Deborah, Awake

By Rod Mills

Based on the biblical story of Judge Deborah, "Deborah Awake" is the account of a young Burger King manager, who was also a divorced mother of two, and how this unlikely woman brought down the billion dollar corporation, Chariots, inc. In her role as a teen Sunday school teacher at the behemoth 10,000 member Kedish Community Church, Deborah was alarmed at the unhealthy identification her students nurtured with the Chariots line of immodest apparel, their chain of 900 Chariot mall outlets coast to coast,and her Christian student's fascination with the immoral "Chariots The Magazine." To Deborah's astonishment, she learned that John Sisera, the manager of the local Chariots store, not only contributed heavily to the Kedish Community Church youth department, was good friends with Pastor Randy the youth minister, and that John Sisera was also a prominent member of the Kedish Community Church council. Senior Pastor Barrak was unaware of the vile philosophy of the Chariots corporation, and of John Sisera's heavy influence on Pastor Randy and the youth department. The Sisera's, in Barak's opinion, were a fine Kedish Community Church family, and was unconcerned with the moral storm brewing in the youth department. God called on Deborah to do something about it, and to recruit Pastor Barak in the Battle.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 29, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465353764

Book preview

Deborah, Awake

Rod Mills

Copyright © 2011 by Rod Mills.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2011915464

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4653-5375-7

                   Softcover                                 978-1-4653-5374-0

                   Ebook                                      978-1-4653-5376-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

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Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-one

Chapter Forty-two

Epilogue

Chapter One

No one knew how many members the church really had. It’s not that there were no counters—deacons loved to count people. The rub was that no one knew exactly who to count, or more precisely, who to uncount; the criteria was murky. Adding new members was not a problem—just showing up got you on someone’s list. But when, if ever, do we subtract? What about the deceased? They were, after all, alive somewhere. What about the brother who hadn’t warmed a pew since the Nixon administration, or the sister who came once to catch the Dale Evans concert and was never seen again, or the bag lady who only made it to potlucks?

Some suggested that the official membership list only consists of official members—those faithful few who had gone to membership orientation class and received the little, suitable-for-framing, certificate. Leadership bristled. Nobody goes to that anymore, leaves us with too low of a number. So the church council suggested counting everyone in attendance for the three Sunday morning worship services, plus Sunday school, Sunday evening worship, Tuesday cell groups, Wednesday evening fellowship, the Christmas pageant, Easter sunrise service, and Vacation Bible School. Let’s toss everyone in the mix whoever set foot on the property.

But counting the same person four or five times would give us an artificially high number.

So what? God likes big numbers!

Conceivably Kedish Community Church could boast of thirty thousand, maybe thirty-five thousand members, but with a parking lot of only 1,700 spaces, there’s the credibility problem. They finally settled on the nice round number of ten thousand members. Where that figure came from wasn’t clear, but in light of having three Sunday morning services in an auditorium that seated 3,300—11:00 AM always a capacity crowd, 9:00 and 10:00 AM about three-quarters full—a membership of ten thousand rolled off the tongue well. Also, the number ten thousand qualified the Kedish Community pastoral staff to participate in the rarified air of the super megachurch ministers’ conventions, as opposed to just the megachurch.

Sunday school at Kedish Community was held at 8:00, 9:00, and 10:00 AM, with the early classes the least attended. Deborah could expect thirty at her 8:00 AM teen class, while Pastor Randy, the Kedish Community youth minister, was usually SRO in his six-hundred-seat youth-group room at the 10:00 AM class.

Deborah always arrived early, first to give the seats a shot of Pledge before running off lesson copies in the Christian education office. She set Bibles out—nice Bibles, not the plethora of defaced and coverless Bibles, and made sure the dry-erase pens were full, and cleaned the whiteboard. The young woman would review her lesson plan—though she never came to class without knowing it cold—and then settled in for a half hour of prayer.

Deborah’s fellow 8:00 AM teachers were friendly enough, they didn’t dislike her, but over the months since being given her own class, there never developed a bond, no esprit de corps. The buzz Deborah heard was she was standoffish. This distressed her, and she wanted to prove otherwise, but she’d have to give up her morning prep time to join the other teachers at the espresso kiosk in the church foyer, something she was unwilling to do. Deborah was free after church, but the sanctuary and campus was a ghost town five minutes after the final amen at noon.

