The Church Ladies

by Lisa Samson

  I jumped up from the desk. “All right.”

  “Look!” He stood to his feet now, dancing as though his bladder had filled to capacity, pointing to the three farm hands in succession. “Those guys … those guys…they’re the guys from Oz! He”—his finger pressed Ray Bolger’s nose—“is the scarecrow. That guy is the cowardly lion, and he’s the tin man! Right?”

  Sure enough, he’d touched Burt Larr and then Jack Haley.

  I sat down next to him, cross-legged, and pulled him into a hug. “I remember when I realized that, Gus.” I purposely failed to divulge the fact that I’d already seen my tenth birthday by the time I’d experienced that particular rite of passage. “It’s cool, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. Like her friends were guiding her all along.”

  “Good friends do that. Even if they have to make fools out of themselves.”

  He turned around, sat in my Indian-style legs, and leaned back against my abdomen. “Wanna watch the rest with me?”

  I could do a million other things with my time. I’d seen The Wizard of Oz at least eight times since we bought him the video for his fifth birthday, the birthday he asked for what he called “a scientific skeleton.”

  “Let me go get my coffee, bud.”

  So I watched and sipped, while Angus sat in the “mommy chair” and told me everything that was coming next. The time on the VCR flashed twelve o’clock over and over.

  All the phrases that eventually became sayings slid past my ears. “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!” “The size of a man’s heart isn’t determined by how much he loves, but by how much he is loved by others.” “There’s no place like home.”

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

  “I wonder what happened to Dorothy’s parents that she had to go live with Auntie Em?” Angus asked, his voice quiet.

  I shook my head. “Maybe it was a previous tornado. I’ll get Daddy to buy you the book. Maybe that’ll say.”

  “And why couldn’t they hear her pounding the cellar door with her hard shoe. It wasn’t as loud in the storm cellar as it was outside, was it, Mama? They could have heard that banging down there. And they knew she was outside. Wouldn’t they have been listening for her?”

  “Look, here comes that horrible Miss Gulch!”

  “I can’t stand her!”

  “Me neither.”

  But the crabby old woman on the bicycle stole his attention even as she stole Dorothy’s dog, and I kept thinking about hard shoes and cellar doors. Duncan was much like Aunt Em and the gang, I supposed. He’d kept on working late, and then he started acting so stressed out all of the time, complaining about his employees, complaining about everything. Our conversations were nothing more than gripe sessions, and, well, that’s when the bag boys began to take on a whole new aura.

  But Duncan would have never cheated on me had the situation been reversed.

  My watch said eight o’clock. And Duncan? Still not home. See?

  Lucky for me the only bag boys they hired here at the IGA were retirees, thank God, and I literally meant that.

  “I feel like a milkshake. How about you, Gus?”

  “Sure.” He sighed. “Do I have to go with you to the store?”

  “Nope. Robbie’s upstairs studying.”

  “Okay.”

  I climbed up the attic stairs. “Rob?”

  “Yeah, Mom.”

  “Can I come in?”

  “Sure.”

  I entered the room. As neat as Josh had been, Robbie was exactly the opposite. Now I have always kept a clean house, and Chris and I often joked that if the boys hadn’t been two years apart, we would have sworn someone switched them at birth. It wasn’t that the room held a wide variety of items, for Robbie kept his interests limited. Clothes shrouded most surfaces, and copies of Sports Illustrated had been slapped down all around the bed. Many times I had managed some variation of skating on Robbie’s floor, all of those slick pages sliding beneath my socks. I stayed near the door just to play it safe. “I’m going out to get some ice cream to make milkshakes. Gus is watching Wizard of Oz.”

  “Okay.”

  “You want anything?”

  “Nah. I grabbed a sub on the way back from Jeanelle’s.”

  “Six inch?”

  “No. Twelve.”

  “Oh … okay, well …”

  I wanted to talk about Josh, but I couldn’t think of how to start. How would Elyse Keaton have started if she’d gone up to talk to Alex P. Keaton? It isn’t that TV moms always say just the right thing. But they sure know how to start up a conversation with succinctness and understanding. And the looks they paste on their faces hold the perfect combination of tenderness and concern. They never look scared to death or queasy, and they never open the conversation by screaming something like, “You’re not going to do something stupid like that, too, are you?”

