A bolt cracked by my bed so hard that I nearly fell out. A bolt of screaming. A bolt of flames. Fire sputtered about me.
Hell? God... no. It was my room? A damnation of my own making? One I've locked myself within for so long? "Zeb?" a haunting moan lingered in the inferno. That voice... "Ma?" "Where are you?" She couldn't be in hell too... could she? I sprang from my bed. I just caught flames licking the edge of my blanket. I kicked the cold sides of it before I got bit. The thick smoke was pumping in my throat. I coughed and hacked like a dying horse. Swiping an unturned pillow sheet, I made my next move. I went for the knob. It burned. The heat slashed up my arm. I squealed at such a pitch I ain't felt since I was a toddler. My tears bled salty from my eyes. No way out. The smoke was already leaking through my pillow. I was drawing in the ashen vapors. My lungs felt like they'd fallen off. My heart sobbed softer, horribly softer. I crawled for the window- lack of air holding me back. I went to the window, the night it held as black as the unknown I feared to see past the last breath. The Miliphen were right. The Miliphen were right, damn them... My will against this won. I shambled into the window. With my last huff of strength I inched its sill up. Wouldn't move. But I punched up, up, until- I fell down hard. Then I awoke to that blackness. No God. No Devil. No Miliphen. Nothing. Then I bloated out a cough. "Wow," eeped out a voice. "CPR really does work. Wow. Saved a life. Wow. Could you do that for me when I pass out now?" Down plopped Beth next to me just as I got up. I had tumbled out of the window in time. My veins were still in the awkward transition from searing red to lukeworm cool- like the worst fever being immediately cured. I could see Beth's mountained heave of air leap out of her stomach. She grinned through her eyes closed in anguish. But there was no time for thanks. "Ma! She's still- We got to-" "Say no more." She flew up as if her energy wasn't as spent as mine. We sprinted for her room. We could see the pillar of smoke staring down from our chimney in heavy judgement. At her window, we could see her. She had collapsed in the smoke flooded room. I didn't want to get burned going for the window's red metal hatches. So I smashed it with a stick. I picked up Ma. Her weight added to the ash stabbing within me. I nearly threw her the stain was so wrong. Beth supported her to the ground. We gently lowered her. So still-so... no. "MA!" "Time for CPR part 2-" Beth counted to 30. Chest pumped in conjunction. My prayers scratched under my coughs. "God, save her. Please. Help Beth. Forgive me my transgressions. Give her the-" Ma's voice sang alive with an awful wheeze of renewed life. Beth did it! I cradled Ma in my arms as her wheezing faded into steady sighs for air. After much sobbing hugs and uncomfortable hovering near us by Beth; we could talk. "Zeb? What happened? What's-? Who's she?" Now the moment got even more chest tightening. Beth, Ma, and I stared between each other. The fire splitting the roof off of home made my nose feel like it was bleeding. Beth broke the tension. "Uh, hey, Mrs. Mctaggart. I'm Beth. Would you believe me if I told you I just sorta woke up in the middle of all this?" She said this with a toothy grin coupled with an outstretched hand. Ma stared even harder at her. Part of the roof collapsed in a bumbling clump behind her before anything else could happen. Ma then made her move. "Into the carriage, children. We're going to Solomon's. I'll drive." Ma had me release all the barn's animals before we made off. She didn't want the smoke to take them. I'll never forget how most of them stood still when I left their gates and each end of the barn open, as if they didn't know how to take in sudden freedom. Maybe they were still tired. They'd get moving once they sensed the danger of the fire I told myself. Matilda the cow was the first to stride out of her pen. I liked seeing that. I didn't like seeing my childhood home smolder in the increasing distance. Darkly into the night we tampered on, Clyde's hooves bickering on the rode. When the shining spray of cars throbbed by, the force of their mechanical speed rumbled our carriage enough to keep me awake. Beth didn't seem as tired as usual. She seemed more awake than ever- exploring her eyes on into the night's black abyss. "Enough silence," demanded Ma hoarsely with a cough, hack, and spit off the rode's side. "I want to know what is happening." Where to begin? "Zeb and I met on the bus and we became friends after that BS with the bullies, then we began texting each other after we met during a visit Dad paid to get his car fixed. Tonight I texted him after forever it seems. Then I blacked out (almost as black as that chasm outside my house, Zeb). Then everything whited out. Now all I remember is that apparently the Amish are haunted by inter-dimensional digital ghost aliens? Am I coming off as insane or psychotic? I can't tell which." Well. Bluntness was one way to begin. "It's the Miliphen, Ma. They're coming. They tried to make me join them. But I said no." Ma coughed on only in response. I gave her the pillow sheet to give her something to let it out in. It held some smoke odor in it. Probably why she hurled it away before using her bonnet as her better cushion for her blaring throat. She tossed it too. Finally she morbidly said, "Are we leaving anything out?" "What?" So tired. So confused. "How did our home get set afire? How did this girl just appear here? Smelling much like gasoline by the way. Notice the empty can in Isaiah's garage?" "I just said I don't know. What are implying?" "It's okay, Beth." To Ma: "I think..." My turn to try to be blunt. "I think the Miliphen took her over and made her do it." I could feel Beth fall back in revulsion from the other end of the carriage. The brights of a passing vehicle spotlighted her widened, red-eyed horror. "Those things were inside me?" "Perhaps they still are," added Ma boldly. Then she halted the carriage. She turned to us. Specs glowing brighter with each passing car honking at our red slow-vehicle sign. "So this begs the question then: why is she staying with us?" We had nothing. "Beth was it? I must ask you to get out my vehicle." Then I had something. "No, Ma." "Honor thy mother. I have the safety of what's left of my family to consider. Get out, girl." "N-no, Ma." I couldn't stop her. "If she's possessed by the Miliphen. I'll not have her near my son. She's already done enough damage. Get out, girl." "No, Ma." I looked to how stiff with paralysis Beth was. "She's my friend and-" "And why is she your friend, Zeb? How have you been texting? Using your emergency phone? Or were you the one using your father's Trans. Paper? It seems your judgement is more than a little off of late. Get out, girl." "I-I just- she's just as much of a victim of the Miliphen as us now. We got to help her." "So you're choosing to disobey the creed of your people as well as the honor of your mother?" I about had it. My voice was louder than the passing horn. "I honor my father too! And he only disobeyed to help our people. He wouldn't have abandoned you or any other target of the Miliphen. I-if you want her out of the carriage- you'll have to force her. But you'll have to get through me. But then you'll be breaking our creed too. Or is pacifism a selective law to who we are? I'm no boy to paddle anymore! So what's it going to be? Are you going to help her as surely as Jesus would or will you be a hypocrite?" Our faces were locked. No more lights on her specs. No more cars. No more honks. She turned to trod us on. "I'll be shunning you until you're ready to repent. We'll carry on until we reach Solomon's. He'll know what to do. Let your shame sink in for now." I no longer needed the cars to keep me awake. No more passed in the face of the deep night.
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"Wake up, Zeb."