At 8:05 AM Deborah greeted the sleepy-eyed teenagers by name as they plopped into empty seats. Few greeted their teacher back. Before getting the nod to take her own class, Deborah was an assistant in Pastor Randy’s huge 10:00 AM class—kids were just as sleepy eyed then too. The 8:00 AM classes, Deborah discovered, were usually attended by families that wanted to get church out of the way—shame to let church screw up my day of rest, now I can haul the boat out to the lake.

Kedish Community Church had a credo, a doctrine of youth evangelism that leaders preached to the teachers with the same conviction that they might declare the virgin birth or the efficacy of Christ’s atonement. It is a sin to bore a kid was viewed on a par with Holy Writ and was reinforced at the monthly teachers’ meetings with group chants and testimonials. Pastor Randy even put the words to song and was always eager to lead the charge with a few rounds of the catchy ditty. To preserve the message, leadership gave teachers sticky-back notepads with It is a sin to bore a kid printed along the bottom, plus pens, plexiglass paperweights, wristwatches, and ceramic coffee mugs.

Throughout Deborah’s tenure as an assistant, she bought into that philosophy and was a vocal proponent of don’t bore a kid. However, as a teacher in her own right, she found that it bogged down in translation—the very thing that entertained a kid last week was cattle fodder the next. It was an ever-stressful, never-ending pursuit to come up with something more crazy, and outlandish week after week after week.

Some teachers, Deborah discovered, were gifted in it. Not her. The previous 8:00 AM teen teacher—she was eventually rewarded with a promotion to 9:00 AM—knew how to keep kids boredom-free and garnered much praise from leadership, as well as the youth. Scavenger hunts! The previous teacher developed scavenger hunts into an art form—kids loved ’em and never, ever called her boring.

Generally during Sunday school, the other teen teacher restricted scavenger hunting to clipping pictures from magazines using blunt-edged scissors borrowed from the primary class, though it was not uncommon to see her teenagers poking around the halls, classrooms, even the sanctuary in search of booty during regular church hours. The teacher especially bloomed when she unleashed the kids on the City of Kedish, usually on Friday or Saturday evening youth nights. One particular scavenger hunt required the use of digital cameras. The kids were divided into teams of four and given different lists of things to photograph around town. The first team returning to the church with their list accomplished and with accompanying photographic proof was awarded the latest CD by the Christian rock band Jak-Rip.

The list of requirements differed from team to team. One team’s list, say, would require a snapshot of a female member kissing the bronze statue of King David on the lips, the one out front of the seminary. Another might require a male member to pose in lingerie at the Walmart women’s department—fully clothed, of course, this was a Christian youth outing after all.

On one particular Friday evening, one of the teams was given the task of finding a Laundromat and photographing a member inside a clothes dryer. Snap! Hey, that was easy enough. Then, just to keep from getting bored, the team dropped a couple of quarters in with the kid still inside. One of the more conscientious members thought it the Christlike thing to turn the thermostat to low first. Then, cameras poised, they pressed the start button on the dryer. Awesome, we’ll take his picture upside down! Unfortunately the joyride went nowhere. Oh crap, man! Turned out the kid was too heavy, and the tumbler just sat there. After burning up the motor, shredding the fan belt, bending the main shaft, and cracking the bearing casing, the four crusaders got bored and went on to the next item.

The kids were recognized and reported—it wasn’t hard, the entire team wore their matching Kedish Community Church Youth Group T-shirts. Pastor Randy was presented with a bill for $1,700. He smiled. Money well spent! The kids weren’t bored. Glory to Jesus.

Deborah’s regulars had nearly all trickled in, some were chatting, others catching a few more zzz’s, and the woman was about ready to start class. Then Destiny walked in, and Deborah did a double take at her outfit. Destiny, not a top-heavy fourteen-year-old, was still able to squeeze a goodly show of cleavage from her low-cut tank top—butterfly tattoo and all. The garment also extended a full two inches above her navel, revealing a gold belly button stud. Embroidered on the tank top, across the left breast, was a half-inch logo of an old Roman chariot.

