Episode 5: Messenger’s Altar

We’re looking for your stories of receiving a message from an unexpected source. Or, can you tell us what message would you like to receive—or give? We want to hear your stories - long or short, profound or pedestrian, and to collect any messages you'd like to share. Send us an email at [email protected], and you can see some that we’ve already received on our social media pages.  We look forward to hearing from you!

 

Audrey's Message:
I was looking for a place to live and had passed a particular apartment complex many times. I soon realized it was really the perfect location for me. I went to talk with the staff about possible openings, but no one was on duty and I couldn’t get in. I turned to go and a woman in a wheelchair came right up to me. “Can I help you?” When I told her I was interested in living there, she said, “Come right on in with me. I’ll show you around and I know two people who will be glad to show you their apartments!” I took her welcome as a sign, the message I was looking for—someone to say, “Come in. You’re welcome here.” 

I called and got on the list but was told the wait time was 6-8 months. Ten days later, I got a call there was an apartment for me. It was the exactly right place for me.

 

Credits/Contacts

Author: Liz Keller Whitehurst: [email protected]For inquiries about MESSENGER or rights queries, 
contact April Eberhardt: [email protected]Book editor: Annie Tucker: [email protected]Podcast design/social media: Brandon O’Neill: oneillcreativeco.comAudio production and voice artist: Rachel Pater: richmondstoryhouse.orgOriginal music and sound direction: Wells Hanley: [email protected]Recording and audio editing: Lance Koehler: minimumwagerecording.comSpecial thanks to Wilson, Joy, Audrey and April

 

Find Us Online 

Website: messengerthenovel.comFacebook: facebook.com/messengerthenovelInstagram: instagram.com/messengerthenovelTwitter: twitter.com/messenger_novel

 

Questions to Ponder

Messenger’s altar may be very different from traditional altars you are familiar with. Have you ever made an altar? What did it consist of? Why was it meaningful for you?Through the flashback to Cathy’s Birthday, we learn that the experience Alana had at Messenger’s altar is not her first of this kind, an experience that cannot be rationally explained. Why do you think Alana withheld her experience in the alley from Messenger?What do you make of Messenger’s theories at the end of Episode 5, about how best to deal with violence and evil?

 

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Episode 5 Complete Text  📖 
(Click here to access the PDF)

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MESSENGER’S COMPOSITION BOOK: SEVEN ALTAR IDEAS

 

INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:

Photos—You don’t need to know who the faces are—The eyes make them so powerful.Anything that sparkles or catches light—glass, mirrors, marbles—chrome or other metal.Anything living—plants, flowers, leaves, rocks, dirt, moss, lichen, bark, feathers, seeds, sand, earth, wood—all bring different qualities. Food, water, drink of any kind. Alcohol has Spirit in it!Holy items, relics, candles and flames. Wax is excellent.Art—drawings or prints or pottery or sculpture. Little figures of people or animals, fabric, old patches of clothing. String.Animal fur, bones. Feathers. Human hair. Pennies. Don’t worry about “heads down.” Finding it is the lucky part. Other coins, bills. They don’t last long on any altar—magic! 

Make your altar in a place of safety, as far away from electrical lines as possible because electromagnetism interferes. If it can be arranged on a known ley line, better yet. Outside, in nature, is best—fresh air, beneath the stars, sun and moonlight, in line with wind or a breeze. Near running water is best yet, though still water is also good. 

            These altars are not only beneficial for the souls who come in contact with them, but to all beings, both physical and spiritual. The altars go deep. They send down roots of energy and connect all holy places on earth and in other dimensions. Even if they are tampered with or—at worst—robbed or destroyed—doesn’t matter! Don’t worry about it! The act of making them brings power and positive energy to our planet and to other levels or dimensions. From there, the Watchers have witnessed your efforts and trials and hold you close with invisible arms. They work on your behalf at all times and in every way.

 

MESSENGER’S ALTAR 

 

Alana had found Messenger on Fifth Street, after getting a tip from the Flower Lady. It was an overcast day that felt colder than it really was. Damp and wintery, dull gray. The sun didn’t stand a chance. It was lunchtime, so Alana had left Messenger on their bench by the school yard and ran around the corner for sandwiches. Once they were made, Alana carried a big white paper bag back and sat down beside Messenger. 

