The Saving Of Earth-777 (Chapter 5)

Chapter 5

The Fighter was drunk when they finally found him. Very drunk. Not the fun kind of drunk, but the type of drunk that only miserable people can attain. He was poisoning himself with alcohol, but it was obvious that his tolerance to alcohol was so high that a normal amount of drinking for a man his size wasn’t enough poison for him to reach his goal. 

No matter how much he drank, he never got as drunk as he used to get. That didn’t stop him from trying, though. He needed to numb himself and drown the memories of the dreams he used to have for his life.

He was a good kid, he really was, but when God and Trevor found him, he was in a pit—a bottomless well, you could imagine—a deep dark well; with no way out except to try to climb out over and over again. God related to him that way. But, seeing the one who had inspired God to climb out of God's own bottomless pit, looking like this, made God uncomfortable. This kid was supposed to be the strong one—the reliable one—but here he was, a miserable, broken man—not someone that inspired anything in anyone, let alone in God. He was, by all accounts, very human, and nothing more. 

“Trevor?” God asked quietly. 

“Yes?”

“What do we do?”

“I reckon we wake him up. What do you think?”

“Will it matter? Look at him,” God said, his eyes going from Trevor to The Fighter. 

Trevor walked around the drunk kid, who was passed out on his desk, surrounded by empty liquor bottles. “He smells like you did.”

“I smelled that bad?”

“Oh yeah. Big time.”

“You saw me like this?” God asked, ashamed and embarrassed. 

“Yes, yes, I did see you like this.”

“I’m sorry about that.”

“It’s okay,” Trevor said, looking at God curiously.

“Why do you still listen to me? You saw how pathetic I truly am. Yet, you stayed. Why?” God asked him. 

“I believe in you. Even when you give me no proof that I should, I still believe.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” God said, his eyes dropping. 

“No,” Trevor said, picking up a slice of cold pizza that was sitting next to an empty whiskey bottle and biting into it, “I guess it doesn’t. But, I figured that everyone goes through the darkness at some point. I figured that it was your turn. That’s all.” 

“But your ‘God’ is supposed to be better than that . . . ‘God’ is supposed to be your inspiration—your lighthouse, so to speak.”

“You aren’t better, though, just more powerful.”

“Thanks, Trevor,” God sarcastically. 

“I like you this way. I wouldn’t follow a God who couldn’t relate to us.”

“Hmmmm,” was God’s only response. 

“You want a slice?” Trevor asked, holding up the slice. 

“Is it any good? I only like good Za.”

“No, it’s not great,” he said, taking another bite. “It tastes a week old, at least.”

God walked over top of the kid, staring down at him. “He believed in me when I was at my lowest. And, so did you. We’ll do the same for him. And I’ll do the same for you, some day, Trevor.”

“It’s really the least we can do for him,” Trevor suggested.

“I don’t want to do ‘the least’ for him. I want to do ‘the best’ that I can.”

Trevor cocked his head, looking at God in confusion. “‘The best’? Do you know what you’re capable of?”

“I think so?” God said, his forehead crinkling as his eyebrows pointed down towards his nose. 

“And what’s the most you can do for him?” Trevor asked. 

“Mmmmm, I’m not sure. Let’s wake him up and ask him,” God said, eagerly.

“Cold water?” Trevor suggested. 

“Think it’ll work? He’s comatose.”

“See that stereo? Put something loud on. I’ll grab the water.”

“Roger,” God said with a playful salute. “Put some ice in it.,” he added. 

“I don’t want to give him a heart attack.”

“He’s a tough sonuvabitch, remember? He can take it. He looks like nothing when he is asleep, though, only a pile of: Oxygen, Calcium, Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen and phosphorus, held up by bone and muscle, wrapped in skin.”

“That is what he is. He is just missing the spark of life you gave him.”

“How’d I do that?” God asked, puzzled.

“I don’t know. No one does.”

“Damn, Trevor, when will these missing memories come back?” God asked him, trying to hide his frustration. 

