Far From The Madding Crowd

Walking to the post office was a very different experience these days. A year ago there had been little to summon his attention away from the wearisome preoccupations of his mind as he ground his zimmer into the pavement. Head down, so determined his neck strained and pulsed continuously, he would drag his body down the street to post letters and purchase tidbits for the cat. Daily walks were ‘necessary’ – his physio had insisted – yet for all the energy they extolled they were never anything but onerous, cumbersome and ultimately dispiriting.

But Joe followed these orders to the letter, as though lifting two fingers up at life. It didnt matter the well meaning advice had been given to him over three years before. He would not give in. He would rather die on the sidewalk in pursuit of continuing mobility than do so comfortably lying at home in his bed. He had always been stubborn and these were the days various parts of his body took their revenge. It was all that kept him going in those days.

You see, living itself, was no easy task. Not now he was old. He resented his body for failing him. His knee for buckling too often; the tremor of his hands as he tried to scrawl on letters and his hips for griping all night so he never slept more than an hour or two at a time. He took the tablets the doctor gave him on repeat and lived in a daze of opiates and sleep deprivation. Most notably he cursed his mind for not allowing himself some slack for being old. The boundless optimism with which he had lived his life had transformed in old age into a different kind of energy; now all he felt was anger, frustration and a deep seated pointlessness to it all.

A year ago to the day, Old Joe Cotterill reflected, in the parboiled light of the midday sun; yes life had been hard. If only someone had told him, as well as everyone else – that things did get better – he might have bore it all with more humility. He wouldn’t have sworn so much at people or had to return home reflecting shamefully on his latest tantrum in the streets of the village. But of course, no one did, did they. No one does. No one is permitted to know this helpful fact. Instead people called it, ‘life’s great mystery’. ‘Life’s clearest absurdity’ he whispered into the air, for whomever or whatever was supposed to know as he did so.

Why? He hadn’t a clue. And still, in death, no one really knew. Some might hold to a surety that held them together, prevented them from jumping in front of the nearest train, in the days before dying. And yes, their ideas still brought solace in this new set of arrangements, but really? Really they were as lost as they had always been. They all were.

Life here was better. There was no doubt about that. When you wake up one day with no pain at all, find yourself getting out of bed with no bother and clothe yourself all within a few minutes, you are certainly thankful. And thankful is where he had remained until now. A whole year of gratitude. To whom, what, why, he didnt really think on that much. He was just content to live without the many, many pressures of ageing. He rejoiced in the simple pleaseures of living and breathing. Of being free of taxes, insurance payments, feelings of guilt toward his intemperate children, bus passes and pensions. He had no need for them now. Finally someone at the local authority, or a medic perhaps, had signed a death certificate and he was excluded from the everyday stressors of life. No one would sign one for him until he actually died – it wasnt worth their job they had told him. He had asked; when he had still been young enough to be playful with civil servents.

A legion of stressors had gnawed at his mind his entire life; not just when age had set about his body, limiting what he could do. When his advancing years dictated to him how far he could stray from a working toilet. When it felt as though his body were worn out entirely and it could not get worse; it wasn’t, and his body was able to provide much worse with the charitable swiftness of a bullet in an abattoir. Until, finally, his body gave up and froze itself on the bed. It would have stayed there too, if it were not for the carers who arrived in their usual rushed manner to offer to make his dinner.

He wasnt going to miss life much. Life was for the young, so people said, and he had to admit that was what he had found to be the case; people stupid enough to think they were going to make any sort of sense out of it all. It wasnt just the you though, even old people could hold onto some sort of hopefu idea that it would make sense if only th continued to look for answers. If not, of course, so challenged in their old age. He saw them sometimes, when he lifted his head from his walking frame, as he walked past the church. Old people shuffling their way amongst the greyed brickwork of the dead as they entered the gate. Scootching their way down the uneven path into the indifferent arms of the equally worn out building. Once the reached the door, however, they were met by the friendly welcome and smile of the resident priest and he would watch them enviously going inside, so sure this was the only place to be. The priest, who orchestrated them in their faith inside, was old herself and so with earnest led them in their singing about creation, death and living forever. The service rarely strayed from its uniform structure, other than a section of variable length, where the priest could regale them with tales from The Bible and tried to relate it to their own lives. There were plenty of old people in The Bible and she drew on their experiences to encourage them, bind them up against their frailties. The service would end and those who could persist, would file to light candles, mutter prayers and attempt to be contemplative. Some offered kindness to one another. Most dropped coins into a box as they left. In return they got to maintain a sense of knowing something others did not. A sense only; for when he asked them of it, it was certainly something non verbal, something they could not really explain. Not to him anyway. And so they returned to their homes with some strain of certainty that it would all be ok in the end.

