

### A ROBIN REDBREAST IN A CAGE:

### Review by Mayra Calvani, 2010

This latest literary novel by R.P. Burnham explores the darkness and hypocrisy of fundamentalist religion.

The story begins in Maine, when our young brilliant protagonist, Charlie, is but a girl of thirteen. She lives a turbulent life with her alcoholic mother, who seems to bring a new boyfriend to their rundown apartment every month. Her mother, blinded by alcohol, isn't able to express the love she feels for Charlie. She isn't able to adequately provide for her daughter either. In spite of it all, Charlie would rather stay with her mother than having to live with relatives or worse, foster parents, a real scenario if child services find out what's really going on in their home.

However, the day arrives when both mother and daughter aren't able to hold up appearances anymore. When Charlie is attacked by one of her mother's boyfriends, a neighbor calls the authorities and the girl's life radically changes. She goes to live with her uncle — her mother's brother — to a beautiful house on the other side of town. Her uncle, an egotistical, self-righteous minister, runs his household like a tight ship. He always has the last word; no one is allowed to express their real opinions; for him, women are mere instruments of reproduction and belong in the kitchen. Charlie, a smart girl, adjusts accordingly in order to please her uncle and avoid problems and in doing so becomes an excellent student of the church's teachings. Her uncle soon sees Charlie's potential and uses her as a weapon for his own purposes. If he can get Charlie to intelligently debate the absolute truth of the church, more followers will join his congregation.

Later, in high school, Charlie is faced with prejudice because of her beliefs and those of her uncle. She meets a boy there, Jeremy, who seems to be the only one who understands her. They become friends, but, because of Charlie's uncle, they don't have the opportunity to see each other as normal friends would. A big part of the novel revolves around Jeremy, as some of the chapters are written solely from his perspective. In these chapters, Jeremy discusses religion as well as several political issues, such as the war in Iraq and the extreme views of the conservative party.

Eventually, Charlie goes on to college, where she serendipitously reunites with Jeremy. Around this time, Charlie's mother stops drinking and wants to reach out to her daughter once again. Will Charlie forgive her mother? Will they ever live together again? Most importantly, will she stand up to her uncle and leave his house and the church? Fate often has a way of helping out, and in this case a terrible event is the catalyst Charlie needs to find the courage to be her own person.

As he does with his earlier novels, Burnham takes his time in skillfully creating his characters so that by the end, the readers know them inside out, down to their raw hearts. Some characters suffer a transformation; others don't; but each word and action count and stay true to them, making them distinctive. Most fascinating about this story is the mind-splitting moral debate that goes on inside Charlie's mind at every second as she tries to fight her uncle from totally controlling and brainwashing her like he's already done to his family. Burnham's style is heavy on narration, and he likes to explore concepts and ideas, so, at times, the pace drags a little, even when the ideas are part of the dialogue. Charlie's story, however, pulls the reader in, and this reviewer was anxious to see what was going to happen to her — and whether or not she'd end up having a happy ending like she deserved. Jeremy's character, while also sympathetic, is somehow less interesting than Charlie, who is obviously the star of the show.

The hypocrisy and evil of religion and conservative governments is a recurrent theme in Burnham's novels, such as _On a Darkling Plain_ and _The Many Change and Pass_. Other questions explored in the novel include what it means to be a good Christian and the role of women in Christianity. If you're interested in fiction dealing with social issues, this is an author whose works you'll definitely want to read.

Mayra Calvani, blogcritics.org review, 2010

### A Robin Redbreast in a Cage

by

R.P. Burnham

SMASHWORDS EDITION

******

PUBLISHED BY:

The Wessex Collective on Smashwords

A Robin Redbreast in a Cage

copyright 2009 by R. P. Burnham

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

A Robin Red breast in a Cage

Puts all Heaven in a Rage.

–Blake, _Auguries of Innocence_

##

*****

Table of Contents

PART I: CHARLIE

Her Last Day at Home

She Becomes a Christian

The Buried Life

PART II: JEREMY

Lost and Found

He Goes His Own Way

The Answer to His Question

PART III: CONVERGENCE

The Duty of Christian Women

The Best Christmas Ever

Planting a Seed

Finding Home

The Kitten

The Opened Door

PART IV: FINALE

Love Is Best

a note about the writer

PART I CHARLIE

I went to the Garden of Love,

And saw what I never had seen;

A Chapel was built in the midst,

Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this Chapel were shut,

And "Thou shalt not," writ over the door;

So I turn'd to the Garden of Love

That so many sweet flowers bore.

And I saw it was filled with graves,

And tombstones where flowers should be;

And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,

And binding with briars my joys & desires.

–William Blake

The Garden of Love

Her Last Day at Home

Her last day at home was a hot and humid Saturday afternoon in August. The birds were quiet and nothing moved. Heat waves shimmered. Skin felt like something fresh from the oven. Charlie Harris, with her friends Jan Parker and Caroline LaRocque, was sitting in the shade on the front steps of Jan's building, which was not much different from the one Charlie lived in down the street or the one Caroline lived in across the street: three stories with a worn front porch, old asbestos shingles from the sixties, pale green above on the third story, gray below, six mailboxes for the six families, two to a floor, all of them working class and tottering on the edge of poverty. The peeling and worn paint on the deck, trim and railings previewed the shabbiness of the apartments within. Even the single-family homes interspersed among the tenement buildings like flowers in a weed patch were shabby and run down. Landlord or owner, all did the minimum amount of maintenance and spent what money was available for things a lot more fun than a new faucet or repaired ceiling. In Charlie's apartment it was a running toilet and old windows that either didn't open or had to be held up with a piece of wood. Caroline's apartment had worn and chipped woodwork from where furniture being moved had damaged it and peeling calcimine in the kitchen after her father had actually tried to improve the place by painting the ceiling, and now the gunk kept falling all the time. Jan's apartment, where they hung out much of the time they were inside, was nicest of the three, but it had a very worn linoleum on the floor and a sagging living room ceiling that could come crashing down the minute someone sneezed too hard.

Charlie didn't used to notice such things, taking them when younger as a natural part of her world in the same way a groundhog would regard a rock or a bramble patch. But the three girls were older now. They were all fourteen and about to enter Courtney Academy as freshmen in two weeks. They were awakening to a new world. For Charlie, becoming aware of the dinginess and despair of her neighborhood was only part of it; what went on inside where she talked to herself and gathered strength to face the world was beginning to reflect that dinginess. She was vaguely aware of this new development and confused. She was beginning to see more clearly a feeling that had been growing for the past few years that she was different, something she had always known to a certain extent because she was the daughter of a single woman and without a father. Today had been another lesson.

They had spent the day doing girlie things. They went to the drugstore where Jan shoplifted some lipstick. They played video games. They hung around and talked. This was the time all the kids were getting new clothes for school, and at one point Jan suggested they get their clothes and try them on for each other. Caroline's mother had bought her two new outfits consisting of a skirt and matching yellow blouse and a pair of fake designer jeans with two v-necked sweaters as well as a new pair of shoes. Jan's mother had sacrificed from the household budget for months in order to buy her several new sweaters, tank tops in red, blue and lavender, short skirts in tan and black, slacks and real designer jeans. But Charlie's mother spent all her extra money on booze and had bought her no new clothes. Not only did she feel left out; she got the distinct impression while the other two were excitedly modeling their clothes that instead of feeling bad for her they felt superior.

Especially Jan. She was so beautiful her mother had entered her in a beauty contest for junior misses last winter where she had been the runner-up. That was the event that spoiled her. Ever since then she had been putting on airs. She had dark eyes and shiny black hair, milky white skin without any blemishes, a perfect nose and full lips that Charlie heard her mother call sexy. She was also fully developed already. When she was trying on her clothes and in her underwear, it was obvious she was very proud of her big breasts and drew attention to them every chance she could. When Caroline was modeling she would stay in bra and panties and even adjust the bra a few times to further draw attention to its contents. Of course there was much squealing with delight and excited giggling between the two, and instead of expressing sympathy for Charlie, they treated her like a servant. "Charlie, hand me the black skirt, would you." "Charlie, draw the shade. I want to see how this lavender tank top looks in indoors light."

Poor Charlie, without new clothes and as flat as a pancake, was also made to feel weird when the two started talking about menstruation. They pretended that it was very unpleasant and a terrible burden, but what they were really saying was that they were women now and she wasn't.

So as they sat on the front steps, with Caroline and Jan still talking and giggling about clothes and boys, Charlie was leaning forward with her chin in her hands and feeling glum. Until quite recently she was the leader of the threesome. If she wanted to play soccer or go to the store or watch TV, that's what they did. But now with her friends only interested in boys, she was beginning to understand that she was being left behind. And for what? Clothes were stupid. Boys were stupid. Putting on airs was stupid.

It was even more stupid that if she said these things to them, they would only laugh at her. She sighed in frustration and clucked her tongue.

Caroline looked at her and was about to say something, but just then Billy Swift turned down their street on his bike. He was a big boy with a mop of sandy hair and bright blue eyes, as handsome as Jan was beautiful. He had a baseball glove hooked over the handlebar and was carrying a big thermos. At first he was pedaling furiously and looking straight ahead, but when he caught a glimpse of Jan, who had stood as soon as she saw him, he braked. Still sitting on his bike, he said, "What are you guys doing?"

Jan shrugged casually, playing hard-to-get. "Just hanging. What about you?"

"We're playing baseball in the park. I went home to get some lemonade."

"Isn't it too hot to be playing baseball?"

"Not if you want to make the team for C.A."

Charlie noticed that he hardly looked at her or Caroline.

"You play football too, don't you?" Jan asked as she put her hands on the arch of her back and stretched so that her breasts stuck out. Billy ogled them with a strange look in his eyes.

"Yeah, but baseball's my best sport. I hope so, at least." He spoke with the false modesty that was really boasting, but it went right over Jan's head. Charlie could see that he thought he was hot stuff, but boy-crazy Jan just saw how cute he was. She remembered a few years ago playing ball with him and some other boys. He couldn't handle a hot smash off her bat. Some baseball player.

"You'll make the team, I bet," Jan said breathlessly. "To play on such a hot day takes dedication."

"Yeah, I hope so. But I gotta go. The guys are waiting. If you're just hanging, come on over and watch."

"Okay. Maybe we will. See ya."

"He's so cute," Jan said as she watched him pedaling away. "Let's go watch 'em play."

"No, let's not," Charlie said sharply. "We were talking about playing the new video game at Caroline's."

Jan smiled at her, putting on airs again and treating her like a little girl. "Boys are better than video games," she said with the air of uttering a great truth.

"Boys, especially Billy, are fools."

"Well, you're entitled to your opinion. I'm going to watch the baseball game. You coming, Caroline?"

It was only then that Charlie saw that Jan didn't want her to come. She was stunned, and a feeling of dread and loneliness swept over her. "Caroline, come on," she pleaded, "let's play video games. Let Jan do what she wants."

Caroline looked at Charlie, then back at Jan. She shook her head. "No, I'm going to the park." She wasn't as pretty as Jan and her breasts were small, but she obviously thought she was pretty enough to catch some other boy's eye.

So Charlie was left alone, standing on the sidewalk and watching them until at the end of the street they turned the corner. Then she slowly made her way home feeling the sting of tears rimming her eyes at this betrayal. Since they were four, Caroline and she had been best friends.

But she quickly hid any signs of her wounded feelings when she realized she was being watched. Mrs. Fecteau, her neighbor who lived in the flat directly under her mother's and her apartment on the second story, was standing in her window. When Charlie looked up, she waved and pointed before quickly leaving the window.

Inside in the hall she was waiting at her door. "I tried to catch you this morning, Charlie, but you slipped out before I could. And then I was at the Senior Center all morning and went shopping after that." She stopped and looked sharply at Charlie. "Your mother didn't come home last night, did she?"

"Oh, but she..." She stopped when Mrs. Fecteau cocked her head.

"Now Charlene Harris, you know you can't sneak a lie past me. Tris didn't come home last night, did she?"

Charlie shook her head while keeping her eyes directed to the floor.

"Well, you know my opinion. It's shameful, her irresponsibility. She's out of control with her drinking. She's a disgraceful excuse for a mother. Child, what have you had to eat today?"

She looked up at Mrs. Fecteau, remembering what she said about not being able to sneak a lie by her, and then stared back at the floor. "A peanut butter sandwich," she said almost in a whisper.

"Oh, Charlie, you come in here right now. I've got some tuna casserole and some sliced tomatoes and cucumbers from the farmer's market."

When she hesitated, Mrs. Fecteau said, "Now listen. I could use some company. And remember, we've been friends for a long time."

That was true. And it wouldn't be the first time she'd eaten with Mrs. Fecteau either—even though it always embarrassed her and made her feel she was betraying her mother. But she was dreadfully hungry, and by now Mrs. Fecteau had her bony arm around Charlie's shoulder and was leading her into the apartment so that she didn't even have to say yes.

Once inside, Charlie as always liked to be there. The place was so cheerful, especially compared to her apartment. There were a lot of plants, and two cats, Tubby and Sly, were more often than not sleeping on the couch or one of the chairs. There were pictures of her grandchildren at different ages in framed pictures on the walls, on some of the shelves and even in a photo album that was always on the coffee table. The walls were painted a pale yellow and the trim a shiny white, a job her two sons did for her a few years ago. They both lived out-of-town, but visited her at least once a month. The new television and the nice rusty-red rug on the floor were two of their most recent gifts for their mom. She was poor, living only on the social security check from her dead husband, but her life was rich. She was very thin and very energetic. She walked faster than most kids Charlie knew even though she was close to eighty. She wore her white hair in a permanent she got once a month, and though her face was very wrinkled Charlie thought that her kindness gave her a kind of shining presence that made her beautiful. Her own grandchildren were young adults now, and Charlie knew that Mrs. Fecteau regarded her as a kind of honorary granddaughter. Like a grandmother she sometimes helped Charlie with her homework when she had a problem she couldn't figure out herself—though that was not too often since Charlie was a very intelligent student even if her grades didn't always reflect it. Her teachers told her that she always scored extremely high on all the achievement and intelligence tests.

It was Mrs. Fecteau whom she proudly informed of her teacher's assessment.

Her mother didn't care.

It was Mrs. Fecteau who gave her a hug and a dollar to buy a treat and told her she was very proud of the smartest little girl in Waska.

Her mother didn't care for book learning.

That was what made her accomplishments so interesting, it turned out. Her teachers assumed she got a lot of intellectual stimulation at home, but she didn't. She wondered a lot, that's all. She wondered why she was different, why she had a mother who was drunk all the time and could fake being a real mother so well when social workers came snooping around. She wondered why she didn't have a father like other kids. She wondered why some kids spent more money on one dress than she had in an entire year. So she had curiosity, which Mrs. Simpson, the teacher she had last year in eighth grade, said was the most important thing in the world. She said Charlie was lucky.

Funny, she didn't feel lucky.

She sat on the couch and patted Sly, the gray tiger cat, while Mrs. Fecteau scooped out a portion of tuna casserole and put it in the microwave. Slicing the cucumbers and tomatoes, she talked about her son's upcoming visit next week and told Charlie some interesting news. "Donny's daughter has some clothes hardly worn that I'm quite sure will fit you. I told him to bring them along."

Mrs. Fecteau knew all about Charlie's lack of new school clothes and had told her she was going to do something about it. Charlie was pretty sure that she had asked her son about those clothes. She even wondered if Mrs. Fecteau was telling a little white lie, because all of Don's kids were in their twenties.

"My mother might not like that," she said timidly.

"If she objects, then she would have to put her money where her mouth is and buy you some new clothes. So let her object. I hope she does, in fact."

Not knowing how to answer this new tone of anger and resolution, Charlie patted Sly's belly and listened to the cat purr contentedly.

Mrs. Fecteau, seeing Charlie's mind at work, wisely changed the subject. "Mayonnaise or vinegar? she asked.

"Vinegar, if you please."

"Vinegar it is." While she was sprinkling some on the cucumbers and tomatoes, the microwave buzzed. Mrs. Fecteau brought the vegetables to the table, got the hot plate from the microwave, and poured a glass of milk, then sat and watched with evident satisfaction as Charlie hungrily attacked the meal.

"Where are your friends?" she asked as Charlie was scraping the plate.

"They went to the park to watch some boys play baseball. They're boy-crazy now."

Mrs. Fecteau smiled at Charlie's disdainful tone at the same time she seemed to understand what was bothering her. "You're going to be a beautiful girl soon. Some girls develop more slowly, that's all. There'll be a day when you're boy-crazy too."

In answer Charlie crinkled her nose, which cause Mrs. Fecteau to laugh.

"You're already a sweet and pretty girl, you know."

She smiled at the compliment but didn't really believe it. But it did make her think. It kept hovering in her mind while she helped Mrs. Fecteau first wash the dishes and then vacuum the rug, and when she went upstairs to her own apartment the first thing she did was go into the bathroom and stare at herself in the mirror looking for any sign that her face was or would be pretty. The first thing she examined was her nose. Once a kid at school had called it a nigger nose. The nostrils flared and the bridge was flat. She had freckles, and her reddish-brown hair was naturally curly and didn't obey any brush she'd ever used. Her brown eyes were small, so small, she thought, that they didn't seem to fit her face, which was way too wide. Her lips were thin, her chin weak, and her neck too long and skinny. There was nothing by itself that was ugly that she could see, but nothing pretty either. She thought of Jan's full lips and how they looked when she pouted. The thought made her frown. No boy had ever looked at her the way Billy Swift was looking at the beauty queen earlier.

She went into the living room, still thinking of Billy Swift's eyes and Mrs. Fecteau's prediction that she would soon be boy-crazy. Before any boy would ever look at her in a special way, she knew she would also have to understand clearly what she now understood only vaguely as a feeling coloring the edge of her mind—that somehow everything before her eyes right now was part of the reason she did not feel pretty inside. She lived in a dump, that much was clear. Jan's and Caroline's shabby apartments were closer to hers than the few really nice houses of classmates she had been in, but they were palaces in comparison. Her mother did no housework so that any cleaning and tidying up that was done fell to Charlie. The furniture was all old and crappy. The newest thing, a grayish brown couch with sagging cushions and worn armrests, was a gift her mother got from someone she worked with last winter. The woman was going to throw it out when her mother said she would take it. Her boyfriend at the time—there had been three or four others since then— hauled it in his truck to their building and then with Charlie's help had carried it upstairs. Its appeal for her mother was that it was a sleeper. Because their apartment was the cheapest one in the building, it was also the smallest one—the landlord had boarded up the door that led to two more bedrooms, which he used for storage for his furnished apartments. A one bedroom apartment, however, meant that before they got the sleeper-couch Charlie slept on a mattress in her mother's room, and whenever she had a man over to spend the night Charlie would have to move the mattress-bed to the living room. Now every night she pulled it opened and slept on it; every morning she folded it back up. The other furniture in the room had a similar history—all used stuff, all hauled in with the help of some man. The cheap recliner with fake leather had numerous slits where the worn plastic had failed. The other chair was a massive things covered with a blanket to hide the torn stuffing. The dinner table had wobbly legs and under the plastic tablecloth was covered with scratches and gouges. The television screen periodically turned red until a bang on its top shamed it out of its embarrassment. There was nothing nice in the house unless a decorative flower pot that her mother said had belonged to her grandmother was excepted. It had a deep black glaze with red roses and sat on the mantelpiece above the closed-in fireplace. Sometimes Charlie had an overwhelming urge to smash it. She didn't know why and the thought always scared her. As a result she didn't dare touch it, and it was covered with thick dust.

Perhaps she associated the vase with her mother, who was equally untouchable. And maybe her face, the worn furniture and the general dinginess were all signs and shadows of her mother. It was she who made Charlie feel different. She rarely talked about her past, but Charlie had learned the salient facts. Her mother dropped out of high school when she was pregnant with Charlie at seventeen. Her father, who was a strict man, threw her out of the house and disowned her. Her grandparents now lived in Florida, though it didn't matter where they lived, for Charlie had never even seen them. She had an uncle who lived in town, her mother's brother, whom she had likewise never spoken to (though she had seen him at a distance on a few occasions) and who had likewise disowned his sister. He was a fundamentalist Christian and thought Tris was under Satan's sway.

With these people her only blood relatives, the only family Charlie had had was the string of boyfriends her mother collected. Relying on her good looks, she could hook any man she set out to get. Because she had always been a drinker, and an irascible one at that when she was drunk, none of these relationships ever lasted much more than a few months. Most of the men who took up temporary residence in their apartment were indifferent to Charlie, but a few had, like substitute teachers, fulfilled the role of a father for the little girl who had no permanent teacher-father. One taught her to play chess. Another was interested in American history when sober and had got her library books on early New England, the Revolutionary War and the conquest of the west to read. Others were simply nice and would play games with her or take her outside to kick a soccer ball or throw a football around.

But good, bad, or indifferent, they all left or were driven away, and she remained a pupil without a teacher. And things were getting worse, not better. It had been over a year since a good boyfriend had come. Her mother, now thirty-two, had been living such a hard life and drinking so heavily that she was on the verge of losing her good looks. As a result the more recent boyfriends had begun to look more and more seedy. And that reminded Charlie of another fear. She was afraid that if her mother got any worse she might lose her job. Despite working many a day with a hangover, she had managed to hang on to her job in the dispatcher's office of a local trucking company, where she had worked since she was twenty. Their apartment might be a dump, but it was better than living on the streets.

Thinking of her mother and her boyfriends and the booze they drank made Charlie feel even more glum. New school clothes seemed trivial when she followed in her mind the path her mother was leading to its end.

An unpleasant smell diverted her attention. She turned towards the kitchen, following her nose. It was sour milk from the dregs of the container thrown away yesterday. She gathered up some pizza boxes and other debris and brought them with the wastebasket down the backstairs to the rubbish bins. It was still very hot and the metal top of one of the rubbish bins felt like an oven door as she lifted it. Across two backyards she saw movement on the back porch of Jan's building, and for a moment she stared after letting the cover of the bin drop with a loud crash. But it was only Mrs. Donahue, Jan's neighbor across the hall, similarly emptying her trash.

Back upstairs she sat in the recliner and in the declining light of the evening read the latest novel in a series about a boy wizard. Everyone else had already read it, but she had had to wait to get the book from the library. After about an hour the light grew too dim, and she put the novel aside and turned on the television, watching some situation comedies where there were a lot of jokes about sex. They weren't funny to her, for she had heard her mother making love many times and had come to see sex as a gross agony of ecstasy that was totally self-absorbed and left her out and made her feel strange. She never said anything when the kids talked about it. In her mind it was all mixed up with booze and her mother's neglect. It wasn't beautiful. It had nothing to do with love. It was only a need so strong that everything else was forgotten. It just made her feel lonely and unwanted. So after a couple of these uncomic comedies, she switched to public television and watched a nature show about the life of orangutans. Then at ten o'clock, with her mother still not home, she gave up hope and unfolded the sleeper-couch into her bed. She got a blanket from the closet, knowing that later in the night it would be cool, and removing her shorts but keeping her T-shirt on, she curled up on the bed.

But she didn't go to sleep. She was used to being alone and was not scared; even so she felt uncomfortable and started every time she heard a noise. To keep fearful thoughts at a distance, she busied her mind thinking about Jan and Caroline, wondering if they would cut her completely. She knew some other kids, including a girl she'd talked to a few times about the boy wizard novels. She too was plain and like Charlie was still flat. Maybe they could become best friends. Then she spent a long time thinking about the novel trying to guess how it would come out. The clothes Mrs. Fecteau promised her didn't excite much curiosity, but she did think of them just to keep her mind busy.

About an hour later she heard her mother's voice downstairs and a voice of the man she was with. She raised her head and looked at the kitchen clock, seeing that she was right about the time—it was ten minutes past eleven. She could see the clock because she kept the light above the kitchen sink on. Once when her mother came home drunk (and alone that time), she'd tripped over something by the door and was very angry with Charlie. She'd even slapped her face so hard it left a welt. Ever since then the light stayed on.

Her mother had made it upstairs now and was fumbling at the door and muttering to herself—signs she was drunk. The man said, "Want me to try?" He sounded more sober.

Just then her mother managed to find the keyhole, and the door opened. Charlie considered pretending to be asleep, but she wanted to see the man, so she didn't. Instead she raised herself on one elbow.

The guy was scary. He had mean light eyes and a permanent sneer on his face. He had a two or three day growth of stubble, and when he turned she could see an ugly scar that began a little below his eye and curved down towards the jaw. He wore a chambray shirt and dungarees with paint all over them.

"Hey," he said when he spied Charlie. "You didn't tell me there was a kid here."

"She won't be no problem. She'll keep out of the way." Her mother teetered as she spoke, and an arm flew out to catch the armrest of the sleeper. "You go back to sleep" was her only greeting.

The man did one worse. He just looked at her without saying anything. But it was scary. He looked at her in the same way Billy Swift had looked at Jan's breasts.

They closed the bedroom door, but that didn't stop the sounds of their loud lovemaking from wafting out. When she heard her mother start barking in rhythmic, increasingly desperate grunts, Charlie knew it would soon be over.

It was, and there seemed to be no pillow talk. Within ten minutes she could hear the loud snoring of the scary man, and soon enough even with the light still on she too drifted off into sleep's darkness.

She was awakened by a sound, a low animal moan. Looking through narrowed eyes she saw the man was right beside the bed looking at her. He was naked and his thing was pointing up. When he bent down to her, murmuring "Sweet baby girl," she screamed, kicked him with all her might, and sprang up on the other side of the bed while the man collapsed, groaning in agony. She screamed again and ran towards the door. Just as she was about to open it and run downstairs to Mrs. Fecteau's apartment, her mother's voice stopped her.

"Jesus fucking Christ! What's going on?" She had thrown on her bathrobe but hadn't tied it.

"He tried to hurt me," Charlie said, pointing to the writhing figure on the floor. Only then did she realize she was screaming, not speaking. "He wanted to do something to me."

"You little whore," said her drunken mother. "I'll deal with you later." She went over to the man, who was still holding his crotch in agony. "You fucking cheating swine," she screamed and started smacking him.

He forgot the pain after the fourth or fifth blow. His face now contorted with a combination of agony and rage, he turned and his hand shot out and smacked her. The blow sent her reeling. "No woman lays a hand on me and gets away with it," he snarled. "You stupid bitch. I was just taking a leak and checked to see if the girl was okay."

Her mother, still in a jealous rage, answered with her fist. He grabbed at her, and when she tried to elude him her bathrobe was ripped off; then they were rolling on the floor, punching, gouging, biting, all the while screaming. After a few minutes that seemed like an hour, they both stopped simultaneously and began panting in exhaustion.

Charlie didn't know what to do. She didn't dare go near them. She didn't dare to speak and draw attention to herself. She wanted to go to Mrs. Fecteau, but she didn't dare to move either. Then over the sound of their heavy breathing she heard a distant siren coming closer. Standing stock still and hardly breathing, she listened to the sound stop outside, followed by a bustle of doors opening and running feet and voices, one male and one Mrs. Fecteau's. Then heavy feet thundered up the stairs.

Charlie opened the door.

Only then did the two combatants understand what was happening. They both sprang up. Her mother grabbed her bathrobe and the man the blanket from Charlie's bed and wrapped it around himself.

A stocky, short officer with a crewcut and dark eyes, square-jawed and clean-shaven, stepped into the room, followed by the scent of cologne. Charlie noticed that his uniform was crisply ironed and fit perfectly. Momentarily he looked at her to see if she was all right. Behind him a tall, slender officer, whose uniform, in contrast, hung on his skinny body, followed. Charlie saw him catch sight of her mother, still in the process of covering her nakedness with the bathrobe, and saw the same lewd and sticky-fingered look of sexual interest on the cop's homely face she'd seen twice before today.

But it was a fleeting impression. The stocky officer, the ranking policeman, quickly took command by speaking in an official tone that was still cleverly not antagonistic: "What seems to be the matter here?"

Her mother, finishing tying her bathrobe up, looked at the cop and said with a sneer, "Nothing. We just had a little spat, that's all."

"Little spat? Ma'am, you've woken up the whole building. Disturbing the peace is just the beginning. Assault is a serious matter. So do you care to elaborate on what you mean by 'little spat' or shall we talk down at the station?"

His threat was not accepted with good grace. Sullenly, like a child accused of stealing a cookie, her mother said, "I tell you it was nothing. He pissed me off, that's all. I hit him. He hit me back. We fought."

The cop rubbed his chin. "I'm afraid that won't do, ma'am. The woman downstairs said you called your daughter a little whore. This old building has thin walls and floors. People heard you say things."

Her mother was sobering up quickly, for Charlie saw the same look of cunning come into her mother's eyes she had whenever she spoke to the child welfare people. "I didn't say that. That old bitch Mrs. Fecteau lied. She's been out to get me for a long time."

The officer exchanged a glance with his partner. "Ma'am, we'll talk to her more a bit later. I'd be careful about who you're accusing of lying, though. But right now I want to know what caused the fracas."

Just then her mother's lover groaned, slumped more than leaned forward, and grabbed at his crotch. Now that the excitement had died down, he was feeling the pain of Charlie's kick with renewed intensity.

The officers exchanged another glance. The tall gawky one grinned. "Looks like she hurt you where it really hurts," he said. The he looked at Charlie's mother. "And it looks like you'll be facing assault charges, ma'am."

Her mother glared at the cop. "I didn't kick him in the balls. She did."

She pointed to Charlie, causing both cops to turn towards her. The statement had aroused great interest. "Is that true?"

Charlie nodded. "He wanted to do something to me. I was sleeping on the bed. He was naked."

For the third time, the cops exchanged glances. The skinny one raised his eyebrows. The stocky one frowned. "Rape," he whispered grimly. "I better talk to the neighbor." He went to the door and called downstairs. "Ma'am, Mrs. Fecteau? Are you there?"

Charlie, still standing near the door, could hear voices downstairs all the time the cops were doing their questioning. Now she heard Mrs. Fecteau coming up the stairs.

In the meantime the stocky officer told the other one to run a check on the man. He was speaking low, but he turned and addressed the man in a louder voice. "What's your name?

"Jimmy Cronin," the man said.

Then the cop said something that filled Charlie with dread. Speaking in the same half whisper, he said, "Before you do that, call Child Welfare. It's beginning to look like the old lady was right."

After hearing that statement, much of what was said in the next half hour was a blur to Charlie. The dread she felt when she heard the ominous phrase "child welfare" grew into terror. She knew Mrs. McCade, the social worker assigned to Charlie, had threatened to take her out of the house several times, and she understood that what happened tonight would be regarded as extremely serious. So while Mrs. Fecteau talked to the officers, Charlie only heard snatches of what was said because she was picturing herself alone and scared living among strangers. Sometimes her attention would be brought back to the room when the cops would interrupt Mrs. Fecteau to ask her a question, so she did know in general what was being said. It was stated that she was thin and small for her age because of malnourishment. The new school clothes business was mentioned. Her mother's drinking was emphasized. The many nights she did not come home were enumerated. Sometimes her mother would loudly and indignantly deny the charges and would be told to be quiet by the senior officer. All the details of the attempted rape came out, which Charlie couldn't deny because she knew she couldn't sneak a lie past Mrs. Fecteau. The most damning point, and one that was questioned very carefully by the police was the fact that her mother was jealous of Charlie instead of protective of her. Again her mother denied everything.

At some point the tall gawky cop got the report from the police station on Jimmy Cronin's criminal record. It was extensive. Besides many minor infractions like public drunkenness, he'd been arrested for driving under the influence twice, for assault three times and once for resisting arrest. He'd been to the county jail twice serving ninety-day sentences. There was a restraining order taken out by his wife against him. For the cops the most interesting charge was one that was dropped for lack of evidence (his wife didn't dare testify)—he'd been arrested for child molestation. After that they arrested the man. The gawky cop went into the bedroom with him to allow him to get his clothes on, and then took him to the station. The senior cop stayed behind to wait for the woman from Child Welfare.

When Mrs. McCade came, she didn't look too happy to have been dragged out of bed. She looked very tired, and for some reason the light made her eyes blink constantly. She was middle-aged with deep lines running from the corners of her mouth up to the nose and crow's feet at the edge of each eye. She wore large, even huge, glasses, each lens seemingly as large as a diving mask. One thing was different. Tonight her hair was in a ponytail instead of the usual perm. Maybe it was her summer look, maybe the result of having to dress quickly. She certainly wasn't her usual, neat self. She wore baggy slacks and a gray jersey.

She came up to Charlie as soon as she entered the room. "Are you okay?" she asked with more than usual sincerity.

Charlie just nodded. She was no friend. In fact she was more like an enemy, and, besides, the man's visit to her bed was less traumatizing to her than the thought of leaving home.

Charlie sat on the edge of the bed and listened to Mrs. McCade talk to the policeman. "I've been at this job too long," she sighed. "Just when you think you seen it all, something like this happens. I've been here many times, you know." Her voice dropped down to a whisper. "She lies to my face every time. I know it, but can never prove it. Tonight is different."

The cop nodded. In a louder voice he went over the facts of what happened as far as they could be ascertained (that was the word he used—Charlie had just seen it for the first time in the boy-wizard novel and had looked it up in the paperback dictionary one of her teachers gave her).

Then Mrs. McCade began questioning her mother, who had sullenly been sitting in the recliner for some time and occasionally blinking as if to keep herself awake. Once the questions started coming, though, she was alert enough. Instead of the usual lies and half-truths and phony tears, she was confrontational because she knew the facts could not be easily disputed. Her first move was to call Mrs. Fecteau an old dried-up biddy, a busybody who wouldn't know reality if it kicked her in the ass.

"Do you deny that you weren't home last night?"

She couldn't, but she explained it away. "She's not a child. She can take care of herself."

Do you deny that you haven't got school clothes for Charlie?"

Her only answer was to glare at Mrs. McCade.

"And you can't deny the facts of what that despicable man did and your insane and unmotherly jealousy."

Her mother did deny it all, but strangely without conviction. Suddenly she looked tired and defeated.

Mrs. McCade turned to Charlie. "You understand that your mother, despite repeated warnings, has continued to act irresponsibly and that she is an unfit mother?"

"It's the drink that does it," Charlie said, begging with her eyes. "I remember many times we'd do things like go get an ice-cream cone together, and we'd be like best friends. We'd have fun."

"But that was when you were much younger, wasn't it?"

"But if she stopped drinking we could be like that again." She turned to her mother. "We could, couldn't we, mommy."

Her mother frowned.

Mrs. McCade started to say something, but Charlie interrupted. "I want to stay with my mother. Please, please..." She started crying, afraid that she was never going to feel safe again, never have the comfort of familiarity again, always and forever to be alone and alien. She didn't remember that only an hour ago she had wanted to flee the apartment for the safety of Mrs. Fecteau's.

"You need to be somewhere where you'll be protected and nurtured, Charlie," Mrs. McCade said. "I'm sorry, but I'm taking you with me right now. You can stay at my house tonight."

Like her mother, Charlie knew she was defeated. The tears kept rolling down her cheeks while she and Mrs. McCade gathered up some clothes and things, including her childhood teddy bear and the library book about the boy wizard.

But what she remembered most about the end of her last day at home was that when she was at the door and said, "Good-bye, Mom," her mother didn't answer. She just sat there with a blank look in her eyes.

She Becomes a Christian

Charlie Harris was always nervous at lunchtime, for that was when she had to go into the large cafeteria at Courtney Academy filled with hundreds of students with the prospect of having no friend to sit with and knowing that her clothes and hair marked her as different. Because her uncle didn't approve of curly hair, she wore her reddish-brown hair in two pigtails that pulled the hair flat on her scalp and minimized the unchristian curliness, even if it was uncomfortable. Her clothes were likewise uncomfortable and most Christian. Today, as usual, she was wearing a frumpy, formless dress that covered her from the neck to below the knees and which, with the help of a special bra, insured that no hint of the female form was visible—just the sort of dress that elicited cruel wisecracks about the potato-sack school of fashion design or mock surprise about not knowing this was honoring your great-great-grandmother day. Charlie couldn't tell her taunters that her uncle forced her to wear her clothes and that she would prefer to wear the jeans and short skirts of other girls. Having no way to defend herself, she would simply become flustered and humiliated. Her uncle told her to think of how the crowds taunted Jesus on the day of his crucifixion and be strong. She tried that, tried with all her might, and still she felt humiliated and embarrassed. And on this day in May of her junior year her trial was going to be much worse. She had to prepare herself to be taunted not only about her clothes and her religion but about Creationism and Intelligent Design. She had not been able to concentrate in her morning classes thinking of how much her life had changed from the day she was taken from her mother up until this day when the whole school regarded her as the embodiment of Christian fundamentalism.

Since the night she left home her uncle, the Reverend Edward Harris of The Church of Salvation Through Jesus, was the major force and reality in her life. And yet he had not wanted to take her in. During intense negotiations lasting for over a week between Child Welfare and the minister, Charlie was staying at Mrs. McCade's house and hoping to be returned to her mother. But Mrs. McCade told her that was impossible and that her choices were either her uncle or an orphanage. Given that stark choice, she wanted to be with family and wondered about the delay. As she found out later, her uncle maintained that she had been living a satanic life and was beyond hope, and to bolster his objections he had cited a passage in _Ezekiel_ where a traveller found a baby girl whom he adopted and brought up only to have her turn into a harlot. Such was Charlie's fate, thought he. It was her Aunt Cora who changed his mind. She was a small, mousy woman, perfectly Christian in her obedience to her husband, but upon hearing his citation from _Ezekiel_ , she had reminded him of Mordecai whose adopted daughter Esther had walked with God and in righteousness, and she had insisted upon their Christian duty to take in the child who had no other family on earth. She had prevailed, but only after certain conditions were met. Charlie was henceforth to be known as Charlene ("Charlie" was not a girl's name, her uncle said). She was to become a probationary Christian, which meant that she was to study the Bible and be examined by him as well as attend church every week and pray to be worthy of baptism. She was to wear decent clothes and give up her former associates and her satanic ways. He also wanted to homeschool her with a woman in the church who taught her own children and the two Harris sons and one daughter, but here Child Welfare showed her uncle Charlie's test scores that were in the 99 percentiles and insisted that someone this academically brilliant must attend Courtney Academy. For the second time her willful uncle reluctantly relented, although as soon as Charlie was in his household he told her that she was not to become friends with anyone at school who was not a devout born-again Christian, nor was she allowed to join in any extra-curricular activities. She was to attend school and hasten home at the end of the day.

Home was a fairly large and nice house about six blocks from the high school. The church tithed but with only about 130 members (comprised of twenty-five families) and with a large mortgage for their new church building due monthly, the minister's salary would not be enough to afford such a house. But Uncle Edward had another source of income—a plumbing supply store across the river in Bedford that had been started by Charlie's grandfather was now owned and operated by her uncle after his father had retired and moved to Florida. Thus the family lived a comfortable Christian life.

Her uncle was always dressed in suit, either brown or grey, a starched white shirt and expensive tie. He wore his dark hair in a crewcut, was clean-shaven, with a hooked nose in the middle of his face, a square jaw below often pointing up like Mussolini's jaw in photographs she'd seen in history textbooks, a couple of ears in the regular place, jowls that rimed with scowls bordered the mouth that never smiled. There was nothing special about the face except for the fact that Uncle Edward had mean dark eyes—and never, ever smiled. He was big and powerful and looked more like a boxer than a minister of Jesus. He was scary from the first meeting—and with good reason. He was a man who would brook no contradiction, tolerate no rebelliousness. Very quickly Charlie learned that she was, like everyone else in the family and everyone in the church, a mere planet orbiting the blinding sun of his presence. His power was most awesome when he preached. "Only Jesus! he'd thunder, and the congregation would be swept away. "Only Jesus! Only Jesus!" the people would cry almost in a swoon. Then, frequently mopping his brow with a big white handkerchief, he'd prove to them by citing chapter and verse from the Bible that everyone upon earth and in the cosmos was under the foot of Jesus, whether in their hearts, in sweet heaven or in the boiling, broiling inferno of hell. Jesus was Lord of all, cried her uncle. "Jesus is Lord of all," boomed the congregation in one voice, and Charlie saw that here on earth, in Waska, Maine, the wrath of the Lord was named Edward Harris. And woe betide anyone who felt that wrath. Charlie witnessed one such miserable sinner one early Sunday in her life as a Christian when her uncle turned his righteous scorn and anger upon a woman who had committed adultery. He forced her to publicly confess her evil, and then when she was driven down to total humiliation and squashed like a bug under his foot, he expelled her from the church and cried upon her anathema.

So she saw that he was a man not to be crossed. To please him, to keep his wrath at bay, became the goal of her life. She studied the Bible. She became interested in every aspect of the church. She asked questions and listened carefully to the answers. Her uncle seemed to be pleased at her efforts and glad to be proved wrong about her. Everything was going well at home even though at school the teasing about her clothes had already started. But her life was home and church, she told herself. It was in those places she would find her happiness and fulfillment. Then one Saturday while being tested on her biblical reading, she asked how David could be considered a good and religious man when he committed adultery with Bathsheba and then had her husband killed after she became pregnant. Suddenly she saw her uncle stand and frown, then fold his arms across his chest and begin rocking on the balls of his feet. Sometimes his arms would swing down and his fists would be clenched. Terror seized her, for she recognized these signs were exactly those he'd displayed as he listened to the adulterous woman make her confession. Charlie had naively thought that because he was so angry at the woman's adultery, he would be pleased with her question. But as he glared at her, she understood she was guilty of the greatest of sins—that of questioning the integrity of the Bible. For a moment she thought that he was going to strike her, but after breathing angrily through flared nostrils like a bull about to charge a red cloth, he calmed down enough to explain her error. It was part of God's plan, he explained with suppressed fury. Bathsheba's baby was King Solomon. That was the end of that day's lesson, and during the following week he was decidedly cold towards her. Sometimes she caught him looking at her pensively as if searching for signs of harlotry. Recalling that when she had had to testify at the trial of Jimmy Cronin he had likewise shunned her for a week, she was able to divine that he also did not like women to show any awareness of sex. She had learned an important lesson in survival.

The adjustment from almost no supervision to total supervision was not easy. Much of Charlie's effort went into adjusting herself to her uncle's expectations, but that did not mean the rest of the family was an easy adjustment, though perhaps Aunt Cora was. She was as kind and motherly as possible, always speaking softly to Charlie, never chiding, never criticizing. But being as dependent and powerless as Charlie herself, she could be of no real help. Her three cousins were a different kind of challenge. She rather expected that the near universal fear of displeasing her uncle would make allies of them, but in that she was sorely disappointed. There was no secret kid world separate from an adult world in the Harris household. The two boys, Matthew, aged eleven, Mark, aged nine, and Martha fourteen like Charlie when she first entered the house, were unlike any kids she had ever known. They were not normal. The boys wore white shirts and dress slacks; Martha was always garbed in long dresses. They were totally obedient and strangely adult-like in their actions. They never yelled excitedly. They never argued. They spoke of Jesus as if he was the guy next door. They knew nothing about comic book heroes, popular television shows, video games, or movie stars. They hadn't read the boy wizard novels. They never met anyone outside of their church and were never allowed to watch any television except for Christian channels and carefully monitored wholesome shows like Walt Disney movies.

The first time they were alone at home when Uncle Edward was visiting a parishioner and Aunt Cora was shopping, they sat at the dining room table and read the Bible. Charlie, expecting them to be following the ancient wisdom of when the cat's away the mice will play, marveled that they weren't playing some game or watching television. Finally her curiosity could not be suppressed and she asked, "Can't you ever have any fun?" She addressed her question to Martha, but Matthew answered. "Our fun is finding joy in Jesus," he said. "He is the Alpha and Omega of our lives. His love fills our hearts and His word fills our mind." That was her first glimpse into Matthew's personality. While they were all prone to citing the Bible at the drop of a hat, Matthew positively reveled in it. Sometimes from a direct question, other times from no context Charlie could divine, he would reel off biblical citations and quotations with amazing facility: the Father sent the son to be savior, John 4:14; Jesus was the way—no one could come to the Father except through him, John 14:6; salvation comes through faith alone, Romans 1:17 and 5: 17. He was very proud of his knowledge and already had let it be known that he wanted to follow his father into the ministry. The younger son, Mark, was proud in a different way. Their mother had almost died at his birth and so had he. That they both lived was regarded as a sign of particular favor on the part of the Lord for Uncle Edward's benefit, and ever after Mark was regarded as a gift from Jesus. That was how he first introduced himself to Charlie. "Hello, Charlene. I'm Mark, a gift from Jesus." As for Martha, she was like her mother, quiet and gentle, powerless and obedient.

After a probationary year and a deep study of the Bible that allowed her to recognize Matthew's citations (and see that he sometimes got them wrong), Charlie was baptized. She had anticipated this day as the time she would move beyond her doubts and reservations. But they didn't go away—not at first. Thoughts unbidden would creep up on her. She'd hear Matthew citing chapter and verse and notice a curiously mechanical ring to his voice as if it was a mathematical formula he had memorized. Some times the behavior of the whole family seemed to her disconnected from reality, as if they were all actors in a play mouthing the words of her uncle, who was writer/director. But these thoughts would be like something glimpsed from the corner of her eye that disappeared when she turned and looked at them fully. They were feelings, not facts that she could prove. So for days on end she would struggle with these doubts while trying wholeheartedly to believe in the peace of Jesus. Days came where she would succeed in driving the doubts away for a while, but they would not last. Something else would come upon her—the coldness that seemed to lie behind their religiosity; a word or citation that reminded her of how the Old Testament kings and prophets were bloodthirsty and cruel; the nagging thought that though the Bible was supposed to be the unerring word of God, there were countless passages that directly contradicted each other; the glee her uncle obviously took in imagining all non-Christians roasting in hellfire after the Rapture of the Second Coming that seemed cruel and inhumane to her; the hatred of things that seemed harmless like watching TV or playing video games and yet were regarded as satanic by all the church members; their general lack of human compassion for others or even any interest in others not born-again Christians; the oppressive feeling that it was unfair that she could not play softball or soccer because she was a girl—all these things could not be driven from her mind as hard as she tried. Nor could she hide from herself that she felt no different after being baptized. Her heart was supposed to be full with the love of Jesus, and yet she felt no joy. Thinking that she was the one at fault for not feeling the great joy the others spoke of, she would turn away in her mind from Jesus and have worldly thoughts about her classmates at Courtney Academy as she daydreamed of a normal life where she dated and socialized. Then she'd feel tenfold guilt and horror at her apostasy and would cry to Jesus, pray to Him, for the deliverance of his joy.

While no divine light dazzled her into joy after these prayers, the Holy Spirit through the course of time brought a certain peace and contentment, if not joy. What actually happened was that pretending to believe and saying the right things when necessary slowly and by degrees became real belief. Being surrounded by certainty finally brought her certainty. By the end of her second year in the Harris home, she had been reborn and changed utterly; she was a Christian and had been saved.

Yet she was aware somewhere inside her must needs have lurked that old Charlie who played video games and loved sports. Why else would she dread every noontime trip to the cafeteria? She understood that in one sense she was never alone: her uncle, her aunt, her cousins, her church and all the ways she'd changed from a gawky kid to a young woman wearing an old-fashioned dress that hid her sexuality were all freight she carried with her through the food line. What made her situation worse today, ten times worse, arose from her intelligence. With no distractions, she had applied herself to her studies and gotten straight A's at Courtney Academy. At first her uncle had been unimpressed by and indifferent to her academic achievements, apparently only pleased to the extent that studying was a path that led away from the wiles and temptations of the satanic world. As a female, she understood that her future pointed in only one direction: towards marriage. But all that changed one night last summer when her uncle came home from a meeting with church elders. One of the elders, Brother Johnson, had spoken of how Charlene, with her high intelligence and ability to write well, could become an asset for the church. His idea was that she could become the spokesman for the national church and its public face, and he had convinced her uncle of his plan, with twofold results. First, she was going to be allowed to go to college, and secondly, she was going to be allowed to take that most satanic of sciences, biology. Her uncle didn't share with her any of the details of his plan, but he did carefully monitor what she was studying in biology, and frequently through the year he had asked her to read various papers on the subject of Intelligent Design by writers such as Michael J. Behe and William A. Demski, as well as an eighteenth-century English thinker, William Paley, who was the first one to use the analogy of a watch—that if a person found such a complex and ingenious device he would have to conclude that behind the marvelous device was a watchmaker. Charlie spent hours explaining her readings to her uncle and answering his questions. He was chiefly interested in knowing whether or not these arguments sounded scientific to her based upon what she had learned in class. She told him that she thought they did, which pleased him mightily. Still up until this week she had remained in the dark about where these readings and discussions were leading. Then last night's local paper had an announcement that the Reverend Edward Harris and Joseph Moore, the minister of the Bible Baptist Church in Waska, were planning to go before the town's school board and demand that Intelligent Design be taught in science classes.

By morning, it seems, every student at Courtney Academy had heard this news, and everyone knew that the Rev. Harris was Charlie's uncle. Unfortunately, as Charlie well understood, the more vicious and ignorant members of the student body now had a target for their scorn and ridicule. She had already heard whisperings in her morning classes and a few snide insults in the hallways. These early signs of what lay ahead had made her dread the cafeteria. It was the one place at school that faculty supervision was slight, and knowing this she had even considered going without lunch. But hunger always gave her a belly ache, and she dreaded even more the embarrassment of a noisy stomach in her afternoon classes. So here she was, so nervous her hands trembled as she held her tray and waited in line. The noise of hundreds of voices talking at once, modulated by an occasional whoop, loud laugh or a grating, high-pitched voice, was making her tingle all over, and she found herself clutching her tray so hard her hands began hurting. With relief she put it on the rollers of the food line and concentrated on choosing her lunch. The fast-food hamburgers and junk food looked terribly tempting, but even though she knew her uncle was unlikely to ever know what she chose, it was as if he was inside her mind and whispering "satanic' whenever the thought of those hamburgers became conscious. Obediently she chose Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes and peas, with a chocolate chip cookie for dessert and a glass of milk for her beverage.

After having her meal ticket punched, she walked down the middle aisle looking for a free seat that was safe. Many eyes watched her progress, and a few catcalls of "Creationism" were shouted while someone else loudly hummed "Here Comes the Bride," but she managed to ignore them. There was an empty chair next to Jan Parker, but she wouldn't think of sitting there. Jan, now a cheerleader and a school bigshot, had cut her completely and didn't even acknowledge her existence as she walked by. There was a seat at the table where three girls who were in her English class were sitting, but they had never been friendly. She looked towards the back, hoping to find an empty table. In the third from the last row Yvonne Wagner was looking at her. A plain girl with a bad complexion, she was too shy to shout at Charlie, but she was clearly glad for some company. She was in her English and Spanish classes and as close a friend as the rules her uncle laid down allowed—she saw her at school and no where else.

Feeling relief, she sat down. "Hi, Yvonne. Did you read the Tennyson poems?"

"Yes, I loved 'Flower in the Crannied Wall.' It expressed the mystery of life perfectly." Yvonne was of a poetic nature. She held her hamburger before her mouth as she spoke before taking a big bite.

Charlie began on her Salisbury steak, cutting a piece with her fork. "Have you heard about all the Intelligent Design stuff?"

She nodded, her mouth still full. "Everyone's talking about it."

Charlie noticed several students in surrounding tables looking at her. She grew self-conscious. "I don't know why kids blame me. It's my uncle's idea."

Yvonne chewed thoughtfully. "I guess it's because you're here and he isn't. But you don't believe in that Creationism stuff, do you?"

Charlie saw Jeremy Lawrence, her lab partner in biology and a kind boy, had sat down at the next table and overheard Yvonne. She thought he had very appealing wide blue eyes. They always seemed kind and gentle, as if he never frowned or thought ill of others. He was another of the very few she was friendly with at school, and it was a comfort to have both him and Yvonne nearby. She started to relax a little as she said, "Hi, Jeremy."

He smiled slightly and nodded. He too was a shy person.

She looked back at Yvonne. "I don't know about Creationism. Intelligent Design is a better argument. That stuff is actually written by scientists who are also Christians."

"What do they say?"

"Oh, lot's of stuff. A good argument is an early one by a man named Paley. He lived in England in the seventeen hundreds. He said that if you found a watch and saw how intricate it was, you would conclude from that that a watchmaker made it. It's the same with the world and God. There's also a lot of complex ideas. One of 'em's called 'irreducible complexity.' It's—"

But she got no further. A boy sitting in the table behind Yvonne had been whispering quietly to his companions for the last minute. Now he turned and said to Charlie, "Hey, Charlene, I'm thinking of having Voodoo as part of the curriculum. Is that okay with you?"

Charlie merely frowned at the childish and unimaginative remark and turned away, but that gesture seemed to anger a boy named Bob Parole, who was in her biology class and had something of a reputation as a smart aleck—she had heard that he was known to rag opposing players at sporting events mercilessly. "Don't you be turning your nose up to Voodoo, Miss Christian. The crap you're selling—Creationism—is no better."

"It's Intelligent Design that's the issue," Charlie said quietly. "Nobody's talking about Creationism."

"Oh, but we are. My father said it's just a way to sneak Creationism in the back door. Only ignorant people believe that crap. How you been getting them A's, Charlene. You sleeping with the teachers, or what?'

Charlie could feel her face burn crimson. She looked at Yvonne, hoping she'd say something in her defense, but her friend was too shy. She too looked embarrassed.

"The way you dress certainly turns all the guys on," another boy said, sensing here a weakness. "You're one fine piece of ass, I'm sure."

"I'm sure she dazzles all the male teachers," Bob Parole said, "but for a minute let's stick to the issue. Charlene, you've seen those trilobites and other fossils in Mr. Adamson's lab. Do you think God made them on the third day?"

To correct him and say that God made animals on the fifth day would only bring forth ridicule. The safest answer was a short one: "I don't know."

"Yeah, that's just it. You don't know. And when you don't know, you should keep your mouth shut."

"I never said anything," Charlie said, feeling tears of frustration and embarrassment stinging her eyes. "I just want to be left alone."

She could see Jeremy looking at her with his big blue eyes expressing concern. Seeing her tears was a strong enough impetus to overcome his shyness. "Hey, you guys. Cut it out. It's not her fault her uncle wants that stuff. Blame him, not her."

"Mind your own business. It is her fault. If she wasn't in school this crap wouldn't even be discussed."

Nevertheless they did quiet down for a while, and Charlie and Yvonne went back to their lunch, eating now in shocked silence. Charlie wanted to escape, to go somewhere far away where no one knew her and she could be invisible. She hardly dared to make a sound in case it drew attention to her again. She had lost her appetite. Her hand trembled as she lifted it for every mouthful, and her stomach felt sick after she swallowed. "I have to leave," she finally whispered to her friend as she rose and started to get her bookbag.

The move was observed and her vulnerability noted. Her tormenters started up again, this time loudly addressing each other for her benefit.

"She's weird," Bob Parole said.

"Weird!? She's left the planet. What do they call it? The rapture."

"Sounds like group sex to me," said another.

"She doesn't belong with normal people, that's for sure," Bob said. "But I wonder, I really wonder, if she even has so ungodly a thing as a twat between her legs."

"It's not worth finding out," one of them said by way of answering. "She's too ugly."

More was said but before she heard it Charlie was rushing away and trying mightily to keep her tears to herself.

Suddenly she found Jeremy was beside her. "Don't listen to those idiots, Charlene. They're morons."

She nodded, feeling grateful but too distraught to even speak.

They emptied their trays into the rubbish, and then Jeremy said, "Come on, I'll walk you to biology."

Again she nodded, feeling grateful but not knowing how to express it.

Outside as they walked to the science building it was a beautiful May afternoon, the warmest of the year. Jeremy seemed to take it all in with delight. He looked at the flowers lining the path, the trees wearing new coats of shining leaves, the birds that flitted among the branches or hopped on the ground, the deep blue of the sky, all with eyes of wonder. From a plastic bag he was carrying he showed her a pair of rubber boots he brought so that he could wade into the marsh they were going to look at.

"They were attacking me for my beliefs," Charlie said. "It isn't fair."

"You believe what you want to believe. There's supposed to be freedom in America, though all those conformists don't know a thing about it."

"What do you believe, Jeremy?"

He smiled strangely. "Now there's a tricky question. The easy answer is—I don't know. I'm still looking. I don't think, though, that I believe in God. I hope that's okay? I like Thoreau a lot. He found spiritual values in the woods. Did you read _Walden_ last year in freshman honors?"

"No, Mrs. Borge had us read _The Scarlet Letter_. But what do you mean about spiritual values found in the woods, and yet you don't believe in God? I don't understand."

They were at the science building now but stayed outside. Today's lab was going to be a field trip to the woods, marshes and fields behind the school to look for plants, animals and birds as well as evidence of ecological interdependence.

"I heard Yvonne say she liked 'Flower in the Crannied Wall.' It's things like that. Thoreau was in the woods, but he was surrounded by mystery and beauty. Those are spiritual, don't you think?"

"I guess. I'm not really sure." She remembered that her uncle insisted there was only one source of spiritual values in the world, the Bible. She thought Jeremy was wrong, but she could see his sincerity and was confused. It made her think of all the doubts she used to have, a thought that scared her. Satan was everywhere, her uncle said, and could easily trick you.

Others from their class arrived and waited at the rendezvous site, excited to be involved with field work so that they could get an idea of how a working biologist did his job. It was the first and only biology lab that was outdoors. In their two classes this week they had studied wetland ecology, and Mr. Adamson had showed them many species, both dried specimens and photographs, they could expect to see on their excursion.

Waiting, Jeremy and Charlie dropped all mention of her lunchtime humiliation and sought normality in discussing their reading assignment. Jeremy said he was especially looking forward to this field work. He loved nature, but books on the one hand and pickled specimens to dissect on the other were an indirect way to experience the beauty and wonder of nature. Today, he said, they would meet her face to face.

When Charlie, thinking of her uncle, crinkled her face involuntarily, Jeremy smiled and said, "You should remember nature is God's handiwork."

They stood a little apart from the rest of the class as they waited for Mr. Adamson's arrival. Occasionally Charlie noticed a few kids looking at her and whispering something to their companions which invariably produced malicious smiles. When she woke this morning she had anticipated any embarrassment she was going to feel today would emanate from the clothes she wore. Everyone was told to wear more casual clothes and the girls especially were admonished not to wear skirts or dresses. She hadn't dared to mention this advice to her uncle, and even if she did it would not matter—she did not own a pair of jeans. Now she knew they might also be laughing at the dress she wore, but they were laughing more about the religion she followed. What was that word Tom Parole and his friends had used—weird? Well, she certainly felt weird. Thinking of the example of Jesus, she admonished herself and tried to look brave.

It didn't last long. She saw Tom Parole arrive late and begin speaking, with many glances towards her, to several of the students. She tensed as she tried to listen to Jeremy's thoughts on wetland loss and what that meant (it had been part of their reading assignment). But before another scene developed, Mr. Adamson showed up dressed in old dungarees and high boots instead of his usual suit, and she suddenly felt safe.

