Traditional Gravity

by Stephen Armstrong

  Chapter Seven

  My mother wasn't champing at the bit when Jordan I got home. In fact, she was sitting in the living room, leisurely reading.

  "What was she like?" she asked Jordan, bypassing me as a source for information.

  "She was really nice. I thought she was smart, funny and generally fun to be around," summarized Jordan.

  "Did you guys find out anything about her kid?"

  I fielded that one. "No. But I'm starting to think that maybe Will's wife didn't have her facts right. It wasn't like she was close to Samantha or anything. Because I haven't seen anything that would lead me to believe that there's a kid living at her Uncle and Aunt's house."

  "And how did you arrive at that conclusion?" asked Jordan skeptically. "Did you expect them to have a sign outside?"

  "No, but I didn't see any toys outside or anything else that would belong to a kid. And usually there's something around that would indicate a kid is on premises."

  Jordan slumped down in the other couch. "You should just ask her. I don't know what you're waiting for."

  "Yes, I know what you think I should do. You've only said it a hundred times so far." I positioned myself in the overstuffed chair. "Besides, I don't know how I would feel about it. I want to know how I feel about Samantha first. And in the end-"

  "You're only going to be here for a week," finished Jordan.

  "Right."

  "Well, she sounds like a lovely girl," said my mom. It surprised me that she didn't say more. It seemed she carefully chose what to say to me on this visit.

  My mom's last comment marked the end of that discussion. We still had about four hours until we needed to get ready for the wake. Mom continued to read and Dad worked outside. Jordan and I watched TV, which made me renew my contempt for afternoon television. I regretted leaving Samantha for this. But even if I did nothing at home, I should have been there. It meant something to my parents to have everyone under the same roof again, especially at a time like this.

  After a few episodes of Cold Case reruns, dinner time arrived. We ate a simple, quiet supper that my mom prepared. The conversation centered around my grandfather, and we had another round of reminiscing. When that wound down, we cleared the table and prepared for the wake.

  Grandpa's wake convened at a small funeral home in Hadenburg, my grandparents' hometown. They lived in that community their entire lives, but were not necessarily well known or influential. Most of the town was probably unaware of his passing. I tried to predict who would attend the wake. Grandpa outlived his brothers and sisters, so none of them would be there. His nieces and nephews were spread across the country, so few of them would travel to Hadenburg for his memorial service. While my grandparents played pinochle with a few other families, their social circle had always been small. Grandmother religiously attended Hadenburg Baptist Church, and my grandfather - who never darkened the doors of any church while my mom was growing up - had started attending in his senior years, before he went to the nursing home. Thus, I expected a strong turnout from the church and an otherwise sparse night at the wake.

  Both of my uncles and aunts beat us to the funeral home. They greeted us with subdued smiles and hushed voices. No one had shed any tears yet. I didn't expect the wake to be a highly emotional affair and supposed the most common feeling would be resignation.

  This was my first wake. Neither of my grandparents on my dad's side had wakes or open casket funerals. I found it a little disquieting to discover my grandfather's lifeless body, solemnly laid in a large wooden coffin. Initially, I didn't want to view the body, but eventually a strong pull to look at him one last time drew me toward his casket.

  His face was shiny from the make-up, he was dressed in his best suit and he wasn't hooked up to any machines. Other than that, he didn't look much different in the coffin than he did in the nursing home bed, when death had mostly consumed his body.

  "I guess this is it Grandpa," I said softly.

  Jordan appeared at my shoulder. "Good-bye Grandpa." He pressed a hand on the casket and closed his eyes. It appeared as though he was praying. I didn't think Christians from Jordan's denomination prayed for the dead, though I was hardly an expert on the matter. I could have asked him what he was doing, but didn't want a theological treatise. Instead, I walked away from the coffin over to a board of photos of my grandfather and his family that my aunt arranged for the occasion. Jordan followed suit.

