Godless

by James Dobson

  “How is what?”

  Angie didn’t say a word. She just waited, and glared.

  Did she know? Julia wondered. Of course she knew. Way back in high school Angie had had a knack for detecting the least hint of distress in others. Seven years of motherhood had sharpened the instinct into an uncannily precise radar. It was one of the things Julia admired about her. Angie Tolbert was a patient friend, a supportive wife to Kevin, and a nurturing mom to their four kids. In short, everything Julia felt herself failing to become.

  “Good,” Julia finally said with an evasive smile. “Real good.”

  Angie’s eyes narrowed.

  “OK. And hard,” Julia confessed. “I guess harder than I expected.”

  Her friend’s pursed lips lifted into a warm smile of approval. Julia had done the right thing by coming clean.

  “I bet it has,” Angie said with a trace of admiration.

  Julia looked back at the woman who, more than anyone she knew, embodied maternal success. Four young children. Four! And one of them disabled. Angie Tolbert was in an entirely different league from Julia, who, it seemed, could hardly handle one.

  “I don’t know how you do it,” she said. A subtle plea. But for what? A secret weapon? A magic wand? A shoulder to cry on? Julia didn’t request or receive comfort easily. Nor did she give it. Which, she feared, made her an unsuitable mother.

  “What do you mean how I do it?” Angie asked. “I’ve never raised a preteen daughter.”

  “No, but you’re raising four kids.” Julia noticed Angie’s shaking head. “What?” she asked.

  “I still can’t believe Kevin and I have four under eight years old.”

  Julia smiled at her friend’s astonishment. “I know,” she squeezed through the corner of her mouth. “What’s up with that?”

  They shared a laugh while Julia tried to imagine herself in Angie’s shoes. No one had been surprised when the bouncy cheerleader inspired her husband’s rise to the halls of Congress. As lovely as any trophy wife on Capitol Hill, Angie rarely visited the salon or shopped for glamorous dresses to wear to the next fund-raising event. She was far too busy changing diapers and cutting crusts off peanut-butter sandwiches. Did Angie ever resent the relative obscurity to which motherhood had confined her? She had even given up her part-time nursing job after Leah’s birth, the sensible thing to do. No, the right thing to do. But it still must have been difficult. Julia wondered if she would have been able to make the same choices in Angie’s shoes.

  She would never know. Julia had never given birth. Never would.

  But she had invited a twelve-year-old girl into her home. Amanda needed a family, something she and Troy could become to her. After everything Amanda had endured during her first twelve years, she deserved a real home. The kind of home Angie and Kevin had created for their kids. The kind Julia was discovering herself ill-equipped to give.

  Angie’s internal radar beeped. “Spill it, Julia,” she commanded.

  After a brief hesitation Julia decided to say what her friend probably already perceived.

  “I’m having second thoughts.”

  “About the adoption?”

  Julia nodded slowly. Shamefully.

  Angie approached, placing her hand on Julia’s arm.

  “I’m not like you, Angie. I get so…” She paused.

  “Tense?” Angie completed the thought.

  Another embarrassed nod.

  “And angry?”

  Julia looked at her friend turned inquisitor. How did she know?

  “And insecure, like you think you’re doing everything wrong?”

  “Exactly,” Julia replied.

  “Then you’re just like every mother on the planet.” Angie smiled reassuringly. “Go on.”

  “Like yesterday morning. I ran Amanda to the store to pick up a bottle of some shampoo her friends insist makes their hair smell like rose petals. New Aroma or New Fragrance. Something like that.”

  “NuScent?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Lilies,” Angie said. “It makes your hair smell like lilies.”

  “Right, lilies. Anyway, I had no idea how expensive it would be until we got to the store, so I suggested a different brand.”

  Angie grinned. “I bet that didn’t go over real well.”

  “Oh, my goodness!” Julia said. “You would have thought I had suggested shaving her head bald. She folded her arms tight like a temper-throwing child and stormed out of the store after calling me a stingy, selfish…” She paused, unwilling to quote the rest.

