Reinventing Leona (7 page)
Juggling chocolate, David’s blood boiled, which seemed to increase the drip rate of the melting ice cream. He led the attractive blonde to the dessert station. If he was a grown man, why had he allowed himself to be pushed around like a kid? “Just put them there.”
Amy slid the plates into place. “Sorry about my aunt. She means well.”
David wasn’t sure what angered him more, the becoming pink blush on Amy’s high cheekbones or being backed into another awkward corner by a meddlesome parishioner. He’d had a bellyful of mystery-meat casseroles, well-intentioned matchmakers, and people making it their business whether or not he ate his raisins. “They always do,” he snapped.
A stunned disenchantment washed over Amy’s flawless complexion. “Sorry about your father.” A quick spin on her pump-shod heel and the little bombshell was headed in the direction of the kitchen.
Mentally patting himself on the back, David credited his legal training for his ability to swiftly and effectively go for the jugular. Then why did the vivid image of the confusion clouding those stunning crystal blue eyes gather like a storm in his conscience, igniting in a flash of shame?
David glanced around the humming room, half expecting all eyes to be upon him, the perfect pastor’s son who’d just lost his cool with an innocent woman. But clusters of jovial conversations continued, oblivious to his undeniable rudeness, his obvious failings. A heavy weight pressed his shoulders. The poor girl was a victim of circumstances beyond her control, or his for that matter. They were mere mortals tossed to and fro by a power he could not escape, and the unsuspecting nurse had been accidentally caught in the updraft. Noticing he stood alone at the dessert altar, David abandoned his pudding and seized his exit opportunity . . . a skill Momma promised could be honed to perfection if practiced on a regular basis.
* * * * *
Maddie tried to slip her sweaty palms free of Wilma Wilkerson’s vise grip. How the woman made those arthritic mitts tickle the ivories was nothing short of miraculous.
Wilma lifted a gnarled hand and stroked Maddie’s. “With fingers like yours, it’s a shame you gave up the organ.”
The church organist would have made Liberace feel like he could’ve been something if he’d only practiced his scales a bit more. Maddie remembered her music lessons with Mrs. Wilkerson. Every Thursday after school, she’d drag into the darkened sanctuary, her untouched practice book tucked under her arm. In the glow of the reading lamp, Mrs. Wilkerson would be coercing the organ to sing as if it were a celestial chorus, her short, stubby legs stomping the pedals while her hands ran up and down the stacked keyboards.
When the rotund lady came to a stopping place, she’d scoot over, making a sliver of room for Maddie on the slippery bench. The croaking scales Maddie pecked out threatened to shatter the stained glass above the baptistry, but her organ teacher suffered through every one of them, offering a word of encouragement here and there, before faithfully assigning more pages for the next week.
Maddie squirmed under the pressure. “Momma was disappointed.”
Mrs. Wilkerson smiled up at Maddie. “I’ve been praying the Lord uses your hands to his glory.” She brought Maddie’s hand to her lips and kissed it lightly. “And he will. Practice and these hands will make the music of healing.”
The glimpse of understanding Maddie saw in her teacher’s eyes sent a sudden surge of warmth to a part of her heart she thought she’d effectively sealed off. “Cotton told me what you did for my father. Thank you.”
“I’m just the Lord’s instrument.” Wilma patted Maddie’s hand, chose a plate with a big slice of apple pie, then lumbered off.
Maddie picked up a dessert, then scanned the crowded fellowship hall. She’d had enough of the icy tension between Grandmother and Momma at the head table. She spotted Cotton across the room and threaded her way through well-wishers to reach the empty seat beside him.
“Did you get some of Bette Bob’s pudding?” Cotton dragged a plastic spoon around his empty bowl.
“I don’t eat sweets.”
One bushy brow raised, he asked, “Does banana cream pie count as a fruit at Vanderbilt?” Cotton’s ribbing covered Maddie like hot fudge melting cold ice cream, a comforting combination sure to sweeten the bitterest of situations.
She slid the plate onto the table, pulled out a chair, and sat down. “Okay, I don’t eat as many as I used to. Gotta watch my figure, you know.”
“Your figure seems fine to me.” The rich baritone voice came from behind.
Maddie twisted in the gray metal folding chair to see Parker Kemp grinning at her, his puppy-dog eyes twinkling. He was handsomely dressed in a dark suit, tasteful tie, and holding a bowl of pudding.
