

# The Ignored and two other short stories

## Voice of the Mute Tales,  
Volume 1

**Copyright © 2014,** Smashwords edition, revision 1.20, published by Eduardo Suastegui

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# Table of Contents

Voice of the Mute Tales, Volume 1

Table of Contents

The Ignored

The Third Start-up

Elie's Choice

From the Author

The Tracking Jane Series

The Our Cyber World Series

#  The Ignored

Monday morning comes after a busy weekend where I did nothing but watch my two brothers and sister run around town from parties to soccer games to recitals back to more soccer games while I tagged along and got bored. I watch them now, jumping out of bed when Dad calls them while Mom, who has already been up for an hour, finishes getting ready. I step out of my sister Angie's closet, where I've spent another sleepless night. I go over to her bed, touch it. The warmth is fading, but still enough of it lingers in its soft padding to make me wish I could sleep like her every night.

No one, not Mom, not Dad, and less than all my brothers and sister care whether I have a warm blanket or a pillow. They ignore me. They try to forget about me. They don't care if I get out of the closet or stay in it all day. But if I did stay in there like I want to on days when I'm sad, they would not only ignore me, but forget me. I can't let that happen, so I don't stay there.

As my brothers and sisters go down to the kitchen and sit around the table to eat the cereal Dad made for them, I run down the stairs after them, hoping that today there's a place for me. But I find none. It's as before. Three places for Jorden, Brenden and Angie, one for Mom, one for Dad, none for me. So I do what I do every Monday to Friday. Once Dad runs off to work and Mom comes into the kitchen, ready to gobble down her own breakfast before taking us to school, I sit in Dad's seat, even if there's no food for me. But that's only Monday to Friday. On weekends it's a full house for breakfast, so I have to sit on the floor, where I definitely don't get any food.

I used to get hungry, but I no longer do. It's what happens once you get used to it: to no one saying your name, to no one looking at you, to no one caring if you're hungry or if you need any clothes. You don't get hungry. You don't get cold if your clothes are thin or have holes. Which from watching the news and seeing all the starving and naked children around the world may seem like a good thing, to never be hungry or cold. But it's not. It's a bad sign that things are going the wrong way for you. That's if like me you're among the ignored, the ones moms and dads still remember but don't pay any never mind to because they'd like to forget you. If they succeed, then you join the discarded. You go away, and you never see Mom and Dad again until many years later in a place where they say there's no more hunger, no more tears, and no more pain. That place sounds good, but the thought of going there and staying there alone for many years scares me. I rather hang on here as best I can.

This means I do whatever it takes to avoid becoming one of the discarded. I have to tag along, stay close to Mom and Dad, though lately for me it's Mom because I think Dad is a lost cause. I haven't been keeping track, but I think he's ignored me long enough that he's finally forgotten me. If I accept this is true and he's no longer thinking of me at all, then I'm halfway out, halfway to becoming discarded. Mom's all I have, and though I refuse to accept it, I fear I'm losing her, too.

Though just last night Mom thought of me. It was clear. No doubt about it. Write it down in the records. There's hope, because unlike Dad, she's given me a name, and sometimes while looking at herself in the bathroom mirror, with the door closed and just me and her in there, she says it.

Hailey.

My heart fluttered when she whispered it last night, and I shouted at her that I loved her. But that's all she did, just stare at herself in the mirror and whisper my name. Once. A long time ago she used to cry when she thought of me. Now she just stares with empty eyes, which is better than nothing at all, but worries me because I can tell she's trying to forget and getting better at it, colder about it, maybe even angry.

When Mom comes into the kitchen, she kisses Dad. The two of them exchange a playful look, like something happened between them, maybe last night or earlier this morning. Something that used to happen more often, I think. Anyway, I'm glad for her, because her eyes don't seem empty anymore. And maybe that's good for me? I don't know. When she's happy and things are going well, she doesn't think of me, so maybe I have things backwards. I'm still trying to figure out how I can keep her remembering me, even if she tries to act as if I'm not here at all, but I also like it better when she's happy. I want her to be happy. I love the way her smile makes her face prettier, and the way her eyes twinkle when she's happy.

That's because even though she ignores me, I still love her. Very, very much. It's something that's true about the ignored. With every passing day, with every bit of disdain, rejection and neglect, we love our parents more and more, no matter what, without needing their love in return, even though we long for them to love us, especially the more they ignore us.

"Okay kids," Mom says. "Time to go." I can tell she doesn't mean me, but I rush out to the minivan anyway and get in first.

Jorden and Brenden are nine and twelve years old, so Mom drops them off at a school for older kids. I could go with them because the ignored can go to school anywhere. It doesn't matter, since for all intents and purposes I'm not there, I don't count, the teachers don't mind me, and I don't take up a seat, just find a place on the floor, or on a counter, wherever. So, yeah, I could go with my older brothers. But I'm pretty sure I'm younger than them. It's hard to tell because they never celebrate any of my birthdays like they do for Jorden, Brenden and Angie. So I have to guess I'm younger, more like Angie who is 6 years old and just started first grade. I usually go to school with her.

I say usually because since I don't count, since everybody treats me like I'm not there, I can skip school whenever I want to. The way other kids talk, you'd think skipping school is a lot of fun. But when I do skip, though, and spend the whole day with Mom, it's not all that great, except that I like being with her, even if the grown-up world is boring, cruel and hard. Mom doesn't seem to mind when I go with her, though I can tell at the end of a day I spend with her, by the time we get home she's sadder, darker, quieter, oftentimes even meaner to Dad and my brothers and my sister.

When we get to Angie's school, she asks Mom, "Are you doing something special at work today, Mommie?"

"Not really sweetie," Mom says, and I get jealous. I so wish she called me sweetie, and that she looked at me how she's looking at Angie now. "But I do have a Doctor's appointment this morning," Mom adds.

"Are you sick?"

"No, sweetie. Not at all. It's just a check."

"Oh."

Mom smiles at her, like she wants to tell her more. In fact, I know she wants to because the ignored, desperate for attention, get this extra sense. We can almost tell what our parents are thinking. It's more like we can feel it. We have to, unlike regular kids like Angie, since they don't need to know or care about what Mom and Dad are thinking to get what they need or want. They just get it. Because they are the included.

But Mom doesn't tell her. She just strokes Angie's hair, kisses her on the forehead, tells her she loves her and to have a good day in school. I stand there, envious of that love, wanting it so bad I hurt inside, in my chest and in my eyes, where tears once came out when I felt like this, but now my eyes just burn. Sometimes they burn so hard, my head gets a sharp pain, and I have to close my eyes for a long time before it goes away.

I'm questioning whether I want to go with Angie. At the last moment, I jump back in the minivan before Mom speeds away. I've never been to the Doctor with her, and I figure this will be more interesting than the usual day at work with her.

At the Doctor's office, the receptionist says, "We can take you back right away."

"No waiting?" Mom says, grinning. "I was so hoping to catch up with all the magazines in your rack over there."

"Well, you're our first appointment for the day. Besides," the receptionist says with a wink, "I hear we may be talking about some good news today?"

"Well, maybe," Mom says waiving a small baggie that she takes out of her purse. It contains something white I saw it in her bathroom last night.

The receptionist opens the door, and I have to squeeze through because I'm almost not quick enough before that rude nurse almost slams the door on me. Now I know the Doctor's office is nothing special. They ignore kids like me here too, which means they'll never take care of me here either.

Mom smiles when she sees the Doctor waiting for her in what the nurse calls "examination room one." There's a big, strange bed with metal things coming up from one end.

Mom asks if she needs to undress, and the Doctor says, "That won't be necessary. We did your last exam just a month ago. Let's just go over the results."

Mom waves her baggie. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours."

"Getting right down to it, huh? Well, I'm happy to say that yes, the official results agree with your home kit there. You are very pregnant."

"Pregnant? What's pregnant?" I say out loud, but they don't answer. I'll just have to pay attention, like I always do when I don't understand something to see what it means by what else people say about it.

Mom is smiling. "Based on my count, I think its six weeks," she says. "Six weeks and two days."

"Good, that's good." The Doctor is paging through some papers inside a thicker, yellow folder. Mom is still smiling, but I sense she's worried, like there's something in those papers she doesn't want the Doctor to notice.

He stops at a page, frowns a little and says, "Oh, yes. I noticed earlier that five years ago you had an elective--"

"Yes. Yes, I did," she hurries to say. Her smile is gone. For a short moment, I can tell she's sad. I get another feeling, but it's too short to tell for sure. Still, I think she just thought about me.

"Well, based on the rest of your history, three healthy and full term pregnancies, I think we're in great shape here. The one concern of course, is your age."

Mom nods. A faint smile breaks on her lips, and I'm glad to see it.

"Still," the Doctor goes on. "I don't see any red flags." He taps her on the shoulder and winks. "We'll just watch you closely, and you'll do your part by getting lots of good rest, eating right, and all that other good stuff."

"Yes, we'll do all that," she says, and her smile now is as big as when she first started talking to the Doctor.

A few minutes later we leave and get to her office, which is not too far from the Doctor. "Almost within walking distance," Mom comments to a woman who asks with a wink how the Doctor was.

"I'm excited for you, Anne," the woman says. "We'll keep it hush-hush since it's still early, but I'm really happy for you. We'll all make sure you take it easy from here on out." She winks again. I'm beginning to think that whatever "pregnant" means, it has to do with winking, because that's the third or fourth time I've seen someone wink.

Mom closes the door when we go into her office. I almost don't make it in. Last time I was here she kept it open all day, so she surprised me this time, almost. Good thing I'm small and quick.

At her desk she takes care of a few things. Then she calls Dad's office and asks for him by name. Where Dad works he can't have his cellphone with him, so he has to use a regular phone.

He tells Mom something I don't hear, and she laughs in a way that makes me smile because it sounds like singing. Her eyes are shiny, not empty like last night. She's still listening, nodding and giggling. "Okay, yeah, this totally proves you're still a stud, and yeah, I know full well there's plenty more where that came from. Thank you so much. Yes... Sure... Okay, you're funny... Yes... Oh, funnier still... I'm sure you'll be just as enthusiastic about changing diapers. Oops, what's that? Cat got your tongue? Yeah, 3 AM duty for you, big stud."

Dad must have said something really funny because Mom laughs really loud. "Okay, gotta go now... Love you too. Lots."

As much as I like seeing her happy, when she told Dad she loved him, I liked that even more. Even if they didn't say that to me like they did to my brothers and sister, I am glad they have love between them. I sure love them. I just wish I could be a better part of their love. Maybe if I keep trying, staying close to Mom, making sure she remembers me, maybe then I can at least be part of her love.

After the phone call, Mom opens the door and leaves it open. The rest of the day is boring. I sit in the corner, watching her work, people coming in to talk to her, asking her what she thinks about this or that, and then they go do what she tells them. By the time we drive home, I can sense she's tired, and maybe getting a little sad, but it's a softer sad, the kind of sad that looks up with hope.

That night, while I'm waiting for her in her bathroom, I overhear Mom and Dad talking about being pregnant. I pay attention to figure out what it means.

"Yeah, let's wait at least another two months before we tell the kids," Mom says. "When we tell them, we tell everyone else, because if we don't, they will."

"I guess we're going to have to explain to Angie where babies come from."

Mom agrees, then says, "If it's a boy, I already have a name. Linden."

"And if it's a girl... Hailey, maybe?"

Mom frowns, shakes her head. "No, not..." She pauses, takes a deep breath. "I do hope it's a girl so she can share Angie's room."

Standing at the bathroom door I say, "Hey, I'm a girl! I share Angie's room!"

"I hope so, too," Dad says, ignoring me. "The boy's room is already a big disaster area. Adding a baby in there is not going to fly. And we can't afford a bigger house right now."

