by Arlene James
He shook her hand with a firm grip, then released it, and after a second, slipped his hand into his pants pocket. An awkward, confusing moment passed before she realized that both he and Evans were waiting for her to sit down! She promptly dropped unceremoniously into the chair, its telltale warmth telling her immediately that Evans himself had been sitting there. She popped up again, only to catch the men halfway down. Embarrassed, she dropped once more. The men were now standing again. Heat spread over her cheeks, and she pulled her feet beneath her once more, only to feel the weight of Evans’s glare.
She smiled up at him weakly. “I believe this is your chair?”
“Not at all,” he said firmly. “Please don’t get up again.”
She nodded self-consciously. The men sat down. What followed was the most awkward quarter hour of Amy’s existence. Her mind was so full of her misguided mission that she couldn’t think of a thing to say to the well-meaning conversational forays of her two companions, until the reverend mentioned that he had hired Mattie to baby-sit his two children on occasion.
“Oh, Mattie loves children,” Amy announced with some relief. “She’ll make a wonderful mother.”
“Not for several years, I hope,” Evans said pointedly.
Reverend Charles ventured blithely onto contested territory. “Oh, you never can tell, really. None of us knows what the future will hold, not for ourselves and certainly not for our children. Now you take my father, for instance. He wanted me to be a professional baseball player, and just because I had the talent for it, he thought I was destined for it. I tried to tell him early during my college career that I felt a much stronger call to the ministry than sports, but he was so sure that my place was in a…more financially rewarding arena that he couldn’t seem to hear me. I disappointed him dreadfully, and several years passed before he forgave me fully, years we can never get back, I’m sad to say.” He slowed down to smile and concluded with “But we’re fine now, thankfully.”
Amy could tell that Evans was holding on to his temper by a thread. To his credit, however, he chose to chuckle mirthlessly and shake a finger at Bolton Charles. “My daughter,” he said tightly, “has been speaking to you about speaking to me about this idiotic notion of hers of not wanting to go to college!”
Bolton sat forward earnestly. “I’m her pastor, as well, Evans, and all I really want is to mediate this dispute between you.” He cast an apologetic look at Amy. “I wouldn’t have brought it up in front of you, ma’am, but I know that she’s been talking to you about it, and that you’ve given her good advice.”
“And what advice would that be?” Evans demanded.
Amy looked him square in the eye. “I told her to at least try it, for the sake of peace if nothing else.”
Evans deflated, groveling apologetically as he shook his head and rubbed his temples. “I didn’t think you agreed with me on this,” he said.
Amy sighed. “I don’t actually, but I know how strong your feelings are on the subject.”
His glare renewed, but after a moment he turned it on the minister. “And you, Bolton, where do you stand on this?”
“I think I understand both sides,” he said calmly, “and because I can sympathize with both of you, I suggest a compromise.”
“A compromise? How can you compromise on something like this? She either goes to college or she doesn’t!” Evans exclaimed.
“Or,” Bolton ventured casually, “she could wait a year and then go.”
“Wait a year?” Evans exploded, jumping to his feet. “And do what? Paint her hair green and line her eyes?”
Amy felt her tongue moving before she could stop it. “That’s not fair! She’s modified her appearance considerably in order to mollify you.”
“And I suppose I have you to thank for that!” Evans snapped, pacing back and forth in front of the coffee table.
Amy took umbrage. “Yes, you do, thank you very much! And I think Mattie’s to be commended for trying to at least meet you halfway!”
“Halfway doesn’t get her to college!” Evans roared.
“No, but it got her a job!” Amy shouted back before clapping a hand over her mouth.
Evans gaped first at her then at Bolton Charles. “Is that what it’s all about?” he demanded of Amy. “You talked her into dressing like a sensible human being in order to soften me up about the job, is that it?”
For answer, Amy bit her lip and looked at her knees. Evans promptly turned on Bolton.
“Were you in on this?”
