Tiger Lillie

Praise for
Tiger Lillie

“Reading
Tiger Lillie
is like bungee jumping in a prom dress—breathless, extreme, elegant, a mixture of freefall reflection and being jerked back to heart-stopping reality! I was completely captivated by Lisa Samson’s quirky and colorful characters, so tender and down-to-earth, but bold and dangerous when one they love is threatened. You’ll never forget
Tiger Lillie.”

—N
ETA
J
ACKSON
, author of
The Yada Yada Prayer Group

“Lisa Samson has done it again! A superbly told story that immediately captivated me with its loveable and quirky characters. The intricacies of relationship between two completely different sisters provide an intriguing and captivating read—a story that becomes a real page-turner toward the end! Way to go, Lisa!”

—M
ELODY
C
ARLSON
, award-winning author of
Finding Alice, Crystal Lies
, and the Diary of a Teenage Girl series

“Like sprinkles of paprika on a sea of sour cream,
Tiger Lillie
’s colorful characters catch the attention and tantalize the taste buds. I read this novel in one sitting, but I’ll not soon forget the cast of flavorful characters—Lillie and Tacy and Cristoff and Gordon. Lisa Samson writes with surprising honesty, genuine love, and indefatigable hope. Make time for this one—you’ll love it!”

—A
NGELA
H
UNT
, author of
The Awakening

“Many writers in the genre of Christian fiction shy away from characters who stray too far outside ‘safe’ conservative lines. Thankfully, Lisa Samson seems to understand that to breathe life into wonderfully flawed characters is to paint a refreshingly honest and compelling picture of the foibles and follies of the human experience. In
Tiger Lillie
, she does just that. Brilliantly.”

—C
ONSTANCE
R
HODES
, founder of
FINDINGbalance.com
and editor of
The Art of Being: Reflections on the Beauty and the Risk of Embracing Who We Are

“Wow! What a book! Strong, courageous characters, compelling storyline, hidden truths that jump out and grab you—all in Lisa Samson’s marvelous and unique voice. Loved it! Loved it!”

—G
AYLE
R
OPER
, author of
Winter Winds, Autumn Dreams, Summer Shadows
, and
Spring Rain

“Nobody writes like Lisa Samson. Not even Lisa Samson! That’s because each of her novels is different, exposing yet another aspect of her literary talent. See for yourself in
Tiger Lillie
, a fresh and wonderful addition to her unique body of work.”

—J
AMES
S
COTT
B
ELL
, Christy Award—winning author of
Breach of Promise
and
A Certain Truth

“
Tiger Lillie
showcases Lisa Samson’s unique ability to write in-your-face fiction. Her vivid characters reach out and grab, providing a contrast between the self-centered mind and the dedicated heart of those who claim His name. This is her best book yet!”

—L
OIS
R
ICHER
, author of
Dangerous Sanctuary

“Lisa Samson creates the most wonderful quirky characters, ones that jump off the page and into your heart.
Tiger Lillie
kept me up reading way too late. Lisa’s voice is unlike any other writer out there, and she’s addicting. If you haven’t discovered this phenomenal writer yet, you’re in for a treat with
Tiger Lillie.
”

—C
OLLEEN
C
OBLE
, author of
Without a Trace
and
Beyond a Doubt

“Lillie and Tacy, two sisters brimming with
joie de vivre
, delight and then draw us into their life and death struggle with darkness.
Tiger Lillie
provokes thought as it tugs the heart.”

—L
YN
C
OTE
, author of
Winter’s Secret

“With insight and complexity, Lisa Samson writes a story of God’s intricate grace in the heartbreaks of life.
Tiger Lillie
is not to be forgotten.”

—C
INDY
M
ARTINUSEN
, author of
The Salt Garden

For my son, my “favorite boy,”

Jacob Patrick.

May you grow up to be a godly, kind,
and gentle man who loves the Lord with all
his heart, mind, soul, and strength.
I love you, buddy.

Acknowledgments

First, to my Creator, who for some mysterious reason gave me this job to do. I know I could be out in an office, away from my family, and I am ever thankful for the privilege You’ve afforded me to write. I am ever grateful for Your grace. I deserve none of it.

I began this book several years ago while biting my nails and waiting for the next contract to come through. The person who encouraged me to write this, a very strong-minded, independent woman, is now gone. I’d like to thank my late mother, Joy Ebauer, for keeping this project alive during a very dark time. I do hope you are able to look down, even for a second, and see, Mom.

