One thing about Jay Meeks: the baphomet tattoo on his right forearm. He made Richard Cordova give it to him one night while they were frying balls on acid, with a heroin needle and a package of Bic pens. It bled like a son of a bitch so that Richard thought he might get sick, but Jay said he should be ashamed of himself, it’s just a little blood, you pussy, do it, so he did it. It was a lot of blood, and it wouldn’t stop so Jay wrapped it in an Ace bandage and wore it like that for weeks, until it was all dirty and bloody and smelled rotten. Then one day it was gone and so was the swelling. In its place was a thin upside down star and wheel etched against Jay’s chalky skin.

Rumor about Jay was that he was a Satanist; that he practiced the rites of the black mass, whatever that was—animal sacrifice and that—he could conjure the devil. He never denied it, not even to Maya Hernandez, who asked him point blank, are you a devil worshipper? Maya Hernandez went home with him one night and vowed to her girlfriends the next morning that Jay Meeks slept with his eyes open, never ate, took ice water showers.

Beau Walker didn’t think much of Jay Meeks, except the world would be a better place without him. Beau’s daddy was the County Sheriff, and Beau, an All-State second baseman on the high school team before he graduated. Now he played for Adams State College right here in Alamosa. Spent his free time with his friends, driving his daddy’s late-model, one-ton pickup up and down Main Street, whistling at girls, pitching empty beer cans out the windows, and loving Jesus.

That’s what he was up to the night he saw Jay walking down Main Street without a shirt. It was midsummer and midnight, and Jay glowed like halogen on the side of the road, that dirty star shining black against his arm. So Beau pulled over and addressed Jay Meeks. Beau only meant to hassle poor Jay a minute, but Jay, who had no soft feelings for Beau Walker himself, would not stand for it. He told Beau Walker to fuck right off. Guess it was a bit more than either of them gambled on, cause Beau broke Jay down and hauled him off in the bed of his daddy’s truck, and drove him out past town, down to Zapata Falls.

In the winter the falls freeze over like an ice sculpture. The most beautiful thing you ever saw. A ton or more of frozen water in mid-gallop poised off the side of the mountain, waiting for the thaw to let it flow again. Every drop hard as stone, caught like the whole world stopped in an instant. But in summer the water falls clean and free against the mountainside and echoes, thunderous as drums, all around the valley, so every living thing is left deaf. Beau Walker’s friends held Jay Meeks down while Beau had his pleasure beating him pretty bloody. They left him there on the ground, curled on all fours like a retching animal. Beau Walker got down close to Jay’s face, close enough to kiss him, and asked, “Do you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior? Say it, and I’ll let you go.”

But Jay only laid there all carnage and fighting to catch his senses, so Beau said, “Say I love Jesus. Say it. Say Jesus is my Savior. Say it.”

Jay caught his breath and got to his knees and made as if to talk. Beau got down close to him so he could hear what Jay had to repent over the roaring falls.

“Jesus is a cunt,” Jay Meeks said.

“Jesus can suck my dick,” Jay Meeks said. And then he spit right in Beau Walker’s face.

Anyway, that’s how they tell it.

*

It was about that same time, give or take, that Melissa Johnson came to Alamosa. She had been Miss Colorado and a former Miss America finalist, before her scandal. Her daddy, the honorable Governor of Colorado, Mr. Robert Johnson, sent her off to Colorado State University at Fort Collins to get educated. She was none too keen on the idea, wanting to go to some liberal arts college in Washington State, but the Governor had an election to think of, and it was in his best gubernatorial interest for the young Miss Colorado to stay respectable.

