Charlie tried to muster a grin. “I guess you could find some humor in it—seeing as it turned out okay in the end.”
“It was hilarious!” she said. “I can’t wait to tell Patsy Pringle when I go into the salon Friday for my set-and-style. She’ll get a big kick out of it, and then the story will be all over the place. I’ll be known as Esther the Wonder Driver. Maybe the newspaper will write me up; what do you think?”
Charlie harrumphed. Reaching out, he took his wife’s hand. “Esther, you’d better be glad it wasn’t a Highway Patrolman writing you up.”
Or the county coroner, he thought.
As Charlie drove on toward home, Esther began warbling one of her favorite songs. She had told Charlie about learning the words in elementary school and singing them with her family every Thanksgiving.
“‘Over the river and through the wood, oh, how the wind does blow!’” she trilled. “‘It stings the toes and bites the nose, as over the ground we go. Over the river and through the wood, to have a first-rate play; oh, hear the bell ring, “ting-a-ling-ling!” Hurrah for Thanksgiving Day!’”
The car pulled into the carport of the house in Deepwater Cove, and Charlie gratefully switched off the ignition. Esther elbowed him for the umpteenth time, and he finally joined in. “‘Over the river and through the wood,’” they sang together, “‘now Grandmother’s cap I spy! Hurrah for the fun! Is the pudding done? Hurrah for the pumpkin pie!’”
CHAPTER SIX
Early on in the history of the Tea Lovers’ Club, every member had agreed they would not elect a president. Neither would they have a meeting agenda, minutes, dues, or any of that folderol. But the following Wednesday when Esther Moore stood and began tapping a spoon on her teacup, Patsy was delighted to see the older woman assume her usual self-appointed role as club leader.
Having gotten the group’s attention, Esther opened her purse to take out the notebook of meeting minutes. At that, everyone in the room began to clap, and she looked up in surprise. Then her face broke into a radiant smile, and she clasped her hands together at her throat.
“My goodness, aren’t you all sweet to welcome me back to the TLC?” she said as the applause faded. “I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed visiting with everyone. There is nothing like a sick spell to make you appreciate your friends. In this case, TLC stands for Tender Loving Care. Charlie and I are grateful to each one of you who brought food to the house. If you can believe my husband, we’ve got enough in our freezer to feed the whole neighborhood twice over.”
“Do you have hot dogs?” Cody Goss spoke up. He was seated at Patsy’s table along with Brenda Hansen and her two daughters. Cody hooked his hands into his pockets. “I hope it isn’t bad social skills to say that I like hot dogs, and if you have some extra ones, Mrs. Moore, I would volunteer to eat them.”
“Hot dogs are just about the only thing we don’t have, Cody.” Esther gazed tenderly at the young man for a moment. “Oh, honey, I have missed you so much. You haven’t been to the house except the one time with the Hansen girls.”
“I’m too scared. I don’t want Mr. Moore to get mad at me again. You told him that I tinkered with your car the day you drove off your carport, even though I didn’t.”
As always, Cody spoke his true thoughts without considering how they might be taken. Patsy loved that about Cody. It was hard to find a person who never lied. It was even harder to find someone who didn’t bother to put on a mask or twist words around to protect feelings. But that was Cody Goss. Other than Jesus Himself, there probably had never been a more honest man in the history of the world.
Esther was brushing him off with a wave of her hand. “Don’t be silly, Cody. Charlie and I both know you didn’t touch my car—and we’re not upset with you. Somehow I just drove in the wrong direction. After what happened the other day, I’ve decided to call myself Esther the Wonder Driver.” Grinning, she glanced around at the group. “If you can believe this, I drove part of the way home from Springfield in my sleep! Charlie was snoozing right beside me in the passenger seat—both of us snoring to beat the band.”
When she laughed, a titter of giggles from around the tea area joined in. Patsy found the story amusing, but it worried her that Esther and Charlie had done such a thing. It was a wonder they didn’t have an awful accident.
“I don’t think that’s funny,” Cody spoke up. “I’m studying for my driver’s license test, and you’re not supposed to sleep while you drive a car. You have to be alert at all times.”
