Greater Love

by Robert Whitlow

  The line was silent for a moment.

  “But you didn’t call about exchange rates, did you?” Zach asked.

  “No.”

  I told him about my conversation with Mr. Carpenter.

  “Did you mention Sister Dabney?” Zach asked when I paused.

  “No, he would have thought I was crazy.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Along with you?”

  “I didn’t say that,” Zach answered. “We went over all this in the car.”

  “But is it over?”

  “My opinion that you’re making a mistake hasn’t changed, but I have to accept your decision and deal with it.”

  I suddenly felt like a temperamental woman.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Did you talk to Maggie?”

  “Yes, and she’s sent an employment contract.”

  “Do you want me to review it?”

  I thought about the starting salary and pitiful benefit package. I was too embarrassed to let Zach see it.

  “No thanks; it’s nothing fancy.” I paused. “And I talked to my parents about the trip to California. They don’t think it’s a good idea. I would have liked to go but need to honor their wishes.”

  I hoped my voice sounded sincere.

  “That’s okay. I’d had second thoughts about it, too. If it’s supposed to happen there’ll be another chance in the future.”

  “Sure.”

  “Hey, I’m due for a meeting in the downstairs conference room with Mr. Appleby and a new client. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  “Okay.”

  The call ended without a hint of a shiver down my spine or a single goose bump.

  ZACH CALLED ME ONCE WHILE HE WAS IN CALIFORNIA FOR THE holidays. I was at home in Powell Station, and after we had a brief conversation, he talked to each member of my family. Ellie changed her voice to make it sound huskier. The result left Emma laughing and Mama rolling her eyes. I wasn’t in a laughing mood.

  “Are you upset with us for not letting you go to California?” Mama asked after the call ended and we were alone in the front room.

  “Not really,” I answered, giving her a hug. “When it comes to men, I’m not sure that I’m much further along than Ellie.”

  I RETURNED TO SCHOOL IN JANUARY. AFTER THE SECOND DAY OF classes, I came home to find a note attached to my door.

  I’m in town for the evening. Could I take you to dinner? Please call.

  Vince

  He’d written his phone number on the bottom. I took the note inside and laid it on my computer desk. After pacing back and forth a few times, I picked up the note and stared at it again. Vince wrote in an easy-to-read print style that matched his organized personality.

  He must have gotten my address in Athens from information I’d made available at Braddock, Appleby, and Carpenter. There could be no explanation for his being in town except to see me. That thought made me uneasy. I’d not received permission from Daddy and Mama to court Vince, and it would be completely inconsistent with the courting process to spend time with two men. My phone rang, causing me to jump.

  “Hello?” I answered tentatively.

  “Tami, it’s Vince. I’m in town for a few hours. Are you free for dinner?”

  “Hey,” I answered, staring again at the slip of paper.

  “I left a note on the door of your apartment but then thought I’d better call, since you might be staying at the law school to study.”

  “I just got back to my apartment and found the note. How did you get my cell phone number?”

  “Your father.”

  “My father?”

  “Yeah, I called information for Powell Station. I remembered that your father worked as a supervisor at a chicken plant and tracked him down. He told me that you finally got a cell phone.”

  “Did he say anything else?”

  “No, but the way he talked reminded me a little bit of you.”

  I’d heard that comparison before.

  “I know it’s short notice,” Vince continued, “but my connecting flight from Atlanta to Hartford was canceled, and I won’t be going back to school until morning.”

  “You drove to Athens from the Atlanta airport to see me?”

  “I rented a car. Look, if it’s not a good night, I’ll understand.”

  I was torn between good manners and confusion over how to relate to Vince Colbert. I suddenly remembered a prior commitment.

  “My intramural basketball team has its first practice tonight.”

  It sounded like a ridiculous excuse as soon as the words escaped my mouth.

  “I could watch and then we could grab something simple to eat,” he responded evenly.

  “No,” I answered quickly. “I can miss the practice.”

  The idea of Vince watching me run up and down and sweat on the basketball court would be neither good manners nor appropriate interaction with a man.

  “Could you come around six?” I added. “I guess you know where I live.”

  “Okay, six it is. Pick someplace casual where you like to hang out with your friends.”

  “Okay.”

  Later, as I brushed out my hair after shampooing it, I took comfort in knowing there was no chance of running into Zach in Athens.

  At 6:00 p.m. there was a knock on the door. I opened it. Vince took a step back and smiled. He was about the same height as Zach, but more lanky. He had dark eyes and wavy brown hair. No ponytail sprouted from the back of his head. In his right hand, which had been scarred in a high school chemistry accident, Vince held a sleek, lightweight laptop. The computer was his constant companion.

  “You brought your computer?”

  “Nice to see you, too,” he answered.

  “Sorry.” I laughed.

  “I have some pictures I want to show you.”

  It was cool outside. Vince helped me put on a long coat.

  “Where to?” he asked as we walked across the parking lot.

  I named a chain restaurant. Vince shook his head.

  “Isn’t there someplace local?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Something more Southern. There’s not much of that available near the Yale campus.”

  “There’s a restaurant that’s famous for catfish, but I haven’t tried it.”

  “You will tonight.”

  The restaurant, named for the man who founded it, was located a few miles from the campus.

  “Have you been in Savannah recently?” I asked as we left the parking lot.

  “Yes. I drove down from Charleston for a couple of days after Christmas to finish a few projects Mr. Braddock sent me.”

  “Was Zach at the office?”

  “No, he was still in California.” Vince glanced at me. “But I’m sure you know that.”

  “Not the exact dates.”

  “I heard you made a trip to Savannah, too.”

  “Yes. I turned down the job.”

  “I know. Mr. Carpenter wanted me to explain it to him.”

  “What did you say?”

  “That I was sure you’d prayed about it and believed it was the right choice. He just shook his head and walked away. Faith inside the walls of the church is familiar. Making it a part of day-to-day life is from a different universe, especially for a man like him.”

  “Did he know I’m going to work with Julie and Maggie Smith?”

  “He didn’t mention it. Is that what you decided to do?”

  “Yes.”

  We stopped at a traffic light.

  “How did you know it was the right choice?”

  Vince rarely asked idle questions, and I didn’t give him a watereddown version. The only thing I left out was the strain the decision placed on my relationship with Zach. We were seated and sipping water at the restaurant by the time I completed my story.

  “How much of this did you tell Mr. Carpenter?”

  “None.”

  Vince sipped his water. “It’s a good thing you didn’
t accept the job at Braddock, Appleby, and Carpenter. You wouldn’t fit in the firm culture.”

  “And you will?” I asked, raising my eyebrows.

  Vince smiled. “We’re not all called to the same mission field.”

  Food was served buffet-style. The catfish were fried bone-in and served with a broad assortment of vegetables. For those who didn’t like fish there was crisp fried chicken. Vince piled a generous portion of collard greens onto his plate next to a heaping mound of squash casserole.

  “Hungry?” I asked when we returned to our table.

  “For the right kind of food. Collard greens aren’t considered a delicacy in some parts of the country.”

  When he blessed the food, Vince quoted a few verses from Psalm 40 about the wonderful things God has planned for those who do his will. Whether for legal principles or Scripture, Vince had a very sticky memory.

  Catfish caught fresh in Putnam’s Pond and cooked by Mama was the best on earth, but the restaurant did a respectable job. The sweet white meat separated easily from the bones and didn’t taste greasy. Vince loved it. He left nothing but the skeleton on his plate. His tendency to focus intently on one thing at a time carried over to eating. He paid more attention to the food on his plate than to me. Knowing this about him kept me from feeling ignored. After polishing off the food selected on a second trip to the buffet, he looked up and sighed.

  “This was what I needed.”

  “Are you going to eat any dessert?”

  “Where is it?”

  I pointed to a table on the opposite end of the room. Without a word, Vince got up. I followed him. Further conversation would have to wait until he finished a good-sized helping of both banana pudding and peach cobbler. I avoided the banana pudding, not because I didn’t like it, but because a woman in our church made such glorious banana pudding that I never ate it anyplace else.

  “Are you driving back to Atlanta tonight?” I asked.

  “Yes, I’m staying at a hotel near the airport.”

  Vince cleared our table himself, placing the dirty plates and silverware on a large round tray used for that purpose by the restaurant staff. Then he placed his laptop on the table and moved his chair so we could both see the screen.

  “What are you going to show me?” I asked as the computer booted up.

  “It’s better to show than tell.”

  He clicked on an icon for photographs. Black faces filled the screen.

  “Where is this?”

  “Rwanda.”

  “You went to Rwanda?”

  “Directly from school at the end of the semester. I was there for ten days working on this project before flying into Charleston to see my family for Christmas and then going to Savannah. It’s been a busy vacation.”

  “What kind of project?”

  Another photograph appeared. A smiling black woman was standing next to a smiling black man in front of a simple house. The woman had her arm around a teenage boy.

  “That’s a beautiful family,” I said.

  “They’re not a family. The man is a Hutu; the woman and her son are Tutsi. They’ve known each other since childhood and lived in the same village. During the genocide in 1994, the man was in a group that killed the woman’s husband and two daughters.”

  I put my hand over my mouth in shock.

  “But—”

  “It was a process. Most would say an unbelievable process. But some people are willing to forgive. This woman is one of them.”

  He clicked an arrow and a picture of two men with grotesque scars on their faces appeared. They had their arms around each other’s shoulders.

  “These men tried to kill each other with machetes. Now, they’re deacons in the same church.”

  Vince showed me several more photos, each different yet with a common message.

  “I was in the country as part of a justice survey sponsored by Yale. But when my translator found out I was a Christian, he took me on side trips to meet these people.”

  I stared at the photo on the screen—three women and a man who helped kill their husbands.

  “This man served these women for several months before a breakthrough came. He worked a laboring job then walked to their village to help them. At first they didn’t want him around, but eventually his repentance won them over.” Vince pointed to one of the women, a regal-looking, middle-aged lady with a colorful scarf on her head. “This is Candice. She told me she had to forgive the killer because God had forgiven her sins. When she forgave, the joy came back into her life.”

  I looked at Vince as he talked. There was a different light in his eyes.

  “The forgiveness in the hearts of these people was greater than anything I’ve ever seen. They’re living in a place of love and grace I didn’t know existed.”

  “I can tell,” I responded. “I’m glad you went on the trip.”

  “Me, too. And I wanted you to hear about it. That’s why I drove here to see you when my flight was canceled.”

  “Why me?”

  “You’re the only person I can talk to like this.”

  “Thanks,” I said, suddenly feeling awkward.

  Vince didn’t seem to notice. He turned off his laptop and closed the top.

  VINCE WALKED ME TO THE DOOR OF MY APARTMENT. WHEN I unlocked the door quickly to go inside, he rested his hand against the door frame to stop me. I felt nervous.

  “Maybe I’ll see you at the bar exam,” he said.

  His comment took me by surprise. The last thing on my mind at the moment was the bar exam given in July to the law students who’d recently graduated.

  “Uh, there’ll be a lot of people there.”

  “Yes. I enjoyed dinner.”

  “Me, too.”

  “I’ll e-mail those photos to you.”

  “That would be nice.”

  Inside, I plopped down on my bed and stared up at the ceiling. The bar exam would be easy compared to finding the correct answers to questions of my heart.

  8

  “DO YOU THINK THERE WILL BE A QUESTION ABOUT THIRD-PARTY beneficiaries?” Julie asked as we stood in line at the entrance to the testing facility in Atlanta.

  “Yes,” I answered. “But you’ll spot that immediately. It’s the ones with hidden issues that worry me.”

  “I thought you weren’t supposed to worry. It’s a sin.”

  “It is, but I’m sure David got nervous before he fought Goliath.”

  “A touch of nerves gets the blood flowing to the brain,” Julie said as the line inched forward. “Keep talking. I like it when your fighting side comes out. It psyches me up.”

  I was more scared than I let on. My palms were sweating so badly the registration confirmation in my right hand was getting slightly damp. If David’s hands had been this moist, the sling would have slipped through his fingers and wrapped itself around Goliath’s ankle. I scanned the crowd of several hundred candidates. It was a somber group. Many would pass the two-day test. All wanted to avoid being among those who didn’t.

  “Did you talk to Zach this week?” Julie asked.

  “No.”

  “How about this month?”

  “No, I’ve been studying.”

  “Is he still mad at you for taking the job with Maggie and me?”

  “He’s disappointed.”

  Julie shook her head. “What does it feel like to be you? You’re like a movie star. The whole world wants a piece of you.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I saw Vinny the other day,” Julie continued. “After telling me that he’d scored over ninety percent on five multistate practice tests, he asked a bunch of questions about you.”

  “He did not.”

  “Well, he told me about the practice tests, but I could tell he was thinking about you the whole time.”

  “I hate it when you lie to me.”

  We entered a large convention room. Almost every candidate carried a laptop. In my hand was a new one Daddy and
Mama had given me as a graduation present. I’d never received such an extravagant gift.

  “Do you want to sit together?” Julie asked.

  I hesitated. Even if Julie didn’t say a word, her presence would be a distraction. And the chances of her keeping completely quiet were nil. I didn’t want a proctor to issue a warning, or worse.

  “Me either,” she continued before I said anything. “I’ll see you at the break.”

  I gratefully watched Julie blend into the crowd, then settled into a seat at a small table and plugged in my computer. Including college, I’d spent seven years preparing for this moment. I bowed my head and offered a silent prayer for wisdom, insight, and the ability to remember what I’d learned. I’d prayed before taking bunches of tests, but this was a big hurdle. I dived into the first section of the exam.

  I worked steadily, relieved that most of the questions raised familiar points of law. But the bar exam wasn’t primarily a memory test. Every question required analysis of the problem before application of the correct principles. My brain felt like a computer as I rapidly shuffled data and concepts. One thing I could say with confidence about law school—it taught me how to think.

  I finished the first section a couple of minutes before time was called and then joined the mob going to the restroom. I ran into Julie as I exited.

  “How’s it going?” she asked.

  “Okay, how about you?”

  “It’s a piece of cake. Did you see Vinny?”

  “No.”

  “He’s down front. I saw him get up a couple of times during the test.”

  I wandered to the front of the room. Clusters of people were gathered together discussing specific questions. I avoided group debriefing sessions in law school and skirted the groups. Nothing created more anxiety than hearing someone mention an issue I’d missed. I tried to spot Vince’s laptop on one of the tables, but they all looked alike.

  “Tami!”

  I turned around. It was Vince. He looked pale and haggard.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked with concern.

  “I’m sick,” he said, rubbing his chin. “Didn’t sleep much last night. Spent most of my time in the bathroom at the hotel. I ought to be in bed now.”