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The Meeting Place |
| Written by JJ Tyler | |
| Sunday, 24 February 2008 | |
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Share it:      If one was to go around to the building behind the store, one wouldn't notice much of anything at all. The building was made that way. The bricks are of non-descript cinder block, painted over in vanilla colored enamel. The roof of the place is attached to a neighboring business, an old tow yard, which has been closed years ago. The real estate sign still sits on its window, asking for someone to call. The building has no signage. There is nothing to tell you what the building is for. It is kept locked with a steel door that is only open on Wednesday nights. On a Wednesday night, you would see the door ajar and would find a stained tile floor. The tile is old and yellow, showing signs of water damage and heavy wear and tear. The building houses one giant room. There are no fixtures or pictures on the wood paneled walls, and there is hardly any furniture. There are only two items in the room. The first is a card playing table with four chairs, and the second is another door leading to the cellar. The card table is old, but not as old as the building. It was bought during the Carter administration, and the plastic covering on the table top is cracking and peeling in places. The chairs have been replaced, from the original set, to trade up for metal folding chairs, which have lasted much longer. There are coffee rings on the table, hardened and crusted over. 4 people would sit there and there would be a box of donuts opened on the cracked plastic table, with a thermos of coffee, and a stack of styrofoam cups along side of it. The four would be sitting in their respective chairs, the same chairs in which they sit in every Wednesday night. In the first chair, there would sit a plump white male, who never eats the donuts and never drinks the coffee. On his face, there are lines of agitation, which have been more and more exaggerated over the years, meeting after meeting. His business attire doesn't fit in with the look of the building with no name, and his overall composure shows that he does not enjoy his time there. The second person is a Black male in his late 40's. He often wears a T-shirt and blue jeans, and his sneakers squeak on the old and stained tile. His face is more passive than the first, and it shows that while he doesn't enjoy being there, he knows it is an important thing to do. His face also shows that being at the meeting may be the most important thing he does all week long. In the third chair, there is a lady who has not aged well. The dark splotches under her eyes tell of long nights and little sleep. Her wrinkles parallel the natural lines of her face, giving her a weathered and beaten look. She wears Sunday apparel to every meeting, and her driver waits for her outside the building, in a town car. A necklace sits around her neck, with a cross on it. But if one was to look closer, the cross has a cold metallic look to it that could be construed as blasphemous. There is no hope or joy hanging on the woman's loose flesh of a neck. The fourth chair is occupied by a young man, who wears his college T-Shirt on his chest, and refuses to comb his hair. The lady has asked him several times to dress accordingly, but he never complies. He hasn't fully grasped the depth of why they are all there, meeting in the building, and his look of apathy shows it. "This is the 1,345th meeting of the four, called into session by the original decree. We will now hear from the members." The white plump man said, saying it much like one would say the Pledge of Allegiance, if forced to say it 200 times over and over. "Any new business?" Said Christopher, the black man, sitting in his chair and leaning over the table, ready to get the meeting over with. "I have something I want to share with everyone." Said the young one. He had been recruited not too long ago. He had only been coming for 7 months. A new recruit goes through several emotional stages. The other three had seen them all. The new recruit was at the denial stage, and he was ready to throw the gauntlet down on the small shaky table. "I'm done with it all. I understand that this may be upsetting to you people, but I've had enough. I can't do this for the rest of my life." The young one said. His name was William, but he went by Billy. The plump man, Carson, shook his head in agreement. Judy spoke up: "We can't allow you to quit, you know that. If you don't show up, we will have to take back the money." She said. "I don't need the money. I'm not concerned about that. I feel stifled here. I feel like some lab rat in a giant experiment that was made for me to push a button the rest of my life. Except for this button isn't just a button, but something that makes me break the law, every time it's my turn." Billy said. He had his back pack over his shoulder where everyone figured he was keeping the week's payload. "Did you bring it this week, or not?" Christopher asked. "Yeah, I brought it, but for the last time." Billy answered. "You can't quit. If you quit, then we all quit. Then we all die." Christopher said. He wasn't excited when he said this, but calm and serene. He had said these lines before, to other members in the past, including Carson. Christopher continued to take sips from his cup, with the steam rising and snaking its way around his angular face.
