Heaven Sent Rain

by Lauraine Snelling

  Then Garret and Jonah got deep into a conversation about holidays, and Easter in eight days.

  So far, she had kept forgetting about getting an Easter basket for Jonah. And jelly beans and a chocolate bunny and all. She remembered her own Easter baskets when she was a child. No chocolate bunnies. Only solid chocolate crosses, usually with a lily molded into them. No chicks. When she was twelve she’d petitioned her parents for marshmallow Peeps. She pointed out that chicks symbolize new birth—in fact, symbolize the resurrection—and to bolster her point, she went through a Young’s Analytical Concordance to find all the scriptural references to chicks. None specifically supported her thesis, and no marshmallow Peeps ever appeared in her basket. Kind-hearted playmates shared theirs, but it wasn’t the same thing.

  Garret finished his coffee. “Almost seven. I have to go on call tonight. Urgent care. So I must leave. I would like to take you both along to Palm Sunday services tomorrow at our church. We do it up big—do the whole Easter week up big. Will you come?”

  “Can we?” Jonah brightened. “Dinah, can we go?”

  She had had enough trouble sitting through the church service with Grandma Trudy. But a fancy, self-proclaimed big service? “Thank you, but I don’t think so.” She glanced at Jonah’s crestfallen face. “If you wish, both of you, Jonah may go. I think he’d love to go.”

  The boy glowed instantly.

  Garret smiled. “Ready at ten tomorrow?”

  “Sure!” Apparently, that settled that. Garret took his leave and Jonah went off to read before bedtime.

  Puppies. She sighed to the depths of her soul.

  The next morning Garret rang the bell at just before ten and Dinah buzzed him up.

  “Sure you don’t want to go along?” Just by standing in her living room doorway Garret seemed to fill the room.

  Dinah smiled. “I appreciate the invitation, but I’m fine here. Thanks.”

  Jonah came out of the bedroom beaming as if he’d just won a million dollars. He spread his arms. “Look. My Sunday clothes are new and they’re not too big. I don’t have to grow into anything.”

  Dinah laughed. “And you look like a million dollars, too.”

  “Be right back.” Jonah snatched Mutt’s leash off the hook by the back door and went out with his dog.

  Dinah explained, “I could take Mutt out while you two go on to church, but for some reason, it’s very important to Jonah that he take her out. So…well…”

  “If it’s important to a kid, it’s important.”

  She nodded.

  Silence.

  He broke it. “Thanks for letting me take Jonah.”

  “No problem. He’s delighted to go.”

  “Are you certain you’d prefer to stay home? We have a special Palm Sunday service that I think you’d like.”

  “No, really. Thank you anyway.”

  Long silence.

  She was the hostess, he the guest. She really ought to fill the thundering silence, but she couldn’t think of anything.

  The silence was broken without her help as Mutt and Jonah burst in through the door.

  Jonah hung up the leash. “We can go now.” All bubbly, he jogged out the front door.

  Palm Sunday. When she was small, how Dinah had loved Palm Sunday. The story of a donkey colt carrying Jesus into Jerusalem. The prospect of a whole lot of chocolate and jelly beans seven days from then; the so-long-ago past and the too-long-to-wait-for future.

  An Easter basket. While Jonah was off with Garret, she would get him an Easter basket. This was the perfect time. But where? She was not a shopper. She tried a couple likely stores at random and finally found one with a large selection of both baskets and candy.

  She could purchase a basket already trimmed, or she could purchase a naked one, so to speak. She chose a large, graceful, pretty, bare-naked one. She picked out the shredded grass. Three packages; two didn’t look like they’d do it. And she paused, surprised by her feelings. This was fun! This was just plain delightful! She would not have guessed.

  Now for the candy. Anything but crosses. Here was a dark chocolate rabbit that was almost too big for the basket. Almost doesn’t count; she laid it in her cart. Soft yellow marshmallow Peeps, the large box of them. Jelly beans, of course. Some mint patties. Peanut butter cups. Gummy bears. How she used to love gummy bears. She was going to take a bag of M&M’s, but no. They would just get lost in the grass. Some other time.