  “Ouch,” Angie said sympathetically.

  “Can you believe it? After all I’ve given that girl.”

  Angie didn’t appear to take up Julia’s offense. “So what’d you do?” she asked.

  “I bought a bottle of the stupid shampoo.”

  “Good girl,” Angie said, to Julia’s surprise. “Then what?”

  “I was upset, so I took my time walking to the car in order to cool down.”

  Angie smiled like a teacher writing “A+” on a struggling student’s test paper. “What did you say to Amanda?”

  “Nothing. I just opened the door and handed her the bottle.”

  “Did she apologize?”

  “No. We drove halfway home in silence.”

  “And then?”

  “And then Amanda opened her window and tossed the bottle of NuScent into a ditch.”

  Angie winced.

  “I nearly lost it,” Julia continued, her head bowing slightly in self-condemnation. “I wanted to pull the car over and make her walk the rest of the way home. I wanted to ask her if she had any idea how much stress Troy and I have been under since she arrived, how much time and money we’ve spent trying to give her a better life, and how much sleep I’ve lost worrying about whether we made the right decision.”

  “You made the right decision, Julia. That girl needs you and Troy.”

  Julia nodded in hesitant agreement. “I know she does.”

  “And you need her.”

  Did she? During the countless hours she had rehearsed the decision in her mind, Julia had always landed in the same place. Troy wanted kids and would make a great father. Since they were unable to conceive their own, taking on a neglected transition-orphan seemed the right thing to do. At times Julia even felt as if God himself had orchestrated the union between infertile couple and parentless child. So why, she wondered, hadn’t he endowed Julia with the kind of calm confidence and loving patience that overflowed effortlessly from her friend?

  “You think I need temper tantrums and flying shampoo bottles?”

  Angie laughed. “I guess, in a way, yeah. You do.”

  Julia gave a puzzled look.

  “If motherhood has taught me anything,” Angie continued, “it’s that nothing gets us in better shape.”

  Julia imagined herself at the gym. “In shape?”

  “Pushes us to become more than we want to be.”

  “I see,” Julia bluffed.

  “I don’t think you do,” said Angie. “You just described a situation that tells me you’re becoming a wonderful mom.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me, a wonderful mom.”

  Julia smiled condescendingly at her friend’s effort to cheer.

  “Don’t give me that look,” Angie scolded. “I’m not being nice. I’m being serious. Listen to yourself, Julia. You bought Amanda the shampoo. You cooled yourself down before getting in the car.”

  “And then I almost made her walk home and almost told her I regret initiating the adoption.”

  “Exactly. Almost. But you didn’t. You swallowed your anger. You gave up the right to retaliate. You forgave. And as a result, you remained an agent of grace in that girl’s life. You probably even moved her a step closer to feeling the kind of security she’s never known but desperately needs. Secure enough, maybe, to start fighting who knows what emotional demons.”

  “I guess,” Julia responded gratefully. It was true
, the past year had brought more opportunities to back off, cool down, apologize, sacrifice, and give than she could have imagined. As difficult as the first year of marriage to Troy had been, adjusting to the expectations and needs of a wife, the year with Amanda had been infinitely more stretching. She had often reminded herself of Jesus’s words Pastor Alex had mentioned in a sermon. “Learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart.”

  She had been trying to learn. And perhaps, if she dared believe Angie, getting in slightly better shape.

  “I’m very proud of you, girl.”

  The force of the words surprised Julia. Had her friend ever used them with her before? She tried to remember. Angie, like the rest of her friends, had expected Julia to graduate valedictorian from her high school class and then take full advantage of her Ivy League scholarship. They took it in stride when she received a Pulitzer Prize in journalism. No big surprise. Julia couldn’t recall Angie offering the sentiment in response to her most impressive achievements. Why, after everything Julia had accomplished, would this put such admiration in Angie’s eyes?

  “And I promise you,” her friend continued while a hand squeezed Julia’s arm, “you’re doing the right thing.”

