Something Old (27 page)

After church, Megan had flitted in with her cheery countenance, joining Katy and Lil for Sunday lunch. Their blond friend had chatted about her summer missions options, then flown off to spend the afternoon with her folks before heading back to Rosedale College.

Now Katy lined up her dominoes. Across the table, Lil did the same. As they played, they could look out the kitchen window and watch the steady rain turn the ground into tiny rivulets.

“I didn’t see Jake at church, did you?” Lil asked.

“No, but I saw his mom. He probably stayed home with his grandma.” Just remembering something he’d mentioned at the basketball game, she added, “He has to bid some blueprints this afternoon.” They exchanged a disapproving look, for even Lil knew they shouldn’t work on Sundays. “Last night he asked me if I’d like to work for his mom, watching Minnie.”

Lil’s gaze softened with fondness at the mention of her grandmother. “Mom and I have watched her before. She’s a handful, but I love her.”

“I’d like to try it and see how it goes. It will be a challenge, but I’ve always loved her.”

“You going to clean their place, too?”

“I don’t know. I’ll do whatever Ann wants. If it works out, the extra income should help us scrape by. Think Megan will ever settle down with a job?”

Lil matched a yellow domino to another yellow domino. “Hard to tell. Jobs can be disappointing. I need to find something better. Nobody ever sees me back in the kitchen, and the restaurant’s not big enough to move to a higher position. No prestige. No extra money. Dead-end job.” She glanced out at the rain. “I should drive into Plain City and buy a newspaper.”

Trailing her friend’s gaze to the dreary weather and back, Katy offered, “I’ll go with you, if you’d like.”

“Okay. Let’s finish this game first. Maybe the rain will ease up by then.” They both glanced out the window again, sharing skepticism. Several plays passed without conversing as Katy thought about Lil not liking her job. Her friend had high expectations and the grit to fulfill them. Maybe that was part of her own despair. She didn’t have any goals. Just then a shiny black car turned into the Millers’ driveway.

“Oh great,” Katy said sarcastically. The image of David’s bruised face flashed across her mind. Who needed goals when it was hard just to survive each day’s handouts? “David won’t be coming here.”

They both leaned toward the window and watched, but the car disappeared in front of Ivan and Elizabeth’s house.

Lil looked over with amusement. “Did you see him today?” Katy rapped her dominos on the table in disgust. “Yes! How could they? What does fighting solve? Do they think I’m going to throw myself into the winner’s arms?”

“I wonder who started it? Jake’s been real jealous, but I never heard of him fighting before.”

“Probably David. He was quietly furious the other night when we talked. It shocked me.” She told Lil about his cutting remark.

“Whoa! Maybe we need to sic Megan on them. Remind them of their Anabaptist upbringing.”

“They both know better. It’s humiliating. And Jake is going to get an earful the next time I see him, too. When I asked him what happened, he said he’d been in a pillow fight.”

Lil giggled. Then she asked, “Is it really humiliating? Or is it a little gratifying?” She slid another ivory rectangle into place. “I’d like that kind of embarrassment—having two guys fight over me.” Involuntarily, she waved a domino. “Maybe the blond waiter and that one guy from culinary school that who wouldn’t give me the time of day. Yeah, that’d be something. I’d want the waiter to win. The other guy was smug.”

“Two things to keep in mind. First, you may be saying good-bye to your blond waiter if you find another job. And second, they aren’t really available if they aren’t Mennonite men, are they?”

Glancing up, Lil said, “Oh, there’s the Katy I remember. Thought we weren’t going to get preachy. Especially since you have it all with your dark, smoldering beauty.” Lil shook her head. “Pass.”

“Don’t forget my lovely smooth hands and preachy mouth,” Katy reminded her. Then she cocked an eyebrow. “You can’t move?”

“Nope.”

Making a dramatic gesture with her occupationally chafed hands, she made a winning move. Lil let out a moan and paused to write down her points. Then they turned all the colored dots over until the pile was plain ivory and worked to shuffle the pieces. “What number are we on?” Lil asked.

