The Lesson (10 page)

“Don’t tell me that guy let you walk home?” He stared at her, waiting for answer. “Did that guy let you walk home alone after dark?”

“I chose to walk,” she said in a tone that clearly implied,
and don’t ask anything more.

Kevin must have gotten the hint because he let it drop.

They chatted all the way to Mountain View while they listened to rock and roll worship music on cassette. Kevin put “Easter Song” by the Second Chapter of Acts into the dash cassette player and they stopped chatting a while to sing along to the rousing lyrics.

Singing made Gina feel better, if only a little. For one thing, Kevin couldn’t sing and ask questions about yesterday’s events at the same time. For another, she was glad for the distraction. She didn’t want to think about last night, but dark thoughts of Rolando kept jumping out like spooks
from the dark crypt of her mind. She felt like a fraud. Then there was the matter of her car. Just thinking about her little yellow Austin America—all alone, stiff, dead, and cold, awaiting burial on Scott Boulevard—distressed her. Her biggest fear was that Kevin, who was so knowledgeable about cars and their maintenance, would question her more about the Austin and its performance before it died, which would, somehow, dangerously lead to questions about her date, and she didn’t want the conversation to go anywhere near there. When thoughts of her car intruded, she comforted herself with the knowledge that her father, at best, could fix any kind of engine; at worst, he knew the owner of every used parts yard in town. Maybe he could get her a deal on one final tow. Also, Mr. Jacobs wasn’t as nosy as Kevin. She would call her father that afternoon.

They drove down El Camino Real through Santa Clara, then Sunnyvale, and finally into Mountain View. It was Kevin’s first visit to Church of the Crossroads. Normally he attended Los Gatos Christian in San Jose. Gina thought it might be a good idea to prepare him. She’d seen the puzzled looks of other visitors.

“Kevin, there’s something you should know about my church.”

“I don’t do snakes.”

Gina burst out laughing. “Would you stop it!”

“No snakes? You swing from the chandeliers and dance in the aisles then?”

“No,” she said, laughing. “But if you want to swing, you can do it from basketball hoops, not chandeliers. We meet in a gym.”

“Gym, like gymnasium?”

“Yes, like gymnasium. With markings on the court, bleachers stacked up against the walls, and cages over the ceiling lights. A real gym.”

“Oh, I get it. You’re one of those boutique churches, like the motorcycle club ministries, Harleys and leather and chains and all that. Please don’t tell me they hawk peanuts and beer between the songs and the sermon.”

“Only during March play-offs,” she said.

He gave her a strange look.

“Seriously,” she said, “It’s a very unorthodox sanctuary. It used to be a Catholic high school, Holy Cross. But Evangel Christian Fellowship—my old church in San Jose—bought it, and most of the original congregation drives from San Jose to worship at the new facility. We hold church services in the gym because it’s the only building on campus that will hold everyone. We use the classrooms for a Christian school. It’s a little odd to worship in the gym, but you get used to it. After a while you don’t even notice. And the people are really nice. Pastor Cannistraci is Italian like my family. Expect a lot of spaghetti jokes.”

By the time they reached their left turn onto Miramonte Avenue, Gina finally felt like she could stop holding her breath. Kevin hadn’t asked anything more about her car or yesterday’s run-in on Scott Boulevard. She was safe.

Pastor Cannistraci’s message was more stimulating than usual this morning. His passionate rhetoric bounced off the hard surfaces of the gymnasium, booming into every corner―except Gina’s heart. Why did God have to take so ever-loving long to do his restoration thing in her life? Take Noah. His faith was tested just forty days, but she'd been waiting six months. God was loving but He was late, He was trustworthy but He was tardy. Michael had walked out of her life abruptly and had broken her heart; Noah hadn’t lost anyone close to him, just his house and his stuff, which probably wasn’t worth much anyway. His entire extended family was on that stinking boat—they were all saved. But she had lost Michael. What’s more, except for a bizarre and exceedingly brief and rainy evening at Marriott’s Great America with a character who claimed to have received messages from the Virgin Mary, she’d had no real dates in six months. She used to date all the time. Her Ugly Girl Clothes couldn’t be blamed. She’d quit dressing like a hayseed and still she wasn’t attracting serious men.