Deborah quietly took the girl aside and whispered, Did your mother know you wore that this morning?

Chomping gum, rolling her eyes, and looking bored, the chatty girl said, Yeah, so?

It’s not appropriate for church, Destiny… really, I don’t think it’s appropriate anywhere. Still whispering, she said, Please put a sweater on or cover up with something.

Shouting back and drawing attention that wasn’t there before, Destiny said, It’s too hot, I break out. Is that what you want?

Deborah reached over to the box of Kedish Community Church Youth Group T-shirts, searched for an XL, and whispered, Slip this on, Destiny, it’ll be loose against your skin.

Oh gawd! the girl shouted. My skin needs air or I break out and I have to go to the hospital. Is that what you want? You want me to die?

Please put it on, Destiny.

Oh gawd! This is so retarded! For the remainder of class, when Destiny wasn’t sulking, she let Deborah know how boring she was.

After class, after the last student filed out and Deborah began picking up her room—returning Bibles to the cupboard and clearing paper scraps, spitballs, and Skittles from the floor—there was a light knock on the open door. Deborah looked up; standing there was Dr. Heller, the Christian education director. Before Deborah could extend a greeting, he walked in and closed the door. I just spoke with Destiny’s mother. She’s understandably upset with what happened in your class this morning.

Why did she go to you, Dr. Heller, instead of speaking with me? Deborah knew exactly why Destiny’s mother went to the CE director, but she let it go; besides, the man ignored the question.

She said you called Destiny a whore.

Deborah’s eyebrows shot up. "She said that?’

The man nodded and continued, You said that she wasn’t raising her daughter correctly.

Deborah just listened.

Destiny doesn’t want to come to church anymore.

Why?

She said you were boring.

Boring?

More than one youth in your class has told me that.

Deborah simply folded her arms across her chest.

"Destiny’s mother confided in me that her daughter suffers from clinical low-ego complex, she’s taking medication for it, and that she does everything she can to raise Destiny’s self-esteem."

That so.

The girl needs encouragement and praise, Deborah. That’s what church is for. Destiny shouldn’t have to fear public ridicule and humiliation. When you make a youth stand out, they feel ashamed. That’s not the role of a Sunday school teacher at Kedish Community.

Silence. Deborah stared at the man as he stared at her.

I realize that you’re new at this, Deborah, and relatively inexperienced, but when Pastor Randy said you were ready for your own class, we followed his recommendation. Dr. Heller suddenly turned on doelike eyes. Why didn’t you come for me, Deborah, if there was a situation you couldn’t handle?

I didn’t know where you were, Dr. Heller. Besides, I thought I did handle it.

Running youth off, Deborah, IS NOT handling it.

Her clothing was dishonoring to the Lord and to Kedish Community Church. Destiny was also a distraction to others. As Deborah took a deep breath to continue, the CE director cut her off.

The Lord is not concerned with a person’s particular mode of dress. He’s only interested in the heart, and we at Kedish Community have never judged people by their clothing. The CE director paused for effect. I thought you understood that, Deborah.

Yes, Dr. Heller, I understand, but—

The man interrupted again. "Destiny’s mother also explained that her daughter has a skin condition. She breaks out in a rash if covered with too many layers of clothing. As a teacher, you need to be aware of those things, Deborah. Show a little compassion. Remember WWJD? What would Jesus do? He would reach out in love. Heller gave the woman a benign smile. Did you stop to say a silent prayer for Destiny’s skin condition?"

Dr. Heller, last Sunday morning it was nippy, and Destiny came to class bundled like an Eskimo. She doesn’t have a skin problem, it’s a power game she plays.

The benign smile screwed into a frown. Are you a dermatologist, Deborah?

No, sir.

Then don’t act like one. The CE director gave the room a stealthy glance to the left and right as though someone might be listening. He lowered his voice. There is something you should be aware of, Deborah. When you signed on to teach Sunday school, you put yourself inside a fishbowl. Jesus’s words about the speck in someone else’s eye when there’s a beam in your own has special significance to people like you.

Oh?

There was concern about giving the 8:00 AM class to a divorced woman—not just a little concern either. The vote was slim.

Deborah’s hands dropped to her side. I didn’t realize that.

I’ll have to bring up this incident at tomorrow morning’s pastors’ meeting.

What will happen, Dr. Heller?

"I don’t know. They may recommend that we chalk it up to inexperience—that you acted hastily as rookies are prone to do. In that case a letter of reprimand will be sent to you, and a copy permanently filed in my office; and unless we see a pattern of impropriety, the matter will be forgotten.

Deborah nodded.

They may also say that you were promoted to full-teacher status prematurely and that you need to put in more time as an assistant.

How long would that be?

The man laughed, as though the answer was obvious. That’s completely up to you, Deborah. He paused and then continued. However, in status-reduction cases, it’s always for a minimum of two years. Deborah unconsciously folded her arms over her chest again and cast a glance at the floor. Dr. Heller continued. "There is also the chance that after prayerful consideration, and it is determined that teaching wasn’t your calling, the staff will recommend that you pray about another ministry."

Deborah looked up. Another ministry?

Like kitchen ministry or work at the bookstore. We always need parking lot attendants, Deborah, or take a shift at the espresso kiosk.

The woman closed her eyes.

Regardless, Deborah, if that’s how the spirit leads the pastoral staff, you will immediately be removed from further classroom consideration.

The woman looked up and jutted her head forward. Will I be allowed to address the pastoral staff?

The man shook his head. That won’t be necessary, Deborah. I suggest that after church today, just go home, prepare next week’s lesson like nothing happened, and you will be notified of our decision.

The woman nodded.

Remember, Deborah, we love you, and we pray for you.

Thanks.

Chapter Two

The children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord . . . and the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin, the king of Canaan . . . and the children of Israel cried unto the Lord, for Jabin had 900 chariots of iron, and mightily oppressed the children of Israel.

—Judges 4:1–3

Jabin Z. King, seventy-two, had no intentions of retiring, ever. The man never had so much fun and wanted to ride this wave of euphoria forever. King had been in the garment industry most of his adult life. The first forty years as a sales rep for several leading sportswear manufacturers, and he always managed to earn himself a six-figure income—that was back when only Joe Namath and President Nixon earned six figures.

Jabin King was very close to his first million-dollar year when he decided he didn’t want to be a sales rep anymore. The man did not want a bigger salary, he wanted a bigger universe, a place where he was its god. To do that he needed cash, lots of it; so forty years ago he mortgaged his home, sold off securities, and gave up his expensive hobby of playing in the options market. King loved options, not necessarily for the frequent windfall, but he was addicted to the rush—he claimed it was deeper than casino action, and more intense than sex. Then after borrowing any spare dime an investment bank would scrape up, the future god set out creating his version of the heavens and the earth. He had read in the Bible that when YHWH completed his work, he called it good. Jabin Z. King called his creation Chariots.

A history buff, also one who appreciated a good Charlton Hesston film, Jabin King knew that thousands of years ago, back when conventional warfare consisted of slings, arrows, and spears, it was the nation that had the chariots—those dreadful iron chariots—that were the armies that razed the ancient boundaries, tore down city walls, and ran through the elders at the gate. The conquering chariots also rewrote history books, enthroned new princes, and established new languages for the vanquished. King realized that the onslaught of the merciless iron chariot precipitated every new age. It was the choice of the war gods and, without doubt, the same weapon that had served Jabin Z. King well.

As founder, chairman of the board, as well as CEO of Chariots Incorporated, Jabin King controlled one of the nation’s largest retail chains of sports apparel for men and women. The nine hundred stores, located coast to coast plus Hawaii and Alaska, were in malls. King freely admitted to his admirers that much of his success came from adopting the mall strategy.

The world changed tremendously in King’s lifetime. The old venues of socialization for his customer base—mostly teenagers—were no longer the park, the ball diamond, Ye Olde Malt Shoppe, the library, the skating rink, or even at home. Teenagers flocked to malls as though driven by an unseen force to Mecca. What their affinity to the malls were King had no idea. He also didn’t care—he’d build a store on Mt. Fuji if that’s where his customers went with Mom and Dad’s credit card.

King’s investment returned a thousandfold, and when he was at the stage of life when most billionaires stepped back from the fray to spend more time at their foundation or to purchase a professional football team, King pressed ahead. The man never stopped learning about this industry he so thoroughly dominated. He began to envision another enterprise, one that was completely unrelated to the rag trade and yet if done correctly could prove symbiotic and would provide a synergism that could boost both businesses into the stratosphere.