To Istvàn Palffy I owe a huge debt of gratitude. I found “Stephen” on the Internet. A count in Hungary before communism declared him a Class Enemy, Stephen provided me with a detailed account of his own imprisonment and journey to freedom in 1956. It’s a story I’ll never forget and one that bears telling in its own right, one my pedestrian skills as a writer would certainly belittle. Thank you, friend.

To my daughter Tyler, who baby-sat Jake and Gwynnie for many hours during the summer I finished this project. You are a precious jewel and a beautiful, strong young lady. I am proud and thankful to be your mama.

To my niece, Melissa Chesser, your help with watching the kids, keeping up my housework, and always doing so with a smile made this easier on us all. Thank you for providing such love to my children. May you always seek God’s face.

To my family—Will, Tyler, Jake, and Gwynnie—thanks for seeing this as a regular part of our lives. If any lives are bettered by these words, and I pray some are, the reward is yours. This couldn’t be done without you. You give me a deeper heart from which to write.

To Kathy Kreyling, who entered from hard copy to computer my many, many edits, who made this process much less stressful, who caught errors I myself didn’t catch, I wish to extend my thanks. The end process was more joyful because of you, Bugg!

And to these people, I owe a great deal: my agent, Claudia Cross, who makes it fun. At Waterbrook: Dudley Delffs, Don Pape, John Hamilton, and all the rest! Erin Healy, my editor whose touch makes all the difference. My Chi Libris friends, especially Jim Bell and Jack Cavanaugh. My family and friends: Lori Chesser, Tim Chesser, Jennifer Hagerty, Heather Born, Chris Burkett, Gloria Danaher, Leigh Heller, Marty Ehrhardt and the Wednesday Afternoon Prayer Ladies, and Pat Reeves for your friendship and prayers. To those who let me write at their establishments: the gang at The Greek Village, especially Jerry and Joan and Becki, and at Main Street Cigar, especially Russ, who welcomed me in his own special way, and Tony, owner and friend who provides community, intriguing conversation, and wonderfully slicing reviews of Stan Remington.

Thank you to my readers! You’re the reason why! E-mail me at
[email protected]
.

1

Lillie

I have a skeleton inside of me.

The bizarre, creepy quality of that thought never wanes. As a little girl, I used to catch my mom gossiping about our next door neighbor, a lady named Rexy Van Bibber who wore nothing but medium gray and ordered Chinese carry-out almost every weeknight. After my sixth birthday party, which, as always, consisted of a can of paprika, two large tubs of sour cream, my mother’s Hungarian relatives, and Daddy’s deaf father, Grandpa Joe (who did, in fact, look alarmingly like Jack Albertson in
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
), Mom was at it again over poor Rexy. This party, as always, also included gallons of red punch and mouth-blown balloons hanging from the dogwood and maple trees in the yard of the rectory. After the Duncan Hines Red Velvet cake with cream-cheese icing, the mismatched candles, and the strong European coffee, we’d relax out on the buckled brick patio and soak up the purple evening.

I’ve always loved evening. Even back then, as a chubby, bug-eyed little girl who also loved a good joke, that time of the day sobered me and filled me with peace. I know now it’s due to the fact that the clock never stops ticking down and the time for making the day’s mistakes draws to a sweet close. Even the circumstances in which to make these blunders fly away, for in the twilight we simply sit and breathe quietly, cross our fingers, and hope the phone won’t ring or the Jehovah’s Witnesses won’t come to the door. Good grief, if their spiel doesn’t usher in the loss of all your good intentions, I don’t know what does. Must be nice to be one hundred percent right one hundred percent of the time. I’d settle for fifty-one percent myself.

That night, Mom sat and stroked the inside of my forearm. Rexy materialized for a moment at her back door to let out her Persian cat. Mom leaned forward. “Have you noticed the way that Rexy Van Bibber always looks both ways as soon as she steps out her front door? I think she’s got a skeleton in her closet.” Then she turned to my father, who rocked slowly on an old sliding cedar davenport Mom had painted lime green the year before. The paint didn’t weather winter too well. “What do you think, Carl?”

With a twist of his head Carl Bauer listened for the perfect A as he turned the peg on his guitar. Satisfied, he closed his eyes, eyes that had seen my face only until I was six months of age, and even before that, I was just a blur. “Well, Kathy, I don’t know, babe. She seems fine to me. A little odd maybe, but certainly not the brooding, mysterious type. You know, just eccentric. Probably nothing more than that.”

“Well,
I
think she’s got a skeleton in her closet.”

Dad shook his head. “Whatever you say, babe. But everyone has some sort of skeleton in their closet, don’t you think?”

“Not her kind.”

