The Beresfords (44 page)

“It’s all right,” Jonathan told her. “I imagine the search committees will ask the same thing.”

“So what will you tell them?”

Color rose in his face. “I’ll explain what I learned from my marriage going wrong and hope that they understand.”

“No,” said Tom, “I’ve got a better idea. All the understanding in the world doesn’t solve the problem that you’re single, and no parents want some single guy around their teenage daughters. I think you better get married again, Jon—or at least engaged.”

I couldn’t bear this. Grabbing the plates nearest mine, I stacked them and took them to the sink.

“—Some nice, churchy girl,” Tom was saying. I clinked and clanked the dishes and let the water run, to drown him out, but my hearing seemed to have gone superhuman on me because I still heard him give a bark of laughter— “I got it! Say you’re engaged to Frannie! She’s perfect. She wouldn’t honeymoon with me but that’s because I’m a bastard. You’ve always been her favorite. You could even pay her. Sweet, nice-y nice, pretty Frannie. She’s got Pastor’s Wife written all over her.”

“Shut up, Tom,” Jonathan cut in. I had my back to him, so I—thank God!—couldn’t see his expression. But his tone was enough to make me squirm. He didn’t think his brother’s joke was the least bit funny. Horrifying, maybe, but not funny.

“That’s enough, Tom,” was my uncle’s surprising contribution.

“Leave Frannie out of it,” added his fiancée. “After all she’s done for you, she doesn’t deserve for you to go embarrassing her.”

“Wow. Jeez! Touched a family nerve there. Everyone could use a chill pill, in my opinion. But hey—I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes, as Job would say. Feel better now?”

That about did it for lunchtime conversation. Tom and Marcy headed out shortly afterward to taste cake samples. Aunt Marie went to lie down, and Uncle Paul and Jonathan were closeted in the study. It had begun to drizzle. I had a problem set due for my college algebra class which would require a couple hours to crank through, but after getting everything out and sitting at the kitchen table I found I couldn’t concentrate. Would Jonathan still want to “catch up” with me, or had Tom’s teasing made that impossible? For him or for me, or for both of us?

The study door opened. I bent my head over my paper, writing out some numbers and then erasing them at random.

“Knock, knock.”

I erased too hard and the paper ripped. “Oh, hi, Jonathan.”

“You look really into that.”

“It’s math. Due tomorrow.”

“Math. Good for you. Okay. Then…I guess I’ll leave you to it and head out.”

“Okay.” I swallowed my disappointment.

“Unless,” he paused and came closer, “you could use some help.” Pulling up a chair, he reached for the textbook and read the header. “Long division of polynomials.”

“I actually have a pretty good handle on these,” I said. I meant for him to be impressed that I was no longer as dumb as when he used to help me, but instead it sounded like I wanted him to go away. “Eric Grant taught me,” I blurted. Worse and worse! That, instead of an explanation, sounded like I was still thinking about the guy. On the other hand, would it be better for Jonathan to think I wasn’t over Eric? It would be pathetic at this late date, but at least it would mean I wasn’t mooning over him, Jonathan.

“Of course.” He slid the book back to me. “I’ve been out of the picture for a long time—
er
—academically, I mean.” We said nothing for a minute. In the background I heard Uncle Paul emerge from the study and go into the living room to turn on a college basketball game. “But I hope,” said Jonathan, “that we’ve stayed connected in other ways. I just wanted to say—when I asked to hang out today—that I really appreciated your letters while I was gone. They made me feel closer to—everyone. Like I wasn’t clear on the other side of the planet. It was great of Mom and Dad to come out and to call me every once in a while, but—it was you—you were the faithful one. And I wanted to thank you for that.”

“Yes.” It was all I could manage.

“I think I wrote you all of once, the whole time you were in Colorado, so you were nicer to me than I deserved.” Picking up my mechanical pencil, he clicked several times rapidly on the eraser and the lead fell out. He didn’t notice.

