Found in Translation

by Roger Bruner

  “Kimmy, aren’t you uncomfortable in short sleeves now the temp is dropping?” He must have noticed I was shivering. The temperature was only partially responsible.

  I didn’t want to lie, but I couldn’t admit the whole truth. “I suppose I am. I’m heading to bed in a minute, though. I’ll be warm then. Thanks for asking.”

  “Kimmy, I can warm you up all over ….” Geoff had never said anything overtly improper, yet innuendos were always close to the surface, ready to pop out unexpectedly like a jack-in-the-box. This Geoff was a one-eighty from the one I’d met at the beginning of the week. And he couldn’t have been more different from the other boys on the team.

  Since the team members were supposed to be Christians and most of them demonstrated their faith through both words and actions, I decided to check Geoff’s relationship with God. After all, that’s what we should’ve had most in common.

  “I’m never that cold. Geoff, I don’t know how to … well, you seem so different from the other Christian boys I know—especially the ones on this trip.”

  He laughed—it was more of a smirk—yet he didn’t seem amused. He clearly considered himself to be in control of this conversation. “Tell me about it.”

  His sarcasm made me more conscious of my challenged speaking than at any time since orientation. I knew what I wanted to say and how to say it, but the relevant body parts balked at having to work together to verbalize distinctly.

  But garbled speech would make me sound weak, and I couldn’t let Geoff detect anything that might signify vulnerability. I already felt like a field mouse facing an owl that’s missed his last several meals. “Geoff … Geoff, you … “ come on, Kim … “you want, uh, seem to … “ calm down, girl … “have your head … your mind …” Lord, help me…“in less spiritual places than they do.”

  Thank You, Jesus.

  “Maybe it’s because I know how to have fun, Kimmy.” Coming from Geoff, Kimmy sounded like a dirty word—one so crass I wouldn’t have used it myself. No degree of fever could have made my face as hot as hearing him say it. I was thankful the darkening evening would cover my embarrassment.

  What made him enjoy intimidating me? A feeling of superiority?

  Maybe. But there had to be more to it than that. “I’ve known many Christian boys who know how to have the kind of fun I enjoy.”

  Reacting as if drooling at the thought of something evil he’d found out about me, he turned my innocent statement against me. “I’ll bet.”

  My concerns sped past irritation. I barely kept from lashing out in anger. Lord? “Geoff, this may sound judgmental, but I’m only asking out of concern. Are you a Christian? A true believer, that is?” I’ve always avoided saying “born-again Christian” because it’s redundant. Someone who’s not born again isn’t a Christian. It’s as simple as that. I wouldn’t have said “true believer” if I hadn’t had such doubts about him. I needed to make myself as clear as possible.

  “I’m a Christian only when it’s convenient and gets me what I want.”

  Although his confession shocked me, it was probably the most honest thing he’d said. I hoped it wasn’t true. I suspected that some of the people in my hometown were hypocrites—even a few of the active members of my church—but I’d never heard one of them admit it. Shaken by Geoff’s response, my mind spun in confusion about what to say next.

  Instead of responding directly to his confession of conditional Christianity, which seemed to signify he wasn’t a Christian at all, I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. It was the worst thing I could have said. “And what do you want, Geoff?”

  “You,” he said quietly and confidently. Geoff wasn’t making any effort to be diplomatic, much less romantic. He hadn’t done a thing to win my favor. His dating game—he’d barely made it past caveman-style—wasn’t acceptable. And what girl wouldn’t resent his possessiveness about something that wasn’t his and never would be?

  Something? That was how he saw me—as a something and not a someone. He might as well have been an impatient diner drooling over a tender cut of beef. No, considering my personal standards of conduct, lamb would be a better comparison. Maybe he suspected that and found me more appealing because of it.

  The Holy Spirit must have been working overtime that evening, for I soon forgot my apprehension. “You don’t waste any time, do you, Geoff?”

  No more walking on eggshells. I sensed God’s approval—perhaps even His encouragement—to act stern and direct in opposing Geoff’s bluntness. I wasn’t Jesus clearing the temple of money changers, but I felt some of that same fire burning inside. Christian love tempered my words, though. How little I knew about Geoff. How could I help him unless I got to know him better, and how could I do that without listening more than I talked?