He was a tall, thin and balding man in his late fifties with gray hair and glasses. He had an habitual round-shouldered slouch that made him look defensive, but it was deceiving. He was a very forceful teacher who wouldn't tolerate any shenanigans in his classroom. Kids like Tom Parole who were wiseguys in other classes were perfectly behaved in Mr. Adamson's biology class, and this despite the fact he never got angry or even raised his voice. Charlie had often thought about the contrast between him and her uncle. He, her uncle, was a strong-willed man too, but he used bullying and harsh words to get his way. What this difference meant Charlie was not sure and never dared to draw any conclusion.

After a quick visual attendance check by their leader, the class walked en masse past the athletic fields to arrive at the natural field of high grass and shrubs where they followed a path made by innumerable feet to the edge of the pine forest. Down a hill to their left where a brook ran out of the woods was the marsh. It had open water about two football fields in length and one in width and was surrounded by some thirty yards or so of marsh reeds and other vegetation. There was a now-unused railroad track on the side nearest to them, and after going down the hill they stopped at it, and here Mr. Adamson spoke for about ten minutes, reminding them of some of the things easily seen and spoke in general terms about some easily seen ecological processes. He said the most common birds we see are the result of the white man's effect on the land—English sparrows, starling and pigeons were all introduced species from Europe. The fact that robins are common in towns now was the result of clearing forests in colonial times, for it was a species of open spaces near woodlands. Bluebirds, which used to be common, have been in decline because aggressive starlings take their nesting sites. Mocking birds, cardinals, and possums are part of a northern migration of southern species, partly or wholly caused by human interference such as feeding stations and the availability of garbage. Garbage also explains the southern migration of herring gulls, which used to be found far north of Maine. He pointed to the abundant and—Charlie thought—beautiful purple flowers called purple loosestrife and mentioned that it was an exotic not native to America that was driving some native species close to extinction. He also mentioned gypsy moths and zebra mussels, but here Charlie's mind wandered because she saw Tom Parole staring at her insolently as if he regarded her as an evasive species that did not belong here. Her attention came back to Mr. Adamson when he discussed the importance of wetlands for a healthy earth and clean water supply, for it was the wetlands that acted as a natural filter.

Then from the case he had been carrying with the help of a shoulder strap, he took out four pairs of binoculars and had the students take turns scanning the marsh for birds and aquatic animals. Besides some mallards, a blue heron was seen and then a green heron. One student saw a strange chicken-like dark bird that nobody knew until Mr. Adamson identified it for them: it was a coot. A red-tailed hawk was seen circling above. A large mound at the end of the marsh was discovered to be a muskrat's home, but the animal was not sighted. As he was speaking, Charlie noticed some small yellow birds with reddish streakings on their breast in the bushes below the railroad tracks and whispered to Jeremy, "Look, there's some yellow warblers. I was looking at their picture last night."

She meant to whisper but in her excitement spoke loud enough for others, including Mr. Adamson, to overhear her. His compliment brought a blush to her cheeks.

"Charlene's right," he said. "That's the kind of observation we all should be looking for."

With the teacher's general remarks completed, the group broke up into the lab-partner pairings and dispersed around the marsh to observe and make field notes of all aspects of nature they encountered. Their instructions were to not only make verbal notes but also sketches as accurate as possible to illuminate the words.

Charlie and Jeremy walked up the railroad tracks some distance before descending to the marsh. Jeremy, wearing his boots, was able to wade into the muddy and watery edges of the marsh to get a closer view of some of the things they saw. Sometimes Charlie could see the specimen fairly well; other times Jeremy would have to shout out the characteristics as she jotted down the notes. Many other things they saw on drier land so that both could examine them closely. In this way they took notes and made sketches of about twenty-five specimen in an hour—plants, insects, birds and amphibians, including a pied-billed grebe, two species of cattail, two different dragonflies, a little sulphur butterfly with black-tipped yellow wings, New England aster, a daisy-like flower purplish in color with a hairy stem and smooth, toothless leaves, a marsh wren and the like. One flower that they spent a long time discussing had a long stem with filament-like leaves and small yellow flowers. Charlie made a nice drawing of it, but all they could agree upon was that it was probably some sort of bladderwort. Another large plant also was a mystery. It was growing in muddy, shallow water, had a spherical fuzzy head and was about four or five feet high.

Mr. Adamson, making his rounds, was with two students forty feet behind them. Since he would be checking on their progress next, Charlie and Jeremy stood and waited. They watched a redwing blackbird drop into the reeds and decided his nest must be hidden there. While Charlie was adding that information to their field notes, Jeremy brought up the lunchtime troubles. His face showed he was still bothered by her victimization, and Charlie, seeing that, knew he was a friend and wouldn't say anything to disturb her. Besides, for the first time today she felt relaxed and happy to be in beautiful natural surroundings.

"Charlene, about those boys. You should remember how ignorant they are. Even the ones who get good grades don't understand anything about life or reality. Have you ever heard of 'group think'?"

When she shook her head no, he said, "Well, they show it. Anyone who is different seems weird to them because they're all little conformists. Thoreau said a man who is right is a majority of one. You should remember that. Belief comes from inside. Those guys live borrowed lives using other people's mediocre ideas. Thoreau also said the majority of people live lives of quiet desperation."

Again she looked puzzled and did not know how to reply.

Jeremy seemed to understand what was troubling her. "I noticed you thought it was strange that Thoreau and Tennyson could have spiritual thoughts without Christianity."

"I'm not sure it's possible."

"Oh, it is. The Buddhists even have spiritual thoughts without God. Our consciousness has a spark of the divine in it. Atman and Brahman are the terms."

"Isn't that blasphemy, or..." She tried to think of a more neutral term, but could only come up with pride. "Isn't it overweening pride?"

He laughed. "For a Christian maybe. My mother is into Buddhism, and she's certainly spiritual."

"Do you believe it too?"

"I'm not convinced, but it is interesting stuff. I think the Buddhists are very wise saying that you must give up all selfish thoughts and desires to become enlightened. But my mother says it's easier said than done."

Before she could answer Mr. Adamson came up. "How are you two getting on?" he asked in a friendly way. He too seemed very happy to be out of the classroom and in nature's lab.

"We've got about twenty-five things," Jeremy said.

Mr. Adamson raised his eyebrows and made a low whistle. "That many? If this was a contest, you two would be winning."

"That's because Charlene really knows the material," Jeremy said modestly. He had been just as good as she was at identifying things.

"But this plant here, Mr. Adamson," Charlie said, pointing, "is a mystery to us."

Mr. Adamson examined the tall plant and seemed to know what it was, but before he said anything he asked to see Charlene's drawing and notes.

He looked admiringly at her notebook and said, "Excellent. You've noted down all the important characteristics and drawn it accurately. That means when you got back from the field you'd be able to identify it easily in the books." He pointed to the spherical head. "That's the thing that nails it. It's buttonbush, _cephalanthus occidentalis_. It grows in very wet places and can survive being under water for long periods of time. It's one of the plants that shows a wetland is of long duration, not just seasonal. Again, you're both doing excellent work."

He was about to turn back when he paused, looked at Charlie and then back over his shoulder. He seemed to be mulling over something before coming to a decision. Reaching into the black case he was carrying and extracting a pair of binoculars, he said, "Jeremy, would you do me a favor and bring these binoculars to Lorraine and Sandy. Before I got to you they yelled up at me that they've spotted a nest they'd like to examine closely."

As soon as he was gone, Mr. Adamson looked at Charlie and gave her a slight smile to show his good intentions. "Charlene, a word about this Intelligent Design business. You're a very bright girl and an excellent student, one of the best I've had in many a year. But you're in danger of completely misunderstanding how science works. You must understand that it has nothing to do with belief. It requires open-minded inquiry, and the scientist should always let the facts lead him or her to the truth, not try to fit those facts into a pre-existing belief. Suppose, for instance, that someone didn't want this area to be wetland because he wanted to build here. Buttonbush is a plant that proves this is a permanent wetland. But if he called it something else so that he could get his building permit, he'd be dishonest, wouldn't he?"

Charlie nodded shyly.

"That doesn't mean that scientists don't think religion doesn't have a place in life. Plenty of scientists are also religious people, but their scientific work is separate from their religious beliefs. We all recognize that life is a deep mystery that gives rise to questions about the creator. There is a place for God in human life and in the life of a scientist, but not in a scientist's work. The way I would sum it up for you is this: if you have Jesus in your heart that's all you need. You don't need proof. If you follow Jesus' teachings like the Sermon on the Mount, then it has nothing to do with science. Do you understand the point I'm making?"

"Yes, sir, Mr. Adamson. I do. And I think you're right."

"Good."

That was it! The conversation she thought was going to be the final crushing attack of the day when Mr. Adamson first sent Jeremy away was nothing—more than nothing, it was a pleasant surprise. She was grateful to Mr. Adamson and surprised at how understanding he was. He respected her and showed it.

She did not have much time to think about the implications of his remarks, however, as she and Jeremy worked against time to find five more specimens to examine before the lab was over, but it was her last class of the day, and after thanking Jeremy and saying good-bye, then going quickly to her locker to get her books, she thought about Mr. Adamson on her walk home. The biggest surprise was that he seemed to be a Christian or at least not anti-Christian. The way her uncle talked, all scientists were atheists and of the devil's party. Even so, she didn't think her uncle would like his remarks about the nature of science, but she hoped he wouldn't get angry with her. If she told him what her teacher said about having Jesus in your heart, there would be less chance of facing his anger. But regardless, she would tell him everything simply because she was incapable of lying to him. Then her mind wandered into dangerous territory. She asked herself why Mr. Adamson was so nice and her uncle so mean. Her uncle was supposed to be filled with the love of Jesus, and yet—but she realized Satan was whispering these thoughts to her and stopped herself. She turned her mind to Jeremy, wishing that somehow he would become a Christian and they could become closer friends. But Satan was beckoning her down that path too, and— then a voice yelling "Hey, Christian bitch!" brought her back from her dangerous daydream. It was a car passing filled with boys from C.A. They yelled and gave her the finger, which had the effect of reminding her of all the excruciating humiliation and embarrassment she had been subjected to today, and just like that the good mood the field trip had induced in her melted away, and she found herself wishing that like her cousins she could be home-schooled. She saw no sign that tomorrow or the days following would be any better. She was now a marked girl.

Thus she entered the Harris home with conflicted feelings. From the picture of Jesus in the foyer, from a bookstand in the dining room with an open Bible, to all the Christian books on the living room shelves and all the prints of biblical scenes in every room in the house, there was no mistaking that this was a Christian home. Though for a long time these displays of religiosity were very strange to her, now they were familiar and part of being at home. That's because she knew the rules to be observed. Though here certain thoughts were to be kept to oneself, and though she still had the feeling that all the inmates behaved and spoke according to a script, still she knew where she stood. She understood the rules and knew how to behave. No one would taunt her here, no one would laugh at her clothes, no one would shout out an embarrassing insult.

So it was a refuge. She feared her uncle and could never be totally forthright with any of her relatives, and yet it was still home, a place where she hoped to be comforted.

Inside the two boys were working on their homework at the dining room table, and in the kitchen, separated from the dining room by only a long counter, her aunt and Martha were making preparations for dinner. Martha, peeling potatoes, saw her first. Her pale blue eyes widened and her red lips made an oval, for the dear sweet and gentle girl had instantly sensed that Charlie was troubled.

"What's wrong, Charlene? You looked pained."

She put her books on the counter and said, "I am. I had an awful day. A group of boys taunted me so much at lunchtime I had to leave."

"You mean about Intelligent Design?"

Charlie nodded and then broke into tears. "The things they said were awful. They made fun of my clothes and our religion." She couldn't mention the sexual insults, for that was one of the forbidden topics.

She looked up to see Aunt Cora had turned from the stove and was gazing at her, her face looking so sad she could have been Mary watching her suffering son, and thought she understood the reason: her powerless aunt could do nothing to lessen her pain, but she could feel it as her own. Fresh tears sprang into Charlie's eyes at the lovingkindness she could feel like a hug.

"What did they say?" Martha asked, gazing into her eyes.

"They were all boys. They said it was ignorant to be Christian, things like that. And as I said, they belittled my clothes."

"Your clothes," Matthew said from where he was listening at the dining room table. "What's wrong with your clothes?"

"I don't dress like the other girls. It makes me stand out."

"You dress like a Christian," said the future preacher. "Those Philistines dress for Satan. You should be proud, not ashamed."

For a moment the old Charlie rose up in her mind, but before she made a sharp retort, she stifled it. "I was defenseless against them at first," she said quietly, looking at Martha. "There were five or six boys taunting me before a nice boy in my biology class came to my defense."

"If it was me I wouldn't need any defender," Matthew said. "I wouldn't even listen to their worldly ways. Paul told the Corinthians to cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump. That's what we have to do. Those boys are all going to burn in hellfire. You should have told them that. It's what I would have done."

"Well, you're a boy, Matthew. It's different for us girls."

"She was bullied and picked on," Martha said. "She couldn't defend herself. Don't you see that?" Then she turned to Charlie. "I'm glad I don't have to go to Courtney Academy. I think you're very brave, Charlene."

Matthew listened to this aside impatiently. "There's never a time we shouldn't speak up for our lord. That's all I can say."

Aunt Cora did not dare to chastise her son, but she answered him indirectly. "Charlene, we'll have apple pie and ice-cream for the dessert tonight—your favorite. I hope that will cheer you up."

It did. The intent behind the words of some sort of female solidarity of compassion was perfectly understood. Charlie went upstairs to the bedroom she shared with Martha feeling that her aunt, Martha, Jeremy Lawrence and Mr. Adamson were on her side. Since she was supposed to see the world's dualism as one between Christians and Satanists, she was aware that this was a dangerous feeling. She didn't let herself verbalize, only feel it.

There were two beds on one side of the room separated by a nightstand, two desks and chairs on the other, and under the window one large bureau they shared. She put her books down on her desk, then pulled at her bra, which was very uncomfortable and which she would have liked to remove except that the rules of the house said she had to crush her womanly shape away while she was awake. She opened her Spanish book and was just starting to work on the subjunctive mood when Martha came into the room. She too had homework to do. In her case, it was to read several chapters of John Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_.

Charlie always found her sweetly sympathetic and loved her gentle and quiet cousin very much, even though she never dared discuss anything serious (such as religious doubts) with her. She always had the feeling Martha was not strong enough and would be hurt and shocked to know of such things. She was closest to her of anyone in the family, and still a wall of separation existed between them. But passive pain Martha understood, and after they both studied for a while, she interrupted the silence to surprise Charlie by saying, "I feel so bad for what you had to go through, Charlene. You must be mad at my father for making you take biology."

"Mad at Uncle Edward? Oh, no. And besides, biology is really interesting if you ignore the evolution stuff."

"Mrs. Pogue teaches us biblical biology. And she makes a good point. God is all powerful. Why couldn't He make everything in one week six thousand years ago? He's God. To me there is no mystery. Have you learned how those scientists claim they know things are older?"

"Yes. They use carbon 14 dating. It's something about something called an isotope that breaks down at a predictable rate."

Martha frowned thoughtfully. "But how do they know it's accurate?"

"I don't know. That's a good point. I know they must be wrong."

Martha went back to reading _Pilgrim's Progress_ ; then after a few minutes, she asked, "Is that carbon test all they have?"

Charlie shook her head. She'd been thinking about evolution and what Mr. Adamson said about being open-minded, and she had the feeling she wasn't being fair. She remembered something else he had told the class earlier in the year. "Well," she said, "there's other things like finding shells and fossilized sea creatures on mountain tops. Mr. Adamson talked about that about a month ago. He said Darwin found such things in the Andes."

Martha's sweet face looked puzzled. "How can that be?"

"It's something about geology. The earth has plates that move and force flatland to be pushed up to make mountains. Mr. Adamson says they move at less than an inch a year. This, though, I do not believe."

"Yes, those shells could have been swept to mountain tops during Noah's flood, couldn't they?"

"I don't see why not."

"So you don't believe Mr. Adamson?"

"I believe he believes it and that he's a sincere man. I think he might even be a Christian. But these things are mysteries. I think life is a mystery and we must have faith in Jesus."

"Amen," murmured her cousin. "But I don't see how he could be a Christian and believe in Darwin."

Charlie smiled. "It's another mystery," she said, and then went back to her Spanish verbs while Martha safely visited Vanity Fair.

There were no smiles at dinner. Uncle Edward, who never smiled, wore a frown through the entire meal, even when he said grace. Before dinner Matthew had told the girls he'd heard his father saying something about the books at the plumbing supply business being all messed up, but Charlie didn't think that was what was bothering him. She was pretty sure she was the cause of his displeasure.

Uncle Edward went down to his office beside the family room in the basement immediately after dinner and stayed there. While Charlie helped clean up and then worked on her biology field notes, she anxiously awaited the expected summons, which came at about 7:30 just as she was about to read her English assignment.

She came into the office feeling almost sick with anxiety. Uncle Edward was standing behind his desk with his arms folded, still wearing a dark frown. He regarded her for a moment in a hostile way as if he was once again searching her face for signs of harlotry.

A long uncomfortable moment passed while she felt his eyes boring through her. She hung her head, ashamed of herself.

"I spoke to your mother today. She claims to be trying to reform herself. She's joined Alcoholics Anonymous and _claims_ "—the word positively dripped with sarcasm when he said it—"that she hasn't had a drink in three months."

Charlie had seen her mother only briefly, infrequently and always with her uncle by her side during the past two years and nine months. Whenever she thought of her mother, the picture she saw in her mind always included a drink in her mother's hand. She could understand her uncle's sarcasm. It fit reality more than the extraordinary message he conveyed.

"She says she knows she wronged you and wants to apologize," her uncle continued, then waited for Charlie to say something. When she didn't, he went on. "I told her that if she goes another three months, she can see you, though only under supervision." Again he looked up, expecting a reply.

"Whatever you decide is best is fine with me, Uncle Edward."

He nodded, then sat at his desk and looked through a few papers. "Your aunt tells me you were insulted and taunted today. I trust you remembered the advice I've given you before. I trust you were a strong Christian."

"I tried to be, Uncle..."

Uncle Edward looked up, frowning, and made an impatient motion with his hand as if waving away a pesky fly. It was the verb he didn't like, she knew. "Remember that they are of the devil's party. Their words cannot penetrate the invisible shield of Jesus."

"Yes, Uncle Edward. I sought his comfort."

That answer was better. He nodded, then leaned back in his chair, but Charlie's hope that she would be dismissed and escape any further discussion was quickly squelched. "Did you have occasion to speak to Mr. Adamson? I'm told he will have a lot to say about our cherished plan."

"Yes, sir. I did speak with Mr. Adamson."

His eyes narrowed. He'd detected something in her tone he didn't like. "And what did he say."

Charlie took a deep breath. She had to tell him what her teacher said, knowing he was not going to like it. "He doesn't believe Intelligent Design is science. He said I was danger of completely misunderstanding how science works, that it... that it has nothing to do with belief. Science, he said, requires open-minded inquiry, and the scientist should always let the facts lead him or her to the truth, not try to fit those facts into a pre-existing belief."

With a sudden motion her uncle stood. He folded and unfolded his arms and started rocking on the balls of his feet while the scowl on his face grew darker and darker. His hands were clenched into tight fists. Seeing these signs, Charlie trembled in terror. "You explained to him how it was scientific, didn't you?

"I did," Charlie said meekly. "But he said science has no place for personal belief. It uses objective criteria."

"And what did you say to that, young lady. Those readings I gave you, weren't they scientific?"

"Yes, sir, they were. I did. I did tell him what you told me to say..." She paused to see if the heavens were going to open at the enormity of the lie she just told, but nothing happened. Her uncle frowned more deeply, that's all. "He said a lot of scientists were religious," she continued, feeling a little more confident, " but that their religious beliefs and their scientific practices were two different things. Uncle Edward, I think Mr. Adamson is a Christian because he said something else..."

"What?" her uncle demanded. "What did he say?"

She thought for a moment, trying to remember the exact words. "He said if you have Jesus in your heart that's all you need. You don't need proof. If you follow Jesus' teachings like the Sermon on the Mount, then it has nothing to do with science."

His eyes widened and then almost instantly narrowed as his face assumed a worried, troubled expression. He turned and looked at a print of Jesus raising Lazurus from the dead, then down at his feet. It took Charlie a few moments to realize that he was dumbfounded and—remembering a word she'd just learned this week in English class—nonplussed. It was the first time she'd ever seen behind the bullying exterior to the man inside, and it came to her as a revelation. He could be bullying and willful only because he simplified the world into black and white. Now exposed to some unexpected shades of gray, he was lost. That he had understood nothing about the awkward position he had put her in in school today also became clear to her. He didn't think of others' needs, only his own. He saw life as a battle where people were used to advance his agenda. And this was the man she had feared? She still did, but it was different now.

She saw him tremble as if his frame was shaken by some horrendous inner battle. But he spoke calmly when he said, "All right, Charlene. You may go now."

The Buried Life

Starting in the fall of her senior year, Charlie was allowed to see her mother once a week on Saturday mornings. Before that she had seen her episodically during visits her uncle arranged at the church, but with a frowning Uncle Edward monitoring their every word no real communications could take place. The unsupervised meetings came about only after her mother had stopped drinking, which was not easy. Three times she had stopped and three times begun again. Only after a whole year went by without her taking a drink did Uncle Edward have to concede that his sister had made significant progress. The first meeting under the new regimen was still extremely awkward. They were to meet at the Harris house and then retire to the basement family room for privacy. When her mother arrived, looking very nervous and dressed in jeans and a tight sweater that displayed her form, brother and sister greeted each other coolly, Aunt Cora kindly offered her sister-in-law a cup of tea which was politely declined, the two boys stared at her as if they had finally seen the face of Satan, and Martha looked nervous for Charlie's sake. Once alone in the family room, the awkwardness continued. There was no hug, and they stood and talked on the opposite banks of a river several feet wide. Neither knew how to begin the serious conversation they both needed to have and instead merely exchanged commonplaces. But there was a desperation in her mother's eyes that was more effective than any words in communicating how much she needed to be forgiven. Eventually they moved in the right direction when Charlie asked her something that had bothered her ever since their separation—why her mother had not said good-bye to her on her last night at home.

Her mother offered a perhaps too facile explanation. She said it was because she knew that she was an unfit mother and that Charlie would be better off without her. She didn't speak simply to make the break a clean one. She went on to explain that she had stopped drinking for Charlie's sake and that she hoped Charlie understood that the bad times were not really her—it was the booze that made her seem so selfish and indifferent. Then, drawing upon things she had learned at A.A., she said, "But I was the one who drank. I'm the one who is responsible for the mess I made. Nothing you or anyone else could say could be more harsh than the things I've said to myself in my own mind; nobody can blame me more than I blame myself for my disgraceful behavior. But," she added, "I do want you to know that I have always loved you and hoped for your happiness."

Those remarks brought on the needed hug and catharsis of tears that washed away all of the past.

Or did it? The past can be calm seas one moment and a tidal wave the next. There were other awkward moments, times when trust was hard to come by, when bitterness would rise up like a hissing snake at the memory of lonely nights of fear, times when her mother would look vacant and distant as if she was thinking of drink. But even these moments lessened as weeks turned into months, and they grew beyond the awkwardness to become friends. It was then that Charlie began to hope that her mother would find Jesus and be totally welcomed into the family. She didn't need to be told that Jesus was the ultimate condition for full acceptance—her uncle was a presence in her mind even here. The hints she made, however, were always deflected. Finally, on a particularly good day when they were laughing and reminiscing about the time the ice cream fell out of Charlie's cone and so did her mother's when she bent to help her, Charlie, suddenly serious, directly asked her mother if she thought she could ever become a Christian.

It was in this way that her mother started talking about her and Uncle Edward's past, for Charlie's question required a long answer, one that embodied, it seems, her and her uncle's entire childhood and even early adulthood. The details of their past came out in bits and pieces. Threads were picked up, dropped again and returned to two weeks or even a month later. But by the end Charlie had learned a great deal about her mother and uncle, especially why she would never be a Christian if it meant being like her brother Edward.

She was almost five years old when Edward was born. Before his arrival she had had her mother's entire attention and devotion; after his birth he instantly became the favorite while she was relegated to the shadows. The change was traumatic and filled her with a resentment that she could feel long before she understood it. At first Charlie did not understand that her mother was speaking only of her relationship with her own mother. But it seems she had never been of much interest to her father. He was a stern, controlling man whose whole life was his business. As a young man he had started working as a clerk in the concern and had made himself so indispensable to his boss that eventually he was made a partner. After the old man died her father bought out the widow and built the business into one of the largest plumbing supply concerns in the area. With money his only interest, he took no part in rearing her. He was always distant and scary. But Edward's birth changed that. As a male, Edward was the heir to the plumbing supply business and was accordingly treated like a little prince and was indulged by the formerly distant parent. That was clearly the deepest wound carried away from her childhood. She didn't say so explicitly, but she talked about the favoritism her brother received so often that Charlie understood the pain was still present in her mother's soul. The contrast between their respective treatment was almost unbelievable, but Charlie was quite sure her mother was not exaggerating. Their father would ride Edward on his knee as a baby, let him have his way even over their mother's wishes, teach him arithmetic before he could read, buy him all sorts of toys, especially mechanical ones so that the boy would learn that men built things. He would come into the house wearing a smile and go directly to the boy. He would not be interested in her schoolwork so that after a while she stopped trying to show it to him. At dinner he would make sure Edward got the best portion of the meat. On vacations he would teach his son how to swim or take him fishing or carry him on his shoulder if he was tired. All this time the only notice he took of his daughter Patricia was to the degree she disturbed his quiet. She couldn't play when she wanted to, couldn't watch television without permission, had to be quiet when he was doing the books at night or reading the paper in the morning. Any backtalk and she was delivered of a sharp blow to the rump and sent to her room.

Their mother, a quiet and submissive woman (like Cora, her mother observed with a strange emphasis), yielded to her husband on every point and jointly was guilty of spoiling the prince of the house, in the process turning him into a little monster as strong-willed as his father. Her earliest memory of Edward was the time when he was about three and refused to eat his hot oatmeal. When their mother tried to force him to eat, he'd held his breath, first turning red, then purple, at which color their mother panicked and gave up.

These stories she told revealed that her mother thought Uncle Edward was a hypocrite, a do-what-I-say-not-what-I-do man. Not that she used that word. She simply called him clever and described how he knew he couldn't get away with anything with his father and was always on his best behavior in his presence. It was only his mother and sister who saw the monster, and neither could say or dared to say anything.

These glimpses at her mother's and uncle's childhoods and parents paralleled Charlie's experiences with her grandparents. She had met them and had independently observed the similarities between her grandfather and her uncle. She had also noticed her grandmother's similarity to Cora. She had no independent mind whatsoever and took her cue from her husband in everything so that both of them did not act like grandparents she'd seen in movies and television. They were so strangely distant and cold to her that she suspected that they still regarded her as a family disgrace for being born illegitimate. And that her uncle was a willful little boy came as no surprise. She'd read in English class Wordsworth's line about the child being the father of the man.

The way she learned of the depths of her mother's hostility to her brother arose from an unexpected and embarrassing question her mother asked her one day. She had been regarding her with a curious expression for some time and not listening attentively to Charlie's description of her courses at school when suddenly she asked her what her breast size was.

Charlie didn't know either by cup size or by measurement.

"But I can tell they're large like mine, aren't they?"

To that she could say yes. Within months after she first started living in her uncle's house and eating regular, nutritious meals she had her first period and her breasts started sprouting so fast she didn't think they were ever going to stop growing.

"And it's Edward who makes you wear something to flatten them as much as possible, isn't it?"

"It was Aunt Cora who got the bras for me, but I do understand it was Uncle Edward's idea."

"Do you think it has something to do with Christian modesty?"

She did and nodded slightly, still wondering where this embarrassing conversation was leading.

"Well, it's not. I've seen you pulling at that uncomfortable monstrosity he makes you wear. Did you know he's never liked the womanly form?"

Of course she didn't. She also did not know her uncle's dislike of women antedated his conversion to Christianity or, her mother hinted, that his opinion about woman was even the cause of his conversion.

She started by telling Charlie what Edward was like as a teenager. It was at this time he began working at the supply house to learn the business. As far as her mother remembered it was his only interest. He didn't care about cars like a lot of other boys. He didn't like athletics. He was a very big boy even as a freshman, but he resisted all the high school football coach's efforts to recruit him for the team. He also was definitely not interested in girls and in fact seemed afraid of them. He avoided them to such a degree that her mother had thought he would never get married.

When she first showed signs of becoming a woman at the age of thirteen and before she turned wild—her mother emphasized this distinction—Edward, with whom she had never been particularly close, began strangely turning against her. In some way she could never quite understand, he seemed hostile to the very notion of the female body. He constantly criticized her clothes and make-up. It was, her mother said, as if he blamed her for turning into something strange and unwholesome. And she emphasized many times that this was before he became a Christian. She conceded that maybe he was just reflecting their father's attitude, for he, their father, noticing the same blossoming that her brother had noticed, became even more controlling and stern.

Mentioning her father turned her attention away from her brother, and Charlie heard no more about her uncle's strange hostility to women on that day. But her mother was explaining why she became the way she was, and that seemed even more important to understand. In high school she tasted freedom independent of home for the first time. That's when she started hating her parents for treating her like an old rag of no importance or value. She was sure this sense of injustice was one of the things that drove her to drink and wild ways. She told Charlie that she felt her treatment was so unfair that it used to make her tremble with a mixture of anger and indignation and make her want to get back at her parents. The only way she could do that was to shame them. She wasn't a good student and had no particular skills or talents. The only thing she had was her beauty, and when she saw the way many boys stared at her she soon figured out how to use her beauty to get her way. That's when she became a harlot (though she did not use that term) and was pregnant by the age of seventeen. Disowned and thrown out of the house, alone she had found her way to a home for unwed mothers. Her knowledge of her family thereafter came from a distance. This she remembered distinctly: how surprised she was that Edward had found religion. They weren't particularly religious growing up at home. The family went to church only occasionally and on special days like Christmas and Easter, and with Edward's interest in business leading him to study business administration in college, she had no idea where his finding of Jesus came from. All she heard was that he had fallen in with a group of fundamentalists in college and transferred to a Bible college where he had quickly met and married Cora and where he studied to be a minister. Of one thing she was very sure: the news must have distressed her father mightily and Edward must have used all his skill in handling the old man to get him to accept his conversion. He must have promised to continue running the plumbing supply business since that was what he did. But one thing becoming Christian did not do: it didn't fill his heart with Christian forgiveness as the Lord's Prayer requires. He became even more willful and judgmental, refusing her requests for help and even refusing to see her after Charlie was born. Then her mother made a bitter remark that surprised Charlie and made her realize that she probably hated her brother. "You'd think a minister wouldn't be interested in money, but it's Edward's first love. Maybe now it's his second love after Jesus, but it's still a love. I wonder if he had to choose what he would do. One is money, the other power."

So Charlie learned that her mother's inherited feelings from her childhood all but closed off the possibility that she would ever become a Christian. That meant that her life, her fate, her future, lay with Uncle Edward and his plans for her. She still hoped that her mother might come to the light, but it was a wan hope, like dreaming of happiness and contentment in a prison camp where there was no possibility of escape.

#

On a chilly mid-April Saturday afternoon, with ugly blackened remnants of snow marring the sides of the street and spring seemingly a distant prospect, Charlie was walking with Martha to their church and thinking about her mother. They were going to clean the church to get it ready for the annual meeting of the congregation where church elders would be elected or re-elected, prizes to the best Sunday school students awarded, Reverend Harris would give his state-of-the-church speech, and new members would be introduced. Charlie had hoped for a long time that her mother would be one of those new members, and now she was thinking about all the reasons she knew it was not going to happen.

"You seem lost in thought, Charlene," Martha said. "What are you thinking about?"

"My mother."

"Isn't she well?" Martha asked, responding to something in Charlie's tone.

"Oh, yes. She's much nicer now that she doesn't drink."

"But it's Jesus, isn't it? Why doesn't she accept Jesus? My mother told me my father talked to her about it."

"I don't know," Charlie said. She wished she could talk to Martha about the real reasons, but all she dared to say was, "She doesn't seem to like religion for some reason."

"Maybe it's because of the northern Baptist Church. My father says that when they went to church as kids it was bad. He says it wasn't Christian enough. They don't feel Jesus as a personal savior. The minister would preach without conviction or feeling. Have you told her that?"

She shook her head.

"You know my father won't accept her unless she accepts Jesus."

Charlie thought of her mother and then the face of Jeremy came into view. "Some people just aren't religious."

"Well, they're wagering their souls."

"I think my mom has taken a huge step in stopping drinking. Maybe in time she'll find Jesus." She said that knowing how unlikely her mother would come to Jesus and knowing that she herself still did not feel the joy she was supposed to feel from the Lord. Again, she wished she could talk about these things to her cousin—or anyone, for there was no one she _did_ talk to who would understand. Sometimes she thought Aunt Cora might, but she didn't dare take the chance.

She realized Martha was speaking. "Sorry, I was thinking of something. What did you say?"

"I was saying yes, you're right. She has taken a big step. And we can take comfort from knowing that Jesus will always be waiting."

"From what I understand, though, it's that if you're an alcoholic, you're always one. It takes effort continually to not drink. I looked it up on the computer at Courtney Academy."

Martha seemed troubled to hear this. She glanced at Charlie and then dropped her eyes. There was a computer in Uncle Edward's office, but the kids were not allowed to use it. Martha seemed to think they were very dangerous things.

"There's all kinds of information on the internet, you know. Plenty of stuff about evangelical Christianity, for example. I was doing some work on school stuff and finished, so I looked up alcoholism and found out a lot."

"Does my father know?"

"That I used a computer? Oh, sure. I've showed him how to do some stuff."

"Yes, I know. But does he know you do stuff beyond school work?"

"I don't know. The only thing I've looked up outside of school stuff is alcoholism. I didn't think he'd mind that I was trying to understand my mother."

"I see. But I think Jesus would be the best help to keep away from drink. That could be a motive for her too."

"Yes, it could." She thought for a moment. "She doesn't like it, you know, that she can only see me at home. She'd like to take me shopping and stuff like that."

"She can do that when she's a Christian. But you understand why my father puts down these restrictions."

Charlie nodded. "Because she's _not_ a Christian. Maybe it's a brother-sister thing, who knows?"

Martha didn't understand the reference, and Charlie regretted making it. "I mean sometimes differences that brothers and sisters have as kids persist. My mother was the older child. Maybe she's stubborn."

"Jesus waits," Martha said, repeating her thought.

They were approaching the church now. Charlie always thought that it looked unbalanced. It had a high concrete foundation of ten feet below a single story of about the same height, and it made the white vinyl clapboards look overwhelmed. She had never dared criticize it, of course, because Uncle Edward approved of the design, but she had hinted at her feeling that architectural dissonance was the first impression the church gave to Martha once, and she had understood Charlie's point. Martha explained that her father wanted enough steps to give the parishioners the feeling of ascending to God as they entered the church. The building, though one story, had a high peak topped off in the front by a short steeple with a white cross. The windows were all plain and unadorned in good Protestant style that suited people to whom the Bible was the one and only anchor of the faith. Inside the peak allowed a high altar which had a large cross, also white, over the altar, which again in good Protestant style was plain and unadorned. There was a lectern for the Bible and a large baptismal fount. At the other end, above the entrance was a balcony that could hold thirty people, but because of the small congregation it was never used. The pews consisted of two rows of twenty separated by a central aisle. These too could accommodate many more people than the current congregation, but that was by design and a sign of well-placed optimism—for every year new members joined the church, including a new family who had just joined last week on Easter. That meant that since this time last year seven more families had becomes members, and the baptismal fount had soaked many a reborn soul.

Elizabeth Pogue was sitting on the stairs waiting for them. She, the daughter of the woman who home-schooled her and the Harris kids, was a big girl, very plain and very quiet. Under a waist-length gray jacket she was attired, like Martha and Charlie, in what amounted to the female uniform of the church—a high-necked dress that at the waist ballooned out, thanks to a petticoat, and went to just above the ankles. On her feet were black shoes. She wore her hair in an old-fashioned bun just as her mother did and peered through thick lenses at the world with an imperturbable face. She was fairly intelligent, Charlie thought, but seemed to be totally lacking in curiosity and personality so that she appeared dull-witted. Martha thought that she was a good Christian, which was the most important thing.

"Hello, girls," she said in her phlegmatic way, her voice flat and emotionless. She saved her enthusiasm for the hymns and responses on Sundays. She stood. "What shall we do first?" she asked, addressing Martha. As the minister's daughter her opinion was the one that counted.

Just then a car went by and someone hooted derisively, "Watch out! The devil lurks everywhere." Another voice, which Charlie recognized as that of Bob Parole, yelled, "Creationism sucks!" He lived at the other end of the street and never went by the church without yelling something derisive. He was also probably the one who periodically sprayed graffiti on the church, four-letter words that made Uncle Edward apoplectic.

Martha frowned, but Charlie having grown used to these verbal attacks, had become inured to them. She had enough doubts and confusions in her own mind to keep her occupied. "Let's do the chairs first," she suggested.

They walked up the steps. At the door, Elizabeth said, "It must be awful to have to go to school with boys like that."

Charlie shrugged. "It used to bother me. I just ignore them now."

Inside they went down to the basement where the meeting would be held. It had a kitchen at one end and tables and chairs placed across the entire basement so that it looked like a cafeteria. Getting their cleaning materials from the utility closet, Elizabeth, still brooding on the anti-Christian boys, said, "I don't understand people who don't believe the Bible. Everything is so plain. The truth shines from every word. Why can't they see it? They wouldn't mock creationism if they actually read the Bible."

Charlie had a thought but stifled it. To avoid saying anything too dangerous, she had to think first. She busied herself looking for the spray cleaner. Martha was pulling the chairs out from the tables; the phlegmatic Elizabeth stood and waited.

Charlie had never been the same after her talk about faith and science with her biology teacher Mr. Adamson and her talk later that same day a year ago with her uncle. But her faith still reigned; still she carried Jesus in her heart. She understood that while her uncle saw the world simplified into black and white, she still believed her uncle was right in saying that Jesus was the only way to salvation. Good and evil were black and white. Jesus and Satan were black and white. Science, though, was not, and she also saw that science was right. Her solution to the seeming antagonism between the Bible and science was to follow Mr. Adamson's advice that as long as she had Jesus in her heart nothing else mattered. Believing that, she could stand on solid ground, even if the solid ground was in the middle of a swamp. Something her mother had said this very morning about Charlie getting straight A's at Courtney Academy complicated things even further. She was proud of her daughter and also mystified by the source of Charlie's intelligence. She always thought her parents were stupid, and she was no brainiac herself, so it must have been from her father, though she wasn't sure who he was. Then she looked at Charlie with a strange longing in her eyes as she thought for a moment; and said, "Charlie, you use that intelligence. It's a gift—from God, I suppose. Don't let anyone take that from you."

She was talking about Uncle Edward, Charlie knew, but she wasn't sure what she was warning her against. Charlie suspected that she was trying to deflect her from religion, and she had had to remember her uncle's warning about Satan being everywhere. But she had grown to trust her mother. That's why everything was so confusing. She had lost respect for her uncle while still fearing him. She wanted to have her mother; she wanted to be a good Christian. She believed science was right; she believed the Bible was right. Elizabeth believed the Bible explained creation perfectly and that a good Christian accepted it totally without question; she knew it was a human explanation of mystery and she wanted to believe she too was a good Christian. Most of all she wanted to talk to somebody and didn't dare to say what was on her mind. Elizabeth's question had an answer. It was there on the tip of her tongue. Dare she say it? Would she understand? Would Martha? Would they help her to understand herself? How could a Christian doubt? She knew both girls were better Christians than she was, but they didn't have her nature. They hadn't seen a mother drunk and shameless; they hadn't felt scared and lonely; they had not been ripped from their home and familiarity and gone to strangeness.

The thinking wasn't doing any good; it wasn't making anything clearer. So for lack of any clear alternative, and because she needed to find out just what kind of a Christian she was, Charlie decided to trust her first impulse. What had been stifled was spoken. She turned with the spray cleaner in her hand and said:

"Elizabeth, you know those prophets and writers of the Old Testament weren't scientists. They were putting the Word of God into language human beings could understand."

Elizabeth's eyes narrowed in—what? Suspicion? Perplexity? Fear? "What do you mean?"

"I mean the Bible story of creation is contradictory. Genesis 1:1—2:3 starts with the dark void and then light is made. The sky is separated from the seas. Then the water pulls back to make land. But Genesis 2:4 starts with dry land; then a stream arises to water the world."

There, she'd said it. She'd voiced a contradiction that was her contradiction as well. Her heart pounded waiting for Elizabeth to speak.

But Elizabeth didn't speak. She looked stunned.

"It doesn't matter, you know. They weren't scientists, remember. They were men of God. They were speaking to men and women about the Word of God. No matter how you look at it, God made the world. That's indisputable."

Elizabeth looked at Martha, who had stopped moving chairs and was listening. She too looked perplexed and fearful. "But that's just saying the same thing. The Bible is never wrong."

Her voice cracked, and hearing it Charlie wisely refrained from mentioning the contradiction about the different versions of Adam and Eve's creation. "You're right. I was just saying what the enemies of Christianity say. We have to have arguments to counter them, you know."

That statement seemed to allay their fears, perhaps because Charlie had correctly seen that that, more than anything, was what they wanted.

They began concentrating their attention on the cleaning job, and while they washed the windows, wiped the chairs, dust mopped the tiled floor, put throw-away tablecloths on all the tables and then set them with silverware and salad bowls, the only conversation dealt with their work.

When they took a break before they began cleaning the kitchen, however, Elizabeth revealed that she was still brooding on the Bible and its enemies.

After drinking a glass of water she sat at the kitchen counter, carefully smoothed her dress, and looked hesitantly at Charlie. "I was talking with Matthew in school yesterday when my mother had to take a phone call. He was saying something that applies to those boys who scoff and mock us."

"Oh, what's that?" Charlie asked, trying to appear casual while instantly putting herself on guard against saying anything indiscreet.

"He was quoting from Revelations. Let the evil doer go on doing his evil and let the filthy minded wallow in filth, but let the good man persevere in goodness. Matthew says that means we have no duty to try to save those who follow the Beast."

"What do you think we should do?" Martha asked. She was standing and leaning against the counter with an expression of deep interest registering on her sweet face. She too had been brooding.

"I said it was our Christian duty to proselytize and bring the good news to those wallowing in sin. But I was just wondering—have you ever tried to explain to those boys the sweetness we feel in Jesus?"

"I've tried a few times, but just got laughed at," Charlie said. It was a lie, but only by half. She knew she'd just get mocked more if she tried to talk about Jesus to Bob Parole and others of his ilk, but she had thought about talking to Jeremy, only to realize it also would lead nowhere. This year she saw him much less frequently than in the past two years. His lunch period was always opposite hers, and they only had one class, American Government, together. At least a few times each week they would talk a little before or after class. Two weeks ago it almost seemed that he was working up the courage to ask her to the senior prom, but because he wasn't a Christian she knew that it was impossible her uncle would let her go and did nothing to encourage his hints. But if he were a Christian...

"If the Rapture comes they will all be damned forever," Elizabeth said, interrupting her reverie.

"We can only hope they will see the light," Martha said, a remark that Charlie seconded emphatically. She felt relieved to feel they were in agreement and that the dangerous topic of evolution vs. Creationism seemed to be forgotten.

But it wasn't. They finished cleaning the kitchen quickly, for it was not used often and needed little more than a dusting and tidying up. Three ladies from the church arrived as they were putting the cleaning material back into the utility closet. The girls helped them bring the meal for tonight's meeting into the kitchen—tuna casserole all prepared and ready for heating, the salads, the buns, the desserts and the like. The ladies were talking about the Maguire family, who just this week had joined the church. They were considered a great catch because they had been Catholics and had been brought to see the true Christianity of The Church of Salvation Through Jesus through the Holy Spirit talking directly to the mother, who had in turn convinced the rest of the family to join.

Outside, Elizabeth said that she took the Maguire conversion as a sign that their church was prospering and righteous in the eyes of the Lord. Maybe, she said, it was even a sign that the Rapture was close at hand, though Charlie dared not correct her by saying it was the conversion of the Jews that was the sign. Elizabeth was strangely excited, whatever the cause. Saying "I feel Jesus is near—He's coming for us and soon we shall be in paradise" was not phlegmatic, but rather strangely unbalanced. Never before had she suggested they hold hands in a circle and pray before separating, but that's what she wanted to do now. Charlie, who didn't think public prayer was a good idea, had no choice put to join hands and listen to Elizabeth say in an ecstatic voice, "Jesus, our every thought is of your glory. We await your arrival with joy!" Her parting salutation was also strange and different. Instead of "good-bye" she said, "Praise Jesus!"

Charlie watched her for a moment before turning to Martha. Her raised eyebrows were understood, and Martha said, "I've seen her like that occasionally, though I'm not sure what gets her excited."

Charlie was pretty sure that it was her fault and felt awful. She had put a tiny kernel of doubt in the girl's mind, and it had unhinged her. To do this to a sincere and authentic Christian meant that she, Charlie Harris, the daughter of Tris Harris the former harlot and recovering alcoholic, was not a good Christian, not even a good person. She remembered reading Tennyson's _In Memoriam_ in English class where the poet specifically said that disturbing the serenity of the believing Christian was an evil thing. In class it had been an abstraction; here it was real. She must never, never ever verbalize her doubts again, never let anyone in the church know what her intellect had seen and what her heart could not understand. It must be her burden alone. Silently she prayed to Jesus for forgiveness.

She was glad Martha began conjecturing on who would win the prizes for the best Sunday school students. The prizes were usually new Bibles. Martha had won one last year, so was pretty sure she wasn't going to get a second one. Charlie eagerly began suggesting a few likely candidates. Anything was better than being reminded of her transgression.

But at home Matthew almost baited her into another unchristian retort. Now fourteen and having added a tie to his usual uniform of dress slacks and a white shirt, he was becoming insufferable—a condition that only she seemed to recognize. The rest of the family was very proud of his earnest and righteous ways. What he did was subject them to an interrogation on the work they had done.

"Did you wash the windows?"

"Did you wipe off all the chairs?"

"Did you set the tables?"

"Did you clean the kitchen?"

"Did you wash the floor?"

The last question was the one that tripped them up. Charlie said that they didn't need to since it has been washed and waxed earlier in the month by some other members of the congregation.

The answer did not please. "You were to do the entire cleaning, not use your judgment about what needed to be done and what could be skipped. Honestly, girls are so untrustworthy."

Momentarily a flash of anger rose up in Charlie's mind. _Who appointed you our boss_? was on the tip of her tongue before she wisely stifled it and instead said, "Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Calderwaller both said the place looked wonderful."

She spoke sharply, and Matthew frowned. "You are becoming a forward girl, Charlene. I would ask Jesus for forgiveness if I was you."

Charlie, feeling chastised and embarrassed at the same time, apologized, but when Matthew accepted it gracelessly, she had to stifle yet another flash of anger. "I'm very tired," she said. "I think I'll take a rest."

It wasn't the work that tired her; it was a paper for her American Government class she worked on until almost midnight that had drained her of energy. Then it had taken over an hour to fall asleep because she was thinking of her mother. She needed a rest. She had about an hour before they would all have to get ready for the church supper.

At first when she lay down she was still thinking about Matthew, but she struggled to get the angry thoughts out of her mind. He was only doing what he thought was his Christian duty to ensure that the meeting went well. That he overstepped his authority could be attributed to his youth. She was aware of the concepts of feminism and of full equality for women but understood they were concepts from the secular world—as alien to her as people who vacationed on Greek isles or tribal people who ate insects and grubs. Thus rationalizing Matthew's behavior, she was able to dismiss it. Elizabeth and her responsibility for unhinging the girl were more difficult to banish from her mind. She still felt awful and again admonished herself for introducing things she learned in school—that alien, secular place—into her church relationships. That admonishment, however, did nothing to allay her guilt for the damage already done. She needed to understand how what she said had had so destructive a result. Understanding it might make her able to avoid moments when she would be tempted to say something unwise.

Why did she need to tell someone her doubts? That led to another question. Why couldn't she just tell her mother, the most logical person who would listen to her confusion and want to help? But that question was easily answered. She wanted her mother back totally, living with her like in her fantasies where she joined her mother in the rooming house run by a jolly and pleasant widow who was also a recovering alcoholic. The ticket to that destination was her mother's conversion to Christianity—almost impossible, she now knew. Unbidden, another question came: How good a Christian could her uncle be if he followed not Jesus' admonishment to forgive those who trespass against us? Now Satan was speaking; the enemy was near. She felt a chill of horror and knew that she was afraid to share her doubts with her mother because she and not her mother might be the one who changed. No, she would not go _there_. A world without Jesus was too bleak and scary a place.

But backing up a little, she got on the right trail in understanding Elizabeth. The best moments in her life each week occurred when she was first alone with her mother in the basement family room every Saturday morning. They would embrace, and feeling the depths of her mother's warm love made her positively tingle with joy and contentment. There was no physical contact in Uncle Edward's house, no hugs, no kisses. Martha and she had lived in the same room for four years and had never see each other naked. Uncle Edward putting his hand on one of his son's shoulder was considered a deep sign of affection in the family—and it only happened rarely and only to the two boys. Charlie had never seen her uncle and aunt kiss or even touch one another. She recalled last fall reading _Great Expectations_ how her heart bled for little Pip at the hands of his cold sister and how she loved Joe Gargery's warm humanity. She'd recognized the hunger in Pip's soul for love. It had helped her to understand how emotionally starved everyone was in the Harris household. It must be true for Elizabeth's family too. Their only outlet for emotion was Jesus. Was He enough? He would have to be if he was their all, but she saw some families at church who were loving. She saw them hug. She saw, too, Uncle Edward frown as she remembered what her mother told her about his attitude towards women. But her unruly mind was pressing her to go in another direction, to a profane thought that had a life of its own. It lurked there in the corner of her mind, and trying to control it was useless, and finally she let it come: the image of Jimmy Cronin with his thing pointing up. It always scared her, but something bigger than the fear always pushed her on until it was Jeremy Lawrence standing above her and calling her sweet baby girl softly and making her want him to come to her. As always she began to feel first warm and then wet as she would remember the sounds of her mother's urgent moans of pleasure.

She knew she was a wicked girl. By nature she was her mother's daughter and every bit the harlot Uncle Edward had thought she was. But not so wicked that she would touch herself. No, there too she would not go. She had to be a Christian or else her soul would be lost forever. She, living in time, had to think beyond time. At school she'd frequently heard girls talking about sex and knew that many were sexually active. But they lived in that world of Greek isles and grubs for dinner, the world where Satan reigned and which she could only see through a dark glass. Uncle Edward in one of his sermons suggested Eve had tempted Adam through sex to partake of the apple. He used the phrase "feminine wiles," but she understood that his message was that female sexuality was Satan's instrument on earth. Still she burned with desire. Oh, yes, she was a wicked person even while trying to be a good Christian. She hoped Jesus understood her thoughts and took pity on her weakness. Now in this condition she needed Jesus more than ever and prayed to him for strength.

Not instantly, not even quickly, but peace came and she drifted off into a peaceful sleep. When she woke she saw that Martha was in the room. She had returned from a shower, fully dressed, and was brushing her hair. The noise of the bed springs made her turn. "Oh, Charlene, I was trying to be quiet."

Charlie looked at the clock radio by the bed: it was almost four o'clock. "I have to get ready soon, anyways. I guess that late-night school work got to me."

Martha, busy tying her hair into a bun, didn't answer. Charlie swung into a sitting position and remembered her profane thoughts in the sight of this sweet and innocent girl. "Martha," she said in a low voice.

She turned.

"Do you ever think about boys?"

She looked down. "What do you mean? she asked guardedly, showing that she _knew_ what Charlie meant.

"You know, getting married and all."

"I'm sure I will get married when my father thinks it's right."

"But what if you met a good Christian boy who was cute and seemed to like you?"

A look of panic crossed her face. "Charlene, is there some boy you think of that way? My father wouldn't like that."

"I know. I'm just trying to find out what is expected of us."

Martha glanced at her and quickly dropped her eyes. "I think we're expected to not think about boys."

Did she really say that? Either Martha was avoiding the truth or she'd never really thought about boys in _that_ way. Of course in this household that was just possible, but she'd seen Matthew regarding her sometimes when she came out of the bathroom wearing her nightgown with that lewd look that boys had and knew he was thinking of sex. She knew its power tested even the best Christian. "Not think? How can that be? I don't plan on seeing any boy if that's what you're thinking—but I do think about marriage, you know. You can't help thinking."

Martha sat on her bed facing Charlie. "I guess I know what you mean. I've thought about marriage and what...it entails, but it's all in the future so not quite real to me. That's all I can say."

She blushed when she obliquely mentioned sex, and Charlie understood she was very uncomfortable talking about something her father would not approve of. Actually, Martha confirmed what she thought. A good Christian girl was not expected to think about sex and that if it did cross her mind she had Jesus to stand between her soul and her animal nature. "That's all I've done really," she said. "I'm still trying to learn how to be a good Christian."

The tension drained from Martha's face. "Oh, you are, Charlene. You're already a good Christian."

"I hope so," she said as she rose to gather her clothes and things for her shower. Before she had chosen the dress she would wear, Mark tapped on the door to say that his father wanted to see Charlie in his office. Instantly a feeling akin to panic seized her. She was sure Elizabeth had talked to her mother who had in turn called Uncle Edward. With her heart pounding she went downstairs passing Matthew and Mark, already returned to the dining room table where they were playing chess. Matthew had a mean yet pleased look on his face as he stopped in mid move, a chess piece clutched between his thumb and index finger, to follow her passage across the room. He obviously thought Charlie was being brought to account for one of her many transgressions, but he held his tongue.

Downstairs, the door to the office was ajar. She paused, took a deep breath to steady her nerves, knocked and then entered. "You wish to see me, Uncle Edward?" she said in a tiny, tremulous voice. She felt her hands shaking.

He was standing in the corner with his back to her studying one of the biblical prints, which she recognized as Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount. He didn't turn right away.

His Bible was open on the desk. She could see a sheet of paper with biblical citations written in chapter and verse. This would be the piece of paper he took with him to the lectern for Sunday's sermons. He always spoke extemporaneously but listed the verses he would use for the basis of his talk. Rarely during a sermon would he actually open the Bible and read the passage—for the most part he knew the Bible by heart.

She could hear the dripping of the faucet in the basement half bath. Though her uncle knew everything about plumbing fixtures, he knew nothing about installing them, and the faucet had been steadily dripping for over a year.

Finally he turned. She noticed his tie was loosened—a very rare sight. "I've been thinking of you, Charlene." He pointed to the Sermon on the Mount picture. "There is a picture of our Lord as a teacher, one of the highest roles a Christian can fulfill. That educational role is, as you know, the role I see you fulfilling in our church nationally—educating the public about our beliefs and practices, meeting with reporters, writing pieces about our church for publication."

She knew of his plans and avoided thinking about them. When she was young she had been bold, but her life as a Christian had taught her humility and how to be shy and quiet, not assertive. The thought of being a public figure, taking questions from reporters and the like, terrified her.

"I have here a letter from the Reverend Doctor Achibald Sharpe telling me that he looks forward to having you as a student at his college."

"You mean I've been accepted?"

"Of course. My recommendation was all you needed."

Charlie got straight A's at Courtney Academy with the exception of one B in calculus. The guidance counsellor told her she could get into any college or university in the country—Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton. He clearly thought her brilliance would be wasted at a bible college, but the thought of those other schools scared her and she was happy to go to a place where she would be surrounded by people with familiar and safe beliefs. She smiled in relief, both at the news of her collegial future and that her fears about Elizabeth had proved unfounded.

"We expect you will be a great asset to the church, Charlene."

"I hope so, sir."

"You will also be receiving a special award tonight at the church supper—and a scholarship to buy books and the like. Your room and board and tuition will be paid by the college. I hope you will look back on this day as a very special and happy one in your life as a Christian."

"I hope so too, Uncle Edward."

He frowned. "You seem hesitant."

"Sometimes it scares me to think I would have to explain things to reporters."

"Jesus will guide you. He's been guiding you now for almost four years. Surely you can trust him to guide you in the future."

She tried to smile. "I trust Him. It's me I worry about."

"Nothing is impossible if you live for Jesus. Remember that, Charlene."

It confused her to perceive that he spoke like a kindly father.

Beside the picture of Jesus raising Lazurus on the wall behind the minister's desk was an etching by Rembrandt of Abraham about to sacrifice Isaac. The angel of the Lord was shown staying Abraham's left arm holding the knife while his other arm was pulling Abraham's hand from where he was covering his son's eyes so that Isaac would not see the horror that was about to occur. It was Isaac her eyes zeroed in on. He was passively awaiting his fate, kneeling without struggle and either trusting his father or God.

Charlie, wondering if an angel would deliver her from the future she had not chosen, was slow to respond to her uncle's kindly remark. She saw him waiting expectantly. "Yes, sir," she said.

### PART II JEREMY

The Child is father of the Man;

And I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by natural piety.

–William Wordsworth,

"My Heart Leaps Up"

Lost and Found

Jeremy Lawrence concentrated on swinging down and topping the ball. He was fungoing ground balls to his pals Tony Dibella, Ray Martineau and Keith Hadley, and all four of them were feeling the pressure. It was already mid May, and with a late spring and Little League tryouts less than two weeks away, they were already behind their self-imposed schedule to get ready. They had rushed home from school to change their clothes and get their gloves, then rushed back to the playground only to find they weren't quick enough. Some teenage boys were already having a game on the diamond, and soccer practice was in session so that there was no room for them. Ray, who lived three houses down the street from Jeremy, suggested they use his backyard. It was a hundred feet long and fifty feet wide. The disadvantage was that they could mostly only practice fielding ground balls. If a pop-up went over the fence and landed in Mrs. Richards' yard, it would be dangerous to try to retrieve it. Mrs. Richards was a grouch and particularly disliked little boys. Ray said it was because some boys had broken her picture window years ago and then run away. So only Tony had dared hit some shallow fly balls when it was his turn to fungo. Jeremy lacked the exquisite bat control that Tony had—he was, they all agreed, the best hitter among them—and was just hitting ground balls. They also had to be careful in case a ground ball got past the fielders because Mrs. Martineau had just planted her flower garden against the back fence last weekend, and she certainly did not want it trampled up. One guy was always behind the two fielders to get any errant ball. But all these precautions were worth the trouble because they desperately needed to practice.

Keith must have been feeling the pressure, for he muffed the second ground ball in a row that Jeremy hit to him. His freckled face turned bright red. They had a rule that if anyone booted a grounder he was hit to until he got one. He was going to try out for shortstop, so his pride was hurt.

"Hey," Jeremy said, changing the subject to ease the pressure on his pal, "we should all make sure to get up real early tomorrow so that we can get to the park before any other kids." Tomorrow was Saturday—no school.

"Yeah, I obviously need the work. I'm still rusty," Keith said, trying to hide his embarrassment by conceding the point. But he cleanly fielded the next ground ball, so the tension lessened.

Things went smoothly after that. They all were good ballplayers and for ten minutes everything hit—hard, soft or in between—was fielded perfectly.