What had happened to her lately that caused the guys all around her to go blind? She appeared to be the same person in the mirror every day as she had been in the past. Had she changed so much her sophomore year that she had lost her sex appeal? True, she’d thrown out her more revealing clothes since that tumultuous time, but those were mostly evening dresses, exotic items she didn’t wear often anyway. One slinky black thing in particular was a relief to toss: it’s dangerously plunging neckline had caused her an entire evening of insufferable anguish, so worried had she been that something provocative might fall out of the front only to plop, like a delightful, unexpected garnish, into her bowl of vichyssoise.

No, for the most part she dressed and looked as she did before. And it wasn’t like she wanted guys to fall all over her. Not at all. She was just tired of waiting for an answer to her prayer. She wanted someone wonderful to come into her life to help her forget the pain of losing Michael, and she was tired of being dateless. The church was full of eligible guys who didn’t notice her … but they noticed the other girls. Indeed, it seemed she was invited to a wedding every month. She could name three couples in the church that had married recently, and still she had no dates. What was she, anyway—invisible? Or was she the Greatly Dreaded One? The dumpy, homely kind of girl with opaque stockings and bad skin that evangelical guys worry that God has set aside just for them. Was she fat? No. Did she have crooked or missing teeth? She had plenty of teeth, all of which had been straightened by braces. She didn’t smell bad and she didn’t have zits. So why did the guys ignore her? She’d been praying for six months! Where was Mr. Perfect? Exercising patience was no fun at all. She’d rather go dancing. Gina felt guilty thinking such rebellious thoughts but not guilty enough to stop.

But then she saw Kevin looking down at her. He smiled. She gave him her most angelic smile in return, consciously masking the treason in her soul. She wondered if he would like her as much if he knew how she really was inside. She was glad for the privacy of her rebellious thoughts. But she decided, at least for the moment, to put them to bed and pay attention to the rest of the service.

It finally ended. As they were walking out of the auditorium into the noisy church foyer, Gina saw Dory Pieters across the room. Dory looked in Gina’s general direction and smiled. Gina looked left and right. Was Dory smiling at her or someone else?
She must think me and Kevin are a couple.
Gina was horrified. She hoped others didn’t assume the same, especially a few nice looking single guys who regularly attended. She determined right then to never sit next to Kevin in church again.

“There’s my friend Bonnie,” said Gina, pointing across the foyer. She heard the ruckus surrounding Bonnie and her two little ones before she saw them. “I want to go help her.”

“Then let’s,” said Kevin.

“Bonnie!” Gina called out. Bonnie’s eyes flashed toward Gina and then Kevin. It was obvious that Bonnie was delighted to see Gina accompanied by a young man—she knew all about Gina’s dating troubles.

“Bonnie, this is a friend of mine, Kevin Wyatt. Kevin, this is Bonnie Brefeld, Benjamin, and Sarah.” Baby Sarah shyly buried her head in her mother’s shoulder, but Benjamin was oblivious. He howled and flailed, immersed in an award-winning tantrum befitting the two-year-old he was. He pulled at his mother’s arm, trying to escape her grip, endangering the modest neckline of her dress with his yanking. Ordinarily Bonnie would have disciplined him for such behavior, but because she was loaded down like a pack mule, discipline was impossible.

Kevin and Gina stood quietly a few seconds while Bonnie did her best to calm Benjamin. Gina thought of taking Sarah off of Bonnie’s hands, at least momentarily, but an image of slick drool running down the front of her dress caused her to
hesitate. Suddenly Kevin looked at Bonnie and motioning toward Benjamin with his hand.

“May I?”

“Go ahead,” said Bonnie.

Kevin bent over and grabbed Benjamin under the arms, swooped him up into his own solidly built ones, and lifted him high. Benjamin was so startled that he stopped his screeching and stared at Kevin, who was just inches from his face. Kevin stared back, fixing his eyes in a straightforward, determined gaze.

“Son, your mama said to stop that. Now you stop it.” Kevin’s voice was calm but firm. He didn’t wait for Benjamin’s response. Silently he pulled the startled little boy to his chest, pressing his body gently to his shoulder, cradling the tot’s head lovingly in his palm. Benjamin didn’t even try to resist. Without another sound he obediently laid his little head on Kevin’s shoulder, and hiccupping loudly, settled in for a good rest. Kevin turned to Bonnie. “He’s just tired. Can we walk you to your car?”