"At least you have a job. We both do," Mom says, and I sense she left out the words "this time," like it wasn't that way before, though I can't tell when that was or why it matters now. I sense also she's getting sadder. But then she sits up, smiles and says, "Well, the baby will be in here with us first, at least for the first six months."

"And then what?" Dad asks. "Well, whatever. We'll figure it out soon enough. We'll stack'em if we have to." He kisses Mom and she kisses him back, hard, in a way I haven't for a while. They start making noises, and I know what's coming next, so I hide myself in the bathroom and stay quiet until they're done.

Mom comes into the bathroom, smiling. She uses the toilet, then stands in front of the sink, looking at herself, touching her face, moving her head from side to side to get a better look at her hair. I sense she feels prettier right now. I'm not sure, but I think it's the baby. I know now what being pregnant means. We're getting another brother or sister. I wonder for a second why they don't know which it is, brother or sister, but that thought runs away when I realize another brother or sister means even less attention for me.

I have to get her to think of me. If she ignores me more than she does now... I get scared. I have to make her remember me!

"Mommie," I say. "I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you."

In the mirror, I see her lips straighten into a thin line. Her eyes grow dark, then empty, like the night before. Two tears run down her face.

"Mommie, don't cry," I tell her. "I love you so much."

But she doesn't hear me, or she's ignoring me. She just gets sadder, closing her eyes now, crying more. "Haley," she whispers. "Baby, I'm so sorry." She sits on the toilet and hides her face in her hands, sobbing.

I take a step toward her, to touch her and let her know I'm right here, but I hear Dad at the door. "Anne? Everything okay in there?" When Mom doesn't answer, he opens the door. He takes one look at Mom, and rushes to her, crouching down by her. "Honey, what's wrong?"

Mom won't answer. She just shakes her head over and over again, and I can tell she's doing that to forget me. She keeps shaking her head until Dad hugs her, hiding her face in his chest. He strokes her hair over and over again, whispering in her ear "it'll be okay." Eventually she calms down. I sit there in my little corner of the bathroom thinking how beautiful it is, the way he holds her and makes her feel better.

But it also makes me sad. It makes me sad because I've learned one other thing. Looking back at all the times I've tried and tried to make her remember me, to not ignore me, I see now how each time what I did and said made her sad. Right now I can also tell that Dad is remembering me, a little, in his own way, and it's making him very sad, too.

I am making them sad. By doing all I can to make them remember me, I am hurting them. I am hurting them with the sadness that presses down on my chest and makes my dry eyes burn.

Back in bed a few minutes later, talking to each other softly, I hear Dad ask Mom, "Do you think you being upset could hurt the baby?"

"Thanks, David. Thanks for piling it on."

"Sorry. I just don't want you to be hurting like this, and I'm also worried about the baby. Maybe we should get some help, some counseling, that's all."

Mom starts crying again, and I realize I have to stop. At least for a little while. I don't want to hurt Mom and Dad. I don't want to make them sad.

And I don't want to hurt the baby.

I leave their bedroom, go downstairs, and out to the backyard where I sit on a swing bench. I don't swing on it, because we aren't supposed to without a grown-up there. It is dangerous, Dad's told us, and besides, it makes a screeching noise, and I don't want anybody to know I am out here.

But my friend Vixon knows and comes to see me. I don't know where he lives, but he comes by to give me advice every once in a while. He's always coming up with new things I can try to make my parents remember me. He calls them prods. Saying "I love you" over and over again is one of the first prods he taught me.

I tell him what happened, and he says, "It doesn't matter. You have to keep at it."

"Even if it hurts them. And the baby?"

"Forget the baby. The baby is just going to make it easier for them to ignore you. Don't be a dolt."

"I know that. And I'm not a dolt. I just don't want to hurt them."

"If they want to stop hurting, they can stop ignoring you."

"That would do it?" I ask. "If they treated me like the included?"

"That's right. If they acknowledge you, and then say they're sorry for ignoring you, then the hurt stops. But you're going to have to make them remember you, using the prods I taught you. Until they can't stand it anymore and they stop ignoring you."

"Has that ever happened, Vixon?" I ask. "Of all the ignored kids I've met, not one has ever told me--"

"It happens. Rarely, but it happens. Based on what happened tonight, you're making good headway. Keep at it. Don't relent." He says that last word with a tight fist.

"What does relent mean?"

"It means give up, quit. Don't be a quitter." He stands up and points a bony finger at me. "Just don't. Quitters get discarded and forgotten. Make them remember you."

I nod, thinking of all the other ignored out there, just like me, trying to get their Moms and Dads to remember them more.

"How many more like me are out there?" I ask.

He sighs, because I've asked the same question before, and last time he told me it wasn't important.

"Why won't you tell me?" I keep asking. "Is it because most of them are already forgotten and discarded?"

He frowns down on me. He's much taller, and sometimes he looks like he wants to hurt me. "Yes," he says finally.

"How many?"

"We used to keep a full roster. Lately the leaders have decided the number is too large. Too sad. But that's none of your worry. You have a Mom and a Dad, and there's hope for you, Hailey. Keep using your prods."

"Even if it hurts them."

"Yes."

He said that, and I sensed he was sad and angry. Angrier than sad. "Vixon, I've never asked you, but are you an ignored?"

Vixon shook his head. "Not anymore."

"Not anymore? Does that mean you're forgotten--"

"No! What is it to you, anyway?"

"You seem to know a lot," I say. "Like you've been through it."

He nodded. "Yeah, I'm experienced. That's why they have me giving advice to squeaks like you. But I don't do it anymore. Not since they died."

"You mean your parents?"

He glares at me, points his bony finger at me. He almost snarls when he says, "That's enough." He walks away and disappears into the night.

I look at the shadows where he disappeared, and I remember what he told me happens if you're ignored and your parents die. You get a choice of going away, but you don't have to. I didn't give it much thought when he first told me, but now I wonder what one would do here, without a Mom and a Dad. Why would one stay? I stare at the shadows into which Vixon disappeared, and I figure it out. You become a counselor, like Vixon. You help out other kids do what you couldn't finish.

I head back in the house. As I climb the stairs I hear Mom sobbing. I don't want to hurt her. Maybe if I'm as far away from her tonight that will help. I go back down and hide in the broom closet. It's dusty and smelly and cramped, and though I try to sleep, I stay awake all night. Even in there, in the musty air, I hear Mom as she cries most of the night. Though I cover my ears, I can still hear her. I hear her whimpers and muffled screams go in and out of the darkness. I hear silence and think she's finally asleep, only to hear her again. I hear her all night long, and it hurts me too, right in my chest, and my eyes burn and sting, until my head is pulsing, pounding with pain.

When morning arrives I go straight to the kitchen. Dad comes down first and prepares breakfast. He looks tired -- very tired, and something else I can't sense all the way. He goes upstairs, calls my brothers and sister, this time with a hard voice. They all come down, but Dad doesn't leave for work, and Mom doesn't come down like she does every morning.

"Mom's not feeling well," Dad explains. "I'll take you guys to school, then I'll come back and take her to the Doctor."

"What's wrong with Mom?" Angie asks.

"That's what the Doctor's going to tell us."

"But Mommie went to the Doctor yesterday," Angie points out.

He shakes his head, tells her to eat her cereal. They leave a few minutes later in a big hurry. I stay. I know I'm hurting her, but I can't leave Mom alone. I go check on her. As I start climbing the stairs, I see a little boy I don't recognize coming down.

"Hey, who are you?"

"My name is Linden," he says. "Vixon said you'll tell me what to do."

"Oh, he did, did he? What are you doing here? Who are your parents?"

Linden points up the stairs. "Mommie is up there. She's crying, and her bed's all red."

"That's not your Mom. That's _my_ Mom," I say.

"Vixon said she's your Mom and my Mommie, too. He also said I'm now ignored. He told me I need your help. Do you know what that means, to be ignored? He said you could explain."

I sit on the bottom step, and Linden joins me. I don't understand what's going on, and he's asking me for answers? I feel lost. And then I realize. Five years ago. That's when I became ignored. I go upstairs, walk into Mom's bedroom. Linden comes in right behind me. Mom's in the bathroom. I can hear her crying in there. The sheets, rolled up on the floor have red blotches on them, like Linden said. Same with the naked mattress.

I've never seen that much of it, and at first I'm not sure because I've never had it happen to me that I can remember, but it looks like blood. Just like the kind that came out of Angie's finger when she got a cut in it, and from Jorden's knee when he scraped it. Something bad's happened to Mom. Maybe that's why she cried all night.

Five years ago I became ignored. This night, while Mom sobbed all night, Linden became ignored. I don't remember how it happened with me, maybe because I was too little, but it looks like being ignored starts with blood. A lot of it.

I tell Linden everything I know. "The more you try to make them remember you, the more you hurt them," I tell him several times, in different ways, so he understands. I tell him now that there's two of us, we'll hurt them even more, and it's going to hurt us, too. He cries. He's scared. But I tell him hurting Mom and Dad is worse than being forgotten and discarded. I tell him I've been at this for five years, and it's not working. I tell him it's a miserable way to live, and he nods, still crying.

I take him by the hand and lead him into the bathroom. Mom's there, on the floor by the tub. Vixon is leaning against the faraway wall, by the window.

Mom is gripping her crucifix, and mumbling, "God, please take this pain away! I'm sorry, just take this pain away!"

"I'm sorry, Mommie," I say, and for a second I can tell she heard me, or at least sensed me somehow. "I won't make you hurt anymore." I touch her, and though she doesn't acknowledge me, she shivers. "I'll go away now, and you'll never hurt again. Not because of me. And I'll tell Linden to come with me, too. He understands."

"Wrong," Vixon whispers with a hiss. "She has to pay for ignoring you."

"No, she doesn't!" I say. "She's paid enough. She's suffered too much. Besides, she said the words. She said she's sorry."

Vixon shakes his head. "She didn't say _all_ the words. She has to say she's sorry _and_ that she will never do it again. She didn't say that, did she? And she certainly hasn't done it. Anybody can say they're sorry, but they have to mean it and show it by not doing the thing they're sorry for."

"But she's hurting! I'm hurting her! And now Linden is going to hurt her, too? No! No, no, no! I'm going away now. You can't make me stay!"

"So that's it. You want to be discarded, forgotten. You know what happens to the discarded? What will happen to you?"

"I won't be stuck here, like you. With you." I've never been angry like this, and in my anger I see something. I'm not sure I'm right, but I say it anyway. "Yeah, you! You're here because your parents were hurting so much, they died from the pain you gave them!"

"I didn't kill them, if that's what you mean! They did just fine killing themselves. They were selfish. Anything to get away from their memories."

"Well, I don't want that. I am going away. I'll be at rest until Mommie comes for me. Then she'll be able to see me and won't ignore me anymore."

"And you'll be a quitter. A failure. Abandoned, discarded."

"I'll be at peace. No longer pushed around by you with your stupid games and your painful prods. No longer chasing after people that are hurting the more I chase them. I certainly won't be killing them!"

Linden seems scared, unsure, but he tells me, "I don't want to be here alone without you, and I don't want Mommie to hurt either. I'll go with you."

"So say it then. Just say it, you quittersssss, you forrrrgotten and disssscarded."

I look at Mommie one more time, there on the floor of the bathroom, propping herself against the edge of the bathtub, filling it one tear at a time. I take Linden's hand, and he nods. Together we say the forgotten's words, the ones Vixon taught me and Linden warned us we should never say unless we want to become discarded. We say them anyway, holding hands together, reaching out to Mom with our free hands, "I love you Mommie. I love you and forgive you with all my heart."