  She surveyed the cart. There was too much candy here; it would not all fit in the basket. She chose a smaller untrimmed basket, a chocolate setting hen, and two more bags of grass. She would decorate both and give one to Grandma Trudy.

  Eggs! Easter had to have colored eggs. She chose an egg-dyeing kit. She would have to ask Garret about paints that would be safe for use on eggshells. Those two artists would surely want to paint pictures on some of the eggs. Wait. Here was a colored-marker kit that promised safe ingredients. Into the cart it went.

  She purchased four dozen eggs. Fortunately, she read the instructions on the dye kit before leaving the store and picked up a bottle of white vinegar. Did an opened bottle of vinegar last from one Easter to the next? She had no idea. It didn’t matter.

  And doughnuts. The baker was putting out trays of fresh doughnuts. Her particular favorites were maple bars, but she also boxed up some chocolates and some plains, for when the churchgoers returned.

  She checked out, loaded the car, and arrived back home fifteen minutes before she could expect Garret and Jonah. She left the doughnuts on the table, separated out the eggs, dyes, and vinegar, and carefully tucked the rest under the sink behind cleaning supplies. Then she made herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. That heady rush of delight was still there, still making her heart sing. This new guardianship posed enormous tasks, enormous responsibilities, enormous woes. But, she realized for the first time, it also offered enormous joys.

  Joy. Had she ever truly tasted joy? Rarely. Fleeting occasions. This occasion, putting together an Easter basket, would no doubt be fleeting, too. She would savor it.

  She thought about all the places she had looked for joy. The church in which she grew up had bought an old bus and painted it white. Then in huge letters they named it “JOY BUS.” It was supposed to transport grown-ups who were otherwise housebound or did not drive. Most of all, it would bring in all the little children who otherwise could not attend Sunday School, whose parents for whatever reason did not go to church. There the children would learn about Jesus, accept Him, and bask in the joy of salvation ever after. Church membership dwindled. The remaining members could no longer afford the bus. No one else would buy it. The last she knew, it was rusting away amidst a tangle of brambles behind someone’s barn. So much for joy.

  Even before first grade, Dinah had recited the words her parents told her to say, inviting Jesus into her heart. Had He ever accepted her invitation? Dinah had no idea, but she didn’t feel any joy in the whole situation. Being a Christian was too dire, too rigid, too demanding to allow joy a seat at the table. And when the only bright spots in her life died, joy departed forever.

  She was the only girl in her small high school who excelled in math and science, but in rural Ohio, math and science were neither encouraged nor discouraged. No joy there. When she forwent marriage and family to earn her PhD in physiological chemistry, her parents disowned her. Girls could become nurses or teachers, maybe, until marriage. Then they were to serve their husband and children for the rest of their lives. That was how it was done. No joy there.

  And now these burdens of a child, a dog (puppies! sigh), a company being harassed, a comfortable lifestyle being destroyed—what little happiness she had felt was under attack on all sides.

  Mutt leaped up out of a sound sleep and ran to the door barking. The door burst open. Jonah bounded in waving a palm frond. The whole frond. In Dinah’s church one palm frond served everyone in the congregation, each of whom had been allowed a single coarse, scratchy leaflet. Garret ente
red behind him.

  Jonah crowed, “They even had a real donkey! We got to ride on him. They are really uncomfortable, Dinah. Really bony. It was so cool!”

  Dinah realized she was watching unbridled joy. And her heart ached with—with envy! She envied a seven-year-old tortured, storm-tossed orphan.

  Garret laid a hand on Jonah’s shoulder. “Got a job for you, Sport. Take Mutt here down to the bus stop and wait for Grandma Trudy to get home. You can give her your palm frond, like we talked about.”

  “Yeah!” Jonah leashed up his dog and disappeared out the door.

  Dinah stood up. “I detect a whirlwind just went through. May I get you a cup of coffee? And here are some fresh doughnuts.” She opened the box on the table.