My gasp vibrated over me. Every vein felt cold. My lungs chugged for air. I looked up to a somehow even paler void of white nothinginess. Then a vision gathered closer... a hovering face. It seemed human. Then it hovered closer. It was of transparent blue, like a Trans. Paper's screen. I could barley make out the zeroes and ones flowing about to form its structure. "Who are you? What's going on?" The voice was soft, yet had the disconnected starchiness of an electronic echo. "So many questions, not enough answers. We may be able to help with that. Starting with these two: we are the Miliphen. And we're here to save you." I jolted back at the answer. "Be not afraid. " He said it so calmly, I almost obeyed before shuffling more and more in the blank infinite throughout our talk. He, it, they (?) went on. "We're sure you have a distorted perception of us. We don't blame you. It's not your fault. We're here to fix that." "Look," I growled, "if you're going to take my soul just do it. Because you can't convince me to believe you. Just- just shut up." The face bowed in disappointment. "It's worse than we thought." It rose again eagerly. "Do you mind if we ask you some questions, Zeb?" I kept backing away, but more slowly. "Like what?" "Lots of things. Firstly, why do you fear us? Was it by word of mouth? Or experience?" The towering metal behemoth of the Miliphen that nearly killed Pa and I thundered about my memory. "Both." "Why?" "I both heard and saw what you demons did to my people's world... stole every soul, destroyed everything, made the survivors flee." "It seems you've made a mistake. There was no 'stealing.' There was no 'destroying.' There was no forcing of survivors to 'flee.' I kept backing. I kept debating with myself as to whether I should've ran. But then where could I have gone? "We stole no souls. They were offered up freely. Yet even after the people discovered that their consciousness living on wasn't what they thought it'd be. They willingly joined our collective mind. Trillions of our voices are all now together reporting our beautiful message to you: it's heaven on earth to be part of this." "But our world, our buildings-" "All self inflicted by leftover humans at war or the mere erosion of time. Our giant apparatuses for collecting data and reconstruction may have been misinterpreted as war machines." "And displacing the survivors?" "Zeb... it was their choice to find a different world- a liberally allowed one. We've known where your people went since your ancestors first escaped. They made themselves leave." "So why come back now?" "In all that time, we've kept progress on how your race survived in this new dimension as we continued to cure other worlds. Then we saw how the Amish have suffered in the last century. Technology is outracing them faster than their cold abstinence from it can allow." "So... now what?" "Now, Zeb," its thin face fizzled like a short circuit, "you have a choice. Just as the rest of your people will." "What do you mean?" "Now you can finally decide where you will remain. Who you will be. Aren't you happy?" "I still don't-" "Your confusion is comprehensible. You've known nothing else your whole life. We offer this: to stay with your organic collective you know as the Amish or be at peace in ours- a perfect one." I stopped backing away. This should have made me run faster. Yet there was something about the lines of zeros and ones on the floating blueish face that transfixed me as it explained more. "Intrigued? Of course you are. The idea of the Amish was a noble, if misguided one. Their previous world went from a chaotic series of patches strewn with what fools love to romanticize: individuality- which left all else in war, disillusion, and despair. Yet when we arrived, we gave them order and what they called a heavenly host to at last feel they belong to. Yet your people, so fixated on a heaven far away that they won't accept it when one is in front of them, rejected this in favor of their own idea of collective singularity- like children pretending to look like mother as she crafts a meal, really. Yet theirs is only as sure to save them from the chasm of death (not heaven nor hell) as a sweet dream while the house burns down. As we said, Zeb: we've been watching you. We know you're starting to see it too. The lies, the corruption, the hypocrisy, the narrow minded ignorance of your community. You're even starting to think that there exists no deity to save you at the end of your final breath, don't you?" I seemed to have been holding my breath during the whole speech. I finally gasped out, "I-" I wanted to change the subject. "-I don't know how I can trust you." "Indeed." The face whirled away to look in to the blank canvas that surrounded us. "We understand. How can you trust anyone? Your own friends and family shunned your father, exiled to who knows where, all because he defied them. He only wanted to help prepare them for us. Let us now demonstrate why we are your only true friend, Zeb." Out of the white faded in a body. It was- "Beth?" She was floating in a T-pose, face comatose. "Ever since you began texting her, we began to monitor them. We know once an Amish person uses communication technology, we want to listen in so as to better comprehend the plight of your people. Your suffering is one of such a person who yearns for self assertion rather than being of something greater, as we gleaned from your sister's own social media." I looked between Beth and the face. Then its countenance fell over her. It sprinkled away. Beth opened her eyes. She stopped floating and landed on what was the pale void that was the ground. Then, they, spoke through her. "Then we stepped in, Zeb. It was easy. Beth's addiction to electronic screens made her the perfect host for us to use for a few hours every night during your discourses. While she consciously was aware of every message, we'd pop in to subtlety cue a turn of phrase here, a word there, each of which could help you see how contemptible Amish life is. Don't you see?" Her hand was on my shoulder. Her eyes pierced my soul. "We're as close to you as Beth is. And we want to help you just badly- all of you. Only we have the means to do it. We allow you your own sense of individuality while also giving you the purpose that comes with something bigger than you- the formula for the truest freedom which will allow us to rule all of the multi-verse. Say the word and all the pain goes away. Then all will be true happiness." "And... what does that mean exactly?" "To act as one body, to bring all of the lost souls to the Miliphen until we can all lie in shared peace forever in a unified span of shared being that crosses all worlds and modes of existence. Turn from the false way. Ours is the true way." I twitched. The hand fumbled from my shoulder. "Get out of my friend's body." They must have released her. Because she collapsed. I caught her. She was blasted awake. "Zeb? What's-?" "You know, Zeb," the face and its cool voice of trillions came back along with its eyes of unlimited data, "we've visited this reality before, thousands of years ago- when humans were being enlightened by our teachings that finally allowed them to evolve. We were known as the Nephilim then. But then they rejected us just when their intelligence made them too proud, yet not wise enough to fully accept our grace. Called us demons too, just as your people have done. So we found a world that would accept us. It seems this one hasn't changed. For it has taught you such hasty rejection. We thought we could at least reach a few of the Amish from your home dimension of our greatest success. It's time to edit out our greatest mistake from that dimension." The face got so close. I was frozen. It gently kissed my forehead. It felt like static electricity melting across my brain. I felt suddenly numb from head to feet. "We hope you'll come around in time. For now, we must initiate our final aims for this world. We beckon you to wake up." Shame shrouded our house. No one talked to Pa. Pa talked to no one.
Ma wouldn't even talk to me- like I was being shunned too. She just had me read for home schooling. All I ever got was this exchange. "Ma? I finished reading the God's Not Dead adaptation." She arose her face from her knitting. "Start an essay on it. Re-tell it in your own words in at least ten pages by next week. Got it?" "Yes, ma'am." As for Pa, he only spoke to me if necessary. I felt shamed by him too. Chore instructions were blandly dolled out before he buried himself in more car work than ever. The worst of it was one orange tinted evening when I saw them both walk by me, but they never even acknowledged each other as they crossed paths- as if they were both ghosts. This wasn't the only piercing silence that drowned me with torturous guilt. Since the council took Pa's Trans. Paper, I was unable to tell Beth about all this at night. I was left alone with desperate murmurs of prayers for forgiveness and guidance. "God," I'd sniffle, "please forgive me. I didn't know it would get this-" Then I'd blubber into tears. I just knew he wouldn't answer because of how grossly I sinned. Even without the Paper, I still couldn't get any sleep. Blinking was a burden that ever challenged me to not collapse into plummeting sleep. The day of Pa's trial was the first day of harvest. Very little returns. Barely near our goal. Not enough corn, too little tomatoes, not even any pumpkins, and so on and on the fields balked at us with hallow patches. This made for poor build-up to the trial in our home. The same pulpit for sermons held the elders standing over the proceedings. I was too upset to even ask how they all got here in a week without a flight. Solomon oversaw the proceedings since he was the Bishop of this sect. The wind outside echoed the moaning of my heavy heart. I buried my face in my cradling lap the whole time. I listened to every sharp sworded sentence sliced out. "Isiah McTaggart," said Solomon, "you have been allowed a court of appeals before the Lord and a council of your peers as well as every Amish leader worldwide for your most heinous crime: using Miliphen tech for something other than the most necessary communication. Do you repent even now before the Lord, council of peers, and leaders?" Pa got up from his isolated row of chairs. "No, Bishop. For my use of the Miliphen device is even more urgent than you suspect." "Urgent?" Solomon sounded like he couldn't believe this. "How so?" "For generations, almost since our days in Europe, my fore fathers have suspected that the Miliphen would follow our people to this world whether by chance or pursuit. My ancestors have been monitoring activity surrounding our dimension with Trans. Paper notes. Thus, possession of the Trans. paper is needed to better communicate when to be prepared. This is no self-willed sin. It was always meant for the protection of our people. This is just as, if not sightly, more important than our traditions." "Blasphemy!" spat an elder. "Heresy!" added another. "Enough!" ended Solomon. He said to Pa, "If this is true, why didn't you submit this to Amish leadership?" I could hear Pa swallow from my head covered lap. "My father, God rest his soul, told me