Chapter 5: Away from the Outhouse

I don't know how long I lay unconscious in the recliner, but when I came awake I ached all over. My mouth was dry and a horrible taste gagged me. My eyelids were stuck shut. When I finally pried them open it didn't make any difference anyway. It was dark in the house.

Evil little men with big hammers banged away inside my skull and I felt dizzy and nauseous. Then I remembered a very important fact in my life. If I drink even a small glass of beer I get sick. I decided I had a hangover and made my way into the bedroom, undressed and took a shower. The cold water helped. I switched to warm water and soaped down and rinsed off. Slightly refreshed, I dried off and got dressed in the clothes I found most comfortable, blue jeans and a sports shirt.

The clock told me it was almost midnight. I put on my parka and gloves and opened the back door I looked out. Even at this late hour there were gawkers out there alongside the roadway. I ignored them all and headed out through the back gate.

The two does met me and nudged my hand. I patted them and rubbed under their chins and along the soft fur at the fronts of their necks. They weren't very hungry right then; they wanted attention. Deer are as affectionate as dogs when they sense you like them.

It was nice how they asked nothing of me more than petting and the occasional snack. Everyone else, everybody and his cousin wanted something from me, even Rachel. Yet, none of them ever asked me what I wanted. Nor did they wait for me to tell them. Right then I felt more than a little sorry for myself. I also felt lonely and all alone, completely cut off from all the rest of humanity.

I turned back toward the house. The two mooches followed me a few steps then returned the relative protection of the trees. Mamma skunk and her brood were just inside the gate munching away on the now frozen way out of season blackberries. A rabbit scampered up and flattened himself out in front of me. I scooped him up and held him close for a moment. He kicked to get down after a few strokes. I smiled and headed back into the house. For some reason those few moments calmed me down a little.

When I came into the house and hung my parka on the peg by the door, I saw the lights were on in the living room. Ralph sat at my main computer as he sent out a story for one of his publications. Silently Rachel came to me and said, "I'm sorry, Forrest." She hugged me close and added in a soft voice, "I never realized how much of a strain all this must be on you. I expected you to act as I wanted you to act and didn't consider what you wanted."

"Rachel, I love you and right now I don't know what I want." I fell silent and did what I always do when I need "thinking room." I went to the kitchen and made a fresh pot of coffee.

"Forrest, please understand I was raised in the church. My whole family is made up of active church members. When we met you turned my world upside down. Then this miraculous change happened in you and my world just changed again. Sweetheart, I feel like a stranger in a strange land and I'm scared and I need reassurance.

"Rachel, I'm beginning to see our whole perspectives are very different. For starters you see whatever has happened to me as a gift from God and I don't. I do not want this gift, if it truly is a gift. This so-called gift seems to come with a price tag and I don't think I'm willing to pay the price." I placed my hands on her shoulders and looked deeply into her eyes.

She nodded and pressed her face against my chest. "Oh, Forrest, please just hold me and tell me things are going to be all right. You don't know how much you mean to me. You changed everything, right from when we first met in High school.

"After you walked away from Church headquarters there was a great big fuss raised. President Christiansen started to yell and the security person punched him in the mouth. Then two others came out to ask where you were. I told them exactly what happened and they became quite angry. President Christiansen said he couldn't understand what all the fuss was about, after all, you aren't even a member of the church." The way she grinned told me that was a fond memory.

"Well, what happened next?" It seemed as if two of the old men had a little gumption after all.

"Elder Fortner suggested Bishop Christiansen should wait for a new calling in the church. Then Elder Drake said as far as he knew God was not limited solely to the Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints."

"I like those two old men and I never met them. They sound like they think for themselves." After all the trouble the church had inadvertently given me, it felt nice to hear there were two of its members who thought for themselves.

Ralph stuck his head out of my office long enough to relay the message, "Well, it looks like you're about to get a chance to tell them in person how you feel. Elder Fortner's secretary just called and asked if Elders Fortner and Drake could come out tomorrow morning and speak with you."

Rachel continued, "After what happened at Church Headquarters, I won't say a word. Whatever you want to do is okay with me. I've started to ask a few questions about things myself." She still had her troubled look.

"Honey, why don't you sleep in my bed and I'll pull out the hide-a-bed in my office."

