The Red Fox Bible

by Jody Zimmerman

coming from Mamma's room? What would he say if I told him I peeked in Mamma's room and saw Mr. Hays naked as a jaybird pumping on top of Mamma? What would he say?

  Preacher Herndon finished his prayer, and I dried my feet off. Aunt Nell exclaimed that the Epsom salts had almost dried up my blisters so she told me to put my socks and shoes back on and we left.

  On the way out we passed by Willie Mae.

  "Willie Mae, I'm so sorry about Bobby running into you," Aunt Nell said.

  "Oh Miss Nell, it ain't nothin'. Sometimes when ain't nobody else 'roun, I bring in my granchillins an let dem slide all ovah dat big hall."

  I smiled at Willie Mae and grabbed hold of Aunt Nell's hand.

  Things pretty much returned to normal after that. Mamma didn't pressure me into getting baptized, and I kept on going to church with her. Then it happened on that horrible Sunday a few weeks later. It just never occurred to me that Mamma would figure out a plot like she did. Aunt Nell had to have known, but she never let on like she did.

  Well, it was my time. I had my solid white robe on over a white shirt and a pair of black pants. I couldn't believe that Mamma would not let me wear just a bathing suit under that robe.

  Preacher Herndon had just finished dunking one of the girls in line on the other side of the baptismal pool, and he turned to take my hand. I smiled because I was remembering the sound of a blow dryer whirring through the entire church after my sister was baptized two years ago. She wasn't about to receive her after baptism congratulations with her hair all wet and stringy. Mamma turned white as a sheet when she heard that blow dryer start up.

  I marched into the warm water, floated to Preacher Herndon, and he turned me around toward the congregation. There I was, floating up above the choir and the entire congregation while pretty organ music filled the air. Preacher Herndon had beads of sweat on his forehead and his horn rims were spotted with water. He said a few words about eternal salvation and the holiness of this special moment in my life. Then he put the white cloth over my mouth and nose and began to say "I baptize thee in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost," and he dunked me.

  I saw bright yellow-red flashes of light as my ears filled up with warm water, and I wondered what the man behind me looked like with no clothes on.