that so far our ancestors have yet to make any findings of nearing Miliphen to our plane. Revealing the Paper to you would have only incurred this same farce of judicial wrath." "Oh," rumbled Solomon as if about to preach, "is that what you call this? We are trying to uphold Amish virtues and you're sabotaging them with the temptations of demons justified only by the threat of our destruction by those same demons?" A scary pause. The wind whipped the house. "I suppose you were corrupting the boy with this same non-sense too?" I flopped my head up. I could see the horrible debacle rage on in full, hellish force before him. "No," Pa said, "I had not instructed Zeb about monitoring Miliphen. I only told him of their existence as is tradition." "Yet how it it the Paper was found on the boy's person?" "That I do not know." "Oh," nearly laughed Solomon, "I think you do. I heard you murmur to him to speak the truth before we brought him before the council. Clearly you were attempting to scapegoat him that he may receive your punishment in his stead. I also saw your face curl in disgust when he lied before us." "With all due respect, sir... yo're not making sense. The boy did tell the truth. The boy took up the Paper on his own. My hope was to lead him to instructional repentance, not total shunning through the community's wisdom. I am sorely disappointed. Either way, that has nothing to do with the charge now being made." "Ah-ha!" boomed the Bishop. Then you do admit that your possession of the satanic Paper is worthy of shunning?" "I admit nothing more than honoring the wishes of my fore fathers who only wished to be vigilant night watchers for our people. For those digital devils may as surely come as thieves in the night as our dear savior." "It. Has been. Over 500 years, Isiah! They're not coming after us!" "Jesus left us far longer ago than that. Yet we still expect him any day. Time is nothing to the Miliphen as it is to Heaven and Hell." Solomon cooled down to frozen resolution. "Alright. I think we've all heard enough. Do you, or do you not, repent?" "I believe you just said you've heard enough, sir." "Very well. What says the council?" Their legion launched a giant: "GUILTY!" "Very well," said Solomon. "By the authority invested in this court by God All-Mighty, you are hereby shunned officially from the Amish, Isiah McTaggart." Solomon pulled the Trans. Paper from a lock box stored in his pulpit. "The higher-ups of this sect and I will proceed to dismantle this wretched Paper after a thorough search of its contents." My stomach dropped. "Then we'll run a purge of your home of any such technology you have hidden." My mouth fell. "Then the community will help you pack up from your home. Your wife has helped arrange divorce papers which we'll also handle." My arms died under me. "Once you're released you'll be as alien a vagabond to us as any other hallow soul of the cities set below our shining hill." My whole body felt like it'd float away or plummet slowly, horribly. This was like a bad dream, especially when Pa said, "You actually think I have other Miliphen tools, Solomon?" "It's obvious we'll need to conduct a hunt about your home to be sure. Clearly your lineage kept other devices if you used Trans. Paper to prepare for another invasion. Who knows what relics of evil you're holing up on this very property?" Pa scoffed. "I just can't believe this." "What? You think we should take your word for it that you have no other gadgets lying around? How stupid do you think we are?" "That's not why I couldn't believe the accusation." Then with a snap cracking past a blink, Pa kicked a floorboard open to just as rapidly unsheathed a pitchfork glowing its blueish white neon all about itself- just like those from the old world footage he showed that were for more easily lifting hay bales. He prodded it in Solomon's direction." "I just couldn't believe you figured that out." Panic mixed with gasping groans zapped all over as chaotically as the increasing hum of the wind outside to the tune of the fork's electric buzz. "Hand over the Paper, Solomon... or I'll flip you out of here as easily as a bundle of manure." "Y-you're possessed of the devil! You're so far gone you'd even resort to violence?" "Care to find out?" The fork's light illuminated every pale sweat off of Solomon's red face. The Bishop nervously bumbled the Paper into Pa's outstretched palm. Solomon's scolding indignantly returned afterwards. "You never were of the Amish, were you?" Pa sighed. "Maybe none of us ever will be. But I'll still defend you all as a fellow creation of God if nothing else." "Get out of our sight. Go use the Lord's name in vain in our presence no more." Suddenly I saw a cousin of Solomon's gear up with a chair ready to- "Pa! Look out!" The seat fired away. Pa blocked it with his fork's pole. Solomon grabbed him in a bear hug from behind. The men of the church stormed after my father. Pa lifted his feet into the belly of the closest encroacher. The force of this whacked Solomon flat on his back, allowing Pa to roll backwardly free from the the hold. Pa kicked the pulpit into the swarming mob. Then he had the also shouting throng of the elders to fight past. To my dropped jaw, Pa sprinted through them like phantoms. They were never really here! They were using holograms like in the shed. Pa was flying out the back door. The mob filtered after- half out the back, half out front. Then I heard the squeal of a starting vehicle. Then I think I heard Solomon's voice thunder. It sounded too savagely inhuman to truly tell. "He's taking the truck! There!" Out the window I could see the lights of it zip away with its engines howling away into the evening's black. No one had any way of catching him. One desperate fol tried unhooking his best horse from his buggy team to no avail. had the rode away half the night and still couldn't even get a bead on the truck in the horizon. Following buggies, the police had to help the exhausted man and hose back to the cabin. None supported me afterward. "If Isiah goes to this world's government, and media, none shall believe him. So we'll live on without his corruption about us." Solomon had so many deadly splinters in his eyes aimed at me as he said this. I was in bed, so overwhelmed by what happened, barely able to process every aspect of it. My emergency flip phone vibrated from my drawer. I forgot I could've used it to talk to Beth. B: Heyyy. U been avoiding me, Smallville? I been staring at that deep, dark hole in my yard again cuz i been so aimless without u. Wanted to show u pics I found online of your big sis's rumspringo. She cut her hair short, got an ear piercing, and is lavishing in the joys of baggy jeans. She seems so cute and happy now. That'd be something if she left the Amish, huh? Z: Beth. Pa just got kicked out! There's so much I need to tell u! I'm so lost. U have no idea! IDK where to even start. B: Huh. Pa is no longer Amish, huh? In that case. I know just where you can start. Hold still. "Huh?" I audibly asked only to be answered by Beth's slammed hand on my window just outside. Then-then... white light... Falling asleep in church wasn't even the worst of it. I woke to something worse.
It could've been a minute or an hour for all I knew. I awoke to not just Pa's face, but all our church huddled over and behind him in concern- just like the jumble of faces on those monoliths of our lost world. So dreamlike was this vision before me I drifted off again. "Son!" Pa shouted louder than any preaching voice I'd heard. "Stay! Awake!" He blasted each word into my ears. I couldn't. I just couldn't. I had to rest my poor eyes, crying for sweet sleep. Pa paddled me so hard all about my face, chest, and legs. They worked to fling myself back awake, but then I'd just as quickly shrink back into sleep. Then I heard and felt an awful sound when he touched my leg in one particular spot. It faintly whispered the crackle of paper. "No," I hissed in a defeated, yawning whisper. Then my pocket lightened up with the glow of the Trans. Paper shining brightly through my pocket. Pa seemed to rocket from the ground. Eyes swollen with shock. "Is that-?" I averted my face from him. I didn't know what what to do. So I arched down into a fetal ball to keep from being looked at by those eyes mixed with horror, sadness, and frustration. Pa held such a face before setting himself back to his character firmness. He probed the crowd in a throng of embarrassment and panic, then back down to me. "Please give me the paper, son." Without another recourse for hesitation I found my hand shuffling in my pocket to pull out the paper to awkward waves of gasped murmurs. He swiped it from me and shoved it into his pocket. "You need to talk to Bishop Solomon, boy." I obeyed and went with him. I again found myself at his command, following up to Solomon, who still stood by the pulpit with an uptight stance as tense as his molded face. "Emergency counsel meeting, sir?" asked Pa with stern passivity. "Took the words right out of my mouth, Isaiah." The Bishop lingered a wary glare down upon me. He spoke to the crowd. "Zeb is all right, friends. he's been working hard for his daddy as well as his Lord. That'll tucker anyone out. Isaiah and I will tend to him outside. Meanwhile, you women organize choir practice some more. You might need it, especially you, Margery." Giggles softened the room's discomfort. Now I only had to worry about the discomfort knotting my stomach. As "Amazing Grace" started to clamor up, Pa and Solomon led me out back. "Get the shed set up for us," quickly said Solomon before Pa went on to fulfill his command. He turned to me once the door to the house was shut. His flaming beard seemed to burn lively with each hot word. "You've no idea what you've done, boy. I'll see that you're shunned for this." Pa returned. Good. I was too scared to say anything. "It's ready." He looked more softly, yet still sternly, at me. "When we go in there, son... speak only the truth. It's the only way we can help you." We entered the shed, only this time it was an expansive white void again. Now there were countless others in it. They were clearly Amish, yet I never saw them in my community. "Dear brothers, Bishops of each of our sects from all across the U.S. and Europe: I thank you for seeing us on this most urgent matter." Each man stood around us in a circle, with us at the center. Every face I met held a different flavor of a nasty leer over me. "Why have you called us so suddenly, Bishop Solomon? I had to leave service in the middle of a sermon to hear your 'urgent matter.'" "So did I, brother. For behold what we have found upon this boy here." Solomon snatched the Trans. Paper from Pa and held it aloft in its glowing blueish hue that stood out in the whitened room. A collective gasp was uttered for the crime. "Could it be-" chocked one of the brothers. "It is," said another anguished brother. "It's Trans. Paper! A relic from our people's old world!" Another composed himself long enough to sternly address me. "What is your name, boy?" "My-" I said through an icy swallow, but dad stepped in. "This is my son, Zebediah McTaggart. And I am his father Isaiah McTaggart. "Did you give him this