“This seat taken?” Parker pointed to the chair beside Maddie.
“Do you see anyone sitting there?” Cotton licked the back of his empty spoon. “Have a seat, boy.”
Parker looked at Maddie. “May I?”
Maddie shrugged, then scooted her chair closer to Cotton’s. She didn’t remember Parker’s shoulders being so broad, or the confident air he seemed to possess, like he was comfortable in his tanned skin. Even when she protested his offer of chocolate cake to Tater after he and Momma got all but a few crumbs off the kitchen floor, his smile and the way he ignored her threats said Parker Kemp was no longer the youth group nerd. What had happened? Had some secret substance changed his entire body chemistry? Maddie shifted in her seat so she could get a better view—purely for scientific investigation, she assured herself.
Parker placed his dessert on the table and sat down. “I thought the service for your father was real nice.”
Unnerved by his directness, Maddie swallowed. “Daddy would have preferred to do it himself.”
Parker nodded. “And, no doubt, he would have done a better job.”
Across the room a group of men laughed. Maddie swiveled in her chair to locate her father’s booming bass in the mix. Her daddy loved a joke more than anyone she knew. But he was nowhere to be found. Was that the joke? David, Maddie, and Momma trapped together without Pastor Harper’s humor to lighten the tension. It wasn’t funny.
Something was off-kilter in this place where she’d eaten more than her share of potluck fare. She’d had this same dizzy sensation while seated in the Harper pew listening to Howard Davis speak from her father’s pulpit.
Either Mr. Davis was in the wrong place or she was. This day was a bad dream. Any minute she would wake up in her loft apartment, yell at Katie Beth for letting her oversleep, throw on some clothes, and rush out the door. She’d phone her dad on the way to the hospital, and the ripple of his laughter would make everything that had been wrong about this nightmare right for his princess.
“So, are you about finished with med school?” Parker touched Maddie’s arm and she jumped.
“I’m sorry. What did you say?”
Parker chewed the large bite he’d popped in his mouth, then swallowed. “When do you finish school?”
“In the spring. Then I’ll start my residency.”
“You coming back to this part of the country to do that?” Parker asked.
“I hadn’t planned to, but now that Momma is . . .” Maddie felt flush under Parker’s gaze. She diverted her eyes and noticed the Story sisters aiming their pointed noses in their direction. Their creaky bodies would not be far behind. Maddie hurried to change the subject. “So, what about you? I bet the stimulating work of an extension agent is never done.”
He smiled. “On call round the clock.”
Nola Gay tapped Parker’s shoulder. “What are you going to do about our wilt?”
“See what I mean?” Parker winked at Maddie.
“Stem rot.” Etta May steadied herself by placing a shaky hand on Maddie’s shoulder. “Just about did in our cucumber crop last year.”
“It’s those blasted striped beetles. They chew into the leaves and the next thing you know, the wilt has spread up and down the runner.” Nola Gay pursed her lips and shook her head.
The unruffled extension agent put down his spoon and rubbed his chin. “I’ve been studying your problem, ladies.” The way he focused his attention reminded Maddie of a doctor contemplating the best way to break the news of a fatal diagnosis. “Why don’t you have a seat, and we’ll see if we can’t come up with a plan to shut down those hard-shelled hooligans before they taste another bite of Mt. Hope’s best cucumbers. Would you mind making room, Maddie?”
Where did this guy get off thinking she’d want dibs on his attention? “Of course not.” Tamping her irritation, Maddie nudged Cotton and they slid over a couple of chairs. “It’s not every day a person gets to see a real live extension agent in action.”
Parker seemed to ignore the sarcastic edge in her voice. “Prepare to be amazed.” He jumped up, repositioned the abandoned seats in a semicircle around him, then situated his troubled clients on either side. “If we happen to get a big snow cover, and end up with a warm spring, we’ll have to take aggressive action.”
Nola Gay and Etta May leaned in close, their serious faces awaiting the plan.
“So, I figure we’ll put cheesecloth tents over the new shoots, then plant several rows of corn on the windward side of your patch.”
The sisters frowned, obviously skeptical of the elaborate plan.
Undeterred by their expressions of doubt, Parker continued, “I promise, those thieving scoundrels will be so distracted they’ll forget all about your cucumbers.”