Joe had tried to emulate their belief whenever he spoke with one of them, but he had never got very far. He had lived his whole life with the misfortune of having to experience everything through the prism of his own personality and his mind raged against it all. There was nothing fair, just or good in all this, his mind would rile. He would try for a few weeks at a time before deciding it was just a building with reasonably nice people in it.

“I’m sorry,” he would say to the usher, as he sloped out the building, noisily scraping his frame as he did so. “I am one of the worst I’m afraid…I’m an optimist, but I have lost all my positivity…”

___________________________________________________

The mornings had been set aside for Joe’s daily ambles down the paths of Purford village. He toiled his way along treacherous paving and crossed alleyways; all to post his letters. Afternoons were set aside for the writing of these and depending on his mood, he wrote accordingly. Some days he was prolific, often spurred on by some feeling of injustice or other, and the next day he would carry a small pile to the the friendly man who worked at the post office. Jas was patient and always kind with him. He tolerated him so well Joe had come to think of him almost as a friend, but he knew it was an unequal friendship and he felt guilty that all he could do was take from him. He tried, depending on his level of pain, to be a listening ear for Jas, who always seemed grateful for this, and he would nod sagely as Jas regaled him with the daily calamities of his extended family and his endless assignment of caring for them all. Somehow this was not enough to Joe, not when he considered, with embarrassment, how Jas helped him everyday to scrawl out the names and addresses of his writings onto the crisp white envelopes.

“Oh, the Prime Minister will be happy to hear from you Joe…its been a while no?…” Joe never cared to work out if this was humour. The letters simply contained his gripes from the day before and he now he was free of them. It didnt really matter who he addressed them too. The Prime Minister seemed as likely as anyone to reply to him. And besides, he didnt write them for any response he might give. Any post that entered his door were often placed in the rubbish pile that accumulated to the side of the door.

On some days he had less to say; less of everything really. These were the most trying of days; often coinciding when no carers arrived to help him register the day could now begin. His assigned social worker had determined he could manage himself at weekends and, though they explained their logic for this, he still hadn’t understood how weekends could halt the tides of ageing. He laboured on his bed scowling and cursing the lady with the fey red glasses and shawl, chiding himself to get up. Until, he finally did and struggled to dress himself, for a simple wash of his face was by then out of the question. He then endured the tedium of eating whatever had been delivered in the assorted plastic trays from the freezer; up, eated: the basics. It wasnt unknown for him to eat chicken madras for breakfast, sometime near midday. These were days of nothing but the flatline of sombre reflection. The heavy feeling of waiting for the end.

He had always been a practical man; and though there wasnt much utility to him anymore, he would refuse to sink back onto the bed, envelope himself in the sheets and just lie there. Grabbing a pen he would sit at his kitchen table, pushing the plastic trays aside, and write. At least one letter; he owed her that. If he did not write, he could not sleep, and if he could not sleep, he could not function. And the people obliged to see him thrice daily would begin to talk about urine, infections and being chesty. He couldn’t abide their concern, it was perfunctory yes, but he did not deserve it. And so, no matter what the day, he left himself the same task for the following day. He was a Man of Letters, he chided ruefully to the cat, that didnt stray from his side until nighttime, when if roamed outside and lived its own life.

It was a rule, his only one. For her.

After returning from his walk he would eat again, mostly to pass the time, but this had also the beneficial effect of dosing off in a chair soon after. Napping was preferable to the pain and random things of the past that would wind and swirl around and around his head. Nodding a farewell to Jas, he would barely notice himself moving his way back to the flat; just as the world had grown toward him. But for his knees, his hips and whatever other part of his body was complaining that day, he wouldn’t know he existed at all. The day’s major chore almost complete, he was vacant as the clouds, the rain, sunshine and landscape of The Fens where he unwittingly had found himself living out his last days. Instead he passed them by; padding along the streets more through instinct and repetition than will or intent.

