THE DEVIL, THE THREE OF SWORDS AND AN UPSIDE DOWN ACE OF RODS
Cindy Maddera
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It was so hot inside the cramped chapel, with barely a breeze floating in through the open windows. The ceiling fans and the personal fans held by every other parishioner only managed to shift the hot air back and forth. Ella could feel the sweat trickling down the back of her church dress. Her hands were sweaty inside her lace gloves. Her spine ached from sitting tall on the hard wooden pew. Every time Ella started to lean back to rest, her grandmother swatted Ella’s thigh with her fan. Ella half listened to the pastor yelling his sermon of fire and brimstone. She was certain that there was a hell and that she was currently in it.
“And the Lord says: Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone and a horrible tempest!” The Preacher cried out and then slammed his open palm onto the pulpit. The congregation responded with amens and praise jesuses. Ella shifted her eyes to the side to take a peak at her grandmother who was now swaying in her seat with her hands held up, eyes gently closed in prayer. Ella took this opportunity to slowly lean her spine onto the back of the pew. She had just barely felt her vertebra touch the wooden back when she felt the sting on her thigh from her grandmother’s fan. Ella sighed, straightened herself back up and wonder how much longer the preacher was going to go on. They’d been sitting in that sweltering chapel for well over an hour now. Ella’s thoughts began to drift to the wicked and how she had yet to see anyone suffer from fire and brimstone. Why just the other day, Billy Thompson had thrown a sizable rock at Ella, just barely missing her head and there he was fidgeting next to his mother, tugging at the tie she’d made him wear for Sunday service. Billy’s sins were nothing compared to the men who had dragged her daddy out of the house two years ago. Daddy still walked with a limp from the beating they’d given him for walking down the wrong sidewalk.
Ella wondered what the Lord’s timeframe was for administering his punishments to the wicked. It seemed to her that he was taking his own sweet time. The more she thought on it, the more agitated her thoughts became. She felt anger rising in her belly at all of the wickedness that she had witnessed just in her short lifetime. Like her momma dying while trying to give birth to Ella’s baby brother because the only doctor available had been the white doctor who refused to come to their side of town. Ella had watched the blood flow from her momma as she held the tiny baby. Ella had named the baby Jordan, but he’d only lived for two days after his birth. Daddy had lost his job at the factory after having to take time off to recover from the beating from those wicked men. Ella’s hair was just now growing back from the time her teacher had taken it upon herself to shave Ella’s head. “There’s no way you can do any proper learning with that nappy head of hair.” the teacher had said. If there had been a lesson to be learned from that, Ella had yet to understand it. Hair or no hair, she had still beat Lily Elliot in the math-a-thon.
Yes, Ella thought, the Lord sure did seem to take a long time to punish the wicked. She paused in her thinking to take a moment to listen to see if the preacher would say something on this matter in particular. He was currently going on and on about turning the other cheek. Ella made a face and thought that she’d been turning the other cheek her whole life and it hadn’t gotten her very far. Ella sighed, bowed her head and closed her eyes. Maybe if she looked like she was praying, her grandmother wouldn't notice if her back rested on the back of the pew. She let her body sway from side to side as if she was deep in prayer and the gently rested her spine on the back of the pew. Smack! Ella snapped to attention and gently rubbed her stinging thigh. There was no fooling her grandmother. Ella shifted in her seat a little and then stopped thinking on the wicked and punishment. Instead she started to dream about her future and how one day she would be a doctor or lawyer. Maybe she’d be both! Delivering babies and justice! Like a superhero! Ella pictured herself wearing a smart business suit with a swaddled baby in one arm and raising a book of the law with her other hand, beams of light radiating behind her.
Ella smiled at the very idea of it as she sat sweating in that chapel while the preacher railed on.