Bro. Joey Diaz looked over the four seniors in a way that reminded Laura Adair of a prison warden looking over his rebellious prisoners. Uh-oh, she thought, here it comes. “This year’s senior challenge is unique,” the teacher said with more glee than Laura thought was rightly necessary. “What if you were there—”
“Where?” Kaya Smith interrupted immediately.
Bro. Joey gave her his best frown. “Really, Kaya? Let me finish.”
Laura saw Edwin Pillado smirking and even Jasmin Martinez fought hard not to smile.
“Sorry, Bro. Joey,” Kaya said.
“Thank you,” Bro. Joey said, sighing. “Think about this: what would you do if you were there instead? Would you—”
“Where?” Kaya asked again, looking somewhat confused.
Laura agreed, wondering if Bro. Joey was being intentionally vague. What was he getting at?
Their teacher sighed. “It would be best if I just showed you,” he said sternly. “Close your eyes.”
The four seniors looked doubtfully at each other. They all sat in a circle in their classroom. The other students had been dismissed, so it was only the four of them and Bro. Joey. And now he wanted them to close their eyes? Laura promptly closed one eye. The other she kept firmly fixed on her teacher. It’s not that she didn’t trust him, but well, she didn’t…at least not when he wasn’t making any sense.
Bro. Joey rolled his eyes. “Guys, come on. Just do it.”
They all exchanged another glance and reluctantly closed their eyes.
The world suddenly spun first one way and then another. Laura felt like she was both falling and rising at the same time, the two forces threatening to rip her in half and then…and then…and then…
* * *
Edwin opened his eyes to find himself standing on a hillside overlooking a wide valley. He didn’t recognize any of it. But then neither did he recognize what he was wearing! He plucked at the brown tunic that fell to his knees and then stared at the calf-high sandals strapped to his feet. What in the world?! Something tugged at his hand, and he turned to find a donkey standing behind him laden down with foodstuff. He held the lead rope to the ugly beast’s neck. Huh?
“David!” someone shouted.
Startled, Edwin whipped around to find Jordan Gieseler striding up to him dressed in some sort of ancient battle armor and carrying a spear. The conical looking helmet on his head nearly covered Jordan’s eyes.
“David!” Jordan shouted again, clanging to a stop before Edwin. “Looky here now, ain’t ye a sight fer sore eyes! Brought some vittles too. That’ll just hit the spot.”
Edwin gapped at him and then shook himself to say, “My name’s Edwin! You know that! And why are you talking like a hillbilly?”
“Ain’t got the foggiest notion of what yer talkin’ about, David,” Jordan growled. He reached out and began pulling Edwin along behind him. “Well come on then. We’ve got us the most rip-roaringest battle ye ever did see, by cracky. Them infernal Philistines is causing quite the ruckus, I be tellin’ ye. One nearly split my noggin’ with an arrow, I tells ye. Honest injun!”
Still trying to understand what was going on, Edwin allowed Jordan to pull him down the path until they came to an armed encampment that was full of warriors milling about behind bulwarks of raised earth. Further up the hillside, nearly to the top, stood a large tent that looked to be made out of…goat hair? What in the world was going on here?!
“Jordan,” Edwin said, yanking his arm free, “what’s going on?”
Jordan eyed Edwin carefully. “You get hit in the head or something? I’m yer big brother, Eliab. And you’re David, come to see the battle.” He flung an arm toward the valley floor. “Well, take a gander and get an eyeful.”
Edwin couldn’t help himself. He looked down into the valley and saw a swarm of armed warriors, most dressed in ribbed armor and wearing colorful headdresses that must indicate either tribe or rank. But one stood out. A giant of a man who strode up and down before the ranks of the enemy warriors, growling like a bear, and shouting insults toward the men entrenched along the hill. Edwin swallowed. He had never in his life seen someone so big. Edwin’s head might…might, mind you…come to the giant’s waist. The spear the man held stuck up like a tree trunk and the sword looked to weigh a hundred pounds if it was an ounce.
A dawning realization began to percolate through Edwin’s brain. If I was there…This was the story of David and Goliath! Only now Edwin was David! Edwin began shaking his head. No. Nuh-uh. Nope. Absolutely not!
The Hebrew warriors began cheering when they saw Edwin. Except their faces were ones Edwin recognized. He saw his brother Caleb Pillado and Jonathan Robbs. He spotted Malachi Ewing carrying a spear much to big for him. And over there was Maison Painter and Gabriella Allen. And there was…wait. He swung his eyes back to Gabriella. Nope. His eyes weren’t deceiving him. The girl was cheering heartily along with the rest of the soldiers, waving her spear in jubilation. The world had gone crazy.
