The Glass Is Always Greener Page 7

  “We’re from the Holy City,” C.J. said without missing a beat. And indeed, the Holy City is a popular name for South Carolina’s largest metropolis, on account of the plethora of churches to be found there.

  “Well, I doubt that,” the man said with a chuckle. “Youse look like lovely ladies, but real angels is men.” His accent, by the way, marked him as a former Bostonian to my ears; that would explain his lack of Carolina knowledge.

  “Why bless your heart,” I said, as I snatched up a Sunday morning bulletin from a stack by the door and sailed right on past.

  As soon as C.J. could disengage from the iron grip of doubt, she joined me in the very front pew. Experience has taught me that these seats are the last to fill up in an ecclesiastical venue. After all, nobody wants the preacher to glance down during his sermon and spot that you have fallen asleep or, worse yet, are the one whispering dating advice to her BFF in a stage whisper. Today, however, I suppose it would be texting and tweeting that would get you into hot water.

  At any rate, the service started right on the dot. From somewhere far to our rear a great organ pealed. After a few stirring notes, a youthful worship minister, dressed in an expensive suit and Ferragamo loafers, ran out to the center of the stage.

  “Put your hands together for Jesus!” he cried.

  The response was both invigorating and deafening. For the next half hour we clapped, swayed, and sang ourselves into a spiritual frenzy. Only then did Pastor Sam make an appearance and, in keeping with the mood that had been created, it was no ordinary entrance.

  First, two very young boys (perhaps no older than six) ran across the stage carrying red pendants. Abruptly the music stopped. Three very buff young men (possibly in their twenties) materialized suddenly from either side. They wore only white loincloths and carried long-stemmed trumpets, upon which they played a single triumphant note.

  All eyes gazed upward, for descending from the rafters on a platform jazzed up to look like a cloud was none other than Rob’s first cousin, Pastor Sam. Undoubtedly the majority of the folks there had seen this mockery in the sky a thousand times, but from the hoopla it created, one would have thought it was indeed the Second Coming. C.J., on the other hand, was livid.

  “Abby,” she shouted into my ear, “there ought to be a law against this.”

  “This is America; we have the freedom to get as carried away as we want. Doesn’t your granny’s church use snakes in their worship service?”

  But she was too mesmerized to answer. I’ll say this, Pastor Sam had a first-rate makeup artist at his disposal; the man appeared positively radiant. Even his robes were dazzling white. If I’d tried to imagine a celestial being, this might have been the image I would have come up with.

  Just as the cloud was about to touch the stage floor, Pastor Sam stepped lightly off and faced his congregation with a smile as dazzling as his robes. I even found myself smiling back. Pastor Sam’s smile grew even wider and he locked his eyes on mine. No, it couldn’t have been me he was gazing at so tenderly.

  But then, sure enough, he was walking my way, his eyes still on mine, his right hand extended.

  “Uh-oh, Spaghetti Os,” I said. “What do I do now?”

  “Run, Abby, run,” C.J. said. “I’ll try and hold him off.”

  Her advice only added to my panic. “I haven’t done anything—except to impersonate someone of deeper devotion. That isn’t a crime, is it?”

  “Actually, I think it might be a crime in Idaho—or is that Montana? You know, where that senator’s from; the one with such a wide stance. Personally, Abby, I never did see anything wrong with having a wide stance. Cousin Leopold Singleton Ledbetter back in Shelby had a wide stance; of course he had three legs—”

  But I wasn’t really listening, because my thoughts were on Sam. And that’s exactly where he wanted them to be, because the next thing I knew, that young, blond-haired devil had taken my right hand in his and was leading me up to the stage. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m no longer a young chickadee, one that can be easily overwhelmed by a stud muffin’s charisma, but I felt like a virgin bride being led to her bed. That man could generate enough electricity to light up Idaho, or Montana, or wherever it was that folks tend to have wide stances—bless their hearts.

  We climbed a short flight of stairs and kept walking until we reached our mark in the center of the stage. Then Sam slid his arm around my shoulders. I was reminded of the story of Eve in the Garden of Eden and the treacherous serpent. But unlike the first woman ever created, I was no dithering innocent; I knew that the slithering arm spelled trouble, yet I could not bring myself to run. It is no accident, I think, that the first syllable of the word hormones is what it is.

