Free Bible Stories for Adults by James Morrow Page A

with Asians.”
    â€œI sympathize with your frustration,” said God, sidling onto His piano stool. “In fact, there’s probably only one thing worse than not being able to understand a person.”
    â€œWhat’s that?” asked Nimrod.
    â€œBeing able to understand him completely.”
    A thoughtful frown crinkled the boss’s brow. “Oh?” Pivoting, God faced Michael and stretched out His right hand, eyes burning like two meteors smashing into air. The slightest brush from the Almighty’s extended index finger was all it took, the merest
touche
, and a white, viscous light flowed through Michael’s brain, seeping into his cortical crannies and illuminating his powers of articulation.
    â€œGo ahead,” God commanded Michael. “Speak.”
    â€œWhat should I say?”
    â€œJust talk.”
    â€œD-Daniel . . .” Michael winced: he’d never called the boss
Daniel
before. “Daniel, the plain fact is that you harbor feelings of insecurity bordering on paranoia,” he found himself saying. Complete understanding . . . total lucidity . . . yes, it was really happening—for the first time in his life, Michael could truly communicate.
    â€œFeelings of
what?
” said Nimrod.
    â€œInsecurity.”
    The boss’s puckish features grew tense and flushed, as if he were suffering from apoplexy. “Well,
this
day’s certainly shaping up to be a pisser,” he said, tugging on the fourteen-karat gold chain around his neck. “First
He
turns against me, now
you.
Really, Michael, after all I’ve—”
    A froggish
glunk
issued from Nimrod’s throat as the Almighty laid a divine hand on his shoulder. Nimrod squeezed his head between his palms and, stumbling across the lush carpet, dropped to his knees as if intending to pray.
    God said, “Your turn, bigshot.”
    The boss lifted his thickly tufted head and gave a meandering smile. Slowly, cautiously, he planted his two-hundred-dollar wingtips from Biagiotti’s on the carpet and rose to full height. “If Freud were here, he might infer my problems have a sexual etiology,” said Nimrod in measured tones. “He would probably note the phallic implications of my skyscraper. I hope I’m being clear.”
    â€œYou’re being extremely clear,” said Michael, putting on his overcoat.
    â€œClarity—that’s the whole idea,” said God.
    â€œWhere’re you going?” asked Nimrod.
    â€œI’m afraid that in a teleological cosmos such as the one we evidently occupy,” said Michael, tucking the valise under his arm, “I can no longer rehabilitate any actual truth from the highly circumscribed domain of financial speculation.” He started into the foyer. “And so I’m off into the great wide world, where I hope to gain some insight into the nature of ultimate reality.”
    â€œThe fact is, I’ve never been entirely certain I love my mother,” said Nimrod, scowling profoundly. “Jung, of course, would project the discourse onto a more mythic plane.”
    â€œDaniel, I know exactly what you mean,” said Michael.
    And he did.
    Â 
    Last night I reread Genesis. On the whole, I find it well-written and poetic. I particularly like My use of the Omniscient Narrator.
    Don’t ask Me why I found the Shinarites’ Tower so threatening. I simply did. “And now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do,” I prophesied. My famous curse followed forthwith. “Let Us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.”
    But that didn’t stop them, did it? They still did whatever they liked.
    This time around, I got it right.
    Â 
    Hopping aboard the escalator, Michael began his descent. As the shops glided by, he realized that an uncanny anomie had overtaken the atrium. Instead of selling