Potter Springs (26 page)

Amanda nodded to herself. For the roses.

Ignored again, she gathered her books and stuffed them in her tote. The small stone church stood in the back of the grounds,
just around the gardener’s path. She followed the walkway, drawn by the fragrance of the flowers, compelled to the dark mahogany
doors. She pushed one open and entered the sanctuary.

Dark and cool, with a slight odor of old velvet. Ancient reverence and quiet. Hymnals lined in rows along the pews, long red
cushions flattened from ages of use.

Hushing the flap of her shoe against her heel, Amanda slid inside. The wood pew backs felt cool to her palm, her fingertips
skimmed along the rounded curves. Halfway down the aisle, she sat under an intricate stained-glass window.

Sunlight shone through ruby and sapphire, royal and serene. Amanda bowed her head to its grace, watched the shadow play on
her fingers as the sun dipped behind the clouds outside. A kaleidoscope. Her mind twirled, brilliant images past and present.

She needed to be still, to find her center.

What do you want?

Almost audible, the question echoed in the hollows of her heart. She shifted in the pew. She had focused for so long on what
had gone wrong. But the time for bitterness and loss had passed.

What do I want? she asked herself.

What she’d always wanted. Home. Family. Love. To know and be known by the ones she cherished.

Daddy at the workbench, holding her hurt finger. Daddy, squeezing her arm as they walked down the aisle. Daddy, pale and wasted,
a ghost in hospital greens.

Then Mother, waiting alone in mismatched clothing. Minutes on the hour. Cigarettes and phone calls. Signing the hotel charges,
no questions asked.

Don’t call me, I’ll call you,
Amanda had said. Cutting the tether. A change in light and color. Surprisingly, the women of Potter. Missy. Shelinda. Peggy.
Peggy called her honeygirl and held her as she cried. Shelinda’s laugh, Pam’s string of plastic pictures, Missy’s little hands
holding Amanda’s.

Her friends. Waiting in Potter. Accepting her and loving her.
That’s how I started up with God again.
Missy had said.
He sent those women, girlfriends, to walk me through it.

And Amanda had walked away.

The wheel turned again, floating. Her blood thumped in rhythm, and she recognized it. That sound, the only voice she’d heard
from baby Grace. Precious one, loved and lost, never to be known, never to laugh. Her chest tightened.

I want a family. I want babies.

Close to impossible,
the doctor had said.

And the grief had swallowed her whole.

Then, Mark. Clearest of all. His soft eyes above her, his strength around her. Tender and human. Saying and doing the wrong
things, but adoring her all the while.

Welcome home,
the card had read. Dark roses and a minivan. Unlit candles and sorrow in his spine.

Did he hurt the way she hurt? Had she expected too much of him? To fill spaces in her that no mere man could ever breach?
Had she made him her God, her savior, following blindly and demanding perfection?

She blinked tears away and turned the kaleidoscope, looking for the next picture.

Amanda Thompson, afraid of a marriage like her parents’. Amanda Reynolds, nauseous and happy in a wedding dress. Amanda, the
new wife, balled up in a hospital. Mrs. Mark Reynolds, starched in a luncheon. Mandy, angry over a car.

Amanda. Standing with old eyes in front of the mirror. Alone.

What do you want?

Shining and bright, the answer cut clean through her soul the way the gardener had cut the dead wood away. Sharp as the prism
in the sanctuary around her. Whispering, guiding her.

I want the roses.

Like the gardener, she counted the cost. Weighed the vines of heartache, the thorns of change and the high price of forgiveness.
Though the suffering had angered her, she had never been promised it would be easy.

It would hurt, she knew, to tend what she’d neglected. It would take the surrender of pride and the dedication of time. And
faith. Trusting when she could not see the way.

She would face her fears, and walk her path. Not out of circumstance, a mere twist in the wind. No, she would choose to embrace
the life she’d been given with all the strength and love she had. And then some.

It was time. Time to return and work in her garden.

