The Makeover (18 page)

God regarded
His Son, whom He had placed above all things of the universe; He also looked
upon the fallen son, who was closer to Him than any other before he was cast
out for rebellion.  “I will give Phoenix more time and Paulo more
assistance.  I will continue to allow You to use the Spirit to draw her
until an appointed time.  If she has not responded to the call by then,
she will be handed over to Satan.”

Frustrated that
he did not get his way, yet again, Satan disappeared without a word.  He
was on his way back to his kingdom on earth.  He had to command his forces
to continue tearing the girl away from the blessings of God.

He could not
lose this time. 

With a
frustrated roar, he commanded his forces to attack the girl and the man God had
chosen to help her.

God was already
aware of the newest plan of Satan and He would allow Satan to make his
effort.  He was a fair God, after all.

But He would
allow His own Son, the Savior, to make His own efforts.

“Send Your power
through the Spirit.  Multiply Paulo’s efforts with the girl.  Order
the truth about Phoenix to be revealed to Paulo as well,” the Father commanded,
before sitting back to continue listening to prayers from around the world.

Chapter 11

Their
minds are full of darkness; they wander far from the life God gives because
they have closed their minds and hardened their hearts against him (Ephesians
4:18).

Six weeks
later…

Phoenix heard
the pounding on her front door.  It was three-thirty in the afternoon. 
She had finished work early and was trying to get fifty new pages of her
dissertation completed for the looming deadline a couple of days away. 
She sighed and rolled her eyes.

Looking up from
her laptop, she stared at her front door.  “I am not going to get
it.  Wasn’t expecting anyone…don’t have anyone to expect, so…whoever you
are, you can go back the way you came,” she murmured.

But the door
began to shake with the incessant pounding that continued for at least five
more minutes.

Tossing her laptop
onto her couch, Phoenix cringed when it bounced on the soft “
pleather
” cushions and fell to its side on the hardwood
floor.  She slipped and stumbled on a pile of dirty laundry that she had
not seen on the floor behind her. 

Now Phoenix was
mad.

“What?!” she
shouted as she stormed her way to the front of her railroad apartment. 
“Who is—”

Her screech
died in her throat. 

Paulo stood
there, arms crossed, wearing a flustered smile.  His ever-changing hazel
eyes swirled from hard gold to chips of green ice, as they traveled up her
frame.  “Ah ha!  There she is.  Phoenix, my dear, how are you?”

“How am I?”
Phoenix looked around, clutching the muumuu she had tossed on earlier tightly
around her throat.  “What’s with the banging on the door?”

Paulo smirked
and shrugged.  “
Dunno
.  Maybe it’s because
I have tried calling, emailing, slipping notes under your door, and everything
just short of sending smoke signals.  You’ve been ducking and dodging me
for the last six weeks.”  Leaning against the door jamb, Paulo shrugged
again.  “Thought we had decided on a plan, you and I.  What
happened?”

Phoenix looked
down at his tan Doc Martin’s, suddenly very interested in the line where his
dark denim jeans met the shoe. 

Paulo’s finger
struggled against her chin until she gave up and met his eyes again. 
Phoenix gasped as she watched them swirl again, this time from his cold, vivid
green to a startling gray. 

Paulo crouched
so he was eye level with her.  “Well?”

Phoenix
shrugged and pulled her chin away from his finger.  “Who cares? 
What’s the use?  I’ve tried before and failed, so what’s the point of
getting myself all worked up and dependent on someone’s help, when it probably
won’t last?  When
you
probably won’t last?”

Paulo tossed up
his hands and let out a breath.  He used his fingers to pinch the bridge
of his nose.  “Phoenix,” he struggled to keep his tone calm, “you haven’t
even given me a chance to help you.  You haven’t even tried to help
yourself.  You’ve already failed.”

 Phoenix
looked around and pursed her lips.  She scratched the back of her neck and
stared at Paulo’s neck through the open collar of his Polo shirt. 
Abruptly she turned away and stalked into the apartment, leaving the door open.

Paulo stood
there for a moment before stepping in and closing the door behind him. 
“Does this mean I can come in?” he called down the hall.

“Do whatever
you’d like, Man.  That’s on you,” Phoenix snapped back.

