Faking Faith

by Josie Bloss

  Abigail, who had been quiet the whole way, gave me an incredulous look. “Really?”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “Are you excited to share some stories with your family and friends back home?” she asked, in a slightly pointed tone.

  “Maybe,” I said. “They’ll be interested in hearing about … some of the things. Some of it I’d just like to keep to myself, I guess.”

  I hoped she understood my meaning—that I didn’t intend to go back home and talk about Abigail and her secrets like she’d been an animal in a zoo. That I was going to try and be respectful.

  “That’s an interesting idea,” Abigail said.

  Mrs. Dean laughed. “You girlies sound like you’re talking in code! Heavens, won’t you miss each other so much?”

  “Yes,” I said honestly. “I hope that Abigail can come visit me sometime.”

  “Oh, how nice!” Mrs. Dean said.

  “Well, of course, I have a busy season ahead of me,” Abigail said, picking at her skirt. “With, you know, the courting and all. There won’t be much of a chance to get away.”

  “I know,” I said. “But I still hope.”

  She met my eye for a moment, and then looked out the front window.

  We were driving through town now, nearing the intersection where the bus stopped. Mrs. Dean pulled over to the curb and turned to give me a short hug across Abigail’s lap.

  “Be good, Faith dear. We’ll pray for your safe travels.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. Dean,” I said. “You’ve been very nice to me.”

  Abigail and I got out of the car and she stood there, her arms crossed tightly against her chest. She gave me an anxious look, seeming almost near tears. Her face was splotchy. It was so different from the first time I’d seen her, bouncing and happy, that I felt like my presence might have ruined everything.

  “I guess this is it,” I said, setting my bag down on the ground.

  “I guess so,” she said, and then furrowed her eyebrows. “I can’t figure out why it is that I think I’m going to miss you.”

  “My winning personality and charming sense of humor, obviously,” I said, grinning.

  “It’s true. I guess you can be pretty funny.” She gave me a small answering smile. “Are you going to keep blogging?”

  I thought about it for a moment. “I don’t think so. I don’t know. Honestly, I’m kind of confused about the whole thing.”

  Abigail nodded, biting her lip. “It was kind of devious for you to lie on your site and make all that up,” she said. “But … you do have a knack with words, I’ll give you that. I mean, I totally believed you.”

  I found this compliment to be far more thrilling than was really appropriate for the moment.

  “Thanks,” I said. “For what it’s worth, I really am sorry I lied to you.”

  “You are?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “Then please shut your site down,” she said. “It’s just … not a good thing to do. You know that.”

  I took a deep breath, panicking for a moment about giving up Faith. But then a feeling of certainty overtook me and I knew she was correct. “You’re so right, Abigail. It’s wrong. I promise I’ll shut it down.” I paused, then smiled. “You might think I’m awful for saying this, but I don’t actually regret making it.”

  “Oh?” she asked. “Even after all this?”

  “No. Because I got to meet you. And Asher.”

  “I have to say, you didn’t exactly improve our lives much,” she said with a laugh. “You basically just came in and shook everything up like a snow globe. I’m not even sure how it’ll all settle down again.”

  Maybe that’s not a bad thing, I wanted to say. But I didn’t. Abigail already knew I thought that.

  I stepped forward and put my arms around her. She allowed me to hug her, but kept her arms crossed between us and didn’t reciprocate. When I pulled away I could see that her eyes were damp. Then she reached into her skirt pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper.

  “He left this for you,” she said, handing it over. And she turned away to go to the car door.

  I looked at the piece of paper, confused. “Oh …

  thanks.”

  Abigail turned back toward me once more and smiled dimly. “I’ll pray for you, Dylan. I’ll hope that you find your way.”

  “Bye, Abigail,” I said. “I hope the same. For both of us.”

  As their car drove away, I opened the paper with trembling fingers.

  It was a short message, written in pencil, obviously dashed off in a hurry.

  Dylan,

  As soon as I deserve you, I will come and find you.

  Love, Asher

  TWENTY-SIX

  I spent the first hour of the bus ride home in a sort of daze, my eyes closed, trying to transition my brain back into being Dylan again.

  Then I took out Asher’s note, and it hit me and rolled over me like a tidal wave, all of the things that had happened in the past ten days. And the fact that it was over.

  There had been such amazing highs. Finally feeling like I had a friend again, in Abigail—someone who judged me for who I was in the present, not for what I’d done in my previous life. And finally meeting a boy who didn’t scare me and make me clam up like a fool, who held me in just the right way and who I felt like I could trust.

  And then there were the awful lows, the things that kept replaying in my brain like an inescapable horror movie. Being called out as a liar by Abigail and having to explain myself had been horrible and embarrassing, but nothing matched the squirmy wretchedness I felt watching her bind herself to Beau.

  Or how horrifying it was to see Asher get hit by his dad. Because of me.

  Or the way all of those kids were trapped in that house, thinking they had no other options. That they were making their God happy by living apart and being ignorant of the rest of the world.

  I turned Asher’s folded note around and around in my hand, even put it up to my lips for a moment, willing myself not to cry. I didn’t know where to go from here.