  The collage contained few pictures. I guessed that taking pictures would have been a luxury for a family with little money most of their lives. Nevertheless, there were enough pictures to loosely reflect most of the periods of his life. A singular sepia-toned portrait of his family, so old it made me ponder when photography was invented, represented his childhood. Several pictures from his wedding showed him with my grandmother, a blushing bride of twenty. Jordan pointed to a portrait of the entire family, when my mom was in high school. More photos covered the various celebrations that marked the last thirty plus years of his life. One photograph had been cut out from a local newspaper, capturing the day my grandfather served as one of the grand marshals in the annual Memorial Day parade. I vaguely recalled being there that day as a prepubescent boy.

  I scanned the photos for any indication my grandfather lived a fulfilled life. No new evidence presented itself. Besides the reminder he was the Grand Marshall in a Memorial Day parade, I knew all of the facts symbolized by the photos already. Most likely, the only one who could have answered my question was Grandpa, and he had taken the answer to his grave.

  "What are we supposed to do now?" I asked after reviewing all of the photos. Jordan had attended a few wakes for acquaintances in Tarrytown, so might have known what was next on the agenda.

  "Well, we just kind of hang out and wait for people to show up. We'll probably be introduced to a lot of people we don't know - friends of the family, people from church, etc. - and will probably never see again. They'll tell us what a good man Grandpa was, or how funny he was, or something like that. We'll agree with them, thank them all for coming and say it was nice to meet them." I don't think he breathed through the whole spiel.

  Jordan and I loitered around while our parents talked with our aunts and uncles and the few mourners who had already arrived. Surprisingly, Will and Dan walked through the door next. They greeted my parents first. Mom and Dad had met Will and Dan before. Will was always appreciated in our house, since he generally understood how to act respectfully toward adults. Dan was not so popular. He frequently blurted out inappropriate things in front of my parents. My mom warned me on several occasions to be careful about hanging out with him. Tonight both of them shook hands with my parents and offered their condolences. Then they made their way over to me.

  "Sorry about your grandfather," Will said. Dan nodded in agreement.

  "Thanks guys. How'd you even know he passed away?"

  "Becca saw it in the newspapers and told me about it," Will informed me. "So we decided to pay our respects."

  "That was really nice of you." While we hung out together at times, I never filed either one of them in the category of people who would be there during moments like this.

  "You remember Jordan, right?" I motioned to Jordan who stood two steps behind me.

  "Hi guys. Thanks for coming."

  We stood in a circle, our hands in our pockets. Wakes were out of Will's and Dan's comfort zone, and I didn't really have too much to say at the moment either. Jordan, his performance with Samantha notwithstanding, didn't enjoy small talk and added nothing to our gathering.

  "The newspaper said your grandpa died Monday," Will said, breaking the silence. "That must have been pretty much after you were at my place."

  I nodded. "Yeah. We knew it would be soon. That's why I came home, actually."

  "Did you got to see him before he died?" asked Will.

  "I did, but he wasn't really conscious."

  Will moved his head up and down slowly. "That's the way it happened with my grandpa too.
But he was a bastard, so I wasn't too upset when he passed."

  Why Will felt compelled to disclose that, I didn't know. Jordan arched an eyebrow, which Will didn't see, because he was surveying the room. I briefly considered asking a follow-up question about Will's grandpa, but decided not to.

  "We got along pretty well with our grandfather. But he had been in a nursing home for a while, so we were expecting this," I said, to ensure Will didn't think we believed our grandfather was a 'bastard' too.

  Another awkward patch in the conversation ensued. Without much more to say or do, Will and Dan excused themselves.

  "We should probably get going," Will said. He and Dan shook my hand and departed from the funeral home.

  After Will and Dan left, Uncle George's three children entered. All three were good looking in their own rights. Tom was the former athlete, who competed against Jordan in basketball. Clayton, a Junior at Oneonta State was fairly skinny, but not in a gangly and awkward way. Alex (short for Alexandra) blended an athletic stature with more typical feminine beauty very evenly. She was also the cousin I got along with best. Though we were two years apart, and lived in different towns, we became friends during college.

