Chapter 1 Matthew
Chapter 1 — MatthewPastor Kevin did not come to Strawberry Brick Backstreet looking for a pulpit.
He came looking for one soul.
That was how it started.
Not with a church building. Not with a choir. Not with polished pews, stained glass windows, offering plates, or a printed program folded neatly in somebody’s purse.
It started in the old warehouse district, where the brick buildings leaned into the night like they were tired of standing, where the streetlights buzzed like insects, and where the rainwater gathered in cracked gutters that never seemed to fully dry.
Strawberry Brick Backstreet was not the kind of place people bragged about being from.
It was the kind of place folks whispered about.
It ran behind the nicer parts of Pocahontas Parish like a secret everybody knew but nobody wanted to claim. During the day, delivery trucks rumbled through, stray cats slipped between dumpsters, and men with tired eyes smoked cigarettes behind loading docks. At night, the street changed. The warehouses became tall black shapes. Broken windows reflected moonlight. The alleyways seemed longer than they were supposed to be.
People said things lived back there.
Not people.
Things.
Kevin had heard the stories long before he ever stepped foot on that cracked pavement with a Bible under his arm.
He had heard about the old warehouse doors that opened by themselves.
He had heard about shadows moving against the walls even when nobody was walking past.
He had heard about children with red eyes standing in the rain, staring from the far end of the street until headlights passed over them and they disappeared.
He had heard about men going into the old buildings and coming out different.
Some came out angry.
Some came out silent.
Some did not come out at all.
But Kevin had also heard something else.
He had heard people crying.
Not always out loud. Not always where anyone else could hear. But Kevin heard them anyway. That was the burden of being called. Sometimes God let a man hear what everybody else had trained themselves to ignore.
Pain had a sound.
Sin had a sound.
Loneliness had a sound.
And Strawberry Brick Backstreet was full of it.
Kevin stood beneath a crooked street sign that read STRAWBERRY BRICK BACKSTREET, the white letters faded and scratched, the metal bent at one corner as if something had tried to pull it down. He looked down the narrow road toward the old warehouse district. Rain shimmered on the pavement, reflecting red light from a distant broken sign.
He held his Bible against his chest.
“Lord,” he whispered, “if You sent me here, You better stand with me here.”
A gust of wind moved through the alley.
The pages of his Bible fluttered beneath his hand.
Kevin looked down.
The Bible had opened to Matthew.
He stared at the page for a long moment.
The first book of the New Testament.
The beginning.
The genealogy. The promise. The arrival. The kingdom drawing near.
Kevin smiled, but it was not a soft smile. It was the kind of smile a soldier gives before stepping onto a battlefield.
“All right then,” he said. “We starting at the beginning.”
He walked toward the warehouse with the least amount of broken glass in the windows. The building had once been used for storage, maybe furniture, maybe machinery, maybe something nobody wanted remembered. Its brick walls were stained dark from years of weather and neglect. A rusted chain hung beside the entrance, but the door itself was unlocked.
Kevin pushed it open.
The hinges groaned so loudly it sounded like the building was protesting.
Inside, the air smelled of dust, wet wood, old oil, and something faintly sweet underneath it all. That smell made Kevin pause.
Strawberries.
Not fresh strawberries. Not jam. Not candy.
Old strawberries.
Like fruit left too long in the heat.
Like sweetness turning.
Kevin stepped inside anyway.
The warehouse was mostly empty. A few crates sat stacked in the corners. Old tarps hung from the rafters. Rain dripped through small holes in the roof, tapping against the concrete floor in uneven rhythms.
At the far wall, someone had painted a cross years ago.
The paint had faded, but it was still there.
Black paint on old brick.
Kevin walked toward it.
He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small white cloth. He wiped dust from an overturned crate and set his Bible on top of it. Then he reached into his other pocket and pulled out a small battery lantern.
The lantern clicked on.
Soft gold light filled the space.
It was not much.
But it was light.
Kevin stood before the faded cross and bowed his head.
“Father God,” he said, his voice low but steady, “I don’t know who’s coming tonight. I don’t know if anybody’s coming tonight. But You do.”
The warehouse creaked.
Kevin kept praying.
“If there is one person on this street who still wants to be saved, send them. If there is one person tired of running, send them. If there is one person who thinks they are too far gone, send them. And if there is something in this place that does not belong to You…”
His voice deepened.
“…then let it know right now that Jesus still saves.”
The lantern flickered.
Only once.
Kevin opened his eyes.
The warehouse had gone colder.
He looked toward the dark corners, but nothing moved.
Not yet.
Outside, footsteps splashed through puddles.
Kevin turned.
A woman stood in the doorway.
She was thin, wrapped in a denim jacket too light for the weather, with wet hair stuck to her cheeks. Her eyes were bloodshot. She looked like she had not slept in days. One hand clutched the doorframe like she might run at any second.
Kevin did not move too fast.
He had learned that wounded people were like frightened animals. You could not rush them. You could not corner them. You had to let them see that your hands were open.
“Evening,” he said gently.
The woman stared at him.
“You the preacher?”
Kevin nodded. “Some folks call me that.”
“You having church in here?”
“I’m having prayer.”
She looked behind her into the alley, then back at him.
“Ain’t nobody coming to church back here.”
Kevin gave a small smile. “You came.”
She looked away.
For a moment, Kevin thought she might leave.
Instead, she stepped inside.
Her shoes squeaked against the wet concrete. She kept her arms folded tight, as if holding herself together by force.
“What’s your name?” Kevin asked.
She hesitated.
“Renee.”
“Renee,” Kevin repeated kindly. “I’m Kevin.”
“I know who you are.”
That made him study her a little closer.
Renee’s face twitched with nerves. Her gaze moved constantly, checking corners, rafters, shadows.