  “Brothers and sisters,” Sam said into his handheld microphone, “y’all know what today’s service is all about!”

  “Healing!” the crowd managed to roar, even though it is fairly difficult to do so without any R’s in the word.

  “That’s right. There will be no sermon today, no plea for funds—although the Good Lord knows we are always in need, and the ushers will be passing buckets around during the offertory. Today it is about healing; healing of the spirit, and healing of the body.”

  Pastor Sam turned to me. “Ma’am, are you saved?”

  The truth is that I’m a lapsed Episcopalian, and one who prefers different terminology; but I knew what he meant. I also knew better than to argue theology with him.

  “Yes!” I shouted.

  “Glory hallelujah!”

  “Glory hallelujah!” The crowd was on their feet, stamping and shouting, and the organist was playing victory music lifted straight from the ball park.

  Sam waved his hypnotic arms. “Then what we got here, folks, is a healing of the body; a genuine miracle that y’all will be privileged to witness.”

  “Amen!”

  “Quick,” Pastor Sam said to me, “what’s your illness?”

  “My what?”

  “Your sickness. Hurry up, ma’am, spit it out.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t have the foggiest notion what you mean.”

  “The front row is reserved for folks who are sick. Didn’t the ushers screen y’all?”

  “Well—”

  “Think of a disease right quick,” Sam growled under his breath.

  “Floccinaucinihilipilification,” I said. “It’s gotten into my bloodstream and my doctors think that I might not last through the night.” I doubled over as I grabbed my gut and let out a heart-wrenching moan.

  “You hear that folks? This little gal has flocci—uh—help me out here, little lady.”

  “Naucinihilipilification,” I said. “The pain is excruciating! Oh Pastor, do something. Please! I beseech you!” By the way, it is a real English word and references the act of making something worthless.

  “Easy does it,” Pastor Sam said under his breath. “Overacting will get the reporters’ attention; and believe me there are always a few embedded in a group this size.” He held the mike closer to his heavily rouged lips. “All in good time, my dear, all in good time,” he said.

  “Praise the Lord and pass the apple Danish,” I said.

  “You see, folks,” Pastor Sam said, “the poor woman’s delirious from all that pain.”

  “And how much wood would a woodchuck chuck?” I said. “How come nobody ever answers that?”

  “Dial it back, sister,” he grunted. “You’re about to blow my cover. Pastor Sam does not like exposés.”

  “Meet me in your office after services, Pastor, or you’ll get an Oscar-worthy show.”

  “So,” he hissed, “you are a reporter.”

  “Absolutely not. I am, however, the woman who inherited your Aunt Jerry’s fabulous emerald ring!” I whipped off my irritating bifocals. “Do you remember me now?”

  “Get out of my church!”

  I threw my arms in the air. “I feel a healing coming on! Say it, Pastor! Heal-ing!” I grabbed the mike from the flummoxed flimflam co
nman. “Come on, people. Put your hands together. Heal-ing! Heal-ing!”

  The congregation clapped and stomped their feet. They chanted to the boisterous beat of the organ, which sounded more human than instrumental. Meanwhile C.J. had joined me onstage, where she was waving her gigantic arms like they were flesh-covered batons. I immediately discovered that the big gal didn’t need a microphone to be heard all the way back to the farthest reaches of the stadium-size sanctuary, but I tossed it to her anyway.

  “Come here, child,” she said to me.

  I stood dangerously close, which is anywhere within reach. She laid a ham-size mitt on my head, and to be honest, I felt another electrical charge run through my body.

  “Naucinihilipilification, be gone,” she said.

  I felt like I’d been kicked by a horse. “Whoa!”

  “Are you healed?” she demanded.

  I pushed the mike away. “C.J., darling, naucinihilipilification isn’t a disease.”

  “Don’t be silly, Abby; of course it is. Granny runs an awful fever each time she gets it.” She felt my forehead, and in the process nearly knocked me over. “Nope; you’re not running a temperature. In fact,” she said, “you’re as cool as a maggot on a week-old corpse. Hallelujah,” she yelled through the microphone, blowing out at least one of the speakers. “This little no- account woman has been completely healed.”

