The Girl Who Slept with God: A Novel (23 page)

“Well, that is too, too bad,” said Grip, smiling and mock wiping his forehead, “because I was just getting warmed up.”

Jory looked down at her shoes, at the fawn-colored moccasins that he had given her. She scuffed one shoe slightly against the floor and listened to the silver bell tinkle. “Maybe another time, though.” She said this so quietly that only he could hear.

Grip smiled and bent down and pulled another record out of the victrola’s bottom cabinet. He looked at its sleeve and read the title. “‘I’ve Got Something in My Eye’?”

“Oh, that’s a good one,” said Mrs. Kleinfelter.
“I’ve got something in my eye and it’s you, you, you.”
She glanced over at Grace on the couch. “At least I think that’s how it goes.”

“I
love
music.” Grace stood up and smoothed Henry’s shirt down over her abdomen. “I’ve played the piano since I was five. I’ve been the church
choir director. I just don’t think that God approves of men and women dancing together . . . for obvious reasons.” Grace picked up the sticky ice cream wrappers that Jory and Mrs. Kleinfelter had left lying on the coffee table. She held these gingerly between her fingertips and walked out of the living room and into the kitchen.

Jory could hear Grace opening and shutting the kitchen cupboards and putting dishes in the sink.

“Well.” Mrs. Kleinfelter shifted her gaze from Jory to Grip. “I think I’d better be getting on home.” She moved quickly toward the front door.

Jory followed Mrs. Kleinfelter and leaned against the door frame. “I never got to say thank you for yesterday. I meant to, but I forgot.”

“No need for that.” Mrs. Kleinfelter stepped out onto the porch and down the steps. She waved her hand without turning around and then was swallowed up by the darkness of the unlit space that separated their two houses. Jory could see her bone-colored hair moving just faintly through the autumn night.

“I guess that’s my cue.” Grip stood behind Jory. “Hey—seriously. I’m really sorry if I caused any trouble.” He made a mock grimace that turned into a yawn, and then linked his hands and stretched his arms above his head. “Wanna walk me out to my truck?”

Jory peeked back toward the kitchen. “Okay,” she said.

The night grass was wet and Jory stopped and took her moccasins off, carefully setting them back on the porch. They walked through the grass and down the dirt driveway and stopped next to the ice cream truck. Grip’s shirtfront glowed a dull green in the bit of light shed by a slivered moon. “That’s a waxing crescent,” said Jory.

“A what?” Grip reached into the truck’s interior, rummaged around for a moment, and then surreptitiously pulled out a can of Old Milwaukee. He quickly popped the top and took a long swig. “Your sister doesn’t have binoculars, does she?” He grinned and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “What were you saying?”

Jory shrugged. “Nothing. Just dumb stuff my dad taught me.”

“Like what?” He took another long drink.

“Oh, you know, just that if the left side of the moon is dark, then the
light part is growing bigger, so that’s
waxing
, and if the right side of the moon is dark, then the light part is shrinking, and that’s
waning
.”

“Hm,” said Grip. He gazed up at the moon. “So wait—if I can see the right side of the moon, like now, it means the moon’s gonna get bigger, and if I can see the left side, it’s getting smaller. Right?”

“Right.” Jory smiled.

“I never thought about this before, but I guess we always only see that one side of the moon, don’t we? The side with the sad old guy’s face.”

“We don’t really even know what the other side looks like, the dark side. It’s there, but we don’t ever see it.”

“Just like some people.” Grip waggled his eyebrows and then lowered the pitch of his voice. “With their dark sides all safely hidden away.”

Jory stared into his browny-gold eyes trying to judge the level of his seriousness. With Grip it was often hard to tell when he was joking and when he wasn’t.

“You’ll have to teach me some more of this stuff. This astronomy stuff,” he said. “The sun and the moon and the stars.”

“And the planets,” said Jory. “And the constellations and the galaxies and solar flares and white dwarves and red giants and black holes.”

“Wow,” said Grip. “Sounds like it’s getting pretty crowded up there.” He climbed up onto the truck’s driver’s seat, and then leaned down and planted a kiss on the top of Jory’s head. On her hair, where her middle part was. “See you later, stargazer.”