According to Vixon, we have to say the words three times before they take effect.

"I love you Mommie. I love you and forgive you with all my heart."

Linden and I look at each other one more time. He's crying, scared, and my eyes are burning, burning, burning. "Let's say we this time," I tell Linden. He nods.

"We love you Mommie. We love you and forgive with all our hearts."

When we come to, Linden and I smile at each other. We're lying on the softest and warmest of beds. Linden turns to his side, looking at me, and I turn so I can see him. His eyes grow heavy, and he falls asleep first. I feel myself drifting off, and I think of Mommie one last time, knowing now for sure that it will just be a blink of an eye before I see her again in the place of no more hunger, no more tears and no more pain.

#  The Third Start-up

On my way into the church's office, I stop at the front marquis to see it one more time, my name and title, "Sebastian Marquez, Teaching Pastor." Since things never happen fast at a church, I wonder how long those 30 letters will hang on to their assigned slot below "Dr. Richard Wolter, Senior Pastor." That's something, to be the implicit second in command. Still, I suspect it will all disappear by morning.

I move on. Arriving at the reception area 10 minutes before 8 PM, I tell Pastor Wolter's assistant I'm a little early.

"You usually are," Cassy says with none of the usual ribbing at my penchant for punctuality. "I think they're still in prayer." With a faint smile she waves me to a nearby couch.

I sink into the soft, padded seat. As best I can, I assuage the thought that my whole life is sinking, not yet knowing whether the final landing will cushion my fall, fearing that it will do quite the opposite. My throat constricts in that familiar way it does when every bit of me wants to cry. I somehow manage to maintain a blank expression.

"They're making you stay late," I comment to Cassy, as much an effort to break the awkward silence as to set aside my inner angst.

"They asked. In case they need something," she says, glancing over her shoulder at a large wall-mounted clock. I'm wondering how her husband and three kids are managing dinner tonight, since he's not much of a cook or home-maker. I wonder how much Cassy knows, what they'll talk about when she gets home to whatever is left of the take-out her husband procured for dinner.

"Shouldn't be much longer now," she adds in an attempt to ease the tension. In her capacity as assistant to the Senior Pastor, Darcy knows at least in broad strokes what the near future holds for me. "I've really enjoyed working with you, Sebastian. Tom and I think you're one of our best pastors here." She pauses, as if searching for the right thing to say. "I hope you're all able to talk things out."

"I suspect at this point there won't be much talking. Not on my end, anyway."

She smiles back at me, but it comes across as sadness. "You have a lot of potential. If not here, you'll do great somewhere else."

A lot of potential, I repeat to myself. It's one of the ways I've been described throughout my life, along with precocious, insightful, wise beyond my years, a rising star, add exclamation mark wherever you feel like it. I look away, taking in the reception area one more time, the dated, clichéd posters, the tired year-in-year-out Christmas decorations, the small bookshelf displaying recommended Christian titles, the crowded whiteboard listing upcoming events, musing as I scan the room that at 28 my precociousness and beyond my youth insight have brought me to a midlife crisis well ahead of schedule.

"Can I ask a personal question?" Cassy says in a lower voice. When I don't object, she adds, "You and Sandy still, you know..."

I smile at her aborted question. Sandy is the twenty-year old daughter of Pastor Wolters. Though I have detected a mutual spark of attraction between us, one of my self-imposed ground rules since I came to work at this church mandates I stay away from the Senior Pastor's daughter. Aside from the fact that I don't much care for the prospect of calling the man my father in law, Sandy has plenty of prospective suitors, and I don't do the competition-chase thing. Yes, I know that's prideful, and I know how pride and the fall connect, thanks for the reminder.

"Anyway," Cassy presses on. "Maybe now, if you have more time, you know, if things don't work out here... Well, it'll be easier to see each other once you're not working such long hours." To add weight to her recommendation, she adds, "You know, she hasn't been coming here for a while. Not regularly."

I give her a short-lived smile. Since I don't say anything, Cassy gets it and reciprocates my silence. As the minutes tick by, I find myself thinking less and less of my predicament, and more and more of Sandy. Cassy's succeeded in re-vectoring my brain to different possibilities, which isn't the same as giving hope for better things, but elicits the same reality-distracting effect. I can't recall the last time I saw Sandy in church, but it's been at least three months. If the rumors are true, she had a blowout out with her dad, moved out of the house, and is completing her studies at Azusa Pacific University.

Cassy's phone buzzes. "Yes. Okay, I'll show him in." She looks up at me with apprehension. "They're ready for you."

Since the clock reads 8 PM on the nose, I guess The Spirit neither inspired nor moved prayer to extend beyond the appointed time.

I follow Cassy to the board room, where she closes the door behind me. Before me, standing around a long table, I see twelve board members. Pastor Wolters stands at the opposite end, farthest from me. He says something my mind does not register and waves toward me. One by one the board members come around the table to shake my hand in what strikes me as a wooden, choreographed gesture. For a brief moment I picture them discussing how they would do this. The next moment I'm wondering which one will kiss me on the cheek.

As I release the thirteenth and final handshake, we stand much as we did on happier times when I was being considered for an associate pastor position. Most of the faces are the same. Some, like Lester's, the Deacon in charge of the mission's committee are thankfully though not comfortingly younger. I'll take that as my legacy, my modest and somewhat successful push to encourage younger members of the congregation to participate in church governance, or to convince entrenched older members to relax their grip a little, take your pick.

We all take our seats, and Deacon Thompson, a round-faced, affable man with a perennial pink sunburn speaks first. Internally, I empathize with him, a sweet, sunny man who happened to draw the unenviable duty as the head of the human resources committee for such a time as this. Externally, I shoot him my best poker face.

"Well, Sebastian," Thompson says. "It's no secret why we're here. Though we tried to work things out, Pastor Wolters tells me we really have no choice."

I nod, poker face still in full play.

"It really saddens us," Thompson goes on. "I think I can say we all like you. We've really enjoyed your teaching and preaching, and you've done some fine work for us. Though, you know, in truth, we all wish your administrative duties... Well, we wish they'd... You know, that you would have been a bit more effective there."

I nod again. At this point I'm tempted to remind them that they recruited me for a teaching pastor position. That was the agreement, or I wouldn't have hired on. Instead, succumbing to the tyranny of the urgent, the board gradually loaded my portfolio with administrative responsibilities. Reluctantly, I filled the gap though never accepted the title. After all, even if I wasn't in control to make the big decisions, who better to run the business end than the boy genius who turned a small start-up into one of the most successful Christian online dating services, then cashed out and left it all behind to serve the Lord?

Of course I failed at it. I had no passion for it, felt trapped and misled into it, eventually souring to the work. If I wanted to do business, I could do it "out in the world," with stock options and lavish compensation to show for it instead of the meager salary they paid me here, Master's in Divinity and Doctorate soon to follow notwithstanding.

I can say all that and more, but end up with a terse, "It's hard to get people excited about concrete."

Though I stop short of bring it up, everyone in the room knows I mean the new office building whose construction stands at a halt after anemic congregational giving in the midst of a toilet-swirling recession reduced available funding to fumes. This financial failure rippled into other areas of ministry, and that irrevocably brings us to, oh yes, salaries and headcount reductions.

"You know better than anyone that we had a very strong fundraising campaign," one board member objects.

I nod, thinking to myself, that yes, the campaign, complete with a consulting firm and two fund-raising rubber chicken dinner galas was quite strong, mind your arm and shoulder lest they become dislocated. Effective is an entirely different word, I almost say, but I opt for another response.

"Do you know how much impact five point five million dollars can have in Africa, or India, or Central America? How many vaccinations, how many hospitals, how many water wells one can buy for the cost of one building that will serve on the order of 40 people?"

Either stunned or indignant or both of the above silence follows, soon set aside through an enumeration of oft-trotted out arguments that boil down to "tend to the flock at home so they can reach out to those in need." I sit quietly. I'm not here to debate. As their rebuttal gets repetitious and climaxes into irrelevance, my mind wanders to Sandy, what she might be doing now, what exactly caused her disagreement with Wolters. I ponder why my thoughts have drifted to her.

"We really wish you had made a better effort to address our financial crisis," Pastor Wolters chimes in, shifting the topic to highlight how I was less than cooperative when it fell on me to select who to let go from the staff, along with drafting up hours reductions for other office and support staff.

After much prayer and consideration -- roughly amounting to a grand total of five minutes -- I submitted a one name list. Whose name? Mine.

It took me half a day to both bolster that impression of much prayerful consideration and show mathematically how my one salary reduction, insubstantial as it was to address core problems, stemmed the tide enough to postpone further reductions in the near future. For extra credit, my accounting itemized the soft hidden costs bean counters never show: administrative out-processing of multiple people, costs associated with productivity loss, inefficiencies and gaps in the transfer of responsibilities to other staff, future re-hiring costs, and so on. As I pressed the send button on the email containing these details and my recommendation to the board, I smiled, musing how this little effort probably stood as the most solid piece of administrative, financial work I'd accomplished for the church, my sad song's last high note.

"We'd like to ask you one more time," Thompson says, his affable smile straining at the edges.

"For my resignation."

Thompson nods, a ray of hope fanning his smile. "Yes, we feel the congregation would better receive the news... It would just help to smooth the transition."

I shake my head. I'm not doing one of those "God has closed a door and opened a window" resignation letters, especially when it's demonstrably false.

Ever since the decision to downsize came down, we've played a game of chicken. The board, shirking the burden of wielding the ax, made it my responsibility -- by passing a bylaw, no less -- to select which goats to banish from the camp. Not a little tweaked the board dumped the hot coals on my lap, I wanted to make a statement not only to them, but to the congregation: this is the outcome of your action or inaction, as the case may be, and no, cuts don't really solve the problem. Once I selected myself as the goat, the board blustered my recommendation amounted to insubordination, to which I said, fine, fire me. Realizing what a firestorm firing a pastor for wanting to save other people's jobs and livelihood would cause, they asked me to resign. I said no, and here we are, with downsizing as the most face-saving way for everyone, with my message wedged in there somewhere, I hope.

"It really would help," an elderly board member says.

"The congregation is full of big girls and boys. You were going to tell them that you were firing around 3 staff members, and reducing hours for five to ten others. You can certainly tell them that you are laying off one pastor. Similar story, same savings, fewer number of severed heads rolling out the door."

For people that want to run the church like a happy-snappy enterprise, my cold business response whacks them across the head with undeniable force. In a brief moment of mercy, I regret coming across that forcefully. From his stern, fatherly expression, I can tell Wolters is casting no mercy in my direction.

"Very well, then," he says. "Cassy has some paperwork for you outside, and Deacon Thompson will assist you should you have any questions."

I stand up and let myself out of the room. In the reception area, I review all the paperwork -- which I've redlined twice -- to ensure all my suggested revisions appear there, primarily those that make it very clear this is a layoff, not a resignation nor a mutually agreed parting of the ways, as initial drafts deftly demurred. It takes me no more than ten minutes to check and sign everything.

Outside, the sunset has all but dissipated. A cool Southern California breeze envelops my face. God's refreshing caress, I recall my grandmother saying. Though I tell myself the breeze has moistened my eyes, I know it's the memory of her, now departed, no longer praying from me in the early morning hours and into the dark of night that shakes me. If my faith were only as pure, as simple, as straight-up as hers, perhaps I wouldn't find myself in this spot -- completely lost while fully knowing what it takes to be found.

Head low, anguish strangling my throat and pressing on my chest, I start walking home. When I came to the church, I rented a small apartment in the somewhat rundown nearby downtown area. I could have afforded a house in the more suburban neighborhoods that surrounded the church, but I don't know, I guess I wanted to live humbly, like Christ's truest servant. Which I'll stipulate now, being finally honest, sums up to pride coated with the sort of facile veneer and pretentious facade that drove Jesus crazy. In any case, of all the pastors on staff, I can claim the shortest, greenest commute into the office. This scored me a lot of creds with the teen to twenty-something crowd when I first joined the church.

