1/0: Entries from the End Times

10/Pig

I have shoved <participant id = 0> onto his side, so he won’t choke on his puke, though I do want to choke him for ruining my dinner. I had to throw it away because he sprayed a bunch of broken glass into it upon his intrusion. He seemed to be having a seizure. He accidentally slapped me when I placed couch cushions under his head. Additionally, he kicked me between the legs. Though I do not possess testes, and I suspect the pain I felt is a fraction of what I would’ve experienced if I did have one, the sun did in fact go down on my indignation. I’ve dimmed the lights, draped cool towels on his neck, and draped more towels over the tainted carpet. He has settled down. His heartbeat remains abnormal.

When I could not tolerate his stench any longer, I sat by the golden lake. I did not dare to ascertain as to whether it seemed golden due to the presence of actual gold in the water, or if it were simply the shade of the iguana’s urine. Leviticus 11:30 - 31 states that the gecko, the monitor lizard, the skink, and the chameleon, that all animals that move along the ground are unclean for us. I assume the iguana is included among them, but I am uncertain. In any case, my main concern is not that I will consume it, but that it will consume me.

11/Pig

Took what felt like forty days and forty nights to clean the carpet with dish soap, white vinegar, and water, but <participant id = 0> proceeded to puke on it after it air dried. Almost disobeyed the sixth commandment. The stench is as bad as I imagine the Lake of Fire to smell. His heartbeat has slowed significantly.

Came across the hairless dog while harvesting vegetables from my garden. The Hebrew word for “dog” is keh-lev, which kabbalistic spiritualists translate to “like the heart.” Revelations says that those who practice magic, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood are like dogs. I’ve always liked dogs. My zodiac sign is a dog.

12/Pig

I have successfully cleaned the carpet! Through the grace of God, I have mustered the might to remove the carpet, drape it over the laundry lines, and carry <participant id= 0> onto the couch. His pulse seems stronger. However, he still smells like the Lake of Fire.

To keep him conscious enough to have a small sip of water, I talked to him about the iguana. He told me that Spanish medieval bestiaries referred to iguanas as a type of serpent, and that the caciques welcomed Columbus’ brother by forcing him to eat an iguana. Columbus called it a lapdog, lizard, wall lizard, calf, and snake all mixed into one. <participant id = 0> called Columbus “Colum-bitch,” which I now realize I probably should not have recorded.

13/Pig

Lord, release me from the shackles of the devil. I decided to see if I could shower <participant id = 0> without waking him. Halfway through scrubbing him down, he arose from the water and subjected me to a shock that momentarily sent me to the sulfurous lake itself. He passed out before I could apologize profusely, so I ask that you would renew my eyes and cleanse my conscience of the sight of his genitalia, which has severely sullied my mind.

14/Pig

Praise the Lord! After five days of looking after <participant id = 0>, his heartbeat has returned to normal, and he has agreed to have another small sip of water. He asked if I had any alcohol. He appeared deeply disappointed when I presented him with my bottle of cooking wine, and assured me that water would do. When I told him that You could turn water into wine, he requested that I immediately “hook him up” with You. When I asked him about the barf, he told me he had food poisoning from his expired canned food. When I asked him about the seizure, he told me he’s had epilepsy since childhood. When I asked him about his sniffling, he said he had a bad pollen allergy. I did not have to ask him to know he lied straight through his teeth.

Takes one to know one.

15/Pig

Worthy are You, my Lord and God, to receive glory, and honor, and power, for You created <participant id = 0>, and by Your will he existed and was created. He has offered to repair my roof, and he has made much progress! A profound affection for mankind, and particularly this man, has saturated my spirit. I like this more than I thought I would, having someone else in my house.

I told <participant id = 0> about the hairless dog. He says it is a Xoloitzcuintli and a symbol of Xolotl, an idol of lightning, death, and fire that guides the souls of the dead. The Aztecs depicted them without collars because they believed it would restrict their passing between the realms of those that lived and those that did not. It makes sense to me. If my best friend collared me, they would not be my best friend anymore.