Next Jeremy went back to the field and Tony did the fungoing. Now pop-ups were mixed in with ground balls, and after any particularly good play they fired the ball around just like during a game when an out was made. They could all feel their confidence building. Best pals all, they wanted each of them to make the team. Any competition that existed was against all the other kids in town who wanted to be little leaguers—and with so many kids playing soccer nowadays, there was less competition than in their fathers' day.

Just when it became Jeremy turn to fungo again, Ray's little brother Pete came out with his glove and a hopeful look in his eyes. He was only six. "Jeremy," he yelled, "can I play too?"

His brother answered for him. "No, you can't, Pete. We're practicing for Little League tryouts. Go back inside and watch TV."

The little fellow had such a hurt and crestfallen look on his face that Jeremy felt sorry for him. "Oh, we can hit him a couple. He's got to learn."

The others reluctantly agreed, and Jeremy tossed him a few balls underhanded to see how ready he was. Not very was the answer. He put his glove pocket-side down and tried to stop the ball by smothering it, not catching it.

"No, no, Pete. Turn your glove around and watch the ball into the glove," Jeremy said.

He was about to tap a soft ground ball to him when he saw out of the corner of his eye his Aunt Leslie hurriedly coming up to him from the side of the house. She lived on the next block and was often at their house, so he wasn't surprised until he saw her face was contorted in fear and anxiety. Feeling scared, he dropped his bat. "What's wrong, Aunt Leslie?"

She was breathless from running, he could tell. "Jeremy," she panted, "there's been an accident. You're to come home with me."

"What is it?"

She glanced at his pals who were all staring in wonderment. "I'll tell you when we get to your house," she said.

His stomach was heavy with dread. When Tony's Sicilian grandmother from Boston had died last year, he remembered seeing the same shocked expression on Mrs. Dibella's face when she came to get Tony. He knew something awful had happened.

"You guys, I gotta go," he said and turned, not waiting for or listening to their replies.

He knew his mother had been at home—she only worked on Mondays and Tuesdays, and he had seen her a little over an hour ago. "Has something happened to Daddy?"

In answer Aunt Leslie put her arm around him and held him tight as they walked the short distance to his house. By the time they reached the door, her hand was digging into his shoulder so tightly it was starting to hurt.

Inside his aunt sat on the couch and patted the place beside her. "Sit down, Jeremy." She waited for him to comply and then placed her arm around him again. "Your dad was hurt badly in a car accident on the interstate near the Waska exit. He was almost home..." Her voice trailed off and she was silent for a moment, collecting herself. "A trailer truck behind him lost control and smashed into his car. He's been taken to the hospital. Your Aunt Jenny and grandmother are with your mother at the hospital. Right now that's all I know."

Jeremy didn't speak. He was thinking of what his dad said to him when he left for work this morning. He taught engineering at a vocational school in Portland and left for work early each morning. Jeremy was just getting his bowl of cereal for breakfast when his father paused to give him some advice. He knew of the plan to practice for Little League tryouts. "Remember to look the ball into your glove." It was the same advice he'd given Pete Martineau just a few minutes ago. His father had leaned down and kissed him on the forehead, then left.

Thinking of that made tears come to his eyes. A trailer truck. He knew how big they were. He started feeling stiff and numb and shifted his weight. "Is he hurt really, really bad?" He could hear his voice as if someone else was speaking. It was low, almost a whisper, and at the word "bad" it broke into a sob. Now he was shaking in terror. He had the feeling that his world was breaking up and that he would never feel safe again.

"I don't know. I just don't know," Aunt Leslie said, speaking slowly. "I think so," she added in a hushed tone.

He looked to see tears in her eyes. A sudden stab jolted him. "He's dead, isn't he?"

"I don't know," she repeated. "We'll have to wait for your mother."

They sat in silence for some time until Aunt Leslie asked if he was hungry, but he wasn't. He felt sick—that's what the feeling in his stomach told him. It was like wanting to throw up and being unable to. He nestled against Aunt Leslie's side, needing to feel that he was not all alone.

In this position, arm in arm, a half hour passed. Occasionally one or the other would conjecture that he was hurt bad but could recover. Both knew they were really only trying to convince themselves. Jeremy was beyond hope and so—he could tell—was his aunt. Then the phone rang and made them both start. He looked at his aunt, a chill of horror jangling down his spine, but she leaped up and rushed to answer the phone.

"No, this is Leslie Godwin. Cathy's at the hospital."

"Yes, it's true."

"No, we don't know."

"It was a trailer truck. It lost control."

"No, we're waiting to hear from her."

"Okay. I'll call as soon as we hear anything."

She hung up. "That was your uncle Gardie. He just heard."

Instead of sitting back down she stared at the phone for a while, lost in thought. At first Jeremy couldn't figure out what was going on in her mind, but he understood when she said, "I wonder where he heard the news? Could it be on TV and radio already?" Uncle Gardie was his father's brother. He lived upcountry, and they didn't see him often, though he worked in Portland and his dad and he had lunch together once a month or so. He couldn't have heard the news from a neighbor.

He reached for the remote on the coffee table in front of him and turned the TV on. Ten minutes later they saw the television pictures of his dad's car completely crushed under the turned-over truck and heard the reporter say that the driver of the car had had to be extracted from the vehicle with the jaws of life. The reporter, a well dressed woman in a pants suit and perfect hair, spoke without feeling as she said that David Lawrence had been rushed to the hospital in Bedford with serious injuries and that there was no further information on his condition. But it was the visual evidence that mattered. He heard Aunt Leslie gasp when she saw the crushed car. He felt it too. He had seen his dog hit by a car and knew the damage that steel could do to flesh and bone. But he couldn't think of it. Seeking to escape, he went far away, to a place where he heard his father's voice and his soft laugh, where he felt his father's hands as he picked him up or lovingly patted his cheek before saying good-night, and he remembered the feeling of anticipation waiting for his father to come home and how when he did the waves of happiness and contentment washed over him in a flood of love and how whenever something scared him like the sound of thunder crashing nearby, he would feel safe and comforted when his father came in answer to his cries. Without him he couldn't even be himself. That's why his backbone tingled: it was fear, it was being scared to be alone. That was why his stomach was still heavy with the feeling of wanting to throw up: it was terror, the terror of truth undeniable. Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, an inner voice wailed. The crushed car, his poor daddy within. He _knew_ his father was dead but he would not say it. To speak the word was to take all hope away; it was to be shrouded in darkness.

Somehow the television was turned off, though he did not remember it happening, and he was in his aunt's arms again, now too numb for tears, without thoughts, as limp as a rag thrown away. A long time must have passed, for when they heard the car pull into the driveway it was already dusk. Both of them became fully alert instantly and rushed to the door.

His mother came in supported by Aunt Jenny. They looked so much alike that they could almost be twins, even though Jenny was three years younger. Unlike their sister, who had dark hair and eyes, they both had blondish, light-brown hair and round blue eyes and a small chin, and both were tall and slender. Now both had the same red-rimmed eyes and devastated faces. Both seemed hardly able to walk they had sustained such a blow.

His mother disengaged herself from her sister. Her eyes searched his. It seemed as if he stopped breathing for an hour. Neither said anything. He felt hot tears running down his cheeks. His mind voiced the word "Mommy" silently as his eyes spoke it.

His mother understood him—she always did. She clasped him in her arms and hugged him tightly. She murmured over and over again, "Your dad is gone, Jeremy."

Aunt Jenny, perhaps thinking that he didn't understand death, said, "He was killed instantly, Jeremy. He didn't suffer."

She was wrong, though. He had seen his dog Stringer die before his eyes, and he did understand death. He knew his father was gone forever. He began crying again, and this time the tears were accompanied by deep body-shaking and uncontrollable sobs.

It wasn't fair.

That's what everybody felt. His mother cried with him and so did Aunt Jenny and Aunt Leslie and later his uncles and grandparents, for everyone who knew his dad loved him.

But people can't cry forever. Tears are like tides: they wax and wain, and body and soul both need respite from the weeping flood. Because, too, people have to talk. They have to remember. They cannot just let love go. And people, even sorrowing people nearly crushed by pain and horror, they have to eat. For that necessity of the flesh, good, decent people who stand apart but feel the pain because they share the same human flesh and blood, mind and spirit—they, mainly Mrs. Dibella and Mrs. Hadley, bring food to the grieving family at some point during the evening and tell his mom and him how terribly, terribly sorry they are, and they too say that they loved Dave Lawrence because everyone who knew him loved him.

As they sit at the dining room table and eat, they begin to talk about his dad. Aunt Jenny remembered how he shared with her the fact he was going to propose to her sister and showed her the ring. It wasn't too big, and he was afraid his mom would be insulted. But Aunt Jenny told him that it was him she loved, not a ring. Aunt Leslie remembered the time he rescued her cat last year from a tree and how typical that act was. He was always helping others. Yes, Uncle Aubrey agreed and said that he must have asked Dave for help on do-it-yourself projects twenty times, and twenty times he got help. All of them remembered how he was concerned about starvation in distant parts of the world and was a kind of foster parent to two different little girls in Africa. His grandmother reminded everyone about another act of kindness he did at their family picnic a few years ago at the beach. Some poor old lady who had lost her memory wandered confused and lost into their part of the beach after they saw her being shooed away by other people, and his dad had spent over two hours walking up and down the beach with her trying to find her family, and then, having no luck, going up to the cottages until he found her home. Jeremy remembered that he was mad at his father for that because his dad didn't have time to play volleyball with him and his cousins. Now he felt guilty and had a deeper understanding of what goodness was. Then all of them laughed at a story his grandpa told. It seems that when in high school his dad had come to pick up his mom on their first date he was so nervous he had tucked his shirt into his underpants. He had to take the young man aside before his daughter saw him and tell him about it.

"Well, you never told me that, Dad!" his mom said with a smile. She was remembering when she was young and falling in love, Jeremy could tell. She had momentarily forgotten her love was dead.

"It was something that stayed between the menfolk," his grandfather said with a smile, and for another few seconds everyone was laughing or smiling until they heard his mother's sobs. She had remembered.

He had already learned that his father had left work early because the usual departmental meeting was canceled for some reason. His mother must have been brooding on that, for suddenly, through her tears, she said, "If only that stupid meeting hadn't been canceled," Dave would be home right now."

The others tried to comfort her and tell her that it was just a terrible accident and not fate, which seemed to be his mother's belief, but it didn't work. For a long time after that she obsessed about the unlucky cancellation until everyone lost the warm mood of remembrance and tears were again in everyone's eyes.

To all of this—to the stories they told and to his mother's regrets—Jeremy listened but rarely spoke. He sat by his mother and at times in her lap until he could tell he was too heavy for her, and his aunts would give him hugs and his uncles and grandpa pats on the shoulder.

As time went on he started feeling more and more sleepy until finally he could not keep his eyes open. The next thing he knew it was morning and he was in his bed. The memory of last night came instantly to his mind, not as some half-remembered nightmare but as what it was, real and forever. His father was dead. He was going to be buried and put in a box underground. Trying to understand what death was and why his father had died, he searched his mind for something to connect. He knew from his Sunday school lessons that his father was supposed to be in heaven now and watching over him, but try as he would he couldn't feel his dad's presence. That's why he started crying again and feeling sick.

But tears answered no questions, so he tried to be brave. He tried comparing his grief to how he felt when he watched death on television and movies, played video games or read about it in books. The trouble was that in those cases death was not really real to him. It didn't hurt. It had no consequences. It was just fiction. Then he thought about his dog Stringer's death. It was certainly very real to him—until last night, in fact, it had been the saddest thing that ever happened to him. But even Stringer's death was different. When his poor dog died he felt awful and sad, but he didn't feel his world was shattered. He did feel guilty, though, for it was he who threw the ball errantly into the street causing Stringer to eagerly bound after it followed by the sounds of screeching brakes, a sickening thud and a piercing, agonized yelp. He could still vividly see Stringer lying on his side with blood coming out of his mouth and his legs immobile because his back was broken. His dog looked up at him with his big brown eyes showing his confusion and fear. He kept patting Stringer's head until he saw the eyes go glassy and felt the body stop breathing. For days after the accident coming home from school filled him with unbearable sadness. Stringer always waited for him on the front porch and grew very excited and began yipping the moment he caught his scent. And here is where Jeremy thought he grasped something about the nature of death. For what would happen a few hours after Stringer waited for him? He would do the exact same thing as his dog, except now it he who was waiting for his dad. He would be impatient but quiet, and then when he'd catch sight of his dad's car the excitement would be so intense that he would make a little cry that was the equivalent of Stringer's yip.

But that made him the one who had gone away, and that was not right. He was confused. He was still here. It was his dad who was gone, and he would never wait for him again at 4:45 before supper. It was so unfair. An accident by a bad truck driver could not be the same thing that dropping his cereal plate and smashing it was. That would be too stupid. But what else could it be? He didn't understand much about the fate his mother spoke of last night. Whatever it was, his dad was still dead.

His thinking was leading him nowhere. It always ended with the realization that he was never going to meet his father again, just as Stringer was never going to meet him again, and he was the one who remained. There was never going to be an answer to the question of why it happened. Now he felt worse instead of better. He felt so wretched that his tears turned into sobs that shook his whole frame and all he wanted to do was to be hugged by his mother.

The hug helped. His mother needed one too. She was in the kitchen looking out the window and lost in thought when he came down. When she turned her tear-stained face to him, he saw her light up. The hug, which they held for a long time, reminded both of them that they still had each other. For the next three days they were inseparable. Most of the time other members of the family, especially his aunts Leslie and Jenny, were with them. While various arrangements were made like meeting with Rev. Covington, the minister, conferring with the family lawyer, or greeting his dad's mom and other distant relatives, and during the calling hours followed by the funeral and burial, much of the time was all a blur for Jeremy. After his unsuccessful attempts that first morning to think, he simply began reacting and following his feelings. He was often numb, other times nervous, occasionally filled with dread, always confused and always scared and never comfortable.

That first visit on Saturday night before calling hours began was the time of dread. Inside the light was subdued and the walls off-white. The flowers didn't look like the ones in gardens. They were dull and looked fake, though when he touched one he discovered they were not. The funeral director, Mr. Connolly, was a very old man who reminded him of the flowers in that there was something unnaturally unlifelike about him even though he was alive. He must have seen death too often, for whether he smiled or looked somber, the feelings were store-bought and phony. He was talking to his mom, but Jeremy didn't listen too attentively because he knew in a few minutes he was going to have to see his father. Soon enough Mr. Connolly led them down a darkened hall past paintings of mountains and of the sea. Even though his mother seemed to be as scared as he was, her arm tightly wound around his shoulder gave him courage. But it wasn't as scary as he thought it was going to be. Just as he had heard people say on television, his father looked asleep, and there was an aura of quietness and dignity that was hard to understand but easy to feel. The only thing they got wrong was his hair. His dad wore it medium-long and casual, but they had combed it as if he were obsessed with neatness. Every hair was in place, making him look too formal. But it didn't really matter. He realized that it wasn't really his father anymore, and he was able to look at him calmly through his tears. Those tears, he knew, came from the memory of his father alive, not from his remains.

Another thing he discovered even before realizing it and only thought about as he gazed at his father was that everything looked and seemed different without his dad in the world. He often passed the funeral parlor on his bike when he and his pals were going to the store and riding across town to play ball. It was a big old-fashioned building painted gray with white trim and with several circular roofs at the corner—just an interesting building, nothing more. One time riding with his pals they had stopped to watch some men load a coffin into a hearse. The coffin was heavy and the men were straining, and he had said, "That guy must be fat." His friends all laughed. But as he gazed at his dead father and thought about his lovingkindness, he knew he would never laugh again when he saw a funeral. He wasn't sure he would ever laugh again period. And he knew he would never pass this building without remembering his dad and feeling sad. It wasn't just a building anymore.

But it wasn't only buildings that were different. People were too. Everyone was nice, but they acted as if they were walking across a room with eggs scattered everywhere. They all said how sorry they were and meant it, but they were tongue-tied and didn't treat him in the usual way. Even his pals, who came to the calling hours with their parents and who had tears in their eyes because they knew his dad, they too were like that. They were guarded and afraid to say the wrong thing. It was like they were strangers, not his best friends. Maybe they were scared that their dads could die.

Then it got worse. During the calling hours when his mother and he would stand by the coffin and greet the visitors, he started to become aware of people looking at him and then turning to whisper something to their companions and knew he was on display. It made him feel self-conscious, a feeling that he hadn't anticipated having. It gave him a strange double vision whereby he was aware of himself as himself and as another person seen through those staring eyes. It made him want to scream, but because he couldn't he hid himself away, showing no emotion or tears.

Then Mr. McLaughton, the man who was his grandmother's new husband from Massachusetts, complimented him on his bravery and gave him some advice to the effect that he was now the man of the house. Jeremy could tell he was nervous and just saying that to have something to say, but nevertheless he took away from this brief interview the knowledge that a man did not cry and the belief that it validated his decision to stoically betray no emotion. And he didn't—not during the funeral or the burial or for the next few weeks among his friends and at school where everyone continued to be nice and yet treat him in a gingerly fashion that made him feel even more isolated and alone. He was not at all happy to be smothering his dark feelings of rage and injustice and presenting himself to the world as a boy in control of his feelings, but he was trapped inside his decision and saw no way out. Only alone at night and in bed did he let loose his feelings and mourn his absent father with tears.

But during this time he was not unobserved. His mother saw how he acted and heard him crying at night. Twice she came into his bedroom and asked him if he was all right. He lied and said he was, but his mother knew better.

Finally after supper one night she had a talk with him. She began by asking him if he would like to go to a psychiatrist and talk about his feelings.

He shook his head at that scary thought.

"There's nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of people have feelings of sadness, anger, despair, and helplessness after a tragic loss and get counseling. These feelings are perfectly normal. I've felt that way too since the accident. One thing I've decided to do is to start taking yoga classes. Your Aunt Leslie suggested it. She has a friend who does it in Portland once a week. She says it's a wonderful way to relax and learn to control your mind. Would you like to do it too? They have children's classes as well as adult ones."

Again he shook his head. He could hear the kids laughing at him if he did something like that.

His mom looked disappointed. He stared out the window for a few moments, thinking. Then she turned, bent down and lovingly kissed his forehead. "I do understand your feelings, Jeremy. I've often wondered how I am going to be able to go on without your dad. He was a very special man. A good man. I know you know that. I've heard you tell your friends you thought he was the best dad in the world. Now I'm going to do my best to raise you alone. That's why I'm talking to you right now."

Instead of responding, he looked away just as his mom had awhile ago and began thinking. He loved her dearly, but she couldn't be his dad. Nothing and no one could fill that emptiness. Women didn't understand boy things. Like what to do when a bully picked on you or how to play baseball and football. His mom didn't care about sports and was always only interested to the extent that he was playing them. She certainly wouldn't be able to give him any tips. She couldn't show him how to backhand a ground ball or look at a fastball and sit on a change-up.

He turned back to his mother. He felt himself on the verge of tears and struggled to compose himself. To his surprise he found himself saying exactly what was on his mind. "I miss Dad."

She nodded, biting her lip. He could see her eyes glistening. "Me too. Like I said, sometimes I don't know how I'm going to live without him." She reached over and again lovingly stroked his chin. "Go ahead and let the tears come, sweetie. It's all right."

Then he really started crying and she took him in her arms to comfort him. When he had cried himself dry and was just letting himself feel warm and protected without any thought, she suddenly asked him a question. "Jeremy," she said and in a quiet and soothing voice, "Can you tell me why you have only cried in secret the last few weeks?"

Then he told her in a confused and rambling sort of way about the double vision he felt when everyone stared at him during calling hours and how Mr. McLaughton had given him advice about being the man of the family and how he had concluded that men don't cry.

"You realize he was just saying the sort of thing expected of him in that situation—you know, the usual conventional advice an older man says to a boy—don't you?"

"Yes. I really did. He seemed nervous and said the first thing that came into his mind. But the advice is also true. I never saw daddy cry."

"Well, let me ask you this. Until this accident happened have you ever seen me cry?'

That question surprised him. In fact, he hadn't, and he sensed what she was leading up to.

"You know your dad was not conventional. He thought for himself, didn't he?"

That was true.

"So he certainly didn't think that he wouldn't cry just because he was a man. Because I can tell you that he did cry. He cried for joy when you were born, and he cried in grief when his father died eight years ago. Besides those times, I've seen him cry at sad things he's seen on television and movies. Your dad was a real man and he cried. He didn't worry about conforming to any stereotypes. He was himself, and he would want you to be yourself. "

Listening to this while enwrapped in her loving arms, he felt an enormous relief. The physical reality became emotional reality: he wasn't alone anymore; neither did he have to pretend anymore. His mother's love could be his refuge, and his father's example of independence could free him. That was the effect her soothing words had. An emptiness inside still abided where his father used to be, but he didn't seem so far away now.

He thought about that distance during the rest of that night and the next morning after breakfast when he found himself alone. His mother was at the store doing the weekly grocery shopping. It was the weekend of her first week of full-time work, and she was still adjusting to the divided demands of her time. She had rushed out, leaving the breakfast dishes in the sink. Jeremy could tell that she was feeling tired and overworked as she adjusted to her new schedule. Remembering that his father often helped with household chores, he decided to wash the pots and pans, put the rest of the dishes into the dishwasher and clean off the table and counters.

As he worked at scrubbing the pan that had cooked the bacon and eggs, at first he just felt proud of himself for helping, but then he began thinking about a conversation he had had with his dad. He had told some kids at school that his father sometimes cooked, did the dishes and helped clean up because his mother worked too. Bob Parole, a guy who wasn't a friend but who had overheard them, scoffed at what he said. "That's women's work," he said. "No real man does it." When Jeremy tried to defend his dad, Bob also said that his mother didn't have to work. His dad provided for his family.

The insult stung, and he had no ready answer to defend his dad, but that night as they were playing catch in the backyard, he told his dad what had happened at school.

" _Well," his dad had said with a strange smile, "we have no right to interfere with other people, but that boy's dad is flat wrong. We must never disrespect other people, including strangers. But that boy—and his father, I assume—used the term 'real man.' Well, let me tell you what I think. A real man is decent first and foremost."_

When Jeremy didn't seem to understand the point, his dad asked, "Do you know what I mean by decent?"

" _I think so. It means being nice to others."_

His dad had been holding the ball, but now he sat down at their picnic table and patted the seat next to him. He waited for Jeremy to join him, then said, "Well, yes. It's the golden rule I'm talking about. Would you want someone to be mean to you?"

" _No, I'd hate that."_

" _Then you see the point?"_

Jeremy, perhaps seven then, maybe eight, thought for a moment. With a sudden insight that brought a proud smile to his face, he said, "I see. I shouldn't be mean to someone because I wouldn't like it if they were mean to me."

" _And you see how it applies to people weaker than you? That's the real test. Bullies, you know, pick on people weaker than them. But there's no bully in the world who doesn't have someone somewhere stronger than him. Just because you can get away with being mean is all the more reason not to do it. That's what being a decent person means. You see my point?"_

His put his arm around Jeremy as he asked the question and gave him a loving squeeze when he said, "I do, Daddy."

Okay, then. Let me ask you something else. Is it right to tell a woman she can't work when she wants to?"

At first he didn't see the connection and was confused. "I don't think so?" he said doubtfully, and turned it into a question as he looked into his dad's brown eyes.

" _Well, we're talking about the golden rule again and also about decency and respect. Say you want to work and someone tells you you can't?"_

" _I see now. Yes, you're right! It's decent to let Mom work."_

His dad smiled. "Well, if you're decent, it's not really a case of letting her work. I respect her as a human being capable of making her own decisions, see? And of course you use common sense. One of your friends says, 'Let's steal some apples.' Is that right?"

" _No, because it's wrong to steal."_

His dad had smiled, showing how pleased he was. "Okay, tiger. Let's get this ball moving again."

After remembering that conversation, he knew it would be the right thing to help his mom around the house as much as possible, and he resolved to continue doing it. But something else happened that he had not expected. That memory began triggering other memories of things he'd learned from his dad. Driving to his grandparents with his mother, he saw a man in the car in front of them at a red light casually toss a cigarette butt out the window and remembered his father saying that the earth was our home. Walking to school one morning, he saw some crows tearing into a plastic garbage bag and recalled that while most people regarded them as pests his dad had a different perspective on those feathered thieves. " _They are among the most intelligent of birds, possibly the most intelligent, and could even count_ ," he said. " _Watch them put a lookout on some branch when they're getting food, and then notice how they take turns being lookout. I like and admire them_." And remembering that, Jeremy smiled at the crows.

Another time at school the kids were picking on Charlie Georgopolis again. He was fat, wore thick glasses, and had buck teeth. When they taunted him he could never defend himself, just get flustered and hurt. When it had happened last year, some girls had finally taken pity on the poor kid and told the boys to cut it out. They had, but one of the boys had defended himself by saying he was just being honest. That had confused Jeremy. They were mean, which was bad, but then they were honest, which was good. That night he had spoken of his confusion to his dad.

" _If you respect yourself and others you will always be honest. Honesty doesn't go to the extent you hurt someone's feelings, though. You don't tell an ugly person he's ugly, even if he is. You accept him for himself. You understand that, don't you?"_

Accept him for himself? That seemed right. "Yes," he said.

" _And if you ever see it happen again you'll try to help Charlie, won't you?"_

" _I'll try, but it's hard when people are ganging up on him."_

" _Sure, I know. But you can try to defend him if others don't. But while we're on the topic of honesty, let's take it a step further. Say you're playing baseball with your friends and a ball breaks someone's window. What do you do?"_

He knew the answer to that one too. It was even a joke among his pals—the difference between a home run and a run home. "You take responsibility for it. You offer to pay for the window."

His dad had smiled proudly. "If that ever happens, I'll even put the window in. But," he said with that wonderful smile of his that always made him feel happy, "the best thing is to be careful and not break the window in the first place. That's especially what being responsible means."

Remembering his father's advice, he knew he couldn't let him down now. Even though he was nervous, he walked up to the schoolyard bullies and said, "Hey, you guys. Quit picking on Charlie. He's just minding his own business. Why don't you do the same." Then some other kids backed him up, and Charlie was left alone.

That made him feel good, and for the rest of the week he felt close to his dad and could almost believe he was watching over him from above.

But Saturday morning found him sitting on his front porch feeling lonely. He hadn't felt up to trying out for the Little League, and now all his pals were at practice and he had nothing to do except watch his neighbor Ned Gilmette mowing the front lawn across the street. He had waved but otherwise been intent upon his work. He was short and stocky, muscular, and with a bad complexion he was not handsome, but he was the star fullback for the Courtney Academy Cougers and a good guy who always had a friendly twinkle in his eyes and loved to joke. Occasionally he'd toss a ball, usually a football but sometimes a baseball, with his brother Lionel and invite Jeremy to join them. Lionel was much different than Ned. He was slender and his face was girlishly smooth and delicate. If that wasn't bad enough, he also acted like a girl. Jeremy, thinking of that, remembered that Ray Martineau's mother heard something and told Ray she didn't want him to have anything to do with Lionel because he was homosexual. Jeremy didn't know what that meant, but he could tell it was something awful. He felt bad because he liked Lionel almost as much as Ned and thought both of them were good neighbors. He had asked Ray what a homosexual was.

"It's a man who loves men." Ray said, spitting it out. "My mom says it's unnatural."

"Oh, you mean he's good friends with some guys. Nothing wrong with that."

"No," Ray said, frowning and shaking his head, "it's not just that. It's much worse. My mom wouldn't explain. _That's_ how bad it is."

After that Jeremy agreed to keep away from Lionel, but it still bothered him so that eventually he asked his dad if he was doing the right thing. It was after supper, and his dad was doing the dishes. He seemed to think the topic was very important because he stopped and sat down at the kitchen table.

" _As you grow you're going to find there's a lot of hate in the world. For some reason some people often hate people who are different than them. That's one reason some people dislike blacks, Hispanic and oriental people. Because they look different, the haters think they are different. But you know my friend Dee Forster from work. You've met him. He's a nice guy, isn't he?_

" _Yes. He's shy but nice."_

" _And he's black, so right there you can see how stupid hate is. It's the same with Lionel. You've known him a long time, haven't you?"_

" _Yes."_

" _And he's always been nice to you, hasn't he?_

" _Yes, but that was before I learned—"_

But his dad didn't let him finish the sentence. "Jeremy, I really want you to understand this. People aren't really different. They all want the same things. They want to have love in their life and friends and family. They want to have a job. They want to feel free. They want to have fun with their friends. They want to left alone if they're different. They want to be accepted for themselves."

" _So it's okay to be friends with him?"_

" _It is. You go on being friends. I myself like Lionel a lot. I think he's a good and sensitive human being. He makes my world richer._

Thinking of his dad's advice, he didn't notice that the lawn mower had suddenly become silent and Ned was yelling at him.

"Whatcha doing, Jeremy?" he repeated when he looked at him.

"Nothing."

"That's what I thought. How're ya doing?"

He knew what Ned meant. "Okay, I guess."

He didn't seem to believe him and walked across the street, taking tiny little steps in his unhurried way. "So where're your pals? I saw Ray earlier going somewhere on his bike. He had his glove with him."

"They're all at Little League practice. Games start in about a week."

He couldn't hide his lonely-sadness from Ned, who took a moment to have a think. His eyes looked up into his head while his finger tapped his chin as if he was a mad scientist inventing something. When he saw that he had made Jeremy smile, he said, "Ain't Terry Levesque the coach?"

He nodded. "Uh-huh."

"I know him. His brother is on the football team with me. And he owes me a favor. If you want, I could ask him to get you on the team—you know, because of special circumstances."

He knew Ned well enough to know he didn't like to talk about feelings—Jeremy had heard him calling it being mushy—but right now when he missed his dad he wished he would. "I don't know. Maybe. It's just that—"

Ned took a deep breath. "I know. I just lost a friend last summer. "Chad Bronson. He drowned. You hear about it?"

"I think so."

"Then you know I feel sad too. He wanted me to go with him but I was too lazy. Maybe it was partly my fault, see?"

"I bet not."

He pursed his lips and looked grim for a moment. "So why don't you want me to talk to Terry? You know your dad would want you to play."

"You think so?"

"I know so. He'd want you to be a regular boy. I know he was always proud of you. He told me so."

Jeremy thought. What he worried about was possibly just dumb, but still it bothered him. Suppose he did something wrong that the coach didn't like? He'd want to talk to his dad in that case. Like if he didn't go to second base on a ground ball with a runner at first, and the coach got mad at him. He would want friendly advice. It was just one of the many ways he still missed his dad.

But then a miracle happened, whether by accident or because somehow Ned understood him he never knew. He said, "Hey, who knows more about baseball than me, I'd like to know? I'm a football player, but that doesn't mean I don't play baseball or that I ain't a strategist about positioning players and stuff. You have any questions, you can always ask me. Don't I live just across the street?"

Just then his mother drove into the yard with the groceries. After greeting Ned, she looked at Jeremy for an explanation. She could tell they'd been having a powwow about something.

"Mom, is it okay if Ned talks to Coach Levesque about getting me on the team? He says that Dad would want me to be playing."

A strange look passed over his mom's face. She was both sad remembering and happy that he wanted to begin again the life of a little boy. "Of course, honey. I agree with Ned. Your dad would want you to be with your friends."

By the next weekend just as school ended for the year and the long summer lay in front of him, he was on the team and ready to play, knowing that his dad was watching from above and that those that remained behind were there to help him on his way.

He Goes His Own Way

Jeremy liked supper time. He and his mother could share their day, she about work at the Davenport Insurance Agency and he about his new life as a freshman at Courtney Academy. They had always been close; now four years after the grievous loss both suffered, they were even closer and able to talk without barriers almost as equals. Today his mother was telling him about a curious incident that occurred at the office. The pocketbook of one of the agents, Stephanie Drouin, went missing, and for a long time they suspected a client who had been alone in her office for about ten minutes while she was searching for his file. Just when Stephanie was about to call the police, the pocketbook was discovered in her car where she had forgotten to remove it when she came into the building.

"Wow! That would have been embarrassing," Jeremy said. "I mean if the man was accused by the police."

She smiled broadly. "We'd have lost at least one client, that's for sure. For the rest of the day everyone was joking that their wallets and pocketbooks were missing and pretending that they suspected respectable people like Rev. Covington or the mayor. 'Come on, Bill,' I said to Bill Delos, 'surrender the pocketbook or expect the full majesty of the law to descend upon you.' That," she added with a girlish giggle, "was my contribution to the fun."

"I see that you all have fun at work."

"We do," she said, suddenly serious. "Just about everyone at work is nice."

"Just about everyone?" He raised his eyebrows and bent his head.

She buttered a piece of french bread they were having with the spaghetti and salad. "Well, I'll be giving away no secrets when I say Ted Davenport is not popular."

Jeremy knew he was the nephew of the founder and that Becky Paine ran the agency when Mr. Davenport was away on business or vacation. He thought he could see where the problem lay. "How come Mr. Davenport doesn't put his nephew in charge. Doesn't he want to keep the directorship in the family?"

"The simple answer is because Becky is ten times better. Instead of accepting that obvious fact, Ted spends all his time frowning and rolling his eyes and using other forms of passive aggression including snide remarks to show his displeasure. But he knows he has not a single ally on the staff. We all love Becky. Today her husband Bill came by with their little son. He was a little angel, staring at us with his big blue eyes and smiling at our cooing. It's the first time we've seen him. They were going to an appointment with their pediatrician after work."

Babies didn't interest him much, so he just nodded. "You remember I'm going to the Halloween party at Bev Frechette's house tonight."

"Yes, her mother was talking about it today. She was as excited as a school girl."

"Is that why Bev invited me? Because you work with her mother? I don't know her very well and was surprised by the invitation."

His mother smiled knowingly. "Perhaps she's sweet on you. You've turned into quite a handsome boy."

He didn't believe that. People said that the older he got the more he looked like his father. That should be good thing because he thought his dad had been a handsome man, but while he was tall, muscular and thin like his dad and had the same brown hair, firm chin, small nose and general facial shape, his eyes were different. He had big, round, blue eyes and hardly any eye ridge so that he looked constantly surprised even when he frowned. He knew his mother and aunts regarded it as a very attractive feature; he thought it made him look dopey. And that was not the only thing that made him feel self-conscious. He had problems with acne and had tried unsuccessfully every nostrum that the drugstore offered. Thinking of his long struggle against his hormonal imbalance, he rubbed at the current irruption, a zit on his chin, and winced as he pressed at the hard nib that told him it was red and swollen.

Seeing his mother looking at him, he quickly changed the subject. "Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. I have some good news about the paper topics in freshman honors."

His teacher, Mr. Tarkenton, had assigned a choice of seven topics. Six were based on their class readings; the seventh allowed students to choose their own topic. Earlier in the week in discussing this at supper, his mother had told him some family lore about an ancestor who had been involved in the Salem witch trials, and had decided to choose that topic for his research paper.

His mother stopped her fork in mid action and asked, "Did he say it was okay?"

"Yes. He said because I was interested in the subject I was sure to do an excellent job."

"I'm sure you will," she said with a proud smile. "Your midterm grades were most impressive."

"Except for that C in algebra. I just don't have dad's knack for math."

"But the rest were excellent. Three A's and a B. Your dad would be very proud of you. I sure am." She leaned across the table and lovingly touched his arm. "I bet you're Mr. Tarkenton's best student."

He felt himself grinning sheepishly but knew modesty was called for. "I don't know about that. He did tell me, though, that I have a very good mind. I do respond to his teaching technique—you know, I've told you before how he allows a great deal of freedom in discussions and brings everyone into them. He says he models his teaching on college seminar courses. And he knows everything about history and even though literature is not his field he teaches _Romeo and Juliet_ and the other required readings great. You know what? I think he inspired me to want to be a teacher too. Dad was a teacher."

She was pleased to hear him say that, he could tell. "You'll be carrying on a family tradition. I was going to be a teacher too, you know."

"You were? How come you didn't?"

"Well, there were no English teaching positions available around here when I got out of college. We got married and your dad got that job teaching engineering in Portland. We wanted to save to buy a house, so I took a job at the insurance agency. Then you came along, and I was busy raising you."

"Does it make you sad—that you didn't teach?"

"Not now. But I certainly had the same thought when I was your age. I had a great English teacher and thought it would be a wonderful life. What do you think you'd like to teach?"

"Well, it won't be what dad taught. He must have been really good at math to know engineering."

"I wasn't very good at math either, and now I'm doing the accounting and payroll for the agency, so who would ever have guessed that. You never know."

"It doesn't require algebra, calculus or trig, though, does it?"

She shook her head with a laugh. "You got me there. So what subject do you think you'd like to teach?"

"History, I think. Mr. Tarkenton has made it so interesting that I've caught the bug. The other day he put a quote from Shakespeare on the board. 'The past is prologue.' He said Americans as a whole live in the present and that it is very dangerous not to understand historical forces. Teaching history is important."

"Yes, it is. And seeing things as they are is also important. Your father and I tried to raise you to think for yourself and be free from the ordinary prejudices of most Americans. I think we've been successful."

He thought about that remark as he got ready for the party. Although he hid it well from his mother, he was very nervous about it. The Halloween party would be his first social event as a high school student. While he might be intellectually mature, he knew that socially he was still an adolescent and extremely shy. It wasn't just his absurd eyes or acne that made him so. Girls were a mystery to him. He was very interested in them and thought often about sex, but how to approach girls, understanding how they thought and what they wanted, were all complete mysteries to him. If anything, he was scared of them. It was the ways they were all different from his mother that confused him. She was straightforward with him. She spoke her mind. But high-school girls when not giggling and making faces were all indirection. They gave hints but never spoke plain. When his mother teasingly suggested Bev Frechette was interested in him, he couldn't really believe it. The only indication of such a preposterous idea was the invitation itself. She had otherwise shown no interest in him or even much awareness of his existence. She had even been completely casual when she asked him to come to the party. "My mother thought a Halloween party would be fun. Would you like to come?" As she spoke her eyes avoided looking into his and were directed beyond him. Maybe she was nervous, but he doubted it. Although he knew as an idea that girls could be nervous, he didn't really believe it. Girls had such a strange power over boys that it seemed impossible that they would be unaware of it and nervous. And as for liking her in _that_ way, he didn't see the possibility of it. She wasn't bad looking or anything like that, but there was nothing interesting about her. She wasn't in any of his honor classes and she was completely ordinary in every way.

He wasn't sure whether his nervousness came from the uncertainty about Bev's feelings for him or—more likely—from the fact it was a social situation he was going to, but whichever it was his nerves got no better. Downstairs he could hear his mother interacting with trick-or-treaters who were already coming to the door. Last year as an eight-grader he, Keith and Ray had gone trick-or-treating for the last time, wearing only an eye-mask and feeling slightly awkward, a feeling reinforced by some classmates seeing them and laughing that they were doing kid stuff. He didn't like that, but it was undeniable that the uncomplicated world of a child held its attractions. That thought passed through his mind as he dressed in a new sweater and a pair of comfortable jeans and felt a tinge of sadness for the lost world and a stab of anxiety for the new world that awaited. Tony, with his inherited Italian charm, already had a girlfriend, and Keith was quite sure they were already doing it. That meant it was possible somehow to get to know girls. Maybe, in fact, it just happened without thinking. Maybe tonight that would be what he learned. He tried to make that thought smother the scary ones that suggested failure and isolation. With a final application of zit medication smeared on in hopes the redness would be covered, he went downstairs.

His mother acted motherly when she saw him. She looked him over and seemed pleased. She told him to have a good time and to be back by 11:30. She suggested he carry a coat against the possibility that it would be much cooler later in the evening. She kissed him lightly on the cheek.

The walk to Ray's house took no time at all. He lived only three houses down. His heart beat excitedly, nervously, and he took deep breaths to calm himself. Across the street a girl dressed as a witch giggled something to the devil she was with, but they could not have been talking about him. For a moment he was almost calm, but then as he approached Ray's door he could hear the sounds of an argument and was pretty sure what it was about. Ray had gotten a D on his history test and had predicted his father would go ballistic on him. He was already on probation because his midterm grades were three C's, a D and only one B, the result of which was that his television privileges had been taken away from him until he showed improvement. Now hearing Mr. Martineau's angry voice, Jeremy became nervous for a selfish reason. If Ray was punished by being forced to stay home, he'd have to go to the party alone. The thought terrified him.

He stood at the door too nervous and embarrassed to knock, but Ray's little brother Pete must have seen him coming, for suddenly the door swung open and a bright, smiling freckled face looked up at him. Pete always liked him. "Hi, Jeremy. My dad's real mad at Ray."

Jeremy couldn't help smiling at the solemnly conspiratorial way Pete was whispering. "About the D he got, I bet."

"Yup. My dad keeps calling him a goof-off." He finished with an impish grin. He seemed to be enjoying his older brother's discomfort.

"I hope he's not going to be punished," Jeremy said anxiously.

"I think the TV punishment is extended until he gets a good grade. And something else. What does carrot and stick mean?"

"Well, the stick means punishment. The carrot means a reward. I think it's from a fable about training a donkey."

Pete's face brightened in enlightenment. "That's another thing my dad called Ray, a donkey. I get it. Ray can get ten dollars for every B he gets. That's the carrot, then."

"What did Ray say to that?"

Pete looked behind him in the direction of Mr. Martineau's angry voice. "All I'm saying, young man, is you have to change your ways! And don't give me that look!"

"He said he wasn't sure he could do it. He said he tried as hard as he could on the history test. Then you know what, Jeremy? My dad used you as the example of what Ray needs to do. You got good grades, didn't you, Jeremy?"

"Well, they were okay."

"You're smart, Jeremy. Everyone knows that."

Just then Mrs. Martineau came into the kitchen carrying a load of dish towels from the dryer. Catching sight of Jeremy, she placed the towels on the table and came up to the door. "Perhaps you can hear Ray's father is having a _talk_ with him."

"Hi, Mrs. Martineau. Yeah, I couldn't help hearing some of it."

"I wish he knew your secret, Jeremy. Your mother was telling me about your grades earlier today. She's very proud of you."

"I'm not so hot at math, though. That's what Ray's good at."

"But his verbal skills are very weak."

Ray came out from his father's home office looking fit to kill. He grabbed his jacket from the hook by the door and said, "Come on, Jeremy. Let's get out of here before my father changes his mind."

"Be back before twelve," his mother called, but Ray was too angry to reply.

"So you had a spat with your dad, huh?" Jeremy said once they were away from the house and passing a large group of kids coming down the street dressed in Halloween costumes and carrying bags for the bounty they planned to gather.

"He's impossible to please. He wants me to be perfect. Sorry, wrong number."

"I could help you next time you have a test. Pete told me you could get ten bucks for every B. That might make studying worth it."

"And twenty bucks for an A. I think the bastard knows his money is quite safe. I told him that I was just an average student. Average students get C's."

"Well, the offer stands."

Ray paused at the corner for a couple of cars to pass. They were walking to the other side of town. "You don't argue with your mom, do you?"

"No, not really."

They scooted across the street while coming towards them were a bunch of kids dressed for the occasion. One of them wore a Batman outfit and another smaller kid, probably his brother, was dressed as Robin.

"I thought they killed Robin off?" Ray said.

"Yeah. Probably an old outfit in the family."

"That's because you get good grades," Ray said.

At first the remark was a non sequitur; then he saw the point. "Probably," he agreed. "But she'd be unhappy too if I ever got a D."

Ray was silent for a while. Jeremy, glancing at his face, saw he was brooding. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. You're the only kid I know who gets along with his parents, that's all."

From what he heard from other kids, that sounded right. He'd heard some students say they actually hated their parents. Others routinely called them stupid. Sometimes he'd been with kids when their parents came to pick them up, and they acted embarrassed and ashamed of them. So he was definitely in the minority.

"I'm lucky, I guess. My mom treats me almost like an equal. She's my friend as well as my mother."

"Hell's going to freeze over before my old man treats me like a friend. Christ, I wouldn't want him to be. Who'd want a pompous old windbag for a friend?" He was speaking bitterly, but in a sudden mood swing, he changed the topic. "But the hell with him. What girls do you think will be at the party tonight? I'm available," he added with a grin. He was already forgetting his angry argument with his father.

The question made Jeremy nervous and he didn't answer for a moment as he tried to figure out how he was going to react to Bev. He knew Ray was more self-confident socially than he. Ray was fairly good-looking with long sandy hair and dark eyes and with skin free from blemishes. He was also big and muscular, and the girls seemed to be attracted to him. With Tony already having a girl friend, and Keith having his first date tonight with a girl who'd been sweet on him since eighth grade, Jeremy felt the pressure. If he didn't get a girlfriend he would be left behind.

"Well?" Ray asked.

"I'm not sure. Just like you, I don't know Bev all that well. I don't imagine it will be the beautiful people."

"You mean like Billy Swift and Caroline LaRocque?"

"Yeah."

Yet another group of excited kids ran past them. They were shouting something about candy bars being given out at some house up ahead. One of them was telling his brother they had to get home soon or their mom would be mad, a remark that apparently reminded Ray of his recent ordeal with parental authority, for after things to quieted down, he said, "How come your mom treats you like an equal? It's kinda weird, don't you think?"

Ray's question required a cautious answer. The equality and friendliness he shared with his mom had a lot to do with her earlier remark at the supper table about both her and his dad trying to raise him to think for himself. All his dad's lessons about how to act rightly in the world were still very important to him, and he would never want to do something that would cast a shadow across the sacred memory of his dad. His mother's progressive attitudes also made her different. The yoga classes she had taken to help relax after his father's death had led her indirectly to an interest in Buddhism. Its gentle ways and introspective philosophy introduced a different and atypical perspective into his life. And both parents were or had been political progressives. These inherited examples had made him more mature than the typical freshman—for he knew that he was different from most students at school. He was intellectually curious and had a mature sense of self that was much different from the ordinary student on the one hand and the cheerleader-athlete-class leaders on the other. Both groups shared the same values despite the social distance between them. They all parroted their conservative parents views on politics and mindless patriotism, followed the lives of rock stars and movie actors, found their world-view in the lyrics to rap songs and the dialogue of TV shows, worried more about their appearance than about their understanding, wore the same clothes, thought the same thoughts, didn't care about anything outside of their narrow little world of school and friends, were terrified to stand out from the crowd.

Not much of this knowledge and awareness could he tell to Ray. Even though they were still good friends, Ray was much more the ordinary student and regular guy than he was. What he could say would answer by indirection:

"I guess it also has something to do with mutual respect. My mom lets me be me, you know? Like when I didn't go out for Little League that second year because I was disgusted about how Billy Swift and a couple others were treated like kings? She totally respected my feelings about it."

"Humph!" Ray snorted. "I still don't understand why you did that. I didn't like Billy being treated like King Shit either, but the next year I became a starter and it was all right."

"Yeah, I'm sure it was. But it was more than Billy. I didn't like how it wasn't democratic. Call me weird, but that was and still is my feeling. Ten-year-old kids shouldn't be treated that way. I didn't feel I was part of a team. It was just like high school, if you know what I mean. The beautiful people walk around campus like they own the place, and we're supposed to bow to them."

Abruptly he stopped, remembering the football rally they had to attend after school in the afternoon where the students were whipped into a frenzy of school patriotism. With drums thumping and bugles shrieking, each class was called upon to show its support for the team. "Freshmen, are you with us?" the head cheerleader shouted, and the freshmen would respond with a thunderous, rhythmic "Yeah, man!" Each class tried to outdo the others, though with the understanding that seniors would yell the loudest. The drums and the excitement almost swept him into the frenzied madness until a sense of estrangement possessed him when he remembered his mother talking about Buddhists seeking a quiet place for the soul to repine. But just when he thought he was safe, some of the football heroes spoke and asked the student body for its support, and he had found himself fantasizing that he was the star quarterback speaking with a swaggering self-confidence and feeling the adulation of the mere mortals. After the rally he was so ashamed of himself that it was one of the few things, together with his nervousness about the party, that he did not share with his mother when they talked about their day. It was as if he'd forgotten everything his father taught him about self-reliance and standing up for his beliefs.

It was dark enough between street lights to hide the redness burning into his face; yet Ray still sensed something was bothering him. He tapped Jeremy's arm. "What's wrong?"

"Talking about the beautiful people reminded me of the football rally for the game against Bedford High tomorrow. It was like a Nazi rally."

"A Nazi rally?! What d'ya mean?"

He didn't dare talk about it. "Oh, nothing. It was just too rah-rah, you know? Who else is going to be at the party?'

"I'm not sure. We're going to Cross Street, right? That's coming up."

They soon found out who two of the girls were. As they turned up Cross Street they saw the McCarron twins being dropped off by one of their parents. Gina and Kathy were both tall, flat-chested and shy, the cause, no doubt, of the frown that passed across Ray's face. So far, not too promising—that was what the frown said.

But the spectacle of Mrs. Frechette and her house cut off any discourse. The ranch-style house was garishly decorated for the holiday. Orange and black crepe paper wound around the posts at the front door in barber-pole fashion. Each window had a carved pumpkin eerily glaring at the world from a candle's flickering light. A string of Christmas lights with orange bulbs was attached to the gutters and draped across the entire length of the house. But the house was demure and unobtrusive compared to the queen whom reigned there. Mrs. Frechette was dressed like a witch with a flowing black robe, a tall pointed hat, and for a final touch of authenticity she had a huge rubber nose with a wart the size of the hope diamond attached to the front of her face by rubber bands.

Ray and Jeremy exchanged troubled glances as they listened to Bev's mother talking to the children in a piercing voice that was supposed to represent a witch. "Here you go, my little dearies. One for you, and one for you—and you're not to be forgotten, young gentleman," she said as she ended with a loud cackle.

Watching the little ones scampering off, she seemed lost in thought for a moment before she turned to Ray and Jeremy. "Oh, hello boys. Come on in. The party's just starting."

Inside they found they were the last to arrive. Besides the twins, there were eight other guests, four females and four males. Jeremy's math was good enough to see that the party was unbalanced with one extra girl. He found himself assessing them to see where he stood.

Loraine Keohan, Bev's best friend and a girl who sat near Jeremy in home room and with whom he was on nodding acquaintance, was a slightly overweight girl who always wore bright colors. Tonight she had on a yellow sweater and white slacks. Joan Hiram he knew slightly better. She was in his freshman honors class. She was plain and wore glasses but had a pleasant personality. He liked her. Diane Nadeau and Betsy Black he knew only by name, but he saw Ray's eyes light up when he caught sight of the latter. She was the prettiest girl there with a cute pug nose which she crinkled whenever she smiled, long dark hair and a stunning body. Bev's appearance, like her personality, was ordinary. She wasn't pretty and she wasn't ugly. When she saw him, she only said, "Oh, hi, Jeremy," in an ordinary way. She wore a short skirt that revealed her bony knees.

The boys he also knew only slightly. Pat Hooper was, like Loraine, in his homeroom and they had talked occasionally. Dan Paige he knew only by name and had hardly ever said more than a few words to. The surprise was Bob Parole and his friend John Dewberry. All the rest of the guests were ordinary people, a long ways off from the beautiful people they had talked about on the walk to Bev's house, but Bob and John were both from upper middle-class backgrounds and usually traveled in quite different circles than the present company.

He felt very uncomfortable. The other guests were all from the west side of town, while he and Ray were east-siders, an absurd distinction when the distance traversed was only six or eight blocks, but in a small town a kid growing up six blocks away might as well be living in the next city. With Ray the only real friend among them, it was going to be difficult to make his first teen party a success.

It certainly didn't start out well. When everyone turned expecting him and Ray to speak, all he could think to say was, "I see the party started without us," a statement so profound everyone was left speechless.

Ray was much cooler. "What's happening?"

"Not much," Bev said. "We're just hanging."

Mrs. Frechette's voice singing out from the front door rescued him. "You kids sit down and have something to snack. There're candy bowls everywhere, soft drinks and pastries, and for you gals watching your figures there's veggies and dip on the dining room table."

Instead of following directions, the boys grouped together, standing near the sliding glass doors that led to the patio while the girls sat on the couch, chairs or floor in the living room.

For the first fifteen minutes Mrs. Frechette was busy with the trick-or-treaters. Her piercing cackle and high-pitched witch's voice drowned out many a conversation, something Jeremy didn't mind since attention focused on her weird behavior was attention not directed at him. After his opening _faux pas_ he was even more nervous. He both wanted Bev to pay him attention and dreaded it, wanted to talk to the other girls but could think of nothing to say. Neither Bev nor any other girl paid him any attention, however, and after a while he actually started relaxing.

It didn't last long. When Ray started talking to Pat Hooper, Jeremy, finding himself standing next to Bob Parole, nervously searched for something to say before stupidly actually giving voice to what was in his mind. "I'm surprised to see you here, Bob."

"I'm surprised too," he said in a low voice. "I was roped into it because my mother rather insisted I go. Bev's my cousin. Her mother is my aunt. You get the picture—poor relatives can't be entirely ignored. That's what my mother thinks, at least."

"No kidding. Mother's side or father's?"

"Bev's father is my mother's brother. I used to wonder why he divorced her. I'm beginning to see why now."

John Dewberry leaned toward Bob and whispered confidentially. "Hey, Bob, these girls remind me of that girl who wears the weird, old-fashioned clothes. What's her name?"

Bob thought for a moment. "Charlene something. I know what you mean. There's no action here except for that little pussy Betsy Black."

Their private conversation was interrupted by Bev calling to all the boys. "Hey, don't you guys want something to eat?"

They all walked over to the girls and started talking. Jeremy heard Ray telling Betsy Black that he was planning on playing baseball in the spring; John Dewberry and Dan Paige joked to a couple of the girls about having a sweet tooth; Pat Hooper told the twins the story of his first Halloween when he was four. He had dressed as a bunny rabbit and everyone teased him about Easter. Bob Parole helped his cousin fill some of the bowls. Jeremy stood alone. Despite the numbers favoring the males, _he_ was the odd man out.

Once again Mrs. Frechette rescued him from awkwardness. When the 7:30 close-off time for trick-or-treaters passed, she left her post by the door, removed her witch costume, and came into the living room wearing casual jeans and a gray sweater. Noticing Jeremy's ugly-duckling status, she said, "My, Jeremy, you look more like your father every week. Such a handsome boy."

Feeling himself blushing, he mumbled a thank-you."

"I thought it was so sweet of you to lend Bev your history book last week when she forgot hers."

He shrugged. "I'd already had class and she needed a book. I was glad to help."

"Well, your kindness was appreciated."

"Bev, did you thank him?"

"Yes, mom."

Mrs. Frechette scanned the gathering. "Isn't it time we heated up this party? Do some fun things?"

It turned out that any expectation that she was going to retire and let the kids find their own fun proved to be fatally wrong. She seemed to regard herself as some kind of a den mother who would run the entertainment and keep the party going. But even that did not quite describe the role she was fulfilling. It seemed, much to her daughter's embarrassment and a certain subterranean scorn expressed in surreptitious rolling of the eyes or muttered comments from the rest, that she regarded herself as a member of the party.

Shining with happiness, bubbling over with enthusiasm way out of proportion to the situation, and often giggling like a schoolgirl, she was trying to act girlish and be one of the kids. Judging by some of the pictures Jeremy saw on the wall—particularly one of a kitten rolling a ball of yarn—she was a sentimental person, but there was more going on than that. She was near his mother's age, 38 or so, but, he thought, she was trying to recapture her youth by living vicariously her daughter's life. But she was trying too hard at the same time she was too controlling. It was she who suggested they bob for apples, something the girls did reluctantly and the boys not at all. It was she who put on a CD of Broadway music and even sang along with some of the sappy songs until Bev asked if she could play some different music. At first Mrs. Frechette's face went rigid, then with a nervous smile she relented. The trouble was that one bad taste was exchanged for another. Bev put on a CD of one of those bottle-blond girl singers who needed all the tricks of the recording studio to creak out her pathetic attempts at love songs.

Those CD's became the occasion for Bev's first approach to Jeremy. She came up to him wearing a moonstruck expression and asked, "Don't you just love that song?"

He nodded diplomatically. At home his mother listened to classic rock on the radio and folk music from his dad's collection when she played CD's. To the extent he liked any music, the folk music was the most enjoyable. He really liked The Weavers, Woodie Guthrie and a New England local, Charlie King.

"Oh, I love it!" she said, speaking earnestly. "It has such feeling in it."

He kept his opinion to himself and changed the subject. "Your mom seems to be enjoying herself, isn't she?"

She smiled nervously. "She's trying too hard, I think."

After letting the music go on for some time, and probably because she noticed no one was dancing, Mrs. Frechette continued trying too hard. This time she suggested they play charades.

The idea wasn't met with much enthusiasm, but everyone seemed to understand that humoring Bev's mother was the cost of a ticket, so after some hemming and hawing the game started.

The first few efforts were so simple they were childish. Dan Paige pretended to saw a board and then nail it, and the collected genius of the group yelled "Carpenter" before he'd finished nailing. Loraine Keohan was next recruited. She enacted two characters. First she put up one finger and lay down as if asleep. Then, after flashing two fingers, she walked away and then back, stopping as if in surprise and gazing down at where the sleeping figure was supposed to be reposing; then kneeling and pursing her lips, she implanted a kiss. "Wet one," Jeremy heard Bob Parole murmur to John Dewbery while the rest of the group shouted "Sleeping beauty!"

Then Jeremy felt Mrs. Frechette's iron gaze and wanted to hide.

"Jeremy, your turn."

He felt very foolish, but would have felt more foolish refusing her and creating a scene. So after thinking for a moment, he pretending to be pouring something into a beaker while trying to make his eyes shine madly.

"A cook?" someone guessed.

He shook his head, then pretending to put the beaker down while he rubbed his hands in glee.

"I know," Ray said. He had watched many sci-fi movies with Jeremy. "A mad scientist."

"You got me," he said sheepishly, glad to be delivered from public display. He saw Bob Parole rolling his eyes.

So did Mrs. Frechette, and she made the mistake of trying to draw the malcontent into the spirit of the party. "It's your turn, Bob."

He shook his head. "I'm no good at those things."

"Oh, come on," she pleaded. "You can think of something."

But he refused her, this time with a dark frown that threw a poll over the party. "I said no and I mean no! What part of that do you not understand?"

An embarrassed silence descended upon the group as Mrs. Frechette stared angrily at Bob, who glared back at her defiantly. But just as she was about to say something she would probably regret, Betsy Black asked in a perfectly normal voice that under the circumstances was electrifying, "Bev, do you have The Rolling Stone CD with "Start It Up" on it? I was telling Ray what a great song it is."

That innocent remark was enough to unlock aunt and nephew from their deadly staring duel and stop any venomous words from Mrs. Frechette. She watched her daughter searching through the CD collection for the requested song. "Well, well," she said with a forced smile, "it looks like you kids have had enough of games and want to listen to some music." Then she turned and went into the kitchen where she started putting the dinner dishes and pots and pans away. Judging by the loud sounds of pans being hurled rather than placed in cabinet shelves, she was still angry.

That display put a period on the party. It continued, but everyone knew that the night would be remembered as a disaster and that it was very unlikely that Bev would ever host another party.