            Messenger clapped her hands. “Did you say, ‘extra mayo’?”

            “Of course! Ham and American cheese on white. EXTRA MAYO!” Alana handed Messenger her sandwich, neatly wrapped in white paper, along with a napkin. 

            “Wonderful! Thank you. What did you get, Honey? Your usual?”

            “Uh huh. Turkey and Swiss on whole wheat. Hold the mayo.”

            “You don’t know how to live,” Messenger teased.

            They sat quietly, enjoying their lunch. Messenger devoured her sandwich and Alana ate half of hers, then stowed the other half in her backpack for dinner. Messenger rolled the foil and sandwich paper into a tight ball and they collected their trash in the big paper bag. Messenger sat quietly for several minutes, then abruptly stood up. “Come with me, Honey. I want to show you something.”

            Alana’s heart lifted. She was usually the one who begged Messenger to share—anything. A tip, a clarification, an explanation. They threw their trash in the basket and Messenger led her to the opening of a narrow alley between the buildings where the guy from Three of Cups Sicilian Restaurant usually sat on a crate to take a smoke. Today it was empty and they were alone.

            As soon as they walked in, Alana noticed a strange buzz, a sort of echoing sound to the space. She wrapped her scarf more tightly around her neck. The smell of garbage, damp brick and dirt filled her nose. The buildings blocked the sun, so it was dark, cold and very damp. Messenger walked ahead until she came to a protected area behind one of the buildings, beside some trash cans. 

            “Here it is.” She spread her arm as if showing Alana her greatest treasure. 

            Alana gasped.

            Perched on two side-by-side plastic crates, which formed a sort of table, Alana saw an altar. Messenger had taken cardboard boxes to create different levels and surfaces for the treasures. On each, she’d burned candles and dripped wax—all colors—red, green, yellow, purple and white. The wax dripped onto the boxes and down the sides. In the wax, she’d stuck pennies, marbles, bottle caps. Green Heineken beer bottles, cobalt blue wine bottles, clear bottles all held white candles of their own. Live yellow, blue and purple pansies dotted the surfaces, along with snips of pine. Several fresh carnations, from the Flower Lady, Alana suspected, added to the living parts there. 

            Alana saw the head of a doll, its eyes wide open. Sunglasses. Photos of people’s faces stared out also, pulled from magazines or maybe “Have you See Her? or Him?” posters from the street. Bits of red and silver tin-foil from the chocolates she gave Messenger dotted it, too. Shards of glass and mirror formed a mosaic in one section.

            Alana pointed. “Where did you get those?” she asked.

            “Off the road after a wreck. They sweep up, but they always miss some. That’s where I come in!”

            Alana continued to notice the buzz echoing through the alley. She could only stare at Messenger’s incredible creation. She saw string, bright red and forest green, squares of red flannel fabric and a floral print. Rocks—some piled in neat little stacks. She wondered if they were held together by wax or just balanced there on their own. Smaller white church candles about as thick as your finger were stuck into the wax and formed the shape for infinity on one level. It took Messenger three matches from a Three of Cups pack to get all the candles lit. Meanwhile, Alana saw pennies, “heads-up,” stuck in the wax and what looked like black human hair. Maybe it was from a weave. There was also a tiny, delicate bird nest and some animal bones. 

            “Messenger,” she finally exclaimed. “It’s beautiful. I love it! Amazing! How long did it take you to make it?”

            Messenger smiled so wide Alana could see all the blank spaces in the back of her mouth where teeth should have been. “A long time, let me tell you. I worked on it a little every day.”

            Messenger motioned to Alana to stand right in front of the altar then walked around behind her. She placed a hand on each of Alana’s shoulders and gently moved and adjusted her. After a minute, she whispered. “Can you feel it?”

            Alana turned around to face her. “What? Feel what?”

            Messenger turned her back around and ran her hand up and down Alana’s spine. She placed both hands on the back of her head, then rested them on Alana’s shoulders. “Can you feel your feet?” she asked.

            “Uh huh.”

            “Anything else?”

