Journal Entry 3

I stopped for a long lunch.  I figured I should finish my journal in case something really weird happens.  But to be honest, I think I’m just procrastinating.  I can’t believe I’m doing this.  I should’ve probably told my sister, but then again.  She’d probably have me committed. 

Jacob picked me up yesterday and took me to a run-of-the-mill charm shop.  It was garish kind of place to say the least.  It was like a giant pre-teen jewelry box.  Cheap necklaces, hair ties, you name it, hung everywhere.  I noticed the snap bracelets right away.  They had every color of the rainbow.  Avery would have loved it. Oh, Avery where are you?

Jacob focused on the clerk.  She couldn’t have been any older than sixteen, but Jacob’s hard stare didn’t faze her.  I couldn’t fathom what was going on with those two, so I panicked.  I bolted to the door and ran into a rack of earrings.  Jacob didn’t look.  The girl didn’t look.  They just continued to stare at each other.

“Where’s Jenna?” Jacob said.  His voice was so cold that my heart sank into my stomach.

The girl told him that she was in the back.  Jacob turned to me and said, “Leave it, Drew.”  Normally, I would have ignored a person who told me not to clean up my own mess, but Jacob’s demeanor had changed.  He’s one tough guy− scary.

I followed him through a beaded curtain.  We entered a small room that had thousands of tchotchkes displayed all along the walls.  Some were like those up in the front, but most looked older and had a dull sheen.  A heavyset woman slumped in a beanbag chair with a laptop on her generous lap.   Two empty bean bags sat opposite of her.  She signaled for us to sit.

“What is your offering?” she asked.

“I ain’t going to kill yah.” Jacob shot back.

“No thanks.”  She looked up from her computer and grinned.

Jacob took out a penny and tossed it to her.

She held it up.  “1955 double die wheat penny.”

Before I could ask a question, she started in on me.  “Ah…the remaining victim of Darrel Jackson.  Jackson was one of God’s projects, you know.  Always looking for ways to end someone’s life, and yet leaves a victim behind so that the pain lasts forever.”

Jacob defended me.  “I didn’t bring him here to be taunted by you, witch.”

Jenna took out a brown paper bag. “You want Andrew to summon an angel, a tool of God, to fight God’s Divine Plan.  You want him putting out fire with fire.  He should understand what he’s getting into.”

I spoke up, “The only thing that matters is finding my daughter.”

“Here is everything you need.  The GPS coordinates are inside.  Go to the location and throw the bag in the fire.  Burn everything in the bag, including the paper with the coordinates.”

Jacob grabbed the bag and peeked inside. 

“He must go alone,” she told him.

“He’s not going alone,” Jacob told her.

“He will, and you must leave now.  The Morning Stars have been tracking you.  They don’t believe in fighting fire with fire.  Jacob, you must go before they realize what you’ve done.”

Jacob had me leave by myself and catch a bus back home. 

So here I am.  Procrastinating at a truck stop.  Writing down what happened to me in case my memory gets erased.  On my way to summon a real angel to save my daughter, Avery.

Journal Entry 2

I decided to write down what has happened to me so far before I go.  I am driving to some GPS coordinates Jenna gave me.  I think the coordinates are sending me to the middle of the desert.  The drive should take me all day.  It’s funny.  I’m more afraid of losing my memories of this past week than going to this ridiculously specific spot a complete stranger gave me.

It’s been a week since Darrel Jackson took my family from me.  Heather and our daughter.  Avery is only seven.  I had left for work like any other day, but decided to go home for lunch to surprise Heather.  I liked to do little things like that just for the fun of it.  Avery should’ve been at school.  Heather and I had been talking about having another baby.  I had thought, “Why not today?”