And then to make matters worse, Jax Wilson ambled up, all thumbs and two left feet, falling at least three times before righting himself before Edwin and bellowing in his face, “There you are, my boy! Come to slay us that giant, eh?”
“What?!” Edwin sputtered. “You want me to kill that thing?”
Jax squinted at him. “Well, ain’t there a cause?”
Edwin was pretty sure this was not how the story went. “What are you talking about?!”
Jordan clapped Jax on the shoulder, driving the smaller boy to his knees. Jax didn’t seem to mind. He never did. Jordan said, “Abinadab here and me done heard you say ye can whip that overstuffed turkey down there. Ye got cause, so go to it, brother. Show us what yer made of. Get on down there and cut off his head.”
Edwin looked back at the giant. The man was a tower of muscle, brawn, and spitting anger. Nuh-uh. Nope. Not on your life. Going down there was suicide! Edwin began to back away, but Jordan grabbed him by the arm and began hauling him with single-minded intensity toward the tent atop the hill.
Jordan said, “Don’t ye be frettin’ none. The king will set you right.”
“The king!” Edwin shouted, trying to pull away to no avail.
Before he knew it, Jordan had thrust him into the tent where two men awaited him. One wore a circlet of gold around his head, obviously the king, and the other was a tall man dressed in fine armor. Edwin knew him. It was Azaiah Martinez, but before Edwin could say anything, the king turned to him, and Edwin nearly sobbed in relief when he recognized him. “Niko!” he shouted, “What is going on?”
“Who is this you speak of?” Niko Alvarado proclaimed loudly. “I am your king. Bow, peasant, and give proper homage to King Saul!”
King Saul? Edwin looked Niko over who was, without a doubt, head and shoulders shorter than everyone else. Definitely not the way the story went. “Okay, the joke’s over,” Edwin said. “Ha-ha. You’ve had your laugh. Now what’s really going on?”
Niko put his hand on Azaiah’s shoulder and said, “My son, Jonathan here, says you can slay the giant, Goliath. Is that so?”
Son? Edwin stared first at Azaiah and then at Niko. Son? The world had truly gone mad, but then Niko’s words penetrated his skull. “No!” Edwin shouted. “I never said any such thing!”
“So modest,” Niko, said. “What say you, Jonathan?”
Azaiah nodded. “He has slain both a lion and a bear with naught but a sling. He will do fine.” Azaiah smiled at Edwin. “I think we’ll be great friends.”
“Don’t count on it,” Edwin muttered.
Azaiah thrust something into Edwin’s hands. “Here’s your sling. Now you’re all set.”
Edwin stared at the unfamiliar sling. “What am I supposed to do with this?”
“Go slay the giant,” Azaiah said.
Edwin eyed Niko’s armor laying in a heap off to one side. In particular, he eyed the sword. “Can’t I at least have the armor and sword?”
“Nay!” Niko cried, his voice sounding most unkingly coming from such a small person. “You have not proved them! Surely the armor is much too large to fit you and the sword too heavy.”
Large? The armor looked like kid’s armor. “But the sword—” Edwin started to say.
“Nah,” Azaiah said, pushing Edwin out of the tent. “You don’t need it. You got the sling, remember? Go on down there and get it done. Bring the giant’s head back and we’ll be great friends. I just know it.”
At that moment, it wasn’t the giant’s head Edwin wanted to cut off! But before he knew what was happening, Edwin found himself at the base of the hill near a little brook that flowed along the base. Remembering the story he’d read in the Bible, Edwin chose five smooth stones from the brook. He glanced up the hill, making sure no one was looking, and picked up two more. Just in case. Hey, you never knew.
Thinking himself loony, he walked out to meet the giant.
The giant thundered, “Fee, fi, fo, fum! I smell the blood of a Hebrew boy!”
And when the giant turned to face Edwin squarely, Edwin let out a long slow breath and grinned. The giant was none other than Efren Lozoya—well a giant version of Efren, if Efren stood ten feet tall and weighed nearly a thousand pounds! Efren was the giant? If anyone, the giant should have been Brayden Pham! But Edwin and Efren were friends! He wouldn’t have to do battle after all.
“Efren!” Edwin called to his friend. “It’s me! It’s Edwin!”
Efren launched his spear at him. Edwin yelped and dove aside as the massive beam sailed right by him and punched through a boulder, cleaving it clean in half from the massive force. The crack of the shattered rock echoed through the entire valley.
