“The Golden City”
Written by “Tulio”
March 2001

Tulio met Miguel outside the little church at noon just as they had agreed to do. Tulio made a face as his friend came skipping down the steps of the church with that brilliantly giddy grin on his face. Pushing himself away from the wall he had been leaning against, he fell into step beside Miguel as they made their way back through town.
	"I really wish you'd come in sometime," Miguel said as they wove their way through the Sunday crowd, "I know you'd enjoy it."
	"No way," Tulio scoffed, "Church is no place for me and, besides, what would God want with me, huh? Putting me in a church in the presence of God would be like putting a filthy, flea-infested dog in a brand new, sparkling clean villa."
	Miguel had to laugh a little at Tulio's illustration, but he felt bad that Tulio viewed God in that perspective.
	"God accepts everyone, you know, Tulio," he said softly, "It doesn't matter what kind of reputation you have. You can't run from Him forever."
	Tulio decided it was time to change the subject.
	"I'm starving," he said quickly, appearing not to have heard a word of what Miguel had said, "You wanna stop by the pub and grab a bite to eat?"
	"Sure," Miguel shrugged, making a face at Tulio and his tactless way of changing the subject.
	As they sat down at a table, Miguel tried to pick up the conversation again, but Tulio would have none of it.
	"Look, if God cared one iota about me in the first place, He wouldn't have allowed my mother to abandon me in an orphanage and I wouldn't be making my living by being a crook!" Tulio slammed his fist on the table lightly to punctuate his statement.
	"The preacher said that sometimes God--"
	"I don't wanna hear it!" Tulio slammed both palms on the table hard enough to make the silverware jump and leaned across it on stiff, trembling arms, glaring angrily at Miguel.
	Miguel bit his lower lip and his expression fell. It was obvious to him that Tulio was bitter at God for a lot of reasons. He silently wished there were a way he could help him see that God did care.
	Both men were torn from their thoughts as a group of sailors came around the corner and recognized them as the con men wanted by the authorities.
	"There they are!" one of them shouted, drawing his dagger, "Let's get them and get our reward!"
	Tulio leaped up, knocking his chair over backwards and, grabbing Miguel by his shirt collar, took off in the other direction. Miguel freed himself from Tulio's grip and continued running. Looking back, he gasped in horror as he saw the sailors plus an army of guards with muskets on horses chasing them.
	"Tulio, there's no way we can outrun them!" Miguel panted, "We have to hide!"
	"Follow me," Tulio puffed, streaking around a corner and diving into an open coal cellar, dragging Miguel with him.
	They fell about six feet down a ladder and landed with a thud in a pile of coal, causing a cloud of black dust to rise. Coughing and sneezing, they picked themselves up and crouched by the cellar door. To their relief, their pursuers ran right past them.
	Miguel sighed with relief, then started to laugh.
	"See Tulio?" he asked, "Tell me that wasn't God. I dare you. He allowed us to get away just in the nick of time."
	"Yeah right," Tulio scoffed, "No, that was just luck. A lot of luck."
	Miguel rolled his eyes. Tulio's hard-headedness was almost impenetrable. Shrugging it off, Miguel climbed the ladder and stepped back into the light, brushing the black coal dust from his clothes, then he reached down to help Tulio out. 
	Suddenly, a shot rang out and Miguel lost his grip on Tulio's wrist. Tulio fell back into the coal cellar with a clatter, but he lost no time getting back on the ladder and climbing back up. As he emerged, he saw a sight he had feared ever seeing. Miguel had been hit.
	"Miguel!" Tulio hauled himself up out of the cellar and dropped to his knees beside his friend, "Miguel, can you hear me?"
	Miguel opened his eyes and winced a little.
	"I'm not going to make it, Tulio," he said, his voice weak.
	"No," Tulio answered, "No, God took Chel away from me at sea. I'll be dipped if He thinks He can take you."
	"Well, you're dipped," Miguel tried to joke over the situation, but then he grew serious, "You have to trust God, Tulio. Don't blame Him and stop being bitter with Him. Please."
	Tulio bit his lower lip so hard, he thought he tasted blood.
	"You didn't trust God when Chel died," Miguel's voice was lowered to a feeble whisper, "Will you trust God now...?"
