“I know,” she answers.
“But you just spent months locked away from any form of media. You have no social accounts left and now you’re saying you’re going to willingly participate in a national reality show.” I know teenagers don’t have fully-formed brains, but this seems borderline psychotic.
“Sometimes God asks us to do things that we wouldn’t do if left up to our own devices,” she says as plainly as she would talk about the weather.
I’m thankful for yet another red light that allows me to slam on my breaks. “God asked you to be on TV?” I ask, admittedly with some skepticism.
“Not like that, weirdo.” She scrunches her forehead as her eyebrows draw inward. She sucks in her lip ring for a split second. As much as I hate lip rings on principle, it suits her. She looks like she’s missing something without it. “He asked me to take a risk for my friends. On my terms. To not just be a reactive spectator anymore. I feel like the more I hide the more they’ll push. I know I said they’d lose interest in me, but that was wishful thinking. I mean, they’ll lose interest eventually, but bringing camera crews to the school does not seem like a step in that particular direction.”
Once again, we’re driving forward and finally winding out of the bounds of New York City, the highway opening up in front of us.
“Do you… hear from God often?” I ask. “How?” I offer an immediate follow-up question.
Kennedy shrugs, plugging her earbuds into her iPhone, giving me a signal that this conversation is rapidly approaching its end. “It’s hard to explain. I guess, like, how some people say they have a sixth sense or intuition? I’ve always assumed whenever I’ve had those sensations that it was God talking to me.”
“Always?” I question. Knowing the theology of the church she grew up in, I wonder what they taught her about hearing from God.
“Well I didn’t always know it was God, but a priest I met once before deciding to come to CU gave me a copy of a book by St. Teresa of Avila. I jived with her. St. Teresa, not the priest, though I jived with her, too. I’m taking a nap now.” Within seconds, Kennedy’s seat is reclined and I can hear the faint thump of music through her neon green earbuds.
So, she hears from God. While I can’t say that I’m surprised, I am surprised she talked to me about it, however briefly.
“She’s got a feisty spirit, son. Guard her,” my dad said just a day after meeting her.
“Nurture her. She’s meant for something big,” my mom said just behind him.
I hadn’t spent enough time with her at that point to know if they were right, or just trying to be encouraging. Even a note from Wendy’s dad, “just checking in” wasn’t enough to persuade me. All children need shepherding, that goes without saying. But there are some that require special handling, if you will. Because Satan can spot the spiritually gifted among us almost faster than we can, and will stop at nothing to take them down. Doubt in Christ as Savior is a favorite tool of his.
The thought sinks my stomach. Is that what’s been happening to Kennedy for the last year? Has she been at the hands of Satan? How could the thought not have occurred to me sooner?
You’re too close to the situation to see things right away. And that’s okay.
Glancing to my right, I watch the peaceful face of my daughter as she lip-sings along to her music with her eyes closed. She wants this. She wants CU, and the reality show, her friends, and me. Maybe her tenacity goes deeper than simply being strong-willed.
“God, you have to help me with her. Please. Help me shepherd her through what will certainly be more trying times than some pictures on the Internet. Show me how to guide her, Lord,” I carefully whisper my prayers, but need to say them out loud. I need to protect her from what she needs protecting from, and let her fight where she needs to fight.
“Huh?” Kennedy props herself on an elbow, pulling out one of her earbuds. “Did you say something?”
I shake my head. “Just singing.”
“It’s off,” she chuckles, eyeing the powered-off stereo system. “But, good for you?” she jokes.
“I know songs,” I tease her.
“You’re weird. Oh!” she says, cutting herself off excitedly. I love when she does that. “What’s the name of the show?”
“What show?”
“Duh. The reality show. Does it have a name yet?”
I grumble. “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”
“Bet I will. Try me.”
I can’t help the ridiculous smile on my face as I say the words. “Jesus Freaks.”