  * * *

  Troy and Kevin arrived, finally, with what looked like “enough wood to build a small condominium.”

  Kevin reacted to Angie’s playful wisecrack with a kiss on the forehead while Troy downed a bite of his now-cold hot dog.

  “You might as well finish,” Angie said, slapping her husband’s behind as if punishing his concealed offense.

  “Finish what?” he asked innocently, winking toward Troy.

  “The conversation you were having about the Robin Hood tax.”

  “Robin Hood tax?” Troy asked inquisitively.

  Angie looked toward Kevin, then Troy, then back to her husband.

  “You mean that’s not what you were talking about?”

  Kevin shook his head. “You told us not to discuss work, remember.” He suddenly looked eager to comply with her earlier, already violated rule.

  “Wait,” Troy said. “What’s happening with the Robin Hood tax?”

  “What is the Robin Hood tax?” Julia asked, apparently the only one in the dark.

  “It’s a distortion of an idea we floated a few months back,” said Troy. “One Kevin assured me wouldn’t see the light of day.”

  Kevin appeared sheepish. “I didn’t want to ruin your trip.”

  Angie, apparently realizing her mistake, tried changing the subject. “How about if I warm up that dog?”

  “Good idea,” Kevin answered, still trapped in the line of Troy’s threatening glare.

  “What kind of idea?” Julia pressed.

  Troy turned toward his wife. “I suggested proposing something called a ‘fertility credit’ that would allow seniors to receive a full tax credit when they donate toward conception and childbirth expenses for a married mom and dad.”

  “You specified married parents?” Julia asked.

  “I know, it was a long shot,” Troy said. “But we provided solid data showing the long-term impact of marriage on the economy and the kids.”

  Kevin chimed in. “I pitched it as a way to make the Youth Initiative slightly less offensive to my constituency. You know, give seniors an incentive for helping future bright spots. The older the donor, I suggested, the higher the allowable credit.”

  “Let me guess,” Julia said. “Franklin rejected the idea because it might reduce the incentive to volunteer.”

  “Worse,” Troy answered. “He loved the part about raising the allowable credit based upon the age of the donor. With one major adjustment.”

  “Rather than offer a new tax credit to seniors, he proposed a new tax on seniors. He called it the Robin Hood tax.”

  “As in stealing from the rich to give to the poor?” Julia asked.

  “More like taxing the old to fund the young,” Kevin explained. “He wants to add a five percent ‘age-graduation tax’ to every taxpayer over sixty-five to help offset the growing portion of the federal budget allocated to senior-care expenses.”

  “And it would increase an additional five percent every five years,” Troy added angrily.

  Julia ran a quick mental tabulation based upon the latest life-expectancy projections. “So by the time they turn ninety they would pay an additional thirty percent?”

  “Only those who manage to resist every other strategy designed to pressure volunteers,” Troy spat, as if a foul taste had suddenly invaded his mouth. He turned back toward Kevin. “How bad?”

  Kevin picked up a small stone and tossed it toward the river. He waited for the splashing splunk before responding. “Anderson called me last week to say it would be best if I kept quiet about my opposition to the Robin Hood tax until after the election.”

  “Franklin is gonna include the projected revenue in his budget plan, isn’t he?” Troy asked crossly.

  Kevin said nothing, offering a single nod while attacking the river with another stone.

  Troy grunted in disgust.

  Julia felt her own anger rise with Troy’s. Two years earlier she might have celebrated such a tax. She probably would have written a column hailing it as another innovative response to the growing financial crisis. Twelve months earlier she might have wondered what to think, torn between the expectations of her readers and a Christian faith she had only begun to nurture. But today she had no doubt or internal conflict. Such bullying of the elderly was just plain wrong.

  “I wish I could help,” Julia said.