"That looks good. It will do." Judy said. She was shaking slightly, due to the cold of the night and the lack of central heating in the building with no name. Sitting on the middle of the table was a severed hand. The skin and muscle tissue had been worn away long ago, and the bones sat, resting. Billy couldn't take his eyes off of it. The fat man couldn't look at it. The fat man took a deep breath, which made his chest swell and the shirt bulge under the jacket. "I agree with Billy. I'm done." Christopher stopped drinking after hearing the fat man speak up. Judy and Christopher looked at each other. "We can't do it alone. If you two are out, we won't be able to get replacements in time, and we won't get the offerings in when they need to be in." She said. She was shaking more wildly now, but now not from cold but fear. She loved the meetings, she loved the offerings, and she loved the namelessness of it all. But she didn't want it to change, and she didn't want to tempt the thing that slept beneath the floor. Billy and the Fat Man looked at each other. They each got up, and scooted their chairs in, leaving Christopher and Judy at the table alone. They walked out without saying anything. "Your trainer, did they ever mention anything like this happening?" Judy asked Christopher. "No. It would never get to this point, as the trainer wouldn't allow their replacement to quit. They would instill fear in them. But not an irrational fear, I'm afraid. I think that we may be going into unprecedented waters here." He said. His calm demeanor was gone now. There was not panic in his voice but deep dread. They sat there for a moment, in the cold room. "Well, I guess we should drop it in, and then try to cut the workload between ourselves for the next few months, till we can find new recruits." Judy said. "You know and I know that we can't train two new recruits in such a time. And how can we keep finding bones in the mean time. It is tough enough doing it once a month, but now...there's no way we can keep up." Christopher said. "We'll have to make do." Judy replied, and she picked up the bone hand and began to rise out of her chair. Before she could do so, Billy returned. At first, the two that were left had a look of deep relief, but then Billy did something even more unexpected. "I'm not going to let you give the hand tonight. I'm taking it back to where I found it. It's going back to the campus." He walked over and snatched the bones out of her hand. A finger snapped off and rolled across the floor from the violence of the snatch. Christopher dove for it, but Billy kicked it across the floor. It landed and rested on the doorway to the cellar. Billy trotted over and picked it up, dropping it and its other part in his bag. Christopher was behind him fast, with amazing speed. Christopher grabbed Billy's arm and swung him around. "You can't take it. There is no way we can find a replacement in 20 minutes." Christopher said. He was breathing heavily, and there was no nonsense in his voice. Billy stayed calm. "This is a game. Nothing is going to happen. And if you don't leggo of my arm, I am going to call the law on all of you. They would want to know about the grave digging. Last time I checked, which was today, grave digging is a felony crime." Christopher let go. For a moment, he expected to see the fat man sitting back at the table, returning to his calling. But the fat man wasn't there. Judy still sat on the table, holding her hand up in the air still, from where she had previously held the skeletal member. "Let him go, Christopher." She said. She wasn't looking back but she could hear what was happening behind her. Christopher had already let go, and before she said this, he had walked over to the cellar door. Billy quickly shuffled off, his extra hand now placed in his pack. He, again, didn't look back. "Well, we need to leave. We need to clear out. We need to warn people." Christopher said, imagining what was underneath the floor and through that door. "No. We wait here. We wait until it's too late. And when it's too late, and nothing happens, then we are free. But if it's not, then we are either dead or dying. We put it all on the line here. Our lives pass before us over the next 20 minutes." Judy said. Christopher sat back down on the metal folding chair. He looked at his watch and shook his head. There was no sign of the fat man. "We could...I mean we could give something of ourselves, if you think that would work?" Judy said. "It would work, but I don't think there is anything on me that I can do without." Christopher replied. "There's always the pancreas, they say we don't truly need that." Judy said.
"There ain't any bones in a pancreas." The following 20 minutes was long, as if someone took the clock of clocks and stretched it like bread dough, making the long hand strain between each click. Judy and Christopher sipped coffee from the thermos, occasionally glancing towards the steel door on the floor. Around 3 minutes till the stroke of eight, Judy spoke again.