It was from that inspiration that he gave birth to Chariots, the magazine—a monthly periodical devoted to affirming today’s teenager with timely and authoritative articles on contemporary living. Even in the embryonic stage, King envisioned Chariots, the magazine to be a surrogate parent. Surveys told him that teenagers did not trust their parents or attribute them with a very high IQ. Truth or fiction, it didn’t matter to Jabin King, because Chariots, the magazine, set out answering questions that Mom and Dad were either unable to answer or felt their children had no business asking. King expected resistance, and before the first issue was published, he hired a public relations firm to counter any fallout—stuff like undermining parental prerogatives and usurping their authority. King was surprised, however, when no protests surfaced and was delighted to fire that expensive public relations firm. Further surveys showed that parents didn’t care what their children read—Hey, if a magazine can keep my kid off the street and away from drugs, it must be good! Besides, they’re reading and not watching the tube, that must be good too!

Another study done by King’s researchers showed that teenagers were loathe to read. Editors got the word to keep articles short and written with nothing higher than a third-grade vocabulary. When even that stretched the energy of his readers, King experimented with large colorful type fonts, plus lots and lots of cartoons on every page.

King set high standards for the girls who adorned the cover of his magazine—she had to be famous, beautiful, and thin, nothing else really mattered. Usually it was some current actress, recording artist, supermodel, and always in a Chariots garment. King liked to tout his cover girls as role models. An in-depth interview—one hundred to two hundred words—always brought out the woman’s nobler traits, like her current live-in was a member of Greenpeace or that she used ethanol in her Ferrari.

Monthly feature columns in Chariots include the following:

Threadbare: A look at what’s hot and what’s really hot in fashion and swimwear, and a spotlight on the latest Chariots apparel.

Shading the Truth: Articles on cosmetics of every color that can make the real you irresistible to your crush.

Dear Tess: Twenty-two-year-old Teresa Van Hoff answers letters from teenagers about dating and sex and gives advice about dealing with difficult parents, teachers, and other overbearing authority figures.

House Calls: Straightforward, no-nonsense information from a panel of medical experts about abortion, contraceptives, venereal disease, and AIDS.

Trim!: Helpful tips for taking it off and keeping it off through vegetarian and Middle Eastern diets, X-TREME fasting, plus advice about your prescription diet pills and tricks for managing your anorexia and bulimia so it doesn’t get out of hand.

In the Spirit: Wicca witch Wanda Golden-Raven discusses how today’s teen can honor the goddess, cast spells, and start her own coven on a shoestring. She also presents articles on psychic phenomena, ghosts, and reincarnation.

Jabin Z. King was a proponent of progressive societal evolution. He may have even coined the phrase. At any rate, it made him a lot of money, and as long as it worked, he’s sticking with it. Nuclear to this explosive doctrine was the understanding that society, like a good chardonnay, grew better with age. Minds grew sharper, the soul became richer, and one’s understanding of the world became wiser. Basically, maturity was a naturally occurring phenomena, no instructions needed. Every issue of Chariots, the magazine—well, every article in one way or another—let its young readers know that by virtue of simply being the latest crop to set foot on terra firma, they were automatically the most qualified to live life exactly as they wanted.

Jabin Z. King told his readers they were smart. Right on! He told them they were mature. Cool! He pounded into their heads that what was right for them was right, period. Awesome! King assured them that they were independent thinkers and limited only by their untapped imagination. But because King also was convinced that his readers ran on a low tank, his magazine became a smorgasbord of lifestyles and values, bewitching his readers to load up their plate and partake. Reading a Chariots magazine was like a romp through a magical wonderland where every wish came true.

