A Shift in the Universe

Death
Year 1962 - Jack

It’s weird when you see death. I stared at the body and knew it had nothing inside.“Tricia, can you hear me? Oh, my God,” said Aaron.He knelt on the side of the country road, holding his girlfriend’s body and kept on like that, but I knew she no longer lived there. She’d dwelt in that body only moments before. But now she’s gone.What happens after you die? Where do you go?After seeing her vacant eyes, I asked those questions often. Tricia made a temporary home in that body and left it an empty vessel.My parents had always trusted Aaron, my older cousin. They let me go with him when they wouldn’t let me go with anyone else.All that changed, of course. Although Aaron didn’t cause the wreck, his decision led to it. He drove us to the party that night.Aaron, Tricia, and I had crashed that party, a typical rich kid’s party that occurs after the parents get away to their chateau on the French Riviera, or some such place.I’d mostly played pool upstairs while Aaron passed by occasionally. He wouldn’t let me drink or get high, which bugged me because I wanted to try both, but I appreciated him looking out for me.Across from the pool table, people sneaked into a room grinning and came out wearing bigger grins, sometimes wiping powder off their noses.Tricia’s parents had bought her a Maserati, and Aaron drove it that night for the first time. When we left the party, Tricia’s brother, who also drove a Maserati, wanted to race.
I’d seen Tricia’s brother go into that room, which made bigger grins, and told Aaron.Aaron wouldn’t race, but that didn’t stop Tricia’s brother.And Tricia wound up dead in her new Maserati.

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Decisions and Consequences
Jack

Decisions and consequences, you reap what you sew, what comes around goes around. That night of the Maserati crash opened my parents' eyes as well as my own. They realized the direction we headed as a family and the curse of wealth upon their son. They saw the real me, not their little boy but a transmutation.As much as I hurt for Aaron, I hurt worse for the Maserati. There goes my sixteenth birthday present. I’d hoped to get one just like Tricia’s when that year rolled around.What a stinking way to think.What a stinking world I live in.Will I be like everyone else?I wouldn’t have used the words “decisions” and “consequences” back then, but I started understanding the truth they represent when put together.What happened to Tricia planted a seed. What later happened to Aaron made it grow and led to a huge decision on my part. You’ll learn about that decision soon.But enough of that—here’s the rest of the story, starting with Reuben on that hotel room floor staring at me face to face on that fateful morning.

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(Lionel - Year 2022)

On the day they sold Lionel into slavery, he waited for the elevator and stretched his legs. Coach expected some miles from him this weekend.His parents had fought again.Would they split? Would they make him move?Would he lose his dog?As he watched the lighted numbers bounce above the door, his fingertip felt the groove of the half-moon part above his forehead. His palm spread over his high fade cut. He stepped in the elevator, and his Adidas Ultraboosts felt firm and cushioned on the marble tile.He’d just left his parents behind in their three-bedroom luxury condo, once known as the Hotel Rivermont, built when black people couldn’t even book a room. The new owner had updated the building with all the fancy perks, but he’d skimped on the elevator, which gave some funky rides that dinged and clanged while nuts and bolts grinded above—uninspiring sounds, sounds no one should hear in an elevator.What might happen, he wondered, if the elevator opened to the Rivermont lobby?

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Paul Hiram Thomas II
Year 1812