The Philistine army broke out into crude guffaws, slapping their thighs and pointing at Edwin in derision. Some of them Edwin knew, such as Ivan, Candice and Katie Ewing, and Ariana Waddell. Kids—well, bigger kids now, and kids with spears, swords, and bows. Ariana even had the gall to shoot an arrow at Edwin. The bolt missed badly, but that wasn’t the point! Those little thugs! Edwin even saw Joel Wilson, though the boy was facing entirely the wrong way and so Edwin saw only the back of Joel’s head, but it was certainly him. And facing the wrong way made perfect sense.
But Efren had retrieved his spear and was stalking after Edwin.
Efren roared, “Fee! Fi—”
Edwin shouted back, “Wait just a minute! Can’t we talk about this like civilized people?”
Efren blinked. “Uh…fi…uh…” Efren blinked again, his massive brow wrinkling in concentration.
“Fo,” Edwin supplied helpfully.
“Fo!” Efren bellowed happily, nodding his thanks. “Fo, fum! I smell the blood of a Hebrew—”
“I’m Hispanic!” Edwin interrupted. “So are you!”
“Huh?” Efren grunted. He stopped, clearly trying to ponder this new development.
This was the opportune moment. Edwin muttered something in Spanish and put a rock in his sling. Kill the giant, was he? Use the sling, eh? Remove the giant’s head—well, that last part seemed a bit gruesome. Efren’s head wasn’t all that handsome to begin with. But why? What was the point? Jordan and Jax had said something about a cause, but Edwin didn’t know what that cause was. The Bible had never said exactly what it was! And if the Bible hadn’t said, how was he supposed to know?
But this is how the story went—well, mostly. Sort of. Edwin began to swing the sling and nearly brained himself. He yelped and spun a full circle to keep the sling from smacking him in the side of the head. After a few tries, he got it up and spinning. He faced Efren, who was still standing as still as a statue and mouthing the word, “Hispanic.” A sitting duck.
Edwin let fly. Naturally, the rock sailed way over Efren’s head, as clean a miss as there ever was, but it did smack one of the Philistine warriors, Kelvin, right between the eyes. Kelvin’s eyes went cross-eyed, and he toppled over in a clank of armor, groaning.
The Philistines all cried out in anger—expect for Joel, who was still facing the wrong way. In fact, Joel let out a happy whoop, misunderstanding the roar. One of the other soldiers, Kaiden Painter, punched Joel in the jaw, knocking him out cold. Somehow Edwin wasn’t surprised by any of it.
But Edwin’s missile had missed the giant! Good thing Edwin had six more rocks. And with every try, he continued to miss, despite the mountain of the man standing right before him without moving or flinching. But it wasn’t as if Edwin had ever used a sling before! But he did take out six more of the Philistine soldiers—including Lauralei Wilson—even the Philistines cheered for that.
Efren suddenly seemed to wake up. He drew that hundred-pound sword from a leather scabbard and lumbered into a charge right at Edwin, roaring out defiance and death and swinging his sword so powerfully that he could mow down entire forests with little effort—let alone one skinny high school senior. Okay, time to go. Edwin dropped his sling and ran like a jackrabbit. The entire Philistine army, including Aarolyn Riley and Luke Gieseler, ran after Edwin, howling like bloodthirsty savages.
The ground shook, causing Edwin to stumble and fall flat on his face. He rolled over frantically to see Efren standing like a mountain over him, sword raised to crush the life from him.
But before Efren could bring the sword down, the world blackened and then faded into intense white, and Edwin was gone.
* * *
Jasmin blinked in the dim light, trying to make sense of her surroundings. She sat on a cushion within a stone building. Light from a single window filtered in, lighting a spot on the dirt floor. A man on a cot rested in the pool of light, seemingly asleep. Jasmin blinked again. What was going on?
“Jasmin?” a voice asked.
Jasmin peered into the gloom beyond the light. “Laura, is that you?”
“Yeah, it’s me,” the girl said moving into the light.
“And I’m here, too,” Kaya said also emerging. “What’s going on? And why are we dressed like this?” she asked, plucking at the front of a white robe-like garment that fell to her ankles. All three of them wore sandals that wrapped halfway up their calves. “Where are we?” Kaya added.
Shaking her head, Jasmin studied the man on the cot more closely. “Hey,” she exclaimed, “Isn’t that Owen?”
All three gathered around the young man. “Looks like him,” Laura said, doubtfully. She reached down and prodded Owen in the shoulder. Owen stirred, groaning.
Kaya knelt for a better look. “I think something’s wrong with him,” she explained. “Look at his legs. They aren’t right.”