  “No-account? I took you into the business and taught you everything you know. Ergo the goat girl from Shelby is now one of the most respected antiques dealers in all of the Southeast. I also introduced you to my brother, Toy, and to hear him tell it, you toyed with his heart, yet I stuck up for you, even though you changed your race in the middle of your short-lived marriage and declared that European-American men smelled like wet dogs.”

  “Oy vey,” Sam said into his hands, which covered his face. “This has got to be hell.”

  “Excuse me,” someone with a thick Gastonia accent said, “but is this the healing line? Sister Eliza’s goiter is growing by leaps and bounds. She refuses to eat any salt—even the kind containing iodine—on account of she heard on television that eating salt is bad for us.”

  “Bring her on up here,” C.J. said, “and let the goiter be gone!”

  “C.J.,” I growled, “you can’t promise that.”

  “Abby, I have the gift, so let me be.” The big galoot’s steel gray eyes seemed to bore right through mine, giving me an instant headache.

  This was a different woman than the one that I knew as Calamity Jane. Intense, focused, charismatic, magnetic, supercharged—a genuine healer! Pastor Sam and I stepped back and observed from a respectful distance, but what we witnessed for the next hour was unbelievable! Indescribable, even, although I shall try.

  I saw a woman with a shriveled arm return to her seat, tears streaming down her face, marveling at the perfectly normal limb that she now possessed. I saw a teenager who had never walked a step rise out of a wheelchair and dance for joy, while his parents wept in each other’s arms, because they too were so overcome with emotion.

  And I saw what C.J.’s intercession did for the woman with the goiter. She approached the stage wearing a blue silk scarf that covered but did not camouflage a huge lump on her neck. After C.J. did her thing, the woman tugged at the scarf, and as it came undone, you could see the goiter disappear in front of your eyes. I was stunned! I mean, there’s simply no faking that. And when the scarf came all the way off you could see that the woman’s neck was as bare and smooth as the top of Aaron Ovumkoph’s head.

  “Wow!” I said.

  “Your friend really does have the gift,” Pastor Sam said. “I’d say only forty percent of those folks in the line were plants.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You know, shills. Nothing opens their wallets like a good old-fashioned sob story. Of course you, and your partner, know all about that.”

  “She’s not my partner—not that there’s anything wrong with that! Unless you meant partner in crime. But again she wouldn’t be my partner—oh, the heck with explaining myself. We’re not scam artists like you. Whatever you saw actually happened.”

  “Give me a break,” Pastor Sam said, and rolled his eyes.

  “Hey, you’re the man of the cloth; you’re supposed to believe in this stuff. Tell me something. Was the woman with the goiter a shill?”

  “Roberta?” He sighed. “Yeah, she ties a bubble in the scarf. It’s one of my oldest scams.”

  C.J. had been giving a final blessing of some kind, but now that she was through, she loped over to us. Gone was the fire in her eyes; also gone was my headache.

  “I’ve changed my mind,” I said. “Instead of talking to you in your office, might we treat you and your wife to lunch?”

  Pastor Sam might not have believed in miracles, but it was clear from his demeanor that he was in awe of the woman from Shelby. He glanced from her, to his departing flock, and then back to her.

  “Just let me call my wife,” he said.

  Chapter 9

  In the olden days, when I was growing up, we womenfolk rose at the crack of dawn to prepare the beef roast (we’d killed and butchered the cow the day before) for the oven, peel the potatoes, carrots, and onions that went in with it, plus make a hot breakfast for everyone, find their missing shoes, walk the dog because some eight-year-old had reneged on her agreement, and do whatever else needed to be done. In other words, we (oops, or our mothers) did enough tasks to run a cruise ship before heading off to church.

  Today it is perfectly acceptable to run through McDonald’s on the way to church, and Burger King on the way back home (although moms still have to look for the missing shoes and walk the dog). No longer does a good Christian housewife need to slave before church, and again during cleanup, while her master snores in bed, or later sprawled across the couch on the pretext of watching the Sunday afternoon ball game. What legislation wasn’t able to accomplish, innovation did. Fast food freed a generation of women who might otherwise have been chained to their stoves.

