being under Ed's verbal abuse and mental
distress had taken on him had left Ben as fearful as a mouse in a barn with
20 cats. Ben was so used to being crushed under the weight of Ed's forceful
personality that he literally had nightmares about the man. It was almost as
if Ben had a type of post traumatic stress syndrome, similar to people who
suffer through catastrophic events and long-term abuse. After decades of
dealing with Ed's rollercoaster rage and unreasonable demands Ben's ability
to even complete tasks of daily living sometimes became ridden with fear and
anxiety.

    Ed suddenly sat back in his chair and with a coaxing smile said to Ben,
"Well Ben, we have made it this far, I know you can get this turned around.
We'll just tighten the belt a little. Let's start by making some personal
sacrifices. We will put our missionary funds on hold until this blows over
and, what else?"

    He drummed his index finger on the arm of his chair and looking at Ben,
tilted his head as if he had the perfect idea. "You can take a small pay cut
for a few months. If you take home two thousand seven hundred  a month now,
I am sure you can get by with say, twenty one hundred?" There was no real
question in Ed's statement, it was a fact and Ben knew it, and rather than
question Ed's logic he would rather face his wife and explain to her what he
was going to have to do.

    Ben didn't dare mention that Ed's $5000 a month salary was one of the
things that was choking the life out of the church. The fact that Ed leased
a new car every 3 years and the church paid for it along with the insurance
didn't help at all either. Besides, how could suspending the missionary
fund, which Ed had already cut in half, and whittling away at Bens salary
even begin to address the problem of the enormous balloon payment?

    The way things sat just seemed to sink Ben into an even deeper
depression if that was at all possible. It made his skin crawl, Ed always
shifting from a kind of Dr. Jeckal to some sort of Mr. Hyde, smiling, using
that singsong tone right before he lowered his ax for the death blow, in the
same way he had just lopped off Ben's salary without any hesitation. It made
Ben dizzy to even try to follow the slashing patterns that cut so randomly
and inconsiderately through the church as well as his own personal life. At
this point Ben eyed the door with a longing wishful look and slowly started
to stack the papers in his lap into a single pile and place them into a
briefcase at his side. As he did this Ed turned his chair back towards the
window and Ben was grateful to no longer be under the range of those two
distressing cat like eyes, and as if being temporarily freed from their
control he made haste to move his large bulk out of the door without so much
as a good by.