The Girl Who Slept with God: A Novel

by Val Brelinski

  “I know, I know,” said Jory, trying hard not to feel utterly guilty.

  “Jory?”

  “I said, I know!”

  Grace stood on the hallway floor clutching the blanket around her and looking silently at Jory.

  Jory turned and walked toward her bedroom. “You’re not my parent, though. And I don’t have to do what you say.” Jory felt as if she had just stuck her tongue out at her sister. She opened her bedroom door and went inside. She shut her door and leaned against it. She couldn’t hear any sounds from the hall. Grace was apparently still standing unmoving in the hallway.

  Jory took a step and fell straight onto her bed. She rolled over onto her back and yanked and pulled the bottom quilt up around her until it covered her up to the eyes. She didn’t care that she was still wearing her clothes. She didn’t even care that she was still wearing her shoes.

  Her bedroom door opened and Grace stood just inside it, her messy hair and capelike blanket making her look somewhat spectral and strange.

  “You look like Mrs. Rochester,” said Jory, lowering her quilt somewhat. “All you need is a lit candle.”

  “Oh, Miss Eyre, you’ve spilled your tea!” Grace curtseyed and pretend batted her eyelashes.

  “That wasn’t Mrs. Rochester,” said Jory.

  “I know, but it’s the only line I remember.” Grace and her blanket walked over and sat down on the edge of Jory’s bed. “I know that you think I’m a real drag,” she said.

  “A drag?” Jory said, moving over farther in bed to make room. “Since when do you use that word?”

  “I don’t,” said Grace, smiling sadly, “but I know that’s what you think of me. I know you think I’m an old fussbudget or something. A complete stick-in-the-mud.”

  “A tosspot and a flibbertigibbet,” said Jory, beginning to laugh.

  “A grumpity-frumper.”

  “A strumpet and a strutfurrow.”

  Grace let herself fall backward onto Jory’s pillow and their two heads now leaned against the bars of the iron bedframe. Neither one of them said anything more. Jory listened to her sister’s breathing slow and then she pulled the quilt back up to her chin and turned on her side. Presently, she felt Grace burrow beneath the blankets too, and then she heard nothing more.

  Grace and Jory sat at the kitchen table eating oatmeal. Morning sunlight poured in warmly from the warped glass of the kitchen window. After a moment, Grace picked up her empty bowl and carried it to the sink. Then she turned around and faced Jory. She took a breath and seemed to be waiting for something, a something that involved a slight, inward-turning smile. “Jory,” she said.

  Jory glanced up sleepily.

  “I felt the baby move this morning.”

  Jory put her spoon down.

  “I was lying in bed—you were still asleep—and then, out of nowhere, I felt this squiggle-like thing, like a little worm wriggling inside me.”

  “A little worm?” Jory tried not to shriek.

  Grace laughed. “I can’t describe it. It was like a twitch, or a flutter, sort of. But not.” She shook her head. “I know it was the baby. Moving.”

  Jory sat perfectly still in her chair. “You have to tell me when it does it again.”

  “Okay.” Grace smiled shyly. “It’s four months old now. I’m four months pregnant.”

  “When do you go see the doctor again?”

  “I don’t know. I think Dad said something about Dr. Henry coming out here maybe.”

  “He won’t even let you go to the doctor’s office?”

  Grace turned away from Jory and put her bowl in the sink.

  “What about when you go into labor? Is he going to let you go to the hospital then?”

  Grace faced Jory again. “I don’t know. We haven’t talked about it.”

  “And after the baby’s born.” Jory held her toast in midair as if to emphasize her point. “You think Dad’s going to let you walk around town then? With a stroller and stuff?”

  Grace picked up a dishtowel and refolded it, but then she merely stood, holding the folded towel against her chest.

  “You really think he’s going to let us come back home, then? And we’ll all live just like before, as if nothing’s happened? And meanwhile, where did this baby supposedly come from?” Jory was now on some kind of terrible roll. “Seriously. Did you see Mom on my birthday? She won’t even look at us.”

