Page 28 of Sugarplum Dreams
“You know you can ask me anything. I hope I can do the same with you.”
“But some things are awkward, you know?” She looked up at him, and as he looked down, she seemed to be asking him to understand, so he bit back the automatic reply, which was along the lines of “even if it’s hard, we should ask anyway” and tried to think about his words.
“I guess it was hard for me to come to your door this morning. I’m not even sure why. Because I knew I was doing what God wanted me to do, even if you said no, but that was what I was nervous about. That you were going to laugh at me and slam the door in my face.”
“Nobody wants that. But… First of all, I didn’t answer the door, so you worried needlessly.” They laughed together. “And secondly, I don’t think I’ve ever laughed in someone’s face or delighted in a rejection. If I had to reject someone, I would want to do it easily, gently, without hurting their feelings any morethan I had to. I mean, I want to treat them the way I would want to be treated.”
“Yeah. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, even when you’re rejecting them and telling them to buzz off.”
“Yeah. Just like that.” They laughed together, because both of them knew that neither one of them would tell the other to buzz off.
“All right then, we just agreed to talk about things, although… I guess sometimes communication is elevated to a biblical standard, and it’s not.”
“Isn’t it funny how we get confused about those things?” she asked as they reached his pickup and he walked around to her side so that he could open the door.
“Yeah. Even Christians start thinking things like communication, which has been preached in secular circles, is the most important thing in marriage, but… The Bible doesn’t say that at all. Probably the most important thing will be to treat the other person the way you want to be treated, but God also commands us to be kind and to love, to be gentle, and to let no corrupt communication proceed out of our mouth. All that would be more important than talking about things, at least in my opinion, and that’s backed up with Bible.”
“Well, we’re in agreement on that. The Bible trumps secular ‘wisdom.’” He liked the way she said wisdom, like sometimes it really wasn’t wisdom after all.
He had to agree with that assessment.
They chatted on the way home, nothing earth-shattering, just getting to know each other, and by the time they reached her house and walked up the sidewalk, he was feeling pretty good about the two of them.
She knew her kids better than he did, and there was a nagging worry in the back of his head that maybe his motherreally was tied up in the closet somewhere. He…might be in some trouble for that.
“It’s quiet,” she said as they stood at the door, her hand on the knob.
“I don’t think that’s always a good thing when it comes to children?”
“Usually it’s not a good thing,” she said, narrowing her eyes, and then she tilted her head. “But I hear laughter.”
“That’s my mom,” he said, feeling the swelling deep in his chest, and he knew it was pride because his mom was pretty awesome.
“You love her. That’s so sweet.” Charity glanced back up at him and then turned the doorknob and pushed it open.
She was right. He did love his mom, and he appreciated the fact that his fiancée, soon to be wife, appreciated that. Some women seemed to be jealous of that bond that a mom might have with her son and worked to destroy it. Those women were foolish. Especially when he was talking about a woman as awesome as his mother. Not that he thought that Charity could learn a thing or two, because he felt like she was pretty amazing as well, but anyone who was open could always learn, and his mother was a good woman to learn from. He knew Charity would be wise in that area. And it was just one more thing that made him feel like his decision was the right one, exactly what God wanted.
“Are you guys home already?” his mom said as they walked in.
“That’s not the way people usually greet me after I’ve left them with my children for an afternoon.”
“It’s only been two hours. It wasn’t a whole afternoon.” His mom looked around at all the children who were sitting at the table, cut-up grapes in front of them, and little…it looked like shot glasses of water.
“Are those shot glasses?” Wilson asked, squinting at the glasses and then looking at his mom.
“What do you know about shot glasses, son?” she asked him, her eyes twinkling.
“Nothing,” he said, his hands in the air like she was pointing a gun at him.
His mom laughed, and better yet, Charity laughed as well.
“They’re little dessert glasses I got somewhere and thought I would never use, and I threw them in my purse today because I thought they would be really great water glasses for little kids, and it turns out that children want water whenever it’s in a cute little glass, and I love water when it gets spilled out of that cute little glass because there’s not much to clean up.”
“I underestimated your mother. You’re right. She is awesome. I’m not even sure that word is strong enough to describe her,” Charity said as she turned to Wilson and spoke with awe in her voice.
“Pshaw!” his mother said, waving her hand around. “It’s just as you get older, you learn a few tricks. Plus, I don’t like to throw things away, so the dessert glasses get used, I didn’t have to throw them away.”
“How did you get them to be so quiet?” Wilson asked, remembering how crazy everything was when they had left that morning.
