The Devil’s Godson
John Henry wouldn’t be here without the Devil. Where will the Devil be without John Henry?
The Devil shuffled his feet.
Dust from the dry Georgia road covered his black patent leather boots. He tapped his gold pocket watch. It was unheard of, being stood up like this.
Today’s appointment wasn’t even anything particularly special. It was a standard soul-for-fame swap. He’d drawn up the contract the night before, which was presently rolled up in the back pocket of his black denims. Jimmy Wells Jr. would be a guitar sensation by the end of the week and filling a silk-lined coffin in six months. If he’d done it once, he’d done it a hundred times. So where the hell was Jimmy?
Call it luck or call it grace—the Devil didn’t give a damn—but while Jimmy sat waiting on a bus to that very crossroads, guitar slung across his back, a petite, round, happy-faced woman sat next to him and began chatting away. Miss Martha had known Jimmy Sr.
“Best guitarist south of Atlanta,” she called him.
In fact, Miss Martha’s brother and Jimmy Sr. had been part of a gospel quartet, playing churches and revivals throughout Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Jimmy’s father had long since passed, but Miss Martha’s brother was now a pastor at the New Day Baptist Tabernacle Church. It just so happened that New Day Baptist was in need of a guitarist to accompany the choir. She said if he played guitar half as good as his father, her brother would offer him a job on sight. Now, New Day Baptist was a big church, one of those churches that actually paid their musicians. Jimmy was desperate, as men who offer to make a deal with the Devil often are, but he wasn’t a fool. A guarantee from a man of God seemed better than a gamble on the morning star any day.
Jimmy took a bus in the direction of New Day Baptist Tabernacle Church.
Of course, the Devil was wholly unaware of this turn of events, and he would have rolled his eyes at nearly every detail of the story had he heard it. Instead, he was so agitated by Jimmy’s slight that he didn’t even notice a smoking, four-door Plymouth sedan rolling slowly toward the country intersection.
The driver was a very pregnant twenty-six-year-old woman named Gloria Henry. Gloria was a sturdy and strong-willed woman, as women who drive themselves to the doctor while in labor often are. Gloria’s father had been a mechanic, so on any other day a broken radiator fan wouldn’t have given her much trouble, but as it stood that day, Gloria’s baby was damn near crowning. So popping the hood wasn’t first on her to-do list.
The Devil was a student of human nature; long ago he had determined that it was far easier to snare an adult than a child.
The car gave up the ghost, gliding to a stop just a few yards shy of the crossroads.
“Goddammit!” shouted Gloria, slamming her palms on the steering wheel.
Just something about that phrase. The Devil turned toward the overheated sedan and saw its driver-side door was wide open. Leaning against the vehicle, in a wide stance, breathing short quick breaths, was Gloria, ready to welcome her child into the world.
The Devil avoided births.
Wasn’t his thing.
He was a student of human nature; long ago he had determined that it was far easier to snare an adult than a child. He steered clear of any souls under sixteen years of age. He viewed children as a waste of his precious, albeit eternal, time. Nevertheless, here he was, standing at the crossroads, jilted at his own altar, as it were, when Gloria called to him.
“Hey, Mister, what are you just standing there for? You never seen a gal in labor? Help me out, goddammit.”
The fallen one, still disoriented, responded to her summons. Truth was, he had only been present at one other birth, and even then, he only watched from a distance. But that was a long time ago and a north star away from here, and this time he was up close and personal.
It all happened so fast. Before the Devil could process the whole experience, Gloria was lying in the backseat of the Plymouth, a tartan blanket from the trunk wrapped around the newborn baby in her arms. The Devil himself, his wide-brimmed, black hat nudged back from his brow, used pages ripped from the Green Book in Gloria’s glove compartment to wipe afterbirth from his hands.
“I didn’t even get your name, Mister,” she whispered through happy exhaustion and half-closed smiling eyes.
“Lucious,” he replied absentmindedly. “Lucious Wright-Hand.” He was staring at the small boy pressed to her bosom.
“Well, Mr. Lucious, how’d you feel about being this little one’s Godfather?” she said with a sly wink. “After all, I’m not sure either of us would have made it without your help.”
