Donut Days (8 page)

My adrenaline surged. “Allowed to preach? So they’re really doing this? They ’re really thinking about firing her as a pastor because she’s a
woman
?”

I could hear my dad swallow. “Yes. Precisely.”

“So when do we know?”

“As I said, sometime between now and Sunday.”

“Well, the board’s not stupid. They’ll say no, right? I mean, they know how important Mom is to the church.”

There was silence on the other end of the line. “Dad?”

“Yes, Emma. I’m here.”

“Dad, what’s going to happen?”

“I don’t need more questions right now, I need answers. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, Dad. Okay.”

My dad was silent for a second, then asked, “Are you safe there?”

“What do you mean? Of course I’m safe. There are donut cops everywhere.”

“Just be cautious, okay?”

I bit my lip. “Sure. I’ll be cautious. And will you call me if you have updates?”

“Of course.”

“Dad, is everything going to be okay?”

“We want God’s will to be done.”

“Dad, come on, that’s not really—”

“Good night, Emma.”

Okay. Conversation over.

“Good night.”

Just as I hung up with my dad, I thought I saw Jake walk into the coffee shop. I blinked once, cleared my vision, and realized it wasn’t him. But, to my alarm, the Jake look-alike started making his way straight for me. I glanced around, wondering if he was headed for someone else close by. But no—he was staring straight at
me
. Who
was
this guy?

He walked up to my table and opened his mouth. “Hey,” he said, and then I knew. It was Jake. Except it
wasn’t
Jake. Not at all.

The Jake I knew had gone off to the University of Minnesota sporting acne so bad that from far away some people thought it was facial hair. The Jake I knew once wiped his nose on his brown crayon and then handed it to me so I could finish coloring Jesus’ robes in Little Saints. The Jake I knew was not this Jake. Because this Jake? Was hot. H-O-T.

“He—” I tried to reply, but I couldn’t even finish. The air whooshed out of me as I stared at him. Jake’s three-inch-thick glasses were gone, and his chocolate-colored eyes were looking right at me. His hair was short and styled, and his soft skin was covering what looked like masses of muscle. Jake had always been tall, but now I had to tilt my neck a little to really see him, making me think maybe he’d grown taller. If I had been standing—and it was a good thing I wasn’t—I figured I’d be eye level with the place where his shoulder met his neck.

I was flustered and embarrassed all at once, so I started digging in my bag, just to have something to do. When had this happened? I was trying to think of something to say, but I was having trouble remembering what English words were, and how to string them into sentences.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said a little breathlessly. “I’ve been doing tutoring this summer and one of the guys that I meet with works nights, so we’ve got these weird appointment times. I came as soon as we were done.”

I stared, openmouthed.

“Uh, can I sit?” asked Jake, grabbing the back of one of the chairs.

“Yummp,” I said, nodding, not trusting myself to open my mouth too far. Then, still standing, he motioned at my empty coffee cup.

“You want a refill before we get settled?” he asked. Okay, so Jake was still a gentleman. Being hot hadn’t changed that at least.
Chill out, Em,
I told myself.
Just keep it together
.

“I’d love a coffee,” I said, relieved that my tongue was now back in working order. “House brew would be great.” I was grateful that I sounded at least a little bit cool.

“’Kay,” Jake said, and he went to the counter. I watched him cross the floor and tried hard not to stare at his backside.

Suddenly, for the first time since the baptism, I wished that I was on speaking terms with God. If I thought there was a chance He would help me, I would have prayed right then for the strength to talk to Jake without sliding off my chair and onto the floor in a blubbering heap.
I just have to be strong myself,
I thought, taking a deep breath and sitting up straighter. I ran my hands through my hair quickly and licked my lips. But when I looked over at where Jake was grabbing our drinks, I almost lost my nerve. Two girls in bright pink shirts with donuts placed strategically over their boobs were talking to him. They both had fingers tucked into the loops of their low-rise pants in a casual way that told me they probably talked to hot guys all the time.

Hot guys like Jake
. I wanted to kick myself—literally. How had I let this happen? Shouldn’t I have at least considered it when Jake said he loved me? Shouldn’t I have at least noticed that he had potential? If I had, we could be making out right now on one of Java Nile’s comfy couches.

