Falling for Grace

by Robert Farrell Smith

  “That’s right,” Noah clapped. “I hear that you and I are a team tonight.”

  “I heard the same thing,” I said back.

  “Well, this will be great,” he smiled falsely. “I’ve been wanting to get to know the guy Grace calls ‘Trust’ a little better.”

  The young girl finally realized she wasn’t going to get any more personal attention from Noah and wandered away. Noah and I picked up a couple pieces of wood and carried them into the cultural hall.

  “So how is Grace doing at work?” I asked.

  “She’s great, Trust, a real gem. I don’t know how I would get all of this together without her.”

  “I’m glad,” I said honestly.

  “Listen, Trust, I’m not going to pretend that I don’t hear all the whispering,” he said softly to me. “I know that people here are talking about all the time Grace and I spend together,” he said in a friendly tone. “I just want you to know that I have absolutely no interest in her whatsoever.”

  I didn’t know what to say. A couple moments ago I was bothered about the possibility of him liking Grace. Now I was bothered by the reality that he might not.

  “Excuse me?” I asked.

  “She’s a nice girl, but I would never pursue someone like her. So, set your worries aside.”

  “I wasn’t worried,” I insisted.

  “Trust, when you’ve been in the business as long as I have, you get used to these girls that see you as more of a hero figure than just a regular guy.”

  Noah Taylor was one pompous person.

  “I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying,” I said, giving him a chance to reword what he had just worded.

  “How old are you, Trust?”

  “Twenty-three.”

  “I’ll be thirty in June.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Southdale is fine,” Noah patronized. “It’s a nice city, but it’s not the real world. Live a year in L.A. or New York. Then you’ll know what I mean.”

  This was the dumbest thing I had ever heard.

  “I’ve been to both those places,” I said defensively, adding to the stupidity of the conversation.

  “Great,” he said mockingly. “Now let’s get this walkway done.”

  We crawled under the walkway on our backs and began to work with the wood to shore things up. There was cloth skirting all the way around, leaving Noah and me in relative privacy.

  “So how did this date of December seventeenth come about?” I asked while shoving wood up into the underside. I expected some great larger-than-life story, but instead I got the truth.

  “Well, as I’ve told the people here, I had a dream where the heavens parted and showed me. But I like you, Trust. You seem like you’ve got things figured out so I’ll level with you. I made the whole thing up. It’s a nice way to make some money and, if you like, I could figure a way to include you. Get people spooked and they’ll pay through the nose, if you know what I mean.”

  There was a moment of awkward silence while the words I had just heard sunk in.

  “What?” I asked in disbelief.

  “Come on, Trust, you’re smarter than that. Admit it. It’s a way to get them off their duffs. They get excited about something for a change and it doesn’t hurt us any either.” He turned his head and smiled. “In fact, December seventeenth is perfect timing, really. It sets me up to take one of those less expensive winter cruises when I’m through here. A penny saved is a penny . . . well, you get my point.”

  “I can’t believe you’re saying this,” I said, anger beginning to build.

  “Oh, Trust, you should be happy,” he offered. “There’s no way I could ever be interested in some pale redheaded girl when I can have my pick of all the bronze women in the Caribbean, or maybe Tahiti. That would be nice. What the heck, I’ll be loaded. I’ll just spend a month at each.” He chuckled and went back to wedging wood supports into place.

  I was absolutely dumbfounded. If someone had just informed me that in a matter of minutes all my limbs would fall off and everyone I ever loved would leave me, I couldn’t have been more shocked. Sure, I didn’t like Noah, and yes, there had been twinges of jealousy, but I had never suspected that under that tousled hair and big sweater there lurked such a truly horrible person. This was fraud to the highest degree, and somewhere in the last mound of garbage he had spit out, my subconscious had heard fighting words.

  Poor Noah.