  That’s it, Kim. Two ears. One mouth.

  I wished someone else had been close by, though. Not a defender—I didn’t need one—but a witness. But no one was in sight.

  If I knew anything about boys, Geoff was the kind who’d talk about a girl behind her back, saying things that were neither flattering nor true. Or was I stereotyping and condemning him on meager and questionable evidence? His attitude might have been a false front, but how could I be sure?

  “I’ve finished playing,” Geoff said. “You’ve been interested in me since we first met. Sweet talk isn’t necessary now. We both want the same thing.”

  “If you were as smart as you think you are, you’d know talking like that won’t win me. You’ve been so clever—never saying anything improper … always implying it. It’s turned me off, Geoff. And, for your information, I don’t believe in mission-trip romances. They detract from the work.”

  He snorted. Maybe he didn’t believe anyone would come to Santa María for selfless reasons. I wondered why he’d come.

  “So who said anything about romance?”

  I shivered at being so close to someone who made no effort to hide his motives. “So why did you come here, Geoff? From what you’re saying, you don’t have much of a relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ. Do you think God wants you to behave this way?”

  “Kimmy, Kimmy, I have faith. Faith in myself. I don’t need to have faith in Jesus or a relationship with God. So don’t bother asking if Jesus is Lord of my life. I’m lord of my own life. The only lord I need. And I’m doing just fine this way.”

  I sighed aloud as I prayed silently about where to go from here. I couldn’t have felt more ill at ease if I’d been talking with the Devil himself. I couldn’t tell Geoff to get lost. If he’d told me the truth, he already was. I wondered whether anything could halt or even slow his pursuit of me.

  I hoped Geoff would apply his brakes voluntarily. Christian boys could make mistakes. Christian girls, too. But at least I could trust their good intentions. I didn’t trust Geoff, though. Knowing enough self-defense basics to get by didn’t make me feel any better about being alone with him in the dark.

  Just as I opened my mouth to respond, I remembered what I’d come to Mexico to do: evangelism. But God had placed me in relief work and home construction instead. Now I’d come full circle back to evangelism.

  Other evangelism in Santa María seemed impossible. Somewhere—perhaps just a few hundred yards away—slept the villagers of Santa María. If they weren’t Christians, they weren’t religious hypocrites, either.

  The villagers had what we called a church, but that didn’t mean they’d heard of Jesus, much less believed in Him. The building looked unused when we first opened it up for breaks. It didn’t look any churchier inside than outside, and the villagers undoubtedly viewed it as just another building. One with supernatural longevity.

  This blasted language barrier …

  Yet two feet away sat Geoff, a boy who’d almost bragged about not being a Christian. If he hadn’t known enough about Christianity to sound convincing, the mission agency wouldn’t have let him come.

  But he didn’t know Jesus. Not personally.

  Alt
hough he and I didn’t have a language barrier, we were opposite sides of the same coin. I didn’t know how to bore a hole to the other side to reach him, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to. Could I possibly learn to love and accept someone I loathed and distrusted as much as I did Geoff? I wondered if even Rob had the spiritual maturity to do that.

  How could I reach out to a guy who’d purposely mistaken my friendliness for a sign that I wanted what he wanted?

  Who are you, Geoff? The real you. And how can I stand being around you enough to find out?

  If God brought me here to plant gospel seeds in Geoff’s heart and maybe even convert him, I’d have to rely on the heavenly Father more than ever and be flexible and obedient beyond the call of duty.

  Duty to God has no limits, though. If it did, the sky wouldn’t be the limit; heaven would.

  So my mind flashed from Geoff to God, from God to Santa María, and from Santa María back to Geoff again during the briefest of moments following his claim to be lord of his own life. Although a smattering of seconds can seem like an eternity, these few hadn’t lasted long enough. I was no closer to an appropriate response than before. I wasn’t apprehensive about Geoff’s intentions now, but I was desperate to pray and to think.