Bob backed away from the group and began conferring with John Dewberry by the sliding doors. He was wearing an ugly frown as the rest of the group listened and hummed along to the Stones. Jeremy, finding himself still odd man out—Ray was now completely absorbed in Betsy and had no time for his friend—eventually wandered over to the two other outcasts.

"Bev's mom didn't handle that very well, did she?"

Bob was still angry. He glared towards the sounds in the kitchen. "She's even more of an idiot than I thought. And those kids"—his lip curled in contempt as he looked at the other kids— "What losers."

Jeremy didn't like his attitude, but he assumed a jaded tone to fit Bob's mood. "They're just kids. Freshmen kids. What do you expect?"

"I expect more than bobbing apples and charades. You call that a party?"

Jeremy glanced at him, trying to read what it was that made him so judgmental and superior. He certainly was no movie star. His nose was too big and his brown hair was trimmed so short that it exposed his protruding ears. But he was dressed in a collarless peasant shirt that Jeremy knew was expensive, and he wore pre-faded jeans likewise expensive. On his wrist was a large gold watch, probably a Rolex. It was money and a life of privilege that made him supremely self-confident. He was used to getting his way. He expected people to defer to him.

In these ways he was the exact opposite of Jeremy. Even though he didn't want to be, he found himself subservient in his answer. "No, I think everyone will agree this party's a disaster. But what's the alternative?"

"What's the alternative? That's easy—the party I wanted to go to in the first place."

"At Caroline LaRocque's house," John said.

Bob nodded. "There'll be plenty of beer and weed and maybe some poppers. Loren Eberhardt will be there—"

"She'll spread 'em for anyone," John said in an excited voice, then whispered when one of the twins seemed to overhear him, "and she's not the only one."

Bob, a little impatient with John for interrupting him, gave his friend a look. "Last week the party got really wild. We played strip poker. Any girl in her underwear or less had to go down on a guy who lost his last article of clothing." A sickly grin broke across his face. "It's the only poker game I've ever played in where the guys were trying to lose."

"I think we should leave right now, Bob. The three of us don't fit here."

Jeremy felt jolted. The _three_ of us. Had he passed some test and not known it? But he couldn't suppress the rising panic. "What? You mean they had public sex?"

"Some did. Others went into the bedroom."

"How come Caroline's mother's not home?'

"She's dating some guy and is out of the house every weekend."

"I wasn't invited. I don't know many of those people."

"Hey, it isn't a stupid little goodie-two-shoes party like this. Who comes, comes, that's all. There ain't any list."

John reached for his coat, which he'd left hanging on the handle to the sliding doors. "Let's go. You coming, Lawrence?"

He thought of his mother and the eleven-thirty deadline. All the times he'd daydreamed about sex, he'd never thought his first experience would be part of some tawdry exhibitionism. But Ray had deserted him and John Dewberry had included him. He was scared to go and scared to say no. He wavered, but it was his mother that tipped the scales. He shook his head. "I'm on a strict deadline. I'm supposed to home in less than an hour."

Bob gave him a contemptuous look that he did not try to hide. "Have it your way. No skin off my nose."

So they left and he stayed. The rest of the kids were listening to music and talking. None paid him much attention, and he was too shy to initiate any conversations. Once in a while he'd say something like, "That was a good song," and the others would agree, but the only conversation of more than a few sentences happened when Joan Hiram asked him if he'd chosen his topic for the term paper and he told her about his ancestor's role in the Salem witch trials. She seemed interested in the topic, and he was just beginning to feel comfortable with her when one of the other kids said, "Hey, you guys. No talking about schoolwork. It's the weekend." That slammed that door shut. After that chastisement he hardly said another word for the rest of the evening. A little before eleven o'clock Ray took him aside and whispered that he was going to walk Betsy Black home.

That meant that all three of his best buddies were starting to become involved with girls and he wasn't. He was the odd man out. Bev, who supposedly had invited him to the party because she was interested in him, hardly even looked at him now. If he had momentarily passed some test with Bob and John, he had equally failed some inscrutable test that Bev had subjected him to. And of course he realized that by refusing to go with Bob and John his passing grade had been turned into an F. But there he was thinking in terms of schoolwork, and on the weekend you weren't supposed to do that. He thought about girls, sex and social situations on his lonely walk home. He was frustrated that his thoughts kept spinning around and going nowhere. He did conclude that it was easier to be a good student than to be a social success, and finding himself valuing that which was difficult and thereby judging himself harshly, he also was forced to admit that maybe he was a nerd and maybe he'd always be one.

The Answer to His Question

Jeremy's friend Josh Gilbert couldn't sit still. With nervous energy driving him like an overheated engine, his body was worn down to skin and bone and sinews. He seemed to be always self-conscious of his nose in the same way Jeremy used to be aware of his acne, which now had finally cleared up. But Josh's nose couldn't clear up. It was long and thin and slightly crooked after not healing properly when he broke it as a boy. He wore thick glasses, had a small chin, sunken cheeks and nondescript brown hair worn in a crewcut. All these things added up to one double-edged fact: Josh looked like a nerd and acted like a nerd. But Jeremy had come to see that nerd was just a name. Maybe he was one too, but there were worse things to be called. Here in early May of his senior year at Courtney Academy, he had just found out that he had been accepted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His grandmother's second husband, the one who led him astray years ago by telling him he was the man of the family, was much involved in Wisconsin alumni activity and was very helpful in getting him a full scholarship, though he modestly said that it was Jeremy's academic excellence that had earned the prize. He was very happy about that and remembered that his mother had pointed out to him that "nerd" was merely a term that described a serious student. Many of the students who laughingly called a good student a nerd, she said, were going to wish they had been one when they later ended up in dead-end jobs.

But right now, not some time in the future when many fellow high schoolers would be filled with regret, he and Josh were certainly acting like nerds as they ate their lunch. What they were doing was engaging in a game of one-upmanship by quoting passages from Thoreau and Emerson, whom they were currently studying in American literature class. Josh started it when he cited a passage from _Walden_ : "I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion." Jeremy had countered with a famous old saw from Emerson: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." For a while they paused and discussed just what was meant by "foolish," but then after picking at the meatloaf, powdered mashed potatoes and peas, Jeremy brought up a passage he particularly liked from Thoreau's essay "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience" where Thoreau says that under "a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison." Josh didn't like that one, however, and let it pass without comment. "I am not alone if I stand by myself," he quoted, and added that he liked that one about hitching your wagon to a star too.

By this time several students in the neighborhood were rolling their eyes and whispering snide remarks to their pals. Josh's eyes flashed, indicating that he had noticed their reactions. He took a spoonful of his pudding, then made a face. "This is inedible." He looked around, forcing some of the students to drop their eyes, and said, " 'A man who is right is a majority of one.' That's something the herd never understand."

"We certainly never understand you, Josh Gilbert," some neighboring wiseacre said while one of his pals lowed like a cow, but Josh regally chose to ignore them.

He had spoken without any attempt to hide his hostility. It was one of the ways they were different. Where Jeremy, shy as ever, spoke softly, Josh flaunted his superiority. But the contemptuous reference to the herd pointed to another, deeper, difference. While Jeremy was attracted to Emersonian self-reliance and individualism because it helped validate his lack of popularity and social insignificance at Courtney Academy, he still didn't like to belittle other people. Josh did. He was a right-wing fanatic who took individualism as an emblem of superiority which he felt was unrecognized. Actually, Josh's position had confused Jeremy at first until he talked about it with his mother. The confusion came from the appeal: individualism, strong, superior. But his mother had poked holes where necessary in that trinity. She reminded him of some of the things she learned from Buddhism. The four noble truths could be summed up in one: selfishness or self-absorption was the cause of human misery and the way out, nirvana, was selflessness. It was a call to compassion and squared with everything he had ever learned from his father. So they were friends, but iron bars separated them from complete communion.

Poetry was another barrier. Josh fancied himself a poet and was so confident in his abilities that he made no secret of the fact he planned to stand with Whitman, Keats and Shelley in the times hereafter. The ambition was a noble one. The trouble was, Jeremy thought, he wasn't a very good poet, and Josh was so sensitive and so insecure that he could never accept criticism. His poems were too self-absorbed and too consciously poetic in a free verse kind of way. Many of his pieces dealt obliquely and obscurely with his troubled family life and his father's desertion. At a party for the honor students last year after Josh read one of his poems there was an embarrassed silence before people found things to praise. Jeremy began, saying that he liked the image of a "tree-shrunken rain," even though he thought it would make more sense to have written "the tree-shrinking rain." "I like that image," he said. "I could see the tree drooping from the weight of all the water that it had absorbed." Joan Hiram said that it reminded her of a poem they read in French class by Paul Verlaine, " _Il pleure dan mon coeur_." Others more generally murmured that they liked it. But of course the insincerity was too palpable to ignore, and Josh was sullen for the rest of the party. He felt like a misunderstood genius.

So his friend was difficult and had to be handled with great care. But where would he be without him? They first met when Josh transferred from Portland High to Courtney Academy in his Junior year after his mother got a new job in Waska. Never having outgrown his freshman shyness and social awkwardness, Jeremy was often lonely throughout his years at C.A. His three pals from grade school all got girlfriends and began traveling in different circles. They were still good guys and were always friendly when they saw him, but on Friday nights and weekends they were always busy. The only social events Jeremy attended were parties some of the teachers gave each semester for their honor classes. Occasionally he would go to a movie with Joan Hiram, always with the mutual understanding that they were just "friends." Joan was a very serious student who got straight A's and studied constantly. Jeremy could tell that his mother wished he had more of a social life, but she never pressured him. The result was most weekends he just hung around the house. Then in the fall of his junior year he saw in history class that Josh was a lot like him. He was bright, inquisitive, and had an interesting mind. He knew things that weren't in the textbook, showing that he read. Jeremy was impressed but too shy to initiate any friendship. It was only after the first exam and they both received 99 out of 100 points and tied for the highest marks in the class that they became friends. The exam was half essay and half two-point fill-in answers. Both got half credit for putting Locke down as the answer to a question about who was the thinker behind many of the ideas in The Declaration of Independence. The teacher was looking for John Adams as the correct answer, but gave them half credit for thinking of the English political philosopher.

After class that day they had talked for a long time and discovered their similarities. Before long they were spending a lot of time together. Both had gotten their drivers licenses as soon as they were sixteen and after taking Drivers Ed. No longer was Jeremy homebound on Saturdays. Josh collected coins, a hobby that offered them an excuse to go on outings to estate sales whenever he learned on the internet that coins were for sale, or to antique stores in Portland and other towns. Josh had money to buy these coins, some of which were pretty expensive, because after years of being a scofflaw, his father was finally forced by the courts to pay child support, and he got the princely sum of forty dollars a week for an allowance. Other weekends they would do stuff on the computer or just hang around and talk. Jeremy was very grateful to have a friend, and he genuinely respected Josh's mind and intellectual independence. Different they were, but no one else at school was interested in ideas in the same way he and Josh were. Most of the other kids in the honor classes were motivated by specific career goals, especially medicine, law and engineering. They were good students and intelligent, but they were not intellectuals, even in embryonic form.

That is why Jeremy put up with all the ways they were different and with all the things that bothered him. Consider the alternative, he would tell himself: alone and lonely. No, he wished that Josh wasn't so contemptuous of others, that he was quieter and less aggressive, or that he was more politically progressive, but on earth nothing is perfect and an imperfect friend was enough.

Josh had not really ignored the kid who made the wisecrack. He only pretended to, for after the kid spoke he grew quiet for a while. While Jeremy finished his lunch and thought about their friendship, Josh looked through their American literature textbook. He ate like a bird and much of his lunch remained uneaten. With a sudden jerk of his head, he looked up from the book. "What do suppose Emerson meant by 'Beauty through my senses stole/ I yielded myself to the perfect whole'?"

"I'm not sure," Jeremy said. He looked up and smiled at Tony Dibella as he walked by carrying a tray with his and Gina Chute's lunch. Tony smiled back and raised his eyebrows, pointing with his eyes and a slight toss of the head to indicate that he couldn't stop and couldn't talk because it was his duty to listen. Gina was saying something about a new pair of shoes that didn't fit. She was quite the talker.

Jeremy watched them for a moment, then turned back to Josh. "But in the introduction the guy said Emerson was bothered by the fact beauty is, you know, like spiritual, but the senses through which we experience beauty are materialistic. I think it's saying that he's just going to yield to the sensation and live in the moment and not worry about it. Somehow he felt he had communed with the Oversoul even if he wasn't sure how."

"Yeah, that's kinda what I was thinking. If you ask me, though, Emerson doesn't go far enough by just stopping being a clergyman."

"You mean the bit where he says he stopped being a minister so that he could preach?

"Yeah. He didn't go far enough. He should have thrown out all that crap."

Josh was an aggressive atheist, so Jeremy knew what he meant, and since most of the students who had heard them earlier quoting Emerson and Thoreau had finished and left, he was not self-conscious when he said, "God, you mean."

He nodded. "Yeah, God. How people can believe that crap is beyond me. God has a son, does he? Another part of him is a spirit, one that sometimes fancies he's a dove. Oh, really? If that second member is a spirit, what the heck is God? Meatloaf?"

While Jeremy didn't like Josh's sarcastic tone because he believed in respecting other people's beliefs, he didn't have many objections to the actual thought. He too had trouble believing in an all-controlling God who answered prayers and looked out for us. Would such a god have allowed his dad to die? So he grinned at the face Josh was making and said, "Yeah, it's quite a stretch. A Catholic friend told me they were told that the trinity is a mystery that remains a mystery even when it's explained. I like that!'

"I had a mystery explained last night. You know that passage where Emerson quotes some saint saying that God is a circle whose center in everywhere? Well, I was watching _Nova_ last night, and according to Emerson and that saint, God is the Big Bang. Or vice-versa." He paused to watch the effect this inscrutable statement had on Jeremy.

"Okay, I'll bite. How is the Big Bang, which Emerson never heard of, the same thing as God?"

Josh waited a moment, savoring the suspense; then he grinned. "The question was raised on the show, where is the Big Bang's location. You know, if something explodes and expands in every direction, the forensic guys can figure out where the explosion originated. But the Big Bang is different. The Cosmic Atom before the explosion was the entire universe. So the answer to the question is—"

"I get it, Jeremy interrupted. "The answer is everywhere. The Big Bang happened everywhere."

"That's it. Good go! I didn't see it until the guy said so. So isn't that a great one to tell to those people who believe the Bible is literally the word of God."

He saw Jeremy frowning and knew why. He rose and gathered his books together. "Come on, we'd better get to class." After they had emptied their trays and were outside, he resumed. "I know you think that Charlie Harris is a nice girl, but really the things she believes are just ridiculous. The trinity is nothing compared to believing that every word in the Bible is literally true."

"I don't think that's fair to her. I'm not positive, but I don't think she's happy. She was forced to live with her fundamentalist uncle, you know. I'm not sure she thinks the Bible is literally true. She told me once that she thought evolution was correct, and another time she said she thought the men who wrote the Bible were interpreting belief in terms of their day."

"So is she a Christian?"

"I think so. I'm sure, in fact. I just meant she isn't some robot being controlled by the Bible."

"Or her uncle?'

Talking about Charlie in so personal a way was starting to make him uncomfortable. "I don't know," he said in a way that cut off further discussion.

He was uncomfortable because of a plan he'd formulated and shared with no one—not his mother, not Josh, no one—to ask Charlie Harris to the prom. In many ways it was insane and impractical and almost surely doomed to failure because her strict uncle was not very likely to allow her to go to so profane an event. But he wanted to do it for another reason. The prom was the most important social event in high school, something that many people remembered vividly for the rest of their lives. He'd heard his mother and aunts talking sometimes about their proms with a sort of hushed reverence. His high school life was socially a failure; here was a chance, slim as it was, to redeem the failure. In this context, even asking would become a kind of victory. Because even if she said no while her eyes showed she wanted to say yes, he would take away from that a kind of joy. Nor was Charlie chosen from mere propinquity, nor from perceiving she was shy like him, nor from any other convenient consideration. He wanted to ask her because she was the only girl at Courtney Academy to whom he really felt attracted. It had to be Charlie he would ask. She was pretty, intelligent, and nice. Under those ridiculous dresses her uncle forced her to wear he could see she had a voluptuous body which he had often fantasized about. More importantly, he was quite sure she was attracted to him as well. He had watched other boys talking to girls and had observed the way girls became nervous and slightly flustered when they were attracted to the boy talking to them, and he'd seen many of these encounters lead to relationships, so he was quite sure the behavior he saw meant what he thought it meant. Charlie acted just like those girls when he talked to her. She too would become flushed and flustered sometimes. So even a no would still put the subterranean feelings they both recognized out in the open. That could at least be the start of something.

But it wasn't going to be easy. He had planned on asking her after class on Monday, only to chicken out. Today was just about the last day he could ask her and allow for a decent interval before mid June when the prom was scheduled. He had not slept well last night thinking about it and didn't want to go through that again. He was resolved to face the unknown.

The trouble was that now that the thought of asking her was in his mind, he was inattentive in class and actually daydreaming when Mr. Tibbett's question to him shocked him into a confused awareness. "Sorry," he said in a low voice as he felt his face growing red, "could you repeat the question?' Fortunately the question concerned Emersonian individualism, a topic he knew a lot about, and his answer led to a lively discussion that filled most of the rest of the hour.

Then after saying good-bye to Josh the heavy dread descended upon him as he headed across campus to his American Government class. It was the last class of the day and the only one he had this semester with Charlie. In little over an hour he was to confront his fate, whether in victory or defeat. Either way the thought caused his mouth to go dry and a weight descend to his belly.

Charlie was already in her seat when he entered the classroom. She wore a long dress faintly yellow (for she never wore bright colors) and square dark shoes. Her reddish-brown hair was no longer worn in pigtails, but rather was cut short, hanging just over her ears. She hadn't been in the sun enough to have any golden highlights. He sat behind her, where through the semester he had seen her many times pull at her bra quickly and surreptitiously so that he knew she was uncomfortable in those awful clothes her uncle made her wear. He thought of that as he sat down, feeling the presence of the fundamentalist minister as an oppressive barrier. The thought occurred to him that he had better not ask her. But that was only an cowardly excuse—

But she heard him coming and turned. "Oh, hi, Jeremy. How are you?" she asked pleasantly and with a quick little smile.

"Pretty good," he said, still dry-mouthed. "How has your day been?"

"Good."

"You took American lit last year, didn't you?"

She nodded as she leaned down to pull her bookbag out of the way as two girls came down the aisle.

"What did you think of Mr. Tibbett's teaching method? I mean teaching the nineteenth century by genres instead of chronologically?" Speaking of academic stuff, he found himself relaxing and noticed that Charlie did too. He saw her breathing became more shallow as he wondered if he was as transparent as she was.

"At first I thought it was strange, but seeing ideas from Emerson and Thoreau in Dickinson and Whitman and Melville gave a different perspective when we actually read Emerson."

"Yes, that's my reaction too. Mr. Tibbett said beginning with Emerson, the students tend to find him dry and abstract instead of an original and brilliant thinker. Did you like him? Emerson. I mean?"

She looked doubtful. Yes, but..."

"He was a minister, you know."

"But very independent." She spoke wryly, as if she was laughing at herself.

"I think he said something about leaving the ministry so that he could preach."

"Yes, strange sermons, though. But he was very interesting." Now she seemed wary.

"He believed in self-reliance and stuff like finding God right now, not just in the Bible. Perhaps your uncle objected?"

But before she could answer Ms. Jose strode into the classroom carrying a heavy briefcase. She was an intense young woman who had worked in Washington for a few years as a Senate intern before turning to teaching. She knew a lot about the inner workings of government. She was at her best when she talked from experience, Jeremy thought. When she lectured she tended to be boring.

The class topic for the day was the checks and balances of the federal government. It became interesting and kept Jeremy's mind from wandering when someone asked if a parliamentary system was better than our three-part government, and to everyone's surprise Ms. Jose said it was. The founding fathers, she said, had a certain distrust of democracy. The checks and balances among the three parts of the government were really a way to insure that the upper classes always controlled the government. After that the rest of the class was spontaneous and interesting as they discussed democracy and the different ways the two forms of government, parliamentary and federal, would confront a crisis.

Jeremy, scholar that he was, got lost in the safety and comfort of class discussion and only felt the return of nervousness when the bell rang. As he gathered his books and papers and prepared himself to follow Charlie out, Joan Hiram momentarily delayed him with a question about something he had said in class concerning people who had been imprisoned not being able to vote being an example of the way the government still showed antidemocratic sentiments. "Where on earth did you get that idea?" she asked with a smile. But in his nervousness and haste, he said curtly, "My mother read something about it and the Florida election in the paper to me just the other day," and turned away quickly to catch up with Charlie, but not before noticing a look of surprise and hurt on Joan's homey face. He knew he would have to apologize later.

The curtness, he knew, came from an internal struggle. Joan was unknowingly offering him an excuse to not have to face Charlie with his question, but the impulse to yield to a serendipitous escape had to be stifled with an effort of will.

Outside he saw her walking to her locker in Main Hall. Walking quickly, he came up to her.

"Hey, Charlie, wait up."

She stopped and turned, her face appearing suddenly tense. She recognized something in his tone. Already he felt his courage failing him.

"I forgot to tell you. Last weekend I found out I've been accepted at the University of Wisconsin with a full scholarship."

She relaxed. "Oh, that's wonderful. Congratulations!"

"Yeah, thanks. Interesting discussion on democracy, wasn't it?" he stupidly asked. He remembered the remark made long ago at his first party when he started talking about school: " _Hey, you guys. No talking about schoolwork. It's the weekend_."

"Yes, it was," she said, appearing to be puzzled by the sudden shift in topics.

They were at the foot of the stairs leading into Main Hall. He stopped. "Where are you going to school, Charlie?"

"I'm going to a Christian college in Virginia. My uncle wants me to be a spokesman for the national church. He thinks that will be putting my scholarly skills to good use."

He noticed she spoke of herself in terms of her uncle, not herself. "Is that what you want to do?"

She smiled nervously. "I don't really know what I want. But if I can help the church that will be worthwhile and important work."

"What would your uncle...?

"What?

"Oh, nothing." He knew he was defeated. He could smell the sweet aroma of the flowers the gardeners had planted on the sides of the stairs. The sky was a deep blue. The yellow and black striping of a bee hovering over the flowers caught the sun's rays through the shade of a tree and glowed brilliantly. "Oh, nothing, it's just that on such a beautiful spring day with flowers blooming and birds singing and the sky cloudless blue and with the senior prom coming up, I was just thinking you should do what you want to do."

He saw the look of panic in her eyes when she heard the phrase "senior prom." He saw, too, that she conquered her fear enough to hide it behind a wry little laugh. "We have a duty to other things, you know. To other people and to God. I'm sure my uncle wants the best for me."

So it was over.

But then came the remark that saved him from despair and showed that she understood him. It was subtle and indirect but unmistakable in tone. "I've got to get home, Jeremy, but...well, thank you. _Thank you_." Then she turned and almost ran up the stairs with quick, nervous steps.

For a moment he did not understand. He looked down at the ground, trying to interpret the way she had thanked him. She was grateful and yearning and sad and frustrated all at the same time. Then it came to him. _She_ _knew_. _She felt the same way_. The joy felt like a volcano exploding out of his heart, but he refrained but shouting out loud and let the emotion level down to a quiet contentment. He would carry the treasure of that knowledge all the days of his life and believe in the possibility of love forever. Still tingling with a joy he knew no one else would understand, he vowed that he would never forget how he felt at that exact moment. Then something made him look up. At the top of the stairs she turned to take a quick look back at him. The emotion he could read on her face was a strange, strange mixture of the same joy and pain that accompanied her last words to him, and he knew she would not forget this day and time either.

### PART III

### CONVERGENCE

This World is not Conclusion.

A Species stands beyond —

Invisible, as Music —

But positive, as Sound —

It beckons, and it baffles —

Philosophy — don't know —

And through a Riddle, at the last —

Sagacity, must go —

To guess it, puzzles scholars —

To gain it, Men have borne

Contempt of Generations

And Crucifixion, shown —

Faith slips — and laughs, and rallies —

Blushes, if any see —

Plucks at a twig of Evidence —

And asks a Vane, the way —

Much Gesture, from the Pulpit —

Strong Hallelujahs roll —

Narcotics cannot still the Tooth

That nibbles at the soul —

–Emily Dickinson, (501)

The Duty of Christian Women

Charlie arrived home from her first year at the Bible college to shocking news. Her first thought was that she misunderstood her aunt's words because she was so stiff and tired, having arisen very early in Virginia and traveled all day in a car with the Wilson family from Portland, whose son attended the same college. They were Bible Baptists, doctrinally close to The Church of Salvation Through Jesus, and often during the drive up the eastern seaboard they sang hymns, sometimes to the amusement of people in passing cars. At lunch at a rest stop on the other side of New York City they had also drawn attention to themselves by saying grace before their meal. Otherwise the trip was uneventful and merely tiring. It was after the Wilsons said their good-byes and left that Aunt Cora, who was alone in the house, told her that Martha was engaged to be married to Tom Johnson, Brother Johnson's elder son.

"Married? How can that be?" Charlie said, unable to hide her shock. She had not received the slightest hint that such an event was in the works, either on Christmas break or in letters and phone calls during the spring semester. Her mind raced through what she knew of the Johnsons. They were the second most powerful family in the church. Together with Uncle Edward, Brother Johnson was the only member of the church who was financially well off. He owned the largest heating, A.C. and plumbing contracting business in the area, lived in a large house and drove an expensive German car. Charlie had long noticed that there was a definite hierarchy in the church that—whether by accident or design—paralleled the economic status of the members. Brother Johnson was the chief among the seven elders; the other six were middle-class men, while the majority of the congregation were working folks just getting by. Was the alliance between the Johnsons and the Harrises like something out of some of those Victorian novels she had read? An alliance of power and wealth? It certainly could not be love. Though she had tried ever since meeting Tom Johnson to overlook his negative qualities, she did not like him. First of all he was arrogant and filled with himself. A doubt had never crossed his mind. He had gone to a private Christian academy for high school and had not attended college. He said that was because it was unnecessary since he was working in his father's business, but Charlie was quite sure it had just as much to do with his grades. He was a very stupid young man. Unlike most members of the church, he didn't even know the Bible very well. His personal relationship with Jesus didn't require book-learning, yet he was extremely opinionated and always cocksure he was right and that he had all the answers. Like his father, and like Uncle Edward, he didn't like to be contradicted. He'd chastised Charlie a few times, once for speaking too loudly with Martha after church and once for contradicting him when he said Jesus hated idleness. He had been talking about street people, and Charlie, still young in the ways of the church, had cited passages in the Bible where Jesus showed compassion for the poor and distressed. Tom had turned bright red in anger and had told her to hold her tongue. After that she was sure he didn't like her. But she was also sure that Martha, who was with her when Tom was belittling street people, did not like him either. And he certainly would not make anyone a good husband. He wasn't even pleasing to look at. He had a big nose, vacant eyes and a protruding jaw. He was heavy-set and would be fat not too far in the future. At church suppers he ate like a pig. He was uncouth. All the Christian charity in the world wouldn't change her mind. She was horrified that sweet and gentle Martha was being offered to this man like a sacrificial lamb.

Aunt Cora watched her face as these thoughts passed through her mind. She seemed to read it quite accurately, for she smiled grimly and said, "It's just been arranged. By 'just' I mean yesterday. Your uncle and Brother Johnson discussed it, and after having the night to think about it, Martha agreed this morning."

"But how does she feel about it?"

"Oh," her aunt said in a way that indicated she was speaking in code, "she'll do her duty."

When Charlie, not knowing what to say, remained silent, her aunt said, "I see you're surprised and know perhaps what you're thinking, Charlene. Perhaps I have similar thoughts, but there's nothing we can do. It's been decided." Then she took both of Charlie's hands in hers and looked at her. She was wearing a white blouse that showed her full figure and a long skirt dark gray in color. Last summer before she went off to college some discussion had occurred that led to the decision to allow her to wear more normal clothes. Who suggested it and why, she never knew, but she did find that all the young women at the college dressed in the way she was now attired—modestly, to be sure, but still revealing the womanly figure. The way her aunt said, "Charlene, you're looking wonderful—pretty and healthy and self-possessed," hinted that she had had something to do with the prohibition against normal bras being lifted.

"Thank you, Aunt Cora."

Then her aunt frowned and her face grew serious. She pressed Charlie's hands almost too tightly as her emotion rose. "Charlene, we women have to carry a burden, but remember everyone has to pay obedience to Jesus."

The sudden physical contact, for the first time ever conveying physically the feelings her aunt had for her, moved Charlie. She remembered the chocolate-chip cookies her aunt mailed to her every month because she knew they were her favorites. To her surprise she felt tears welling in her eyes.

Their appearance changed the mood instantly. They seemed to embarrass Aunt Cora, and quickly she let go of her hands. "I can tell you're very tired, Charlene. Why don't you take a rest. We can put your things away later. The children will be late because they're doing biblical reenactments in home school today."

Charlie nodded. She wasn't really tired anymore—the shocking news had jolted her mind out of its travel weariness—but she was feeling embarrassed to have embarrassed her aunt by her show of tears. It violated some unspoken code, she knew. "Yes, perhaps I should rest for a while," she said, turning towards the stairs, only to pause when her aunt spoke.

"Oh, by the way, Charlene, your mother wanted to come to see you tonight, but I had to ask her to wait until tomorrow. We're having a special dinner tonight to celebrate the engagement. The Johnsons are coming."

The thought of having dinner with the Johnsons was displeasing, but she merely nodded and offered to help prepare the meal after a short rest.

"It's all ready," Aunt Cora said. "You get yourself all the rest you need."

Up in her and Martha's room she noticed her bed had been freshly made with recently laundered linen and blankets. She could smell the detergent, or was it the fabric softener? She sat on the bed, then instantly arose and went over to Martha's dresser. To the left of the mirror was a picture of Jesus with long light brown hair and blue eyes, on the right a framed award from Sunday school for memorizing all the books of the Bible when she was six. That was the only personal item Martha had. Her well-thumbed Bible on the table by her bed was only indistinctly hers, and a hair brush with some strands of dark hair and comb were the only other items on display. Unbidden, wayward and dangerous questions formed in her mind: How could Martha say yes to such a monstrous proposition? How could her uncle offer up his only daughter in such a way? What right did two old men have to determine a young girl's future? How could it be stopped?

The last question brought her back to reality. The only way to stop the marriage was to somehow convince Martha to change her mind, and how likely was that?

She reclined on her bed—not to sleep but to close her eyes and think. That Martha did not like Tom Johnson she was quite sure. The sweet girl had never said anything critical about him, but she never spoke ill of anyone. Charlie remembered an involuntary look of repugnance Martha showed once when Tom was talking to them at one of the church suppers. His mouth was full, making him speak indistinctly, and when he grew excited the word "salvation" was spat out with a stream of food particles. And this man, or this boy, whose grossness had clearly disgusted her, was going to be her husband! She would do her duty, her mother said. Duty. The word had the effect of making Charlie see the similarities between her and her cousin's situations. The same two men who were arranging Martha's life for her had arranged her life as well. Unlike Martha, though, she had not even been given the chance to make a pro forma assent to their scheme. They had defined her duty as preparing to function as the public face of their church, and she was expected to do it. For a moment the old sense of unfairness she felt when first an inmate in the house and learned she could no longer play sports or watch TV because she was a girl held sway. Her uncle and Brother Johnson had decided her duty. They decided Martha was to marry a cretin. Why was the word always used as a bullet to wound? Why did she feel bullied instead of appreciated? Why was duty so joyless? Why were females treated like children? The questions agitated her and made her toss and turn on the bed before she remembered her aunt's remark about everyone having a duty to Jesus. Momentarily it softened the sense of injustice and unfairness she was feeling. Life wasn't supposed to be fun. It was the time you earned eternity.

But these thoughts didn't exactly allow her to achieve calmness, only the equilibrium to be able to think about her life objectively. A year of college had passed. Others spoke of college as a new and awakening experience. For her, though, the Bible college was exactly—or almost exactly—like home. True, it was slightly more open-minded. Women were allowed to wear more normal clothes, and occasionally she saw examples from the professors of a more scholarly and tolerant attitude towards different ideas than her uncle or any other members of the church displayed. She had even been allowed to do her literature paper on Dickens' novels. Most of the other students were choosing clearly Christian writers like Tim Lahaye and Jerry Jenkins, the authors of the Left Behind novels, or C.S. Lewis or John Bunyan, so it was only with great trepidation that she asked the professor for permission to write a paper on the Christianity in Dickens. After considering for a moment he said, "Certainly. He's mostly a good Christian, though far from perfect in doctrine. As long as you realize he belonged to a flawed church, you are safe." So it was that she was allowed to see a different conception of her religion in _Oliver Twist, Nickolas Nickleby_ and _Great Expectation_ and experience the same moral anger at the unfeeling power structure that allowed poor people to suffer and even starve, as well as see and agree with his idea of a Christian as one who had compassion for suffering. But these examples of open-mindedness were few and far between. Mostly in dealings with students and staff she had to be careful and avoid such topics as sex, biblical inconsistencies, science, her fear rather than love for her uncle, and so forth just as she had to take care with everyone at home, including Martha and Elizabeth. So the college offered her no escape. She confronted the same two realities, one external, one internal, and between them dissonance. She did meet people, especially females, who like Martha and Aunt Cora had good hearts and gentle natures, the kind of people who when they saw suffering wanted to alleviate it. Her three roommates, all from Virginia, were like that. Two were plain, one was pretty, none were particularly intelligent, all spoke with a soft Southern drawl, and all were sweet, polite and decent Christian girls. But there were many, many people at the college, most of them male, whether student or professor, who were like Uncle Edward and Brother Johnson—people absolutely convinced of the rightness of their beliefs, people who never had a shadow of doubt darken their minds. Some of them, she thought, were even worse, filled as they were with hatred instead of Christian love. They hated liberals and progressives and feminists and unmarried women who were sexually active; they hated abortion and contraception; they hated homosexuals and anyone who did not fit the pattern of the "normal" family; they hated the secular world and all nonbelievers; many of them even hated other Christians who were not evangelical. If they knew about her mother's past and how she refused to become a Christian, they would hate her mother too, just as they would hate Jeremy Lawrence, the only boy she had ever been attracted to, if they knew of his existence.

While these haters were not the majority, again just like the church in Waska, they were the ones who dominated the majority and controlled every aspect of the college. In this atmosphere, to some degree or other everyone had tunnel vision; the gentle ones were afraid to confront doubt perhaps because they would become unhinged like Elizabeth Pogue had that time they cleaned the church; the cocksure and bull-headed ones became angry if doubt was expressed. For a long time Charlie staggered under the burden of her isolation and was deeply unhappy, a condition that compounded her struggles because to be unhappy was to somehow not feel the presence of Jesus in her life. It was to be a bad Christian. She read somewhere that faith implied doubt, for no one has to have faith in facts such as gravity: stepping off a cliff and falling was not an article of faith. But everyone at the college regarded faith as fact. It was black and white, all or nothing. She had to pretend, at some cost in the violence it did to her serenity, that she was free of doubt. Ironically, in her early months at the college the one piece of advice that kept her sane was Mr. Adamson's remark that as long as you had Jesus in your heart nothing else mattered. When frustration and dissonance crowded any peace from her mind, that was her leap of faith. Often taking comfort from the memory of that day of the biology class field work, she began thinking it was the best Christian advice she had ever received. But of course it too was another thing she could not speak of.

Eventually she understood that what she hungered for was connection; with no one with whom she could she feel entirely herself, she was lonely and isolated; with barriers everywhere there was no one she could really talk to and her burdens went unshared. So she lived a secret life, even still having daydreams and sexual fantasies about Jeremy, which reminded her that she had inherited a harlot's heart and that her life was an inactive volcano.

Then slowly things began changing. As the year progressed into the second semester she began receiving the occasional hint in the look of an eye, a guarded statement (often instantly retracted), and other verbal and nonverbal signs that others like her lived shadowy, subterranean lives, revealing themselves only momentarily when they were surprised into confrontation with issues that caused doubt. By degree she came to see that not every one was a rigid and blind believer in every last aspect of fundamentalist doctrine and that she was not, perhaps, as alone as she had thought. Then on three separate occasions the suggestions of honest doubt or freer thought and belief came clearly into view. One time it was a boy who must have recognized something in her eyes, for after a class where some of the more bloody and cruel incidents in the Old Testament had been discussed, he walked with her back to the cafeteria and told her that he was thinking of leaving the school. At first he would not be specific, only emphasizing that the college was not what he expected and that he did not like it; but then he did hint that he was troubled by all the times in the Bible plagues were said to be caused by God's wrath. "Today we know it's unsanitary conditions and germs," he said in a voice an equal mixture of scorn and despair that told Charlie the nature of his doubts. Then his face reddened when she asked him if Jesus was still in his heart.

Another time it was her professor of New Testament studies, Rev. Doctor Johnson who revealed subterranean doubts. A kindly, sweet-tempered and soft-spoken man, bald and gray-haired and peering at you above his reading glasses with a benign patience, he was her favorite professor. One day a student came into class in genuine distress. He had stumbled upon an internet site that showed inconsistencies in the Bible. In Luke 3:35-36 Shelah is identified as the grandson of Arphaxed whereby in Genesis he is the father. This was a small error, a human error, but when doctrine said that God was the actual author of the Bible, a small error became gigantic in its implications. Nor was that the only one the student mentioned. The Epistles of Paul and Gospel of Mark did not mention the virgin birth. The internet source showed how the story of Adam and Eve was actually a Babylonian story. It seemed to Charlie that her professor was aware of these inconsistencies and somehow closed his eyes against their implication. He was not surprised by the information, but he appeared very ill-at-ease while the student spoke and his only explanation was a weak one—he said they were only apparent inconsistencies. Paul and Mark did not mention the virgin birth because other books in the New Testament had already covered it. Scholars disagreed about the other inconsistencies, he said with a nervous smile. Then he changed the subject. But Charlie, adept at reading eyes, saw that he was whistling past the graveyard. Perhaps, she thought charitably, he did not want to distress the students and had a more sophisticated view of the Bible that paralleled her own: that the writers were divinely inspired but still human beings and still explaining God's mysteries in terms ordinary people could understand. Maybe, though, Professor Johnson had titanic struggles of faith and doubt. If that was the case, she would not be displeased. It would mean her favorite professor was someone she might talk to in the future.

Along with the professor and the reluctant student, a third person showed a different kind of doubt about the Christian life on the last day of finals last week. She had thought about what happened frequently since then. With Kasey Lapham, a male student in two of her classes, she was on an innocent mission to gather flowers to be presented to the receptionist of the dormitory as a thank-you for all her help through the year. In a field near the college filled with fragrant wild flowers of every color, shape and size, they were alone and without witnesses when suddenly Kasey had tried to kiss her as he incoherently declared his love. She had seen him eying her figure before and was not unaware of his interest. Now that her breasts were not crushed and hidden away, she was used to roving male eyes. Christian or not, males were males. But she had no idea his interest was personal. Luckily he was a small boy, short and thin, and she had no trouble fending off his advances. "Stop it, Kasey. You know this isn't right."

"Isn't love right?" he countered, still trying to reach her mouth.

"Not this way. You'll just get us into trouble."

"I don't care. It's you I want. I don't care about the college. Compared to you, I don't even care for Jesus."

That blasphemous remark was what most surprised her. It was totally unexpected, very probably an honest, uncensored statement of feeling, and—she could not deny—quite flattering to her. She had been thinking of it constantly for the past week. Since she was not attracted to Kasey, nothing had happened, but she didn't know what would have followed if it had been Jeremy Lawrence who had played the bold lover. She suspected her harlot's heart would have responded in kind. Was it true that love and sex were so strong a force that one could forget Jesus? Instead of troubling her as the thought of sex had in the past, she knew and could feel within her a strange new confidence in herself. She knew Jeremy was attracted to her in high school, and the many roving male eyes she had caught magnetically locked onto her now that she wore more normal clothes confirmed that she was not unattractive to the opposite sex. So she was glad that the incident had occurred, and the changed attitude it gave rise to was one of the things she was going to think through during the summer along with what the first year of Bible college meant to her. Those glimpses of doubt behind the rigid armor of fundamentalist thinking had emboldened her to seek honest communion. That was why, she now realized, the news of Martha's engagement came as such a shock to her. Of all the people in the world she could talk to about her doubts and conflicting emotions, only Martha was close enough to her to listen sympathetically. Of course her mother would too, but her mother was not a Christian. She realized that a large part of the shock at hearing of the engagement was selfish. She was prepared to talk openly to Martha about her doubts about biblical inerrancy and other doctrines even though she knew it might distress Martha. That in itself showed a selfish desire, but her excuse was her desperation. Sometimes she felt as if she was trapped in a locked box and unable to breathe; the feeling was so oppressive it was no wonder she feared exploding like a volcano. But her selfish needs would have to be put on hold by this shocking news. Now it was Martha who would needed a sympathetic ear. Somehow she was going to have to try to talk that sweet girl out of throwing her life away. She went over arguments she could use, but knowing that any suggestion that Martha should think about herself and her own happiness would be met with counter-arguments about obedience to elders and Christian duty, she finally decided that the only argument that might work was suggesting that Martha was too young to be married. She had turned eighteen in December. If she could be convinced that she should wait until she was twenty-one, a lot might happen in those two and a half years.

She tried, not too successfully, to think of things to make a convincing argument for delaying the wedding until she heard voices downstairs. It was time to meet the family.

Coming down the stairs, she saw Martha looking up expectantly. Her brown hair was still in a bun but it look fuller as if she was letting it grow. She too wore more normal clothes now, though her breast were smaller and the change wasn't so glaring. Her eyes betrayed her nervousness. She didn't look like a girl who just got engaged. She had no glow about her, no aura of excitement. Quite the contrary, she looked more subdued than usual. Charlie took that as a sign of her reluctant affirmation of the proxied proposal. She knew Martha would never speak any such thoughts without help and much prodding. But now it was time to be conventional.

"Hello, Martha. Congratulations on your engagement."

She didn't smile at first. "Thank you," she said in a deadened tone. "And congratulations to you for getting straight A's again." That she said with a warm smile.

"The grades haven't been announced yet. How do you know what I got?"

"Father spoke on the phone last night to Rev. Sharpe," Aunt Cora said from behind the kitchen counter.

"And he told him your grades. He also said you're one of the best students the college has ever had."

Aunt Cora put some dishes on the counter and said, "We're all very proud of you, Charlene."

"So you all knew before I did."

Martha smiled again, a sweet loving smile. "It wasn't really a surprise to you, was it?"

She returned the smile while modestly murmuring, "No, I guess not. So how did your teaching go?"

Now eighteen, Martha was helping Mrs. Pogue with the home schooling. Four more younger children from the church had joined Elizabeth, Mark and Matthew. Mrs. Pogue concentrated on the two Harris boys and Martha was teaching the young children.

"Fine. Little Luke and Tobias can read now, and Sarah has finally mastered the multiplication tables. Only Lewis is a bit slow. He takes a lot of my time and effort."

All three turned at the sound of the boys at the door. While she was talking to Martha, Charlene could hear them taking the trash cans into the garage. Already socialized to be Harris males, they greeted their cousin without even a show of emotion. Matthew, taller now and gawky, managed to kick over the coat rack when he turned from the door upon seeing her and was self-consciously embarrassed. Like his father, he liked to be in control and show no weakness. So his greeting was a frowned, "Hello, Charlene." Mark, instead of saying hello, launched into a description of what he learned in home school today, that three presidents—Carter, Reagan and Bush—had been born again and saved. "Soon," he said, speaking by rote, "no one will be president unless he has accepted Jesus as his personal savior. Did you know that?"

The question reminded Charlie of a question in history class at the college. A girl had asked the professor how Lincoln could have been a great president when he didn't belong to any church. Charlie had waited in careful anticipation for the professor's answer. She had recently read the Gettysburg Address and found it filled with Christian love and forgiveness. But the professor hardly answered the question at all. "What do you expect," he said. "The man was a Yankee." Thinking of that now, she felt the incongruity of her life. But feeling it and showing it were opposite poles, for a conventional answer was called for. "Yes, Mark, I have heard others say that."

Perhaps she gave too much away about her true opinion. Mark grinned foolishly, but Matthew gave her a hard look and his eyes narrowed suspiciously. He held his tongue, though, probably because now that she was no longer a girl, he didn't dare to chastise her as he used to.

Both boys were not really interested in Charlie. They wanted something to eat and were allowed a cookie and a glass of milk. After that they disappeared upstairs and the women talked about the recipes for dinner. The topic of marriage was carefully avoided.

The father of the two boys was also distant when he arrived soon after. Whenever something was not coming out right in his financial books, which was rather frequently, he would be in a black mood. Charlie recalled the time a few years ago when her uncle was in that mood and Aunt Cora had suggested he hire a C.P.A. For a moment she thought he would explode as he frowned and his face darkened in fury. But he held his temper—and his pride, for no one was ever hired. With money, as with God, the Rev. Edward Harris would take advice from no man. Everyone understood that when he was in one of his moods the best thing to do was simply stay out of his way. He loosened his tie and put on his slippers while gruffly saying, "Hello, Charlene," and then he and his briefcase went down into the basement office, where he remained while the boys returned to the family room floor to play a game of chess, Martha and Aunt Cora made a salad, put the roast and potatoes in the oven and simmered some green beans, and Charlie unpacked and called her mother. She returned to the kitchen to find little needed to be done except set the table. She had no opportunity to speak to Martha alone.

At six o'clock sharp the doorbell rang announcing the arrival of their guests. The women waited for Uncle Edward to open the door. He came up the stairs still looking rather put-out, but was composing his face even as he walked across the space between the basement door and the hall. By the time he opened the door, he wore a smile. "Welcome," he said in a big, booming voice.

Brother Johnson shook his hand. He was bald, wore thick black glasses resting on a prominent nose, had a thin, severe face but was puffy around the eyes as if he habitually slept poorly. He was often irritable, so perhaps appearances were reality in his case. Tonight, however, there was an air of triumph about him. His puffy eyes, instead of looking sleepy, were shining, and he seemed very pleased with himself.

He was even avuncular with the boys, patting Matthew on the shoulder and asking, "How is the future minister today?" and turning to Mark and calling him a young scholar before even hearing Matthew's answer.

"Fine, sir," was the older boy's words, said with a respectfulness bound to please Brother Johnson.

It certainly had the desired effect. Brother Johnson beamed with pleasure and bestowed another pat on the shoulder to the future servant of the Lord.

Meanwhile, Sarah Johnson was delivering the dessert of apple pie and ice-cream to Aunt Cora. She was a plump, matronly woman of around fifty, phlegmatic in mixed company, talkative and gossipy and opinionated among women. Today she would be holding her tongue in the presence of the minister.

Brother Johnson glanced at the two women going into the kitchen to put the dessert away, then turned. "The future of our church is bright indeed. Jesus has blessed us all this day. Praise the Lord!"

"Praise the Lord," everyone repeated, Charlie coming in late because her attention was centered on Tom and Martha. No one noticed.

Shyly Martha stood behind her father. This was the first meeting of the newly-engaged couple, and yet so far they had not exchanged a word.

Brother Johnson, observing the situation, took the matter in hand. "Greet your bride, Tom, my boy. Be thankful to the Lord for this auspicious day."

Tom took after his father in his features, but had inherited his mother's tendency towards stoutness. He looked much the same since last Charlie had seen him except that his girth had expanded. Charlie had heard a big belly called a beer belly, but in his case it was a a pie belly. The Johnsons, like the Harrises, like most members of the church, had a rather pronounced sweet tooth. It was a wonder the whole congregation wasn't overweight.

Dutifully, Tom went over to Martha, first pausing to shake his future father-in-law's hand and receive his blessing. Then, facing Martha, he appeared unsure of what to do.

Martha appeared very ill-at-ease as well. Both simply stared at each other for a few moments before brother Johnson moved things along.

"Kiss her!" Brother Johnson said. "Kiss the bride to be."

A perfunctory kiss, the merest brushing of lips, followed the parental directive. Charlie thought she saw Martha recoil instinctively before presenting her pursed lips. She stood back embarrassed to be the center of attention.

With the kiss of possession, Tom got over his awkwardness. He sniffed the air and said to Aunt Cora, watching from the other side of the counter, "Sure smells good, Mrs. Harris."

"Call me Cora now that—"

"You're a fine cook, Cora. I hope you've taught Martha the art."

"Oh, yes. She's a very accomplished cook."

Tom looked at Martha. His eyes narrowed as he assessed her. "Last time I saw you you were wearing a blue blouse. Blue becomes you."

She wore a yellow one tonight. Was his first words to her as fiancé actually a criticism? Was he already asserting his power? Or was he still awkward and nervous and trying to hide it?

Martha blushed and didn't know what to say. Everyone seemed perplexed or embarrassed. Then Brother Johnson laughed. "There'll be plenty of time to get her just right after the wedding, Tom. She looks pretty enough in yellow."

"I'm delivering up to you a treasure," Uncle Edward said in his pompous, ministerial voice. "I hope you realize that." He was still in a black mood, Charlie could tell. He was looking at Tom rather sternly, making her hope that somehow he would lose his temper and call the wedding off.

Tom seemed to sense the danger. "I do, sir. I do indeed," he said so deferentially that he was almost craven.

From the kitchen Aunt Cora announced that the dinner was ready. Charlie went into the kitchen to help her aunt bring the food to the table while everyone else sat down. Martha and Tom were placed on one side with Matthew; the Johnsons, man and wife, and Charlie were crowded on the other side with Mark; and her uncle and aunt had their usual seats at the ends of the table.

The grace was longer than usual as Uncle Edward expatiated on Christian marriage and the duty to be fruitful and multiple as well as spread the word of Jesus among the heathen. Charlie noticed Tom exhibited some signs of impatience as the grace went on and on. Food was an important part of his life as a Christian. But soon enough the sounds of silverware clacking against plate superseded the human voice as the Christians gathered together separately attacked the mountain of food before them. Some conventional compliments were paid to Aunt Cora for her cooking, and a question or two was directed to Tom and Martha about their plans. Having none except the vague date for the wedding a year from now, those questions were as quickly dispatched as the food. Charlie had pretty much been ignored by all on this special night for the newly engaged couple, but quite unexpectedly Brother Johnson asked her how the college year went.

She answered that it went well, and as he beamed, obviously because he regarded her as his discovery, Martha said, "She's being way too modest. She got straight A's."

"Excellent," he said as he cut into his beef, holding his fork in a fist and sawing at the meat with his knife. "Our beloved church is going to benefit from those straight A's."

As everyone murmured in assent, Charlie noticed Tom was frowning sullenly. It disconcerted her so much she could only mumble a "Thank you" with her head bent down.

But Martha smiled sweetly and said, "She's a good Christian too."

Tom's frown darkened further and he flashed a look of anger at his fiancé, who didn't notice because she was still looking at Charlie. Nor did anyone else notice his hostile behavior since like Martha their attention was fixed on Charlie.

Uncle Edward seconded Martha's compliment. "Yes, we're all very proud of you, Charlene."

"Thank you, sir."

"I had to fire one of the guys in one of our crews today," Tom said. "He wasn't a good Christian."

"Was he a good plumber," Uncle Edward asked as everyone exchanged puzzled glances at this sudden change of topic.

"Well, yes he was. But he was insubordinate. I told him to skip the furnace inspection because we were late for the job at our next site. He had the insolence to ask me if I was going to adjust the bill to reflect we didn't do the work requested."

"Well, but did the furnace require servicing?" Uncle Edward asked.

"It wasn't bad, but that's not the issue. The man was surly and insolent one time too many."

"Young Tom here sometimes has a temper," Brother Johnson said. "The man in question was one of our better repairmen, actually. He may not be much of a Christian, but in business that's not always an issue. I'm going to talk to him this weekend and if he apologizes reinstate him."

Tom didn't like this information. He was frowning darkly as he listened, but recomposed his face the moment his father turned to him. "You understand business has different rules, Tom. An apology should settle the matter."

"Okay, but he better start showing me more respect too."

Brother Johnson gave his son a sharp look as if he suspected Tom of lacking the proper respect for him, then turned his gaze to Charlie. Helping himself to more mashed potatoes, he said, "So what sort of things have you been learning at the college?"

Noticing that most of the plates were clear of their treasure, Aunt Cora interrupted to ask who was ready for a second helping of beef. Uncle Edward, all three Johnsons and Matthew were; the rest gave a polite no thank-you. Once the plates were replenished, brother Johnson looked at Charlie expectantly.

"You mean about the Christian life, sir?"

He nodded gravely. "Specifically in defense of the Christian life against the heathen world we live in. Salvation, for instance. We see your role as that of a public defender, you understand. You'll need to come up with good arguments."

Charlie tried to think of something that would please him. "Well, we students would often talk among ourselves just as much as we did in classes. Salvation through faith is the first step. But I remember a lot of the kids at Courtney Academy had no sense of direction in their lives. That is something that Jesus offers. You see, a lot of those students didn't really have the faintest idea what they were going to do with their lives. They were just drifting. But I was impressed with how the students at the college knew exactly what they were going to do. They were filled with a sense of righteousness and purpose to spread the word of the Lord."

Brother Johnson seemed pleased with that remark. She saw, too, her uncle nodding in approval. "How about that Catholic family, James?" he said.

"Yes, they are a case in point," he said to her uncle, then turned to her. "We have, you see, a Catholic family interested in joining our church. The trouble is, the young woman seems most interested in works."

"Yes, yes," her uncle interrupted, "but it's plain. Salvation only comes through accepting Jesus."

"I know that," Brother Johnson said with considerable irritation. "But the question is, what arguments can we bring forth to convince them."

For a moment Uncle Edward glowered.

Matthew took occasion here to display his biblical knowledge. He cited Romans 1:17, "Sinners receive through faith in Christ alone the gift of righteousness," and Acts 4:12, where Peter announced that "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."

"We also talked about the importance of charity, sir," Charlie said to her uncle while noticing that Matthew looked sullen that no one congratulated him.

"If one has Jesus in one's heart, that _is_ charity," he said with finality, then regarded in turn his two sons. "Matthew and Mark," he said in a voice to command attention, causing everyone, not just the boys, to look at him, "I want you to be perfectly clear on that word 'charity.' It hasn't got anything to do with nonsense like giving to starving people in Africa or whatnot. The word translated into English as 'charity' is from the Greek word _agape_. It refers to the love we feel when Jesus is in our hearts. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," Mark said.

"Corinthians," said Matthew.

"You see that's the problem, James," Uncle Edward said to the elder. That DeClercq woman is all atwitter about works. She seems to think the Christian life is sitting on committees and whatnot. She's got to understand that only by accepting Jesus in her heart is she delivered from the stain of Adam and Eve's sin."

"And that a woman's place is the home," Tom Johnson said. "She said she didn't like the Catholic priest because he wouldn't let her do some things she wanted to do in the charity line."

Uncle Edward frowned. "She seems willful. I don't know."

Brother Johnson shook his head. "It would be good to ween her from popery, though. For that it's worth going the extra mile. That's why I said we needed good arguments."

"Tom," Uncle Edward said, "it was you she first approached, I take it?"

Tom, busy cutting and devouring an enormous piece of beef, didn't answer right off. "She's a neighbor—lives down the street from us," he said with his mouth full.

"Maybe we should get the Maguire family to speak to her," Brother Johnson said. "They've been with us three or four years now after leaving popery and are very happy. They'd be a good argument just in themselves."

Uncle Edward ignored that remark and spoke to Tom. "But does this woman's heart thirst for Jesus? I ask because it sounds as if she's in profound error. Am I right?"

Tom, smacking his lips loudly as he chewed and swallowed the beef, finally managed to say, "What do you mean?"

"I mean what we said before. She doesn't seem to realize that works do not contribute to merit. Doing good does not redeem one. Only accepting Jesus does."

"I think she can be made to understand that, sir. Father's suggestion that the Maguires talk to 'em might be effective. Most effective would be your personal attention, but I understand the interview with you comes late in the process.'

The compliment pleased Uncle Edward and seemed to have the effect of putting him in a better mood. With everyone's plate empty, he stood and said, "Well, enough of that. Shall we go into the family room for coffee and dessert?"

While the males settled into comfortable chairs in the family room, the females cleared the table and cleaned up. Sarah took advantage of the men's absence to gossip nonstop about some members of the congregation and neighbors, giving Charlie no chance to talk with Martha.

By the time the dishes were washed and coffee and dessert of apple pie and ice cream brought into the family room, the men appeared to be in the kind of pleasant mood that a good meal and a satisfactorily arranged marriage can bring about. Uncle Edward now seemed contented. Tom Johnson looked as if he had successfully won his bride through his own intrinsic merits. Brother Johnson was looking very pleased with himself as he patted his belly and complimented Aunt Cora once again and pretended he didn't know where he was going to find room for the pie and ice cream.

The tail end of a conversation that Charlie heard seemed to have been on the faulty financial records and some sort of suggestion about getting professional help, but now the thought did not bother Uncle Edward. He was brushing aside the suggestion as the tray with the dessert was brought around. "Again, James, I'm the one responsible for the finances. It's dangerous to let something like that fall into the hands of sharpers."

Brother Johnson, busy eating his pie and ice cream, bided his time. "Professionals have their place, I'm saying. Take the ad for my business, for instance. I spent all day in Portland just so I could deliver one line after the model we hired did her part." He jabbed the air with his spoon. "I'll tell you what. Those hours of waiting were worth it. We made a good ad. And I'll tell you something else. That model was expensive, but she'll more than earn her money. A pretty woman helps to sell things. The difference in ads with no pretty women and ones with one is about thirty percent more."

Uncle Edward nodded. Perhaps he too noticed the boastful tone and thought it was too worldly. Dealing with contractors in his business, he didn't have to advertise. "I suspect we're going to need the church painted this summer," he said, pointedly changing the subject. "There's peeling, and those places where we painted over the hooligans' graffiti stand out like a sore thumb."

"The paint's faded is why," Tom said with a full mouth.

"Charlene, did Reverend Doctor Achibald Sharpe get you students to paint the college this year. He spoke about it in a letter."

For a moment she panicked. Her mind had been elsewhere thinking about what Brother Johnson's remarks about pretty women selling things had implied about how he saw her. He was the one who had suggested her for the chosen role of spokesman. Now she felt cheapened, hurt, angry, uncertain. During the interview to determine her suitability as a national spokesman by five ministers after Easter in April she was mostly asked questions about the Bible and church doctrine, which were all answered to their great satisfaction, but now she recalled how all the ministers were taking note of her physical appearance and one of them had even said, "You're a handsome girl, Charlene." Were they too thinking that a pretty woman helped to sell things? The idea made her wonder if Brother Johnson had anything to do with her uncle allowing her to wear a normal bra that showed her figure. And she had noticed both Johnsons observing her chest on more than one occasion this evening.

Luckily she had heard enough of her uncle's question to have an answer ready. "Yes, the boys painted it except for the steeple of the church and the girls provided lunches and drinks."

