Camp Damascus(21)

Cotard’s syndrome is a rare mental disorder that makes people believe they’re dead.

The Turritopsis dohrnii jellyfish lives forever. As far as science can tell, it’s the only immortal species on record.

I’ve buried myself in death facts, devouring everything I can find on the subject. My behavior is obsessive, and I know it, but it’s better than staring at the wall for hours on end, watching shadows gradually creep across my bedroom as a thousand intrusive questions dance through my mind.

What kind of god would let this happen?

Is Martina really happy now?

Because she certainly didn’t look happy with her head cracked around backward, her spinal column shredded, and her shattered bones rending her flesh like hundreds of tiny knives.

A shudder rolls across my frame as I revisit this terrible image, tears forming at the corners of my eyes that I swiftly wipe away. I dive back into the massive blocks of text on my phone, returning to an article about the burial customs of ancient Greece.

“You okay?” my mother’s voice sounds from the doorway behind me.

I scramble to tuck away my device, which they’ve made clear is for emergencies only. In any other circumstance I’d be receiving a hearty taste of parental discipline, but it appears Lisa has momentarily holstered the whip.

Mom steps onto the wooden porch and stands behind me, gazing across the backyard. There’s not much of a view here, just a huge patch of grass and an abrupt line of trees at the far end, but it’s quiet.

“Wanna go on a walk?” my mother asks.

I don’t, but after sitting inside for two weeks this idea might be the lesser evil.

I glance back at her, struggling to plaster on the most natural expression I can manage. Typically, I’m great at masking, but right now the cracks are simply too profound to maintain.

“Sure,” I offer, my voice wavering slightly.

Right-handed people live an average of three years longer than left-handed people.

I stand up and move past her, making my way into the house as I gather my things. I grab a jacket and pull on my shoes, ready for a temperature drop as the evening settles in around us.

Soon, we’re heading down the front steps and taking our usual right turn up the quiet suburban street.

This walk is a ritual for Mom and me, a little moment for us to connect in ways directly spoken and otherwise. The modest neighborhood loop has gotten me through a lot, but nothing quite like this.

We remain silent at first, the soft pulse of our middle-class hamlet filling in the spaces between words. Sprinklers shuffle and churn as dogs bark in the distance. I pick up on children laughing behind the fence next door, and the faintest chime of a bicycle bell rings out just a few blocks onward. It’s not as crowded as other neighborhoods, with plenty of distance and swaths of forest between the houses, but this time of the evening it seems like everyone’s up to something.

After we pass by a handful of familiar abodes, my mother points over at a home on the corner.

“Adultery,” she offers. “Husband is cheating on his wife with…”

Mom drifts off for a moment, considering her options.

“The maid,” she finally concludes.

I remain silent, unable to play along. I refuse to turn and assess the target.

“Come on, Rose,” my mother continues.

All I can do is shake my head, then abruptly stop in my tracks as tears begin to well.

Mom sees it coming, but she doesn’t demand I pull myself together. That’s what my dad would do.

To be fair, though, he’s absolutely right.

Tobias Herrod Cobel wouldn’t have accomplished a damn thing without perseverance and sacrifice, and that spirt runs deep through the congregation. The Industrial Revolution wasn’t a great time for a workplace accident, especially one that took his hand and stole two months of his life in a coma, but without that horrible moment the Prophet would never have received his vision, and without his vision we wouldn’t have Kingdom of the Pine.

Prophet Cobel managed to pull himself up by his bootstraps, and he had it much worse than this.

My mother doesn’t recite any of the tenets, however. She doesn’t remind me of Tobias’s story or tell me to have faith. Instead, she opens her arms wide and wraps me in a tight hug.

We stay like this for a long while, until I finally pull back and instinctively reach up to brush the tears from my eyes. There’s nothing to wipe away, however. I’m all cried out.

My mother starts walking again and I follow her lead.

“Husband cheating with the maid,” she reminds me.

I glance over at the light blue structure, warm light emanating from the kitchen where a family loudly clinks their dishes and laughs with their whole bellies. It’s hard to picture the story Mom’s created, especially given that the Kimberlys live here and we know them very well, but I go with it.

“Send the couple to church counseling,” I offer. “Fire the maid. Remind them of John 3:18, Ephesians 5:33 … Exodus 20:14, obviously.”

Mom nods along, my skills of biblical recollection so precise that it actually prompts her to chuckle in amazement. “That’s great,” she offers. “Consider them saved.”

We continue onward, strolling up the next lane as it curves and sweeps around a large hill. This section of the route is a little more forested than the rest, trees stretching out over the road and a modest creek trickling parallel to cracked pavement.