Read Online The Brunist Day of Wrath: A Novel by Robert Coover - Free Book Online
Authors: Robert Coover
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silence. The turmoil within brings Wesley to a temporary halt at the edge of the road, clutching his stomach. The miserable farms are behind him, now nothing but the bizarre extraterrestrial landscape of inundated strip mines, reminders of this morning’s ignominy. God is dead. And has left His Only Begotten buried in him like a gassy tumor. When did this happen? Thursday night, probably. Debra left him that night after offering to prepare for him what she bitingly called a last supper. “It’s our anniversary,” he said. “Oh, is it? Well, I’m sorry, dear Wesley. Shall I make you an omelet before I go?” “No. What thou doest,” he said, quoting his own traditional Thursday sermon on the theme of the betrayal of Judas, one of those annual replays Debra finds so despicable, “do quickly.” He wanted to break her neck, but instead accepted her chilling bye-bye kiss (“This is forever, Wesley…”) on his forehead. After she’d left, he decided to commune with Jesus’ body and blood, consuming the True Vine and Bread of Life, as was the evening’s custom. He ate an entire loaf of sliced white bread, washing it down with a half gallon of jug wine, and when that was done, emptied the gin and bourbon bottles, too.
He woke up the next day before dawn on the bathroom floor where he’d fallen, suffering from a splitting headache, his sacred head as if disfigured and crowned with piercing thorn, as someone has said. “O blessèd Head so wounded, reviled and put to scorn…” Thus, deep in hell, he mocked himself. He even had (the passion of Wesley Edwards was complete) a pain in his side and his hands were numb; he worried he might be coming down with multiple sclerosis, though it was most likely due to sleeping all night on the floor. He seemed to remember a crashing tile, but maybe that was himself crashing on the tiles. Had he been throwing up? He had been throwing up. He was lying in the evidence. It was Good Friday. He had more services to face, hospital calls, who knows what all. What a season. It never stops. He stripped and crawled on all fours into the shower and scourged himself with stinging lashes of ice-cold water, which woke him up—but he was still desperately sick, and he threw up again, this time finding the great white throne, praise the Lord. Left a sour vinegary taste in his mouth. In the mirror, he saw a skull with some pale greenish skin stretched over it, eyes red like the devil’s, its tongue out. He did not stay to study the ghastly apparition, but pulled on his bathrobe, the silky lavender one given him one bygone Christmas by Debra (how she longed for her own little manger event, oh yes, failure upon failure!), and staggered into the kitchen, hoping to find she’d come back and cleaned up his mess. No such luck. It was not a pretty sight, the walls decorated with the eggs he’d thrown at them, milk spilled and sour now, chairs and table overturned, though it was not so bad as the bathroom. He leaned into the sink and drank straight from the tap, consumed by thirst. There were puddles of pale wax here and there. He must have lit some candles. Might have burned the manse down around him. Might have meant to.
In the bedroom he found Debra’s old wedding nightgown with the hand-embroidered scarlet hearts ripped to shreds. In grief? Rage? Horror? She’s grown heavy, it no longer fits, so maybe just in humiliation. A more intimate grief. Or maybe he found it and tore it up himself. Everything else of hers was gone. All her clothes, shoes, hats, toiletries, personal papers, scarves and kerchiefs, adornments. Her red-rimmed reading glasses. Address book. Her sunflower alarm clock and her makeup mirror. Probably the stuff had been disappearing for weeks; he hadn’t noticed. Empty dresser drawers hung open like jaws agape, her closet stripped out like a vacated jail cell, door mournfully ajar. Though he hadn’t slept in it, the bed was unmade. A spectacle of hurried flight. No matter. Good
He woke up the next day before dawn on the bathroom floor where he’d fallen, suffering from a splitting headache, his sacred head as if disfigured and crowned with piercing thorn, as someone has said. “O blessèd Head so wounded, reviled and put to scorn…” Thus, deep in hell, he mocked himself. He even had (the passion of Wesley Edwards was complete) a pain in his side and his hands were numb; he worried he might be coming down with multiple sclerosis, though it was most likely due to sleeping all night on the floor. He seemed to remember a crashing tile, but maybe that was himself crashing on the tiles. Had he been throwing up? He had been throwing up. He was lying in the evidence. It was Good Friday. He had more services to face, hospital calls, who knows what all. What a season. It never stops. He stripped and crawled on all fours into the shower and scourged himself with stinging lashes of ice-cold water, which woke him up—but he was still desperately sick, and he threw up again, this time finding the great white throne, praise the Lord. Left a sour vinegary taste in his mouth. In the mirror, he saw a skull with some pale greenish skin stretched over it, eyes red like the devil’s, its tongue out. He did not stay to study the ghastly apparition, but pulled on his bathrobe, the silky lavender one given him one bygone Christmas by Debra (how she longed for her own little manger event, oh yes, failure upon failure!), and staggered into the kitchen, hoping to find she’d come back and cleaned up his mess. No such luck. It was not a pretty sight, the walls decorated with the eggs he’d thrown at them, milk spilled and sour now, chairs and table overturned, though it was not so bad as the bathroom. He leaned into the sink and drank straight from the tap, consumed by thirst. There were puddles of pale wax here and there. He must have lit some candles. Might have burned the manse down around him. Might have meant to.
In the bedroom he found Debra’s old wedding nightgown with the hand-embroidered scarlet hearts ripped to shreds. In grief? Rage? Horror? She’s grown heavy, it no longer fits, so maybe just in humiliation. A more intimate grief. Or maybe he found it and tore it up himself. Everything else of hers was gone. All her clothes, shoes, hats, toiletries, personal papers, scarves and kerchiefs, adornments. Her red-rimmed reading glasses. Address book. Her sunflower alarm clock and her makeup mirror. Probably the stuff had been disappearing for weeks; he hadn’t noticed. Empty dresser drawers hung open like jaws agape, her closet stripped out like a vacated jail cell, door mournfully ajar. Though he hadn’t slept in it, the bed was unmade. A spectacle of hurried flight. No matter. Good
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