Behold All the Dwellers Upon Earth

By John A. Merullo

He keeps these powers to himself until he meets Sarah, who has similar, but lesser, abilities. They eventually marry and have four children. The Brimmer children all have these powers at some level, but David and James-William have the greatest of all. They know things. They can understand and do things no one else can. Nathan enters local politics and seems to have a great career ahead of him. David and James-William can see a disaster looming that they know their father can prevent. They guide him onto the national political stage to help correct many injustices in the country and stop the horror they foresee. Religious and LGBTQ themes are also explored, as is the importance of both family of origin and family of choice. Behold All the Dwellers Upon Earth is the first book in The Brimmerverse series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 5, 2023
• ISBN: 9798350913200

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Behold All the Dwellers Upon Earth

Book One of The Brimmerverse

©2023 by John A. Merullo

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 the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

ISBN: 979-8-35091-319-4

ISBN eBook: 979-8-35091-320-0

Please visit us online at:

Web: brimmerverse.com

Facebook: @brimmerverse

Instagram: @brimmerverse

For George, Tony, Max (RIP), Daniel, and John

The five people to whom I have said:

If you did not exist it would be necessary to invent you.

You are all Extraordinary.

Contents

Preface

Safely Brought Us to the Beginning

The Hearts of Parents to the Children

So Fill Our Imaginations

That He May Dwell in Us and We in Him

Pride, Vainglory, and Hypocrisy

So to Rule the Hearts

Inquiring and Discerning

Grant to Them Even Now Glimpses

Let My Prayer Be Set Forth in Thy Sight

Things Which Were Cast Down Are Being Raised Up

Manifold and Great Mercies

Whose Never-Failing Providence Ordereth All Things

This Good Land for Our Heritage

The Ministries of Angels and Men

Raising Up Among Us Faithful Servants

Give Rest to the Weary

Remember Thy Servant

The Race That Is Set Before Us

Unto Whom All Hearts Are Open

Greet with Joy

All Such Have Erred

Laborers into Thy Harvest

From Whom No Secrets Are Hid

Who Settest the Solitary in Families

In Confidence Shall Be Our Strength

Keep This Nation Under Thy Care

You Have Called Your Servant to Stand in Your House

The Yearly Remembrance

That We All May Be One

Guide Us in the Way of Justice and Truth

Make Thy Chosen People Joyful

Draw Our Hearts to Thee

All Our Works, Begun, Continued, and Ended

All Such Good Works as Thou Hast Prepared for Us to Walk In

Read, Mark, Learn, and Inwardly Digest

Quiet Confidence

Thy Saving Health Among All Nations

Whose Presence We Find Wherever We Go

Suffer Not Our Trust in Thee to Fail

Fill Them with the Love of Truth

Be Present With Those Who Take Counsel

The Way of Justice and Truth

Who Has Knit Together Thine Elect

Ever Thankful for Thy Loving Providence

Make No Peace with Oppression

May Run with Patience

Who Dost from Thy Throne

Preface

Fiction is, for me, an escape from a cruel world. In literature, movies, and TV, I gravitate toward worlds more exciting, interesting, or just better than ours.

That’s what I try to do as a writer, too.

This novel began with National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in 2018 and grew from there.

The characters have evolved since then. Some have had their names changed several times, though the family name, Brimmer, has been consistent from the day I started writing.

At some point, I decided their fictional world needed a name. It follows that the Brimmer Family lives in the Brimmerverse. This has become the title of the series as well. Look for more of The Brimmerverse books soon.

Of course, I am grateful for all the support I have received from everyone along the way. I hesitate to name anyone for fear of leaving someone out, so thank you to all my family, friends, and colleagues for their encouragement.

Love to all.

John A. Merullo

Houston

Nativity of St. John the Baptist 2023

Chapter One

Safely Brought Us to the Beginning

1971 to 1986

Nathan Brimmer lived a life of privilege, and he knew it.

He grew up in an upper-class Boston family—what was once called Boston Brahmins. The Brimmers could trace their line to a family who settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the seventeenth century. Nathan grew up in their townhouse on Louisburg Square on Beacon Hill. He went to private schools and got a legacy place in Harvard College, graduating in the class of ’83, and then went on to Harvard Law School.

He easily got a position in a prestigious firm. He was tall, handsome, talented, and athletic. He had every privilege of race, class, and nearly everything else one could imagine.

But there were a few things that separated Nathan from many of

his peers.

One was that Nathan realized his privilege very early on and wanted to help people who did not have the same advantages he had. It was inevitable, then, given his background, that politics would be in his future.

There was something else that separated Nathan from the rest. He was different. He could do things other people couldn’t. He had supernatural abilities. As a young boy, he didn’t have a word for what he was, so he called himself a witch—a word he assumed was only used in works of fiction.

