celestial beings

        When Leah and Cherry Blossom finished with Sid he looked like The Mummy. They had poured hydrogen peroxide upon his partially ruined face until the flesh was clean of blood. They swabbed him with antibacterial gel and then bandaged his entire face. Cutting holes for eyes, nostrils and mouth. Mister Zig-Zag and Artie hauled Sid out to the Skell Van and loaded him inside.
        They locked the Potlatch and hung the Closed sign on the doorknob.
        Sid moaned and groaned until the opiate kicked in.
        "You've got quite a stash, Ziggy," Artie said. "A regular pharmacy."
        Closing the army surplus ammo box, the hippie grinned. "Be prepared, I always say."
        The men sat in the rear with Sid as Cherry Blossom drove to the hamlet called Chewbacca where there was a decent grassroots medical clinic. Open 24-7 because Doc Bainbridge lived there.


                                                                                       *


        "It was him," Leah lamented. "I'm sure of it."
        They were home now, comfortably seated on their new futon bed, donated from the Potlatch by a grateful Sid. Their modest abode resembled a yurt. Warm and cozy when they wanted warm and cozy. There was a victory garden out back, and a screened gazebo. Artie held her hand and nodded.
        He recalled how wonderful she had been when they first met.


        At the apex of his vision quest two golden angels appeared to him. They wore halos. They spoke as  deities in a far away tongue.
        "We are Saints," they told him, and in his starving mind he believed them.
        "I must be dead."
        "What's in your sack, Jane," Leah asked.
        "Let's see. Beenie-Weenies, Cheetos, Fig Newtons and Hershey's Almond."
        "I have Vienna Sausages and Slim Jims, from the Aces and Eights."
        "Beggar's banquet!"
         Artie observed through slitted eyes. Jane was a chesty teen in a snap-button western shirt. Blue and white with Roy Rogers white piping. A blue denim equestrian skirt covered wide hips and knees large as baguettes, which he espied later. Like Tarzan, he said: "Jane good."
        Leah wore a black polo shirt that hinted of pear-shaped breasts, frayed bluejeans and rough-out cowboy boots. Her western hat was rain-specked and floppy. She offered him a porcelain mug of something. "Careful. It's hot."
         Chicken broth from God's private larder.


                                                                                        *


        At dusk the main-spring of the world unwound and stopped. Sunset majesty. Salmon clouds. Aspens cloaked in sepia and crimson. Deliverance was nigh.
        When all was dark Leah lit her Coleman lantern and began reading a book.
        "What are you reading?"
        "The Book of Mormon. The part where Jared's brother beholds the finger of the Lord. A divine finger of  flesh and blood. In all Glory."
        "But God is a thing of spirit."
        "God is the Perfect Man."
        "Far out."
        "Are you a man of faith, Artie?"
        "I am a man of many faiths with no faith at all. Tell me of yours."