Her uncle beamed. "There's another example of the fellowship of Christians in action. There's nothing we can't do if we stand together."

Tom didn't volunteer to help do the work, but he did say, "I'll start asking around for volunteers." He was just finishing the last of his pie and spoke with his mouth full. Looking at his now empty plate, he said, "Martha, get me some more ice cream, would ya."

"Yes, more for me too," Mark said. "Can I, Momma?"

Aunt Cora nodded indulgently as Martha obediently sprang up and went to the kitchen.

"Where's that photo of the church when we first built it?" Uncle Edward asked Cora. "I remember the doors were dark blue then instead of black. I think I might like blue again."

Charlie remembered that the album containing photos of the church used to be on the bottom shelf behind her. "I think it's here, Uncle Edward," she said as she leaned back and twisted her body to reach for the album. The action caused her left breast to jut out, and as she sat up she saw Tom eying it lewdly. When he didn't drop his eyes but instead brazenly kept looking at her, she felt herself blushing.

This was not the first time she felt his eyes upon her, but it was the first time he impudently did not cast them away. She didn't know what to make of that. Was he asserting dominance? If so, was he even aware that was what he was doing? Or was it contempt for women that he was telegraphing? Or even jealousy? She, a woman, was destined to be prominent in the church. The highest honor he who thought women's place was in the home could achieve was to succeed his father as a church elder, where his duties would not be much more than rubber-stamping what the minister wanted. Or was it mere sensual lewdness? Whatever it was, it did not bode well for Martha's future, and that was Charlie's first thought after she got over her embarrassment.

Self-consciously she walked across the floor to give the album to her uncle. Back at her seat she observed when Martha returned that Tom was more interested in the ice cream than her. The question in her mind for the rest of the evening was how she could use this information to persuade Martha against the marriage. Because it involved a hint of sex, she could not see her way clear.

In the meantime, the photo of the church when it was brand-new had induced a nostalgic mood in the parental Johnsons and her aunt and uncle. For more than an hour they talked about the early beginnings of the church, first preaching in the home, then in a hall rented from a fish and game club (they would "purify" the hall before each Sunday's services using special prayers), and finally as the congregation grew in their own church, now twelve years old.

After a while she didn't attend very closely to the conversation. The long journey north from Virginia was taking its toll, and she was very tired. Seeing the Johnsons off and getting ready for bed was effected while half-asleep, and Martha's arrival from the bathroom wearing her nightgown went unobserved, which meant she must have fallen asleep. But something brought her to the awareness of Martha brushing her now loosened hair and standing before the mirror attached to the dresser. Charlie could tell she was being as quiet as possible so as to not wake her. But seeing her reminded Charlie of her plan.

"Martha, are you happy about the engagement? I mean really happy?

She seemed surprised that Charlie was awake. She turned quickly and uttered a little cry before saying, "Oh, I hope I didn't wake you."

"No, I wasn't fully asleep yet. But are you?"

She turned from brushing her hair and said in a tone that was meant to discourage further conversation, "About the engagement? Don't worry, Charlene. I'm fine with it, really."

"But they act as if it's your duty to marry him. What about your wishes?"

Martha thoughtfully brushed at her long hair before once again turning towards Charlie's bed. "I know what you're thinking. Even a Christian should marry for love. But what is human love compared to the love for Jesus?"

Charlie momentarily debated telling her about Tom's lewd eyes and what they implied, but this didn't seem to be the time. Weakly she said, "Nothing, of course, but still we have to live our human life even as we direct our thoughts to the divine."

She put the brush down and came over and sat on her bed, where she faced Charlie. "I'm very tired, Charlene, so I haven't got much to say right now—or really ever. But I do understand you are thinking of my welfare and for that I'm very grateful. I know you don't like Tom. I could tell the news distressed you. But he is a dedicated Christian, and I always knew he was the kind of man I would marry."

"But don't you think it would be wise to wait until you're twenty-one?"

"No, I don't think that will change anything." She stood to turn her bedspread and sheet open, then crawled under the covers. "Here's how I look at it. My true groom is Jesus. My life is dedicated to Him. So I'm going to do my duty. I'm going to marry Tom. I thought about it for a long time last night, and that's what I decided."

"And you won't change your mind?"

"No. I decided. That's it."

"Well, I hope you will be happy, Martha. I won't distress you any further. Tomorrow I'm going to visit my mother in the morning. After that maybe I could help you and Mrs. Pogue with the home schooling. Is that all right?"

"Yes, that would be nice. Good night, Charlene," she said, reaching over and turning off the light.

"Good night, Martha. Sleep well," she said, her voice tremulous in the sudden darkness.

The Best Christmas Ever

I

Steps Along the Way

One lucky day Tris Harris met Ted McNaughton and changed her life, but change is something you have to be ready for, so the life-transformation came only after dozens of small steps along the way. One realization was necessary to begin this journey: she had to see that she was an alcoholic. You would think a woman who got drunk every night and lived so slovenly and chaotically that she lost her daughter would pretty easily realize that she was an alcoholic, but such was not the case. Self-reflection, and accordingly self-knowledge, was not a habit of mind with her. Seeing life merely as days, as units of time that she had to get through, she did not look before and after. She always believed herself to be a strong woman because she had left home, had a baby, raised her (sort of) on her own, had never missed a day of work because of drinking, and could get just about any man she wanted because of her perfect body and good looks. After social services took Charlie away she did feel awful. The memory of fighting naked in front of Charlie and later the cops because of her sexual jealousy of her daughter brought her such a sting of shame every time she thought of it that for a long time after that night it was the direct cause (or excuse) for her getting drunk again.

The rock-bottom point they say every alcoholic has to hit before he or she can begin to change was not, then, that shameful night; rather it came almost a year and a half later after nearly drinking herself blind drunk every night. Even when she got to the point of realizing she was drinking herself to death, she still thought of herself as a strong woman. She had moved into a rooming house run by a widow; she still made work at nine o'clock every morning; she still had found plenty of male companionship and made sexual slaves of many of them until they, or she, tired of the game and broke it off; then she'd started the cycle again. She felt she was keeping her head above water and knew you had to be strong to do that.

But she wasn't stronger than time, and it was the force that caused her toes to feel the rocky bottom of her life. After many tearful phone calls to her stubborn and cruel brother wherein he told he she was not worthy to see her daughter, it became clear that Charlie was gone from her life for good. The guilt and growing self-disregard she felt would visit her every sobering-up morning. The loneliness she felt grew oppressive: she knew many a bar patron well but had no close friends. The thought would come unbidden and without any immediate cause that this kind of life could not continue. The inevitability of losing her beauty was becoming very real. Despair was looming. Emptiness oppressed her. Fear was huddled in a dark corner ready to spring. Tiredness overwhelmed her like water as she felt herself drowning. Thoughts of suicide cackled madly inside her head. It even occurred to her that maybe she was not strong. Reality stared her in the face and she saw her drinking was a crutch, not a lifestyle. Nevertheless she still found herself at a bar after work that night. By chance, though, a drunken woman made a spectacle of herself when she ripped off her top and tried to do a lapdance on some guy who was disgusted with her behavior and shouted at her angrily, "Get off me, you hag!" The woman, five years older than she, had been one of her principal rivals for men through the years.

That was it. She saw her fate. It was going to happen and she couldn't kid herself. Not even finishing her drink, she rushed out of the bar and into her car. On the drive home she started crying, and before she knew it she was bawling her head off like a little baby and didn't stop until she got to the rooming house, where she sat in her car for a long time composing herself before she went inside. The widow, Mrs. Franklin by name, was watching television in the parlor. They were not friends. A couple of times when she'd brought married men into her room because that was the only place they could screw, the widow-landlady had been displeased, to say the least. She was a stern old bag, fair in her dealings with her tenants but not friendly. Tris had been put on notice: one more misstep and she was out. Nevertheless Tris went into the parlor because she simply had to talk to someone. Mrs. Franklin, who already knew all about the Charlie business, listened without any particular signs of sympathy to her confused cry for help and only had one piece of advice to bestow: "Everyone knows that if you want to stop drinking you have to go to A. A."

So she went to A. A. But it had a surprise for her—it expected alcoholics to admit they were not strong enough alone to lick their problem: they needed God. She found that out the first night and decided the group was not going to be any help to her. But the group leader was a sensible man and explained to her in a private conversation after the meeting that it was acceptable to put her faith in a higher power without becoming a clone of her brother, who was in her eyes what a Christian meant ("a sanctimonious pig" was how she described him when she was asked to introduce and talk about herself). After a few more meetings she did start feeling support, though the higher power for her was in fact the fellowship she felt from being with people who could understand her. It was comforting to hear the others saying that thinking about having a drink could drive them crazy, that they would pace until almost running, that they would bargain with themselves to just hold off another hour, that distracting themselves by going for a walk or shopping or watching TV would help some but not completely. Others had suggestions on how to deal with the addiction. Some took up hobbies that required time and concentration. One man built furniture, another played computer games, a woman in the group began hooking rugs. Taking their advice, Tris, who had only needed four courses to graduate when she left school pregnant with Charlie, got a book on studying for the G.E.D. and spent weekends, the worst time for her, studying. It helped, but as the months passed and twice after frustrating conversations with her brother she fell off the wagon, the others were there to tell her they had done the same thing and that the way to lessen the chances of yielding to temptation was to very clearly understand what events, interior or exterior, had led to the drinking. Tris confessed that it was the helplessness and guilt she felt for not being allowed to see her daughter. Guilt was something every alcoholic felt, they told her; that is why A.A. insisted that the only way to free yourself from it was to try to make amends.

The other and in the end far more important benefit she derived from A. A. followed from more good advice from their sensible leader. He was an accountant whose life was almost ruined by alcohol, and there was nothing he didn't know about its power over people and how to fight that power and win. He suggested that since her brother was frustrating her attempts to apologize to her daughter and therefore hindering the healing process that she should see a psychologist who could help her talk through the unresolved issues inherited from her childhood. At work she checked and found out her health insurance would pay for counseling, and her boss offered no objections and was not judgmental.

So four months after starting A. A. she was seeing a psychologist once a week. Things didn't start off very promisingly. Dr. Alicia Tellas had a pinched mouth and half-closed eyes that reminded her of an English aristocrat she'd seen in a comic movie. She wore minimal makeup, just some lipstick and pencilled eyebrows. A family photo of a boy and girl sitting on the laps of her and her husband was displayed next to her fancy degrees, telling Tris she was a married woman. But although she dressed well in a silk blouse, skirt and hose, she was not an attractive woman. Tris's first impression was that such a plain Jane could never understand the life of a beautiful woman like herself. The inner office was also small, so small that their knees almost touched they sat so close together. The close proximity made Tris uncomfortable. Worst of all was the advice she gave. She would listen to Tris relate the story of her life when she was a girl and a woman, her drinking and sexual escapades, her loss of her daughter from that drinking and those escapades, and sometimes ask probing questions, other times make general observations. It was the latter that bothered Tris. One of her office mates at work had a monthly calendar with inspirational sayings on her desk— things like "Always be true to yourself and the world will be true to you"—which Tris regarded as sappy and stupid just like her office mate. Some of the remarks Dr. Tellas made reminded Tris of this sappy woman. "Only when you start believing you're valuable for yourself will you start to get better." "You need to respect yourself before others will respect you." "When you've suffered a lot of pain, you can use that to understand the pain of others; then you'll grow."

On the positive side, Dr. Tellas was unflappable and would remain calm even when Tris in speaking of her brother or father or some other man who had mistreated or neglected her would sometime forget herself and either lose her temper or her composure. She also emphasized and praised Tris's good qualities, including her never missing work and always paying her bills on time. And it was Dr. Tellas who suggested that she take her studying for the G.E.D. to another level by enrolling in night classes for G.E.D. preparation at Bedford High School and attend classes two nights a week. Tris followed her advice and found the classes beneficial in two ways. First, as her group had suggested, they helped keep her mind off drink; secondly, they helped her grow in self-respect. She did so well in the courses that her instructors complimented her on her intelligence.

She was still very frustrated at not being able to see Charlie, but here Dr. Tellas came up with a solution that revealed her humanity and made Tris begin thinking of her as a friend instead of an officious stranger. When she learned that Edward's condition for allowing visits was for Tris to be free from drink for a year, the two entered into a conspiracy together. In a letter she wrote to Edward, Dr. Tellas stretched the truth a little and informed him that by December Tris would have gone a full year without drinking. She also suggested, in wording that hinted a legal remedy would be pursued if he refused the request, that Tris should be allowed to see Charlie under supervision before that date. She knew her man, for Edward backed down and reluctantly agreed, and for the first time in almost three years she saw her daughter, though with Edward's presence being like a poisonous fog they were unsatisfactory meetings. But now she had a goal to aim for, and not drinking became easier. That she had come to trust Dr. Tellas and regard her as a friend also helped because if she drank it would be like a violation of the trust they had.

So things were getting better. In the summer she took and easily passed the G.E.D. examination and was very proud of herself. She felt as if it was the first real accomplishment in her life. Then, just as in her past life bad things had caused further bad things, now it was the opposite. A good thing like getting her G.E.D. led to another opportunity. At work the company accountant was going to retire in a year. Mentioning this development to Dr. Tellas and to her A.A. group leader, both suggested she take a course in accounting. She was already familiar with much of the work because at busy times and particularly at the end of the fiscal year she had helped the accountant do the books. She had a good mind for figures and taking the course in the fall semester she got an A. After that her boss let her become the accountant's assistant in preparation for her assuming the full-time responsibility. As if as a reward, starting in the late fall she was allowed to see Charlie alone and was able to apologize to her and tell her that she had always loved her.

With her trust in Dr. Tellas now fully realized, the therapy became more intense. The psychologist would challenge her and force Tris to recognize her destructive behavior: "You don't think sleeping with a guy just because he buys you drinks all night is the behavior of a woman who disrespects herself? Then what do you consider it?" Or she would create situations: "Suppose you've been sitting with a man all night and felt like taking a walk because you were stiff. What would you do? Ask the man you're with to go with you? If he doesn't want to, would you still go?" Other times simple questions would lead Tris to the truth: "Have you ever told a man of your hopes and fears?" Eventually, Tris got the point that a good relationship entailed give and take and mutual respect. She realized she had never had such a relationship. Here was no reason to despair, however, for Dr. Tellas's purpose in making her see the inadequacy of her past behavior was to change it; once Tris understood that there had to be deconstruction before she could be built anew, she could be hopeful because she saw in a hundred ways how she was growing in confidence and understanding.

Then they entered a dark period where probing of her childhood relationship with her parents and brother became very painful. Amidst all the pain, though, came discoveries. Somehow she had forgotten or suppressed the memory of her brother's behavior when she went through puberty. Now she remembered the times he would spy on her, walking into the bathroom while she was naked in the shower or in her room when she was dressing. She was sure he was sexually aroused by these encounters, and she remembered how they made her feel a strange self-loathing at the same time his behavior disgusted her. She was afraid to say anything since he was so clearly her parents' favorite.

Her life of sexual promiscuity followed directly from these encounters with her brother, which Dr. Tellas was sure was no accident. She tied the behavior to the way her brother and father treated her, but with Tris needing to understand the man who had control of her daughter many sessions were devoted to Edward and the way he thought. Speaking generally, and not specifically of her brother, Dr. Tellas explained that fundamentalist ministers who blame Eve and woman for sin and evil were merely transposing their profane sexual temptation from its true seat in their minds and placing it outside of themselves, resigning their moral responsibility for their behavior and in effect blaming the victim. Making behavior not a ethical question but instead a set of exterior rules and beliefs that can be followed was characteristic of those people, as far as she could understand them. She thought Tris's description of her brother both as boy and man showed that he was an egomaniac who regarded other people, including his family, as mere instruments of his will.

But her father was even more important to her development, and many more sessions were devoted to the way his indifference to girls was destructive to Tris's sense of self-worth. It was at this point that Dr. Tellas, in making the connection between Tris's individual life and the social forces that shaped that life, began talking about feminism. It had always meant to Tris something that concerned rich, privileged women who wanted to be rich doctors and lawyers like their husbands and brothers, but when Dr. Tellas explained that it was opposition to a patriarchal society that demeaned women and made them feel inferior, she made the connection to the way her father and brother had treated her. She saw that she was a victim of sexism, though when she said that Dr. Tellas responded by saying that it was true but that what women needed to do was to become empowered and not feel like a victim.

By this time she had a fairly good relationship with Charlie, who was now in college. They exchanged letters weekly, spoke on the phone together once a month, and were getting along quite well. At work she was told she would get the job as the company's accountant. Although the slightest little frustration could still sometimes make her think of drinking again, all these personal and professional gains were strong enough fortifications against those dangerous thoughts. Dr. Tellas had strongly urged her to remain celibate until she met a man with whom she could develop a relationship. She had not been sexually active for over a year, but in the fall of Charlie's sophomore year she met such a man.

Ted McNaughton was an army veteran badly wounded in the first gulf war and a carpenter by trade. This and much more information about him Tris learned when he spoke about himself at his first A. A. meeting, which he attended after not drinking for a year. This strange chronology came about because the V.A. psychiatrist he had been seeing was temporarily re-assigned overseas for four months, and in his absence he had recommended the A.A. as a organization that would help reinforce his sobriety. He was not handsome, though his bright blue eyes were striking. He was tall and thin with brown hair already speckled with gray at the temples and thinning at the crown. A scar running from below his eye and down his cheek into his chin was the result of the same shrapnel that had lacerated his leg. When he noticed people looking at it, he explained its origin without being self-conscious about it at all. He also spoke of his war experiences and the terrible wound he had received without the slightest hint of self-pity and rather in the tone of one stating facts that could not be disputed. His leg had been so badly hurt by the shrapnel from an exploding rocket grenade that the doctors were ready to amputate it before deciding that a series of operations had a thin chance of success. He was airlifted back to the states and spent a year in a hospital submitting to numerous operations to sew his muscles and tendons back together, suffered much pain and underwent much physical therapy. One thing he learned from this ordeal was the value of patience, something he would later need when he was back in civilian life and the drinking started ruining him. He explained—again simply as fact and without any self-pity—that he'd had a rough childhood as the son of an alcoholic odd-jobber and a sweet mother whose meager income from a paper route was often the only money the family had had. When his mother died from cancer when he was seventeen, he couldn't wait to get out of the house and joined the army a week after his graduation—but not before marrying his high-school sweetheart, who was already pregnant with their son. One thing only his father had taught him, skill with tools and how to fix things. That came in handy when he returned to Waska after his rehab stint. He got a job with a carpenter's crew and became so skilled that four years later after his daughter was born he started his own contracting business. This hopeful idea, he said, turned into the biggest mistake of his life. Demanding customers, customers who wouldn't pay him, screw-ups of various kinds that invariably happened, underestimating a job so that he would work crazy, long hours trying to finish it before the promised start time of another job—all these things led to pressure and tension first and then to drinking second. When the drinking started affecting his work, the tension got worse with the result that he started having terrifying flashbacks of his war experiences, which would make him drink even more to drive away the horror. With a self-deprecating smile he told the group that he became a regular posterboy for PTS. His wife put up with this behavior for years but finally filed for divorce, for which he didn't blame her one bit—if the shoe was on the other foot, he said, he'd have divorced himself. The only thing he was glad about was that he was always loving to his daughter and son so that luckily they did not hate him.

He was different from every other man Tris had ever know. She could easily understand why his kids continued to love him; the mystery to her was how his wife could have thrown away such a treasure. She noticed she was not alone in her admiration: everyone in the group liked him instantly. There was a calmness about him that made people relax in his presence. He had a childlike air of vulnerability and yet had a hidden strength that you felt instinctively. He was not in the least naive. He had a sweet temperament that implied he was never angry, never self-pitying and never mean. He was simple and direct; there was no humbug about the man.

After his first meeting where all these things were learned, Tris thought about him during the rest of the week and was already half in love with him by the time his second meeting came around. That's when she saw him do something that was so wonderful she knew she wanted him in her life. At the meeting one of the members in talking about his sad loveless and neglected life started weeping so uncontrollably that no one, including their leader, was quite sure what to do. But Ted, without a word, stood and went over to the man and hugged him, comforting him like a child until the tears stopped flowing.

Everyone watched in awed silence before they internalized the compassion and began verbally comforting the poor man with such as remarks as: "We know how you feel, Bob." "You'll get through this, don't worry." "Hang in there, friend. We're with you."

But Tris was too moved to speak. The possibilities for solidarity and strength that you could gather from others who understood your suffering was the most hopeful thing she had ever seen. No longer would she ever feel alone as long as people like Ted were in her world. She felt the tears smarting at her eyes and her heart go heavy with... with what? Was it really love? No, she thought, remembering Dr. Tellas's teachings that relationships were reciprocal. It was the knowledge that she needed love in her life to be whole and the overwhelming desire for Ted to be that love.

That night after the meeting she talked with him for a long time. They leaned against his car in the cool hush of the evening and watched the sunset paint the sky red. Tris, honest and forthright in her praise for his humanity, told him she thought he was a very special person, and thrilled at his apparent interest in her. She was nervous and flustered by him like an innocent and shy schoolgirl, something she had never been, but later in bed that night she thought about him and could almost believe that that red sky and that hushed evening coolness was really the dawn of her new life.

After that it became their practice to talk before and after every A.A. meeting. Both were tentative and careful, wanting to take it slow, but both recognized the growing feeling between them was something special. When she told him about Charlie, he was extremely sympathetic, saying that to love children was our most important duty and repeated again how glad he was that he had managed never to have alienated his kids. Tris said that was because he was such a nice guy no one could dislike him, to which he replied with a smile that had she seen him in Iraq she wouldn't say that. They discussed the possibility that Charlie knew his son Mike, who was at Courtney Academy at about the same time Charlie was. His story about a nephew who had joined a fundamentalist sect when he was young and then later managed to escape their mind-control gave her hope for Charlie. He said that you can never tell a child that you love them enough. He said that he told his kids that he loved them every time he saw them. And of course they talked about their own lives. He was working for a carpenter now and content to have no responsibility except to do a good job. She told him about getting her G.E.D. and taking the course in accounting and how that led to her being groomed to be the accountant at her firm. Remembering Dr. Tellas's advice that a relationship had to be based on honesty and mutual respect, she told him that she had been a slut for most of her life. He, having heard about her father and brother and how they treated her, said that was because of the bad set of cards life had dealt her and her drinking. She was a lady now, he said. He could tell she was a person who wanted to do good, love her daughter, and make up for wrongs she had done. That led to their first kiss, tender and tentative at the same time.

Both were still taking it slow. Ever mindful of Dr. Tellas's advice, she never held anything back except the fact that she was heads over heels in love with him. She thought he knew that; she could tell he had feelings for her. They never had a first date in the usual sense. One time after the Thursday meeting he asked her if she'd like to go to the beach with him on Saturday. It was fall now, so he meant just an outing to watch the surf and hear the seagulls. They did, walking arm in arm on the sandy beach and on the breakwater at Camp Melton and having a seafood lunch at a restaurant there. The next Saturday he came to her rooming house to help her paint the walls in her room and even mesmerized that old crab, Mrs. Franklin, by repairing a gimpy leg on her dining room table.

A few weeks later she met his son Mike, who was home for the weekend from college, and his daughter Belinda, who lived with the man she was soon to marry but came to Ted's apartment to meet the new woman in her dad's life. That that was the purpose of this filial visit was plain enough though unspoken, and Tris was very nervous. She knew Ted's strong feelings for his children and feared what might happen if they did not like her. She had thought a long time about what to wear. She wanted to be attractive but demure. She finally decided on a pair of designer jeans and a light V-necked sweater. For make-up she applied only blush lipstick. But she passed the test—if it was a test—just fine, for she could tell they both liked her and admired her—in fact they both seemed awed at how good-looking she was and treated her at first more like a Hollywood starlet than a woman whom Time had battered and bruised. But she did have to admit that meeting Ted made her feel young and loving him made her feel beautiful, so she quickly relaxed and made friends.

Then it was real dates, with dinner and movies, and following that weekends together and making love feeling like a new bride because it was making love and not screwing. Not many weeks after they had told each other the three little words, they were living together in Ted's apartment. Then, because Ted had done little with the place and it was bare-boned in regard to furniture, they had other weekend projects to share: decorating and finding furniture. This was a new discovery for Tris, who had always lived in dumps after leaving home, but now finding out how much fun it was to make your private space reflect your personality. Certainly the decorations reflected joy. The walls were painted golden, like their love, the rugs and new couch were red-tinged like their passion for each other, the pictures on the wall serene landscapes reflected the trust they had in each other, and the bare, unfinished places pointed to the future of sharing their lives they had in store.

II

Christmas Time

One thing Tris had learned about Ted was that he loved to do things on the spur of the moment. It was one of his most appealing characteristics and one that made her life interesting. He'd think of something, get excited about it, and do it instantly. When they got their new couch shortly after she moved in with him, he'd looked at the dingy walls, back to their new couch, and then stared into space for a moment before deciding the walls needed painting. It wasn't a day, a week, or a month later, but that very day they went to the paint store, chose a golden color for the walls and white for the trim, returned home with the paint, plastic dropcloths, brushes, rollers, buckets, pans and spackle to repair holes in the wall, and during the rest of the weekend they'd painted. Other times he'd be reading a movie review in the newspaper one moment and mere hours later they'd be in the theater watching the movie, or he'd think of how much fun it would be to walk along the beach after a storm passed through and an hour later the salt-ladened air would be blowing her hair around. So on the day before Christmas when he called her into the living room from the kitchen and said, "Hey, I've just had a great idea," Tris knew that she should be prepared for action. She looked at him expectantly with a wide smile on her face anticipating something of great fun and thinking of how much she loved this spontaneity of his.

"Let's get a Christmas tree!"

"What? Now?"

"Yeah. Don'tcha think it would be fun? I haven't had one in years and I bet you haven't either."

She hadn't. When Charlie was young they had a small plastic one about two feet high that they put on a table and plugged in, making tiny colored lights shine; then years later it somehow disappeared and they had no tree. She remembered on the last Christmas they had as mother and child she'd been drinking so heavily and was so self-absorbed that she'd forgotten to get Charlie a present. For a moment the painful and shameful memory quelled the excitement she'd caught from Ted, and it took an effort to say, "No, it's been years. But is that what you've been smiling about all day?"

He smiled, sheepishly this time, from where he was sitting on the couch. "Nope. That's something related but not it." He stood and—because his bad leg was always stiff after sitting for any considerable time—limped across the room and removed a chair from beside the TV. "We could put the tree right here. Fits perfect."

"You know we don't have any ornaments, lights and all that stuff?"

"That's what they got stores for. We can get that stuff easily, and with the bonus money the boss gave us for finishing the Wallace place, I got the money."

She smiled. "Okay. So where do we get the tree?"

"I've got that covered too. Mr. Wallace's house is upcountry and he owns at least a dozen acres of woods. He was so pleased with our work he let Larry cut a tree yesterday. He told me I could cut one too, but at the time the idea hadn't hit me, so I said no thanks. But I'll call him and ask."

It turned into a very interesting experience. Tris had almost never been in the woods. Despite living her whole life within a few miles of the forest, she was a thorough town-city girl. If anything, nature scared her. She imagined it filled with poisonous snakes, biting insects, bears and other dangerous animals, including crazy human beings, lurking in those wild places. She was terrified of mice and would cross the street if she saw a dog ahead of her. But with Ted she felt safe, and through his eyes she saw nature as beautiful. There were only a few inches of freshly fallen snow on the ground, so walking was easy and lack of footprints gave assurance that no one else, crazy or otherwise, was here. White trees with black patches which Ted said were birches shined radiantly while distant clumps of thick pine were a faded bluish-green the color of her favorite sweater. Even a fallen tree with half its bark gone and a ridge of snow partly melted looking as if it was balancing on the rounded top was pretty as a picture when they approached it. A patch of ice right in front of it mirrored the fallen tree. The air was crisp and clear, and with her coat on she felt the cold only as an invigorating stimulus to movement. Besides the occasional rumble of a distant car, it was very quiet with only the chattering of birds above their heads and the sounds of soft breezes scraping dead leaves across the snow for background noise. When they stopped once to admire the varying patches of sun and shade playing across an open space among the trees, she felt a peacefulness she'd never felt before. As they walked deeper into the woods, with Ted concentrating on searching for the perfect tree, the peaceful feeling grew stronger. She remembered her shamed pang of guilty regret for Charlie's neglected Christmas, but here is did not sting. Somehow the beauty and peace she witnessed was inside and gave her an expansive feeling of hope. In this mood, Charlie was not lost forever. She began daydreaming of having Charlie living with Ted and her, but before it got too far it was interrupted by Ted's excited voice. "What do you think of that one?" he asked, pointing to a thick pine over six feet tall.

She liked its fullness of branch and its shape, but it was a little too big. She looked around to spot another well proportioned tree closer to her own height of five feet, five inches. "I think this one's better," she said. "It'll fit beside the TV just right."

"Okay, he said, and with the saw he'd been carrying cut the tree in a few skillful stroke perfectly flat. On the ride back to town while Ted talked about the decorations and the stand he'd have to make, she found herself thinking of Charlie and wondering what she would think of the tree. After agreeing with him that besides the tinsel, bulbs and lights they would need a special ornament for the top of the tree which should not be an angel, since that was too religious, she asked him if he thought Charlie would like the tree.

He seemed surprised by the question. "I would think she'd like it. Or do you mean to say those fundamentalists don't do trees because they're too pagan?"

"No, no. What if it makes her think of the Christmases we used to have without one? Wouldn't that bring up bad memories?"

They were just turning down the street in town that led to the department store. Ted signaled to a car trying to make a left turn and nodded when the man waved his thanks. "She'll have all those memories anyways, so I don't think it will matter."

Getting the ornaments, lights, tinsel and so forth, including a star for the top of the tree, interrupted the discussion on Charlie, and when they got home it was deferred further while Ted made a stand for the Christmas tree with some scrap lumber and they decorated it. Once the lights were turned on they were so gleeful they both shouted their joy as they admired the tree from many different angles and lighting conditions. Then because it was still an hour and half before the time for even an early supper, Ted decided to make a batch of oatmeal-raisin cookies from a recipe he learned from his mother, something he said he used to do every Christmas when his kids were young.

Tris sat at the kitchen table drinking a cup of tea and having a cigarette while he made the batter. Charlie was still on her mind, and eventually she brought her up again. "I keep wondering about what can we do to change Charlie's mind. She'll be twenty-one in a little over a year."

"Age don't matter. Eighteen's the legal age now, anyways. But she could decide to leave that church right now if she wanted to. We can only do so much. Whatever happens has gotta happen in her own mind, and mostly she's got to see that her uncle's teachings are false on her own."

"Yeah, but like I told you I'm pretty sure she already sees a lot of that stuff. I know she doesn't like it that her cousin is being forced to marry some guy in her church. And she doesn't say so, but I know she doesn't like some of their rules like girls not being allowed to play sports or the ridiculous clothes they made her wear."

"What about that business of your brother spying on you in the bathroom? You could tell her about that."

She shook her head doubtfully. "Would she believe it? And besides, I'd rather spare her that kind of sick knowledge."

Ted was spooning the batter onto a baking pan. With his back to her he said, "You mean win her back fair and square?"

"Yeah, something like that."

" Well," he said after putting the cookies into the already hot oven, "my nephew Jeff came around on his own. Really, I think that's the best we can hope for. It's just like us deciding not to drink. We had to do it ourselves. So what we need is patience. We can hint and we can nudge her in the right direction, but she's gotta see it all in her own mind before she changes. One thing I think is promising."

"What's that?"

"Your brother. If he's even half as creepy as you say, and I'm sure he is, she's already noticed it or will soon."

"Yeah, I think she does already—a bit at least, maybe a lot."

With that remark the subject was dropped if not forgotten while the cookies baked and filled the apartment with their wonderful aroma and through the rest of the evening with first a light supper and then their first Christmas together. Exchanging gifts became an occasion for much laughter. Once shopping together after Thanksgiving she had looked at a cashmere sweater she thought exquisite but put it down because it was too expensive; at the same time in the same department store he had looked at and wistfully tried out a beautiful fly fishing rod. Both had noticed the other's interest and both had got their love the gift they wanted. Laughing and thanking him with a kiss and hug, she felt very happy and very contented.

She sat down on the couch as he excused himself to get something else. When he returned he had a strange smile on his face as he walked up to her. He paused, rubbed his chin, then looked at her and smiled again, appeared unsure of how to proceed. But now recognizing the smile as kin to the smile that had often broken across his face earlier in the day, she had a presentiment. Suddenly on edge she looked into his eyes.

"I've been thinking... that we're doing all right together. I'm thinking we can make a go of it... You know, mutual support and partners. Love is what I'm thinking. But you know all that, I'm betting. You know I love you and want to marry you." With those words he dropped to his knee (carefully because of his bad leg, but still quite quickly) and took from a tiny velvet box a ring.

Tris gave out a little scream that merged into a squeal of delight and felt her heart pounding as she felt him slipping the ring onto her finger. Then the feeling was pure blinding joy that was beyond words as they kissed and embraced, with him awkwardly leaning forward from his knees. She told him it was the happiest moment of her life, and it was as she spoke, but almost instantly a stabbing fear seized her and she felt her face drop. What right did she have to be happy? Charlie's hurt, lonely face came into her mind from that night the cops took her away. She felt her face burn red with shame. She tried to shake it off, saying, "Ted, this is so wonderful it's almost unbelievable."

But he saw it all and read it on her face. Miraculously he said just the right words that she needed to hear. "I know what you're thinking, Tris. I sometime think of all the suffering I caused Laura, so I know. You're thinking of Charlie, aren't you? You think you don't deserve to be happy."

The soothing words brought a quiet relief, but she silently appealed to him with her eyes, which he also understood. Awkwardly he stood up, only to instantly slide beside her and take her in his arms. "You're going to make it all up to her—all that you can. You have to realize, though, that the past can't be changed. It's what we have to live with. We suffered too, remember. And remember that things in our lives we had no control over caused our suffering. Accept that it happened and make the amends that are possible—that's my philosophy. And don't forget you're not alone—that's my philosophy too. We have each other. Together we're twice as strong. I love you and will go on loving you. Us, together."

Enveloped in his loving warmth she felt calm as if nothing could harm her as long as he was there. She remembered Dr. Tellas's description of a real relationship and how she had doubted she would ever experience one, and could almost have laughed in wonderment at the way her life had changed. "I love you too, Ted. I want to spend the rest of my life with you."

Through the rest of the day and evening she was so happy that she would often tremble to release the pent-up joy. Charlie was there in her mind, but every time the thought of her was in danger of dominating and distracting her mind she checked it with one word: patience. She kept looking at the ring or surreptitiously feeling it; even waking in the night and thinking it was all a dream, she touched the small diamond with her right index finger to remind her of its sweet reality. In the morning Ted left to spent some time with each of his kids. That he was going to visit his ex-wife Laura was the main reason she did not accompany him. The other reason was that she wanted to clean the apartment and make everything perfect for Charlie's first visit to her home. She dusted, vacuumed, scrubbed the bathroom, and washed the kitchen floor, then spent a long time rearranging furniture, knickknacks and the like to achieve maximum effect; though truth to tell, after moving the couch here and the rocking chair there, nudging a carved bird of Ted's a few inches to the left, and moving books to a lower shelf, in the end when Ted came back home everything was in the same place it was before all her fidgeting.

At a little after one o'clock Charlie came. In one small way, the visit started off badly. Despite all the time she'd spent cleaning and tidying up the place to make it look as pretty as possible so that Charlie would be struck by the difference between the old hovel they lived in and the brightness and niceness of her new home, when she arrived she took no notice of the surroundings. Her mind seemed to be elsewhere—possibly because she was preoccupied with her first meeting with Ted. But if her daughter noticed nothing new, she did. Charlie was miles away from the awkward kid that she raised; instead she was an even more confident and self-possessed young woman than she was last summer. When she removed her winter coat after putting two wrapped presents on the table by the door and hugging her, Tris noticed her breasts under her light blue sweater and the pretty tight skirt, beige in color, that she wore. It's true that the skirt covered most of her legs, but she was learning color coordination and dressing as closely as possible like a normal girl of her age. The discovery pleased her so much that she dismissed her disappointment about the apartment as trivial.

"You're looking great, Charlie. Quite the young woman now."

She smiled and she looked over Tris's shoulder at Ted as she said, "Thanks, Mom."

She turned and took Ned's hand to bring him forward. "Charlie, this is Ted."

"Pleased to meet you, Ted." She smiled sweetly and Tris felt relieved. Just as she had done when she first met him, Charlie recognized something gentle and sweet in the man and liked him instantly even before he had said a word.

"And I'm very pleased to meet you too," he said, holding out his hand, which Charlie took. "I feel I already know you. Your mother here"—he pointed with his thumb and made a comic face as if she were his general—"is very proud of you and talks about you all the time."

The remark made Charlie feel uncomfortable. She dropped her eyes and appeared confused, probably because she correctly understood that the topic of conversations about her entailed schemes to rescue her from the clutches of her uncle.

It put Tris on guard, but she decided an open admission would not only be honest but effective too. "Don't worry, Charlie," she said trying to be light-hearted about it, "we aren't planning to kidnap you. But I have told Ted my opinion of my brother."

"He's a minister," Charlie explained to Ted. "He acts different than most guardians because of that."

It was a weak defense, Tris thought, but that Charlie didn't give anything more away disappointed her. "Hey," she said, "never mind that now. I have some wonderful news." She raised her hand and flashed the engagement ring in front of Charlie's eyes.

"Is that what I think it is!?"

Tris smiled broadly and instead of nodding bobbed her head vigorously. "I just got it last night. It's the best Christmas present I've ever gotten."

"Oh, Mom. That's great! Congratulations"—she turned and looked at Ted—"to both of you. I'm very happy for you both."

"Well, we've been together long enough to know it's going to be a marriage made in heaven," Ted said.

"And when will it take place?"

"Sometime in the spring or early summer. Right now the only thing we're sure of is that we don't want to get married in the winter." Tris looked at the gifts Charlie had placed on the table. "Shall I put some tea water on before we exchange gifts? We can have some oatmeal-raisin cookies Ted baked with the tea."

Charlie looked at Ted for an explanation.

"Oh, yeah, I'm handy around the house too," he said with a droll expression that made Charlie grin.

Tris felt herself smiling at this further proof that Ted and Charlie were hitting it off nicely, but as they went into the kitchen she saw her daughter looking at her grandmother's black vase with the hand-painted roses. She seemed much disturbed by seeing it as if it, the one and only nice thing in their old apartment, was flooding her mind with everything else that was not beautiful and precious in that dump they lived in. Not wanting Charlie to be distracted by dark, unchangeable memories, she asked in a cheerful, sunshiny voice, "Well, what do you think of our home?"

"I love it," she said, recovering her good spirits. "It's nicely decorated and bright and cheerful."

In the small kitchen, which had room for only a narrow, six-foot counter and a small table with two chairs, Tris poured some water into the teapot and turned the gas burner on. "It's a new skill I've developed." She tried to be modest, but she could not stop herself from smiling proudly and feeling a rush of joy and pure happiness. "Now that I don't drink I have money to buy nicer furniture. We're getting some more stuff—our dining room table is really old and we need a dresser in the bedroom—but Ted doesn't believe in buying on credit so we're waiting until a couple more paychecks come in."

"What do you do, Ted? I don't think my mother told me."

"Me? I do the same work Jesus did. I'm a carpenter."

For a moment Tris feared his choice of words was unwise and Charlie might think they were blasphemous, but all she said was, "That's a skilled occupation. You must know a lot of stuff."

"I suppose I do, but of course it's the sort of thing that all carpenters know."

Just in case the conversation got too dangerous, Tris said, "When the water's boiled we can have the cookies and tea. Shall we exchange gifts while waiting?"

This went well. She knew that material things cannot make up for moral failings, and yet the message conveyed by a special gift can still speak to the heart. That was what the expensive and nice watch with a gold link strap that she got for Charlie seemed to do. Her daughter was genuinely touched and pleased with the gift, and the loving look she gave her mother spoke of her understanding of the feelings that lay behind it.

She in turn was very happy with the thoughtful gifts Charlie got her. In a letter in the fall she had told her daughter that Ted loved Chinese food. With that in mind the sweet girl had gone out and bought a wok and Chinese cookbooks.

She knew something about the prices for kitchen utensils, having purchased several for their apartment lately. While they were having their tea and cookies, she hinted that she was worried Charlie had spent too much of her meager resources on the gift. But Charlie only smiled proudly and explained that she was working in the publicity department at the college and receiving a monthly salary.

That explained some of her new-found self-confidence. As someone who had seen professional success translate to personal growth, she could understand her daughter's proud smile. She was proud of her too. "Oh, that's wonderful, Charlie. What sort of things do you do?"

"Oh, you know. I write stuff for brochures and catalogs prospective students receive, and when some interesting news happens at the college like having an eminent speaker come, I'm the one who writes that stuff up for the local paper. It's training, you see, for the job I'm going to do for the church after graduation. But really, Mom, your news is much more interesting than mine. Who's coming to the wedding?"

"Well, it's going to be small, so probably just Ted's kids, his brother and two sisters and you—I hope."

She turned to Ted, who was leaning against the sink while they sat at the small kitchen table. "How old are your kids, Ted?"

"Mike would be just about your age. Melissa just graduated from C.A. last June. Perhaps you knew my son, Mike McNaughton."

She searched her memory. "Not personally, but I seem to remember he was a computer whizz and worked on the school newspaper."

Ted nodded. "That's him. He's going to Worcester Polytech now studying computer science. Melissa is planning to get married close to the time we are, so she's not going to college. She was never much of a scholar."

"So they'll be there."

"And we hope you will too, Charlie," Tris said.

"I will if it's after school gets out."

"You, ah, won't have any problems, will you?" Ted asked.

When she looked puzzled, he said, "I mean from your uncle."

"I don't see how he could object."

"Well, I just meant I'm not his kind of Christian, so maybe he wouldn't like you to be there."

"Oh," she said hopefully, but you are a Christian?"

He stroked his chin thoughtfully but with the slightest hint of comic exaggeration. Well, yes and no. There's a lot of wisdom in the Bible—"

—"Oh, there is—"

"But a lot of bad stuff too, like the Israelites slaughtering people, slavery and sexism and all. They acted no different than their enemies."

She nodded gravely. "I think people wrote the word of God in terms that people of that time would understand. It was a savage time. That's why you see stuff like whole towns being slaughtered. A lot of the Old Testamanet is just history of the Israelites. There's a lot of beautiful holy writing too."

Ted raised his eyebrows as he exchanged a glance with Tris. She recalled him saying that believing in the inerrancy of the Bible was the toughest nut to crack when his nephew was being weaned from fundamentalist doctrine. Charlie was already past that problem. It didn't, though, seem to make any difference. She was showing no signs of disillusionment. Maybe she was hiding it well; maybe minor inconsistencies didn't bother her because she bought wholesale the big picture. Maybe she would always be a fundamentalist Christian and lost to her. That's what worried her now, at least. The hopefulness she felt before Charlie came was the thing that seemed illusionary to her.

But Ted wasn't giving up that easily. "I'm sure you're right, but I think God asks only one thing from us."

"Which is?"

"Well, the man upstairs, he sees all, doesn't he? And he created us, didn't he? Which means he can understand the human heart, both when it's good and when it's bad. But I think all he really wants from us is that we have good hearts. You see what I'm saying? He would rather have decent people living decent lives and caring for others."

"Is that your religion?"

He shrugged comically—which helped Charlie relax, Tris thought. "I guess it is."

"But how is that enough?"

Ted put his teacup down on the counter. He'd been holding it in his right hand and seemed to just remember it was there. "It depends on you conception of God, I suppose. He's the creator of the universe, so why would he need people praising him—it's like he was an insecure guy, not God. God does not need us; we need him, that's my point."

Tris could tell that Charlie was confused. Some of Ned's statements seemed to belittle religion while others recognized God's presence.

"But as you say, he made us and we need him. That means we should be humble before him. Humility—that's one of the best virtues of religion."

"Humble? Yes, I suppose we should be. We're all weak in one way or another, so there's no need to get puffed up about anything."

"They call it the sin of pride, don't they?" Tris asked. She was thinking of her brother.

"Yes," Charlie said. Turning to Ted she asked, "What church did you grow up in?"

"Catholic. There's a lot of ritual in that church, you know. The older I got the more I noticed how everyone including the priest said the mass and the responses in a drone, like a lawn mower two blocks away. People were just repeating things from habit. It wasn't real. There was no soul in it. So when I was older I stopped being a Catholic."

"My church is different," Charlie said. "People put their whole heart and soul into their worship."

"I know. I've seen some of those services on television. I've seen black churches too."

"Isn't that better—to be surrendering yourself to the Lord and feeling the joy?"

Ted started to speak then hesitated. He scratched his head, looked at the floor, and then seemed to come to a decision. "I don't deny there's plenty of feeling and plenty of sincerity, but who are they feeling good about? Ain't it themselves? Ain't they only thinking of themselves and how happy they're going to be in heaven? When I say God wants us to have a good heart, I mean by that a person thinks of others and tries to ease the pain of others. A lot of those evangelical ministers on TV always support our wars and seem to gloat when we bomb our so-called enemies. I've been in war and it's awful. It's awful what those leaders want us to do to other boys. I ask myself, would Jesus gloat? Would Jesus be a war hawk?"

Tris could tell Charlie was very uncomfortable hearing such a disturbing description of evangelical ministers.

"I had a high-school biology teacher who said something like that. He said as long as you have Jesus in your heart the rest doesn't matter."

"He may be right. I don't know. But I think having a good heart is just as good. Life ain't easy. I've known people who do bad things from desperation, like breaking into a house to steal stuff for drug money. There's plenty of kids who've had awful parents and were neglected and do bad things. We can't be judgmental. We need to have compassion."

Charlie looked at her mother and dropped her eyes in embarrassment. Ted's remark made Tris just as uncomfortable as well, though she knew he was making a point, not a judgment. She looked at him.

"My point is that bad things happen. They lead to further bad things. Me and Tris know all about that. We were alcoholics—"

"We are alcoholics and always will be," Tris corrected, remembering the A.A. teachings.

Ted nodded. "Now we're alcoholics who don't drink."

"I know," Charlie said in a low voice. "I think you've both shown tremendous courage and strength."

"So maybe the man upstairs helped us, who knows? It takes humbleness to know your human weakness—that and patience and endurance. But one thing I'm quite sure about—it doesn't take rules and obedience to them to be a good human being."

Charlie toyed with her teacup, holding it in both hands and nervously rotating it on the table. "I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at."

Ted, watching her teacup, seemed fixated by the motion, which in turn made Charlie self-consciously stop. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that God gave us our minds. Humbleness is often good, but is obedience? I mean someone, an army buddy I think, told me he always thought when he had a doubt it was Satan whispering in his ear. That's what he was taught, you see."

Tris saw a look of almost panic dart across Charlie's eyes.

"He said he finally saw that it just stops you from thinking on your own. But to be a good person you've got to do what you think is right. God gave us our minds. We've got to use them—and our hearts."

Charlie squirmed uncomfortably in her seat. She didn't seem to know how to answer Ted. Tris, seeing her discomfort and distress, felt a motherly instinct and wanted to protect her. "Hey, you guys, it's Christmas day. Enough of this philosophy stuff. Who wants another cookie or more tea?"

Her light-hearted tone changed the mood, and the rest the visit passed without incident. Charlie described her work at the college in more detail, and a question about how Ted made the Christmas stand led to his explaining at length various secrets of the carpenter's art, all of which Charlie listened to with genuine interest. She didn't seem to hold any grudge against Ted for making her squirm, and when she departed she even gave him as warm a hug as she had given her mother. Tris, remembering Ted's wisdom, whispered "I love you" into Charlie's ear, and Charlie said "I love you too, Mom" before the door closed.

When she was gone and they were cleaning up, Ted explained that he knew he was making Charlie uncomfortable as he used some of the experiences and stuff his nephew had told him helped him escape the fundamentalists. He knew how important regaining her daughter was to her and apologized if he went too far.

"I think you must have been very effective because she did looked confused and uncomfortable quite often."

Ted nodded. "I'll tell you what, though. I bet you anything that I didn't say a thing that she hadn't already thought about."

"She's very intelligent," Tris agreed. "You're probably right."

"But don't forget, it won't happen overnight." He dried the last teacup and put it in the cupboard, then turned to her and chucked her playfully under the chin. "What's the magic word we have to remember."

She nuzzled him, laying her face on his chest. "Patience," she said. "Patience, patience, patience."

Planting a Seed

In their apartment near Regent Street in Madison, Wisconsin, Jeremy Lawrence and Drew Jensen were both quietly studying as they waited for Chad Kubek, the third roommate, to get home. Jeremy had to work from six until closing time at the undergraduate library, and Drew planned to walk to Helen C. White with him to study for a biochem exam scheduled for tomorrow. They needed to eat early, and as it was already past four o'clock, Jeremy was starting to feel uneasy with the result that his concentration was wavering. More and more he found himself looking up from his book and blankly surveying the apartment from the recliner where he sat. Their place was one of thousands in Madison that catered to the student trade. The furniture was mostly nondescript, motel-like stuff—a gray sleeper couch, a utilitarian table and chairs, a small armless easy chair in the living room, and in the bedroom where Drew was studying at the student desk made of plastic fabricated to look like wood, the beds and bureau were likewise institutionally bland. On the floor a tightly woven commercial rug grayish in color went from wall to wall, stopping only at the small efficiency kitchen, which was tiled. The only personal touches were the recliner Chad had bought at a garage sale that Jeremy was now sitting on and a board and brick bookcase they'd bought together. The cheap pine was unfinished. The walls, painted an off-white, were mostly bare, though above the TV Chad had put a poster of a clenched fist with the single word SOLIDARITY under it. Jeremy stared at it for a while, thinking of everything he had learned from Chad. They had been roommates in the freshman dorm last year.

He forced his eyes back to the European history book, but after reading a few more pages on French society after the fall of Napoleon, he called to Drew. "Hey, Drew, you sure Chad remembered that it's his turn to cook tonight?"

"Yeah, he said so, even made sure there was some hamburger helper in the cupboard."

"It's not like him to be late. He knows I work Thursday nights."

Drew didn't answer. He was a serious student, a biology major who wanted to be a doctor.

More time passed during which Jeremy somehow managed to read most of the assignment and make some annotations, and then the phone rang. Drew answered it—the phone was on the desk.

"Hello."

"No way!"...

"How is he?"...

"Otherwise okay?"...

"Right. See you soon."

He came into the room excited. His pale face was flushed. He was tall and thin and high strung, but now he was even more agitated. He smoothed his white-blond hair with one hand and scratched unconsciously at his chest with the other. "Chad's found my brother on State Street. He's bringing him here."

His brother was Rick, born with and called by the name Dietrich after some old uncle until a few years ago when he announced that he always hated the name and henceforth preferred to be called Rick. He had been missing for a week. His parents in a small town about a hundred miles from Madison suspected that that was where he had gone, and his mother had called every night hoping for some information. Drew somewhat reluctantly had told his roomies a bit about the Jensen family dynamic. His father, a doctor, was a stern, cold man who demanded of his two sons the same excellence he expected from himself. Where Drew's way of handling his father was to get straight A's and be obedient so that he never gave occasion to incur his father's wrath, Rick rebelled. He'd flunked several of his high school courses, did drugs and alcohol, and engaged in mindless destructive acts like deflating tires or snapping a whole street's worth of car antennas that got him in trouble with the law several times. He was also going to a psychiatrist, though Drew said he frequently blew off the appointments.

All this information passed through Jeremy's mind and made him feel uneasy. He suspected that they were going to be in for a lot of trouble. From Drew's description, he was sure Rick hated authority so much that even a friendly suggestion would be taken hostilely. He was going to be sullen, filled with anger and mistrust. He might even steal things and then sneak away. The best way to deal with this kid, Jeremy decided, was to keep his mouth shut.

"So where'd Chad find him?"

"I told you, State Street," Drew answered impatiently.

"I mean where on State Street."

"Near the campus. He was coming out of Paul's Bookstore when he saw Rick with a group of teenage boys."

"Do you think he will be hostile—to us, I mean?"

Drew, pacing nervously up and down the living room, said, "I don't know. We aren't close—he won't let me be. Last summer after one of his escapades I tried to talk to him brother to brother. I told him I understood how he felt about our father but that pissing him off wasn't the way to go."

"What'd he say?"

"Nothing really. It's no accident that he's in the city and hasn't looked me up. I'm sure he thinks I'm on the side of the enemy."

"Your father?"

"Not just him. Society, the whole thing. He's very alienated."

Simultaneously they sat down, Jeremy in the recliner, Drew on the couch. They became silent, both of them nervously brooding about how their routine and peace was under attack. That was the selfish part of their ruminations, the emotional part that knows no duty and understands no logic, but Jeremy did spare a thought or two for Drew's brother. He must have been desperate to have run away, and it must have been scary for him living on the streets with no support to fall back on. Probably Drew was even more worried, realizing that a biochem exam was not as important as his brother's life and future, and then worrying some more because even so it was an important exam. Nor was supper and getting to work on time anything to sneeze about. Jeremy's scholarship covered tuition and more, but still he needed the money his mother sent him every month and the money from his campus job to get by.

Luckily, it was not long before they heard the door downstairs together with the sounds of heavy feet (those would be Chad's) coming up the stairs. They stared at the door.

Rick lived up to the expectations his brother's description had engendered. Jeremy could see the family resemblance—the nordic hair, the straight nose, the fair skin, and even the facial features showing the same contours, but somehow all this similarity was rearranged so that while Drew's face was pleasant, his brother's wasn't. He was frowning and pouting as if he'd tasted something unpleasant, and his eyes darted around as if he was looking for danger. He was like a stray dog that might lunge out and bite you at the slightest provocation. His first words were not a greeting but a warning. "Don't you call home. Drew," he said, displaying no happiness or relief in seeing a familiar face. "I'm not going back to that house. I've had it with them."

Drew rolled his eyes for Chad's benefit, but if he was planning on saying something harsh, Chad's slight shake of the head stopped him. He took a deep breath, turned in a circle, and said calmly and softly, "Well, what are your plans?"

He didn't have any, at least none he could put into words. He hung his head while his brother glowered in exasperation.

Chad, handsome with dark hair and light brown eyes flecked with gold, tall and muscular and always in command of himself and any situation, said, "There's plenty of time to figure everything out. First we need to get this young man cleaned up. He's already confessed to me that he's been a stranger to a shower since he left home." His eyes went from Rick to Jeremy and back. "You look to be about the same height and built as Jeremy..." He turned. "Jeremy, you got some clothes you can spare our friend?"

While Chad showed Rick where the soap, shampoo and towels were and Jeremy found a flannel shirt, a pair of jeans and underwear and socks, Drew nervously paced. Perhaps he too noticed how Rick regarded only Chad as an ally; perhaps, like him, he was worrying about supper and the need to be at the library. After Chad brought the clothes into Rick, at any rate, Drew wasted no time in bringing up supper. "Jeremy and me have got to be there by six, remember."

But Chad had a simple solution. "We'll order a couple of pizzas." That being agreed upon, a phone call was made.

Then they all sat down in the living room, Chad now occupying his chair, the recliner, and got the story of Rick's discovery in more detail. Chad was coming out of Paul's bookstore when he saw a group of teenaged boys, four to be exact, hanging around in front of Starbuck's. At first he didn't think anything of it. They were typical high-school-age boys, dressed in jeans and trying to be cool. But as he crossed the street and approached them, he recognized Rick from the photograph Drew had showed him. When he asked the boy if he was Rick Jensen, he looked frightened and was about to run.

"Why didn't he?" Drew asked.

Chad shrugged. "I told him who I was, and just like that he lightened up." He looked at Drew with a bemused expression, the hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth. "Hey, I had no idea you thought I was such a hot shit."

Drew colored slightly. "I told him about you last Christmas because he'd asked me who my roomies were. I think I said nice things, but that's all."

"Well, whatever you said, it made him trust me. He said, 'I know who you are. You're a radical and student agitator.' I think that's why he trusted me. I think he hates adults and assumed a lefty hates 'em too."

"Well, he's a confused boy. I do know one adult he hates—"

"Your father."

"Right. And my dad being a Republican and supporter of Bush's wars, that puts you on the right side."

"It describes you too."

Drew managed a wan smile as he raised his eyebrows. "But I'm his brother, the guy my father approves of because I get A's and never get in trouble. He—my dad— doesn't know much about what I think of Bush. It's a topic to be avoided."

"What about the kids he was with?" Jeremy asked.

"Oh, they gave no trouble. Were real casual, in fact. 'See you around, man,' they said. They looked a lot like him, you know, defiant, playing it cool, scared and hiding it. It's probably a good thing he found those kids, though."

"What do you mean?" Drew asked.

"Only that it's safer. You know—safety in numbers. Keeping from getting rolled, maybe safe from sexual predators and the sex trade. I've known some runaways back in Detroit who got into bad trouble. They ended up with AIDS or drug addiction or even dead. It can be suicide to be alone on the streets in America."

"What will we do with him tonight?" Jeremy asked. "I mean he can sleep here, but who's going to babysit him? Drew's got that big exam tomorrow and has to study."

"I've already got an idea—one that will keep him here even if alone."

"What? Are you going out too?"

"Only for an hour. I've got to meet some people about planning the rally for tomorrow. But that's my idea. Suppose we harness Rick's anger and alienation in a productive way? He doesn't like adults? What about Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the boys? They could use some more hating."

Jeremy smiled. He could see why Chad hurried Rick into the shower. As always, he had a plan. "You mean take him to the demonstration tomorrow, don't you?"

"Yep. It'll give him a taste of campus life and it will keep him here tonight. If we're lucky, it'll be good for what ails him too."

Drew looked doubtful.

"What?" Jeremy asked.

"You'll keep an eye on him, won't you, Jeremy? You know I've got to take that exam so I can't be there. He might do something stupid and get himself arrested. You'll keep by his side?"

"Oh, sure."

He saw his friends smiling broadly and knew why. He pronounced "sure" the Maine way, "Show-ahh." One time with Chad and Drew someone asked them where a classroom was, and he'd said, "It's upstairs," pronouncing it "stay-ahhs, and pointing, "There," which came out "they-ahh," and the guy had a panicked look in his eyes as if Jeremy was a foreigner who couldn't break the language barrier. Ever since, his Maine accent was a joke among them.

"Remember to bring your passport tomorrow, Jeremy," Chad said.

But they heard the sound of the shower turned off and changed the subject to other things. Presently Rick emerged. The clothes fit him fairly well and he looked more comfortable now that he was cleaned up.

"Feel better?" Chad asked.

"Do you need a belt?" his brother asked.

He paid attention to Chad's question and ignored his brother. "Yeah, actually I do."

"We ordered pizzas. They should be here pretty soon."

Drew's remark elicited a shrug, but when Chad said that they had ordered a combo and a pepperoni and asked which he preferred, he brightened and said, "Oh, pepperoni!"

Seeing the dynamic of barely disguised hostility, Jeremy remained silent.

Drew, not giving up, asked Rick what he'd been doing for the past week.