"I have to say, that I have always doubted the validity of all of this." "I don't know what would be more disturbing. To release a monster or to find out there has never been a monster." Christopher said. He studied the steel door for a second, taking another sip of coffee. "I have always wanted to ask you something, but I know that we aren't to get personal here at the meeting. But, seeing that this meeting and our tradition has gone to the dogs, I'll just ask. What is with the cross around your neck? I have never seen anything like it. It almost seems, robotic? Is that the right word?" "Man made, would be a better term. It is made to look wrong to the eye, and I like it that way." Judy replied. 2 minutes now, and it would be too late for the feeding. "Why wear something like that? Does it mean anything?" Christopher asked. He had become too nervous for coffee. His leg bounced up and down underneath the table. "It means that what I used to believe in, I now find it to be man made. It reflects my views on religion and God, so to speak. It's a constant reminder, that my faith is dead." Judy said. She said this while lighting a cigarette. She had never smoked in the building with no name before. "That's a terrible way to live." Christopher said. "What do you think is down there, a monster that has been alive for 1000 years? Don't you think that with an evil like that, there has to be an opposite, a true good?"
"As I told you before, I do this for the tradition, not because I believe." Judy replied. "I never remembered asking for your opinion on my paradigm, so it is of no effect to me what you think." Judy said. It was time. They both glance at their watches and looked over to the door. There was no noise and no visible sign of movement. What they were told could happen, by their recruiters, long ago, was that an unspeakable evil would be released upon the town. There would be no hope in containing it, only its appetite. They were not told what it was, or where it came from. They were just told of the building with no name, and how this building was built 60 years ago, over the underground pit that had been there for centuries. They were told they were the guardians of the pit, and to never fail. Financial backing was given, but it was never revealed from whom the money came. Christopher thought he heard something. The lights went out. Outside the building, sitting next to Judy's towncar, Carson the fat man sat in his Buick, with the engine running. He was debating of going back into the building, and his eye was on the digital clock on his console. 8 P.M. had flashed minutes ago, but there had been no sign of Judy or Chris. Carson waited a few minutes before. He reached underneath his seat, where he carried his snub nose .38. It was an old, old gun that had been passed to him from his grandfather. The gun was older than he was. It was a six shooter, and Carson couldn't remember the last time he had cleaned it. When he looked into the chambers, to see if they were full, the lights around the building with no name went out. He sat there, in the glow of the green clock, waiting to hear something. He thought he did, even through the car door, but he wasn't sure. He opened the door and walked around the building. The driver in the town car paid him no mind. He walked around the corner, and saw the open door. There was no light through it. He reached in his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. It was an older PDA model that lit up like a miniature flash light. He turned it on and held it in the room. The yellow stained tile glowed ominously in the cell phone's light. When he aimed it towards the chair, he saw that the chairs and table were not where they usually were, but sprawled about in all different direction. There was no more Christopher and no more Judy. There was no blood, and no sign of any type of struggle. As he headed for the corner of the building, stepping on a cup which had rolled a distance away, he saw what his heart feared most, and open cellar door. There was a deep and vast breathing noise coming from it. It was eating or resting, whatever it was. He quickly backtracked, towards the night. He scuttled around the building, started his car, and drove for the downtown police station. He looked back at his gun, nearly laughing. The size of the gun compared to the size of the thing would be like him trying to stop an earthquake with a bag of concrete. Before he pulled out, heading south, he saw Billy sitting at a bus stop, unharmed. He pulled up and opened the door. "Get in." He said. They drove back to the building with no name, and by this time Billy was shaking. "You aren't going to scare me into joining again." Billy said. "If you don't bring it, it may be too late." Carson replied. The both went into the room, where the sound was everywhere, and it sounded like the wind being born from underneath their feet. "Drop it in." Carson barked quietly, and Billy did as he was told. Afterwards, Carson shut the door, took Billy back outside, and locked the outer door. They went home, again without saying anything. Carson drove back the next morning, to find the only entrance still dead-bolted. He didn't see Billy till the following meeting, at the 1346th meeting of the charter. Recruiting two new board members was difficult, but the cash from the trust account always made things go down easier. And Billy and Carson didn't tell their two new recruits much either, only that it was a game played by some rich man. Weeks later, they would reveal some more, and weeks later more. Eventually, the meetings would be back at full force, and neither Billy nor Carson would ever miss again. Copyright 2008 JJ Tyler |
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