by Lisa Samson
“Oh, I almost forgot to tell you!” Sassy said, combing May’s hair into a big gooey dollop atop her head.
May looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. “I look like they could sell me at Dairy Queen.”
Sassy laughed. “You do! Anyway, I was at church the other day when one of my friends was talking about her daughter’s wedding, and I recommended you and Callie to do the flowers. I’ve got her number in my purse.”
“Isn’t that neat?” Callie’s eyes sparkled.
May agreed. She could hardly imagine picking up that phone and making the call, though. The feed store was one thing. But a regular lady on the other end? She was going to end up stammering and stuttering. She knew it.
“I also told her you were a wonderful photographer. She said she wanted to see your work.”
“Really? That sounds like a lot of fun.”
“We don’t have a photographer around here. It might be a good way to supplement your income.”
Night had fallen and Callie was long in bed when May rose to go. Sassy had told her all about Eli as a child, and May hadn’t laughed so much in years. Or cried.
“Buell lost his job,” Sassy said as May put on her jacket. She gripped her hands together, and May realized she’d been wanting to tell her all evening.
“Oh, no!”
“I don’t know what we’re going to do. We’re already a couple of months behind on the mortgage.”
“I wish I could help. I just spent my last penny on that little truck.”
“I wasn’t asking for your help, May. Just hoping you’d pray for us is all.”
May drove home with Sassy’s request in her mind. She couldn’t remember the last time somebody had asked her to pray for them.
Poor Sassy and Buell. And Callie. This was just what that poor girl needed. A dead father and losing the only home she remembered.
May was about to vent her anger at God, but the words of Father John resonated in her heart, the words he’d spoken about those who join in on doing God’s goodness seeing his care for his children. Sassy hadn’t asked for help, but May was going to give it to her. May had plans.
April 16, 2004
Dear May,
I put the Rwandan quote on my wall. I’ve tried to face what’s inside me since I’ve come to prison. But maybe there’s more. I’m praying God will show me whether or not he wants me to appeal. I’ve never asked him. By the way, Father John gave me that idea. He’s pretty shifty, isn’t he? I like the man, though. He’s really been the only pastor figure I’ve had since I’ve been here.
I’ve got six weeks left, so your pictures of UK were especially wonderful to see. For a good fifteen minutes I remained in a world of good memories, and the glow of old times seemed to follow me throughout the day. I look at them at least twice a day and try to capture who I was then. Not that I was all that wonderful, but it was better than who I turned out to be. Thanks, as well, for taking some pictures of Callie. I imagine you two have a great time together, the way she smiled so easily into your camera.
I got an idea about the farm. (Again.) What if you raised money for the down payment? You don’t have much time to save up the cash. I know that probably seems impossible, but you do have people who love you: Callie, Sassy, even Buell. Glen would probably help out, some of your friends at Harmony Baptist, and maybe Sister Ruth would return. Callie told me about those biscuits and Violet Borne’s recipe book. Maybe you could cook a big feast to raise money. What do you think of that idea? Assuming, of course, Pastor Marlow agrees.
Well, enough of me telling you what to do. Pray for me in these last weeks.
Love,
Eli
May put on her best dress, a pale green cotton shift, and headed over to Harmony Baptist. The church office, gussied up with silk flower arrangements and a wallpaper border, anchored the basement. The heels of her sandals clicked on the white linoleum squares. She came with an offering in hand.
Sister Racine, who said the pastor was ready for her request and who wouldn’t reveal her persuasive secrets, had assured her that Pastor Marlow loved pie. May had picked up some apples at the farmers’ market, rolled out some of Violet’s No-Fail Easy Piecrust dough, and with Callie’s help cut out fancy leaves and swirls with a paring knife.
“That’s the way to get to any man of food,” Sister Racine said. “And Pastor Marlow is a man of food.”
His status as a bachelor helped her cause. The man didn’t go home to a home-cooked meal each night. He had to be sick of Dairy Queen and Dooley’s Purple Cow, his two favorite haunts according to Brother Ben.
May loved Brother Ben, a loud, blustery man who’d give you the shirt off his back while telling you why you didn’t deserve it. Both he and Sister Racine were on board for the feast and had offered to help in the kitchen at St. Thomas. Of course, John and Lynn had jumped at the prospect. They’d all kept it a secret so far, but now it was time to get Pastor Marlow on board. May wanted the front ten acres; that was it. According to the appraisal she’d need fifty thousand dollars, due to the fact the barns and the house sat on that part of the property. She just needed five thousand of that for a down payment. Easy, right?
Pastor Marlow took the pie. “You want something, don’t you?”
“Yep. And whether or not you get to keep that pie depends upon your answer.”
He looked down. Looked up and stared hard at her. Then he shook his head and laughed. “You want that farm bad, don’t you?”
“Just a little piece of it. Ten acres in fact.”
“So Sister Racine says. Have a seat, May.” He set the pie on his desk, a simple gray steel desk, and she sat down facing him.