  They said hello to Mom and Dad first, then Uncle Chris and his wife, and finally to their own parents. I watched Alex move toward the coffin with her brothers in tow. I didn't interfere while she paid her final respects to Grandpa. When she made her way to the photo collage, I approached her.

  "Hi Alex," I said.

  She recognized my voice and rotated excitedly to see me. "Hi Evan!" She gave me a modest one armed hug - the kind that is appropriate for cousins to give - then backed up from me. "You look great!" she exclaimed.

  "So do you." I would have probably said that even if I didn't believe it.

  Alex glanced over to Grandpa, laying placidly in the coffin. "I can't believe he's really gone," she said. But she wasn't crying either.

  "I know."

  "It's weird to see him in the pictures." She pointed to the collage. "He's so young in some of these. And there's my dad when he was just a boy."

  Alex marveled over the pictures for a few more minutes. I indulged all of her commentary. Finally, she finished her inspection of the collage and we moved to some unoccupied chairs to catch up.

  "You still with that guy?" I asked, remembering seeing her in some Facebook pictures posing with a guy who looked like he belonged in a frat.

  She sighed. "No, we broke up a few weeks ago."

  "I'm sorry to hear that." Actually, this revelation made me happy; I never liked the looks of him.

  "It's okay - we wanted different things."

  She turned the conversation back on me before I could ask what she meant.

  "How about you? Any new women in your life?" she asked.

  "Kind of." I didn't mind telling Alex about Samantha.

  "Kind of?"

  "Yeah. She's actually someone from high school, and I ran into her on Monday."

  "Wow, that really is new. Was she a friend from school?"

  "No, actually we never really talked. But I used to like her. So when I saw her, I just took a chance and asked her out. We've gone out three times in the last three days."

  "Evan, that's pretty cool! What's her name? I guess I wouldn't know her though because she went to your school."

  I answered her anyway. "Samantha Rodgers."

  A look of recognition slowly spread across Alex's face. "Samantha Rodgers? I knew a Samantha Rodgers!"

  That was a first. "How did you know her?"

  "She went to my church youth group when I was a sophomore. Then she and her mom started going to a different church and I didn't see her again. But I think..." She stopped in mid-sentence, and her eyes narrowed. "Didn't she get pregnant?"

  Once again my feelings for Samantha were shaken, even though I should have been prepared for this information.

  "I don't know. Someone else I talked to thought that she might have been, but Samantha hasn't mentioned having a kid or anything."

  "Evan, I'm pretty sure it was Samantha. We heard about it at the beginning of Senior year. I think one of the other girls in our youth group kept in touch with her, and when she got pregnant, told some of us about it. She was really afraid that Samantha was going to get an abortion. But I don't remember what happened. We kind of forgot about it. I guess we moved onto the next drama."

  The idea that Samantha might have had an abortion hit me hard. Although my Christian faith subconsciously influenced some of my private moral decisions, I never jumped onto the larger social issues that Christians typically railed against. Still, I never felt comfortable about the idea of terminating a pregnancy.

  Alex seemed to sense how this information affected me. "Maybe I'm wrong, you know. In fact, let me text one of my friends from school that I'm still in touch with. Maybe she'll remember what happened." Alex whipped out her cell phone and rapidly composed a message to her friend.

  "Thanks," I said.

  Jordan and the rest of our cousins made their way over to us, so we curtailed our discussion of Samantha.

  "Evan, nice to see you again, man." Tom greeted me surprisingly enthusiastically and shook my hand firmly. "What have you been up to lately?"

  "Not much." I shook Tom's hand absently. Perhaps I would have done a better job at greeting him if I wasn't so distracted by Alex's news.

  Clayton also said hello, though in a much more sedate way; Tom always possessed the biggest personality of the three.