As soon as he put the truck in reverse, she peeked up and watched the truck’s taillights glowing small and smaller all the way down the road. Then she turned back to the diamond-windowed house and went inside to help her sister put the dishes away.

I
t was a beautiful Sunday morning in October, and it was her fourteenth birthday. Jory lay in Henry Kleinfelter’s old metal-framed bed beneath the wedding quilt and inspected the rays of sunlight filling her bedroom. It was going to be warm and sunny. And she was going to be fourteen! Jory stretched her toes out beneath the quilt luxuriously. She had been born at noon exactly. Her mother had told her this story many times, how Dr. Henry had had to be called out of church, and how everyone knew exactly where he was going since Jory’s mother was the only pregnant lady in their church at that particular time, and how Pastor Ron had said, right in the middle of his sermon, “Well, I guess there’ll be another Quanbeck joining us for church next Sunday,” and how everyone in the congregation had smiled and laughed and then how the moment the service was over they had all (or nearly all) trooped over to the Good Samaritan Hospital, which was right across the block, and peered in at Jory in her incubator bed or whatever it was that the nurses put the newborns in. And then her father was there and he had dragged some of his graduate students over to see Jory too because he was so proud and he really didn’t want any sons anyway—they were nothing but trouble—but girls, well, girls were lovely and sweet.

The phone rang downstairs, which meant her father was calling, since no one else knew (or was allowed to know) their number. Although Jory was thinking of giving it to Grip, since he’d already met Grace now and there was no more real harm to be done.

Already in the birthday dress she’d chosen—sleeveless lavender—Jory ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. Grace was sitting at the table with her Bible and book of commentary open in front of her. Jory gazed around the kitchen, looking expectantly at the oven, at the
countertops. The kitchen looked the way it always did—slightly old and messy and yellowish. “Hey,” said Jory.

“Hey,” said Grace, not looking up. She underlined something in her book of commentary.

Jory sat down at the table across from Grace. She watched as Grace wrote a sentence down on a small sheet of paper. “What are you doing?”

“My daily devotions.” Grace turned a page in the Bible.

“Nothing else?”

Grace put her pen down and turned toward Jory. “I’m reading about the Parable of the Ten Virgins. Do you remember how it goes?”

“Sure,” said Jory. “I think so.”

Grace looked down at her Bible. “Matthew 25,” she said. She cleared her throat and began reading.
“The kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Now five of them were wise, and five of them were foolish. Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.”
Grace turned the page and began reading again.
“And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise answered, saying, ‘No, lest there should not be enough for us and you; but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’ And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.”

Grace put the Bible down on the table. “Now, what do you think that means?”

“Well.” Jory examined her own thumbnail. “I guess it means that you should always be doing whatever it is that you’re supposed to be doing because you never know when you might be caught not doing it.”

Grace sighed. “Seriously, Jory, what does God want us to be doing?”

“Not sharing our oil with foolish virgins?” Jory glanced up at Grace. “I know all about what it means. I went to Sunday School and Junior Church and Bible School, too, you know.”

“Okay, then you understand that God wants us to be ever vigilant—to be ever ready for the world that is to come after this one. Which means sometimes not doing the fun, easy thing that everyone else is doing, and instead doing the difficult, self-sacrificing thing that would make Jesus happy. That would make Jesus proud to say that he knows us.”

Jory put her hands in her lap. “Are we talking about dancing now?”

Grace shut the Bible and stacked it carefully on top of her commentary. “This passage concerns all kinds of behavior,” she said. “Not just dancing.”

“Today’s my birthday.” Jory trained her eyes on Grace.

Grace picked up her books and stood up. “That’s right,” she said, “which makes it the perfect time to think about how you’d like to live the rest of your life. How you’d like to develop spiritually as a young Christian woman.”

Jory cocked her head. “Did you make me a cake?”

“Yes, I did.”

Jory hopped up. “Where is it? I didn’t smell it baking.”

“Mrs. Kleinfelter has it at her house. She helped me make it yesterday. It’s supposed to be a surprise, so when she brings it over, look surprised, all right?”

“Is it chocolate with white frosting?”

Grace smiled.

“Ha!” Jory did a tiny dance on the kitchen floor. “Do I get any presents?”