He found out much later that some people did use the word witch to refer to themselves. He respected other people’s beliefs, but Nathan himself was a Christian, an Anglo-Catholic Episcopalian.

This power he had ran in his family. Back in the colonial days it was much more common. Unfortunately, the Calvinist clergy who held another kind of power at the time did not recognize it as a natural aspect of some people’s lives. They condemned it as being of the Devil. It came to a head in 1692 in Salem Village and resulted in the death of twenty people.

After that, and many similar events around the world at about that time, the power was mostly suppressed. Eventually, no one talked about it. People who inadvertently used their powers dismissed things as coincidence and chance. It might have been forgotten completely, and it nearly was for almost three hundred years.

There were exceptions, especially in Nathan’s own family. There was Nathan’s grandfather, James-David Brimmer. He was always a little different. He knew things other people didn’t know. Grandpa delighted in Nathan’s birth. When Nathan was very little, his grandfather told him, When you get a bit older, we’ll talk about things. You’re like me.

Tragically, Nathan would never get to know his grandfather that way. His grandparents were killed in a train derailment when Nathan was only six years old.

One day in the summer of 1971, a bored ten-year-old Nathan was in his room. He looked over at a stack of books sitting on his desk. He had picked them up at the library the previous day. He was going to reread his favorite series, starting with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. He looked at the book. He remembered something about his grandfather and some feelings he had about him and some vague memories of talking to him without using words. He very faintly remembered his grandfather doing other things that he had always thought he dreamed of or imagined. Magic was real in the books, movies, and TV shows he liked. Was it actually real?

Oh, why not? He figured he would try. He reached out from five feet away. He stared and concentrated for about a minute. Then it happened. The book started to quiver. Then it shook. And, wonder of wonders, the book flew over to him, just as he had willed it.

The rest of the summer, Nathan experimented. While his powers were pretty amazing, he had limits. Despite his wishes to the contrary, he could not conjure up anything he wanted with a twitch of his nose like Samantha Stephens, the main character on Bewitched, his favorite TV show. He moved small objects to start and then worked his way up to larger things. He could read minds—which he tried very hard not to do. He could influence events in very small ways around him. Perhaps these powers would grow with age and practice, he thought. Sometimes, when people weren’t paying attention, he could will them to say things or do things, but that wasn’t always possible. He would never be able to turn people into toads, but, for the most part, why would he want to?

He needed a name for what he was. On Bewitched male witches were called warlocks, which apparently meant oath breaker according to the big dictionary at the library. That wouldn’t work. He was honest, a good guy. The same dictionary said that witch meant wise one. He wanted to use his gifts wisely and that is why he decided he would call himself a witch.

That is, he called himself that only to himself. He chose not to tell anyone about it. He talked to his beagle about it when they were alone—and briefly considered referring to the dog as his familiar but thought better of it.

He also prayed about it for weeks and weeks. If God could give people gifts for music and athletics, why not this? It was a struggle, but he made peace with who he was. He was terrified of what people might say or do, so he told no one, practicing secretly.

He knew not to tell his parents. He felt they would disapprove, especially his father. Nothing was ever said. He just knew this was something his father would not have wanted to hear about.

His parents were kind and loving, but sensible people. They would never understand. Sometimes he felt a little something from his father, but it was always a fleeting thing, as if he were prying into a world he didn’t want to know about. If there was a glimmer of recognition from his father, there was much less from his mother. She was almost a cipher about this. If there was something there in them, it was so buried that they could not find it. He wished he could have known his grandfather better. Grandpa could have helped him. He doubted that anyone else would ever understand.

He had fun at his classmates’ expense a little when school started up that fall, but soon decided that was not fair. He did not have any qualms in using his powers subtly against kids who were picking on others. If he could help someone else, he would make something happen. It may have been moving a rock out of someone’s way so they wouldn’t trip on it. It may have been making the water fountain spray someone who just called someone else a mean name. It was always something small and never anything that any rational person would trace to that nice, quiet Nathan Brimmer. Still, he was lonely. He didn’t have anyone to tell about this whole new and very exciting part of his life. Sometimes, he would get the feeling from some random person that they might be like him, but he never got close enough to anyone to ask. What if he was wrong? Was he the only one? Was there anyone else?

Finally, he met the person he thought maybe might understand. While at Harvard, he met lovely Sarah Bowdoin. She had a similar lineage, having grown up in nearby Belmont. She was of average height, a full head shorter than Nathan, with long, curly red hair and green eyes. They quickly became friends and started dating in junior year.

After undergrad, Nathan went on to Harvard Law, while Sarah enrolled in library science at Simmons. He kept his secret from her until one night, not long after they were engaged to be married, when they were alone in his tiny studio apartment, one of many Beacon Hill properties his family owned. He asked Sarah if he could tell her something he had never told anyone.