  “Thank you. Sure.” He sat down across from her chair. “Maple bars!” He pulled a white paper napkin from the holder on the table. “I have the day off. I was hoping Jonah might come to my house so we can finish the paintings we started. And you are welcome, too, of course.”

  “Don’t kitties ever get sick on Palm Sunday?”

  He grinned, an engaging, infectious grin. Obviously, he was just as ebullient in his own way as Jonah was. “Jason is holding down the fort today. He is Jewish. He gets Saturday off and doesn’t mind working Sundays. Reformed Jew, he says, because sometimes he works Saturdays when we need him. We’re hiring on some more help soon, and then we won’t need him at all on Saturday.”

  “What is the difference between a Jew and a Reformed Jew?” Dinah poured.

  “Not sure. I really should read up on that.”

  She settled into her chair and plucked a maple bar and a napkin.

  Dinah Marie Taylor, you did not become a major-league entrepreneur by being timid. This is an excellent opportunity. Do it! “I think it’s interesting that I thought you were freezing me out and you thought I was freezing you out. I still say you were treating me like ice when you were warm to everyone else.”

  “I apologize. I didn’t know you.”

  She was momentarily distracted not by his apology but by the size of his hands. They were burly. How could they perform such delicate surgeries? “And I apologize, too. I didn’t know you, either. Which brings me to my next question. This sounds very obsessive-compulsive of me, but I want to know more about you.”

  Garret sobered, nodding. “I hear you. In this day and age, you can’t be too careful.”

  “I don’t mean…like that.” Now how should she proceed?

  “You mean more than what’s on the Websites.”

  “I guess. And, please believe me, I trust you or I would not have allowed Jonah to go to your place. I mean, well, just more about you. You became very sober, in fact dark, when I asked if you had kids. I thought it was an innocent question.”

  He pondered the maple-smeared stub, all that remained of his maple bar, popped it into his mouth, and chose another. “No, it wasn’t a bad question. It just hit me wrong. Sorry. As I said, I was married once.”

  “I’m sorry, is this too personal?”

  “No, it’s just…” He stared at the table a moment. “I was still in school and she was a middle-management drone in a department store. She put me through school; we lived on her salary. She worked her way up through the ranks and ended near the top of the management heap. When I graduated I worked for other vets awhile, and she was making twice what I did. More. Then I started this practice and made even less at first. Most of us—Sue, Amber, myself, the core people—have been with the clinic since the beginning.”

  “Almost all of my employees have been with me from the start, too. They are the company.” Should she have another maple bar? Oh, why not. She took the next-to-last one.

  “Exactly! The company takes care of us and we take care of the company.”

  Dinah found herself nodding. They thought alike on that subject, at least.

  “My sisters could see it better than I could. They claimed my wife was too controlling. A manipulator. Gloria ran me pretty much like she ran her job; she was the CEO. Boss. And I was the peon. I still insist that when I was just getting started, that was what I needed. Keep me focused. You may have noticed I tend to bounce off walls.”

  Dinah grinned. But what was making her happiest was that he was finally opening up to her, becoming real, and it had nothing to do with walls.

  “Sue says the clinic people were watching me change from cheerful and outgoing to sober and passive. Sue says Gloria’s power—I guess power is the word I want—started to wear me down, robbed me of my exuberance, to use her words.”

  Dinah’s head was wagging. “Are you saying she wore the pants and you became subservient?”

  Garret smiled. “Subservient! That’s the word. So one day an old friend of mine from Australia came to visit. He’s a psychologist. A good one. He was our houseguest for a week while he attended a seminar series. Saw the way we interacted, of course. Just before he left, he took me aside. I still remember that his first words were, ‘Now, look, mate. I know this isn’t my business, but I have to say this.’ And he laid out in plain English what he saw happening.”

  “Did you believe him? Usually, a person refuses to believe criticism.”

  “You’re right, but it got me thinking. So I asked around the clinic what they thought and got an earful. That’s when I started watching myself more objectively, you might say.”

