The Upside of Death

The Meeting of the Minds. Part 9

You can buy The Upside of Death book at Amazon, iBooks and Kobo.

Zach walked into the church hall. Inside, two women around seventy years old moved plastic chairs into position with the agility of wounded cattle.

“Can I help?” he asked. The closest woman turned to him, a sweet smile breaking open.

“Of course,” she replied. “We need to set out eight rows of eight for the visitors tonight.”

He pulled chairs off a stack in the hallway and joined the women setting up. The other one dropped a stapled booklet onto each seat. 

“Your first time here?” she asked.

“Yes, I’m interested in what you do here,” he said. Trying to sound sincere, he felt like a fraud. An idiot as well.

“I’m sure you’ll find the evening very informative,” she said.

He sounded desperate but he didn’t care. He said, “A friend told me I might be able to get a message from a loved one.”

She paused with a chair in her hand. “You should talk to Reverend Rachel.” She indicated a woman at the front of the hall.

The Reverend Rachel was short, dressed in floral, and moved with an industrious bustle while she stacked literature on a side table, placed a vase on the front table and set out drinking glasses next to it. She exuded the buoyant energy of a person who loved their work.

Zach approached, seven years old again and teacher shy. He cleared his throat. “A friend suggested I come here to receive a message.”

Reverend Rachel regarded him with a crinkle of amusement in her eyes. “I see,” she said. 

Perhaps it was the calm in her expression, or the openness. Somehow he felt he could talk to her and not be laughed at. He said. “I need to speak to somebody on the other side. I mean, I hope she’s not there but she might be, and I have to know.” His words rushed out.

“I see,” Reverend Rachel said again. “Stay the evening and I’ll see if I can get someone to help afterward.”

He took a seat in a row he had constructed and waited. More people arrived, shy, with nervous eye movements. Followed by a bunch of regulars, greeting the church members like they were family. The final groups were like him: those who had come reluctantly but with hope. He saw it in the way they held themselves, not open, but trying not to close off the door to their souls.

He couldn’t imagine Keera in a this place. She was careful to hide her abilities from others, and it was only because her guide Bardo insisted she join up with Zach for a particular mission a year ago that they came together at all. 

He’d had to make a big leap of faith just to believe the paranormal was, in fact, quite normal. His training and logical mindset stopped him taking too much on trust. He needed solid proof of all assertions, and Keera couldn’t provide them. 

“Nobody can,” she explained once. “This isn’t something for science. It’s beyond that. That’s why it’s hard to establish principles. Maybe in a hundred years we’ll understand more. Right now, I use what I have and it never lets me down.”

Now, the mediums assembled themselves, after exchanging hugs and kisses on arrival, at a long table up front. Reverend Rachel rose and said, “We’ll start with a song to lift the energy in the room. You’ll find the words in the booklet we put out for you on the seat. I’m sure you know most of the songs already.” 

She leaned over the table and pushed a button on a small round CD player. Zach recognized the opening bars of the Carpenters’ “Close to You.” He would never forget it. His father sang it in the shower every morning. Sang it the worst it could be sung.