  For a fleeting moment Grace’s mouth seemed to crumple. “I just have to have faith. That’s what I’m supposed to do. Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.”

  “Just how long are you supposed to wait exactly?” Jory felt a small bitter thrill of power surge through her, exacerbated by the onset of a headache that had been lurking behind her eyes all morning. “And for what? A sign in the heavens? An eclipse or meteor or something?”

  “Stop it, Jory!” Grace threw the folded dishtowel at her sister, but it merely fell, impotent and soft as a large feather, onto the linoleum floor. The expression on her face revealed something close to fury. “Don’t you dare make jokes about this!” Grace’s mouth grew thin and ugly. “You don’t know the first thing about me and you never have.”

  Jory was shocked into silence, and Grace seemed too stunned to say or do anything further.

  The morning sunlight continued to stream in through the window next to the table; So Handsome lay directly in a patch of it, avidly and silently licking his upstretched back leg. Several silent minutes went by as Jory determinedly stirred her oatmeal around in its bowl, mentally apologizing and then retracting her apology. Grace stood with her back to Jory. She too made no move toward modifying or denying any part of what she had just said.

  The back screen door opened and creaked shut and then Grip strode into the kitchen carrying several books in his arms. “Hey, hey,” he said, patting Jory on the head. “Am I too late for church?”

  Grace tried to rearrange her face into something resembling a smile. “Maybe we don’t really need to have any services today.”

  Grip took a mock step backward. “Wait. What’s this I’m hearing?”

  “It’s nothing,” said Jory. How could Grace say that Jory didn’t know her? Jory stood up and began getting a bowl and glass down from the cupboard. And worst of all—and this was a thing she could barely even stand to consider—what if it were true? Jory’s face felt tight from smiling so falsely. “Do you want some toast and oatmeal? There’s orange juice too.”

  “Oatmeal!” Grip rubbed his hands together and sat down and spread his books out on the table. “I have to warn y’all, I come armed with information.”

  Jory leaned over and picked up one of the books, still not daring to look at her sister. “I don’t even know how to pronounce that.”

  “It’s the Tao Te Ching. Hey.” Grip took Jory’s chin in his hand and turned her face this way and that. “What happened to the other guy?”

  Jory closed her eyes. “I just bumped my cheek, is all—no big deal.”

  “That’s some bruise.” Grip took the bowl of oatmeal that Grace handed him and started stirring in some raisins. “So,” he said. “Here’s the topic for this morning: there’s more than one way to skin a cat—sorry, So Handsome—and there’s more than one path to enlightenment.” He poured a little milk into his bowl. “And just to even things out a little, since we’ve had two Sundays with the Good Book, I thought we might extend our knowledge of all things spiritual to include some ancient Eastern wisdom. What do you say?” He took a large bite of oatmeal and one of toast.

  “As long as you don’t expect to convert us,” said Grace. Jory could still hear a residual shakiness in her voice.

  “Heavens, no,” Grip said, and put his hand on his heart. “So . . . anyone here know anything about Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism? Any of those ring
a bell? No? Okay, well, I don’t think we’ll try to cover all of them today. We’ll just go through the bare-bones basics and see what we think.” Grip handed a small piece of paper to Jory and another one to Grace. “I wrote down some of the main ideas from the Tao. Grace, you wanna read the first few?”

  Grace sighed a little as she sat down at the table across from Grip and looked at the square of paper. “‘Ice cream treats are good to eat. Y-U-M spells dee-licious.’” Grace put the paper down on the table. “Actually, Y-U-M does not spell delicious.”

  “Turn it over, turn it over.” Grip waved his hand at Grace. He shrugged at Jory. “All I had was napkins.”

  Grace flipped the napkin over. “One whose needs are simple can fulfill them easily. Material wealth does not enrich the spirit. Self-absorption and self-importance are vain and self-destructive.” Her reading voice had been toneless, but now it lifted in pitch. “The Bible already said these things. It’s all in Proverbs and the Beatitudes.”