"Forrest," Rachel asked me carefully, trying to sound casual about it, "When did you start to drink?" She held up the empty wine bottle.

I gave a rueful laugh, "I'm afraid it was a big mistake. I felt uptight when I got back here and tried to drown my sorrows. That bottle was a present last year from one of my suppliers. It's been on a shelf gathering dust until I drank it and got sick. I passed out and felt miserable when I woke up."

"Good," she said vehemently, "I don't want you to get in the habit of drinking anything stronger than your coffee."

"You go on to bed and I'll run Ralph off to the other bedroom so I can prepare the day bed in my office." I squeezed her hand and called for Ralph to finish whatever he was doing. I entered my small office and stopped, amazed at all the activity.

My printer was spewing out page after page of something printed on both sides. My main computer was downloading files from yet another computer. Ralph sat at the keyboard of the computer I use mostly for research. His fingers flashed over the keyboard in a blur as he transmitted orders to underlings back east.

"Good grief, Ralph, what are you doing, trying to see if you can burn out three computers at once?" Even my scanner/fax machine was clicking happily away.

He hit the "Enter" button and leaned back in my custom-built office chair with a sigh. "Hoo boy, it is hard to run a business by remote control. You are taking up more of my time than I anticipated. I like this chair, by the way." He stood and stretched. "Now just so tomorrow will not be a total loss, we have an appointment in Denver in the afternoon. You're scheduled to appear on Dan Maloney's television show. Please treat him gentler than you did that Gooding guy." He leaned back and grinned.

"And how many reasons do I have for being on the Dan Mahoney Show?" I asked in a sarcastic voice, referring to the five thousand dollars Ralph garnered for the Hal Gooding appearance.

"Oh, double what you got before but with a twist. After the show you are going to visit a children's burn ward. The visit is a freebie." He paused for a dramatic second and added, "Well, if you don't want to make the trip, we can stay right here."

"Ralph, you have again placed me in a bad spot and you know it. If you ever do this again, I'll walk away from you and everything else. I will not be manipulated by you or by anybody. No more appearances will be booked unless I first know in advance. I reserve the right to veto anything I don't like. Now if you don't like it, you can leave right now. I mean it."

He looked at my face and saw I was serious. "Okay," he said without further argument. Ralph had bought and bullied his way through life in the business world. But he had also learned to not push when it would do no good. He knew this was one of those times.

I walked over to day bed and removed the cushions. "Rachel is in my bed so I'll camp in here," I told him, "Good night."

I sat down on the side of the bed and closed my eyes for a moment. All of a sudden I felt so very tired. I went to sleep still sitting there. Alcohol has an "echo effect" on me when I drink it. Two or three hours after I pass out and come to, I'll pass out again. This was the third time I drank to excess and the third time it happened to me. I decided getting drunk was not worth the bother.

"Forrest, wake up." Rachel shook my shoulder. "Forrest, it's almost ten o'clock and Elder Fortner and Elder Drake will be here any minute now. Go get cleaned up and make yourself presentable for them."

I opened my eyes and saw a perfectly turned out Rachel, all dressed up and looking like she had just stepped out of a beauty salon. It made my throat ache to look at her. "People who look so good in the morning, as you do right now, ought to be punished somehow." I told her.

I became aware of the taste in my mouth. "Yuck," I said and stumbled toward my recently vacated bedroom.

"Behind me I heard Ralph grumble, "Good. Now our Sleeping Beauty is up, I can get some work done." I closed the bedroom door behind me and undressed, leaving a trail of discarded clothes on the floor behind me. The icy cold needles of water punished me for whatever sins I might have committed if I had the chance to commit them. As soon as the icy spray woke me up, I switched to hot water and soaped down and rinsed off.

Minutes later I strode almost dressed into the kitchen and started my coffee pot and put on shoes and socks. I heard a scratching at the back door. Mama skunk and her two offspring were there, waiting for me to open the door. She regally led her growing larger by the day babies into the warm kitchen and chirped at me.

"You are becoming more bother than some women I know." I told her as I placed a handful of trail mix in a shallow bowl and placed it on the floor in front of her. She and her two young quickly demolished their ration and demanded more. I placed another handful in the dish and stepped back.

"Careful what you say there, Buster," Rachel said from behind me. She hugged me and saw mamma skunk feeding from the bowl. "You are such a softie."