A car comes upon me unnoticed, its whisper silent electric engine concealing its approach until one of its tires crunches over street debris. I look over just as it pulls to a stop next to me.

"Buenas noches, pastor," a female voice says.

I crouch down to see the driver, try to feign non-surprise when I recognize her. "Sandy. Hi."

"Let me give you a ride," she says.

I wave my hand, searching for the polite way to decline.

"None of that. Just get in."

"Please, Sandy, not tonight. I'm just not--"

"Get. In."

I look her in the eye. At that moment I remember another reason I decided not to date her, namely her reputation for tenacious assertiveness. I get in and we pull away. I've ridden in a few hybrids, but none with the get-up-and-go this one exhibits. I conclude at once this responsiveness has less to do with the engine than with the foot pressing on the accelerator.

She turns right, heading north. "My apartment is not that way."

"Who said anything about going to your apartment?"

I retrace the words we've exchanged, and she's right. "Okay, how Clintonesque of you. So you're giving me a ride, and now I have to figure out where."

"Dinner, of course. You haven't had any, have you?" I smile at her, recalling the conversation during which I told her I never go into a stressful situation with a full stomach.

"Got me there," I say. "But I'm not really hungry."

We go to dinner anyway, which turns out to come in the form of a drive-thru at a local Mexican eatery. She pulls out onto Florence Avenue and heads west, somehow managing to balance a soft drink and an order of chicken flautas submerged in guacamole. Without the responsibility of handling a steering wheel, I'm struggling to maintain the same semblance of control over the massive carnitas burrito she convinced me to buy. Actually, I purchased the entire meal because she reminded me that though she's "quite progressive for a Christian chick, I never goes on dates with guys that don't pay for dinner."

"Still headed in the wrong direction," I point out.

I've caught her right after she took a massive bite of one of her flautas. She chews it into submission, douses it with a long sip from her soda and says, "We're still not done with dinner." She smiles at me and returns her attention to the road.

I take the time to take in her appearance. She's dressed in a sage green, long sleeve canvas shirt and baggie cargo pants, neither of which accentuates nor fully succeeds in concealing her lean, muscular figure. Her dark, almost jet black hair drapes over her shoulders, framing a face whose smooth skin hints at a tint of olive. Her lips, still curled into a smile, half mock me, half invite me to accept that life is good, still worth mirth and laughter. Her eyes twinkle in the passing lights with that bright something I've seen in them before, or are they beckoning me with something different, larger, more significant tonight?

She catches me looking at her and asks, "Thoughts? I'm all out of pennies, but I know yours are worth at least a quarter."

Without hesitation I say, "God makes beautiful things."

"Hmm." Her head rises and falls in two small nods, and she smirks. "How does it go? When you come across a beautiful woman, instead of lusting after her, acknowledge God as the creator of beautiful things. Thank him for the beauty he creates. Praise him for his sense for the aesthetic." She looks over at me with a grin, having just quoted verbatim something I said during an all-men's gathering on the topic of self-control and sexual purity. "I may have listened to the tape. Possibly more than once." Her smirk softens. "And you're right. He makes beautiful things. We sometimes turn them ugly, but He keeps giving us beauty."

I look away and out the passenger window. If I cry, I don't want her to see it.

We're driving through the city of Bell. By now I should be asking where we're going, but I know. In a few minutes and after a long interminable string of red lights we reach the outskirts of Huntington Park. A couple of miles later, she makes a right turn on Pacific Avenue. At this time of night, most of the stores, by now dilapidated remnants of once storied Pacific Mile, are closed. Finding a parking spot isn't terribly difficult.

Sandy lets me take in the moment at my own pace. She doesn't say much, just lets my own words and memories get her point across. "When David faced Goliath, he knew he could beat him because God had already helped him defeat the lion and the bear," she says.

That and this neighborhood where I grew up into adulthood is all it takes for me to recall how two years prior I gave a talk to the College and High School groups as part of my interview process. Having just graduated from High School, at age eighteen, Sandy sat in the front row, her eyes locked on me as I shared my testimony. And what a story that young candidate pastor standing before her had to tell. Orphaned boy from Nicaragua, escaping the Contra-Sandinista war that took both his parents' lives, coming to America to be raised by his ailing grandmother, succeeding in his studies at UCLA and starting up his first company while still in his junior year. Eventually that guy would sell his share of the company, pocketing an undisclosed amount, which he used to launch another start-up, this time a Christian online dating service. Having risen from nothing under the most challenging of circumstances, the American dream with faith sprinkled on top, I told the wide-eyed youngsters that, like David, when I faced a big challenge, I recalled how God had already intervened in my life. Which is mostly true, in principle, anyway.

"My problem is that my Goliath has been dead and buried for some time," I say now. And I see nothing but downhill from here, I almost add but don't for fear she'll diagnose me with clinical depression.

Sandy takes the remains of my burrito and re-wraps it in its aluminum foil packaging. "You're having quite the pity party." She adjusts her seat so that she can turn to face me. "Okay, so I make a terrible cheerleader. But surely you know you're not done. Right?"

"I'm feeling pretty done."

"You may be feeling that way, but you know that's not what's actually true, right?"

I blink, taken aback by hearing a woman counsel me on how facts rule over feelings. "Sometimes it feels real because it really is what you ought to feel."

She smiles. "See, you still have your wits about you."

"Look, I appreciate what you're doing. But I really need some time... some space to process this."

"I know." She purses her lips, as if considering the optimum conclusion to her response. "I just want to make sure you're processing... in the right space."

"I'm sorry. The right space?"

"Thought you'd never ask."

She restarts the engine, heads north for a block, hangs a U-turn, and now we're aiming south. The miles and another string of red lights roll by along blighted streets. Pacific Avenue becomes Long Beach Boulevard as we traverse South Gate and Lynwood to arrive in Compton. My unease crosses a maximum threshold when we turn into a parking lot. Decades old vehicles line the parking slots nearest the street, each featuring a hand-made for sale sign. A small, boarded up building that hangs on to a fleeting semblance of church architecture stands, barely, on the other end of the parking lot.

As we drove here, I supposed she wanted me to consider how much space this part of L.A. has for hurting people, or for my memories, or something. Now I realize the space she meant all along lies beyond that graffitied plywood, inside that building where Anglo, then African American, maybe even Hispanic congregations once worshiped.

Sandy pulls the keys out of the ignition and jingles them. "Tour? Yes, Tour."

I consider briefly whether or how to object. Nothing comes to mind other than climbing out of the car and following her. Like she owns the place, she unlocks the front door into what I presume is the sanctuary. Before I change my mind, she grabs me by the arm and pulls me in. Once inside she relocks the door.

"You think your car's going to be out there when we leave?" I say.

"Shut up." She flips some lights on, comprised of no more than four dim incandescent bulbs and pulls me further into the dusty, dingy room. "But you're right. We'll make this quick." She steps away from me, and with keys jingling in her hand, waves around the room. "I know half of the pews are gone, and that's O-K. I rather have chairs so we can reconfigure the space as needed. Get it, the space?"

I don't need to ask a lot of questions. I know why she brought me here. She wants me to start a church here, or to resurrect one, or something even more awesomely miraculous and heroic, and preferably in Spanish, por supuesto.

For a number of reasons, none of them defensible by anything found in the Gospels, I can't do this. I didn't spend my growing up years bettering myself, learning solid English, integrating myself into American society to now rejoin a mini-version of the culture I left behind. Oh, I accept I'll always be Nicaraguan. But that's the Geographical fact of where I was born, not where I need to live now. Add to that how I would be going from a mega-church in the cusp to less than single-A league ball, and this is just not how one advances in ministry.

At this moment I admit who I really am, an opportunist, a comfort first, peace of mind close second, sure thing all the way Christian. I've known this all along, but now I have no choice but to face it at full throttle.

My legs weaken, and I take a seat at a nearby pew. A puff of dust goes up. I cough, then say, "Yeah, I see what you mean about the space." I'm feeling dizzy. The burrito, even what little I ate of it, is roiling in my stomach. To both hide my unease and regain composure I rest my elbows on my knees and lower my head. Unfortunately with every attempt to draw in cleansing, long breaths I inhale the musty scents and dust around me.

From somewhere, Sandy pulls a metal folding chair she opens with a clank in front of me, over the slot where the missing pew once attached to the floor.

"How much did we sink into the castle before we stopped construction?" she asks, referring to the stalled building, the one whose large, pitted brick facade and jagged incomplete walls earned it the title of "the castle" among the younger segments of the congregation. "Two and half mill, give or take?" she asks.

I nod, and she says, "Two and half million, Sebastian. Think what that would have done here."

If my prior admission of selfish ambition proved crushing, her echoing of the question I posed to the board a little over an hour ago pulverizes whatever sense of self-righteousness I have left. I look up at her, and though her lips aren't drawing a smile, her eyes are, or perhaps they are sparking with knowledge she should not have.

"Lester texted me," she says. I flash back to Lester, the youngest board member, head of the mission's committee, quiet, unassuming, and I guess now, not so on cue with the rest of the crew.

"It's the right question to ask, Sebastian. It's the one I would have asked, except I would point out you don't have to look as far as India or Africa. Welcome to Los Angeles, where the Third World is right here among us. But the last thing you need is me lecturing you about that."

I look into her bright blue eyes, shimmering with excitement and with brightness the dim incandescent light bulbs cannot energize. Someone once told me my eyes shone with that same intensity, and that I should not let that passion burn out. Somewhere, somehow, it did. I keep looking at her, my eyes clouding with tears, and I longer care that they start to fall on my cheeks, or that she sees them.

"Tell me more," I manage to say through a strangled throat.

She lunges in and hugs me, hiding my head between her face and shoulder. She lets me cry there for a few minutes. Then she says we have to go, before her car disappears from the parking lot. Outside, I make a crack about the car being there with all four wheels still attached, and we laugh at that as we drive away.

Over the next few minutes the mood remains lighthearted as Sandy recounts how she became involved in the "renewal campaign" for defunct or struggling churches in South Central L.A. The building we just left, as I suspected, was abandoned by an African American congregation.

"A start-up Hispanic congregation tried to make a go of it," she says. "But the building has a lot of problems. Right now they're meeting in homes, saving up to fix it up to at least meet city codes." Sandy pauses to let that sink in before she steps up her pitch. "With your experience in start-ups, starting a new church is more or less in your core, Sebastian. The two or so years you spent at our church, that's just on the job training, mostly to learn what not to do. This is where it's at, though. For you and for ministry that makes a difference."

I weigh whether and how to tell her that an Internet start-up and a church start, or whatever this is she wants me to do are two different things. But I can anticipate her come back, that it's the mode of thinking that's the same, the innovation, the bare bones entrepreneurial ability to get a lot done with barely nothing. I've heard or read it all before. I don't want to get into the argument, so I say nothing.

She breaks the silence with, "They're mostly from Central America. Two Nicaraguan families, actually." She doesn't have to say the rest, that I'm a perfect fit. All I have to do is walk in, speak two words in Spanish, and they'll accept me. She can't do that. Few can, fewer with a seminary education and a Doctorate one semester away.

I'm starting to think if this is God's plan for me, He's entrusted Sandy with all the detailed blueprints. This thought makes me chuckle, in response to which Sandy's brow curls into a question mark.

"I've done two start-ups, so what's one more, en Español this time. Is that it?"

Her brow relaxes, and she smiles. "You're a quick study."

