by Dorian Valentine

A year ago, my father passed from hepatitis, leaving behind my poor, grieving mother—and me, not precisely grieving—to sort through his belongings. The house was the same, only there seemed to be more of it: stacks of Bibles and portraits upon portraits of Mary and her baby, Jesus. It took weeks for the two of us to sift through his study, and there was still the storage locker and everything else he’d hoarded over the years, towering high over my mother’s head. In the end, he’d forced me to shove everything into a U-Haul and drag myself back to St. George, just like he’d promised.

That Christmas, my stout mother, bundled in all sorts of sweaters and shawls, climbed into my Bronco. We navigated not-yet-icy roads, parking in the handicapped spot just as the church bells rang. When I was young, it had been surrounded by a towering cornfield. Now, however, it was a clean-cut dust bowl.

 I helped my mother and her walker up the creaking stairs and into a pew, where I hunkered down like G.I. Joe. We sat in line with other seasoned veterans, filling the church with families of four, six, eight, and ten—girls I’d known before the whispers of my defecting.

Pastor Major meandered through the aisles, and I began compiling our grocery list: eggs, butter, pecans, sugar, flour, cranberry sauce, corn …

“Corn!”

I froze, wondering if a vengeful holy spirit had orchestrated a miracle, damning me and my groceries to the scrutiny of the pastor and a hundred fainting goats in flannel. While it was more rational to assume I’d just misheard, I still found myself peeking over the pew in fright.

But to my disbelief, he pressed on about corn. “Beware the kernels of temptation,” he warned. “For the harvest reaps only moral ruin!” The pastor insisted we were amid a spiritual famine and that every bite of buttered cob was a bite from the Devil’s banquet. To me, it seemed absurd to get hung up on something so inconsequential as corn.

But there would be no corn at the potluck that night, only body and wine and gossip of the pastor’s daughter having run off to join the corn industry. I said, “What’s the big deal? It’s just corn.”

My mother smacked my arm.

In the following months, people began treating it like pork but with a zeal that pork had never inspired. For some, their dedication transcended mere observance, picketing at the farmer’s market and proudly brandishing signs like “REJECT THE COB, EMBRACE THE CROSS” and “SOW FAITH.” On the other hand, I watched teenagers hurriedly stuff their skinny jeans with packages of baby corn while merchants turned their backs.

Every time I turned my back, The Corn Hub stand seemed to swell, along with the sea of picket signs and the crowd. I wasn’t pro- or anti-corn—I just wanted my groceries.

On Sundays, mothers exchanged mortified whispers about teenagers tangled in cornfields and vegetables hidden beneath their beds, and I told my mother it sounded like a balanced diet. She might’ve done more than chastise me for my comments if I weren’t her only ride to church.

By late spring, it felt like we talked about corn more than Jesus; it was to such an extent that I would jump at the mention of a second coming. Yet, if I’m honest, part of me grew as eager as my mother to attend mass. Listening to them rant about corn felt like watching a car crash, and I found guilty pleasure in the sense of superiority my silent mocking brought me.

 I started going to the ladies’ sewing circles, even though I’d never sewn a stitch, just to eavesdrop without the scrutiny of my elderly mother. While I learned to baste blood-stained blocks, I engrossed myself in the gossip of grandmothers, who told outrageous stories of husbands who broke their covenants and ran off to live and work in the Corn Hub cornfields. Barbara even claimed that those who hadn’t strayed suffered from erectile dysfunction after going to the Corn Hub just once. Susan said, “No, it fell off!” I would nod my head and bite back the tickle in my throat.

I overheard even stranger rumors at the farmer’s market, listening to teenagers insisting they spotted symbols in The Corn Hub’s fields. Instead of the healthcare crisis, this is what made headlines, sparked a local crisis, and compelled politicians to take a stance. There were anti-corn and pro-corn politicians. Some revolved their entire campaigns around denouncing corn—promising to bring down “the business burgeoning on the backs of broken families.” They organized rallies and protests outside The Corn Hub, made speeches, and donated to Fight The New Drug. Yet, those same politicians were often found with silos registered in their names and receipts for popcorn at the movie theater.

My mother asked who I would vote for in November, and I said I would have to consult an almanac.

By fall, my enthusiasm for attending church had waned. Fewer and fewer lobotomized attendees returned, and I heard whispers that some had even stopped going to work. As for those who did attend regularly, the church had become a foil hat teepee. My mother, who had grown hesitant to leave the house outside of church and insisted on constant news coverage, which sounded more like Home, Lawn, and Gardening nowadays, was included in this.

Although I still found the pastor’s sermons amusing, they had become increasingly difficult to digest over time, making less and less sense, especially since they had never made much sense to begin with. Still, the old pastor staggered up and down the aisles like a drunk until one day, in the midst of slurring his sermon, pink puree began oozing from his ears onto the red carpet, and he dropped dead. Later, when going through his belongings, they found he’d been buying bushels of corn with the tithes.

As a result, the church was covered with signs announcing a TEMPORARY CLOSURE, at least until they could find a replacement for the pastor. While I hadn’t anticipated the pastor’s death, I expected to see the signs eventually, given how much the church had deteriorated under a pastor preoccupied with something as absurd as corn.

Since my mother couldn’t attend church anymore, she settled into my father’s empty study, surrounded by her votive candles and rosaries. In the center, she’d sit with the posters and planks I’d picked up from the store, scribbling on them with permanent markers, the inky fumes of which would ward away any evil spirit.

She prayed twice a day, sometimes more, and insisted that we pray over all our meals. The rosary wrapped around her palm would leave sores. I would sit next to her recliner as she followed the news. Then she would squeeze my hand tightly in her unsteady, spindly fingers.

I would head to the farmer’s market on Saturdays, where the shambling crowd grew increasingly sparse. But that Saturday, my mother nailed herself to the door and forbade me from going. I insisted, exasperated, that it was just the market; I wouldn’t buy corn. But then she began to cry, and suddenly, it wasn’t funny anymore. I didn’t know this then, but that would be my last conversation with my mother.

On November twenty-fifth, I woke to the TV humming softly in an empty room — my mother and her orthopedic shoes gone without a word. The sun had not yet risen, but I put on my slippers and hopped into my Bronco. I didn’t know where I was going, but some quiet instinct led me down deserted roads through an eerily silent town and dropped me in the cornfield.

I climbed out of the Bronco but didn’t call for her. Something deep inside me said it was too late, so I walked silently down the gardened paths, past rows of weathered tents, burlap sacks, and sickles. I stopped at the crop circle’s edge, where everyone I’d ever known stood motionless with picket signs gathered between the clipped lines of a pentagram.

The overhead light illuminated their faces against the twilight as they gazed upwards. My mother was at the edge of the crowd, and with empty eyes like the pastor, I knew she was no longer my mother. She turned her back to me and joined the crowd, staring up at the lamp, and like moths to a flame, I watched them float away.