Kevin recognized fear.
Not regular fear.
Spiritual fear.
The kind that followed a person even when nobody else could see what was chasing them.
“You hungry?” he asked.
She gave a bitter little laugh. “That what this is? Food pantry?”
“No,” Kevin said. “But if you hungry, I’ll find you something.”
Her expression cracked for half a second, and Kevin saw the girl she had been before the street got hold of her.
Then the wall came back up.
“I don’t need food,” she said. “I need it to stop.”
Kevin’s hand rested on the Bible.
“What needs to stop?”
Renee looked toward the back of the warehouse.
The lantern flickered again.
This time, Kevin saw her flinch.
“They talk back here,” she whispered.
Kevin did not interrupt.
“At night. In the walls. Under the ground. I thought it was people at first. Men joking. Somebody messing with me. But it ain’t people.”
Her voice trembled.
“They know my name.”
The rain tapped harder against the roof.
Kevin watched the shadows along the wall.
“They know things I did,” Renee said. “Things I never told nobody. They tell me I belong to them. They tell me I already signed myself over.”
Kevin’s jaw tightened.
“Did you?”
She looked at him sharply.
“I don’t know.”
That answer held more truth than a simple yes or no.
Kevin nodded once.
“Come here, Renee.”
She shook her head.
“I ain’t trying to get possessed in front of you.”
“You ain’t getting possessed,” Kevin said. “You getting prayed for.”
Her eyes filled with tears she clearly hated.
“I done too much.”
Kevin stepped closer, slow and careful.
“So have all of us.”
“You don’t know what I did.”
“I don’t have to know everything you did to know what Jesus can do.”
Renee swallowed hard.
The warehouse groaned again.
This time, the sound came from beneath the floor.
A long, low scrape.
Like something dragging itself across concrete under concrete.
Renee gasped and backed away.
Kevin lifted one hand.
“Stay right there.”
“I told you,” she whispered. “I told you.”
The lantern flickered so violently the shadows jumped across the walls.
Then a voice came from the back of the warehouse.
Not loud.
Not fully formed.
A whisper that seemed to crawl through the bricks.
Rennneeee.
Renee covered her ears.
Kevin turned toward the darkness.
“No,” he said.
The whisper stopped.
Kevin picked up his Bible.
He did not shout. He did not perform. He did not act like the power was in his volume.
He opened the Word and began to read.
“Repent,” Kevin said, his voice steady, “for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
The air shifted.
Renee dropped to her knees.
Not gently.
Hard.
Like something had finally let go of her legs.
Kevin stepped closer and placed one hand above her head, not touching her yet.
“Father God, in the name of Jesus, I ask You to cover this woman. Whatever has spoken to her in the dark, whatever has followed her through these streets, whatever has lied and told her she belongs to it, I break that lie right now by the authority of Jesus Christ.”
The whisper returned, sharper this time.
She is ours.
Kevin’s eyes hardened.
“She is not yours.”
The warehouse lights were dead, but something red pulsed faintly beneath the crack in the far wall.
Renee sobbed.
Kevin raised the Bible higher.
“She is a daughter of God. She is not property of the Backstreet. She is not property of the warehouse. She is not property of addiction, shame, fear, or any shadow hiding under this ground.”
The floor trembled.
Dust fell from the rafters.
Renee screamed once, then bent forward with both hands on the concrete.
Kevin kept praying.
“Lord, call her by the name You gave her before the world broke her. Call her louder than the darkness called her. Call her home.”
For one terrifying moment, the entire warehouse seemed to inhale.
Then Renee went still.
The red glow vanished.
The lantern steadied.
The rain softened.
Kevin lowered his hand.
Renee remained on the floor, breathing hard.
Then she whispered, “It stopped.”
Kevin knelt beside her.
Tears ran down her face freely now.
“It stopped,” she said again, like she could not believe it.
Kevin nodded.
“That’s Jesus.”
Outside, another set of footsteps approached.
Then another.
Kevin looked toward the doorway.
Three people stood there now.
A man in a grease-stained work shirt. An older woman with a scarf tied around her hair. A young man with shaking hands and hollow cheeks.
They had heard something.
Or felt something.
Or been sent.
The older woman looked at Renee on the floor, then at Kevin.
“Pastor,” she said quietly, “is this where the prayer service is?”
Kevin stood.
His heart beat heavy in his chest.
Behind him, the faded cross on the brick wall seemed darker now, clearer somehow, as if the dust around it had been wiped away by unseen hands.
Kevin looked at the small group gathering in the doorway.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “This is where it starts.”
They came in slowly.
One by one.
No choir sang. No organ played. No offering plate passed from hand to hand.
Just rain.
Just brick.
Just broken people stepping out of the dark.
Kevin opened the Bible again.
Matthew still lay beneath his fingers.
The beginning.
He looked at Renee, still kneeling, still crying, still free.
One soul saved.
Then, from beneath the warehouse floor, something struck back.
A deep boom rolled through the concrete.
The lantern flickered.
The people gasped.
Far down Strawberry Brick Backstreet, every broken window in the old warehouse district reflected the same red glow for one single second.
Kevin looked toward the floor.
Then toward the crowd.
His voice was calm when he spoke, but everyone heard the fire in it.
“Don’t be afraid.”
Another boom sounded beneath them.
Kevin lifted the Bible.
“We didn’t come here because it was empty,” he said. “We came here because something was holding souls hostage.”
The red glow faded again, but the cold remained.
Kevin turned back to the faded cross on the wall.
“And now it knows we’re here.”
Renee wiped her face and whispered, “Pastor Kevin?”
He looked down at her.
“What happens now?”
Kevin stared into the dark corners of the warehouse.
For the first time that night, the shadows seemed to stare back.
He took a breath.
“Now,” he said, “we have church.”