About a month into her second year at Fort Collins, it came to the governor’s attention that his daughter was missing. She was not in her dorm room. None of her friends knew where she was. She hadn’t been to class in weeks. It was a big story, sure enough. Hit all the papers, all the TVs. Governor Johnson’s daughter had been abducted. He offered a ten-thousand dollar reward for any information leading to the recovery of Melissa Johnson. Still, she stayed missing. For six months there was no information to speak of. Then she got found out living in a hippy commune in Northern California, cultivating honey bees and hosting free love orgies. Somehow the governor still managed to get reelected, but it was important to keep Melissa in low profile, so he decided to hide her away in Alamosa. So here she came.

She kept a studio apartment on Main Street, above the U.S. Army recruiters’ office. Appeared every day at high noon looking too elegant in all this deathly heat, fresh and lovely. She kept her skin moist and white, in an array of exotic summer dress, shining in the gory sun like opal. She went around barefoot, a toe ring glaring in the sun, which seemed obscene to the better ladies. Her hair was slick and dark, perfumed, bundled tight against her scalp with some oriental looking sticks. She smiled at everyone, didn’t seem to notice the young men gawking at her all the time. Rambled off to the café to eat a bowl of fresh fruit and read the morning paper.

Every noon the men would come out to watch her soft stride along Main Street. Beau Walker was no exception. No stranger to the fairer graces, he had no qualms about offering his services to any lovely girl. Beau asked Melissa for a date right off.

She graciously declined. “Beau Walker, you are too sweet,” she said, “but my father has sent me here on a probation, and I want to stay on his good side, you understand, which means no boys.” Indeed, the Governor had already charged Beau’s father, Sheriff Riley Walker, with his daughter’s welfare, something everyone knew. “Aren’t you the sheer image of your father,” Melissa said to Beau. “I’m sure you’re a gentleman same as him, I feel safe already, just knowing you’re here.” And Beau smiled tentatively, shocked as hell at the rejection (a phenomenon he was not naturally accustomed to) and wringing his oafish hands so as to avoid his broken heart.

Beau solemnly swore to himself that he was, indeed, a gentleman just like his father, and set himself to every awkward chivalry on Melissa’s behalf. He escorted her to and from the market where she did her shopping. Came for her on Sunday afternoons and invited her for a platonic walk in the park. Did her heavy lifting, her handy work, anything she would let him do—even her swearing, which was fine, since she cared little for it. On every encounter he solicited her for affectionate company, and she politely declined. Beau Walker kept his head high, but when he was alone he felt miserable and wanted to cry.

It was at the end of her daily breakfast ritual that Melissa Johnson finally met Jay Meeks. Beau had been detained by a hangover, and she was left to walk herself home. Jay stood with his back against the side of the recruiting depot, dry blood on his face and hate in his heart. When she saw him, she smiled, and he glared back at her horrible enough that it made her stop. Her eyes were confused. She searched him out. Tried to find him behind long greasy hair and battered skin.

“How do you do?” she said, but he said nothing. “My name is Melissa, what’s yours?”

Jay shook his head, lit a cigarette.

“Please don’t smoke,” she asked, and he exhaled at her.

“It’s very rude to ignore a person who only wants to be polite and make new friends.”

“Is it?” Jay Meeks asked.

“Yes, it is,” Melissa Johnson confirmed.

“I am not kind,” Jay Meeks said.

“No, you’re not,” Melissa Johnson confirmed. “I can see that now, so pardon me.”

She made to walk past him, and he said, “My name is Jay Meeks, and I’ll smoke where I like.”

She stopped and looked at him again. Used one long finger to pull the hair out of her eyes and fasten it neatly behind her ear. “I’ve heard of you,” she said. “You’re the Satan worshipper, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Jay said.

“That’s silly,” Melissa told him. “Why would you worship something that does not love you?”

“Because I hate love,” Jay said.

“You’ve never even seen love,” Melissa said. “If you think by spurning Christ you will spurn love, you are sorely mistaken. Divinity is not love; it is only a vessel for love, same as you. Without love, you die. Hear me. Love is in you. I know it.”

Jay said, “I love no one, and yet I live.”

