Southern Girl

by Lukas,Renee J.

  She spent the rest of the service barely breathing, conjuring up images of lighthouses and those places on her calendar because imagining the wide open coastline and vast ocean took her far away from this small church and the walls that had begun closing in on her.

  Finally Patty Jo Jenkins came to the pulpit to do her favorite reading. She was also playing the organ today, since the woman before her had been caught stealing a sack of wingnuts from P.J.’s Hardware Store earlier that week. Everyone wondered what she could possibly need that many wingnuts for. Reverend Aimes didn’t want the church to be associated with an organist who stole things, especially questionable items. This was the third new organist they’d had so far that year. The frequent turnover had become a major topic of gossip.

  Dan returned to the pulpit when she finished. “Very nice,” he said, looking in Patty’s direction. “I’d like to close with a little reminder. We’re seein’ a lot of people nowadays tryin’ to change the rules of right and wrong. Let me be clear! It says in Leviticus: ‘A man shall not lie with another man. It is an abomination!’” He pounded his fist to the mutters of “Amen” throughout the congregation.

  Why this sudden interest in Leviticus? Jess wondered. Maybe it was because of Boy George. Nearly every pop star in the eighties was confusing to her father because he couldn’t tell who was male and who was female, and he seemed increasingly disturbed by this. Lately her father’s closing remarks regularly had had to do with unnatural things and staying on the path of righteousness. It sounded to Jess like code for something, something that everyone else in church seemed to understand. Maybe she only imagined it, but her dad seemed to be getting angrier. After the service, his fists would be red from smashing them on the pulpit.

  Interestingly, he saved his yelling for church. At home, his voice was modulated and more zen-like than a Japanese garden. But that’s also what made him so frustrating. Her dad was a force of nature, normally as placid as a breeze, but potentially as destructive as a tornado. To Jess, a calm demeanor and artificial smile made his rules and objections no less infuriating.

  Jess rushed out of the church after the service to avoid talking with anybody, especially Stephanie and her mother, not to mention Alex. She was the first to get to the family car, an Oldsmobile sedan, the color of rust. She and her siblings called it the “ugly car.” Whenever they said this, their dad would lecture them on how they needed to live modestly and follow the example of Jesus.

  “Jesus didn’t drive,” Jess had said. “If he did, it wouldn’t be a car this ugly.”

  Her dad wasn’t amused. He’d tip the rearview mirror, glare at her and say, “The idea is not to be too flashy. A preacher can’t be showin’ up to church in a Cadillac. Where’s your sense?”

  Sometimes, Jess swore her father had no sense of humor. She and her siblings would have to muzzle their laughter all the way home.

  This particular morning Jess had to wait a while in the ugly car in the parking lot. Her father made a point of standing outside after every service and shaking hands with everyone, as if he were some kind of celebrity. And her mother usually stood by his side.

  “Hurry up,” Jess moaned to herself.

  Then Ivy got in. “It’s too hot in here,” she complained. The sun had been beating down on the vinyl interior for over an hour. “How can you stand it?” she asked, opening her door and fanning it to create a breeze.

  “It’s fine to me,” Jess lied, sweat streaming down her face.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Ivy asked, waving her church bulletin for more air.

  “Nothin’.” Realizing that they hadn’t talked to each other in a while, at least not about anything important, she added, “How’s it goin’?”

  Ivy pointed to herself. “You talkin’ to me?”

  “Yeah.” Jess shrugged.

  “You want something?”

  “Why can’t a sister talk to another sister without wantin’ something?”

  “Because you never do,” Ivy replied. “Unless you want something.”

  “I thought we’d have a conversation. Geez.” Jess realized there were a million questions she had for Ivy which didn’t get asked because she was often too wrapped up in her own worries to voice them. “I’m really askin’. How’s it goin’ with you?”

  “Fine.” Ivy turned away, obviously not in the mood for a deep conversation.

  Jess stared at her a moment. “How’s college?”

