Under the Dome

Barbie turned to look, and was stunned to silence himself. The sun was going down red as it often did after warm, fair days unsullied by late showers. But never in his life had he seen a sunset like this one. He had an idea the only people who ever had were those in the vicinity of violent volcanic eruptions.

No, he thought. Not even them. This is brand new.

The declining sun wasn’t a ball. It was a huge red bowtie shape with a burning circular center. The western sky was smeared as if with a thin film of blood that shaded to orange as it climbed. The horizon was almost invisible through that blurry glare.

“Good Christ, it’s like trying to look through a dirty windshield when you’re driving into the sun,” she said.

And of course that was it, only the Dome was the windshield. It had begun to collect dust and pollen. Pollutants as well. And it would get worse.

We’ll have to wash it, he thought, and visualized lines of volunteers with buckets and rags. Absurd. How were they going to wash it forty feet up? Or a hundred and forty? Or a thousand?

“This has to end,” she whispered. “Call them and tell them to shoot the biggest missile they can, and damn the consequences. Because this has to end.”

Barbie said nothing. Wasn’t sure he could have spoken even if he had something to say. That vast, dusty glare had stolen his words. It was like looking through a porthole into hell.

NYUCK-NYUCK-NYUCK

1

Jim Rennie and Andy Sanders watched the weird sunset from the steps of the Bowie Funeral Home. They were due at the Town Hall for another “Emergency Assessment Meeting” at seven o’clock, and Big Jim wanted to be there early to prepare, but for now they stood where they were, watching the day die its strange, smeary death.

“It’s like the end of the world.” Andy spoke in a low, awestruck voice.

“Bull-pucky!” Big Jim said, and if his voice was harsh—even for him—it was because a similar thought had been going through his own mind. For the first time since the Dome had come down, it had occurred to him that the situation might be beyond their ability to manage—his ability to manage—and he rejected the idea furiously. “Do you see Christ the Lord coming down from the sky?”

“No,” Andy admitted. What he saw were townspeople he’d known all his life standing in clumps along Main Street, not talking, only watching that strange sunset with their hands shading their eyes.

“Do you see me?” Big Jim persisted.

Andy turned to him. “Sure I do,” he said. Sounding perplexed. “Sure I do, Big Jim.”

“Which means I haven’t been Raptured,” Big Jim said. “I gave my heart to Jesus years ago, and if it was End Times, I wouldn’t be here. Neither would you, right?”

“Guess not,” Andy said, but he felt doubtful. If they were Saved—washed in the Blood of the Lamb—why had they just been talking to Stewart Bowie about shutting down what Big Jim called “our little business”? And how had they gotten into such a business to start with? What did running a meth factory have to do with being Saved?

If he asked Big Jim, Andy knew what the answer would be: the ends sometimes justify the means. The ends in this case had seemed admirable, once upon a time: the new Holy Redeemer Church (the old one had been little more than a clapboard shack with a wooden cross on top); the radio station that had saved only God knew how many souls; the ten percent they tithed—prudently, the contribution checks issued from a bank in the Cayman Islands—to the Lord Jesus Missionary Society, to help what Pastor Coggins liked to call “the little brown brothers.”

But looking at that huge blurry sunset that seemed to suggest all human affairs were tiny and unimportant, Andy had to admit those things were no more than justifications. Without the cash income from the meth, his drugstore would have gone under six years ago. The same with the funeral home. The same—probably, although the man beside him would never admit it—with Jim Rennie’s Used Cars.

“I know what you’re thinking, pal,” Big Jim said.

Andy looked up at him timidly. Big Jim was smiling… but not the fierce one. This one was gentle, understanding. Andy smiled back, or tried to. He owed Big Jim a lot. Only now things like the drugstore and Claudie’s BMW seemed a lot less important. What good was a BMW, even one with self-parking and a voice-activated sound system, to a dead wife?

When this is over and Dodee comes back, I’ll give the Beemer to her, Andy decided. It’s what Claudie would have wanted.