  “Exactly,” said Grip. “Their ideas are very, very similar. But the weird thing is that Lao-tzu said this stuff five hundred years before Christ was even born.”

  Jory picked up her napkin. “The truly wise make little of their wisdom, for the more they know, the more they realize how little they know.” She chose another napkin from the pile on the table. “Glorification of wealth, power, and beauty beget crime, envy, and shame. Humility is the highest virtue.” Jory leaned her chin on her hand. “And the meek shall inherit the earth, right?”

  Grace leaned over and picked up Jory’s napkin and closely examined it. “So what then? You’re trying to say that this Lao-tzu person is just as much of a God as Christ?”

  “No, no—I’m not trying to make any claims about God at all. I just think it’s interesting how many of the Bible’s basic concepts are already right here, hundreds of years before the Bible was written.”

  “So you’re saying the Bible is just a copycat version of this Tao thing.” Grace frowned and folded up the napkin. “Well, there is only one God, and the Bible is His holy word. And the Scriptures are more than just a collection of wise sayings. It’s more than just lists of things you should do and not do. The Bible foretells the coming of Christ. The Old Testament predicts it and the New Testament reveals it. I doubt that any of these books do that, do they?”

  “Well, actually . . .” Grip raised his eyebrows and smiled and reached for the jar of raspberry jam.

  Grace stood up. “You know, I could be wrong, but it seems like your whole goal here is to try to make me look stupid for believing in Christianity.” Jory could see Grace’s rib cage moving rapidly up and down.

  “Hey, hey.” Grip stood up and put his hand on Grace’s arm. “I thought it would be cool to share some ideas with you, that’s all. You’ve been teaching me about the Bible and I thought it would be fun to show you some stuff.” He kept his hand on her arm even as she tried to shrug it off. “I know you’re super smart. Maybe I was just trying to show you that I’m smart too.” Grip’s voice trailed off.

  Jory’s eyes darted back and forth between Grip and her sister. For more than a second, she felt completely unobserved.

  Grace pulled out of Grip’s clasp and moved away from the table. She paused for a moment at the screen door. Then she opened it and went outside.

  Grip sat back down and then just as suddenly scooted his chair back from the table. He stood up and walked toward the back door, where he stood looking out. “I think I’d better be taking off.”

  “No,” said Jory. “You always stay on Sundays.”

  “Not this Sunday.” He turned around and walked toward the living room. “Tell Grace I said good-bye, okay, and thanks for breakfast.”

  “Wait.” Jory ran forward and tried desperately to think of some way to forestall his leaving.

  Grip turned and gave a brief tug at the untied string on Jory’s sweatshirt. “See ya later, alligator.” He walked to the front door, pulled it open, and bolted down the front steps two at a time.

  Jory slammed the door closed behind him and flopped down in the horsehair chair. So Handsome immediately scaled the side of the chair and jumped delicately onto Jory’s lap. He licked one of his front paws and then ran that paw over and over his ear. Jory pulled at the loose skin at the back of So Handsome’s neck, and as if in obedience the kitten began purring his funny gravelly purr. She petted his belly and felt its soft roundness and its tiny pinpricks of nipples. The midmorning sun poured into the living room at a sharp angle and filled the room with a false autumnal warmth, while somewhere very far away a harvester or a tractor of some sort started up its one-note drone.

  When Jory woke up, her neck was stiff and the side of her cheek was covered in drool. For a strange small second, Jory could not think who she was, or even if this was what it meant to be alive. She stood up and went to the front door, and stumbled outside onto the porch. Her feet couldn’t seem to feel much anymore. Outside, it was hazily bright, as if there were a layer of smoke in the air. It smelled faintly of newly fallen leaves and the wild anise and flowering sage that grew by the side of the road. She sat down in the porch swing and tried to push off with her sleep-deadened feet. She yawned and then shivered. There was a flat cardboard box resting on the porch railing that she hadn’t seen before. She got up and walked over to the box and folded back the two large flaps on top. Inside was a white crocheted blanket. Jory pulled it out of the box and cradled it in her hands. Intricate crocheted stitches formed a tightly woven pattern of stars and moons and planets. It was a small rectangular blanket, just the right size to wrap a newborn baby in. For one wild moment she considered putting the blanket back in the box and throwing it into the bushes. “Grace,” Jory turned and called. “Grace!”

  After a minute, Grace walked out through the front door. She saw Jory and what she was holding. “Ohhh,” she said. She reached out and touched a corner of the blanket. “It’s beautiful.”

  Jory handed the blanket to her.

  “Where did it come from?” Grace held the blanket out in front of her. “It’s the night sky. Look, it even has Saturn. And different phases of the moon!”

  “It’s for you,” said Jory.

  “Do you think?” Grace’s eyes were glowing.

  Jory held out the napkin.

  Grace took the note and read it in a quiet voice. “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork. Psalms 19:1.” She put the napkin down on the porch railing.

  “I have homework I need to do.” Jory turned around and walked into the house and up the flight of stairs. She shut the door to Henry’s bedroom and lay down on the metal-framed bed. She stared up at the pink glass light fixture that hung suspended from the ceiling by three silver chains. There were two dead moths inside the fixture’s glass dome. Her father said that moths used the moon as their primary reference point and that any light source drew them toward it, even if this often meant their own demise. Jory thought this wasn’t a very smart navigational tool, but her father said that overall it worked fairly well. That the greater good was worth some individual unluckiness.

  Grace knocked quietly on Jory’s door. “Can I come in?” she said from the other side of the door.

  “No,” said Jory.

  Grace opened the door and came in and sat on the edge of the bed. She took hold of Jory’s foot. “I think he was just trying to make up for this morning.”

  “It took a long time to crochet that. Weeks. Or months, maybe.”

  “It doesn’t mean anything. He was just trying to be nice.”

  “I know that,” Jory said. She continued to gaze at the light fixture. “I’m not worried about it,” she said.

  “Of course not,” said Grace. “I’m just talking to myself mainly.” She retied Jory’s moccasin. “What homework do you have?”

  “I don’t know,” said Jory. “Couldn’t you wear a dif
ferent dress sometime?”

  Grace glanced down at the brown dress, her face flushing. “I don’t really have anything else.”

  “Maybe you could crochet something.” Jory rolled over onto her side away from Grace. She closed her eyes. “You or Grip.”

  For a moment it was quiet.

  Grace began talking in a small serious voice. “I know you’re angry with me. And probably for a whole bunch of reasons . . . but we can’t keep having this same argument again and again.”

  Jory rolled back over. “What same argument?”

  “The one in which you act like anything bad that happens to you is in some way my fault.”

  “That doesn’t really qualify as an argument per se.”

  Grace stood up and put her hands in the pockets of the brown dress. “I am not your enemy.”

  “Oh, really?” Jory leaned up on her elbows.

  Grace said nothing for a moment. “I’ll see if Mrs. Kleinfelter has any more old dresses she’ll let me wear.”

  “He’s my friend,” said Jory.

  “I know he is.” Grace nodded and averted her eyes from her sister’s.

  “And I do too know you.” Jory said this in a quiet voice.

  Grace made no response. “Let me know if you want any help with your homework,” she said finally. She walked out of the room and Jory could hear her moving toward the stairway and going down the stairs.

  Jory reached down and pulled the wedding quilt up and over her again. She lay back against her pillow and closed her eyes; one tear oozed out from beneath her lashes and made its way steadily into her ear. She turned on her side and pulled the quilt up over her head. It was like they were some old married couple who couldn’t live without each other, yet couldn’t live without fighting with each other, either.

  “Don’t be a baby, you stupid baby,” Jory said. “Don’t, don’t, don’t.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Hear you had quite the Saturday night.” Laird Albright leaned toward Jory and grinned. It was lunchtime and Jory was sitting on the hood of someone’s car. “Tipped back a few with the big kids, huh?” Laird made a drinking motion with his thumb and little finger.