No!
screamed a different part of my brain.
You are friends. It doesn’t matter that Jake is hot!
I took another deep breath and immediately agreed with my more rational self. Just friends. Absolutely. Just like we’ve always been.

At that moment, Jake set two steaming mugs of coffee down on the table. Some of the dark liquid spilled out of the top of mine, and Jake handed me a napkin wordlessly.

“Thanks,” I said, and started patting the small puddle of coffee.

Jake wrapped his hands around his coffee mug and watched me. “How have you been?” he asked politely after a few moments. He was so courteous, he was almost medicinal. My heart jerked in my chest.

“Fine, thanks,” I said. “You?”

“Great. I had a good summer at the U. I worked on campus in a physics lab with one of my profs. It was pretty cool.”

“Oh, wow.”

“Yep.”

The conversation was like watching a turtle try to turn itself over after being flipped. I practically expected one of us to start flailing our limbs, that’s how awful it was.

Jake cleared his throat. “So, uh, how is your mom?” he asked, switching subjects. “I mean, how is your family holding up since—”

Since your dad waded into the water and started splitting up the church over women’s issues? Great, they’re great.
I thought about throwing a pile of heaping sarcasm on top of his question, then taking off. But I knew that Jake—even though he was an O’Connor—didn’t deserve that. He’d come out to Java Nile after all.

“My parents are fine,” I said. “I mean, things are pretty screwed up, but they ’re fine. They ’re fine.”

A gorgeous little wrinkle of concern appeared between Jake’s eyebrows. “You know that you just used the word
fine
three times, right?” he asked.

I blinked. No, I hadn’t realized that.

Jake scratched his smooth chin thoughtfully. “So what you’re saying is that everything is . . . fine?”

I couldn’t help it—I laughed, and I was relieved to see a little smile playing at the corner of Jake’s mouth. At that moment, despite everything, I suddenly realized how much I had missed him after a summer of not talking. I knew—in a way I never had before—that I had a Jakesized chunk of my heart that had been beating irregularly for the three months he hadn’t been in my life. Now that he was around, I felt like everything was in sync again.

“I guess everything is . . . almost fine,” I said. I wished I could tell him that my mom had shed bucketfuls of tears over the prophecy, sobbing until she was weak. I wished I could tell him that my dad had gathered us all together as a family and herded us into the living room, asking us to pray until our hands and knees left deep indentations in the carpet. But neither of those things had happened. Instead, my parents were still keeping me out of the loop, both of them determined—at least to my face—to pretend nothing was really wrong. But what they didn’t know was that the plastic, impersonal way they were “believing God” and “pressing through” made me feel worse than if they’d taken all the dishes out of the cupboard and shattered them against the kitchen floor, one by one.

“Well, for what it’s worth, I think your mom is a great pastor and this whole ‘no women preaching’ thing really blows,” Jake said.

“This ‘no women preaching’ thing?” I asked. It came out meaner than I had intended.

Jake shrugged. “I don’t know what else to call it.”

Actually, neither did I. It was hard to call it
anything,
like trying to fit the power and the glory of the Son of God rising from the grave and conquering evil forever into two words: The Resurrection. Did it really do the event justice?

I stared at Jake’s face and, despite all the changes, saw that it was the same honest, kind face it’d been when he was a dork in high school. It reminded me that Mr. O’Connor and all his money had done a lot of good for Living Word Redeemer over the years. Their funds had built a library and a kids’ center. My dad got a new pulpit, and Mr. O’Connor had even given us a brand-new Nissan Maxima when our old Ford Escort had broken down and we didn’t have the money to fix it. There was also the fact that our families were friends—or at least used to be. In the early days of the church Mrs. O’Connor and my mom used to bake together in our kitchen for fund-raisers, laughing and gesturing at each other with flour-covered hands while they kneaded dough and flattened pie crusts. For years, Mr. O’Connor and my dad had a standing breakfast date together two days a week.

“That’s nice of you to say about my mom,” I said to Jake, tapping my coffee mug with my fingers, “that you think she’s a great pastor and all.”

