by Lisa Samson
After slipping into thermals, jeans, and one of Claudius’s flannel shirts, two pairs of socks, and his old fleece-lined moccasins, she set the kettle on the stove.
The screech of tires in the driveway sent her running out the front door.
Sister Ruth jumped out of the Suburban. She raised her hands in the air, hooting and hollering with joy. “May-May! Honey baby, I won! I won!”
“Sister Ruth, what on earth are you talking about?”
She rushed up, hand on her panting heart. “I decided to play three times instead of my usual one ticket, and I won the lottery! Thank you, Jesus!” She raised her hands again and danced in a little circle.
“How much?”
“Two hundred thousand dollars!”
May screeched, too, and pulled Sister Ruth into a giant hug, and they twirled around like the crazies right there in the driveway.
“I came right over. Woo!” She breathed in again. “I can’t believe it. I never thought. I just had a little fun with it, gave me something to dream about here in this godforsaken town. You know what I mean. I thought about traveling, or buying a nice little house somewhere, or even just a small shopping spree at Dillard’s. Nothing big, maybe two complete outfits, everything brand-new.”
—And she’d deserve it.
“Or maybe even buy a new car. Nothin’ fancy, but with a lot better gas mileage.”
“Sister Ruth, you just can’t help being practical, can you?”
“No, I can’t! You’re exactly right.”
“So what are you going to do? And can we go inside? I’m freezing, and the kitchen should be nice and warm.”
The kettle had been screaming for who knew how long. “How about a celebratory cup of tea?” May asked.
“That sounds like just the ticket!” Ruth set her purse on the table. “Get it? Ticket? Lordymercy! Honey, I cannot believe it!” She danced again, this time the crazies joining her, yipping and barking and turning circles.
Having those two ugly dogs was worth it, they made this scene so perfect. In an odd sort of way. But why should May expect anything else?
“Do you know what I think you should do?” She set Sister Ruth’s tea on her place mat and they sat down.
“I’m open for any and all suggestions.” She peeled off her coat and bared a Thanksgiving sweater with a colorful turkey in desperate need of a diet program.
May imagined the bird, when he wasn’t decorating sweaters, driving a semi up and down I-75 and stopping at every Waffle House along the way.
“You’ve been talking about a Florida vacation ever since I’ve known you. Which means you’ve probably been talking about it longer than that.”
“I won’t contradict you there.”
“So why not do it? It’s getting cold now.”
“I have family down there. My father’s cousin Mary’s girl lives near St. Petersburg.”
“Would she let you come?”
“I think so. I don’t know why not. We’re family.”
“But we’re in Kentucky, we do things differently. Family means something more here.”
“No, she was always a good girl. We had fun together as children when we got to see each other.”
“What’s her name?”
“Oella.”
May winced.
“Now, now,” Ruth said. “Now, now.”
“Just be back by Christmas,” May told her.
Sister Ruth drained her cup. “Got to go, honey. There’s so many people to tell.” She stood up and waved her hands again. “Lordymercy! What a day!”
May saw her to the truck and waved her down the driveway. Sweetie and Stinky ran around her in their sweaters. She picked them both up and headed back to the kitchen, logged onto the Internet again, and decided to see if Vogue had a Web site.
“Years ago,” she said to the dogs, “I wanted to be editor in chief of that magazine.”
Stinky passed gas and ran into the other room. She couldn’t blame him there.
November 13, 2003
Dear Eli,
Well, I still don’t know how it can be called a suicide. I’ve been thinking it over too. Now, I dislike capital punishment as much as those people who are trying to fight for your life, but they’re the ones calling it a suicide. I mean, not that I’m the greatest Christian in the world, but Jesus didn’t open his mouth when they were laying all those charges on him, did he? His plan all along was to be killed, and nobody calls that a suicide. I think, and I’ve got no expertise in either theology or criminology or the law, as you might guess, unless you stick that needle in your own arm, you’re good to go as far as suicide goes. I’d offer to be there for you, but I can’t even go to Subway without freaking out.
I’ve been taking a lot of pictures and got the Internet. The other day I ordered a few shots of the farm to send you. Don’t expect any pictures of me, not that you asked for one, because I’m not exactly what you’d call photogenic these days. Years ago, I wanted to work at a fashion magazine and had all the latest clothing and hairdos. Now, well, I’m just going for clean. The animals probably don’t even care about that! Sister Ruth sure would get on me, however, if I developed body odor and bad breath. She’s a clean freak.
Do you get any kind of Thanksgiving dinner there? It’ll just be me here again this year. But I make a turkey anyway and then a big pot of soup to freeze. That’ll last me until the end of January if I eat it for lunch every day. I didn’t know how to cook before I got here, but I do pretty well now, so at least there’s that.
I think I’m going to have to get Claudius’s old car fixed. Sister Ruth won a bundle in the lottery and is heading to Florida for a nice long visit with family. She leaves tomorrow, and I don’t want to bother her with a phone call, but I have no idea where to get the darn car fixed. I’ve lived here for nine years and don’t know anything about anything. All I know is, it won’t start. Not even so much as a rumble.
