16

Peebles

Grace had sounded okay on the phone before Thomas pulled out of Adamsville, but he insisted on bringing home dinner. “You rest until I get there. We have a lot to talk about.”

“Give me a hint.”

“I’d rather not.”

“Please, Thomas.”

“Well, maybe you can think and pray about it before I get there. It’s a prison chaplaincy.”

“Oh, my.”

He chuckled. “My response exactly.”

Thomas spent the entire drive ticking off the pros and cons and soon began to weary under a burden of guilt. The situation, strange and exotic as it was, would clearly be a nine-to-five weekday job. He supposed he might be called in some evening for the occasional emergency, but otherwise, he would have a routine he had not enjoyed as an adult.

What kind of a man was he to long for that? Rising every morning at the same time, being able to have devotions and breakfast with Grace, getting home at a decent hour, not having to worry about the phone ringing, the endless committee meetings, the people problems he’d had to endure for so many years.

As he drove, Thomas found himself daydreaming about the structured existence he had always yearned for. He had felt called to preach and teach and pastor, but everything that went with it had proved a distraction. And his daughter was right; it wasn’t in him to fight all the forces that wanted to use and abuse him.

Could he make a difference in prisoners’ lives? He certainly couldn’t hurt, couldn’t make things worse for them. He imagined, and Chaplain Russ had confirmed, that real results would be scarce and hard to evaluate. But that was God’s work, wasn’t it? Wasn’t Thomas’s role simply to be faithful and diligent?

By the time he reached a Chinese carryout place a few blocks from the borrowed home, Thomas realized he had allowed the glamour—yes, it seemed that way to him—of a new life, an ordered day, to outweigh all his misgivings. He realized he had been beaten down, wearied, wounded by all the shots he’d taken so recently. From being summarily dismissed by the folks in Foley, to the condescension of the search committee chair in Vidalia, to the tough discussions with Ravinia and then her blatant rebellion against all she had been taught . . . from the mess with the Pierces at Oldenburg, to even the kind but stabbing assessment of Jimmie Johnson, all the while worried about what was happening with Grace—well, he was just weary.

Inside Thomas felt stooped and old and depressed, yet as he waited for his order, he caught a glimpse of himself in the ornate mirror behind the counter. He stood ramrod straight, shoulders back, head high, and smiling. Genuinely, warmly smiling.

A young family with a noisy toddler amused him, and the girl at the cash register had a refreshing countenance. But Thomas knew his renewed vigor was from the Lord and that the prospect of the new job—despite its sobering environment—was making him his old self again.

Addison

It was clear when Brady stepped in the door that his mother was payday drunk. Trouble was, he never knew what kind of a drunk she’d be. Sometimes she was sullen and quiet and sad and just sat dozing or smoking as she watched TV. She might weep and complain about life and plead for someone to tell her they loved her. Brady was long past succumbing to that temptation.

It was the other times that bothered him, when she’d had just enough booze or little enough food—who knew what combination might set her off—to make her angry. Then no one could do anything right. Nothing pleased her.

For now she was sitting, but she was clearly out of it. And as the time came for Brady to head to the work site, he debated taking Peter with him. Of course Peter didn’t want to go, and he kept assuring Brady he would keep his distance and that, yes, he would escape if he had to.

But then, all the while Brady was on the forklift truck, improving his dexterity with the machine (and thus hopefully his elapsed time), he was listening and watching for his brother. Would Petey come running? And if he did, would he have eluded her in time? If he showed up with so much as a mark, Brady was prepared to make his mother pay. He didn’t even know what that meant. Would he beat her? threaten her with the old sawed-off his late father had stored somewhere in the back? Would he kill her?

He honestly didn’t know, but he had a feeling most people would be sympathetic to him if they knew he was protecting an eight-year-old boy. Part of Brady hoped it wouldn’t come to that. Another part of him hoped it would.

He had spent enough time on the machine that he should have been more accurate, but his state of mind caused him to break two car stops. For a few minutes he drove in anger and once had to hit the brake so hard to avoid hitting the metal building that he nearly pitched out of the seat.

Just as he was loading the last pallet under a black sky by the light of the security lamps in the company yard, he heard a noise and jerked to see if it was Peter. It wasn’t, but his action caused the load to shift, and one stop slid halfway off the pallet. It hung there, and Brady could feel the weight pulling on the truck.