  Ivy was getting her bachelor’s degree before going to veterinary school. She loved all things nature. Jess called her the Dog Whisperer. She’d sleep outside with the family collie if she could. Radar, named after a character on the TV show M.A.S.H., loved Ivy more than chasing cows.

  Ivy rolled her eyes. “It’s fine, and don’t say it.”

  “What?”

  “I know, you hate animals.”

  “I do not!” Jess exclaimed.

  “You don’t like them. You hardly ever pet Radar.”

  “That’s because he stinks.” Jess was trying to be honest, not aware of how it came out. “If you want to pet a stinky dog or stick your hand up a cow’s ass, that’s your business.”

  “There’s more to it than that,” Ivy huffed.

  When Ivy said she wanted to be a veterinarian, their dad had recommended that she watch All Creatures Great and Small. “That James Herriot. Now there’s a good, wholesome family show. We should be watchin’ that instead of those god-awful music videos. Y’all got no business watchin’ half-naked people on TV.” Jess happened to walk into the living room when Ivy was watching it—right as James Herriot stuck his entire arm inside a cow that was giving birth.

  “Does Cobb kiss you with his tongue?” Jess asked abruptly.

  At first Ivy seemed shocked that Jess knew about him, as if she hadn’t advertised it all over her bulletin, as if his initials were too mysterious a code to crack. Then she said, “I…don’t know.” Her face was red.

  “You’d know.” Jess shook her head, reliving the trauma of her own date. “Just promise me you won’t quit school for him.”

  “What?”

  “You know, you always hear about those guys who are all, like, you gotta stay home and help work the farm.”

  Ivy was indignant. “He’s fine with me goin’ to school.”

  “Good.” Jess was pleased to hear that Ivy wasn’t changing all her plans for a boy.

  “Is that what you think of me?” Ivy asked.

  “Huh?”

  “You think I’d let a guy tell me what to do?” Her voice squeaked.

  Jess had no idea that what she thought mattered to Ivy. Since she had seen her sister transform into someone else when she began to notice boys, Jess wanted to make sure Ivy would still be herself, after all.

  “No,” Jess said. “Forget it!” There was no point in arguing. Ivy didn’t see it—how she changed around him, laughing at jokes that weren’t funny, twirling her hair. For heaven’s sake, sometimes when he was around she’d even forget how to put together a sentence.

  Something about that last thought stopped Jess in her tracks. Forgetting how to speak…Flashes of her first reunion with Stephanie, then her search for words when confronted with the sight of her in the cafeteria…Jess rested her hand under her chin and leaned against the car door. She couldn’t hear anything else that Ivy said over the noise of her growing anxiety. Were the feelings she was having for Stephanie similar to those of someone who was in love? Finding one person in the whole world more interesting than anyone else…was that what it was like?

  Their parents finally came out with Danny straggling behind. The delay was due to the fact that Danny had insulted someone’s son or daughter in school, and he had had to apologize in front of their parents.

  “You need to watch that tongue of yours,” their mother snapped. The car engine started.

  Danny sat on the end next to Ivy with his arms folded, pretending not to listen.

  Jess was glad it was his turn to be in trouble.r />
  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Jess spent the first part of the afternoon raking up the grass left by her dad’s lawnmower, the sun beating on her back. She’d had to do this ever since his mulcher broke, and he seemed to be in no hurry to get it fixed. Since their land was the size of two football fields, it was an ordeal every time he cut the grass. She decided to take a break, using the heat as an excuse for spying on what Ivy was doing in the adjoining field with Cobb Wallace. She propped the rake against an oak tree and walked closer to the property line. Ivy was kissing Cobb in the tall grass. Wearing overalls with no shirt underneath, he was very tall and husky with broad shoulders and arms made muscular from working on the farm. Ivy’s hands were falling down his shoulders as they kissed. Jess glanced around to make sure their father wasn’t nearby. Ivy really did seem to lose her mind whenever she was with this boy. She wasn’t even remembering to hide!