  I’m not sure what it was. Perhaps it was all the stress I had gone through in the last few weeks. Maybe it was Elder Jorgensen and his relentless pursuit of Grace. Maybe it was Southdale and their gullibility to buy into Noah’s plan. Maybe it was all the pent-up emotions I had held back on my mission—the companions I had bit my lips and counted to ten for. My mother, my father, my half-shaved head, my most recent concussion. Maybe it was the drought, or the season. Or perhaps it was the fact that I had still not fully digested Leonard Vastly’s fire-starting brick. Or maybe, just maybe, I was flashing back to Thelma’s Way, and the time Elder Weeble had bad-mouthed Grace on the front of the boardinghouse steps. I had wanted so badly to stick up for Grace, to wrestle Elder Weeble to the ground and demand him to take it all back. I had restrained myself due to the fact that I was a missionary at the time, and that I needed to act the part.

  I was no longer a missionary.

  I sat up quickly, banging my head on the underside of the walkway. Then I lunged at Noah. His smug smile quickly vanished. He was obviously a man who was used to little resistance. I jumped on him, hitting him in the face as he desperately scrambled to get out from under the walkway. I pulled on his pretty sweater, dragging him back under. Then he screamed and kicked at me like a sissy grasshopper with huge lungs. I could hear footsteps running into the cultural hall. I grabbed Noah’s arm and pushed it up behind him. He screamed again, ripping his arm out of my grasp and frantically crawling out from under the walkway. I followed right behind him, not yet satisfied with the amount of damage I had caused. There was a small crowd of onlookers now. Sister Barns rushed up to the fleeing Noah and grabbed his hand.

  “What’s going on here?” she demanded.

  Before Noah could answer, I pulled my right arm back and threw a punch directly into his right eye. Noah seemed to fly backwards out of Sister Barns’s grip. He fell with a thud to the ground, his rear end sliding across the gym floor until he came to a stop against the wall. I stood there with everyone looking on in astonishment.

  The young woman who had been talking to Noah earlier ran to his side. She then yelled at one of her friends to bring her a wet towel. Noah stood, embarrassed about what had happened and by all the attention he was receiving in the wake of it.

  “I demand to know what’s going on here,” Sister Barns stamped.

  “Ask him,” I said, cooling down, already beginning to regret what I had done.

  “Well?” She turned to Noah.

  “I’m not sure,” he said innocently. “I told him that Grace was doing such a good job and he went ballistic.”

  “That’s not true,” I tried.

  “Trust, I think it would be better if you left now,” Sister Barns said, pointing toward the far door.

  “He’s duping you all,” I insisted. “He told me so himself. Said he’s going to enjoy spending all the money you’re foolishly giving him in the Caribbean.”

  Noah looked shocked.

  “Trust,” he said calmly. “Lying about this isn’t going to make it any better. I forgive you for hitting me. There’s no need to make this situation even worse.”

  “Tell them what you said about Tahiti,” I demanded, not sounding like I made much sense.

  Everyone just stared at me, pity and shame painting every self-righteous mug in the room. I looked at Sister Barns, who was still pointing toward the door.

  “Sister Barns,” I tried.

  She replied by pointing with even greater fervor.

  As I walked from the cultural hall
, I could see everybody begin to huddle around Noah Taylor. I picked up the pace, hurrying from the building and out to the parking lot.

  I needed to get to Grace before Noah did.

  24

  Swapping Wounds

  By the time I had arrived home, Noah had already called and spoken to Grace. Grace met me in the entryway of my house, leaving the full-time missionaries who had been teaching her tucked back in the den. She claimed that Noah had called to apologize if he had done anything wrong, and that he felt just awful.

  “Tell Trust I’m sorry if I said something that offended him. I thought we were just having a friendly conversation,” Noah had weaseled.

  “Grace,” I groaned. “He’s a phony.”

  “Trust.”

  “I’m serious,” I went on, taking off my coat and setting my keys down in the small dish by the door. “He told me he’s only doing this for the money.”

  “He said that exactly?” Grace asked, obviously torn between believing Noah and believing me.

