Bound South

by Susan Rebecca White

  That’s a big one, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I don’t have the money for my own room. And Lord knows nothing’s going to happen between Charles and me.

  Even if I wanted it to.

  ALL DURING THE trip Charles points out—and laughs at—the billboards with godly messages written on them. There are lots of them in South Carolina, and we’ve passed a couple in North Carolina too. My favorites are the ones with the black background with a quote—in white letters—smack in the middle. In every one the speaker of the quote is God. One of them says, “Why don’t you stop by my house on Sunday before the game?”

  Charles thinks the God quotes are “hilarious.” I think that they are funny too, but in a different way from him. Charles wants me to write them all down in a little black-and-white-speckled notebook he pulled out of his glove compartment. I’m torn. A part of me wants to write them down, mainly because I think Pastor Finch might like to copy one of them for his sign in front of our church.

  Right now his sign says, “Sign up for a Free Trip to Heaven. Details Inside.”

  But Charles doesn’t want me to write down the signs for any righteous reasons. He’s just making fun of them, like he does with everything.

  And all of a sudden, I start to feel tired. Tired of him. Tired of that way of his, always teasing, always saying little things that don’t make any sense to anyone but him, always putting on different voices and accents.

  All of a sudden, the thought of being with Charles straight through the weekend is wearing me out.

  Or maybe I’m just tired from thinking about seeing my daddy. Wondering what he will do when he sees me in my white dress, the one I packed in Mrs. Parker’s old Neiman Marcus bag, the one I wore two years ago on that Easter Sunday when I recommitted my life to Christ. I kept thinking, all during that Easter service, that maybe Daddy would slip in the back so that he could witness me, down at the front of the church, making all those promises to God in front of Pastor Finch and the whole congregation.

  Daddy would have been proud of me standing up there. That’s what Mama told me after the service.

  Mama. I’m trying hard not to, but I can’t stop wondering about her. Wondering what she’s doing right now. Wondering what she’ll think when she calls from work to check on me (I told her I was feeling sick) and I don’t answer the phone. Wondering at what time of the day she’ll actually get home and read my note, which I left for her on the kitchen table.

  Wondering what she’ll do to me if Daddy makes me go back home.

  SOMEWHERE IN NORTH Carolina I must have fallen asleep. I remember us passing the exit for the Billy Graham highway near Charlotte, and I remember Charles putting in another album, this one with a man singing in a real soothing voice, pink, pink, pink, pink, pink, and I remember talking with Charles about food, saying something about how much I love green bean casserole with the potato sticks on top, and then I must have started dreaming because the next thing I knew I was sitting in Mrs. Parker’s living room with that portrait of Jesus on the wall. But then Jesus’s face became Daddy’s and then Daddy was sitting on Mrs. Parker’s sofa with me and he was wearing a giant marshmallow strapped on top of his head like a train conductor’s hat. I asked if he was home for Thanksgiving and he said yes, he came home to see his girl.

  I reached out to give him a hug and for a moment he stood still while I wrapped my arms around his middle and felt his chest against my cheek and breathed in his smell, which was sweet like Aunt Jemima syrup. At that moment, everything was okay. Daddy was home and he still loved me and I still loved him. Then he sort of evaporated into the next room and I went following after him just wanting to grab on to him again. I kept going room to room looking for Daddy but then suddenly I was in the lobby at DeKalb Medical Center where Meemaw was when she died, and I was waiting for the elevator and there was a couple next to me arguing about whether or not they were supposed to go to the third or fourth floor. And then Charles must have started poking me in the shoulder because I feel his finger jabbing into me and I hear him say, “Wake up, Missy. We’re here.”

  When I open my eyes he says, “Welcome to the Church of the Holy Rolling Waterfall of the Graceful Durham Bulls.”

  And we are parked in front of a long, low, windowless building that I guess must be Daddy’s church but that looks more like a giant version of one of those trailers they use at school when they run out of classrooms.

  “WELL, SHALL WE venture inside?”

