Part 3
Beverly jotted down the information Kelly gave her on this Janice Bleufleur, which included the woman's phone number, email, and street address. A quick search through her employers' database also told Kelly, and summarily Bev, the location of a shop owned by Ms. Bleufleur, called The Dim Domain. Bev thanked her younger sister and headed to her little Neon.
First, she punched in the address of the store. It was a weekday, so the place would be open. If Janice Bleufleur couldn't talk on the phone, Bev intended to pay her store a personal visit. She had the time; after all, of all the Jenkins kin, she was the only one with no children.
Beverly had made True Power Baptist Church her priority for a long time. Long before the advent of their website, JesusHatesQueers.net, she'd gone to college and then law school in order to learn how to defend the family and the church from litigation. At the time, she'd earned a living serving as an attorney specializing in cases involving any element of faith or religion.
But when she and her sister had designed and launched the website, running and maintaining it became her career. Her father authorized her to sell merchandise such as shirts, posters and bumper stickers, all of which she designed and put on the site. She kept a quarter of the profits, and thanks to their conservative Christian site visitors, she made a tidy enough living to stop working.
Because of her devotion to the church and site, she had little or no time to start dating now. She accepted that she would likely never marry or have kids- so long as the faith was kept, she was happy.
Which was why she hoped Janice Bleufleur wouldn't answer her phone, so that Bev could pay the heathen a visit in person. She dialed the number Kelly gave her and hit send. The phone rang twice before clicking on. "Hello?" The woman sounded young to Bev.
"Miss Janice Bleufleur?"
"Hey, you even pronounced it right. Yeah, this is her."
"My name is Beverly Jenkins, I'm with the True Power Baptist Church. We just received an injunction you filed for with the local district attorney, and I'd like the chance to talk to you about it."
"Oh, yeah, you people," Bleufleur replied, sounding exasperated. "You wanna talk? Come on by my shop. I can give you the address."
"I already have it, I'll be by soon," Bev said and hung up. It sounded like this woman wanted a fight, and she wouldn't disappoint. Bev put the car in drive and headed out of the hotel parking lot, getting herself turned north.
It had been a while since anyone had attempted to sabotage one of the church's activities by legal means. Counter-protests had become the most common tactic by their detractors in the last four years, along with websites and forums dedicated to lambasting the church. She cycled through no less than thirty hate mails sent to the main site each day.
As she navigated the city's streets with the aid of her GPS, Beverly found herself thinking about the strange, dark visitor they'd had back at the church days before. He'd frightened her badly, though she would admit as much to no one. The idea that he'd been keeping tabs on them with the small camera in the RV's bathroom vent added further to her concern.
She almost hoped he would show himself in the open, soon. At least then they would know where he was. While the others of the congregation might think themselves better off not seeing him, she felt that the only way to really deal with creeps like that was to know where they were.
Beverly finally pulled up to the curb in front of The Dim Domain, a store that looked exactly as she had imagined it would. A purveyor of things dark and goth, likely offering occult paraphernalia for the curious teenage heathens of this forsaken city.
She killed the engine and got out, grabbing her heavy brown purse. Inside she kept the usual things a woman would, along with a pocket-sized bible and a canister of mace, just in case.
Bev pushed through the door, trying to ignore the annoying jangle of bells overhead. At the counter along the right wall of the main room of the store sat a bored-looking, pale young woman, the left side of her head shaved short, the rest dyed an electric blue. She had more metal in her face than Bev had in the little coin pouch in her purse, including a chain from her left nostril to the left corner of her mouth.
Bev cleared her throat meaningfully. The young woman looked up from her Fangoria magazine and squinted at her. "Can I help you," she asked.
"I called a short while ago, Beverly Jenkins," Bev said evenly. The younger woman narrowed her eyes, but a grin started to quirk her mouth. "I wanted to talk to you about the injunction you started up against us."
"It's not against you," said Bleufleur with a sneer. "It's against brainwashing little kids to be hateful bigots. And as I'm sure you've been informed, my request was granted."
"Why not just for a second counter-protest," Beverly asked innocently. But this Bleufleur girl, though young and dark, was not a fool.
"Because, with all the kiddies left behind, you'll have to take fewer grownups to your little rally. And in case you didn't know, in Amelia County, any group of minors under 12 in a group of more than 5 kids must be watched by at least two adults. That's two less douchebags waving signs."
Beverly gave a little grunt, clutching her purse in front of her. "I don't suppose you could be persuaded to rescind your injunction, could you?" Bleufleur leaned back on her stool and folded her arms over her chest. Beverly sighed, shook her head. She looked around the store pointedly, then back at the younger woman. "You're into all of this stuff. It isn't exactly normal, is it? But you wouldn't want someone to tell you you couldn't indulge in it, would you?"