The title sent a chill down his spine. An unusual sensation for him, but he quickly shook it off. As Gloria fell into a deep sleep, he adjusted his hat and turned to stroll back up the road. With a blood-stained hand, he slid the now useless covenant from his back pocket and tossed it carelessly into the center of the dirt road, where it burst into flames. A small gust of wind blew the remaining ashes into a nearby tobacco field as Lucious’s silhouette faded away into the heat-hazed horizon.
Gloria raised a fine young man, as single mothers often do. She knew his life would be full of adversity, so she named him John Henry, after her favorite folk hero. And young John Henry lived up to his name. He was six feet tall and strong as a baby ox by the time he was fourteen. John was also a sensitive and intelligent young man who excelled in school and was well-liked by folks in the community. On his sixteenth birthday, the Godfather paid John his first visit.
A bloodstained hand quietly swung open the garden gate. Black patent leather boots softly clicked on the stone path, past the lilacs, leading up to the farmer’s porch, filled with enough rocking chairs for a full-on family reunion. His gold-handled walking stick, a new accessory taken as part of another trade, gently rapped on the beautiful stained-glass pane of the double front door.
One door swung open to find a serious-faced Gloria with her right hand on her hip and left eyebrow raised.
“Look who turned up,” she grunted, gesturing him inside.
The Devil crossed the threshold.
The house was bursting with the scent of fresh biscuits, cheesy eggs, and homemade pork sausage.
“You’re just in time for breakfast.” Gloria said, ushering him into the dining room and waving a hand toward the chair at the foot of the table, before shouting toward the back of the house, “John, your Godfather’s here!”
A tall handsome teenager in a white undershirt and neatly pressed black slacks pushed through the swinging door from the kitchen, his arms laden with dishes heaped with all the good things the aromas had inferred. The three of them sat around the table, the young man filling each plate, beginning with his mother’s and ending with his own. Gloria provided reintroductions.
“They don’t make ’em like that anymore,” his Godfather opined. “Hold onto that. It’ll keep impeccable time and have a long life. And let it be a reminder to always be prompt, honor your agreements, and build something you’re proud of.”
“John, this is your Godfather, Mr. Lucious Wright-Hand. Mr. Lucious, this is your Godson, John Henry.”
“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr. Lucious,” John responded between bits of biscuit.
“Child, don’t speak with your mouth full,” his mother snapped. “You know better.”
“Sorry, ma’am. Sorry, sir.”
The Devil smiled.
“Manners are indeed a lost art,” he purred, although he still wore his wide-brimmed, black hat at the breakfast table.
He was glad to see his Godson being raised properly. The three enjoyed their meal. Gloria, regaling them with tales of John’s childhood achievements and mischiefs, John sharing his love of cooking and his recent interest in the young lady from down the street who worked weekends at the local library. Someone walking in on the scene would have likely found it as wholesome and traditional a picture as you could imagine. But frozen moments such as that can be as misleading as hell warmed over for a winter revival.
Plates cleared, the Devil got to his feet, pulled a small, silk-wrapped bundle from his back pocket, and handed it to John.
“This is a little something for your birthday. Sixteen is a big deal. You’re on the cusp of manhood.”
John unwrapped the gift, a gold pocket watch as fine as any he had ever seen.
“They don’t make ’em like that anymore,” his Godfather opined. “Hold onto that. It’ll keep impeccable time and have a long life. And let it be a reminder to always be prompt, honor your agreements, and build something you’re proud of.”
With that, John’s Godfather collected his walking stick from its perch beside the chair, saw himself to the door and disappeared down the street into yet another hazy horizon.
The Devil smelled biscuits and gravy.
It got noticeably quieter when the man in the black patent leather boots walked into the New Day Diner on Main Street. But just for a moment. Little could distract the patrons of the town’s most popular eatery from their cups of perfectly brewed coffee, mouthwatering rosemary grits, or maple-drizzled flapjacks, light as air. Their joy wasn’t even deterred when the man in the wide-brimmed, black hat gave the juke box a swift knock with his gold-handled walking stick, replacing the sweet sounds of Marvin and Tammi with Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’s “I Put a Spell on You.”
The tables were full, so the Devil took a seat at the counter next to several older men enjoying their breakfast.
“Working on your birthday, John?” shouted one of the men toward the window that opened into the kitchen.
“Who else gonna cook y’all breakfast if I don’t?” returned the proprietor from his command station.
“So what is this, twenty-nine?” the man prodded. “Thirty?”
“Thirty-two, Floyd. But all joking aside, nowhere else I’d rather be than cooking for you fools and the rest of these fine folks.”
