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  She moved her foot as she prepared to exit. She would turn and walk, quickly, quietly and be back in the familiar surroundings of her home within minutes.

  Before she could command her legs into motion, her eyes fixed on something she could not turn away from. As the bearded man’s hands held the young, blond boy’s head, his own body flung backward in a dramatic display of motion. The people gathered around him collectively gasped in a mixture of fear and awe. Becky noticed the dingy, yellow light coming through the canvas had become extremely bright and white.

  Then her knees buckled beneath her as her mind tried to conceive of all she was seeing. The bearded man, his face still contorted, his hands still wrapped around the young boy’s skull, began to lift off the ground. Slowly in his bare feet he stood on his toes and then completely left the floor.

  Becky’s mouth dropped open, and she stared wide eyed in disbelief. OH, MY GOSH! THAT MAN IS FLOATING IN THIN AIR!

  His body became elongated as he silently rose. The gold silk scarf tied neatly around his waist hung loosely. The young boy stood up from his kneeling position as the bearded man’s arms stretched to maintain his grip on the boy’s head. The bearded man hovered about two feet off the ground.

  Becky’s heart pounded wildly. She became aware that her mouth was hanging wide open. The people gathered around him knelt and stared adoringly, waiting, building to an expected crescendo.

  “YOU ARE HEALED!” The bearded man’s voice exploded like a loudspeaker through the thick canvas walls and echoed throughout the park. He released the boy with a flamboyant gesture. A woman who had been standing near the boy looked quizzically at the child. A low murmur of voices moved through the crowd.

  The boy turned to the woman and smiled. “Mother, I can hear!”

  “Johnny?!” The woman’s voice cracked with tears as she bent down and embraced her son. “It is a miracle!”

  A shock of energy moved through the tent, and the people suddenly contracted closer to the bearded man. The woman looked up at him, fighting to control her sobs of joy “Thank you, Jesus. Thank you! Thank you, Jesus!” Still clutching the boy to her chest she fell to her knees. With one hand she reached for the hem of the bearded man’s robe and sobbed.

  Others in the crowd began to weep. “JESUS! JESUS!” the people began to chant in unison. “PRAISE YE THE MESSIAH!”

  Becky remembered the scenes of miracles she had read in her Bible. Was this what it was like for those who witnessed the work of Jesus of Nazareth?

  She could not deny the hope that had leapt through her mind or the overwhelming excitement that pulsated through the tent.

  Could it really be? She wrung her hands together as she watched the people reach for the bearded man, tears streaming down their faces, struggling against each other to touch him.

  She felt her own eyes moisten with tears. Had he seen the tragedy on the East Coast? Had he seen the mother rocking her dead toddler in her arms? Had he heard her cry out in anguish? Had he come to save us?

  She pulled herself away from the scene in the tent and hurried back through the weeds to her home.

  She could still hear faint, jubilant chants of “PRAISE JESUS” and “HALLELUJAH” as she clicked the sliding glass door shut behind her.

  David sat on the couch in the living room, a bowl of popcorn on his lap. He didn’t acknowledge her when she entered the room. His eyes were on the line of survivors stretching through the rubble-strewn streets of Miami. Suze Graham’s tired voice pleaded with viewers to donate as much food, clothing and money as they could.

  The desperation on the faces on the television was completely incongruous with the hope and happiness she had brought with her from the tent in the park.

  “David,” she said as she plopped herself heavily down onto the couch cushion next to him in a deliberate effort to break his attention away from the television.

  “What?” He begrudgingly acknowledged her presence.

  Becky exhaled a long breath, uncertain of how to broach a subject she wasn’t even sure she wanted to discuss with her little brother.

  “What?” David said impatiently again.

  ”Do you think Jesus would come to us? Here? Now?” Her voice was halting. She didn’t look at David. Instead she focused on the scenes of devastation flashing on the television. Exhaustion stung the face of a white-haired black man in tattered clothes as he pushed an overweight woman through knee-deep sand and mud in a shopping cart.

  Becky felt her brother’s eyes on her. She swallowed nervously.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked as he munched on a white puffed-out kernel.

  “There is so much pain in the world. With the wars, the earthquake and now the tsunami, don’t you think Jesus would want to do something? Don’t you think he’d try to help, if even just a little?” Becky continued to stare at the television.

  “What the heck has gotten you on this?” David was genuinely curious.

  “There is some kind of revival or something going on in the park. I know it’s crazy. . . .” She searched her mind for the right words to describe what she had seen. “This man did stuff. Amazing stuff! There were no wires or smoke and mirrors or anything. And if you had seen how people reacted. . . . He really had an effect. I could feel it.”

  David’s brow arched. Becky knew his look of sarcasm. “Becky, that magician made the entire Statue of Unity disappear. Was he Jesus too?”

  Becky felt a twinge of embarrassment at her younger brother’s stoic skepticism.

  “‘For as lightning comes from the East and flashes to the West, so shall the coming of the son of man be,’” he continued.

  “What?” Becky was surprised to hear David quote Scripture.

