Godless (17 page)

“Let me sleep on it,” she said.

But she knew full well that Mrs. Simmons, the woman formerly known as Julia Davidson, was heading back into the game.

“Good morning,
Mrs. Mayhew.”

“Good morning, Pastor,” she answered warily. “And what, may I ask, has you in such a chipper mood? You looked like the weight of the world was on your shoulders when you left the office last night.”

It was true. He had felt pretty down, in part because he had been unable to help Julia Simmons unravel her mysterious dream. But it was mainly due to a call from Phil Crawford sharing “more good news” about the response to Sunday's announcement. “Two potential donors with sizable estates!” he had said in self-congratulation.

Of course, that was before Alex went home to Tamara and the kids. They had been fixing his favorite dinner, meatloaf and mashed potatoes. His wife had let six-year-old Ginger mash, so the potatoes contained more lumps than usual. But the look on Ginger's face when Alex gave the “Yummy” verdict transformed them into the best he had ever tasted.

After the meal, Chris offered to help Daddy with the dishes while Tamara got the younger two down for the night. Alex knew Mom had made him volunteer. Eight-year-old boys don't do such things un-coaxed. But he enjoyed the time alone with his son anyway. They talked about things far removed from foreboding nightmares and overbearing board members. The really important stuff, like whether Superman could fly faster than the Flash could run and how tall Chris would be when he was Dad's age.

Then came the best part of the evening. While helping Chris button up his pajamas, Alex realized his wife had disappeared from their usual tag-team routine. “I'll get Mommy,” he said, intending to pull Tamara into the room for Chris's traditional good-night hug.

“She already gave me a hug,” Chris said. “She said you would read me a chapter and tuck me in yourself.”

Odd
, he thought. Had she said why?

“Tired,” Chris said with a bounce.

Concerned something might be wrong, Alex handed Chris his chapter book while excusing himself for a moment. “Go ahead and start reading,” he said. “I'll be back in a flash.”

But he wasn't. After quietly slipping into the bedroom he did not, as expected, find Tamara sleeping. Alex instead noticed the glow of candlelight dancing out from a slight opening in the doorway to the master bath. He approached. There was just enough of a gap to peer inside with a single eye. There she stood, inspecting an outfit he had never seen, the kind meant for his eyes alone.

She turned toward the sound of her husband's gasp, revealing an even more enticing view of the gift she intended to give. A gift she had been giving for nine amazing years.

He tried to flee back to chapter book duty but Tamara whispered his name before he could reach the door. “Where are you going?” she asked with a welcoming smile.

That's when Alex turned to face the most beautiful woman in the world. He had intended to explain that Chris wasn't quite in bed yet. He wanted to lift a single finger, indicating he would be right back. But he couldn't bring himself to say anything to halt her approach.

Tamara kissed her husband's cheek while gliding her fingertips across his torso and letting him taste the scent of his favorite perfume.

“Wait,” he said while taking a reluctant step back from her alluring invitation. “I didn't finish getting Chris to bed.”

He recalled the mischievous smile on her face and the stretching yawn she pretended on his way out the door. “OK,” she had whispered. “But I'm pretty tired. Better hurry or I might just fall asleep.”

Both of them had remained wide awake for at least another hour creating intimate memories. Despite less sleep than he needed, Alex felt like a new man, a refreshed man, a completed man.

He looked at Mrs. Mayhew's doubtful glare, then said, “I guess I'm just eager to tackle whatever assignment God has in store for me on this
very
good morning.” He returned a book to his shelf. “So, what's on the agenda for today?”

Mrs. Mayhew read off a list of duties that included approving the latest invoice from their cleaning supply vendor, calling a long-term children's ministry volunteer who, according to Mrs. Mayhew's confidential sources, probably wanted to complain about her exclusion from the new curriculum selection committee, and a preliminary review of the monthly budget report due to the finance committee by the end of the day.

“No lunch meeting?” he asked hopefully.