“Dunno.”

“Do you have the water?”

“Yep.”

“With ice?” God asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Yep.”

“Okay. Let’s wake up this drunk sonuvabitch.” Trevor threw the bowl of ice cold water on the head of the kid, and God blasted ‘Like A Prayer’ by Madonna.

They blinked and stood there, dumbfounded. 

The man barely stirred. God turned up the music. Still, nothing, just snoring and drooling. God frowned at the young man and turned down the music. 

“Huh,” Trevor said, confused. “What now?”

“Maybe some AC/DC instead?” God suggested. 

“Thunderstruck?”

“Oh! How about some real thunder?”

“You might have just enough of your power right now to pull that off.”

“Will it wake the neighbors?” God asked.

“Oh well,” Trevor said, shrugging. “Screw em.”

God closed his eyes and mumbled to himself. The dark room grew darker. The pressure dropped. Clouds started to form along the ceiling. The thunder cracked way louder than God had anticipated, shaking the whole house. God and Trevor immediately covered their ears and recoiled. “I THINK I’VE GONE DEAF, TREVOR!” God yelled. 

“WHAT DID YOU SAY??” 

“WHAT ARE YOU ASKING?”

“WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?”

“WHAT?!”

“HUH?!”

“IS HE AWAKE?”

“NO. I THINK HE IS 23, NOT 8! BUT THESE EARTH YEARS DON’T MAKE ANY DAMN SENSE! I CAN’T KEEP TIME STRAIGHT!”

“WHAT??”

“HUH??”

God walked up to the man, examining him as he continued to snore. Trevor followed. They both stood behind the sleeping kid—God over his right shoulder, Trevor over his left. “Well, what now?” God asked, turning to Trevor.

“I don’t know. I didn’t think it was possible for a human to sleep this hard.”

“Should we try ‘smell’? He’s a fighter, right? Any chance he’ll have any smelling-salts around this house?” God suggested. 

“Maybe . . .”

God closed his eyes again and mumbled, “Search,” under his breath. “‘Search’ works! Check that cabinet,” God said, pointing to the kitchen. 

Trevor grabbed the smelling salt out of the cabinet and brought it over to the desk. He handed it over to God. God snapped it in half and held it under the kid’s nose. 

“Holy Spicy Toilets, Catwoman!” ‘The Fighter’ said, gasping for air as he did. “Ugh . . . What the hell?? Aw, my head!!” he said, grabbing his head before rubbing his eyes. With his other hand, he reached out for a bottle. His hand found it, and while he was still rubbing his eyes, he brought the bottle to his lips and tried to take a pull. Nothing came out. “Dry?? Just like my love-life lately,” he muttered, supposedly to himself.

“Here,” God said casually, handing him a different bottle of whiskey that God had filled with water.

“Thank you,” ‘The Fighter’ said, sounding genuinely grateful. He took a long swig from the bottle and then wiped his mouth. He rubbed his temples before taking another long swig. 

“You smell, kid,” Trevor said. 

“I know.”

“Don’t you shower?” God asked.

“Haven’t had hot water here in a week,” he muttered into the bottle.

“Your expansion tank got a leak or something?” Trevor asked. 

“How’d you know?” The Fighter grumbled. 

“Intuition,” he said with a smirk. “I’ll take a look at it.”

“Appreciate it,” The Fighter said, nodding to Trevor. “But, hey, I was  just wondering . . . who the hell are you two, and why the hell are you here?” He turned and faced God, “And why do you look so familiar to me? Do I owe y’all money? I don’t have any. Nope, I am a broke joke.”

“No, we aren’t here for money,” God said.

“What, then?” he asked, puzzled and in pain.

“We just wanted to check in on you—to meet you,” God said.

“So, we haven’t met before, then?” he asked.

“Not exactly.”

“Is this a dream?” The Fighter asked, pinching his arm.

“No. It’s not a dream,” God answered. 