“I don’t know why we gotta be fools, but we’re glad you’re here too!” roared another man at the counter, and the restaurant’s hungry chorus echoed the sentiment.
John Henry, head chef and owner of the New Day Diner, looked around his packed establishment with an expression of deep contentment and satisfaction, until his eyes landed on the man in the wide-brimmed hat sitting at the far end of the counter.
John stopped mid-dish, wiped his hands on his apron, navigated around to the door that led from the kitchen to behind the counter, and walked right up to the newly arrived customer.
“Godfather!” he exclaimed, with a warm smile and an outstretched hand.
The title had grown on him a little. At least, he appreciated the irony. His black gloved palm grasped John’s and the man and the one-time angel exchanged as affectionate a greeting as two men in such a situation might be expected to do.
“Mary,” John called to one of his waitresses, who was busily filling diners’ cups with fresh joe, “this here is Mr. Lucious, my Godfather. Whatever he wants, it’s on the house.”
Mary eyed the man in the black hat suspiciously, filling his cup and writing down his order while the two continued catching up.
The Godfather asked about John’s mother and the young lady at the library. John informed him that his mother had moved to Louisiana to stay with her sister, but wrote to him weekly. The young lady, Loretta, had been sent off to Bennett College by her parents and had been working in the Greensboro area since, but word was she was moving back to take up a position as head librarian at the same library she had worked at sixteen years prior. John’s excitement was palpable, but he quickly gathered himself and rushed back into the kitchen to handle the orders, now piling up.
“They is what greatness attracts. Folks who would tear it down, those who’d steal it and take credit as if it was their own. This country was founded on that.” The Devil nodded at the door. “Everything out there designed to support it.”
Mary returned shortly with a plate of biscuits and gravy and six pieces of bacon on the side. She glared through a forced smile as she gently put down the plate with as much discreet disdain as possible.
The Devil sucked his teeth. He eyed his plate, not bothering to glance up.
“I knew a Mary once,” he said quietly, right over the steam. Then leaning in, placing his mouth next to her ear, he spoke in hushed, hissing tones. “She was a tramp.”
He sat back with a satisfied grin, and without further word or another moment of thought, dug into his breakfast.
Mary, hardly surprised but still taken aback, considered the implications of his statement for a split second before ripping off her apron and walking out the back door of the diner with no intentions to return.
After his meal and as the restaurant started to let out, the Devil glanced around the room, unable to avoid the joyfulness in the space. He approached his Godson, placing a black-gloved hand on his shoulder.
“You’ve got something special here, John. I can’t say I’m not envious of what you’ve built.”
“I took your advice to heart, and I’ve built something I can be proud of in this place, Mr. Lucious.”
“I’m glad to hear that, John, I really am. Understand that a time will come when they’ll try to take this away.”
“Who’s they?”
“They is what greatness attracts. Folks who would tear it down, those who’d steal it and take credit as if it was their own. This country was founded on that.” The Devil nodded at the door. “Everything out there designed to support it. I’ve seen greatness burned to the ground in this very spot a dozen times over. I’ve even done business with some of those who did the burning. But you built this, you deserve it. Don’t let anyone take that away. And know that I’m in your corner when the time comes.”
And with that, he exited the restaurant and disappeared down Main Street.
A soft sun crested above the happy homes of a willow-lined street. The birds were normally up well before now, singing their gospel or spreading their gossip, but it was unusually quiet. The man in the wide-brimmed, black hat didn’t bother to note it, though, as he stepped onto the front porch of a large home halfway down the block. Birds often fell silent when he was around; it had been that way since the fall.
The Devil eased into one of the old rocking chairs on the porch. While he rocked, his walking stick tapped a rhythm that would have gone perfectly with the now absent bird song.
One of the double front doors of the home flew open and John Henry spilled out, coffee cup in one hand with a biscuit saucer perched precariously on top, the other hand frantically tucking his maroon button-down into his tan slacks and pulling up his suspenders. He almost blew past his visitor, but he turned just before he stepped off the porch.
“Well, well, what do we have here? You making house calls these days, Mr. Lucious? It must be my birthday.”
The Devil closed his eyes and turned both black-gloved palms upward. “I just try to be in the right place at the right time,” he cooed, in the absence of the usual mourning doves.