  The rest of the wake dragged on. Jordan and I talked amongst the cousins, though I only halfheartedly listened and said little. As Jordan foretold, we were introduced to many people that we didn't know. Since the cousins were clustered in one big group, the introductions were very impersonal, which was fine with me. There had been a decent turnout at the wake, though I didn't really know how to measure such a thing.

  After half an hour of introductions to obscure family friends, I needed to catch a breath of air. I walked out the back door of the funeral home. Uncle George stood on the wheel chair ramp, quietly smoking.

  "Evan." He gave me a slight smile. "You smoke?" He gestured toward me with his pack of cigarettes.

  "No thanks." I didn't remember my uncle smoking before - at least not in a while.

  "Yeah, I shouldn't be smoking these things either. I guess we have to die one way or another anyway."

  "I guess so."

  "A lot of people in there, huh?"

  "Yeah. Grandpa got a good turnout."

  "Well, if you live long enough and have enough family, there better be some people who show up for your wake."

  "These last few days must have been really exhausting for you guys, with all of the planning and stuff that needed to get done," I said.

  Uncle George laughed softly. "It's not the planning that makes me tired, it's all of the people coming up and telling me how sorry they are and asking me how I'm doing. Everybody wants to know how I feel. Like I'm supposed to feel bad that my father never told me he loved me or was proud of me. I mean who cares anyway?" He turned toward me. "Has your father told you he was proud of you?"

  "A couple of times - but not all of the time."

  "Exactly. It's not like I needed to have some conversation with him to tell him how he never said he loved me. It wouldn't have mattered anyway if I did talk to him. He was the way he was and I was the way I was. And there wasn't a damn thing I could have done about it anyway."

  He took one more puff then threw the cigarette to the sidewalk beneath him.

  "Well, I guess I better get back in there." He slapped me on the back and went inside.

  Apparently there was unfinished business in my grandfather's life, which I supposed was virtually impossible for anyone to completely avoid. I stood outside for a few more moments before heading in myself.

  At 8 PM, the wake ended and the family said goodbye until the next day. As we left the funeral home, I felt Alex grab my arm gently.

  "My frien
d texted back and said she didn't remember what happened to Samantha's baby," she whispered to me. "In case you were still wondering."

  "Thanks."

  "Hey, why is everyone going home so early?" asked Tom. "Anyone up for grabbing a drink or something?"

  Jordan and I looked at each other. I couldn't remember ever hanging out with Tom and the rest of the cousins outside of family gatherings.

  "Where are we going to get a drink? It's a Wednesday night and we're in Hadenburg, remember?" challenged Alex.

  "Isn't that ice cream place open - the one with the fancy soft serve?" asked Clayton.

  "Ice cream it is. Let's go!" Tom declared. He and Clayton headed out to the parking lot without confirming we were following.

  Jordan shrugged. "I guess we're getting ice cream."

  I traded looks with Alex. "I guess so."

  The Penguin - the ice cream place with the fancy mix-ins - recently moved inside so it could stay open year round. It looked like a small cafe, with tables clustered around the ice cream counter.

  "Sorry guys, we just closed. You just beat me in before I locked the door," a surprisingly striking blonde said when the five of us made our way in. She wasn't the kind of girl I expected to run into in one of these small towns.

  "But it's only a little after 8 PM," protested Tom.

  "I know - but we close at eight. Sorry."

  Tom refused to give up. "Can't you do us a favor? We just came from our grandfather's wake, and this one..." he motioned toward Jordan - "Is taking it really hard. This was one of our grandfather's favorite places, and it would mean a lot to us if we could get some ice cream."

  The girl looked at Jordan, and gave him a sympathetic smile. Jordan glanced hesitantly at Tom. The fact that we were all dressed formally supported Tom's story. "Well, I guess I have to do some cleaning up anyway before I go home. What can I get you guys?"