“Three. I’ve got it.” They kept their peace while lining up their dominos, and then Katy gave Lil a wry grin. “You’re right. It’s really hard for me not to preach. But you set me up with such lovely opportunities all the time. Speaking of, what did you think of Brother Troyer’s sermon? Are you going to be submissive when you get married?”

“Ah, the awful
S
word. You did hear him say that men and women are equal? One’s not superior over the other?”

Katy nodded. “He was talking out of both sides of his mouth, ‘cause in the next breath, he implied that the husband was in charge.” She knew that her own mom showed deference to her dad in a lot of ways and that Lil’s folks had modeled the same type of marriage, but she couldn’t picture Lil settling for that type of arrangement. And to be honest, she had to wonder if she could settle for it, either.

Lil thoughtfully tapped a domino on the table. “I like what he said about it being purely an order issue. Adam was made first to reflect God’s glory. Then woman next, to reflect man’s glory.”

“Glorious man,” Katy taunted, and Lil burst into giggles. Then Katy pushed back from the table and stared out the window. “Seriously, I don’t get the glory thing.”

Lil glanced out the window and back. “You agree that God’s creation shows His greatness?”

“Sure. Nature draws me to God.”

Lil explained, “Man’s the highest of his creation. When a man shows honor to somebody, he removes his hat. So Adam worships with his head uncovered. But mankind sinned. When Adam and Eve sinned, what did they do?”

Katy shrugged. “Hid and covered themselves with fig leaves.”

Lil pointed to her own covering. “So when woman wears a head covering, it’s a symbol of mankind’s fall.”

Inadvertently, Katy touched her own covering. “Wow. What a spiritual picture.”

“For the angels to witness.”

Katy felt drawn to Lil’s depiction of equality. “So what about the angels?”

Lil shrugged. “Honestly? I don’t know. I’m not
that
smart.”

Katy would have laughed if it wasn’t such a crucial topic. “So it’s not just about the woman submitting to her husband?”

“If it were, only married women would wear it.”

Katy demanded, “How do you know all this?”

“Duh? Brother Troyer preached it today. Weren’t you even listening? Sometimes I get the impression you think I’m totally lost and going to hell or something.”

“Lil! Don’t say that. Of course I don’t think that.” Katy felt contrite. “But I did think you’d be happy to ditch the covering.”

“Not really. At work, but not at church. The important thing is that the church doesn’t split apart over it.”

Katy hoped for more than peace. She hoped nothing would change. Since their big argument, Lil had seemed softer, more sensitive toward spiritual things than Katy had given her credit for, and yet she couldn’t picture Lil taking a submissive role. “So back to the
S
word. You going to submit to your husband?”

“I’m hoping to find a man who’ll welcome my opinions, but right now I can’t even find a man.” She pushed back her chair. “I think we need a hot chocolate perk or we’re never going to finish this game. And I need that newspaper.” She started the teakettle, then returned to the table. “Since you’ve got two guys fighting over you, the
S
word seems to be more your problem than mine.”

Katy cringed. She didn’t like the idea of submission. Thunder cracked, and she glanced out the window at the dark sky, considering God.

When Lil returned to the table with two steaming cups, she placed one in front of Katy. “Just take your time with Jake. I don’t want to lose you as a roommate.”

After the game was finished, they left to get Lil’s newspaper. While they drove, they discussed the benefits of Katy getting a cell phone versus a landline. Lil finally persuaded her that just because cell phones were more modern didn’t make then any worldlier than landlines. A phone was a phone, and it was a safety precaution to have while driving.

When Lil brought up driving, it touched a chord with Katy. She did get nervous when she drove alone in the dark.

After they got back to the doddy house, Lil gave her a demonstration of how a cell phone worked, and Katy finally relented to the idea. After that, Lil circled two job ads that she meant to check out the following week.