“Yes, but you have to wait until Mom and Dad get here.”

“Is Frances coming?”

“Of course. What’s she going to do—stay home by herself?”

“This is going to be weird,” said Jory. She walked into the living room and sat down on the couch.

Grace followed her into the room. “It’ll be okay,” Grace said, but she didn’t look entirely convinced.

There was a faint knocking on the front door. “That has to be Hilda,” said Grace.

Jory hardly had time to register her surprise at this sudden familiarity since Mrs. Kleinfelter was already opening the door and stepping inside.
“Many happy returns,” Mrs. Kleinfelter said. She was holding a white-frosted layer cake in one hand and a grocery sack in the other. She seemed slightly frazzled and her large men’s cardigan was buttoned wrong.

“A cake?” Jory clasped her hands together. “For me?”

Mrs. Kleinfelter frowned. “I just pray it’s any good. I haven’t baked a cake in years. Your sister did most of it.” She handed the cake to Grace and the grocery sack to Jory. “That’s your birthday present,” she said. “I hope you’re not allergic.”

Jory peered inside the large brown bag. A small gray kitten with huge yellow eyes peered back at her. “Oh!” Jory said. “Grace, look!” She reached into the bag. “It’s a kitten!” She pulled the little thing out and cradled it against her chest.

Grace and Mrs. Kleinfelter looked on. “I’m going to take care of it when you’re at school,” Grace said.

“It doesn’t know how to pull its claws back in yet,” Mrs. Kleinfelter said, reaching out and unhooking one of the kitten’s paws from Jory’s dress. “My old housecat, Birdie, surprised me with this batch. I thought she was long done with that kind of thing, but no.” Mrs. Kleinfelter made a sort of snortling noise. “Oh, well, they pretty much take care of themselves—unlike human babies.” Mrs. Kleinfelter’s face suddenly flushed a bright pink. She fiddled quickly with her topknot. “I’d probably better be going,” she said. “Your folks will be showing up and everything.”

“Thank you
so
much.” Jory tore her eyes away from her kitten. “I love her. Him?” Jory held her cat up above her head and peered beneath. “He doesn’t have a tail!”

“It’s a Manx,” said Mrs. Kleinfelter. “I saw this old tailless tom skulking about a while ago, and sure enough.” She shook her head.

Jory ran over and hugged Mrs. Kleinfelter, who looked more than a little surprised. “Goodness,” Mrs. Kleinfelter said, stiffly returning Jory’s embrace and patting Jory lightly on the back. “Let’s not squish the cat, now.”

A car door slammed, and then another. Grace leaned forward and peered out the front window. “It’s them,” Grace said. She turned and gave Jory a look of fear and happiness.

“Oh, my—I’d really better be going.” Mrs. Kleinfelter opened the
front door. Jory peeked around her shoulder at the sight of her father and mother and little sister walking up the driveway to Henry’s house. Jory felt strangely light-headed at the thought of meeting her mother’s eyes for the first time in two months.

“Come on,” said Grace. She pulled at Jory’s hand. Jory followed Grace out the front door, the kitten still clenched tightly to her chest.

The two groups of Quanbecks met at the bottom of the porch steps.

“Well, hello hello,” said Jory’s father, smiling and reaching out to shake Mrs. Kleinfelter’s hand. “It’s nice to see you again . . . Mrs. . . . um—mm—”

“Hilda.”

“Mrs. Hilda.”

Grace touched her father’s shirtsleeve. “Hilda’s her first name, Dad.”

“Oh, right, of course.” Her father ran his hand through his hair. “Hilda, um, this is my wife, Esther, and our youngest daughter, Frances.”

Mrs. Kleinfelter stepped forward and shook Jory’s mother’s hand. “You have two very wonderful girls here,” Mrs. Kleinfelter said.

Jory’s mother smiled a very small smile and then trained her eyes on the ground near her feet.

“They really are,” said Mrs. Kleinfelter. “Wonderful, that is.” She nodded, as if to further convince everyone of Grace’s and Jory’s wonderfulness.

For a moment no one said anything.

“Hey, Franny,” said Jory, bending down.

Frances was partially hidden behind the fullness of their mother’s Sunday skirt.