Other than a few cars driving up Main Street, and the occasional new mother ploughing the sidewalk with buggies and other small children in tow, he saw nothing, felt nothing, was nothing. Amidst the chirrup of birdsong and a low steady breeze any chatter from the houses he passed were brief and fleeting, but he did not hear them. The village of Purford was a quiet place. A place removed from the rest of the world that seemed to be teeming with life’s incidents and events when he took in the webpages that lulled him to sleep. A final thought would rouse him for a moment, when unable to recall one step of the journey home, he would wonder whether he had done so at all. A quick glance at the mantlepiece would reassure him through the absence of letters and he would allow himself to drift again in the semi-reality of his dreams.

___________________________________________________

It was all very different now.

A walk in the village was an adventure. It was unpredictable. Faces came and went. Newcomers wandered the streets like the demented in their nightgowns, asking questions nobody could truly answer. “Its better here”, he would say trying to reassure them, “you will get used to it”. He saw the panic on their faces, such monumental degrees of change did that to a person. He wouldn’t hang around to see their faces as they realised their loved ones were nowhere to be found. He knew there were others in the village much more qualified to help them than him, but he did his bit to be part of this new atmosphere.

Faces that had become familiar now smiled at him and asked him how he was. They knew his name. Where he lived. When he had arrived. Some even knew he had once been married, had children, worked; that he had one day been useful. He now knew most people more than a perfunctory glance, for there was little need to sit in their houses alone. There was nothing to do in them. There was no internet, no television, nothing to read, nothing to do; nothing to divert them from the reality of one another. Life’s daily chores no longer troubled them. There was no need to eat and therefore defacate. Their bodies seemed to clean themselves. The surfaces of their homes were forever spotlessly clean. Their clothes never wore out. There was no music, no pens, no paper; and so no letters to write.

The lawns seemed to manage themselves. Their houses were similarly maintained. Carpets never soiled. Dishes and cutlery remained in the cupboards and so did not need to be cleaned. Really everything here was done for them by the village itself. There was no need for money, no bills, no energy suppliers milking the populace, no rubbish to be bagged or collected. And so even the most isolative of them, eventually, would wander outside.

Though the post office remained, it was just a building now. A house inhabited by a middle aged lady called Sally, who knew nothing of running such an establishment and said she never had. She had been murdered by her husband, she had told him, who she was now thankfully free from. He had been a tyrant by her account and had made her life miserable. She hadn’t been able to go outside without his permission; in case she threw herself at any passing man and left him alone. In his total control over her he assuaged something within him but it made him no happier. His psyche sapped her strength, robbed her of the previous things within her she only now was finding again and yet he grew no stronger himself. He remained powerless over his own mind. For thirty years they had been married! She cried a little. Twenty eight of them spent steadily dismantling her and their children. The first two were happy but with ominous warnings of what was to come – a cup thrown, just missing her temple over a row about a phone bill; furious stares, long chasms of punishing silence. It was their first child that had triggered the ultimate change, snowballed this effect in him, perhaps brought out his true nature, so that things never changed back.

It had been Sally who had first welcomed him to this place. Though he had realised things were different that first day, he hadn’t really noticed things as being so unfamiliar until he had shuffled his way to her door expecting to see Jas. On arriving he saw the sign had gone and the door that had always been open to him was now closed.

“Yes?” She said, answering the door. “Oh” she said looking him up and down. “You new here?”

“What happened to the post office?” He said, grasping four letters from his pocket, as though he would continue to post them through her door once she closed it again.

“Look, um…You want to come in?” He stood there gawping at her until she sat him down on a bench outside her window.

“So, do you know where you are?” She asked.

Joe considered the question at length. He pushed his walking frame to one side guiltily, as though he knew the answer but wouldn’t say.

Until finally: “Are we? Dead?” He asked, slowly lifting his eyes from the ground to meet hers.

“Quick learner” she said, grasping his hand gently. “That we are…”

“Oh” Joe mustered. Blinking, he adjusted his shirts a little that were snagging at his side.

“You don’t seem too upset about it.” She said. “You probably weren’t that happy before I guess?”

“No” Joe said. “I was not”.

“We are the lucky ones”, she said, “it is easier for people like you and me. We don’t miss it so much”.

“Miss what?” He asked.

“Being alive”.

