“Elijah’s going to get us back to safety. You’re going to be fine. Open your eyes. Look at me,” Tim kept repeating.
But Elijah didn’t make it in time, and Matty was declared dead on arrival at the base. And Elijah had always wondered if those few extra minutes without refueling the chopper might have made the difference.
“I feel like a complete failure.” Novalene’s voice brought him out of the past and back to the present. “This is my first time ever to lose a girl, and she slapped Mary. I’m sick to my stomach over that. I keep asking myself if something I did or didn’t do caused her to flip out like that. Should I have gone easier on her over the cigarettes?”
“Don’t beat yourself up. Like Henry said, some folks can’t be helped. Maybe Lauren will get some good professional help at this new place.” Elijah made the last turn and parked the van in front of the dining hall.
“Well,” Novalene sighed, “it’s a good day for church after all that.”
“Amen,” Elijah agreed.
Novalene’s two remaining girls had been on milking duty with Henry that morning and had evidently finished their job, because they were sitting on the Moonbeam porch. Jayden’s crew was on the dining hall porch. The remaining three were coming across the grounds with Diana behind them.
“We’ve got about an hour.” Novalene unfastened her seat belt and got out of the van. “I’m going to use the time to talk to the two I’ve got left. Do you think this will shake the whole camp up?”
Elijah held up his forefinger in a gesture that said he would answer her in a minute, and then followed her to the porch where Jayden waited.
“Hey, everyone, gather up here,” Elijah yelled.
When the rest of the girls had come close enough, he said, “Lauren won’t be coming back, but we’ll continue on with our lives just like before. We will be attending church and then coming back here for Sunday dinner. Any questions?”
No hands went up, and not a single one of them opened their mouth.
“Okay, then go on to your cabins and get ready for church,” he told them.
When they were out of hearing distance, he turned to the counselors. “Novalene asked me if I thought this incident would shake the whole camp up. It usually does when we have to take one away. The rest of the girls realize what they’re up against if they don’t finish the course,” Elijah said. “Let me know if you have any problems.”
“If we have any, they’ll probably come from my cabin. Keelan and Lauren were pretty close,” Novalene said. “Hopefully, going to church as a group will help them.”
“Let’s hope so, and we will be attending the first church on the list this morning.”
“If I remember right, that would be the small one with the nice red chairs rather than long pews, right?” Novalene asked.
“Yep,” Elijah answered. “Henry and Mary still think it’s best if we go to a different one every week.”
“If we do what?” Jayden asked.
“We attend a different church each Sunday,” Elijah explained. “We know that the girls don’t all have the same religious affiliations, so that makes it fair. When we have girls that usually attend a temple or a mosque, we make arrangements for that, too, but this time around we don’t need to include those.”
“Makes sense to me.” Jayden started to get up and follow them, but Elijah reached out and grabbed her hand. “Just a word before you go.” He dropped her hand and asked, “Are you all right? How’s Mary?”
“I’m just fine,” Jayden assured him. “Mary and Henry have already left for their services. She seemed fine when they drove away.”
He tucked his hand under her chin and turned her face toward him. “You’re going to have a shiner.”
This just proved that people who got too close to Elijah had bad luck. First his brother died, then his parents, and then almost half his team. Jayden would do well to steer clear of him.
She put her hand on his and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I’ve had black eyes before, and from a person a whole lot smaller than Lauren. My first one was from a seventh grader who was throwing a tantrum over not being able to eat candy in the classroom. He decked me harder than she did.”
Elijah dropped his hand. “I’m so sorry this happened. I’d still feel better if you would let me take you to the emergency room.”
“I’ll be ugly for a few days, but we’ve got to take these girls to church this morning. That’s more important than a bruised eye,” she told him.
He walked across the lawn with her. All three girls were sitting on the porch, their young faces filled with questions.
“We want to know more about what happened to Lauren,” Tiffany said. “Did she settle down or do something stupid like kick the windows out of the van?”
“We took her to the police station, where they were waiting. Her father sent his private plane to take her to a rehab center,” Elijah answered.
“What if her father pays for her to come back?” Carmella asked.
“Three-strike rule applies here, and there’s no coming back, ever. If her father didn’t have the means and connections, she’d be on her way to talk to the judge about spending some time in juvie. What do you think would happen to you if you got two more strikes?” Elijah locked eyes with Tiffany.
“My daddy might have pity on me, but Mama wouldn’t. She says I’m an embarrassment to her. Last time she wouldn’t even let me talk to the judge. I’d go straight to jail if she had her way.” Tiffany stood up and headed toward the cabin. “Do we get a siren when it’s time to go to church? And what place do we go to? At home, Mama takes me to mass on Christmas and Easter.”
“And do me and Carmella get a demerit for not staying in our seats this morning?” Ashlyn asked.
“No to your question, Ashlyn. You were trying to help, not hinder, the situation. And to answer your question, Tiffany, we go to a different one every single week,” Elijah said. “You’ve each got a list of the churches. This is the first Sunday you are here, so we start with the one at the top. It’s a small church, not far from here.”