“Here’s the deal, Pastor Marlow. I’ve got a nice little business going, and thirty acres is plenty of space for Harmony Baptist. The land will be free and clear to you, of course, but I’m willing to pay you a good price for what I want. Do you realize what fifty thousand dollars would do? It would be a great help for the new facilities. Have you talked to the bank about financing yet?”
“Yes.”
“And do you have enough down yet?”
“That’s the church’s business.”
“Oh, come on. We’re not enemies, are we?”
He sighed, then rubbed a hand over his bald head. “No, May. We’re not.”
“Then tell me what’s going on.”
“No. We don’t have the down payment in hand. This is a poor church, May. We’re growing, and the giving is enough to keep things going here, but no. We won’t build on that for another three years without some help.”
She crossed her arms and waited. “Think of all the powerful anointing that can happen with fifty thousand dollars.”
He shook his head. “Oh, May. I don’t know …”
“Please! This is the perfect solution.”
“I know. But I’ve been thinking, doing a lot of soul searching.”
“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?”
“I’d like to think so. Do you know this is my third church in six years? Did you know I get hired to build up a congregation and then move on to the next struggling church?”
May shook her head.
“But I’m tired, May. I’m tired of growing churches. Tired of giving empty pep talks every Sunday. Tired of tickling itching ears and telling everyone about all the good things and forgetting to mention we have to take up our cross.”
—Take up our cross.
Was that what she was doing in Rwanda?
—Oh my! Oh my goodness!
She folded her hands tightly. “Then do that on the farm,” she whispered. “Tell people how to really follow Jesus.”
Father Isaac did that. Every Sunday. Every day.
“At what more beautiful place could that happen? Every time they come to church they’ll see fields of flowers and cows and chickens. Please, Pastor Marlow.”
“I’ll take it before the board,” he said.
“Do you know what they’ll say?”
He smiled, the real man—tired, a little disillusioned, and in need of a real church family—shining in his eyes. “They’ll say yes and amen, May. In fact, it will most likely be the loudest amen I’ve heard since I came.”
May jumped up from her seat, ran around to his chair, and gave him a hug. And before he could take back what he’d said, she shot out the door, leaving a beautiful pie ready to be eaten.
April 19, 2004
Eli,
We have less than six weeks left. I realized just the other day that these letters won’t go on forever and I almost broke down right there in the kitchen. I need you to send me a visitor’s form, Eli. If it’s okay with you, I think we should meet face-to-face. I can come once a week as soon as the paperwork goes through.
We’re going for the fund-raiser. I’m really excited. So are Sassy, Callie, and Buell. I don’t know if you know it, but they’re about to lose their house. They’re going into foreclosure. But here’s the silver lining around the cloud. If it all works out, I’ve invited them to live with me. Callie’s still going to help me with the flowers, and Buell (he grew up on a farm) is going to grow a big garden and take produce to the farmers’ market. We’ll get more chickens and another cow! The goat’s still around. Little Flower will get to stay on, providing us with laughs, and we’re getting her a companion too. If we raise the money, that is.
I couldn’t have done any of this without you.
Don’t forget to send me the form!
Love,
May
• 23 •
May was heading to prison.
She looked in the closet. A sundress, of course, the black-and-white one, and her white sweater and black sandals. She’d been wearing those sundresses all the time, but it wasn’t like Eli had ever seen them before. He didn’t know most likely everybody in Beattyville and beyond was sick to death of them. Even if she wasn’t.
She hadn’t felt nervous about seeing a man in years.
—Yeah, May. A dead man. Dead man walking and all that, remember?
She shoved those thoughts down. Maybe she just didn’t want to look homeless anymore. But nerves filled her as she recalled his letters, the tattered papers she’d read over and over again, though she’d never told a soul. The letters that had kept her company during the long winter in the kitchen.
May fed the crazies, gave them plenty of water, picked them up and hugged them. She climbed into the truck, threw it into first gear, and set out.
A guard ushered May into a sterile room with some tables and chairs, plastic and beige. The floor was tiled in linoleum squares in a shade of chilly gray, and they shimmered under a coat of wax, or whatever it was they used these days. May doubted it was wax. That just seemed kind of old-fashioned, and yet she could see prisoners in their jumpsuits spreading it with fraying mops. Yep, it was a fraying mop kind of room.
“Just a few minutes,” said the guard, a corpulent, tired man with red hair and a terrible case of conjunctivitis. He looked wearier than twenty-year-old chicken wire, and May didn’t blame him. What little child ever dreamed of growing up and working in a prison? He probably felt as jailed as the inmates at times.
In her bag she’d arranged all the pictures she had printed from UK, the farm, Beattyville, and loads of shots of Callie. She figured if they got tongue-tied in person, the pictures would help keep the conversation going. But unfortunately, she had to secure her purse in a locker in the lobby.
He entered the room. Clothed in black sweatpants and a gray T-shirt, Eli definitely looked older, the skin of his face slightly broken in like hers, but the same boy-next-door good looks had clearly hung around the neighborhood.
“May!”
“Hi, Eli.”