The air was lighter and the people less weighted down. Purford village had changed. He had changed. He could not guarantee when he would return to his little flat now. At the door he would grab his stick to steady himself, not because he was doddery any longer but out of excitement at the thought of what he might find today on his daily walk. He would feed Cedric, it was so good to see him again, he arrived a few months after him. Cedric, like him, was perpetually full, but was always a willing participant in the ritual and rubbed his fur against his leg as he tipped the contents of an imaginary pouch onto a saucer. He then look into the mirror to slick down his hair from his night’s sleep, then covered this with a tweed cap he had found under the stairs.

And then open the door.

The street looked as it always had, only without need of maintainance. The black tar of the road had yet to fade and without fail glimmered in the morning sun. Cars lined driveways – though they were no longer useful. Some in the street had pushed them up to the edge of the village where they together they congregated until somehow, when no one was looking, they no longer existed. This was Carlisle Street where he now felt at home; a newbuild set of red brick houses that snaked toward Main Street. He gazed at slate rooftops, at the long row of uniformity that was in such contrast to the other homes of Purford, yet he would know, that beneath each roof were stories as yet undiscovered and friend to be made. He made it his business to be friendly whenever he saw any of his neighbours now and did his best to sketch out their lives a little further in the library of his mind whenever he met them. Everyone here had a story and eventually they would be ready to share them. For some it took time. In a fit of confusion newcomers would sometimes chose to board up their windows, fortify their doors and windows to protect what they had – until the sudden changes around them become clearer and more familiar. They hid for a while until they realised they no longer had jobs and the people they knew were no longer there. And that they didnt need money, and they didnt need to eat, or use the toilet. And that there were no answers inside. Until they would venture outside and ask someone, more often than not Joe himself, what was going on. He would tell them what he knew, which wasnt a lot and they would relax some and the boards they put up to defend themselves were left to be used as blank canvases for scenes from The Bible – since 1927 the village has hosted a small congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses who had inevitably, like everyone else, also died. One of these was responsible for this graffiti but was harmless enough and people let him dawb his faith on whatever he could find, creating colours and instruments from the nature around him. There, at number ten, was Noah thanking God for splitting the Red Sea. Smiling out from the windows of number seventeen was Joshua, standing at the head of the musical procession, singing gleefully until the walls of Jericho fell over and the Israelites killed everyone inside. And there was Paul, cowering outside number twenty two, covering his eyes on the road to Damascus.

Joe would look down at his stick – somehow he had progressed from the old frame he had used before – and he would think of Moses, as he had been taught by one of them, but it was no staff and he was no leader of anyone.

When he stood outside 5 Carlisle Street, Flat 1, his flat, he now breathed in admiration at the air, always so thick and heavy with the scent of warm tree blossom. Had it always smelled so wonderful? Had he simply never paid it due attention? He liked to turn his head to watch the bees slowly alighting from one flower to another, fearlessly drawing close toward him before veering away again. Lifting his head he could feel the warmth of the sun caressing his cheek and he would stand there a while, eyes closed, smiling at the skies. Opening them he would see the clouds, so perfectly white, as they trailed one after the other toward the horizon. Their slow procession was imperceptible, unless you took the time to observe them, which he found he could now.

And for a while he would do nothing but stare at the skies and breathe.

___________________________________________________

It had been a long time since he had witnessed beauty in the world. He must have been a child the last time he had truly noticed this. His life had progressed at too fast a pace. He had lived a life too intensely felt for such lighter, freer, emotions. Living had been a series of unfortunate accidents and unworkable knots that he could never untangle. Wildly wrong and intense experiences brought about a steady flow of adrenaline, as well as its associates, wearing away at his gut and health in general. By the time he was twenty five he had already established himself as the owner of three lifelong medical diagnoses. He knew he had begun life at a disadvantage in many ways, but hadn’t everyone? Not since he was very young had he felt life had been unfair to him or dwelt upon this, not until he was old and increasingly infirm when this notion re-emerged as an ongoing theme of his thinking. Despite multiple setbacks he had always brushed himself off, picked himself up and enthusiastically bounded back at life with the optimism he would make things work out. This time. But he never did; though no one could say it was not for trying.

Perhaps, this was why he was here?

Back in the days of childhood. When he saw the world more cleanly. The days before all the strangeness of learning what people had made of everything and what had occurred previously; before he had arrived. Before speech, maybe, before it all started to be boxed in so unnecessarily. He had always had the sense of something lost, something he would never find again, not there, not in world of so many.