Melissa Johnson narrowed her eyes on him, and then she saw something in Jay Meeks, the kind of thing no one could ever be accused of seeing in his likes before. She said, “I like you, Jay Meeks. Meet me here tomorrow at noon. I want to show you something.”

*

Don’t nobody know what it was Melissa Johnson showed Jay Meeks the next day after noon breakfast, only that he must have liked it and she must have liked showing it to him. They met on the sidewalk in front of the U.S. Army recruiters’ office, Jay Meeks and Beau Walker, side by side. Melissa opened her parasol and curtsied, and Beau Walker offered his arm. “Always the gentleman,” Melissa said, “Beau Walker I feel safe just knowing you’re here, but not to worry. This boy here, Jay Meeks, has agreed to escort me to breakfast this morning, Beau. So I’ll give you leave.”

To be sure, the gasps and chuckles were audible all down Main Street where the men stepped out of their businesses every day to watch Melissa walk to breakfast. They had attended this particular morning with increased interest when they noticed both Jay Meeks and Beau Walker waiting at the bottom of the stairs. Beau stood slack jawed and red faced. Jay Meeks only shrugged, confused in his own right, and walked alongside Melissa down to the café. After breakfast, Jay Meeks was permitted what Beau Walker was not: she invited him upstairs, alone, to her boudoir.

Whatever it was, it was bright. Even foiled by the midday sun, you could see something glow behind the draped window above the Army recruiters’ office. Brighter than any heavenly body, it started off soft and swelled until it overwhelmed the horizon and shot, white hot, across the skies.

Some kind of magic, they whispered, some kind of witch’s spell. So bright and lovely it made the daylight sun seem dull. To look upon it would make you weep. Everyone did. All the folks of Alamosa that day looked up at the beautiful slash that effaced the heavens, and when they looked back at one another, tears streamed down their faces, and they couldn’t stop weeping for the rest of the day. Whatever Melissa Johnson had up there that she thought to show only to Jay Meeks, it made everyone in Alamosa cry for want of love.

If anyone was spurned, though, it was neither the sun nor Christ; it was Beau Walker. He had ample reason, everyone agreed. Something harmful came into his eyes, and every man feared it. He accosted them one afternoon outside the U.S. Army recruiters’ office. Melissa had taken to walking with Jay to the market for her shopping, and they were on their way back when Beau presented himself and grabbed Melissa by the wrist. “What’s to Jay Meeks,” he wanted to know.

“I find him quite interesting,” Melissa said, “and you’re not very interesting, are you, Beau?”

“I suspect not, if by interesting you say ‘weird’?”

“That’s exactly what I say. Good day, sir.”

Beau’s heart broke for want of love and he nearly bawled, “But, why him?”

“I love him!” Melissa sang out, “I love him, and he loves me!”

Jay Meeks, who until now had been standing aside, his arms full of grocery bags, said, “No.”

Melissa looked back at him. Her face deepened in shadow and she said, calmly, to Beau Walker: “Because he shows me what I need to see. He sees me, and it burns me straight through.”

Beau found himself relieved of his duties that day and ever after. Melissa went to noon breakfast with Jay Meeks every day and even permitted him to smoke at the table. His bruises were all gone, as well as the dry blood on his face. He assumed a healthy luster after that and was even quite handsome. Jay accompanied her on Sunday afternoon walks in the park, and to the market where she did her shopping. Sheriff Walker commented to her concerning her choice in company and reminded her of his oath to her father. But she only said, “Sheriff Walker, you are such a gentleman. My father would be pleased at the faith you keep, but never you mind about my visitor.”

She continued to invite Jay upstairs. Sometimes he even stayed all through the night. When he did, the glow that came from the window was so intense as to turn the black night sky to clearest day, so that no one noticed when dawn came. Everyone who beheld it wept all through the night with awe.