“Of course you do,” Esther said. “Unless you’re Esther the Wonder Driver! Anyway, all that’s behind us now, and it’s time to focus on our meeting. Since I haven’t been here for a while and no one took minutes …”
Here she paused and glanced at Ashley Hanes, who flipped a hank of long red hair over her shoulder, obviously unconcerned about falling short in her duties as club president pro tem.
“Does anyone have old business to report?” Esther asked, holding a pen poised over her notebook.
“Old business,” Cody said, standing. “Last Saturday, the men got together to repair Mr. and Mrs. Moore’s carport. The two Mrs. Finleys organized the ladies to fix up Mr. Moore’s broken garden fence and repair the flower bed. All these things were knocked down by Mrs. Moore when she drove off the back of her carport. Also, Mrs. Finley—the older one—helped Ashley Hanes by separating beads because Mrs. Moore was laid up in bed and Mr. Moore couldn’t do it all by himself while taking care of his wife. Ashley is getting lots of Christmas orders from rich ladies in St. Louis. They want necklaces, earrings, and bracelets made out of Ashley’s beads. Mr. and Mrs. Moore went to Springfield to get their veins checked; young ladies need to drink milk or they’ll become hunchbacks; and Mrs. Jones has thumbtacks if anybody needs to borrow one. That’s all.”
Cody sat down to a second burst of applause from the roomful of women. Registering pride, he looked across the table at Jennifer Hansen. Immediately, she leaned over to whisper something to her sister.
Patsy had heard a disturbing rumor that Jessica was thinking of dropping out of college after her wedding. Maybe even before the big event. This would be a blow to the young woman’s parents. Steve Hansen had worked his tail off to sell enough real estate so all three kids could go to college debt-free. Neither he nor Brenda were graduates, and they had big dreams for their offspring.
“Cody, you have amazed us all,” Esther was saying now. “What an excellent recitation. I may have to put you in charge of old business from now on. And though I haven’t been out and about much, Charlie tells me the carport and the backyard are in tip-top shape thanks to our dear neighbors. Such gifts you’ve given us! I don’t know when I’ve ever felt more loved.”
Patsy drank the last sip of her tea and hoped the official part of the meeting wouldn’t last much longer. She wanted to enjoy another cup of Earl Grey and a chat with her friends before returning to a long lineup of clients in the salon area.
“New business,” Esther announced. She looked around and then swallowed. “Well, I don’t believe I can think of a thing. Does anyone know of a plan in the works?”
“Patsy Pringle is going to the movies with Pete Roberts on Saturday night,” Cody announced. “He already shaved.”
Struggling to keep her cool, Patsy glared at Cody. Point-blank honesty could have its disadvantages, after all. To keep from chewing out the young man, she excused herself from the table and headed for the hot water urn. Though she focused on listening to the uplifting Color of Mercy CD playing in the background, Patsy could hear the women conversing. She hoped they weren’t talking about her and Pete.
She had agreed to see a movie with the man, but now she was doubting the wisdom of that decision. As she waited for her tea to steep, Patsy hummed along with the words to one of her favorite songs by the local trio. The Potter has us on His potter’s wheel, the chorus went, molding, stretching, shaping us to His will.
The idea of being prodded and pressed and spun ar
ound like a lump of clay had never sat well with Patsy, even though she knew the message in the song was taken straight out of the Bible. All her life, Patsy had needed to be strong and independent, forging her way toward a station in life that would make her proud. But pride was exactly the opposite of what God wanted from her. He demanded submission and surrender. How did Pete Roberts fit into God’s plan? Was she supposed to let him near … or run away before she got fried in her own grease?
“How about a Thanksgiving parade in Deepwater Cove?” Esther was suggesting as Patsy made her way back to the table. For some reason, the woman seemed to think parades were essential to every holiday.
When no one responded, Opal Jones proposed a day trip around the lake to look at fall foliage. A committee formed to check into it, and then Miranda Finley once again pleaded for help with Ashley’s business. This time a round of hands went up to volunteer for bead duty. Next, someone mentioned Halloween, and that brought up a discussion about whether or not trick-or-treating was a sin.
