Visiting the Neighbors

Mr. Andrews and Emily's siblings were already at the table. There must have been a dozen of the little ragamuffins – all boys unfortunately – it isn't that I hate boys. It's just that their frantic boisterousness was so … jarring. And this crowd was no exception. They kept jostling each other – and me – until Mr. Andrews intervened. They just seemed to be everywhere at once, reaching in every which direction, touching everything at the table. Back when I enjoyed such food it would have stolen my appetite to have dirty little boy hands handling every biscuit on a platter before deciding which one they wanted.

"How do you like your eggs, Melissa?" Mrs. Lafontaine asked, carrying in a platter of fresh biscuits.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Lafontaine," I said, "but I'm really not hungry today."

"Oh, but you must have something! You're much too thin, girl."

I shook my head. "No, really."

"Mrs. Lafontaine is right, young lady," interjected Mr. Andrews thoughtfully. "You must have something. That Henrich girl – the gymnast – starved herself to death last year. And a nice little gymnast she was too. Even if they make them wear those revealing costumes."

"Perhaps a little tomato juice." I yielded with great reluctance.

"Has anybody seen Josiah?" Zacariah, the oldest of Emily's horde of younger brothers, interrupted. He was nearly fourteen and dark olive with thick black hair cropped at his shoulders. The complete opposite of both Emily and her father. I wondered where he got his looks. Probably the proverbial milkman Mama always referred to, when she was feeling gossipy.

"He's probably out Tom-Catting around," Mrs. Lafontaine remarked with distaste. "I swear! That cat is worse than the postman.

'Neither rain nor snow nor dark of night' keeps him from the ladies."

"That's enough!" Mr. Andrews interrupted sharply.

Mrs. Lafontaine changed the subject. "I finally met the two women who bought the old Simms place." Mrs. Lafontaine started picking up empty plates and dirty napkins as she prattled on. "That Joyce Strandwick is one of those women," she said, giving Mr. Andrews a look that was simply pregnant with meaning. "Her hair's in a crew cut, men's pants and shirt – I thought she was a man at first. It's shameful, Joseph. Absolutely shameful!"

Mr. Andrews's eyes narrowed and his lips thinned. "Keep the boys out of the far south pastures. I don't want them getting exposed."

"The worst news, Joseph, is the Oregon initiative failed to pass."

Mr. Andrews scowled. "I expected it would. Hoped folks would have enough sense to vote for it. Folks are just too easily misled these days. Queers own the networks … propagandizing our youth." He folded his cloth napkin, laid it next to his plate and pushed angrily away from the table.

All the time he said this he stared at Emily. I couldn't help thinking that if looks were daggers he would be murdering her. All the color faded from Emily's face as I watched from the corner of my eyes, pretending to sip at my tomato juice.

"The good Lord saw fit to punish Sodom and Gomorrah for their perversions! And all who practice them are subject to his law." He spat, and the intensity of his glare made Emily shrink in her chair.

At that moment I hated Mr. Andrews. I didn't know what was going on, but I really didn't need to … I just hated him. Only my old promise to Mama (which was wearing thin) and my uncertainty about how Emily would react kept me from showing Mr. Andrews exactly how I felt about him and all his narrow-minded, stiff-necked kind.

"Well, what can you expect in the last days, Joseph?" Mrs. Lafontaine said with a deep sigh, "All we can do is hold ourselves apart and wait for the Rapturing."

My stomach tightened. How could Mama have been so heartless as to dump me with people like these? There would be a reckoning this time when Mama returned.

"Amen, Mary. Amen." He turned his gaze to me. "As no doubt your fine mother told you many times."

I nodded. "That's why we moved to Montana."

"Your mother's an unusually godly woman for times like these! I'm proud to have a woman like that for a neighbor. Handsome widow woman like her ought to have a husband. No shame in remarrying. Just haven't found the right woman until now."

Was he hinting that he was interested in Mama? It certainly sounded like it. I wished Mama had decided to stay in Montana this winter just so Mr. Andrews could discover exactly what kind of woman she was!

GODWAR CENTRAL

Visiting the Neighbors