Page 83 of Kiwi Sin
I said, “What? Something happen? Is it school?” I knew she was nervous about starting, even though Patience would be starting along with her. Yeh, the look was worry, and I gave her a cuddle. No shower for me yet, and I probably didn’t smell the best, but what could a brother do, when it was his youngest sister and she was looking like that?
She didn’t seem to care that I was sweaty, because she buried her face in my chest for a minute, then stepped back, gathered herself, and said, “No. I’m fine. It’s just … Mum and Dad are being odd.” The last part in a whisper. “And I think it’s about you. Dad’s in the shower, and Mum’s in the bathroom with him, talking.”
“Oh.” Another lurch in my gut, and I said, trying to joke, “This feels like one of those times when people have a beer first. Pity we don’t do that.”
Patience was out here now, too, and she’d heard that, because she asked, “D’you want a lemonade?”
“Yeh,” I said. “Thanks.”
My mum came into the kitchen while Patience was pouring it, gave me a quick cuddle of her own, and said, “Your dad says it’s going well, on the house.”
“We’ll get there,” I said. “Could be some long nights, though, pulling it all together. The baths, especially, though they’re going to be beautiful. I never knew bathrooms could be beautiful.”
“Marble, Dad says,” Mum said. “Which is vanity.”
“Yeh,” I said, “but is it, really? It’s a natural stone. Made by God, eh.” She glanced at me sharply, but my dad came in, then, and she didn’t say anything, just stood and poured him his own glass of lemonade, though the pitcher was right there. For that matter, Harmony and Patience were right there.
Both my parents sat down after that, and Dad told me, “Sit down,” then told the girls, “Go to your room, please.” Harmony cast me a speaking look, and Patience cast me a sparkling one, and they went.
I didn’t say anything. That was because I couldn’t think of anything to say, so as usual in that situation, I shut up. Dad said, “I’ve been giving some thought to your future. Talking it over with your mum as well, which is why she’s here.”
Mum nodded, but was quiet, her hands folded in her lap. I took a sip of lemonade, because my mouth was dry, and said, “My future feels pretty well sorted at the moment. Just depends on me, eh, but I’ll be giving everything I’ve got.”
Dad said, “Time for you to be married, though. Well past time. Paul says, ‘It is better to marry than to burn.’ Young men burn, and burning leads to sin. You’re twenty-five.”
Oh. Here we went. I said, “I agree,” and put my own hands in my lap in case they shook.
Dad looked surprised, but recovered himself and went on. “Patience is a good girl, but she needs a husband to set the standard for her to follow.”
I got that sinking feeling in my gut again. If this kept up, I’d be seasick. I said, “She’s barely sixteen. Looking forward to starting school, surely.”
Dad said, “That school has boys in it, and she’s ready to sin. If it’s wrong for a man to sin, how much more wrong for a girl? She needs leadership. I’m not talking about a heavy hand. I’m talking about ajusthand, a hand she can obey, because she’ll know it’s coming from concern for her soul.”
He glanced at my mum, and she said, “She’s been looking at magazines in the shops. I found one under her mattress two days ago. I got her a job at the knitting shop, and she spent the money she earned on that? It’s for teen girls, yet half the articles are about sex. One of them’s about …” She lowered her voice. “Abortion rights. Not just birth control. I’ve used birth control myself. I’m not keeping that a secret anymore. Butabortion?There was something else under there as well. Two skirts that can’t reach her knees, and three T-shirts. In size small, which meanssmall.Where is she wearing those things, and when? If she isn’t brought under control now, I don’t know that it’ll be possible.”
“Why are you telling me?” I was gobsmacked, but I was something else, too. Angry, I thought it was. “Why aren’t you telling Glory? She’s her sister. Or why aren’t you talking to Patience, for that matter?” Patience hadn’t looked one bit abashed when she’d greeted me, which meant theyhadn’ttalked to her. What, they were going to present our marriage to her like it was done? I thought that was why we’d left!
“It’s not Glory’s place to say,” my dad said. “Patience had the right to walk out of Mount Zion, but she walked out because all of us were here, and her parents will need to know that she’s properly settled. That’s why we took her in with us, because Uriel and Glory can be—” He stopped.
“And now you want to … what?” I took a drink of lemonade. Somehow, my hands weren’t shaking anymore, because I knew what.
“To give her to you,” Dad said. “You need a wife. After that? She can finish school if she likes, if you agree.”
“She’s not yours to give,” I somehow said. “She gets to choose what she does, and I don’t want an unwilling wife.”
My dad’s face darkened, and my mum looked shocked. Dad said, “She wants you. Anybody can see that, not that it matters. She’s not capable of making a right choice. Her head can be turned by anything. She needs direction.”
“Then,” I said, “she’s not ready to be married.”
“So you’re saying,” Dad said, “that you refuse.”
I breathed in, and then I breathed out. “Yeh. I refuse. Because it’s not right for her, and it’s not right for me. I have somebody else I want to marry. I’ve found the right woman.”
My mum said, “Oh, no.” Faintly, as if this were her worst nightmare.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “She’s from Mount Zion. It’s Oriana.”
If I’d expected a thunderclap, it didn’t come. Nothing at all came for a long minute, in fact. Mum said, “You realize that Patience is probably sitting on her bed right now, hugging her pillow and wishing for you.”