Ralph came into the kitchen, lured by the aroma of fresh brewed Blue Mountain Jamaican coffee. "They don't bite, do they?" he asked.

Rachel laughed, "No, they don't bite, but if you ever make one mad, you'll wish you got bit instead of the alternative." She thought a moment then asked him, "You have never been around wild animals before, have you?"

"In Manhattan all the wild animals have two legs and try to rob you," he answered. "I just came to tell you your friends are here."

Friends? It took a moment to realize what he meant. The two general authorities from the Mormon Church had arrived. I took a last sip of coffee and went into the living room. "Good morning," I greeted them with reserve. I still felt resentful from the previous day's occurrence.

"Good Morning, Brother Eden," Elder Drake greeted me. We shook hands and I gestured for them to be seated.

"Brother Eden, how did you choose such a distinctive surname?" Elder Fortner asked.

It was a stupid assumption on his part. "Look, fellows, maybe this isn't such a good idea after all. I'm sorry to have wasted your time. But to start with, I imagine there have been many generations of Edens. I am merely the latest one. The original family name could have been something else originally. Maybe my mother made it up, who knows or cares? I did not choose the name, it was chosen for me."

"But we could find no applicable records on the name Eden in the church archives," Elder Drake protested.

"Well, it might be because no member of my family has ever been within spitting distance of Mormonism. Perhaps we were originally Catholics who became Anglicans and then whatever. I was mostly raised Southern Baptist." I exaggerated.

"My last foster mother attended services at a Missionary Baptist church in West Jordan when we lived there. After a few episodes in Sunday school when I questioned their church doctrine it was suggested I would find greater happiness and enlightenment in a pagan church, or words to that effect.

"But your fiancé, Sister Nelson, is a very active member of the Church," protested Elder Drake. "It seems there has been a breakdown in information gathering here."

"No, not at all. The fact of the matter is I have never done anything to come to your attention except to become engaged to Rachel. I write my ads and sell my wares, travel to exotic places like East Los Angeles on an occasional buying trip and lead a quiet life."

"Oh," Elder Fortner said. "Well permit me to ask this question, do you feel anything spiritual when you use your amazing gift? Is there a sense of the, ah, divine?" He looked a little embarrassed at his choice of words.

"No, all I ever felt at all was a sort of tingling, much like an electric current come from somewhere deep inside me and flow out through my hand. The only time I felt anything different was when the disfigured boy got cured. Then the effect, or whatever it is, was a hundred times stronger and I felt it start in my brain, deep inside and flow along my arm and into his face."

"Ah, yes, we saw a rerun of the whole incident and came to the conclusion the green glowing aura we saw was a carefully contrived special effect. There are no references to green halos anywhere in church history."

I got a little testy right then. "This is where you in your arrogance keep falling flat on your collective religious faces. You assume either it's completely in accordance with Mormon experience and history or it's somehow a fake." I shook my head and continued, "From what I can tell the Baptists and the Church of Christ, the Catholics and nearly all the other denominations labor under the same illusions. You seem to think it's either in line with your teachings or it's of questionable validity."

"But, but, but we have to have a continuity in our Church doctrine or it ... is not valid," Elder Drake protested.

"Well, if you wish to argue and contradict what I say, you might as well go home and believe what you will. I will not be a lap dog when I have no interest in your church or any other. Okay?"

Elder Fortner held up his hand in a placating gesture, "Please, young man. Please be patient with two old men whose lives have turned inside out. All the questions we had prepared are no longer germane to the issues here. Please tell us by what authority you do these things." The old man was in a world of spiritual hurt.

More gentle than before, I told him, "I have no so called 'authority' from anybody. I never asked for this gift and I don't particularly want it. I am not a holy man. I make no pretensions of holiness, wisdom or anything else but what I am, just me."

Mama skunk wandered into the room and tried to climb up my leg. I lifted her up and her two babies wanted up also. I lifted them up one at a time and they all three snuggled up against me and went to sleep. I absently stroked them. Rachel must have let them in.

"Ah, have they been de-scented?" Elder Drake asked nervously.

"I hope not. After all it is their natural defense against predators. These are not born in captivity animals. Ever since I removed a sticker from her paw, the mother skunk seems to have adopted me. Otherwise they are wild as wild can be. They just dropped by for a snack. This winter is colder than usual in the mountains and the animals need a little help to survive. I leave salt licks out and around on the mountain behind here and feed the hungriest animals to help them make it through the lean times. Animals trust me."