He heard a voice in the middle of the night.“Paul,” it said, “Paul Hiram.”Did he really hear a voice or a whisper from a dream? Might his father be waking him for school?Half asleep, half awake, he remembered … but scenes blurred in and out, faces and people, places and memories forming a panorama of clouded emotion.He saw Elias’s face, centered in the panorama.“Paul Hiram Thomas, why didn’t you do something?”Between dreamworld and reality, the soft feathers through his mattress drew him in, until he felt roots and rocks below his feet and heard the laughter of older boys around him. Drifting away through feathers, he watched and relived the day before.Paul sat with Elias, a boy two years older than him, eating lunch on the trunk of a fallen tree in the woods near his schoolhouse. Elias had walked from the plantation to Paul’s school to bring him the mutton and bread they shared. Not far in front of them, in the clearing where they sat, stood a huge tree they loved to climb. While they chomped their food, Paul scanned the tree, from the dirt at its trunk to the sparkling sunlight at its crown where the topmost branches stretched into the sky.“Do we got time to climb that tree?” asked Elias.“You know I can’t, Elias, not while school’s in session.”“Yeah, but it don’t hurt to ask.”Paul chewed a bite of mutton, then spit out the fat. “You’re lucky,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about school.”“Quit your griping,” said Elias emphatically. “You are learning to read.” He dug at a half-buried rock with his shoe and flicked it out, then threw it into a hollow in the trunk of the climbing tree.Paul picked up a rock and threw it at the same hollow. It hit the edge and ricocheted out.“When you get older like me,” said Elias, “you’ll know that learning is a good thing.” He took a swallow from the canteen they shared. “What’d you learn today?”“We’re reading, reciting, and memorizing something Thomas Jefferson wrote. We went to war over it, a war we might fight again soon.”“Are we going to war?” said Elias.“It looks that way. My Pa sees it coming any day now.”“What did Mr. Thomas Jefferson write to cause a war?”“He wrote about truths,” said Paul. “I don’t understand the way he wrote it.”“What did you understand?”An insect flew past, and Paul swiped it away. “Not much.”“Did you memorize it?”“Not much.”“Come on, what’d you memorize?”Paul cleared his throat and spoke in an oratorical tone. “We hold these truths to be self-evident.”Elias grinned.“How do you hold a truth?” asked Paul, “and what’s ‘self-evident’ mean?”Elias picked up a small branch and handed it to Paul. “Write it in the dirt.”Paul finished his bite of bread and took his time scratching it out.“I like that sentence,” said Elias.“How do you hold a truth?”“You hold a truth by believing it,” said Elias with certitude.“What about the last part?”Elias leaned forward. “I think ‘self-evident’ means you don’t have to be smart to understand it.” He raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. “So, what are these truths?”Three older boys ran into the clearing. Paul knew them from his classroom.Jed, the largest boy, wore patched overalls.Arnold had bad acne. The fresh red marks at the tip of the largest pimples showed he’d been picking them.George, in new overalls, stood with his hands on his hips, grinning at Paul. George usually acted friendly when away from Jed and Arnold.Jed spoke first. “What we got here?”“A boy and his slave,” said Arnold.George rubbed the stubble on his chin. “Ain’t that special,”Paul sat scared, holding his food on his lap.Elias pulled back, nearly dropping his food but caught it.“You’re lucky to have a slave, Paul,” said George. “None of us got one.”“That ain’t right,” said Jed. “How come you got one, and we don’t?” He looked at Arnold and George. “Gentlemen, we need to get us a slave.”Paul cowered, hoping they’d just go away.“Let’s have an auction,” said Arnold.“Yes, an auction,” said Jed, and grabbed Elias by the arm and pulled him up. Arnold grabbed the other arm, and they placed him on top of a tree stump.“The highest bidder get’s to keep him,” said Jed.Elias stood on the stump in submission, lips quivering, arms straight, and eyes straight ahead.“Take a good look at him,” said Jed. “This fine young lad is worth at least fifty dollars.”Paul ached for Elias, who knew better than to fight back or run. Paul, however, knew he could do something. He could stand up and resist them. But he didn’t.“Fifty? Ha,” said Arnold. “He ain’t worth more than a dollar.”“I bid a dollar,” said George.A trace of tears shone in Elias’s eyes, and Paul hoped he wouldn’t give in to them.Paul finally stood. “Stop it,” he shouted. “He belongs to my Pa.”Then Paul cringed inside. What a horrible, stupid thing to say, as if he fought over ownership of Elias. How could those words escape his mouth? He should say something else, but what?Elias looked at Paul. His expression changed to fiery eyes of hurt, shock, and anger.Paul deserved that look from Elias. He had betrayed his friend, and it ripped him apart inside.“He’s mine now,” said Jed. “And I ain’t selling him for no measly dollar.”“Two dollars,” said George. He picked up two stones and handed them to Jed.“Sold,” yelled Jed. Then he and Arnold grabbed Elias and handed him to George.The school bell rang, and the three boys ran away laughing.The shame inside Paul weighed his head down. He couldn’t bear to look at Elias.The dream faded—Elias, the tree stump, and the clearing in the woods disappeared, but not the shame.“Paul,” said the dream voice, “you are loathsome.”He couldn’t hide from that accusation, not under his pillow, not under his bed.“Paul,” said another voice, one he recognized, “time to get up for school, son.”