"No, I wouldn't, but don't even try the whole first amendment argument on me, lady," Bleufleur said with a savage smile. "I keep my business in my store and among my friends. I don't go out and try to force my opinions on everyone else. If I did, things would get messy, and in a hurry."
Beverly wasn't quite sure what to make of that last statement, but she pressed on. "We can have this contested before the funeral, you know. And if we got it revoked, we would come after you for the legal fees. I could easily argue that the stress of going through all of that is worth damages on top. I'm offering you a gift by simply asking you to drop your injunction."
Now the young woman seemed to be considering her options, chewing her lip nervously. Finally, her shoulders sagged. "All right, fine, I'll drop it." She hopped down off of the stool. "Come with me into the back, I'll write up a formal notice so it can go quicker."
The woman started towards the back of the store, Beverly following on the opposite side of the counter. Bleufleur lifted an access partition and stepped out onto the floor, letting Beverly walk right behind her. "I thank you for coming around on this, Ms. Bleufleur."
"Oh, not a problem. Say, is that your Neon out front?"
"It is. Why?"
"Looking for a new car for a friend of mine," Bleufleur said. "And hey, no hard feelings. Stuff like this, it's really unimportant, so it can be dropped easily."
At the rear of the store stood a flat metal door labeled 'Employees Only'. "Should I wait here," Bev asked politely.
"Oh, no, come on through. Remember, I own the place." She opened the door, and without really looking first, Bev followed her through into a strange stone chamber, the wall ahead far off and hidden in shadows. Bleufleur stopped a few feet away and spun to face Beverly, who cried out at the sight of the woman, her eye sockets now empty and weeping blood.
Powerful hands grabbed her, one around the throat and one up between the legs. She was hoisted, screaming, up over the head of a red-skinned ogre with a bone through its nose. Bleufleur was looking up at her, and she said in a demonic twin voice, "As I said, unimportant things can be dropped." She waved a hand to her side- there came a rumbling from the floor as a slab of stone slid aside, revealing a spike-lined pit. "And that's what you wanted, right? For something to be dropped? Well, let's do it, Oni," she rasped, speaking to the ogre. "Drop her!"
Beverly flailed as her body was hurled up and forward. She fell twelve feet down on one of the larger spikes with her left leg, her body flopping back and crashing into its side before sliding down, her leg bones scraping the jutting metal spike, her cries weakening.
Slick from bloodflow, her leg and body slid quickly down the rest of the way, until her neck and back rammed home atop a smaller batch of six-inch spikes. Her eyes and lungs ruptured, and before she died, Beverly Jenkins tasted her own blood. It was, not surprisingly, quite bitter.
**
"Butch," Kelly called through the crack in the door. "Sweetheart, everybody's getting ready to eat. Daddy called in some pizzas for us all. Butch?" She poked her head into the bedroom of the RV when her husband didn't spring up at the mention of pizza. The bedsheets were rumpled up on the floor, but of Butch there was no sign.
Curious, she headed back out to the parking lot, the end of which had become a sort of sprawling commons for the True Power Baptist Church's faithful flock. Two or three local supporters had come to talk with Ted and Barbara, and the patriarch of the church had welcomed them to stick around and break bread with them all.
Kelly made quick introductions (must be a lady whenever possible), then pulled Cody aside from his wife and their kids. "Have you seen Butch at all in the last hour or two," she asked quietly.
"No, I thought he was sleeping in the RV," Cody replied.
"I just checked, he ain't there. All right, I'll check with the others." And so she did, but after five minutes she discovered that nobody had seen her husband for hours. Her father finally pulled her aside gently.
"Now dumplin', I'm sure he's just fine," he said, rubbing her back between her shoulder blades, the way he always did for any of his children when they were ill or frightened. "Your husband is a good provider, but he has always suffered wanderlust when he comes with us on these trips. He probably just got hisself turned around somewheres."
"You're probably right," she said, feeling a little better. "And Bev is probably downtown at the courthouse about that injunction."
"That's how I figure it," her father replied. Her panic appeased, Kelly rejoined the family and mingled. More trouble, but of a different sort, was minutes away.
**
The station wagon pulled into the parking lot, angling into a spot right near the entrance. Its driver had no intention of sticking around for long, and he wanted to be able to get off the property quickly once he was back in the vehicle.
The driver flipped down the visor mirror and swept a hand back through his usually unruly hair. It had been slicked back today for the media, who he'd just finished speaking with a half an hour earlier. He didn't enjoy talking to reporters, or being the center of attention. This was not just humility- it was also self-preservation.