            “No. Nothing,” Alana answered quickly. She pulled away from Messenger, turned and took her notebook out of her backpack to make some notes. “Do you use the altar to receive messages?” 

            Messenger sighed. “Sometimes. You mean you don’t feel anything?”

            Alana shook her head no. “How does it help you with the messages?”

            “It amplifies them. Also, it’s quieter in here, off the street.”

            Footsteps echoed in the alley. Alana jumped. “Somebody’s coming!” she whispered.

            “It’s okay,” she told Alana. “Is that you, Professor?” she called.

            “Madame? Can you come into my office please?”

            “Okey dokey.” Messenger nodded her head down the alley, in the opposite direction from where they’d come. 

            Alana followed, noticed the alley curved slightly to the right. “Who is it?”

            Beyond the curve, Alana saw an old man seated at a small desk. He was dressed in a ratty tweed jacket and wore frayed green wool gloves with all the fingers cut out. He stared intently at the blank screen of his old, boxy Mac monitor. 

            “Hello Professor,” Messenger greeted him. “Meet Alana.”

            “Hello,” Alana said.

            “Madame, a message for you of the utmost importance.” He handed Messenger a blank sheet of paper from the multiple stacks in front of him. 

            “Thank you very much, Professor.”

            “Not at all. Not at all!” He turned back to his desk and typed a hundred miles a minute on a keyboard that wasn’t connected to anything. “Very busy today,” he muttered.

            “Don’t work too hard,” Messenger told him. Alana watched her fold the paper in half, then into quarters and slip it into her pocket. They turned back the way they came. As they got closer to the altar again on their way out, Alana noticed the echoing had grown stronger. They paused before the altar. Messenger turned and headed on down the alley, but Alana hung back. 

            Because she’d lied. She had felt something—the moment she’d seen the altar, to be honest. No. Earlier. When they’d entered the threshold to the alley. What? A buzzy pressure with that weird sound. A tingling in her fingers and even her cold toes, down deep in her boots, her feet covered in thick socks. And when Messenger had stood behind her with her hands on her shoulders? She’d actually felt it through her whole body. The sight of the altar did something to her heart, made it leap or open up. She didn’t know how to think about or describe it. She’d only felt that intense whole-body sensation several times in her life. 

            But why didn’t she tell Messenger the truth? 

 

ALANA’S QUESTIONS 

 

Alana greeted Ed one dark, cloudy morning, ordered a dark drip. He had a short line, for a change, so there was time to talk.

            “Have you seen her? Has she been in yet?”

            Ed shook his head, focused on the latte he was making her. “Haven’t seen her come down the street yet, either.”

            “Good!” Alana said. She shivered, still cold from her walk from the train, then stared at Ed. “How can you stand that short-sleeved tee every day? Aren’t you freezing?”

            “Nope,” he answered. 

            Watching Ed work soothed that tense clutching in Alana’s gut. She noticed an intentionality to everything Ed did—steam milk for a coffee, mop, wash dishes—a studied grace. No matter how backed up the line got, Ed took one task at a time. Today, an iris tattoo on the inside of Ed’s right wrist caught her eye. “Did you just get that?” she asked him.

            “No. I’ve had it.” 

            “Oh, okay. Sorry. Guess I just hadn’t noticed before.”

            “It’s a tribute to my mom and grandparents.” He took a sip of his own coffee—black, drip—the endless cup he drank all day long. “There’s a Japanese card game that has flowers as suits. The iris is one of them.”

            “Nice! Were they all from Japan?”

            “My grandma was Japanese, grandpa American. They met when he was stationed in Japan after the war.”

            “Wow.” Alana touched Ed’s wrist and turned it to see the tattoo better. “Beautiful,” she murmured. “The tattoo, I mean.” When she touched him, she felt a charge go through her.

            Their gazes met. Alana watched Ed’s dark eyes soften for a moment, but then he pulled away.

            “Did your mom like it?”

            “Are you kidding? She hates tats.”

            They laughed.

            “Is that why you make flowers in my lattes?”

            Ed shrugged. “I guess.”

            The line behind Alana had grown so she took her coffee and moved out to her usual stool. 

            “Bet she’ll be here soon,” Ed smiled, eyes still soft, then turned back to work.