  Tom's face brightened. "Thank you so much. You have no idea what that means to us - what's your name?"

  "Christy."

  "Christy. Thank you - you're an angel."

  Christy took all of our orders warmly, though she paid special attention to Jordan. He received substantially more peanut butter cup mix-ins and Christy heaped his cone higher with ice cream too. Even when Christy served someone else, her eyes wandered back to him. Jordan happened to be a good looking guy, but I never saw Jordan interest a girl like that; he didn't even have to say a word.

  "I don't think Grandpa was even allowed to come here because of his diabetes," Alex accused Tom after we sat down in some green metal chairs around a few small, round tables.

  "Well, if he could have come here, he would have loved it."

  "Why did you single out me?" asked Jordan, though he didn't seem offended.

  "Because I think you're the best looking out of all of us."

  "Hey, I take offense at that!" said Clayton.

  "Sorry Clay, but I think Christy is a bit old for you. If you were a little boy of course I would have said that it was you - you'd be a much more sympathetic figure. And if Christy was a guy, I would've said Alex was taking it hard. Besides, Jordan is definitely the most sincere looking of all of us. And you should be thanking me Jordan, because that girl seems kind of into you now."

  "Don't you feel a little bad using Grandpa's wake to manipulate this girl into letting us in after closing?" asked Alex.

  "No; it's not often I get to use a death in the family as an excuse to do anything, without lying at least. By the way, do any of you recognize Christy?"

  Clay and Alex shook their heads. Tom turned to us.

  "Don't look at us, we didn't go to school here," I replied.

  "How old do you think she is?" asked Tom.

  "She actually looks about Jordan's age. Definitely out of college since no one in college would be here this time of year," said Alex. Christy emerged from the back room.

  "What was your grandfather's name?" she asked. I think she asked more out of curiosity than suspicion that Tom had lied.

  "Eugene Meyers," answered Tom. "Born and lived in Hadenburg his entire life. A World War II veteran and POW."

  "Sounds like a good man."

  She struggled to pick up a large box of supplies. Jordan had been tracking her movements, and rose up to assist her.

  "Do you need a hand with that?" he asked.

  She smiled. "Normally I would tell you no, but since this box seems a little big for me, sure, that would be great. If you could bring it to that back room, I'd really appreciate it."

  "No problem." He turned to me and handed me his ice cream. "Here, hold this." Jordan picked up the box and walked down a fairly lengthy hall way. Christy picked up a few small sleeves of cups and followed him.

  Tom smiled. "See - look what I've done for him."

  Ten minutes later Jordan was still in the backroom with Christy. His ice cream cone began to drip down onto the table and my hand.

  "What am I supposed to do with this?" I complained.

  "What do you suppose they're doing back there?" asked Tom. "You don't suppose-"

  "Don't say it!" warned Alex.

  "It's a valid question. I think I'm going to take a peek and see what's happening."

  "Trust me, he's not doing that," I said.

  "What else would he be doing with an attractive woman in the backroom of an ice cream place - he's at least got to be making a move, right?"

  "I'd bet you twenty bucks I'm right," I replied.

  "I'll take that bet." We shook hands as confirmation of the wager.

  He crept halfway down the hallway, and then leaned as far as he could to the opposite wall to see if he could peer into the room where Jordan and Christy were.

  "The door is closed! They closed the door behind them!"

  Tom tip toed further down the corridor and stopped just outside the door.

  "What's he doing now?" asked Alex. She couldn't see down the hallway from her position - only Clay and I could.

  "He's listening outside the door," Clayton informed her.

  Tom pressed his ear up to the door. Something startled him, and he hustled back to the table. Jordan and Christy emerged from the room, and walked back down the hallway.

  "Thanks for your help," she said to Jordan, as they reentered the seating area.

  "No problem." Jordan sat back down next to me and retrieved his mostly melted ice cream.

