THE MANGROVES’ NEW LIGHT
(A short story)
____________
“Oh, Christ—just what I needed this morning—those Jehovah people in the neighborhood!”
68-year-old Cicely Mangrove moaned and kept her spiteful eye fixed on neighborhood intruders organizing themselves into pairs outside.
How could a person ever relax on a Sunday morning?
“Nathaniel, come down here right away! Don’t make me say ‘please’.”
“I’m shaving. . .” echoed her husband’s voice from the floor above.
“Well, stop shaving and get down here. I don’t want to talk to them.”
____
Mockingbirds swayed warily above Cicely Mangrove’s garden terrace on Lollard Lane as the sound of a car door slammed and voices crept in through a raised window where Cicely sat at the breakfast table smoking the last inch of her cigarette.
Cherry blossoms stirred like mad pinwheels in her front yard as two carloads of religious folks turned the corner and glided to a halt next to two other similar vehicles. These were sedans with sincere occupants.
Eight serious religious folks divided up responsibilities and split into couples, each headed in diverse directions. A large man in an ill-fitting suit and a mature woman in unfashionable clothing pushed against the garden gate approaching the Mangrove’s house.
The door buzzer sounded. A sort of “ping-pong” chime rang out.
“Nathaniel, get your ass down here right now!”
“Why are you shouting—I’m standing right here?” Nathaniel Mangrove spoke inches from behind her ear.
An average-looking man in khaki slacks, Hawaiian shirt, and leather house shoes stood wiping a cup towel across his face where tufts of creamy shaving foam still clung. He was average-looking, with a high forehead and mischievous smile.
The door chime repeated the annoying pattern once more.
“Are you going to get that, or do I have to call the cops again like last time?”
____
Cicely Mangrove was a nervous woman of variable moods; all of them dark. Telephone solicitors and religious peddlers were high on her arousal scale. Neighborhood scuttlebutt held her out to be manic-depressive, but her husband assured everyone who knew her it was nothing of the sort.
“Cicely is just plain mean, that’s all. She doesn’t like people. I think it’s kinda cute—once you get used to it.”
Nathaniel Mangrove, or “Natty” as his friends preferred, was well-known to be even-tempered and good-humored in stark contrast to his wife’s incessant grouchiness.
They met at an art gallery opening eighteen years earlier.
Natty had quipped something provocative just as Cicely was biting into
hors d’oeuvre. She immediately choked and spat spinach, scurrying off to the bathroom not to be seen again. It was an auspicious beginning, fraught with bad-timing and farce- not unlike their marriage.
____
Just as the persistent couple jabbed at the doorbell for the third time, the broad oak door opened wide. Nathaniel Mangrove filled the doorway with a quizzical presence and lifted eyebrows.
The surprised visitor flashed a grin.
“Oh heck—Hi, I’m Gus Womper and this is my wife, Lorry. We’re in your neighborhood with a group of ministers this morning, offering a message of—“
“Of total BULLSHIT!” The wail burst forth from inside the Mangrove’s living room.
Cicely Mangrove hovered behind her husband not three feet back, but her voice projected clear down to the mailbox in front of Mrs. Vandersloot’s duplex at the end of the block.
“Please forgive my wife for that outburst. She hasn’t felt too sociable since . . . um. . . birth. Her birth.”
Immediately, the reddened face of Mrs. Mangrove popped into view as she administered a hip thrust sideways, jostling her husband against the doorjamb.
“I’ll call the cops if you don’t get off my property in the next five seconds—you hear me? I already know what you’re peddling and it’s more ARMAGEDDON nonsense.”
Natty Mangrove, in one smooth, well-practiced movement, encircled his wife’s neck with a wrestling hold he frequently referred to as a “half-nelson.” He pulled her aside and spoke soothingly in measured tones as the couple on the porch watched eagerly.
“Now Cissy, it doesn’t cost you a penny to extend hospitality to strangers at our door. Settle down or I’ll switch to that sleep-hold that worked so well at Anderson’s party last Christmas. Understood?”
The half-bent wife tapped her husband’s back three times in a frantic gesture of compliance and immediately he relaxed his grip. In no time at all the color returned to her pale face as she stood huffing and puffing like a mugging victim.