So that’s where some people kept their skeletons. The simplicity of the arrangement amazed me. And it made perfect sense to my six-year-old mind. Skeletons, being such ugly things after all, hardly deserved the light of day. The next morning, I proceeded to investigate all of our neatly arranged closets. My mother, Katherina Bajnok Bauer, boxed and labeled everything. She’s kept Sharpies in her pocket ever since I can remember. Red for her own items, black for Dad’s, blue for mine. And my sister Tacy’s birth commissioned that final pen in the Sharpie four-pack, the bright LEGO green, lined up in the confines of her pocket according to age, of course. I never saw her without them back then.

I began the search for my skeleton in the cool recesses of my own closet. Good move, right? I mean, if skeletons lurked in closets, surely they lurked in the closet of their owner. Rexy’s obviously spent a little time there. And if Mom was right, it was a doozie. Did she hang it up in one of those vinyl zippered clothing protectors? Or did she arrange it in a box?

The scent of lavender sachet pillows, lemon oil, and cedar weighted the air inside my narrow walk-in closet, and the light bulb discharged a soft, pulsating pink. Clothes, in order of length, subcategory color, subcategory fabric, lined the right-hand side of the skinny cubby: coats, long dresses, dresses, pants, skirts, sweaters, shirts, shorts, and socks. Yes, Mom even hung up the socks, three pair secured by clothespins to one wire hanger. I did have an underwear drawer though. “Some things aren’t meant to be hanging in plain view, Lillie,” Mom explained the day I asked why boys are allowed to go without shirts but girls aren’t. “That’s why we have underwear drawers.”

Which explains why women don’t hang up their bras either, I guess. And these days, mine would take up way too much closet space anyway.

I owned lots of clothing. We all did. Parishioners donated bags and bags, and Mom drew up a chart ensuring we wore at least a few garments from each donor regularly so they’d feel good about their largess. The rest—torn, stained rags, really—she threw out, knowing firsthand how insulting receiving such tatters could be. “It’s not good enough for us, but surely, it’s good enough for the rector’s family,” she’d say with a shake of her head.

Floor-to-ceiling shelves checkered the left side of my closet. Shoe-boxes labeled in alphabetical order rested in neat stacks. Having been taught to read in kindergarten, I closely examined the
S
stack, but no mute bone-filled shoebox dwelled there between the
Scenery for Puppet Stage
box and the
Supergirl Dress-Ups
box. No box with
Skeleton
written in incisive, voltage-blue Sharpie letters resided in this proper little nook of our tidy, tiny manse.

Now embarked upon a mission, I hurried down the hallway and into my parents’ small, sea blue bedroom.

Maybe parents conferred skeletons upon a child’s eighteenth birthday, which might mean my skeleton waited, gathering a minimal amount of dust, in
their
closet. The same shelving configuration latticed the right-hand side of the long, narrow space. My fingers slid over the smooth surfaces of the
S
boxes. No boxes marked
Skeletons
there either. What else might they be marked under?

Family Skeletons?

Family. F-f-family. F-f-f-f. F-f-f-f. F.

So I checked the
F
s for
Family Skeletons
because, knowing my mom, she would have grouped them together to save space.

“What in heaven’s name are you looking for, Lillian?”

Oh no.

“Just standing here, Mommy.” I shoved my hands in the pockets of my purple overalls and turned to face her, belly thrust forward, feet pigeoned.

Her chapped fingers fluttered back to the nape of her neck where they tightened the knot of her navy blue kerchief. She wiped her hands beside the sharp creases down the legs of her Monday-Wednesday-Friday maternity pants. The aroma of Tide, Mr. Clean, and Clorox puffed out with her movements along with a slight hint of Tabu talcum powder. “You can’t fool me, Lillie. You’re up to something.”

And then, heavily pregnant with my sister, she knelt down on her haunches and settled my squishy, six-year-old body onto her diminishing lap.

I have no beefs with Carl and Kathy Bauer’s parenting skills. Other than high expectations, they hardly ever stormed and raged, except for the time I missed Ash Wednesday Mass because I’d lost track of time at the school library. “Lillie, it’s a holy day,” my father reminded me after mass, during which I’d made a commotion as I ran from the rain into the church, my feet sliding right out from under me there in the center aisle. “I would think you’d learn to take my responsibilities as priest of this parish into consideration.” Of course I felt bad. Who wouldn’t? When you see a man set his life aside for God, it leaves you almost no leverage for a great retort. Ever.

Ever. Ever.

Besides that, my tailbone hurt for weeks and I ended up with a B on that paper I’d been researching.

As I sat on Mom’s lap, I pressed my nose into her full white blouse, the Peter Pan collar ruffling my bowl-shaped bangs. She ran her rough fingertips up and down my slick blond braid. “Come now, Silly Lillie, you know I have mother magic. I can find anything.”