Paulo
hesitated, noticing the small octagon-shaped kitchen just a few paces from the
front door.  It was filled with dishes on the countertops and sink, while
pots littered the range.  There was a strong odor coming from the kitchen
and Paulo recognized the over-flowing trashcan in the corner by the stained,
whirring refrigerator.  “Oh, no, Phoenix.  Is this how you live?” he
whispered. 

Unable to take
the rapidly-growing stench much longer, Paulo grabbed the items that were
strewn around the trash can and stuffed them into the sack that was filled with
rotting pizza, meat, eggs, and bottles of liquor.  He also found smaller
shopping bags filled with garbage and stuffed them into the bags.  He tied
the trash together and lifted it out of the filthy can. 

“Phoenix? 
Uh, no disrespect to your home or anything, but I am going to take the trash
out, okay?  Do you have any trash bags?”

Phoenix didn’t
answer, but appeared soundlessly at the entrance of the kitchen with her hands
on her hips.  Her face wore a scowl that was meant to deter Paulo from
trying to help while her wavering eyes sent a different message. 
Addressing Paulo’s neck, Phoenix asked, “What are you doing, Man?  You
ain’t got to come to my house and clean.”

“Well
someone
should, Phoenix! It’s the middle of September and it’s still hot out
there.  You’ve got garbage everywhere and the window is closed.  How
can you expect to be motivated with all of this clutter?  And in your
kitchen? 
This is where you keep food!”

“Don’t come in
here lecturing me, P.  You have no idea how—”

“What? 
How depressed you’ve been since Cedric broke your heart?  How stressed out
you’ve been trying to work and go to school?  What?” Paulo sneered.

“Well you said
it best…” Phoenix trailed off.

“Okay,” Paulo
shook his head and bit his lip before he took God’s name in vain.  “I am
not going to argue with you, Miss.  Where are your trash bags?”

Phoenix
gestured around.  “Didn’t you see all the shopping bags I’ve been
using?  There aren’t any.”  Phoenix frowned as Paulo began searching
through her cupboards and cabinets. 

Paulo gave her
an unrepentant glare before continuing his search through Phoenix’s
kitchen.  “Alright well, I am getting this trash out of here.  I am
going to buy trash bags, a bigger trashcan, and whatever else I see is needed,
so please don’t play games.  You
better
let me back in.  We
need to have a conversation, Phoenix.”  With that, he stuffed the trash
back into the trash can until it was filled to the brim with garbage and
take-out containers all filled with rotting food.  He breathed through his
mouth as he stormed out of the apartment, slamming the door on his way out.

Phoenix stood
in the kitchen for a half hour, wondering exactly who and what this Paulo guy
was.  How dare he come unannounced to her apartment and look down at her?
But even as Pride and Self-Deception shouted at her from their places in her
heart, Truth began to shout back, rebutting their thoughts before they could
take root.  Her eyes were opened and she saw her kitchen for the first
time.  She saw the huge pot of short ribs that was
still
in the pot
that Cedric left them in, along with the same pot of rice.  She knew the
food had been spoiling in those pots since that fateful night eight weeks ago,
and she had not been able to toss them away.  She was grateful their
rotting smell had not leaked out of the air-tight stainless steel pots as badly
as they could have.  She was afraid of opening them and seeing what was in
them. 

She saw the
grease splattered around the walls, the tons of dishes littering every inch of
the sink, cabinets and countertops.  She saw the grease stain on her
linoleum floors where a slice of pepperoni pizza had fallen several nights
ago.  She tried not to remember how drunk she was when she had picked up
that slice from the box, dropped it, giggled, kissed it up to God and taken a
huge chunk of it.  She didn’t even flinch when she pulled out a long,
black hair from the food in her mouth.

Shuddering,
Phoenix opened the refrigerator door that was splattered with an array of
colors and prints and saw the molded orange juice in its clear container. 
She looked at expiration date on the milk and saw it should have been poured
out five weeks prior. 

There was also
a ton of papers, junk mail, bills, and catalogues littering the huge, dusty
china cabinet, that was tucked into the corner of the kitchen.  Cobwebs
were graying in the corners by the large window that overlooked the next
building.  Phoenix opened it to let in the late summer breeze, only to
find ants crawling all over a stain that she been left by an exploding Pepsi
bottle several days before. 