“I’m Nathaniel Mangrove and this is my bride, Cicely. Don’t take my wife too seriously. She has 'Jehovah' ‘issues’ with doomsday intrusions into her daily schedule. The two of us are in couple’s therapy and our task for the week is to engage others in pleasantries. Won’t you both please come in and take the weight off your feet?”
____
An awkward silence settled into the Mangrove’s living room. Two couples arranged themselves like department store manikins around a coffee table in stiff postures of stressed body language.
Plastic ice tea cups rested on cork coasters untouched. A dish of cashews and peanuts rested in the center of a lazy Susan unmolested. A neighbor’s dog could be heard yapping incessantly several doors down and the faint rumble of a lawnmower competed with the wind chimes suspended from the next door Chandler family’s kitchen window—a present from their son-in-law back in Toluca Lake.
“So, here we all are. You were about to share some good news with my wife and I, if I’m not mistaken, Mr. Whomper—right?”
Gus and Lorry Whomper, alert as pet shop puppies, were busily inspecting the interior of the Mangrove’s home with slack-jawed wonderment. The couple absent-mindedly attuned to a channel inside their minds quite impossible for Nathaniel Mangrove to fathom. Mr. Whomper spoke in the cheerful voice of a vacuum cleaner salesman. It was a practiced cadence of lilting rhythms and improbable optimism.
“Yes, Sir—Lorry and I are ministers sharing an important message of coming destruction to most of the earth’s vast population of non-believing, Satan-influenced, selfish and willful goats. This will be you and your wife’s final warning before complete and total doom takes you down in the day of Jehovah’s wrath.”
With that, he munched a handful of cashews and went back to inspecting the premises like a TV detective keen for clues.
Cicely Mangrove’s lips puckered into a lemon-sour pout as if she could taste the words of Gus Womper’s sermonette. She opened her mouth to speak—but, faster than a flash—Natty jumped in with a speech of his own.
“Whoa—take it easy, Gus. I invited you into our home as a demonstration of sociable grace. What in the world makes you think your doom-sayings are ‘good news to my wife and me?”
Lorry Womper’s eyes flickered like a battery-operated toy with fresh double AA batteries.
“Oh, that’s just what we say, Mr. Mangrove. It’s really good news for us.” She grinned. “It’s a win-win for us. If you don’t listen - after you’re destroyed - heck - I’ll get first Dibs on your house!”
Gus widened his forced smile.
“We figure you folks aren’t ever going to study the Bible with us. But we’re still obligated to give fair warning. When you are destroyed at Armageddon, we’ll get to move into your house! Lorry and I have had an eye on your swimming pool.”
Gus began to chuckle, Lorry elbowed him in the ribs teasingly.
Cicely Mangrove gave a slow-burn turn of her head toward Natty and lifted her eyebrows with a mute, “Now do you see why I hate these…??” expression on her twitching face.
Natty shrugged complacently with a calm eye roll.
“Uh—when is this latest Armageddon event going to strike us down, Gus? Do I have time to finish the shave you interrupted when you were leaning on our doorbell?”
“Gosh, it ought to be here by the end of the year—or even sooner.”
“Says who?” Cicely growled.
“The Faithful Slave.” Lorry proudly replied.
“Hear that, Natty? They have SLAVES!”
Gus and Lorry frowned disapprovingly. “Tsk tsk tsk. Not THAT kind of slave.”
Natty puffed out his cheeks and rolled his eyes once again. Cicely snuffled.
Gus reached into a leather bookbag beside his chair and rummaged around. Presently he tugged out a small green folder.
“Surprise—surprise! This is our New Light contract—have you seen one before?”
Natty and Cicely glanced sideways at each other and leaned forward to scrutinize the formal printed papers Gus held in front of him resembling a lease agreement.
“Tell them, Lorry—it’s your turn.”
Cicely removed the papers from Gus’s hand as Natty leaned closer and they both began silent reading as Lorrie spoke.
“That’s the new standard contract offered by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society. We guarantee in writing that Armageddon will come no later than the middle of October next year.”
“Or what?” Cicely and Natty spoke simultaneously.
“Or else we promise to shut down our religious activities and stop our preaching and publishing work all over the world. If you sign this, you agree to study and get baptized . . . until then.”
“You’ll shut down how long?”