Childhood: there were days before he saw his family for what it was; broken, like any other. Before the tensions tightened all the more and it had spilintered apart and they became alienated from one another. His mother, kind, yet neglectful, fierce. His father, mostly hostile, asleep, or not there. And they, the children, all alternately squabbling amidst the general din of the household, or hiding together in a room – often his own, for he was the eldest – providing comfort to one another when it was not really their job to do so.

But that wasnt uncommon he would tell himself. Not in those days.

People didnt know any better.

It had been there, beauty, just outside his front door – where it had always been – but he had been thrown far from its view. If he ever felt this childish truth, for even a moment – for he couldn’t fully acknowledge it when alive – he would feel that knee jerk response to back away from it; for being lost was to be human, and tried manfully not to dwell on the feeling that life had come to the point where nothingness was preferable to living. It was odd, he thought now, how sensing beauty had made him so automatically think of suicide, as though the feeling of loss overwhelmed him that he could not bare it in his mind.

Was that why he was here? To reconnect with the world around him? To see it as he once had? What then? What was the point of all that stuff that had come before? It wasn’t something he hadn’t already known was it? Though he now wasnt sure exactly what it was he was thinking of.

There not being nothingness thereafter had been a lovely surprise though. He hadn’t expected that. But he had as many answers to questions as he always had. It didnt take long for the burning question to adapt to the new environment: Why was he here?

He would think a moment on this, as the clouds roiled above, the flowers stood proud in the sun. Himself, held up by a stick in the rain. But still nothing.

So he would turn his attention to spiders. He would watch them as they weaved and built their homes upon the surface of his own. They were a nuisance no longer; one swatted at the first opportunity. They were, a curiosity. Like the flies. Flies buzzed, not to frustrate him, but because that’s what they did. Watching flowers bloom by the small manmade lake that providing drainage from the Fen, he saw no reason to pluck them and place them in a jar.

___________________________________________________

In his pocket was a letter – the last he had written and not managed to post. He would clutch it tightly sometimes and wonder: where is she now? Such a simple question, but not one with any answer. Just as it had been before. Like all the other questions.

If he dropped it, or if it fell from his pocket, someone would find it and return it to him. If he struggled to lift it from the floor, someone would come to his aid, so long as he was outside, for everyone in the village now wrestled with the need to do good. The idea had caught on that in order to move on from here, they would need to do such things. Until it became second nature. No one knew if this was truly the case. Really there had seemed no sense in what they were doing before. And it was certainly easier here.

To some the adjustment was a welcome change, something they had valued anyway but not acted upon for a long time. Others struggled. It took longer to see how the world could be set spinning to another set of rules. That it wasnt about looking out for one’s own anymore. That one’s own was everyone else. For once, Joe was thankful for those that had come before, as it was them who must have thought it worth a go and become so good at it they either joyfully vanished one day or remained to teach others how it was done. People like Sally, perhaps.

___________________________________________________

The premise seemed simple: be nice. If you got nothing nice to say don’t say it, and so on. But conspiracy theorists remained amongst them in the village of Purford and there were certainly lots of views and opinions to set you thinking, if so inclined. Some were so outlandish people wondered how and why they were here, so unlike everyone else they seemed to be. When they arrived, people like this went at it all with the tireless energy they had before. They questioned everyone, tried to arrange some pooling of ideas so any pieces of puzzle in other people’s head could be shared and worked on. Until, at some point, some threshold or other, people would grow fatigued with them and they would be banished to their own homes to give everyone else a rest. There, they were free to pursue their endless interest in the true meaning of everything in the privacy of their own homes, until, or if, they calmed down again and could be allowed out. Some chose themselves to remain there, staring at the ceiling, thinking, thinking, thinking. To them the world could not change overnight. Something more sinister must lie beneath the veneer of this new way of living.

They were welcome to. So long as they did not push it on others, for there were no right answers, and maybe they would find one. Most people were not interested, Joe included, it was too much like the other life. And this place, to him, felt like rehab from that sort of stuff.

__________________________________________

Joe finally set off out down the street, greeting the odd neighbour sitting out to enjoy the sun.

“Morning”, he would say to each of them.

“Morning”, they would answer. “What a beautiful day”, they might agree. “How do Joe, its good to see you”.

Whenever he reached the end of the street a man would accost him in a suit and tie.

