John Frum The Reluctant Messiah

Secrets Of The Wooden Crate

It was dusk when John turned the latch on his apartment house door. Ever since the 'incident at the Red Witch', as it became known, he took to checking his surroundings more than usual and always stopped and listened before entering- even in his own apartment.

His concern certainly wasn't theft- after all, it was a typical college apartment where most of what little furniture there was, was made of pallet wood and painted cinder blocks. There were numerous boxes lining the hallway floor, filled with trophies and achievement plaques all left unhung and not displayed, a testament to his lack of interest in them. 

Interestingly, it was a select few primitive pieces that made the cut and were on display; a foreshadowing of his future path, perhaps. Other than a framed vintage movie poster of Peter Sellers' "Being There", it was pretty much nothing but off-white walls wherever you looked.

John opened the fridge and stared into the empty, white void. The bare bulb revealed the same inventory as when he had left. Nothing but a large, filtered water pitcher, an open pack of string cheese, a to-go carton with God-only-knows-what inside, a single craft beer and three different types of hot sauce. He grabbed the lone beer, wiped the top with his shirt and using the hinge on the cabinet door, popped it open and began sifting through the mountain of papers inside Wharton's mystery crate.

Much of it looked like typed up lab notes- handwritten chemical symbols scribbled in the margins complete with scratched out sections, nothing compelling to say the least. But in one folder, amidst the notes was a black and white photograph. It was the same photograph as the one that fell into his lap in the cockpit of Miss Edna. But unlike that one, this one wasn't missing the bottom right-hand corner. 

There was a little girl, no more than four or five dressed in her village finery, grinning from ear to ear, her big, bright eyes staring straight into the camera's lens. John turned it over and in pencil, the names of each had been written. All but the little girl's. It had been erased causing John to wonder who she was and why her name had been removed.

It had served to cause John to now go through each stack of documents more carefully, more methodically. When he finally reached the bottom of the crate, it was nearly 1 am and without all the papers covering the crate's wooden interior the musty smell of years of mildew filled the room. There was one last photograph, but its corner had gotten stuck in a crack of the wooden bottom. John gently tugged on it and when he did, he noticed the entire bottom moved.

"A false bottom!" he said to himself.

He rummaged through his junk drawer, found an almost used up roll of duct tape and fashioned a crude handle out of it. He attached it in the center and without much effort, it came right out. Sitting in a very shallow cavity was a thin, handwritten diary whose leather cover had begun to crack and tear. 

When he saw the gold leaf initials, JF, it caused him to audibly gasp. He stared at it at length, holding it with both hands. This was his father's diary, written in his own hand. This was big. He set it down, almost afraid to open it. Beneath the book was a small 8mm metal film canister. He took it out and placed it on the table and then gently pried the lid open.

It seemed to be in remarkable shape. A touch brittle perhaps, but all things considered it looked rather good. He turned back to the book. With one last pull on his beer, he hunched over it and carefully opened to page one. Except page one was not page one. The first few pages had been torn out- how long ago and what they contained was anyone's guess, but John began to read it out loud. It was his way to somehow bring it more to life- he wanted to hear it as well as comprehend it.

"There is a refusal on the part-"

John stopped and actually blurted out "This was...It's my dad!" still struggling with the magnitude of what he was doing. He took a breath and continued.

"There is a refusal on the part of any bureaucrat to even consider anything other than hard, empirical data as the cause for this society's incredible abilities. And so that's what we have given them. We've filled our official reports with copious amounts of flora and fauna examinations, diet and nutritional habits and sleep patterns. All of which mean nothing.

The concern is that they may tire of our inconclusive conclusions and replace the team before we've had a chance to master the fundamentals. The French have already sent in an observer and I suspect it is just a matter of time before the Americans do as well. It should be noted that we have made some progress, albeit small, in our own abilities. We have managed to grow an entire row of breadfruit without any water whatsoever. Not exactly the grand Koontal of the elders, but impressive nonetheless. I am optimistic that my ability to operate Koontal will begin to increase exponentially. It feels like a muscle that gets stronger with each day.

I'm a scientist so all this goes against all that I am to reach the conclusions we've reached. It is its simplicity that is the most baffling and the reason it is so elusive. Believing is receiving. Nearly impossible for us to comprehend and execute because our knowledge promotes doubt- we trust in the five senses. Not these people. Their world is a world of magical simplicity. Life lived in the absence of doubt. And that is key. We westerners see this on rare occasions usually because of absolute dire circumstances that demand a supernatural answer. Somehow here that component is not a requirement and the impossible is done on a daily basis- I suspect simply because they don't know they can't."

It was signed, John Ferrum Sr.

John went back and read the passage a second time. This time more slowly, like a well-crafted pour-over coffee, stopping every couple of sentences to give the words time to filter down and be fully absorbed. There was both comfort and a completion of sorts in the words. For the first time he felt a confirmation of his own outlook and began to sense that his lifelong curiosity, a curiosity that had gnawed at him for so long, was about to be satisfied.

Someone else understood him. More importantly someone else shared his bizarre experience that till now, was so difficult to even put into words. As much as he continued to deny the events that made him different as a kid, this somehow allowed him to finally accept and embrace his knowledge of his own unique abilities. Just the admission in using those words to describe himself- "unique abilities" was groundbreaking. The simple act of reading something written decades ago, by someone he hardly knew- for John, the discovery was nothing short of exhilarating.

He laid the book back down, much the way one would pause during an incredible meal to savor the moment. He picked up the film canister again and gently unrolled a short length of film. He held it up to the kitchen light but the tiny frames of the 8mm film revealed little. He was going to need a projector and he just so happened to know who had one.

He left his apartment and walked down the hall. He stopped briefly as he neared the last door on the left. The muffled sounds of explosions, gunfire and screeching tires told him that Max was home.

John knocked on the door. A Latino voice yelled out, "Whatchu wan wit me!"

"Yeah, hey is Max there?" John yelled back. " I just want to-"

"He gonna beat yo ass, floor it!" another voice shot back. More gunfire.

"Ohhh..." he laughed, "GTA."

John let himself in. There was Max, headphones on, sitting on his avocado green Goodwill couch, Grand Theft Auto on the flat screen, completely oblivious to John's presence behind him.

"Hey Max- Just gonna borrow that old projector... and this box of doughnut holes......and... your wallet. By the way, your couch is on fire. Later dude!"

He grabbed the projector, stuffed a doughnut hole in his mouth and let himself out. Back in his apartment he placed the projector on a box and plugged it in. Because of John's penchant for 'minimalist' design, it wasn't hard to find a blank wall to use as a screen. After carefully threading the old film through the sprockets, he doused the light and sat down in his ratty plaid recliner with Max's box of half-eaten, leftover doughnut holes. He paused briefly, nodded to himself in preparation and flipped the projector on.