Now no one would deny that Beau Walker had a mean streak to him, and he let out with a vengeance after Jay Meeks. Confronted him right at the steps of the recruiters’ office one morning while Jay waited for Melissa to appear. “I mean to beat you nearly dead,” Beau Walker said.

“Then do it,” said Jay Meeks. And right then Beau Walker saw something in Jay Meeks that no one ever suspected in him before. Ought to reckon it scared him fairly, cause beat Jay Meeks nearly dead is what he did.

“Say I love Jesus,” Beau Walker commanded. “Say Jesus is my Savior.”

“I love Melissa Johnson!” Jay Meeks cried.

“Melissa Johnson is my Savior!”

Melissa Johnson is just who came to poor Jay’s rescue then. She chased Beau off and told him he was no gentleman and never come back again, “I never want to see your face again, Beau Walker!” And then she gathered up all the broken pieces of Jay Meeks and took him upstairs.

*

After that night, you know, they had to take Beau Walker to the mental asylum. Sure. Governor Johnson didn’t survive, either. He was impeached and done away with for his daughter’s mischief. That’s so. Any gambling man would have been smart to put his money down on Beau Walker that night. No way Jay Meeks stood any chance. Smart money was on Beau Walker, but smart money was wrong; it didn’t take count of any Melissa Johnson.

They found poor Beau Walker the next morning curled up under the stairs at the foot of the U.S. Army recruiters’ office, shivering with fever and utterly blind. That’s God’s truth. Blind, and sobbing about Jay Meeks being ten feet tall and the devil himself. They found Beau Walker so blind he might as well have had no eyes at all.

Beau Walker had got himself properly drunk and marched right up the Army recruiters’ office stairs, to Melissa Johnson’s apartment door. He had the whole town’s support behind him, since they had all grown tired of broad daylight lasting all through the night, and with the weeping, too, not a man was able to sleep with Melissa Johnson showing Jay Meeks whatever it was she had up there.

Beau Walker pounded on the door until someone opened it. He swept right in and shoved Jay Meeks aside and took Melissa Johnson into his arms with every intention of laying her whether she wanted it or not. Beau swore later that was when Jay Meeks stood upon, black as tar and vicious as hell, ten feet tall or more, eyes of fired steel that clenched down in Beau’s throat and willed him away. Out the door and down the stairs.

“You love me!” Melissa Johnson cried out.

“No,” Jay Meeks said.

“Yes!” Melissa Johnson insisted, “You love me. It’s true. Dare not deny me three times. You see me truly, and are not afraid!”

Beau Walker said later he heard all this sitting at the bottom of the stairs, rubbing his skull. He went out to his daddy’s pickup and fetched his Adams State College baseball bat from the cab, and hauled back up the stairs set to punish Jay Meeks once and for all. When he got to the top of the stairs, he threw the unlocked door wide and beheld Melissa Johnson bent in half, her naked ankles braced hard against Jay Meeks’ shoulders. He was naked, too, and thrust against her. When Beau Walker came in, they both looked up at him some delicious agony. Tears stood out against their cheeks. That was the last thing Beau Walker ever saw.

What came next was a flash so powerful the sky above Colorado was fully golden for three days and three nights. A flash of such violence it was followed by a scream of thunder that left the whole town’s ears ringing. All the birds took to flight for miles around, and every dog in three counties set its ears back hard and cried for the moon, which was gone, erased by the platinum wash that consumed the firmament so wholly. They cried, they all cried. Every living thing wept for three days and three nights, engulfed inescapably in Jay Meeks, and Melissa Johnson, and their love for each other.

***

Adrian Stumpp

Adrian’s fiction has appeared in Aisthesis (Spring 2008) and Metaphor (Spring 2009) and has been accepted for forthcoming issues of BlazeVOX and The Emprise Review. His work has also received honorable mention and second place in the Utah Arts Council’s annual Short Story competition in 2007 and 2008 respectively. In 2009, his short story collection, All the Variables & Other Love Stories, received first place in the book-length category of the same competition.