Chapter 1 

Anderson 

A foot of soft fresh snow blanketed my front porch drifting its way up to the front door. The blinds snapped as I pulled my fingers from prying them open. So much snow. 

 Yep, it was time to begin working.  

I quietly slid on my winter boots, lined overalls, and threw on my oversized Carhartt. I looked over to my parent's bedroom door; the whole house was silent except for the crackling of firewood in the wood burning stove. The door squeaked loudly as I opened it, I feared that I might wake up my parents, as it was not yet five in the morning, 'oh well' I thought. I better go before the entire community wakes up. I walked about a mile in the snow to my neighbor, Lincoln's house. He owned a plow truck, the only plow truck in the community that was used to plow the few roads lined with similar if not identical cabins, all of which were filled with families that I knew well. I grabbed the keys from the hook next to his front door. Lincoln hated early mornings and was very glad to have me replace him as the communities' grounds keeper. I liked the early mornings, especially cold and snowy; they were uncomplicated, welcoming to my introspective thoughts.  

I loaded the truck with salt and revved the engine, the plow lifted, I drove around for four hours, clearing the private roads. As the day drew on, more snow began to fall, tomorrow I would be doing the exact same thing. When I worked, no matter which season, I worked for the people I considered not just neighbors but family.  

The wind was ripping through my overalls; my eyes burned despite the glasses I wore to protect them. My body felt weak and sore; my bones were on fire. I was drawn to the outdoors, to manual labor. Working with my body was all that I was good at; it was all I knew how to do. Despite having a vast knowledge on my father's theology, I was inclined to work with my hands rather than my mind. He was determined, though, to teach me to become like him, despite our differences in interests and talents.  

 At the last house of the day, there were no footprints in the snow, no tire marks, no one had gone in or out, I didn't need to even knock on the front door because it was the O’Conner’s. 

"Anderson, come in."  

Jade O'Conner welcomed me inside. She hadn't turned on the lights as the sun had already gone down, so it was dark, but a few candles lit the kitchen table.  

"Are you alone?" I asked.  

"Lu and Rick are out of town."  

"Still searching for Gia?" I asked. 

Gia was my age, a girl I grew up with since we were five. She was a close friend of mine and she'd been missing for three weeks.  

"We don't have any leads, any clues, she just vanished...gone but they are driving all around trying to ask anyone outside of the community if they've seen anything...Lu wouldn't let Rick go alone and since my health-"  

"How can I help?"  

"If she had told you anything, if you can think back to your last conversation, something, I just think maybe she ran away, maybe she wanted another life... I pray she wasn't taken or killed. Every day I pray the same prayer; it just doesn't feel like it's being heard. Don't tell your father."  

"I play back our last conversations over and over again. She never gave any hint she might want to leave; you know she and I have always confided in each other. We could almost read each other's minds," I paused as I found myself about to smile, but it would be inappropriate in front of a grieving mother. "I think my father would understand but I won't say anything. Do you need me to take you into town this week?” 

Jade nodded, she was diabetic, and the past three weeks I had been checking on her since her husband and daughter were gone looking for Gia. I looked in her fridge; the insulin nearly ran out. She had no car or way to care for herself, and I knew Gia would want me to do so. Gia was very passionate about her family. She was nearly attached to her mom throughout her childhood; she was her biggest caretaker, her defender.  

"And Anderson?" 

"Yes?" 

"I won't be at the meeting tonight." 

The urge to offer to take Jade with me was strong. She looked at me, though, with such sadness that I felt I should let her be, despite the fact that missing a meeting for no reason other than being sad, was not acceptable. Jade walked me to her front door, and I said goodbye. I knew my father would ask me about her and I couldn't lie. He would send my mother over to check on her. I drove to Lincoln's house, he was already at the meeting, I walked home, changed, and headed out to the community center where the big meetings were held. The teaching had already begun, and I sat in the back. About two hundred people sat in a circle surrounding my father. He soon saw me and gave me a look. I got up and found my mother sitting in the shadows. 

"No Jade."  

"No, she isn't feeing up to the meeting." 

"Well, that means she's been avoiding them, for three weeks now." 

"Gia has been missing for three weeks." 

My mom looked at me and seemed to relax. 

"I am going to check on her still, make sure she's not beginning to doubt." 

"Sure." 

This meeting was not the only one that was mandatory for the week. Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, these were the times us people in the community needed to meet, to learn from my father, Harlan Beaumont. I was born into this tradition, and the strict schedule was so normal, so consistent I couldn't fathom a life without such specifications. Of course, now as a nearly nineteen-year-old and the only son to the leader, I am beginning the process of becoming the next generation's leader. It was something I was always destined to become, just like my father, no matter what. 

When I was born, my parents, Harlan, and Jolie Beaumont, lived amongst their friends who all shared similar values. I was surrounded by young people, doted on by the college students, left in the attic to go to sleep while they met, woken up to be taken home in the middle of the night. It was all normal life to me, being passed around throughout the week while my parents pursued their active ministry life. At some point when I was four, we left to move to Wyoming from Ohio. A whole mass of people slowly trickled in, building on land my parents inherited from my grandfather. It was parceled out, one by one, until a neighborhood of like-minded people was formed, but my father's vision was not satisfied; he wanted hundreds of families to live in the area, to attend his meetings, to follow his leadership. He called it being in constant communion, but we always referred to this place, this land as the promise land.