He slowly lowered the forks, but it was clear the hanging stop would touch the ground before the flat bottom of the pallet. If he was careful, perhaps it would push itself back into position without breaking. When it was just inches from the ground, he toyed with the levers that controlled the hydraulics, but at the last instant he held one too long, and the hanging stop hit the ground and cracked, held together only by a thin strip of rebar.

He swore. Three broken stops in two hours of work! Alejandro was a good guy and had predicted this learning curve. But with that third break, Brady knew he had actually cost the company money for that shift. He would not be docked, but what would the foreman think?

Alejandro had said such was the price of his training, but with everything else going on in Brady’s life, he suddenly couldn’t abide this. It was embarrassing, humiliating. Worse, what if the former guy’s back got better and Alejandro got tired of waiting for Brady to be productive? Maybe he would get switched to sweeping floors for just pennies or, worse, lose his job.

Brady carefully snagged the broken stop with one fork and slung it out of the way, then grabbed another good one, completed the pallet, and loaded it onto the delivery truck.

He knew the right thing was to move the broken stop onto the pile with the other two so Alejandro would see the true picture in the morning. But forty feet past the delivery truck was a steep drop into a ditch. Did anyone ever look down there?

Brady hopped off the truck and crept to the edge. He squinted in the darkness where it appeared a trickle of water ran through some gravel. Hurrying back, he fired up the machine, grabbed the third stop, and drove it to the edge. He raised the lift and angled the forks so the cracked slab slid off. But he didn’t hear it roll to the bottom.

Furious, Brady scampered off to find that the thing had stuck to the muddy side of the gulley, midway down. Maybe that was good. Someone would have to look hard to see it. But it would be even better if he could cover it. There would be no getting the truck down there without it flipping, so Brady ventured down, quickly ankle deep in the soggy incline. It took him twenty minutes to dig and spread more mud over the block.

As he parked the forklift and went to turn off the lights in the outbuilding, Brady saw how mud-caked he was. His shoes were covered, his pants filthy to the knees. He’d have to leave early the next night and wash them at the Laundromat, but the shoes were another matter. He hosed them down before walking home, squeaking and leaking as he went.

At the trailer he sat on the steps and removed shoes and socks, setting the shoes where the morning sun might dry them before he left for school. He wrung out his socks, making enough noise to rouse his mother. She moved to the doorway and blocked the light.

“So what’d you do, fall in? Thought you were driving a forklift.”

He turned and pushed past her.

“Answer me, you oaf! You too uncoordinated to even stay in a truck?”

There was so much he wanted to say, to do. But if he could just settle into this job, get them comfortable enough with him that he would never be suspected if he raided the office, he would be out of the trailer soon enough.

Nabertowitz was still on his case about his grades, but Brady had an image to protect. What would it look like, him meeting with a teacher, especially more than one, and having a tutor assigned? Some kid, maybe even younger, sitting with him in study hall and working with him?

Like that would happen.

Peebles

“You’re going to be surprised at how this hits me, Thomas,” Grace said, dishing out their meals as if moving in slow motion. “While it doesn’t sound like there’ll be a role for me, at least that I know of—perhaps I can write letters or send in baked goods or something—I can at least pray for you and for the men you’d minister to. But two things about it are really attractive to me. Can you guess?”

He smiled, chewing, and shook his head.

“First, we will be able to find a church to just attend and enjoy. Can you imagine simply drinking in some teaching and not having responsibilities? How I’d love that. Oh, I’m sure we’d both get busy soon enough, teaching Sunday school and whatnot, but we’d just be members. Lord, forgive me, but it sounds delicious. I could organize the ladies to somehow minister to prisoners.”

“You said two things.”

She nodded and sat back, setting down her chopsticks after only two bites. “I did, but I’m feeling a little selfish about it. I believe I’d have more time with you. You wouldn’t be there all hours, would you, like you’ve had to be at the churches?”

Thomas laughed. “We’re feeling guilty together. Nothing sounds better to me. I also like the idea that you can take a break for a while. Whatever’s wrong with you, whether it’s just a bug or something serious, we’ll have time to find out before you have to dive into anything.”

“And that can wait. I feel wasted, I confess. But I don’t think it’s anything dire. Why don’t you pursue this, and if it happens, once you get settled in and we find a place to live, if I still feel I need to, I’ll see a doctor.”