16/Pig

<participant id = 0> fell through the roof and fell on me. Currently recuperating on the couch with him. My patience wears paper thin. I now see why You said, “Let a man meet a she-bear robbed of her cubs rather than a fool in his folly.”

17/Pig

While <participant id = 0> repaired the roof, I baked chocolate chip cookies, so he could have a snack whenever he came down. He recommended that I open a bakery. I told him that I wanted to have a flower cafe, but I didn't bother because there were no more customers.

If it is Your will for me to have a flower cafe, these would be the flowers I would incorporate into my arrangements:

Vitis vinifera (Vine)

Prunus dulcis (Almond blossom)

Hyssopus officinalis (Hyssop)

Passiflora incarnata (Passion flower)

<Log date = 17-4-Movement>

<message id =1>

<participant id = 3></participant>

This is an oFficial broadcast from NEon Jerusalem.

If you hAve Received THis, congratulations! You arE alive, and you musT be wondering wHo and whEre we are.

We are the ALphA and Omega, the first and last vestige of huMan civilization after the death of the sun. The entire structure of our compound is constructed from crystal-clear jasper, as pure as glass.

Come to the throne! Come drink of the Water of Life! Let us wipe all the tears away from your eyes. Here, there shall Be no death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain.

18/Pig

Hark! The herald angels sing, “Glory to the newborn King; Peace on earth, and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled!’ I received a broadcast from a place named Neon Jerusalem. He told me he would help him pack for the trip, but by then, I had already packed for the both of us. He advised me to leave him here, as he is unsure as to whether they will accept him. I flatly refused. I told him that, Your kingdom has twelve gates, three facing each direction, meaning that it is open to all the corners of the world. Here are our goals for tomorrow:

1. Gas
2. Groceries

• Whole black chicken
• Shan Yao
• Jujubes
• Bamboo fiber
• Dried shiitake mushrooms

“Slow, slow, slow, take it slow!” I shrieked at <participant id = 0> from the backseat, clutching my seat belt as our hot-wired turquoise Nissan Verda sped along the deserted highway.

He rolled his window down and leaned out of it, whooping while the wind whipped through his short, dark disheveled hair.

“First perk of the end times, One: No more speed limits!”

I fumbled for my Bible. It had fallen to the floor after he took a right turn sharper than the edge of my Japanese cooking knife, which could cut through paper, and harder than the diamonds on which the craftsman had sharpened it. “The speed limit is there, so you don’t crash into another car –”

“What other cars?” He draped an arm over the passenger’s seat.

“– or just crashing the car!” I quickly countered, now clinging to my rosary instead of the belt and cradling the Word to my chest. My heart nearly burst inside of my ribcage when we ran right into a speed bump, and the Nissan Versa jumped ten feet off the tarmac.

<participant id = 0> pulled up next to the nearest gas pump. “So, you’d rather not go to Neon Jerusalem.”

“If you drive like that, we may not even make it to Neon Jerusalem.”

“You wanna drive?” He turned off the ignition, reached under his seat to pop the panel open, and tossed the keys to me. I unbuckled my seat belt and leapt towards them. They slithered through my trembling fingers and flopped to the floor. By the time I scooped them off the carpet and I tried to toss them to him, he had vanished from in front of the steering wheel.

“If I drive, we will definitely die before we make it to Neon Jerusalem.” I clambered over the center console and peered at him through the window. “Besides, we said I would cook, you would drive. That’s the deal.”

“John 8:7.” He lifted the handle of the nozzle upwards, then outwards to unhook it. “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” He stuck the nozzle in and squeezed the handle, the gas gurgling as it crept through the plastic pipe and into our trusty turquoise vessel. “Isn’t that your whole deal?”

I went from furrowing my brows to reluctantly raising one.

“It is.” I rested my elbows on the windowsill. “You’ve read the Word?”

“My mama would read it to me before bedtime.” He adjusted his sunglasses and gestured grandly at the crucifix hanging under my collarbone. “Hardcore Christian, like you.”

“I don’t think I’m hardcore.”

“Yeah, sure you aren’t.” He shook the last few drops of diesel off the nozzle before shoving it back in place. “You’re even more hardcore, because even my mami didn’t highlight and tab the book.”

The valves of my heart caved in on themselves. Electricity crept across the crucifix and across my collarbone. Hands with nails in them closed around my vocal cords. “It’s not, it’s not just a book –”

“Whatever you believe.” He sniffed. Slammed the panel shut. Sniffed again. Wiped his nose with his brass knuckles. “Are you alright with driving or are you gonna give me my seat?”

I climbed over the center console, collapsed into the backseat once more, buckled my seat belt, and traced slow, soothing circles around the crucifix with my fist. The pierced palms gradually let go of me.

About five and a half hours of following the broadcast’s directions through around a hundred hills (<participant id = 0> drove too fast for me to count, and even if he slowed down, I’ve never been much of a math person), we screeched to a stop at the foot of a vermillion valley.

Two mountains framed it, both streaked with shimmering slabs of azalea pink, hydrangea white, calibrachoa carmine, zinnia green, Angel Amber Kiss Pansy, err, amber, and mustard yellow.

“So, now you slow down,” I remarked dryly while peering over the passenger’s seat. “Is there a speed limit, after all?”

<participant id = 0> shook his head, drumming his right fingertips against the steering wheel and squeezing the gear shift with his left hand. I watched him through the side mirror as he lowered his sunglasses a little, grimaced at the glare, and glanced at the star-feathered, eyeball-necklace-toting owl diving into the vermillion valley to snatch a two-headed mouse sniffing at the soil for seeds.

Then, the mountains moved. In the beat of a heart, they closed the space between themselves and collided together. The owl exploded in a burst of bones, marrow, flesh, feathers, and glitter. Oh, and eyeballs.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” <participant id = 0> flinched from the windshield and tugged his dislodged sunglasses onto his bumped nose bridge.

“Yeah, take all three names in vain.” I peeked out from behind the passenger’s seat, still shuddering. “It’s not like we need all the godly intervention we can get.”

“Oh yeah? And how do we get this godly intervention?”

I began to frantically flip through my Bible. My signature, which I’d scribbled onto the inside of the cover after my baptism. The Table of Contents. Genesis. Exodus.

The mountains peeled apart.

I felt the Holy Spirit descended upon the blessed turquoise Nissan Versa. The crucifix seemed to warm against my collarbone. The pierced hands flipped to the right page for me.

The mountains crashed into each other.

“Hey, <participant id = 0>?”

He stopped drumming his fingers against the steering wheel and whirled towards me. “Hit me with your best shot, <participant id = 1>.”

“Did your mother tell you about the Red Sea?”

I couldn’t see his eyes behind the sunglasses, but the Holy Spirit told me that if I could, I would see recognition flicker around his pupil like a halo.

“She did –”

“Oh, praise the Lord!” My cheeks became increasingly sore from the smile plastered across them.

“– but I don’t remember it.”

My cheeks recovered, then ached again when I willed myself to smile once more. “That is fine, I will tell you.” I gestured grandly. “You see, it all began with the Garden of Eden –”

“Can you tell me the important part?”

“But all of it is important.”

“I meant the part that will prevent us from being crushed to smithereens by those mountains.”

“Right. Right,” I responded reluctantly. “The Israelites were enslaved by the Egyptians. Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt after God killed all the Egyptian firstborn children.” Another electric current crawled through my vena cava. The pierced hands dug their nails into the pages. Lightning leaked out from between my lips before I could swallow it. “However, when the Israelites reached the Red Sea, the Pharaoh decided he wanted all the Israelites dead after all, so God split the Red Sea for the children of Israel, so they could cross through, and then closed it when the Egyptian royal army tried to cross, drowning them all.”

“What if I told you the Egyptians never enslaved the Israelites?” He leaned over and unlaced his steel-toed boots.