  Maybe I needed a writer to slip me scripts for all occasions.

  “Rob?”

  “Yeah, Mom.”

  “Are you okay?”

  He nodded.

  “Really?” I asked.

  “Yeah, you know. Just …”

  “Do you want to talk to me about Josh?”

  He shook his head. “Mom, what is there to say?”

  “Well, are you wondering why it happened? Anything like that?”

  Robbie, sitting on the bed with his legs out in front of him, crossed at the ankles, started to bob his feet back and forth, jitters of movement. “What’s the point in wondering why it happened, Mom? People die. People die young. It happens every day. So wondering why that happens is like wondering why there’s a food chain, why black widows eat their mates, why giraffe babies have to learn to run right away.”

  “I don’t think I’m following you on this one, buddy.”

  His face petrified. “It’s like we can accept all the cruelties in the animal world and say ‘that’s the way God made it,’ and then it’s like, whoa, if it happens to us. Why do volcanoes erupt and kill with hot lava? And what about that tsunami thing that wipes out entire villages? So, no, I’m not asking why because I’m not that stupid. It happens! Stuff like this happens all the time!” He paled and shuffled through his papers. “Okay? Okay! Is that what you wanted to hear?”

  I maneuvered over the magazines and sat next to him. I tried to take him into my arms but he resisted, pushing gently against me. “No, Mom. Man, I’m not a little kid anymore.”

  Sucking in my breath, the most profound sense of awkwardness I’d ever experienced ricocheted inside of me. Awkwardness and loneliness and a deep, groaning sorrow flooded my sinking heart. Tears filled my eyes, and I jumped off the bed, slid across the floor, and ran down the stairs.

  “Mom!” Robbie called after me, but I ran into the kitchen, grabbed my keys off the counter, and yanked open the pantry to lift my windbreaker off the hook.

  “Mom!”

  I wanted to run right outside, but I stopped, remembering I was the parent. Right? “Yeah, Rob?”

  Turning, I saw him standing there in a pair of large boxer shorts and a gray T-shirt with the mange. “I didn’t mean I don’t love you any more, Mom. I just meant I can fight my own battles now. I really can.”

  I nodded. “I know, buddy I’m just a little emotional about stuff right now. I’m sorry, too.”

  He leaned back on the counter. “Sometimes a guy is forced to see all the sides of God. And sometimes it takes some doing to accept them. You know?”

  Boy did I. “Yeah, I do.”

  “And then you feel so wrong and shallow and shortsighted even for having the nerve to actually judge God.”

  “Is that what’s happening now?”

  He nodded and looked down at the floor. “I’ve been asking Him a lot of questions lately.”

  “Have you talked to Dad about them?”

  “Yeah. But there comes a time in a man’s life when he’s got to find out the answers on his own.”

  A man’s life.

  Robbie saw hi
mself as a man now. That was good.

  “I miss Josh, Mom.”

  The words were so soft I barely heard them, but I watched with a breaking heart as his face crumbled and his tears poured forth. I rushed over and held him in my arms. My Robbie. My son, weeping. When he gained his composure a few minutes later, he said, “There’s so many moments I wish I could go back to and live all over again.” And he cleared his throat, wiped the reddened wet of his face with a flat, horizontal hand. “You go on to the store before it gets too late.”

  “It’ll get easier, Rob.”

  “I hope so, Mom.” He disengaged from my embrace and walked out of the kitchen leaving a void I knew I couldn’t fill. Only one person could, and there was more than enough of Him to go around. And that was my prayer as I walked out in the misty darkness.

  With the amount of snow that had fallen a few nights ago when I’d gone to Miss Mildred’s, there still should have been more left than there was, but the thermometer had climbed back up to a regular spring day I did what I intended to do in the first place, climbed into the van and turned the ignition key.

  The radio blared a praise song. And I sang along, knowing that verse in the Bible about God inhabiting the praise of His people was true. I gave Rob over to Him for the millionth time since he’d been born. Peace visited me, ushering me along the dark road, and as I mindlessly drove the familiar ribbon of asphalt, a light rain began to fall, dissolving the cottony puddles of snow spring was overtaking.

