A Time to Dance/A Time to Embrace (11 page)

Abby was proud of the way her daughter handled the woman— patient, polite, but firmly determined to go with her own tastes. Nicole took the dress gently and placed it back on the rack. “Actually, I’m looking for a more traditional dress. White, yes. But also elegant, unforgettable, that sort of thing.”

Jo nodded, slightly dejected, then turned her attention on Abby. “By the way, I’ve been meaning to tell you . . .” She paused and Abby mentally braced herself. Jo was from North Carolina, and many times that day only a lack of oxygen had stopped the woman from going on for hours on every topic they’d hit on.

Jo adjusted her head so that her eyes were level with Abby’s, her eyebrows raised dramatically. “That’s one fine man you’ve got there in that John of yours. Yes sir. Big U of M football star.” She waved a hand in the air. “I remember how it was. Me and Denny’d be wasting a day, nothing to do on the weekend, and we’d tune in to college ball. And that man of yours . . . mmhhhm.” She carried the sound out as long as she could and then grabbed a quick mouthful of air. “Best-looking quarterback I’ve seen before or since.”

The ache in Abby’s gut took her by surprise. So what if John was handsome? That didn’t hold a marriage together any more than paint held together walls. “Yes, he’s always been good looking.”

Jo gave Abby a quick once-over and grinned. “’Course, you’re not bad looking yourself. Must be nice, that’s all I can say.”

Nicole—capitalizing on the fact that she was no longer Jo’s target— moved on down the rack, lost in private thought as she carefully checked out each gown in the section. Again Abby felt her frustration rise. This was supposed to be
her
time with—

“How long you say you were married?”

Abby blinked.
Here we go.
“Twenty-one years last July.”

“Twenty-one years, eeeewwwhheeeee!” Jo sounded like a farm woman calling the pigs in at the end of the day. Her last, loud note lingered in the afternoon air, and Abby glanced about in hopes that they weren’t attracting an audience. Jo set her hands firmly on her hips. “You know what I think? I think twenty-one years is a miracle anymore.” She poked Abby roughly in the shoulder.

Abby took the slightest step back and wished desperately that the woman would leave her alone.
Don’t talk to me about miracles, lady.
Those kind of miracles don’t happen to people like me.

Abby worked to hide her discomfort, not that it mattered. Jo was too busy enjoying the sound of her own voice to notice much of anything else. She examined her fingernails, admiring the way the ends were perfectly rounded and painted burnt orange to match her blouse. “You know, I might even step foot in a church one of these days if I thought it’d get me my Denny back. Yes, sir, I believe I just might.” Her hands fell to her side and she looked straight at Abby. “You’re churchgoing folk, right? That’s what Matt tells me. Ever since he went and got himself saved, that’s the first thing he talks about. ‘They’re Christians, Mama.’ ‘She’s a believer, Mama.’ Seems like people making more and more a big deal out of spending time in a church building, but you know what I say?”

Abby opened her mouth but didn’t have time to answer.

“I say more power to ’em. And you know what else? If I thought it’d get me my Denny back, I’d probably take it up, too.” She refueled instantly. “Matt didn’t tell me what you folks are exactly, anyway. You those Pentecostals or Presbyterians or Baptists or door-knockers or TV-watchers or what? ’Cause I don’t have nothin’ ’gainst any of it; I want you to know you heard it from me first. Right here. Out of the horse’s mouth. Don’t want no arguing about religion when it comes to the kids’ wedding.” She hesitated, actually giving Abby a chance to speak, but Abby wasn’t sure what to say. “Well, what is it? Which one are you? ’Course you don’t look like a door-knocker, and I mean that as a compliment.”

“We belong to a Calvary Chapel, actually.”
The woman’s a lunatic.

Be prepared in season and out.

Abby was inwardly shocked at the words that filtered through her mind.
I can’t even make my marriage work, God. You can forget me
being prepared with this woman, especially if she’s going to keep on—
“Calvary Chapel . . .” Jo gazed at the store ceiling for a moment. “Sounds like a Christmas shop.” She gasped. “Wait a minute! I think I know the kind. They the ones that get all wild and start laughin’ and runnin’ around in circles?”

Despite her frustration, Abby had to resist the urge to laugh out loud. That’d be great, to make her think it was true. “No, nothing like that.”

