Page 31 of Mail Order Bride

Gina

They say heat makes people do crazy things. Maybe that’s true, but it’s the dead of winter, and I want to marry this man more than I’ve ever wanted anything. I don’t care if it makes any sense. But we’re not talking about me. We’re talking about Mama. “The heat makes people do crazy things,” Daddy says again. He’s talking to Joel, but he’s looking at me. And I know exactly what he’s up to—this is one of his tests.

“I’ve heard that,” Joel says. He’s trying to be polite, and I admire him for it. I can see that it’s a bit of an effort.

“Why don’t you tell him, honey? Tell your friend here what kind of things the heat can drive a person to.”

“Maybe another time,” I say to my father, patting his hand. “Let’s enjoy breakfast. It was a gift from Joel.”

“Ain’t much of a gift if you have to fry it up yourself.”

I mouth an apology to Joel.

“Go on,” Daddy says. “Tell your friend the story.”

“He’s not my friend,” I snap back. “He’s my fiancé.”

My father stops mid chew and drops his fork. “He sure as hell ain’t.”

“He is, Daddy. He asked me this morning. And I accepted.”

“Well, nobody asked me.”

“About that,” Joel says.

My father stands so abruptly it nearly knocks the table over. “I gotta take a breather,” he says. “It’s too goddamn hot in here.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Gina

The heat made people do crazy things. According to my father, it was the temperature that caused Mama to mow down our town pastor.

But I know better. I was there. It wasn’t pretty. The pastor was stealing from the parish, and Mama hated anyone who stole. She volunteered at the church, and she did the church budget. How she caught him, I don’t know. I only know that she did. She gave him an ultimatum, according to Mona, but he must have felt he was untouchable because he didn’t stop embezzling from the congregation. These are your salt of the earth types. People that work hard for every penny they’ve got. Mama was the type of person who never took no for an answer.

Then one day we just stopped going to church. I was sad because I missed my friends and my Sunday school teacher, Mrs. Jones.

But one Sunday, out of the blue, Mama and I ended up in the car heading to church. Daddy had gone fishing that morning—that was his version of church. He always said God was nowhere if he wasn’t out there on that water. Mama sent Oliver along with him, which she usually didn’t. I threw a bit of a fit. It wasn’t fair that my brother got to go and I didn’t. I couldn’t care less if he were older.

Mama drove us to the church, but instead of going in, we just sat in the lot. I don’t know what happened, only that she was real quiet and nothing was ever good when Mama got quiet. I watched as she white-knuckled the steering wheel. She put the car in reverse, looked over at me, and smiled. “What do you say we stop in town for some ice cream?”

I don’t recall what I said. More than likely, I breathed a sigh of relief that whatever Mama was angry about, it had nothing to do with me. She always hated it when I pouted. My bottom lip would start to quiver, and I would know that I was seconds away from an outburst. Daddy called these “my special powers,” but Mama did not agree. She would give me a look that could kill. Nobody could teach self-control like my mother.

So we’re driving out of the lot when her foot stomps on the brake. She throws her arm across the seat in front of me. When I look up, there was Pastor Richards crossing the lot. “He should have been looking where he was going,” Mama said. Her voice was tight, like she was trying to keep the anger in.

She glanced over at me, giving me the once-over to make sure I was all right. “Do me a favor,” she said, patting my thigh. “Climb in the back, honey.”

I did as she asked. I wasn’t really thinking about anything, except maybe ice cream. “Be thinking about what flavor you want, okay?”

Mama made a quick U-turn and floored it. I didn’t know what we’d hit, just that we hit something. I heard it before I felt it. The thump-thump of the tires going over something solid. “Don’t look back, honey,” she said. “Never look back.”

Her voice was gentle now, like she was trying to calm me. But I could see the panic and the rage in her eyes.

I caught her looking in the rearview mirror. She put the car in reverse and hit the gas once again. It felt like going over a big bump. Two heavy thuds. “What are we thinking… chocolate? Strawberry? Strawberry with sprinkles?”

“Sherbet,” I said. I didn’t know that was going to be one of our last private conversations.

She put the car in drive. “Sherbet it is.”

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