watching Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory , the old one with Gene Wilder.
“Life occurs at conception,” I said.
“Do you just repeat everything people tell you?”
“I’ve thought about it plenty. And it doesn’t matter when the baby becomes a baby. If you let it grow long enough, it’s a baby. This debate about when, exactly, it becomes a baby is stupid.”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said.
“And you just repeat everything people tell you, too. Only it’s the opposite thing I repeat.” I thought I’d made a good point, which she confirmed by not saying anything. But maybe she wouldn’t have to go through with it—she wouldn’t have to have the baby or kill it—because we’d be saved. And after we were saved, the great storms and fires would descend upon the earth and then the earth would explode, and after it had exploded, it would be sucked up by a black hole followed by a quiet that was so quiet it would blow your eardrums out.
I wanted to believe we were special. I wanted to believe all of it—heaven and happiness and joy unlike anything I’d ever known.
“Okay,” she said. “Life occurs at conception and we’re going to heaven and it’s going to be fucking awesome.”
“You have to believe it.”
“I wish you’d stop telling me what I have to believe. I’ve never been to church once—not once—and felt the presence of God, or anything else. So what exactly do you want me to believe in?” She handed me a cup and sat on our parents’ bed.
“I don’t want this,” I said.
“So don’t drink it. Answer me, what should I believe in?”
“It’s about faith. You have to have faith,” I said, realizing it was my own faith that was the issue. Elise had already decided God didn’t exist and she was okay with it. I wanted to go back to the time when I hadn’t thought about whether or not I believed, when I’d gone to church and Sunday school and passed out tracts and it never occurred to me to question any of it. Now everything was in question, all at once, and it mattered.
“What about you?” she said. “Do you feel the presence of God when you’re in church, or do you just stare at peoples’ asses and try not to yell curse words at the top of your lungs? Because that’s what I do. Or I play hangman with you. I like those little sushi pencils.”
I stuck my tongue in the cup—whiskey on ice, undrinkable. I didn’t say anything, but she kept looking at me, waiting. “I count colors,” I said. “How many people are wearing purple or yellow or green?”
“That’s just sad.”
“It’s always some odd color that everybody’s wearing, like half the congregation woke up and decided to wear orange.”
“Wow,” she said. “You’re really boring. It must be really boring to be you.”
“Sometimes I count fat people or bald heads.”
“Bor-ing.”
I spent most of my time, however, looking around at the other families, trying to determine how we stacked up. I looked at bodies and faces, hair and clothes and demeanors. We were usually pretty high up, because of Elise and my mother’s church involvement.
“On Saturday night, I’m going to take off all my clothes and leave them on the grass at whatever shithole motel we’re staying in, and then I’m going to hide in a bush and watch everybody freak out,” she said.
“Good for you.”
We sat there for a while, not saying anything. She drank her whiskey. I looked at my feet. I needed to do something with my feet.
“This isn’t the first time this has happened, you know. Every generation’s predicted the end of the world. We can’t control war or unemployment or drug addiction or poverty but we can predict an end to these things, which makes them seem not so bad.” She picked up her phone and typed while I waited, fingering the birthmark on my thigh. It was pale and Jamaica-shaped. As far as birthmarks went, it was nice.
“Okay,” she said, “William Miller, a Baptist pastor,
“Life occurs at conception,” I said.
“Do you just repeat everything people tell you?”
“I’ve thought about it plenty. And it doesn’t matter when the baby becomes a baby. If you let it grow long enough, it’s a baby. This debate about when, exactly, it becomes a baby is stupid.”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said.
“And you just repeat everything people tell you, too. Only it’s the opposite thing I repeat.” I thought I’d made a good point, which she confirmed by not saying anything. But maybe she wouldn’t have to go through with it—she wouldn’t have to have the baby or kill it—because we’d be saved. And after we were saved, the great storms and fires would descend upon the earth and then the earth would explode, and after it had exploded, it would be sucked up by a black hole followed by a quiet that was so quiet it would blow your eardrums out.
I wanted to believe we were special. I wanted to believe all of it—heaven and happiness and joy unlike anything I’d ever known.
“Okay,” she said. “Life occurs at conception and we’re going to heaven and it’s going to be fucking awesome.”
“You have to believe it.”
“I wish you’d stop telling me what I have to believe. I’ve never been to church once—not once—and felt the presence of God, or anything else. So what exactly do you want me to believe in?” She handed me a cup and sat on our parents’ bed.
“I don’t want this,” I said.
“So don’t drink it. Answer me, what should I believe in?”
“It’s about faith. You have to have faith,” I said, realizing it was my own faith that was the issue. Elise had already decided God didn’t exist and she was okay with it. I wanted to go back to the time when I hadn’t thought about whether or not I believed, when I’d gone to church and Sunday school and passed out tracts and it never occurred to me to question any of it. Now everything was in question, all at once, and it mattered.
“What about you?” she said. “Do you feel the presence of God when you’re in church, or do you just stare at peoples’ asses and try not to yell curse words at the top of your lungs? Because that’s what I do. Or I play hangman with you. I like those little sushi pencils.”
I stuck my tongue in the cup—whiskey on ice, undrinkable. I didn’t say anything, but she kept looking at me, waiting. “I count colors,” I said. “How many people are wearing purple or yellow or green?”
“That’s just sad.”
“It’s always some odd color that everybody’s wearing, like half the congregation woke up and decided to wear orange.”
“Wow,” she said. “You’re really boring. It must be really boring to be you.”
“Sometimes I count fat people or bald heads.”
“Bor-ing.”
I spent most of my time, however, looking around at the other families, trying to determine how we stacked up. I looked at bodies and faces, hair and clothes and demeanors. We were usually pretty high up, because of Elise and my mother’s church involvement.
“On Saturday night, I’m going to take off all my clothes and leave them on the grass at whatever shithole motel we’re staying in, and then I’m going to hide in a bush and watch everybody freak out,” she said.
“Good for you.”
We sat there for a while, not saying anything. She drank her whiskey. I looked at my feet. I needed to do something with my feet.
“This isn’t the first time this has happened, you know. Every generation’s predicted the end of the world. We can’t control war or unemployment or drug addiction or poverty but we can predict an end to these things, which makes them seem not so bad.” She picked up her phone and typed while I waited, fingering the birthmark on my thigh. It was pale and Jamaica-shaped. As far as birthmarks went, it was nice.
“Okay,” she said, “William Miller, a Baptist pastor,
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