“I don’t even know for sure what there was to be in on,” Bolton said good-naturedly, “but I do know this, Evans. Mattie is a great deal more mature in some ways than her peers. I’ll admit that the wild hair and extreme makeup threw me off for a while, but I’ve come to realize that it was Mattie’s way of trying to make us see that she’s different. I’ve said as much to her, and she commented wryly how ironic it is that no one seemed to recognize that difference until she started to look like everyone else. She said, too, Evans, that everyone seems to see her more clearly than you.”
Evans rubbed both hands over his face and head. “What she doesn’t understand,” he said raggedly, “is that when I look at her I don’t see just the girl she’s become but the pretty baby she used to be, the toddler I read bedtime stories to, the little tomboy who used to scrape her knees, that fragile near stranger who cried her grief out in my arms when her mother died. I see more than everybody else, and more than anybody else, I want what’s best for her. Why can’t everyone understand that?”
“I understand it, Evans,” Bolton said flatly. “Don’t forget, I’m a father, too. But I’m willing to admit that parents don’t always have the most dispassionate view of what’s best for their own children.”
“What possible harm can college do her?” Evans asked desperately.
Bolton shook his head. “I agree, going to college isn’t a fate worse than death, but look at it from Mattie’s point of view. Going to college keeps her in the slot of student, which she feels that you do not equate with the status of an adult. All she really wants, Evans, is for you to admit that she’s growing up, that she has a right to make some of her own decisions. Give her a year to work after high school. She’ll be much more amenable to college then.”
“She’ll be much more independent then,” Evans countered. “She might even tell me to go soak my head when it comes time to keep her end of the bargain.”
“Mattie has more integrity than that!” Amy said. “If she gives her word, then she’ll keep it.”
“How do you know that?” Evans insisted. “How can any of us know that?”
Bolton spread his hands. “Life doesn’t come with any guarantees, Evans. No one knows that better than the three of us, having lost our loved ones to disease or accident, but I firmly believe that your chances of losing your daughter to acrimony is stronger if you pursue this course of no compromise than if you trust her to uphold her word. And think of this, Evans. You can’t make her go to college now or later, but you can drive her away if you resort to ultimatums. If you can’t agree to the year’s respite, then please just let the argument wait until the end of this school year.”
Evans stood dejectedly in the middle of the floor, his head bowed, forehead furrowed in worry. Finally he nodded, sighing. “Until March,” he said. “I won’t bring it up again until March. That will still give her time to apply and be accepted.”
“If she chooses to do so,” Bolton said mildly. He smiled in obvious satisfaction and deftly shifted the conversation onto a different track—a track that ran right over Amy. “Now, didn’t I hear something about you coming to issue an invitation?”
“Oh.” Amy felt her tongue thicken as her heartbeat sped up. “Uh, it’s not…important. That is, i-it can wait until…”
Bolton slapped his knees with both hands and slid to the edge of his seat. “Until I’m gone,” he supplied succinctly. “Forgive me, Amy, I’m not usually so obtuse.”
“Oh, n
o, please don’t go on my account!” she cried.
“I really should,” he insisted.
“Stay, stay,” Evans urged. “I put coffee on, if you’ll remember.”
“Amy obviously has something personal to ask,” Bolton pointed out.
“No, I don’t!” Amy denied instantly. “Uh, I just wanted t-to invite Evans…” She gulped. “A-and Mattie…I wanted to invite Evans and Mattie to dinner. Uh, I’d invite you, too, Reverend, but my little house won’t—”
Bolton Charles held up a hand, chuckling. “That’s quite all right, Amy, but please, call me Bolton. I’ve heard so much about you from the Shaws and the Kincaids that I feel I know you very well.”
“Oh?” Amy looked at Evans, whose red ears seemed to indicate that he was embarrassed. Had he been talking about her to the rev—er, Bolton? Just what, she wondered, had he said?
“Yes, indeed,” Bolton was saying. “You have some very ardent supporters, Evans and Mattie, Joan and Griff, even Danna. I can’t tell you how happy she is that you’ve given up smoking, and it certainly seems to have agreed with you.”
“Thank you,” Amy murmured. “Thank you very much.”