John’s now-free hand fumbled in his pocket, retrieved an only slightly tarnished gold pocket watch, and checked the time. “Sorry, I’m running to a meeting this morning. But as you can see,” he lifted the coffee and biscuit in his other hand, “the Wife doesn’t let me out the house without some kinda breakfast. She’s knows I’m liable to feed everyone else all day and forget about myself.”
“The Wife?”
“Loretta. The one from the library... Well, the head librarian now.”
“Oooh.” The Godfather stretched the word out, forming his thin lips into an uncharacteristically warm smile at the end. “That’s wonderful, John. Really.”
“She’s blessed me, Mr. Lucious. I don’t know what else to call it. My food tastes better, the lilacs in the garden here smell sweeter, what can I say, I’m still head over heels after thirteen years of marriage.”
The Devil got to his feet. “Don’t let me make you late. You know I believe in punctuality. I’ll walk with you.”
John nodded and the unorthodox pair strolled down the path, past the lilacs, through the gate and down the brick sidewalk.
They walked in silence for a moment. John sipped his coffee in between bites of biscuit, eventually breaking the silence.
“So, all these new laws, right? They’re supposed to make things better and I get it: we can shop wherever we want, eat wherever we want, we can even sit wherever we want.”
The Godfather lifted his chin in agreement. “Sounds good to me.”
“Right. It is, it is. That’s as it should be. But I’m seeing something else now too. All of a sudden, all these new businesses are showing up around here. And they ain’t owned by folks from around here. But they end up undercutting the locals or just enough of the customers’ll get caught up with the newest, shiniest thing that the old businesses end up taking a hit. And a lot of ’em are having a hard time keeping afloat. I’ve been fine. Folks around here appreciate my cooking. These new folks can’t cook like me. They ain’t got it in ’em. So now they’re trying to buy me out or push me out with some kinda new licenses or policies. I’m on my way to fend one of ’em off now. Lord knows I don’t have time to keep dealing with this though.”
“You can do everything by the book and still not get what you want when you understand why these laws were written to begin with and who they were written for. I told you before they’d come for what you’ve built, and all you had to do was say the word and I’d handle it.”
“You know I could make this all go away, right?”
John stopped walking and turned to face his Godfather. He looked him up and down. The wide-brimmed black hat, the black gloves, the ominous gold-handled walking stick. There was something about him that John had somehow never noticed before. His Godfather was an intimidating, damn near terrifying looking individual. The first of several dark thoughts occurred to him. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
Lucious Wright-Hand let out a short laugh that was more breath than sound. “What? That I’ll kill them? No, no, no. Those are the actions of Man,” said the Devil. “There are other, cleaner ways to get things done.” After all...
The Devil is a bureaucrat.
John stayed rightfully quiet. The man in black went on. “I’ve done my share of work in politics and governments at just about every level, I understand how these things work. You can do everything by the book and still not get what you want when you understand why these laws were written to begin with and who they were written for. I told you before they’d come for what you’ve built, and all you had to do was say the word and I’d handle it.”
For a second, just a second, there was the faintest hint of consideration in John’s eyes. And then it was gone.
“I’ve got this, Mr. Lucious. You’re right. You said they’d come for the diner, and they did. But I’ve built this thing on my terms, and I’ll keep it on my terms. I appreciate you, but I won’t ask you to handle this for me. Shit, I’m forty-eight today. If a man can’t handle his own at my age, I don’t have much hope for him.”
They walked on in silence, arriving at the New Day Diner a few minutes later. Two men in gray suits and leather briefcases stood by the front door. They both seemed to recognize John’s Godfather and gave him a courteous tip of the hat. The Godfather grabbed his brim in acknowledgment. He turned and set his course back up the street, walking a bit before he turned the block.
A discarded newspaper with an ominous, front-page piece about the impending Y2K crisis blew into the middle of the quiet street and began to burn in the hot Georgia sun. It was mid-afternoon and the New Day Diner was empty with this exception of its proprietor, ol’ John Henry, who was thinking about the upcoming night out with his wife to celebrate his sixty-fourth birthday. John was busy behind the counter, a well-worn apron around his neck and a blue Bic pen between his teeth, tallying up the day’s sales.
The front door swung open.
“I know I’m late. But I seem to have misplaced my pocket watch,” the Godfather said with an apologetic tone, although...
The Devil never apologizes.
John looked up over the top of his frameless spectacles, placed a stack of receipts on the counter, removed the pen from his teeth, and grinned.