"Just hanging."

"Did you have any trouble—with cops or others?"

He shrugged. "Not really."

"Mom said you brought a backpack with you. I don't see it."

"It was stolen."

"So you did have trouble."

He didn't answer.

Then Chad said, "You were starting to tell me something about some street preacher. What was that all about?"

"Yeah, we got bugged by some fundamentalist creep who kept telling us that Jesus was just about to come to earth because the place was so sinful, but we ignored the asshole."

Jeremy saw Chad's eyes flash in approval. Like his high-school friend Josh Gilbert, Chad was very hostile to religion, as he found out last year when they were roommates in the freshman dorm. Chad's great-grandfather was a Wobblie, his grandfather a communist until Stalin's show trials in the 1930's turned his stomach and thereafter he was a fervent socialist, and his father was a labor organizer in Detroit. The irreligious sentiments in Chad's family went back to that Wobblie great-grandfather, an immigrant from what is now the Czech Republic, who was rabidly anti-Catholic because the church back in Bohemia was always on the side of the rich and powerful. But Chad's background made him an interesting roommate. Sometimes last year Jeremy thought he was getting two educations, one in the University of Wisconsin classrooms and the other in the long conversations about politics, philosophy, and life in general he'd have with Chad. Religion, though, was a topic Chad didn't think merited much discussion. He maintained that only stupid people believed in God. Jeremy, thinking of Charlie (and to a lesser extent of his mother with her interest in Buddhism) would deny so categorical a statement and defend his own open-minded agnosticism, arguing that since the origin of the universe is a mystery, then it was perfectly legitimate that many people called the author of that mystery God. "Call it what you want," Chad would retort, "it still ain't nothing to pray to." When Jeremy would point out that many Christians were progressive and on the side of poor and working people and trying to alleviate hunger in the third world, Chad would say, "Their help's welcome, but I don't have to like their opinions."

It was the one subject he was close-minded about. Thinking of those past conversations, Jeremy hardly listened to him railing against the meddling idiots trying to ensnare everyone who was in need. The word "fundamentalist" had triggered memories of Charlie. That days and even weeks went by now without his thinking of her made him feel sad. It was almost like a betrayal of some finer instinct of youth. He had not seen her since graduation night almost two years ago when they had wished each other good luck in college and exchanged glances that communicated worlds of secret, shared regard. He remembered the time he was about to ask her to go to the prom and realized that she had feelings for him. But now she probably hardly ever thought of him as well. Life went forward.

"So what do you think, Jeremy?'

Chad's question swept the nostalgic memories from his head. "About what? I was thinking of something else."

But just then the pizza guy arrived and fundamentalism was dropt from the conversation and Charlie from his mind.

Chad was clever in suggesting Rick come to the rally tomorrow. First he brought it up casually. They had the TV news on as they ate, and a report about the latest casualties in Iraq offered an easy opening. Chad went on about the lies the Bush administration used to draw us into the war, the incompetence and arrogance of Rumsfeld, the torturing of prisoners and other war crimes, the administration's use of fear to manipulate ordinary Americans, and so forth for a long time before saying, "Tomorrow our campus Stop the War organization is going to have a demonstration against the war. Would you like to be part of it? Jeremy and I will be there, and Drew would be too except he's got a late class and a big exam he can't skip."

Of course Rick, already besotted with admiration for and hero-worship of Chad, said yes, and he even seemed surprised that Drew supported the rally. Almost instantly the patent hostility he had been showing his brother disappeared. Taking a sip of milk and reaching for another piece of pizza as he regarded his brother with a look of wonderment, he said,"Dad's a big Bush supporter, you know."

"Yeah, I know. He's like millions of Americans, luckily fewer now that Bush's poll numbers are in the sewer. He thinks Bush is protecting us, not using us for his agenda for making the world our slave so that his rich pals get richer."

"You believe that?" Rick asked, wide-eyed.

Drew reclined his head slightly as if doubtful of his brother's good opinion. He took a bite of his pizza slice to delay any comment, but one was supplied by Chad as he was busy chewing:

"You'll believe it too after you see what we stand for tomorrow. I'm guessing you've never thought about politics much."

"Not really." He seemed afraid that the admission would lessen him in Chad's eyes.

"Well, tomorrow you'll see committed citizens opposing the evil their government does." He turned to Jeremy. "What is it the Bible says? You shall know the truth and it will set you free?"

"Something like that, though I'm not totally sure it is from the Bible, and I didn't know I was regarded as the expert on that book."

Chad, chewing on his pizza, turned to Rick and with his mouth full said, "Jeremy believes in respecting people's beliefs. Myself, I draw the line at religion."

"Me too," Rick said. My parents are devout Lutherans. It makes no sense to me."

His brother saw an opening here. "But it doesn't hurt to see others' point-of-view, Rick. Sure Dad's a Republican, but he thinks it's the party of self-reliance and individual responsibility. He's wrong, but you aren't going to change his mind."

Chad didn't like where that was going. Putting his juice box down on the table with as much of a bang as cardboard allowed, he said, "So he supports torturing people and imperialistically crushing small countries? That has nothing to do with self-reliance. It's greed, it's arrogance, those creeps stand for."

"Yes, it is, but he lives in a small town. He believes what the newspapers say about Bush's doings."

"So he doesn't know the truth and he isn't set free."

Chad's remark brought a smirk to Rick's face. He wasn't a candidate for open-mindedness, at least not when it applied to his father.

But there was no time for a rebuttal. Jeremy and Drew had to leave Rick to Chad, who was already talking about the purpose of tomorrow's demonstration as they left. Naturally they discussed the changes they both perceived in Rick as they walked to Park Street. It made Drew hopeful that his brother could escape his teenage nihilism and straighten his life out; at the same time he was still afraid that his impetuous brother would get into trouble tomorrow at the demonstration and made Jeremy once again promise to watch him like a hawk. At the library Drew found a carrel and Jeremy was put to work by the night librarian restacking books. Later he manned the check-out desk and still later was sent to clean out all the carrels of books and paper. Before that last assignment Drew had already left. He was anxious about his brother, he said, and knew the material cold. He had great powers of concentration, so Jeremy did not doubt him.

He didn't have to walk home alone, though. Carol Abercrombie, who had been at Memorial Library, stopped by just before closing time to walk home with him. It was she who told him and Chad about the availability of an apartment in the same building she and her two friends, Liz Prendergrass and Margo Wagner, rented. He had been in two classes with Carol freshman year, and they had become friends. All three girls, including Liz, who was a business major, were open-minded and progressive. This semester the six of them had formed a social unit. They often barbarqued together in the small backyard of their building, went to movies and parties together as a group, and often socialized at each others' apartments on weekends. Margo had a car, and they also did their weekly grocery shopping together on Sundays. None of them ever paired off. Margo had shown a keen interest in Chad until she found out he was engaged to his high school sweetheart back in Detroit, where she attended a community college. And there was one embarrassing thing that concerned Jeremy. One night a few months ago when the women found out that Jeremy was still a virgin they had giggled and said that as his friend they would have to do something about that. Nothing had yet happened, but if and when it did, Jeremy rather hoped that Carol would be the one. He liked her in that way. She was pretty in a dark-haired and dark-eyed way with milky white skin and a terrific figure. And she was a nice person, a good sport, unpretentious and kind.

Walking the darkened streets of Madison, he told her all about Drew's brother being found and Chad's plans to make a committed radical of him.

"He probably will," Carol said. "He's got a very forceful personality and is very persuasive."

"Yes, and without arrogance too. I think his father's work as a labor organizer has taught him how to compromise and accommodate others. He's a good guy."

She started humming as they waited for a traffic light. For some reason Jeremy started thinking about Camp Randall just down the street and how on Saturday afternoons when the Badgers played this area was as busy as Time Square. Everyone would be wearing red with the Bucky Badger logo or WISCONSIN either on their hat, T-shirt or sweater.

"How about you, Jeremy? How'd you become a progressive? It wasn't all Chad's doing, was it?"

"Not really. It wasn't that big a jump. I was ten when my father died, but I've always remembered his lessons about hating bullies and accepting people for who they are. And my mom's a liberal Democrat, so Chad's radicalism made sense."

"How did your dad die?"

The light finally changed, and they walked in front of a big truck. Jeremy could see the driver leering at Carol. "He was killed in a car accident."

"That must have been horrible."

"It was. I suppose that was also a factor in why I can easily side with oppressed people. For a long time after he died I could feel nothing but desolation. I know how it feels, see?"

In answer she touched his arm. They walked on a bit in silence, but when they got to the door she said, "I understand what you said and how it led to compassion for the poor."

"It's funny you said that. In those discussions we had in our dorm room last year we finally decided that the difference between us was there."

Under the porch light he could see her crinkle in nose. She looked beautiful. "You mean...?"

"Chad has a very strong sense of justice. The money those C.E.O.'s make he finds disgusting. He doesn't think anyone has the right to be as wealthy as Bill Gates. I agree, but what motivates me more is when we hear of billions of people living on less than a dollar a day or even a week. If their cow dies they can be ruined. They're absolutely defenseless. It's their situation that makes me want to change the world."

"With that attitude, maybe you will," Carol said with a laugh and another light touch to his arm, and then they went inside and up the stairs where they bade each other good-night. Inside his apartment the other three denizens were sitting around and talking, but having had a long day that started at six P.M., Jeremy hardly spoke to them. He went straight to bed and was almost instantly asleep.

II

Mid afternoon the next day found Jeremy sitting on the steps of the Catholic Church next to the bookstore and facing the side entrance to Memorial Library. It had just occurred to him that the church's modernist architecture was designed to suggest a giant pipe organ, making the steps he was sitting on the keyboard, but he didn't pursue the thought. At breakfast this morning they had arranged that the rendezvous spot for meeting Rick was these very steps. Drew's part was to go back home to collect his brother and deliver him to Jeremy before taking his biochemistry exam. Having arrived first, and having put his backpack with his books and things in one of the bookstore lockers, Jeremy was watching all the activity at one of the liveliest places on campus. The vendors in their carts who sold everything from hot food to T-shirts were hawking their wares; students and professors strolled by; among them were many students who were going to be part of today's anti-war rally, which was to begin on the library mall, using the steps to the library as a kind of podium, followed by a march across University Avenue to University Square where the military recruitment office was, and then end by marching up Bascom Hill to the chancellor's office where they would demand to see him and ask him to refuse to allow military recruitment on campus.

To occupy his mind while he waited Jeremy made a sort of game out of identifying which people walking by were demonstrators. With many it was easy. Those wearing T-shirts with the peace sign or a picture of Che Guevara, or slogans such as BUSH SUCKS or WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER gave themselves away without a fight. Others revealed their intentions by snatches of conversation he overheard as they passed by: "How many do you think will show?" "Jenny says we should be prepared to get arrested if the cops try to make us leave in front of the recruitment office." "I wonder if the chancellor will meet with us? Somebody told me he's snuck out of town." Other students who gave no obvious sign of left-wing politics still revealed themselves by their eyes. What was it? An expression of determination? A certain nervousness, or relatedly, a certain look of excitement at the anticipated action?

His guessing game ceased when he caught sight of Drew and Rick walking towards the church from the direction of Park street.

He stood and they caught sight of him. Coming over, Drew said, "I told Rick to listen to you and follow your advice." With a slight tilt of his head and narrowing of his eyes he added as plain as words: "Keep an eye on him, Jeremy. I'm depending on you."

Jeremy went for a light, jocular tone. "Rick, are you ready to exercise your rights as an American to protest your government?"

"Oh, yeah," Rick said, deadly serious, and yet he was so excited his eyes shined.

Drew started to say one more thing but thought better of it. He left, both roomies exchanging good-luck wishes and another eye reminder given and received. Drew didn't want to be a nag, but Jeremy could tell he was very worried. For a moment he caught the feeling and started worrying that Rick was going to be a loose cannon. And how was he going to talk to someone who didn't understand irony?

They started walking the short distance to the center of the library mall where the protesters were gathering. "Drew gave good advice, Rick. The safest thing for you is to do only whatever I do. Does that sound okay?"

"Sure." That he spoke off-handedly did not reassure Jeremy at all.

They were in the library mall now. Memorial Library faced the Wisconsin Historical Society (whose extensive library Jeremy as a history major had already begun to make use of). They were separated by a hundred yards of grass and walkways that radiated out in a circle from the central fountain. To his right was Langdon Street with the old red gym and the parking lot for Memorial Union on Lake Mendota. There were two campus police cars parked next to the mall. Four policemen leaning against the cars appeared calm. They were even joking amongst themselves. One of them pointed to the gathering crowd and said something that made the others laugh. To Jeremy's and Rick's left was the Presbyterian Church, the faculty club and at the corner on Park Street the Humanities building. Its modernist architecture, comprised of cold slabs of concrete and columns supporting irregular higher floors, stood in strong contrast to the rest of the architecture. The library and historical society were institutional and the faculty club red-bricked traditional. But the focus upon entering the mall was always the fountain—not only did the concrete pathways lead to it, but the eye too was led to its central spot. Except in winter it was always a popular spot filled with people tossing a Frisbee, just hanging around on the benches or, like today when it was a very warm day even for early May, cooling themselves off in the spray or soaking their feet in the pool. A few coeds running through the spray amidst loud shouts of laughter as Jeremy and Rick approached were in effect competing in an ad hoc wet T-shirt contest. Rick stared at their perked breasts longer than he should have.

But women's breasts were not his only interest. Presently and decidedly with an air of anxious excitement he surveyed the crowd in search of Chad. From the intensity of his search and the sheer neediness his eyes betrayed, Jeremy suspected Chad had instantly become a father figure to him. He found him on the steps of the library where his hero-father was standing with the other student leaders. For a long time he stared raptly until he was startled into panic by a test of the sound system that was very loud and so indistinct that at first one could not discern that the word being repeated was "testing." Judging by the way the buzzing of the crowd ceased, the sound had startled just about everybody. It was quickly cut off, and the sound man made a few adjustments before the second test was a sheepish apology by one of the student leaders for the first test.

Rick, high-strung and embarrassed at his public fright, nervously laughed and said to Jeremy, "That's better than the first time, isn't it?"

Jeremy nodded. The regular students, seeing that the rally was about to start, were leaving. Some of them appeared to be afraid of being caught up in something dangerous and unamerican. One of them was a student Jeremy knew from his freshman English class last year. He nodded to Jeremy in an embarrassed, half-hearted way. Last year when they read Euripedes' _The Bacchae_ , the student, Alan Klein, had asked the T.A. if dionysian frenzy could be what anti-war protesters felt, and the T.A. had said, "Why don't we ask Jeremy?" At first he'd denied it, saying that it was a duty to address a moral wrong and that all the student leaders emphasized the need for discipline so that the only time anyone should get arrested was when it was part of nonviolent resistance as in a sit-in. Then he'd grinned and admitted that it could be an adrenaline rush and that it was very liberating to burst through the ordinary restraints that politeness and civilization expected of us and yell at the top of your lungs. He'd concluded by conceding the point—yes, protest could be dionysian even though its origin was an ethical one. Alan was remembering those remarks. He was a shy and conservative young man, whereby Jeremy, partly because of his friendship with Chad and his involvement in the antiwar movement, was becoming less shy and had never been conservative.

Alan's presence was another reminder that the dionysian impulse would have to be tempered today if he was to keep a proper eye on Rick. The resolve was easy; implementing it far more difficult, for even as he was making it the student leader yelled into the microphone, "Are you ready?" and instantly the intoxicating cry of the crowd followed by the rhythmic chant "Stop the War!" overwhelmed Jeremy's restraint and he joined in. Then the banner that would lead their march across University Avenue was unfurled. When the crowd of over three-hundred students saw the hand-painted, three-line legend on it they screamed even louder:

STUDENT STRIKE

BOOKS NOT BOMBS

THE MONKEY WRENCH FOR THE WAR MACHINE

The crowd's chanting continue until Jeremy's ears began ringing, yet he was yelling at the top of his lungs and felt the blood surging through his veins driven by his thumping heart. Rick's face was contorted as he too had caught the crowd's spirit.

When finally things quieted down, one of the student leaders spoke at length about the lies the Bush administration used to justify the war, the incompetence with which it was run, the war crimes it gave rise to, including the torturing of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, and the fascist tendencies of the administration shown in their contempt for the constitution and international law.

Jeremy noticed that Rick listened with a blank face. These issues, which spoke of the dark forces that endangered democratic liberties perhaps for all time and stated plainly the reasons the students were opposing the war, did not really interest him. The only thing that brought him to attention was something he didn't like. The speaker mentioned the military's hostility to gays and lesbians as another example of what the rally opposed.

With a troubled and puzzled expression, Rick whispered, "How come he's defending gays?"

Jeremy could tell what lay behind the question, even though it surprised him since he himself had learned about these issues in health class at Courtney Academy. But Rick had learned no tolerance and had a teenager's fear of different sexualities.

Trying not to sound professorial, Jeremy explained the thinking. "We stand for tolerance for all people, no matter what their race, religion or sexual orientation. Gays deserve the same rights as everyone else. The military's policies are discriminatory, do you see?"

But he did sound professorial, and though Rick said he did understand, it was doubtful. With Chad about to give his speech, however, this was not the time to pursue the matter. Rick had seen Chad making his way to the microphone, and instantly his whole attention was directed at the library steps. Chad's assignment was to talk specifically about military recruitment on college campuses. He began with a history of ROTC and then talked about student action a few years ago that had forced the military to cancel a free lunch with a recruitment talk. Then he gave various statistics that told the lie to the military's claim that the skills learned in the military were valuable in life. Only six percent of females and twelve percent of males ever actually used the things they had learned in the service in their careers. The crowd was mostly silent during the talk, though unlike Rick who listened closely, they were mostly being polite. When Chad started talking about how the military targeted poor students because they had limited choices, Rick betrayed a bit of adolescent self-importance. Speaking loud enough for people standing nearby to overhear him, he said, "Chad told me that last night and gave some good examples. It's a good point." Seeing people roll their eyes and smile patronizingly, Jeremy was at first embarrassed for him, but then he reminded himself that Rick was just a kid. Chad's idea of planting a seed in him to get his adolescent alienation directed outward to useful purposes that would help him grow into maturity was just the first step. He himself had gone through a similar process of being proud of himself for standing up to misguided authority. Seeing Rick's behavior reminded him of how far he had come in just one year. If he were to be honest with himself, he had to admit his first days as a student protester had gone to his head too. Many fellow students told him they agreed with him but didn't dare put their beliefs on the line. It had made him feel like quite the special fellow for way too long. Only over the summer in contemplating his behavior had he found the wisdom to be humbly proud.

In the meantime Chad was finishing his speech. His peroration, "We shouldn't have to kill people to get an education," brought a huge roar from the crowd, followed by the chant "Stop the war" that went on for a long time until everyone's voice grew hoarse.

When it finally subsided, another student leader gave instructions for the march to University Square to protest in front of the recruitment office. The protesters were to group in lines of five or six behind the large banner (that was so that after they crossed University Avenue they could make their way down the street on the sidewalk, as the police permit required). Following the instructions, the crowd moved to the end of the library mall between the Humanities Building and the state historical society. Almost everyone was serious and somber. The exception, a student who was laughing and joking as if he was on his way to a party, caused resentment. Many people frowned, and one guy snapped at the young man to quiet down. Jeremy rather thought the guy's nerves were jangled and joking was his way of releasing tension. The vague anticipation of danger was something he always felt. Something could happen that sparked violence which could lead to being injured or, worse, arrested, not for political reasons but on a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge that could find its way into one's personal records. But most of the protesters were probably not thinking of that possibility. The potential for danger simply gave an edge to their ethical duty; it was the vinegar in their salad dressing.

There was a great deal of jostling and bustling about as friends sought each other's company. People with signs wanted to be on the outside so that they could be seen, and if a protester found him- or herself next to another sign carrier, he or she sought a better location. So despite the instructions, the situation was rather chaotic for a while. Most of the signs were routine, with STOP THE WAR the most common. A few were very clever. One was based upon Goya's _The Colossus_ with Bush's face superimposed over the giant's. When someone said, "He must be an art major," Rick looked at Jeremy for an explanation. "It's a take-off on a famous Spanish painting," Jeremy explained. "Back then France under Napoleon was ravaging Spain just like what we're doing in Iraq." Rick nodded, but once again Jeremy could tell that most of what he said went right over the boy's head. He wasn't even sure Rick knew much about Napoleon.

Rick's historical and intellectual naiveté continued to reveal itself as the people in front of them began discussing the outrage of the prisoners held at Guantanamo without the right of a court hearing and the evil outrage of Abu Ghraib prison in Bagdad where Americans routinely tortured prisoners. "A lot of the people they picked up in Afghanistan were completely innocent," a shapely woman with tight shorts and revealing T-shirt said. "The stupid Americans asked locals to finger Al Qaeda terrorists, and some of the townspeople took advantage of that stupidity to get rid of some enemy of their clan or someone they owed money to."

"Yeah," her friend said, "and in the meantime Ben Laden is playing dominoes in some cave and enjoying hot tea."

"Bush doesn't want him captured. He needed him free as one of his excuses to invade Iraq."

Jeremy noticed that Rick did not so much listen to this conversation as watch the woman with the nice body as she spoke. He wasn't sure, but Rick didn't seem to know who Ben Laden was. "What they're saying is true," he whispered, tapping Rick on the shoulder. "The Bush administration is not only evil—they're stupid too. Incompetence is their hallmark."

"My father loves Bush," Rick said with an ugly frown. "I hate him."

Jeremy tried to convince himself that that was a good start, but he couldn't get by what Rick's hatred implied. It meant he hated Bush for the wrong reason, seeing him the same way Bush, that little man, that mediocrity, saw himself: as a father figure.

They started moving down Park Street the one block to University Avenue. There were no cars in the intersection, so the cops had already stopped traffic. Students on the bridge between the Humanities Building and Bascom Hill were leaning over the railing. Some of them were shouting their support. Others wore displeased expressions of sticky repugnance as if they were watching a freak show. A few students on the sidewalk spontaneously decided to join the demonstration. They were welcomed with a cheer. As they crossed University Avenue many cars honked in support. Some drivers even thrust a clenched fist out the window. In a rusty old car in front of one of the cops stopping traffic, a big burly man with a dark scowl on his face looked so dangerous that Jeremy was afraid he might do something stupid like plow into the protesters. When he looked into the man's eyes, the man leaned out the window and screamed, "Fuck you, commie!" It was scary, but the cop pointed a finger at the man and said, "Hey!"

That guy needs to be taught a lesson," Rick said.

"Maybe, but not by us."

They found a surprise awaiting them inside University Square. A group of about forty campus Republicans were there, and their presence instantly set off an absurd shouting contest. The protesters started shouting "Stop the war!" and the Republicans answered with "Support our president!" but it didn't last long as the protesters easily drowned out the Republicans. There were many Madison police in front of the recruitment office. While the shouting contest was in full swing, Jeremy noticed several of them looking nervous and feeling their billy clubs in their belts. When things quieted down, one of the Republicans suddenly stepped forward and said, "You people are traitors. You don't deserve the freedoms of our country." Someone shoved the guy, and for a moment a scuffle ensued before the cops separated the two. Rick started towards the scuffle, though it appeared he had picked out a little mousy guy with thick glasses as his antagonist. "Hey, you, tell him to shut up," he said before Jeremy grabbed his arm to restrain him.

A look of anger flashed in the boy's eyes, but it was quickly suppressed. "Okay, okay. You can let go."

Jeremy dropped his hold. "The situation's already under control," he said. "But remember, this is a nonviolent demonstration. That's our tactic, see?"

When Rick as expected looked doubtful, Jeremy delivered the clincher. "Chad agrees."

Rick quickly looked over to where Chad and the other leaders were talking to the cops and one of the student Republicans. He was happy Chad had not seen his indiscretion.

"There are times when we want to get arrested," Jeremy explained. "But that will be nonviolently. We go limp, see? It's a tactic from Gandhi."

Of course the name had no meaning for Rick, nor would any lengthy explanation of _satyagraha_. To Rick's "Who's he?" he said, "He was the leader who drove the British out of India. Martin Luther King used his techniques in the 60's with black liberation."

He had heard of King, thank God. Jeremy was beginning to think turning Rick into an outer-directed activist was hopeless. "You know how effective Dr. King was with his nonviolence. Jim Crow laws were changed throughout the South."

"Yeah, I see your point. It makes the big boys in government look bad."

Jeremy smiled. Maybe there was hope.

The message to the recruiters that they were not welcome on the campus of the University of Wisconsin was delivered to the door, for no recruiter left the safety of their office to come out. The portable sound system was loud enough, however, to blast and vibrate its way through the window glass to the finely-tuned military ears, so with mission accomplished, the group got back into rows—more efficiently this time—and began the march back to the campus. The sound guys, two serious-looking individuals who looked as if their idea of fun would be calculating pi to the millionth digit, hurried ahead of the marchers to set up in front of the chancellor's office.

The protesters saluted honest Abe Lincoln, sitting in his chair in front of Bascom and staring at the Wisconsin capitol dome a mile away, but that was the last spontaneous and happy event of the demonstration. The rumors of the chancellor being out of town turned out to be true, rendering the demonstration in front of his office anticlimactic. Nevertheless, the leaders decided to go forward with their plans, which included a demand that the chancellor disallow recruitment on campus, and, to give the edge to the demand, a speech by a mother of a national guardsman who had been taken out of the university and sent to Iraq. She spoke feelingly about the terror she felt every time she heard a car stopping in front of her house. She also held up a large photo of her son as she spoke, making him a living example of the statistics Chad had cited in his speech earlier. Their family was not rich, and her son had joined the National Guard as a way to help pay the cost of his education.

The end of her speech was temporarily delayed as complaints from nearby offices and some distant classrooms of the noise level led the campus police to suddenly turn off the sound system. While this was happening and a compromise of using a megaphone was being negotiated, Drew joined Jeremy and Rick fresh from his exam, which he felt he aced—at least that's what the circle he made with his thumb and index finger indicated when Jeremy asked him how it went. When Rick's attention went back to the discussion (Chad was doing most of the talking), the two roomies exchanged yet another glance, Drew asking how Rick behaved, and Jeremy with pursed lips and a slight tilt to the head followed by widening eyes answered, _not too bad but it could have been better_.

But Rick's attention was not just on Chad, for he asked a surprising question. "Was the exam really that important, Drew?"

"Yeah, it was. If I hadn't taken it and therefore flunked it, I would have flunked the course. That would very likely mean I'd never be a doctor."

Rick didn't seemed convinced. "If you turned out like dad, would that be such a loss?"

When Drew didn't defend himself, Jeremy intervened. "But your brother wants to serve people, people who are poor and still need medical attention, in a clinic, maybe overseas." He turned to Drew, "That's right, isn't it?"

Drew didn't usually like to talk about himself—maybe that's why his brother had never understood him—but the situation was different here. "Yes, it is. And you know something else, Rick? It's not the job; it's the person doing the job that makes the difference."

That set Rick to thinking, which he seemed quite intent upon while the mother finished her speech through a megaphone and then the student leaders negotiated with a dean to meet with the chancellor next to discuss their demands.

Then after a little talk by the student leaders about the nature of a pep rally to induce a feeling of solidarity, the demonstration came to an end.

Outside Rick revealed that he had indeed been thinking. He looked very serious. "How many students go to Wisconsin?" he asked. "I know it's a lot."

"Over 40,000 including graduate students," Drew said.

"And we only had three hundred at the demonstration? Shouldn't it be more?"

Drew didn't know what he was looking for, but Jeremy did. "First all all, a huge number of students are more interested in the Camp Randall jump-around than serious things. But second, thousands agree with us, but for various reasons don't dare put their beliefs on the line. It's always a minority that changes the world, you know. When we demonstrate we _are_ the voice of the campus. In that sense we're all leaders."

"Jeremy's right," Drew said. "Most people just stay at the personal level as if the larger world had no role in their lives."

"Not demonstrators," Rick said.

"Not demonstrators," Jeremy and Drew said in unison as they exchanged yet another glance. Both could see Rick's mind working as he calculated the pros and cons of private vs. public reality. Jeremy also knew that the boy had found the demonstration exciting in the primitive, dionysian way that was not to be discounted. He had role models now, not only Chad but Jeremy and Drew as well. And his asking some of the right questions showed he was starting to get it, if only a little.

As they started walking back to the apartment, Rick was silent for some time and still thinking, but before they had even left the campus he made a suggestion that showed Jeremy and Drew their intimations were correct.

"Drew, I think you should call home. Mom's probably worried as hell."

Finding Home

Martha looked up from the envelopes she was addressing and peered at Charlie, who was stuffing one of the printed wedding invitations into each envelope after it was addressed. Charlie, who had just returned home from her second year at the Bible college, was slow to feel her cousin's eyes, but when she did and looked up she saw Martha looked troubled.

"Did Father allow you to go to your mother's for supper?"

Charlie smiled wanly. "Reluctantly, but yes."

"Because they're living in sin. That's his objection."

"I know. Would you like some tea?" They were alone in the house. Uncle Edward had taken the boys to the church where they were overseeing some repairs and Aunt Cora was doing her usual Saturday grocery shopping for the week.

"No thank you. Have some yourself, though."

Charlie got up from the dining room table where they were working and went into the kitchen to put the tea water on. From across the counter, she asked, "Do you think he was right?"

Martha's soft eyes looked uncertain. "Yes and no. He's right to disapprove of their living arrangements, but she _is_ your mother."

"And the reason for the supper is to plan the wedding party. Soon she'll be legally married."

Again Martha looked troubled.

"It's the 'legal,' isn't it? It's not going to be a church wedding like yours."

"Yes, I wish Aunt Tris would become Christian."

"Well, remember she has issues with her brother—your father—and I now think it's very unlikely she ever will."

"Doesn't that make you sad?"

The tea kettle was already whistling. They'd had a cup of tea when they began their chore an hour ago, and in the high heat of a beautiful May day the water hadn't cooled much. Pouring hot water into her cup and getting a tea bag from the jar on the counter, Charlie said, "It would have a year ago. Now..." But she didn't want to think of that _now_. Walking carefully so as to not spill her tea, she came back to the table. "I've learned that she has to lead her own life. I can't control her."

That was a safe thing to say and seemed to satisfy Martha. She did look down and think about it a little too long, though. The safest thing would be to change the subject. "How long do you think Matthew will stay mad at me?"

Soon after her arrival home yesterday, Matthew had proudly showed her an essay he wrote for Mrs. Pogue. The assignment was to write an argumentative paper; instead he had written a sermon against abortion. To her eyes it was rather intellectually weak and grammatically and stylistically even weaker. There were comma splices: "These people only want to indulge themselves, they are dedicated to sin." He used "effect" when he meant "affect." There were misspelled words and ungrammatical punctuation. But the biggest fault of all was the logical one of begging the question: he assumed the other side of the argument had no validity whatsoever. Abortion was murder—period. Charlie was familiar with the issues because she had written a paper against abortion in her English class last fall. Her teacher, though a good Christian, was very intelligent and sophisticated and had worked with Charlie to make the paper stronger by allowing the pro-abortionist position to be fairly stated before refuting it. When Charlie had suggested ways to make the paper stronger, however, Matthew had simply bristled.

"He thought that in criticizing his paper you were being pro-abortion," Martha said. There it was again: that troubled look in her eye. Was she sensing something different about Charlie? Catching a hint, perhaps, at some underlying dissatisfaction?

"No, that's not it. I was trying to get him to see that in college writing—and in debating too—it's most important to understand your opponent's argument and subject it to analysis. He didn't do that, so it wasn't an argumentative paper. That's why I called it a sermon."

"That's what he was writing, I think."

"Yeah, but probably even a sermon should use those techniques when they're arguing a point. Different writing requires different techniques. That's why I'm taking the course in journalism at USM this summer."

"Well, it's beyond me," Martha said. "I never had to write one for Mrs. Pogue."

"It's because of those state guidelines for home schooling. Mrs. Pogue told me last Christmas time she had gotten a letter from the state."

"Can they do that? Interfere with religious instruction, I mean?"

"You mean tell a school what to teach? I don't think so. They can tell you what to cover in the curriculum, though."

"We don't need their interference. I heard Father say that."

Now the safe topic was getting dangerous. "How many more envelopes do we have to do?"

"About a dozen. Just about the whole church is invited. At least those guidelines don't affect me much. Teaching the little ones is pretty much reading, writing and arithmetic."

"You love teaching, don't you?"

Martha's eyes brightened. "Yes, but..."

"Will Tom allow you to continue?"

"I don't know. He thinks a woman's place is in the home."

Charlie, remembering the times Tom had chastised her for showing an independent spirit, thought it was unlikely that he would allow his wife any freedom, even the freedom to help the church by nurturing their young. The thought distressed her, and Martha must have come to a similar conclusion, for they both grew quiet as they finished the envelopes.

The wedding was scheduled for mid June, less than a month away. Last summer after making a few more ineffective attempts to get Martha to reconsider, Charlie had given up the effort and accepted the marriage as inevitable. For Martha she felt awful. Not being able to express her true feelings in turn made her feel awful. It was yet another reminder that no where and with no one could she be totally honest. Her life was becoming more restricted, not less. Without Martha the Harris household was going to be more estranging, more alien. She feared rather than loved her uncle; she had little love for the boys, and she knew Matthew actively disliked her. Only Aunt Cora had a warm and loving heart, which in this family was allowed little scope for expression. Nor did she have any friend at the college with whom she was close enough to open her heart. The boy who last year had expressed disillusionment with the college had not returned for his sophomore year. She had tentatively approached a few others who showed signs of having doubts or of thinking differently than the official way, but one had been angrily shocked that she verbalized a doubt about the inerrancy of the Bible and the other one became frightened. She seemed to fear that questioning even a pebble in the seawall of faith threatened the wall's destruction and death by drowning. The boy who had tried to kiss her last year had had some kind of conversion experience in the summer, for he returned to the college fanatically devoted to the evangelical cause and clearly went out of his way to avoid Charlie.

The result was that everything in her life was "the same old same old," as she used to hear kids at Courtney Academy say about the routine in their lives. In plain English, nothing had changed for the better and much had become worse. She continued living a hidden life, with war between heart and mind her inner reality and the schizophrenic split between what she thought and what she said governing her confrontations with the world. Even having Jesus in her heart was not always enough. He couldn't give her a faith strong enough to lead to peace. He couldn't make the feeling that she was different go away. He could do nothing about the isolation and estrangement of her life. Nor could He, when she was alone deep in the night, keep her thoughts safely away from sex and the hunger in her loins. Her projected career as a spokesman for the church, the one thing that had given her self-confidence and promised future fulfillment, turned to dust when in April Rev. Charles Hamlin, the national leader of their church and a man who was frequently in the media speaking for the evangelical position, paid a visit to the college. His attitude towards women in general was a revelation, and his demeaning treatment of her in particular made her question not just her faith in God but herself. Now more than ever she needed to talk to someone. With no one in the evangelical community capable of understanding her doubts and fears, the only person in the whole world, she now realized, who would listen to her sympathetically was her mother. Last night she had made a brief visit just to say hello to her, and her mother had invited her for supper so that they could talk about the arrangements for her wedding in two weeks. Ted was going on a fishing trip with his son for the whole day so that her mother and she would be alone for hours. If her courage didn't fail her, there was going to be plenty of time to talk.

The rest of the afternoon dragged on. Aunt Cora came home, and they helped her put the groceries away, after which they also helped her bake some pies. Uncle Edward returned in a good mood, the repairs to the front stairs of the church where water damage had led to punky wood having been successfully completed. Matthew and Mark were allowed to shoot baskets in the yard so that even potential nasty remarks from Matthew were safely avoided. Any spat, any sign of disharmony in the house, could make her uncle lose his temper. Still, Charlie was uneasy until Uncle Edward, after looking through the mail, went downstairs to his office to work on his sermon. It was now unlikely that anything could occur to make him change his mind and forbid her to go to her mother's.

Occasionally as she helped with the pies and took part in the conversations, a contrary thought would sneak into her mind and she would find herself hoping somehow that the visit would be forbidden. It made her feel foolish and ashamed of herself until after thinking about it she saw that it was just nerves and uncertainty. First she was uncertain how she was going to bring up the subject of her confused life with her mother. Then, too, the conversation itself could also become very dangerous. The apprehension she was feeling was the recognition that once the topic was broached it might lead anywhere. She wanted her life to change at the same time the thought of change terrified her. She lived under oppressive restrictions and rules at home and at college, but at least they were familiar. Did she want to have this conversation with her mother or did she _need_ to have it? Even of that she was not sure.

All this fear and expectation and need was safely kept bottled up, however, and she was quite sure Martha and Aunt Cora didn't notice any of her inner agitation. Once when she stopped in front of the refrigerator and became lost in thought, Aunt Cora did ask her if something was the matter, but her explanation that she was always nervous before visiting her mother seemed to satisfy her aunt. After that she was more careful to keep her thoughts hidden away.

Finally four o'clock arrived, and it was time to go. Reflectively Aunt Cora reminded her that she needed to be home by eight o'clock. Promising that she would, she left and walked the six blocks to where her mother lived on the other side of Main Street in a three-story apartment building incongruously in the middle of a street of single-family homes. The street was much nicer than the one she grew up on. Most of the houses had flowers and ornamental bushes in the front yard and were all neat and well maintained. Already she was starting to feel calmer.

As she walked up the stairs, still trying to decide how she would open the conversation she needed to have, her mother opened the door and greeted her with a wide smile and a hug.

"Heard you coming up the stairs," she said as she enveloped her in loving arms. The hugs had started last Christmas and now were the usual practice whenever she arrived and departed. Charlie, who had hardly touched another human being since she began living with her aunt and uncle, loved them. She could feel her mother's love as a warm, protective presence that put her instantly at ease. Along with the love she could feel came a trust and calmness that put to rest her unease. Somehow their conversation was going to happen, and it didn't matter how she broached the subject, nor did it matter where the conversation led. Here she was loved for herself. Her sudden sense of trust and well-being was reinforced by the cheerful ambiance of her mother's pleasant apartment. The light coming through the two living-room windows separated by a bookcase imbued the place with a golden glow, which was reinforced by the walls painted the same color, and the shadow of a tree outside swaying in the soft spring breeze danced and swayed across the red carpet.

"Did Ted and Mike leave as early as they planned?"

"Yes," Tris said, her hand still lightly touching Charlie's back, "they were driving away a little after five o'clock. By the time they get home it's going to be dark and they're going to be very tired being in that boat on the ocean all day with the sun beating down on them."

"Tired, but happy, I bet," Charlie said. "Whose boat was it anyways?"

"The man Ted is building an addition for. He's so happy with Ted's work they've become friends, and last week when he found out Ted loved to fish he invited him to take the fishing trip."

"Wow! He must do good work." She thought of his son Mike. They'd met last Christmastime and had become friendly. She knew him well enough to get the sense he was not an outdoorsman like his father. "But what about Mike? He's not really a fisherman, is he?"

Tris shook her head and smiled. "No, but he does love his father. Being with Ted will be his fun. Mike likes you and thinks you're nice, by the way."

She said this in a way that made Charlie blush. She thought of Mike as a brother and not in _that_ way. "How did he do at Worcester Polytech this year?"

"Pretty good. He got three A's, a B and one C. The C was in English—he's not good at that like you are."

"Well, Mom, are you getting excited now that the wedding is almost here?"

"No, not really," she said, then smiled broadly, aware that that was not the expected answer. "And there's a reason for that. We already love each other and have been together now for almost ten months. So the wedding is just an occasion to celebrate the love we feel with those family and friends we love. Does that make sense?"

Charlie thought of Martha's loveless marriage and the hundred strangers who would witness it and felt strangely elated to understand her mother. "Yes, I think so. You're saying a marriage is made with love. It isn't a ceremony."

She nodded. "That's it!

Charlie looked at the new dining room table behind her mother. "You've made the place even nicer. The dining room table is beautiful. I saw it yesterday but didn't have time to ask you about it. I remember last Christmas you said you were planning to replace the old one."

They'd been standing by the door, but the mention of the new table drew them towards it for a closer inspection. With her eyes shining brightly, Tris ran her hand across the table. "You should have seen it when we bought it at a barn sale. It was painted but chipped and nicked all over. Guess who finished it?"

The pride in her voice gave away the answer. "Where'd you learn to do that?"

"Ted taught me the techniques and our landlord let me use the garage to do the work. I must have spent forty hours all told on it, but it came out perfect. It was worth it."

"And you got a new dresser too?"

"Yes, but it's not worth seeing. It was store-bought," she said with the pride of a craftsman.

They went into the kitchen where Tris had water already hot for tea. As she was pouring the water, Charlie looked at the new photos on the wall. They were 8 X 10 blowups of photos of her and Ted's two kids. The photo of her was taken last Christmas when she was excited about her future career and feeling good about herself. The distance she felt from that photo was a reminder of her mission. As Tris poured the tea, she asked, "Mom, what do you think of feminism?"

The question seemed to take Tris by surprise. She tilted her head and her eyes narrowed momentarily. "I used to think it was a bunch of bra-burning lesbians, but my psychologist is a feminist. To her it means women should have the same rights and opportunities as men."

"Do you think that's right?"

Her mother thought for a moment. "Yes, I think I do. It's just basic fairness, isn't it? When I started working at the UPS depot years ago I was doing the same work as the men but making less. It wasn't fair. Of course they don't do anything so blatant anymore. It's against the law. But why do you ask?"

"Because of something that happened last month." Then she related the story of Rev. Hamlin's visit to the college. It was still so vivid to her that as she related the events she experienced the same emotions she felt when they occurred.

The minister's visit to the college had come in early April after Easter. When it was announced that he would be coming to the college to pay a visit and give a lecture on the Christian life, the whole college was excited. Rev. Hamlin was a famous and eminent man, often the national spokesman for the evangelical cause. It was regarded as a very great honor that such a man would favor the college with his presence. For two weeks he was virtually the only thing students, professors and staff talked about. For Charlie the prospect of the eminent man's visit was even more exciting, for the college president, Rev. Achibald Sharpe, had personally asked her to write up a report on the visit for the local media as well as the school newspaper. It would be another step along the way in the career chosen for her, and quite the most important writing assignment she had had thus far. For the first time she became truly enthusiastic about her future and even daydreamed of flights into major cities, meeting important people, and being praised for her writing. She could hardly sleep the night before Rev. Hamlin was to arrive on campus, and as she had walked to the president's office in mid morning, she found herself dry-mouthed in anticipation.

The first thing she had noticed when he arrived was that he didn't look like his picture. There he was smiling; in life he had cold eyes and a grim expression that was off-putting. Something about those eyes and thin lips had reminded Charlie of Uncle Edward. Rev. Hamlin also looked like a man who would be slow to forgive his enemies despite the Lord's Prayer and swift to find fault. His dress and appearance had suggested a worldly vanity very far from the humble gentleness of Jesus. He was attired in a very expensive suit and bright blue tie with the Christian symbol of the fish as the tie-clasp. His shiny shoes had squeaked as he walked in short, mincing steps. His hands were flawlessly white and manicured.

These impressions had flashed through Charlie's mind before she had heard him speak. She was ashamed of them and berated herself for judging by appearances. Coming into the large outer office at the same time Charlie had arrived were several prominent members of the faculty and two trustees. While Charlie shyly had faded into the background, Rev. Sharpe had taken it upon himself to do the introductions. She had noticed that the smile she'd seen in the photo appeared on his face as Rev. Hamlin shook hands with and said a few words to each of the local dignitaries. But when the president had introduced him to Charlie and Mrs. Hunter, his secretary, he had merely nodded curtly and not offered his hand. Charlie, about to say what an honor it was to meet him (words she had rehearsed to herself last night), had felt herself flush at his discourtesy. She had stepped back and listened to the men chatting about the need for more troops in Iraq to crush the infidel terrorists. When they all had started into the conference room across from the president's office where Rev. Hamlin was going to address the college leaders before his afternoon speech to the student body, Charlie had followed with Mrs. Hunter, only to stop when the eminent man had looked back at her and then said to Rev. Sharpe, "Excuse me, Achibald, but this girl is not needed." Rev. Sharpe, clearly embarrassed, had said something about her duty to write a report on his visit, which explanation was waved away. "My administrative assistant always handles these affairs. He will tape my remarks." Then looking at Charlie and Mrs Hunter, he had said, "You girls run along."

The full force of his demeaning dismissal had struck Charlie like a slap on the face. She had felt her jaw drop and had to fight to keep the tears from her eyes. "Oh my," Mrs. Hunter murmured wryly, but it was obvious she too was hurt.

By the time she finished telling her mother about the most humiliating experience in her life, both of them were crying. Her mother's face while she listened displayed a series of emotions, beginning with curiosity as she heard how everyone at the college was full of expectation, then a certain fearfulness when the man was described, and ending with surprise, shock, anger, and outrage in rapid succession at his boorish behavior and finally an empathy so strong she was in tears for Charlie. At one point she had reached across the table and taken Charlie's hands in hers and unconsciously begun squeezing them harder and harder as she felt Charlie's pain.

A stricken silence of uncertain duration followed the narration; then Tris, speaking tremulously, said, "Oh, Charlie, that's just awful what that man did. He's a creep, arrogant and full of himself. I hope you realize it was more a comment on him than on you. He ought to be ashamed of himself."

Somehow without her being aware of how it happened, Charlie found herself standing and enveloped in her mother's arms by the time Tris had finished speaking. For a long time she lost herself in the embrace and let all the hurt be cried out while her mother made soft cooing sounds. Emotionally she felt an enormous relief and comfort more like a little girl than a woman scorned by an arrogant man, but she could feel the love her mother was communicating as a source of strength that was far from girlish. She was not alone. She was loved. Now she knew what it meant to have a mother.

When the tears finally stopped flowing, Tris showed that she perfectly understood the implications of what had happened. "Your career was going to be doing the exact thing that pig—excuse the expression but there is no other word for him—wouldn't let you do. What's going to happen?"

"I don't know. Dr. Sharpe was very kind to me the next day. He called me over to the president's office and apologized."

"But that doesn't change anything, does it?"

"No, it doesn't. But what Rev. Hamlin did does change everything. What if it happens again?"

"You wouldn't be able to do the job, would you?" She looked into Charlie's eyes as she gently stroked her cheek. "Charlie, tell me, has it made you start thinking about your church?"

It did, of course, but she tried to anticipate where the question was going. She looked down, undecided. The old stupid fear was still there, making her want to be guarded. Then still feeling her mother's eyes she raised her head. Her mother was too loving, too supporting, too _motherly_ , to not be completely honest with.

"It's not just that, Mom. It really bothered me because it's not the only time I've seen women treated poorly. In fact, Martha is also a victim. Next month when her wedding day comes she'll be entering into a loveless marriage with Tom Johnson."

"What do you mean? How did Martha meet this man? He's in your church, right?"

Again Charlie hesitated, this time, though, only for a fraction of a second and only because she was slightly embarrassed. She had never told her mother the circumstances of the engagement. "She didn't. It's an arranged marriage."

"What!?"

"Uncle Edward and Brother Johnson, the man's father, they arranged it."

"I thought that just they did that in old books and movies. Couldn't she refuse?"

"Well, yes and no. Martha had to say yes to it, but..."

"Did she want to marry this guy?"

"I don't think so. In fact, I don't think she even likes him. He's kinda creepy, arrogant and selfish, a real know-it-all and yet stupid." These were unchristian remarks, but she didn't consider that man a good Christian.

"Then why in the world would she say yes?"

Charlie nervously clenched her fist. "You have to know Martha. She's a very sweet girl, very obedient, very devout. She told me she always knew her marriage would be like this. She said her true husband was Jesus, so it doesn't matter."

Tris shook her head in disbelief. "Doesn't matter," she muttered to herself.

"I know. I find it strange too."

Tris frowned thoughtfully, then took the teacups from the table to the sink to rinse. "How come you never told me this before?" she asked with her back turned.

She sat down, suddenly feeling tired. "I was embarrassed, I guess. I was afraid you'd think they planned the same thing for me."

The teacups rinsed, Tris was leaning against the kitchen sink with her arms folded. "Will they?" She spoke anxiously.

"I don't know."

"Would you agree if they did?"

"I don't think so."

She unfolded her arms and began waving them for emphasis. "Oh, Charlie. Don't ever do that. Love, human love, is the greatest gift in the world. If I've learned anything, that's it."

"Is that what saved you from drinking?"

"Yes and no. By stopping drinking I became capable of...even worthy of love. I was a terrible person when I drank. You know that."

"You were still my mom."

"But not a good one. But I still feel responsible for your..."

She was going to say "situation" or "life," Charlie could tell, which they both knew meant her life as an evangelical Christian.

"You know, Mom, they already did something like that to me."

"You mean the college they sent you to. You weren't asked where you wanted to go, were you?"

She shook her head. "And I know why they chose the career I'm supposed to have. Brother Johnson has an air-conditioning business and advertises on TV. He was talking once about it and said that he'd found that pretty women in adds are the best way to get a lot of responses and bring in the business."

"So you think you're the pretty woman in their plan. It's true that you are pretty, but even I see in this context it's insulting."

"Well, they did know I wrote well and was, you know, smart. But yes, I think they were thinking of those air conditioning ads Bother Johnson runs.

Tris sat down and pulled the other chair close so that they could sit beside each other. She put her arm around Charlie's shoulder. "I don't want to interfere in your life if you don't want me to, but let me ask: Do you believe everything Edward does?"

That was a subject she had thought about a great deal. She knew the Bible wasn't perfect. She knew Uncle Edward was not following the example of Jesus when in the Lord's Prayer he instructs us to forgive our enemies. She didn't think Jesus would be a warhawk. She knew evolution was an accurate account of reality. She knew her mother and Ted were decent, good people while her church believed they would be damned. She also had thought often of Ted's belief that above all God wanted us to have good hearts and be decent people and believed on the whole he was right. She knew her own instincts for compassion and pity were closer to the teachings of Jesus than the hate that motivated many in her church. She believed it was unfair to force a young girl into marriage. The short answer was no. She said the word. The heavens didn't part. The sky didn't fall. The earth did not move.

Her mother did not seemed surprised. In fact she said, "I didn't think you did. Edward is no good for you, if you want my opinion. There's no love in the man."

"He loves God so much, that's why," Charlie said, trying to be charitable.

"You'd be happier here, though, Charlie." She looked at her in silent appeal; then after a few moments passed, she said explicitly, "I wish you could live with Ted and me."

"I do too, Mom. But Uncle Edward wouldn't like it one bit. Besides, I think he might have legal guardianship. He said something like that to me a few years ago."

Tris searched her memory, her finger tapping her lip and her eyes looking up. "I do remember after my bad behavior lost you, I had to sign a whole bunch of documents a month or so later. But would you really like our apartment to be your home? I know I would."

"Yes, I really would. It's so much nicer here, so safe and bright and warm. At Uncle Edward's there's always tension. No one dares to say something that would displease him."

She frowned. "He's always been a tyrant. You're an adult now, you know. You can vote. Even if the documents said something about being twenty-one, you're almost that age, and as I say, you're really an adult already."

Charlie hesitated. Where she had been talking abstractly about the possibility of living with her mother, her mother was hinting that she could leave her uncle and live here right now. Why did she hesitate? Wasn't that what she always wanted? She remembered the many nights as a girl when her mother found a man at a bar and left her to face the darkness alone. The sound of the downstairs front door opening would fill her with an agony of expectation; the creaking of the floor or walls when the building shifted would make her imagine all sorts of terrors. Then, alone and defenseless, ghosts and ghouls and bogeymen were real to her. Yet despite growing up with fear and hope for siblings, even when Mrs. McCade came on that awful night she still wanted to stay with her mother more than anything else in the world. To be orphaned and at the mercy of strangers was scarier than all the ghosts and goblins in her building. To never have hope of an opening door and a mother coming home closed off all continuity and sense of belonging in her life. That was the way she thought then, and she had never completely let go of desire to live with her mother like a normal girl or young woman. Now here with her mother offering that shelter from storm, that safe haven from the wrack and ruin of the world, fear and hope were still her reality, only now instead of bogeymen and doors opening it was an uncle's stern and unyielding face she saw in her mind's eye as she looked at her mother's anxious face. For a moment the two wrestled for supremacy, then her courage failed her. It was too sudden. Charlie felt the panic rising and for a moment she even thought she might throw up.

Her mother had been closely watching her eyes and saw the internal defeat. Not being willing to give up without a fight, she tried one more thing. "You could live here and go to school at USM. You could commute so that it wouldn't even be all that expensive."

"I'll think about it, Mom," she said quietly and with downcast eyes.

Her mother nodded grimly and in answer took her in her arms. "We have the summer," she murmured.

Safely in her mother's arms, the panic passed. "I'm already going to take a journalism course at USM this summer. It could be a test. By the end of the summer when I'll be close to twenty-one, then we could decide."

After that they spoke no more of escape and reunion. They had a quiet dinner of stir fried chicken and vegetables, cooking and cleaning up together and talking about pleasant things like finishing furniture and the kinds of clothes and colors that suited Charlie's face and physique. The real possibility of making such pleasant evenings routine had passed into a future maybe.

Only later did she realize that not once during the moment of decision or even during their conversations as they ate supper and cleaning up afterwards did she think of Jesus.

The Kitten

On a pleasant day in late June with nesting robins hopping across the lawn and a soft breeze filling the air with the fragrance of nearby flowers in full bloom, Jeremy Lawrence found himself outside of Luther Bonney Hall on the campus of USM discussing French adjectives with three classmates from the summer-session course. They were all good guys who, when they learned Jeremy planned on a career teaching college history, began calling him "Professor" in a good-humored way. One of them, Chuck Farley, had gone to the Red Sox game in Boston last night and had not gotten home until 1:20 A.M. The late evening had the unfortunate result of causing him to fall asleep in class. It was that catnap and its results they were discussing.

With a sheepish grin Chuck said, "It was the Red Sox that caused me to be the class dunce."

"You got that nailed already," one of the other guys said. "You don't need any help from those guys." He imitated the French professor's voice with its slight hint of a French accent: "Are we disturbing your rest, Monsieur Farley?"

That's when Chuck was asked to translate a passage from English to French that was filled with adjectives, the lesson of the day. Chuck translated "a great man" as _un homme grand_.

The French professor had corrected him, but apparently Chuck was too sleepy to understand the grammatical principle because he turned to Jeremy and said, "Perhaps our professor will have the goodness to explain what I did wrong."

They all turned to Jeremy, making him feel embarrassed. "It's like Professor Sonet said. Most French adjectives, with the exception of a few like _petit_ and _mauvais_ that go before the noun, go after it. Then there are some that depending on the sense, the meaning, go either before or after the noun. " _Un grand homme_ means 'a great man.' _Un homme grand_ means 'a tall man.' That's what you got wrong."

"I see. So you could say David Ortez is both _un grand homme_ and _un homme grand_."

"You're thinking of Big Papi's homerun that won the game, aren't you? I saw it on TV."

"Yeah. The crowd went wild. Me and my buddy yelled until we were hoarse."

"Where were your seats? Last time I went we were ten rows behind the visitors' dugout. Great view."

"Right field, near the foul line and about twenty rows up. My friend brought his glove."

Jeremy, sitting on the low concrete wall and listening to the guys with but slight interest, looked around and saw a pretty and shapely woman coming out of the door and turning left towards downtown. She wore a long skirt and white blouse which was tight across the chest because of her large breasts. At first he was merely regarding her as a fine specimen of female flesh, but with a shock that actually jolted him to his feet he recognized Charlie Harris. He couldn't believe how good she looked at the same time her face had changed little. She was not beautiful in any conventional sense, but her face was attractive and appealing with the qualities of shyness, earnestness and sincerity mixed in equal part with a dollop of sweet naiveté. Now that face was connected to a magnificent body.

"Hey, you guys. I see an old friend I haven't seen since high school. See you next class."

Without even listening to their responses, he hurried to catch up with Charlie. "Hey, Charlie! Wait up!"

She turned, looking fearful momentarily until her face lit up in recognition. "Jeremy! Jeremy Lawrence. What are you doing here?"

"I'm taking French. I need it for my major, European history. What about you? Have you left the bible college?"

She colored. "No. I'm taking a course in journalism here. It's not offered at my college."

He hid his disappointment. "You're looking great. How have you been?"

The question elicited a strange look and a cryptic "Okay" that told him that something was wrong. Not wanting to pry and make her even more uncomfortable, he changed the subject. "Are you driving now? Is that how you got here?"

"No. I took the bus. A few times my uncle drove me in and once my...my brother-in-law gave me a ride. But mostly I've been taking the bus."

That was the answer he hoped for. Trying not to sound too eager, he said, "I'm going home to Waska right now. Can I give you a ride?"

She had to think about that question too, but not long. She smiled warmly. "That would be wonderful. Thank you."

His car was parked on the street on the other side of the campus, which necessitated retracing their steps. He was glad the guys were already gone. Introductions would have been awkward. He was already so nervous he could feel the sweat pouring out of armpits and his mouth was dry. He had the impression Charlie was glad to see him and nervous in a maidenly-shy way, but over and beyond that something else was bothering her. He knew he had to be careful. But walking in silence was worse than saying the wrong thing, so thinking that it would be safe he asked her about the journalism course.

His instincts were correct. It was a topic she could discuss unguardedly. She told him the class was learning how to conduct interviews and ask pertinent questions. Their homework from last class was to read material on half a dozen fictitious government officials; then in class students assumed either the role of the reporter or the interviewee. She was the reporter when it was her turn. When he asked her how she did, she smiled broadly and said that the professor said she was a natural.

They were off campus now. "There's my car," he said, pointing to a late-model Japanese hatchback, his mother's old car. Last summer when she bought a new German car she had given it to him. Now he was confronted with another moment of indecision. The women he knew at Wisconsin would be horrified and insulted to be patronized to have a man open the door and close it after they were seated. He rather thought Charlie would not think this way, but still his hand shook as he unlocked the door and opened it. Then he went around to the driver's side as she got in and closed the door without any sign of either feeling patronized on the one hand or neglected as a lady on the other. The crisis having passed, he relaxed a little, but not so much that as they started driving through the streets of Portland he stupidly forgot himself and asked her the first thing that popped into his mind. "How are things at the bible college going?"

In a tone that that showed she really didn't want to talk about it, she said, "Oh, it's a small place and everyone is pretty much the same. I bet it's a lot different at the University of Wisconsin. Tell me about it."

Her request led to a burst of verbiage fueled by his nervousness and by the fact he could talk about the University of Wisconsin for hours. He started speaking generally, but finding her to be genuinely interested in life at a big university, soon he was talking enthusiastically. It was a world-class university with a majority of its academic departments ranked in the top ten in the country. Its football, basketball and hockey teams were likewise nationally ranked and had the most enthusiastic fans in all of college sports. Students came from all over the world drawn by its academic reputation and famous scholars and scientists. In research it produced more books, monographs and scholarly articles than any other university. Its campus on the shores of Lake Mendota was the most beautiful in the country, and the architecture of its building was likewise world-class. It was founded by New England Yankees who came to the Midwest and who modeled their university after Harvard, Yale and other ivy league colleges. The city of Madison had a vibrancy you could feel. It had great restaurants of every imaginable cuisine in the world.

