The Lutheran Ladies' Circle: Plucking One String

by Kris Knorr

  After the audience and the actors settled down from the laughter, the play continued in the spirit of a group improv. Hettie, reading from the script, cued anyone who missed their lines. When she prompted, “Shepherd Marcus, don’t you want to say something?” there was no answer.

  A shepherd kneeling on the floor pointed a finger. Marcus sat against a bale of hay, head thrown back, mouth open—sound asleep.

  Vera put an end to the production by turning the lights out. She gave a push start to the acolyte, sending her weaving down the aisle toward the altar. The tall, white Christ candle that had presided over the Advent wreath for weeks was lit. Its tiny glow reached into the blackness of the sanctuary. Gentle chords of “Silent Night” began to play.

  “The Light has broken into our darkness. Jesus Christ is born!” announced Pastor Poe as he removed the white candle and carried it into the congregation. The first person in each row lit their small candle, and the flame passed from wick to wick, spreading gradually to the candles in the corners of the sanctuary then out the doors to the overflow of worshippers in the narthex.

  When notes of the last stanza stopped resonating, the organ broke into a spirited rendition of “Joy to the World.” Candle light bounced around the sanctuary. Impromptu harmony swelled through voices. Kay’s halo flashed in a strobe pattern.

  *

  Families and friends exited through the doors, finding Lutheran-brewed coffee and hot spiced cider. Lorena and Brynn had set up a cookie buffet. Johnny and the other little angel continued their elbowing over chocolate chip treats.

  “It snowed. It snowed!” someone shouted. A thin layer had blanketed the parking lot. The shepherds and Holy family were already outside, hurling snowballs at each other.

  Lorena, behind the cookie table, made sure handfuls of baked goods didn’t disappear into bathrobes.

  She signaled with a furtive wave to Kay and Hettie. “Does anybody know the guy in the khaki slacks over there? He’s been here the last couple of Sundays.”

  They craned their necks. They could see his partial profile through the crowd. Turtleneck, blue blazer, dark hair with graying temples.

  “Go introduce yourself. This is a friendly church,” Kay said.

  “No. He’ll think I’m pushy.”

  Kay cut through the visiting groups, stuck out her hand, said something, and then pulled the man toward the cookie table.

  “Oh crap.” Lorena almost made it into the crowd before Kay grabbed her jacket.

  “Lorena, this is Robert Fullerton. He likes coffee and oatmeal cookies. Robert, this is Lorena.” She turned and left.

  *

  Anyone who could be recruited away from the cookies and snowball fights was downstairs, stuffing wings and sheep’s clothing back into boxes. “I wanted to crawl under a table, Kay.” Lorena carried the empty urns through the melee to the kitchen.

  “Well, you wanted to meet him. What’d you find out?” Kay asked.

  “Nothing. I apologized for you, explaining you had the social skills of a badger, and then I offered him a cup of coffee. That’s when I noticed he already had a cup. I felt even stupider, so I blurted out that the single folks, old and young, went to the all-night diner after Christmas Eve services. I invited him, but he declined. I don’t even know if he was single. I’m such an idiot.”

  “No worries.” Kay raised her eyebrows twice with a big grin. “I’ll help you.”

  “Please don’t. Are you coming tonight?”

  “No,” Kay stacked boxes. “Gabe, my ex, gets the boys tomorrow, so I want to spend tonight with them, even though they’ll be more interested in their new video games than talking to me.”

  Vera appeared in the doorway, but seeing most of the boxes already packed, turned to leave. Hettie jabbed an elbow into Lorena’s ribs, hissing, “What about her?”

  Lorena cast a dark glance at Hettie before calling out, “Hey, Vera, what are you doing tonight? You want to go to the Cherokee with us?”

  “Uh…no, my family will be here tomorrow.” She quickly retreated up the stairs. Lorena looked to Kay, but she was already ordering kids to carry items to the closets.

  Room by room the lights went off in the church as families left. Only the twinkling lights of the Chrismon tree shone on the faces of Walt, Roger, and the few women waiting in the narthex.