Laura smirked. “Well, they are very hairy,” she said.
Jasmin gasped. “Laura!”
“Well, they are!” Laura said defensively. “You could make a rug from them. A big rug.”
Jasmin did her best to ignore Laura. Kaya was right. Something wasn’t right with Owen’s legs, maybe the rest of him, too. “I think he’s hurt,” Jasmin added.
But before anyone could say something further, the wooden door was flung open and Seryna Wilson burst through in a rush. “Oh good,” she exclaimed. “You’re all here. We must hurry!”
“Seryna, what is going on here?” Laura demanded, setting herself before the other girl like a bulwark of determination.
Seryna rolled her eyes. “Oh, you’re such a kidder. My name is Hannah. It’s a good Hebrew name, don’t you think? But we must get Jaben to the Messiah!” She pointed right at Owen.
Jasmin looked from Seryna and then to Owen. Something wasn’t right. Then what Seryna said dawned on her. “The Messiah?” she repeated. “Are you talking about Jesus?”
“Yes,” Seryna acknowledged, “Jesus of Nazareth. He’s here, right now, in Capernaum, at Simon’s house! He’s teaching, but if we can get Jaben to Him, then he can be healed!”
Kaya looked down at Owen. “What’s wrong with him?”
“What are you talking about?” Seryna said, “He’s been paralyzed. Quit stalling. What sort of friends would we be if we didn’t get him to the Messiah?”
“Wait a moment,” Laura said, shifting position a bit away from Owen. “What friends?”
“We’re his best friends,” Seryna clarified.
“Owen?” Jasmin said in amazement.
“No, silly,” Seryna said. “Jaben!” She pointed at Owen. Jasmin frowned, thinking the girl had lost her mind.
“If we’re his best friends,” Laura said, “then we need to get a life.” She paused, thinking. “Or he does,” she added.
“Exactly,” Seryna snapped. “We need to get him to the Messiah so he can get his life back.”
The situation was beginning to dawn on Jasmin. “Hey, guys, I think this is the story from the Bible…you know, the one where four friends brought a paralyzed man to Jesus. I think we’re in it, right now.”
Kaya said, “But weren’t the friends all men? We aren’t men!”
“Brilliant deduction, Holmes,” Laura muttered. “Thanks for clarifying that.”
Kaya flushed and fell silent, so Jasmin stepped in and said, “This is probably Bro. Joey’s doing. This is what he meant by if we were there. We’re living that story.” She looked down at Owen. “Come on guys, we can do this.” She went to the head of the cot and prepared to lift one end of the two poles that the cot was attached to.
Kaya nodded eagerly and went to help along with Seryna. Only Laura hesitated. She asked, “Do you really think we’ll see Jesus?”
Jasmin thought about saying something sassy, but instead said, “Do you want to pass up the opportunity?”
“No. Guess not,” Laura said, taking a place next to the cot.
With all four of them lifting, they managed to hoist Owen up. Owen’s eyes snapped open, and he looked around, smiled, and said, “You guys are the bestest friends ever!”
“Oh shut up,” Laura snapped with a grunt. “Why do you have to weigh so much?”
They maneuvered Owen through the door with minimal bruising and scraping, but he seemed content to be carted around by four girls. He even began humming the tune to Gilligan’s Island of all things. Jasmin considered dumping him into the big lake she saw after coming out the door. That would show him. But the chance, just the chance, to see Jesus Christ during His ministry here on earth, stopped Jasmin from suggesting it. Laura for sure would have gladly dumped Owen in the lake—weighted down by a rock or two for good measure.
With Seryna’s guidance, they made their way through the drab looking city or town or village—or whatever it was—to a compound of rock houses that were all joined together without a front lawn or a back one. Mostly, all Jasmin saw was rock and dirt. Ick. This was certainly a dirty period in history.
But before they could go much further, they came up to the back of a crowd of people. “Let us through!” Laura roared so loudly that Jasmin jumped and nearly lost her grip on the cot. “Make way!” Laura continued, “Cripple man coming through!”
Several of those at the back of the crowd turned around. Jasmin was surprised to see people she knew. “Beth,” she said, “Can you help us get through?”
Beth Hart shook her head. “None shall pass!” she proclaimed in a voice so unlike her that Jasmin blinked in surprise.
“But we need to get this man to Jesus!” Kaya protested. “He’s paralyzed.”
It was Melanie Gieseler who responded. “No can do. You’ll have to wait your turn like the rest of us.”
“None shall pass!” Beth shouted again.