  Because she had not cooked a Sunday dinner, Tina Ovumkoph, bless her heart, was perfectly amenable to my offer. She quickly farmed all her children out to friends and relatives and off we went, riding in two cars. Our destination was the Viet Thai Noodle House at the rear of McMullen Creek Shopping Center.

  “Used to be there were no really good authentically Asian restaurants in town,” Sam said. “Now there is a plethora, but this one is special; this one is primarily frequented by other Asians. It’s not like Bubba’s China Gourmet. You ever been to Bubba’s?”

  “Gag me with a spoon,” C.J. said.

  “What a gross expression,” Tina said.

  “No,” I said, “she means that she literally choked on a spoon at that establishment. It was one of those porcelain deals and C.J. had never seen one before, and thought it might be edible. Anyway, we had to call the paramedics, but by then it was too late—for the spoon; obviously not for C.J. Bubba, being the parsimonious dear that he is, has hung on to the spoon—even though it came out in five pieces—and glued it back together. If you’re lucky enough to grab it with your place setting when you’re in the buffet line, Bubba will give you an extra fortune cookie.”

  “Ugh,” Tina said.

  I made up my mind to hush my mouth before I ruined everything. Usually I can be such a delightful dinner companion, skilled as I am at small talk.

  At the door to the Viet Thai Noodle House we were greeted warmly and shown to a booth with a view of a large fish tank. The Ovumkophs, who’d dined there numerous times, ordered “bubble drinks,” fruit- flavored concoctions embedded with “pearls” of tapioca. C.J. was denied her request for a “tall glass of refreshing goat’s milk” and settled for a Diet Coke. I asked for a glass of water with lemon and a Vietnamese ice coffee.

  “You like?” the waitress asked.

  “I’d never had it,” I said.

  “You will like,” she said. Her enthusiasm for my beverage choice was encouraging.r />
  “Are you originally from Vietnam?” I asked.

  “No, we are Laotian. You know where Laos is?”

  “Yes,” I said, “above Thailand, and to the west of Vietnam.”

  Her face glowed. “Very good,” she said. “Most Americans, they don’t know. If we make restaurant Laotian, they not come.”

  “We would,” Tina said. “The food here is divine—oops, sorry honey, that word just slipped out.”

  Sam squeezed out what just barely passed for a smile. “Let’s order, shall we? We’ll have number thirty-four all around.”

  “But honey—”

  “Yes, sir.” The waitress bobbed her head and scurried off to the kitchen. No doubt she was glad to be shed of what could have blossomed into a full-blown domestic scene. In fact, it would have done so for sure, had I been writing the script. I mean, what chutzpah for him to not even consult us about our meal choices when I was the one paying for lunch.

  “I hope I like whatever it is,” I said with a laugh. One must appear to keep it light, especially when one is the gift horse. This etiquette rule is found in The Moron’s Guide to Southern Manners, the handbook given to every baby born south of the Mason-Dixon Line.

  But I didn’t like what Sam had ordered for me; I loved it. Never mind what it was called. It was strips of tender grilled steak served over a bed of steamed rice, accompanied by a mixed green salad. There was a small bowl of sweet yet tangy dipping sauce for the beef. The flavor of this meat was so fabulous that my tongue couldn’t stand it, and wanted to come out and box my ears silly.

  As for the coffee, it arrived in a cute metal drip pot set atop a glass that contained sweetened condensed milk. When all the water had been put through the press, I stirred the milk and coffee mixture and poured it into a much larger glass that was filled with ice cubes. I stirred that. The result of this minimum amount of effort was a party for the mouth, making my tongue quite glad she’d played by the rules and stuck around.

  Of course we engaged in a lot of conversation. Pastor Sam tried to steer the talk to the moneymaking possibilities of C.J.’s miraculous power. C.J. wanted to talk about new technological development in the direct reduction of iron ore using microwaves. Then there was Tina Ovumkoph, who was dying to get a word in edgewise about her nine children.