  “Those weren’t his exact words, but he’s out to make fools of everyone.”

  “I just don’t—”

  “Believe me?” I finished for her.

  “I’ve worked with him, Trust. He’s not like that.”

  “What’s he like?” I asked in frustration. “Cute? Handsome? Funny?”

  “You’re being stupid,” Grace said boldly.

  “I’m trying to tell you the truth, but you just want to take ‘sweater boy’s’ side of the story.”

  “Let’s talk about this later,” Grace said softly.

  “Why? So you can go to work and get all the details from him?”

  “Trust, have I ever given you reason not to trust me?” she asked firmly.

  “No, but . . .”

  I was interrupted by the missionaries. Apparently they had heard enough from their listening point back in the den to sense that it might be best for them to leave. They came slinking down the hall, hoping to slip out unnoticed.

  “You guys don’t need to leave,” Grace told them.

  “Well, we just remembered . . . uh . . .” Elder Nicks said, unable to conjure up what he had just recalled.

  “Yeah,” Elder Minert tried to help. “We just remembered.”

  “I’ll call you tomorrow, Grace?” Elder Nicks asked forlornly.

  “That’d be great,” Grace said. “I’m sorry about tonight.”

  “Will you be okay?” Elder Nicks asked, looking at me suspiciously.

  “She’ll be fine,” I insisted.

  The two elders took their cue and cleared out.

  “Listen, Grace,” I tried to reason once they were gone. “You have to believe me. Noah is in this for himself and no one else.”

  “I’m sorry. I just don’t believe you.”

  The words hit me harder than anything in my life ever had. I felt like a crash test dummy that had been shot from a cannon directly into a cement wall. My head collapsed as my ego tucked and folded. How could Grace not believe me? How was it possible that in such a short time Noah Taylor could cause her to turn on me?

  “You don’t believe me?” I asked incredulously.

  “Trust, I just know that Noah . . .”

  “No way,” I cut her off. “Don’t give me the ‘I just know’ line. For a year I’ve loved you. Now Noah walks in here and you instantly decided that he’s right and I’m wrong.”

  “He told me, Trust,” Grace said soberly.

  “Told you what?” I asked, angry.

  “He told me how you threatened him into leaving town.”

  “Ha,” I laughed. “And you believed him?”

  “We should talk about this later,” Grace said.

  “Much later,” I replied, so disgusted with all of it that I wasn’t thinking straight. “Maybe I’ll be back tomorrow. Maybe.” I turned and stormed out, slamming the door behind me. I stood on the front porch waiting for Grace to come out and stop me.

  She never did.

  My coat and keys were inside, and there was no way I was going to put my pride through the kind of pummeling that going back in would induce. I stormed off into the night, having absolutely no idea where I was going.

  25

  Be Thou Bumble

  I wandered around Southdale until about eleven o’clock. I refused to go back home, confident that Grace would be watching out of her window for me to come slinking back. I had no money, no credit cards, and the cold was only getting stronger. I thought about going to another member’s home and asking for shelter. But I figured word of Noah’s and my disagreement had already been properly spread around. I didn’t think anyone would agree to shelter a known miscreant.

  At 11:30 I finally gave in and decided to do the one thing I had been avoiding all night. I made my way over to Leonard Vastly’s Bio-Doom. I knew that Leonard didn’t have an extra bed, but he did have a vacant couch, and I had remembered his home being warmer than the naked outdoors.

  I walked quietly through the posh neighborhood surrounding Leonard’s bubble house. Then I approached the plastic-covered monstrosity and tapped lightly on the window that I believed was closest to where Leonard slept. I was worried about making him mad by awakening him from his fatigue prevention, but I was now tired enough not to really care.

  I tapped louder.

  Nothing. I walked around to the bay window and knocked some more.

  “Psst! Leonard, it’s me, Trust.”