Time to go home.

Outside the church, the weight of her decision hit her with the blinding sun. For the first time in her life, when she’d thought
of home, she meant Potter Springs.

Weeping may last for the night, but joy comes in the morning.
The promise followed her like a Sunday benediction. Now she would be ready to face the thorns. Any more hardships coming
her way would be worth it.

For the roses.

AT THE HOTEL
, she stepped into the cool marble interior. A young employee vacuumed the thick lobby carpet with an industrial machine.
She hardly heard its roar for the swell of plans in her mind, the excitement singing through her.

Amanda waved to Consuela, busy on the phone. An irate customer, judging from the hostess’s drawn brows and animated speech.
Consuela covered the receiver and motioned Amanda to come over.

“Later,” mouthed Amanda. What she wanted was a shower, and to begin packing. She would leave in the morning.

Her friend waved again, more frantic, still on the phone. She tried to speak over the vacuum, moving her magenta lips in an
exaggerated fashion.

“Mother”
Consuela seemed to say.

What?
Amanda shook her head. Her mother was in Houston, or probably the lake house in Conroe by now. She splayed her fingers at
her friend.
Ten minutes. I’ll be back in ten minutes.

Amanda turned in her flip-flops, only to be caught by the snake cord of the vacuum cleaner. She lost her footing, tripped
over and dropped her bag. Paperbacks tumbled out like movie popcorn, littering the hotel’s immaculate floor.

Blushing, she gathered them quickly and shoved them into her bag. Scooted on her knees to retrieve the last one.

A pair of navy pumps stopped her midshuffle. Amanda’s gaze met crisp cuffs, traveled up the length of pleated khakis and rested
on a peach sweater set and the inevitable strand of pearls.

“Well, hello, Amanda.” Round brown eyes blinked under cropped, perky curls. “Need some help?” A small hand held out a worn
copy of
Pride and Prejudice.

“Thank you,” Amanda murmured.

“You’re welcome,” answered Marianne Reynolds. Her mother-in-law, the Queen of the Baptists.

Thorn number one.

E
rv, I need to talk to you.” Mark stood at the entry to his boss’s office. The space duplicated Mark’s work area—dark paneling,
teetering shelves, musty odor—with about ten more square feet. Minus, of course, the enticing view of the Dumpster. “There’s
something we need to discuss.”

Ervin looked up from his computer, where he was no doubt e-mailing Peggy. Since he’d gotten computer savvy in a church staff’s
development seminar, he and his wife were known to send each other flirtatious zingers via electronics.

Once, Mark intercepted a love letter by accident.
Hey there, hellcat,
read the note.
What say we chase each other round the room tonight? You let me catch you too quick last time, you little devil!

After that, he opened e-mails from Ervin with a finger ready on the delete key.

“So, you have time today?” Mark said.

“Sure, son.” Ervin rolled across the laminate floor, skidding cowboy boots to a halt in front of his desk. He flipped through
a calendar. “Got a meeting in about five minutes. How’s this afternoon for you?”

“Fine. When?”

“Later. After lunch. Say, three?”

Mark didn’t ask what Ervin planned on doing for that long of a lunch break. He didn’t want to know. “I’ll be here.”

Returning to his office, Mark worked awhile, then opened his sack lunch. Less than exciting, but edible. Bread with lukewarm
salami and a Coke from the machine. He’d run out of casseroles and had taken to packing his own meals. Better that than reinvoking
the interference of the Ladies’ Guild.

At 2:55, he headed back to Ervin’s office. Empty. He asked Letty, “I’m supposed to have a meeting with Ervin?”

Heaving a sigh, she rewrapped waxed paper over her sandwich. Letty snacked on homemade takeout throughout the day. Pickled
eggs. Blue cheese on toast. Sardines.

Mark smelled the tuna from his comfortable distance of about four feet. Not pleasant.

Letty handed him a yellow sticky note. “He said to meet you down the hall. Room 125.” She went back to her lunch, picking
at it like a feline.