“Why, um—forever.”
Four people stared at each other in silence.
“You two are barking mad. I looked you guys up in the Encyclopedia. You’ve predicted Armageddon over and over again. Wrong - every single time.”
Gus and Lorrie began laughing and exchanging knowing glances.
“That’s what everybody says at first. We know we’ve made mistakes in the past. Do you think we haven’t noticed how often we’ve been wrong?”
Gus chuckled and shook his head gleefully.
“We’re as sick of preaching false prophesies as everybody else is of hearing them. That’s why our Governing Body has come up with this iron-clad contract. We’re laying it all on the line once and for all.”
Lorrie jabbed the air with her finger for emphasis.
An expression of astonishment hung from Natty and Cicely’s faces like rumpled curtains. They sat shaking their heads like wobbly toys in the back of an automobile.
“You’re telling us you are challenging the Almighty to ‘shit or get off the pot’?”
Lorrie turned and offered her husband a mock-expectant expression—then both turned and nodded broadly in an exaggerated “Yes!”
“It’s extortion, I suppose. But, Jehovah is very jealous of his Name and reputation. This is the only workable strategy for getting Him to do what is necessary. Don’t you see—it is pure genius on the part of our Governing Body! Otherwise, this door-to-door ministry might well go on for who knows how many eons?”
Cicely, still shaking her head with improbable internal dialogue, stood and walked into the kitchen, opened the refrigerator door, and bent forward scanning a shelf inside.
“You folks want a beer?” Her voice had softened - for the first time.
Lorrie and Gus widened their eyes at each other like naughty children rewarded with chocolate.
“Sure—we don’t mind if we do. Thanks, Cicely.”
Four silent people sat quietly sipping and nodding . . . sipping and nodding.
______
Spring arrived and the sound of newborn kittens, chirping fledglings, and giggling children danced in the air. The Mangroves attended their local Kingdom Hall regularly and never missed the opportunity to witness to friends, neighbors, or the FedEx driver. Their baptism was attended by a great many of their neighbors. They too had heard the message of destruction and signed the contract.
Weekends arrived with clockwork regularity and the calendar pages flipped and fell like autumn leaves in October’s wind.
The summer brought just enough rain to satisfy the neighbors with the well-manicured lawns. The onset of winter was gentle. Very little snow came toward the end of the year, but enough to satisfy the dyed-in-the-wool traditionalists.
By December’s last tolling bell the year ended and the giant glowing ball in Times Square dropped with the absolute certainty of Einstein’s famous equation.
The New Year arrived.
____**____
EPILOG
Mangroves and Whompers ran into each other occasionally in the post office and grocery store. A formal nod was exchanged and a comfortable grin of familiar recognition. No words were spoken or greetings exchanged. Knowing glances said everything needed to be acknowledged.
Cicely might notice that Lorrie was sporting a new tattoo and her neckline had plunged even more since the last time they’d passed each other in front of Wal-Mart. Gus had lost a lot of weight since the divorce. His new sport convertible was often observed roaring down Lollard Lane with a trim blonde next to him, or a fancy redhead.
By the first of the year, signage had come down from all the Kingdom Halls in the city. Word was, the same was true of Watchtower headquarters, factory, and farm. Service centers around the world had been sold off and missionaries dispersed—some volunteering for the Red Cross. Former zealots sought out former members once disfellowshipped from their families for apologies and reconciliation. Christmas trees were once banned from windows, bedazzled neighborhoods, and little witness children now knocked on doors with raucous “Trick or Treat” on Halloween.
Pews in the churches of Lollard lane sported many new members that year.
There were happy faces, crucifixes, and loud singing on a grander scale than ever before.
Flags received snappy salutes, voting was up in local precincts, and the pregnancy rate among High-Schoolers stood at an all-time high.
A southerly breeze swept past the hollyhocks and jacarandas along the sidewalks of Lollard Lane as mockingbirds swayed cheerily above Cicely Mangrove’s garden terrace.
Anyone who passed the Mangrove household was sure to hear a loud shout from inside the kitchen window of,
“Hi there—how are you folks?”
This, of course, was invariably accompanied by a wave of the hand and a broad, satisfied smile.
Cicely Mangrove was finally able to relax.
At last, she loved Jehovah.
_THE END_