A sharp laugh from Kennedy’s throat pierces through the silence of the car. “Oh,” she sighs. “That’s brilliant.” She shakes her head without another word and puts her earbud back in, this time seeming to fall quickly asleep.
“Yeah,” I mumble. “Just. Brilliant.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Roots and Wings and Scary Things
Wendy, One year and two months ago…
“You know she got in.”
“Yeah,” I snort between sips of wine. “And she’ll go if she got in.”
“Not if,” Dan says with an arched brow. He points to the large Carter University envelope sitting between us at the table. “And stop staring at that thing like it’s a live grenade.”
I take one more long sip of wine. “Isn’t it?”
“You know,” he says to me in the tone he uses when he’s trying to make a point without making my head explode, “most of our friends are worried about if their kids will get in anywhere. And if their drug use will slow down or pick up when they’re at college. Or if they’ll get pregnant. And, you’re worried about Kennedy… what is it you’re worried about?”
I roll my eyes and point to the refrigerator, which holds the acceptance letters to two Ivy-League schools, among a few other private contenders that aren’t too shabby. Purdue. Stanford. Amherst. All of them have accepted Kennedy. Many of them want her. Badly, judging by some of the scholarship offers. And here at the kitchen table is the thing that could ruin all of that.
“She has much more potential than this school can groom out of her and you know that. It’s not even a top-rated school among small private schools.”
Dan sighs. I’m clearly tugging at the threads of his patience. “If Kennedy has all the potential we both know she has, it won’t matter where she goes to school.”
I shoot him a look to match the derisive click of my tongue. “Don’t patronize me. You work for top-tiered colleges and the NHL, for God’s sake, and I’ve been in politics since before I even went to college. Where you go matters more for some jobs than who you are as a person.”
He shrugs, grinning behind his scotch. “And what if she wants to be a pastor, huh? Go into the family business?”
“Politics,” I snap, standing. “Politics is the family business. Roland is only her family because they share some pesky DNA.”
“For now. Until she gets to know him, which she should. Kids should know where they come from. And, really, it won’t be so bad. He’s not the antichrist, you know.”
I open the drawer where we stash the takeout menus and shove the CU envelope inside.
“And that, my love, is exactly why she doesn’t need to know about this.”
“You’ve finally lost it,” Dan says. “What is it you’re really worried about?”
I can’t stop my eyes from stinging with tears of betrayal. “He didn’t raise her,” I squeak out. “He didn’t stick around for the stomach bugs and the broken arm or the boys who broke her heart. Why does he get to have her now that she’s a mature, awesome young woman? Why does he get to hang out with her and have coffee and dinner with her and talk God and politics with her and why do I have to stand by and watch it happen?”
“Oh, Honey,” Dan says, wrapping me in his warm embrace. He kisses the top of my head before holding my face in his hands. “Because you’re her mother. And it’s your job to let her go now. This is part of the parenting deal.”
“You’re right,” I say in a rare moment of clarity since Kennedy first announced she’d be applying to CU. “But I don’t like it.”
“And she won’t like you if you hide this from her.” He eyes the drawer like it’s thumping with a telltale heart.
I move my eyes there, too, and give a heavy sigh. “Fine. I’ll show it to her in a few days.”
“Tomorrow,” he commands, mostly serious, holding my chin between his thumb and forefinger.
I roll my eyes. “Tomorrow,” I concede. “Why couldn’t she have a tiny pill problem like that Tara friend of hers?”
Dan laughs and tickles my side. “Not our lot, Dear. Not our lot.”
I wait two days before finally pulling it out of the drawer and sticking it back in the mailbox, so Kennedy can find it when she comes home from school. I spent the last two days studying her. Wanting to cast a spell to seal her wherever she went. Hermetically, like she has some autoimmune disease or something.
Those people won’t understand her the way I do. They won’t see the heart for God she has that scares the hell out of me. Because it will scare them, too.
And they’ll tear her down.
CHAPTER FIVE
Let her go…
Kennedy
“Jesus Freaks,” I blurt out. “Isn’t that just…”
Asher arches his eyebrow. “Insane? Degrading?”
I shoot him a scowl as I drop my application papers for the summer internship with his prison ministry on his desk at Word. “Degrading? Please. It’s brilliant.”
He tilts his head to the side, completely unamused, it seems. “Kennedy, the word freak is hardly ever a positive thing.”
“You’re looking at this the wrong way. Check out the Facebook and Instagram profiles of any student at CU. Twitter, even. I guarantee you at least seventy-five percent of them call themselves a Jesus Freak. Nearly a hundred percent of them use the hashtag Jesus Freak at one point or another. In fact, I know both Bridgette and Eden do.”
Asher rubs his hand over his face. “It’s different when it’s among your own people. It’s like how women call each other… certain things sometimes when they’re with each other.”
“Like what? What women?” I poke at him.
“I won’t say it because I think it’s unnecessary.”
I huff. “Jesus Freaks is hardly on the same level as the slutty things women call each other in jest sometimes, Asher.” He winces, but I continue. “It’s provocative.”
“No one will watch.” He looks defeated.
“Everyone will watch. Ones who think we’re all freaks, to see if they’re right, and the ones who know we’re not just to see if we’re being portrayed accurately. And who cares, anyway? Jesus himself was a freak, wasn’t he?”
“Yeah,” Asher snickers. “And look where that got him.”
Leaning forward, I put my hands on the edge of his desk. “Absolutely everything. Eternity? Oneness with God? I think you’re looking at this freak thing the wrong way.”
Asher grins standing and leaning in to match my position, his hands on the opposite side of his desk. “Pray you’re right, Sawyer. Pray you’re right. Editing is a magical tool, and I don’t put it past a single secular network executive to edit the freak to their ratings advantage.”
I playfully smack the side of his freshly buzzed head. “When will you get it? People will see what they want to see regardless of what’s in front of them. Look, my mom’s in policy, okay? She’s a lobbyist. The scariest of lawyers according to some people. I know all about how sound bytes can be cut, copied, and pasted together. Everyone watching knows that, too. Sure, it had its heyday of believability a couple of decades ago, but not now. People don’t actually view reality TV as reality anymore.”
“Have you talked to all the people yet? Telling them you’ll be back in the fall and that you’re signing onto the show with a smile on your face?” Asher winks, picks up my yellow papers, and shoves all but one in his top desk drawer.
Ignoring his question I point to his desk. “What was that about? I worked hard on those essay questions!”
Asher’s famous Cheshire-cat-like grin lights up the room. “I know. But you only needed to fill out this one. The rest are for my personal entertainment.”
He laughs at me as my jaw hinges open.
“Jerk!” I shriek. “Those took me half of yesterday!”
“Calm down. Everyone has to fill them out. It helps me figure out where to put each person, though I already know where I’m putting you.”
I cross my arms in front of me. “Where?”
“Not on TV.” He arches an eyebrow.
I shake my head. “You haven’t even asked me what my terms and conditions will be.”
“Enlighten me,” he jokes. There’s a knock on his door, but Asher keeps his gaze on me as he moves to open it.
“First of all, I’m going to—”
Puke.
Asher’s still not looking at the door, even when he pulls it slightly open to let the knocker in.
“Wh—oh…” Asher catches up to my sudden muteness as he assesses his guest.
Matt Wells.
Standing in Asher’s doorway with a familiar looking packet of yellow paper. His eyes take a moment to focus on me, then they widen, which breaks my heart because it’s the first time he’s looked at me in months with anything but disdain. It’s the first time he’s looked at me in months, period.
Asher’s right. Matt does look good. Healthy, clean, strong. As bright and cunning as the first day I spotted him in Word what feels like a lifetime ago. Thick brown hair just short enough to avoid an infraction, a strong jaw, unclenched for the first time in I can’t remember how long, though it’s tightening now. He looks so much like the boy who pleasantly ambushed me at the train station before Thanksgiving break. The one who joked with me, protected me, and led me through the twisting social alleys of Carter University. There’s barely a shadow of the broken kid from inside The Pink Pony left. Not a dark circle to be seen under his eyes so deeply brown they’re almost black. Rich soil, I’ve always thought. He looks so much like my best friend that my chin quivers. I’m not inside the safe walls of the temple anymore—my tears have no business here. Not now. Not yet.
Matt clears his throat and turns his attention to Asher while I look at my feet. “Here’s, uh, here’s the papers you needed.”
“For the prison ministry?” I blurt out, unbelieving that these are the first words I choose to say to him. I shift my gaze to Asher, so we can all pretend I was talking to him. Asher. Not Matt. Asher.
I’ve planned for months what I might say to Matt if he ever gave me a few seconds to say anything to him, and that sentence never came up.
Matt looks a little startled to hear my voice. He swallows hard. “Yeah.” His voice is different. Softer, broken somehow.
Facing Asher, I try to saw him in half with a look of angry betrayal. He knew this whole time that Matt would be volunteering with him. And he asked me to join anyway. He knew this very situation would happen—wanted it to happen. I feel ambushed; Asher knows far more about how I’m feeling about Matt than almost anyone else in my life. And if Matt and I were going to come to any sort of terms with each other, I wanted it to happen organically. I wanted it to happen when each of us were in a place of forgiveness and trust—that he could trust me as a friend. I didn’t want us thrown together by a meddling coffee shop owner.
“Well… I’ll see myself out,” I finally say, calmly, trying to mask my emotions. My sadness and Matt can’t fit in this room together much longer. I’ll cut Matt a break and go for a long walk before I start punching people.
Footsteps follow me toward the back door, but Matt’s voice stops them.
“Let her go.”
***
Let her go…
Fine.
Walking into a coffee shop two blocks away from Word, I’m comforted by the unfamiliarity. I hung out here a few times last semester, and I really lik
e it as a non-work option. I love the atmosphere of Word, but who wants to hang out where they work all the time? Since it’s still summer, the cafe is mostly empty with the exception of the soft glowing apples from the front of the MacBooks of a few grad-student-looking customers scattered throughout the large space. It’s actually a coffee shop and a deli, which is perfect since I’m starving.
It’s an industrial-looking space—polished cement floors, exposed wood and metal beams. A far cry from the cozy feeling of Word, but interesting in its own right.
I order a turkey, avocado, and bacon sandwich. After she takes my order, the girl at the counter stares at me like she knows me. This is an increasingly common occurrence, but I refuse to assume people know who I am, so I just smile awkwardly as she stares.
“You look familiar,” she says, her eyes narrowing slightly. It’s clear she’s not a CU student based on her lack of knowledge of my face, and her “unconventional” hairstyle. It’s shaved up the back and long in the front with a single blue streak. For a minute I think she looks familiar, too, but then I realize she just looks like my friend Tara from home.
I shrug. “I get that a lot. Sometimes people say I look like a young version of that actress… A—”
“You’re Kennedy something-or-other. That pastor’s kid,” she cuts me off with accuracy.
“Yeah. That’s me.” I smile broader than usual because… I don’t know why. I want people to like me? I feel like I’m on parade? Either way it’s annoying, but I do it anyway. She stares a little longer as the guy to her right whips up my sandwich. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
I squint a little, as if that will help, and I try to place her. Clearly my feeling of recognizing her was valid.
She leans forward, hooking her finger toward me to do the same thing. “Planned Parenthood,” she whispers, one of her eyebrows slowly stretching into an enticing arch.
“Oh that’s right!” I try to whisper, but it’s a bit loud. “How are you?” I ask as if we’re old friends. Her hair is slightly different, but she’s most definitely the girl I talked to in front of Planned Parenthood at the end of my first semester. The girl Eden and Bridgette were throwing anti-abortion fliers at. She was with a couple of other girls, I think, but I remember her most.
The Broken Ones (Jesus Freaks #3) Page 4