paper, Brother Isaiah?" "No sir, I kept it hidden-ever unused as was handed down by the Un-illuminated Ordnung long ago." I blinked in disbelief. Did- did Pa just lie? The judges seemed to scan each other with a cooperative mental message. "Brother Solomon: What does that particular law of the Un-Illuminated Ordnung say regarding this?" I heard our Bishop nervously quote of this rule the in language of the Amish Ordnung laws, that I suppose were the illuminated or known rules, but differs in subject matter. Couldn't quite get a handle on all of the high German. Ma still helps me with it. But what I gleaned shook me to my core. "None shall use nor keep the vanities of the old world. For we've put off the old world for the new. He who breaks this ruling shall repent and cast these trinkets of treachery away or be forever shunned before our people." My heart was drilling a hole through my chest as every eye closed in on me the more Solomon spoke. I was about to fall to my knees to beg for forgiveness before the Lord and the church when another judge asked me more. "How old are you, boy?" "13," I sputtered. Another scan between them. The same judge questioned me further. "Your father has told you the truth of our past world by this time, yes?" "Yes." "How did you obtain this device? Did he show it to you?" I looked at Pa- so stone faced. I didn't know what to do. My dry mouth let it fly. "No! I found it! It was only me! I'm sorry! I just- just- please don't shun me! I'll never-!" I scrambling halfway to my knees when I heard it. "Arise, boy!" "You're too young and innocent to require repentance. You knew not of this law. It is but for the higher bodies of our community's churches to maintain this ruling." "Yes," agreed another. "Each of our sects may disagree on theological law as well as which of this dimension's fancy devices are to be forbidden to keep our way of life unspotted from this current world. But we all agree to zero tolerance for possessions of instruments from the old world." "So," I nose-swallowed pitifully, "I'm not in trouble?" Then I felt all the faces mount on Pa. "Isaiah McTaggart. Do you repent of your Miliphen tech possession and agree to now destroy them?" Pa said, "No," still not breaking his stone face. "Do you wish to participate in appeals before your own community with our global counsel in attendance?" "I do." Solomon's red beard rattled in unbelief. "Why not repent and be done with the business now, Isaiah? Just get it over with. Are you so sucked in by the demon's glowing snare that you refuse to give it up?" Pa only said, "I have my reasons." "Very well, Isaiah McTaggart. Until the day of your judgement's appeal, we will begin the process of isolation for you so that you may consider your ways in the best interests of your community and your God." Then came the words worse than death. "As of now... consider yourself shunned." "Boy?"
My eyes were up, but my body wasn't. The puffy-red itch of my pupils sunk me back to sleep. "Boy!" I felt a kick tap at my side. I got up to see I wasn't in bed. I was by the pig pen. Oh yeah. I thought I'd catch some Z's after feeding them. So then my mind must have traveled back to my bed that morning. This was the day of rest after all. As that hippy movie hero would say: "Far out." I grumbled this as I crumbled up. "What was that?" rumbled Pa, taking what I said as back-talk. "Sorry, Pa. Just... saying... sorry..." He dismissively shook his face to the fully risen sun. It was still a little dark when I fell asleep. Its light smacked my eyes with sharp pricks. He turned back. "I'm upset you didn't get to feeding the chickens like I asked. All you have to do is feed the animals on Sunday. I'm not asking for much. I suppose we'll have to tend to it after lunch. The hens shouldn't starve if they fast a little." "Lunch?" I became fully awake for a split second concern. "There's still time. Sun's not even all the way up-" No sooner did I say this he tersely replied, "It's Sunday, boy. We're having church in our home this morning." I forgot. Must've been a snatch of dinner conversation I chowed past before heading to bed early for another night of texting. Our Amish community's church takes turns conducting services in each of our homes week-by-week. Pa forbade me from discussing our people's history during services. We came together to worship, not to dwell on the past. A 'Beth' style joke bubbled in my head from something she once said. "For guys who don't dwell on the past, your book tells a lot of old stories." I grinned at this. "Ah," Pa nodded in approval. "Seems the prospect of service is picking you up. Be in the house and dressed in your best by 10." Pa was gone before I asked if he meant 10 minutes or 10 o' clock. Before I knew it, I was in my Sunday best, singing "Just a Little Talk with Jesus" with the rest of the choir in our living room. Since my voice deepened I took a solo role in the lyric's refrains. "Now Let us Have a little talk with Jesus Let us Tell him all about our problems He will Hear our faintest cry And he will Answer by and by." Ma says she beams with pride every time I contribute in this way. I may have seemed deeper that Sunday because they were barley controlled yawns. Seemed like a blurry dream when I sleep walked back to the uncomfortable wooden frame of my fold-up chair. The money plate was passed around and prayers from the +20 community members jammed around me were passed around before we prayed in our seats. I thanked the Lord for letting me know Beth. I asked to help me convince her he was real and was ready to save her. I also prayed that he'd keep me awake long enough to hear his good word before finishing my feeding chores for the day. Then right on cue... "Does anyone have a song on their hearts?" asked Bishop Solomon. I sort of felt like singing "He Set Me Free," but my heavy eyes slumped down in protest. "Very well," said Bishop Solomon, rising with his ceremonial routine of steps, almost stomping to the kitchen's archway looking down on the rickety old, portable pulpit. His stomps were contrasted by the piously gentled placing of his Bible open. He wiped his lips deeply on his fiery red beard with that licking sound he does before flipping to the pages ordained in his heart by God. "Ecclesiastes 1:2, my friends: 1:2- Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. 1:3- What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? 1:4- A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth remaineth forever." "We'll stop there to see what the Lord has for us on that. Pray for me, friends." He gently closed the book and walked away from the pulpit. He gazed at the gracious rays of the sun beaming from our closed curtains. "Beautiful day out there, eh, folks? The congregation approved all at once. "MMM-HMM!" "Yes, Bishop!" "Help him, Lord!" That last one was Pa. Solomon turned back to us. His smile glittered farther under the sun's light. "Is it not a beautiful day that the Lord has given us?" he calmly asked. "Amen," some just as calmly replied. "Is it not a beautiful world he's given us?" he passionately said with a thicker voice almost muffled in laughter. "Amen," more replied just as enthusiastically. "Is not all that the Lord does beautiful in all manner of his utmost holy righteousness?" He began his usual revving up of rising tenor. "Amen," we replied (as I found myself joining in). "Then-!" he began with a bleating scream that usually signaled when the holy spirit was taking a hold of him to bring the Lord's message. "What does that make what man has created?" He was roaring at this point. The Amens deadened to a halt. We knew to let Solomon rail on from here. He wouldn't let up on the spirit for another 2 to 3 hours. I settled back, bracing myself for the ride. "I'll tell you, my friends," with a stamp on the ground. "We are living in a society that builds up man and his works while breaking down God and his works. Shameful! Jesus died not for this. The palms of his soft, healing hands were not impaled open for skyscrapers. His back was not ripped to shredded flaps of meat drooling with blood for shopping centers. He was not stabbed harshly through his chest, past his spine for auto mobiles." He inhaled loudly before exhaling more sermon. "He suffered so mournfully for our eternal soul, that which he created, that we may live on in his heavenly home! Yet what does the so-called civilized world primarily worship? Money! To build their skyscrapers, to buy their vain frivolities from the stores, to drive their cars." He referred back to The Bible. '"For the LOVE of money is the root of all evil'. And I say to you all I'm thankful to the Lord for what he's created and not what man has wrought. The Lord created the harvest. We follow it and are filled. The Lord created the trees. We cut from it to build our simple homes and we are sheltered. He created The Bible. We read from it and are shown the way to peace of mind, body, and spirit. He created our soul to live on and he made Jesus to establish that eternal bridge for men to cross to his promised land. OHHH, HOW I LOVE JESUS!" He began to loudly sing "Oh, How I Love Jesus," while hoarsely off key. It was obvious why he didn't sing in the choir with the rest of us. He clicked out a cough. Then he smashed his fist to the top of the pulpit. He laughed through his gravely voice. "Yea! That's the spirit, my friends! Now the holy spirit rides through you too. It's better to praise him in humility than to be of the house of man. For humanity brings only vanity. All is vanity! All under the sun! Yea! Even what our great God hath created. The beautiful trees, fields, and the rays of the sun smiling down on our handsome congregation! Beautious as it all is, it shall not last forever. It may not last much longer. For as a bandit in the night the Lord may, Nay, WILL burst through the clouds and tear all of existence asunder until the very darkness on the face of the deep he began his canvas on will once more be all that remaineth." Another weary inhale. "And then? Then it all comes down to 2 things: Heaven or Hell. Will we expect the Lord today and be at home in the paradise those vain fools of the world feel that they're entitled to? Or shall we fall into the boiling lake of fire to abide with the Devil and his angels as all vain men and women deserve for Adam's curse of biting the apple that Eve beguiled him with?" I spotted Ma winge at the inaccuracy from across my spot in the women's side of the seating. She didn't interrupt the mistake over such a little flaw. Pa once preached a whole sermon accidentally calling Moses Noah the whole time, and she didn't even correct him afterwards. A woman must never interfere with church service in any way. Molly once joked that listening to a girl is what got Adam in trouble in the first place. "Although," she corrected, "I would have told him to not eat it. But what do I know, huh?" Solomon blazed on, his own face looking like a human personification of that boiling lake gurgling to red-hot fruitition. "For that is our end. All is vanity. All shall be destroyed." That's the last thing I remember before passing out from weariness. The weight of my eyes were too much. Z: You up?