Jabin King was a student of advertising, and he especially admired the market share Marlboro cigarettes lassoed in the ’60s and ’70s. Marlboro was the brand of the nation’s youth. Why? Was it because they found them to be such a doggone tasty smoke? Huh? Probably not. There was another reason, the Marlboro Man. The youth wanted to be like him, especially in his rugged, and at the time, unconventional fur-lined brushed leather jacket. He also wore a mustache—mustaches in the ’60s still carried the outlaw aura. People on the fringe of convention wore mustaches. There was a reason Roy Rogers was clean-shaven. The Marlboro Man rode a horse, not a Chevrolet, and was always out on the untamed range, not in a classroom or on Wall Street or even on a Detroit assembly line. The Marlboro Man was the consummate independent thinker. Nobody told him what to do, he lived life for himself. He was the person to be like.

The genius stroke behind the Marlboro campaign defied logic. The establishment spent millions giving youth the Marlboro Man, yet youth smoked Marlboros because it was the antiestablishment thing to do—go figure. Of course, nobody said that was why they smoked Marlboros, but enough did to make Phillip-Morris a really great stock in your portfolio.

Jabin Z. King’s demi mondaine wasn’t a cowboy, but a simple half-inch embroidered profile of an ancient Roman chariot sewn prominently on every Chariots garment. That tiny icon, however, was much more than the sum of its parts. Unraveled, it was just a short length of thread, worth much less than a penny. Attached, however, the thread became gold and transformed an ordinary four-buck shirt into an eighty-dollar relic and proclaimed lofty notions about the teenager who wore it—ecce homo, ecce vates, behold the man, behold the prophet! The logo was raw status.

Of course, nobody said they bought Chariots garments for status. Chariots customers were too smart for that, King told them so. King told his young customers that they were the most informed consumers on the planet. They believed him too. That’s why thousands of times every day teenagers drove right past Walmart, K-Mart, Target, Mervyns, and Penny’s to one of the nine hundred Chariots mall locations and paid eight times the price for one of Jabin Z. King’s shirts. Sure, the logo is cool; but hey, I’m no trend junkie, I think for myself. I buy Chariots for the high thread count, and it came in my favorite color, white!

The cross of Christianity is an emblem that represents two thousand years of complex but necessary theological discussion and doctrinal opinion about God, man, and breaching the chasm between them—there’s a lot behind those two simple sticks. Likewise the Chariots logo was the simple, tangible expression of a religious order—a religion of self, where Jabin Z. King clearly defined the essence of self to his readers.

A Christian understands his nature as sinful, and only after redemption by the Son of God is he filled with power from on high and commanded to live his life as the child of his creator that the cross reconciled him with.

The god of Chariots had it a bit different. Teenagers were fine just the way they were; in fact, they’re better than all generations that preceded them. They knew things that nobody else knew and were bestowed with power from within. Jabin King also wanted his teenage readers to believe that they were the first to discover sex, and like Christopher Columbus, King told them to exploit their rightful share of spoils from their New World.

The Chariots logo said it all, and though teenagers couldn’t quite put in words what they heard the logo say, it didn’t matter to King as long as his readers felt the message—like the enchanting rapture after a nice dream, or the ambrosia that conferred everlasting beauty, youth, and power. Really, the Chariots logo was a spell, and those who fell under it became a god. Cool!

King’s modus docendi was to promote, promote, promote the Chariots logo to the widest audience, in the most cost-effective manner. He did studies. Billboards dotting America’s interstates on average cost $500 per month—that’s $6,000 per year, and $18,000 over three years. Full-page spreads in major magazines could easily push fifty grand for a single issue. Sixty-second spots on hit TV shows ran in the hundreds of thousands. King thought he could do better than that.

Though the Chariots Corporation could easily afford a high-profile ad campaign, Jabin King would rather keep the loot, load his girlfriends into his Gulf Stream series 2 jet—G-2 he was fond of calling the beauty—and fly off to Monaco for the weekend.

King’s first major advertising coup came in the 1980s when computers became household items, also when both public and private schools proposed to make their students computer literate. When he learned that schools usually didn’t have the money to equip a computer lab, King began paving a wide boulevard to his target audience. Mr. Principal, Madam Superintendent, Chariots Corporation would be honored to give your students a leg up on the twenty-first century.

King contracted directly with manufacturers in China to purchase boatloads of computers for about three hundred dollars apiece. These units were equipped with a Chariots logo screensaver and programmed to come on after thirty seconds of keyboard inactivity instead of the usual five minutes. Also, the screensaver was next to impossible to change—one needed a specially tooled star driver and a soldering gun. There was also a plastic inlaid Chariots logo for the keyboard and monitor case. The unit was also equipped with a special keyboard function, Alt + C, and the budding computer scientist could adorn his schoolwork with a Chariots logo.