“I knew you’d turn up, Mr. Lucious. And looking like not a day has passed since last we spoke.”
“Flattery, John?”
“Nah, just observant. You’ve looked like shit since I was sixteen. I’m just catching up to ya. They say change is the only constant, but I guess I’ll add you as a close second.”
“As I’ve always told you, I’m just a shout away.”
“Well, I’ll tell ya, I’ve come to appreciate that about you. I always know what to expect. Anyway, how are you these days?”
The Devil didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t good at talking about himself, so he changed the subject. “The neighborhood is looking a lot different from the last time I was here. Seems like your place is the last holdout of a bygone era.”
“Not anymore.”
“What do you mean?” the Godfather inquired, genuinely interested.
“I sold. I’m out.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, it’s been a great run. I’ve been happy doing what I do, but it’s not the same. Folks ’round here don’t want what we make like they used to. And that’s all right. It’s just different folks, different tastes, that’s all. I’m too tired to take it personal. I guess I felt it was just time for a change.”
John tossed the pocket watch to his Godfather, who caught it in a black-gloved hand. “Hold on to that for me, will ya? Maybe you’ll be on time for our next get-together.”
“That’s a shame.”
“Nah, it ain’t. Got good money for this place. Prime real estate now. Think they’re putting in a bank here. Honestly don’t know why this street needs another bank, but I didn’t pay much attention to the whole thing. Don’t matter much to me anyway. Loretta retired last month, now she and I are gonna finally get to do some traveling. We’re gonna visit the Caribbean. And Paris. Greece, you know with all those white buildings built on the side of the hills, just looking out over that turquoise water. Mmm. That’s something I’m looking forward to seeing. Selling this place’ll foot the bill for all that and keep us comfortable for a long time to come.”
“Sounds like you got it all figured out.”
John Henry put his hands on his hips, surveying the empty restaurant.
“We never had no kids, Loretta and I. She’s dedicated herself to the library, and this here been my life’s work. After all these years, though, I realized that these walls weren’t what made this place, it was me and my food. So I ain’t leaving that behind. I’ll be making meals for the woman I’ve been smitten with since tenth grade, as long as these hands are able.” John’s grin widened as he gazed dream-like out the storefront window.
Pulling the old gold watch out of his shirt pocket, John popped the latch and checked the time. “Ah, can’t be late for Mrs. Henry. I gotta get going.”
John tossed the pocket watch to his Godfather, who caught it in a black-gloved hand. “Hold on to that for me, will ya? Maybe you’ll be on time for our next get-together.”
“You won’t be needing it?” Lucious asked.
“I’m done punching a clock. Only time I’m worried about now is when the next plane or boat is leaving,” John quipped with a smirk.
The Devil followed John out of the diner. John locked up. The Devil stood there for a bit and watched John stroll toward home, his godson’s silhouette dissolving against another heat-lined horizon.
The old house with the stained-glass windows in the double front doors sat dark and silent. The rain from the night before seemed to make the house heavy. Mama had died years and years ago, and been gone from the house longer still, but something else had changed. It was overcast, dimming the early morning sun. The clicking triplet of a pair of black patent leather boots and a gold-handled walking stick could be heard echoing throughout the quiet neighborhood as Mr. Lucious Wright-Hand made his way down the sidewalk, through the open gate and up the path to the house. Climbing the steps of the porch, the Devil noticed the door was already open, and let himself in.
The lights were off, and the home was cast in a pale blue glow. The front room was full of flowers, and just beyond, at the table where he had shared that first meal with his Godson, sat a very elderly John Henry slowly sipping a steaming cup of coffee.
John Henry had been thinking about his mama. Thinking about his wife. Thinking about a lot of people he’d loved.
“It’s been two weeks, and it still feels like she’s gonna come down those stairs any moment.”
“John?” The Devil squeezed his shoulder gently.
“Love of my life, that woman was. And what a life we had.” John still hadn’t raised his eyes from the table. “I was at peace with it at first. She wasn’t in pain, it was as easy for her as it could have been, and lying there she looked as beautiful as the first time I saw her.”
“She was lucky, John. Not many get to go like that.”
“Most of our friends have moved or moved on, but some of the younger folks who knew her from the library or used to come by the diner dropped home-cooked meals for me or flowers.” He gestured toward the front room. “It was three days before I got angry, started feeling sorry for myself. Would you believe I almost called for you?” He looked up and made eye contact with his Godfather, who now appeared ever so slightly younger than him.