“I liked your letters, too,” I said. “And postcards.” My face felt hot.

“So many times I—I wished I wasn’t just writing to you. That you could see what I was seeing, or I could talk to you face to face.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know what to make of that. I only knew I was not going to make anything of it that Jonathan wasn’t making. “The Great Barrier Reef must have been cool,” I mumbled.

He was rolling my pencil lead under his finger now, leaving smudges on the paper. “So…that was all. Oh, and that I’m sorry about Tom being such a dickhead at lunch.”

“Just at lunch?”

We shared a smile.

Rallying, I said, “Don’t worry about Tom. I’m—thrilled you’re going to be a pastor, Jonathan. At last. You probably don’t need me to tell you that. And married or not married, any church will be lucky to have you.”

“Thank you, Frannie. He’s got a point, though. The whole divorce thing. Lots of churches will rule me out right off the bat. But if God has a place for me—I’ve thought about it, of course. A lot. About where I went wrong with Caroline and—what I would do differently in the future—if I’m so fortunate. I would be wiser now, I hope.”

Uncle Paul gave a cheer from the other room, and I was glad to have Jonathan look away for a moment. Now was the time, I thought. The time to act like a completely normal, cousinly human being and to put our footing back on a comfortable plain.

“For a while I thought I wouldn’t get married again,” Jonathan went on, “—or not for a long, long time. I didn’t know if I could ever feel for another person what I felt for Caroline. That was my attitude probably for the first eighteen months I was gone. But as I healed, the feeling passed. By my last semester I even went on a few dates. Classmates.” He gave a half-smile. “Though going to seminary is no guarantee anybody’s a Christian, strangely enough. Just that the odds are a tick more in that favor. The times I did go out—they were mostly because I was caught off guard and didn’t know how to say no. But there was one woman, Barbara—”

So much for normal. “You don’t need to tell me all this,” I said breathlessly. Pushing back my chair I sprung up to refill my glass of water. “It’s none of my business. These weren’t
the kinds of things we wrote each other about.” I didn’t want water—I wanted to run from the room. Now I understood where he was going. He was being gentle, but his hints were hitting me like a pole-ax to the chest.
I get it!
I wanted to say.
You’re finally over Caroline, and you’re open to another relationship now, just not with
me
. Maybe there’s even some stupid Australian theologian girl somewhere in Sydney, parsing her Greek and dreaming of you. I get it, Jonathan
.
I didn’t for a second think you’d marry me just because Tom made some stupid joke at lunch
.

My anger must have shown because his face fell. “Well—no—I didn’t write about these things. And I certainly don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want to hear.”

I laughed, sounding false and brittle. “Oh my gosh. That sounded wrong. I mean, if you want to talk about something—someone—in particular, go right ahead. Of course. But you don’t owe me anything. I don’t
need
to know or need to have anything explained to me. That’s all I meant.” Another artificial laugh, as if this moment could be saved by an excess of casualness. “Sorry,” I said again. “—I think I’m just hypersensitive after the whole Eric Grant thing. Too many people weighing in on what should be personal. Your love life or whatever—that’s your own business. That’s all I mean. I’m not explaining myself very well.”

The hard line of his jaw stood out in his cheek. “I’m sorry you feel this way. It was an old habit, confiding in you—”

“Not about your love life! We never talked about your love life except for the time we fought about Caroline, and look where that got us! I tell you it’s not a good idea.”

“Forgive me,” he said in the same stony voice. “I never shared about my so-called love life with you before because it wouldn’t have been appropriate—me being so much older, and you an adolescent. I thought—now that we were both adults—we could talk like adults. But I won’t trouble you with my stuff, if you don’t like it.”

“I’d rather you didn’t.” I might not have been a Beresford, but I was discovering my own streak of obstinacy. I had no intention of being patronized, even if Jonathan was motivated by affection for me. He didn’t need to tell me Barbara stories to break it to me gently.