Jo shifted her weight to one foot. “So what’s the deal with the Calvary Chapel folks? What’d y’all believe? All that hellfire and brimstone stuff everyone’s always talkin’ about?” She caught herself quickly. “Not that I care, really. Never bothered me all that ‘Gotta-get-your-ducks-in-a-row-Lord-might-be-comin’-back-tomorrow’ stuff.” Despite Jo’s words, concern flashed in her eyes. “I mean it’s okay for you and all, but I’m a very busy person. Sundays are my cleaning days, really.”

Tell her the truth, Abby.

The voice was so strong and clear Abby wondered if Jo had heard it, too. Out of habit more than anything else, she looked tenderly at Jo. “Our church is like a lot of churches. We believe in Jesus Christ and that the Bible is the only infallible Word of God.”

Jo seemed intrigued and she was silent nearly two full seconds, something of a record for the afternoon. “You really think so, huh? Smart woman like you?”

Abby nodded. She did, didn’t she? She might not have been living like she believed it, but somewhere deep in her heart she knew His Word was truth.

Everything on earth will pass away but My word will remain forever.

Longer than Abby or John or the fact that they’d chosen to divorce. God’s Word was eternal. “Yes, I believe it.”

Jo’s jaw dropped. “Huh. Well, you and me’ll have to have ourselves some down-home, old-fashioned, long, drawn-out conversations on that one. Especially between now and the big weddin’ day. Denny and his new wife are split up now, and don’t I know he was the best thing ever happened to me. I’m gonna lose ten pounds and dye my hair between now and then just to get his attention. And he’ll come all right, know why?”

Abby studied the woman’s hair and realized the red wasn’t natural after all. “Why?”

“’Cause ever since Matt’s been into this God stuff, Denny’s been into it, too. I think he’s actually startin’ to believe it. Nothing wild, mind you, but Matt says it’s almost like there’s something different in his tone. Something that wasn’t there before.” Jo smiled broadly and Abby noted that the woman must have had her teeth bleached. They were whiter than the wedding dresses.

If she weren’t so obnoxious, Jo would almost be a pretty woman— but if she had talked like this during the years she was married, Abby could only congratulate Denny for having had the good sense to leave.

What God has joined together let no man separate, My daughter.

Fear washed over Abby, and she felt the holy admonishment as strongly as if God had appeared and spoken it to her face. What was wrong with her? When had she begun feeling so jaded and cavalier toward marriage? The situation between John and her was one thing, but to agree so easily with divorce? Just because a person talked too much?

I’m sorry, God, I don’t even recognize myself anymore.

Nicole was fifteen feet away and she held up a dress. “Mom, what do you think?”

Abby cocked her head and studied it. High lace collar, fitted bodice, narrow waist, and a traditional skirt that glistened with sequins and lace. She pictured Nicole in it and smiled. “I like it.”

Nicole glanced at her watch. “We still need to eat and I have to meet Matt in a few hours. Maybe I’ll ask them to hold it for me.”

“Good idea.”

When the dress was safely put away, the threesome headed for a salad restaurant a block away. Jo was talking about Denny again, and Abby reminded herself continually that the outing was nearly over.

“I told you the story about me and Denny, right? How we decided it was too much work and threw in the towel?” Jo was walking between them. “Worst decision I ever made.”

“Uh . . .” Abby caught a glimpse of Nicole’s grin and she smiled at her daughter in return.
Oh, fine, little girl. Let me deal with her.
“I don’t think you mentioned it.” Abby kept a straight face and waited for the next chapter.

“Thing of it was, with me and Denny, we really loved each other. I mean really. Started off that way and seemed that way right on through about the seventh year or so. Then something happened and good golly if I’m just stumped to tell ya what it was.”

That last part caught Abby’s attention.
She could be telling my
story, too . . .

“One day we was flyin’ high as a kite, spendin’ time together, laughin’ and lovin’ and making babies and fishin’. The next—” Jo made a ripping sound with her teeth and lower lip—“the next we weren’t hardly talkin’ to each other. Before you could say cat-got-caught-in-the-washing-machine, we was livin’ separate lives. I mean, completely separate. Him stayin’ out in the trailer, and me not carin’ if he did. And that wasn’t the way it started out at all. Fact, if you have a minute I’ll tell you about how we got started. Nothing short of a love story, tell you the truth.”