  And to talk with …

  “Kim? Kim!” the familiar voice broke through the darkness.

  chapter forty-one

  A flashlight beam moved in my direction. “What you doing out here in the dark, gal? It’s time to be home in bed.” I’d never been so keenly aware of God’s perfect timing. He answered a prayer I hadn’t prayed in a way I wouldn’t have thought of suggesting. Thank You, Lord.

  “Coming, Aleesha!” I shouted. I wondered if I sounded as relieved as I felt. “We’ll talk again tomorrow, Geoff,” I whispered to keep Aleesha from hearing. She probably didn’t realize anyone was with me. “I promise.”

  Although I could barely see Geoff in the darkness, I sensed how much Aleesha’s intrusion irritated him. Without so much as a good-bye, he stomped off toward the boys’ field like a petulant star athlete the coach has benched mere seconds before he can break the tie in the championship game and lead his team to victory.

  I heard him mumble something about “that …” The last word wasn’t clear, but what I think he said made me sick. If he was an expert at anything, it was in making himself unlikable.

  Aleesha and I talked in whispered tones as we made our nightly visit to the edge of the field and came back to change into nightclothes. No one slept as close to the bonfire as we did. Our relative isolation proved to be a blessing that night. Although the other girls sometimes stopped by for a late-night chat, I couldn’t talk about the evening’s events with anyone but Aleesha.

  No matter how much I needed to pray, I needed to unburden to human ears first and receive human feedback. Even if it made me feel like a gossip.

  Aleesha knew so much about so many things. She could read people. All kinds of people. Maybe that’s why she accepted me before anybody else did. I could count on her to react with both her head and her heart.

  If anyone could say whether my concerns about Geoff were legitimate, she could. She could also help me figure out whether my compulsion to reach out to him was my idea or God’s. Had God brought me to Santa María to bear witness to Geoff? Was he the major challenge God needed to prepare me for?

  But Angel said I’d laugh at the ultimate project, and I wasn’t laughing about Geoff.

  Aleesha spent several minutes digesting everything I told her. “Girl, you’ve got a sure ‘nough mess on your hands.”

  “Aleesha, no.” I’d almost convinced myself things weren’t as bad as I’d thought.

  “I’ve been studying Geoff; I’ve been studying everybody here. When you’re a minority of any kind—even among a Christian majority—you can’t help paying attention to your environment. Experience helps you interpret what you see and hear. So I can tell that most of the people on this project—definitely Charlie and Rob—care about these villagers as much as you and me.”

  I nodded, although I doubted whether Aleesha saw it in the darkness.

  “But Geoff stays as far from these villagers as he can. If he has to interact with one of them, he does it grudgingly and doesn’t try masking his feelings. The villagers would have to be deaf, dumb, blind, and dead to miss that bad attitude of his. Geoff is only one person, but one seriously bad apple can do a lot of damage. I guess you know what that means.”

  “Mmm.”

  “Geoff resents the time you and Anjelita spend together, but that’s another issue. I don’t think he cares the least little bit about the villagers’ needs. I don’t know why he came here unless someone made him.”

  “Like his parents? I asked him about that. Why he came, I mean. He never answered. You think someone pressured him into coming?”

  “Why would he act so resentful about being here if he had a choice?”

  “But I was resentful at first, too.” I marveled that the memory of orientation didn’t redden my face in the darkness.

  “Yes, but you still came as a volunteer.

  ” I grunted.

  “Something else to keep in mind. My observations aren’t the most objective.”

  “Meaning …?”

  “Meaning Mr. Geoff doesn’t have any more use for us … thick black-skinned folks than he does for those light brown-skinned Mexicans.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Girl, you’re a sweet young lady, a fine and gentle young lady—when you aren’t cussing, that is ….”

  We both cackled. I looked around at the girls camped closest to us. They were still sound asleep.

  “I’ve been good for at least a couple of hours.” I’d have to tell her about teaching Anjelita not to curse, but not now.