Jasmin wondered why she was trying to sound like a megaphone, and Jasmin’s arms were getting tired. So, as if in accord, they set Owen down. “Please,” she said softly, “we need to get Owen to Jesus.”
“Jaben,” Seryna corrected absently. “His name is Jaben.”
“Whatever,” Kaya said in exasperation, “just let us through!”
The third girl, Gabbi Wilson, pointed to a set of stone stairs. “That is the only way to get closer. You’re going to have to go up on the roof.”
Jasmin looked doubtfully at the stairs. How were they to lug this heavy oaf up there? The staircase looked barely wide enough for one person, let alone two side by side!
“Impossible,” Kaya said, echoing Jasmin’s thoughts. “We’ll never get him up there.”
But Jasmin knew this was how the story was supposed to go. “We have to,” she told the others. “We get up there, tear up the roof, and lower Owen down. I bet that’s how we win the senior challenge.”
Laura and Kaya exchanged glances but nodded. They were game. So, along with Seryna, they heaved Owen back up. Jasmin noticed that the fool still had a smile on his lips as he stared at the sky. He began whistling the theme song to the Beverly Hillbillies. But then why not? He didn’t have to do any of the work! Typical man. They trudged over to the outside staircase and found it clogged with Jamal Pittman, Alex Buehrer, and Kali Pickard.
“Make way,” Laura warned as the girls marched up. “Let us pass!”
Jamal crossed his arms. “Nothin’ doing, doll, this here is my spot.”
Jasmin’s mouth popped open. Doll?
Laura had a different reaction. She simply grabbed Jamal and pitched him into the crowd. He let out a strangled cry as he landed into the backs of Raini Allen and Hugo Alvarez. With that demonstration of Laura’s no-nonsense manner of dealing with obstacles, Alex and Kali wisely got out of the way.
“How are we going to do this?” Kaya asked, looking up the empty staircase.
“We’ll have to take turns,” Jasmin said. “Kaya, you and Laura go on top and pull and Seryna and I will push from below.”
“It’s Hannah,” Seryna corrected. “Why do you keep forgetting my name?”
Jasmin sighed. “Just do it.”
It was slow going. Only two of them could work at a time as they pushed and pulled Owen’s cot up the stairs. Halfway up, Owen sighed happily and said, “You guys are the bestest friends ever. I’ve never been on top of a roof before.”
“Ever fallen off a roof before?” Laura muttered back.
“See?” Owen said, looking back at the sky, “Bestest friends ever.”
“I’m going to kill him,” Kaya whispered to Jasmin.
Jasmin was inclined to agree, but said nothing, focusing on pushing Owen higher up the stairs. By the time they got to the top, all four girls were thoroughly exhausted. But they’d done it! Just like in the story. But on the roof, they found Annaliza Alvarado lounging near the edge along with Gracie and Destiny Ardt. None of the three girls said anything as the seniors dropped Owen onto the middle of the roof. So, Jasmin ignored them, focusing on the roof itself.
The roof looked to have been constructed from wooden beams and fronds of some kind and then coated over with a thick plaster. She stomped on the roof with one foot. It felt incredibly solid. Kaya groaned, and Laura looked ready to chew nails for dessert.
“How’d they do this in the story?” Kaya asked. “I mean, they hadn’t planned on going on top of the roof, so I doubt they brought tools. We didn’t. So how’d they tear up the roof?”
Jasmin didn’t have any idea. No one had ever said. Come to think of it, she’d never even wondered how the friends in the Bible had done it.
Annaliza wandered over to them and said, “Are you planning on doing some constructive destruction?”
Jasmin blinked slowly as she worked her way through that sentence. She nodded, thinking Anni could help. “Yes, we need to break the roof open so we can lower our friend down to Jesus.”
“Okay,” Anni said, “think this will help?” She produced a full-sized sledgehammer from behind her back.
Astonished, Jasmin peered behind Anni, wondering where the girl had kept the thing. There was no way such a big tool could have been hiding behind her. But apparently it had.
Laura snatched it and grunted with the effort of lifting the heavy tool. “This should do nicely,” she said. “Come on, let’s get to work, girls. The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can go back home.”
The sledgehammer was heavy. And though they took turns, they only really succeeded in cracking the plaster and chipping some of it away.
“We need something with more of a point,” Kaya finally said, dropping the sledgehammer. It almost fell on Seryna’s foot who had been watching everything with great interest. Seryna jumped away, throwing Kaya her well-practiced scowl that could curdle milk and freeze your blood solid. “Uh, sorry,” Kaya said, backing away from that expression.
Anni appeared again as if conjured. “Will this help?” She held out a pickaxe.