Abby had the feeling there was no way around hearing it. They entered the restaurant, and Jo paused long enough to get the attention of the hostess. “Ma’am, we need a booth for three and not too busy either.” Jo smiled big at Abby and then Nicole. “We got us a lot of talking to do.” She pointed a finger at the reservation sheet. “And not too close to the smoky section, if you don’t mind.”

“Smoking section?” The hostess was a brunette not more than sixteen years old, and she seemed genuinely confused by Jo’s comment. Again Abby and Nicole exchanged a look that made them both bite their lips to keep from laughing.

Jo leaned closer to the girl. “The smoky section. That’s what I call it, okay? The place where the air’s so thick with smoke a person could lose her voice in fifteen minutes. We don’t want the smoky section ’cause like I said, we got a lot to talk about.”

The girl stared blankly at Jo for a moment. “Sure. Okay.”

Jo remained unmoved, obviously waiting for more information. “Well, how long a wait are we talking? ’Cause there’s a Micky D’s around the corner if this isn’t going to work. Nothin’ personal mind you, but we ladies need a quiet place to talk.”

And we’d get that at McDonald’s?
Abby kept her comments to herself and watched the hostess sympathetically as she checked her seating chart.

“Should be about five minutes.” The girl sounded uncertain, as though she’d spiraled into confusion the moment Jo walked into the building and hadn’t quite recovered yet.

“All right, five minutes it is.” Jo grinned conspiratorially at the girl. “I’ll be timin’ you, startin’ now.”

With quick nervous steps, the girl headed for the dining room, and Jo used her departure as a signal to resume her monologue.

“So anyway, like I was sayin’, there’s never been a love story like me and Denny and I’m tellin’ the God’s honest truth about it . . .”

She rambled throughout their five-minute wait, pausing only long enough to follow the hostess to the table and fill her plate at the salad bar. By the time they were back at the table, Jo had talked about her love story with Denny for almost half an hour, and still Abby wasn’t quite sure how the two of them had met.

Nicole seemed lost in her own thoughts, content to let Jo ramble.
She’s thinking about Matt and the dress and the rest of her life.
Abby pretended to be listening, but inside she was smiling at Nicole.
You’re so
beautiful, honey. I couldn’t be happier for you.

How would Nicole remember this, her love story with Matt, when one day her own daughter was getting married? In some ways she was thankful for the distraction Jo provided. Otherwise she was sure Nicole would have been peppering her with questions about Abby and John’s love story.

Someday . . . Maybe someday I’ll be able to talk about it without feeling
angry and hurt and frustrated, without wanting to punch my fist
through a wall at the way John ruined everything. The way he let me take
over the efforts of raising the kids and got so busy with football he couldn’t
so much as pick up after himself.

Abby tuned in for a moment.

“But after that day at the county fishing derby, there was no turnin’ back, no sir. Denny had himself the shiniest, most man-size fish you or anyone in all of Marion, Illinois, ever saw before or since. I mean to tell you, it was a big fish. Truth be told—and I’m a truth-teller from way back—fish don’t get any bigger than the way that one looked when . . .”

Abby’s mind drifted again. Jo and Denny didn’t have anything on her and John. Theirs was a love destined from childhood, like an amazing rainbow laid across the sky for everyone to marvel over. She swallowed hard and set down her fork, staring at the wilting lettuce on her plate. Of course, like all rainbows, their light had faded, and now all that remained were stormy grays and lackluster hues of beige. Very soon everyone would know that no matter how great a story it had started out to be, no matter how long it had lasted, it had long been doomed to an awful ending. The kind that made people leave movie theaters wanting their money back.

Oh . . . but once upon a time their story had been truly brilliant.

Back in their first decade of marriage, she had told the story often, referring to John as her Prince Charming and secretly savoring the way other couples tried to model what the two of them had together. Lately the tale of how they’d met as kids and eventually married seemed to belong to another time, another woman. As though maybe it had never happened at all.

Jo’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “So there we were, all these belly-opened fish spread out on the kitchen counter at his mama’s house when what did we see but something shiny lying in the guts of one of the little fellers . . .”

Jo didn’t need an audience. If Abby and Nicole leaned their heads back and fell fast asleep, the woman would continue talking. The story would go on as long as the two of them were breathing— maybe even if they weren’t. She noticed Nicole picking her fork through a scoop of tuna fish on her plate. Fish guts. Great lunch conversation.