“Morning Brother Cotterill, Jehovah has created us another day like no other”. This was one of the Witnesses. Some saw them as an unnecessary burden, but they were ok, and their basic niceness may have contributed to the overall vibe going on here in Purford, he thought.

“Good morning to you Brother Masterson”, he said, “You will remember though, I am still not one of your Brothers.”

“Ah…not yet…” Masterson smiled keenly searching his mind for an appropriate scripture to confirm his previous statement. He was sorry, he had forgotten the exact scripture, but it from Psalms he said. It was a sentence in length and essentially said the very thing he had wanted. Confirming to him that it was indeed Jehovah, who had made today such a peaceful one. If you read those words alone and not others.

“Do you see Joe?”, the Brother asked, calm, earnest. “Do you see in this scripture who has created this fine day?” The sunlight seemed to grow stronger as though awaiting Joe’s reply.

“Well, you just said it, Jehovah.”

“Yes! Yes Joe! Jehovah! Jehovah has created for us this fine day. And why? Because he cares about us! We truly thank him don’t we?” Joe felt the Brother was trying to think of another scripture and that this part was merely padding.

“Indeed brother Masterson. Indeed. ” Deftly he sticked a path around the man in the suit. “That’s what it says.” Masterson obliged and smiling warmly, allowing him to circle round him onto Main Street. “That, is, what it says”, Joe called back, sounding so certain of this the brother allowed him to continue on his way with no further extrapolation.

He walked in silence for a while half expecting the man to follow him to show him more but turning he saw the brother had gone back inside.

———————————————————————

Joe had been developing his own theory. One that he kept to himself and nurtured in his free time – that was still ample and far reaching to cover a fair deal of the day. He wasn’t in heaven, he thought, though it was certainly a much better version of the life before. And he didnt seem to be in Hell, unless Hell was where he had been before. If he wasnt in heaven or hell, then he must be somewhere in between – Purgatory perhaps – which granted, wasn’t an original thought by any means. He didnt know what Purgatory meant and there were no books to look up what the word was meant to mean, but to him it was enough explanation for now.

The Brothers told him such a place does not exist – and would recite to him scriptures they recalled seeming to confirm this – but it seemed the most plausible explanation to a man as simple as he. Heaven would be better than this, he thought, and Hell was much worse surely? And there was the fact he seemed much happier here in this place where he mostly did good, but sometimes in hindsight saw he had not. It suited him. He was happy to stay here for now.

A man like him was not heavenly material. But he had never killed anyone or willfully done things wrong. He had tended to veer away from the most heinous things he could have done. By his estimation he had done some bad things in life, but he hadn’t been altogether bad. He had tried his best mostly, he thought, what with how the world had been and the situations he had stumbled his way into.

The brothers seemed assured where they were. Like everyone else they had just woken up here, in their own beds, but in a different world, with no explanation as to why, or what they were meant to do now. It was all another puzzle. Another realm they must now inhabit, with no instructions or apparent purpose. A reality where everyone was once again free to decide what should happen next. But they were convinced they were in Paradise.

The people he met here also confirmed to him that this was Purgatory. No one here was intrinsically bad. No one was wholesome, or good, or holy, or whatever a good person in heaven would be. Everyone here did their best to make things work, to be kind, they tried their best to be civil. Where they failed in doing so you could see there had been nothing malicious about it. They had tried to do what was right, but unintentionally their actions had had the opposite effect and when this occurred most people apologised, would stop to explain their rationale for doing so, but admit in hindsight that they had been wrong. The brothers were an oddity here but another case in point. They were lovely people. Kind, generous, well meaning. But something was amiss. Despite their easy going demeanour and unnerring desire to help, there was something robotic and reserved about them. A sense of the superior in their stunted reach for connection. A removal of self in their conversations. When they recited a scripture to you they did so in the manner of a friendly school teacher guiding an unruly teen rather than sharing their thoughts with an equal. Perhaps, he had thought, they are here to learn to be human again, not as they thought, to guide us all on a paradise earth.

When speaking with one of them he would listen for somewhere amidst their talk for any nuggets of wisdom. It was from a time when people had time after all to sit about and think, like now – The Bible. These he took gladly. But he was aware that if they were here you could not believe everything they said, and it would be dangerous to do so. For in the things they said must be inaccuracies, though well meaning, and to swallow their story completely would do nothing to lead them out of this place. But then, he had this in common with most of them: they seemed happy to remain here, forever if necessary.