Those prints should be here next time I write, so I’ll send them on. Happy Thanksgiving. Oh, here are a couple of really sappy books that will leave you as intellectually and emotionally bereft as you were when you started. I don’t know how stuff like this gets published, and I’m not all that deep.
Sincerely,
May
May only gave out her new phone number to a few people. Sister Ruth, of course, Glen, and Father John from St. Thomas. The last one was a mistake because he called at least twice a week if he didn’t visit.
He was coming a few days before Thanksgiving, and May was sure his visit would include an invite to his house for Thanksgiving dinner.
Glen knocked on the front door at mail time. “Look, May! I think you got a check from iStockphoto!”
She snatched it out of his hand and ripped it open. “Fifty bucks! Wow!” She didn’t check her account every day, because that just seemed like asking for bad luck.
“Congratulations. You might be able to make a go of this.”
“I don’t need much.”
“What about articles?” he asked, leaning against the porch post. “You can write those, and Web sites will buy them.” He looked good that morning in his winter uniform. Probably because of that girlfriend of his.
“I have no idea what I’d write about.”
“Well, how many women do you know that run their own flower farm?”
“Farmette. And how many women do I know, period?”
“Good point. Gotta fly. Here’s the rest of your mail.”
The electric bill and a letter from Eli. She tore open the bill first. $35. The advantage of not having central heat. Guess the hot water bottle in bed at night was worth it. If it got bad enough, she could sleep in a sleeping bag in front of the woodstove in the kitchen. She generally spent most of January in front of the woodstove. But it hadn’t been that cold yet.
November 19, 2003
Dear May,
I wish I could help you with the car. I have no idea what to tell you. It was an old car years ago, and sitt
ing for a decade, well, I doubt there’s hope for it. Hopefully something will work out before you have to take your flowers to market. It’s probably best to sell the Galaxy for parts and at least get something out of it if you can.
You’re right. Those books you sent did nothing for me intellectually, spiritually, or emotionally. I’m indebted.
I’m sorry you won’t have anybody for Thanksgiving there with you. It’s always been my favorite holiday. My mom always cooked up a ham and a turkey; she’d save up a few dollars here and there from her grocery money throughout the year, and that day she’d pull out all the stops. She’d let me help her in the kitchen.
I’m actually a pretty good cook, though I haven’t made a thing in years. Before I went into the service even. What about you? Do you have any good holiday memories? I remember the Thanksgiving when I was eight. It was before we went to live with my grandfather. My dad was a lazy bum who my mother supported ever since I could remember, and my grandfather wasn’t much better but at least he could hold a job, which was more than I could say for a lot of the men in my family who sat by the mailbox and waited for their crazy check to come in.
At least she finally ended up with a good man, and when I went away to UK I knew she’d be okay. But then I came home, and this area, Beattyville, everything, it’s depressing. I don’t know how you stay. I went into the military as a way to try and get beyond all that, and it worked for a while. But I should have never come back home after I got out. That was my big mistake. Anyway, that Thanksgiving it was just the two of us. No angry men.
I’m glad my mom found Buell, though. He’s a good man and he does right by Callie too.
Hopefully you grew up in more stable circumstances, but with you being a hermit (excuse me, recluse), I have to wonder about that. You didn’t really talk about your family much.
Well, at least you don’t go to bed thinking about the people you’ve killed. I don’t just think about Roger and Faye. I think about all the people I killed in the military. Law-abiding citizens are thankful for us, but they rarely think about how those deaths wear on a soldier’s soul no matter who the fiend is that gets it.
I’m looking forward to those pictures. I remember seeing you one day in Woodland Park snapping pictures of the flowers near the restrooms and tennis courts. It was before we met at the Fishtank. I thought you were beautiful. I just wanted to say that I never meant to use you. I didn’t think I had. We met at the Tank and went back to my place and you were gone by three a.m. I was hoping to catch up with you at school but never ran into you. We hung with such different groups too. And then the summer before boot camp, I thought maybe we had a chance, but I’d already fooled around with “the mayor’s daughter,” and the wheels were set in motion. Wow. How different life would have turned out if I’d had you to come home to.
Do you think God was giving us a lifeline and we didn’t recognize it?
Eli
Thinking about Eli, May made up a pitcher of sweet tea for Father John and set it in the fridge to cool before he arrived. She cared for Eli, sure, but he had obviously felt a little more strongly about her than she had him. May had to admit he’d never been a jerk like some guys she’d gone home with. In fact, he’d been rather sweet. She’d stopped feeling guilty about all of that. It was over and done with, she’d confessed it to Father Isaac and to God, and those days of recklessness were over. She was amazed, even all these years later, she hadn’t ended up pregnant or with a disease. A thankfulness remained. That was all. Done.
Now Father John, having arrived with his happy attitude, gratefully took the glass from her.
“May?” he asked, settling at the table, “is there anything you want to ask me about, spiritually speaking? I’ve been coming for a while now, and I was just wondering.”
“Well, let me ask you this, Father. Is God ever out to get certain people?”
“I guess that depends on who you ask.”