  “Where’s Jerod?” asked Lorena as she and Kay switched off the stairway lights.

  “This was his first and last Christmas.” Roger bowed his head. “Brynn arranged to donate him to a low-income nutrition program that teaches cooking and canning. Jehovah Jirah, God provides.

  “They’re slaughtering Jerod? We should launch a rescue mission,” Kay said.

  “I hope he falls out of her van and cracks into a million pieces,” Lorena said.

  Roger squinted at her. “My! Such Christmas spirit and good will.”

  “It’s a gourd the size of a space ship, and I’m tired of that pumpkin attending every event and marring the decorations. I’m surprised he’s not going to the restaurant with us.”

  “Well, actually,” Roger looked sheepish, “he is. He’s in the back of my van. Brynn didn’t have room for him tonight.”

  “Oh for-cryin-out-loud!” Lorena threw up her hands. “I’m not sitting next to him.”

  “Ready? Pastor’s already left. I’m locking up.” Vera unplugged the tree, leaving everyone to make their way out the doors using the dim light from the parking lot, shining through the windows.

  The snow crunched underfoot. People didn’t speak as they listened to the quiet world and watched their breath rise in the air. Planning to come back later for their cars, the diners piled into Walt’s van.

  “Vera,” Lorena tried once more, “why don’t you come with us? We’ve got plenty of room.”

  “No…thanks. I…I have things to do before my family gets here.”

  “Leave her be,” Walt mumbled, staring out the windshield, watching ice crystals swirl under the parking lot light while the engine warmed.

  “I was just trying…” Lorena closed her mouth and got in the van.

  “It’s kind of sad, looking at the church.” Roger rubbed a circle in the window fog for a better view. “Just an hour ago it was bursting with lights, kids, and people singing. Now, it’s locked and every window is black. This surprise snowfall made folks hurry home. Even the streets are dark and deserted.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I think Pastor Poe nailed it with that benediction of his: ‘The Light of Love has come. Go forth in joy.’” Walt pointed to a car leaving the parking lot. As it motored cautiously away, multi-colored lights flickered from inside.

  Kay’s halo.

  Epiphany

  THE WEEK AFTER Christmas, teenagers slouched in the overstuffed couches of the church’s High School Room. Late as usual, Phil, their twenty-eight-year-old, part-time youth director, dashed in. “Let’s get started,” he called through the chatter. Short in stature, but wiry in muscle, he sported a T-shirt, shorts, and a dark tan from the previous summer’s soccer season. He shoved a pair of clunky-footed tennis shoes off the coffee table as he strode to the front of the room. “Okay, Pastor Jim once said that an epiphany meant—”

  Eyes were watching the big screen TV even though the sound was muted. Taking two long steps, he smacked the “off” button to a chorus of groans.

  “Now, if I could have your full attention. Kevin, how about removing your leg from the back of the couch, so you’re in a more upright position? Thanks. Now, because we’re in the season of Epiphany—”

  “What’s epiphany?” a blonde youth said as she checked her cell phone.

  “I’m glad you asked. Pastor Jim used to define it this way: Epiphany is when you have a moment that makes you do this…” He held up one finger, signaling wait-for-it, drew a breath, and said, “Aaaaaah! I didn’t know that.”

  The kids stared at him with a nobody’s-home look.

  “When life makes you gasp, ‘Aaaaah! I didn’t know that,’
you’ve just had an epiphany,” he explained. The room filled with kids practicing their gasps and I-didn’t-know-thats.

  “Okay, okay. Now in order to give you many opportunities to have your own epiphanies this year, the youth group is going on a mission trip.”

  “Aaaaah! I didn’t know that,” said Marcus.

  “That’s not an epiphany. That’s an announcement,” said Phil.

  “What’s the difference?” Marcus squinted.

  “You’ll find out on this mission trip.”

  “Where’re we going?” someone asked.

  “Your committee voted on San Francisco. We will be working with inner-city youth, serving in soup kitchens and doing some improvement projects.”

  “San Francisco? I thought all the mission projects were in Mexico,” a tall blond teenager said.