“Where’d you get that?” Laura demanded.
Anni shrugged and both Gracie and Destiny smiled knowingly. Jasmin looked from the twins to Anni and back to the twins. They were all up to something. All three of them.
Just then, Jacen Baker stormed up onto the roof waving his arms in protest. “What are you doing to my roof?” he yelled at them. “The noise is interrupting the Master downstairs! Didn’t anyone ever teach you manners?”
Jasmin stood to her full height—which wasn’t all that impressive—and said, “Don’t you talk to us like that, Jacen!”
“Jacen who?” Jacen shot back. “My name is Simon. Simon Peter. This is my house! And you’re trying to tear it down!”
That was another thing Jasmin had never thought of. The roof the four friends had destroyed had belonged to someone, but the story never said who or how they would react to having their roof dismantled.
Laura brandished the pickaxe at Jacen. “Stay back or I’ll brain you with this…this…whatever this is!”
Jacen prudently took several steps back, which was odd. Jacen had never understood the definition of caution. But Laura certainly looked intimidating with that pickaxe raised over her head like some mythical warrior-princess out of legend.
“I think you better leave,” Jasmin said in her soft voice to Jacen. “You wouldn’t want to get hurt.”
Jacen eyed the three seniors. Kaya had picked up the sledgehammer and stood next to Laura. Knowing how heavy the hammer was, Jasmin didn’t think Jacen needed to worry much about her, but then again, Jacen didn’t know that. He backed up again and then spun around for the stairs. “Now you’ve done it!” he called over his shoulder. “I’m going to tell my wife about this!”
Kaya yelled after him, “You don’t have a wife!”
“He might,” Jasmin said, “here, in this story. Simon Peter was married after all.”
Laura snorted. “That’s right. I forgot. Well, it’ll probably be the only way he’ll ever get one, knowing him.”
“Oooo,” Destiny chortled. “That was mean.”
Laura flashed her a wicked grin and said, “Isn’t it?”
Even Gracie allowed a small smile at that.
The three seniors went back to work, trying to break up the roof enough to lower Owen down to Jesus. Jasmin was excited for another reason. She really wanted to see her Saviour, her Redeemer. And short of heaven itself, this might be her only chance.
They worked for days on the roof, laboring tirelessly without any food or sleep to try and make the hole big enough for their purpose. They swung the sledgehammer and pickaxe with single-minded intensity, not caring how much time had passed in their determination.
Finally, Jasmin sat back and rubbed her sore muscles. “How long have we been at this?” she asked.
Gracie came forward and looked at hole they’d made. And it was a hole now, about the size of a basketball. “Impressive,” Gracie said. “See what thirty minutes of work will get you?”
“Thirty minutes!” Kaya exploded. “We’ve been at this for hours!”
“Days,” Jasmin muttered, dismayed. At least that’s what it felt like.
“No,” Destiny said, agreeing with her sister. “Thirty minutes.”
“We’ll never get this done,” Kaya lamented, slumping to the roof.
Anni appeared as if from nowhere, again, and said, “Here, maybe this will help.” From behind her back the small girl produced a giant scoop shovel and handed it to Kaya. How did the girl keep doing that?
“Uh-oh,” Gracie said, looking beyond Jasmin. “You’re in trouble now.”
Jasmin turned to see Alexxus Sanderson come storming up the stairs. Her face looked like a thundercloud and hard enough to break rocks and chew cactus needles for fun. “What are you doing?” she demanded, looking aghast at the broken roof.
“Alexxus?” Laura asked. “Is that you?”
“My name is Mary!” Alexxus snapped. “I don’t know you…any of you. You’re making a mess, and dust and plaster is falling down below onto the Master’s head. You’re disrupting His teaching! Don’t you have any sense? Don’t you have any respect for the Master?”
Realizing that Alexxus was merely another character in the story, Jasmin asked, “And who are you?”
Alexxus drew herself up. “I’m Mary, Simon’s wife! This is my house you’re destroying!”
For a long moment, all three seniors stared at Alexxus as if she’d gone mad. Then Laura broke down, laughing. “You?” she guffawed. “You’re Jacen’s wife?”
“Jacen?” Alexxus said, obviously insulted and confused. “I am wife to Simon, disciple of Jesus Christ.”
That sobered Laura up as she realized that Alexxus was simply another character in the Bible story. Curious, Jasmin asked, “How did you come to marry Simon?”
“It was arranged when we were children,” Alexxus said.
Laura nodded knowingly. “Told you that was the only way he’d get one,” she said.
Destiny fought hard to stop a grin. “Oh, that’s so mean!” she said.
