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“YouandyourGod can kiss my ass,” Jackson shouted—Jackson who seldom curses and whoneverraises his voice. He laid the phone in its cradle gently as if afraid his anger by extension might otherwise damage it.
I attempted to sit up, knuckling sleep from my eyes. “What was that about?”
“I’m not sure. But I’m guessing they saw MJ’s weekly wrap-up tonight.”
“Oh. I assumed that was only aired locally.”
“Apparently not. And they are an hour behind us, so it makes sense they must have just seen it.”
“I can ask her. What was that noise in the background?”
“My mother praying and quoting scripture—Leviticus mostly.”
“Oh,” I said.
Sunday, September 13, 2015, Janus—Reverend Jack is dead. Jackson’s mother called to tell him. The mighty warrior for Christ—her words—is dead, felled by an apparent heart attack in the middle of one of his fiery and thunderous sermons. The congregation had sat still for several minutes as he lay on the cold terrazzo floor, assuming he’d been overcome by passion and was gathering his strength before mounting the next sally against sin and fleshly corruption. A deaconess fanning him to cool his passion noticed his large, usually florid face and neck were turning blue and sounded the alarm.
“Are you going to the funeral?” I asked.
“Yes,” Jackson said. “I need to see his lips sealed, his body removed from this earth.”
I nodded. I too wanted to see him consigned to the darkness he’d wanted to condemn us to. But I knew Jackson’s mother would object, and the gossip about Jackson and me would play like a bassline at the funeral. I didn’t want to put Jackson in an awkward position, so I said, “I can’t bring myself to go back there.”
“I know,” Jackson said. “You know, he never once hugged me? He said that’s what made boys grow up to be sissies.”
After we’d moved to the farm, I hadn’t been touched without violence until I met Jackson. That’s the kind of place we grew up in. Jackson and I hugged. Reverend Jack was dead. Though he had always been far away, it felt as if the air we were breathing had been cleared of a noxious gas.
Saturday, September 19, 2015, Janus—Jackson came back from Locust Hollow today, his father buried and his mother firmly in the care of the church deaconesses. He’s only been gone a week, but I see a change in him. When he walked in the door, he seemed thinner, drawn, almost gaunt. And sad, which I would expect if anyone in his life other than Reverend Jack had died. He hugged me like he’d never let go. I eased him onto the sofa, making sure to sustain our physical contact.
“How did it go? How’s your mother?”
“She said I shouldn’t have come, that I was too late, that he, like Christ, had given his life to atone for my sin.”
“She was talking about our marriage?”
He nodded. “I told her marrying you was the most natural thing in the world—the thing I wanted most—and that I wouldn’t,couldn’tchange, even if I wanted to, which obviously, I don’t.”
“You never tried, though, did you?” Kitt asked.
Jackson started and so did I; he hadn’t noticed her, and once I saw Jackson’s state, I’d forgotten she was there.
“Tried what?” Jackson asked.
“To change.”
Jackson pulled away from me and reeled back against the sofa’s cushions as if Kitt had slapped him. “What?”
“I just mean…you and Oren were just teenagers when you…got together. Surely, it must have occurred to you at some point that there were other paths available to you?”
“What?” I asked.
Jackson, more tired than I’d ever seen him, asked wearily, “Haven’t you said enough, Kitt?”
“I—I—I just meant—”
“Kitt,” I said. “Please just…go.” I’d tried to forgive her outburst at our reception and accepted at face value her excuse that she was a little drunk and still reeling from her recent breakup, a tad envious of our relationship and marriage but that she’d meant no harm. Now, I just wanted her gone, away from us.
She looked at me pleadingly. Frankenstein watched us with his crooked eyes. I jerked my head at her.Just go.
