Mary

I don't know what made me do the things I did. I always heard voices telling me , "Go ahead do it, it'll be fun." And the voices never agreed on what to do. Conflict upon conflict crowded my mind. I never kept friends for long. Mostly because they dropped me after they found I slept with their husbands. The last guy I slept with was the last. We just finished having a good time when the door flew open and there stood his wife. She ran screaming from the room. Seconds latter if not sooner the room was filled with neighbors. I barely had time to wrap a sheet around me before I was hauled outside. Sharp things pelted me. Beer bottles were breaking beside me. People were slapping and kicking me. This was it. The end. I wouldn't walk away from this. No one was going to call for help. Suddenly calm. More calm. My heart was pounding so hard that's all I could hear in my ears. I peeked out of the sheet I had pulled over my head, feet were walking away. They had stopped tormenting me. Timidly I lowered the sheet and looked around.

A group of men were sitting a ways off watching me. One of them walked over and handed me his long coat. "Try not to get into anymore trouble, okay?" He helped me to my feet and left.
I got up and raced home, showered and dressed. I felt something different. I didn't feel anything.Something was different, I always felt something. The voices were gone. This was strange. No one ordering me around.

I sat and drank some tea and reflected on things... for a long time. The sun set and rose again several times. I didn't go to work at the bar. I didn't feel like stripping for a living anymore. The desire to shock people had left with the voices.

A few days passed and I eventually stepped out of my house, no one recognized me as I had washed the goo off my face and was wearing a modest outfit. Strolling no where in particular I noticed an assembly in the park. There he was. The guy who gave me his coat. He must be some kind of story teller, an actor or something. I couldn't get close enough to ask him where he was staying since he was performing. Off to the side were some of the guys I recognized from that horrible night. I approached them to get his address. They politely gave me directions and told me when I could find him at home.

I couldn't get there fast enough with his coat. I really wanted to thank him for helping me. I didn't know the right way though because I usually expressed thanks physically and some how I didn't think that would go over big this time. I actually didn't even feel drawn to have sex with him or any of his buddies for that matter. When I arrived where he was staying there was another group of people. Man, was this guy ever alone? Such is the life of performers. Women and men were spilling out of the house having a good time. They wouldn't want me around. They were out of my league. They seemed like nice people. I never mixed well with nice people. I'm the girl every one's mother warns about. Then I saw him coming down the street. He was limping. His feet looked sore. I got to him first and offered him my shoulder to lean on the rest of the way home. He quietly accepted my offer. When we got there I took off his shoes and noticed a blister on his big toe. I inquired of his friends where the bathroom was and went for a wash rag and some water to clean his foot. Damn, I'd forgotten a towel to dry his foot with. I didn't want to look any stupider so I undid my braid and used my long hair pulling it between his clean pedal digits. It tickled his feet and we shared a comfortable laugh. He was really easy to be with. I had some perfume in my purse so I scented his feet with it for fun.

A long and wonderful relationship started between us. Since I was now out of work I followed him in his story telling trips and helped cook for the entourage. He hadn't been on the road long. His was a new act. It was a combination family counseling, medical treatment, entertainment show. We were cleaner than Walt Disney and no comparison to the Hare Krishna's. There were a lot of men and women devoted to him. We were a mixed bag of nuts but completely family. The people I thought were upper class clean cuts were from the same dysfunctional ,maladjusted drug pushing, alcoholic back ground as me. I loved him the most. But strangely nothing sexual ever entered my mind. I'm guessing it didn't enter his either because he never made a pass at me. For the first time since I'd been on my own I was treated respectfully and I was beginning to like it. And what's more I had female friends. We shared makeup stories and intimacies that I never got to share with anyone else before. We all had weird backgrounds, lots of excess baggage we dumped somewhere and actually walked away from.

Some of the established acts resented his apparent success. They had seniority with their acts and didn't like the throngs leaning towards his stage. His gimmicks and tricks really attracted attention. One day a group of jealous, murderous felons grabbed him and tortured him before they killed him. The law closed it's eyes to the event. No one wanted to take the blame or point a finger. He didn't even have a descent funeral. Someone just took his body and dumped it in a hole. I went with some friends to see that justice was done on his behalf and put him to rest properly. We looked all over for him. He was no where to be found. I got frantic. Life wasn't fair. He was such a quiet calm man. He hadn't looked for trouble, he just loved telling peaceful stories, stories that gave you that feel good about yourself feeling.

Suddenly we saw an explosion. I say saw because we didn't hear anything, just saw a bright light that covered half the horizon, then we felt the earth move, we fell to our knees and covered our heads. After a few seconds we regained our footing and hurried in that direction. As we got close two men ran past us, I remembered seeing them in the mob that killed my friend. The front of their pants were wet and they were babbling incoherently about ghosts and zombies, their faces were severely contorted. We weren't sure we wanted to investigate the explosion anymore and started to retreat when a young man walked up to us. "We're looking for a body, have you seen it?" I asked him.

Then he said my name. It was him. He was radiant, not a sign of the beating he'd received was left on his body, except for a few scars on his hands and feet. We fell at his feet and kissed him. Pulling us up he told us to go tell his staff where they could find him.

As per his instructions we gathered on his favorite mountain to meet him. He gave us some instructions and encouraging words and told us he wasn't staying here anymore. We all wanted to go with him. We could start over also. He didn't have to go by himself, his enemies were our enemies. As we were begging him to take us with him his head looked taller, looking down we noticed his feet were not on the ground anymore. The more we looked the higher off the ground his feet rose till we were looking at the bottom of his shoes. We all stepped back. Was this an other one of his wonderful acts, if so it superseded them all. Higher and higher he went till we saw him no more. The silence was deafening. No one wanted to admit what they saw. There were hundreds of us yet none of us believed our own eyes.

A voice attached to a white willowy figure informed us. "Close your mouths and go home, He'll come back again in the same fashion, keep your eyes open for him." The wispy figure dissolved into the air and we stumbled home filled with awe and a deeper love for mankind than I can ever explain.

We all broke up and went in different directions to spread the story of Jesus, our best friend and now our saviour. My name? Mary Magdalene. And no, I never slept with him or any of his followers for that matter. Leave my name out of the gossip mill.