I did not think too much about it and when I got home, I wiped my Trek Fuel Ex and got some Gatorade to drink as my ride was sort of something short of epic. I biked for about three (3) hours and my body felt refreshed from all the sweat I managed to squeeze out of my half-sedentary body. In my quiet time, I realized that Gabe was a chatty biker. Usually, I get annoyed by the kind but since Gabe is a mighty archangel of The Lord, I took exception and found his company to be relatively enjoyable since his angelic glow shown on the path and I actually turned off my Nite Rider headlight since with that light coming out from all over his earthly body, I found them to be superfluous. God was missing. Well what do you know...
The next morning I heard a voice inside my head seconds before I opened my eyes. I was already awake but still to lazy to do anything but go back to sleep. The voice said: Jorge, wake up, I will test you.
"Test? What test?" I sheepishly retorted. Then I realized that it was His voice. God's.
God was sitting on the foot of my bed ridiculously tanned for June, He looked like He stayed at Bora for a week or two without sunscreen or a shirt on His back. His magnificent white beard still shone like the sun and the black of His eyes still looked like miniature black holes that suck everything. He still looked like freakin' Jerry Garcia from The Grateful Dead.
"Answer me my son, if the Philippines and the United States go to war against the Chinese, who should I will to win?" I almost instantly answered the first party, myself being a Flip and all. But knowing God like I do, I knew from the very start that this was a silly trick question. There are no straight answers with God. If there was, then anybody would just be able to know what will happen to their prayers. So I pondered a bit and slowly inhaled and exhaled, just like before answering the very first question on the very first test on my Bar examinations roughly four (4) years ago.
"The general who wins a battle makes many calculations in his temple before the battle is fought. The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations beforehand. Thus do many calculations lead to victory, and few calculations to defeat: how much more if no calculations were done at all? It is by attention to this point that I can foresee who is likely to win or lose." I quoted The Art of War in verbatim.
"Are you really a lawyer?" asked The Almighty.
"Are you really God?" I asked back, injured by the rhetorical but kept looking up waiting for lightning to smite my blasphemous existence.
"Your answer is not responsive to the question!" God was now shaking His head.
"But Lord, if You come to terms with it, technically, every answer is a response!" I was really screwing myself big time, but I simply just cannot stoop-down like a slave when someone, whoever-in-the-green-hell he may be, question my capability and qualification as a member of the Bar. He who mocks me shall be mocked much more scornfully, and he who exalts me shall share with all I have. It turned out that God was just bluffing. He rarely bluffs but when He does, you must be ready to call it. The daughters of Job failed to do so, and I have learned that lesson a very long time ago.
"..." God paused for dramatic effect. He was sort of like Pacino, in II.
God, in all His wisdom, took out what looked like a Marshall foot switch from his pocket. Its a handy black box with a single red button in the middle. He handed it over to me.
"Push the button and it will all be over." God declared.
"What will be over?" I asked, though I had some clue on what he was talking about.
"There would be no war. Nobody will be blamed and to the opinion of some, the world would become a better place...Push that red button and all the lives of all Chinamen all over the world shall instantly end."
I pondered into it a little bit, the Confucian that I am. But after a second and a half, I handed the black box back to The Almighty.
"I can't do it. No, I won't do it." I said while chuckling like a gambler who refused to go all in despite the magnificent hand.
"OK." God turned His back, flicked His pepper hair over his shoulders and walked right through my bedroom wall like it was made of thin air. Just like in the B-movies.
But His voiced echoed all over the room after He left. "Tell Gabe that I was fishing at the Spratlys last week. The some Chinese boats came around and caught them all in their huge nets...I'll try the coast of Nova Scotia this week...maybe I could catch lobster there without any fuss. Gabe is often too much of a pussy...On the second thought, scratch that last one"
And there went God, The Fisherman. Finally I could go back to sleep. Then I reached for the A/C remote, pushed the button, but it did not work.