  “It’s a Friday afternoon,” I say. “There’s not going to be anyone in there.”

  Charles is combing his hands through the front of his hair, making it lie sideways across his forehead. He really ought to cut it. Not shaved like it was earlier this summer, just short and neat. He would look real cute that way.

  “Your dad might be in there,” he says, “writing Sunday’s sermon.”

  I know, I know. That was our plan from the beginning, to first go to Daddy’s church and see if we can find Daddy or anyone else who knows where Daddy might be. But the inside of my mouth tastes like old McDonald’s from when we stopped in Greenville. And that means my breath smells like old hamburger and french fries. I can’t see my daddy after all of these years with nasty breath.

  “Do you have any gum?” I ask.

  Charles reaches into the side pocket of his car and pulls out a pack of Extra.

  “Here you go,” he says, tossing the pack onto my lap. “There’s a mirror in the visor if you want to freshen up before we go in. Or we could see if there’s a bathroom in the church.”

  “Freshen up” is something Mrs. Parker says. Every time Mama and me have stayed late at Mrs. Parker’s house, usually when Mrs. Parker wants Mama to do a deep clean, Mrs. Parker always goes upstairs at 5 p.m. to “freshen up” for when her husband comes home.

  I pull down the passenger side visor and look at myself in the mirror. My curls are frizzed at the ends, so I comb them back into a ponytail and secure it with the rubber band I keep around my wrist to pop any time I talk back to Mama.

  (See, I am working on following the Ten Commandments more faithfully—including the one about respecting your mother and father. All of us in Young Warriors are doing it. We are supposed to pick a commandment that we often break and then pop the band any time we start to do so. Since I’m away from home and obviously can’t sass Mama, maybe I should pop it every time I get aggravated with Charles. Then again, if I did that, I’d be popping that thing all the time and my wrist would get all red and swollen like Darren’s, who is trying to stop thinking impure thoughts. Plus, it’s not breaking any commandment to get aggravated at Charles.)

  I’m wearing my favorite T-shirt, one from Old Navy with a little American flag on its front, on top of a pair of jean shorts, which are actually an old pair of Caroline Parker’s that Mrs. Parker gave to me. Mrs. Parker says that she was saving Caroline’s clothes in case Caroline wanted to wear any of them when she came home to visit, but she hardly ever comes home. The shorts are real cute. Still, they are pretty short, and I worry I don’t look dressy enough for church even though it is Friday and there’s no service happening or anything like that.

  I give myself one more look in the visor mirror. Before Charles came this morning I put on a little blush and some lipstick, but it looks like all my makeup wore off during the drive. I pinch my cheeks just to give them more color, swallow my piece of gum, and tell Charles I’m ready.

  ONCE INSIDE I am immediately hit by that new house smell—like the smell of Mrs. Black’s house in Dunwoody. We are standing in the lobby. The floors are covered in gray carpet and there are bulletin boards on all of the walls advertising the special programs run by the church. There’s a whole board dedicated to Salt of the Earth. Someone did a nice write-up about it, saying it stars “Holy Faith’s favorite youth pastor, Lucas Meadows.” Beside the write-up is a photo of the entire cast of the show, Daddy standing in the middle with his arms around his “children,” Matthew and Dawn. Looking at this picture
of Daddy, inside his church, in Durham, North Carolina, is almost too much. I feel a little dizzy. I feel like I might need to sit down.

  In the photo Daddy’s eyes are piercing but kind. I imagine Jesus’s eyes will look the same.

  “Missy, come here,” Charles calls from the other end of the lobby. It seems wrong for him to be saying my name out loud in here. What if Daddy is nearby and overhears? Don’t get me wrong: I want to see Daddy. Eventually. Once I have time to take everything in. But I want to be the one who decides when that moment happens. Not Charles.

  “Come here!” he says, motioning me with his hand.

  “Okay, okay,” I whisper, walking toward him.

  He is standing by a pair of double doors that say “Worship Room” on a small sign to their right.

  “Behold the chapel,” says Charles. “I’m sorry. I mean, the Worship Room.”