  Troy put an appreciative hand on his wife’s sagging shoulder. They both knew it had been months since Julia received an assignment worthy of her reputation. The series of bright spot and dark zone stories written for RAP Syndicate had helped Kevin by creating a stir among readers. But it had also prompted questions from the editorial board that eventually led to the hushed departure of Paul Daugherty, the editor who had contracted Julia to pen the series. So her once-steady stream of work ran dry. All she had left was an occasional opinion column carried by syndicates too small to realize how far Julia’s star had fallen.

  “So do I, Julia,” said Kevin. “So do I.”

  She sensed Kevin willing himself back into good spirits, a man determined to enjoy his brief but overdue break. Julia blushed at having burdened Angie with such minor worries as Amanda’s tantrum.

  “Listen, Troy,” Kevin began, “I’ve got a few ideas brewing…” He hesitated, glancing toward Angie, who nodded permission to continue the thought.

  But rather than continue, Kevin’s eyes peered toward the food pouch lying open on the ground. “But we can talk about that after…”

  A spark of recognition lit Troy’s eyes as Kevin removed a small object from the bag. “I’m with you, buddy!” he said eagerly, as if suddenly transported to another time and place.

  Julia looked curiously toward Kevin’s hand. From it dangled a package she hadn’t seen in decades.

  “Moon pies!” Angie said with repulsion.

  “Yeah, baby!” Kevin answered, winking away his wife’s rebuke. “A Tolbert/Simmons tradition.”

  “Toss one of those beauties my way!” Troy said lustfully.

  Angie moaned while flashing a mock gag in her friend’s direction.

  “Like I said,” Julia winked. “They can’t help themselves!”

  Chapter Nine

  Alex finished his usual Sunday morning greeting with a “special welcome for anyone visiting this weekend,” then moved seamlessly into the few platform announcements. As usual, each had been scripted so he could emphasize key details with a quick glance at a tablet screen embedded in the pulpit. He had learned not to veer too far from the prepared comments, since the same text would arrive in every attendee’s pocket device halfway into his message, another brilliant idea from the innovation committee. They knew that many of the people sitting through the sermon while looking at their digital tablets only pretended to fill in the open
spaces in his notes. Why not reinforce the announcements by providing a scrolling script in the right column of their screens? Those actually listening to the pastor would benefit from reminders of upcoming church activities. Those playing a game or reading an article might instead tap the links and learn more about how to get involved.

  The next item, however, had no scrolling text. Phil Crawford had decided to bypass the usual routine in order to “up the game” for his announcement.

  “Thank you, Pastor,” Phil began after approaching the microphone. As planned, Alex had explained that the chairman would be sharing “an important word from the elder board.”

  Phil paused before launching into his prepared remarks. That’s when a digital image appeared on the platform screen. It took Alex a moment to recognize the couple, a much younger version than the one he had met.

  “Those of us who have been around for some time fondly remember Wayne and Wendy Bentley.” Phil paused while a different picture appeared, followed by a series of others, each showing the couple a bit older than the last. “The Bentleys modeled what it means to give sacrificially to the ministry of Christ Community Church.”

  Alex took a seat beside Tamara in the front row. As usual, she clasped his fingers with hers and gently pulled her husband’s body close. Only this time her reassuring touch met the stiffness of bottled ire. He knew what was about to happen. Everything within him wanted to stand back up, walk onto the platform, and cut Phil off. But he instead sat silently in his usual spot waiting for the teaching portion of the service, the one part of his job still largely in his control.

  “Ten days ago Wayne went to be with the Lord and his beloved bride, who had ended a long battle with cancer only six months before.”

  Alex recognized the next photograph. It included an image of his own daughter smiling broadly while presenting flowers to a weak but grateful Mrs. Bentley. Wendy loved it when Alex and Tamara brought the children with them on their visits to the hospital.

  “Wendy loved children,” Phil said with a smile. “Not to mention flowers,” he added, prompting the congregation to chuckle on cue.

  Tamara gave her husband a gentle squeeze as if inviting him to enjoy the moment. What his wife didn’t know, and what infuriated Alex further, was that the image of their daughter had been included to increase the congregation’s receptivity to a request Alex would never have made and that Wendy Bentley would have deeply resented.