He angled the mirror down a little and adjusted his collar. The white block sat center, perfectly square. It was the first time since seminary that the priest really worried about putting forth an air of authority. He had good reason, though. These True Power people had to listen to him, for their own sake.
The priest got up out of the car and tucked at his black shirt and matching coat. The sun was setting, darkness swooping over the city of Amelia. He knew that the coming of night wasn't necessary for the evils of the area to work their dark business, but the loss of daylight brought them out in greater numbers. Time ran short.
The priest walked solemnly toward the gathering around the RV at the far end of the lot, his eyes fixed on his primary target, Theodore Jenkins. He was the man to convince of the danger, the one whose lead the others would follow.
For his part, Ted spotted the Catholic dog when he was halfway across the parking lot. The priest had his short hair slicked back over his head, his pale cheeks and pointy, elf-like ears giving him a uniquely vampiric quality. This was fitting, for the members of True Power often referred to Catholic priests as vampires.
The priest stopped a few feet away from the edge of a circle of light the Jenkins family sat in, cast by a nearby lamp and the windows of the RV, completing the tableau. He cleared his throat. "Theodore Jenkins," he said in a soft, moderate tenor.
"I am," said Ted with a nod, his teeth showing in his bestial smile. "And who does the diocese send to us?"
"The diocese does not know of my visit here to you this evening," the priest replied. "I am Father Michael Sternin. I serve the Lord at Saint Bartholomew's."
"You serve the Lord of Lies, you and yours, all minions of Satan," Ted retorted, pressing aggression immediately. "Why do you bother us? Haven't you got an altar boy to touch in his no-no place?" This was met with laughter from the members of his flock, forming up ranks behind him. But Father Sternin made no sign that this sally affected him on any level.
"Much as I would enjoy trading barbs with you, there isn't time. This city has marked you, all of you. If it has not yet already begun to, it will soon start trying to destroy you utterly," he said without a hint of anger or aggression in his own voice. "You and yours need to leave this place, Mr. Jenkins. Amelia City shows no mercy when it comes for its chosen prey. I know," he added, eyes cast downward.
Ted scoffed loudly, flapping a hand at Father Sternin in dismissal. "The people of this city are like any other, cowardly heathens eager to drag everyone down to their level. They can't stop us spreading the truth of God's hatred of the fags, let alone destroy our works!"
"You aren't listening," Father Sternin said, still calm, still peaceful. This more than anything irritated Ted. Most priests he'd dealt with lost control of themselves in under a minute, yet this man, this pale, narrow, unassuming priest, held his composure. "I'm not talking about the people of the city, Mr. Jenkins. Not folks like you and I. There is another breed in Amelia City, and it is them that you should be afraid of. I speak not of opponents of your brand of Christendom. I speak of opponents of human life itself."
"What are you babbling about, priest," Ted asked, his initial heat slowly fading.
"There are creatures here, Jenkins," Father Sternin said softly, his voice barely carrying to the group. "Things that come from the outer dark, things that not even the Book of Revelations could prepare us to face. You should flee before it's too late."
Dead silence filled the air, and a clamminess invaded Ted and his flock. Ted finally planted his hands on his hips, taking two steps forward to stand inches away from Sternin. "Now see here, padre," he rasped, teeth clenched. "We're not going anywhere. If this city is so wicked a place, why haven't you run off with your tail tucked between your legs?"
"Because this city has already tried me once," said Father Sternin, "and I prevailed. I may not always survive what comes to me from the shadows of Amelia City, but I am far better prepared for it than you and yours. Your hate," Sternin snarled, jabbing a finger into Ted's chest, pushing him back half a step, "will not protect you. Only God's love will, and you have too little of that to survive."
"You touch me again and I'll have you arrested, mister," Ted said, his voice quavering with shock. "Now you go on and get out of here, Vatican vampire," he continued, coming once again within an inch of Sternin's infuriating circle of calm. "We don't want some frock-wearing dog hanging around."
Father Sternin, eyes half-lidded, full of quiet resolve, stared the older preacher down. "Stay, and be condemned," he half-whispered before turning his back to Jenkins and walking away. When he was almost to his car, the sound of a coyote howl echoed through the deepening evening air. Father Sternin looked back at Jenkins and made the sign of the cross over his own chest.
Ted headed for his and Barbara's rented room without a word to the others.
Haven't I seen Miss Bleufleur and Father Sternin before here?
"JesusHatesQueers." Oh, my God...
I figured. Balzac did a lot of this kind of thing in "La Comedie Humaine".