  I push in one of the doors and peek inside.

  I can’t help but be disappointed by what I see.

  Somehow I was thinking the chapel would look like the chapel in Granddaddy’s church, which was also Daddy’s church before he left. Now, Granddaddy’s church wasn’t a fancy place; it wasn’t like one of those Catholic sanctuaries where they worship statues and graven images and burn incense until no one can breathe. We had a slide show about those churches during Sunday school and our teacher lit some of the incense just so we could smell it and everyone agreed it smelled awful.

  No, I wasn’t expecting the church to be fancy. Granddaddy’s was just the opposite, actually. It was simple, a white wood chapel with six rows of pews running on either side of the aisle, dark wood floors, and a big brass cross erected right behind the pulpit where Granddaddy stood.

  Mama once said Granddaddy thought he was the risen Christ standing up there in front of that cross. To be honest, I don’t remember all that much about Granddaddy, I was so young when he died. Mama says she can’t smell the plain kind of Chap Stick without thinking about him. She says he was always applying it to his lips.

  Pastor Finch’s church is much bigger than Granddaddy’s and it isn’t as, well, as pure-looking as Granddaddy’s was, but still, it has pews and stained glass windows and a big baptism tub at the front. When you’re in there, you know you are in church.

  But the inside of Daddy’s new church—well, you could be anywhere. In fact, the place it most resembles is the gym from my high school all set up for a pep rally, just a big, windowless room with a couple of mike stands up front and rows and rows of folding chairs where otherwise the basketball court might be.

  Hung on the walls are handmade posters, which spell out “The Way” and “The Truth” and “The Life” and “Believe.” I hate to say it, but even the posters remind me of a high school gym. I keep expecting one of them to say “Go, Team, Go!”

  “What do you think?” asks Charles.

  I shrug, trying not to show him how disappointed I feel.

  “It’s sure not All Saints Episcopal,” he says. “There’s not a Tiffany window in sight.”

  “I bet the acoustics are real good,” I say, “when the band plays.”

  “Yeah,” says Charles. “I bet you’re right.”

  He looks at me with such tenderness that I almost think he’s going to lean over and kiss my forehead, like a daddy might do.

  CHARLES AND I look for the staff offices, where we figure Daddy might be. My heart is beating so fast as we walk through the building it’s as if I just ran ten miles. I keep thinking I’m going to turn a corner and bump into Daddy. I hope he thinks I look good. I hope he likes the way I’ve grown up.

  I see Charles open a door labeled “Private” and then he’s calling me again, in that loud, aggravating voice he has.

  “Here are the stairs,” he says.

  “Are you sure you want to go down them if they are marked ‘Private’?” I ask.

  “You’re really worried about a little sign after everything you’ve done to get here?”

  “Fine,” I say.

  Downstairs is a hallway just like the one upstairs, only there are no bulletin boards on the walls. From the end of the hall we hear what sounds like typing.

  “Might be Luke working on his sermon,” says Charles.

  We walk toward the typing noise, passing several closed doors along the way. The door is open to the room where the noise is coming from. Looking in, I see a plump woman with curly red hair pinned and piled on top of her head. And Lord help me, she has a bright green parrot sitting on her left shoulder.

  “Hello there,” she says, looking up at us from her computer. Her voice is warm and throaty, her accent thick as Meemaw’s was. “Buster, say hi.”

  That bird looks right at us and squawks, “Hello.”

  “Hey there, Buster,” says Charles, and I just know that he is loving every minute of this.

  “Buster, we were wondering,” says Charles, “is Luke Meadows around today? Pastor Meadows, I mean.”

  My mouth gets dry. What if the bird woman says, “Why yes he is,” and then just pulls Daddy out from some back room?

  “Buster says to tell you that Luke is off shooting that program of his today. Do y’all know about it? It’s called Salt of the Earth and it is as cute as it can be. It’s just like a soap opera only it’s made for Christians. Pastor Meadows writes, directs, and stars in it.”

  “Yes ma’am, we’ve heard of it,” says Charles.

