instead of complaining to Tracey, she might realize what she’s doing and how it hurts me. If she only knew, I’m usually well aware of my heart’s condition before saying a word. “Now let’s just let it go.”
“Fine.” She sounded wounded.
I stormed into the living room, slowing with each step. Normally, I would have taken Rochelle’s dishing because I knew she had it hard being a single mom and sometimes needed to let go on somebody. But today, I just couldn’t take it. Was it because I’d used Tracey for the same purpose?
I didn’t want to think about it. As I dropped onto my leather sectional, a bulletin board framed with orders stared back at me. My bread store soap rack leaned against the wall like a gas tank at the middle of a long trip, half empty and half full. Just like my week. Just like my life.
“If you get your clothes on, we can grab some dinner before we go.”
The apple cobbler soap I’d made two weeks before filled the room with scent as I rotated the bars so air could hit every side. The tart sweetness settled down around my shoulders like an old sweater. Or an old friend.
I turned. “I’ll go, but I’m not voting and if Tad uses the words spiritual intimacy more than once, I’m out of there.”
“Deal.” Rochelle wiped her eyes and walked toward me, the skirt of her dress swaying with each step.
Knowing that she needed a hug, but wouldn’t offer one, I opened my arms to her. She accepted my affection, but more stiffly than usual. My gut wrenched. Letting off steam had seemed right at the time, but now it seemed foolish. I hugged her closer, bending her rigid fear into my soft shoulder. Fear of loving again, fear of what would happen to our friendship without Tracey to blur our sharp edges, to make us laugh in the right places.
I patted Rochelle’s back. “It’s okay. I’m scared, too.”
Chapter Three
Deal. I should have known better than to say that to Rochelle, to agree to drag myself to the singles group. Such things never work in my favor. When I heard Kirk Franklin playing and saw the disco ball, well, all hope of escaping unscathed went out of me.
“What on Earth is this, Chelle?” I tugged at her sleeve, my feet poking around in those moccasins I’d vowed to save for a special occasion. This definitely wasn’t it.
Waving to the DJ and other thirtysomethings trying desperately to look cool, she patted my hand. “Lighten up, Dane. It’s just a little fellowship to go with the elections.”
Fellowship? Maybe on an alien planet. Though a few hairs short of thirty myself, I knew I’d long since ceased to be cool. Somehow, these people hadn’t been given the you-are-out-of-date memo. I’d been duped again. “Whatever.”
I slumped into a chair for the first half hour, dreaming of my Chunky Monkey ice cream and my comfortable bed, and wondering whether the salon where I’d cancelled my pedicure took walk-ins. Today had been draining and tomorrow I’d have to be singing in the choir, serving dinner after church and probably back again in the evening. Coming along for the ride was one thing, but this added too much onto an already heavy day.
Rochelle’s elbow, pressed to her side like a broken wing, jabbed me once again. “Are you asleep? Come on, we’re counting the ballots.”
I formed a lengthy reply, but telling Rochelle that I’d thrown my ballot in the trash with my last plate of chips would hurt her, so why bother? “Okay.”
“Seriously. You should come on over. Talk. Some people are picking prayer partners and discussing ideas for next quarter’s activities.”
A look in the direction she pointed revealed all the reasons why I dare not leave my seat: Tad admired himself in the punch bowl, while next to him, Deacon Rivers checked for nose hairs. Near the door, the did-I-tell-you-about-my-divorce-yet group gathered in the corner. Normally, I’d suck it up and participate, but my tolerance for the ridiculous had run dry, expended on Tracey’s wedding.
“Chelle, I don’t think I can—”
“Wait! Hold that thought. They’re here!” She whirled around and paced to the front of the general-purpose room…its general purpose tonight was to torture me. She had the DJ stop the music.
I drank in the quiet, trying to remember which scary movie this scene was edited out of.
“Well, everybody, I wasn’t sure if they could make it, but I invited a few friends from the regional singles’ conference. They’re from Agape Worship Center, over by the mall.”
I watched in disbelief as a line of balding, bulging fellows trailed into the room. They slapped hands with Tad, who promptly marched off to sanitize himself in the bathroom. For once, I had to agree with him. These gentleman just looked…wrong. Like a bunch of football players who’d been squished into a time machine and had the plug pulled midway through the trip. Those jeans definitely didn’t make it to the new millennium. Not attractive. And to think that Rochelle tried to give me a makeover to come here.
Even if the room had been filled with male models, this church basement happy hour just didn’t work for me. Rochelle, Bible guru that she was, seemed to be having a wonderful time, flitting from person to person, and just like earlier, not spilling a single drop of punch.
I’d already stained my jeans. With Sprite.
Why didn’t I drive?
As I pondered the distance home, one of the once-upon-a-time tight ends from the other church reached for Rochelle’s hand and proceeded to a chair at the side of the room, where he opened a Bible and began speaking intensely, no doubt trying to cultivate “spiritual intimacy.” Too bad Tad was still in the bathroom. That subject was his specialty.
As the anger and the confusion of the day detonated within my mind, I knew I was going to lose it. I mean really lose it, like say something all of us might regret. I’m still not sure how I got that microphone…
“What are you people? Crazy?” I asked through the blaring sound system. “Hell-ooo, this is a church, not some pathetic nightclub. The singles group is not about getting with somebody, it’s about being single!”
I raised both my hands and quickly dropped them to my sides as cheetah memories flashed through my mind. No time to think of that nightmare. I was on a roll.
Rochelle looked up from her deep conversation as if she’d swallowed a fly.
“I’ve come here week after week and listened to you people tell your little pity party stories about your ex-spouses and your baby Mama drama and—”
“I don’t have any out of wedlock children, thank you—” Tad dried his hands.
Thank God there’s only one of you.
“Anyway. I came here for you to pray for me, to study the Bible with me, not have you all tell me I’ll be a real person when I get a man.”
My voice quivered. “This should be a place where it’s okay to be alone. Instead, you all act like it’s some sort of crime. The real issue is, if none of us ever gets a mate, is God enough…or isn’t He?”
A wall of silence crept up between