	Miguel's eyes closed and he said no more.
	"Miguel. Miguel? Miguel!" Tulio yelled out his friend's name over and over again before finally breaking down and shaking his fist heavenward, "No! No, I will not trust you, God! Never!"
	The guards were coming and Tulio knew it. He could see them approaching through eyes blurred by tears of uncontrollable grief. He didn't bother to try and run or struggle as the guards seized him and bound him with ropes. Slapping him around a bit, they dragged him to the prison yard and chained him in a cell.
	After spending three days in the cell, practically dying in his own grief, a guard came and unlocked his cell, then his shackles.
	"There have been orders to release you," the guard said gruffly, "We've captured a killer and the jail is full. You are the only one here who hasn't committed a crime that endangers anyone's life but your own."
	As Tulio stiffly got to his feet and stumbled out of the cell, the guard could sense his grief and put a hand on his shoulder.
	"I heard about the shooting," he said softly and sincerely, "I'm really sorry about your friend."
	Tulio nodded a little and allowed the guard to escort him to freedom. Once out in the sunlight, Tulio leaned wearily against the prison wall and closed his eyes that ached from his sorrow.
	"Will you trust God now...?"
	Tulio heard it as though Miguel were standing right there with him. He looked around, expecting to see his friend standing somewhere nearby, but there was no one.
	"What?" Tulio snapped, eyes turned upward, "Y-you think that just because you arranged my release, I should trust you? Forget it! Didn't you hear me? I said I would never trust you and I meant it!"
	Enraged and grief-stricken, Tulio darted through the streets aimlessly, as if he were running from someone pursuing him relentlessly. In fact, he felt like someone was chasing him. Someone that he could just barely outrun.
	"Leave me alone!" he screamed over his shoulder, though there was no one behind him.
	Tulio ran until he had totally exhausted himself and had no idea where he was. He collapsed in a heap in an alleyway and locked his hands around his shins, forehead resting on his knees. He was too exhausted to grieve, too exhausted to run, and too exhausted to even sleep.   
	As darkness settled in the alley, Tulio's night passed in a blur of pain and restless sleep haunted by nightmares of the recent tragedy he had witnessed. He awoke several times, short of breath and heart racing. Several hours before dawn he was awakened by a barrel tipping over a few yards away. He gasped and jolted upright, startled. This alerted the huge dog that had knocked the barrel over. The dog raised its hackles, bared its teeth and, growling low in its throat, it advanced toward Tulio.
	With the dog snapping at his heels, Tulio raced blindly through the streets. Diving into another alley, he tripped and fell in a gutter and, for some reason, the dog leaped the gutter and continued running.
	"Will you trust God now...?"
	There it was again. Tulio pulled himself up out of the gutter and flinched as he tried to put weight on his left ankle. Too tired and out of breath to yell, he spat his answer in a sharp, pained hiss.
	"No! No, I will not trust God!" he seethed in pain as he limped further down the alley, "Give me one good reason why I should trust God after He's taken my best friends from me."
	When dawn finally broke, Tulio was far from town and out in what appeared to be farm country. He limped along the narrow dirt roads, head hung low. His thoughts ran back to when Chel had gotten so sick on the way back to Spain. One day she was fine and the next she had come down with a raging fever. Tulio had promised they would get her to a doctor as soon as they reached Spain, but Chel never made it that far.
	Then his thoughts jumped to the last time he had seen Miguel. As he passed a small country church, he remembered how Miguel had pleaded with him to try going with him sometime.
	"Is that why you took him, God?" Tulio growled in a gravelly voice, "Because I said I didn't want anything to do with you or a church? Why am I even talking to you? You don't care. You're God. Why should you care?"
	Tulio was suddenly silenced as two gangster-like men jumped out from the bushes and came at him, knives drawn. Tulio knew he could never outrun them with a sprained ankle. He gasped fearfully as the two hoods pressed in and backed him against a tree. Holding him a knifepoint, they took what little money he had on him and turned to go.
	"Thanks," one of them laughed.
	"Oh, and um..." the bigger of the two turned back toward Tulio, "Thanks for providing a cell for our leader."