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Prologue - Reuben
Year 1962

You’ve never seen a hotel bed with space underneath to hide, but I assure you, once upon a time, such beds existed.The trauma stirred within him now as consciousness returned.Reuben awoke on his hotel room floor, lying on the edge of a throw rug. Its stale odor filled his nostrils.He opened his eyes. A teenage boy, about his own age, lay under a bed in front of him.The boy gasped, startling Reuben, who jerked and stared hard back at him. The boy slapped his hand over his mouth, much too late to restrain the sound.Next to the boy, also under the bed, lay another teen with his index finger pressed against his mouth, silently pleading with Reuben not to give them away.The wooden floor pressed against his aching head and busted cheekbone, at least it felt busted. His whole body ached.Outside the room, voices he did not recognize spoke urgently.Reuben understood. He must not make noise. He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again. Who are these guys?The boys stared back at him, faces frozen. Their eyes wide in terror.And he didn’t know why.

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An Epic Tale of Deceitful Hearts
Jack

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (Jer 17:9)On the day they sold Lionel into slavery, I woke as any other day, just like he did. In the same building even, but with an insurmountable chasm separating us, or so you’d think, a chasm so deep, long, and wide that it’s the death knell to any friendship, but in due time you’ll learn about that and about Lionel, a 21st century teenager who did not acquire his knowledge of slavery from a book.When I woke that day, the adventure began.My name is Jack Murdock, Tyler Jackson Murdock. My dad likes to call me Tyler Jackson since it has a ring befitting a member of the Murdock family. I’m also the guy who startled Reuben from under his bed.But I’m not sharing this story as the boy under the bed, more as an old man with a boy’s heart—ageless, outside of time.Back then, as a teenager, I had no idea that old bodies with baggy, wrinkled eyes and long, hairy ears could carry such vivid, far-off memories that seemed so close, the way a high school kid might remember elementary school.I’m not recounting a simple tale but an epic tale of the deceitful human heart, that brings the past alive, history awakened, no longer dull and stale but full of secrets to discover.Despite the complexity, it’s a homespun tale with outrageous exploits (every word of them true) and dumb laughs—cringeworthy even. But pay close attention, and your eyes will open to the world we cannot see—the world of good and evil, darkness and light, demons and angels, time and its relativity, and, most importantly, the divine purposes of God woven into the fabric of our universe.