“I looked at the list this morning. That’s the kind of church where Mama’s housekeeper goes,” Ashlyn said. “I went with her a couple of times. I like their singing. Can we please at least have our own jeans and shirts for Sunday services?”
“Sorry, girls,” Jayden said. “Rules are rules, like you just heard. You will attend services in what you are wearing. You can brush your hair and your teeth, but don’t forget to put your caps back on.”
Carmella wiped sweat from her brow. “Thank God we go to a different place every week.”
“Why?” Jayden asked.
“Because if there’s any sexy boys there, they’ll only see us lookin’ like this one time,” Carmella answered and then went inside the Daydream Cabin.
“All of the girls expected you to bring Lauren back and give her another chance, and that concerned me,” Jayden said. “I’m glad you didn’t. She seemed way too violent to have around the other kids. What if she really did decide to go on a rampage?”
“Part of why she didn’t come back. She’s got problems way beyond what we can do to help her. Had Henry settled down when he and Mary left? His blood pressure was probably out of sight,” Elijah asked.
“He seemed to be fine,” Jayden answered. “How’s Novalene?”
“Feeling like a failure. You and the other ladies might want to visit with her this afternoon. I’m going to get a softball game going with the girls so they’ll keep busy.” Elijah turned to walk away and then stopped and looked over his shoulder.
“Thanks for all you’re doing in the kitchen, and for having the foresight to use an apron for handcuffs. Henry appreciates it and so do I.”
“I enjoy working with Mary, and I love to cook, so it’s a win-win there. And working in an underfunded school district has taught me to use whatever is at hand,” she said. “But you might invest in some real restraints for next season.”
“You
sure I can’t take you away from your job at the school? I’ll pay you better and you’ll get more time off. Since you’d be a full-time cook, you wouldn’t even have to take care of a cabin. I’ll give you my house, and I’ll move over into Henry and Mary’s place when they retire,” he offered.
“I’m not staying here, Elijah, but again, thanks for the offer.”
Jayden sat down on her porch and wished she had a good cold beer in her hands. She’d lied about her first black eye. That had come at the hands of Skyler when she was twelve and her sister caught her using her lipstick. Skyler had picked up a silver-plated hand mirror and smacked her in the eye with it. She’d cried after she’d done the deed, but not because she was sorry for hitting Jayden. Her little hissy fit was because she’d broken her mirror, and she said that Jayden had caused her to have seven years of bad luck.
Jayden put that memory out of her mind and was trying to figure out if she could have helped Lauren in some way when “I Saw the Light” came over the loudspeaker that usually sent out the sound of a siren.
“Nice touch,” she muttered. Then she opened the door and yelled, “Church time!”
She hadn’t set foot in a church since her mother’s funeral. God was supposed to be merciful and kind, right? Well, He had failed Jayden when He didn’t answer her prayers, so she had turned her back on Him. He could have woken her mother up from the coma that she’d fallen into after the aneurism.
Jayden’s three girls came out of the cabin and got into the van with Diana and a couple of her girls. The rest of the camp members rode with Elijah and Jayden. Turned out that it was on the north side of town, and it was a very small place, with only five or six rows of chairs on two sides of a center aisle. As luck would have it, when they all walked in the door, the back rows were filled. Apparently, the back two rows on the right-hand side were where the cute boys sat, and all eight girls put a little extra swing in their walk when they passed by them to sit on the front pew.
Elijah was the last one in the door, and since the only chair left was right beside Jayden, his broad shoulder touched hers all during the service. Cool air flowed down from a vent right above her, but her hands were still sweaty, and her pulse jacked up another notch or two every time he leaned a little more her way.
If he was getting the same vibes she was, there was no way they could ever work together every day like Mary and Henry did. No, sir. No way. With the chemistry she felt, she’d be dragging him off to her cabin instead of cooking meals.
A lady wearing a purple dress took her place behind the lectern and said, “Special welcome today to the girls and their sponsors from out at Piney Wood. We’re always glad to see y’all when it’s our turn for you to visit us. If everyone will turn to page three eighty in the hymnals that are under your chairs, we’ll begin our services with congregational singing,” she announced, and then continued to the sound of pages flipping. “Everyone likes to sing, so we just let the whole church be our choir.”
You can’t sing in the choir. They wouldn’t have a robe long enough for you, and besides, your voice sounds like you’re a boy. Maybe you should have been a guy. God knows you’re tall enough to be one. Skyler’s voice came back to Jayden’s mind.
Jayden must have been about fourteen at the time, and that was the last time she ever asked her mother if she might start going to choir practice with Skyler on Friday nights.
The pianist played a short prelude and then the lady led them in “Abide with Me,” with an upbeat version of the song that bore little resemblance to the music notes in the hymnal. The boys on the back rows kept time by clapping their hands. Jayden mumbled through the first verse, but by the second one, she had it down.