  “You figured out what she was doing to you and divorced her?”

  “I wish it were that simple. By now she was a senior vice president in the main office. Probably aiming for the presidency, and she might get it, too. The big thorn was children. She didn’t want them. I did; it was the only thing I wanted from life. She didn’t want to hamper her upward climb, she said, but she was making enough money that she could have hired a full-time nanny. Shucks; hire a whole staff.”

  “I see. Being denied the one thing you wanted; that’s so sad.”

  He shrugged. “We just sort of drifted apart. Money means everything to her. I don’t care about it much. She doesn’t like pets; they’re dirty. She wanted me to sell the clinic and move to Chicago. Lots of little points; a pitchfork with many tines.” He shrugged. “Finally, it fell apart.”

  “Surely you know that more than half of marriages these days end in divorce.”

  His voice rose. “I don’t care how many marriages fail. This was my marriage. I let her down. I let God down. I made promises and didn’t keep them. I didn’t take control and spend the time on our relationship that it needed. I let the big bad powerful woman cow me. And now it’s too late.” He hopped to his feet and went to the sink to wash off his sticky fingers.

  Dinah just sat, trying not to look too stunned, as wave after wave of realization washed over her. He was angry, maybe even fearful of powerful women. Naturally he would see Dinah as a strong, determined woman who built a successful company, maybe even in a strange way fear her. Was that too overblown? Probably. But any way you looked at it, he was emotionally crippled. If only he could see the reality, what the rest of the world sees. If only. The saddest words in the world.

  And with a shocking jolt, Dinah extended that thought: I, too, am emotionally crippled. Am I seeing the reality, what the rest of the world sees? Is there hope for him?

  Is there hope for me?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Monday morning, nothing seemed more appealing than to burrow back into bed, pull the covers over her head, and hope Jonah and Mutt would keep on sleeping. That no one from work would call to see where she was. Actually she wished the whole world would go away and leave her alone.

  While sanity knew her company would survive a six-month-or-more hiatus on Scoparia, feelings of rage and fear about the forces trying to kill the product could not be ignored. Low down. High handed. Everything in the middle.

  And poor Marcella. It was not her fault, but she was so ripped up. Dinah had talked with her for over an hour last week, trying to get her to see that she had done her job correctly. Marcella was suppos
ed to submit the documentation; she had done so clearly and adequately. But Marcella was still upset. Irrationally upset. On top of all that, something was bothering April, but when Dinah asked, she said she wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. That meant it had to be serious, and that made sure that Dinah’s imagination took off and dreamed up all kinds of horrible things, like cancer and divorce and—

  She crawled from the bed as silently as possible, not able to tolerate the crazy mind attack she was suffering from. After pulling on her robe, she opened her door to find Mutt sitting there looking up at her, her head cocked as if asking a question.

  “If you need to go out, which I’m sure you do, I am not dressed for that. Let me get some sweats on, okay?” Mutt followed her into the bedroom as if not trusting her to stay up, or do what she’d said.

  Feet in sheepskin slippers, she grabbed a jacket and out they went. She was halfway down the stairs when she remembered her key. Huffing a sigh, she kept on going. She’d have to do a Jonah and put her jacket in the door. That was better than having to trek around the building and come in the front. That would be mortifying.

  Outside, jacket in the door, she let Mutt lead. The dog sniffed and nosed before finally doing her business and trotting back to the door. “You’d think spring could manage to stay around, wouldn’t you?”

  Mutt looked over her shoulder but kept on going.

  Jonah met them at the door. “She all right?”

  “Yes, just wanted to go out and I thought you might sleep in.”

  “Why? I have to get ready to go to Grandma Trudy’s.” He headed for the kitchen. “Come on, Mutt.”

  Dinah stared after them. You could have said thank you.

  Her phone sang while she was dressing for work.

  “Dinah, this is Trudy. I’m sorry, but I think Jonah better not come here today. I have been hacking and miserable. I don’t want him to catch this.”