Alexxus looked first from one and then to another before waving her hand about. “That is beside the point! Stop ruining my roof! The Master is teaching, and I will not have Him disturbed anymore!”
“But we’ve got to get our friend to Jesus,” Kaya said, pointing at Owen who had begun whistling Yankee Doodle for some reason.
“Then wait until the Master is done!” Alexxus shouted. “When the crowd is gone, come then!”
Now why hadn’t anyone thought of that before? Jasmin looked at Owen. What had so possessed the real friends in the real story to destroy someone’s roof in the middle of Jesus’ teaching to save their friend? Would a couple of hours waiting really make that much of a difference? Jasmin felt embarrassed for disturbing Jesus while He was teaching. It was like Pastor Cowling calling her down for getting up to use the bathroom during one of his sermons.
But that was not how the story went. In the story, the four friends had broken the roof and lowered the sick man down to Jesus. So that is what they had to do too. She looked down into the hole. The light was dim below and she couldn’t see or hear much, but Jesus was down there, and Owen was up here. They needed to get him down there, and this was the right way to do it—at least, according to the story.
“I’m sorry, Alexxus,” Jasmin said. “We’re going to have to make the hole big enough to lower our friend through.”
Kaya and Laura nodded, and together, each wielding hammer, axe, and shovel, they attacked the hole in the roof. Alexxus stormed off in a huff, no doubt to complain to Jacen—er, Simon Peter, rather. They let her go as they worked frantically to try and enlarge the hole enough to lower Owen down.
After another thirty minutes, they’d had it. With exhausted arms and sore backs, they all fell into sitting positions atop the roof, breathing heavily. Jasmin regarded the increased hole doubtfully. “I don’t think he’ll fit,” she said.
The other two seniors studied the hole and then Owen, who was now whistling the jingle from the Marine’s Hymn. He was getting on Jasmin’s nerves.
“If we stuff him into it, we could get him to fit,” Laura suggested.
Seryna was aghast. “Not him and the cot, you couldn’t.”
“True,” Kaya said, frowning. “But then we don’t really need the cot, do we? Don’t we just need to get him in the hole?”
“He’ll fall through,” Jasmin pointed out.
Kaya shrugged. “So?”
“It might kill him!” Jasmin said.
Kaya looked confused. “But it’s Jesus down there. He can raise him from the dead.”
Jasmin and Laura both froze. Jasmin clearly hadn’t thought of that possibility. Was it murder if they killed Owen but then Jesus simply raised Owen from the dead? She looked at Owen, considering the possibility. Well, if she had to kill someone, she figured it couldn’t happen to a nicer fellow. Finally, Jasmin shook her head and said, “But in the story, they lowered him down on the cot. Don’t we need to do the same thing?”
Laura tossed aside the sledgehammer. “Are you kidding? We’d be here for months trying to get this hole large enough to do all that. I say we stuff him into it and let Jesus handle it.”
Owen had finally caught on to the gist of the conversation. “Hey,” he shouted. “No one’s stuffing me in anything!”
“We could lower him into the hole slowly and hold him in place for a time so someone below can catch him,” Kaya suggested.
“That would mean stuffing him in headfirst,” Laura pointed out. She blinked and suddenly an evil gleam came to her eye, and she smiled wickedly.
“Hey!” Owen shouted again. “You stay away from me. I’ve changed my mind. You aren’t my bestest friends…none of you! Stay away!”
“What’s the worse that can happen?” Laura asked him, practically purring in glee. “Jesus will heal you.”
“It’ll hurt!” Owen cried out frantically, waving his arms about.
Jasmin nodded again. He was right.
Laura sighed. “Oh you big baby,” she muttered. “This was my one chance, my one chance…” She trailed off and sighed again.
They sat there for a long time trying to think it through. None of them really wanted to keep working on the hole. It was simply too large of a task and would take too long. This was turning out to be a lot more work than Jasmin had expected.
Finally, Kaya said, “Hey, it’s awfully quiet.”
Jasmin and Laura perked up. Jasmin listened hard, but other than the normal sounds of people going about their business, she heard nothing that spoke of a large crowd. She leveraged her aching body up to her feet and waddled over to the edge of the roof and peered down. No one. Not a single person stood in the courtyard below. “They’re gone,” she told the others. “There’s no one down there.”
“No one?” Laura asked, working her way to her feet too. “Jesus is gone?”
“I think so,” Jasmin replied. “I don’t see or hear anyone.”
She looked around then, realizing that Seryna, Annaliza, and Destiny were gone too. Peering closer, she noted that Owen had disappeared. Only Gracie stood nearby, watching them.