Skyler had chosen this very hymn to be played at their mother’s graveside service, but Jayden had been too angry that she and her sister were the only ones there that day to even pay attention to the lyrics. Now as she sang the words, it seemed fitting. The last verse talked about pointing me to the skies, and heaven’s morning breaking. It asked that, in life or death, the Lord abide with me—whoever me happened to be.
When they had finished the hymn, the song leader and pianist took a seat over on the wall behind the piano, and the preacher stepped up behind the lectern. “I’ll add my welcome to the ladies and to Elijah from out at Piney Wood. This morning’s reading is from John 15. ‘Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.’ Now, I ask you all, each and every one of you, what does it mean to abide in Him? Well, that’s what I’m going to tell you this morning.”
That word abide stuck in Jayden’s mind. Was someone—she looked up at the ceiling—bringing back memories of her mother’s death and burial so that she would talk to Skyler about it? Or was the fact that Elijah was sitting so close supposed to be an omen telling her to think about abiding right there at Piney Wood? Would God speak to her after she had cut all ties with Him? Until that moment, she hadn’t even considered such an idea, but suddenly she found herself wondering what it would be like to do something with her life other than be a counselor at school.
Chapter Ten
One of the red chairs on her front porch was the perfect place to watch that afternoon’s softball game.
“My front porch,” Jayden muttered. “This place isn’t mine by any means.” She took a sip of her cold root beer.
Ashlyn was doing a fine job of pitching. Tiffany was on first, Carmella in outfield, and Rita had two strikes, and then she hit the ball.
“She’s got a home run if Carmella don’t catch it.” Diana sat down in a chair at the other end of the line. “They seem to be having a good time.”
The ball went high and landed right in Carmella’s glove, giving Rita a third out and sending that team back to the sidelines.
“I’m glad they’re doing something fun.” Novalene came up the steps and sat down in the chair right next to Jayden. “They need it after this morning.”
“I love these chairs,” Diana said. “I keep saying I’m going to have one of these connected ones built for my front porch at home, but then I don’t get around to it. How are you holding up, Novalene?”
“Church helped,” Novalene said. “I don’t know if it was the message I was supposed to get, but what I heard was that we should just leave it in God’s hands and abide with Him.”
“Did you talk to your other girls?” Jayden asked.
“Yes, before and after church,” Novalene answered. “They verified that Lauren had managed to sneak some pills past us when they arrived. They told me she got so angry with them over not taking some of them with her that they were actually a little afraid of her. Rita said that she was glad to see her leave, but Keelan told me she felt sorry for her. I’ve never lost a girl before. I got to admit that even leaving it in God’s hands, I still feel like a failure.”
“One of my favorite sayings is that a change in behavior begins with a change in the heart,” Diana said. “You can’t expect fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen years of behavior to change in just a week, especially when that kid’s heart didn’t want to change.”
“I kind of got that impression when she started ranting and raving about her brother being perfect,” Novalene said. “Seems to me like she wants everyone around her to change and make her world better, but she doesn’t want to do what she can to make herself a better person in her world.”
“That’s the way we get ’em, and then if we’re lucky, they leave us with a different heart,” Diana said.
“What do you think, Jayden?” Novalene asked.
“I think that I may be learning more than the girls are,” she replied.
“That’s the way of it sometimes,” Novalene said. “Want to talk about it?”
“Before my mother died, she gave my sister the job of executor over her estate and then gave her
power of attorney. When my folks divorced, I stayed with Mama. Skyler was in college, but she seldom came home until that last year. Mama gave Skyler the house where we were both raised, and she sold it without even giving me the option to buy it. I’ve had trouble forgiving either of them,” Jayden began. “I didn’t even know about the decision to put Skyler in charge until our mother went into a coma because of a brain aneurism, and Skyler held everything in her hands. All she would tell me was that Mama had a dream that her time was up, and she made final arrangements in case it came true. Even as children we were never close like sisters should be. She was the pretty and smart one, and I was . . . I have always been a ‘you get what you see’ girl.”
“Why do you think your mother did that?” Novalene asked. “Maybe the brain problem had already affected her mind, and she made the wrong decision.”
“Maybe so, but I intend to nail Skyler down when I go home and find out if she knows why,” Jayden answered. That word home stuck in her mind. After the thoughts she’d had that morning about Elijah’s offer, she had begun to wonder exactly where home was.
“You girls definitely should talk about it,” Novalene said. “Skyler is a good person, a little religious, and, in my opinion, always coming close to preaching to her girls when she was here, but she’s your sister. I would give anything to have my sister back to talk to her. We had our differences, but we were best friends as we got older. I lost her last summer, and my first thought this morning when all that went down with Lauren was that I wished I could call Dora Lou and talk to her about it.”
“I never had a sister, but I’ve got three brothers. I’ve told folks that’s why I went into teaching—so I could be the boss for a little while,” Diana said. “But one of my sisters-in-law has been my best friend since first grade, so it’s almost the same thing. She and my brother live up in central Oklahoma. We talk on the phone at least three times a week, and we can’t wait for the family gatherings when we get to see each other. I don’t know what I’d do without her.”
The Daydream Cabin Page 13