She sat and pulled her knitting onto her lap. “True. I remember this kid in my CCD class when I was twelve or so. He loved talking about hell, and the more people that ended up there the better.”
“I’ve met some people like that myself. But I assume you’re speaking about you, Rwanda, and then the death of your friend Claudius?”
“Pretty much, I guess.”
“Hmm. It certainly would seem that way if you didn’t take into account the fact that if you hadn’t have gone there, you would never have met Father Isaac. And I’m sure having that year with Claudius was worth it, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Would you go back and not come to the farm if you’d have known he was going to die so soon?”
“No. I’d still have come.”
“So, there’s that. Now back to Rwanda—”
“I don’t know how you’re going to make any sense of that one.” She crossed her arms. “But I’d like to see you try.”
“Well, there was meeting Father Isaac.”
“Yes, but if we’d have escaped the war, that would have been better.”
He pushed his tea further toward the center of the table. “Well, that’s a different question, and one that doesn’t have a good answer other than everybody wants free will for themselves but not for other people.”
“Those were evil people!”
“Right.”
“And God could have stopped them!”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“Me either,” he said. “All I know is he didn’t. And he doesn’t usually, even though we think he should.”
“So do I just accept that?”
“Not at all. You participate in making things better. The only way we can see how God works is when we join in. I tell you the truth, the people who do the most to bring about mercy and peace in the name of Christ aren’t the ones who question God the most. It’s usually those who aren’t doing anything but getting mad on behalf of people they themselves aren’t willing to lift a finger for.”
“I still don’t get it. Why was I there? Why can’t I move on?”
“Maybe you’re stuck in the senselessness of it all.”
“No kidding.”
“I guess that’s obvious, isn’t it? And you surround yourselves with living things. The flowers, the animals.” He pointed to the dogs asleep by the stove. “The crazies.”
“My life wasn’t complete until the crazies came.”
“Obviously.” He lifted a brow. “Let me ask you a question.” He sipped his tea. “What did you bring to the people of that village before they died?”
She thought about it. Father Isaac was doing everything she did before she got there. “Well, I don’t know. Other people came and served there with Father Isaac. I wasn’t the only one who came.”
“You were the only one who stayed.”
She could feel her eyes smarting.
He took her hand. “Maybe, May, you told them the world cared. That God cared in a bigger, wider way than they knew before then. Maybe God wanted them to know that before they died.”
“But why did I have to live? I feel stupid even saying that. But Father John, they’d suffered so long, and I was just a spoiled kid. Why was I allowed to keep going and they ended up—” A sob escaped her. She squinted.
“No!” he cried. “Don’t hold it back, May. For heaven’s sake, and yours, if there’s a time to weep, it’s now.”
He stayed until May stopped crying. She didn’t rant or rave, or wail. A river had found a straight stretch and she allowed herself to ride along. Finally she lifted her head.
“Survivor’s guilt. It’s so cliché.”
He hugged her tightly, then let go. “It wouldn’t be cliché if it didn’t happen to so many people. To tell you the truth, May, life is cliché. We seek after love and acceptance in almost everything we do, from people, from God. If that isn’t cliché, I don’t know what is.”
When he left, he invited her to Thanksgiving dinner and she said no, thank you. “But
if you want to come over for some turkey soup on Sunday after church, you’re invited. Bring your wife too.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“I have two kids.”
“Them too.”
“I’ll see you then.”
He slid into his coat, and she walked him to the door. “May, just something else for your consideration.”
“Okay.”
“Maybe God stops things a lot, but we don’t know it and never can know it because the event just didn’t happen or didn’t even come close to happening.”
“Maybe. Hey! I’ve got a question, real quick.”
“Go ahead.”
“What does ‘once saved, always saved’ mean?”
“Depends on who you ask.” He scratched his temple. “You’ve been talking to a Baptist?”
“Eli Campbell. We’re pen pals.” Oh boy. Talk about cliché!
He nodded. “Good. I’m glad. Well, it’s the belief that once you make a commitment of faith, you’ll never have to worry about going to hell again.”
“Even if you murder a father and his daughter, or a hundred of your neighbors?”
“It’s always a little more complicated than that, May. I don’t think there’s a Christian in the world who believes a person can commit themselves to Jesus one day, and then murder and not feel bad about it, and ‘once saved, always saved’ still be true. It’s always about the heart. Repentance. We’re going to sin. For some people it’s going to be horrible. But the sinner always can repent and turn to God.”
“But what if Eli had murdered those two people and then walked outside and been struck by lightning and died?”
He laid a hand on her arm. “But he didn’t. And right there, May, is the grace of God.”
• 13 •
November 24, 2003
Dear Eli,
Thanks for telling me about your childhood. It’s funny how we can get to know somebody and really know so little. My childhood was pretty typical, a professor married to a music teacher. They got along well. No siblings. Lots of time in my bedroom reading or walking around the neighborhood with my camera or playing with the kids on our street. I used to spend all of autumn making the Christmas newsletter for our family to send out with the Christmas cards. Always got rave reviews. Okay, on to your letter.