“My Datsun is parked right next to the chapel. It’s white.” Bonnie said.

Kevin took the lead, guiding the girls and baby Sarah through the throngs of adults and children who streamed into the parking lot. Once he was safely a few steps ahead of the girls, Bonnie looked at Gina and lifted her eyebrows as if to say, “Wow! Where’d you get this guy?” but Gina shook her head madly and mouthed a resounding “No!” It was obvious to Gina that her girlfriend was most impressed by this Hallmark cuddle moment; Gina didn’t know what to make of it. She was anxious to explain to Bonnie how things really were with her and Kevin, but that would have to wait.

Bonnie stopped in front of her shiny, new, two-door Honeybee.

“A new car?” asked Gina.

“Olive branch,” whispered Bonnie. “I’ll tell you about it later.” Then she awkwardly tried to fish her keys out of her purse while she held Sarah with one arm.

“Here, please let me,” said Kevin, as he put out his hand to take her keys.

Bonnie handed Kevin the keys. He opened the car door, pushed back the driver’s seat, and easy-as-pie placed Benjamin onto the back seat, unreeled the seat belt from its housing, and buckled him in. Gina watched through the window as little Benjamin smiled at Kevin and patted his face with his grubby hand. Kevin picked up a small stuffed toy off the floor, handed it to the boy, and then kissed him on the forehead. Benjamin was obviously delighted with the male attention, but not nearly as delighted as his mother, who kept making bug eyes at Gina that said, “Can you BELIEVE this guy? Where on earth did you find him?” Then Kevin took sleeping Sarah from her mother, walked around to the other side of the car, opened the passenger door and just as deftly strapped the baby girl into her infant seat, adjusting one ill-fitting strap then the other to fit her securely, buckling her in as smoothly as though he’d done it a hundred
times. He grabbed a cloth diaper that had been tossed onto the seat and wrapped it around the buckle to keep the warm metal away from her skin. The last thing he did was check under her seat to make sure it was actually secured to the car. It was not, so he reached underneath it with both hands and secured it. Sarah never stirred. At last he shut the passenger door and walked around the car to where the girls stood, gaping.

Kevin must have noticed their questioning looks. “The mechanics of buckles and straps are all the same,” he said with a shrug. “Firefighters have to learn how to buckle on an O-B-A. Oxygen breathing apparatus. It’s a pack you wear on your back that makes oxygen for you. We practice putting them on really fast to stay ahead of smoke and flames. After you’ve buckled a tank like that on your back ten thousand times, a car seat is a cinch.”

Gina did not have to make eye contact with her best friend to feel Bonnie’s pleasure at all the manliness being thrown around. Gina was growing more ill at ease with the whole situation by the minute. She was anxious for Bonnie and the kids to drive away so that Bonnie would quit the histrionics over Kevin.

Bonnie thanked Kevin and got into the driver’s seat, and then Kevin reached over and shut her door. Kevin and Gina stood, waiting for Bonnie to drive off, when she motioned to Gina to come near the driver’s door window. Gina complied while Kevin waited in a gentlemanly fashion for the girls to finish their tete-à-tete.

Good gracious,
thought Gina uncomfortably,
he must know we’re talking about him.
She leaned into the driver’s door window so that Kevin would not hear anything. “What?” she whispered.

“Call me when you get home,” Bonnie whispered back, still smiling.

“I will,” said Gina, and then she quickly pulled away from the car so that Bonnie would get out of there.

#

Lunch at El Zarape was good. It was Gina’s first visit to the restaurant, a small, clean place, old but comfortable and friendly, located on El Camino Real near Miramonte. The seating area was L-shaped. They entered the restaurant on the side of the L that faced noisy El Camino, but Gina was glad to see that the waiter, who was middle-age and looked as though he could be the owner, ushered them to the other part of the L, to the rear, farthest from the street, where it was quieter, though with all the California-style picture windows on three sides of the little building, diners could still see cars whizzing down El Camino no matter where they sat. Kevin and Gina sank into a booth with deep red bench seats and a corn-yellow table. They both ordered chicken enchiladas, rice, and beans, with flour tortillas on the side.