Every Boy Should Have a Man (20 page)

“Tha’s all?” said the man with the patch over his eye. A hand in a dirty work glove rested against the controls. “Y’all finish?”

“Yes,” said my grandmother. “You may lower it again.”

The man snorted, “Church folk.” As he set to work lowering the casket, he mouthed what may have been obscene words but we couldn’t hear him for the singing:

We are marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful Zion,

We are marching upward to Zion, that beautiful city of God

I ushered Sister Morrisohn into the hearse already loaded with sisters from the Missionary Society. The widow squeezed my hand. “Thank you, Elwyn. He really cared about you. Your music meant so much to him.”

“Thank you. I’m glad.”

I remained by the door of the hearse because Sister Morrisohn yet held my hand. Should I tell her that Peachie Gregory was waiting for me, that we had planned to stop off at Char-Hut to finish our grieving over french fries and milkshakes? How does one break away from the recently bereaved?

I averted my eyes and in a sudden move wrenched my hand from her grasp. When I dared look again, the hand that had held mine was brushing at tears.

“Don’t forget about me, Elwyn.”

Strange music began to play in my head. Was my light-headedness a result of her flowery perfume? The memory of the shape and feel of her waist? God forgive me, I silently prayed, this is Brother Morrisohn’s widow. Brother Morrisohn, a man I loved.

“I won’t forget you,” I said.

When I got to my car, where Peachie awaited, I was breathing as though I’d just run a great distance.

* * *

“The church is going to be a sadder place without Brother Morrisohn,” I said as we drove to Char-Hut.

“Poorer,” Peachie answered distantly. Her forehead was beaded in perspiration despite the wind from the open window that animated her long braids. It was hot and my old Mazda didn’t have air-conditioning. “No more free rides for the Faithful. The candyman is gone.”

“At any rate,” I said, “I think we presented him a great tribute.”

“Especially your playing, Brother Elwyn. It brought tears.”

I ignored her sarcasm. “He was a great saint. He’ll be missed. I for one am going to miss him.”

“You and the widow both.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” Peachie continued to stare out her window. “I said nothing.”

She was not telling the truth—she had indeed said something, a something that unabashedly implied impropriety:
You and the widow both
. I may have been in love with Peachie, but I was not going to suffer her insolence. I had never been anything but a gentleman with any of the sisters at the church, Peachie and Sister Morrisohn included. How dare she intimate such a vile idea! Such a rude side of Peachie I had never encountered.

Was she jealous?

Just as I was about to chastise her for her un-Christlike behavior, my Mazda stalled.

“This old car,” she grumbled.

“God will give us grace,” I said, cranking the engine to no avail as the vehicle rolled to a stop in the middle of traffic. Other cars began blowing their horns, whizzing around us.

I got out. Peachie crawled into the driver’s seat. I popped the hood and jiggled the wire connecting the alternator to the battery. Peachie clicked the ignition at regular intervals. When her click matched my jiggle, the frayed end of the wire sparked in my hand and the engine came to life. I closed the hood and got back into the car, rubbing my hands. “That takes care of that.”

Peachie stared out the open window again. “I’m not hungry. Take me home.”

“Peachie—”

“Please, just take me home.”

I passed to the center lane to make a U-turn. The traffic light caught me. I floored the clutch and the gas pedals so that the car wouldn’t stall while we waited for the green. “You could at least tell me what I did to upset you.”

“Who said you upset me? I have serious things on my mind.”

Serious things I had little doubt. She was jealous.

“Ever since you got into the car, you’ve been answering me curtly or ignoring me altogether. I thought we were friends.” The light changed. I made the U-turn. “See there,” I said, “you can’t even look at me.”

“Says who?” She turned on me with angry eyes.

“Are you jealous of Sister Morrisohn?”

“Jealous of the fragile widow?”

“Are you jealous?”

“Now you’re being silly.” Peachie laughed. “Wait. Are
you
in love with Sister Morrisohn? You certainly seemed concerned about her at the funeral. And what—do you think she’s in love with you? She’s only about ten times your age.”

“You don’t have to be so mean to me. I just thought that maybe you felt threatened.”