  “‘If they say to you, “Look, he is in the desert!” do not go out; or “Look, he is in the inner rooms!” do not believe it!’”

  “You’re right,” Becky conceded. “I mean, I didn’t really think. . .it was just nice to think there was someone who could fix things.”

  Becky stood and left her brother on the couch.

  Her curiosity led her back down the hill and through the field to where the crowd of people and the bearded floating man were still gathered beneath the tent. Again she stood unnoticed near the entrance as people shouted, “PRAISE JESUS!” Again Becky felt joy wrap around her. The energy of the tent was addictive.

  She stared at the bearded man; his bare feet were planted back on the ground. She became aware of a longing to touch him. She wanted to reach out, like all those crowded around him, and touch his robes. Her legs began moving her toward the white light that seemed to radiate from him.

  “Come, my child.” The voice was muted, as if it was audible only in her own head. It was the bearded man. His deep, brown eyes locked with hers. “Come,” he said again, softly in a deep mesmerizing tone.

  All those who had been pressing close to him and praising him now backed away and cleared a path between Becky and the bearded man. They stared at her. Becky relived her fear standing before the judges at cheerleading tryouts.

  “It’s okay, dear.” A lady’s voice prodded her forward. “He’s here to save us. Let him save you too, child.”

  Becky’s flip-flop dangled as she slowly moved her foot forward. Her instincts screamed at her to turn and run, but she could not turn away from the bearded man. His gaze held her tight. She realized she was walking forward, closing the gap between them. As she neared him, she felt warmth cover her body as if she were sinking into a hot bath.

  She stopped and looked up into his deep, black, radiant eyes.

  His thick eyebrows pulled together as he smiled and examined her face.

  A strange power was there that held Becky both fascinated and yet afraid. Her skin began to crawl with an indefinable sense of unease.

  The bearded man leaned over her. She felt a cold, bony finger stroke her cheek.

  “What is your name, my child?” he asked.

  Becky remembered her brother’s sarcastical
ly arched brow, and she felt an arctic chill run down her spine.

  She slowly inhaled the tent air into her lungs then blurted, “Jesus would know my name!”

  The bearded man’s thin lips tightened into a sneer, and his dark eyes locked into a frozen stare as if he was ready to devour his prey.

  A sudden coldness hit Becky in the pit of her belly. Her body began to shake involuntarily with quick, short movements. She took a step backward.

  The woman whose son was healed stared angrily at her and said, “How dare you mock Jesus!”

  Becky could feel the people closing in around her, caging her like an animal. Her breath became panicked.

  “Who are you to deny our lord?” someone from the crowd shouted, their words enraged.

  A surge of adrenaline shot through Becky’s veins. She pushed through the crowd, knocking an older man to the ground. “GET AWAY FROM ME!” she screamed as she pushed. “WHAT DO YOU WANT?” Cold hands grabbed at her arms and shoulders and legs. “LEAVE ME ALONE!”

  She saw the inviting bright sunlight streaming through the tent opening and bounded toward it. A hand grabbed her lower leg. She tried to kick it free. It was pulling her back into the tent. . . .

  Her eyes suddenly jarred opened. Her red-and-green plastic hummingbird nightlight cast long, faded shadows against the walls. She was safe in her room, in her bed and not in that horrible tent in the park anymore. She held her pillow in a death grip. Her heart and breath mimicked each other. Moisture gathered on the back of her neck like condensation on a glass of iced tea. She looked at the clock on her nightstand, 4:34 A.M.

  Her breathing began to calm. She closed her eyes and replayed the dream in her mind over and over again.

  She tried to figure out what she had just seen and felt. The quiet of the wee hours fueled her thoughts. How was David able to quote Scripture verses from the Bible? she wondered. Maybe this dream was a message─or maybe a warning from God?

  Her body tingled, and her muscles were still tightened, alert and ready for a fight. She rolled over in her bed and looked at her new Bible resting on the nightstand. The gold lettering shimmered even in the low light.

  “Dear Jesus,” she whispered softly. “I believe5 you are the Christ, the Son of the living God. I believe in you, and I want to be belong to you. Amen.”

  She closed her eyes. The stillness of the night enveloped her. She felt herself relax and her mind quiet. She drifted off into a peaceful slumber. . . .

  And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

  Matthew 24:30-31

  2

  THE DAY OF PENTECOST

  “Hap-py Pen-te-cost!” the guard speaks in broken English with a rare smile as he retrieves the breakfast tray.

  Becky forces a smile and nods as he walks away from her door and disappears into the dark corridor. His cheerful whistle echoes off the block walls. She recognizes the tune as the old Christmas carol, “God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen,” but she knows that isn’t the song he whistles to himself. Instead he’s whistling the new version rewritten to praise the day Maitreyas emerged, the day now celebrated each year as the Pentecost.

  Sounds of more singing and the clinking of glasses wash up from the unseen guard’s break room at the end of the hall. Becky cannot help but scoff at their festivities. To Becky the Pentecost occurred more than two thousand years ago and held a vastly different meaning. She could never celebrate the day Maitreyas was revealed6 to the world.