“Enlighten me.”

“According to archaeological records, no Israelites resided in Egypt.” He flipped his boot over and fiddled with the heel. “At least, not a significant number. Furthermore, workers had the right to negotiate transactions, own personal property, and campaign for better conditions, such as in the case of Deir el-Medina, the Place of Truth.”

“That doesn’t mean the Egyptians didn’t enslave the Israelites.”

Like a gear toggling from Park to Drive, his chin shifted from mild irritation to barely repressed rage upon finding nothing in his secret compartment. “Enlighten me.”

“Though the workers had these rights, they could still be beaten. Records of the exploitation they experienced are similar to what the Israelites went through in Exodus. Every place, and every ruler of every place erases the corrupt parts of their records to assert their moral superiority over those they oppressed. There is no place of truth.”

I don’t know what I expected from him. I just know my church told me to expect from the same unbelievers that sentenced my Lord to death. For the rage gear to shift from neutral to four-wheel drive and make me one with the tarmac. For persecution, as they would call it, as if we weren’t historically and usually the ones doing the persecuting. Rejection. Ridicule. A pinch of his crooked nose bridge. An incredulous shake of the head. Perhaps a scoff, a sneer, or a stifled snicker if God were in a merciful mood.

No repentance. No tears. No sign of the soil of <participant id = 0>’s heart softening, so the sapling of the gospel could be planted there. Just a nod – not even of agreement, but of acknowledgement. Just a curl in the corner of his mouth – not of contempt, but curiosity. And no more trace of rage.

“So,” he said softly, “you’re saying we need to cross through the mountains before they close in on us.”

“That’s not all I’m saying, I mean, there’s more to it than that, and…yes, that’s what I’m saying.”

“Okay –” he rapped his knuckles against the windshield “–when do the mountains open?”

I squinted through the glass. “Err, every four seconds.”

“And for how long?” He inhaled deeply through his nostrils and kneaded his temples in tight circles.

“Five seconds.”

“That, <participant id = 1>, would be the important part.” He chucked his boot into the backseat and eased his bare right foot onto the gas pedal. “Say when.”

I jumped into the passenger’s seat, pulled the seat belt over my crucifix, and brushed my thumb along the beads of my rosary.

The Lord split the mountains.

“When, when, when, when!” I hollered at the top of my lungs. “I mean, fast, fast, fast, fast now!”

“That’s more like it!” <participant id = 0> stomped the pedal to the floor.

The azalea pink, hydrangea white, calibrachoa carmine, zinnia green, Angel Amber, and mustard yellow all spiralled into a liquid tunnel. And the car and my entrails rotated with it. Around and around and around and around and around. The owl’s slimy remains splattered against the windshield. I almost retched. No, that’s not right. I did retch.

“Hey, it’s better than being stuck in that stuffy house!” <participant id = 0> whooped loudly and activated the wipers with a flourish of his partially gloved hand. “You want me to roll the window down?”

“No,” I gurgled.

He rolled the window down.

I unloaded my lunch into the portal. It joined the spiral of colors. The shade complimented them surprisingly well. I couldn’t believe I just thought that and concluded that the constant spinning had severely damaged my brain.

And then, the tunnel began to narrow.

In an instant, the lightness left <participant id = 0>’s words. He bumped the clutch up a few inches. The tires screeched. The car shot forward. The mountains rumbled behind us. Louder and louder by the millisecond. I braced for impact.

The airbags smothered me.

When I came to, my neck had crystallized. It itched, too. Too subtle to pinpoint where exactly it pricked me, but not subtle enough to shove aside. The Holy Trinity took turns hammering the misshapen octagon that formed my manubrium. And my face felt as if God had fashioned it from lead, my skull straining against its sore, swollen, and half-melted mass.

In my periphery, a few feet away from me, <participant id = 0> stirred on the tarmac. Right arm bent upwards at the elbow, and the left downwards. Left leg bent backwards at the knee (normally, thank goodness), and right leg bent (also normally, thank the Lord).