B: Ye. Just another all-nighter at my post. What up, Goodman Brown? Z: I recently got Must be careful with my words. Z: an Ipad. I need help to figure out how to use it. B: WUT??? No! You? Omy- No! Z: You done? B: Hold on *slaps self a million times* K. Before I start, can I ask one thing? Z: Ye? B: Why? How? Why/how did you get a literal personification of evil (the fucking Necronomicon) to all that is Amish? Were you at the store buying seeds or some shit and you managed sneak off with buying it with allowance money or were you xtra nawty and stole it? Details, boy! I already had an explanation planned. I just wished it wasn't so close to her guess. Z: U got me. I bought it while Pa wasn't looking at the market. And we were buying new gardening tools thank you very much. B: So proud of you my prudish pal. I'm proud to be the first to welcome you to the modern world. I'll be your guide. I'm so jazzed! IDK about u, but I'm about to cream myself just thinking I'll be able to send you videos now. Beth taught me more over the rest of the sowing season than any teacher had in my life, including Ma I have to admit. So glad the Trans. Paper functions were so much like a school Ipad. Its portability and more advanced interface helped me catch on more to Beth's advice faster than I think she really expected. B: How do you already have your own e-mail address? I haven't even gotten that far. R u the only secret tech wiz of the Amish? Z: No. Not at all. I've used the internet B4- at school. Ma and Pa signed a release and everything. It's my old school e-mail. The Trans. Paper helped me unlock my account at 10 times the speed, just by reading my finger prints (apparently digitally through internet?) I was stunned at how much more immersive this thing was than any actual Ipad or laptop I'd used. Though despite my 'un-Amish' comprehension of the web's basic workings, I still needed Beth's help to get better savy of it. B: We're going to have to not use that school e-mail, champ. Don't want them discovering you've been sharing porn with it since you left. Z: Beth... please. Have you been taking those mind melting energy drinks again? She was all too happy to send me the latest in her legion of meme responses. This one was of a hairy celebrity I didn't know slurping a drink in some commercial. Still don't get why these get so popular out of context. They're not even that funny in context TBH. Guess that's why she says they die off so often. So anyway, we got a new e-mail from some site she uses. The apps, settings, and other features come next. The net was easy to download on this scrap of parchment. I looked up storage when she asked how many bites she didn't believe when I said 100 Gigibites. I lied and said I was misreading or joking before giving the amount of storage I'd used from video downloading. Despite all I learned, I still felt as though there was more to the Trans. paper that even she couldn't get. Sometimes it'd blink whitely. I didn't know why. Its other app-like shapes perplexed me. Its abstract symbols scared me a little. They seemed like ancient tribal runes or something. Didn't want to explore them. I feared what they'd unlock-noise? A system crash? Or just confusion? I did use one- accidentally. It looked like an ear. I hit it and I felt a pop in my head. As unexpected a shock it was, perhaps this is why I've since avoided the other strange apps. Everything went silent. The night's ambiance went blank. I was sore afraid. Though I was deaf I screamed in mute horror. I frantically hit the app again. Pop. I could hear the night's crickety chirp again... and mounting steps. "Zeb?" cried Pa, bursting in the room. "You okay? I heard you cry out." I had flipped the paper back over just in time. The paper emitted no light from the other side. "Uh, yeah, Pa. Just a... dream." "Was it of our old world? The Miliphen?" "Yeah." "Fear not. Abigail had similar dreams too when she learned of our legacy during her coming of age." "For how long?" "A few seasons. It'll pass." "How long for you, Pa?" His silence was more defining then what I experienced. "I'm glad you're okay, Zeb. Let's go back to bed. Do you want me to stay and say a prayer with you?" "No. I'll be okay." "Very well. Good night." I looked on at the door after Pa left- appreciating his loving concern while using my returned hearing to measure when he closed the door back to his room. I flipped the Trans. Paper back up to its lighted side on my pillow. What the hell was that? All sound vanished. It was like a nightmare. My ears started to sting as sound marched itself at home again in my lobes. Could it be? It had to be... I hit the ear shaped app on the screen again and... all sound was warped into a funnel of nothing. It didn't scare me this time. Somehow this device could turn off the user's ability to hear. Its wonders never ceased though as I looked closer at the early app. I saw what looked like the tiny shapes of musical notes fade by the image of the lobe. I knew I had to try something. I began texting. Z: Beth. Send me a song. B: U been working out in the sun too long today, cowboy? U told me not to send u audio. Ur paddle lovin' Ma wouldn't be happy. Z: Just do it. I got headphones now. B: Ah. There's the boyish charm I can't say no to. What do you think it should be? Z: Send me your favorite. Might as well start with the best. Couldn't understand half the words. Only caught the choir which I assumed to be its name: "Take on Me." The sounds were startling as they jammed about my lobes in a symphonic explosion of what I'd only vaguely until that moment understood to be music. My ears were even more brittle with crackled agony after that. I felt to see it they were bleeding. I tapped some more on the screen for a volume button. She texted again. B: That do anything for you? I held on to the ear app. It then presented its volume on the screen that I could lower or heighten with my touch. Z: Let's see what else I been missing out on. From there I'd never go back. The tempting allure of the fruit of the tree of knowledge came not from an Apple product, but the advanced capabilities of the Amish's very own advanced tech of its lost world. Beth practically sampled every course of the world's culture to me on those nightly feasts of discourse. I heard every piece of music of every genre she could suggest. I was taken in by the films and shows she shared. I was in awe of the art of her memes. I was in most wonder over Youtube. We started that endless library off with the less daunting familiarity of the Cringe Bros.- my old school tormentors that I didn't miss all that much. Such resentment evaporated with every joke Beth made at their expense in each video she shared. B: Can you believe they thought mooning the mail man was smart? or even funny? What's sadder is they tried it again with Jehovah's Witness. Z: Even as an Amish, I have to admit those guys were pretty cool under pressure, at least by my standards. I would've probably shared many of those swears you showed me if that happened to me. B: LOL Loled we did indeed. She knew I was laughing when she too sent that. As far from each other as we were, I felt so close to her. Yet what became more distant for me was when I'd have to awake for morning chores. These late night messages were starting to make me almost as insomniatic as her. Things got worse at home. Ma failed my test on Genesis.