Keeping my face buried, I whispered, “I was looking for my skeleton.”

“Your what?”

I gazed up into her face. “My skeleton.”

“In the closet?” She pressed a hand against her mouth, but amusement bounced around in her sweet nutmeg eyes.

“It’s not funny, Mommy. Rexy Van Bibber keeps hers in a closet so I thought maybe that’s where you kept mine, too.”

Fifteen minutes later, after hefting open the
Britannica
, displaying several diagrams of the human anatomy and explaining the term “a figure of speech,” she phoned the church office.

“He’s with a parishioner? Oh. But listen to this, Jean.” Her laughter, probably mingling with the church secretary’s, rustled my eardrum tissue all the way from the old, metal-cabineted kitchen to where I sat on my bed upstairs, examining the knobby bone-bumps on my wrists and ankles.

Well, Halloween never seemed quite as scary after that, I can say. At least not the part skeletons played. And even then I leaned toward jack-o’-lanterns.

I have a skeleton inside of me.

The thought pops up with alarming frequency on first dates, especially those destined for some hall of fame of weirdness, or on nights most likely to make a girl feel she’s having an out-of-body experience.

So when Leslie Ferris, the newest male member of the “happening” singles social group I joined a year ago at Chesapeake Bay Baptist, reaches out his hand across the table at Della Notte, I see a skeleton hand. How can I possibly put my skeleton hand inside his skeleton hand? Talk about bizarre and creepy. Holding hands on the first date? Sure. But not with
this
guy. And a second date? Perhaps a few more minutes will open a previously unseen rose, but optimism isn’t exactly blooming here in Little Italy’s newest, sleekest restaurant, its wide curved window the only smooth thing about the evening thus far.

First of all, Leslie suggested we go Dutch as soon as he flung open the cab door…from the
inside.
Where did this guy’s mother go wrong? “I hope you understand, Lillie. But let’s face it, a first date isn’t the time to make a financial investment.”

Great. Here we go again. Curse those stupid bra-burning bimbos who sullied it for those of us nurtured by gentleman fathers, those who realize a female can be honored and served and basically elevated on a pedestal and still be a liberated roaring woman too big to ignore. As Saint Paul, via Dad, said, “There is neither male nor female.” But Daddy, now he’s special. He actually reads the writing of female Christian mystics (or rather, Mom reads them to him) and passes the books on to me and my sister. I know what a special relationship a woman can have with her Lord. So much more intimate in character than a man can experience. My younger sister, Tacy, loves the mystics, or used to, but since marrying that Rawlins McGovern…well, I won’t think about that now.

Second, Leslie asked where I would like to eat, and I answered, “Ban Thai would be nice,” and he said, “I didn’t have that in mind. Let’s eat Italian.” Not, “Let’s eat Italian,
okay?
” Not, “Thai food is a little spicy for me. Is Italian a viable alternative?” Just, “Let’s eat Italian.”

I mean, why even ask if my opinion meant so little to begin with, right? And don’t I have some say? I mean, I’m paying my own way here!

Obviously he isn’t nearly as enlightened as Dad. It’s funny that someone who cannot see has a clearer outlook on the stuff of life than anyone else I know. It may not be fair to compare other men to my father, but it is my right.

And now, Leslie’s waxing and waning and waxing again about his pet snakes and how expensive mice are getting. But you can get them frozen now, which cuts down on trips to the pet store.

Is he testing me?

Just nervous?

Maybe a little socially backward?

Most important, he is
nothing
like Teddy.

And why does this kind of guy always want to hold hands? Why didn’t that cute architect named Cliff make even one physical advance during the entire bevy of Monday evenings I accompanied him to his church-league softball games?

Baptist guys. So free and easy with other people’s hearts and emotions. As my Episcopalian father might say, “Nothing a good long dose of liturgy wouldn’t fix right up!” And he’d wink. He’s been blind for more than thirty years but obviously remembers the power of a good wink. I’m glad. I love Daddy’s winks.

But this dating rigmarole hardly proves a worthy antidote to loneliness. Twelve days of my life invested in Cliff, three months of listening for the phone, all for nothing more than twelve ice-cream cones at High’s Dairy Store and a couple of drives out to Pretty Boy Dam to stargaze. I thought surely he’d kiss me, but no. Not even a peck on the cheek. At thirty-one, I don’t have more than three months to dole out to the noncommittal types. I mean, if a guy reaches forty-two and still lives with his mother, something’s just not right. Right?

And looky there. Leslie’s wearing huge hiking boots. On a date.