"This start-up of yours needs a lot of financing. In case you didn't notice, I didn't do so well at handling the finances at my last job."

"That's totally different." Her demeanor has switched from levity into a bow wave of passion and indignation that makes me shift my weight toward the passenger door. "Completely different. First, we're talking about a church here, not an office building. An office building. Really? We expected God to bless burning that kind of cash so that pastors and staff could have posher offices while the sanctuary looks like a faded version of something out of the 1970's. Really? Jeez, let's imagine why that failed. Let's ponder why people didn't get behind it with their wallets. Here," she says, her right arm pointing back down the road. "Here's the real thing. Real need, real ministry, real people struggling to find their way."

She retrieves her arm, then points an index finger at me. "And you... You gotta stop beating yourself into the ground. You think that building would be as far along if it weren't for you? You think there would be much more than a hole in the ground if you hadn't managed the project, even though your heart wasn't in it and you were doing it blind-folded and with both arms tied behind your back? You think people would have given as much as they did if it hadn't been for your appeals, even though, again, anybody with half a connection to the Spirit could tell you didn't really have a passion for it? Listen here, and listen clear, Sebastian. You. Were not. The problem."

She's not really watching the road, and I ask her to pull over. We stop along Firestone Boulevard, directly across from South Gate High School.

"You were not," she says. Her lips are quivering and her right hand, index finger still pointed at me, is shaking. "You were not."

I take her hand in mine and lower it gently. I let a moment pass while I weigh whether to ask the question her outburst has prompted. I ease into it with, "You may not want to hear this, but you preach a lot like your dad."

"Delivery may be similar, but please give me credit for better content."

"Must be interesting when you two exchange content." I pause again, hating myself for what I'm about to say, but I have to go there. "I heard you and your dad had a disagreement."

At once I know I've hit a chord. "You could say that." She grips the steering wheel with both hands and looks straight ahead. "You hear a lot of things growing up in a pastor's house, you know."

"The sausage making," I interject.

"Sausage making is purity incarnate compared to what I've heard and seen." The grip on the steering wheel relaxes. She glances at me with a mournful smile. "I heard dad on the phone. When they were working out the bylaw that gave the admin pastor hire-and-fire authority. I heard him say, 'yeah, he'll balk, but eventually he'll go along with it.' A day later I heard him and a couple of board members talking in his study, saying that by having you do the staffing reductions, they'd cause less controversy. Translation: less flak for them. You were still relatively popular with the congregation, especially with the young folks that might object the most. I was incensed. They were setting you up to be the fall guy for the mess they created."

I nod. "You know, your dad isn't a bad man. He's not evil. He's just like the rest of us, trying to find the best way forward."

She faces me again and spits back, "Sure. He's just misguided. He's just lost the thread." She pauses, points at me with her chin, then adds, "It can happen to all of us, even the best of us. We should all be careful not to lose the thread, right?"

I shake my head. The fire in her eyes forces me to look away, down the street. "You should try to work things out with him."

"Hmm. Yes, reconciliation. What was it that one of my favorite Sunday school teachers said once? The role of the Christian isn't to judge or condemn those with whom he has a grievance, but to work through those grievances to reconcile and live at peace with fellow men."

"With a memory like yours, I think I'll stop typing up and saving my lessons."

She shrugs and her lips break into another of her playful grins. "Speaking of that reconciliation thing, there's something we need to talk about."

She restarts the car, and we traverse South Gate and enter what I consider the safer environs of Downey. We find a coffee shop. For the next three hours, Sandy walks me through her plan, or what I at one point I call the "Sandy-Jesus grand bargain." She has it all worked out, except for one thing: the money. When I point that out, she simply reminds me faith and not money is the issue. And vision. Don't forget that you have to inspire people with vision.

Sandy drops me at home after midnight. This will make for a shorter night's sleep than I like to get, but the late hour doesn't really matter. I don't sleep at all. Instead, I lay awake, sit at my kitchen table, lounge on the couch, stare at my computer screen, everywhere thinking about the thing that shouldn't matter. The money. Truth is, as much as we like to say that faith and vision drive purpose and success in ministry, including things that take hard cash, yes, money is important. Jesus wouldn't have burned so many calories talking about it if it wasn't. Money is not the end thing, but it helps run things, and more than anything, how you use it says just about everything there is to say about you: what you prioritize above other things, and what helps you sleep well at night, to name two leading indicators.

So, yes, I think about it. The money. I fret about it all night, until the sun comes up lighting up the answer I don't want to hear, the one I've been running from. Where it's going to come from, or more to the point, where it has to come from.

I stare at my laptop's screen and read the balance summary sheet. When I left the business world, I threw all my assets and investments into a blind trust. Unlike politicians who enter such arrangements, I didn't do it to avoid conflict of interests or the appearance thereof. Rather, I was tired of dealing with it, worrying about it, figuring out where to stash it, where to move it, when and what to buy and to sell, how to stay tax efficient. It may surprise you, and I know most people struggling to make it don't want to hear it, but dealing with too much money can be as much of a consuming burden as figuring out how to pay for your next meal. I wanted someone else to deal with it, so into a blind trust it went.

And there it is, in black and soothing shades of grayish blue. My blind trust, all $1.7 billion of it. My assurance that no matter what I do now, I once did great things, I once was a big deal, and also that if I fall on hard times, I'll never drown in the type of poverty I experienced as a child in Nicaragua or while growing up in a down-trodden L.A. neighborhood. Of course I know all this amounts to foolishness, the sort that hangs hope on a faint, fleeting mirage. I only have to recount the times when various bubbles burst upon financial markets to see that my portfolio had dipped as low as $1.1 billion, poof, just like that, over half a million dollars gone, then slowly reappearing as if out of thin air, testimony that none of it is terribly real and that with a more severe burp in the market, that balance sheet could just as easily flash a long stream of goose eggs.

Thinking of eggs, after I shave and shower I treat myself to an omelet with diced mushrooms and shredded ham lunch meat. Two cups of coffee later I return to my laptop to put together the story, the one about the money. It takes a few phone calls to my blind trust manager and a couple of venture capital colleagues who helped me during my old start-up days. Accepting the devil and his details still lurk, waiting for me to find them, I reach a point of good-enough satisfaction some time before 2 PM.

Realizing I haven't eaten anything for seven hours, I chew on a granola bar and wash it down with milk. I set my cellphone's alarm for 3:45 PM and lay on the couch for nap. I catch a 95 minute nap and wake up refreshed, the best sleep I've had in months.

The ten minute walk to church takes me seven. There, I pause again in front of the marquis. I smile when I find my name still listed below Pastor Walter's. Inside I meet Sandy, standing by the receptionist's desk. She raises one eyebrow and smiles. I can tell she and Cassy have been exchanging notes, and Cassy's smile leaves no doubt she's pleased with the turn of events. Well, what we hope is the turn of events.

A few minutes pass before Cassy's phone buzzes. She ushers Sandy and I into the boardroom where we find a subset of the board, namely Pastor Wolter, the de facto Chair -- though neither the church bylaws nor the board calls him that -- Lester, the Chair of the Mission's committee; Thompson, Chair of the Human Resources committee; and Albert Hensen, Chair of the Finance committee. A couple of Hensen's committee members have joined us as well. After all, when the spiritual faith and vision dust clears, we're here to talk about The Money.

Handshaking and greetings soon give way to business. Looking across the long table at me, Walter jump-starts with, "I understand we're here to rescind your dismissal."

I consider whether to correct his misstatement -- again -- of how it came to be I no longer work for the church, but Sandy is already answering.

"No, we are here to talk about where and how God wants us to invest His resources."

Her sentence strikes the room with the snap of a cattle whip. Women don't participate in these types of meetings, much less talk like that, and perish the thought they should attempt to remove the plank in the Senior Pastor's eye, even if he happens to be her father. The tension is palpable, and I fear this meeting is speeding toward a quick and thunderous derailment.

To my relief, Lester steps in with, "I think it would be best if we focus on the outreach and mission aspects of this proposal, then consider other details."

"I agree, Rick," Thompson tells Wolter. "Let's hear them out. From the overview Lester gave me at lunch today it sounds interesting." Hensen and at least one of his committee members are nodding, which tells me they too broke bread with Lester and Thompson.

Wolter's nose flares in that way it does when he feels blindsided, out of the information loop, unable to foresee and control. I look at Lester, and he flashes me the briefest, subtlest of winks. When I look back at Wolter, he's staring at me, saying, "Well, let's hear it."

I stare back at him for a brief moment, then break eye contact and turn to look at Sandy. Every other head around the table turns to her as well.

For the next few minutes she summarizes how through a weekend project at school she learned hands-on about the plight of small churches in the inner city. With efficient prose she describes the demographic shift from a predominant African American to an immigrant, poor Hispanic population. She explains how this shift has resulted in many struggling or closed churches. "A mostly unchurched Hispanic population, with sporadic involvement in the Catholic faith offers a hungry mission field," she says. Many social needs exist as well, and the opportunity to help Hispanics with tutoring of school children and life skill classes for adults is "immense, almost overwhelming." She concludes that "our church, affluent and ripe with gifted people, only a few miles away, must step in and help."

Lester nods his approval when she concludes her remarks.

"Wow, this is something we really need to pray about," one of the finance committee members says.

Sandy shakes her head. "No, this is something we're going to do something about. And now." She's snapped that cow whip again, and I'm once more imagining a massive derailment.

"Well, this takes money. And preparation," Hensen says. "We can't just jump in--"

"As it turns out, we have to jump in, or there won't be any water to jump into," Sandy says. "A silent investor has stepped in and offered to refinance the castle at zero percent interest, with additional funding thrown in to help with the church start-up project, so long as our church's congregation supports the inner city outreach campaign. The offer expires in two days."

"This silent investor," Wolter says, looking at me. "Does he have any other conditions?"

Again, I turn to Sandy, and she says, "Only one, in addition to having the congregation get behind this outreach effort, the castle must be reassigned into an education building."

"We can't do that," Hensen says. "We don't have the money to reconfigure a building"

"Perhaps you missed the part about the silent investor and additional funding?" Sandy shoots back. "Besides, have you been in the castle lately? The insides are pretty much a blank slate. You can do anything you want in there."

"But the engineering blueprints, the plans--"

"The architect will have to revise the plans," I say, deciding it's a good time to step in and diffuse yet another bout of tension. "And yes, that will cost some money. But net-net, the overall construction costs to setup an educational space will actually come in lower by about--"

"How much lower?" Hensen cuts in.

"By about $300K, maybe $350K." I am guesstimating, but on the conservative side. Even if I don't have a precise estimate from the construction company, I know throwing out a number, especially a sizeable one, cuts through the irrational bunk spewed in these types of meetings.

"Hmm," Sandy puts in. "Maybe we could use some of that money to retrofit some of the old educational building into offices, and maybe have a little left over to spruce up existing office space."

I catch Wolter's eye to see he is glaring at me again. "This your idea, I take it?" he asks.

"I know it's hard to believe, Rick, but I didn't know anything about this until last night."

"You're right. It's hard to believe."

I nod. "Perhaps you and I should sit down and clear the air in private after this. All I'll say for now is that hard or not, we're in the belief business, aren't we?"

Now I've snapped the whip, and someone else \-- Lester as it turns out -- has to step in to prevent the derailment. In his soft, matter of fact, unexcited way he outlines what must happen from this point on. He passes out an action plan, point by point, and over the next hour we go over it, agreeing on red lines and adjustments. As Lester guides us through this process, I exchange several glances with Sandy. From the glimmer in her eye I gather she and Lester plotted this chess game down to the last possible combination, including the inexorable end game wherein I remain as a deputy pastor, sent out to run an inner city church plant, my salary cut in half, though retaining full medical benefits, supported by the home church's congregation.