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Ricky
Year 1962

Ricky’s uncle spat, and the chaw flew past Ricky, splatting into the brown water churning beside the towboat. The white foam swirled atop the grand old Mississippi, the Father of Waters.On the larboard, atop a bluff, a tree stretched into the sky, almost touching the clouds. Ricky longed to climb its topmost branches and take in the view.They followed a bend in the river.Behind them, the barge stretched out like a football field with crewmen scurrying about, some shouting orders.Before them, way in the distance lay another bend in the river.He heard music again and looked upriver into the trees from where it came. “Uncle Charley, do you hear that music?”His uncle wore a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers hat and bore a short, scruffy beard. “You hear music, son?” He grinned a puckered smile, a smile that old guys make when talking with teenagers. “Well, isn't that something? You hear the music.”“Yes sir, I also thought I saw lights through those trees over there, but they’re gone now. Is something coming around the bend?”His uncle stared at him long and hard. “You ever hear of Hopefield, Arkansas?”Ricky shook his head.“Hopefield set on the Mississippi south of Memphis, way back in the Civil War, a thorn in the side of the Union.”Ricky braced himself. He’d heard about his uncle and the Civil War. Once you get him started, he won’t stop. His dad had warned him.“After the Yankees took Memphis,” said his uncle, “the people of Hopefield swore their allegiance, but not for real. Secretly, the Rebels used Hopefield as a base of operations. First, they captured the Transport Musulman. Then they plundered the steamer Grampus at the Wolf River. The final straw occurred when the vessel Hercules headed upstream with seven barges full of coal.” The words flowed with passion, bursting from enthusiasm.Ricky stared at his uncle, whom he’d rarely seen growing up. He must be an encyclopedia and truly means to inflict all these facts upon me.“On that day, Captain John McCluskey landed the Hercules in a heavy fog at Mound Landing—built by slaves’ blood and sweat. Then a band of Confederate cavalrymen dashed up on horseback and took it right from him, torched it, and made off with all they could carry.”“My dad told me you’re part of the Sons of the Civil War?”“You betcha, a proud descendant of General George Henry Thomas, the Rock of Chickamauga, which means you are too, young man.”A dark shift in his uncle’s eyes revealed a hint of suspicion that Ricky did not hang on his every word.“So, what happened next, Uncle?”His uncle shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not so sure you really want to know.”“Sure I do, Uncle.”His uncle looked away coldly and spoke devoid of interest. “The Yankees could take no more and dispatched a fleet of mortar boats to shell the woods around Hopefield. Then they burnt the city to the ground.”“Excuse me, Captain,” said one of the crewmen.Uncle Charley turned his head.“I just put some papers on your desk you might want to look at. The quartermaster says they need your signature before we get to Memphis.”“Thank you.” His uncle nodded toward the man who turned and walked away. “Oh, one second, Chester. Could you take a look at the tie-downs on the transom? They’re getting loose.”Ricky looked out on the water for the lights he had seen before. He still heard the music, but barely, on-again, off-again. The sun had set, but dusk’s light still reflected on the horizon. Nothing but wilderness surrounded them, trees, mud, wild grass, and patches of land, the aroma of water and wildlife. He loved chugging along the river all alone. At least he’d thought himself alone until he’d heard the music.“Have I bored you silly, Ricky?”“No sir.” Ricky dug deep to give his full attention. “What happened to Hopefield next?“Are you just humoring an old man?”A tug of guilt pulled at Ricky. He wished he could find a little interest, enough to nod his head with a clear conscience.His uncle’s face changed from disappointed coldness. He held his palm out, looked at Ricky, then hit his palm with a fist and grimaced, frustration oozing out the pores of his skin. “I wish I could shake your shoulders, young man. Why don’t you get it?”Ricky jumped back, caught off guard, not sure what to say. He hadn’t seen him like this before.His uncle removed his Corps of Engineers hat and pointed at a harsh, deep groove, even a crevice, carved into the crown of his skull, surrounded by hair but bald inside, except for a small tuft that grew between a twisted pocket of skin. “Do you see that, son?”Ricky stood with eyes wide open. This is off the scale, not normal. Did his parents really know his uncle?“I got that gnarly-looking scar re-enacting a duel in an open field before a live audience. Supposedly, my opponent’s gun only had blanks.”To Ricky’s relief, his uncle returned his hat where it belonged. ”Now that’s living history,” he said, grinning. “Have I got your attention now?”Ricky made an exaggerated, slow nod of his head.