By the time he was talking about the city of Madison they had long left the streets of Portland and were driving on the interstate. He hardly remembered the stops and turns of the city driving, and having Easy Pass so that he didn't have to stop to pay a toll, he barely remembered getting on the turnpike.

By now he was perfectly calm. Charlie, who occasionally interrupted him to ask a question, had also relaxed.

"I'm surprised I've never run across you in Waska. You have been there this and last summer, haven't you?"

She laughed. "I was and am, but I lead a very quiet, a very sheltered life. Home, church and visiting my mother pretty much describes my life."
"Your mother?" He knew she had been taken from her mother and had heard rumors that her mother was an alcoholic, but he knew nothing for sure.

"She's stopped drinking. She's a completely different person now and is married to a wonderful man, also a former alcoholic."

"That's wonderful news. I bet you're very happy to have her back in your life."

"I am," she said emphatically. "She's become a fanatical decorator now. She refinishes furniture and makes them beautiful—almost like works of art. I help her sometimes. Their apartment is filled with beautiful furniture and is bright and cheerful, a lot different from the place we had when I was growing up."

Suddenly she was quiet. He looked over to see a dark thought pass across her face. It distressed him. But when he said, "No kidding. You've helped refinish furniture?" the dark moment had already passed.

She became aware she was being observed. "I'm just an assistant, of course. And anything really tricky is done by Ted, her husband. He's a skilled carpenter."

"You say he's a nice guy?"

"Oh, yes." Then she became serious. "Jeremy, you told me all about the University of Wisconsin, but you didn't tell me anything about your personal life."

He had purposely avoided that subject since it inevitably would lead to his anti-war activities, but now that she had asked he was glad. Far from wanting to keep it from her, he wanted her to know.

He told her about his roommates, Drew Jensen and Chad Kubek. In giving their backgrounds he even told her about Chad's father being a union man in Detroit and his grandfather and great grandfather union activists as well, though he did slide over the fact one was a communist and the other a Wobblie. Then remembering his mother telling him that honesty was the most important part of a relationship, he took a deep breath and told her about his anti-war activities and how he had participated in numerous demonstrations on campus.

He was pleasantly surprised by her reaction. "Iraq is such a mess there," she said. "I wish we'd just get out. Just leave."

"So you agree the war is evil and stupid?"

She seemed to understand what he meant. "Yes, I do. I have to keep my opinion to myself at the college. Everybody there thinks Bush is wonderful, but I hate war." She was silent for a moment. He saw her dreamily looking at the trees lining the highway. The she turned to him. "Tell me why you do it. And how too. How do these demonstrations work?"

"First the whys. Because the war is wrong. Because it's based on lies. Because the government is doing evil in our name. I think most of us, or even all of us, who protest feel it's our moral duty to oppose evil."

He looked at her. Her nod said "go on."

"Remember Thoreau protested the Mexican War in 'On the Duty of Civil Disobedience'?"

"Yes, I agree. I think you're doing the right thing."

He smiled, feeling a rush of contentment and pleasure. "I'm glad you think so."

She smiled back. "I've seen protests on TV. Are yours like that? Lots of chanting, signs and stuff?"

"Yeah, we have all that. We have discipline too. We're nonviolent. We follow Gandhi's and Dr. Martin Luther King's principles of passive resistance and nonviolence."

"Good. Violence is what you're protesting, right?"

He nodded.

She giggled, her face looking beautiful and happy and... but he stifled the sexual thought. "What's so funny?"

"It was Bush I interviewed in class. He was supposed to be an unnamed president, but everybody knew it was Bush. I asked him why he couldn't admit the Iraq war was a mistake."

"Really? What did the guy say?"

Again she giggled. "You mean President Bush? Well, the guy was against the war too and had a hard time pretending to be Bush at that moment."

"That's funny—and true too. Just about everyone I know is turning against the war. Our demonstrations at Wisconsin and other colleges have been doing the job."

Their exit was coming out. He slowed down and put his blinker on. Now that they were about to enter Waska, the pleasant feeling of closeness dissipated and he grew nervous again. He wondered what her uncle would think about her riding with a non-Christian. "We have our classes at the same time," he said after they passed through the toll booth. "Do you think your uncle would mind if you rode with me to every class? I'll be glad to pick you up."

"He might not like it, but he's aware that I'm going to have to be on my own if I'm to do the job for the church."

"What job's that?"

She became guarded again. "It's a long story. I'll tell you some other time. What I mean, though, is that he's already aware that he can't, ah...what is the word? protect me from the world."

That was a strange thing for a twenty-year-old young woman to say and she knew it. Its unspoken message was the paranoia of fundamentalism. Maybe she was telling him indirectly that she knew what her uncle did not: that looking at anything too closely would reveal the absurdity of their beliefs. And yet if there was perspective and balance, there was also a tinge of fear in her voice. She was afraid of her uncle. It wasn't love that bound her to the church; it was fear. The flash of insight had an immediate impact on him. He became more and more nervous and fearful the closer they came to her house.

"It's the third house on the left," she said as they turned onto her street. "The one with black shutters."

He nodded, too nervous and dry-mouthed to speak.

He pulled over next to the curb and stopped the car.

Opening the door and reaching down to gather up her backpack, she looked over at him. "It was great to see you, Jeremy. Thanks for the ride. Bye!"

"I was great to see you too, Charlie. Take care."

As she started walking around the front of the car he realized the return of his nervousness had made him forget to ask her how they could communicate. He opened the window to feel a hot blast of air. "Oh, Charlie, how shall I know if I can pick you up on Thursday?"

A strange look passed over her face. More than embarrassment, it revealed a feeling of being frustrated and stymied that she wanted to hide but could not. In a low voice, she said, "I'm not sure. I guess I'll try to call you."

As she spoke, behind her he saw the front door open and Rev. Harris, wearing a scowl, issue forth. Jeremy had seen his picture in the newspaper. He looked even more intimidating in person. He was a heavyset bull of a man, with a severe crewcut, small dark eyes, jowls and a hooked nose. Even on a hot summer day he wore a suit and tie. Right now he was glaring at Charlie, waiting for an explanation. Jeremy saw Charlie cringe reflexively before standing straight and addressing her uncle in a steady voice.

"This is Jeremy Lawrence, the nice boy who protected me from attacks on our church by mean boys at Courtney Academy. He's taking a course in French at USM and offered me a ride home when we ran into each other."

Jeremy, seeing Rev. Harris's frown darken and feeling the primordial mammalian fright or flight impulse, was actually putting the car in gear and preparing to drive off before he came to his senses. Here was the perfect opportunity to settle the matter. Bravely he opened the door and got out of the car. Braver still, he walked up to the minister. "Pleased to meet you, sir." He put his hand out, but when the minister made no offer to reciprocate, he awkwardly pulled it down. "I've offered to give Charlie a ride each class day, Rev. Harris. It would be much easier for her than taking the bus. We found out our classes are at the exact same time."

The minister frowned darkly when he said "Charlie." Pointedly he said to her, "Charlene, go into the house while I talk to this young man."

They watched her obediently and wordlessly go directly inside. When the door closed behind her, Rev. Harris turned and regarded Jeremy with a looked of undisguised distaste. "Tell me about yourself, young man."

Jeremy, still so nervous he could feel his hand shaking, somehow had the wherewithal to come up with an inspired answer that he thought would please the minister. "We belong to the Congregationalist Church of our puritan ancestors. I'm a history major at the University of Wisconsin where I'm attending with a full scholarship. I hope to be a professor of history some day. I'm taking French because I need it for course work and it's most convenient to take it in the summer. I'm also working at the library here in Waska on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays helping Mr. Seavey organize the history collection. I find it interesting work because I've run across references to my puritan ancestors, some of whom were on the Mayflower."

His instincts were spot on! He could see the minister's face relax a little and become less severe as he talked about the puritans.

"They were holy men, those puritans. Righteous men. You seem to be proud of them?"

"I am."

"Are you righteous?"

That was a loaded word. For a moment he felt another stab of panic, but there was an easy answer that would be sincere, though not in the way Rev. Harris intended. "Yes, sir. I try to be."

The minister thought for a moment. His pudgy, well manicured hand felt for and found his tie clasp, a small gold cross in a silver setting. Jeremy hoped he wasn't going to ask him if he was a believing Christian. He didn't think he could pull that lie off.

The silence was becoming oppressive until Jeremy realized it was Rev. Harris's attempt to assert dominance. Instantly some of the fear he had been feeling turned to secret contempt.

"You can give Charlene a ride only on one condition. You go directly to class and you come directly home. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir."

He turned towards the front door before another thought occurred to him. "Her name is Charlene. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," he said very earnestly, though already he could see Charlie and him laughing about that when he told her on Thursday.

His sense of triumph as he drove home was short-lived. Even as he was vowing to himself never to be afraid in that man's presence again, he remembered Charlie literally cringing when her uncle spoke sharply to her and knew that words were cheap. He could see through the tricks the man used to dominate others. He knew that the reverend was a bully and a cretin and that he was stupid. But the man's self-confident belief that he was always right put him at an advantage and gave him the ability to crush the merely human that recognized doubt and complexity and knew truth had to be pulled out of a deep, swirling pool of contradictory lights and shadows. No, he shouldn't try to kid himself. Reverend Harris was a formidable foe.

Even with his mind filled with Charlie and her uncle, he had chores that had to be attended to when he got home. He brought the trash receptacle back into the garage and lined it with a new plastic bag. Looking at various boxes stacked haphazardly on both sides of the garage, rakes leaning against the wall instead of on their hooks, a pile of debris on the old workbench, blown-in leaves lining the back floor of the garage like a discarded rug, he recalled promising his mother he would clean up the mess. He had planned on doing it today, but meeting Charlie changed his mind. Inside the house, he looked through the mail and, finding nothing for himself, put the letters and catalogs on the small table by the door. Catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror above the table, he was surprised to see a worried, haggard look on his face. Had Rev. Harris that much power to destroy his tranquility? Or was it his newly awakened feelings for Charlie herself?

In the kitchen, he remembered that his mother asked him to make a salad and get a rice dish going for their supper of chicken barbecued on the grill. He got the material out of the refrigerator to make a salad. He found the lettuce, cucumber, carrots, olives, onions and half of a green pepper but no radishes. That was a disappointment. The crunchy and pungent radishes were his favorite part. While he washed the produce, made the salad and put the pan and the box of rice mix out on the counter to remind him to put it on the stove at five o'clock, he thought about Charlie and the chances for a relationship. The scowl on Rev. Harris's face looming over his thoughts like a billowing thunderhead before the storm broke too clearly told him the source of the worried, haggard face he'd seen in the mirror. The frustration he felt came from the same source. Trying to connect with Charlie was like seeing a lushly green oasis in the desert guarded by a pride of lions.

With a sigh he went up to his room where he first checked his email. There was a message from Chad telling him he and his girlfriend were going to an antiwar rally in downtown Detroit on the weekend and attaching the gist of a speech he hoped to give. Jeremy decided to read it later. The thought Chad's email gave rise to was a jealous one: how wonderful it must be to go to an antiwar rally with a girlfriend. Instead of checking his favorite website, _Counterpunch_ , as he had planned, he lay on his bed and daydreamed of him and Charlie sharing their lives.

The reality was that in the summer he had a very limited social life and was often bored and lonely. He was even considering next summer staying in Madison. If it wasn't for the French class and his library job he would be completely stir-crazy. The job was serendipitous. Early in the spring his mother was returning some books to the library on a slow Saturday morning when Mr. Seavey, the librarian, happened to be on duty. They chatted for a while and the librarian told his mother of the grant money he had gotten to organize and upgrade the local history collection. When she told him that Jeremy was a straight A history major at the University of Wisconsin, everything fell into place. He worked six hours on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and studied French and attended classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Weekends were the lonely time. Last Saturday he and Ray Martineau had watched Ray's brother Pete play Babe Ruth baseball. He was still not much of a player, but his enthusiasm made up for his athletic deficiencies. Once the game was over, however, Ray had to leave to get ready for a date that night. Jeremy saw Tony occasionally, always with Gina. Tony was working for a trucking company and Gina worked as a clerk at a local department store. They were going to marry next summer. Keith Hadley wasn't around this summer. Last summer he saw Josh Gilbert a few times, but their political differences had widened into an ocean, and implicitly and mutually they ceased being friends. Then there was Joan. He had gone to a few movies with her this summer, still with the understanding that they were "just friends," though he got the impression she would like it to be more.

But he didn't think of her that way and knew he never could. He was no longer a virgin. After finals at Wisconsin and before he went home for the summer, his friend Carol Abercrombie had in fact initiated him into the mysteries of sex. It was wonderful, but it caused an awkward problem. Never having been that close to another human being, he began to act as if it would lead to something more, only to find out that Carol regarded it as merely hooking up. She wasn't interested in a relationship, not with her career goals her immediate concern. Gently and kindly she had explained her position, which he pretended to understand and accept.

He had worried that seeing her in the fall was going to be awkward, but meeting Charlie changed that. Now his worry was that his tryst with Carol was a sort of infidelity to Charlie, though he was aware his scruples were absurd. On the one hand they had never shared a trust that could be violated, and on the other a future relationship was unlikely since the barriers separating them seemed insurmountable. All he could do was what he did until he heard his mother's car pull into the garage: he daydreamed.

At supper he told his mother about his accidental meeting with Charlie. When she asked him if Charlie had changed much from high school, he told her that she wore more normal clothes and looked striking. As for her character, he thought she was still naive and sweet, but she had matured and had a stronger sense of self than in high school.

"You think or you hope?" his mother asked.

"What do you mean?"

His mother smiled and her eyes sparkled. "You like her, don't you?"

"Yes, we've been friends for years."

"You know what I mean, Jeremy." She sipped at her glass of wine, then held it before her lips and peered at him from above the rim. "In _that_ way, as a girlfriend, I mean."

She was right, of course. In fact, he thought about Charlie constantly through the rest of the evening and all day Wednesday. To his disgust, he even had to re-catalog some historical papers at the library because he had become so moonstruck he lost his concentration. He was only able to study his French lesson on Thursday morning by forcing himself to focus his mind, but then became so nervous that he hardly touched his early lunch of a tuna salad sandwich. He paced from the living room to the kitchen until it was time to go.

At her house he refrained from tooting the horn, knowing that Rev. Harris would not like it. It was a moot point, however, for she was waiting for him and came out directly as soon as she saw his car. It was cooler today, and she wore a light sweater that still showed her full figure and a dark skirt that went below her knees. Her uncle had been working on her spirits too, it seemed, for telling her the story of her uncle reminding him that her name was "Charlene" didn't get the laugh he expected. Instead she looked like she wanted to cry.

"He's a difficult man to live with, isn't he?"

She nodded grimly, then changed the subject by asking him what he was studying in French.

The result was that the ride was awkward and uncomfortable for both of them. Long periods of silence were interrupted by some dull remark where they both could perceive the desperation behind the commonplace observation.

"Look at that car with all the bumper stickers. Green earth this, save the earth that."

"What kind of exams do they have in journalism courses?"

"I hope it doesn't rain. Those clouds look threatening."

"Traffic is very thick today. It looks like a lot of out-of-state people are getting an early start on the weekend."

Those and similar topics got them to the campus. Their parting words, "See you after class" and "I'll meet you in front of Luther Bonney" were similarly forced and lifeless.

He was depressed all through his French class and had to force himself to pay attention so that he could avoid being this day's class dunce. Going home, both made an effort to talk spontaneously, but yoking together effort and spontaneity was like trying to dance with a wooden leg, and the awkwardness continued. Every time he thought of her name he heard Rev. Harris saying "Her name is Charlene? Do you understand?" He did understand—perfectly. She belonged to a different world from which he was barred. Charlie felt some form of estrangement too, for their good-byes at the Harris house were heavy with despair.

On Tuesday they both were in better spirits but as if by implicit agreement confined their conversation to the safe topic of class work. Charlie had studied Spanish and was aware that both French and Spanish were Romance languages. That led them to a comparison between such French and Spanish words for heaven, country, man and nose that was actually fun and animated— _ciel_ and _cielo_ ; _pays_ and _pais_ ; _homme_ and _hombre_ ; _nez_ and _nariz_ —and only lost steam when Jeremy brought up the German words for these things ( _Himmel_ , _Land_ , _Mann_ and _Mensch_ , _Nase_ ). When he explained that _Himmel_ was both the word for sky and heaven and that while English "country" was latinate, "fatherland," "homeland" and the like showed the same connotation as in the related German word, the look on Charlie's face told him he was becoming too professorial. Making a joke about it set things right. "If that's your eyes glazing over, just remember I was just practicing to be a college professor."

"No, no," she laughed. "It was interesting. I just didn't know German and English were closely related."

"The Anglo-Saxons were Germanic tribes, so English is definitely a Germanic language. But there I go again," he said, and they both laughed.

He felt better. That he could laugh at himself and that they could laugh together was a good sign. French class went well, and that after class Charlie greeted him with a warm smile showed she too had shaken off the incubus of her uncle's ghost.

They met at the back door of Luther Bonney because not being able to find a parking spot on the street, he'd gone into the parking lot below the campus. As they made their way in the direction of Forest Avenue and approached a small shed used by the ground crew to store lawn mowers and the like, they saw a tiny kitten, a yellow tiger with fluffy kittenish fur, pink nose, green eyes and white belly, probably a month to six-weeks old. She was sitting on her haunches warming herself in the sun, but when she caught sight of them she hastily ran under the steps of the shed.

"It's a kitten," Charlie gasped in surprise. She started walking fast and then running towards the shed, and Jeremy followed. Before the steps, Charlie turned to him, her face etched with a deep concern for the little creature. Her eyes were wide, her mouth open. "She's afraid of us."

"Poor little kitten," he said. "Do you think she's abandoned?"

"Don't you? "I don't know why she would be here if she wasn't. I bet someone dumped her from a car to get rid of her."

"Maybe. But what if she belongs to someone? What if she's lost?" He leaned down and peered under the steps. The kitten, her head cocked at an angle, stared at him with eyes wide with fear and yet the desire for attention. Charlie got on her knees beside him and reached under the steps trying to touch her, but withdrew her hand when she saw the kitten backing up fearfully. Undeterred, she tried to coax it out. Speaking in a soft, singsong voice one used with babies, she said, "Don't worry, little kitty, we won't hurt you."

Jeremy joined the effort by making sucking sounds he's seen work with cats before. It definitely had an effect, for the kitten took a step forward. The space under the stairs was not very large. He reckoned he could easily reach in a grab her, but he didn't want to frighten her. He put his hand just under the steps and held it still.

With Charlie whispering babytalk and Jeremy making the sucking sound and rubbing his fingers together, a minute or so went by. The kitten stared indecisively, her eyes wide, still afraid, still wanting comfort. Again, Charlie leaned forward and said in a soft, soothing voice, "Come on, little kitty, we won't hurt you." She was so close he could feel her breath against his cheek.

Then after one final moment of hesitation, the kitty moved forward. Jeremy's hand was still partly under the stairs. He didn't dare move it for fear of frightening the kitten. Then he felt the kitten put her snout under his hand and press up with surprising force. The invitation to pat was understood, however, and no sooner did he start stroking her little head than he heard purring.

When Charlie adjusted her legs to a squatting position so that she could face the kitten, he saw her inner thighs momentarily—a dazzling sight he knew he would long remember.

"She looks skinny," Charlie said, reaching out and patting the kitten's side while Jeremy continued working on her head. "I think she _is_ abandoned."

He heard the appeal in her voice. She wanted to take the cat with them. "She does feel a bit boney. Yeah, maybe she is abandoned, but..."

He stopped patting and watched the kitten. Trusting them now, she came out from under the steps. When Charlie took her into her hands and onto her lap, she offered no resistance.

"My uncle doesn't like cats. Do you think your mother would like her?"

Jeremy, thinking it wasn't surprising that her uncle didn't like cats—tyrants couldn't abide their air of superiority and independence—was momentarily inattentive. "What? Oh, my mother? I think she probably would. But I'm still not certain we should take her. I read somewhere that most pets are just lost. What if someone in the neighborhood is looking for her? It wouldn't be right to take her."

Charlie was looking down at the kitten, her face wearing a happy, even blissful expression. In a voice laden with maternal instinct, she said, "It wouldn't be right to leave her unprotected either. A dog might kill her or she might get run over." She looked up at him, now cajoling, "You've seen students roar out of the parking lot like race drivers."

Instead of responding to her objection, he asked, "Did you have cats when you were a kid?"

Still patting the kitten, she shook her head. "No, but a nice neighbor, Mrs. Fecteau, did. I loved her two cats. How about you?"

"We had a dog, but when I was ten he got run over. It was very sad. Then not too long after that my dad was killed in a car accident. Somehow after that we never got another pet."

She looked up, her brown eyes widened in sympathy. "Oh, I didn't know about your dad. I'm very sorry."

He nodded, feeling the pang of a memory that even after ten years was still throbbingly alive. "But here's what I think we should do. I'll talk to my mother. I'm sure she'll say yes if I were to bring the kitty home. Right now I just don't think we should take her in case she just wandered away from a loving home an hour or so ago. But if she's here Thursday, then we'll know she's abandoned. Then we'll take her. How's that sound?"

"I guess you're right," she said. "I think I'll worry about the poor little thing until then, though. Then after one more pat, she stood. "You be careful, Tiger."

Jeremy smiled. "You just named her. Tiger is perfect."

On the way home the conversation was animated. They talked about the kitten endlessly and shared their memories of the pets they'd known. He told her he had seen his dog die. "I can still see Stringer looking at me, his eyes confused and scared and making an appeal to me. He was just a puppy. He waited for me in at the front door every day after school. For weeks afterwards I couldn't come home without crying."

"It must have been awful. I'm so sorry, Jeremy."

Her sympathy made him open even more. "It was just the opposite when my dad died. At the funeral my grandmother's second husband made one of those ridiculous stock remarks that now I was the man of the family. I took him seriously and tried for weeks not to cry. But my mother heard me crying one night and came into my room. We had a long talk. You know what she told me?"

"What?"

"That strong men cry. She told me my dad cried when I was born and when his dad died. She said at really sad movies he would cry sometimes. It was okay to cry."

"I think a lot of boys don't think so. I'm glad you do."

"Strangely enough, after that it brought my dad back to me. He was a good man. He taught me to respect people who were different than I was. Whether they were black or white or gay or straight, Christian or some other religion, he told me all people want the same things, a loving family, a job so that they can contribute to the family, self-respect, and the respect of their fellows. He had sympathy for birds and animals too. He taught me the golden rule and made it real to me. So like when I saw someone bullying some kid, I would remember my dad's advice and know that I wouldn't want to be treated that way because it wasn't right."

"Was that why you defended me against those boys who teased me."

"Partly. Don't forget I already knew you when that happened. I was also helping a friend. That was the way I looked at it. But even if I hadn't known you, I still probably would have tried to help. Bob Parole and those other boys were evil little creeps. Bullies and spoiled brats. I didn't like them. My dad always impressed upon me the importance of doing the right thing, which means of course not only not doing evil but opposing evil."

"So he's also the reason you've become an anti-war demonstrator, isn't he?"

He was pleased, very pleased, with her question. It demonstrated that not only could she connect the dots but—more excitingly—that she had been thinking of him. "Yeah, I think so. What he taught me about being a decent human being is very probably the main reason why I got involved with anti-war demonstrations at Wisconsin."

"I think he would be very proud of you. You've learned his lessons well."

"How about your dad, Charlie. Does he ever come around to see you or your mom.

"I never knew my dad. I don't even know who he is. My mother when she drank led an irregular life, so..." She shrugged to finish the thought.

He slowed down and waited for a chance to get into the right lane for the Waska exit. Even though she displayed great delicacy in conveying the information that her mother was promiscuous without explicitly stating it, this was the first time Charlie had ever talked so frankly about her background. It was a good sign, he thought, a sign that she trusted him. He moved into the right lane behind a big tractor-trailer. "You must have felt different as a kid."

"I did. But it wasn't all bad. When my mom was sober she could be nice. We had fun times together. And even when she started drinking more and being a bad mom, I still wanted her to be my mother. And Mrs. Fecteau was like a grandmother to me. Her cats helped too. I remember how soothing it was to pat Sly and Tubby."

But now on the streets of Waska and too close to her uncle to continue to share intimacies of their lives, they reverted to talking about Tiger, with both of them expressing the wish that she would still be there on Thursday.

She was. Before they saw her hiding under the shed stairs they already knew she would be there because a girl in Charlie's class told her another student had been feeding her milk and pieces of tuna from her lunch on Wednesday and as recently as half an hour before class started today. A cat lover, this female student lived in a dorm room and couldn't take the kitten. She had been trying to find someone who would for the past two days. Her friend told Charlie she would be much relieved to know the kitten had found a home.

With Charlie calling to her in the same singsong voice she'd used on Tuesday, Tiger remembered them and came out from her hiding place as soon as they approached her. She offered no resistance to being picked up and carried away and sat quietly and contently on Charlie's lap during the drive home, which took longer because they heard on the radio that there was a massive backup on the turnpike due to a three-car accident and had taken Route 1 to avoid it.

It was a lucky thing for them, Charlie observed when and only when she heard no one was killed or seriously injured in the accident, for it could be used as the excuse for any delay bringing the kitten to Jeremy's house.

She talked to the kitten for a while, softly cooing to her and occasionally holding her high enough so that she could look out the window. Many cats hated being in a moving vehicle, but Tiger was a curious little beast and took in the moving world with wide, innocent eyes.

Traffic was heavy on Route 1, and for some time while progress was stop and go he concentrated on his driving. Only slowly did he become aware that Charlie had stopped cooing to the kitten and had grown quiet. He stole a glance and saw that she looked pensive, even troubled.

He was about to ask her if something was bothering her, but the car in front of him, which had Massachusetts plates with the "Spirit of America" slogan, was slowing down and obviously going to turn into a gas station on the left even though the driver didn't have his directional signal blinking. When the car came to a dead stop, Jeremy had to follow suit. This section of Route 1 did not have double lanes.

"Wish the interstate wasn't backed up. These stops and goes drive me crazy."

His remark startled her out of a reverie. She looked at him, her hand still unconsciously patting Tiger, and said, "Sorry, I was thinking of my cousin, the one who just got married last month. It was a arranged marriage, you see. Martha has been teaching the kids at the home school, but her husband Tom has just forbidden it. I think it's unfair."

"Arranged marriage!? Who did the arranging?"

She smiled wryly. "I see you have the same reaction my mom had when I told her. It was my uncle and Brother Johnson. He's one of the church elders and the father of Tom."

"Do they love each other?"

She shook her head. He noticed her hand never stopped stroking Tiger, who promptly had gone to sleep the moment the car came to a standstill. "I doubt it. In fact I know they don't. I think Martha is going to be very unhappy. She loved teaching. Her husband thinks a woman's place is in the home."

Finally a gap in the oncoming traffic allowed the Massachusetts driver to take his left. Jeremy started moving again. "That's old-fashioned," he said, then had a disturbing thought. "They don't plan something like that with you, do they?" He spoke too earnestly, betraying his deep interest in the answer.

She noticed it, but a slight, momentary frown also indicated she was displeased he was only thinking of himself and not Martha. "Again that's what my mom wanted to know. I hope not."

"Charlie, that wouldn't be right. That poor girl doesn't deserve such bondage. Neither do you. This is the twenty-first century."

"I know. It gets worse." Then she told him all about her humiliation at the hands of Rev. Hamlin and how it undercut her projected career as spokesman for her church.

He was stunned, though upon reflection he decided he shouldn't be surprised. "You must have felt really insulted."

"I did. It was the most humiliating thing that ever happened to me, even worse than the Intelligent Design business at C.A."

"I know fundamentalists tend to be conservative people, but really. That minister must be a world-class boorish egomaniac. On a human level, what he did was unspeakable."

Again she said, "I know," this time in a tone that openly conveyed her disillusionment with her church. But they were in Waska now, and she grew quiet. She was nervous about anyone seeing them going in the opposite direction from her uncle's house.

At home he drove into the driveway and shut off the ignition. "You'll have to carry Tiger. The front door is double locked, and I would have a hard time holding him while getting it."

She looked around nervously. He knew the family who lived in the house at the corner were members of The Church of Salvation Through Jesus. "It's okay. Nobody's around."

Even so she quickly got out of the car and walked hurriedly to the front door, scanning the street as she did so. Tiger, feeling her nervousness, started squirming for the first time since they rescued him from the shed. A small meow grew insistent as it was repeated. "Meow. MEOW. **MEOW**!"

Inside everyone, feline and human, returned to calmness. While Jeremy got a bowl from the cupboard and poured some whole milk into it, which Tiger began lapping up instantly, Charlie was looking at the portrait gallery by the door.

"I'll have to get some catfood after I drive you home."

"And kitty litter stuff too. "Is that your dad?" she asked, pointing to the photo on the upper right. Beside it was a picture of his mother and below it a family portrait and then an eight by ten picture of him from the senior yearbook at C.A.

The kitchen in the small house had only a counter dividing it from the dining room. Jeremy walked over and leaned across it. "Yes, that's him. My mother is next to him."

"She's pretty." She looked at the photos and then back at Jeremy. "Mostly you resemble your father."

"That's what everyone says. I've got my mom's blue eyes, but everyone says my nose, chin, brown hair and height all come from him."

"He was a handsome man, and you can tell from his eyes that he was a gentle and good man. It's funny how you can see a person's decency in his face. Was he a religious man?"

"Not very. He did go to church when I was going to Sunday school as a kid—he thought that was important for me and he wasn't one of those people who say 'do as I say, not as I do,' so he went to church too, but really I don't think he was too religious."

When she seemed disappointed, he added, "But he was Christian in the way the Sermon on the Mount describes a Christian."

She nodded. "My stepfather, Ted McNaughton is like that. He thinks the most important thing is to have a good heart. God wants us to be good people. I'm guessing you'd agree with that?"

"Yes, I think I do." He got the impression she wanted to talk about religion and explain herself. By way of offering an invitation to do so he added, "But your uncle doesn't, does he?"

"No, he doesn't."

He felt certain enough of her answer to ask, "You're not happy with a lot of things in your church, are you?"

"No, I'm not. And not just the way it treats women. You realize, don't you, that I know my uncle is wrong in all kinds of ways. When I first came to his house he had me study the Bible so that I could become a good Christian. The trouble was right from the start I saw the Bible is filled with inconsistencies. My uncle sees God's hand in everything, like if someone is killed it's because God wanted it."

"I know about that way of thinking and don't buy it. My father was killed, but it was an accident. He was at the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Yes, that's a perfect example. And plagues are caused by germs, not God's wrath. The Old Testament chronicles ancient days when war could be as savage as it is today. Slaughtering innocents was supposed to be God's work, not human savagery. Supposedly God tells the Israelites when they were coming from Egypt to kill all the people in the land of milk and honey, but God would never want such a thing. It was the people rationalizing their cruelty speaking in that passage. The story of Adam and Eve has inconsistencies. I came to see the Bible was an attempt by human beings to explain the ways of God in terms people could understand. Really, what I'm trying to say is that right from the beginning I saw that my uncle's beliefs could only be believed if you ignored all sorts of evidence. Even the Intelligent Design business that everyone at C. A. thought I believed I knew was wrong. Mr. Adamson convinced me evolution fit the facts. You see what I'm saying? I know the Bible isn't literally true, but spiritually it has a great deal of truth. It's in that way you could say it's inspired by God."

Tiger, having finished a goodly amount of milk and explored the kitchen for a while, came over looking for companionship. Charlie picked her up and held her between her breasts. Instantly she started patting her.

"I think she's going to be happy here," Jeremy said. I hope you'll be able to see her some times."

"Me too," she said. They both were aware of what his hope implied.

"Back to your point about the Bible. I would agree it is filled with wisdom."

"Jeremy, do you believe in God?" she asked and then quickly looked down at Tiger. The question was important to her, he could tell. She was nervous.

"I'll have to give you a long answer. Chad, my friend and roommate at Wisconsin is an aggressive atheist. We used to argue all the time. I would defend the religious point-of-view. Nobody knows why the universe started. It's a big mystery, one that will never be answered. Maybe science can answer the how, but it will never explain why. If there was a beginning, doesn't that mean there was, or could be, a beginner? How can there be an unbegun? It's so strange, so puzzling. That's why I don't disbelieve in God. I don't think we can ever know. I do know that I have no problem seeing why people attribute the world to God. They are recognizing the mystery. I think the great religious leaders like Jesus and Buddha have connected to something eternal. Maybe they're really even inspired prophets, which would be the word religious people would use. Even if you think that wasn't literally true, it's spiritually true. Suppose Jesus was just a man—a great man, a special man, a genius, a man of insight—but just a man? I don't think that invalidates his teachings. The things he taught in the Sermon on the Mount are the things my father taught me."

"Agnostic," she said when he finished his long explanation. "You're an agnostic."

"Yeah, the word fits, but I'm an agnostic who understands and is friendly to the religious attitude. In my intellectual history course last year we talked about an idea Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the English poet and thinker, had. He said that any idea that has engaged the great minds of the past deserves to be treated with the utmost respect. I agree with him. The idea of God and the desire to know God is one of the dominant ideas of mankind. That's one reason I'm open-minded about it. My friend Chad isn't. You realize when I was defending the religious attitude against Chad, it was you I was especially thinking of."

She blushed, understanding what he was implicitly saying.

"But, Charlie, you're open-minded and intelligent, unlike your uncle who's so close-minded he's blind. Why don't you just leave? Go home to your mother. Then you'd be free to be yourself."

She looked down at Tiger, then back at him. She started to speak, hesitated, then with a look of resolve, said, "Well, I'm actually thinking about it. My mom definitely wants me to live at home. She says I could live there and go to USM. But it's a big step."

"I know. It would mean you'd be leaving your uncle's church. But I think they aren't worthy of you. They don't deserve you."

When she didn't answer, he pushed the point. "A lot of people change their church, you know."

"I know. You can't say anything I haven't thought. I'm leaning towards leaving, but not yet. That's all I can say."

He remembered her cringing at her uncle's sharp words a few weeks ago and knew she was afraid of him. He could understand how difficult it would be to extricate herself from the life she had known for the past six years. There was no use in trying to push her. She had to be the one who jumped.

He looked at his watch. "Well, come on. It's time I took you to your uncle's house."

They both understood why he did not use the word "home."

The Opened Door

August found Charlie happy and frustrated at the same time. She was happy that Jeremy Lawrence was in her life again and knowing that he was interested in her, maybe even in love with her. She was happy because she knew past all doubt she she was falling in love with him and saw in the trust and respect that were growing between them real hope for the future. Her mother's loving support was also a constant source of personal satisfaction and emotional stability. But she was frustrated because all these bright associations with her mother and Jeremy were thrown into the shadows by the dark presence of her uncle. She did not know how to extricate herself from that man's clutches and was ashamed of herself for her waffling, dithering, dallying, delaying and a whole thesaurus of words to describe her shameful cowardice to face that man. Intellectually there was nothing to stop her. She was long past the time when her doubts could be interpreted as a personal failure of faith instead of what they actually were: a recognition of the tunnel vision and inconsistencies of biblical inerrancy. These inconsistencies of fundamentalist religion, many of them in support of a mean-spirited, unchristian and unloving view of the world and of humanity, were only too clearly seen and understood. The insults visited upon her by the Rev. Hamlin foretold the sort of troubles that awaited her if she continued to pursue the scheme hatched by Brother Johnson and her uncle to make her something like the advertising logo of their church. The way Martha was treated was another reminder of their contempt for women. The poor girl, always quiet and obedient, had become afraid of her own shadow. The tension of living with an ignorant tyrant had caused her to grow pale and thin. If someone asked her a question, she would not speak until a nod from Tom gave her permission. She was like a prisoner of war, one who had totally surrendered her freedom and will.

In her relationship with Jeremy, Charlie had even found her old self—the kid who was assertive and not afraid to express an opinion. When they first came upon the abandoned kitten she had found herself contradicting him and arguing that they should take the kitty home. She had spoken spontaneously without thinking of the consequences, and yet Jeremy had not even noticed anything special. He regarded her as a normal human being, one who had opinions and her own. He respected her, and in respecting her he was showing her yet another way to see the possibility of becoming herself again.

So what was stopping her? Fear. While she could see a future life of freedom, what she couldn't visualize was actually telling her uncle she was leaving his home and his church. Trying to figure out a way to confront him, she would become the prey to all sorts of terrors, and separating the real from the imagined was impossible. One of her fears was that her uncle, instead of letting her go, would hold her prisoner and wear her down by brainwashing her until she gave up. Knowing he was a man who didn't like to be crossed, this fantasy appeared to her to be a real possibility.

Of course she could simply go to her mother's home and never return, trusting in the protection of her mother to keep Uncle Edward away. But even an elopement with that bold lover, the secular world, came with its own terrors. She remembered the legal documents her mother had to sign and was not sure that until she was twenty-one she had any rights independent of her uncle. In this scenario she saw a scowling judge wagging his fingers at her as he upheld the law and delivered her back to her righteous uncle.

She knew she was being irrational. She knew fear was driving these visions like a runaway train in her mind. Still she hesitated. Still she waited for tomorrow.

Tomorrow came when only one week of classes remained and two more after that before she would have to return to the bible college. It was a Thursday. Jeremy drove her to Portland but was unable to bring her home because he was going to attend a lecture on European history given by a visiting professor that evening. She had planned to take the bus, but when it was mentioned at dinner last night, Tom, who with Martha was spending the evening at the Harris house in honor of Uncle Edward's birthday, volunteered to give her a ride back to Waska. He had some business with the advertising agency that he was going to do in the morning, but could easily reschedule it for the afternoon. Charlie's polite refusal was brushed aside, and a glance at Uncle Edward, who revealed his preference for his son-in-law over the pagans likely to be on the bus by nodding and murmuring "excellent," told her it would be unwise to argue the point.

Tom's behavior when he picked her up at the pre-arranged rendezvous point near Luther Bonney confirmed her instinctive wish to avoid him. The other time he drove her to Portland one of his workers was with them; this was the first time they had ever been alone together, and remembering the many times he would stare at her breasts when he was at the house, she was uneasily anticipating the likelihood of some more crude remarks. She didn't have to wait, for she saw him leering at her breasts as she got into the seat of the expensive German car and then watch her readjust her skirt as she settled in. With his belly so fat it was almost touching the steering wheel, he was even more repulsive than usual. "You're looking good today," he said in a salacious way that he didn't try to hide.

"Thank you," she said coldly, hoping her tone would send a message and they would talk as little as possible during the trip. Temporarily he was quiet as the thick city traffic demanded his attention. He was an impatient, angry driver, frequently tapping the steering wheel and muttering "Come on, come on, move it" when cars in front were slow to recognize a green light and glaring at drivers who cut in front of him.

At the bridge he took Route 1. Feeling uneasy, she asked, "Why aren't you taking the Interstate? It's quicker."

He accelerated and passed several cars. "It's better this way. Don't worry your pretty little head about it." Though he spoke with his usual arrogant condescension, he seemed nervous now as if unsure how to broach some topic he had in mind.

When she shifted her weight to be more comfortable, what he had in mind became clear.

"Is your bra too tight?"

She didn't answer.

"False modesty will get you nowhere. If it's tight, go ahead and loosen it. I don't mind."

"There's nothing wrong."

He leered at her, his eyes scanning her breasts. "I should have asked for you. Those are real beauties. Martha is flat compared to you."

He was making her feel sick to her stomach. She decided she wouldn't speak to him as long he continued making lewd and disgusting observations.

"She's no good in bed either, just lies there."

That was too much. Immediately her vow of silence was thrown out the window. She turned and spoke sharply. "I don't want to hear about that. Stop it!"

"Don't be so high and mighty, missy. I know you went to that Jeremy Lawrence's house for a quickie last month."

She felt her face go crimson as simultaneously an electric current jolted her backbone. She knew he was referring to the time they brought Tiger home. Someone in the Nasons' house must have seen them. She remembered that Ted Nason, the father, had become friendly with Tom, but why would he tell Tom and not Uncle Edward if there was any telling to do? Confused, she said nothing.

At a red light he turned and grinned triumphantly. "Cat got your tongue?" Then, feeling emboldened by her look of confusion, he reached over and put his hand on her breast and squeezed it.

That had the effect of waking her to the present danger instantly. She slapped his hand away. "Stop it! You're being a pig."

"Don't call me a pig, you whore. Did you take him in your mouth? I want to hear all about it."

"Stop it," she repeated. When the only effect of her words was his hand dropping to her inner thigh and trying to knead it through her skirt, she tried threatening. She pushed him away, finding him surprisingly weak. "Stop it or my uncle will hear about this."

The car was moving now. "That's where you're wrong. If he heard about it, he'd also find out you were fucking that boy. You don't want that now, do you? You a whore and the daughter of a whore."

She glared at him. "You're disgusting. Do you actually think you can blackmail me? We were bringing an abandoned kitty home, that's all."

"Likely story," he said as he slowed down and passed a car turning left. "I can read a woman. I know when she wants it."

"And you're a Christian? It's a sin to commit adultery. It's one of the Ten Commandments."

He said nothing and she knew why—because it meant nothing to him. He was saved. He didn't have rules. She thought of Rev. Hamlin. Alone with her, he probably would do the same thing as Tom, such being the moral perversion of this religion they shared.

His hand sought her out even as his eyes followed the curve of the road. She slapped it away, but he wouldn't stop.

"There's a motel about half a mile ahead. We can stop there for a quickie. You cooperate, and your uncle will know nothing about that boy and you."

Clearly this was what he planned all the time. It had probably been born in his perverse mind the moment he volunteered to give her a ride last night. She remembered he had leered at her while Uncle Edward was acquiescing to his suggestion. Ahead a yellow light showed they were about to stop. Quickly she weighed the possibilities and just as quickly decided this was her only chance to escape. She reached for her backpack. Even before the car came to a complete stop, with a sudden motion she release her seatbelt, opened the door and leaped out of the car, then darted across the right lane, causing a driver approaching from behind them to have to slam on his breaks.

Tom opened his window. "Get back in the car!" he yelled angrily.

She saw an old man in the gas station watching her with a troubled look. He was very thin, even frail, but he was dressed neatly, was clean-shaven and behind his thick glasses his eyes gave him a kindly grandfatherly air. She ran up to him.

"Are you all right, young lady."

She felt embarrassed and relieved at the same time. "He's a horrible man."

"You know him?"

She nodded. "I wish I didn't."

She saw Tom glaring at her, but when the light changed he went through the intersection. She watched to see if he turned around, but he kept going.

"What can I do to help, young lady? Do you want to call the police?"

"No," she said emphatically, then felt embarrassed. More calmly, she explained, "Unfortunately he's married to my cousin. But could I use your phone?"

It was in the cluttered office of the gas station. A man repairing a car engine in the garage looked up expectantly through the open door, but the old man followed her in and said, "It's okay, Frank. She's using the phone."

She searched through her backpack for the phone number Jeremy had given her when they first started driving to the university together. Unsuccessful at first, she started panicking before she remembered it was written on a bookmark in her pocketbook. Taking a deep breath, she dialed the number.

He answered on the third ring. "Hello?"

"Jeremy, it's me, Charlie. I need your help."

"What's wrong!?" It wasn't a good connection, but still she could hear the panic in his voice.

"Tom Johnson tried to assault me." She saw the old man look at her, then politely turn away.

"You mean...?"

"Yes, that. I jumped out of the car. I'm at that station with the three flags—you know, U.S., Maine, and New England Patriots."

"Yes, I know where that is. Right before the light on Route 1, right?"

"Yes. Could you come get me? Tom drove off but I'm scared he might come back."

"I'll be there as soon as possible. Are you sure you're safe there? You can trust the man there, can you?"

"Yes, yes. He's very nice."

"Okay, I'll see you very soon."

"Thanks, Jeremy. Bye."

The old man looked up from a bunch of credit card receipts he was organizing, or perhaps pretending to organize, and said, "I couldn't help overhear parts of your conversation. Don't worry, you'll be safe here until your boyfriend comes for you. Where is he coming from?"

"Portland." She thought about the lie of omission in not correcting the man's designation of Jeremy as her boyfriend because it would require a long explanation, then, remembering the concern Jeremy's panic revealed, decided it wasn't that much of a lie.

A bell rang, startling her before she realized it was a car pulling up to the pumps for gas. "He should be here soon," the old man said as he was going out the door.

She looked around. A board with hooks for keys on the back wall had seven sets. The calendar next to it showed a buxom woman in a bikini. The door to an inner room was partially opened and revealed what appeared to be a storage closet. Three chairs with worn plastic seats and even a few tears that revealed gray stuffing were lined up across from the counter that had a cash register and credit card machine along with a basket with what appeared to be invoices. There was a pile of magazines on one of the chairs, and she decided to sit down and try to read. The magazines were of no interest, however, _Popular Mechanics_ , _Car and Driver_ and the like. She sat and watched the old man who was talking animatedly with the driver of the car. She could see a wife in the front seat and two children in the back. Probably they were tourists, and probably they were asking for directions. Disjointed thoughts passed through her mind, all of them felt, none of them analyzed. The thought of Tom's hand grabbing at her breast revolted her. Poor Martha married to that cretin. The moral hollowness of thinking because you're saved you could do anything you wanted. Her uncle, responsible for inculcating those ideas, also disgusted her. Jeremy's panic, his love. She was sure he loved her. He might be driving too fast right now. Be careful, Jeremy. She mouthed the words. Her mother would be even more angry with her brother. She wouldn't be surprised when she heard the news.

The old man came back into the office. As he processed the credit card, he said, "Those folks are from Oregon. They've just come from a week at Acadia National Park and Baxter State Park. They think Maine is beautiful."

"Yes, a lot of people say that, don't they."

"Have you ever been to Acadia or Baxter?"

She shook her head. "No, I've never been further north than Portland."

"Well," the old man said on his way out the door to service two cars that pulled up to the gas pumps, "you have something to look forward to."

His remark started her thinking about what she had to look forward to. At some point in the car with Tom fending off his physical and verbal assaults, the decision had been made seemingly without quite consciously formulating it in words that this was the event that freed her from any obligation to her uncle and his church. She already knew she was going to ask Jeremy to drive her to her mother's apartment. She had found the courage to face her uncle now and tell him to his face that she was leaving. And after that...freedom. The thought of it made her giddy as she started daydreaming about what her life with Jeremy would be like now. She could become a normal girl, going where she wanted, doing what she wanted, even making love to Jeremy if she wanted. It seemed almost impossible. To acclimate herself to freedom, she started enumerating possibilities. She could wear shorts. She could play soccer again. She could go out of the house without asking permission. She could choose her own clothes. She could read any book she wanted, see any movie. She could study what she wanted.

At that point she stopped enumerating things. What would she study if she chose for herself? It was another way of asking what would she do if she could choose her career for herself. She loved literature. She liked teaching when she helped Mrs. Pogue at the day school. Maybe she could be a teacher in grade school, she thought, since she loved children. Or maybe like Jeremy, she could be a professor and teach English to young adults. And what about religion, another voice inside asked. She still loved Jesus. What church would she go to? Maybe none. She remembered Ted's remark about God wanting us to be good people with good hearts being enough. Maybe it was.

But she couldn't decide all these things now. Calmer now and gaining perspective, she was surprised to find she felt strong and confident and optimistic. Events would enfold and things made known. For that she was ready.

As time passed and Jeremy was taking longer than she expected, she became nervous again, nervous and less optimistic. Unable to sit still, she stood by the door watching traffic coming from Portland. The moment she saw his car, she rushed outside.

He saw her and drove right up to where she was standing, jumped out of the car and rushed up to the office door.

They both felt the urge to embrace but the old man's presence inhibited them. As a compromise, he took both of her hands in his and looked into her eyes. "Are you all right?"

"I'm feeling calmer now." She squeezed his hands tightly, drawing strength from him. She felt totally safe now.

"Have you called your mom?"

"Not yet. When we get into the car I'll call her if I can use your cellphone."

"Is that where you want to go, to your mom's house?"

"Yes."

"Good, that means you're leaving—"

"Yes, my uncle's house and the church. Even if I wanted to stay, which I don't, it would be impossible now."

"Good. I'm glad," he said, and she knew why.

She turned and thanked the old man, feeling Jeremy's hand on her lower back. "Thank you for everything. I really appreciate your kindness."

The old man modestly waved her off. "I have three daughters, grown now, but I understand. I was glad to help."

In the car she called her mother at work and briefly explained what happened. When her mother anxiously asked how she felt, she glanced at Jeremy and said, "Now that Jeremy is here, I'm all right." Then her mother spoke to someone in her office for a minute. Back on line she said she would get out of work a half hour early and should be home soon after she and Jeremy arrived.

Hanging up, she told Jeremy of her mother's plan.

"Good," he said, then looked at her for a moment before his eyes returned to the road.

"I'm sorry you have to miss that lecture."

He seemed almost insulted that she could think that mattered. "I don't care about that. What's important is that you're safe. Did that man, uh, you know, physically attack you?"

"He tried. I slapped his hand away. Mostly he tried to blackmail me."

"Blackmail? How's that?"

She hesitated for a second, thinking she would be embarrassed, but found she wasn't. "That neighbor of yours in the church saw us when we brought Tiger home. He seems to have have told Tom about it, and he accused us of—you know."

She stole a glance at him and saw him color. He drove in silence for a while thinking. "I see," he finally said, "cooperate with me or I'll tell your uncle?"

"Exactly."

"What a dirtball he must be."

"Yes."

Again they lapsed into silence for some time. She found herself thinking about what Tom had accused her of doing with Jeremy, and she suspected he was thinking the same thing.

"What do you think he'll do now?"

"I'm sure he'll lie to my uncle."

That wasn't the answer he seemed to expect. Puzzled, he asked, "What do you mean?"

"I bet he'll say I tried to seduce him. My uncle and the church in general think women are, you know, she-devils and temptresses."

"Do you think your uncle will believe him?"

"Probably. But my aunt won't."

"You're definitely going to leave your uncle's church now, aren't you?"

She knew he repeated the question because it was so important to him. "Yes, I am. I've already left it, really. I've been trying to escape all summer but just couldn't find a way to face my uncle and tell him to his face."

"I understand. He's a scary man. But now he can't make any claim on you."

"I know."

They conjectured more about her uncle's reaction and how she would respond as they drove the rest of the way to Waska. She told Jeremy she was ashamed of her inability to face her uncle, saying she should have left the church after Rev. Hamlin's tawdry treatment of her last Easter. She tried to make Jeremy understand that it was important for her to face her uncle and recover her self-respect, but he said she was being too hard on herself. "Having met him," he said, "I know he can be scary."

Alone in the apartment, she could tell Jeremy felt awkward. He remarked about how nice her mom's furniture was just to have something to say. Like her he was distracted, and she was sure it was for the same reason she was. The embrace that hadn't happened before the old man's eyes now had nothing to stop it except their mutual shyness. She knew that to have the strength to face her uncle she needed to feel Jeremy's love and support. She needed a physical confirmation of his feelings for her.

"Jeremy," she said softly, watching him slide his hand across the dining room table.

He turned and looked at her. When, speaking as softly as she had in whispering his name, he said, "I'm sorry this had to happen to you. You deserve nothing but the best," she appealed to him with her eyes across the four a five feet separating them.

He understood. For a moment they stood facing one another with only their eyes locked in an embrace, but when he took one tentative step towards her that was all she needed. She flew into his arms. For a long time they clasped one another tightly. It was the most wonderful, most delicious feeling in the world. Then came a kiss, the first kiss she had ever shared with a boy, and it thrilled her from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet. She felt flushed all over as her excited blood throbbed through her body. Kiss after passionate kiss followed. She had vaguely feared that with her only sexual experiences so vicarious and unpleasant that she had been forced to have to fend off unwanted advances, she might be psychologically damaged somehow, but the feelings coursing through her body told her that was a misapprehension of love's reality. She was quite sure that if her mother wasn't expected momentarily, they would have had sex. She was certainly ready and knew he was too. She could feel him pressed close to her.

"I love you," he murmured into her ear.

"I love you too, Jeremy," she said, and they kissed again, a long lingering kiss. "My mother will be home pretty soon. We—"

"I know," he said. "I think we're both pretty hot and should cool down."

They went into the kitchen and sat across from each other at the small table, looking into each others' loving eyes and holding both of their hands in each other's across the table.

"Finding you this summer has been the joy of my life, Charlie."

"I feel the same, Jeremy."

"I love you, Charlie. I have for years, I think. There was always something special about you that made every other girl uninteresting."

"I know because I've had the same feeling and I love you too. Ever since ever."

"We can be together now."

She squeezed his hands. "I know. I want to always be together with you." Then they stretched across the table and sealed their vows of love with another kiss.

Soon after that kiss and more expressions of love that she knew she would never tire of hearing, her mother arrived.

They stood and moved into the living room.

Tris was stylishly dressed in a royal blue short skirt that showed off her shapely legs and a tight yellow blouse that displayed her large breasts. Her hair was cut short now but still framed her pretty face and accented her eyes. Charlie could see that Jeremy was impressed with how beautiful and sexy she was and saw that her mom was in turn taken with Jeremy, dressed casually in jeans and a red T-shirt with Bucky Badger blazoned across the chest. She seemed to notice something was in the air, probably seeing in his big blue eyes, his most striking feature, the love he felt for Charlie.

Her mother stopped, seemed surprised, and then looked at Charlie.

"Mom, this is Jeremy."

"Pleased she meet you, Jeremy. Charlie has often spoken of you. But Charlie," she said, turning and opening her arms for an embrace, "how are you doing."

Enveloped in her mother's loving arms and feeeling her love as another shield in her coming battle with her uncle, Charlie said, "I'm okay now. Really," she added when her mother, still holding her drew back and gave her daughter a quizzical look.

A slight smile broke across her face and widened into a grin. "I expected to find a traumatized daughter and instead find two happy and contented young people. Can you explain to me what's going on?"

Charlie looked at Jeremy, who mouthed the words "No secret."

"I _was_ traumatized, but now Jeremy and I are—"

"In love," he interrupted.

"I thought so. I thought the way you both were acting was telling me that. I remember the way you talked about Jeremy made me think that you had feelings for him." She turned and regarded Jeremy. "But I didn't know that you felt the same way."

"I've loved Charlie for a long time."

"It must be great to be young and resilient," she said, still with a pleased smile on her face.

"You still look young, Mrs. McNaughton," Jeremy gallantly said.

She smiled in appreciation of the compliment. "Call me Tris. I have a feeling I'm going to see a lot of you in the future. But let's sit down. I have a million questions."

The two lovers sat side by side on the couch while Tris took the recliner that faced them. She asked if they would like something to drink, coke, tea or coffee, but both declined.

"Okay, Charlie, tell me everything that happened so I have a clear idea of where we stand with my miserable brother. What did that Tom what's-his-name do exactly?"

"He pawed me, grabbed my breast, used vile language and four letter words and called me a whore. When I kept telling him to stop he then tried blackmail. His friend Ted Nason or his wife must have seen us when we brought the kitten to Jeremy's house and thought we were there illicitly. He said there was a motel a half mile ahead and that if I cooperated Uncle Edward would never hear of it. When the car slowed down at a red light, I jumped out and ran into the gas station where Jeremy picked me up."

"Wow! That was a brave thing to do. I'm impressed. And that husband of Martha's, he's real piece of work. Charlie, obviously after this you're not going back to Edward's house, right?"

"No, I want to live here with you."

"That's what I've been dreaming about ever since I stopped drinking. I'm very happy, even happy this happened since I've got my daughter back. I guess we could say some good has come out of this evil."

Then unable to contain herself, she leaped up, pulled Charlie to her feet and embraced her in a long, loving hug different from Jeremy's but nice in a different way that made her realize the two people in the world who loved her best were here in this room with her.

Tris sat down. "What do you think Edward will do?"

"Charlie has a definite theory about that," Jeremy said.

Tris looked at her, her eyebrows raised.

"Tom's going to lie. He's going to say I tried to seduce him. He probably already has told Uncle Edward that or soon will.

Her mother nodded in agreement. She knew her brother. "He'll believe it too. Then he'll want to punish you."

"How can he do that?" Jeremy asked.

"Well, he can't now. He doesn't know Charlie has flown the coop. Right now he doesn't know he has no control over her. Charlie, what do you want to do and when?"

"I want to get it over with. I want to get my stuff, my clothes, mementoes like the award for being the best player in the eighth-grade soccer tournament, my clothes."

"You played soccer?" Jeremy asked. He didn't seem to know anything about her earlier years, but then she didn't know him until high school either.

"Charlie was very athletic when she was a girl. She'd have played softball and soccer at C.A. if...if she'd been with me."

"Do you want me to call him?" Tris asked, getting back to the business at hand.

"I was thinking after supper would be a good time."

"Okay, we'll make it an early supper, though." Her mother must have been reading her mind, for then she turned to Jeremy and asked him if he would like to join them for the evening meal.

"Yes, thank you. I would," he said too emphatically, showing that he had hoping for the invitation.

They all turned at the sound of the creaking front door opening on the first floor. "That'll be Ted," Tris said. "He's going to be surprised."

"Will there be enough food for four?" Jeremy asked. He looked worried.

"Ted was going to make enough to have leftovers. There's a microwave at the place where he's working now. But don't worry. He'll be glad to forego that. There'll be plenty of food."

Ted came through the door carrying his lunch pail and wearing khaki workpants and a grimy T-shirt that showed he had put in a hard day's work under the hot summer sun. He started to say something but stopped abruptly when he saw Tris was not alone. His bright blue eyes, as with Jeremy his best feature, only momentarily registered surprise. "Well, hello to you, handsome young man. I'm guessing you must be Charlie's friend Jeremy."

"I am," Jeremy said, standing. They shook hands.

"Charlie's leaving Edward's house and the church," Tris said.

"I'm pleased to hear that. Welcome home, a real home. I'd give you a hug, but right now I'm not fit to embrace a princess like you."

"Thank you, Ted. Thank you for making me feel welcome."

He smiled, then winced.

"Hard day, honey?"

"Yup. We had to redo a wall because the floor was not stable. Had to redo the floor too, I should add. Strained my back pulling at a stubborn stud. Heat reminded me of the desert. Aside from that pretty routine day. But I'm guessing there's some reason Charlie left her uncle's. What happened?"

When her mother explained, Ted raised his eyebrows and emitted a low whistle. "This is the guy who just got married a month and a half ago? Whew!"

Remembering what Tom had said about Martha in bed, Charlie felt a stab of pain, which she was glad no one noticed. Ted made his way to the kitchen where he rinsed out his thermos and put his lunch pail away. The others followed.

"Supposedly he's a good Christian and a leader in the church," Tris said.

"Hypocrites come in every stripe. The worst is the religious hypocrite. At least we expect politicians to be hypocrites. But I'd better hit the shower before supper."

While he showered, at Tris's suggestion the other three went into the kitchen to get the meal started. They took turns cooking, but with the object being an early supper so that they could be ready for Uncle Edward if he called, doing the prep work would save time. While Charlie and Jeremy chopped onions, carrots, green pepper and mushrooms, Tris started the rice and made a sauce with ginger, sesame oil, cayenne and soy sauce.