Though King never visited any school that received his computers—and there were thousands across the country—he was assured by his associates that it was a glorious sight to behold a classroom illuminated with forty thirteen-inch Chariots logos.

Jabin King found it amusing that when he occasionally spent fifty thousand dollars for a quarter-page single-issue printing of the Chariots logo in the New York Times he was viewed as a ruthless capitalist. But when he spent three hundred bucks for practically the same size logo to burn its image into the mind of a hapless teenager—not for one day, but a minimum of three years—local school boards and state boards of education made him man of the year. King also received more than a few letters of thanks from state governors.

Public schools, simply through their sheer numbers, received the lion’s share of the free computers—personally Jabin King was a proponent of public education. He felt that it offered the students more opportunity for much needed socialization. However, Chariots Corporation maintained an open minded and religiously tolerant distribution policy. As soon as a request came in from some Saint Mary’s Parochial School or a Trinity Christian Academy or even the Holbrook Family Home School, like clockwork computers were sent out. How many do you need?

King ordered routine site inspections of his computers—you bet he did—and they were always unannounced. An attractive, slender twenty-ish woman attired in Chariots apparel would just pop over. Hi, I was in the neighborhood. Just wanted to make sure everything was okie dokie. Really she didn’t have a clue how to fix anything if there was a malfunction; her job was to see if the screensavers were monkeyed with. More than a few schools were caught each year, all summarily bled dry with lawsuits.

One year a television network president approached Jabin Z. King. They had won the bid for next year’s Super Bowl, and he told King they’d like to have Chariots as a sponsor. Imagine the prestige of being on the Super Bowl with fifty million viewers!

How much?

A million dollars, plus production costs, figure another million. I know you’ll want to do it right.

King then did some figuring. He knew that most of that fifty million audience would either be in the bathroom, the kitchen, or out back shooting hoops because it was a lousy game. He’d be lucky to have fourteen million viewers, and of those only a fraction would have the remotest knowledge of Chariots—they wouldn’t get the ad. That would cost him two million dollars for a sixty-second commercial on the Super Bowl. On the other hand, King just bought eight thousand computers for a little under two million dollars. Those computers would have a daily captive audience of 56,000 students—or fourteen million viewers for the school year. King had to smile, those fourteen million prime Chariots consumers would be exposed to the intoxicating aphrodisiac of the Chariots logo not for sixty-seconds, rather for fifty-five minutes a day, five days a week, for nine months. Studies showed that the average commercial must be repeated six times before the viewer will grasp the message. Ad executives call that domination—don’t waste money with spotty coverage. Dominate! Dominate! Dominate! An advertiser must dominate a time segment—get the message to the same people over and over again.

To Jabin King’s satisfaction, Chariots was doing that with textbook precision through his school computers. He looked up at the network president. The numbers don’t add up for me, sorry. Any chance of getting me some tickets anyway?

King told his customer base that Chariots realized that back-to-school was a difficult transition for students—you know, leaving those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer, meeting new teachers and friends, and settling into the classroom grind. Actually Jabin King had no idea if back-to-school was a difficult transition, he never had any problem as a kid, but everybody believed him—students, teachers, administration, parents, holy crap what a difficult transition this is! and it opened another window for King to evangelize his congregation. So when the Chariots Corporation, with the permission of school districts across the country, gave out tens of thousands of back-to-school packets to ease the trauma of back-to-school, King’s concern was applauded. Chariots really loves me!

The packets were heavy-duty vinyl tote bags printed with the Chariots logo on both sides and chock-full of back-to-school essentials—discounts on cell phones and cell phone paraphernalia, 2-for-1 video game rentals, credit card applications, and student discounts on new cars (providing Mom and Dad cosign). There were also condoms, samples of spray foam spermicidal, an array of cosmetic and perfume samples, and discounts on Lasik and plastic surgery.