“Well, what the hell do you want to talk about?” he snapped. 

“. . . You used to be a fighter?” God asked him patiently. 

“Something like that,” he mumbled, taking another pull of what he still thought was whiskey. “Long long time ago,” he added into the bottle.

“Will you tell me what happened?”

“No. I won’t,” he said stubbornly. 

“Was it that bad?” God asked, wincing slightly.

“No. It wasn’t. I was just,” he paused, a wave of pain crossing over his face, before he said “. . . naive.”

“How were you naive?” God asked curiously. 

“I believed I could accomplish my dreams if I worked hard enough, but that’s a bunch of bullshit.”

“Is it?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“But some people do, don’t they?” God asked him. 

“Almost 8.2 billion people on this spinning poisoned rock and how many of them accomplish their dreams? And how many are happy when they do?” he asked God. “Something like .1% do.”

“Aye,” God said, nodding slowly, “Not a lot. That is a good point. Not very many people ever search their souls in an attempt to discover their purpose in life.”

“No one does. We just move our goal post as soon as we get close feeling proud of ourselves, so we are never satisfied; always longing for more; never good enough—it’s the American nightmare.”

“I am proud of you,” God said, seemingly randomly, catching the young man off guard. 

The kid glared at him. “No offense, old man, but who the hell are you, and why should I care if you’re proud of me or not?”

“You don’t know yet?” God asked with a smile that grew. 

The young man just grunted and then reached in the empty pizza box.  “EMPTY?? You take my last slice, Pops??”

“Trevor did. I only like good pizza,” God said. 

“You people are something else,” The fighter said, shaking his head in dramatic disbelief that his last slice of week-old pizza was gone. “So smug and entitled. I hate people like you two. You think you know what’s best for me, huh? Well . . . WHERE THE HELL WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU!?”

Trevor walked back in at the moment. “Expansion Tank is fixed. You got hot—”

“You ate my last slice of Pizza?!” The Fighter yelled at him.

“Oh yeah, I did do that,” Trevor said, letting out a small burp. “My bad.”

“You better pay me for that!”

“I just fixed your Expansion Tank, Kid. Ain’t that payment enough?”

“AND WHERE YOU WHEN I WAS PRAYING 27 TIMES EVERY GODDAMN DAY??” he yelled, turning back to God.

“We were—”

“NO WHERE! YOU TWO WEREN’T ANYWHERE! WHEN I WAS IN MY ACCIDENT, YOU WEREN’T GODDAMN THERE!!”

“Here,” God said, handing him the whiskey bottle again. He took another long swig. The bottle was almost gone. 

He stopped yelling and turned to God. “Where . . . Where were you when I tore my shoulder? . . . Where were you when she dumped me? . . . Where were you when I believed in you? . . . Where were you when he killed her??” Tears started to roll down The Fighters face. 

God felt his pain and wanted to curl up and hide from everything and every one. “I was where you are now,” God admitted quietly.

“You . . .” The Fighter cut off whatever it was he was going to say and asked, “what?? You were here? Where the hell is ‘here’?”

“I was in a similar bottomless pit to the one you’ve fallen into.”

“No, no, no,” The Fighter said, shaking his head.  “That’s not true . . . God doesn’t suffer like this. He’s better than this.”

“I wish that were true,” God said remorsefully. 

“IT IS!!” The Fighter yelled, slamming his fist on the table. 

God looked into his eyes. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, kid. I really am. I . . . uh, I stopped believing in myself. I stopped believing in you—in all of humanity. But, you kept believing in me. You kept working. You kept dreaming. You inspired me to try again. You motivated me to believe. And you made me feel like a fool for doubting you.” God put a hand on his shoulder, and the fighter trembled. “You believed in me during the lowest time of my life, you had faith in me,” God looked down before looking up at him again, his chin held high. “Now I will do the same for you.”

The house started to warm up, heat coming off of God. 

The fighter shivered anyway. He was cold and hungover.