  “I’m sure you have, Kim, honey. But my point is this. You aren’t a woman of the world like I am. I’ve seen things you haven’t seen. Things you don’t know enough about to recognize if they up and bit you. I’m not gonna tell you more ‘cause I don’t want to discourage you.”

  I almost laughed at Aleesha for calling herself a woman of the world, but I managed not to. She was already more of one than I’d ever be. “Am I that naive, Aleesha?”

  “You know that’s right, girl, but don’t change. That’s one of your most charming and endearing qualities. If you were like me, we’d lock horns all the time. I don’t take well to competition.”

  “I can’t imagine us ever tangling.”

  She didn’t let my comment distract her. “Kim, you’re always looking for the best in people. I guess Jesus was ‘guilty’ of that ‘bad habit,’ too, and look where it got Him. But He saw inside people’s hearts. He knew who was sincere and who wasn’t. And He knew who would betray Him.”

  “Can you do that, Aleesha? See inside people’s hearts, I mean?”

  “Almost. Sometimes, anyhow.”

  I was so tired I started losing my focus of the conversation. I hoped she wouldn’t notice. “So you … read minds?”

  “No, Kim. I’m not clairvoyant, and I’m not Claire anybody-else, and you know it.” Aleesha had the most amazing ability to be outspoken without being offensive. With me, anyhow. “That was your fatigue mouthing off. But God often shows me if someone is who he claims to be. Not who so much as what. Whether that person is real or not. So I’m apt to be cautious when somebody would jump in noncautiously ….”

  “Incautiously,” I said without meaning to. I hated having other people correct my English, but my dad was an English professor.

  “Incautiously, whatever. It helps keep me out of trouble. I thank God every day for that gift.”

  “So is that the same as ‘streetwise’ or ‘street-smart’?”

  “You’re catching on, girl. But those concepts are more complicated than I’ve been describing, and most streetwise people don’t see their ability as a gift from God.”

  I groaned inaudibly as Aleesha continued.

  “Then there are people who thi
nk they—”

  “Who think they’re streetwise, but aren’t?” I asked. “I thought you either are or you aren’t. Like being a Christian.”

  “You’ve got it, honey. But I’m talking about people like Geoff. He acts like he’s street-smart, but he hasn’t got a clue. He thinks his bad-boy attitude is all there is to it. So he puts that attitude on before he gets up in the morning and doesn’t take it off again until he crawls back in the sack at night.” She paused for a few seconds. “They say you can’t really speak a language till you start dreaming in it ….”

  I nodded invisibly in the dark. “Uh-huh,” I said, yawning once before each syllable.

  “Well, he only daydreams this role he wants to play. His act isn’t very convincing—not to someone who knows what it’s really like. I can’t see inside Geoff, but I can tell you he’s a fake on the outside. He’s not nearly as bad as he wants people to think.”

  “I … Aleesha, I’m almost dizzy from trying to take this in.”

  “At least it ain’t ‘cause you’re blond, girl.” On those rare occasions Aleesha said “ain’t,” I knew she was teasing.

  Although I needed to hear more, I could barely keep my eyes open. Or my mind. “You’ve … given me a lot to think about. I’m not sure which thread of this conversation to ask more about.” I thought for a minute. “You said Geoff has no use for black people. How can you tell? Has he said or done something specific?” I was thinking about what I thought he’d said when he heard Aleesha coming earlier.

  “He doesn’t have to. You know that attitude of his? It has a slight ‘odor’ that’s immediately recognizable to somebody who’s smelled it before, even though it’s not something anyone else would notice. I’m familiar with it, so I recognize it now.”

  “So Geoff ‘stinks’?” I wasn’t trying to be funny, and neither of us laughed. Geoff’s situation was pathetic, not amusing, and I felt the blood flood my face in embarrassment at the way I’d misstated my reaction.

  “Yes. If I sound judgmental, that’s why you should form your own opinion. Don’t believe what I’m saying just because I believe it. Don’t chance accepting my prejudices.” She added in such a quiet whisper I could barely hear her, “Yes, I have them.” Then she spoke a little louder. “At the very least, Geoff seems seriously lacking in that ‘rare and sweet perfume’ the apostle Paul referred to.”