  “See, you’ve had an epiphany already,” said Marcus.

  “Nope, that’s not an epiphany.” Phil pointed at the unenlightened youth. “That’s just correcting misinformation.”

  “I still don’t get it,” said Marcus.

  “You will. We’ll have fundraisers, so each of you can go. The Lutheran Ladies Circle has graciously offered to help us do the first one. Mrs. Henley is here to tell us about it.”

  The kids hadn’t seen Vera slip into the back of the room. She strode to the front, clutching a clipboard and pens, and stared at them until she felt it was quiet enough to begin. “The Ladies Circle wants to support you in raising money for this mission trip, so we propose to work with you in a deli sandwich sale for the Super Bowl.”

  Blank faces looked at her.

  Vera cleared her throat and continued, “All of us will take orders for custom-made sandwiches from now until a week before the big game. We’ll sell them by the foot, up to three feet. Our ovens can’t bake buns bigger than three feet.”

  Kevin snorted.

  Vera gave him her dead-pan stare. “We’ll meet on Saturday before the game and assemble them so people can pick up their orders when they come to church on game day. All of us will be working together, ladies and youth. I have sign-up sheets for baking, manning the sales table, and helping shop for supplies. All of us will assemble. Any questions?”

  “Didn’t Jesus kick over the tables and whip people who were, uh, you know, selling stuff at church? Isn’t this wrong?” Marcus had kept his hand in the air the whole time he’d asked the question.

  “Way to pay attention in Sunday school.” Kevin smacked his brother on the back. Marcus replied by elbowing Kevin in the ribs. Rowdiness broke out as the kids began laughing and talking.

  “Okay, okay.” Phil sprang out of his chair and stood bouncing slightly on his toes. “We’ll work out the theology. It’s a great start, and we want to thank Mrs. Henley and the ladies, don’t we?” Vera was squinting toward the back of the room.

  “Mrs. Henley?” Phil asked.

  She craned her neck forward, trying to peer into the darkened corner. There were four wooden chairs in a semi-circle, facing the wall. From the seats, one could have an eye-level stare into the face of the picture hanging there.

  “Mrs. Henley?”

  She gasped, “Is that my painting? Why is it in the High School Room?”

  *

  Vera did not wait until she got home to make the call. She proceeded to the secretary’s office, unlocked it with her personal key, and phoned Walt, the Property Manager. When he didn’t answer, she left a quiet message loaded with meaning, “Walt. I found Saint Peter.”

  *

  Walt, set in his ways for sixty+ years, only answered the phone if he felt like it, and often he wasn’t in the mood to be disturbed. He hadn’t had much use for chatter before his wife died, ten years ago. She was the one who used the phone. His kids had brought him an answering machine. He’d finally hooked it up and found it surprisingly handy. He could listen to calls and never even get out of his chair.

  He used the remote to turn down the TV when the phone rang.

  “Walt. I found Saint Peter.” He could imagine Vera’s face. Her mouth tight like two boards epoxy-ed together and eyes like drill bits biting into him. God bless the person who’d invented the answering machine.

  Her St. Peter picture was like a squeaky floorboard. It kept coming back, no matter what you did to it. It must have been over fifteen years ago when she’d painted the thing.

  The white hair on the old guy looked like it needed a dryer sheet, sticking out in all directions as though he’d been hit by lightning. Maybe he had been, because his overly large fingers curled inward like claws, and his eyebrows, black as night, fuzzed upward in eternal anger. It was the eyes, though, that gave out the jeebies. Walt had never seen a human with black eyes. They cut right through a person—at the neck.

  He remembered talking about it with Ruby, his wife. She’d said that Peter sure was a scurrilous bub if that’s what he looked like. Walt agreed, saying that was a face to guard hell, not heaven’s gates.

  He’d dutifully hung it in the narthex, as instructed by the Council. After all, it was a gift of art to the church. Walt supposed that he wasn’t much of an art connoisseur because he never heard anyone comment about how menacing it was. The ladies always sat the Christmas tree in front of it. Visitors stared at it. But no one said anything.

  When it was time to paint the narthex, the portrait was removed and it never reappeared. Vera seemed pleased when she was told that her masterpiece was making guest appearances in the Sunday school rooms. It was true. If a Sunday school teacher found the painting in her classroom, she’d sneak it into another room because small children cried if they had to stay in a room with a guy who looked as though he’d cut off your hand if it caused you to sin.

  When the kids were taught they were both sinner and saint at the same time, their eyes grew big. Imagining the scowling, pirate-faced portrait, they stuttered, “Like Saint Peter?” Walt figured those kids would need therapy to get over their exposure to that painting.

  Then one day it had disappeared. Other members of the Property Committee told him it was in storage. He hadn’t spent much time looking for it, but he knew Vera had. He figured it must be in the attic with the organ pipes. It was the one place Vera couldn’t get to.

  Now, it was Saint Peter’s second coming.

  *

  Walt had expected more phone calls from Vera during the next few days but heard nothing. Only Phil, the youth director, seemed concerned about the artwork.

  “Hey, Walt.” Phil stopped outside of the propped-open door of the men’s restroom at church. Walt stood inside, on a ladder, replacing a ceiling light. “Pastor Poe said I should check with you to see if the youth could keep St. Peter a while longer. Mrs. Henley said it was an important piece of art that was to be installed in the narthex.”

  “Uhh. It’s been missing for a while; where’d you find it?”

  “Oh, when we had the all-night-gamer for New Year’s Eve, we unlocked the closet to the belfry. The kids wanted to ring the church bell at midnight.”

  “Yeah, I heard that. It was grand. Hadn’t been done in years,” Walt said.

  “Lots of people in the neighborhood called the church, thanking us for ringing in the New Year.” Phil shook his head. “Who knew? I figured we’d get complaints. Anyway, the painting was in the rope-pull closet. The kids really like him. He looks like a punk-rocker. They didn’t think anyone would mind if they stuck him in their room.”

  “Just Vera…” Walt climbed down the ladder.

  “No, she’s okay with it. She seems pretty pleased the kids refer to him as their mascot. Well, mostly the guys. The girls sometimes hang a scarf over it. I didn’t mention that. It might hurt her feelings.”

  “That’s my #2 Rule: Never give ’em too much information. One-word answers if you can.” Walt flipped the switch to test the bulb.

  “What’s #1?”

  “Complain about everything.”

  “Oh! Well, in that case, I’m sorry to bother you. I just wanted to let you
know she said we could enjoy it for a while, but not to get too attached because you were scheduled to reinstall it in the narthex. Pastor Poe—he kind of likes it, too—said to check when you’re going to hang it.”

  “Aaah, well, Rule #3 applies here. You and the kids just enjoy your new mascot. The Property Committee’s gonna have to discuss when and where to display that portrait.” Walt patted Phil’s shoulder. “And you know how long it takes some decisions to come out of committee.”

  “What’s Rule #3?” the young man asked.

  Walt picked up the ladder and started toward the maintenance closet, calling over his shoulder, “Try to get away as quick as possible.”

  “Our Mouths Were Filled With Laughter” Psalm 126:2

  “LADIES. LADIES. I’D like to get started. We’ve lots to cover today.” Vera tried to speak over the settling-in noises of the January Circle meeting.

  “Thank you, thank you!” Kay said as Micki set a plate of her Skillion Dollar Fudge on the table. “Has someone made coffee?”

  Vera, who had been conspicuously ignoring Kay since the Christmas Eve incident, spoke over Kay’s last syllable. “We’ll start with new business because we haven’t made it that far into the agenda in past meetings. We will be working with—”

  “Am I supposed to mail off that stuff from our Hygiene Drive?” Hettie asked.

  “Hettie,” Vera nailed her with a stare, “I’d like to finish with my new business.”

  “I agree, Vera,” Nan said, helping herself to the fudge and ignoring the inner voice that told her to shut up. “I just need to understand…when did we have a Hygiene Drive?”

  “Oh, you know. Someone,” Hettie looked at Kay, “suggested a mission project, and I was privileged to do it—like always.”