The meeting concludes shortly after seven in the evening. I'm guessing Pastor Wolter is not terribly interested in clearing the air, or he has more pressing matters, like dinner or spitting in his beer because he heads out the door before we can hold the one-on-one I suggested. Though she didn't have to stay, Cassy is waiting for us in the reception area. A look at Sandy's smile and Cassy knows the meeting went well.

"So you'll be coming back to preach twice a year?" Cassy asks, and I shake my head at Sandy, wondering how many more people she included in her planning.

Sandy shrugs and says, "I may have recruited a few prayer partners."

Lester slaps me on the back and looks at me in the way guys do when they want to non-verbally say, "Dude, you never knew what hit you."

We say our good byes, and Sandy offers to take me out to dinner again. When I inquire further to ensure a sit-down dinner, she says the Chinese restaurant within walking distance will do. So long as I'm paying.

After dinner, I walk her back to the church parking lot.

"I have a question," I say. "Why didn't you tell me about all this before? You and Lester knew what was going on. Why wait until I'm out on the street to come to me with the grand plan?"

She grabs me by the lapels of my jacket and for a moment looks at my chest, rests her forehead on it, as if the answer lies there. When I look back on this moment I will admit that yes, actually the answer was in there.

"The holier and hypocritical answer is that everything happens in God's timing," She says, looking up at me. "The rubber-meets-the-road answer comes in the form of a question. Would you have even given me the time of day before last night?"

I shake my head and smile. She leans in and kisses me, and I know this too was part of the plan all along.

#  Elie's Choice

Behind him the packed chapel murmurs with the polite whispers of mourners. Through a tearful blur Steve Morris stares at the coffins of his wife and daughter. Or is it his guilt, unjustified as he keeps telling himself it is, that he sees before him? Or are those coffins monuments to his inability to foresee and prevent tragedy? Or maybe he is staring down God himself for so senselessly and prematurely snatching them from life. No matter how many variations of these questions and thoughts his mind composes, in the end he ends up with guilt. Guilt that he wasn't a good husband, that he caused his wife's depression, and hence the car crash. The car crash no one can classify as accidental because of all the open questions, including the one that goes something like, "but she wouldn't kill herself _and_ her teenage daughter, would she?"

Steve closes his eyes. He has to regain his composure. The preacher is winding down the recounting of Betty's short life and shorter accomplishments. Steve knows every word because he drafted them himself. He couldn't bring himself to reading them, knowing he'd fall apart, but as they draw to a close, he'll do what he can do. He'll stand and sing for his wife, Maggie, a selection from John Rutter's Requiem titled _Pie Jesu_ , followed by a Bebo Norman song, _All that I Have Sown_ , for his daughter Betty.

He can do this, he reminds himself, because he's a professional, classically trained, talented, and above all, experienced, capable of channeling emotion -- even, no, especially the crushing kind -- into his art. He will not cry. Not a single note will crack. At the end of himself, this is all he has left, the last gift he can give the two women in his life, now in their death, or eternal life, if he can still manage to hang on to that.

Eyes still closed, he hears the preacher's voice go silent before his name, Steve Morris, echoes through the hushed chapel. Steve opens his eyes and stands. He nods to the organist, a personal friend and collaborator, and steps up to the platform as the first chords ring out softly. Facing the audience now, he closes his eyes. The solo portion is written for a soprano boy and requires a wide range, which Steve carries, falsetto included. He has arranged the music so that the organ fills in the choral portions in the original, as-written arrangement. Together the organ and his lone high tenor voice reverberate through the chapel repeating the Latin lyrics, _Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem, Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis sempiternam requiem._ "Blessed Lord Jesus, grant them rest. Blessed Lord Jesus, grant them eternal rest." As challenging as this piece may be, the four and a quarter minutes it takes flow by softly, gently, soaring with every high note, ebbing with every inflection, gravely floating with the low notes.

The next song proves tougher, not technically but because the words, more plentiful and in his native tongue lash him too truly, too harshly, too sadly at every raw spot of suffering within him. He is also at the piano, eyes open this time, partially facing the congregation. And as he breathes out the first few lines he sees her, the reason for the guilt, Elie Jensen, that beautiful sixteen year old, the talented star pupil in his youth church choir, the one that's haunted his thoughts and tortured him with regret though all she means for him is love, and the purest kind at that.

All that I have sown, he sings out during the chorus. All that I have sown.

With eyes closed he folds back into the music and the lyrics and nothing else because that's the only way he'll finish. And he does. He finishes what some will tell him later, with arms around his shoulders, stands clearly as one of his most outstanding, most heartfelt and inspiring performances.

Outside he foregoes the car ride and walks along lawns of green and tombstones and trees that sway in the warm early afternoon wind. His friend the organist, the pastor, and a few others follow a few paces behind, giving him space while the rest of the procession winds through side roads to arrive at the nearby grave site where two deep rectangular holes await those caskets. _All that I have sown,_ he reprises.

By the time he arrives, the crowd has already formed.

She is also there, standing to the side with her parents. Sweet thing that she is, she offered to sing at the funeral, but that would have proved too much. Steve couldn't have stood that. He would have collapsed under the weight of her, and she, Elie, angelic in voice and spirit, has no idea, no concept because life has yet to stain her conscience or lash at her with unbearable, senseless pain.

Steve cannot sit with the others. Instead, he kneels, hands resting on his thighs, squarely in between the two graves where minutes later caskets rest atop each of the temporary fixtures. There he remains through the brief graveside ceremony. There he kneels as friends and family pat him on the back, or bend down to hug him before taking their leave. There he kneels until he's all alone, and until behind him he hears the backhoe beeping up the hill.

A nearby tree provides him cool shelter from the westward leaning sun. From there he watches workers lower the caskets, stitch up the ground and roll ready-made grass over it all. When they're gone he goes back, sits between them, facing west this time. It's a good spot, he thinks comforting himself with visions of the beautiful sunsets Maggie and Betty will see from here. Except they won't. Not really, because that's not them down there. Not if everything he's heard and read in church proves true in the end, that end he once considered so clear and certain and which now smells of dirt and replanted grass.

The sun is beginning to make its way down into the Pacific when he sees her, coming up the hill toward him. His first reaction wants to be anger, but it can't linger for long. Maybe there's no guilt to be had. Maybe now he could be free from it, from the insidious trap of feeling it when there was nothing to regret or forgive or confess but a dream, a what-if scenario, a mirage of what might have been.

"You okay?" she asks in that voice and tone she uses when when wants to sound more childish than she truly is.

He shrugs and looks away.

"It was beautiful. The service. The way you sang. I'm glad I didn't sing anything. It would've been like nails on a chalkboard compared to how you poured your heart into the moment."

He rubs his eyes, expecting tears, but they're raw and dry, all out of self-pity, he rues to himself.

"The most beautiful thing of all is how you loved them," she adds. "Whatever happens next, I'll always love you for it. Forever. Without shame."

"Elie, this isn't the time--"

"I know. I'm sorry. My heart's just aching for you. But I know you need the space. And the time." She pauses, perhaps waiting for him to respond, but he has nothing to say.

"When the right time comes, I want us to talk. I know it's very painful now, but things are different now, too. Anyway, I'm sorry. I'll go now."

"No, sit." He pats the ground next to him.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, stay with me."

Showing more respect than he did, she sits a few yards away, just outside of the perimeter of freshly planted grass. "It's not good for the grass," she explains. "To sit on it."

"It will grow," Steve says. "And if it doesn't, they'll plant more. Trust me, if my checkbook is any indicator, it's all covered." He looks at her to see her cast an awkward smile.

"It's getting dark," she says.

"And your parents will be wondering where you are."

"Yeah."

"We can't make this work, Elie. Not even now that I'm free to marry whomever I want. For a number of reasons."

"Let's not talk about it now," she says. "It's not the right time for you. Grieve, and then we talk, okay?"

"It doesn't feel right, Elie. And it doesn't feel right because it isn't."

"It doesn't feel right because what? You're laden with guilt about spending time with me to give me voice lessons and help me rehearse songs? Because you think you were lusting after me, and Jesus says that makes you an adulterer? Well, that's just Satan's lie. I may be sixteen, but I've seen plenty of guys looking at me lustfully, and let me tell you, I didn't see any of that in your eyes."

"It's more than that."

"It's what you make it. In your head. The lie you let seep into your heart and fester until you swear it's real. You did nothing wrong. If anything, I did, by harassing you and not taking no for an answer when you wanted to curtail things. So stop it, okay. Stop beating yourself up, especially now that you are alone. You don't need that baggage."

Steve looked at her, admiring not so much her beauty and talent, but her forcefulness and insight. But he knew she was also biased. He knew her arguments and insight came from love, not reason, even if they had the ring of reason. They came because she wanted to love him, and wanted him to love her in return.

"I don't know why Maggie crashed the car," he says.

"And you don't have to dream up that she did it because she thought you had a crush on me or me on you. You never touched me, never even made a move, Steve. You've nothing to be ashamed--."

"Still--"

"Still nothing, Steve. Did she know you liked me, or that I liked you? Did she call you out on it? Ever? Did you talk about me? Well?"

"No."

"Then it sounds like you're beating yourself up over facts not in evidence."

Steve nodded. "Whenever we talked about you, it was always about how wonderful you were, how well you sing. And it was mostly Maggie doing the talking." He refrains from adding he kept it that way because if he talked about Elie, Maggie might have clued in. Then his mind skips to another memory, and he blurts it out. "Maggie loved you. I think sometimes she wished you were her daughter instead of Betty," he adds, recalling all the fights and friction between Maggie and Betty, all the times he stepped in to avert further strife, and the last time they fought, the morning of the car crash.

"I loved Maggie, too," Elie says. "And Betty. We were good friends."

"Yeah," Steve says, at once out of words and thoughts.

Elie stands up. "I gotta go. You wanna ride home?"

"I think I'm okay to drive. Haven't had a drink in hours."

She giggles, then stands there, and Steve can tell she's weighing whether it'd be okay to come over and hug him. "Alright," she says as she steps away. "Let's talk, okay? You get better first then we talk. Okay?"

He watches her head down the hill. For the next thirty minutes, he watches the last of the sun dip beyond the western horizon. Even in darkness, the air remains warm and soothing, and he stays there until the last bit of sky goes black.

###

Elie waited until her mom went grocery shopping. She'd said she was also going by the cleaners, the shop she preferred on the other side of town, so Elie figured that gave her around an hour and a quarter alone with dad. She found him sitting in front of the TV, in his recliner chair, reading from his tablet, the TV showing a pregame football show with the sound off.

"Dad?"

His angular, stern face lit up and softened. "Yeah, sweet-ums."

"I need to talk to you about something."

He turned off the TV, flipped the tablet cover on and set it aside, just as she expected. When she turned eleven, her dad sat her down and said he wanted to keep the communication channels open between them. "Father to daughter, daughter to father, without interference," he said. No matter what she was going through, no matter what she'd done, all she had to do was come to him, and he'd be there to listen, to understand, to help, to love her no matter what. He'd said it just like that.

Elie was banking on that now, was about to cash in on the open relationship they'd struggled to maintain once she got her period and ran full speed ahead into teenagehood. It wasn't always easy, but things stayed good between them, channels flowing open wide. Except for one thing, the one thing she'd kept from him. Until now.

"Everything okay?" he asked. Concern clouded his face, which seemed to whiten a bit, or maybe she was just imagining it.