“The wages of sin is death”, one brother had told him, “What do you think that means?” He said, his patience endless and warm.

Joe looked at him blankly.

“What about the rest of the book”, he would say. “Didnt people get stoned for sinning? Surely stoning someone wasn’t a good thing?”

“Well,” the brother said, “that is true. And we can answer that question, but first let’s just focus on the what this scripture means. What are wages?”

Wages? It seemed an obvious question. Why was he asking him this? Wages were wages.

The brother waited quietly for him to answer.

Finally Joe relented. He would have to answer the question, in case this man really was a representative of God, or whoever ran this place.

“They are what you get paid for the work you did.”

“Yes! Exactly!” Joe stared at the brother. He was a little too enthusiastic. “Or…for your works…” The brother allowed a long pause, even Cedric might have made the connection. “Our works in life.” He said with finality. “No one is perfect,” he said, “so we all have to die.”

“Ok”, Joe said, thinking this was the end of the matter. Everyone died as everyone could not be perfect. It seemed an unfair arrangement to him but true enough on both counts. We were all born to die.

“So when we die…”. The brother waited for him to complete the apparent puzzle set before him. Joe felt slightly irritated. Does this man not see that treating people as though they were children could be one of the reasons he was here?

“When we die…”, Joe began, hoping this would end the conversation, “we have received our wage for not being perfect – we have died”, he said. This seemed grossly unjust now, seeing as they were created this way in the first place.

“Yes!” The brother closed his mind and smiled. Joe was stupefied. Was that it? Was that the wisdom of a higher being? Joe shrugged and went to leave him.

“But…”, the brother said as he stepped forward. “The wages of sin…have therefore been paid. How?”

Ok, now he saw what the brother was driving at. It was the paradise earth thing.

“By dying”. He said. He smiled at the brother. He couldn’t help but feel happy to comply.

“Exactly”. The word patted his head, kindly. “When we died all our sins were paid. Our deaths absolved us of all those things we regret. How kind of Jehovah to make such an arrangement!”

“Yes, I guess so” Joe said. “I guess so…” He still didnt see why such an arrangement should be in the first place. He thought of his theory, of Purgatory, it was clear to him why this man was here. His intentions were good, selfless, but his actions not so much and he couldn’t believe a God would wish to be represented in such a way, by such a man. Surely this should make sense somehow. Chime deeply within. This was wisdom, but wisdom of a man, it seemed to him.

“Your sins have been forgiven Joe. Through the blood of Jesus Christ.” He nodded, pleasantly.

“Lovely”, he said, though there had been no mention of Jesus in the short line the man had recited to him.

“Ok brother, thank you”.

“No Joe, thank Jehovah, not me”.

So…according to this man, God created everyone to die as they wouldn’t live up to his standards. Made them live in a world that actively encouraged them to do so. Then told them it’s their own fault and showed them they should be thanking him for this? This seemed to be what he was saying, but there was undoubtedly more, there always was. He wasn’t going to ask.

“So, apart from the sins I’ve made since being here…I’m doing ok”. Did he say that out loud? Joe scalded himself quietly. It was a nice thought though, for there to be no need to feel guilt for all those things that could not be undone.

Thankfully the brother had seen someone walking toward them and was busy trying to make eye contact with them.

“Hmm?” He said. “Yes that’s right, you are in paradise.” The brother beamed at him. “This…” he motioned around him, “is paradise Joe…” Joe nodded ok. “but you know Joe, it’s not paradise yet…we have an awful lot of work to do. The earth was almost ruined by man. We have a lot of clearing up to do. And then there’s the teaching programme. I mean you didn’t even know where you were until just now…but Jehovah is kind, he has given us ample time to get there. A thousand years! Did you know that?”

Joe stared at the woman walking towards them until the brothers’ eyes shifted toward her.

“Well, let’s talk some more another day Joe. Until then think about what Jehovah might want us to achieve in a thousand years. And what will happen then? Its better in short bursts. We don’t like to overwhelm people with the truth, you see. One piece at a time and you will complete the puzzle.” He started walking toward the woman who stopped to inspect her shoe and retie her lace. This was in vain as the brother bade her a lovely morning.

Slowly Joe crossed the road and shuffled onto the kerb, away from the talk and polite conversation. Here there was a bench so he rested a while, motionless beneath a tree on the path, drawn in once more by his surroundings and a feeling of peace.

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