by Erynn Mangum
“No, Tyler. I want it to be interesting.”
“But not exciting. You don’t want people shaking some delicious chili-spice mixture all over that popcorn.”
Layla makes a growling noise in the back of her throat. “I want it to be interesting and exciting without being awkward and awful.”
“If you want to not have an awkward wedding, don’t give anyone spoons,” he tells her, buttering another roll.
“What?”
“Spoons. Just leave them out of the silverware on the tables.”
Layla rubs her cheeks with both hands. “Why, Tyler? Why would spoons make my wedding awkward?”
“Have you ever seen a more awkward utensil? If you use it to stir sugar into an iced tea or a coffee, you can’t set it on your plate because then it drips iced tea or coffee all over the meal. You can’t set it on the table because then you’re the guy who messed up the tablecloth. And have you ever seen someone eat anything with a spoon? If you slurp, you’re the guy who can’t drink his soup quietly. If you eat ice cream and you don’t suck all the ice cream off the spoon, you’re the nasty guy leaving his germs all over everything.”
Peter grins. Layla starts laughing and then grabs two fistfuls of her hair. “You make me crazy! I don’t know why I’m encouraging this!” She waves a hand between Tyler and me.
He smirks at her. “Because. I make your life interesting. Like popcorn with — ”
“Just quiet, Tyler. Quiet now. And I would really appreciate it if you’d stop referring to my wedding as popcorn.”
“I wasn’t talking about your wedding right then, I was talking about your — ”
“Shhh,” she interrupts again. “Shh, Tyler.”
I look at Peter and shrug. “It doesn’t seem like we were needed to discuss the wedding after all.”
And for the first time ever, Peter laughs at something I say.
We end up talking at the restaurant until nine o’clock, and then Layla decides we all need to get coffee. The Starbucks nearby closes at nine, so we head over to a locally owned coffee-house not too far away.
“That was a very fun dinner,” Tyler says as he drives the five minutes to the coffeehouse.
“Yeah it was.” I nod, blocking a yawn with the back of my hand.
“I’m not sure how I will fit a coffee in my stomach too.” He rubs his rib cage.
I’m not sure how he’s going to either. I only have a sister, and my dad doesn’t eat a lot. I’ve never seen someone put away food the way Tyler does. He ate four rolls, a side salad, about half of the onion dish, the entire sweet potato, the entire bowl of cinnamon apples, and the whole steak.
I would be dead somewhere if I were him right now. I have no idea where they take people whose stomachs explode, but it can’t be a happy place filled with laughter.
“You could have taken some of that home with you, you know.” I tap the Styrofoam container on the seat next to me. Most of my dinner is in there.
“I don’t believe in leftovers.”
I believe him.
We get to the coffeehouse and Tyler looks over at me, smiling sweetly. “This is really fun, Paige.” He reaches over to squeeze my hand.
I smile at him, suddenly very thankful that I hadn’t finished that onion-dipper thing.
Layla and Peter are already in line when we walk in. This place is known for their coffee, their desserts, and their fireplace. People are at almost every table, reading books, clicking around on laptops, or chatting with friends.
“What are you going to get?” Layla asks me.
“I don’t know. I’m stuffed.”
“Me too. I just didn’t want the evening to end, and the waitress at the steak house was giving us the evil eye.”
I end up getting a cup of decaf, because if I’m already getting wrinkles beside my eyes, I probably shouldn’t be drinking caffeine past nine. Isn’t that a rule somewhere? I feel about ninety-seven years old, though, as I carry my little cup to the table Layla found.
“How’s this?” She sets her mocha on the table. Peter and Tyler are right behind us with their drinks.
Tyler’s holding a piece of chocolate-mousse pie too.
“I thought you said you were completely stuffed,” I say to him.
“Yeah, but the pie looked good.”
Maybe all guys are like this, except for my dad. Or maybe they all start like this.
Whatever the case, I bet my parents are very thrilled that they only had to feed two girls.
Whoever says girls cost more to raise didn’t factor in food, I bet.
“So, Paige, how’s it going with Preslee?” Layla asks as we sit.
I sigh. I’d conveniently put tomorrow’s dinner date out of my mind tonight. “Thanks for bringing it up, Layla.”
“No problem.” She grins cheekily.
“I’ve got dinner with them again tomorrow,” I say. “I guess Wes and Preslee found a house they really like in Waco.”
“Waco isn’t too far,” Tyler says.
“No. No it’s not.”
I guess Layla hears the “I’d rather not talk about this” that is behind my words and changes the subject. “How about that job Rick offered you?”
Tyler looks curiously at me and I realize that other than him hearing that I was thinking it over at youth group, I hadn’t mentioned a lot of details to him. “It’s nothing big. Rick just wants me to quit the agency and start working for him with the youth group.”
“Wow,” Tyler says, raising his eyebrows. “That’s definitely big, Paige. What are you thinking about it?”
In all honesty, I was trying not to. I’m not good with change.
A change of jobs is a Big change.
Capital B.
I shrug. “It would be the same amount of money.” Rick e-mailed me a potential salary yesterday. At least I assume it was a potential salary. The subject of the e-mail said For Your Consideration and he just wrote a dollar amount in the message.
No hello, no good-bye, no sincerely or anything.
It’s like I’d be working for a covert op dealing drugs or something. All I need is a second e-mail to appear that just has some guy’s name and address in it.
Really have got to stop watching NCIS.
“Same hours?” Tyler asks.
Tyler was pretty instrumental in helping me clear up my schedule. I’m sure he’s not asking just out of curiosity.
“So Rick says,” I tell him.
“See, I think you need to really decide if you want to work for Rick,” Layla says, sipping her mocha. “Have you heard his knock-knock jokes? They are not good at all.”
“Hey, Layla. Knock knock,” Tyler says.
“Go away.”
“Anyway,” I say loudly. “I’m still deciding. I feel like I would be letting the agency down if I quit there, and I feel like I’d actually be able to use my degree if I start working at the church.”
“For Rick,” Layla clarifies.
“Yes. For Rick.”
“All I’m saying is that he’s got to be about the weirdest boss on the planet. And I wouldn’t consider my boss a piece of normal cake,” Layla says.
“Hey, Layla. So these two penguins are sitting in a tub and one says to the other — ”
“Look at that nice table over there!” Layla exclaims, interrupting Tyler. “Tyler, wouldn’t you love to go sit with them?”
Peter grins.
“So you wouldn’t take the job?” I ask Layla.
“I don’t know. I mean, I know you’ve wanted to counsel people since you were in high school. I just don’t want you to end up in a shrink’s office yourself, you know?”
I smirk. “Don’t forget, I do know Rick pretty well. And Natalie has made it this far.”
“That’s because Natalie is a freak of nature.” Layla shrugs. “All I’m saying is think about it. That’s all I’m saying,” she says again.
“Hi, guys.”
We all look up and Rick is standing there with his arm
lazily draped across Natalie’s shoulders. No baby is in sight.
“And speak of the freak of nature.” Layla smiles at them. “No Claire?”
“The perk of working as a youth director, Layla, is I have instant access to literally thousands of kids who would love to babysit,” Rick says.
“Thousands, huh?” I say.
“Yep. Sadly, only three of them are qualified to watch my daughter.”
I laugh.
Natalie looks at Layla. “Out of curiosity, is Rick the freak or am I?”
“You are.”
“Huh.” She shrugs. “I’ve been called worse.”
“Do you guys want to join us?” I ask them. “We can pull up more chairs.”
Rick shakes his head. “Paige, you’ll understand this someday. And I hope you don’t take offense to it right now. But if I have three uninterrupted hours with my sexy wife, I’m not going to spend them with other people there too.”
I hold up my hands. “No more information needed.”
“Please,” Tyler tacks on.
Natalie smiles warmly at Rick.
“But. We did want to come say hi before we left,” Rick says.
“Hi,” Layla says.
“Hi,” I say.
“Hello.” Rick waves one hand in a big arc across his body. “Well. Let’s go, Nat. Peace out, homies.” They walk for the exit.
Tyler watches them go, takes a bite of his chocolate-mousse pie, and then looks over at me. “Sorry, Paige. I’m going to have to side with Layla on this one.”
I just laugh.
I pull my Bible onto my lap later, shivering under the covers. Somehow my thermostat got bumped and it is now fifty-three degrees in my apartment. I cranked it up as soon as I got home, but I still feel like someone is going to come to my door in the morning and find me all Han Soloesque — frozen in some desperate position, hands up.
I am not looking forward to this month’s power bill. I have the weirdest thermostat. It took me two months and a three hundred dollar bill to figure out how to use it when I first moved in here.
I hate being an adult sometimes.
I also dislike having to decipher what the apostle Paul is trying to say when I am cold and tired. Paul should have hired an English major.
Maybe this is blaspheming the Word of God.
I murmur a quick apology to God and ask Him to pass it on to Paul. Then I flip to Galatians and try my best to pay attention.
“Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.”
Tonight’s isn’t so difficult. I can follow that logic, even with my brain cells quivering from the arctic frontier that is now my bedroom.
An heir. Through God.
As cool as my room is, that is even cooler.
Chapter
14
Sunday, I’m once again standing beside my car in the church parking lot, debating about “accidentally” driving my keys into my tire and having to skip out on family dinner because of the flat.
A very long time ago when I first moved to Dallas for school, Dad took me out to the driveway one day and tried to teach me how to change a flat tire. All I remember is something about hex nuts.
Or was it hex bolts?
Regardless, if I ever have a flat, my line of action is probably going to include sitting on the side of the road helpless for a while.
Hopefully this will never happen in the rain.
My mother always tells me that she got married purely to have someone take care of problems like that. “And to keep my grass looking nice,” she always adds on.
I clear my throat, rubbing my fingers along my lymph nodes, gauging for scratchiness or swollenness. Because nothing can spoil a family dinner faster than someone there with some awful flu or meningitis or cholera.
Sadly, I appear to be in excellent physical condition.
And I’m not sure I even know what the warning symptoms of cholera are. As far as I can remember from high school history, it included being on a boat.
I will never go on a cruise.
“What are you doing?” Luke suddenly materializes next to my right bumper.
Apparently God thinks I need a good dose of Luke whenever I’m about to see my sister. It’s like the double whammy right from heaven.
I never used to see God as the type to deal out double whammies.
“I’m thinking about cruises,” I tell him, hoping the icicles forming off the words as I say them will convince Luke to be friendly somewhere else. I’m remembering what I read last night in my Bible, and I’m trying to silently remind God of it as well. Remember, Lord? You said I was now an heir. Remember? Like a son? You don’t give snakes to sons. You give muffins. Or something like that. Remember?
I thought a lot about Luke since he brought the doughnuts over. It was hard not to since I had a doughnut for breakfast every day this week.
My pants are getting tight.
I thought about the past. I thought about the word then that Luke tacked on to his last sentence. I thought about how it was a lot to think about before I really woke up in the mornings.
Luke is smiling at me, his eyes shaded behind some very nice sunglasses. He’s wearing straight-cut dark jeans, some fancy leather shoes, and a plaid button-down shirt over a T-shirt. All I can read on the T-shirt behind the button down is SMO BEA.
Unless it’s a shirt that says something like I WANT S’MO’ BEACH, I’m going to assume he bought it at Pismo Beach.
I should not do this much thinking right before a two-hour drive.
“Cruises, huh?” Luke says, his smile flirtatious. “Who are you going to go with?”
“No one. I don’t like boats.”
“It’s not really a boat, kid. It’s more like a ship.”
There’s his old nickname for me coming out again, if you can call “kid” a nickname. Either way, it makes something very old and familiar curl around my heart and squeeze.
Cholera. It’s starting.
“Boat, ship, whatever. I don’t go on boats. People die on boats.”
“It’s a cruise ship, Paige. People sail on them all the time.”
“They probably said the same about the Titanic. I’m very happy on the ground.” I look under my feet. “Or the asphalt. Or whatever this stuff is.”
He squints at the ground as well. “Looks like concrete to me.”
“Sure.”
He looks up and pulls his sunglasses off his face, flashing another sparkling smile my way. Luke always has had the whitest teeth. It used to make me crazy in high school because he would drink coffee like his arms would fall off if he stopped, and his teeth never showed any signs of it.
It’s so annoying.
“You look beautiful, Paige.”
I am wearing jeans and a purple drapey shirt thing. I skipped the whole hair-washing routine this morning because I was running late and I decided that I’ve already met Wes and seen Preslee again, so I don’t have the same desire to showcase how well I’m doing without her.
So my hair is falling around in haphazard waves and I’m about three seconds away from just putting it up in a bun.
I do not look beautiful.
“Luke,” I say, ready to tell him that the tree has been chopped down and he can go find some other tree to bark up.
“Well. I’m late for service. See you later, Paige. I’m still holding you to that coffee date.”
I watch the back of his head as he heads into the building and roll my eyes. What coffee date?
I am glad to see he’s going to the third — and last — service. I usually go to the second one.
Maybe we can be some of those people who go to the same church and never interact.
I slide into the driver’s seat, abandoning hope of a flat tire or a sudden case of smallpox. After backing out, I leave our church’s parking lot and head for the interstate.
Again.
I flip the radio to country and start making a mental list of top
ics I can talk about with Preslee and Wes.
First up, the weather. I squint out the windshield, and while it is fairly sunny right now, there are some big clouds building up in the north. I will likely be driving home in the rain.
Hurray.
Maybe that will be my excuse to leave as soon as dinner is over.
Mom called me this morning and told me that Wes’s favorite food to eat is barbecue, so we’re going to be eating at a little local barbecue place right outside of the campus.
“I figure we should probably get there early,” she told me. “Those restaurants around campus always fill up quick.”
“How often do you eat in Waco?”
“Remember when we helped you move to Dallas? We tried to stop at Long John Silver’s on the way back and it was just packed.”
That was a good five years ago.
I reach for my can of nuts in the passenger seat.
Preslee is getting married.
The thought stopped me a few times this week. Getting married. My younger sister is getting married.
I feel both old and young at the same time, but way too young to be the older sister of the bride. I remember when Preslee and I were tiny and we’d pretend to be the brides or have our dolls be the brides marrying emaciated-looking Ken dolls.
Ken never said much.
It just makes me wonder …
I pull out my phone when I start getting close to Waco. Mom gave me the address and I put it in the maps app on my phone instead of trying to write it down. I don’t do well with the whole watch-for-street-names thing. It’s better if I can just hear some woman’s voice telling me when to turn right or left.
I really wanted a British man’s voice telling me directions, but I didn’t want it enough to pay for it.
Layla likes to remind me that I’m cheap on all the things that count.
I get off the freeway inside the city limits for Waco but before the real city part starts. The bodiless woman leads me through an old neighborhood, past a park filled with huge and likely rotting trees, and under a bridge covered in graffiti.
Seems like a classy area.
Finally I’m told that my destination is on my left. I pull over and park at the curb across the street from an old red brick house with peeling white eaves. There’s a knobby old tree in the front, crumbling cement steps leading up to a porch, and a faded yellow wooden door.