“Oh, for heaven's sake,” she said, flustered, while rereading her list. “I can't believe I forgot to write that down.”

He believed it.

“You have a lunch meeting with that board member.” She looked up as if trying to find a name written on the ceiling. “Oh, what's-his-face?”

“Phil Crawford?” Alex asked tentatively.

“I would remember Phil's name,” she said with offense.

“Roberto?”

She shook her head back and forth slowly while closing her eyes tightly in search of the slip of mental paper on which she had jotted a detail too boring for gossip.

“Kenny? Stephen?”

Still no luck.

“Well, that only leaves Brandon,” Alex said, somewhat relieved.

“Baxter!” Mrs. Mayhew hollered with self-satisfaction, as if the pastor's help had been unnecessary. “Mr. Baxter!”

“So I have lunch with Brandon Baxter?” Alex asked while raising a single eyebrow. “You're sure?”

The question agitated Mrs. Mayhew. “Of course I'm sure, Pastor. I just forgot to write it down.” She walked toward the door indignantly.

“Where are we meeting?” Alex asked cautiously.

She turned back, the blank stare on her face providing the only answer he could expect.

Alex shot off a quick message to Brandon Baxter. He replied immediately, confirming they were meeting at Napoli's Italian Bistro, a place convenient neither to the church nor to the board member's office.
Oh, well
, he thought,
Brandon must be craving ravioli
.

Having completed his chores with time to spare before heading off to Napoli's, Alex decided to give his wife a quick call.

“Thank you,” he said tenderly when she finished reminding him about Chris's after-school soccer game and telling him about a great new powder she'd found that seemed to be helping Joseph's diaper rash.

“For what?” she asked with a giggle, knowing full well what he meant.

“I love you,” he added.

“I know.”

“A lot.”

“Me, too,” she replied before ending the call.

“I'm sorry,” Alex said while extending his hand to the woman seated beside Brandon. “I don't believe we've met.”

“Pastor Ware,” Brandon said, “let me introduce my aunt, Ellie Baxter.”

The name had a familiar ring. Then he remembered. Brandon had asked Alex to call his aunt after the service on Sunday. Upset over Phil Crawford's transition announcement, however, he had let the request slip his mind. He and Mrs. Mayhew, it seemed, were a matching set.

“Of course,” Alex said contritely. “I'm so sorry. I intended to call you.” It was all he could say without crossing the thin line from slight prevarication to outright fib.

“Don't be silly,” she replied, swatting away the apology. “I know something about what it's like to pastor a church.”

The comment resurfaced another lost detail. Ellie Baxter had been married to the late Reverend Frederick Baxter, the founding pastor of the church Alex now led. Few in the congregation remembered the couple who had given so much to bring the fellowship into existence some forty years earlier. He vaguely recognized the eyes smiling toward him now. He had seen the same lively gleam in the photograph of three prior pastors and their wives hanging in Mrs. Mayhew's office.

“Of course,” Alex replied gratefully. “Only I'm certain it was much harder in your husband's day.”

“In some ways, I suppose,” she answered. “But in other ways, nothing has changed.”

“I hope you don't mind,” Brandon said while inviting Alex to sit in the chair across from his aunt. “I took the liberty of ordering you the ravioli.”

“Sounds good,” Alex replied while taking a seat and looking toward Ellie compassionately. “I'm sorry about your treatment denial,” he said. It had become a common sentiment when meeting with older members of Christ Community Church. “Brandon told me what happened.”

“Oh, that.” Her tone suggested a surprising disinterest. “I understand. They need to prioritize scarce medical resources.”

Brandon appeared to seethe upon hearing the common mantra come from his aunt's lips.

“The reason I asked Brandon to arrange lunch,” she continued, “was because I sensed the Lord wanted me to tell you something that I needed to say in person.”

Alex had heard the same words on countless occasions in the past. Only this time it didn't raise his defenses. He knew that Ellie Baxter had not come to offer “constructive criticism” on his preaching style or to let him know that God wanted the church to go back to “good old-fashioned rock tunes” instead of the more contemplative liturgical music that appealed to the younger crowd. Ellie Baxter, he knew, had something to say worth hearing.