Still dwelling on what to do about Pete Roberts, Patsy paid scant attention when Miranda stood to give a short history lesson on the origins of the holiday. Pagans, druids, Celts, Romans, and one saint or another all seemed to have contributed to the controversial event.
Patsy herself had never celebrated Halloween. When she was young, her family had been too poor to buy or make costumes or to use up gas driving from one neighborhood to another so Patsy could collect candy. Nowadays, she decorated the salon for autumn with hay bales and pumpkins outside the front door and a few garlands of colorful leaves inside. She left the witches, ghosts, and spiderwebs for folks who liked that kind of thing.
The moment Miranda finished her speech, Jennifer Hansen rose to offer her own opinion. “The question I have about Halloween,” she said, “is whether it’s beneficial in any way.”
“It’s beneficial to the kiddos, honey,” one of the widows piped up. “They come home with all that candy to eat. Besides, I enjoy making popcorn balls every year, and the little ones are so cute when they traipse around the neighborhood as fairies or pirates. To my way of thinking, there’s nothing evil or wicked about it.”
“Whether or not Halloween has satanic influences,” Jennifer replied, “we have to ask ourselves if it glorifies God. If an activity isn’t beneficial to us and it doesn’t exalt the name of the Lord, then I don’t think it belongs in our lives.”
“You brush your teeth, don’t you, Jennifer?” Miranda asked, her voice tinged with a faint hint of derision. “How does that activity ‘exalt the name of the Lord’?”
The retort provoked another hubbub of discussion among the TLC members. As Patsy nibbled on a homemade chocolate-chip cookie, she decided that the outspoken young Jennifer was going to make an excellent missionary—if she could keep from getting herself into a knock-down-drag-out with Miranda Finley first.
“All right, ladies … and gentleman,” Esther called before things got out of hand. “If that’s all, we’ll close this week’s meeting of the Tea Lovers’ Club.”
At that, Jennifer sat down and so did Miranda—thankfully at separate tables. Patsy let out a breath. She liked both women. Jennifer was especially dear to her, but lambasting folks in the name of the Lord just wasn’t Patsy’s way. She knew God could use all kinds of people on His side, though. Bold or shy, dumb or smart, fat or skinny, it didn’t matter at all as long as a person was willing to do what He asked. Patsy had no trouble imagining Jennifer as a messenger for the Lord—hacking through jungles to pour out the Word of God on some unsuspecting tribe.
“I don’t know what Halloween is, but I do know that Satan is bad.” Cody addressed the women at the table. “I remember what the Bible says. ‘Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.’ James 4 :7 -8 . Nigh means near, so that verse tells us to stay near God if we want Him to be close to us and keep the devil away.”
The moment of stunned silence that always followed one of Cody’s scriptural recitations was broken by Jennifer. “That’s exactly right,” she said. “Whether we believe it or not, we’re in the midst of a battle between good and evil. We all need to wear our spiritual armor and be ready to fight for God.”
“I fight for God,” Cody told her.
Jennifer looked at him. “I know you do. You’re one of His best soldiers.”
“I can say lots of Scriptures.”
“Your father was wise to help you memorize all those verses.”
Cody’s face sobered. “My daddy used to read the Bible out loud a lot. He called it the Good Book. He said I was a great rememberizer. And I am. Also, I can read and write whatever I want to now that Brenda taught me how. I can paint good too. And I work hard all the time doing chores for people. But I can’t do numbers. My daddy tried to explain them to me, and finally he said, ‘Cody, you are a hopeless case.’ He was sure right about that.”
“We’re still working on math,” Brenda Hansen told the others. “I’m not giving up and neither should Cody.”
“Oh, I’ve figured him out!” Jessica gasped. The younger of the two daughters leaned forward across the table, glancing from woman to woman. “I just figured Cody out! We’re learning about people like him in the Abnormal Psychology class I’m taking this semester.”
“Abnormal?” Jennifer frowned at her sister. “Cody’s not abnormal.”