  . . .

  The bus stop was in the middle of downtown Chicago, in a dense corporate area of towering buildings. I stepped off just as rush hour was beginning. Thousands of people in dark business clothes were crowding the sidewalks and rushing to catch trains back to their homes in the suburbs. I felt like a strange exclamation point walking among them in my long denim skirt and unstylish pink blouse. I caught people giving me sideways glances, as if trying to figure out my place in this bustling city.

  After ten days on a relatively quiet farm, the noise and crush was almost overwhelming.

  But eventually I got to the Metra train that would take me home. I sat next to a kind-faced woman in a red suit and bright white commuter tennis shoes. She talked quietly on her cell phone, asking the person on the other end what they were fixing for dinner.

  I couldn’t help but smile. It felt like my perspective shifted. Here was normal.

  As I walked the long mile from the train station to my house, I considered explanations for why I was home a few days earlier than expected. I predicted that my parents would freak out and think that I’d been thrown out of camp for bad behavior or something. But I knew that nothing worked better or more efficiently than telling the actual truth.

  And I was tired of hiding and lying.

  All my confidence flooded out of me, though, when I saw my mom’s car in the driveway. She shouldn’t have been home at that hour—it was way too early. I’d expected to have more time than this to prepare, or at least time to change clothes, but apparently I would have to face the situation immediately.

  I let myself in and stood in the entryway. From somewhere upstairs, there was rock music playing. Weird.

  I took a deep breath.

  “Mom?” I called.

  After a second, the music switched off. “Who’s there?” my mom’s voice called back.

  “Mom, it’s me,” I said, putting down my bag and wal
king up the stairs.

  She emerged from the upstairs hallway, dressed in ratty jeans and an old button-down shirt of my dad’s. Her hair was pulled back in a messy half ponytail and there were smudges of lavender paint on her hands and her face.

  “Dylan! What are you doing back? I called you the other day and you never called back!” she said as I climbed the stairs to reach her. “And … and what the hell are you wearing?”

  She grabbed me by the shoulders and gave my outfit an incredulous once-over. “Is this the style these days? God, I’m so out of it.”

  There was something so strangely bright about her. So free and gleeful. And I was overcome with missing her, even though she was right there in front of me.

  I threw my arms around her shoulders. “I missed you, Mom.”

  She hugged me back, seeming surprised. “I missed you too, Pickle! How was it? Did you learn a lot?”

  “Yes,” I said, still clinging to her, feeling tearful again.

  She drew back and looked into my face. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded, pressing my palms to the corners of my eyes. “Just kind of emotional right now, I guess. You know.”

  “Well, maybe this will make you feel better,” she said, walking off down the hallway. “I thought I had a few more days to get it done, but now you can help me finish up.”

  I followed her down the hall to my room, where all of my furniture was pushed into the middle of the floor and covered with plastic. On my dresser were a CD player and a glass of white wine.

  The dark blue walls of my bedroom, the ones I’d painted myself when I was fourteen, were in the process of becoming a light, cheerful purple.

  Mom was searching my face.

  “I’m sorry, I know I should have asked you first,” she said. “But I came up here the other day, just to look in, and I couldn’t believe how dark and claustrophobic this room was. It felt like being in a cave or drowning underwater. So I thought I’d surprise you. Do you like the color? If not, we can paint it something else, but I just thought this was so pretty.”

  It felt like a whole new happy planet in there. I looked at her and slowly nodded.

  She put her arm over my shoulders. “Good! Well, that’s a relief.”

  “But … how do you have time to do this?” I asked. “And why are you even home?”

  “Oh, I didn’t tell you yet!” she said. “I took myself off the arbitration.”

  “You … what?” I said, confused.

  “Took myself off,” she repeated. “I gave it to some of the younger associates. The client was being ridiculous and it’s been three damn years and I’d been doing a lot of thinking the past few months about how I want to live and what I should prioritize. And it just slowly became clear—slaving away on that case was not it.”

  “You … wait, you gave it away?”

  “Yeah! I figured, I’m a partner, I worked my ass off to get there, and why shouldn’t I take advantage of my seniority a bit? It seems like all the boys get to take time off for their little midlife crises, and what do I ever get? So I decided I’d take a nice long summer break, and here I am. Drinking wine and painting my daughter’s room. It feels fantastic. And now you’re back! God, Dylan, we’ll have a blast!”

  “A … break?” I said. I couldn’t process what I was hearing. Mom had been obsessed with that case since I’d started high school. I could barely remember a time when it wasn’t a part of all our lives.

  “Sure!” she said, and then her face turned solemn. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how I haven’t been here for you as much as you needed me to be, especially this past year with everything that happened. I know I let that damn case take over my life. Even as it was happening, I knew I was allowing it to get out of control. And here you are, only a year away from going off to college, and Scottie is in high school, too, and soon you’ll both be grown up and gone forever, and what will I have spent my time on?”

  She sighed, and then looked at me and smiled. “I hope I can make it up to you both this summer, at least a little bit. I’m going to make Dad take some time off, too. Bring some balance back to this family. I was wondering … what do you think about taking a kickboxing class with me?”