“Don’t worry. I’m not crazy, son.” He smiled warmly. “That bullet just missed my brain, a warning from death that he’s never far away.”His uncle put a gentle hand on his shoulders while Ricky slowly relaxed. “Your parents told me they baptized you right before they brought you hear.”Ricky smiled.“Did you really mean that, or were you just being polite?”“I meant it, sir.”“You must know that Bible you committed yourself to obeying is also a book of history. It records what’s happened to man for thousands of years. Don’t you think God cares about history?”“Yes, sir!” Ricky nodded, standing up straight“We’ve got a rich family history ourselves, young man, a history of faith that first dwelt in our forefathers.“Look around you. Feel the history! Think about all that’s happened on this very river in the centuries before you popped out of your mama, day after day, year after year floating along—Old Man River.”His uncle slapped the top side of the boat railing. “You listen up now. Look at this river. Go back in time a thousand years. Indians alone traveled these waters. Hundreds of years later, the conquistadores crossed it. Then, a couple hundred more, Lewis and Clark came and went. Man built steamships that chugged up and down it. Mark Twain brought it all to life in stories and made its history something you could breathe inside you just as if you’d been there. “Are you listening, Ricky?”Ricky sure enough listened.“Feel the history—living, moving, breathing. Feel it deeply. They fought battles here. Men bled and died. Slaves lived brutal, hopeless lives while the white man prospered. Then God rose up during the Civil War and put those white men in their place.”A big smile spread across Uncle Charly’s face. “I live all this out in my head, Ricky, as I go up and down the river, just as if I’d been there myself. I imagine it, watch it, feel it, hear it.”Uncle Charley stopped, leaned over inches away from Ricky’s face, eye-to-eye. “What if we could actually go back in time and be there?”His uncle placed his hands on top of the rail and stretched until he got a good crack from his back. “Yeah, I needed that.” He looked back at Ricky, steady in the eyes again. “Any chance I made the slightest hint of a crack in that thick-as-granite teenage skull of yours?”Ricky chose his words carefully. “Maybe just a scratch, Uncle,”Now that the smoke had cleared from the conversation, he no longer feared for his safety. Looks like his uncle wasn’t crazy after all, just passionate.Upriver they approached the bend.“So, Ricky, what do you think of life on the Mississippi? Would you like to spend your summer working with me out here? We could have some grand adventures and make up for those years we lost.”“I’ve been thinking about it. Could be a cool way to live.” Ricky paused, looked away, and shifted on his feet. Then his eyes lit up, and he started to speak but caught himself.What is it, son?“I wanted to ask you this, but now I’m thinking maybe not.”“Go ahead. Let me hear it.”Ricky looked at him sheepishly. “My dad told me you’ve got an old pair of dueling guns. Could I see them sometime?”“You betcha.”The towboat and its long cargo rounded the bend. They passed a stream that poured into the river under tall trees on both sides. A mist hung over the land, which cleared into unexpected shapes. Ricky saw scattered pieces of buildings surrounded by forest, rusted railroad beams jutting up here and there, a few grave markers set off by themselves, and the frame of a log cabin set on pilings in the center of a field.Farther back, another magnificent tree like the one he’d just seen, a mountain of a tree, jutted out from the landscape, its branches extending far and wide, chock-full of memories of an age long ago. How much time had passed since that tree’s first shoot had popped through the dirt? How much history had it seen? Not far from the tree, in another field, set a broken-down brick building with a chimney poking through.Ricky took a deep breath and soaked it all in—that must be it, age-old Hopefield. But now it’s nothing but a ghostly wasteland of broken buildings and broken dreams.“You see those graves over there,” said his uncle. “That’s the old Grenock Cemetery. That, and the rest of it, is all that’s left of the town of Hopefield, now just Hopefield Point. Those Rebels paid a price for buying and selling people and making them slaves.” His uncle gave him a knowing smile and tilted his head. “As to the lights and music you’ve been hearing, maybe you should ponder that inside you a tad and only let it out carefully. Folks could start thinking your nut is a couple turns short of tight.”Their boat rolled along, steady on its course, while a faint shimmer of starlight snuck through the clouds, reflecting on the water, breaking into the darkness before them. Ricky pondered it all. He would miss his parents, but maybe this Summer would open his eyes to a world he’s never seen before.