While Ted, returned from his shower and much refreshed, stirfried the chicken and vegetables and during the meal, the topic of conversation was mostly conjecturing about how the day's incident would turn out in the coming confrontation with Uncle Edward. A few times when they wandered from that topic (which understandably obsessed them all), Charlie saw that Jeremey related well to her mother and foster father.

What got them going was Ted spilling his apple juice half-way through the meal. His elbow accidentally hit his glass when he reached over for the soy sauce. "Oops," he said, "there I go again."

While Tris grabbed her napkin and sopped up the liquid, she and Charlie laughed, but Jeremy looked mystified.

"He did the same thing at their wedding in June," Charlie explained.

"Only then," Tris said, "it was when Mike, his son, had just given the toast to the bride and groom. Ted reaching for his glass hit my elbow and made me spill half my grape juice on my lap."

"But," Charlie said, picking up the narrative, "Ted recovered himself quite well."

"What did you say?" Jeremy asked.

"I said I was just christening my new wife like a new ship. It got a big laugh."

Everyone, including Jeremy, laughed again. "You're quick on your feet, I see," he said.

"You have to be when you're a clumsy idiot."

Soon after that anecdote had lightened the mood, Ted asked Jeremy a question that momentarily caused him to be nonplussed. "So, Jeremy, I hear you're an anti-war activist at the University of Wisconsin."

The question made Jeremy nervous. He knew Ted was a veteran of the first gulf war, but Charlie was not sure she had ever told him that he also hated the Iraqi war. Bravely he admitted he was. She remembered his telling her of the moral and ethical reasons he opposed the Bush administration and was proud of him for not trying to hide it. "It's a war based on lies by an administration that is dishonorable and evil. I feel I have no choice but to to my small bit to try to stop it."

Ted noticed his tension and laughed good-humoredly. "Don't worry, I've been in war and wouldn't wish it on anyone. I'm glad you're trying to stop that damn thing. I can tell you as an ex-soldier that the best way to support the troops is to get them out of danger."

"I'm sure Edward is a big Bush supporter," her mother said.

"He loves Bush," Charlie said.

Even in this context, Tris bristled at having the word "love" in any way associated with her brother. "Are you sure? I think he only really loves himself. He's a hater, not a lover. He hates Moslems."

"And Christians too," Jeremy said. "Doesn't he only like funda-mentalists?"

Ted, having finished his chicken and rice dish, interjected a bit of historical perspective. "I was reading a book on Napoleon last winter. The French people loved him to distraction, at least while they were on the way up and conquering countries."

"It's the same with Hitler and Bush," Jeremy said.

"Hmm. Do you think Napoleon was a great man? Ted asked.

"I'm not sure. Like a lot of leaders, he was an egomaniac. But he was a brilliant general."

"Or was it," Ted said with a twinkle in his eye, "that the generals he faced were boobies?"

Jeremy saw the bemused expression on Ted's face and smiled. "What are you getting at?"

"I've been reading a book on the Iraqi war, though I've been so busy lately I haven't had much time for reading. But those generals we have over there are incompetent and ignorant. They're desk jockeys and pols, you know what I mean?"

"I do. We're a long ways from Alexander the Great actually leading troops. Like those nincompoop generals in World War I who sat miles behind the front lines and ordered tens of thousands of men to their death."

"Yeah, I know what you mean. The biggest danger they face is a fly falling into and ruining their soup."

"So you have an interest in history, Ted?"

"I do. Maybe one day you'll find me sitting in on one of your classes when you're a professor. Of course by then I may be in my dotage. Or maybe I am already?"

"Oh no, you talk very intelligently about history. I know I could learn a lot from your perspective."

That made Ted smile with pleasure.

The relaxed and pleasant atmosphere continued through the dessert of ice cream and strawberries, then shattered instantly when the phone rang. Its grating and loud clang sent waves of nervous tension through Charlie's backbone and settled in her stomach a heavy weight. Knowing she wouldn't be able to finish her ice cream, she put her spoon down. Tris looked at her, her drawn face likewise betraying her nervousness. She rose, saying "Well, here it goes" as she walked quickly to the wall phone in the kitchen. Her hand reached for the receiver and then stopped while she collected her thoughts for a moment before picking it up.

"Hello."

"Yes, she is."

"No. I—"

She listened for some time, her face clouding over until finally she said very forcefully, "That's a load of bull!..."

"Why? Because he's a liar. I'll tell you what really happened. He spoke lewdly and used four-letter words. He made advances, pawing at her. She slapped his hands away, told him to stop, but he wouldn't. Then he accused her of having a tryst with her friend Jeremy Lawrence and tried to blackmail her into going to a motel—"

She was interrupted at this point and forced to listen for some time.

"No, no, no. All they were doing was rescuing a poor little kitty. If you don't believe me, ask Mrs. Lawrence. She'll show you the cat. If necessary, we can get witnesses in Portland at the university who knew about the abandoned cat and knew Charlie rescued it. And her perfect attendance in the journalism course will prove that swine is lying. You want to know my opinion? That son-in-law of yours is a creep and a viper..."

Listening, she looked at the table and rolled her eyes.... "I think that described him perfectly. Listen, Edward, that man committed a crime. We'll go to the police if we have to. You heard the evidence we can gather. We'd win—"

"Your opinion doesn't matter.... No, you can't do that. Actually she's leaving your house and your church and going to live with me."

Again she looked over at the table and rolled her eyes.

"No, that's not it at all. If you must know, it's something she's been thinking about all summer and even longer. There's hate, not love, in that church of yours, and Charlie has a loving nature. This business is only the last straw. That evil minister Hamlin last Easter who was so disgustingly rude to her almost was the last straw then. So her mind is made up..."

A long paused ensued. Putting her hand over the receiver, she whispered, "Your aunt's on your side, Charlie." She was about to say something else, but stopped.

"Yes, right now. There's no better time. We'll come over with some boxes and suitcases to get her things. You can expect us within a half hour." Then, without even saying good-bye she hung up.

She returned to the table but did not take her seat.

"Well?" Ted asked.

"Well, indeed," she said answering Ted's question but looking at Charlie. "You were right about the lies that man would tell and that Edward would believe him. He even made a bigger lie. He said you and Jeremy frequently skipped classes."

Under the table Jeremy's hand sought and found hers. She squeezed it gratefully. "I'm not surprised," she said. "But Aunt Cora?"

"She was saying to him you can't stop her from leaving. She's an adult. I thought Cora was a little mouse but really, I think she's the one who just made Edward agree, not me."

"Aunt Cora has a good heart," Charlie said. "Her instinct is to do the right thing, but..."

"But living with Edward, that's often just about impossible. I understand," Tris said. She turned to Ted. "What have we got for boxes and such?"

While they rummaged through closets and Ted clattered down the backstairs, Jeremy and Charlie remained seated. "Are you nervous?" he asked.

"A little," she said, then more honestly—"maybe a lot."

"I'd like to be with you when you face your uncle—unless you think my presence would be distracting—you know, confirming your uncle's suspicions."

"Oh no, it would make me feel good to have you with me. Please come. I don't care what my uncle thinks."

Tris returned from the bedroom ladened with boxes and girded for war. She was grim, almost angry, but not at what her eyes saw. The coming showdown promised to be as much her mother's as hers.

"We'll leave the dishes for later. Ted's coming. He's getting an old suitcase stored in the basement. Jeremy?"

"Yes, I'm coming too."

"Okay. Ted will meet us downstairs."

Everyone kept their thoughts to themselves during the short drive. Charlie was already so nervous her mouth was dry. Ted hummed along with a song on a radio; since she had never heard him do that before, she assumed he too was nervous. Jeremy's hand in hers felt damp from nervous sweating. When Tris spoke as they neared Uncle Edward's house, everyone was startled. She heard Jeremy gasp.

"You know what I think?" she asked. "I think Edward wanted you to come back so that he could throw you out. Know what I mean? Like when a guy says 'I quit' and the boss says, 'No, you don't. You're fired.' He wants the last word."

Charlie remembered in her first year attending the Church of Salvation Through Jesus the poor adulterous woman who was humiliated and anathematized by her uncle. What her mother said rang true, but she made no response. She was trying to visualize actually saying the words to her uncle that would forever free him from his dominion. Her only answer to her mother's observation was to squeeze Jeremy's hand even harder.

Her uncle certainly looked intimidating when he opened the door. Behind him she could see Aunt Cora tight-lipped and distressed, but the reverend minister looked like a boxer stepping into the ring to do battle with the Enemy. He frowned at his sister, frowned more darkly at Charlie, and glared at Jeremy and Ted with positively hostile dislike. That's because he thought he was only going to have to deal with women and hoped to bully them. He would still bully, but he, a man who disliked any restraint, would have to be more circumspect.

He didn't invite them in. Instead he merely stepped back and allowed them to pass. Charlie noticed the boys were absent. Probably they has been sent to their rooms. Aunt Cora made a silent appeal with her eyes, to which Charlie nodded slightly and tried to make her own eyes speak the love she felt for her aunt.

Her mother politely said, "Hello, Cora," before turning to her brother and immediately launching her attack. "You're going to have to do something about that miserable son-in-law of yours. He's a danger to society."

Her uncle's face reddened, but he controlled his temper. "How I deal with him is none of your business. Right now the issue is Charlene." As he spoke he pointedly avoided even looking at her mother. Instead his eyes followed Charlie's every expression as if trying to find a weak point to attack. Now he paused in a further attempt to intimidate her. "I want to hear from your own mouth that you are leaving the church that nurtured you in Jesus. I want you to speak, understand?" He wagged his finger at her. "You, not your mother."

Her mouth was so dry her tongue hardly worked. Her heart thumped and her arms trembled. "I'm leaving" was all she could say.

Naturally her uncle with his instinct for power and control noticed her nervousness and seized his supposed advantage. "What did you say? I didn't hear you."

She felt Jeremy's hand on her lower back as he came up beside her. "I'm leaving the church. As my mother said to you on the phone, Tom's behavior was just the final straw. I don't think the church properly respects women. I was shocked by Rev. Hamlin's behavior, and I'm sorry to say I never, ever thought it was right that poor Martha was forced upon that man. I knew she didn't like him. I also feel the church doesn't really follow the example of Jesus in loving people and in forgiving their sins and weaknesses. I also think the Bible is a beautiful book but that it is not perfect. So the answer is yes, Uncle Edward. I am leaving the church."

Uncle Edward's face gave nothing away, unless a slight trembling of his lower lip was something she saw and did not imagine, but the pressure of Jeremy's hand on her back communicated the love and pride he felt in the effectiveness of her words. She looked at her mother, who signaled her approval by a quick raising of the eyebrows and a quicker smile. They both confirmed her own impression, for she was aware that as she spoke her fear melted away and she felt in complete control.

But the real test of their effectiveness was standing before her. His fists were clenched at his side as he looked at her through narrowed eyes. "I'm disappointed in you, and from this point forward I will have nothing to do with you," her uncle said, whereupon he immediately turned and went down to his basement lair, banished and vanquished.

She felt strange, both sad and triumphant at the same time. That's why she spared a charitable thought for his hasty retreat. Maybe he fled because he was about to lose control. Maybe that thought scared him. Maybe that's why his beliefs were so narrow and rigid, and the only way he knew to escape from chaos. And she couldn't forget that Martha was trapped in a loveless marriage to an ignorant brute. These were the sadnesses she felt. The triumph was her victory over the fear that had held her down and the certain knowledge that she was now completely free to be herself and love Jeremy.

Tris's feelings were unalloyed by any sad regrets, however. Listening to her brother's footsteps grow fainter, she registered her disgust. "Edward has lived with Charlie for six years and still doesn't understand the first thing about her."

Aunt Cora, who had watched her husband's retreating back with troubled, sad eyes and was now staring into space, turned. "Oh, he understands who's telling the truth and who's lying," she said. "The shock is just too much for him right now. Plans he's made for years..." But she did not finish the thought. "Charlene, I'm so sorry Tom was such a beast. I'm ashamed of him and afraid for Martha's sake. I don't know how he could have done such a thing."

"I do," Tris said. "He thinks he's saved. Anything he does doesn't matter. It's the same thinking that causes all those famous TV ministers to get caught up in scandal with hookers. It's the church's fault."

"Maybe you're right, Tris, but it still doesn't solve anything," Aunt Cora said with quiet dignity.

"I'll tell you what the problem is. Your church doesn't respect women. That's the attitude that Tom showed today with his gross behavior."

Tris's argumentativeness was misdirected. Her brother's hasty retreat had robbed her of the revenge she wanted to wreak. But Charlie knew Aunt Cora was thinking of Martha, not anything so abstract as the church as a whole. "Martha's too sweet a girl to be connected with that man," she said. "Aunt Cora, can't she divorce him or get the marriage annulled?"

She shook her head. "Our church frowns upon divorce, and a family scandal would ruin Edward. I don't think—"

"Isn't it time he started thinking about his daughter and not himself?" her mother asked.

"Perhaps." Her clipped tone hinted that she was starting to resent her mother's relentless criticisms.

"Maybe we should collect my things," Charlie suggested to end Aunt Cora's torment.

In her room upstairs the men were put to work gathering her books into three boxes while she and Tris collected all her clothes and toiletries. Charlie debated leaving behind many of the clothes that would never be worn again, but in the interest of time decided to do the winnowing at home.

As a result their work was done in ten minutes. Downstairs Aunt Cora waited near the door.

Before she left Charlie knew she had to say something to her aunt. It required no thought, for she spoke from the heart. "Aunt Cora, I want to thank you for your many kindnesses through the years. You've been wonderful to me, and I want you to know that I will always be grateful and always think of you with love." Then she hugged her aunt and felt the wet tears on her face that told her that Cora felt as she did. Such a show of open emotion was beyond rare; it was unique.

"God bless you, Charlene. I hope to see you again under happier circumstances."

"Me too."

Then they were gone. On the ride home her mother continued her gloating, calling her brother cowardly and power-mad. Remembering all she had heard of her mother's neglected childhood, she understood the emotions, but wished she wouldn't.

Finally Charlie had an idea that was guaranteed to change the subject. "Mom," she said from the backseat where her hand was entwined in Jeremy's, "I'm going to need some new clothes now. Can we go shopping on Saturday. I've saved a lot of money from my job at the college."

She turned to Jeremy and smiled as she whispered, "Almost all of it, in fact. I didn't have anywhere to spend the money."

She knew her mom. Instantly she grew excited at the prospect of helping her daughter choose new clothes. For months upon end, it seems, she had been perusing advertising circulars from newspaper with this very idea in mind. She became delightfully girlish, almost like a friend instead of a mother, as she shared a few ideas about shorts, blouses, sandals and the like.

"Hey, Jeremy," Ted said, "much more of this and we men will need to make our escape."

But by then they were already pulling into the driveway of their apartment building. The three boxes of books and one suitcase were left in the corner of the living room for tomorrow, and it was time to say good-bye to Jeremy.

She walked downstairs with him. They kissed again, another long and loving kiss that electrified her body, and they made a few plans.

"I want you to meet my mom," he said. "I've already told her so much about you that I'm sure she'll feel she already knows you."

"And I hope Tiger will remember me too."

"He meows for you every day," Jeremy said with a smile. He too was ecstatically happy and thinking about their future together.

They made plans for her to come to dinner at his house tomorrow evening, after which they would go to a movie. It would be her first date. Then at the car they kissed again and each said, "I love you."

She made her way back upstairs, so happy and fulfilled she was vibrating. As her first contribution to the household, she volunteered to do the dishes, after which the three of them sat and talked for a long time in the living room. Clothes were much discussed, plans were made for her to attend U.S.M. in the fall, and much further conjecturing about how Uncle Edward would deal with Tom and Martha filled the time. At one point she and her mother went into the spare bedroom to get it ready for her first night at home. When they returned to the living room at shortly after nine o'clock, Ted announced that his long, hard day of work was catching up to him and he retired.

That was when they had a mother-daughter talk about life, men and sex. They were sitting on the couch side by side. Frequently as they talked her mother would touch Charlie as if to convince herself that she actually had her daughter back. Sometimes the touches were light pats; other times she would have her arm around Charlie's shoulders; a few times she lovingly stroked Charlie's cheek. But when they started their talk, they were simply side by side, hands in lap.

Her mother started by saying, "Jeremy is a really fine young man, Charlie. You're lucky to have him.

She thought of how she felt when he kissed her and how his voice showed panicked concern when she called him in the afternoon and how his hand was at her back when she faced down Uncle Edward and said, "I know."

"Can you tell me how you came to fall in love with him?"

"Well, really it started in high school. He was always very supportive and always treated me with respect. That's when just about everyone else was treating me like a freak. I remember in our senior year he wanted to ask me to the senior prom but knew that I wouldn't be allowed to go. Somehow, though, we both understood each other."

"So what happened this summer to change things? I mean, I know you didn't just suddenly fall in love today."

"We talked a lot during the drives back and forth to Portland. He explained to me why he was an anti-war protester."

"Which was...?"

"Because he was being true to the things his father taught him about being a good person, sympathizing with the weak and the poor, not being a bully. That kind of thing. One day he told me how he learned it was all right for men to cry. When his father was killed in a car accident, his grandfather or someone said, 'Now you're the man of the family.' He said after that for weeks he didn't cry, but then his mother talked to him and told him that his dad cried, cried when he was born, cried when his own dad died, and cried at sad movies. When he told me that it showed he wasn't a conventional guy, that he thought for himself. Really, Mom, I felt so close to him after that I just wanted him to be mine. The trust he showed, the respect he showed me, believe me, I knew he was special. And then today when I called him and told him I needed his help, his voice was so concerned, so panicky in fear I was in danger, that I knew he loved me too."

"Wow! That's quite a story. Again, I'll say you're a lucky girl, and"—here she put her arm around Charlie and her voice broke when she added, "And he's a lucky guy to have such a treasure as you. I'm very proud of you."

"Thank you, Mom. I feel just as lucky to have you back in my life."

"I'm really impressed with how strong you are. I've been thinking about that since this afternoon. A lot of women would be traumatized by what Tom did, to say nothing about that awful night I lost you. But I remember some things Dr. Tellas says. In both cases you weren't passive. You fought back and took control. So instead of being victimized, you were empowered. That last word I learned from Dr. Tellas. It's a feminist term, you know."

"She's really helped you, I'd say, because you're strong now too, Mom. You're a strong woman."

"Well, I try. What especially I want to be is a good mother. I have a lot of years to make up for and a lot of mistakes to try to undo. I'm not sure I'm qualified to give you any advice except to say don't do what I did when I was your age. One thing's for sure. Your life is going to be much different now."

"I know that. It's exciting and a little scary."

"Does Jeremy drink?"

"Very little. He never has more than a few beers. He told me he got drunk at a party his freshman year at Wisconsin and didn't like it. His mother let him drink wine with meals when in high school and taught him to be a responsible drinker."

"That's good to hear. Charlie, I don't know if alcoholism is something in the genes or just from bad treatment as a kid, but if it is genes, you be careful. Drink moderately just like Jeremy. Remember booze almost ruined your mother's life."

"I don't know if I'll even drink anything, but I think I'm old enough now to be beyond the wilding stage."

"I hope so. Now, Charlie," she said, looking into her eyes and stroking her cheek, "there's that thing called sex. When you and Jeremy have sex make sure to have protection."

Charlie, remembering how hot she and Jeremy had gotten in the afternoon, felt herself blushing, which her mother interpreted as virginal modesty. "Sexual feelings are perfectly normal, Charlie."

"I know that, but..."

"Things don't change over night. Just take it slow. When you're ready you'll know."

"I think we're already close. There's definitely a spark between us."

Her mother's eyes twinkled. "What did you two do this afternoon before I got home?"

"We kissed a lot and got very excited. That's how I know we're close."

Her mother smiled broadly. "Why you devil, you. You continue to surprise me."

"There is something I think I should do to get ready, something I hope you can help me with."

"If it's technique and such, that you'll learn through experience."

"No, it's something silly almost. I've never shaved my underarms. I was thinking that Jeremy might find that strange."

Her mother laughed. "You know, I never thought of that, but of course in Edward's household no one would do that, would they? Did Martha, for example?"

"I don't know. We always dressed and undressed in the bathroom."

"You mean you lived with her for years and never saw her?"

"Naked? No."

"Do you have a razor for your legs?"

"Yes, that I did learn to do."

"Half way there. I think what we'll need to do is trim the hair with scissors, then we can use my electric razor for the rest. The first few times might irritate your skin, but then you'll get used to it."

"When can we do this?"

"When I asked you that question about getting your stuff from Edward's house, you said 'the sooner the better.' How about right now?"

Thus it was that the last thing Charlie did on the most important day of her life, the day she first told Jeremy that she loved him, returned to her mother's home, and began her life of freedom, was to go into the bathroom with her mother, remove her blouse and bra and raise her arms while her mother carefully clipped the reddish-brown hair away and then shaved the rest with an electric razor. Nor was she embarrassed to expose her breasts to her mother, who had, after all, brought her into the world naked and vulnerable. She knew now that there was nothing she could not share with her mother. After years of physical and mental isolation, there were two people in the world to love and to share her life with. That's what home really meant. A home was not made of wood or brick; it was a life built with love and trust.

Finale

In one year they sent a million fighters forth

South and North,

And they built their gods a brazen pillar high

As the sky

Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force–

Gold, of course.

O heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns!

Earth's returns

For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin!

Shut them in,

With their triumphs and their glories and the rest!

Love is best.

–Robert Browning, _Love Among the Ruins_

Love Is Best

All day Friday Charlie was nervous in anticipation of meeting Jeremy's mother. She knew that Jeremy's love was not going to change because of his mother's opinion, but just as in her confrontation with her uncle she had imagined all kinds of irrational and frightening scenarios, so too did she fall prey to fears that Mrs. Lawrence would take an instant dislike to her and make her and Jeremy's life difficult and unpleasant. When Tris got home in the late afternoon, it didn't take her long to notice Charlie's state of mind and understand its cause to be the desire to make a good impression on Mrs. Lawrence. She tried to put Charlie at ease by saying that any normal person—just about anyone except her brother, she meant—would find her a sweet and wonderful girl, but when that didn't have much effect, she suggested that a second course of action was to work at making a good impression.

Doing something as opposed to waiting passively while jangled nerves became more jangly so distinctly appealed to Charlie that she instantly put herself in her mother's hands. First they went through Charlie's meager wardrobe looking for appropriate garments. Almost everything they looked at Tris found wanting. This skirt was too long, that one too dark, this blouse was too frumpy, that one too baggy. The inventorying gave rise to much heated railing against her brother and his hatred of women and made Tris wish the dinner invitation had been delayed until Saturday night after they had done their shopping at the Maine Mall on Saturday morning. Here Tris's anger at her brother was quickly forgotten as she began speaking so eagerly about the shopping trip and was so full of suggestions about new fashions and styles that Charlie had to bring her back to the subject at hand, finding suitable clothes from those available now, which finally led to their choosing a collarless blouse and a charcoal-gray skirt that was the shortest one she owned—it came to two or three inches below the knee. Color was not an option since she had no bright colors in her college wardrobe. That done, Tris examined Charlie's face and head and suggested make-up, but Charlie nixed the idea. She already had sensed that the progressive women Jeremy knew at Wisconsin wore little or no makeup, and besides she was repelled by the heavily made-up eyes with false lashes and mascara that made celebrity women in magazines and TV look like they were wearing goggles. There was something disgustingly narcissistic about such a look that was alien to her. But Tris had more luck persuading her to do something about her hair. ("It's time to move beyond the fundamentalist look" was how Tris phrased it.) Charlie had been parting her hair in the middle and trying to de-emphasize her natural curliness. After Tris was done with her, her brownish-red hair was parted on one side with a bang covering half her forehead, and instead of trying to tame the curliness Tris accented it. The results were stunning and made her look even more attractive.

Once she was dressed, Tris had one more suggestion, which was to also leave the second button on the blouse open. It would give just a hint of sexiness that would please Jeremy, she said. Charlie demurred, afraid that while it would please Jeremy it might make Mrs. Lawrence think she was cheap. Her mother smiled at her naiveté. "Have you seen the way young women dress today? They leave nothing to the imagination. All I'm suggesting is a hint of femininity."

So Charlie conceded the point. Ted when he arrived home was asked his opinion, which was fulsome, and when Jeremy soon after arrived to pick her up, he too was genuinely pleased. Charlie saw him glancing at the hint of cleavage the open blouse afforded and then more closely at her hair. "Wow! I like your hair!" he said with unrestrained enthusiasm.

So did his mother. Her eyes widened as if surprised at how attractive a young woman her son had fallen for, and Charlie's nervousness instantly melted away as his mother warmly hugged her and told her to call her Cathy. As she patted Tiger, who had not forgotten her and had eagerly bounded up to her carrying his tail straight up like a flag, she watched Jeremy and Cathy get ready the shrimp salad, a simple supper appropriate for the season. She could tell that they were very close and related to each other like friends, not parent and child. The friendly equality her mother was trying to achieve with her came from the same impulse and had the same effect. Where one person ruled arbitrarily and imposed his will, everyone was alienated, but equality created trust and love. Of course she was thinking of the awkward formality and subterranean assertions of power that characterized her uncle's house. Her freedom was new to her; for a long time, she suspected, she would have moments when she would have to figuratively pinch herself to remember that she was no longer living the pitifully cramped and crabbed life she had escaped.

It was a warm summer evening, and as they sat on the backyard patio serenaded by a mocking bird that flitted from bush to bush to declare his nesting territory, Cathy asked her many questions about the course work she would pursue at USM and her career plans. Jeremy was pleased with her answers. She wasn't totally sure, she said, but she was thinking of becoming an English major so that she could be a teacher, either of children or maybe as a college professor. Later, some time when they were alone, he wanted to tell her of the plan he had hatched. It was elaborate but in essence was simply that they both would go to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin and be together.

When the topic of teaching was exhausted, Cathy complimented Charlie on her clothes. With a blush Charlie thanked her, then explained that she and her mother were going shopping tomorrow to get new clothes. That led to a long discussion about the latest fashions and the like that Jeremy could only listen to in silence with a bemused yet pleased expression, which his mother finally noticed. "Don't you want Charlie to look her best?" she asked.

"Sure, but she would look great in sackcloth or a burlap bag."

His mother exchanged a glance with Charlie. "I had no idea he had such a honeyed tongue," she said as Charlie laughed.

So the informal dinner was a success. Just as yesterday Jeremy had met Tris on a first-name basis, so today Charlie had done the same with Cathy. And it fit. She knew she had found a new friend.

On the way to the movie in Bedford, Charlie asked him a question he had often wondered about. "Your mom's pretty and very personable. How come she never remarried?"

While he was still in high school he was sure it was because she did not want to disrupt his life with a stepfather. For the last two years he knew she had dated some men, but nothing had come of it, at least not yet. "I'm not sure," he said. "Maybe it's because she measures every man against my father, you know?"

It was her turn to pay him a compliment. "If he was like you, and I know he was, I can understand that."

When he brought her home from the movie, they kissed for a long time, with the result that both of them got very aroused, and when the same thing happened Saturday night, Jeremy suggested she come to his house Sunday afternoon. His mother was attending a retirement party for a man in her insurance agency and would be gone until early evening. She understood what he was suggesting and eagerly agreed. That's how on the first Sunday in six years that she had not gone to church she lost her virginity. She was very nervous on Sunday morning and still nervous up until the point they went into his bedroom, but their first kiss inflamed her, and she quickly discovered she had inherited her mother's sexuality. From the first time and after less pain than she anticipated, she easily achieved ecstatic fulfillment. It was everything she had imagined it would be and more—quite the most wonderful experience of her life to love completely the one she loved and to know what the expression "to become one flesh and one spirit" meant.

After that on most weekdays—in the first week after their last classes and on the Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays after he got out of work at the library—they made love in his bedroom. Both told their mothers what they were doing. Jeremy's mother was momentarily taken aback, but quickly accepted it. "You're both really adults now and clearly love each other. Just be careful, you know." When Charlie told Tris that their lovemaking was the most wonderful experience of her life, Tris was pleased. She even made a joke, asking if Jeremy was pleased with her clean-shaven underarms, which Charlie answered by saying that she thought he was pleased with every part of her. Then Tris got serious. She was so drunk her first time, she said, that she hardly remembered it, but after meeting and falling in love with Ted, she understood that making love, as opposed to screwing—which she had done when she was an alcoholic—was truly the most wonderful thing that life had to offer. A surprise followed. Though she was almost thirty-eight, she and Ted had decided that they wanted a child together now that they had settled into their marriage. "With any luck, you will have a little brother or sister this time next year."

The thought intrigued Charlie, but with her mind filled with her love for Jeremy, she didn't think about it too much.

Making love was not the only new experience. In three weeks she passed from the constricted life of an evangelical into the life of a normal young woman. In many ways, everything was new and exciting. When they were naked and alone, they felt like Adam and Eve before the fall, and with the egoism of new love the whole world in microcosm bore only their names. But though happy and ecstatically fulfilled, they only had three weeks before Jeremy had to fly to Madison to make up for the missing years they could have been together. Time gave their love urgency and perspective, reminding them that they were not giddy kids anymore, and the egoism of new love was tempered with the knowledge that sweet Martha was entrapped, that they owed duty and respect to their mothers and others in their lives who were loved in a different way, and that practical things like jobs and course selection and transportation all had to be taken care of.

If alone they were Adam and Eve, in their social life Charlie was more of a Miranda discovering a brave new world. Even Jeremy, who had been living in this world found almost everything new since simple experiences became heightened and more meaningful, more memorable, when shared and seen through fresh eyes.

She did things she hadn't done for years or had never done. One evening she and Jeremy took a walk on the beach after all the sunbathers had left. Now wearing shorts and sandals, she removed the sandals and walked in the low-tide water. The feel of the cool water and hard sand on her feet was so exhilarating she laughed out loud. Music was almost nonexistent at her uncle's house, but now she listened to the classic rock station her mother favored and remembered many of the songs. Jeremy played for her CDs of Woodie Guthrie and The Weavers, which she liked but not as much as the Beatles, Pink Floyd and the other groups her mother loved. Then he played Tchaikovsky's piano concerto and Schubert's Unfinished Symphony, and she loved them. He suggested she could might take a music-appreciation course at USM. By that time they had finished their summer courses in which they both got A's, and Jeremy had gone with her to the administration office so that she could register for the fall semester. With her grades and tests scores she had no trouble getting in, but three of her courses at the Bible college were not transferable, since they were religious, not scholarly, courses. Driving home to Waska, she made plans to take summer courses to make up for the deficiency, and Jeremy took this occasion to share with her his plan. One of his professors in European history was very impressed with a paper he had written on François Babeuf, the founder of the Society of Equals during the French Revolution and one of the first great martyrs to liberty, and his professor suggested that the points he made in the paper were capable of being expanded into a Ph.D. thesis. He would go to graduate school at Wisconsin and, he suggested, so could Charlie. With her mind and good grades, she too could get accepted into just about any program at U.W., including the English Department, and they could be together. They grew excited thinking of the future and perhaps a little sad since in the immediate future they were going to be separated.

The first shopping trip was followed by several others. While Jeremy worked on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, she and Tris, who took a week of her vacation to spend more time with Charlie, went to various stores to get shoes, casual wear, more school clothes and accessories, all paid for by Tris, who wouldn't hear of Charlie using the money she saved from her college job. "I owe you years upon years of clothes I should have been buying for you, you know," she said, "and I'm just doing my duty." In that way most often Charlie was dressed in shorts and Tee shirts or jeans and tops when cooler.

Getting to and from Portland led both Tris and Jeremy separately to suggest she needed to learn to drive. Several times in early evening she and Jeremy went to the parking lot at Courtney Academy to practice handling a car. Tris took her out a couple of times as well and told her that in the fall she could use her car most days as she could arrange for a coworker to pick her up. They made plans for her to get her driving permit. Another thing she did for the first time in six years was go swimming. On the second Sunday of their allotted three weeks, they went to a family gathering at his Uncle Gardie's cottage on a lake. Now no longer a virgin, she boldly wore a bikini, though she was a bit self-conscious when she noticed Jeremy's cousins ogling her. It was another thing to get used to. She would, however, occasionally exchange knowing smiles with Jeremy. They had had great fun when he had helped her remove hair from the bikini area. That was something she was glad to get used to.

One day after they had made love and showered together, they were in his backyard throwing a baseball back and forth while waiting for Cathy to come home from work. Charlie was staying for dinner, which she and Jeremy were going to cook, and was going to be joined by Ted and Tris, who were coming to dinner to meet Cathy. To kill time, Jeremy had found his and his dad's old gloves and a scuffed-up baseball in the garage and suggested they play pass. He had been curious about Charlie's athletic ability and was pleased to see Tris's praise was not exaggerated. The first thing he noticed was that she did not throw like a girl with a motion as if slapping at something in front of her; rather with her arm perpendicular to her body she would snap the ball from behind her ear the proper way. She also threw the ball with good velocity and accuracy and fielded cleanly every ball he threw to her, even showing quick reflexes when a few had to be snagged on the first bounce. When he complimented her on her natural athleticism, she said she'd always loved sports and knew that she was a physical person.

"You don't have to tell me that," he said, his wide grin making it clear that he was referring to their lovemaking.

She smiled but quickly became serious. "I mean I'd like to do some regular exercise. For six years I wasn't allowed to touch a ball or move faster than a walk."

"You're obviously naturally strong and in good health." He threw the ball. "But what do you have in mind?"

She threw the ball back, but not concentrating she threw it over his head. He retrieved it against the fence and fired it across the yard, watching her in admiration as she backhanded it. "I see a lot of people running. I was thinking that would be good exercise. What do you do, Jeremy?"

"You mean for exercise? I walk a lot. In Madison my apartment is over a mile from where my classes are. So really just walking."

"Wouldn't running be better?"

"I guess." He was less enthused than she but knew she was right.

The very next day they started running and ran every day remaining to them before Jeremy would fly away. Because they were in the midst of an August heat wave, they did their runs mostly in the early morning or occasionally in the evening. The first few days they were quite winded even after a few miles, but with each passing day the run was elongated and their breathing easier, and they often carried on conversations as they ran. One day Jeremy hesitantly asked her about her religious beliefs, and she repeated that Ted's opinion that God would want us to have a good heart seemed the best advice. She had thought of the things Jeremy told her earlier in the summer and had also concluded that all religions had validity and that God would not be so petty and arbitrary as to condemn most of humanity to hell just because they were not Christian. Finally she said she still loved Jesus, but didn't think going to church made any difference. It was what was in one's heart that mattered. Listening to this explanation, Jeremy rather thought that religion was losing its hold on her, but he said nothing. Christian or pagan, he loved her and everything about her.

Then a day or so later she surprised him with a request he hadn't anticipated. They were about halfway through their run when she said, "Jeremy, I want you to teach me to think like a progressive."

"You already do. Progressive politics is being for the people—you know, poor and working people, not the well off."

"I know. I grew up in a working class neighborhood. I saw the desperation. Already jobs were moving overseas."

They were at the end of Sandstone Street. "Let's go by the river this time," he suggested, not because they'd see much of the river, what with all the houses and trees, but the day's heat was already building and running by the river offered the chance of cool breezes.

"But I mean more than that. For six years I've lived among conservative people."

"That taught you how not to think—is that what you mean?"

"Yeah. I don't mean I don't see things. Like I know you don't like capitalism because it's so unfair. A few get rich and the many scrape by. And if a boss at some big company is anything like my Uncle Edward—you know, ruling with an iron hand, being arbitrary, things like that— then I see that already. And I'm already grossed out by the Bush people. Just looking at them with their mean eyes and tight, unfeeling mouths tells me they're awful people. But I'm just reacting instinctively. What I want you to do is teach me how to think like a progressive."

"For example?"

She stopped to tie her shoe. Jeremy ran in place.

She looked up from where she crouched. "For example? You said the other day that the news media is really just the corporate view. So how do you see behind the news to the real news? You know, some murky international crisis develops. How do you determine the right side?"

They started running.

"Okay, now I see where you're coming from. It so happens my roommate Drew Jensen asked that very same question one time."

He was thinking of a day last fall when he, Drew and a couple of other guys were on the union terrace on Lake Mendota after one of their demonstrations and going over what had happened that day when one of Jeremy's professors walked by and stopped to talk to them. He praised the young men and told them he had done much demonstrating when he was a graduate student at Columbia University in New York City. He was glad to see the struggle for social justice was still ongoing.

"He said in his day it was different places and different issues, but underneath it was the same because the world's troubles always came from the usual things—selfishness and greed that blind people to other people's rights and needs. We all agreed with that, but that's when Drew asked your question. Drew too wanted some analytical tool that could be applied. As I recall he even used the word 'murky' like you did. Anyways, that's when Professor Schultz told us about what he called the empathy-ego scale. He said most leaders, coming as they do from the upper classes, hadn't the foggiest idea how poor and working people felt or thought. They would be at the right extreme on the empathy scale. That's where egoists and narcissistic people reside, see?"

"And the other end?"

"First I remember a sarcastic thing he said about the right end. He added that sociopaths, serial killers and U.S. presidents would always be found there. He was referring to the millions of third-world people we've killed since the end of World War Two."

"I've heard you say that. I'm guessing the left side of the scale has...?"

"Right. That's where you find your Gandhis and others like Jesus and Buddha who think of others, who sympathize—or empathize, since that's Professor Schultz's term for it—with poor and exploited people. He added groups like Doctors without Borders, people who run soup kitchens, Quakers."

"Okay, and most people fall somewhere in the middle. I see."

"Well, he didn't let off ordinary people that easily. Most people expand their egoistic concerns to family and friends but care not a whit if the TV they watch or clothes they wear were made by wage slaves working for pennies an hour. That describes an awful lot of people. Evil always comes from selfishness and egocentric thinking, he emphasized. The good in this world are always a minority."

"Was he cynical or realistic?"

"Probably a bit of both."

They stopped at a corner and waited for two cars to go by. "I get the idea, but we still haven't got to anything murky."

"Oh, yeah. Well he had the perfect example. He was a graduate student during Ronald Reagan's presidency. You've heard of the Sandanistas, haven't you."

They were rounding the corner of Jeremy's street by now where it was their practice to race to the finish, so it wasn't until they were sitting on the picnic table in the backyard and each drinking a bottle of water, that they picked up the conversation.

"The Sandanistas were in Nicaragua, right?"

"Right. They had overthrown a really evil, fascist dictator, and U.S. fruit companies that were exploiting the peasants were feeling the heat. This is where Professor Schultz's empathy scale comes in. The peasants in Nicaragua were oppressed. They barely kept from starving, they were mostly illiterate, and they had no health care so that huge numbers of them died from diseases easily controlled by modern medicine. What the Sandanistas wanted to do was bring health care, education and decent living wages to the people. But guess whose sides the U.S. was on?

"I'm guessing the old dictator's side."

"Yeah, as always. Any decent person would think helping desperate people would be a good thing, but that wasn't the goal of the U.S. government. They said it was to oppose communism, but think of it. To be on the side that thought it dangerous to help people even in the most basic way and instead side with the big landowners and the old government that oppressed the people tells you who benefits from the U.S. government and its policies."

"I do see. The government is for the rich people of this country and the world. The rich and the powerful don't give a hoot about poor people's suffering."

"Yeah. Mind you, Professor Schultz was no fool. Just because a man or woman was supposedly on the empathy side where policies are formulated to help the people doesn't always mean he or she is a compassionate or empathetic person. Plenty of Marxists are egoists driven by ambition. Sometimes you have to look really hard to see that selfishness is operative. I know I guy who thinks Mother Teresa—you know, that Catholic nun that helped lepers and poor people in India—was really selfishly pursuing a course that led people to praise her. But in that case I don't think it matters much what her motivation was. The lepers and poor were being helped and treated with compassion." He finished his water with a long swallow. "Okay, now I'm going to be professorial. Apply what you've learned to the Iraqi situation."

Charlie laughed at the exaggerated professorial tone he affected, then showed that she was a good student. "It's because the U.S. government wants to control the oil, isn't it?"

"And the Bush administration is filled with neocons. It's for Israel's benefit too. So you get the point of Professor Schultz's empathy scale. In any situation look for who's being oppressed and that will be the decent side."

"There are cases where both sides are bad. Like World War One. Right?"

"I see you know your history," the professor said.

"And that I think like a progressive?"

"Yup. As I said at first, you already have the most important thing—empathy."

The next time they went for a run they had their first disagreement. It was not quite an argument, and in the end they reached a compromise, but they did find themselves on the verge of anger.

It started when on their run Charlie said that she wanted to visit her cousin Martha. Jeremy didn't think that was a good idea. He sensed danger, though he wasn't sure if it was an irrational fear that somehow Charlie would be swept back into her uncle's orbit or, more likely, that he feared such a visit would only upset Charlie and her cousin while making her uncle angry enough to want some kind of revenge. Whatever it was, he felt he should warn her against the dangers. "I don't think you should do that, Charlie."

She was surprised at his reaction. She felt deflated, even disappointed. "Martha is oppressed too. She needs to know she's not alone. How can you think that's a bad idea?" She spoke sharply and felt herself growing defensive and willful. She was ready to carry the point no matter what.

It was a cool morning, but Jeremy felt himself sweating under his windbreaker. "Well, what good could you do her? I don't think she's going to leave that man."

"I know, but as I just said she's needs to know she's not alone."

"Do you think she thinks of you as an enemy?"

"I don't know."

"Is that what you want to convey to her—that you're still her friend?"

They had to wait for cars to pass. As they waited, she had time to think. What she really wanted to do was to liberate her cousin from bondage, but realizing that was an unlikely event, she also wanted to defend herself against any lies told about her and to make sure Martha understood that she had a friend to turn to.

They started running again. "I guess I want to make sure she doesn't feel alone. When I used to feel that way, I could turn to her. I can't just desert her."

"Okay. I see how this is important to you. I think I should go with you just in case."

"What do mean?"

"You know, in case Tom Johnson showed up."

"Yeah, good idea," she said, feeling her love for him flood her mind. He wanted to protect her. His objection was fear for her safety.

"I bet she doesn't know what happened in the car."

"Unless my aunt told her." She ran several yards, considering. "I bet she does know. I bet Aunt Cora told her."

"It's a cinch your uncle didn't."

After showering and making love, they decided that now, mid-morning, was the best time for the visit. It was Monday, the day Brother Johnson and Tom always went over the books, so they could be certain that Martha would be alone.

They drove since Martha lived in a ranch-style house on the outskirts of town that had been Brother Johnson's first home before he started a family and before he made enough money to move into a trophy house. Instead of selling it some dozen years ago, he rented it to a family that had lived in it up until six months before Martha and Tom's wedding when Brother Johnson had given the family notice. He was going to give the happy couple the house for a wedding present. According to what Aunt Cora told her, that led to a squabble that threatened to boil over into a lawsuit. Brother Johnson insisted that a verbal agreement had made them responsible for maintenance, but the family, feeling they were being evicted and betrayed, did not want to pay for a paint job and other repairs and threatened a lawsuit. In the end Brother Johnson backed down and paid for the repairs and painting. Charlie thought there was something fitting about the sordid squabbling over money when the beneficiary was a bride being sold by two old men.

At least the house looked pleasant as they drove up. There were flowers in front, the lawn was immaculate, and the house boldly wore its new coat of bright white with black trim; in the full sun of the hot August day, its gloss paint was almost blinding.

Martha's eyes betrayed fear instead of welcome when she opened the door. Clearly Charlie was the last person she expected to see, and despite herself she let out a nervous gasp and then became very rigid. Even allowing for her nervousness, she did not look well. Her complexion was sallow and her eyes sunken, suggesting that she wasn't sleeping well. She wore her usual long dress buttoned at the neck and with long sleeves which at the waist billowed out into a full skirt that went to her ankles. After her many shopping expeditions with her mother, Charlie was uncomfortably reminded that not that long ago she wore the same plain dresses from a fundamentalist mail-order firm. She wondered if part of Martha's surprise was to see her wearing tight shorts, sandals, and one of Jeremy's Wisconsin tee-shirts with Bucky Badger that displayed the fullness of her breasts.

"Martha, forgive the unannounced visit. I just had to know if you're all right."

Too polite to ask her to leave (which her body language indicated she wanted to do), she spoke hesitantly and almost in a whisper. "Charlene, hello. I don't think you..." but not able to say anything so cold and unfriendly as 'you shouldn't be here," she nervously wrung her hands and looked down.

Charlie, unsure how to proceed, bought some time by introducing Jeremy. "This is my friend Jeremy Lawrence."

Martha said hello with her eyes downcast while Jeremy murmured a greeting.

By now Charlie understood that Martha was not going to invite them into the house and got right to the point. "You're not happy, are you, Martha?"

"We're not on earth to be happy, Charlene."

"But many Christians are. God doesn't want us to suffer just for the sake of suffering."

Martha started to speak, then stopped. She looked at Jeremy, perhaps because his presence inhibited her. "Why have you come, Charlene?"

"Just to make sure you're okay.'

She cast her eyes down yet again. She appeared confused.

"They haven't told you, have they?"

Still looking down and avoiding eye contact, she said, "I don't know what you mean. They told me you left the church, that's all."

Charlie looked at Jeremy, who tilted his head slightly. "What did they say was the reason?"

When Martha continued staring at the floor, Charlie said, "They must have said something."

Martha looked up, then quickly reverted her yes. "They said you were willful and secular. That you left because..."

"Because of Jeremy?"

She nodded.

"That's partly true, but it isn't the whole truth. Jeremy and I are in love, and I suppose 'willful and secular' partly describes my disillusionment with the church. But Martha, you've got to know the truth about Tom. Ask your mother if you don't believe me. He vilely and crudely tried to seduce me. I had to jump out of the car to escape. He pawed me and used crude and vile language."

Martha's sallow face reddened. "I don't want to hear that."

"But it's the truth, Martha. Again, ask your mother. I'm sure she too was told to say nothing, but I know she knows it's true. She told me."

She paused waiting for Martha to respond, but she continued staring at the floor, though now she started teetering on her feet from nervousness.

"Tom is a bad man. He doesn't deserve such a wonderful and sweet girl as you."

She started to speak but stopped. A look of panic crossed her eyes when she heard a car driving up the street.

Charlie turned to watch the car drive safely by. "Uncle Edward's church hates women. It sees us as nothing by baby-making machines."

She saw Martha involuntarily put her hands on her belly.

"Martha, are you pregnant?"

She looked up and nodded slightly. "I think you should go, Charlene."

"Okay, we will, but talk to your mother, Martha. Please."

No promise was made. After muted good-byes, they departed to the sound of the door closing.

Charlie couldn't fool herself. The visit was a disaster. Jeremy had been right, and she probably did more harm than good. In the car she asked, "Do you think I did any good?"

Actually he didn't. He thought that perhaps she had made things worse for that poor girl, but he couldn't hurt Charlie by saying that. "I hope so," he said.

She understood the meaning behind his words. "She can't be any more unhappy than she already is, and they do say the truth will make you free."

"Yeah, but the trouble is, your uncle doesn't believe in divorce."

"He believes in an abstraction. Even he will come around, I'm hoping."

Jeremy was doubtful. "He's a very arrogant man. He doesn't like to be wrong."

Charlie, aware that she was expressing a hope more than a conviction, said, "My aunt is the wild card here. She's stronger than you'd think."

Luckily they had too full a day planned for Charlie to have much time to brood. From Martha's house they drove directly to a cellphone store in Bedford where Jeremy bought a cellphone for Charlie that was similar to his and then upgraded his plan to one that had a buddy-system special deal. It was an early birthday present for her that would enable them to talk to each other just about every day when he was in Wisconsin. They next stopped at a fast-food place for lunch, then home where he taught her how to use her new phone. Then at one o'clock they went to the library to meet Mr. Seavey, the librarian. Jeremy's summer job ended last week but not before Mr. Seavey told him he still had grant money to continue the program into the fall and winter. That's when Jeremy suggested Charlie would be a perfect candidate to continue the work, and after an interview with the librarian where he was clearly impressed with her intelligence and competence, he agreed. She would work sixteen to twenty hours a week, the exact hours to be determined after she got her class schedule.

Now in their last week together, time hung as heavy as the August heat haze. The love they had shared intensely and completely for the past weeks was now threatened by separation. It forced them into recognition that life is process, not permanence, the proof of which is everywhere. Virginal, naive Martha was pregnant. The flowers that bloomed yesterday next to Jeremy's front door were wilted the next. The moon, full on the night of their first date, was moving towards a crescent. Every morning the birds were less and less noisy. Charlie went with Tris to visit their old neighbor Mrs. Fecteau, now in a nursing home, only to find her frail and suffering from Alzheimer's disease so advanced she barely remembered them. A neighbor's dog that Jeremy had known for years had to be put to sleep. In the tears Mrs. Scowcroft shed while talking to his mother, he remembered his dog Stringer and by association his dad.

To see that nothing was permanent and eternal while feeling that their love was undying was to introduce a dark fear that love, like everything else on earth, was mutable. Each had a secret fear that separation would lead to their drifting apart, and each dared not utter the thought. Walking on the breakwater at Camp Melton one night, they watched the sun set behind the Waska River. In the hushed silence, broken only by the soft rumble of a late lobsterboat heading to its mooring, a sadness suddenly enveloped them as if they mourned more than the death of the day. It was Charlie who gave voice to the feeling. "Another day is gone," she said softly, to which Jeremy, feeling tears rimming his eyes, could only murmur "Yeah." In some inextricable way night had become their coming separation, as scary and bleak as death itself. They revived their spirits the next day, but neither could shake the feeling of uncertainty and vulnerability that was the antithesis of new love which feels total plenitude of action and infinity of time. During their love making all was still wonderful; it was afterwards that time impinged upon joy.

A small but interesting occurrence made them forget the coming separation, if only temporarily. Just as they had rescued Tiger earlier in the summer, they reunited a lost little girl with her mother at the end of the summer. On their next-to-last morning run they saw a freckled-face blond girl with huge blue eyes looking rather waifish. She was wearing a soiled pull-over that was so short it didn't cover her bellybutton and a pair of baggy shorts, and she was shoeless. Some dark sticky substance was smeared on her chin that looked like jam from her breakfast. She didn't say anything to them as they approached her, but the forlorn expression on her face as they passed by made them turn back. They asked if something was the matter, and when she started talking disjointedly and unclearly about a doggie, they asked her name. It was Samatha and she was five years old. That and the fact her house was yellow was all the information they could get out of her. When they asked her if she was lost, however, she started crying. Charlie hugged her and told her they would find her mommy. Working on the assumption that in wandering away from home following a dog she couldn't have gone too far, they circled the block, each of them holding one of her little hands, only to see no yellow house. They asked if she remembered crossing the street, but she said she wasn't sure. They went up the next street and circled that block without seeing any yellow house, then crossed the street perpendicular to them and followed that street around the block. They were just turning the corner when a woman ran up to them. She was a neighbor, not the mother, who was frantic and had already called the police. She was searching in the opposite direction. It turned out the mother was not, as they suspected, an irresponsible person. While she was drawing the bath water, Samatha had caught sight of the neighbor's dog and followed him. In less than a minute she had disappeared. Now reunited with her mother, who alternatively chided her and showered her with hugs and kisses, the prodigal was safe. The grateful mother could not thank them enough. She told them she could tell they were good human beings and that it was obvious that they were in love. They modestly hedged on the first compliment but proudly admitted that they were in love.

They were in high spirits after that. "First a kitten and now a little girl," Jeremy said.

"We should start an agency for finding lost little mites," Charlie said.

But their high spirits soon passed. Everything became the last time—the last run together, the last lovemaking together, the last meal together, until finally it was the last morning together.

Tris drove with Cathy in the front seat and Charlie and Jeremy in the back holding hands tightly as if afraid to ever let go. They didn't talk much, mostly communicating their thoughts and feelings through touch and only occasionally becoming aware of things outside of themselves such as when passing a farm they heard Cathy say, "Oh, look at those beautiful horses," and looking up to see the grazing horses and colts all with chestnut coats gleaming in the sun.

Then they were inside Portland International Jetport where two of the 911 terrorists boarded a plane for Boston. People with tense thin-lipped faces hurrying to their terminal; people in seats checking their watches and looking impatient; others, the veteran flyers betraying nothing beyond sleepiness, boredom or indifference as they read newspapers or went through papers from their brief cases. They passed a tall, thin woman stopping to adjust her high heel and heard her cursing. In the distance a child was loudly crying. A poster advertising flight insurance triggered in Jeremy's mind the memory of his father's death. Still their hands tightly grasping each other was the center of their attention.

Then came the routine business of flying as Jeremy checked in his suitcase and got his boarding pass after which Tris and Cathy discreetly went to get a coffee to allow the lovers time alone.

They sat with arms around each other's shoulder and their free hands joined awkwardly with a right hand in a left. Both felt the heavy feeling of sadness that made it hard to act normal.

"Remember the day after Ms. Jose's American government class?"

Her eyes lit up in recognition. 'Yes, I do."

"I was going to ask you to the prom."

"Yes, I know."

He squeezed her hand. "And I knew you knew. Why did you say thank you?"

She thought for a moment. "First because to be asked by you was an honor. Then also because it confirmed that you did care for me in a special way—"

"I think I was in love with you even then," he said, interrupting. "You were the only girl I thought of that way."

"I felt the same way. I thought about you all the time."

"We were meant for each other."

"Yes! The other reason why I said thank you was because you gave me hope for the future. I was so totally under my uncle's sway then I didn't think I would ever have a life of my own. I saw a possibility because you were in the world. You gave me hope. I remember thinking that I could have been a normal girl."

"It sounds foolish," Jeremy said, speaking quietly because an old lady sat down at the end of the bench, "but I remember thinking we were mystically connected—though maybe it wasn't foolish after all since now I know we are. Love knows no distance, Charlie. I've been worrying all week about our parting—and I'd rather you were coming with me—but now I know you're always with me in my heart."

"So you too think we were made for each other?" Charlie whispered.

"Yes, I do. We're so obviously compatible. I love everything about you. My dream is that we'll always be together—now spiritually but after that together under the same roof."

"I want you to be always in my heart and always to feel your arms around me."

"When we're in graduate school at Wisconsin we can get married."

She smiled at the thought, then voiced a fear. "What if I wasn't accepted?"

"You will be. I just know it."

He looked up to see his mother and Tris coming down the corridor. "It's time," he said, suddenly feeling his euphoria evaporating.

They stood and embraced, holding each other tightly and repeating over and over, "I love you" and promising each other that the last thought each would have before they fell asleep each night was of the other, though both said they would be thinking of their love all the time.

The old lady smiled at them benignly.

They walked down to his gate where the conversation was forced and conventional. They all wished him a good flight and reminded him to call as soon as he arrived in Madison. He waited until the last possible moment before going through security. Cathy had promised him money to fly home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, so the last greetings were "See you Thanksgiving" as he hugged Tris, his mother and Charlie, in that order, and they whispered "I love you" one final time, then after going through security and retrieving his carry-on bag and shoes, he waved to them. Right before he entered the ramp he turned one more time to see from Charlie's face that she was trying not to cry and bravely smiling. He mouthed the words "I love you, " then was gone.

The three of them then walked down the terminal to where they could watch the plane take off. As they waited and watched the plane taxi to the flight runway, Charlie hardly listened to Tris telling Cathy that she had raised a wonderful young man, and Cathy returning the compliment. Her concentration was entirely on the plane that held not just her love but almost literally her life. It made her reach back into her memory. This time six years ago she had been taken from her mother and delivered into the rigid, close-minded world of her uncle's house and church. Those first few weeks under her uncle's dominion, the time before she learned the survival techniques that kept his wrath at bay, were the saddest and scariest days of her life. Now again feeling sad and afraid in a different way, she turned her mind to the awakening love between them. Her thoughts went back to high school when Jeremy was one of the few students who saw her as a person instead of a freak Christian dressed in old-fashioned clothes and how kind he was in supporting her against the taunts of Bob Parole and the other bully-boys. She relived again the mystical connection both she and Jeremy felt when he didn't ask her to the prom with words but instead with his eyes. But as she watched the enormous jet roaring down the runway with a sound so loud she could hear it through the thick plate-glass windows and feel the glass vibrating, her mind settled on the day they had rescued Tiger and were driving back to Waska.

Something happened that day that changed everything between them.

When he talked about his father's death and how he had tried not to cry until his mother told him that it was okay to cry because his dad had, she remembered her arms tingled with the desire to hug him. He was so openly vulnerable and honest that he inspired her to open up and be honest just like him by telling him about her doubts and early problems with biblical inerrancy, her distress at Martha's arranged marriage, and her feelings of humiliation at the hands of Rev. Hamlin. She understood now, as the jet became airborne and seemed to shake for a scary few seconds, that what they were doing that day was making love using words instead of their bodies. She had never felt so close to another human being in her entire life. It was at that precise moment they had moved from feeling attraction for one another and having a sort of daydream love to a real relationship based on trust, honesty and mutual respect. Their physical lovemaking was only wonderful and intense and exciting and beautiful and totally fulfilling because they loved one another as human beings. That was the love that was primary; and it was the love that burned in her heart here on earth and in his heart in the sky. You couldn't put your finger on it. It was an aura, a presence; it resided in their bodies but was independent of their bodies. He was right when he said they could not be separated, not when each carried the other in their hearts. The plane was banking now as she remembered something else he said that day, something that opened her up to a braver and scarier world, and now she understood why she felt afraid here in the airport. After she told him that her uncle believed God's hand was in every event, he said that he knew his father, who was a good and decent man, had not died at the hand's of God but rather from an accident unadorned by any manipulation beyond happenstance.

An accident.

"Jeremy," she whispered "Jeremy, Jeremy." She needed his presence and the feel of his arms around her; she wanted her love to come back and be with her; she wanted to go with him right now following in another plane, following after him to Madison, to be with him, to not be separated, to love him, to feel his breathe on her cheek, to know him, not to have to cry because already she was lonely and wretched and wanted her love to never go away, to always be with her, to love and to love and to love always.

Always.

If anything happened to him she knew she would destroyed. The plane was climbing now. She watched until it was a tiny speck in the sky. It seemed impossible that that huge, heavy piece of metal was actually flying.

"Keep him safe and watch over him," she whispered as the plane disappeared from sight. "Keep him safe from all harm," she said to God, even while knowing that prayers would make no difference.

####

a note about the writer

R. P. Burnham edits _The Long Story_ literary magazine and is a writer. He has published fiction and essays in many literary magazines. He sets most of his fiction in Maine, where he was born and raised and has deep roots. _The Least Shadow of Public Thought_ , a book of his essays that introduce each issue of _The Long Story_ , was published in 1996 by Juniper Press as part of its Voyages Series. Four other novels, _Envious Shadows,On a Darkling Plain_ , _The Many Change and Pass_ , and _The Two Paths_ have also been published by The Wessex Collective. Burnham was educated at the University of Southern Maine (undergraduate) and The University of Wisconsin–Madison (graduate). He is married to Kathleen FitzPatrick, an associate professor of Health Science at Merrimack College in North Andover, Massachusetts