Bolton looked to his host. “Suppose that coffee’s ready now, Evans? Why don’t you check on it while I badger Amy about coming to church? I want to thank you for recommending us to the Kincaids,” he said to Amy. “Now tell me how I can induce you to take your own advice.”
Amy watched Evans leave the room before turning to the charming minister with a smile. “Actually, I think I may be ready to start attending church again,” she said smoothly.
The reverend smiled as if he understood very well her reasons for coming to that decision, understood—and approved, though nothing in the next few minutes of conversation even obliquely alluded to a relationship between her and Evans.
Evans was still scowling when he returned with three cups of coffee on a tray. He slid the tray onto the coffee table and stood with his hands planted on his hips. “Anybody want cream or sugar?” It sounded so little like a polite query and so much like a dare that both Amy and Bolton burst out laughing. Evans didn’t so much as crack a smile. He dropped onto the sofa, grumbling, “I’ll be hanged if they aren’t teaming up against me.”
“Merciful heavens,” Bolton Charles teased, helping himself to a steaming cup, “what is the world coming to? Your own pastor agreeing with your…” He flipped a look between Evans and Amy and smiled. “Your next-door neighbor.” He made that last word sound far more intimate than it should, so much so that Amy felt herself blushing.
Was she that transparent? she wondered. And if Bolton Charles, who barely knew her, could see that she was falling in love with Evans, then Evans himself, who knew her so much better, could have no doubt of it. Suddenly, she wanted out of there. She sprang to her feet. “I, uh, have to be going. I…have things to do.”
Bolton nodded sagely. “You’ll want to start that special dinner for your guests.”
Dinner! Tonight? Alarmed, Amy flew a glance at Evans, who sat up straighter and said exactly what she had thought. “Tonight?”
Amy gulped. “Well, i-if that’s not c-convenient…”
To her dismay, he shrugged. “Fine with me…unless Mattie’s needed to baby-sit?” That last he addressed to Bolton, who puffed his lips and shook his head.
“Not on my account.”
Evans nodded as if that settled it. He looked at Amy. “What time?”
She couldn’t seem to think. “S-Seven? Unless…Aren’t you working?”
He shook his head. “Nope, I traded with a fellow. I was telling Bolton before you got here…” His voice trailed off, and suddenly Amy knew what he must suspect, that Bolton Charles had neatly manipulated both of them! “Seven will be fine,” Evans muttered, frowning.
Amy wanted to cry. Wonderful! Now he felt trapped, no doubt. And what was the point anyway, with Mattie coming along? So much for her romantic dinner, for putting ideas in Evans Kincaid’s head, for thinking she could pull off something so asinine! She mumbled a goodbye and hurried home, trying numbly to twist her mind around the evening’s dinner menu, unaware that Evans’s own feelings and assumptions closely matched her own—and went another step away from the mark.
Mattie was ecstatic, leaving little doubt in Evans’s mind that Bolton Charles had duly reported the outcome of their little conversation, if conversation was the word for what had actually transpired that afternoon in his own house. He had been ambushed, caught in a neat crossfire of opposing forces. And just in case Bolton’s salvo had not done the job of convincing him that he did not know what was best for his own daughter, there was Amy’s impromptu little dinner party. The worst of it was, he had given his word. No wonder Amy had tried to wiggle out of the dinner date. Why even bother? But that made Bolton’s obvious manipulation of this very event all the more puzzling. Obviously, he had had a double motive. Obviously, he was promoting a romance, and obviously his daughter was the co-conspirator in the latter case. And obviously, Amy was as uncomfortable about it as he was, even more so. Evans felt like wringing someone’s neck; he just couldn’t decide whose neck to get his hands around, his well-meaning but heavy-handed pastor’s, his stubborn daughter’s, or pretty Amy’s. She was pretty, a fact about which Mattie seemed to want to gush.
“Honestly, Amy, I’m in awe. To quit smoking and to lose weight at the same time! You ought to write a book. Do you know how many people the world over would love to have your secret?”
“No secret,” Amy replied succinctly. “I just got sick of myself.”