Elie was banking on his concern, too. She'd imagined that when she approached him like this, all serious, he'd imagine the worst, like she'd contracted some venereal disease or gotten pregnant. She'd banked on the sigh of relief he would breathe when she told him what this was all about. But to get the full effect, she had to get there gradually, not all at once. She felt a little odd about thinking this way. Manipulative was the big word that kept flashing through her head as she prepared to talk to him. But it was for a good cause, no, a pure cause. It was for love, and he'd understand. She just had to do it lovingly, and he'd get behind her, like he always did.

Elie let his question hang in the air as she pulled an ottoman and sat in front of him, close enough that if he wanted to, he could lean forward and touch her face or hug her. "Dad, I need your help with something that's really weighing heavy on me."

He leaned forward, close enough that she could smell his breath. "Anything, sweet-ums. You know it. I'm here for you."

"Dad," she said, both surprised and pleased that her voice had cracked all on its own. But she didn't need to feel fake or manipulative or anything like that about it. This _was_ a big emotional deal for her, wasn't it?

"Dad," she started again. "I have something to tell you, and you're not going to like it, okay?"

Elie saw him clench his jaw. His voice got raspy and shaky. "I'm here for you. Anything."

She nodded, feeling a tear, a real one, she told herself, starting down her cheek.

"Honey," he said, dabbing the tear with his right thumb. "Just tell me, okay?"

"Suppose I'm in love, really in love, Dad. And yeah, I know I'm young, and I know what they say. By the time I'm eighteen, my world will be different, and when I'm twenty, it'll change again, so I don't know what love is. I've heard all that."

"There's nothing wrong with being in love, sweet-ums. Nothing. It's natural. It's good and holy so long as you keep it pure."

"I have, dad," she said, watching the first wave of relief wash over him. "And it's not a fling, not some infatuation with a cute guy I met last week. It's real, dad. I know what you're thinking, but I've been at this for two years, dad. Two solid years, and it's not going away. It's getting stronger, and more painful because I can't do anything about it."

He nodded, taking in what she'd said, not jumping on her. This was good. He was doing well, Elie assured herself. He was living up to his promise to be supportive, to not assume the worst, to hear her out no matter what.

"How can I help? What can I do to help you?" he asked after a short but heavy silence.

His question caught her by surprise. Elie didn't want him this far along yet. Still she should've known he'd just get right to the bottom line, just like he did business at work and at church. Straight up, no beating around the bush, let's just get it done, life's getting shorter every second, like he often said.

"It's complicated, dad. It's hard. That's why I kept it in. I didn't tell you because I didn't think you could do anything about it except worry." Or move out of state, which would have killed her, she didn't say. "That, and I told myself it'd just go away, that I wouldn't feel this way for long. But I was wrong about that. Very wrong, and now things have changed, and I think you can help me."

He took Elie's hands in his and said, "Okay. It's okay. No matter how big this feels, just remember what the Bible says--"

"And it came to pass."

"Right. As heavy and big as this may feel, it will pass. And, I'm going to be here for you all the way, okay? We're going to carry it together."

Elie let his words hang in the air, letting the pause cement and fortify them until she felt the time had come to say, "I need your permission to get married."

He tightened his grip on her hands just a little and looked at her with a tense smile. "Now?"

Elie noted his reply came one letter away from the answer she feared. That additional W made all the difference. It came down to timing, when, rather than never, and that left room for possibility. But not too much possibility. The question mark could also mean not now, not immediately, not until you are ready. Her answer had to thread the delicate span between the W and the question mark, or they could both drop off and leave her with "no." And she needed him to say "yes" because in the state of California, she needed parental consent or else she'd have to wait nearly two years before she could marry Steve.

"Soon," she said.

"How soon?"

"I want it to be a nice wedding. We'll have to prepare. Six months, maybe eight?"

He kept smiling, but Elie could see him swallowing.

"I know I'm sixteen, dad, and I'll still be sixteen in eight months. More than anyone else, I'm fully aware of that. But you said it yourself during my birthday party. You said I'm poised and wise beyond my years."

"I did say that," he interjected. "But it is wise to acknowledge you may not be ready yet."

Yeah, she knew the word ready or some permutation thereof would come up. She'd worked out an answer for that, too, and she fired it out. "Well, maybe it's true that most girls aren't ready to marry when they're sixteen, but I am. I know I am. Besides, this thing about not getting married until you're twenty-something or out of college or out of High School is modernist fiction, institutionalized into our laws under the guise of protecting the children. Yeah, I know. Big words, but one should wonder how many Bible characters would've had to postpone their births by a decade if their mothers waited to be _old enough_ to marry. That includes Jesus, by the way, virgin birth or not. Apparently God himself thought Mary was _old enough_ and when he got her pregnant as a teenager, with the Savior of the world, no less. Guess she was _ready_ after all."

"That answers at least two questions I haven't asked."

Elie cocked her head, shrugged half way. "Just trying to move things along."

She could tell he was trying to keep up a serious expression, but soon his lips broke into a broad smile. "I can tell you have been pondering this for a while, Bible research with modernist _and_ social analysis sprinkled in."

She smiled back and gave him her best girly one-shoulder shrug. "Google is my friend."

For a few seconds they shared a sincere but awkward chuckle before her father's face returned to serious-business mode soon enough. "But there's more," he said in his usual way of just throwing out a mere three or four words that evoked a million open questions.

"Dad, I _don't_ have V.D., I'm _not_ pregnant, I am still a virgin, the whole package, okay? You can relax. It's not like that." In her mind, she'd rehearsed this line. It came out just as she had envisioned, but she wasn't sure whether it belonged in the current conversation's flow and context. She looked him in the eye and held him there to let him know she wasn't lying. "I haven't even kissed the guy, okay? Tell me you and mom could say that before you got married."

That last sentence came out on its own, without the benefit of pre-rehearsal or assessment of impact. That was okay, because it sort of fit, and it sounded natural, organic, non-rehearsed. And perhaps a little too raw. She regretted saying it as soon as she saw him flinch. His jaw muscles tightened and rippled as he ground his teeth like he had when, as a littler girl, she sassed him. She'd pushed too hard, and she really didn't need to take that dig, anyway. The-never-been kissed part would have been fine enough.

"I'm sorry, Dad. What I meant was--"

He cut off her apology with a raised hand. "Like I've told you. It's okay to kiss so long as it stays within the right boundaries. And that's what we're talking about here, isn't it, Elie? Doing things the sound way, the wise way. Thinking it through so we don't bust past boundaries just because it seemed like a good idea at the time."

He paused, and Elie could tell he was struggling with what he'd say next. She gave him the space and time he needed. At this point she could have argued about boundaries, how sometimes you do have to go off trail to see what else is out there. But they'd had that discussion before, and now she'd said enough. Pushing harder now would not prove as productive as listening. And respecting him.

He held her eyes, and in his she could see his love and concern in proportions she hadn't seen before. After a few moments not as tense as they felt comforting, he said, "Look, your mom and I, that's ancient history, and no, we weren't perfect. We've hinted at that, and I'll tell you now we could have been better, and that's why we've worked so hard with you, to make sure you have it better. And I'm glad to hear you are doing better. You may not think so, but I'm even glad to hear that you want to get married in order to fully love the person you've fallen in love with."

"But you wish it came a few years later."

"Of course I do," he said, squeezing her hands again. "You're my only daughter, my one child. My angel, and all that sappy stuff."

His eyes welled up with tears, and Elie felt a little guilty for putting him through this. But it had to be, and he'd be okay in the end, if she could just get there the right way. Besides, she could tell he was softening, warming up to the idea. If he was going to stand against it, he would've balked harder by now, wouldn't he?

Another preconceived line came to mind, and she let it fly. "Well, look at it this way, Dad. The sooner I get married, the sooner you can play with my babies. I'll even promise to work hard at getting you at least one girl."

Still tearful, he smiled, even laughed a little. "You've really thought this conversation through, haven't you?"

She tilted her head, gave him another of her coquettish one-shoulder shrugs. "Okay, yeah, maybe a little."

He smiled back in a way that told her, okay, but he was still older and wiser than her. Elie braced for the hardest part.

"So... you want to fill in some of the details, like who's this knight in shining armor patiently waiting in the wings for two years, why you haven't kissed him, what are some of the reasons I couldn't help you until now, and anything else you think will help me fill in the gaps?"

Elie tried to smile, suddenly feeling outmatched by his wit, unready to pull off what she needed to get across. He loved her, unconditionally even, but her dad was sharp, the smartest guy she knew. Even if as her mom claimed his brains had gone one hundred percent into her, Elie knew that if it came down to a match of intellects, she'd flub this whole thing. No, she had to keep it higher than that. This was about love. Hers for another man, and her dad's love for her, which meant the way forward must balance those two things above what made sense, or actually, what people foolishly thought made sense.

She took a deep breath and said. "He's older."

"Ah," her dad said with that there-drops-the-other-shoe look of his.

"Significantly older, actually."

He tried to smile, but his lips twisted into something less jovial. "Quantify significant for me."

A sound at the front door announced her mom's return. Elie looked at the clock mounted on the wall to her left. It had been, what? Only thirty minutes? Great! What was she doing here?

When Elie turned the other way, her mom was already standing at the doorway into the family room, purse slung over her left forearm.

"Went by the cleaners first, forgot my coupons for the groceries..." Her mom paused, frowned. "Everything okay?"

"Elie and I are chatting," her dad said, letting go of Elie's hands, as if caught in an awkward situation he didn't want known.

"You need me?" her mom asked.

"Nah, we're cool," her dad replied. "Father-daughter stuff."

Elie let out a silent sigh at his response. The last thing she needed was mom inserting herself in this conversation and complicating dad's thinking. Since his style was to have agreement between him and mom for all big decisions, he'd have to convince her, but he could do that much better once _he_ became fully convinced.

Her mom said okay, went into the bedroom, came back out, sped by in a blur saying something about having fun with their father-daughter secrets, closed the front door behind her, and Elie was back to facing her dad, and his question.

"Dad, I love him. And he loves me. Age should not have anything with it."

"Okay, since you're not telling me, I'm going to guess he's what? Twice your age?" She could tell he'd said that expecting to get the final answer out of her because he expected the guy was actually younger. When she didn't answer, he sighed. "What? Older than that?"

She'd prepared for this moment, too, but when she'd daydreamed about it, her next response sounded good, powerful, a total clincher. Now, in the moment, it struck her as harsh and offensive, but it was all she had, so she shot it out, fast and without blinking.

"Dad, do you think you're old?"

"Oh, Jesus, Elie. You mean older as in my age?"

She raised an index finger. "Lord's name in vain."

"Yeah, sure, Elie. Cute." His jaw was clenching again, he tightened his lips in an obvious attempt to get a hold of himself. He stood up, walked over to the fire place, raised his hand to say, "I'm sorry. I'm blowing it right now. I'm losing my cool. But help me out, okay?" He turned to face her. "Stop drawing this out. It's killing me. Just tell me, all at once, like you're ripping off the band aid, okay?"

"It's hard, dad."

"I know. But just tell me. I know him, right? I do, from church probably. Just let it out, okay?"

"Okay," she said, and she ripped off the band aid all the way.

###

Elie's father, Elliot Jensen, and Steve Morris met during the noon lunch hour at the Palm Restaurant in Downtown L.A. On the phone they'd agreed on this spot as appropriate, since they both had business nearby earlier that morning, Steve just up the 101 in Hollywood, Elliot in a local law firm. Over the phone, they'd discussed the matter at the summary level. So, Steve wanted to marry Elie. Yeah, but it wasn't an easy decision, Elliot. Elie seemed pretty set on it. Yeah, she was pretty adamant about it, Steve agreed.

They could have talked the whole thing out over the line, but Steve wanted to handle the discussion face-to-face, amicably, over a meal. He'd learned over the years and even saw it as a spiritual principle that breaking bread together made things go better, especially the tough discussions, whether they involved secular, church or personal business. He said as much to Elliot now, and the two men agreed on this point at least, which Steve wanted to take as a hopeful sign, while knowing better than to underestimate the upward steepness of the slope ahead of him.