“Where is everyone,” Jasmin asked the younger girl. “Where did everyone go?”
“Gone,” Gracie said softly. “They all left while you were up here.”
“And Owen?” Laura demanded suspiciously.
“Jaben is gone too,” Gracie said. “The story is over.”
“Over?” Kaya repeated. “But—” Whatever she had meant to say faded into oblivion as the world flashed into intense white, and all three seniors were simply gone.
* * *
Kaya opened her eyes and found herself back in her classroom sitting in a circle with her fellow seniors. Bro. Joey sat in front of her with an expectant eyebrow raised. Kaya heaved a deep breath. That dream, or whatever it had been, had been intense. She could see that the others felt the same way, each looking at each other with that startled expression that comes to those who experience something profound and hadn’t had time to process it yet.
“Wow,” Laura said, slumping in her chair. “That was incredible.”
“So?” Bro. Joey asked. “Did you succeed? Did you finish the story?”
Edwin shook his head. “No,” he said, “I tried. But I didn’t know how to use a sling. I missed every time.”
For some reason, Kaya knew this was true. She had somehow seen Edwin facing Goliath—or a giant Efren—and fail. She had seen him run away with the Philistine army in hot pursuit.
“We didn’t succeed either,” Jasmin said. “We couldn’t get Owen to Jesus like the friends did in the story.”
Bro. Joey tapped the side of his face expectantly. “And why not? You were there. You had every chance to do what they had done in the stories.”
“We tried,” Kaya echoed. “But the roof was too hard to break up and people kept interrupting us.”
“And then everyone left,” Laura added.
Bro. Joey flashed them his best smug smile—you know, the one that said he knew something no one else did. Kaya always indulged him when he was afflicted with that smile. If she didn’t, they’d be here until they were old enough to retire before he would tell them the answer. So, she plastered on her most confused expression and said, “What did we do wrong? We tried to do it the way they did in the stories. Why did everything go wrong?”
It worked. Bro. Joey’s smile went from smug to satisfied. He explained, “The reason you failed was because the stories in the Bible are only stories to you. You knew the stories, knew how they were supposed to go and what was supposed to happen, and you tried to do the same, except you were missing the keys as to why David was able to defeat the giant and why the sick man’s friends were able to get him to Jesus against all the odds.”
“What were we missing?” Edwin asked.
“You,” Bro. Joey said, pointing at him, “were missing the cause. David had a cause when he went up against Goliath, something more important to him than his own life, more important than anything else. This alone drove him out to face the giant with nothing more than a sling. It was David’s faith, his cause and desire to please God that enabled him to succeed. You didn’t have any of that when you faced your giant. You were only trying to duplicate the story. What would happen if you were there? Something totally different. You’ve read the story, knew the story, but you didn’t have the passion, the zeal, the drive, or the desire that drove David.”
Bro. Joey turned to the girls. “And you were missing the friends’ faith. The sick man had friends who so believed that Jesus could heal their friend that they went to any length and did whatever they had to do to get their friend to Jesus.”
“But we knew Jesus could heal Owen,” Jasmin protested.
“No,” Bro. Joey disagreed, shaking his head, “you knew how the story went. That’s different. The friends didn’t have a story to look back on or to follow. They simply believed. They believed so much that they incurred any cost to get their friend to Jesus. You lacked their determination, their need. To you, it was only a story. To them, it was real life. What would happen if you were there? It’s obvious, your friend would have never gotten to Jesus.”
“So what was the point of all this?” Laura asked.
Joey looked around at the seniors. “You are adults now, preparing to go out into the world. You are going to face challenges, giants, and obstacles. The stories you read in the Bible need to be more than stories. You need to glean from them more than the facts. You need the same determination, the same cause, the same faith that they had if you are going to overcome your own challenges in life.”
Bro. Joey held up his Bible. “This book is full of stories, real stories that happened to real people, who had real emotions and real fears. The stories are more than merely stories. They are lamps to light our steps, to help us along our own journey in life. Think about it. Do you have the same passion and faith they did? The same cause? You will need it as you go into the world.”
Bro. Joey fell silent, and Kaya sat back thinking. Her teacher was right. All of them lacked those key ingredients, and that’s why the stories hadn’t ended as they were supposed to. But she determined not to go through life without her own faith and her own cause for the Lord.
Laura sat up straight and sighed. “I get it, Bro. Joey. Thank you.”
“Then why such a big sigh?” Bro. Joey asked.
“Because I had this one chance to drop Owen down a dark hole, and I missed it.”
The End