Jeri Smith-Ready: This Side of Salvation

Now I look him straight in the eye, and what I see chills my spine. The wheels in his mind are spinning, maybe careening off the track. Something inside him is disintegrating.

“Why would she do that?” he whispers to himself.

“Who, Mom?”

Dad turns away, rubbing his chin, then his hair, gripping the thick, dark strands at the back of his head. “If she was sending someone back for you, why would—” He stops, then spins to face me. “Have you mentioned the pajamas to Sophia?”

“No, why?”

“Good. Don’t.” My father comes back to the window and stares out, his jaw shifting from side to side. “I need to think. Something is very, very wrong.”

NOW

The “residency director” Rusher finds single rooms for me and Mara one floor up from our parents. Mine has the same view as the wood shop, of the forest in front, mountains to the right, and the lake to the left. When we visit our parents’ room before dinner, I notice that my father’s stuff is everywhere, but my mother’s bag is still mostly packed.

Mara and I have nothing but the clothes we’re wearing. They took our phones when we arrived; our emergency supplies, I assume, are still in our boat, which is probably no longer our boat.

After dinner Sophia holds a worship service in the lodge’s great room for all the Rushers. There are no light shows or fog machines or rock-band choirs, but because it’s her, it feels overwhelming and in my face. I slip out the back and venture outside.

Last night on the lakeshore I couldn’t see much of the sky, what with the trees, but in the clearing around the lodge, the stars are huge. I feel like I could reach up and almost touch them, like the hanging snowflakes at Longwood Gardens.“Hey, David.”

I turn at the sound of a girl’s voice. “Eve.” I’d totally forgotten about checking in on her. Ezra would’ve been so pissed if I’d come back without word on her welfare. “How are you?”

“Cold.” She wraps her pale-blue sweater tight around her chest as she sits next to me on the stairs. “And bored. You?”

I’m not chilly, but I cross my arms to cover the “Bass Man” on my sweatshirt. “I’m okay. Except for the part where I’m held against my will.”

“Yeah, that sucks.” She tucks a strand of dark-brown hair behind her ear. “I’m so jealous of my brother. He actually had a choice.”

I check behind me for eavesdroppers, then shift closer to her. “We talked to Ezra before we left. He said if you came home, you could still live in the house with him. And Molly,” I add, figuring Eve must be attached to the dog too.

“Ugh, Molly. Old dogs are such a pain.” She picks up a fallen pinecone at her feet. “I miss her, though. I cried when we left, because I know she’ll probably die before we ever go home again. If we ever go home again.” Eve wipes her eyes with the hem of her sleeve. “Sorry. I just feel so alone. There’s hardly anyone my age here.” She gives me a hopeful look. “Except you now.”

“I’m not staying.”

Eve picks apart the pinecone for a few moments. “Wanna play Spin the Bottle?”

“What?” Caught off guard, I scrabble for a response. “With just two people?”

“I hate surprises. Especially after last weekend.”

“I bet. But I’ll take a pass on the game. I have a girlfriend.” “Right. Bailey. How long do you think she’ll wait for you?”

A fair question. Bailey and I discussed the matter before I left, knowing I might be trapped here forever, and promised to wait as long as we could before giving up on our reunion. I can’t believe it was only two nights ago we lay in my bed making this promise—and making up for time we lost to the Abandoning. Those stolen hours seem like weeks ago, and yet when I close my eyes, I can still taste her.

Eve scoots her butt up against mine on the stair. “Come on, just one round. I’ll let you spin.”

The doors behind us open, letting out a low wave of murmurs. Prayer service must be over.

Dad’s one of the first out of the exit. He beckons me to follow him back to our residence house, quickly.

I trot to keep up with him. “What’s going on?”

“What’s going on is I’m getting you out of here. Tonight.”

My father found out that come morning, Sophia’s people will take Sandy’s boat back down the lake to her, leaving us without an escape pod. All the other boats need keys, of course, to start their motors. So we’ll have to leave tonight, under the power of my rowing arms. After the last day’s exertion, I can barely raise my hand to comb my hair, but I’ll just have to suck it up. Anything to get Mom, Mara, and me out of here.Dad’s not coming, of course. The boat only fits three people, and the rest of us need him to create a diversion, a not-so-fake fire alarm.

At least, those are his excuses. I’m done arguing and pleading with him to come home. If Almost Heaven is where he thinks he belongs, fine. I can’t save him.

The two of us head back toward the lodge, where Sophia is holding court in the great room with a nightly Bible study for teens and adults.

We stop outside the back door. Farther down the porch, a handful of Rushers are lounging in a semi-circle of Adirondack chairs, chatting and drinking what looks like cocoa. I guess that means the Bible study is optional. It also means my father and I can’t look like we’re saying good-bye. No hugs—not that we would.

Dad hands me a pair of flashlights. “You know what to do?” “Yep.”

“Be careful.”

“I will.” I test the flashlights to make sure they work. “You too.” “Yep.” He scratches the back of his head, examining the porch’soverhang. Nothing to see here. We’re just thinking about cleaning the gutters. “Thanks for this.”

“Sure.” I step up past him one stair and onto the porch, then turn, ready to try a longer, more weighty sentence. “Thanks for letting us go.” I hope he knows I mean that in both the large and small senses.

Dad looks up at me, his dark blue eyes unreadable now. For a moment I worry he’s about to change his mind.

Then he blinks and he asks, “Are you ready?”

I recognize Sophia’s password. “I wasn’t born ready.” I flip one of the flashlights end over end and catch it. “But I am now.”

One side of his mouth curves up in a smirk. “Remember, if you see a little bit of smoke, keep rowing.”

“What if I see a lot of smoke?”

Dad gives me a wink as he turns away. “Row faster.”“He said, ‘Go out, and stand on the mountain before Yahweh.’”

I’m sitting in the hallway outside the lodge’s great room, listening to Sophia read from First Kings, the bit about Elijah on Mount Sinai. The prophet had run away into the wilderness after Queen Jezebel threatened to chop off his head (long story). Elijah journeyed forty days with no food, and when he got to the same cave Moses had once hung out in, he was kind of hoping to see a good show from God. Like maybe The Ten Commandments, Part 2 .

Sophia continues. “Behold, Yahweh passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before Yahweh; but Yahweh was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake; but Yahweh was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake a fire passed; but Yahweh was not in the fire. After the fire, there was a still, small voice.”

She lets out a contented sigh. “This is why we’ve come to the mountain, my friends—to hear that still, small voice and understand what the Lord needs from us.”

Sophia keeps talking, but I tune her out. I’m listening for Dad’s fire alarm, but also thinking of the rest of the passage, where God tells Elijah to get his butt back to work anointing kings and making prophecies. She’s conveniently ignoring that part. I guess because it doesn’t serve her purpose.