Shrieking, Phoenix
grabbed a mildewed dish towel from the sink to smash the ants before dropping
it to the floor.  She struggled to open the window and when she did, she
burst into tears.

Just when her
sniffles and tears were about to turn into a loud, racking ugly cry, the angry
sound of the buzzer snatched her out of it.  She raced to the intercom to
let Paulo in.

Paulo was
shaking with anger outside the building as he struggled with a large trash can and
bags filled with large and small garbage bags, gloves, cleansers, Lysol, air
freshener, and groceries.  He had not known what to buy but he figured
that anyone whose house was that filthy didn’t have fresh groceries to
eat.  He had asked the Holy Spirit to guide him as he purchased a carton
of eggs, milk, orange juice, bread, turkey bacon, cans of tuna, canned salmon,
soup, low-sodium stews, pita bread, hummus, a head of lettuce, carrots,
tomatoes, and cucumbers.  He also purchased small amounts of various fruit
that he knew would quickly revive a sluggish system by
detoxing
the body and delivering natural sugars for energy.

When Phoenix
buzzed him in, he had to stop before he hurled the can and bags across the
hall.  Leaning against the wall, he struggled with his quickly rising
disgust.  “God,” he whispered, “I am getting sick of this.  Several
weeks ago, you poured my life out into this woman.  The burden to help her
overwhelms me worse than ever.  You caused me to begin praying and fasting
for this woman and I haven’t stopped.  I offered her practical help as You
told me to, and she never took me up on it.  She has not returned my
efforts to contact her.  Now I am about to cook her a meal and clean up
her apartment.  What’s going on here, Lord?  I don’t have time for
this foolishness.  You had me try to help Elizabeth very much in the same
way and look what happened to her.  I need You to confirm again what You
want from me in this situation.  Did I get this all wrong again?  I
am really tired of chasing someone down who clearly doesn’t want help and—”

But the Spirit had
enough of Paulo’s grumbling.  He told Paulo so by whispering words from 2
Corinthians 9:7 into Paulo’s spirit,
You
must each decide in your heart how much to give. And don’t give reluctantly or
in response to pressure. For God loves a person who gives cheerfully
.

Dolefully,
Paulo sighed as he stomped to the elevator and got on.  “Alright, Father,
if You say so.  Thing is though, I
do
feel pressure…”

 
Do everything without grumbling or
arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without
fault in a warped and crooked generation.  Then you will shine among them
like stars in the sky
... 
The words of Philippians 2:14-15
were even louder in Paulo’s heart.

“Well, Holy
Spirit, please help me to obey.  Give me Your grace because this chick is
really a piece of work, God.”  Paulo stepped off the elevator.

My son,
you were a piece of work. You are a work I am still perfecting, even now, after
nine years of being in My Kingdom...

Paulo stopped and
closed his eyes.  “Pride, Lord.  Again, I ask you for forgiveness for
my hypocrisy.”

I will
cause you to be fishers of men.  Do this in My Name, Son.

Taking another
long breath, Paulo let his Father’s words take root in his spirit before raising
his fist to pound on the door.  Before he did, he felt the Spirit nudge
him from a place in his stomach.  Sighing again, Paulo forced himself to
gently rap on the door. 

Phoenix met him
with red, puffy eyes.  She said nothing as she turned and walked back into
the apartment.

“Hello to you,
too! And gee, thanks Paulo, for running out and getting things for my
apartment.  I am so grateful that—”

My son
…
the Spirit warned, cutting off Paulo’s rant.

“Sorry,
Father,” Paulo whispered, as he dropped the bags into the hallway and gently
closed the door, rather than kicking it shut as he’d originally intended. 

He walked down
the long hallway of the railroad apartment until he was in the spacious,
square-shaped living room.  His eyes blinked rapidly as he noticed the
layers of dust and cigarette smoke clinging to the leather sofa and arm chairs,
the wall unit, and figurines.  Papers were strewn in heaps all over the
unit, coffee tables, and end tables.  More cartons of left-over take out
littered the small dining room table tucked in the corner by the windows. 
Books were all over the apartment.  What confounded Paulo most were the
broken pieces of glass and figurines littering the ground.  It was as
though someone had smashed glass and furniture with a bat or stick or
something.  Again Paulo struggled to keep condemnation out of his tone as
he addressed Phoenix.