Anyway, it shouldn't be too bad, Steve told himself. Elie'd texted saying Elliot just wanted to talk it thru, but never said no or shown himself against the marriage. That, Elie had texted Steve, was the real sign of hope.

They ordered appetizers and sparkling water, planning to talk one-on-one first, hopefully getting everything settled in an hour, since Eli and her mother Cynthia were joining them at around 1:00 PM for a full lunch.

"She really loves you, Steve," Elliot said the second the waiter stepped away. "She's crazy about you. Deeply. Claims she's loved you for two years."

"I know this is hard for you," Steve said, repeating what he'd said on the phone, then adding, "If this were my daughter, I don't know that I'd be sitting here with the old geezer that wants to take her away from me."

Elliot smiled. "You should have heard her talk about the age differential. Gave her mother and I a Biblical dissertation, example after example of older men marrying younger women in the Bible. Capped it off with her favorite story, Ruth and Boaz, her kinsman redeemer."

"She may have to reprise that lecture to the entire church."

"Is that what you're most afraid of, Steve? What the church will think about you marrying her because of the age difference?"

"It wouldn't make you take pause?"

"It's not what matters. Yes, I'm still Elie's father, but to heck with what other people think. That's not what's keeping me up at night."

"What is, then? You don't care about the age thing?"

"Oh, I do. For practical reasons, like I hope you leave a generous nest egg for her when the Lord takes you, and I also will pray you have the physical energy to keep up with her and do a solid job in raising your kids. That's way ahead of what a few gossips will say and what others will think. But actually, Steve, after really thinking this through and praying about it, I have to admit it's not really the age thing that bothers me most. Not directly, anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"Kids, they can be manipulated. You know that. As her choir director, you could have done that. For more than two years, if memory serves me right. While you were married. I need you to look me in the eye and tell me that didn't happen."

"I'm sorry. Are we talking about the same Elie? You know her better than I do, Elliot. She's got a strong and keen mind. I don't want to seem overly flattering here toward you, but she's kind of like you, from what I hear. You can't get much past her."

"Still, in matters of the heart--"

"Sure, Elliot. I know where you're coming from. Look, I'm not pointing the finger at her, but she herself will tell you she drove things. Okay, I see that doesn't sound good to you, and I get it. Let's just say this is very much her choice. Be honest with me. We wouldn't be sitting here if she hadn't driven hard when she talked to you. Did she seem manipulated to you when you two talked?"

Elliot seemed to tense up, then eased up, as if rolling down the other side of a hill of emotion.

Steve considered whether he'd said enough, then decided to add, "In all this time, Elliot, you have to believe me when I say I've been discouraging her and pushing her away in every way I know how. Even after Maggie--"

Steve halted in midsentence and looked away. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Elliot nodding, waiting, giving him the space.

"Even after I was single," Steve said.

"You weren't attracted to her. Didn't flirt with her. Didn't give her the wrong idea. At all. In all that time."

Steve felt himself well up with emotion, and he didn't care. He'd let it hang and spray all over the place, whether it created a mess or not.

"Come'on, Elliot," he said. "Your daughter is beautiful, sings like an angel and dreams like a prophet. Of course she's attractive. Remarkably so. Show me a guy that says he isn't attracted to her and distracted by her, and I'll show you a guy that's either a liar or six feet under. Yeah, I was attracted to her, but that's where it stopped."

"I sense a touch guilt or regret in your voice. I don' want to judge, okay? From everything I've seen and heard of you around church, I have no reason to believe you're anything but a solid guy. I saw how you raised your family... How you mourned them. I'm just not God, Steve. I can't know your heart. I just want you to level with me. Let me know my daughter isn't stepping into something that started on the wrong foundation."

"Okay, here it is. My heart, all of me," Steve said, his eyes welling up with tears. "I gave her more attention than I should have. I favored her, though God knows that's the natural thing to do since he Himself favored her with amazing singing talent and beauty and poise and intellect few of us mortals dream of. In my heart of hearts, I knew I was spending too much time with her, potentially leading her heart astray. As soon as I caught myself doing it and sensed her developing an interest, I stopped it. When she sought more time with me than was appropriate, I confronted her, straight out. Told her that could not go on and would not go on. At all. In no uncertain terms. I told her, Elliot."

Elliot nodded. "Okay, fair enough."

"And it broke my heart when I saw hers shrinking, shriveling with shattered hope. It kills me just now thinking about it. I wasn't perfect, got way too close to the edge, but I never crossed the line."

"See, I think you did, but we can disagree on that," Elliot replied. "So long as you can look me in the eye and tell me nothing impure happened."

"If you want me to tell you my mind was one hundred percent pure, sorry man. Sinner saved by grace here, muddling my way through as best I know how, holding on to the Lord's coat tails as if my life depends on it because it does. But if you want to know that we didn't as much as touch in an impure way, here are my eyes. Read from them what you may."

Elliot took this in for a few moments that for Steve foreshadowed eternity, namely the length of it.

Elliot nodded again, double-tapped on the table with his ring finger. "Fair enough," he said right before he noticed his phone was buzzing. "It's Cynthia," he said and answered it, listened to it, cupped his hand over it, and said to Steve, "They're early, just parked. Want to know if they can come in. Are we good?"

Steve drew a long breath, let it out slowly, like he did to calm himself before a difficult song. "I am if you are."

"One last thing," Elliot said, his hand still covering his cellphone's microphone.

"Shoot."

"You've been through a lot. Are you getting counseling?"

Steve nodded. "Yeah. It's helping."

"Good. I want you and Elie to get pre-marital counseling. I'll pay for it."

"That won't be necessary. I mean, the bill's on me."

Elliot shot Steve a hard stare then spoke into the phone, "We'd love to have you join us."

Steve heard the voice on the other side and recognized it as Elie, letting out a squeal. Elliot hung up and the two men smiled at each other.

They stood up as the two women approached.

"I hope you two were done talking," Cynthia said, tilting her head in Elie's direction. "This one just _had_ to call and see if you were ready for us." She gave her husband a peck on the cheek, then turned to Steve to give him a sideways hug.

She then took her seat, next to Steve, effectively forcing Elie to sit across the table opposite Steve.

"I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the brains in the family," Cynthia said. "But I'd still like you to explain to me, Steve, how it came to be that you are snatching my daughter away in the prime of her most annoyingly frustrating teenage years. Or to put it more simply, convince me."

"Mom!"

Cynthia raised a hand "You've said your piece. Now it's his turn."

Steve looked at her and allowed his tears to flow unrestrained. "Cynthia, I love your daughter. Very much. I'll give my life for her. If there's something else you want me to say, I'm sorry, but I'm all out."

Through his tears he saw Cynthia reach for her napkin. "You made me cry at the funeral," she said. "And now you're out to ruin my mascara again."

###

Elie and Steve walked hand in hand up the grassy hill. Steve led the way, drawing a path that avoided stepping on the graves. Midway up the hill they stopped. Elie was already dabbing away at her eyes with a lacy handkerchief. Steve's eyes remained dry, his expression less than joyful, but not somber. His chest did not ache with the anguish that attacks a man unwilling to cry. He was good, he thought, calm. Maybe this was the right time and place after all.

"Thanks for coming with me," he said to Elie. "It's hard to come here by myself. First time I couldn't even drive myself home. Had to call a taxi."

Elie nodded, smiling and blinking off a couple of more tears. "I don't know if I'll be much help in the driving department today, though."

He lowered his head and kissed her on the forehead. "They'll always be a part of me. You know that."

"I would think you're a jerk if that wasn't the case."

"It complicates things. You know that. You aren't my first. In the back of my mind I'll always fall into comparisons. Maggie used to do it that way, but Elie--"

"Shh." She pressed an index finger against his lips. "I get it."

"And I'm going to die long before you, and they're going to bury me right here, next to Maggie. You get that too."

"All the way."

Steve shook his head and felt his throat constrict, not with anguish or sadness, but with the joy that hurts just as much. "You are such a blessing, Elie. I don't deserve you. I really don't."

"You're not going to go into the you-should-marry- a-strapping-young-stud talk again, are you?"

"No. I'm not."

"Good," she said, then rose on her toes to steal a quick kiss.

"All I'm saying is, you do me a great kindness, Eli."

"Okay, Stevo-Boaz. Message received."

She took a half step away from him and faced the two grave stones as if suddenly deeming her levity out of place and improper. He mirrored her posture and took her hand in his again. They stood there quietly, hearing the white noise of traffic along the freeway behind them along with the occasional bird chirping on faraway trees. They felt the warmth of ebbing sunset rays on their backs, and the caress of an ocean breeze sweeping over their shoulders.

"It's beautiful here," Elie said. "Peaceful. Reverent."

"I like it here, too," Steve said. He turned to her and made her turn as well. "I don't know that you'll think this is the best place, nor whether you'll find it romantic. But it feels right to me. Righter than any other place."

He knelt as he reached inside his jacket to hand her the ring box.

"It's the rightest place," she said, foregoing the ring box to take his face with both hands. Slowly, she also knelt down and kissed him. Only then did she take the ring box, which unopened, she cradled against her chest while she looked at him and he at her, both of them weeping in silence.

#  From the Author

Thank you for reading _The Ignored_. Writing this story surprised me more than any other I've authored so far. The topic is one many of us approach with hard opinions, definitive ideas, and even harsh words from time to time. The precious value of human life when juxtaposed with our desire to be free and control our destiny can produce some hot, often hurtful sparks.

So it was for me, when I set out to write this story to convey the plight of a lonely, discarded little girl. I wanted those who read her tale to confront her pain and in so doing perhaps be moved through guilt to right the situation that placed her in such a terrible situation.

Then came the surprise, that moment when the story, driven by the character that inhabits it, took a turn I did not anticipate and intend. Grace, love, and forgiveness trump guilt, shame, and pain. Isn't that what the Gospel tells us? Why then the surprise? It is my prayer that _The Ignored_ will help us ponder and address the question.

I hope you also enjoyed the other two stories in this collection. _The Third Start-up_ and _Elie's Choice_ form sketches for a wider narrative I plan to turn into a novel, _The Beloved_. I hope I stoked your interest enough to stay tuned for its development and eventual release.

Speaking of which, you can keep up with progress and release announcements through my site to see what other projects I have going. I encourage you to  sign up for my mail list to stay appraised of ongoing and future developments. To contact me with questions, comments or suggestions, feel free to e-mail me at eswriting@gmail.com or find me on the Internet:

Website: http://eduardosuastegui.com

Twitter: <http://www.twitter.com/imagesbyeduardo>

#  The Tracking Jane Series

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The  Tracking Jane series follows the story of Jane McMurtry, an injured Army veteran who has spent her adult life training warrior dogs and partnering with them to find bombs and track missing soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Jane comes home having suffered grievous injuries during an IED explosion. A double amputee, she must not only learn to walk again, but also face a life she can scarcely contemplate in light of deep psychological wounds. Alongside her dogs, she will strain to restore her life and build a professional career. With her human partner and investigator Dan Murphy, she will struggle to love and be loved.

#  The Our Cyber World Series

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The  Our Cyber World series: Starting with _DEAD BEEF_ , and expanding with _Pink Ballerina_ , _Decisive Moment_ and _Active Shooter_ , the _Our Cyber World_ series explores a complex world as conveyed through the different points of view and voices each story's leading characters offer. Rather than applying a straight sequel-prequel chronological story structure, this series follows a  paralellequel approach. That means each story will feature a different protagonist, with appearances from characters from other stories in the series.