Nola Gay thought a minute, and then her eyes began to gleam as one plotting evil. “Outsmart the little buggers.”
“Beat them at their own game.” Etta May glowed, rubbing her hands together.
Maddie watched Parker pick up his spoon and polish off his pudding under the admiring gaze of the Storys. The guy must be secretly nipping on the fertilizer because somewhere along the line, Mt. Hope’s extension agent’s unflappable way with the ladies had blossomed tenfold, no question about it.
David sat on the front pew in the empty sanctuary listening to the hum of the baptistry heater kick on and off. Leaves that had fallen from the plethora of funeral wreaths lay scattered over the worn carpet spanning the space between the preacher’s son and the large wooden pulpit towering over him.
In the glow of the afternoon light, David studied the sparkle of the golden rays shooting out from behind a stained-glass ruby cross. The hopeful scene reminded him of the sun rising over the private pond he and Dad fished in the spring when the bass took to their spawning beds.
But upon closer examination of the glass depiction, David realized he took issue with the jeweled path that started wide at the base, curved around, then disappeared into a tiny point beneath the cross. It didn’t take a scholar to figure out that in real life, the road to redemption was much longer and not nearly as inviting. He slumped forward, resting his forearms on his thighs.
“Your step is still there.”
David jumped. “Cotton. You scared me to death.”
“Sorry.” The janitor squatted, his knees creaking. Piece by piece, he picked up the curling foliage. “Came in to set the thermostats. Can’t afford to heat an empty room.”
“Momma go home?”
“I saw her loadin’ dirty tablecloths into your grandmother’s limo trunk.”
“The woman took home the laundry?” The urge to hit somebody balled David’s hand into a tight fist. How could church members, people who claimed to be her friends, be so inconsiderate? A better question was, why did his mother continue to let them take advantage of her? Didn’t she know she owed these ingrates nothing? “I’m surprised the funeral food committee didn’t ask her to make a green bean casserole and a couple of desserts for her husband’s funeral as well.”
“Your momma is a strong woman.”
David shuddered, visions of his mother’s disappointed face in the lunch line haunting his thoughts. “I hope you’re right.”
Cotton’s X-ray vision cut clean through the wall David had built around his secrets. The old man could smell guilt as surely as he smelled cigarette smoke behind the parsonage when the preacher’s son was twelve.
“Talk to her, boy.”
The faint odor of chlorine emanated from the pool of salvation’s waters swirling behind the stage. David dropped his head into his hands, too weary to hide his struggles from his old friend. “And say what?”
Cotton’s broad hand cupped his shoulder. “The truth, son.”
Truth?
Christians had a hard time with truth. In fact, many turned a blind eye just to keep from coming face-to-face with the tricky virtue. For example, the church members would have a cow if they knew the full extent of the sacrilege the preacher’s kids had committed in this very sanctuary. Within these sacred walls he and Maddie had learned to roller skate, ride their bikes, use sidewalk chalk, and sneak pieces of the stale communion bread after school. The obvious tire tracks crisscrossing the center aisle carpet were not caused by Maxine Davis’s Easy Spirits, nor were the crumbs littering the pews left by church mice. Truth was, the preacher’s kids played in the sanctuary. But nobody
really
wanted to know the extent of the pastor’s indulgence in this matter because crossing the dangerously fine line of truth could cost a person all sorts of privileges.
But David and Maddie had never kept the truth from Momma. Despite the risks. No matter how dire the punishment was sure to be. Lying to Momma would have been futile anyway. Somehow, and he had yet to figure out how, the woman knew their sins even before they confessed them. But like some sadistic lunatic, she always compelled a complete tell-all.
David’s stomach twisted, as if his emotions had emerged from their darkened corners and come out swinging. Struggle all he wanted, but a camel had better odds of getting through the eye of a needle than he did of finding the loophole that would spare him another nasty scene with his mother. Before it was all said and done, he would have to tell her the truth.
He shifted under Cotton’s watchful eye. “Momma may be a pro at swallowing injustice, but I don’t know if I can stand to watch her choke down the news I intend to serve her when we get home.”
* * * * *
Leona handed Maddie a butter tub filled with baked beans, then stacked another foil-covered casserole tin upon the two her mother balanced across her outstretched arms. “Let me find my keys to lock up.”