“I know! But he is different—and that’s because he’s autistic!” Jessica beamed as if she had just laid a home-baked, flaky-crusted, meringue-topped chocolate pie on the table.
Autistic? Patsy looked at Cody, who was grinning and nodding his head.
“Jessica’s right,” he said. “If you turn around, everyone, you’ll see my paintings right over there on Patsy’s wall. Seven ladies with pretty hairdos. Seven beautiful ladies.”
He focused those sapphire blue eyes on Jennifer Hansen, whose lovely face—framed with different colors and styles of hair—was clearly the subject of every single portrait in the wall mural Cody had painted that summer. With a slight smirk, he shrugged.
“I never knew I was artistic until Patsy bought me a sketchbook and some pencils. But once I got to drawing and painting, nobody could stop talking about my talent. Mrs. Moore said I am an artistic genius, and she knows because she has a friend who makes illustrations for magazines in New York City. I guess God fixes people exactly the way He wants them to be. There’s not a thing I like to do better than paint, paint, paint. If you looked in my room in the back of the salon, you would see what I mean. It’s full to the brim of pictures. Whenever I have spare time, all I do is be artistic. I’m glad you figured it out, Jessica, and if you want, I would be happy to paint a picture of you in your wedding dress.”
Once again, Cody had managed to silence the entire table. Patsy considered excusing herself and getting back to work, but she had a feeling she ought to stay. Something was hovering over the table—something unpredictable and worrisome.
“Autistic,” Jessica said. Reaching out, she laid her hand on Cody’s. “Autistic is different from artistic.”
“Uh-oh.” Cody glanced at Brenda. “Did I do bad social skills?”
She shook her head, then turned to her daughter. “Jessica, I think you should save your theory for another place and time.”
“But there’s nothing shameful about being autistic, Mom. That’s the whole problem with disabilities. In class, we learned that back in the olden days, people with physical or mental disabilities were hidden away, even locked in cages.”
“Cages?” Cody stiffened. “I’m not going to live in a cage. I am not an animal.”
“That’s exactly what I’m trying to say. These days we make all kinds of accommodations for people with physical disabilities. We have handicapped parking spaces, wheelchair-size toilet stalls, ramps, elevators, you name it. But those with mental, social, or developmental disab
ilities are still misunderstood and mistreated. It’s as though we think they have something to be ashamed of—but they don’t!”
“I am not an animal,” Cody repeated. “I am not a dog. I am not a bear. I am not a fish. I am not—”
“Stop.” Jennifer slipped her arm around Cody’s shoulders for a brief hug. “No one is going to put you into a cage. I promise.”
Cody gazed at her, his blue eyes deepening. “I love you, Jennifer Hansen.”
“I know,” she whispered. “You’re a wonderful guy … and I love you, too.”
Patsy nearly choked on the last crumb of her chocolate-chip cookie. Oh, boy. This was not a good thing. Autism. Cages. Love. What next?
“Everyone in Deepwater Cove loves you,” Jennifer went on. “Everyone. That’s because you’re kind and good-hearted and smart.” “Not to mention handsome as all get-out,” Patsy put in. She couldn’t refrain from drawing attention to Cody’s good looks—at least some of which were due to her own efforts.
“He’s wonderful … and he’s autistic, Jen,” Jessica said. “I’m sure of it. I just turned in a term paper about that disability. There’s a spectrum of different kinds of autism from mild to severe. I think Cody fits a type called Asperger’s syndrome.”
“What’s an Asperger?” Cody asked. “It sounds like one of the vegetables my aunt kept feeding me. Asp … asp … asparagus.”
“Cody, most people with Asperger’s syndrome have special interests, even giftedness in certain areas. They can be very intelligent and skilled, especially in their main areas of curiosity—like you are about painting or memorizing Scripture or learning to read and write.”
Jessica looked around at the women. “Who would have thought that someone who didn’t know a single letter of the alphabet would be reading in a few short months?”
“I can read anything,” Cody boasted. “I learned my letters and words from Brenda, and now I’ve read all the books about painting in the Camdenton library. That’s because I have asparagus syndrome.”
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