“You think once you get married things get easier?” Katy asked.

“Nope. Then you get kids. That’s when your trouble really starts.” Lil moved to the floor to begin her regimented sit-ups, and Katy knew the conversation was over.

She opened the jar that contained her latest concoction and rubbed

the greasy cream on her hands. After that, she slipped into her night gloves and jotted notes in her journal. She had an entire section devoted to her hand-cream experiments.

Since her journal had become a handy tool for housekeeping, she decided to add a spiritual section. Nibbling on her pen, she came up with a practical heading: The Prayer Covering. Below it, she copied the scripture Brother Troyer had given them to study.

T
he telephone store might not have been so intimidating if it hadn’t been located inside the indoor mall, which screamed to Katy
lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride of life
—all phrases from a Bible verse. Lil told her she was lucky it wasn’t the weekend for that’s when it became a breeding ground for weirdness. Katy didn’t even want to know what that meant.

Young moms in tight-belted jeans and high-heeled boots pushed strollers and shushed babies without dropping their gaze from the window displays that carried the latest fashions. Some hurried by as if they were participating in a shopping marathon in which they wouldn’t hesitate to run over stragglers. Others stared at her and Lil, their gazes sweeping over them from their oxfords to their coverings, but Katy kept her shoulders ramrod straight. She had as much right as anyone to spend her money. To own a cell phone without being frivolous or self-centered. Or so Lil maintained.

A sudden face darted in front of her. “Ma’am, try this ring cleaner?” Katy halted and stared at the teenager, who blushed when he discovered that she wasn’t wearing any jewelry.

“No thank you.” Katy sidestepped, bumping into Lil.

“Over there.” Lil pointed.

Katy glanced at the store’s sign. When they stepped inside the phone store, Katy felt more out of place than a guy at a quilting.

“I already looked the phones over and can point you to a couple of good deals,” Lil advised. She pointed out various features of the display phones that rested on tiny glass shelves throughout the store. Next a sales representative explained the terms and told Katy about rebates. After Katy chose a phone, she followed him—careful not to stare at his low-slung pants—to the cash register and got out her checkbook. She wrote the check out for the amount he had indicated and pushed it toward him.

“Um, if you write a check, I need to see a debit card.”

Katy glanced at Lil, then back at the young man behind the counter. “I don’t have any cards.” A card had come with her checking account, but she had filed it away, refusing to use it.

“Sorry.” He glanced up at her covering. “I can’t take this then.”

She returned the wasted check to her checkbook and dropped it inside her purse, pulling out her billfold instead. “I’ll pay cash then.”

The young man seemed surprised and patient as Katy worked to get him the correct amount. He programmed the phone and handed it back to her. Her pulse quickened unexpectedly as she stared at the shiny rectangle in her palm. Beside her, Lil snatched Katy’s shopping bag off the counter and nudged her toward the door.

“Thanks,” Katy tossed over her shoulder. The clerk smiled.

“Let’s celebrate. I’ll buy lunch,” Lil urged.

After everything happened so quickly, Katy did need to catch her breath, so she agreed to dine at a Mexican restaurant. Over the chips and salsa, Lil entered some of her phone numbers into Katy’s phone and demonstrated its unique features.

“Thanks for going with me. It was pretty intimidating. How did you ever have the nerve to go by yourself?”

“I didn’t. Jake went with me. Here, let me show you about texting.”

“No thanks. I only bought this for practical purposes.”

“That’s why you need to learn how to text. Watch, I’ll text Jake and tell him your new number.”

“No. Wait. I’m not ready for that yet.”

“What good’s a phone if you don’t use it?”

“Oh fine,” Katy relented.

Moments later she got a reply from Jake. C
AN U COME TO DINNR
F
RI NITE TO C HOW
G
RAM DOES?

Lil showed her how to reply: Y
ES.

I’
LL CALL W D TAILS.

Amazed, Katy wondered how she could have feared something so convenient and practical.