I collapsed when I found Heather on our bed.  Jackson had raped and mutilated her.  I managed to call the police, but I dropped the phone in the middle of the conversation when I remembered Avery.  She wasn’t there.  I called the school.  I remember praying while the phone rang that she had left for school before the attack.  She wasn’t there either.  I threw the phone down and search the house.  I couldn’t find her.  Hope filled my heart.  Maybe she was still alive.  I prayed and prayed that she’d be safe.  The police found Jackson later that day outside of town at a gas station.  I thought my prayers had been answered, but the joke was on me.  Jackson had hid my daughter. My little Avery.  She looks so much like her mother.  Their beautiful blue eyes.  The way they light up when they eat their favorite hot fudge sundaes.    My heart aches… I can’t lose Avery too!

I’ll never forget his evil smile and his black eyes the first and only time I came face to face with Jackson.  He had told the police that he wouldn’t give them any information on Avery until he saw me.  The police said that it was just a trick.  They were right.  He just smiled and told me she had a month if she knew how to ration food and water.  I pleaded with him to let her go.  That she was my world.  He just laughed.  His black eyes sparkled.  It was the moment he had been waiting for. 

My sister tried to assure me that the police were doing everything they could, but it was clear that their hands were tied.  I stormed out of there.  My sister tried to stop me.  She knew I shouldn’t be alone, but I left anyway.  I didn’t know where to go.  I couldn’t go home.  I couldn’t bear to be with my sister’s family.  So I went to church.  I hadn’t been there since Easter, but I had nothing left.  I prayed with all my might.  I begged God to save her.  I lost it.  I even threw my wallet at the altar and screamed begging for help.  Nothing.  I would give God anything to have her back.  To have both of them both back.

Exhausted, I left and headed for the nearest bar.  I didn’t plan on drinking.  Looking back, I don’t know why I went there.  I just didn’t want to go home.  It hurt too much.

After a couple of drinks, a man named Jacob sat down next to me.  It was like he had been waiting for me to have a few.  He freaked me out.  Jacob’s clothes were two sizes too big and much too pricey for the bar we were sitting in.  He must have been the only black man for miles.  He was completely out of place there.  Actually, he looked like a drug dealer.  The whole place had their eyes on him.

Jacob laid it all on the table and got right down to business.   He told me that he had people inside the jail and that he could find out where my daughter was.  He didn’t brag and announce it to the whole bar.  He just matter-of-factly spoke.   I instantly believed him, not because he scared the heck out of me, because he knew my story with perfect detail.  He didn’t ask me for money. I just had to give him the okay.  What did I have to lose?  Hell, I didn’t actually have to believe him.  I nodded and mumbled, “okay.”  But after he left, I had to wonder who he was and why was he trying to help me?

It was two days later when I saw him again.  The day I buried Heather.  It was the first night my sister had left me alone since I had woken up in a police cell the morning after my visit to the bar.  Jacob rang the doorbell late.

I felt very uncomfortable letting Jacob in my house.  There is something unsettling about him, not to mention he claimed he could get my daughter back.  I might not have let him in at all if it hadn’t been for the rain.  Before I could invite Jacob to take a seat, he started to cry.  Yes, he sat there crying.  The scariest man I ever met sat there and cried like a baby.  Between his tears, he squeezed out that his team had not been able to get the location before they had beaten Jackson to death.  I awkwardly padded his shoulder.

I made tea for him.  It felt good to wait on someone.  I hadn’t made tea since the last time Avery had had a sore throat.  I wasn’t upset with him because I didn’t believe him.  Heck, I didn’t even know if I believed Jackson was really dead at that point. 

Jacob calmed down and told me of the Morning Stars.  He told me that his organization fights against angels and helps answer prayers for people, like myself.  He told me that angels will cover up Jackson’s death as a suicide and if they traced the incident back to me, my memory would be erased. 

As far as I was concerned, Jacob was a lunatic.  I figured since he was calm I could get him to leave without incident.  But then he said something that trumped any disbelief.  He said that there was still a chance to find Avery.   He told me about an angel that could be summoned to find her.  Crazy or not.  I am willing to try anything.   So here I am…..a desperate father going to summon some kind of angel.  Why?  Why not?  I can’t really lose anything.  That and Jenna was so crazy I think she might actually be right.

I got a call from the police station early the next morning.  They said that Jackson committed suicide.  It was released to the media an hour after they told me.  I guess I’ll follow Jacob for a while.