“I do,” said Jake, nodding. “And that’s why, you know, I’m here. I think you—I mean, your whole family—you’re all good people and you don’t deserve anything bad. I’ve always thought that, but I guess I have to admit I was surprised when you called. I wondered, after all summer, why
now
?”

Because you were the only one I could talk to. You’re the only one I could trust.
I opened my mouth and said, “Because I am so totally at a loss with all this church stuff. I just really needed a friend.”

I could have imagined it, but I thought I saw a flicker of disappointment flash over Jake’s face. Was he hoping I would say he was
more
than a friend?

“Well, yeah,” Jake said, leaning forward in his chair. “I agree with you, it’s pretty nuts. Especially now, after your mom’s sermon about Adam and Eve.”

“You were there tonight?” I asked, incredulous. “I didn’t even see you.” I wanted to slap a hand over my mouth as soon as the words were out since,
dur,
I wouldn’t have recognized him even if I had seen him.

“Yeah, I was,” Jake said. “I heard it all.” He folded his hands together and suddenly seemed nervous. He looked around.

“What?” I asked. Watching him, I felt an unease creeping into my gut. “What’s going on?”

“Okay,” said Jake, taking a deep breath, “the truth is, I kind of have something to tell you. I was planning on doing it a while back but—well, you know. We weren’t exactly talking.”

I nodded. “What is it?”

Jake leaned even farther in and I could smell his after-shave. I nearly toppled off my chair. “I heard that the church was thinking about buying land in Owosso County,” Jake said. “
Mollico
land in Owosso County.”

I stared at him. The church had been looking at buying land for years so it could expand. I wasn’t surprised they’d look into buying it from Mr. O’Connor. He’d probably cut them a deal. “So?” I asked.

“So,” Jake said, glancing around again, “all of the land that Mollico owns in Owosso is polluted.”

“Polluted?”

“Shhh,” Jake hissed. “Keep your voice down.”

“All right,” I said, dropping my voice. “Polluted land?”

Jake nodded.

I grabbed my knit bag and took out my pen and paper. It was practically a reflex. “How do you know this?” I asked, pen in the air, poised to start writing.

Jake glanced at the pen, then at me. “Is that really necessary?”

“I’m not trying to write an exposé, I’m just trying to keep track of things. I’m practically confused already. So just tell me what you know.”

Jake tapped his foot nervously against Java Nile’s sparkly floor. “I found some documents,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to be nosy, but I was home for spring break and I was in my dad’s office looking for paper clips.”

“Paper clips?”

“I was trying to organize my bank statements. I glanced down and the documents were just sitting there.”

A mug clattered to the floor somewhere nearby us and I jumped. About ten feet away, two people scrambled to clean up spilled coffee.

“Anyway,” Jake continued, “what I saw was a land contract between the church and my dad for ten acres out in Owosso. I wouldn’t have thought anything about it except right next to it was a printed e-mail from Jerry Dean to my dad. Jerry’s one of Mollico’s attorneys. And the e-mail said something to the effect that if the church buys the land, then it, um . . . ‘assumes the responsibilities for any environmental hazards on the land’ is I think how it was worded.”

“Except how do you know this memo wasn’t just, like, a formality or something?” I asked, scribbling away.

Jake looked out the window where the camp lights glowed. “Mollico is a chemical company, Em. All their by-products go somewhere.”

“But in Owosso? It’s a county. People live there.”

“Yeah, but fifteen years ago when my dad started Mollico, it was just fields and trees. I’m not saying he’s dumping stuff there now. But back in the day, when he was getting started, I know he did some shady stuff. The company wasn’t always this profitable. He cut corners where he could, and I’ve definitely overheard him mention Owosso before. And now, if he can unload the land to the church and have the church own it, all the better for him. The land becomes the church’s problem, not his.”

I tapped my pen against my teeth and looked at my notes. Suddenly, a spark flared in my memory. “Didn’t the
Paul Bunyan Press
run something about Mollico a couple years ago?” I asked. I closed my eyes, trying to remember the exact headline, but all I could recall was Molly huffing at Nat and me, saying her dad was being falsely accused of something.