  To Becky, the new Pentecost marked the beginning of the end. She has re-enacted that day and the events leading up to it in her head at least a million times. Every time she arrives at the same question, How could no one have known?

  She closes her eyes and holds her hands over her ears trying to block the sound of the guard’s off-tune singing. In her mind the hollow, foreign tunes meld into the cheers and joyful cries of thousands gathered in Saint

  Peter’s Square on that day. She can see their tear-soaked, smiling faces looking up into the bright Roman sky in utter admiration. They are holding out their arms in devoted praise.

  How could they not have known their cheers and songs were welcoming to the earth the first beast of

  Revelation?

  * * * * *

  On an early August morning the world stood in tearful silence after the Vatican announced the pope’s sudden death just as Maitreyas had predicted.

  The media was in a frenzy─they all wanted an interview with Maitreyas. He was invited by WNN (World News Network) and the international media to speak directly to the entire world through the television networks all linked together by satellite.

  He agreed to speak to the media at St. Peter’s Square in Rome.

  Months had passed since the tsunami had killed millions of people on the East Coast of the North American Union. The endless torrent of television coverage of the disaster had slowed to only a few minutes dedicated at the beginning of each evening broadcast. Becky’s school was back to a regular summer school session. And it had become a social norm to direct polite conversations away from the plight of the refugees to less depressing topics.

  Momma had stopped relaying the experiences of the doctors from her work who had been dispatched to help with the recovery. Instead she indulged in conversations that centered on possible reasons for the neighbors’ pending divorce.

  Rations had been eased for those living in most major cities. And most people ignored criticism of the Film Stars’ Association for holding their annual awards gala as scheduled.

  Like most others, Becky had found it easy to divert her attention from the sad and discomforting images of families living in tents surrounded by festering piles of rubble. She sat with her back to the television, cradling the phone between her shoulder and ear and flipping the brightly colored pages of her teen magazine while she traded valuable bits of information about who-liked-whom with T.J. on the other end of the line.

  It was during one of these comforting conversations with T.J. that Becky first learned of Maitreyas.

  “I wish Maitreyas could tell me if Dennis is going to ask me to the dance,” T.J. said plaintively.

  “What? Who?” Becky asked when she heard the strange name.

  “You know, Maitreyas. The man who can predict the future,” T.J. explained.

  “You mean that weird kid in geometry class who wears that long black coat?” Becky asked puzzled.

  “Where have you been, girlfriend?” T.J. said with a tone of exasperation “It’s all over the news. This guy in London, Maitreyas, he predicted the tsunami and the earthquake. They have proof of it. He’s like a prophet or something.”

  “You mean like Nostradamus?” Becky said incredulously.

  “Kind of, but way more accurate. Seriously, he can, like, talk to God or something.”

  There was a silence on the line as Becky pondered the possibility.

  “Really, girlfriend. You need to read the news once in a while,” T.J. admonished her.

  Late that night Becky sat at her computer. Her room was dark save for the blue light cast against her face by her monitor as she scrolled through websites dedicated to the teachings of Maitreyas.

  She read in astonishment that The London Times had quoted Maitreyas six weeks before the tsunami:

  “The greed of the West has placed the future of the world in undeniable jeopardy. Because of their unwillingness to change and share their resources with the rest of the planet, a giant wall of seawater will hit the East Coast of the Americas causing great death and destruction. . . .”

  In the quiet of the late night she clicked on one link after another. Thousands of pages and headlines reported on the story of Maitreyas and his teachings.

  “BRIGHT
STAR HERALDS MAITREYAS’S EMERGENCE”

  “Our great world teacher, Maitreyas, traces his ancestry to the ancient tribe of Dan in the Holy Land,” one website quoted.

  “Like the Buddha, Maitreyas is a fully self-actualized, enlightened being. He brings hope and peace to us.”

  Becky’s eyes darted back and forth across her monitor as she quickly absorbed the information and clicked on the next page.

  “Maitreyas shares his peace and wisdom with us. He warns that mankind’s greed and arrogance threaten God’s greatest gift, our planet and all its abundance. He teaches us to heed the warning signs: melting glaciers, hurricanes and rising temperatures. In his wisdom,

  Maitreyas counsels us to practice the ‘principle of sharing.’ The wealthy nations of the world must provide for the poor. Only through the ‘principle of sharing’ can humankind avoid complete destruction.”

  At the bottom of the page a link to a World Union Network story jumped to Becky’s attention. She clicked and read the headline dated three weeks ago:

  “WORLD LEADERS LISTEN CLOSELY TO MAITREYAS.”

  The bold words spread across the monitor beneath a constantly spinning WNN logo.

  “Unable to deny the uncanny accuracy of his predictions about the great Hollywood quake a few years ago and the recent East Coast tsunami disaster, more and more world leaders are turning to the teacher Maitreyas for advice on everything from foreign and economic policy to the best times for scheduling meetings.”

  On the sidebar Becky found a list of more recent articles about Maitreyas. She clicked on the headline: