Bluegrass Courtship

by Allie Pleiter

  Charlie looked about as calm as one could expect under the circumstances—which wasn’t calm at all. As a matter of fact, it was the closest thing to panic Drew had ever seen on the man’s face.

  “Let me get this straight,” Charlie said, rubbing his hands down his face as they sat in the hotel coffee shop with the smog-tinted Los Angeles sun just dawning over his shoulder. “You’re leaving Missionnovation? For a girl?”

  “She’s not a girl,” Drew sighed. “In my experience women don’t take nicely to being called girls. And it’s not just about Janet. She just sort of brought everything to a head, that’s all.”

  “I don’t get it.” Charlie stared at him, genuinely stumped. “Now, of all times, when we’re about to go big—now you leave?”

  “I think that’s just it, Charlie. I thought I wanted Missionnovation to ‘go big.’ I understand all the reasons why it’s a good thing. But for the first time since we started, I think I finally understand the difference between Drew Downing and Mr. Missionnovation. I want Missionnovation to go big. But I don’t—all those trappings of a big show, none of that appeals to me. None of it feels right. My brain’s been mud since we started this negotiation and I couldn’t figure out why. It’s because I’ve lost my bearings. I never wanted to be famous, I just wanted to help people fix stuff. Show them how the body of Christ helps each other out. And somehow, in a way I can’t really explain yet, doing it on a big scale isn’t what I’m supposed to be doing. It’s not the crowds that jazz me, it’s the one-on-one. Don’t you get it? That’s why I’m always fixated on the ‘hostile’ even though the whole crowd is cheering.”

  “Your timing is lousy.”

  Drew managed a thin smile. “It’s not my timing. Actually, I think I’m a little late on the uptake. I think God’s been shouting in my ear for weeks now and it took Janet Bishop to shake me up enough to hear Him. This is something I have to do.”

  Charlie still looked forlorn.

  “Look, I think you had the notion right—that it was time for my role in Missionnovation to change. You just didn’t realize that launching Missionnovation was my thing. Tinkering with it until she was strong enough to fly on her own. Kevin and Annie and the rest of them, they’re ready. I got them ready, and I’ve been so blessed by it. They’ll be great. This isn’t going to fall around your ankles. It’s really going to take off because now you’ll have the people God intends taking it from here.”

  “You sure know how to test a guy’s faith.” Charlie gulped his coffee—his fourth cup. “I’m not sure I can pull this off.”

  “I am,” Drew replied, meaning every word of it. “You’re the guy who makes things happen. And I know this is what’s supposed to happen. I’ve known it since the minute I figured it out, and it feels right. Really right. You have to know I’m sure or I would never get you out of bed at this hideous hour.”

  “It’s dawn,” Charlie said, cringing. “I don’t do dawn.”

  “It’s one of the most amazing times in Kentucky. You should see the mist, Charlie. It takes your breath away.”

  “Man,” said Charlie, narrowing his eyes. “You do have it bad.”

  Drew grinned. He did, didn’t he?

  “Start praying, Downing. And get everyone you know on their knees. It’s gonna take God in all His might to pull today off.”

  “Welcome to my world, Chuck. If God in all His might didn’t show up every day, I’d have been sunk three years ago.”

  Janet found her mom in her garage, putting away gardening supplies for the winter. As it had always been, the Bishop garage was tidy—swept, organized, with a place for everything and everything in its place. Her dad used to joke that even the garden hoses wouldn’t dare kink or wind in the wrong direction when Bebe Bishop was in charge. Her mom pulled off a pair of work gloves and straightened when Janet came up the driveway. “Well hello, dear. Nice to have everything back to normal up at the shop?”

  That was the question of the hour, wasn’t it? Was it nice? And was everything back to normal?

  No, and no.

  No matter how she tried to deny it, Drew Downing had left things too quiet at the shop and too stormy in her soul.

  “Got a minute? Can I talk to you about something?” Janet said as casually as she could. She tried to make it sound trivial, but moms have a radar about that sort of thing, and her mother dropped the gloves immediately and gestured toward the back door.

  She poured two glasses of iced tea—Bebe drank iced tea year round, preferring cold drinks to hot for as long as Janet could remember—and sat down at the kitchen table. “What’s on your mind?”

  “How’d you marry Dad?” She could have picked a more subtle start, but couldn’t think of one.

  A smile washed over her mother’s face. “Well, there was a minister, and he said the usual things, and we said the usual things, and we were married.”

  Janet rolled her eyes. Couldn’t her mother see she was trying to have a serious conversation? “I mean how’d you decide to marry Dad?”

  Bebe sat back. “That’s a mite more complicated. Then again, not really. I loved him, and you don’t really decide something like that. It just sort of happens.” She stirred her tea. “But I did have to decide to marry him. And that wasn’t quite as easy. I knew I could when I wanted a life with him more than I cared about the challenges of living with him. No one gets married without a few doubts.” She looked at Janet. “Why the sudden questions?”

  “Vern and I argued because I’m mad at Drew Downing. You know I think Missionnovation made mistakes over at MCC. Vern told me to hush up and be grateful, to accept an imperfect world with imperfect people.” Janet ran her finger around the top of her iced tea glass, not feeling very thirsty. “He said something about how even Dad was imperfect, and to ask you about it.”

  “He and your dad were in the middle of a big fight when your father died. Actually, he and your dad fought a lot.”

  Dad and Vern? Fighting? They somehow managed to keep her from seeing it. “What could those two fight about?”

  “Oh, you’d be surprised. Your dad had a stubborn streak a mile wide. But you wouldn’t know anything about bein’ stubborn, or insisting on your own way, now would you?”

  Janet let that go without a reply. She knew perfectly well where her stubborn steak came from.

  “I’m not saying your dad wasn’t a wonderful man—he was.” Her mother’s eyes strayed to the dark blue Bishop Hardware jacket hung on a peg by the back door. “But Vern is right, and no one’s perfect. You know your dad had one way of doing things—his way. He had blinders on as to anyone else’s ideas, no matter how fine they might be.” Janet recalled the dozens of arguments she’d had with her dad over how to run the store. “Before you took over, Vern had a front row seat to most of it. People make mistakes when they won’t take advantage of good advice and only see their own way on things.”

  Janet toyed with the ice cubes in her glass. “I know Dad could be a tough boss. I still don’t see what that’s got to do with Missionnovation.”

  “Well, like I said, I did think about your dad’s faults before I said yes to his proposal. I had to decide if I liked the good things of a life with him more than I wanted to get my own way most of the time. I loved your dad to pieces, but he was a bit of a schemer, and that didn’t always sit well with me. I had to take the good with the bad.”

  “Dad? Scheming?”

  Bebe chuckled. “Well, I suppose it looked more like planning to you. You two are so alike in lots of ways. But Dad had been a schemer when he was younger. That’s why he was so angry about what happened with Tony. Saw his former self in that boy. And it made him furious.” She looked at Janet tenderly. “It broke his heart to see what happened to you. I always hoped, for your sake, that with some mercy Tony would wise up and turn his life around. ’Course, I was wrong. I never thought you’d be so hurt by all of it for so long.” She stared down at her hands. “I would’ve come down like the wrath of God on that boy if I�
�d known he was gonna destroy your faith. I just kept thinking of Jacob, how scheming he was, but how God turned him around to be such a man of faith.” She looked up at Janet. “I wanted Tony to be like your dad, but he wasn’t, and that’s my mistake.”

  “Tony was never Jacob,” Janet said bitterly. “And Tony was never Dad. He had us all fooled.”

  Her mother leaned in and grabbed Janet’s arm across the table. “I know. Mercy, how I know that now. But Jannybean, the whole world ain’t like that. I wish I could make you see that. You fell for a bad man, and I’m sorry every day for what it did to you. But I think the right man is out there, waiting for you to come round, just like God is.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Janet expected the conversation with her mom to make things clearer, but it didn’t. She bumped around the house all evening, unable to work on birdhouses, unable to find anything to do or eat or read and she certainly didn’t want to watch television. She wandered the house, restless, until she ended back at her workbench, trying to sketch ideas for new birdhouses. Every attempt ended up wadded in the trash—nothing seemed to work for her tonight.

  Her eyes landed on the Bible where it had fallen off her workbench, waiting to be picked up. The Bible had its share of imperfect people with plans gone wrong. Jacob, for example. She also remembered Jacob as quite the schemer, and something about him meeting his future wife Rachel at a well.

  A well. A cistern, if you will.

  Her faith was like this Bible. It was waiting, but she’d have to make the step of picking it up. It had never changed—it was still the same Bible that had guided her through such leaps of faith at church—only her distance from it had changed.

  She picked up the book and opened to Genesis, thumbing through the pages until she caught sight of Jacob’s name. She wandered back until she found the twenty-fifth chapter where Jacob and Esau began their adventures in life. The stories were filled with deceit, plans gone sour, bad advice and all kinds of wrong turns. As she read them, the tales became not so much about a man gone wrong as they were about a God determined to set things right. God loved Jacob, warts and all. Jacob’s faults didn’t make God any less powerful or less righteous. God was God all along—He only seemed to fade when you stopped looking at Him.

  She had let Tony stand in for God. Let Tony’s shadow block out anything Drew or Missionnovation may have shown her about God. Let Tony’s sins define church and faith when it was God who should define her church and her faith. A God who hadn’t moved His eyes off her no matter how long it had been since she looked at Him.

  Janet poured on through Jacob’s life until she hit the story of Joseph. She laughed when she read about holes in the ground causing more trouble—Joseph’s brothers threw him in a pit to get rid of him. Two thousand years later, and holes in the ground were still wreaking havoc on relationships. As she read of Joseph’s prayers in prison—a man who definitely understood what it was like to be hurt by someone else’s deceit—an understanding seemed to dawn. Joseph didn’t ignore Potiphar’s wife’s crimes. Her lie about his conduct landed him in jail. Yet, Joseph didn’t let that scheming woman define his God. Joseph allowed his faith to stake a claim in God’s bigger plan for his life, even when all he could see were dire consequences.

  If Joseph—who’d endured far more than a broken heart—could find a way to keep faith in God, then maybe Janet could find a way to return to faith.

  I don’t know how, she offered up the fragile prayer. But You do. You can chart my path back. You already have, haven’t You? It’s begun already. That big green bus really was a blessing, I was just too hurt to see it. Too caught up in the imperfections to see all the good things You brought to Middleburg through it.

  She remembered now the verse her mother would quote to her when she became especially bitter about what had happened with Tony. “I will repay you for the years the locust have eaten.” She had lost years. More importantly, she’d lost hope. Perhaps it was time she asked God to restore both. Can I come back, Lord? Can You take away the bitterness? I don’t want to let Tony steal any more than he already has. Janet picked up the Bible and took it to her couch, looking up “locusts” in the concordance in the back to see if she could find the verse.

  When she found it in Joel, it was as if the verses jumped off the page to speak to her. The way they once had.

  “Even now,” declares the LORD, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning. Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and He relents from sending calamity.”

  Wasn’t that exactly what she’d feared? That He’d sent calamity in the form of Drew Downing? She could come back. In fact, God had been waiting, patiently, for her return. And she knew, even if she knew nothing else, that the door of Middleburg Community Church would always be open once she found her way there.

  She decided, just then, that her next birdhouse would be shaped like a wishing well. Not exactly a house, but then again, maybe it was time for holes in the ground to get a new reputation.

  Drew sat at an enormous black conference table between a line of network high-ups and several HomeBase executives.

  Charlie, seated next to Drew, looked like he’d just run a marathon. Kevin and Annie were on the sidelines of the room, holding hands and looking nervous. Jeremy looked as if he hadn’t decided how this was going to affect his precious career path. Mike hadn’t even flinched.

  “Missionnovation will move forward in exciting new directions with Kevin and Annie at the helm. It’s time for me to step aside and move on to other projects.” Drew caught Charlie’s glance out of the corner of his eye. “I’ll stay on board through the Christmas special and remain as an executive consultant to the production team. I’ll do whatever limited appearances HomeBase deems necessary, and oversee whatever’s needed to let these folks take Missionnovation into its new format.” At that, all eyes turned to the quartet on the sidelines. They were ready to take the spotlight. Drew knew it, and they were beginning to see it as well.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Janet hung a new beach-shack birdhouse in the window of Bishop Hardware. The week before, she’d presented Pastor Anderson with a new birdhouse—the wishing well birdhouse—for the church lawn. He’d been delighted to accept a second birdhouse, but he made sure Janet knew he was far more delighted to have her in church again.

  Her return to church was not the usual “come back to Jesus” dramatic moment. As a matter of fact, Pastor Anderson joked with her about having the most unusual return to faith of his career. It had started with daily inspections of the new roof. Excessive, yes, but Janet couldn’t shake the constant need to look it over, watch it, guard it.

  As she made those visits, she and Pastor Anderson began to talk about all that had happened, about God, even about Drew. Then it didn’t seem like such a big leap to stay for a Wednesday night service. Then a Sunday morning. Then every Sunday morning.

  The original church replica birdhouse now sat on a post right next to the giant watering can Janet still couldn’t bring herself to like. Everyone thought it was the cleverest thing they’d ever seen, and while she stopped saying it, she still believed it belonged underground. She’d made a little bargain with herself about that tank—she’d keep her mouth shut through the winter. If it survived the freeze without problems, she’d revise her opinion. If it broke or heaved or did anything of that sort, she’d allow herself the luxury of a loud, long, “I told you so.”

  Vern was late to work this morning. Granted, business wasn’t exactly booming this late into October, but it still wasn’t like Vern to ever show up anything less than five minutes early. With a tug of alarm, she hoped nothing had happened to that dear old man. He lived alone, and he was getting on in years.

  She was just getting ready to call Vern’s house when an unfamiliar car pulled up and parked right outside the shop windows. Vern got out of the passeng
er side, waving to whomever was inside. He walked into work with a wide smile, whistling besides.

  “Who drove you to work, old man?” Janet snapped the ladder shut and pulled it back into the shop.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know, missy?” Vern practically winked. Winked. Something was definitely up. “I’m just gonna head on back into the stockroom and tidy up a bit.”

  Vern? Tidy up? Not in a million years. “What’s going on?”

  “Oh, nothin’.”

  Shaking her head, Janet headed to the back of the store to put the ladder away. A minute or two later she heard someone call out, “Well hello again and how are ya, Middleburg?”

  She knew that voice. Janet turned to find Drew Downing standing in the paint aisle. Drew Downing, standing with his hands in his pockets and a gigawatt grin on his face, in her paint aisle.

  “I’m here to check on a certain roof. The frost’ll set in soon, and I want to make sure there’ll be no leaks. So I need a ladder.” He walked toward her, and Janet thought the paint aisle might just blow away to bits behind her.

  Janet found her voice. “You’re here?” she gulped out.

  “I took a few days off. Actually, I took most of next season off. I’m still there, sort of, but it’s going to be Kevin and Annie’s thing now. They make a really good team.”

  She’d heard things about how Drew Downing was changing his role in Missionnovation. She had tried not to think about what that might mean. Now, she didn’t know what to think. Thoughts of surprise and suspicion and delight were colliding so fast in her head she couldn’t sort them out. “Why are you here?”

  “Like I said, I came back to check on the roof.”

  “Why’d you come back to check on the roof?” It wasn’t fair. He looked even better than he did before. Less theatric, which made him all the more handsome somehow. Janet’s insides were doing jumping jacks, and she found a broom at the corner of the aisle and held on to it for support.