Peachie stared at me with eyes that mocked. “And what—how can I feel threatened? Do you think, my dear brother in the Lord, that I possess any feelings for you other than the sincerest and purest friendship?” If she had been standing, Peachie’s hands would have been akimbo. “Did I forget to share with you that Barry McGowan has written to me several times from Bible College?”

“Barry McGowan?” Why didn’t he just leave her alone? He was too old for her. “What does Barry have to do with this?”

“He graduates in December. He’s building a church up there in Lakeland. He already has the land and everything. He wants me to direct the choir.” Then she added with finality: “He wants me to marry him.”

“What? Well you won’t,” I said. “At least you won’t marry him now. You still have school to finish. And your mom and dad—”

“They’re all for it. They love Barry. I can finish school up in Lakeland, and then go to Bible College.”

“But they’ll just let you go like that? You’re so young.”

“Lots of sisters get married young,” she said, as though I should know this, and well I should, having played at many of their weddings. But Peachie didn’t have to go that way. She was virtuous, I was sure. “Don’t worry, Elwyn, Barry can take care of me. He’s a great man of God.”

I had trouble focusing on the road. “This is so sudden.”

“I’ve been thinking about it for four months.”

“Four months! You never told me. We’re best friends. You tell me everything.”

“Everything but this.” Her features softened, and she lowered her eyes. “I didn’t tell you this, Elwyn—because, I guess, I didn’t want you to hold it against me. You’re so perfect, so holy.”

“I’m not that holy. I told you that I deceived my parents in order to take piano lessons.”

“That’s small, Elwyn. Everyone does little things like that,” she said. “I took piano lessons with Sister McGowan in order to be around Barry.”

I shook my head. “You never told me that. You’re making this all up.”

“Elwyn, you’re so innocent, you wouldn’t understand how these things happen. If I had told you about Barry and me, you’d have held it against me.”

“I’d never hold anything against you.” I said a silent prayer for courage, and the Lord sent me courage. “How can I hold anything against you, Peachie? I love you.”

“Don’t say that.”

“But I do. I love you—”

“Elwyn, do you?”

“—and I think you love me too, Peachie.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“You knew. We both knew.”

“Oh, Elwyn.”

I let go of the gearshift and found her hand. “Don’t go to Lakeland with Barry. Stay here with me. You are the love of my life. You are the only girl I will ever love.”

She squeezed my hand in both of hers for one hope-filled moment. Then she pushed it away.

“Stay, Peachie.”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

“You can,” I said.

Peachie patted her stomach. I had to look twice before I understood. Now it made sense, but impossible sense.

“You and Barry?”

“Four months.”

“But that’s a sin. Fornication. The Bible says—”

“It is better to marry than to burn.”

“But you have defiled your body—the Temple of God.”

“God forgives seventy times seven. Will you forgive just once, Elwyn?”

How could she smile such a cruel smile? She was mocking me. And the church. Where was her shame? I wanted to cry, really cry. My Peachie, whom I had never kissed. Gone. Out of the ark of safety.

“Christ is married to the backslider. Barry and I went before God on our knees. We repented of our sin. But you, Elwyn, will you forgive us?”

“I’m not God. It’s not for me to forgive.”

“It’s important to me. You are my true friend.”

“I’m not God.”

She made a sound somewhere between a gasp and a sigh. My Mazda stalled again. I got out, walked around to the front, and popped the hood. I jiggled as Peachie clicked. Oh God, I prayed, give me grace.

* * *

I didn’t feel so holy as I waited for the last remnants of the Missionary Society to leave Sister Morrisohn’s house.

My grandmother, of course, was the last to go. She stood on the porch with her heavy arm draped over Sister Morrisohn’s shoulder telling the grieving widow a last important something. As my grandmother talked, she scanned the surroundings. East to west. What was she looking for? Did she think I would make my move with everyone watching? She should have known that I would park down the street behind a neighbor’s overgrown shrubbery where I could see and not be seen.