            Alana settled in at a table, pulled out her notebook, and flipped through the growing pages of notes. She wrote, I want to pursue the book idea, feel the urgency to move forward with my investigation, yet everything with Messenger is so SLOW! I spend a lot of time with her, talk with her, listen to her. I want to trust her. But should I? How can I tell? Do I see in her only what I want to see? Can I stay objective? Logical? Rational? Is all this career suicide? Or should I just follow my gut, keep going and see where it leads? RISK EVERYTHING? What would Messenger say, if I asked her about turning our work together into a book? How could I convince her? I feel like she holds back—so very much, like I’ve only touched the tip of the iceberg. Some of the things she tells me make sense or resonate. Some things make no sense at all. She seems to know things she can’t know.

            And that altar! What happened to me there? Why did she show it to me? Was it to watch my reaction and see if I felt anything? Like I did? Why didn’t I tell her? Because it all scares the hell out of me. How to make logical sense of it? Journalists don’t believe in magic or usually have a sense of wonder or the miraculous. It’s our job to explain things. There must be a rational explanation to everything, right? 

            So how do you explain Cathy’s Birthday? a voice inside her asked pointedly. 

            She glanced up as Ed took her cup, then brought her a refill. “On the house,” he said. He’s sweet. Shy, she thought. He’s trying to help. Their earlier conversation was the most she’d ever heard Ed talk, to her or to anybody else. Why did that make her feel so happy? When she’d touched his wrist and their eyes met, she knew he’d felt it, too. 

            She distracted herself from thoughts of Ed by remembering Cathy’s Birthday, so long ago. Alana could mentally see, as if it was lying on the table right in front of her between her notebook and coffee cup, the old plastic ballerina from on top of the cake she’d won when she was seven. Sara Snyder’s mom had taken the girls to a ballet called Cathy’s Birthday, and had bought them each a ticket for the cake they would raffle. After the ballet was over, the director had walked onto the stage with a clear goldfish bowl full of the orange stubs to everyone’s tickets. Alana watched the woman stick her hand into the bowl, mix up the tickets, then pull one out. But something really weird had happened. Time had somehow slowed down. Alana could still feel it, sitting there in Ed’s coffee shop. Within that time warp, Alana had known without a shadow of a doubt her ticket would be pulled.

            She’d been right.

            She’d held onto the plastic ballerina through all her moves and losses, one of the few keepsakes from her childhood. The ballerina always sat on her desk. She wore a sapphire-blue tutu painted over her too-pink plastic skin, and she had a painted red bow mouth and a silver crown perched atop her brown bun. 

            Alana took a sip of the fresh, hot coffee Ed had just brought her and wrote: What I felt that day in the dark auditorium, knowing the director was about to call my name, walking down the aisle and up onto the stage to get my cake and what I felt yesterday at Messenger’s altar—same feeling.

            Just add that to a growing list of unexplainables.

 

MESSENGER’S AIM

 

Several days later, Messenger sat on the bench by the playground. She panted, tried her best to catch her breath and slow it down. She didn’t think they’d go that far. Not so soon. Totally destroyed. The Professor could have been hurt. Darkness was gathering.

            But she set her resolve. It’s not right, she thought, to keep quiet about all that we know. Not when my babies are hurting so much. Hurting all the time. No let up. Just their hearts broken, ripped out of their chests. Huge chunks of their spirits broken off. Smashed. They’re killing each other. Killing themselves! Everything’s going wrong. Why? They don’t know where to put their energy. Energy unexpressed for too long grows dangerous. Wants to destroy. Just look at the altar!

            She breathed. Welcome, Anger. Welcome Despair. Welcome Fear. Name it, welcome it. Hold it all until it shifts. Then surrender. Give up. Let go. Surrender to the energy of love. She knew from hard experience nothing can solve this except one thing. The energy of love. You have to start from the heart, not the head. Not through the emotions, either. That’s not the heart she meant. The heart was a powerful transmitter to send and receive, to change and transform. To come at it from any other angle is just a waste of time. So, when emotions overtook her, she returned there. She’d been doing it for so long it was automatic. It never failed her.