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Gabriella
Year 1862

She heard a voice in the middle of the night.“Gabriella,” it said, “Gabriella.”Did she really hear a voice or a whisper from a dream? Might her mother be waking her for school?Half asleep, half awake, she remembered … but scenes blurred in and out, faces and people, places and memories forming a panorama of clouded emotion.She saw the boy’s face, centered in the panorama.“Gabriella, why didn’t you do something?”Between dreamworld and reality, the soft feathers through her mattress drew her in, until her shoes made tip-tap sounds on the splintered surface of the wooden walkway, and she saw the sign again. Drifting away through feathers, she watched and relived the day before.“To Be Sold and Let at Public Auction,” the sign had said, dated that very day, an auction, with fleeting notice, designed to escape the watchful eyes of the Union Army in Memphis, which soon might demand from them an oath of loyalty, as they had in other towns nearby.It’s happening today—but when? Down the street, crowds gathered at the Town Square. She hoped this would be the last auction until the collapse of the Confederacy, the last auction ever.It’s happening right now. Should she get her mother from the dress shop?An older boy stood on the platform, too far to see his face, but she could see his body language and skin color. Her heart went out to him as well as to those in chains and shackles lined up behind him.It’s not just the auction that stirred her so intensely, nor the people lined up in chains. She’d seen that before. This boy, though, had her attention. She felt compelled to do something. What should she do? The right thing to do existed, but she couldn’t find it.At least she would do something. Stepping off the wooden walkway, she ran toward the platform.She passed faces of consternation and surprise. After kicking dirt on some disgruntled souls, she slowed down, but still her feet kicked up dust. Young ladies in dresses do not run through dirty streets. She changed to a rapid walk. In her peripheral, she saw some friends from school and their families whom she pretended not to notice. Most of those friendships had not proven real. Oh no, Marybeth and her mother too. Why them, of all people?She reached the crowd, breathing heavily with, of course, a dirt-brown dress at the hemline. Standing at the back, she pushed to the front, close enough to see the splintered wood at the edge of the platform. She looked up at the boy, who stood as tall as a man. His eyes wandered over the crowd in a daze. Chains and shackles lay at his feet, unused for now, but she saw the marks on his ankles where they had been.Behind him stood a dozen or more male and female slaves. The male slaves wore homespun breaches with coarse hemp shirts and blank stares. The female slaves wore full-bodied cotton gowns or plain gray dresses with cloth head wraps. They clutched their children tightly if they had any.The white men around him wore tightly tailored coats and trousers. No white women stood on that platform.The white men moved about, organizing documents, checking lists, positioning the merchandise, while the slaves waited their turns, their moment in time on the auction block to the highest bidder. They either stood individually or grouped in families.Amidst it all, a couple of male slaves chatted and even laughed, just another day of horse trading where you’re the horse—one person’s nightmare, another one’s casual event.Gabriella stood unique in the crowd with no other females near her.The boy, not much older than her, stood next in line, with an unweathered, clear complexion, as if he had grown up in the plantation house, not on the field. His hair had been roughly cut short, yet his sideburns had been shaved cleanly with a razor. Strange—he did not look like the other slaves, resigned to their fate or defiant. He looked terrified, horror-stricken like she’d never seen before, all alone, without a family. That must be it. He’s being sold away from his family for the first time, but she’d seen that before too. What about him had stood out from such a distance? Why had she felt compelled to come so quickly?A conversation from the side of the platform by the steps where the line of slaves began caught her ear.“Master, I’d be a good slave for you, strong as an ox and work twice as hard. I done taught my boy the same, sir. Look at those arms a his.” The son smiled, lowered his eyes, and bowed down a bit. “My wife? Who-eee can she cook. She teaching my girl too. And my girl will clean a room and leave nary a speck a dust. You be mighty happy with my family, sir.”Gabi’s heart ached when she saw the broken, submissive smiles of the man’s family. She looked at the master and saw some friendliness on his face, not as cold and hard as the rest of the gentlemen in the crowd who perused the merchandise. The slave father must have seen it too, his future depended on the kindness of the master who bought him and hopefully his whole family as well.The master smiled at the slave father, took a keychain watch from his vest pocket, glanced at it, nodded politely, and walked onto the other slaves down the line.The boy’s turn arrived. “Ladies and gentlemen,” the auctioneer announced. “Next, we have an exceptional young negro.” The auctioneer pulled his sackcloth shirt off him, leaving him naked at the waist, and prodded him onto the auction block, his terror-stricken eyes open wide.Maybe they’d kidnapped him from the north. She’d heard of that before—someone born free, having an education, living like a white man, with no expectation of slavery in his future, then kidnapped, thrown on a ship, and sold on the auction block almost overnight. That must be the terror she saw in his eyes, a terror not yet resigned to its fate, unhardened by hopelessness, then thrust into it, feeling the full brunt of slavery’s evil all at once. Imagining herself on the auction block, she had some idea of his terror.“A strong, healthy workhorse of a boy,” continued the auctioneer, “with many years of hard-working labor stored in those muscles you see. Who will make the first bid?”If only Grandpa had been there. He would have put an end to the bidding quickly, just like he’d done with Quigley and his family.As the panorama faded, the dream voice returned. “Gabriella, the high and mighty, self-righteous one, why didn’t you do something? You weep, you plead, you hurt, but you don’t do anything.” The voice laughed. “You just stand and watch.”She woke now and clung to memories of her grandfather. He had done something. He had been the first to take a stand and fight. Afterward, the rest of us followed. But now what?“Gabi,” she heard her mother’s voice from the side of her bed, “it’s time to get up.”

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A Shift in the Universe
(final chapter)
Year 1812 - Paul

