Tom calls my healings “the crowning moment of the service.”
Now they’re passing the collection plates, and Sugar Tomis drowsing behind the curtain while I watch the night through the saddle flap.
This is the first time since Verbena that I’ve felt halfway comfortable with the way things are going. Maybe I’m being ungrateful? Is this the life I need to be in? Maybe I haven’t truly understood the whole importance of my mission up till now. Maybe—
It’s her—a flash of blue at the rear of the tent, mixed in with the back of the congregation. That same shade of blue …
Lucy!
What in the world is she doing here? What should I say? What should I do? I scramble to straighten my shirt, smooth my hair.
Should I go straight to her, ask her if she’s all right? But she must be, elsewise why would she be here?
She wants to thank me. Thank me for saving her life
.
I stand frozen and slack-jawed watching her. She’s staring straight ahead, not speaking to anybody else. How long has she been there like that? The whole service? What is she waiting for?
She’s waiting for
me.
The congregation is starting to break up. I look around quick, scanning the faces. No sign of her parents. I haul back the saddle flap and look outside: no Gulf Breeze motor home. Maybe she rode over with a friend?
To see me
.
Okay, Ronald Earl. Just go talk to her. Do it now
.
I hop down from the stage and make a beeline for the center aisle, keeping my eyes straight ahead so they will let me through. I can see folks swirling past Lucy. I feel like there’s a big silver hook in my side yanking me toward her.
“Little Texas,” Miss Wanda Joy calls, but I pretend I didn’t hear.
Lucy
. The inside of my head is on fire. She’s starting to move away now, skirting the last row of chairs. There’s something odd and jerky about the way she is walking, like her leg is hurt or something.
I spy a blue flick of Lucy’s dress as she turns the corner of the tent.
What do I say? Ask her about her school? Her folks? Her town? Anything but the healing. Let her bring that up
.
I run to the back entrance and race around the corner. I jerk my head right and left; I see people streaming across the lumpy grass. A scattering of cloudy stars. The Wilbankses’ little frame house glowing yellow. The line of a fence, cars, a dog nosing around a tractor tire.
And nothing else.
“So how’d we do?” Sugar Tom says.
“The Church of the Hand won’t starve … yet,” Miss Wanda Joy says, clutching the prayer box to her lap.
“Speaking of which,” Certain Certain says, “I could eat the hind end of a mule. Without the sauce.”
We pile into the motor home and head out to Shoney’s. Everybody else is keyed up from the service, saying it was our best in weeks. They all chatter away, Sugar Tom having fun with a cute little waitress. But I was that close to talking to Lucy.
That close
. I am pure heartsick.
“You were quiet tonight at supper,” Miss Wanda Joy says when we get back.
“Yes’m.”
She shakes the box in her lap, letting me hear the coins bounce. “It was a good service. Nothing to worry about.”
“I know.”
“Our next stop is Clampton. They were good to us last time.”
“I don’t remember.”
“Well. Sleep.”
She moves away from my end of the motor home, skirts swishing and leaving behind a cloud of lavender.
Laying down in my bunk, I feel like a car is squatting on my chest.
Why is she so important to me? Why do I feel like I’ve lost something I never had to begin with?
I fall into a ragged sleep and keep waking up with pieces of dreams on the edges of my mind. Each scrap of dream has something blue in it, hanging just out of reach.
The next morning the sun comes up like three-day-old orange juice. I rub my stinging face and stare out at the dark green of the trees against the horizon.
YOU ARE NOW ENTERING CLAMPTON, MISSISSIPPI , a little sign tells us. The town looks to be a little bigger than Cobbville,
Now they’re passing the collection plates, and Sugar Tomis drowsing behind the curtain while I watch the night through the saddle flap.
This is the first time since Verbena that I’ve felt halfway comfortable with the way things are going. Maybe I’m being ungrateful? Is this the life I need to be in? Maybe I haven’t truly understood the whole importance of my mission up till now. Maybe—
It’s her—a flash of blue at the rear of the tent, mixed in with the back of the congregation. That same shade of blue …
Lucy!
What in the world is she doing here? What should I say? What should I do? I scramble to straighten my shirt, smooth my hair.
Should I go straight to her, ask her if she’s all right? But she must be, elsewise why would she be here?
She wants to thank me. Thank me for saving her life
.
I stand frozen and slack-jawed watching her. She’s staring straight ahead, not speaking to anybody else. How long has she been there like that? The whole service? What is she waiting for?
She’s waiting for
me.
The congregation is starting to break up. I look around quick, scanning the faces. No sign of her parents. I haul back the saddle flap and look outside: no Gulf Breeze motor home. Maybe she rode over with a friend?
To see me
.
Okay, Ronald Earl. Just go talk to her. Do it now
.
I hop down from the stage and make a beeline for the center aisle, keeping my eyes straight ahead so they will let me through. I can see folks swirling past Lucy. I feel like there’s a big silver hook in my side yanking me toward her.
“Little Texas,” Miss Wanda Joy calls, but I pretend I didn’t hear.
Lucy
. The inside of my head is on fire. She’s starting to move away now, skirting the last row of chairs. There’s something odd and jerky about the way she is walking, like her leg is hurt or something.
I spy a blue flick of Lucy’s dress as she turns the corner of the tent.
What do I say? Ask her about her school? Her folks? Her town? Anything but the healing. Let her bring that up
.
I run to the back entrance and race around the corner. I jerk my head right and left; I see people streaming across the lumpy grass. A scattering of cloudy stars. The Wilbankses’ little frame house glowing yellow. The line of a fence, cars, a dog nosing around a tractor tire.
And nothing else.
“So how’d we do?” Sugar Tom says.
“The Church of the Hand won’t starve … yet,” Miss Wanda Joy says, clutching the prayer box to her lap.
“Speaking of which,” Certain Certain says, “I could eat the hind end of a mule. Without the sauce.”
We pile into the motor home and head out to Shoney’s. Everybody else is keyed up from the service, saying it was our best in weeks. They all chatter away, Sugar Tom having fun with a cute little waitress. But I was that close to talking to Lucy.
That close
. I am pure heartsick.
“You were quiet tonight at supper,” Miss Wanda Joy says when we get back.
“Yes’m.”
She shakes the box in her lap, letting me hear the coins bounce. “It was a good service. Nothing to worry about.”
“I know.”
“Our next stop is Clampton. They were good to us last time.”
“I don’t remember.”
“Well. Sleep.”
She moves away from my end of the motor home, skirts swishing and leaving behind a cloud of lavender.
Laying down in my bunk, I feel like a car is squatting on my chest.
Why is she so important to me? Why do I feel like I’ve lost something I never had to begin with?
I fall into a ragged sleep and keep waking up with pieces of dreams on the edges of my mind. Each scrap of dream has something blue in it, hanging just out of reach.
The next morning the sun comes up like three-day-old orange juice. I rub my stinging face and stare out at the dark green of the trees against the horizon.
YOU ARE NOW ENTERING CLAMPTON, MISSISSIPPI , a little sign tells us. The town looks to be a little bigger than Cobbville,
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