 

ALANA AND MESSENGER RETURN TO THE ALTAR 

 

“Listen, can we go back to the altar today?” Alana asked Messenger when she found her at Ed’s early one morning the next week. “I want to take of photo of it.” Alana didn’t tell Messenger she’d only just that morning gotten up the nerve to go back, to see if she felt the strange buzz in her body again, the echoing, or if it was just a fluke.

            “Sorry, we can’t,” Messenger told her, no expression in her face. “It’s gone.”

            “What! What do you mean?”

            Messenger sighed. “Okay. I’ll show you.”

            Alana picked up Messenger’s bags and totes. Some days she had them with her, others she didn’t. Alana didn’t feel comfortable asking why. It felt too personal. Alana wondered what it was like to carry all your stuff around with you. She shrank from the thought, but imagined it must be freeing, too. 

            They turned down the alley, which felt even damper and reeked even more than the last time. They headed straight to the altar but before they reached it, Alana spied the baby doll head flattened in a pile of mud on her left. The altar lay in shambles all over the gravel. Someone had completely trashed it, ripped it apart, kicked its parts up and down the alley. Candles here, rocks and bottles there. All that remained were the two crates, but they’d been stomped in, too. 

            “Oh, Messenger! Who did this?” Alana asked. Her voice shook. 

            “Some of those baddies we were talking about. They also got the Professor’s desk.”

            “I’m so sorry.” 

            Messenger led her around the corner through a trail of dirty, soggy papers. The desk was turned over and all the legs broken. Alana figured they’d used those legs to trash Messenger’s altar. 

            “Did they get his monitor?”

            Messenger shook her head. “He always takes the monitor and his keyboard home with him.”

            “Were you here when it happened?”

            “No. We found it yesterday morning.”

            “I’m so sorry. I just don’t understand why anybody . . .”

            “Well, you know. They get off on destroying things. Feel like it gives them power.”

            “Uhhh! I’m so mad! Your beautiful altar.” But part of her fury was anger at herself for being so afraid, for not taking a photo earlier, when she’d had the chance. Now it was too late. “Want me to help you clean it up? Will you start over?”

            “No. Not here. This place is done.” Messenger stood still like a stone. 

            Alana bent down and picked up a candle. “Don’t you want any of it?”

            “Nope. It’s ruined.”

            “Why aren’t you mad?” Alana demanded, her voice rising. “You mean to tell me after all the work you put into the altar, you’re just going to walk away?” 

            A tight smile spread across Messenger’s face. She closed her eyes. “Oh, my. What a fuss! Don’t you know everything’s okay?”

            “How can you say that after what they did?” Alana was surprised to hear herself yelling. She frowned, searched Messenger’s face for clues.

            “Because I’m not surprised. Look, I don’t play by their rules. What do you expect? Do you think they’ll come up and give me a big old hug? Of course they’re upset and want to destroy things. They sense the shift. Every action creates an equal and opposite reaction. That’s why we have to carry it. Remember this always: nobody likes change. Especially not the ones in charge.”

            “Who . . . what are you talking about? What shift? What change?” Alana struggled to follow.

            “Trust me, I know what’s going on.” Then she did the most unexpected thing. She started giggling, slow and deep at first, then higher until her laughter sounded like a young girl’s.

            Alana, startled by Messenger’s reaction, tried to resist, to hold onto her anger. “What in the hell is so funny?” she demanded. “How can you laugh like that. Are you crazy?” But then she felt her stomach release and giggled, too. 

            “Crazy? Oh, whew!” Messenger gasped. “I sure am! Hee, hee, hee.” Tears flowed down her cheeks and her eyes disappeared into two slits. She gasped to catch her breath, then burst out again in another round. “Oh, my. That feels so good, doesn’t it? Come on. Let it loose like I did.”

            Alana was full out laughing, too, filled with an effervescent river of joy. 

            “Oh, they think they got me. All high and mighty. But, hee, hee, hee.” She wiped her eyes with a brown Starbucks recycled paper napkin she pulled from one of her folds. “Oh, Honey. You’re so sweet to be upset, but it’s fine. They can’t hurt me.” And then she was rolling again, waves and waves of laughter.