At first the back-to-school packets were written off as an advertising expense, but it soon became a nice income generator as noncompeting companies paid a premium to have their particular goodies included. Since King let students, administrators, and parents know that nothing important was supposed to happen the first day of school—in some districts they stretched it out the first week—the packet always included the latest issue of Chariots magazine to keep kids from getting bored in class.

King was a staunch proponent of high school sports. Publicly King lauded the strong mind, strong body approach to education. Behind closed doors, however, King doubted that few of his teenage customers were bright enough to ever advance beyond truck-lumper or warehouse worker, and that they’d starve without a strong body. Go team!

The fall halftime shows were a made-to-order celebration for the great promoter, and Jabin Z. King took full advantage advancing the Chariots cause. On any given Friday night, on 817 high school football fields across the nation, the halftime highlight was when one of King’s life-size Roman chariot replicas was pulled out to the fifty-yard line, usually toting some campus luminary like the homecoming queen or the costumed school mascot.

King never charged a dime to use one of his state-of-the-art fiberglass chariots, and there was always a waiting list—schools needing a chariot on a specific date had to make their request a year in advance. Those ancient weapons of mass destruction were lightweight and hand-pulled, though some booster clubs attached the chariots to riding lawnmowers. This was discouraged as more than one football field inadvertently found itself with a forty-two-inch swath between the goalpost and the fifty-yard line at the start of the second half.

Long before delivery of a fiberglass chariot, local school officials signed a waiver releasing the Chariots Corporation from liability. Mishaps were bound to happen, the most frequent was when one of the chariot pullers—usually a cheerleader, booster club member, or student body officer—was drunk. They tended to slip and get run over by a chariot wheel. Sometimes the passenger tumbled out the back for the same reason, and just giggled their way out to the fifty-yard line on foot.

The school also agreed for the public address announcer to read, verbatim, the following script twice—first when the chariot enters the playing field, and again when it exits: Silver Lake High School thanks the Chariots Corporation for the generous use of their full-scale replica of an ancient iron chariot, and for adding to the evening’s festivities. Chariots reminds all students to stay in school, go to college, and keep off drugs. If the PA announcer forgot to do the script and graciously thank Chariots—spotters were always present to monitor compliance—a team of lawyers ungraciously made everyone connected to the school rue that omission for the rest of their natural lives.

Chariots headquarters occupied the six top floors of a fifty-story Madison Avenue high rise. Two-thirds of the forty-seventh floor was the Chariots in-house legal department, where thirty-one lawyers and forty paralegals protected Jabin Z. King from the most insidious type of criminal mind ever to plague civilization—copyright bootleggers. King, being a patient man, realized that men had their weaknesses, their soft links, their besetting sins. Murder, rape, incest—hey, come on, give the guy a break! But you’ve crossed the line when it came to brand encroachment. His team of crack copyright attorneys vigorously prosecuted all unauthorized logo reproduction. Since Chariots never had, and never will have, licensed second-party franchisees, it was easy to spot a fake—they all were fake. The only exception, the only exception, was the kid who posted a Chariots logo on his term paper with the Alt + C stroke.

The legal team was ruthless, and they didn’t just go after the large, sophisticated black-marketers, but the kid in crafts class or the old hippie who screen printed in his garage better duck too. In many countries there was no trademark protection, and well-financed brand pirates shipped containers of hundreds of thousands of illegal Chariots garments into the United States. Manufacturers in China, mainly sweatshops and prisons, could turn out a completed shirt with embroidered logo for about forty cents—an excellent acquisition for the bootlegger, but because of low wages some Chinese laborer probably didn’t sit down to a dinner of veal picatta and a glass of chablis that evening.

The favorite dumping ground for these unauthorized reproductions were flea markets, where the forty-cent copies were sold at a fraction of what they cost at the Chariots mall store—$80 to $200 for the real thing, twenty bucks for the fake. Retaliation was swift, and raids were sweeping. Chariots gave no warning, no cease-and-desist, no nothing, before a highly trained army moved in with SWAT team efficiency to confiscate everything bearing the Chariots logo. When asked about these strong-arm tactics, Jabin King always replied with something he picked up from Major League Baseball. Chariots customers expect authenticity. These were fake, and we couldn’t sit idly by while our customers got ripped off with counterfeits.

Settled comfortably behind his desk in the fourteen-room, eight-and-a-half-million-dollar Trump