He rolled onto his back, flinched from the starlight, groped for his broken sunglasses, and secured the gold-lined temple tips behind his ears. He dragged himself to his feet. Fell over. Grumbled under his breath. An expletive, most likely. He hobbled over to me, his shaky, shredded, and now brass knuckles-deprived-hand held out.

“You okay?”

A nail pierced his palm.

For a moment that seemed an eternity, an eternity ago, before the sun disappeared into the dark, I laid on a bed with blue blankets.

What’s wrong, Aihan? My mother’s visage seemed a smudge of ivory with violet specks, unfurled like the petals of an orchid. You can tell us, we’re family.

I squeezed my eyes shut. When my lids peeled apart, <participant id = 0>’s palm had no blemish, but I couldn’t reach for it. Or rather, it wouldn’t matter if I reached for it.

“It’s okay.” I pushed myself off the soil until we were level. “What about the car? Is it okay?”

“What do you think?” He tilted his head towards the heavily scuffed, vomit-splashed Nissan Verda, which glistened and glittered with vermillion.

My hands flew to my mouth and fused to it.

“Hey, it’s okay.” <participant id = 0> patted my arm. “I made a mess of your house, and as the big book says, He will repay.”

I almost laughed, but the nails lingering in my manubrium transmogrified it into a strangled grunt.

He popped the hood. “That’s what I thought.”

“What did you think?”

“Battery’s shot to hell.” He jutted his index finger in the trunk’s direction. “Portable charger, please.”

When I passed it to him, he clamped the red cable to the positive post, and the black cable to the negative end.

“That’ll take about thirty minutes.” He cleaned his sunglasses with the hem of his shirt, which had deteriorated from tattered to threadbare in my washing machine. “In the meantime, we can get our groceries.”

“And where are we going to get said groceries –” My jaw plummeted so suddenly that it must’ve momentarily unhinged. My legs went wooden. Still, I did my best to stagger towards the beautiful dark green behemoth breaking through the vast field of sheeny flowers.

<participant id =0> channeled his inner boa constrictor as well. “Is…is that what I think it is?”

“T&T!” I cried excitedly.

“Cardenas!” He cried excitedly at the same time.

“What?” we both spluttered.

“What the hell is ‘T&T’?” He started to massage his temples again, applying more pressure than before.

“What –” I blinked hard and rubbed my eyes “– what does this ‘Cardenas’ look like?”

“It’s like, red, with arches, and a logo like those flowers over there, but the petals are round and not razors.”

“That’s not red, that’s green, and those are Chinese characters, not a flower.”

“Whatever you say.” He rolled his shoulders. “Anyway, that doesn’t matter. It’s a grocery store, isn’t it? Let’s get some grub. Someone could call animal control on my gut.”

I grabbed his elbow. “Wait, what if it’s a trap?”

“It’s not a trap.” A sliver of his dark irises peeked out from behind the breaks in his black lenses. “I’ve been here before.”

My brows raised a bit. “Where else have you been?”

“Oh, I’ve been everywhere.” He laughed sheepishly, patted my hand, and pried my fingers off his bicep. “The kinds of crooks and crannies that would send your precious Shepherd into a coma.”

The flame of the Holy Spirit flared at that. “My Lord has been scourged, stabbed, and crucified. He can handle whatever you can throw at Him.”

“But could you handle it?”

The Holy Spirit flickered. “No, you win.”

“If you think about it, it’s a win-win.” The corners of his mouth twitched – too quickly for me to tell if it were upwards or downwards. “I don’t have to embarrass myself, and you don’t have to be second-hand humiliated.”

“Is it that bad?” I asked softly.

“You’ll likely have to confess on my behalf.”

“You could confess yourself.”

“God gave up on me long ago.” He drummed his fingertips against the portable charger’s handle, the rhythm of an off-beat heartbeat.

Du-dun. Du…dun. Du - du-dun.

“God never forsakes us,” I insisted more to myself than him.

He glared at the stars. “Not all of us.”