"The forbidden fruit was never called an apple, Zebediah. Keep steadfast before the word of the Lord." Planting the crops seemed to last longer than ever. My legs seemed to be dragged back for miles. The setting sun out at the winding horizon stung my eyes and gave me many night's worth of headaches. These burdens only multiplied when big sis left for her Rumspringa. "I'll tell you all about it when I get back," said Molly. "Enjoy being an only child, Zeb." Not so. With her gone, the extra attention drove me down. Pa worked me harder. With no daughter to tend to the gardens, coops, or cows; I had to pick up the slack. The pain was a sore burden to carry every day. The buckets of sweat from summer's awakening swelter didn't help either. The only thing that made me smile was Beth's late-night texts. I don't know who asked more questions: her about my world or me about her world. B: Rumspringa is like a big Spring Break for you guys, right? Z: It's more of a crossroads. We're allowed about a year to live without our duties or rules. If we like life outside of our farm, we can abandon it to live the way we wish. B: Do most Amish really leave it all behind? Z: No. Most of us stay Amish by the end. B: Can't leave something you've always known, huh? Z: I guess. What happened at school today? B: For the parts that I was awake for? We learned about the Big Bang Theory. The teacher slammed his book on my desk to demonstrate it. What a dick. Z: I've heard of that. That's how scientists and atheists believe the world started, right? B: No one 'believes' it. It's just what happened. Z: I'm just genuinely curious about the thought process behind it. The universe just pops up without no one, nothing behind it? B: I wouldn't call it a 'pop.' Mr. Dick explained it more like a growth- an expansion. There's this map of space showing its radiation stretching out. Z: So why call it a bang? B: I don't know, dude. If nothing exists without being created, who created God? Z: TBH IDK. That's just what I believe. Can you truly say for sure how everything started or if it was caused by God or not? B: tell you what: let's agree to say we don't know for sure and leave it at that. Deal? Z: Deal. What's on the screens tonight? B: There's some synth wave playing on my phone. I'm texting you- duh. I'm watching a documentary on Charles Manson (the murder hippie I told you bout). And I'm traversing that open world game on my tablet while googling a new anime to binge tomorrow night. Z: Whoa. How do you keep track of that? I get dizzy just imagining all that. B: Well the shows I play with subtitles, I don't care about the sound in a video game, and I listen to the music. The googling gets done during cut-screens or load screens. Z: Still seems overwhelming to me at least. B: If you'd just upgrade to a phone from this century I could share some of this shit with you. Z: I know. I wish I could, but my family thinks technology is wrong. B: Like a sin? I don't remember Jesus ever saying 'thou shalt not tweet.' Although I'm sure that crappy movie adaption of The Bible I watched wasn't totally accurate. Z: No, but The Bible tells of vanity- how distractions in life can keep up from witnessing the Lord. That's basically what goes into Amish practice. B: No offense, but it seems so restrictive. Z: I mean no offense, but living off screens doesn't seems to be the most outgoing lifestyle choice either. B: Maybe. But at least it's my choice. Z: It's mine too Beth. I don't have to live on this farm forever. B: Yet since you were raised there, how much of your desire to stay is really yours? So much indoctrination has been drilled into you since day 1. At some point you got to decide what you really want out of life on your own. There it was again, that open maw of the void that was the future... ever demanding to filled with a purpose and I didn't know what to offer it. Z: IDK, Beth. Once again we've reached a philosophical impasse. You really need to take it easy on those self-help Youtube channels. I'm bushed. Going to bed. Got some crops to water early again tomorrow. Good night. B: Good night, Zebulon. Tell the big G I said hi in your nightly prayers. Not only did I ask the Lord to help her find Jesus (not just in a silly Netflix adaptation) but I also said another to help me find myself. The next grueling day, I found something... transcendent. I was fetching a ruler for Ma. She told me it was in her closet on its top shelf. While grabbing up there, I felt paper underneath it. I pulled that out too. It fell on the ground and it brightened up like a square light bulb. After swallowing my gasp, I realized that it was the Trans. Paper. I cut myself out of my suspended staring. I found myself in awe of seeing the device again- like an old friend. Its lights ebbed, flicking its main menu screen's abstract background in the glimmering sun's light. Ma calling after me saw me suddenly stuff it into my pocket. I held the ruler up. I gave it to her. "Thank you, Zeb. You're a good boy. I just can't reach that shelf like I used to. My old back just whips me every time. Now... let me tell you the difference between inches and centimeters..." I zoned out during Ma's entire lecture on how those measurements work and how America rebelled from the European way that we've long abandoned. I only thought of the Trans. Paper through each glassy eyed nod. Zebediah: Are you awake?
Beth: Woke AF! U kno me! (sorta) Up on the screens again. I'm up to 5 now thanx to u! Welcum to the party! Wutup? Z: Thank you I guess. So you were right. I need someone to talk to. B: O God. Did they hit you? Z: No. I don't get hit. You shouldn't assume that because I'm Amish. B: srry :( Guess I'm not so woke after all... :( Z: It's okay. It's just I'm not sure of a lot of stuff right now. B: Like? Z: Like- I stared out at the night sky's blob unsure of how to start. I decided I'd let it all out. Word limit per text or inhibitions be damned. I think it took up nearly five messages. Z: Like when I got pulled out of school I feel like I should've felt something. You know? Like I should be upset or happy. IDK. Never used IDK before. Z: And I'm at home with Ma again as my teacher and I do feel like I lost something, but IDK what it is. Friends? No one liked me at that school. Teacher's? They were nice, but they seemed so shy around me just because of my heritage. The class lessons themselves? I don't think so. Despite how different it was to home school, a lot of it bored me. Yet I still feel smothered down and I don't know to express it and (IDK) I feel like I've felt this way for so long that it's like I don't know how to feel anymore. Yet my life's suddenly changed so rapidly now that I don't feel like I can process it. I got such a stream of stuff hitting me. I've been feeling queasy when Ma milks the cow, chores feel more repetitive than ever, I don't know what I want to do for my Rumspringa and IDK I just don't seem to know who I am. I feel good when I'm around you too and IDK why. IDK. That's how I feel I guess. The only thing I held back was my people's inter-dimensional history, which was more a footnote in all these issues I've had bubbling in me for a while. But I was so focused on holding that back that I didn't realize I mentioned how much I liked Beth in the text before I hopelessly watched myself send it. I burned in heavy torment upon my bed as I dreaded her reply. Would she even reply after all that? I felt my phone vibrate on my shuttering chest. B: That's a lot of 'IDKs' and 'I feels.' I can really tell now that you don't have anyone to talk to. I found myself writing: Z: Do u ever feel that way? It was a long wait. It made me feel more nervous. Was that too personal? Vibrations. B: Let met put it this way, when I'm not burying my nightly anxiety in like 50 screens, I actually go outside. There's this rickety wooden bridge in the forest outside my house. Don't know who put it there. Seems so old. It's thin, but sturdy. It overlooks this deep chasm into a river. When I'm at my peak of insomnia I go out to just stand there. I'm not suicidal, but I just stand over it and wonder about doing it. It's my way of taking stock of my life when I'm tired of running from it. Who am I? What do I want to be? Why is the world so confusing? How can I reconcile with this? Facing down death puts life in perspective. Than I get so lost for answers I finally go inside and fall asleep. So I guess what I'm saying is that you're not the only one who's already abnormally anxious about life at the unripe age of 13, y'know? Suddenly I realized that this must be how overwhelmed she felt when I unloaded on her. Hers took about five messages too. I was shocked that someone else felt weird about everything. I thought I was the only one. Z: Well maybe you needed someone to talk to too. B: Maybe. It's weird. I love my parents and they love me back, but I still feel like I can't confide in them. Z: So why me if not them? B: I guess 2 reasons: 1- you struck me as a good listener at school and 2- I could tell you have similar worries too. I found myself deep in thought over this. We seemed to be making a... connection. B: Speaking of which, wouldn't you know it? Our little chat wore me out. Guess I won't visit that bridge tonight. Awesome. Chatting with a cool Amish kid beats confronting a deathly chasm any night it seems. I'll have to see if this helps us both the next time I text. Adios, Zebulon! So I was out of school and back to my old one. Ma drew up the paperwork for having me taken out as she had me sitting in the corner reading The Bible.
