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

[Sheila Leigland]

Hi, I hope you finish this one. I'd like to know how this one turns out 
and what happpend to poor Ben.
On 7/24/2014 12:01 PM, Poppa Bear via Faith-talk wrote:
> 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.
>
>   
>
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