“All right.” He rose from the table, and I thought he might leave, but he didn’t. He leaned his back against the island, crossing his arms over his chest. “And there’s nothing you want to confide in me?”

I stared at him. If he thought I was going to confess to being in love with him—! What earthly good would that do, except to make what was already awkward between us even more awkward?  No, thank you. I’d shared that particular secret with no one but God—and, yes, Pastor Tim way away in Loveland, Colorado—for fifteen years, and I wasn’t about to change.

“You know more about me than anyone, pretty much,” I murmured, trying for an offhand, Caroline-
Grantish
tone. “I wrote you all the news that was fit to print.” Another
fakey
laugh escaped me. “
‘
There’s a friend that sticks closer than a brother’—that would be you, Jonathan.”

“All right,” he said again, his eyes steady on me. “Which am I, then, Frannie? A friend or a brother?”

“Brother,” I replied instantly. “And friend, of course. Friendly brother. Brotherly friend.”

“Brother.”

“Yes.”

Uncomfortable as I was, it was Jonathan who looked away first. He pushed off the counter. I thought he was going, but at the door he stopped and half-turned. “And you would never talk about your love life with your brother?”

My hands balled into fists. I was not going to be the one who caused a break between us. He could not force me. Shaking my head, I said, “It wouldn’t be my first choice. Can you imagine telling Tom anything?”

“I was under the impression that I wasn’t
Tom
to you. But maybe I was wrong.”

“No, you’re right. You’re Jonathan. In a separate category altogether.” The conversation had way too many undercurrents. I couldn’t interpret them. The old rapport Jonathan and I used to share, where we could almost read each other’s minds—that was long gone. All I knew was that he needed to leave. Right now.

Gathering my homework, I waited until I got my voice under control. “Whatever category you’re in,” I began again, “one thing’s for certain. If I don’t get this problem set done, I might flunk college algebra, and then there’ll be plenty to talk about. I’ll see you later, okay? Good luck applying for jobs.”

He didn’t answer. But he did go.

When I was safely upstairs, books and papers dumped any which way on the floor around me, I threw myself across my bed. Looking up at the ceiling, I waited. Until, at last, too soon and too late, I heard him drive away.

Easter fell late that year, and like the very first Easter, it came after a rough patch.

If I had to pick a starting point, I would say the Rough Patch began with my manager Monica getting pregnant. We threw her a shower at work, one Saturday after the branch closed, and when everyone had gone, I helped her carry her loot out to her car.

“Who knew a baby needed so much crap?” she asked, rotating the portable playpen a few different directions before finally giving it a shove so she could shut the trunk. “If I’d known everyone’d give me so much free stuff, I’d have quit sooner.”

I blinked at her. “But you haven’t quit, Monica. You’ll be back, won’t you, after your maternity leave?”

She was making a pained face. “Ooh. I didn’t mean to say that out loud. Pregnancy brain. Pretend you didn’t hear it. No—hang on a second.” She settled with a sigh onto the car’s bumper, splaying her legs so the baby bump would fit. “I can tell you, Frannie. I
should
tell you. That I’m not coming back. Jim and I decided. If we scrape and pinch pennies, I can stay home. At least for a while.”

“Oh…I’m glad for you, but I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too. You’ve been great. But that was the bad news, at least from your perspective. The good news is maybe we wouldn’t have worked together that much longer anyhow.”

“You were going to fire me?”

She laughed, wheezing a little. “Is that good news? No, no, nothing like that. Genuine good news. Remember Wendy Brewer, our old district manager? She’s the new DM for the five Colorado branches. Now that her mom’s passed on she’s looking to start over out there. You know what that means, don’t you?”

“No.”

“Come on! It means that, if you wanted me to recommend you for the management trainee program in Colorado, I could do it! I always felt so bad getting your hopes up and then having Wendy take off. But maybe it was for the best. Now you’ve made progress toward your A.A., which is great, but Wendy won’t require it. What do you say? Should I put your name in? You liked it out there in—where were you?”