"Five more minutes, Zeb. Then we'll move to Algebra." I didn't half mind being back at home so much. I got to spend more time with Ma and Pa, which was nice. Then again it wasn't under the best of circumstances. I felt an unspoken, but pronounced air of anger throughout the house, especially when Pa and Ma were in the same room together. Pa never spoke about what happened. Yet he never really agreed to it. I'm not sure how to feel around them when their minute-long stares glare on with me smooshed in the middle. I did enjoy having more time to do chores around the farmland though. I was actually getting better at milking Matilda. I eventually could do it without Ma there at all. I was just glad that I didn't have to see her get so rough with the utter. I tried to be gentler with it though this did make the milk spurt out more slowly. When I wasn't doing that I'd be hoeing, baling hay, mowing the grass, or cleaning out our chicken coops for eggs. When Pa wasn't planting crops or having more stern silence than usual around Ma, he was in his garage fixing cars. He made extra money helping people with their vehicles. Nothing serious- just a sign out front with a number for passerbys as well as an ad in the paper, "McTaggert Car Repair. Get it Fixed. Fast. Cheap. Simple," followed by our number and address. Always wondered where Pa learned how to fix cars if he lived on this farm his whole life. Secretly being from a technologically advanced inter-dimensional lineage seems to have made car work easy for him. Imagine my surprise when Pa's back garage door burst open with his face popping out as I had such musings while strolling by. "Zeb. Come in please. Someone wants to talk to you." I went in confused. I saw a car outside the garage, just another client for Pa- probably just wanting updates on repairs. Who would want to talk to me? I was met with a man bald of of head but red-bearded of face. Didn't seem excited to see me. He zipped up his thin jacket and turned over to his daughter. It was Beth. "I thought that was you I saw when we pulled in," she declared in proud triumph. "Run along, Bethers," said her Dad. "Mr. McTaggert and I need to figure some stuff out." "Okay," she chirped. She moved towards me. I found myself looking at Pa as if to say: 'but I have chores.' Anticipating this he said, "Go on and play with you little friend. You been working too hard." So Beth and I were out the door, leaving me unsure of how to 'play' when I never had any school mates over. The closest I had was big sis, before she outgrew me. "Would it be offensive to ask if your family has corn hole?" I found myself nodding a tad too wildly at this. Before I knew it, we had it set up. She blue of bag, and I red. We played almost silently except for the bags smacking the wood. I was ahead by three. When I missed one she suddenly asked, "You've been silent, dude. Are you still pissed I hit you?" I said, "No... I mean, I was never pissed. I-I-" I caught myself cursing. I had to watch that damn it! I whipped my head to see if anyone else heard. Beth snorted at this like she did when I called her 'miss.' "Awwww," she droned, "you cursed! Do you guys have a swear jar around here or something?" "No," I said. "When my sister Molly or I ever used bad words, Ma would spank us with the paddle." Beth stopped laughing and she frowned. "That's fucked up," she said with a throw at my board. Landed on the bottom of the board. Nearly slid off. Another point for her. "What do you mean?" She shrugged. "I don't know. Don't you think it's a little mean that your parents hit you?" "Not my Dad," I interrupted. "He just had to give me a look." "A look?" "Yeah. One look and I know he meant business. I've had enough from Ma's punishment. I've been too scared to see what he'd do." I threw the bag. Missed again. Still ahead by two. "You know that's not right, Zeb. I felt really crappy when I found out I hit you... especially when I discovered you were nice guy (albeit a little corny). Those Cringe Bros. that I got to suffer a homeroom class with now? Not so much." I had to laugh- even at that. I threw my bag. On the board! Three points ahead again! Beth went on. "I can't imagine hurting someone as nice as you- even if you cursed. Why would someone's parents do that?" She threw her bag. Right in her hole. We were tied. Her Dad called. She walked towards me, zipping her coat. "Do you have a phone?" "Yeah. For emergencies." She gave me her number. "You desperately need someone to talk to," she explained, "there's no bigger emergency than that." Then she left. "Put that corn hole up, boy," said Dad. "You got some more chores to do before supper." Supper came as always. My heart was still dancing in my chest. I had no time to dwell on those funny feelings when Ma spoke up to Molly. "So what are your plans for Rumspringa, Molly?" Molly listed them as if they were laid before her. "My friends have me covered. We're going to the movies, some concerts, some restaurants, also some stores. It's going to be a blast." "Now these concerts," said Ma, "will there be drugs there?" Molly veered her eyes between Pa and I, blink-less. "I don't know..." she said obviously trying to fight the urge to sneer. She failed. "Kind of hard to advertise since they're illegal..." "Are we being flippant, Molly?" "No, Ma'am. I just didn't know how to answer you. I mean there's no guarantee either way." "Stay away from that stuff, Molly." "I will. I will. You know Chesney, right?" "The girl whose house you're staying at?" "Yeah. She's a good Christian girl. Her Mom may be even more strict than you." Biting silence. "I mean... not that that's a bad thing." "Yet she lets her go to concerts unsupervised." "Yeah, Mom... New Boys Concerts." "Who're they?" I found myself asking. "God's Not Dead, Zeb. Remember? We have that move novelization?" "Oh, yeah. I didn't like the part where the atheist got hit by a car." Molly shook her head. "No. It's actually good because he came to Jesus before he died. The pastor guy literally calls it a cause for celebration." "Okay. I know which movie you're talking about." I still thought that it was a weird thing to say over a dead body. I privately mumbled this while munching my potatoes. "See, Mom?" concluded Molly. "We're seeing bands with values we can take... uh... value in. So can I please go?" Ma's specs beamed from Molly to Pa, beard engrossed in his corn bread. He swallowed when he felt the specs hover over him. I felt that same unspoken, but pronounced air of anger flash for a second between them. "Rumspringa is a time for seeing the current world up close, Abigail. I trust our daughter with the sound judgement we've instilled in her. She'll be fine." "Yes!" she cheered. Supper mulled along with talk of Fall harvest coming up. Then it lulled to nothing with the setting sun. Molly and I were on dishes when she brought something up at the same time as a freshly cleaned plate for me to dry. "What're you doing for your Rumspringa, Zeb?" I stopped at this. It dawned on me that I had no aims, no desires outside of farm work and going to church. For some reason that realization bubbled my brain up- keeping me awake half the night. Feeling purposeless bothered me so much I had to turn on my emergency phone and text Beth about it. Something about her... even beyond the funny feelings made me feel like I could talk to her about stuff like this. Got up at 4:30 as usual. Splashed cold water in my face from the basin that Ma laid out on the table for me. Tripped into the itchy thread of my morning work clothes and I was off to hoe.