“Please,” he said. “Go on.”

“I sense that the Lord wants me to tell you to stay the course.”

He waited for the rest. Nothing came.

“Which course?” he asked.

She appeared confused by the question, as if she might need to check the status of her wireless connection. “Well,” she answered, “I assume he means speaking out against the Youth Initiative.”

The comment alarmed Alex. He
hadn't
spoken out against the Youth Initiative. Not in public, anyway. He hated it, sure, the way he hated cancer and hurricanes and traffic accidents. He considered it one more massive ricochet of shrapnel from Adam's and Eve's bites of the forbidden fruit. But not something he could change with mere words. His task was to affirm the goodness of God while comforting those afflicted by the harsh realities of a fallen world; or, in the words of his favorite seminary professor, to “shine a light instead of scream at the darkness.”

“But,” he stumbled, “I haven't said anything about political matters. In fact, the board has specifically cautioned me against doing so.”

“Brandon has told me about conversations with the board,” she interrupted. “And they're wrong.”

Alex looked toward Brandon with concern. “Broad strokes,” Brandon said while raising three Scout's-honor fingers. “No names or privileged information. I swear.”

“Wrong about what?” Alex asked in Ellie's direction.

“About transition donations, for one thing.”

Another glance toward Brandon.

“Don't look at me,” he said defensively. “She heard Phil's announcement on Sunday.”

Of course.

“Like I said,” Ellie continued, “in some ways nothing has changed.”

“What do you mean?” Alex asked.

“Let me ask you a question,” she said as her answer. “Why didn't you make the announcement about Wayne Bentley's gift yourself?”

He sat in silence.

“Did you have knots in your stomach when that man celebrated Wayne's decision to volunteer?”

His gut tightened at the reminder. “Still do,” he confessed.

She nodded in solidarity.

“How did you know?” he asked.

Ellie leaned toward Alex. “I know,” she said sternly, “because that's exactly how my Frederick felt the entire year before he was asked to resign his pastorate.”

Asked to resign
? “But,” Alex said, “I thought your husband retired on good terms with the church.”

“Who told you that?” she asked.

He didn't know. “No one,” he fumbled. “I just assumed.”

“So did most of the members at the time,” she explained. “Everything appeared to be going great on the surface. The church had grown from a small group of folks who could fit in our tiny living room to several thousand in weekly attendance. By 2007 we had launched a second campus, a third by 2012. I'm not sure how many people were coming by the time Frederick resigned, maybe seven or eight thousand.”

“Actually, nine,” Alex recalled. He remembered the number from an attendance chart the search committee had shown him, revealing rapid, expansive growth during the first decade of the church's history followed by a steady, gradual decline. It had reached the low point just before Alex arrived. 

“So,” Ellie was saying, “you can imagine why the board didn't want anyone to think Frederick had been pressured to leave.”

“What happened?” Alex asked.

She sat back to receive a plate filled with steaming ravioli. “Thank you, young man,” she said with a wink to the sixtysomething waiter.

Alex accepted Brandon's request that he say grace over the meal, then looked back at Ellie. She enjoyed a first taste of her lunch before finally responding to the pastor's question.

“We had a campus in downtown Denver that my husband launched in partnership with the homeless shelter. He raised enough money from our main campus folks to build a small chapel and a medical clinic where a few of our members who were doctors volunteered to help AIDS patients one day per week.”

“A medical clinic?” Brandon said with surprise. “In a church?”

Alex was equally astonished. “What about the separation of church and state?” he asked.

“Neither of you are old enough to remember this, but medical treatment wasn't always considered the domain of the state. We couldn't pray in schools or place our hands on a Bible in courtrooms, but the church could still care for those without medical coverage.”

A blank stare from both men. “Never mind that,” she said as if feeling even older than she looked. “The point is, the church once provided medical services to hurting people in the city before the incident.”