Read Pulphead: Essays for Free Online Page B

what those are, apologies. I was born-again, not raised on acid.
    Baldwin said many things; the things he said got stranger and stranger. He said his Brazilian nanny, Augusta, had converted him and his wife in Tucson, thereby fulfilling a prophecy she’d been given by her preacher back home. He said, “God allowed 9/11 to happen,” that it was “the wrath of God,” and that Jesus had told him to share this with us. He also said the Devil did 9/11. He said God wanted him “to make gnarly cool Christian movies.” He said that in November we should vote for “the man who has the greatest faith.” The crowd lost it; the trailer all but shook.
    When Jake and Bub beat on the door, I’d been in there for hours, getting weaker, rereading The Silenced Times and the festival program. In the program, it said the candle-lighting ceremony was tonight. The guys had told me about it—it was one of the coolest things about Creation. Everyone gathered in front of the stage, and the staff handed out a candle to every single person there. The media handlers said there was a lookout you could hike to, on the mountain above the stage. That was the way to see it, they said.
    When I opened the door, Jake was waving a newspaper. Bub stood behind him, smiling big.
    “Look at this,” Jake said. It was Wednesday’s copy of The Valley Log , serving Southern Huntingdon County—“It is just a rumor until you’ve read it in The Valley Log .”
    The headline for the week read MOUNTAIN LION NOT BELIEVED TO BE THREAT TO CREATION FESTIVAL CAMPERS.
    “Wha’d we tell you?” Bub said.
    “At least it’s not a threat,” I said.
    “Well, not to us it ain’t,” said Jake.
    I climbed to their campsite with them in silence. Darius was sitting on a cooler, chin in hands, scanning the horizon. He seemed meditative. Josh and Ritter were playing songs. Pee Wee was listening, by himself; he’d blown it with the Jewish girls.
    “Hey, Darius,” I said. He got up. “It’s fixin’ to shower here in about ten minutes,” he said. I went and stood beside him, tried to look where he was looking.
    “You want to know how I know?” he said.
    He explained it to me, the wind, the face of the sky, how the leaves on the tops of the sycamores would curl and go white when they felt the rain coming, how the light would turn a certain “dead” color. He read the landscape to me like a children’s book. “See over there,” he said, “how that valley’s all misty? It hasn’t poured there yet. But the one in back is clear—that means it’s coming our way.”
    Minutes later, it started to rain, big, soaking, percussive drops. The guys started to scramble. I suggested we all get into the trailer. They looked at one another, like maybe it was a sketchy idea. Then Ritter hollered, “Get her done!” We all ran down the hillside, holding guitars and—in Josh’s case—a skillet wherein the fried meat of a still-unidentified woodland creature lay ready to eat.
    There was room for everyone. I set my lantern on the dining table. We slid back the panes in the windows to let the air in. Darius did card tricks. We drank springwater. Somebody farted; the conversation about who it had been (Pee Wee) lasted a good twenty minutes. The rain on the roof made a solid drumming. The guys were impressed with my place. They said I should fence it. With the money I’d get, I could buy a nice house in Braxton County.
    We played guitars. The RV rocked back and forth. Jake wasn’t into Christian rock, but as a good Baptist he loved old gospel tunes, and he called for a few, God love him. Ritter sang one that killed me. Also, I don’t know what changed, but the guys were up for secular stuff. It turned out that Pee Wee really loved Neil Young; I mean, he’d never heard Neil Young before, but when I played “Powderfinger” for him, he sort of curled up like a kid, then made me play it again when I was done. He said I had a pretty voice.
    We all told one another how good