“It’s not just that you’ve slimmed down,” Mattie continued, “it’s the whole change. You’re positively glowing! I mean, it’s the same face, but there’s something new about it. Your eyes are like jewels, I swear! And your skin’s so pretty! Your teeth even look whiter!”
“Now we’ve reached the realm of the absurd,” Amy said laughingly.
“No, really! It’s like, I don’t know, like the old Amy was just an imitation of the real thing.”
“And moved on to science fiction!” Amy declared, then deftly turned the tables. “And look who’s talking. You, my dear, have moved from radical rebel chick to wholesome, model-quality beauty. We’re a pair of reformers, that’s what we are, but I wouldn’t want to have to compete with you in the looks department.”
“Oh, but you could!” Mattie insisted. “Why, you look ten years younger now, at least!”
“Which would bring me nowhere near you, even if it were true!” Amy exclaimed, smiling.
Mattie made a face. “I hate being such a baby! Eighteen, ugh!”
Amy laughed and shook her head. “Mattie, you’re the least babyish eighteen-year-old I’ve ever known.”
Mattie leaned forward eagerly, one hand reaching across the small table for Amy’s wrist. “Someone else must think so, too!” She hunched her shoulders, obviously holding some delicious secret close. At the last moment, she shot a nervous look at Evans, then came out with it. “Kate Novak’s older brother Bailey wants to take me out!”
Evans sat bolt upright in his chair. “Novak. Is that the same Novaks from church?”
Mattie spared him a one-word answer, “Yes,” and went right back to Amy. “I told you about Kate, remember? She’s the girl who baby-sits with me. Well, we were walking home from the church nursery the other afternoon—they do an aerobics thing on Tuesdays after school and the moms pay us to watch their kids—and Kate says, ‘I have to ask you something. Can I give your phone number to my brother Bailey?’ And I said, ‘That’s the one at OU, isn’t it?’ And Kate says, ‘It’s the funniest thing! He never liked any of my girlfriends before!’ Anyway, he called me last night, and he’s coming home on the weekend, and he wants to go out with me!”
“Oh, that sounds like fun,” Amy said, “and you already know his family, and they know you.”
“I’ve seen that guy,” Evans put in, more and more irritated at the way he was being left out of the conversation, �
��and he’s no kid. He must be what, twenty-one, twenty-two?”
Mattie shot him that old, rebellious look. “I didn’t ask him that? What does it matter?”
“What does it matter?” Evans echoed, amazed. “He’s too old for you, that’s what it matters!”
Mattie rolled her eyes and went back to Amy. “He’s majoring in social work, and this is his last year for that degree, but he wants to go on and get his doctorate in psychology.”
“His doctorate,” Amy repeated meaningfully at Evans. “Isn’t that impressive?”
“It would be impressive,” he growled, “if she was twenty.”
“I’m going out with him, Dad, and that’s final,” Mattie said flatly.
Evans could only gape. “Who’s the parent here, for pity’s sake?”
“I knew you were going to be unreasonable about this,” she retorted, flopping back in her chair and folding her arms. “Well, we just won’t discuss it anymore.”
He thought his head was going to explode. “We won’t—God help me! Has the whole damned world gone cockeyed?”
“You don’t have to cuss,” Mattie said witheringly. Then she got to her feet, leaned over and kissed Amy on the cheek, and said oh-so-reasonably, “Thanks. Dinner was great. I’ll talk to you later.”
Amy patted Mattie’s cheek. “You don’t have to hurry off.”
Mattie shot a glare at Evans. “Homework.”
“Ah. Later, then.”
“Thanks, Amy,” Mattie whispered. “I can always count on you.”
Evans bit his tongue until she got out of the room. “And she can’t count on me? Is that what she’s implying?” he demanded. “I’m just her father! Maybe I should move next door! Maybe I’d get some respect then!”
“You’re being silly,” Amy said quietly, which incensed him all the more, for some reason.
“Silly? I’ll tell you what’s silly, letting that girl go off with some college man is…No, it’s not silly, it’s dangerous, is what it is. It’s irresponsible. It’s—”
