The Blue Zenith

Natalie roams at night. She long ago stopped hauling herself out of a warm bed for early morning jogs, and when an elderly neighbor lady threatened to shoot her for petting her cat, she decided that late afternoons were out too. She waits until later, after sun-down, when she no longer hears the clinking of her neighbors’ dinner dishes being washed and put away, and the blue glow of TVs begin to flicker in their windows. Then she slips on her worn sneakers and starts her wanderings.

One Saturday night last autumn, she started a walk down Blackmore Street near her house. A night mist had rolled in from the beach, shrouding trees and shrubs with condensation and making orange halos around the street lights. She passed in rapid order: innocuous stucco homes, Craftsmen houses from the Twenties, Spanish-style bungalows, gentile-looking with red-tiled roofs and graceful archways—all remnants of a suburban paradise desperately trying to keep the onslaught of urban misery at bay.

Natalie’s shadow slipped among palms and rubber trees of one yard and then passed among spruces and maples of the next. Bougainvillea, engulfing a garage roof, glowed blood-red under the street lights, and she could smell the sweet scent of Night-blooming Jasmine. It was a couple of days after Halloween and some of the houses still had orange twinkle lights and jack-o-lanterns decorating their yards. Then she remembered: it’s the Day of the Dead, El Dia de Los Muertos. How appropriate: she allowed herself a moment of whimsy and imagined the forces of good and evil duking it out on her dull little street in suburbia. She wondered who would be the victor.

As she approached the intersection of Pine Street, she heard a faint shuffling sound behind her. Slightly breaking stride, she turned and looked back over her shoulder. About halfway down the block was a figure. Natalie caught her breath. The figure, moving every bit as fast as she, did not appear to have any arms or legs. It was tall, with broad shoulders, and its head seemed square-shaped. It glided smoothly down the sidewalk. “What IS that?” she muttered. The figure entered the shadow of a low-hung magnolia tree and passed from sight.

The voice of her mother echoed in her head: “You shouldn’t go walking after dark. It’s not safe. You don’t know what kind of perverts are out there.” Oh yes I do, Mom, perverts with no legs and arms, she chuckled to herself. She rationalized that the figure was just some trick of light and shadows. Nevertheless, she picked up speed and decided to change her route. She turned right on Pine Street, walked quickly to the next street and turned left. After a couple of blocks, Natalie paused for a moment at the corner to catch her breath. She glanced up the sidewalk. About sixty feet away was the legless figure, quickly closing in. She could see a full silhouette now and that it was in fact not a legless phantom but clearly a man in what appeared to be a full cape. A cape? A momentary image flashed in her mind of her being the main act at tonight’s gathering of a cult. Convinced that the man had circled around the block in order to intercept her, she turned right, crossed the street and broke into a jog. Three blocks later, she stopped, sweat starting to trickle down her back. She looked down the street. Nothing. Natalie stood for a moment, waiting for her panting to subside and thanking God that she’d lost the guy.

Then a movement caught her eye. The caped silhouette loomed out of the shadows heading right towards her. Natalie gasped. She wheeled around to look for an escape route. She realized then that she was in front of St. Peter’s Orthodox Church. The large double-front doors were slightly ajar, and she could hear voices coming from within. Any port in a storm, she thought and bounded up the front steps, two at a time.

She slipped through the door and quietly pulled it shut behind her. The doorway entered straight into the sanctuary, a surprisingly small area of about the size of a large living room. The room was packed with about 75 people, all standing. A woman stood near the door trying to comfort a fussy infant. The priest held his place at the front near the altar and was saying something in what Natalie supposed was Russian.

She wanted to get as far from the door as possible so she tiptoed behind the back row, a group of about five or six teenagers. A boy poked a girl in the ribs. “Cut it out!” the girl hissed. The sanctuary was surrounded by several arches, each leading into small alcoves. Natalie slid around the side in front of one of these alcoves and squeezed between a middle-aged woman in a business suit and an elderly man with a hearing aid and gold embroidered red vest.

Natalie’s heart was hammering, and she was still breathing heavily from her sprint down the street. She lowered her head, covered her mouth and tried not to draw attention. To her surprise, she was shivering.

A moment later, she felt an arm encircle her shoulders. She looked up. The woman next to her was smiling and pulling her closer. She thinks I’m crying. Natalie smiled at the woman and indicated that she was fine. The woman released her and returned her attention to the priest.

A chorus of voices erupted from above. Natalie craned her neck and noticed a balcony rail above her. The choir must be up there, she reasoned. The congregation began singing. Natalie relaxed a little and looked around.

The small size of the sanctuary lent an intimate feel to the proceedings. A huge oriental carpet of maroon, blue and white designs spread across the center of the floor, and an enormous crystal chandelier glittered overhead. On each of the pillars that separated the sanctuary from the alcoves were silver sconces holding lighted candles. Behind the priest was a large altarpiece, its center panel depicting a large Christ figure. Every open bit of wall space held a gold, silver, or wooden-framed icon. The faces in each one varied in style from Byzantine to something almost akin to a Modigliani. Each one glowed with gold leaf and paints in rich, sumptuous shades of crimson, ivory, blues, and browns. Natalie looked at the one closest to her, a rendering of Mary holding the Christ Child. She had a white gown inlaid with sparkling stones. Each icon seemed to pulsate with life under the flickering light of the candles. The room, in spite of its intimacy and warmth, had an unearthly quality about it.

Strangely, the most striking element of the room was its simple vaulted ceiling. It was painted in a stunning sky blue. Natalie’s eyes were drawn upward, and she marveled at how much the ceiling resembled a real sky at mid-day. She continued to stare at the midpoint of the ceiling, and she allowed her imagination to spiral upward, carried by the voices of the choir toward that blue zenith. She felt as if she were being swallowed up by Heaven itself. Her face flushed, and a quiet warmth spread over her. She thought she felt the wind blowing.

Natalie didn’t know how long she stood there, but the harsh wail of the fussy infant by the door roused her. She noticed then that the people were beginning to file out, many of them genuflecting and kissing the picture on the icon-stand in the center of the room. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do, and began to feel self-conscious. With the service apparently at an end, she decided she’d better make a break for home, hoping her stalker would be long-gone.

The woman next to her tried to ease by. As Natalie stepped back to allow her to pass, she felt herself step on a foot. Natalie turned around to excuse herself and found that she was staring into someone’s broad black chest.

“Oh, excuse me. I’m so sorry,” she said. Natalie stepped back and was surprised to see that the person behind her was a priest dressed in full regalia: long black cassock and a small, square cloth hat.

“That’s quite alright,” he said. He was a distinguished looking man, about fifty, with intense blue eyes and a striking silver goatee. “It looks like I wasn’t the only one late for Saturday Vespers,” he smiled.

“Excuse me?”

“I saw you running to church….Forgive me, my name is Father Dmitri. I’m visiting Fr. Vladimir for a few weeks.” He pulled one of his hands out of the pocket of his cassock and extended it to Natalie.

My stalker is a priest? Natalie started to chuckle.

“Did I say something funny?”

“Not at all, Father.” She took his hand in both of hers. “Not at all—you’ve just made my day, that’s all.”

“Well….. my pleasure.” He looked at me with amusement.

“Good night, Father.” She released his hand and walked out the door. When she reached the bottom of the front steps, Fr. Dmitri called to her from the doorway.

“Be careful on the way home. You don’t know who might be out there.”

As the darkness enveloped her, Natalie started to laugh.

Lori Gloyd © 2006