  The lump in my throat grew, until I felt like it might be bigger than my head.

  “Does that sound good, Pickle?”

  “Sure, Mom. It sounds really great.”

  I reached over and hugged her again, my badass lawyer mom, so strong and sure of herself. So ready to admit that she’d been wrong and to change and tackle life.

  “So, do you want to tell me about this camp you went to?” she asked. “Is this a future state legislator that I’m hugging?”

  I laughed. “Maybe!”

  “The girl who answered your phone when I called sounded a little strange,” she said, pulling back and looking at my face. “What were the people like?”

  Instead of answering, I walked over to my dresser and picked up the glass of white wine as if I were going to take a swig.

  “Hey, stop that! You’re not old enough!” said Mom, scandalized.

  Part of me wanted to snort and say Oh, so now you’re all concerned about underage drinking? But instead of sassing off, I walked over and handed the glass to her. “All right, but you might want to finish this off,” I said.

  Her eyes went wide. “Uh oh. Why?”

  In response, I sat down on the plastic tarp on the floor, motioning her to do the same.

  “Because I have a lot to tell you.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Mom tried to feign being very displeased and disappointed that I had lied to the Dean family.

  “I insist that you write the whole family an apology,” she said sternly. “That wasn’t very nice of you to do to them. In fact, it was fraud. You took advantage of their trust, Dylan!”

  I nodded. “I know.”

  She scowled at me for a moment, but then softened.

  “But … they … they really have courtships?” she said, a fascinated gleam in her eye. “And girls never get to leave home until they’re married? No college at all, ever? What do they think this is—the Dark Ages?”

  Mom wanted to know all the gory details—all the things that had also captivated me at the beginning. I began to feel a little guilty relaying them, like I was betraying some confidence to Abigail. So I omitted certain things that felt too private … Abigail’s secret about Beau and Mr. Dean hitting Asher among them.

  “Wow, Dylan, that’s crazy,” Mom said, shaking her head and taking a sip of her drink. She’d gone downstairs and gotten us Diet Cokes.

  “It’s … something,” I said, weirdly unwilling to call them crazy now that I’d seen they were real people with feelings and problems and faults. “I mean, in a way, it definitely makes sense. It’s safer, I guess.”

  “The way living in a prison cell is safe?” Mom asked. “Or a sensory deprivation tank?”

  I shrugged. “Sort of. But there was just something so … peaceful. I mean, about how they felt like they knew everything. Exactly what God wanted them to do at all times. The exact definition of good. There was nothing to figure out. No reason to be scared about anything. Just read the Bible and it will tell you what to do. Sort of. Though … I guess mostly it was Mr. Dean telling them what to do.”

  Mom nodded. “I suppose there can be something bizarrely appealing about giving your autonomy over to someone else. It’s easier.”

  I looked at her. It sounded like she got it.

  “The world is big and scary, and we’re just small people trying to make our way,” Mom said. “But, honey, does that really sound like a full life to you? Letting someone else make all the decisions? Letting someone else tell you that you’re weak and flawed and need to be taken care of? Letting someone take advantage of you?”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “You never get to grow up, that way,” she said. “You never get to fight it out on your own and figure out who you are. And what you wa
nt. And what you can do.”

  She took a sip of her drink. “Have I ever told you about my favorite time in my whole life? I mean, besides having you and your brother, of course.” She patted my leg and winked.

  I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

  “It was the two years between undergrad and law school, when I was living in the city in this gross little studio apartment up in Lakeview.”

  “That sounds cool,” I said.

  “Cool? I was scared shitless!” Mom replied with a laugh. “It certainly didn’t feel cool. My parents were no help at all … they’d already set off for Florida, telling me I’d be fine. But I had no idea who I was, what I wanted. Oh God, I did some of the stupidest things … ”

  She shook her head, looking off into the distance.

  “Like?” I prodded.

  “Oh, you know,” she said, with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Slept with a few of the wrong kind of guys, got a little too drunk too often. I even almost got arrested once, but that’s a story for another time.”

  “Mom!”

  She smiled. “I was terrified and uncertain and inexperienced. And it was only then that I figured out who I really was, and what I really wanted.”

  I squinted at her.

  “To … be a lawyer?” I asked, raising my eyebrow.

  “Well, yes, I realized how much I wanted that … professional success. But I also realized that I wanted to be a mom,” she said. “And I hoped to someday have a daughter so I could help her fight through that stage of life as well, and convince her that it truly does get better. Because you fight it out, and stumble, and write bad poetry, and pick yourself up again, and at the end, hopefully, someday you’re sitting with your kid on her bedroom floor, talking about how you screwed everything up too. Because we all screw up. The test is what we do afterwards.”

  I smiled at her. She smiled back, reaching over and cupping my cheek.

  “And you know, I recently realized how much I was screwing up and not sticking to what I wanted and what I’d planned for myself,” she said. “Because I didn’t want to be spending my entire life in some skyscraper with a bunch of grumpy clients. I also needed to be with my beautiful, fascinating, brilliant, brave daughter before she grew up and left. And now … how lucky am I? I get to do just that.”