Arukou

In the dark cool of the basement, the pastors wait, year in and year out. Their white robes gather gray coatings of  dust that seeps in through the drafty cracks of grimy leaded windows. Though they move, they move imperceptibly, so that if you watched them for five minutes, you would not notice, but if you looked and then looked again, something will have changed. Every so often, the old wood of their chairs settles and creaks and groans under the weight of a faded, sunken body. The pastors do not eat. They do not drink or sleep or dream. In the pale gray of Midwestern mornings, thick with muggy, cloying humidity, they raise their voices as one, and praise a god ancient and terrible, a god who does not speak but watches and watches and waits. Their song drones out a long and faint , and those brave souls who happen to be passing by turn their heads and then just as quickly look away. Their parents warned them, and their grandparents before. Even if the gaping arched maw of the church looks inviting, you must never go in. The sign outside the church changes irregularly, and no one ever sees who shifts the spidery black letters. Its messages seem insidiously friendly. “Church Luncheon, We love having students for lunch.” “Join us in prayer, Pray for Our mercy.” “Do not fear Death, It comes for us all.” One hundred, fifty-eight long years the pastors have been waiting, waiting for you, dear student. Won’t you come in? Won’t you come in?