  I ran into the store, veered past the produce, past the dairy section, and right into frozen foods. The price of ice cream alone was enough to bring me to the proverbial screeching halt. Good grief, Breyer’s was expensive these days! Five bucks for a half gallon of vanilla bean? Principle alone propelled me to choose some cheap, plastic bucket variety instead. Just vanilla would have to do. I’d get some Oreos as well and make blizzardy things. The boys would like that.

  And there she stood, sunny, young Sunny, a vision of pert, glossy-haired, young womanhood up there scanning items at the checkout, wearing a fisherman’s sweater and a knee-length, black polyester skirt. With hose and church shoes. “Hi!” she called out to me when I got in the short line. “Late night run?”

  I held up the ice cream and cookies in reply and waited until a blushing guy with batteries, a pack of Coor’s, and a box of Tampax was rung through, as well as a suited, middle-aged man with a Healthy Choice chicken dinner and a bottle of Snapple.

  “How you doing?” I asked Sunny after the man left with his lonely, heart smart supper.

  “Oh, all right, I guess. A little tired.”

  “Long day?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Been here since noon.”

  I looked at my watch. Eight-thirty. “You on until closing?”

  “Yes, ma’am.… Um, ma’am?” Sunny hesitated. “Y’all are friends with the Knights, aren’t you? Over at Mount Oak Community?”

  “Yeah. Chris is my friend.”

  “I heard about their son.”

  “The whole town has, I guess.”

  “Yes, ma’am. It’s not like I’m prone to talebear or be a gossip or such, but I wanted you to tell them that I’ve been praying regularly for them.”

  “Where do you go to church?” I asked as Sunny put the items into a blue, crackly store bag. I knew, of course, from the general gossip, but I didn’t want Sunny to think I was prone to talebear or such.

  “My husband, Mark, is the interim pastor over at Oak Grove Baptist Bible Church.”

  I smiled. “Out on Route 29?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Naturally, I also heard about the troubles they had six months ago. If one could compare church tribulations to the offerings down at The Sweet Stop on the square downtown, the troubles at Baptist Bible would be akin to a Banana Split Royale. For five. Served in a trough. “You like it here so far in Mount Oak?”

  “Yes, ma’am. We’re sort of new to town. A coupla’ months. That’ll be $4.68, by the way.”

  I looked behind me. No line. Good. This girl intrigued me for some reason. I pulled my wallet out of my purse and dug out a five. Ha-hahh, Breyers people. Ice cream and Oreos for less than a half gallon of your overpriced stuff. “Where’re you from originally, Sunny?”

  “Bainbridge, Georgia.”

  “Where’s Bainbridge?”

  Sunny took the bill and began to make change. “Southwest corner. Not too far from Dothan, Alabama, and about an hour from Tallahassee, Florida.”

  “Convenient to everywhere, eh?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  I meant that as a joke. “Well, welcome to Mount Oak, Sunny. I’m Poppy Fraser.”

  “That’s a nice name.”

  “I’m a pastor’s wife, too. My husband, Duncan, is the pastor up at the Highland Kirk.”

  She handed me the change. “What kinda church is that?”

  “Presbyterian.”

  “Oh.” She looked down. “Don’t know much about Presbyterians.”

  “Well”—I gathered the two handles of the bag—“we don’t bite.”

  “No, ma’am, I don’t guess y’all do.”

  “Heyyy, sunny Sunny!” A loud voice, sweet and smooth like pecan syrup and more flowery than magnolia perfume, sang from behind my back.

  I jumped.

  Sunny gave a little wave. “Hey, Mrs. Hopewell!”

  I turned my head to see a face smack up to mine. Charmaine Hopewell, wife of the Reverend Harlan Hopewell, singing star of the Port of Peace Hour, stood right behind me at the IGA without a stitch of makeup on her face. And the woman’s cart burgeoned with nothing but prepackaged junk! That went a long way for me. Nice to know a TV personality like Charmaine Hopewell had her downfalls like the rest of us regular gals. And when she smiled, an orthodontic retainer glimmered.