  Christy turned to all of us. "Okay guys, I need to do some work in the office for a bit. So take your time and finish up. And I'm so sorry for your loss."

  "Thanks Christy," said Tom, resuming his position as our unofficial spokesman.

  Christy disappeared, allowing the firestorm to begin.

  "What were you doing back there?" started in Tom immediately. "Were you fornicating?"

  "Fornicating? Since when do you use the word 'fornicating'?" piped in Clay.

  "Well Alex hates it when I use vulgar language, so I figured fornicate sounded a little classy. Besides, it's biblical, right? And Jordan has always seemed like a very biblical guy."

  Alex, Clay and Tom did the whole church and youth group thing too. I doubted any of them adhered to what they had been taught as kids though.

  "We were just talking," Jordan answered innocently.

  "See - not every guy is like you!" said Alex.

  Tom wasn't pacified. "Talking about what?"

  Jordan turned just a little red. "About Jesus."

  "You were talking about Jesus? Is that how you pick-up women? Please tell me that isn't a euphemism of some kind."

  Jordan shook his head. "Nope - it's exactly what it sounds like."

  "Huh," said Tom, leaning back in his chair. Some would have mocked Jordan, but Tom didn't. Instead, he patted Jordan on the shoulder. "I guess you are a very biblical guy."

  "I'll take my twenty now." I reached out my hand.

  Tom took out his wallet and produced a twenty. Jordan smiled. His exoneration forced us to move on to another topic. This time Clay took the lead. />
  "So what was everybody's favorite memory of Grandpa?"

  "Oh no, we're not doing this, are we?" complained Tom.

  Alex raised an eyebrow. "What's the problem with remembering Grandpa?"

  "Because we've been doing it non-stop for the last few days. And everyone always says the same thing."

  "Well, that's what people do when someone they loved dies. Even if they end up repeating themselves," said Alex.

  "It's not just that. Don't get me wrong, I loved Grandpa and all, but we didn't really know him."

  "What do you mean?" asked Clay.

  "We knew him - but only as our grandfather. Does that make sense?"

  "Not really," said Alex.

  "To us, Grandpa was the guy who sat in the corner, tried to steal people's food, mispronounced words and played pinochle. But that wasn't all he was. He lived over fifty years before we even showed up."

  "So you're saying that it's impossible for us to know anyone who's older than us?" asked Alex, frowning.

  "No, not impossible. But we didn't know how Grandpa felt about anything, besides pie and pinochle. For us to know him, we'd at least have to have a feel for what he thought about stuff. We'd need to know-"

  "His perspective," Jordan completed Tom's statement.

  Tom nodded. "Exactly. His perspective." He looked around at us to see how we were receiving his theory.

  "I think you think you're deeper than you really are," observed Alex.

  Tom glared at her. "Whatever. Fine. My favorite memory of Grandpa was when we played pinochle. It would take him so long after the cards were dealt before he would make a bid, and we'd all just sit there waiting. But he never ever hurried."

  Clay nodded. "Mine was Christmas dinner - how he would always rush everybody so we could start eating."

  "Defending my plate from his fork," chimed in Alex. "He always tried to steal food from me. He must have thought I was an easy target."

  "Fishing trips," I said softly.

  "Me too," agreed Jordan.

  A hush came over us. Tom was right - none of us really knew him.

  "So if your theory about knowing people is right, then we don't really know Evan or Jordan - we only know them as cousins," said Clay.

  Tom considered his statement. "That's probably true. Although maybe Alex knows Evan - but not in the biblical sense of knowing, which meant they had relations. And that of course would be very unbiblical."

  "Eew!" exclaimed Alex once she figured out what Tom was talking about. "You're so disgusting! Is the stuff about sex the only thing you remember from the Bible?"

  "What? Evan is a fine looking young man - you could do a lot worse."

  "Thanks Tom," I said.