  Her sister had become a cliché preacher’s daughter, sneaking out with Cobb, then rushing through the back bushes to resume her portion of the yard work. They’d meet halfway between Jess’s house and his family’s farm, beyond some small pines, under a clump of poplar trees. It was their make-out spot, one which they mistakenly thought was private.

  Nobody appeared to have noticed Ivy’s absences except Jess. Because Ivy had a good, straight-A reputation, she was less likely than her siblings to be suspected of any wrongdoing. Jess wouldn’t tell on her either. It was against the sister code that must exist somewhere, she thought, and in any case, being a snitch wasn’t her style.

  The truth was Jess had known that Ivy liked Cobb even before her sister did—and she hadn’t been pleased about it. When he’d wave from his tractor out in the field, sometimes Jess hoped he’d have an accident—fall off and run himself over like that Tipton guy—something like that. Then she’d feel guilty and pray about it. She wasn’t sure where these murderous impulses came from. With Ivy spending all her time with Cobb when she wasn’t working on college stuff, maybe Jess just missed her sister.

  Danny, on the other hand, was going nowhere. Weeds had long since grown up and eclipsed the BMX bike trail of years ago, and he now sat in his room for hours, sometimes plucking at a guitar, sometimes doing nothing. People knocked on his door now and then to make sure he was still alive.

  He was going to have to leave his room today. It was his job to come out after Jess raked and gather up the grass piles and throw them into the next field. He hated this chore and always did a sloppy job. Usually their father would get mad at him, and they would go at it for a while. Danny would storm outside to clear away the trail of dead grass chunks he’d left behind and then stomp back to his room to brood.

  “You’re careless,” their dad would tell him. “You need to take pride in your work.”

  “I don’t care!” Danny would yell.

  “Maybe you’ll care a little more after you jog around the property five times.” The little smile her father always gave when he administered a punishment spooked Jess; it didn’t seem to match his harsh words.

  If such tactics were meant to “break” Danny, to force him to be the person Dan needed him to be, they had the opposite effect. After taking a shower to rinse off the gallons of sweat the jogging produced, Danny would retreat to his room to sulk, followed by playing loud rock songs making frequent mention of the word “hell.” If their father could understand the lyrics, he would have most likely broken all of Danny’s records in two, but lucky for his son, he couldn’t decipher them. Jess felt sorry for her brother. In an odd way, she understood him. His life wasn’t going to be as predictable as their parents had hoped.

  Having taken care of the raking, Jess was tending to her regular yard chore, weeding the flower beds. But her mind wasn’t on it. Today she was lost in a fantasyland of gray eyes, seeing a certain face in her mind, hearing songs in her head and trying to understand what all of this was.

  On her way back to the house, Jess heard garden shears making clipping noises in the backyard. It was Ivy, back from the tall grass and hunched over a clump of unruly weeds. She wasn’t in a sundress today, just a pair of shorts and a girly blouse. Her long hair was pulled back in a braid.

  “Hey, Ivy?” Jess’s sneakers made crunching noises as she crossed the freshly cut grass.

  “Hey.” She wiped her brow and resumed snipping.

  “Can I ask you somethin’?”

  “No.”

  “C’mon.” The sun was burning a hole through Jess’s T-shirt. She was getting irritable.

  “Okay.”

  “If Cobb asked you to marry him, would you say yes?” Jess asked.

  Ivy sat back on her heels and sighed. “Yes, and don’t start.”

  “I’m not startin’.”

  “I know what you think of him.”

  Jess kicked at the ground. “I’m sorry I said he looked like a toad.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Okay, I’m not, but I’m tryin’ to make peace here.” Jess’s unspoken questions were clamoring to get out. “What does it feel like…to be in love?”

  Ivy snipped faster and more furiously. Jess almost felt sorry for the weeds.

  “I’m not tellin’ you,” Ivy snapped. “You’ll make fun.”

