What she had originally intended as a scathing expose therefore turned into a facetiously deadpan news story, pretending to give the cult’s pronouncements (number seven: women are forbidden to wear denim) serious consideration. She had submitted the story on a whim to the Banner, then a fledgling evangelical monthly. To her surprise, the Banner’s staff loved the story and published it without alteration as a straight news piece. When the issue came out, her article proved to be so popular that the Banner decided to start a regular feature on fringe figures obsessed with the Apocalypse (cleverly named “End Notes”), and she was immediately asked for more. She rode a serendipitous wave of interest in the Apocalypse into a full time job; nearly a year ago she had moved to Glendale, not far from the Banner’s L.A. headquarters, but she had spent most of the last three years bouncing between interviews with ersatz prophets of varying degrees of sanity. During that time the Banner had become a semi-respectable news magazine, and she had developed an ambiguous but mutually beneficial relationship with the Banner’s owner and publisher, Harry Giddings. Time might still not fear God, but it certainly feared the Banner.

So here she sat, at 5:19 in the morning, waiting for the sunrise or the Second Coming, whichever came first. As she was about to nod off in her lawn chair, she was startled by a sudden outburst from Prophet Jonas.

“FANTASTIC!” howled Jonas. “The time we have been waiting for is upon us!”

Intermittent clapping and the occasional cheer nearly drowned out the sound of the Ten Virgins’ teeth chattering.

“The Bridegroom will be here any moment!” declared Prophet Jonas. “Are you ready?”

Muted cheers.

“I said, ‘ARE YOU READY?!’”

Muted cheers and some whistling.

“Brothers and sisters,” said Jonas, more quietly, “Allow me to read from the Sacred Texts.” He opened a well-worn paperback to a page marked by a bookmark. “Elko, Nevada,” he read solemnly. “40 degrees, 49 minutes, 57 seconds north; 115 degrees, 45 minutes, 44 seconds west. April 29. Sunrise: 5:44 a.m.”

“Brothers and sisters,” he continued, winking almost imperceptibly at one of the more attractive sisters in the front row, “it is now 5:20 a.m. We are assured by calculations based on the inerrant Word of God that the Bridegroom will arrive before dawn on this very day.” He set the Angler’s Almanac down on the makeshift podium that had been constructed at the last minute out of three fruit crates and picked up a heavier, leather-bound book, opening it to read:

“Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom.

“And five of them were wise, and five were foolish.

“They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them:

“But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.

“While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept.