Where Do I Go?

by Neta Jackson

  My confidence wobbled. “Well, good point. Not much. But I’d like to learn. And one thing I do know, Mr. Bentley—everyone, rich or poor, male or female, young or old, needs to feel useful, needs purposeful activities or work to occupy their time.” I chewed on my lip. “Including me.”

  His expression softened. “Good luck then, Mrs. Fairbanks. I’ll be lifting up a prayer for you today. Want me to call you a cab?”

  For some reason, his blessing buoyed my confidence again. “No thanks. I’m taking the El. I did it once, think I can do it again.” I waved and pushed through the revolving door for the three-block walk to the elevated station.

  The Red Line. That’s what Josh Baxter had told me. Take it south to . . . I squinted at the transit map on the platform at the Berwyn El Station, trying to keep my eyes from straying to the street below. Sheridan. That’s it. One . . . two . . . three . . . only four stations. Shouldn’t take long.

  But I was still anxious once I was on the train, counting the stops, craning my neck at each one to be sure we hadn’t passed it yet. The train bent around a big curve just before pulling into the Sheridan station. Okay, that’s my clue, I thought, relieved to get out the door before it slid shut again.

  Once back down on street level, I stood uncertainly, looking both ways. Did I turn right or left? Then I saw Rick’s Café and the Wrigleyville Bar down the street to the right. Aha. Back on course. I glanced at my watch . . . only ten thirty. Good grief, I had a half hour to kill. Was there any place around here to get a cup of coffee?

  I glanced around—and had to laugh. The Emerald City Coffee shop stood right under the El tracks next to the station, so close it could have bit me on the rear. Pushing open the door, I smiled at the decidedly casual décor. On one side, couches and comfy chairs circled around a beat-up coffee table. On the other, small tables were occupied by individuals busy at their laptops. At the counter I ordered a medium-size coffee with cream. The proprietor—a slender older woman with spiffy gray hair—looked at me oddly, as though trying to place me among her clientele as she poured the steaming coffee. “Just made a fresh pot. You want a muffin or anything with that?”

  The lemon poppyseed muffins looked good. I took my coffee and muffin to a comfortable chair near the front window, sank into the cushions, and sipped the hot coffee slowly. Now that I was safely back on the ground, uneasiness niggled at the edge of my excitement. I shouldn’t be doing this without telling Philip. Especially after he’d made his feelings about me just visiting the shelter abundantly clear.

  But, darn it, what else am I supposed to do? He took me away from a job I enjoyed back in Petersburg, left our boys in the academy there, hung me in a penthouse like a pair of panties on a clothesline . . .

  I snickered at my mental image of the penthouse panties and pushed the problem of Philip into the recesses of my mind. I’d deal with that after the fact. No point getting him all stirred up if I didn’t even get the job.

  After enjoying a refill, I paid my bill and walked the few blocks to Manna House. It had started sprinkling, but not enough to need my umbrella. 10:55, I noted smugly, grabbing the handle of the heavy oak door. Early but not too early.

  The door didn’t budge. I tried the other one. Locked too. What in the world? I hunted for a doorbell and found a white but-ton beside the brass plate that said Manna House. I pushed and was rewarded by a shrill ring inside. But no one came to the door.

  I pushed the button again . . . and finally the door cracked opened. “Oh, Mrs. Fairbanks!” Angela peeked around the door, her straight black hair swinging over her face. “Sorry the door was locked. I was on the phone and couldn’t—oh, come on in. Did you want something?” She locked the doors behind me.

  “Well, yes. I have an eleven o’clock appointment with Mabel Turner. Is she here?”

  Angela grimaced. “Actually, no. I mean, she’s not back yet. She had some kind of emergency with her nephew, C.J., at his school. But that was her on the phone. She’s on her way. Do you want to wait in her office?”

  Hiding my annoyance, I agreed to a seat in Mabel’s office. I’d tried so hard to be on time, and Mabel Turner just blew me off. Did she go running to school every time her nephew had a problem? What about his parents? Couldn’t they take care of whatever? Besides, I had a son about C.J.’s age and one even younger, and we didn’t go running to school every time—

  I stopped myself. I didn’t even know if my boys had problems at school. Parents weren’t supposed to call during the day, only in the evenings, before study hall, and weekends. But I no longer saw P.J. and Paul on weekends, either, because we’d moved a thousand miles away. Admit it, Gabby, you’re jealous of Mabel, that she can go to school and check up on her nephew.

  Reaching for a tissue box on Mabel’s desk, I blew my nose, took a deep breath, and tried to think of something else. It wouldn’t do for Mabel to walk in and find her new program director blubbering away.

  Mabel Turner bustled in at eleven thirty. “I’m so glad you waited, Gabby.” She dumped her bag and umbrella on the floor and hung up her trench coat on the back of the door. “I didn’t forget you. Did Angela explain?”

  “Just said it was something about your nephew, C.J.”

  Mabel nodded. “I’m his legal guardian, so when anything comes up at school . . .” She sat down at her desk, moved a few papers out of the way, and leaned forward, hands folded. “Now, tell me about yourself.”

  I blinked. That wasn’t exactly the question I was expecting to start the interview. “You mean, my qualifications and work experience?”

  “No, just tell me about yourself. Let’s get acquainted.”

  Well, this was different. But I kind of liked it. Relaxing, I re­­hearsed the story of our recent move to Chicago from Virginia . . . the new business . . . two sons still in private boarding school back in Virginia until the end of the school year . . . I’d left college to marry my husband, but finished my BA degree and CTRS a few years ago, and had been working as activities director in a senior center in Petersburg . . .

  “Did you always live in Virginia, Gabby? What about your parents?”

  I squirmed a little. “No, actually, I grew up in Minot, North Dakota, a small town of about thirty-five thousand. My father owned a carpet store, but he, um, died a couple of years ago. My mom still lives alone in the home I grew up in.” Alone. Kind of knew how she felt.

  “Siblings?”

  “Two older sisters. Celeste lives in Alaska, her husband works for the Park Service in Denali National Forest, one daughter in college. Honor has two kids, is divorced, and moved to San Diego so she wouldn’t have heating bills.” I skipped over my disastrous two-year marriage to Damien. What was the point? Water under the bridge.

  Mabel put a hand to her mouth in an unsuccessful attempt to hide a smile. “Celeste? Honor? And Gabrielle? Your parents must have been very heavenly minded.” The smile turned into a chuckle.

  I grinned wryly. “It gets worse. My dad’s name was Noble . . . Martha and Noble Shepherd. I think the names were my mom’s idea. The three of us endured a lot of teasing at school and church when we were kids, but”—I shrugged—“we’ve all gone separate ways. It’s mostly Christmas letters and birthday cards now.” Another sore point, but why go into it?

  Mabel studied me. I squirmed. What was she thinking? What did she want from me? What did all this have to do with applying for a job at Manna House?

  The director leaned forward once again. “Gabby, as you’re probably aware, Manna House is a privately funded, faith-based shelter for homeless women—which is a politically correct way of saying we are unabashedly Christian in our outreach and ministry. You say you went to church growing up . . . can you tell me about your own faith journey? Then and now?”

  I stared at her, my hopes crumbling. Sure, I could tell her I grew up in the Minot Evangelical Church, attended Pioneer Girls clubs—a Christian version of Girl Scouts—from third through seventh grades, gave my heart to Jesus at age eight in my
first summer camp, had memorized all the books of the Bible and my weekly Sunday school verse too. But she’d see right through my lame attempt to explain my insipid adult “spirituality” . . . “Well, before we left Virginia, Philip and I were members of the Briarwood Lutheran Church all our married life, and we always took the boys to church on Christmas and Easter . . .”

  I studied my hands in my lap, twisting the tissues I’d been holding into tiny shreds. Finally I looked up. The compassion in Mabel’s face brought tears to my eyes. There was nothing to do but tell her the truth.

  “To be honest, Mabel, I gave up on God after . . .” I told her about Damien, about getting married right out of high school and dumped two years later by my supposedly “Christian” husband. When I’d married Philip, God had taken a backseat. After all, where had that gotten me with Damien? “But . . .” I twisted the tissues some more. “Ever since I walked in here last week, something has been stirring up in me. I . . . I’ve been praying again, though I have to admit I’m pretty rusty. Sitting in on Edesa’s Bible study, and coming to the worship service Sunday night . . . well, I just wanted more. Almost like God tapping me on the shoulder and asking, ‘Hey there, Gabby! Where’ve you been?’”

  Mabel just looked at me, chin resting on her hands, elbows propped on the desk, as if trying to read my heart.

  “I guess that sounds pretty dumb,” I admitted. “Like I’m trying to say the right thing just to get this job.”

  “No. I believe you’re being honest with me.” Mabel sat back in her desk chair. “Now, I’m going to tell you something which may sound just as dumb. From the first time you walked in here, Gabby, I had the sense it was God who sent you. And He kept bringing you back. Maybe you don’t see it this way, moving here because of your husband’s business and all, but I believe God brought you to Chicago because He has a purpose for you”—she tapped the desk firmly with her finger—“right here at Manna House.”

  My lips parted. I blinked. What was she saying?

  “But,” she acknowledged with a small smile, “we do have to get approval by the board, and they are going to want to see this application.” She pushed a couple of pages stapled together across the desk at me. “You fill that out, and I’ll go get us some coffee. We still need to talk about what your job responsibilities would be as program director.”

  chapter 12

  Mabel Turner made it clear that I didn’t officially have the job yet. “But I’m going to bat for you, Gabby,” she’d said, as we left her office and headed downstairs to see if there was anything left from lunch. “If this is God’s doing—and I believe it is—we don’t have to worry about it.”

  I thought about what she’d said all the way home on the El. I mean, I wanted the job, knew I had the right credentials, and was pretty sure I could put together a good program for the residents of Manna House . . . but what did she mean, God brought me to Chicago? And He had a purpose for me at Manna House?

  “Bryn Mawwwr! Next stop is Bryn Mawr!” the loudspeaker squawked.

  Wait a minute. I peered out the window. Was Bryn Mawr one of the stops before Berwyn, or had I gone past it? I stood up on the moving train, holding tight to the nearest pole, and scanned the row of advertisements and No Smoking signs running above the windows, looking for a transit map. Not there . . . not there . . . rats!

  As the train slowed, I turned to the nearest person moving toward the door, a young black teenager with iPod plugs in his ears, nodding his head in time to some music in his head. “Berwyn!” I said loudly, trying to get his attention. “Up ahead?”

  Without skipping a beat, the teenager jerked a thumb over his shoulder, back the way we’d come. The train jerked, stopped, and the doors slid open.

  Oh, brother. I got off with the flow, finally found a map on the platform, and realized I’d only gone one stop too far. I decided to go down to street level and walk back—it only added a few more blocks.

  But not even my stupid mistake could dampen my spirit today. Mr. Bentley peered at me over his reading glasses as I came through the revolving door. “Ah. There she is. Are you now gain-fully employed, Mrs. Fairbanks?”

  I simpered a little. “I’ll find out Monday. But in the meantime, I’m going to work on my business wardrobe—shred a few of my jeans, forget to wash my clothes . . . what?”

  Mr. Bentley’s scowl stopped my spiel. “Homelessness is not a joke, Mrs. Fairbanks. If you don’t know that by now, forget the job. They don’t need do-gooders down at that shelter.”

  My face reddened. What was up with him? Wasn’t he the one who didn’t want me bringing Lucy into the building that first night? “I was just kidding around, Mr. Bentley.” Miffed, I headed for the elevator, which, for some reason, took its own sweet time getting down to the ground floor. But as I waited, my irritation subsided. Next to Lucy and Mabel, Mr. Bentley was one of the few “almost friends” I had here in Chicago. I couldn’t afford to let some minor comment become a wall.

  I walked back to the lobby. Mr. Bentley was talking to another resident in the building who was upset because someone else had dared to park in the parking space he’d been guaranteed. I waited until Mr. Bentley had calmly assured him that he would contact the manager and get it taken care of immediately. The man went off in a huff, muttering about the hassle of having to park on the street.

  I sidled up to the half-moon desk before the doorman could pick up the phone. “Mr. Bentley? You were right. My comment was inappropriate. I apologize.”

  The dark eyes studied me. “That’s big of you, Mrs. Fairbanks. Maybe you’ll do all right in that job after all.” A grin escaped above his short, grizzled beard. “You’ve got guts, gotta say that.”

  Guts. I grinned as the elevator whisked me up to the thirty-second floor. When was the last time anybody had said that to me? Probably the time snotty Marvin Peters dared me to go up to the front door of “the old witch’s house” on the outskirts of town when I was in fifth grade and still wearing my hair in braids. All the kids whispered about the old lady who lived there, saying she kept twenty cats and rode out on her broom at Halloween, and anybody who knocked on her door got a spell cast on them. I’d pooh-poohed the whole thing, marched up to the porch, and knocked on the door. The old lady invited me in, offered me cookies and hot chocolate, and we had a nice chat. Ruby was her name, and she invited me to come back anytime. But when I went out to the cluster of wide-eyed kids, I put my nose in the air and said. “You were wrong. It’s twenty-one cats.”

  Marvin Peters never pulled my braids after that.

  The answering machine light was blinking when I let myself into the apartment. I dumped my bag on a chair and touched the button. “Philip, darling. Call home when you get a chance—oh. I’ll try your cell.” I rolled my eyes. “Call home” indeed. Why couldn’t Philip’s mother get it into her head that he wasn’t her baby any-more? I felt like pushing the Redial button and telling Marlene Fairbanks that Philip’s “home” was with his wife and children now and had been for fifteen years.

  Except—my children were spending their weekends at her house, not ours. A mad that lay dormant most of the time popped out and burned behind my eyes. Well, that was going to stop! P.J. and Paul were not going back to George Washington Prep in the fall. If Chicago was our home now, that meant the kids too.

  I was so busy fuming about the first message, I almost missed the second. “. . . need your next of kin and emergency info. Please call ASAP so I can get copies of your application to the board before we meet on Saturday.”

  Had to be Mabel Turner. I fished in my purse for her card.

  “Manna House.”

  Didn’t sound like Angela. “Mabel? Is that you? This is Gabby returning your call. What are you doing at the reception desk?”

  A laugh echoed in my ear. “Oh, we all cover for each other. Especially the front desk. Thanks for calling back. You forgot to fill in next of kin and that kind of thing. Your husband’s name, I presume . . .”

  I hesitated.
Did I want Manna House to call my husband for some emergency? Of course, you dodo-head, I scolded myself. “Uh, his name is Philip Fairbanks, and you have our home number. But his cell is . . .” I rattled it off.

  Mabel repeated his name and number absently as she filled in the information. “Gabby, what does your husband think of your application for this job?”

  Good grief. The woman was as perceptive as Merlin the Wizard. I hesitated again, then realized there was no way around being straight up with her. I already had the sense that Mabel Turner didn’t stand for any baloney. “He . . . doesn’t know about it yet.” I took a deep breath. “To tell you the truth, Mabel, his nose has been out of joint ever since I brought Lucy home. He’s trying to establish a new business in Chicago and is very sensitive about our, um, ‘connections.’ ”

  “Gabby.” Mabel’s voice was firm. “You need to talk to your husband—now. Do it, girl. But, here, let’s get God on the job.” And Mabel began to pray right in my ear. I was startled. We didn’t pray out loud in the Fairbanks household. In fact, even back in the evangelical church when I was growing up, people might say, “I’ll pray for you,” and they probably did . . . later.

  “—and Lord God, give Gabby the courage to share her heart with her husband. And prepare his heart to receive this direction You are leading her in. I pray for a blessing on both Philip and Gabby. Pour a blessing on Philip’s new business, that it will flourish and prosper. And a special blessing on Gabby, as she seeks out Your purpose in her life. I believe You have sent her here, Lord . . .”

  I barely heard the end of Mabel’s prayer, because I started to cry, silently at first, and then shoulders shaking, my nose running, and tears messing up my makeup.

  “I’m scared, Mabel,” I finally hiccoughed. “Scared Philip will say no way. But if the board will have me, I really want—no, I need—this job.”

  “Girl, didn’t we just give the whole thing to God? Now, you go pull yourself together, call up your husband, and take him out to dinner tonight. Ask him how things are going with his business . . . what did you say it was again?”