  “No, I won’t. Promise.”

  Ivy was suspicious, looking at her sister and cocking her head to the side.

  “Well,” Ivy began with a slight smile. “You get these butterflies in your stomach every time you see him. But they’re good butterflies.” She stared off as if to some distant land.

  “What do you love about him?” Jess asked.

  “His hair…his smile…”

  As Ivy listed the things she loved most, Jess was picturing Stephanie cheering at the last pep rally, imagining every detail about her as her sister spoke.

  “His hands,” Ivy continued. “Definitely his hands. They’re soft but strong.”

  Stephanie’s slender hands sweeping through the air as she danced with the cheerleaders…or when she held her books…

  “His smile,” Ivy repeated dreamily. “A smile can make your heart hurt.”

  Jess knew what she meant. Her face twisted in anguish.

  Ivy finally noticed her sister again. “I guess it’s all the little things about him. They just add up to love.” She laughed. “I know you don’t believe it, but even you will fall in love someday.” She went back to her garden shears, and Jess went to her room to worry.

  As she lay on her bed, she studied the photograph of the two of them, best friends at age five, still holding a place of honor on her dresser mirror. How much simpler everything was back then.

  Jess had seen the way boys forgot how to talk around certain girls. They stumbled over their own feet and made absolute fools of themselves while girls giggled. It was understood that it was just a boy who liked a girl—“aw, how cute.”

  Jess knew, though, that a girl wasn’t supposed to stumble like that around another girl. If she did, the truth might be revealed. Jess had to be perfectly cool around Stephanie. This was so unfair. So not only did she have to get through adolescence like everybody else, but she also had to get through it with the grace and demeanor of some old Hollywood actress who never messed up a line. Sometimes it felt like the pressure was so great she’d crack.

  That night, gripping her basketball tighter than ever, Jess rolled over to face her window. A hint of moonlight poked through the curtains. She braced herself, wondering anxiously what the next day would bring.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  P.E. class was long over, but Jess needed some time alone. She was shooting hoops by herself in the high school gym, throwing the ball so hard it nearly cracked the backboard before dropping through the net. This felt good. It made sense to her. Throw the ball, it goes in the hoop. Nothing complicated there. It was life that was too complicated. If only she could just live with her basketball. They could live a long and happy life together.

  She was lining up for another shot when the
double doors opened and Alex came in. She heaved a mental sigh. He was always hunting her down.

  “Hey, how’s it goin’?” he asked, trying to sound casual, even cheerful.

  “It’s goin’.”

  He watched as she took shot after shot, never missing. He laughed and dug his hands deeper into the pockets of his football jacket. His face was awash with admiration, and, frankly, it annoyed her. He looked as if he’d discovered some rare gem and couldn’t wait to tell people about it. He didn’t know her or her secrets at all, not deep down.

  “I was wonderin’,” he said. “If you’d like to go to the dance this weekend.”

  She took another shot. “I got plans.”

  “You’re not goin’ to the Promise Dance? Whaddaya gonna be doin’?”

  “Eatin’. Sleepin’.”

  He retrieved a stray ball and threw it back to her. “You’re crazy.”

  “Did I mention that mental illness runs in my family?”

  He shook his head. “Why are you always pushin’ me away?”

  She stopped dribbling and looked at him squarely. “You could have any girl you want at this school.”

  “I don’t want them. I want you.” He glanced around the gym anxiously.

  “So that’s it,” Jess said. “I’m a challenge.”

  He tried to steal the ball away, but she quickly got it back, took the shot and made it.

  “You’re too much for me,” he said, trying to laugh to save his dignity. Before he left the gym, he turned around. “You oughtta know, Jess. I don’t just like you ’cause you’re a challenge. I don’t like you at all for bein’ a challenge.” He tried to correct himself. “I mean, you are challenging as a person.” He tripped over his words, his face red-hot.

  “Okay,” she said softly.