A LIFE IN SAN ANTONIO
SAM B. HOUSTON. That would be Sam Ben Houston, or S. B. Houston, or Son-of-a-Bitch Houston back when he was a drunk. He had celebrated his fortieth birthday with the biggest bender of his life, after which somebody shoveled him into a taxi and sent him to San Antonio General. As he ebbed in and out of consciousness, he could have sworn that his wife came back like a good angel and told him it wasn’t his fault he’d taught her to be a big girl who liked the taste of beer, and it wasn’t his fault the alcohol had eaten the calcium out of her bones and teeth, and their child had had fetal alcohol syndrome and was someone who needed an institution. And it wasn’t his fault about the recreational drugs either or that she had wrecked the car, dead drunk. Come on to heaven with me, she whispered, fanning him with her snow-white feathery wings.
That was in the past. That was way before Perpetuity got hold of him and made him into somebody smart and important and damn-near rich, too.
But before Perpetuity, there was AA and Jesus. And that was what saved him after Susan died in the wreck. Almost dead drunk himself, he had stood unbalanced on the edge of a high red rock cliff, and Jesus had grabbed the middle of the back of his belt and pulled him away from the abyss.
These days Sam B. Houston was an expensively dressed businessman who taught Sunday school. He was an expert on the Second Coming, the Rapture, the End of the World, and the last book of the Bible, Revelation. He knew that before Jesus could come again, the Jews must return to their homeland. He was helping to make it come to pass. His church supported Jewish settlers. Mr. Houston had escorted both young Christians and uncommitted teens to the Holy Land to increase their awareness of how little time was left for repentance. While he was there, he had been approached by a Jewish member of Perpetuity.
People were always trying to debunk God’s Word. Treat it like damn literature or tribal history. They’d tried with Jesus; they’d tried to make out like he was a man, like any man. Sex and all. Now the evolutionists were after God the Creator.
As a souvenir, Perpetuity gave Sam Houston the most expensive holster and six-shooter you could darn well imagine.
He was a great shot, too.
There was some sort of papers found in Egypt, and they wanted him to get hold of them. The scientists were out to rewrite Genesis.
In early spring, 2020, back home, Sam Houston sat on a rock far from the city, though he was still wearing his business clothes. He hadn’t had a drink in seven years. It was time for the rattlesnakes to come out and sun themselves. When they did, he’d pop off their heads. Here came two big guys so long they just kept pouring and pouring out of the rock crack. Sam B. squinted his eyes, took aim, and squeezed the trigger.
“Get thee behind me, Satan!” he said, his voice suffused with venom.
Soon they were going to send him to the Holy Land again, or thereabouts.