  First time I’ve ever heard him say “ma’am.”

  “Missy and I are just the biggest fans of the show. We even chartered a fan club in Atlanta, where we’re from.”

  “Well dang if Buster and me don’t have a cousin down there in Hotlanta! He’s in Sewanee to be exact, but we always go to Atlanta when we visit. Buster here just loves the World of Coke.”

  RD once took Mama and me there. The tour was kind of boring but at the end you go into this big room where they have every flavor of Coke you can imagine, and you can try as many of them as you want. There are also all kinds of weird Fantas, like Fanta Passionfruit and Fanta Melon. And there’s this one soda that tastes real bitter. It’s from Italy and it is called Beverly. RD said it should be called No Thanks.

  What I want to know is, how in the world did she take a big green parrot into the World of Coca-Cola with her?

  “Buster was allowed in the World of Coke?” Charles asks, as if he can read my mind.

  “Honey, Buster here knows a trick or two about covert operations. For that adventure I just stuffed him into this big ol’ purse I have that has polka dots all over it. Nobody notices I’ve punched out a few of those polka dots to make air holes for Mr. Buster here.”

  “Wow,” says Charles, sounding like he genuinely means it.

  “Ma’am,” I say, “would you mind telling us where Pastor Meadows films his program?”

  I figure if I don’t go ahead and ask, Charles is going to forget all about finding Daddy and just want to stay here all day yakking about that bird.

  “Sorry, darlin’, but that information is top secret. Pastor Meadows will have my hide if I give it out again.”

  “You have the most amazing hair,” says Charles.

  Charles, I think to myself, if you think she is going to fall for such obvious buttering up, then you are a fool.

  Except her face is turning bright as her hair and she’s wearing this little smile like Mama used to get when RD was chasing after her.

  “Aw, now, don’t you go getting too attached to this hair,” she says. “It’s just a piece I clip on and it’s coming out tonight.”

  Charles claps his hands together and screams with laughter. “You are too fun! You and Buster.”

  “My name’s Carol,” she says, running her fingers down the bird’s back while he stays perched on her shoulder. “Born on Christmas Day which is why red is my signature color.”

  “Perfect,” murmurs Charles. “Just perfect.”

  “Where’s the bathroom?” I ask, thinking I cannot stand to watch Charles with her for one
more minute. He’s acting like he really likes her, but the truth is he is just amused by her. Probably he thinks she is “hilarious.” She’s just one more funny thing to entertain him. Just like Daddy’s show. Probably even just like me.

  “Take a left out of my office, then it’s the third door on your right down the hall,” she says.

  Reaching into a Wal-Mart bag beside her desk she pulls out an eight-pack of toilet paper. “Would you mind putting this under the sink while you’re in there?”

  “Sure,” I say, but what I’m thinking is, I lied to Mama and drove all the way to Durham just to be this woman’s janitor?

  CHARLES IS WAITING for me outside the bathroom. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s go to the car.”

  “I thought you’d still be flirting with Buster and that woman.”

  “Shh. Come on. I’ve got some good news, but I need to tell it to you outside.”

  We make our way back outside and into the car. Charles starts up the engine.

  “Guess where we’re going?” he asks.

  “I don’t know, Disney World?” I say, just to be dumb.

  “Noo, we are going to visit the set of your favorite Christian soap opera!”

  “You found out where Daddy is? Charles, I can’t believe she told you!”

  He’s driving now as if he knows where he’s going.

  “She said she really shouldn’t, but you and I were so sweet and such obvious fans that she would break the rules just this once if I promised not to tell Luke she was the one who told us where the show is filmed.”

  He turns right.

  “How do you know your way around so well?” I ask.

  “I’ve been coming up here since I was little. More to Chapel Hill than Durham, but there’s a barbecue place over here my dad always likes to eat at. Plus Carol wrote out the directions. It’s just off Five-oh-one.”

  He picks a piece of paper off his lap and waves it at me. Carol’s directions are written in round, curly script; instead of dots she marks her i’s with stars.