“Too many years standing on that hard kitchen floor all day. Eighty years old today, all kinds of strange things start happening with your body. Not sure if it’s giving out or giving up.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I don’t know what I thought would happen, what you could do. I just felt helpless, desperate, empty, and...tired, I guess.”
John Henry got up from the table and limped toward the staircase, nursing his right hip gingerly.
The Devil stepped forward and offered the man his gold-handled walking stick.
John nodded. “This weather. The old thing always acts up after the rain. Too many years standing on that hard kitchen floor all day. Eighty years old today, all kinds of strange things start happening with your body. Not sure if it’s giving out or giving up.”
John stood at the foot of the stairs, looking up, a longing in his eyes.
“What if I could do something?” the Devil posed.
John Henry sighed with his eyes on the staircase as his Godfather leaned in and whispered in his ear.
Two large, heavily lined hands rested atop the knob of a gold-handled walking stick, patting a pensive rhythm. John Henry was waiting on a bus. He wasn’t sure to where just yet, when a well-dressed, friendly looking young man walked up and sat down on the bench next to him. The clouds had cleared, and the sun was sitting low in the orange and pink sky. Mr. Wright-Hand had left John’s side just a few hours before.
“God bless. It’s a beautiful afternoon, ain’t it?” the young man announced more than asked.
“Mm.” John nodded, still somewhat lost in his thoughts.
“Reminds me of my favorite scripture.” The young man paused, awaiting the natural follow-up question.
It didn’t come.
“This is the day the LORD has made,” the young man practically sang, undeterred. “We will rejoice and be glad in it. Mmmm, those Psalms. Chapter 118 verse 24, sweet and simple and true as the day it was divined.”
John couldn’t help but chuckle at his fellow traveler’s unfettered eagerness.
“My name’s James Wells the Fourth, by the way. I was born here in town but raised with my Auntie in Macon. Just moved back to serve as pastor of the New Day Baptist Fellowship Church. We’re operating out of a storefront right now, but the congregation is growing every day.”
“New Day?” John’s eyes sparkled ever so slightly.
“Yes, Sir. My grandfather was a deacon at the old New Day Baptist Tabernacle Church. They closed down long before I was born, and he’s the reason I began preaching. He was a true man of God, patient and kind, a strong father, loving husband, everything I aspire to be. We’re hoping to bring some of that energy back to the town. I think folks around here need that in their lives, just a good word. But how about you, sir. You from around here?”
John raised his right eyebrow in a way that made him look just like his salty mother. “Born right up the street a mile or so, used to be a crossroads, on-ramp to the highway now. Was waiting on the next bus that way, I guess.”
John raised his right eyebrow in a way that made him look just like his salty mother. “Born right up the street a mile or so, used to be a crossroads, on-ramp to the highway now. Was waiting on the next bus that way, I guess.”
“You guess? Well, seems to me you’ve already been that way. I’d love to invite you to service this evening. Do you have a church home? We’re always looking for new members of our fellowship family.”
The young man beamed with enthusiasm and John could imagine how charismatic he might be when he got behind the pulpit. John smiled deeply. Two buses pulled up on either side of the street. What the hell, thought John.
At the edge of the highway, cars and semi-trucks howled by like freight trains on fire as the sun set. The noise didn’t bother the Devil. He knew the power of a whisper in a deafening world. He knew that the lives of men and women were filled with crossroads and whispered opportunities. He prided himself on knowing how to use the right words at the right time.
The Devil was a creature of habit.
But it was getting late, and he always liked to wrap his plans up before dark. The Devil checked his pockets, retrieved a tarnished gold watch and popped it open. All three hands had stopped dead at seven o’clock exactly.
The sun set.
Goddammit, thought the Devil.
About the author
J. Michael Hayes is a writer, filmmaker, musician, and founder of Anansi Hayes Media, a boutique creative agency. In 2023, Hayes launched Cast Iron Rocket Films and his first short, Submerge, debuted at the Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival. His fiction has been published in Space & Time, with music journalism and editorials published in No Depression. Hayes lives by the ocean in the New England woods with his wife Nekeshia and their three near-adults. He is deeply inspired by nature (human and otherwise), jazz and religion, folk tales and futurisms, and all things haunting and mysterious.