The dream faded—Elias, the tree stump, and the clearing in the woods disappeared, but not the shame.“Paul,” said the dream voice, “you are loathsome.”He had nowhere to hide from that accusation.“Paul,” said another voice, “time to get up for school, son.”He opened his eyes to the smile of his father sitting beside him on his bed. “How’d you sleep?”“I need to tell you something,” said Paul.His pa put his hand on Paul’s shoulder, and Paul told him the whole story, including the dream and the voice."I didn't know what to say, Pa. I just watched the whole thing like a coward. Then when I finally spoke, I said something foolish."His Pa took a deep, knowing breath. "Ignorance, foolishness, and pride are all around us." He stood up. "And inside us too—you'll have to live with them the rest of your life." He looked down at Paul who had leaned himself up on his elbows. “Get your clothes on young man. We’ll talk more at breakfast.”As Paul dressed, he looked out the window from the second floor of their plantation. A fresh and lively Southern, Spring morning stared back at him, but he didn’t see its beauty. Wagons, horses, and people scurried about.He opened the window and stuck out his head. The crisp air cooled his face. A slave walked by pushing a wheelbarrow and waved at him. “Good morning, young master.”Paul returned a perfunctory nod and pulled in from the window.The slaves worked in the field, in the heat of the sun on a cloudless day—a tough job for a paid worker, a nightmare for a slave. The white overseers stood by watching them. At least they didn’t have whips. His pa would not abide by that.Paul looked around his room. Ideally located at the corner of the house, with a window in each of the two outside walls allowing a breeze to pass through. He had a fancy pitcher full of water with porcelain cups next to it, set on a fancy chiffonier, brought by a slave to his door each morning. He had a room full of Chippendale furniture, imported from Europe, and a closet full of fancy clothes for every occasion—even some silk shirts.He had it made, born with a silver spoon in his mouth as they say. All because he’d been born white to a rich pappy.What if he’d been born a slave?At breakfast, the whole family gathered as usual. His Pa said nothing about the story he’d told him, which Paul didn’t mind at all. He’d rather keep his shame to himself.When Paul took his last bite, his Pa stood up. “When you’re ready, Hiram, we’ll walk together to your school, so we can talk.” His Pa called him Hiram sometimes since they both had the same name, Paul Hiram Thomas—Senior and Junior.Paul did not like the suffix, Junior, however. The moniker “Paul Hiram Thomas the Second” set better with him. Besides, he planned to have a Paul Hiram Thomas the Third someday.Later, as he and his father walked along, they passed the slaves who worked the fields on both sides. Paul made small talk, and his dad listened.When Paul stopped talking, he heard the scuffing of their shoes on the rocky, dirt road and the birds singing their morning songs. He smelled the dust their shoes kicked up, making their clothes dusty, especially his father’s frolic coat.His pa opened his shiny pocket watch and glanced at it. The gold chain hung at his side. His pa cut the perfect image of a powerful, austere plantation owner.“Do you have a meeting this morning, Pa?”“Yes, and it’s too hot for these clothes now.” He began taking off his black, frolic coat, with the help of Paul who grabbed one sleeve. As Paul tugged at the sleeve, the cuff links held firm to the wrist, and the coat, which he tried pulling past the sleeve, got caught. Father and son laughed together. They tugged away in the middle of the road while the slaves, on both sides of the road, watched. Finally, the coat gave way, and the cuff links popped off. One of them hit his pa in the forehead.Jack laughed even harder, and so did his pa—then even the slaves joined in.Jack picked up the cuff links while his pa wiped the perspiration off his forehead with his frolic coat.The perspiration had soaked into his cravat, so he took it off and folded his cravat and frolic coat over his arm.His father turned to the slaves, took a slight bow, and said, “We hope you enjoyed the show.”They laughed.The father and son continued walking.Paul dreaded that he’d have to wear clothes like that someday.On their dusty journey, those they passed showed an obvious regard for his father as usual.He looked at his pa. “Are you planning to say something to Jed, Arnold, and George when we get to school?”“I’m not sure. I may just give them a long hard look in the eyes. I know their fathers, and they know that I know their fathers.”His pa could have an intimidating presence when he wanted. He had a fierce look, a warning look that said a hundred words. Paul had been its recipient before.“I’m hurting for Elias, Pa. Yesterday those boys called Elias my slave as if that’s something to brag about. They want their own slaves.” He put his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. “I’m not proud that we own Elias. We shouldn’t own him.”“You know I’m not proud of owning people either,” said his father, “but we need to own slaves, and I’ve told you why.”Paul shook his head. “Do you remember when we took the steamboat to New Orleans last year?”His father nodded.“Do you remember the slave auction?”“What are you getting at, Paul?”“I ran into Billy Perkins back then. He came with his father to buy more slaves.” Paul took a deep breath. “That Perkins’ plantation already has hundreds of slaves.“As we stood there, near the auction, Billy pointed out a pretty black girl about his own age standing in line with her family to be auctioned. ‘Look at her,’ he said. ‘She’d make one amazing concubine.’ He told me his Pa has concubines, and he uses them to make other slaves. ‘You don’t always have to buy them,’ he said. ‘You can make your own.’ He thought himself funny and laughed. Imagine that. Billy’s father doesn’t give birth to children. He gives birth to property.”A wagon came alongside them and slowed down. “Good morning Mr. Thomas,” he said deferentially. “Would you two like a ride?”“Thank you kindly, mister, but my son and I are taking this time to talk.”The man tipped his hat and rode off, kicking up more dust.“I’ve been thinking a lot about Billy and his family,” Paul said.“Son, stay away from that Perkin’s boy. I stay away from his father except for business.”“Just think, Pa. If you had me by a concubine, I’d be your slave.”His father cringed.That had cut.Then Paul had an inspiration, a conviction from deep inside, words different from what he’d normally choose. He looked at his father until he had his attention.“Paul Hiram Thomas,” he said, then cleared his throat. “God does not want you taking part in slavery. He does not want you to own slaves.”His father looked at him, confused, then angry. He looked down at the ground and then back at Paul. He spoke each word of his response slowly. “Paul Hiram Thomas Junior, I don’t see any way out of owning slaves.”Later at lunchtime, Paul watched Elias walking up the road toward the schoolhouse carrying the bag that held their lunch. Paul walked down to meet him. He’d dreaded this moment and still had no idea what to say. He and Elias connected at the climbing tree.“Hello, Elias.”Elias nodded and handed him the lunch bag.“With your permission,” said Elias with carefully pronounced sarcasm, “I won’t be staying for lunch. I’ll just head back to the plantation.”Paul looked down and Elias walked away.Paul watched him until the sounds of nature covered the sound of Elias’s footsteps. Next to Paul, on the other side of the road from the climbing tree, a trail opened that led down to the river. He took it.The air became crisp as he entered the shade. When he kicked a dead branch off the path, a squirrel ran up a tree. He turned a corner, and the downward slope of the path shifted his weight while the sound of the rolling river increased.He thought of the pretty girl standing in line in New Orleans waiting to be sold, the anguished look on her face. Back then he did indeed know what Billy meant by having a concubine, but he didn’t understand the big deal. He didn’t have those desires. Now he did. Now he understood why men want concubines. Now he understood the power of those feelings, those longings.Jed, Arnold, and George don’t have what he has and likely never will. He, on the other hand, should easily have all the pleasures this world has to offer.Elias can’t—and neither can that pretty girl.Thoughts filled his mind, dreadful, specific thoughts, almost as if a voice said them. He loved and hated those thoughts.Then he remembered his shame. The shame he felt about Elias. The shame he knew would come if he took the wrong path now, the natural, easy path, if he fulfilled his desires in the wrong way, in a way that displeased God.But maybe the shame would go away if he ignored it.He prayed.He prayed more deeply and more powerfully than he’d ever prayed before.When he reached the shore, a big New Orleans steamboat headed his way down the river.Up the trail, a small clearing opened with a stump in the middle, like the one Elias had to stand on yesterday.He walked to that stump, knelt, and leaned on his elbows. He heard laughter and party music from the steamboat passing behind him.He told God how he felt. He told God about his shame. He asked God to help his father set their slaves free. He asked God for the power that he himself would need to resist the desires fighting to overwhelm him. He wondered, in the back of his mind, if his pa had ever had a concubine.A deep, rich love for God stirred within him, a love for God and everything He stands for. That love hadn’t stirred within him in a long time. Why had it gone away?“God,” he said, “I love You”. Then he lost his words. A battle raged inside him between his desires and his love for God, desires for the things of this world and the boasting of what man has and does. He knew God punished sinners, but at a moment like this, punishment didn’t matter. People do what’s wrong and get away with it all the time. Maybe it’s not so bad anyway. He’d never allow himself to be as bad as Billy Perkins.But he can’t allow himself to hurt people either. He can’t hurt Elias. He can’t hurt people standing in lines at auctions living a nightmare.He choked up.Most of all, he can’t hurt God. He imagined the pain God endures at the horrible things people do to each other, people whom God loves so much.“God,” he said, “I love You. He paused and dug down deep into his soul where convictions that last a lifetime reside. “I’m going to love and obey You the rest of my life.”Suddenly, the earth rumbled and shook—the land, the trees, the shore, and the river. The ground rippled below his knees. Paul clung to the stump and looked around. Downriver, the steamboat gyrated and swirled about.The water stopped flowing forward as if a hand held it back, turned in a directionless, sloshing pool for a timeless moment, and then flowed backward.Staring in awe and wonder, he beheld a miracle of nature. He’d even forgotten to breathe. An earthquake, he’d never passed through one before.One day, many years later, he would reflect on this event, not just an earthquake but a shift in the universe—the shift unleashed when a young person loves God with all their heart, chooses to seek Him the rest of their life, and truly means it.

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