“Look what I have,” said Jory, holding the kitten out in Frances’s direction.

Frances peeped shyly at Jory, while still holding tight to some lace beneath their mother’s skirt. “What is it?” she said in a small, croaky voice.

“Don’t be silly, Frances.” Their mother pulled Frances firmly out from behind her and gave her a push in Jory’s direction.

Frances smiled in a dazed fashion, and plucked at her own skirt.

“It doesn’t have any tail,” said Jory, turning the cat around to verify this information. “See?” The kitten clawed the air and began to mew with urgency.

Frances gazed at the kitten’s backside. “Why not? Who cut it off?”

“It was born like that. Look, you can feel just a teeny tiny little bone where its tail should be.” Jory took Frances’s hand and rubbed it over the kitten’s rump.

Frances pulled back her hand and made a funny face. The grown-ups laughed a little more than necessary.

“Well,” said Mrs. Kleinfelter, “you folks enjoy your day. I’m off to weed my tomatoes.” She waved one hand and walked quickly in the direction of her house.

Jory’s father turned back around and clapped his hands together. “What do you say? Shall we all go inside?” Jory’s father appealed to one pair of females and then the other. “I believe we have a couple of presents to open, and some cake to eat, right?” He put his arm around Jory’s mother. “This is a pretty important day for all of us.” He gave his wife’s arm a squeeze. “We certainly remember fourteen years ago today, don’t we?” Jory’s mother said nothing. “And it was even on a Sunday, just like today.” He steered his wife ahead of him, up the front steps, and through the open door. Once inside, Jory’s mother shook his arm off and walked over to the dead cat couch, where she stood.

“Do you want to sit down?” Grace pointed vaguely at the kitchen. “We can eat in there, or in here—it doesn’t really matter.”

“Where on earth did you get that dress?” It was the first time Jory’s mother had spoken to them.

Grace held out the hem of the long brown paisley dress she was wearing. “Hilda gave it to me. It’s an old one of hers that she altered . . . at the waist.”

Their mother sat down on the arm of the couch as if the air had suddenly been let out of her.

“She gave me the kitten, too.” Jory tried to smile. “The Manx kitten.” She glanced at her father, who was running his hand through his hair again. “For my birthday,” she finished weakly.

“Well, I’m afraid we didn’t bring anything half that interesting.” Jory’s mother sat up a little straighter and stared directly at Jory. “Not a single dog or puppy or Shetland pony.”

“Afro Cat died,” said Frances. “Mr. Garmendia put him in a cupboard out in his lawn mower shed. I got to see him. He’s going to get stuffed.”

“Stuffed?” Jory made a face.

“Frances, get up off the floor.” Their mother frowned. “Oren, why don’t you get the things out of the trunk?”

“Good idea, good idea.” Jory’s father sprang out of the chair he was sitting in. “Come on, Frances, you can help me carry the presents.”

“I’ll get the cake ready,” said Grace, and disappeared into the kitchen.

Jory and her mother were left alone together in the living room. Her mother sat on the edge of the couch, gazing down and rearranging the folds in her skirt. Jory felt herself breathe in and out. Once. Twice. Three times.

Her mother stood up. “Where’s the bathroom?” she asked.

“Oh,” said Jory, quickly standing up too. “It’s down the hall on the left-hand side.” She pointed.

Her mother swept past her. Caron’s Fleurs de Rocaille, Aqua Net hair spray, and talcum powder: the most powerful scents of Jory’s childhood. She’d almost forgotten.

Her father and Frances banged back in through the front door, carrying several small, brightly wrapped packages. Frances laid her package on the coffee table; she was still holding the kitten in her other arm. “I picked out the cowboy paper,” she said.

“I love it,” said Jory.

Grace came through the kitchen door carrying the cake. It was now lit by fourteen yellow and white candles.

“Ooh,” said Frances. The kitten squirmed wildly in her arms.

“Shall we sing?” said Grace. She glanced around the room. “Where’s Mom?”

“In the bathroom,” said Jory.

“I’m sure she’ll be out in a minute,” their father said. “Here, I’ll hold the cake.” He took the cake from Grace and held it out toward Jory with a certain amount of ceremony. “Do you have a good wish ready?”