In front of 125, Mark stopped cold. The counseling room. Outside the shut door stood a metal-inscribed sign on a pedestal.

QUIET PLEASE. IN SESSION.

Good God, I’m in counseling.
He rapped softly on the door, waiting for the punch line. Surely this was a joke. A mistake. Ervin ushered him in, shaking
his hand like a long lost friend. A white-noise machine whirred in one corner and a box of tissues and a Bible rested on a
table between two worn leather chairs. An amateur oil painting of a wooded lake dominated one wall. Lakeview.

Ervin sat down and gestured for Mark to do the same. “Thought we’d be more comfortable in here. No phones, no secretaries,
no pesky congregants.” Ervin smiled. “It’s one of my favorite hiding places.”

“Good idea.” Tension released from Mark’s shoulders when he realized Ervin hadn’t planned a secret sabotage on his psyche.

“What did you want to talk about?” Ervin rested his palms on his knees, relaxed. Just two guys talking, his posture seemed
to say. Not, I’m-about-to-fire-your-sorry-self-because-Dale-Ochs-told-me-to.

Still, looks could be deceiving. Mark knew that from looking in the mirror.

“You know about Mandy. That she’s gone. You’ve probably figured out it’s more than her father being sick. More than a vacation.”

Ervin nodded, quiet.

“I know the board wants me to leave. And maybe I should. But first I need to tell you why,” Mark said. “Why she left in the
first place. Why we’ve been having trouble.” The catch in his voice surprised him. He coughed and rubbed his hand on his pants.
“It’s not an excuse and I’m not here to beg. But the air needs clearing, like you said.”

“Go ahead.” Ervin leaned back in the chair. “You can trust me.”

Is that so?
Mark didn’t voice the doubt aloud. At this point, he had no choice. He just started the telling. Pulled forth what he’d buried
deep inside, had hidden away in the darkness in himself.

Maybe in doing so, he prepared his own coffin, paving the way for Dale to replace him. But if Mark was going out, he’d go
out honest, with the truth etched on his grave. For the entire world to see.

He raised the chisel and started at the beginning. “We were together before we were married. Do you know what I mean by
together?
I know we should have waited, and I wanted to, but not enough, and it’s my fault….”

The scent of confession smelled sour and dead. Mark wrinkled his face against it. Each word hurting as he spoke, tugging the
truth, bone by bone. “I didn’t leave Houston because of God’s calling at all. I was fired. My best friend looked me in the
eye and said,
You can’t stay here….”

He pressed on, digging deeper, bringing the darkest parts to light. Unearthing his need to hide, his desire to be perfect.
To appear perfect, no matter the cost.

Copper pennies. Take backs.

Little sage, heartbeats floating over him. Gone, without ceremony. No name, unclaimed by a father. Sorrow painted the memory
in shades of blue.

Shame forced Mark’s vision to his knees. “And she lost it, the baby. I found her and she was bleeding and she had to go to
the hospital….”

He looked at Ervin, expecting condemnation. Some sort of a judgment at all Mark’s deception. The disappointment he’d seen
from James Montclair.

Yet, Ervin’s face held the same open expression, like a blank page. Not childlike or gullible at all. Just accepting.

A countenance of grace.

It helped Mark finish what he’d started. To reveal the fault lines that had finally broken him down. “I kept trying to break
through, to fix her somehow, but I couldn’t. We didn’t connect anymore, and she left in the van. I don’t think she’s coming
back….”

Given air, the past breathed anew. Less scary and not so dark. What had seemed grievous secrets revealed to be… ordinary.
The sins of an imperfect soul.

Now emptiness took the place of secrecy. Mark sat back, exhausted. “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“Aren’t you going to say something? Fire me? Call me a hypocrite?
Something?”

“Is that what you think you deserve?”

“I don’t know what I deserve. I just want to know what you think.”

“I think you’re an idiot.” Ervin’s eyes sparkled.