  "Besides, I remember other stuff about the Bible. Something about about a fellow named Jesus..." Tom pretended to be deep in thought. "Oh well, it will come to me. At any rate, we did learn something about our cousin Jordan tonight - put him in a backroom with a cute blonde, and he'll end up talking to her about Jesus."

  Jordan blushed again. Inwardly, I think he celebrated this accomplishment. I imagined he would boast about this to his Christian friends back home.

  "Well, I suppose we should be heading home now, before we get to know each other any better," Tom said.

  I doubted we would gain too much knowledge of each other’s perspectives that night, given Alex and Tom's rapid fire arguments that mostly excluded Jordan and I from contributing. One by one we stood to leave. I took the twenty I won from Tom and slipped it into the tip jar on the counter.

  "For your friend," I said to Jordan.

  "She was nice to us," he concurred.

  We said goodbye to Tom, Alex and Clay and boarded Jordan's car.

  "It was kind of fun watching Tom and Alex interact without our parents around," said Jordan.

  "I would have thought it was fun for you for others reasons than that." I gave him a knowing look.

  "You mean Christy?"

  "Yes, I'm referring to the beautiful girl who seemed totally into you and who you spent ten minutes alone in a back room with."

  "She was really nice." I detected a faint hint of dreaminess in Jordan's words.

  "How did you end up talking with her about Jesus?" I meant this more as an accusation than a question.

  "She was wearing a cross necklace, so I told her it was nice and asked her if it had any special meaning."

  Christy probably assumed Jordan was flirting with her when he made the remark about the cross - I think just about any other guy who made that comment would have been. But not Jordan. He was trying to proselytize her.

  "Did you lead her through the sinner's prayer?" I asked.

  "No, I just listened to what she said, asked her a few questions about her beliefs, she asked me a few questions and that was about it."

  I imagined the detour into religious waters made Christy feel awkward, and she said she had to get back to work to escape from this religious nut. I was embarrassed for Jordan and mournful he squandered such a good opportunity.

  "Did sex at least cross your mind?"

  Jordan looked confused. "Of course it did. I'm still a guy, even if I'm Christian. I mean I didn't really imagine anything specific, but just the fact I was really attracted to her."

  "Well, that's a relief."

  Jordan caught the edge in my tone. "What did you expect me to do? Have sex with her in the backroom? It's not like you would have done that either."

  Jordan was probably right about that. But I would've at least tried to get her phone number.

  "If Christy lived in Tarrytown, you wouldn't have tried to get her number?"

  "No, probably not."

  "Why?"

  "My faith in Jesus is the most important part of my life right now. If I don't share that with her, I don't see how we could ever make it work - we'd be going different directions in life."

  Jordan's words slowly sunk in. "It's never going to be like it used to be between us, is it?" I blurted out. I had never said anything so direct like that to Jordan before. He must have realized the unintended meaning of his words, because he looked at me somberly.

  "Well, we won't always be what we are today. Both of us will probably change some."

  "I guess, but it feels like unless you stop being a Christian - or at least such a serious one - or I stop being so agnostic, things will just get harder for us."

  He nodded. "Maybe so."

  There didn't seem like much else we could say. Finally, Jordan spoke.

  "Christy was really pretty." It was an olive branch of sorts - a demonstration that we were not so different after all.

  I took the peace offering. "Would you have helped her carry that stuff back if she were an overweight middle aged woman with bad teeth who smoked a few packs a day?"

  "I think so. But definitely not as enthusiastically." He grinned at me and I grinned back. It still wasn't the same.

  I settled down in my bed that night feeling quite forlorn. The mix tape I played kicked off with a Toad the Wet Sprocket song. While I laid in my bed, I tried out the possibility that Samantha had an abortion. I lost sight of that potential information while I ate ice cream with my cousins, and confronted Jordan about our dissolving relationship. Once I returned home, my thoughts gravitated back to Samantha. Perhaps if I just got used to the notion it wouldn't bother me. But why was I thinking about this relationship in the long term view again? I was only here for the week.