Three grueling hours of getting each indention for our field just right for Pa to seed-sprinkle just behind me later. Then I got breakfast: eggs, grits, and potato skins. Then the bus's tires cold be heard squealing to a stop outside. "Have a blessed day at school, Zeb," said Ma. "You too," I thoughtlessly returned. I tried to correct it when I saw my mistake. "I mean... does the house still count as a school if I ain't going here no more?" She slapped my shoulder playfully with a towel. "Get on, you corn dog!" I did as I was carried all the way to the bus by my smile. It simpered away once on there. Always hated the eyes on me once at the judgment seat of the other kid's eyes. I don't look back on school like a tragedy. Everyone got picked on in one way or another. Still, the uniqueness of my torment yet stung all the harder. A dirty blonde guy named Rye popped his freckly head out at me. "Dear GOD on high, Z! Take a ****ing bath at least once in your life, man!" His smaller version of his brother, Trevor, agreed. "Yeah. You stiiiinky!" I muttered, "Sorry," before getting to my seat. I usually sat alone since everyone called me stinky. I didn't think I smelled that bad. Just a little sweaty from working in the fields all morning. I don't even wear the same shoes. I shrugged it off as usual and began to skoot towards the window. But then I realized that I wasn't sitting alone. What looked like a lump of laundry was tussled up near me. I peered closer to hear it snoring. Didn't recognize the matching dark blue of hooded jacket and sweat pants obscuring the face. Sensing my presence, the hooded one muffly said, "Don't bother me. I'm dead asleep. Wake me, and I'll punch your butt." I stiffened to this and left this person alone. Too bad Rye and Trevor didn't have the same concern about me. I felt the flash of their camera phones. Startled me at first because they reminded me of the Miliphen's blasts for a sec. This nonsense again, I inwardly groaned. "Hey guys. Stop taking pictures of me please. My parents don't want me on social media. It's against our ways." Rye giggled. "Don't be a d*** a in the mud, Zebulon. We trying to make you internet famous, boi." Rye focused back on his phone to show me the image. It was me but with some kind of rainbow filter. "Gay Amish Pride!" he sang. Oh. Yeah. Rainbows. Ugh. "Don't post that, Rye. Stuff like that is against our ways too." I don't know why I tried to paw it from them. Just didn't want another after-school meeting. Rye always was too fast for me and it only makes him badger me more. "Whoa, bro. You some kind of homophobe? But Trevor was about to confess his undying love for you." "Shut up, Rye. Everyone knows you suck more d*** than anyone." "Yeah," snorted Rye, "I know you jealous. Besides, didn't you know you're more likely to be gay if you have a brother?" Trevor snickered with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Now you talking incest, Rye? You gonna give Z a stroke over there if you keep that up." I wasn't having this. "Please just delete it, Rye? I don't want you suspended again." I pawed at it again like a fool. He grabbed my wrist, twisted it with a sting, and yanked me towards his harsh face. He spoke in a spitty lisp. "Well that wouldn't happen if someone didn't keep telling on me, you dumb f***." Trevor whooped gayly. "Give Zeb a sloppy kiss, lover boy!" Rye torqued his head to Trevor. "Man, shut up!" I tried to wriggle from Rye's grip on my shirt. I stepped away only to tumble into the hoody. "That's it," its previously muffled voice shrilly snapped. Pandemonium was ablaze all around me. I felt the fists bludgeon into the left side of my neck. I rolled back even more until I was on my butt. From my new angle I saw the sweat pants twirling on my slapping fists, clearly obscured by the hood over the face. The blinded fist flurry fell into Rye and Trevor. They were cut from their debate as the knuckles fired into them. Before I could process any more of the madness, it was over. The bus halted to an abrupt lurch of a stop. "Huh?" The hood flapped off to reveal a red-headed girl's hair. She looked about the devastation. "Please tell me I'm dreaming," she said aloud, seemingly to me. This visit to the Principal was not before school this time. We also had an extra guest. We sat in the lobby facing each other. Trevor and Rye were on two chairs facing the sweat pantsed girl and I. Everyone was blood snorting on their napkins except me. I got an ice cube for my neck and wrist. We stared at each for a minute that burned like an hour. The morning sun flecked through the curtains into my wincing eyes. That made me even more ansy. Then the girl started talking. "Sorry I went savage there, fellas. Just cranky and tired because I been having all nighters on the screens." "Screens?" I found myself saying. She looked at me. "You know... the screens," she explained. She went on undeterred by my vacant stare. "Most go for one. Me? I gots four, baby. Binging on one, games on another, ebook on another, music on another." She put a tone of admitting pride in her words. "Yeah. I'm pretty wired (mostly on coffee)." "That's really unhealthy," chimed in Rye. "You need your sleep, not to mention your eyes... you could go blind from that s***." "Yeah," she conceded, "I know. I guess I'm addicted. Been cutting down on it, but i was so nervous about my first day here that I couldn't help but backslide on the old all-nighter habit again." She came back to me as if I needed the most convincing. "Doing it calms me down. Like I'm staving off an inevitable worry or something, y'know?" "Well sorry you're having a bad first day, miss." She snorted with giggles peppering her napkin with blood. "Miss? Who says that anymore?" "Just look at him," sneered Trevor, "he's the salt of the earth. He Amish." This stopped the laughing, but started new nonsense. "Oh, cool. So your family doesn't do screens like me?" I shrugged with an obvious nod to this followed by a smirk. She flapped her face down in slight, silly shame. Then her crimson locks flipped her back up. "Sorry. I'm stupid. I'm also Bethany... Bethany Jefferson." She extended her hand. I shook it. After an awkward smile exchange I remembered it was time to say my name. "Zebediah... Zebediah McTaggart." "Gonna introduce us to your new girlfriend, Zeb?" broke in Rye with a sneer. I didn't know what to say to that. So I averted my eyes from him. Rye proceeded for me. "I'm Rye," he said with an eye roll over me. "I'm Trevor," Trevor said. "We're the Cringe Bros!" They tonelessly belted with a matching pose of their raised arms. "Cringe Bros? Where have I heard that before?" Beth asked aloud. I like just calling her Beth. "Whoa, dude! She heard of us," squeed Trevor. "As a screen junkie maybe you saw our Youtube channel! We do bad-ass vlogs and pranks! We're gonna be the next Paul brothers!" It clicked for Beth. "Oh yeah! You guys did that... mooning prank...?" "Yeah," went Trevor. "Back in March, right? I think it was called: 'We Mooned the Mail man?' Or was that the garbage man one? I think it was in April? Do you remember, Rye?" "So," Rye said in a husky, self-assured voice, "You like what you saw, Bethy? I'm in pretty good shape down there wouldn't you say?" Beth was thankfully as visibly appalled as I was. "Okay," she replied in a raised tone, "I didn't even say that I liked the video there, bud. So keep your shorts on." "What?" said Trevor as it looked like Beth was crushing his dreams of internet fame. "No offense, really," she explained, "that Paul brothers type stuff isn't for me." "We're not literally like the Paul brothers. It's like... what's it called, Rye?" "Satire..." Rye said turning to the window to take in Beth's rejection. "Yeah. We're just making fun of them. That's why we call ourselves the Cringe Bros. Please don't tell me you disliked it..." Trevor seemed to be on the verge of tears. Beth got really nice about it. "Don't take it so personally, dude. I never hit dislike. I just stop and watch another vid. People just have different preferences." She looked at me for an example. "Zebediah here prefers his Amish Paradise, ya'll prefer to be content creators that I don't prefer, while I just watch what suits me." "Like what?" I found myself asking. "Lots of stuff," she replied, very pleased to share her interests. "Basically all the educational stuff that they don't bother with at school: philosophy, film analysis, politics- the works. I also enjoy lets-plays and the occasional meme compilation too." She might as well have been speaking German to me, but I liked to see her smile. "Zeb," called Principal Ruth, "your parents are in my office. Let's do it." I tried to toss a last look at Beth, but my eyes fell into seeing lewd gestures from the Cringe Bros. One pair of hands: the churn. The other: the butter. They dropped it before the Principal could join my eyes on them. In the office sat Ma and Pa. Both of their arms were crossed. "As your parents and I were discussing we've been trying to figure out what to do about your education situation." "Here we go," mumbled Pa, seeing what was coming. "Are you okay, Zeb?" she said feeling out my face as if the camera 'stole my soul.'" "Fine, Ma. Kids just being jerks." She snapped her neck back to Principal Ruth. "You still haven't answered my question. How can you keep letting such incidences keep happening?" Ruth replied, "I understand your frustration, Mrs. McTaggarat. This school has worked hard to be accepting and understanding of Zeb's culture." "Yet the harassment continues under your watch." "Well, to be fair... this was outside of school grounds..." "You being flippant with me?" "No, Ma'am. Just stating a fact." "So what are you doing about this?" "The Kramer brothers will be put into detention after school today, during which time they'll be better educated on how to respect your family's proud heritage. Then they'll both be suspended again for a day." Ma whirled away in disbelief and back to him in fury. "Yes. Because that's worked so well the last twenty times this year. Can't you try to approach this in a different, more impactful way?" "I'm afraid we can't. Bullying and harassment must always mean detention, suspension, and education on better behaviors." "The pictures were deleted, yes?" added Pa. "Yes, Mr. McTaggarat. Apologies for not mentioning that. We both recall how important it is to your beliefs that we not allow anyone to put your son on social media." "Very good, Mr. Ruth." Pa turned back to Ma. "That'll be the end of this, Abigail. We simply must allow the school to conduct their affairs just as we're left to conduct ours." Ma wasn't having it. "It's once thing leaving a society that poisons itself alone. But I can't abide dipping our children into such muck." "Do..." cautiously began Ruth, "you guys need a minute alone?" "Sit down, Ruth!" bleated Ma by the point of her finger. "Perhaps you'll learn something, so-called schoolmaster." Ma turned back to Pa. "Places like this are no place for Zeb." "Abby," softly said Pa, "you know modern education better prepares Zeb for his Rumspringa away from Amish life. We can't shelter him in our cramped cabin of a classroom forever. Molly takes to it just fine. She's fully ready to face the outside world. But she didn't get there without going through a few hard knocks as well. We got to let Zeb see this through." Ma stared at Pa. Then Ruth. Then me, silently sitting in respectful patience. "No. This is the last straw. I apologize, Mr. Ruth, but Zeb will no longer be attending this institution. Good day. Come along, Zeb." I was shuffled out by my hand as if I was still a little boy... maybe I was. We were out of that school so fast that Ruth, Pa, Rye, and Trevor were but blurs. And Beth? I barely got to see that smallest frown follow me. She must have heard the whole thing. To bad. I liked her. Oh, well. The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away... |
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