Fathermothergod: My Journey Out of Christian Science by Lucia Greenhouse Page A

Years Away,” on low volume, lifting the needle delicately and setting it back precisely on the wide groove at the beginning of the song, over and over again. Olivia knows every word, and her voice is rich and low, and I wish I could sing like she does. I hear the unhurried rhythm, and Stevie Wonder’s voice overlaid with hers, and even though the song is about God and the cosmos and being black, to me it voices a universal sorrow and—somehow—my own unexpected, blurry longing.
    We page through the Principia yearbook together, and Olivia points out all her friends; I can almost see their faces beneath the loopy, smudged ballpoint scrawl and scratch of various hands, the
i
’s with tiny circles or hearts for dots. A lot of them are seniors now; Olivia has always preferred the company of older people. She calls most of Mom’s and Dad’s friends by their first names, not Mr. and Mrs. the way Sherman and I do.
    Sometimes when Olivia talks about life at Principia, I try toinsert myself into the picture, but I’m not sure boarding school is for me.
    In the morning, we go to church, where Dad leads the service, because now he is the First Reader, which is sort of a big deal. (Everybody knows us now, which is annoying. Sherman, Olivia, and I have to shake hands with people after church, and it takes twice as long to get to the car and go home.) When Dad invites the congregation to stand and testify, I watch Olivia move to the edge of her seat a couple of times, putting both of her hands on the pew in front of her. Has she had a healing at Principia that I don’t know about? She lingers there for moment, and then she eases back into a slouch. After several minutes, she winks at me and I realize she is just fooling around.
    My stomach growls loudly. Sherman snickers, and Mom bites her upper lip.
    We are greeted
at Ammie and Grandpa’s front door first by Uncle Truck, Aunt Adrienne, and their two kids, Mimi and Truckie, who are visiting from St. Louis. Then there is a huge, happy ruckus as everyone else squeezes into the entry hall: Ammie, Grandpa, Mom, Dad, Aunt Laurie and Uncle Nick, and their six kids, Jane, Ted, Sage, Sasha, and the twins, Tib and Cal.
    All the grandchildren except Olivia (who is the oldest and chooses to stay upstairs with the grown-ups) retreat to Ammie and Grandpa’s basement—the girls to play with Ammie’s old dollhouse from her childhood, the boys to Grandpa’s workshop. The dollhouse stands five feet tall, with real electric chandeliers and wallpaper, miniature Oriental rugs, and tiny plates and silverware. When we play with it, it is easy to imagine Ammie’s life in the olden days. From old photographs, and the stories we’ve heard, Highcroft was a magical place where fancy balls and Christmas pageants took place attended by ladies in ball gowns and gentlemen wearing tuxedos and monocles, in rooms that probably looked something like those in the dollhouse.
    Across the hall, Sherman and Ted hammer nails into a workbench and saw two-by-fours in half. There is never a speck of sawdust anywhere, on the floor or the benches or the equipment, until the boys spill their hard-earned shavings on the concrete floor.
    “There’s two tables in the dining room,” Ted says through gritted teeth, without looking up. Jane and I have strolled in, our interest in the dollhouse exhausted. Ted is pounding a thick nail into the workbench, with a spare one sticking out of the left side of his mouth.
    “
You’re
sitting at the
other
table,” he adds, indicating with his eyes that
you
means Sherman and me.
    Sherman stops hammering.
    “Why?” I ask, puzzled.
    “Because you’re Ewings,” Ted says matter-of-factly. The edge of his mouth turns up in a satisfied smile.
    “What are you
talking
about, Ted?” Jane says. She looks at me and blushes.
    “It was a
joke
,” he says.
“Jeez.”
    Jane grabs my elbow and whisks me away. Sherman seems fine, he resumes his hammering, but I am unnerved, even if I