My grandmother embraced Sister Morrisohn and kissed her goodbye on the cheek. At last, she lumbered down the short steps with the help of Sister McGowan (the mother of Barry!), who often gave her rides now that she was too old to drive. As Sister McGowan’s car pulled off the property, I fired up my engine.

I left my black funeral jacket and tie in the car. I prayed for courage.

I rang her doorbell. “Elwyn. Come in.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Sit down. Would you like something to drink? There’s some fruit punch left.”

“Okay.”

I was sucked into the plush red-velvet couch. Mounted on the wall across from me was a large oil painting of them on their wedding day. She was chubbier as a young woman. He looked about the same. She had only been twenty-six the day they married. He had been sixty-two. Beneath the painting was the grand piano he had bid me play every time I visited his house. I remembered that two years prior, the youth choir had performed the Christmas cantata right here in their living room. I had played “O Holy Night,” while Barry, on Christmas break from Bible College, had sung. I had foolishly thought that Peachie’s enthusiastic applause was meant for me.

Sister Morrisohn, still wearing black, returned with a glass of fruit punch and a napkin. I took it from her and she sat down on the couch a few inches away from me. Limb brushed against limb. I drank the better part of my punch in one swallow.

She cupped her stomach. “I don’t know when my appetite will return. I haven’t eaten but a mouthful of food since I woke up and found him. I knew it would come one day, but I still wasn’t ready for it. We’re never ready for it, are we?”

“Well,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say. “Well.”

“If it weren’t for the church, I don’t know how I would have made it. Everyone has been so nice to me.”

In a voice that flaked from my throat, I said, “You must have loved him.”

“Yes. I was a very different person when we met. He saved me from myself. He led me to the Lord.”

She was different when he met her. I prayed, Lord forgive me, as I glanced at her doubly pierced ears. What was she like before? Could she be that different person again?

“Before you met him, what kind of sins did you commit?”

“Sins? I don’t think about them anymore.” She raised holy hands. “Praise God, I’m free.”

“Praise God,” I said, raising holy hands, careful not to spill the remainder of my drink. “But are you ever tempted?”

“All are tempted, Elwyn, but only the yielding is sin.” She clapped her hands. “Hallelujah.”

“Hallelujah” died on my lips as my eyes followed her neckline down to the top button of her funeral dress. Bright flesh showed through black lace like a beacon. All the signs were there: her smell, her touch, her plea that I not forget her. Limb against limb. I would not let her get away as Peachie had. “But do you ever feel like yielding?”

“What?”

I folded my napkin under my glass of punch and with trembling hand set the glass on the octagonal coffee table before the couch. I turned and reached for her hand.

“Elwyn, what are you doing?”

I kissed her on the mouth. I pressed her hands up against my chest.

She tore away from me and sprang to her feet. “Elwyn—help me, Jesus!—what are you doing?”

“You’re a beautiful woman,” I squeaked, but it was no use. She was not to be seduced.

“Elwyn!”

I buried my head in my hands.

“You need prayer, Elwyn,” she said sadly. “You need the Lord.”

“Yes,” I replied, without looking up. “Yes.”

Now there was a soothing hand on my neck like a mother’s. I wept and I wept.

“Serving the Lord at your age is not easy, Elwyn. Don’t give up.” Sister Morrisohn rubbed my neck and prayed. “Christ is married to the backslider. Confess your secret sins.”

And confess I did.

And then I wept some more because the more she rubbed my neck, the more forgiveness I needed. For when she got down on her knees beside me and began to pray against my face, the very scent of her expanded my lungs like a bellows, and her breathing—her warm breath against my cheeks, my ear, into my eyes burning hot with tears—was everything I imagined a lover’s kiss might be.

End of Excerpt

Praise for Jesus Boy

“Heartfelt and occasionally hilarious,
Jesus Boy
is a tender masterpiece.”—Dennis Lehane, author of
Mystic River
and
The Given Day

“Generations of illicit sex run through this clever and wide-ranging book [about religious addiction] in which the flesh always triumphs . . . Surely no one does church sexy like Allen . . . Allen’s writing by turns is solemn and funny . . . It would be easy for
Jesus Boy
to become fluffy satire but Allen keeps his characters real.”
—New York Times Book Review