  No answer. I walked back and down to the master bedroom window and tried rapping there, thinking that perhaps he was taking a late bath in his water supply. Not a single sound came from within. I looked around at the dark night and decided that now would be a perfect time to break the law. I snuck over to where Leonard had let me in before. Then I dropped to the ground and crawled under the plastic covering and beneath the mobile home skirting.

  It was pitch black below. I tried to feel my way around, finding cans and buckets blocking almost every way. Eventually I felt the trap door and pushed up and into Leonard’s kitchen. It was almost as dark inside as underneath. I located the couch and sat down. Then I called out Leonard’s name a few times, hoping he would answer.

  I would have walked around and searched the house for him, but I guess I was too tired. The thought occurred to me that he may have been balled up in his oven hideout. If that was the case, I could wait until morning to find out. I leaned back on the grain-filled couch and fell asleep.

  What seemed like only moments later, but in reality must have been a couple of hours, I was awakened by the sound of the hinged linoleum swinging open. My eyes were adjusted enough to the dark to see that it was Leonard. He came up through the floor pulling what looked to be a couple of grocery bags. Then he closed the floor and opened the refrigerator door. Light flooded the room, silhouetting Leonard as he stood in front of the fridge looking in. From this perspective, I could tell that he had put on a few pounds while living off his low fat fruit bars. I was also surprised to see that his refrigerator had electricity. According to Leonard, he had shut off all current so as to not be a servant to energy.

  Brother Vastly began to unload groceries into the refrigerator. Then he shut the refrigerator door and walked right past me. He picked up a huge cardboard box to reveal a TV set. He turned it on and backed up toward me to take a seat on his couch.

  “Hey,” I warned as he bent to sit.

  “Whoaaa!” he screamed, throwing the soda he had in his hand into the air and jumping on top of the bags of flour lying on the floor. In the light of the TV, I watched him scramble frantically for something.

  “Brother—”

  Before I could finish my sentence, gunshots began to ring out wildly. I slid off of my seat and pushed my back up against the base of the grain-filled couch, thinking about what an absolutely pathetic way to die this was. I could see the headlines already: “Local boy buried by bullets and barley.” After a couple of seconds, however, I realized that I was still alive. I looked up just as Leonard thr
ew something across the room at me. I jumped up, running out of the way and knocking Leonard into a huge bag of flour. The bag ripped and exploded all over the two of us and the TV. Brother Vastly slipped away from me and fell to the floor. He folded into a fetal position mumbling something like, “Must protect the soft innards.” I rolled him over and stared at him.

  “Brother Vastly, it’s me, Trust.”

  He slowly opened his eyes and gazed at me in astonishment.

  “Trust?” he asked as bits of flour continued to flutter to the floor.

  “Yes,” I said with great relief.

  “What the heck are you doing in my dome?” he whined, straightening himself and sitting up. Then he leaned over and pressed the stop button on his home stereo. The sound of gunshots ceased.

  “Clever,” I observed, indicating his method of home security.

  “I never much cared for guns,” Leonard said, embarrassed.

  “I won’t tell a soul,” I promised.

  “So, what are you doing here?” he cleared his throat, trying to act tough.

  “I had no place to go, so I came here. When you didn’t answer I crawled in the way you showed me. I’m so sorry.”

  “‘Sorry’ is nothing but a lower form of flattery,” he said, leaning over and pushing himself up.

  “Well,” I tried, “I didn’t mean to break into your beautiful palace.”

  “Thank you,” Leonard nodded.

  I stood up straight and dusted myself off.

  “So why can’t you just go to your home?” Leonard asked.

  “Grace and I sort of got into a disagreement, and . . .”

  “Say no more,” Leonard insisted. “We’ve all been there.”

  Falling flour shimmered under the light of the infomercial now showing.

  “I’m sorry about the mess,” I apologized. “I didn’t think you’d react so hastily.”

  “I’m a pro at reacting,” he pointed out.

  “What about your neighbors?” I questioned. “I’m sure they heard the fake shots. Won’t they call the police?”

  “Don’t worry about the police,” he piffed. “I’ve been through this before.”