	Tulio cried out in agony as the man stabbed him then ran away laughing. Bleeding heavily from the large gash in his side, Tulio lay where he'd fallen, wanting nothing more than for the pain to stop.
	"Will you trust God now...?"
	Hearing that again, Tulio fought the desire to remain where he was and pulled himself to his feet and forced himself to run.
	"Leave me alone!" Tulio shouted desperately, "I don't want anything to do with you!"
	Hours later, weak from excessive blood loss, Tulio collapsed behind an abandoned barn. Gasping for air, whimpering in pain, and shivering in a chill that wasn't present in the surrounding air, he closed his eyes, trying to rest.
	"Will you trust God now...?"
	Hearing that voice again, Tulio wanted nothing more than to get up and run again, but the pain and weakness he was suffering forced him to remain where he was. He bit his lower lip and tried to hold back the tears that threatened to spill over.
	"You can't run from Him forever."
	The truth in that statement Miguel had made finally got through to Tulio. He had been being chased by someone who refused to let him be. As his body went numb, he silently confessed that he had reached the end of his rope...the end of himself, and deep down he knew, the end of his life.
	"Will you trust God now...?"
	The question came again. Tulio knew it would be a losing battle if he resisted again as he had been all this time. Even if he had the strength and the will to get up and run, God would just chase him wherever he went.
	"Yes," he whispered hoarsely, "Yes, I'll...I'll trust you, God..."
	As twilight fell, Tulio was in the same place, his eyes closed in a peaceful rest...until he felt a gentle hand shaking him awake. Forcing his eyes open, he looked up into the glowing face of a man he'd never seen before.
	"It's time to go," the man spoke with a soft, but deep, authoritative voice, "Are you ready?"
	"Go where?" Tulio groaned as some of the pain returned.
	"I believe you're ready," the man smiled, extending a hand to him, "Come. Many are waiting for you. Follow me."
	Tulio couldn't figure that one out, but he got to his feet, surprisingly, without any pain. He felt as though he were walking in a dream as they entered through a doorway of bright white light. When his eyes adjusted to the intensity, they beheld the most welcomed sight he could ever hope to see.
	"Tulio!" Miguel shouted, embracing his best friend.
	Tulio couldn't speak. He was too busy laughing and crying all at once.
	"It's a good thing you finally stopped being stubborn," the man with the deep voice chuckled, "Your friend refused to enter the city without you. So now that you are reunited, come home."
	Miguel and Tulio gasped in amazement as the man pushed open a magnificent gate to spill a brilliant golden light over them. As they stepped through the gates, their eyes beheld a world of radiance. A crystal sea lapped gently at the shores off to one side. The street below them was paved with the purest gold and mansions stood tall and golden, studded with precious stones all around them. This golden city held more beauty and more wonder than El Dorado itself!
"Miguel! Tulio! You're here!" Chel ran up the street and flung herself at them, "I thought you'd never come!"
They were soon joined by Altivo and Bibo the armadillo and, escorted by the kind man. They walked the streets of gold toward a grand temple-like structure where songs burst forth and from where the golden light seemed to come. Stepping through the doors, they saw a King sitting on a throne. Seeing them enter, the King raised his hand, silencing the multitude. Gracefully, He came down from His throne and approached the group.
Miguel grinned broadly and quirked an eyebrow as Tulio fell to his knees like his legs were made of cooked spaghetti.
"Oh, my God..." Tulio said breathlessly, hanging his head in shame.
"I thought you'd never call me your God," the King smiled, kneeling down in front of Tulio and lifting his head, "I've waited so long for this day, my child. This day when you would confess that you are mine and I am yours."
Taking Tulio by the hand, He pulled him to his feet.
"You don't have to be ashamed," the King said gently, putting His arms around Miguel's and Tulio's shoulders, "Nor do you have to live the life of  crooks. Come. Enjoy the riches of my kingdom. We're all family here."
As they walked side by side into the great throne room, their hearts swelled with joy. His arm around Chel, Tulio grinned broadly at Miguel.
"Well, our dreams have finally come true, partner," he said, "We've always wanted to live in gold and glory and what better kind to be in than the gold and glory of the King of kings?"