She steeled herself.

Sarah, Nathan said tenderly, I love you more than I thought I could love anyone, but I need to be honest with you about something.

She nodded. Yes, Nathan?

I’m a witch.

Oh, thank God! I thought you were going to tell me you were gay!

What?

Oh, I have tons of gay friends. We both do! But I’d rather my husband be straight.

Sure. But the witch thing…

I thought you were an Episcopalian. I’ve been going to the Transfiguration with you.

No, it’s not a religion, at least not the way I am. And it’s not like Samantha or anything like that. Not exactly.

She reached up and stroked Nathan’s short, dark hair. What is it exactly?

Nathan turned and saw a book sitting on a table. He stared at it, and it rose up off the table and flew to his hand.

Nathan. . . Sarah stood agape. How?

I think this kind of thing has been around forever. I’ve spent some time poking around family histories at the New England Genealogical Society. There was some stuff about one of my ancestors in. . .

Don’t tell me Salem!

"Actually, it was Salem Village, not the city we call Salem. It would be Danvers now. But, yes, one of them was accused of witchcraft. He apparently escaped and fled to Boston. I think I inherited it from him.

I think my grandfather was like me, but I don’t remember him all that well. I remember some things he said to me and how I felt when he was around. It was like he was singing, and when we were together, I would sing along. It’s a little different with dad. It’s like he wanted to sing but couldn’t. I don’t know how else to describe it. I wish I had more relatives. Dad and Grandpa were both only children. So am I, of course. On dad’s side at least, I can only guess. I don’t even think my mother has the least clue about any of it.

Sarah shrugged. Okay. So, what do you do with—this?

I try never to use my—my powers to give me any unfair advantage. I figure I have enough of those already.

Really, my little egomaniac?

I mean my wealth, education, and all that. Does this change anything between us?

Oh, Nathan, of course not! I’m so lucky to have you!

They embraced and kissed.

I’m so glad. Because I think you’re a witch, too.

Sarah gasped. What?

You’re also from an old New England family. It was rampant back then, it seems. Till the Puritans made it out to be evil, anyway.

But I can’t do anything like that!

Have you ever tried? His deep brown eyes gazed into hers, looking deep into her soul. Maybe. She thought.

She stared at the same book. Nothing. She continued for a minute. Still nothing.

I don’t think so, Nathan.

I’ve been doing this since I was ten. I guess it’s easier to believe in this kind of stuff then, but I struggled a bit too.

Since you were ten?

Yeah. I did a few pranks on other kids at first, but that didn’t seem right. More than one bully got his comeuppance from Nathan in a way he never expected, though, he grinned mischievously with deep dimples forming in both cheeks.

Sarah giggled. Okay. I’ll try again. She stared at the book again. It didn’t rise off the table, but it moved. A little.

They embraced. That’s a start! Nathan beamed. You just need to practice. You see, Sarah, I want to sing with you also.

I guess I do feel different around you, Nathan. It’s kind of like wanting to sing, but I guess I chalked it up to, you know, being in love?

They both laughed.

Sarah shook her head. Try to come up with a better word for what this is than ‘witch,’ please. It would be very confusing to people.

I’ll do what I can. Nothing seems to work. We’ll see. Meantime, you can practice. . .whatever it is.

Sarah did practice. It was their shared secret for the rest of their engagement and into their marriage. Despite her efforts, Sarah didn’t seem to be able to do all the things he could. Nathan seemed to have a greater mastery of his abilities. He wondered if it was that he had had more time to learn it.

After they received their degrees, they were married in the spring of 1986 at a beautifully ornate, but relatively modest wedding at the Church of the Transfiguration, where he had been raised, and which Sarah, also an Episcopalian, though raised in a much more Low-Church parish, joined. They had a nuptial mass with their favorite hymns and lots and lots of incense. Sarah had already started her career at Boston Public at this point and, shortly afterward, Nathan began his law practice.

Chapter Two

The Hearts of Parents to

the Children

1988 to 1993

After the wedding, Nathan and Sarah settled in a townhouse on Beacon Hill that Nathan’s family owned on Mount Vernon Street, around the corner from Louisburg Square. It was the house where Nathan and his parents had lived before his grandparents’ death. Their first child, born two years later, in 1988, was a girl they named Rebecca, after Sarah’s best friend. Two years later came the twins, David and James-William, named for Nathan’s late grandfather, James-David. Honoring the hyphenation in that name, the James element was combined with Nathan’s father’s name. Another two years later came Paul, named after Sarah’s favorite uncle.

Rebecca was a bright little girl. Paul was also very bright. David and James-William were something else