"Forrest Eden, if you were a member of the Church, membership would be up a thousand percent," Elder Fortner said wistfully.

"And it would be up for all the wrong reasons. People who need such things as miracles are very shallow and would not benefit your church or themselves by converting. As you are aware, Jesus taught the very same thing. Remember his warning about those who demand miracles?" Sometimes I even amaze me at the trivia I've picked up through years as an avid reader.

In silence they both looked at me and nodded and never said a word. I gently placed the skunks gently on the floor and stood. I walked to the back door and opened it and they obediently walked outside. "Oh boy." I exclaimed, "Rachel, come here, quick."

"What is it, Forrest?" she hurried up and saw what I saw. "Oh boy." she exclaimed. Two no longer pregnant does stood at the bottom of the steps and looked up at me.

I started to laugh, "Our moochers have multiplied."

Rachel hurried down the steps and stroked the new mothers' cheeks and squatted down to examine the very shaky on their feet babies. The onlookers along the fence all began to cheer. "They are so beautiful." Quickly she stood and hurried back into the house.

Without a coat on, a couple of minutes were all she cared to stay outside. I slipped on a parka and took another five-pound plastic bag of mix outside and opened it up for the two new mothers. Mama skunk and her two hurried over to get their share.

I came back inside just as the two elders started to put on their coats. "I find nothing here to take exception to," Elder Fortner said. Elder Drake nodded and they took their leave. The deputy let them out the front gate and they drove away.

"Come on and get ready, the chopper will be here in a few minutes," Ralph told me. I nodded and hurried to grab a coat.

"Aren't you going to dress up?" Rachel asked me.

"Nope. I don't have anyone to impress. They can take me as I am or don't." I wasn't being stubborn so much as I wanted to assert my independence. I refused to let the lure of money or fame or whatever cause me to lose track of whom I was inside.

She saw I meant it and said, "Well, at least wear your clean parka. It's cold in Denver." She smiled fondly at me and shook her head.

I barely got the parka on and partially zipped when I heard the "whup, whup" sound as a helicopter landed in my front yard. The inside of my circular drive was the perfect size for the pilot to land in. As we hurried out to get aboard I thought how easy it was to get used to this more affluent life style. I noticed the call letters of the Denver television station on the side of the helicopter. I figured this was the VIP treatment. I wondered if we would have to hitch hike home if I made them mad in Denver.

I buckled in beside Rachel and Ralph sat up front beside the pilot. I felt my stomach fall into a pit as we quickly took off and headed eastward. Rachel looked down at the countryside passing underneath us in wide-eyed wonder. "This is the first time I have ever been up in one of these," she told me in a shaky voice.

A little voice inside me warned I better not get too accustomed to this sort of thing. Reluctantly I agreed with the little voice. I did have to admit that there is something very alluring about being driven in a limousine and flying from my front door to my destination hundreds of miles away. I began to appreciate just a little of what temptation was all about.

It took us less than three hours to make it from my house to the Denver TV station where we landed on the roof. Two nice seeming people with all the sincerity of Arabian used camel dealers met us. A toothy guy of about thirty smiled his insincerity and said, "Welcome. If you'll come this way we'll take you to makeup and then wait for your turn to go on."

The equally phony young woman smiled a sisterly smile at Rachel and led her away. "Hey. Where are you going?" I called after them.

"Not to worry, just a little gab between us girls," The woman in the electric blue blazer called back. They disappeared around the corner while a prototype for the latest model talking head took Ralph and I in another direction.

He led the way to a door marked "Makeup." Ralph parked himself on a low couch along one side of the room and watched while a motherly looking woman seated me and got busy. She sprayed and brushed my hair and applied eye shadow. Halfway through the process I caught a glimpse of me in the mirror and stood up. "I look like a freak." I yelled at her.

I spied a sink in the corner and hurried over to wash the junk off my face. My eyes had so much shadow they looked like they were buried in a coal bin. Light wrinkles were drawn on my forehead and the slicked down hair made me look like a sissified freak. I scrubbed with soap and water until I got most of the gunk off. I finger combed my hair back to its usual shaggy look.