            Alana heard a woman’s voice call, “Messenger!” from around the corner, echoing down the alley. “I need to talk to you.”

            Messenger froze and put her finger to her lips. 

            “I know you’re in there,” the voice called again and echoed. “Come out this minute.”

            Messenger trudged toward the light at the opening to the alley on Fifth Street and Alana followed. A tall, thin woman wearing high-heeled cheetah print booties and engulfed in a red puffy down-coat stood in the opening. A single, long dread-lock from the crown of her head trailed down her back. 

            “What happened in there?” she demanded. Her huge cat-eye glasses magnified her eyes and made them look enormous. 

            “Same old thing, Jackie. Same old thing.”

            “Oh!” The woman turned towards Alana without smiling. “I didn’t know she was with you.”

            Alana didn’t like the way this woman stared at her, like she was an insect in a collection. What’s more, she didn’t like how the woman seemed to already know who she was. 

            “Alana,” Messenger said. “This is Jackie.”

            “Hello.” Alana didn’t smile either.

            Jackie didn’t answer. Alana wanted nothing more than to get Messenger out of that alley and away from Jackie. She looked down the street and saw Ostap outside the shop, straddling his chair and smoking. He stared down the street at the three of them.

            Jackie turned back to Messenger. “Professor?”

            “He’s okay. Just the desk is all.”

            “That’s good.”

            “Yeah.”

            She looked at Alana then back at Messenger. “Okay, then. I’ll find you later.” She shuffled down the sidewalk, clicking in her boots.

            “So that’s Jackie,” Alana said. “A friend of yours? She sure doesn’t act like it.”

            “Oh, Jackie’s okay. She’s mad at me—not you. Listen, Honey. I’ve told you before, don’t take anything on that’s not yours to bear. Always better that way.”

            They headed back to the wooden bench by the playground. As soon as they sat down, Alana felt her anger well back up. “I still can’t believe somebody would do that to your altar. It’s just not right to destroy what you spent so much time to create. It was really a work of art. Not to mention poor Professor’s desk.”

            “Believe me. It was worse than that,” Messenger said.

            “Worse how?”

            “Let’s just say it was a message to me. A warning.”

            “Why don’t you call the police?”

            Messenger threw her head back and started in again with that wild laughter. “Hah, hah, hah,” she cackled. 

            This time, Alana didn’t join her. She jumped off the bench. “For God’s sake, that was a simple question. Why can’t you ever answer a simple question?”

            “Oh, dear. Mad again? Is that some kind of new dance?” she managed to blurt out between gales of laughter. She rummaged around in her pocket for another napkin and wiped her eyes.

            Alana sighed and flopped back down, arms folded in front of her. “Come on, Messenger. Be serious for a minute. You said you knew who did it. Well—don’t you hate him—or them—for it?”

            Messenger looked at her like she’d just said the most ridiculous thing in the world. “Hate?” Then she laughed again.

            Alana turned away. “To be honest, it feels like I’m always waiting for you to stop laughing at me!”

            “Oh, dear. No. I don’t mean to upset you. I know you don’t get it. Look, he and his kind are just mopping up. It’s all over but the shouting—like my mama used to say. And they know it.”

            “What? Who?”

            “It’s happening now. You know—the swerve. With change comes fear. The fight. Which is crazy because everybody knows in their hearts and in their cells, it’s already happened. The earth knows—and rejoices. So, what do you think all those folks who say, ‘No!’ to it, who don’t want things to change, who are on the wrong side of things, are going to do? When they feel backed into a corner—feel their world and everything in it, everything they were taught, thought and believed is threatened? What do people do when they’re cornered?”    

            “Fight like hell?”

            “You got it. As hard and as viciously as they can. That’s all that’s happened. They’re scared out of their minds. They are not in their right minds with any of it.”

            Alana still didn’t get it. “So, you don’t hold them responsible for what they did? You could justify anything using that rationale, you know.”

            Messenger shook her head. “No. They’re responsible. I just see what’s going on, that’s all. And when you see what’s underneath the surface and pull it apart, it’s the damaged person you find, not the hate. Not the fear.”

            “Are you saying there’s no real evil?”