A guard stood by the door as Eli crossed the room and embraced her. And May realized something in that moment. Eli Campbell was her friend. Not just someone with a pen and good ideas, Eli Campbell actually cared. She felt it in his arms.
A broad smile split her face as she pulled back. “It’s so good to see you.”
He returned the grin. “Yes, it is, May. It really is.”
She felt herself blushing. Darn it. “Want to sit down?”
“Sure.”
“So what did you have for breakfast?”
He laughed. “Scrambled eggs and toast. I forewent the turkey bacon. You?”
“Rye toast.”
“Very nice.”
“You look good.”
“So do you, May. I like the brown hair.”
“It’s my true color. Well, before it went gray.”
“It suits you.”
“I didn’t know what to expect at seeing you. You’ve gained a little weight since the last time I saw you.”
“You mean I look healthier than when I was a drugged-out skeleton?”
“Something like that.”
They sat in a corner where two large windows met to welcome in the midday sun streaming through, heating the air around them. Combine that with nerves, and sweat began to break out on her brow. She wiped it off with the sleeve of her sweater.
“Why don’t you take that off?”
“You sure?” she asked.
“Why not?”
He wasn’t thinking about Rwanda.
She slipped it off.
He whistled and reached out, running his hand along the scars. “Wow.”
“Yeah.”
“I mean, I knew it would be bad. But without a picture …”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know. It just seems like all of us might be a little guilty somehow.”
“I’m not sorry.”
Did she really just say that? She was sorry it all happened, yes, but if it had to happen, she wasn’t sorry she was there.
—Oh, God. Finally! Thank you!
The guard shuffled a little. Everything sounded so loud in the room.
“Why?”
She held up her arm, allowing the sunlight to glisten along the pale stripes. “I guess I realize something. These stripes connect me with the people I left behind. The people who first showed me how to live. Really live.”
“I’m happy for you, May.”
They sat in silence for a minute or two, the sunlight growing and the heat collecting. May figured she might as well get the first order of business over with.
“Are you still set on the execution?”
His mouth formed a line. “Yes. It’s too late for an appeal now anyway.”
“Are you sure?”
“No.”
She batted his leg. “I didn’t think so.”
He shrugged. “When you live into something long enough, it’s hard to turn it around.”
“Oh boy, is that the truth.”
“I took Father John’s suggestion and prayed about it, but God hasn’t said anything one way or the other.”
“Maybe he’s leaving this one up to you.”
“You seem to be doing well, now.”
She allowed the subject change. “You don’t know the half of it.” She began relating her plans. “Buell’s going to build a new, larger coop. Four times as many chickens, and Sassy’s going to sell the eggs. Buell’s going to grow an acre or so of tobacco. And over behind the barn, soybeans. But mostly he’ll grow produce for us and the market. An old friend of his from high school is going to help him get Claudius’s tractor up and running.”
And on it went.
“Well, you’ve got a month left, May. Can you get everything worked out by then?”
“I’m going to try my best. If all goes well, I’ll get to stay in Beattyville.”
“I sure wish I hadn’t stayed!”
May reached out and took his hand. “Me too. Maybe things would have turned out different.”
“How’s Callie?”
“Fantastic!”
She thought of the pictures she’d mailed. Callie making biscuits. Callie drawing, tongue at the s
ide of her mouth in concentration. Callie holding both crazies by their bellies, high over her head.
“Isn’t she something?” he asked.
“How are you feeling about dying?”
It seemed like a terrible question, like one asked by those boobish reporters who shove a microphone in front of the face of someone who just lost his family in a monsoon. How do you feel? they ask as the masses sit back in their living rooms and groan, pointing to the screen and saying, “How do you think they feel, you idiot? Do you really have to ask?”
She wanted to shock him. She wanted to contrast her question with the images of lovely, sweet Callie.
“I’m ready.” His blue eyes glittered in the sunlight across his face, the same light warming his blond hair. He almost looked exactly like he did in college.
“How can you be sure?”
“You’ve come on the scene, May. You’re a survivor. You’ll make sure Callie’s okay from here on out. Your pictures prove that. And Mother too. I wish I could see that farm.”
“Me too.”
“Even if I didn’t die, I would never get out of here. I deserve this life, but that doesn’t make it any less unbearable. Imagine a life that will never change.”
“But that’s not true. We’ve become friends again!”
“Correct.”
“And that’s not enough?” Even as she said it, she realized how lame it was. “Never mind.”
“Thanks. I didn’t want to answer that one truthfully.”
“Well, I don’t know where I’d be now without you. You have to realize how much you’ve changed my life.”
He began to wave that away.
“No!” she said. “Don’t do that! Don’t take that away from yourself or from God’s uncanny ability to use people most of the world would deem hopeless.”
He squeezed her hand. “Your heart has always been bigger than that.”
“And you know that because … ?”
“You wrote to me while you were dealing with your own sorrow. I’m the only guy here who gets letters from someone other than family, and most of them don’t even get those. Can you believe that?”
—Not really.
She shook her head, but deep down she knew it was true.
“Yeah. Not many people want anything to do with us.”