  “How are you doing, Sunny?” She turned to me. “Isn’t she just a peach? Makes coming to the grocery store a little more … sunny!” Her laughter should have annoyed a woman like me, but it didn’t. It made me smile. “So what are y’all talking about?” Charmaine asked.

  “I was just telling Mrs. Fraser here—”

  “Call me Poppy, please.”

  “Oh, I know!” Charmaine Hopewell laid a comfortable hand on my arm. “All those ‘missuses’ and ‘yes, ma’ams’ make you feel like a patriarch’s wife, don’t they?”

  I laughed. Back in Maryland, the charity organizations I served with would bring in celebrities from time to time for their galas. Usually politely distant, they did nothing whatsoever that made me want to say, Let’s hang out. But Charmaine, loved by hundreds of thousands all over the South, seemed like the type you could invite over for a chicken dinner and ask to get the bottled salad dressing out of your scary refrigerator while you plated up the food on your everyday dishes. “I sure don’t need any extra help in feeling old,” I said.

  Sunny turned red. “Yes, ma’am, but I was just saying how sorry I was about Josh Knight, because I remember how Mrs. Fraser and his mother used to come in here together when I first started working here, so I figured they were friends and all.”

  Charmaine Hopewell’s face dropped with a genuine sadness. “We’ve been praying over at our church, too. How’s the boy’s parents doing?”

  “Gary’s holding up, but Chris …” I set down my bag. “I mean, how do you get over something like that?”

  Charmaine leaned against the counter. “I don’t think you can. I mean, you go on, especially if you’ve got other children—”

  “He was the only one,” I said.

  “Then I just don’t know. You’ve got to keep praying, though. I know that much.”

  I looked at the two pretty faces before me, both so different. The fact that they really did care about perfect strangers amazed me in a way. “Do you all know Mildred LaRue?” I asked.

  “Oh yes! Love her! You know, she’s sung with me on the Port of Peace Hour several times.”

  Sunny shook her head. “I don’t think I know who y’all
mean.”

  Charmaine took over. “Real skinny black lady, always wearing green.”

  “Drives that big green Impala?”

  “Yep, that’s her.”

  I said, “Well, she and I get together Monday nights to pray for Chris. She lives out on Route 45, across from Tweed Road.”

  Charmaine nodded her head of huge auburn hair. “Been there a couple of times myself.”

  “Well, you’re both welcome to join us. Around six o’clock. She makes dinner, too.”

  Charmaine pushed off the counter. “Monday night’s a good night for me. And it’ll keep me from suggesting we eat out for supper…again! Harlan hates it when I spend money even if it is the money I make myself with my CD’s. After the televangelist scandals of the eighties …” She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, I’ll be there. How about you, Sunny? You want to go, too? I’ll give you a ride.”

  She shook her head. “No, ma’am, I don’t believe I can.” She didn’t bother to give an explanation as to why, so I didn’t ask.

  I doubted whether a glitzy TV personality like Charmaine Hopewell would really show up anyway

  Fourteen

  Angus still danced around when he had to go to the potty badly, which provided some consolation to me. I’d take my warm moments when and where I could get them these days. It wasn’t that life didn’t have its joys anymore. But a cloud definitely shadowed my relationship with my sons. Josh’s cloud, a gray rain falling from its gloom, seemed to taint the ease with which I had always loved my boys. It wasn’t easy anymore, not when you really, really knew they could be snatched up at a moment’s notice.

  There’s that verse in the Bible that says the death of a saint is precious in the eyes of the Lord. It’s easy to picture Jesus welcoming Josh into heaven, and if it was true that he died before he hit the ground, well, I guess he was just swooped right up. One second he was falling in fear, the other he was flying with the Lord, right up to a place where he’d still be precious indeed. If we could see what is really happening during the death of a Jesus child, we’d view the whole thing differently. But we can’t. I can imagine, though. And because it’s true, it comforts me. I’ll see Josh again. I’ll see him again because Jesus died for him and opened up the pathway to heaven for all who believe in Him. Jesus’ death covered it all.