            “Oh, there’s evil, all right. A whole lot of it. It’s a force. But fighting evil with evil just makes a bigger mess. See how it infected you, just being around it in the alley today?”

            “Me?”

            “Yes, you. What did you feel in there?”

            Alana thought a minute. “Anger. Hate.”

            “Uh huh. I know. But that doesn’t ever work. It just ratchets it up and creates a bigger mess. It’s nothing compared to the love way.”

            Alana wanted to keep asking questions, but Messenger bolted up. “Walk with me. We need to keep our energy moving. It’ll make you feel better.” They headed down Fifth Street, carrying Messenger’s bags with them. They watched the cops across the street take a guy out of a squad car. The purple ribbons in the ground outside the building placed there in memory of fallen officers waved in the breeze.

            Messenger paused and pointed to them. “There is no power on earth greater than love. That’s the energy that bends the universe towards justice. Remember Dr. King? Well, he didn’t come up with that idea, let me tell you.”

            “I’ve always loved that quote,” Alana said, “but I’m not sure I really get it.”

            “Do you know how many times this world has been saved from complete disaster? Over and over, many, many times. Look at history. So often we hang by a thread, but love pulls us back from the edge. That and lots of energy from our Helpers.”

            “Okay, if you say so,” Alana responded. “But aren’t we supposed to fight?”

            “No. violence only makes things worse. Always. It feeds energy to it. You fight darkness with light—not more darkness. You need to change the consciousness of the opposing forces to focus on another level.”

            Alana’s head spun. “What? I don’t get it. Can you give me an example of what you’re talking about?” 

            Messenger turned towards her. “Okay—sports. Whole countries that would give anything for a chance to kill all the people from another country, or sometimes even their own people, come together and compete. They might even become friends with their competitors. Or look at children. Oh my, our children are our greatest hope. You’ve heard of them bringing kids from warring nations or groups within countries to a camp together?”

            “Uh huh.”

            “They play together—have fun. Run around. Children live in that other consciousness. They’re oblivious to hate. It doesn’t occur to them unless somebody teaches them. They have to learn not to love. Love is our default, you know.”

            “I see what you’re saying.” Alana rearranged Messenger’s packs and put straps over each shoulder. “It’s all so overwhelming, though. And, it seems hopeless, as messed up as everything is right now.”

            Messenger smiled and nodded. “This is a very hard teaching, I know. But it’s what I’m working on. That’s my aim.”

            Alana stopped and turned. “What is your aim? Could you state it for me exactly?”

            Messenger laughed and took one of the heavy bags off Alana’s shoulder. “My aim is to go to Ed’s for an afternoon coffee. Let’s take a load off. I know he’d just love to see us.” She winked.

            Alana rolled her eyes and followed Messenger down the street towards First Avenue. So close, she fumed. But Messenger will probably refuse to say any more about this. What would you call it? Cosmic? Even though Alana didn’t understand all of what Messenger said, she sensed that the messages were part of this bigger picture Messenger alluded to.

            They waited in line behind a woman with bright red lipstick, a cowl-necked sweater and boots with studs all over them. She smelled really good—expensive perfume, no doubt. They chatted with Ed while he made their coffees. Their favorite spots were waiting for them. Messenger unbuttoned her top-coat but she never took her red stocking hat off. She swigged her coffee.

            “Messenger, please help me understand. I feel like I wasn’t following what you said about evil.”

            “There is evil, of course.” She held up a finger with chipped red fingernail polish. “Acknowledge it for what it is, then move on. Don’t give it energy. Don’t feed it. That’s all I’m telling you. Attention gives energy which gives power. It’s all about the energy, as I’ve told you many times before.” Her face softened and she reached over and rubbed the space between Alana’s eyebrows. “Relax right there. Feel better?”

            Alana nodded. It felt wonderful.

            “No, you’ll never beat it by fighting. Be like water. Assertive, but yield to aggression. Bend but do not break. Don’t fight terrorists with terror. Love, compassion. My advice is—keep moving. Keep the love flowing, right Ed?”

            Alana looked up and realized Ed had been staring at them from the bar. Staring at her. He spun around, busied himself cleaning the blender. But it was too late. At Messenger’s words, they watched him blush beet red. 

 

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