Jeri Smith-Ready: This Side of Salvation

“No. Have you eaten bacon today?”

“Gross, no. Do you like your middle name?”

My dad’s name is John David Cooper. John was John David Cooper Jr., while I got the names reversed: David John Cooper. I guess a third son would’ve been named Cooper Cooper. Probably better not to be born.

“Yes. Is that a real tattoo on your leg?”

“Yes,” she said. “Have you ever gone to regular school?”

“Yes. In the event of a zombie apocalypse, would you last longer than a week?”

“Definitely not. Do you have any other siblings?”

The song on the radio segued into a soft part, accentuating the sudden silence. Even if I could’ve figured out how to answer in simple yes-or-no form, my lungs felt like a cold hand was squeezing them. Usually when that happened, I mentally recited the twenty-eighth Psalm (it’s like the famous twenty-third, but more emo and with a happy ending) until my breath returned.

But right then, I couldn’t think of the verse, and Bailey was staring at me, waiting for the answer to what should have been a simple question.

“We had a brother,” Mara said finally. “He died in Afghanistan three years ago.”

“Oh,” Bailey whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

I kept my eyes on the floor, where a crumpled receipt poked out from under my sneaker. “That question didn’t count, since I didn’t answer. Ask another one.”

Bailey’s voice came soft and close. “Do you miss him?”

I was stunned she hadn’t changed the subject like most people did. “Yeah. Do you know what that’s like?” I’d never made friends with other kids in grief groups. Who’d want to look into that mirror of mourning every day? For Bailey, I would’ve been willing to try.

“No.” Her brows scrunched together, then parted as her face softened. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, be grateful.” I cleared my throat. “Does your wrist still hurt?”

“Yes. Hey, you went out of turn. I get two questions in a row now.”

She switched to pop culture, asking who I thought would win the latest talent reality show, mentioning the contenders one by one until she got to my favorite, on my nineteenth question.

“You’re kidding,” she said. “She has no chance.”

“You don’t like her?”

“I love her, but she’s too oddball to win. She barely follows the rules. When they told them to cover a Beatles song, she did Ringo Starr instead.”

“Who’s Ringo Starr?”

Mara snickered. Bailey rolled her eyes at me. “Are you hopelessly lost in the twenty-first century?” she asked.

“Is that an official question?”

“Is that an official question?”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“Yes.” I met her gaze. “But I do like some old stuff. I have Arcade Fire’s first album.”

She let out a full belly laugh, and the sound was like the first hit of a drug I knew I’d soon be addicted to. “So your idea of old music is from 2004?”

“Hey, that was a long time ago. Back then, everyone had tiny flip phones that didn’t even play music.” I gave her a brief smirk to let her know I knew I sounded ridiculous, then dropped the irony. “I’m also into Johnny Cash.”

Bailey examined me as we turned in to the emergency room driveway. She looked skeptical, which I could understand; my fashion stylings sprawled between geek chic and jock slob. Nothing like the Man in Black. “That’s kind of random,” she said.

I picked up my jacket from the seat, where it had just fallen from her shoulders. “Only because you don’t know me.”

•••

Bailey had broken her wrist falling over Jinx, so for the next month I tried to be her substitute right hand. Since she couldn’t write lefthanded fast enough to keep up with Mr. Ralph’s lectures, I recopied my class notes in careful print, then scanned and emailed them to her. I’d purposely include illegible bits, so she’d have to call me to clarify. And then we’d talk, sometimes for minutes.

I couldn’t ask her out, since I wasn’t allowed to date until I was a senior. Even group dates were forbidden until I turned sixteen. Mom and Dad had found these rules in a popular Christian parenting handbook and had never made an exception for Mara. I hoped my sister’s hundred-percent-compliance rate would buy me some leniency.

But just as I worked up the courage to ask permission, my father got laid off from his finance job, and our family fell into another mourning period. When Dad still hadn’t found a job after two months, my mom went back to work part-time, but the housing market sucked, so she made hardly any money. Mara got a job as an “intake specialist” (receptionist) at a local mechanic’s, and I started mowing neighbors’ lawns, in addition to my already busy regimen of school, volunteer work, and baseball.

So I barely had time to think about Bailey—though I absolutely made time—much less try to get her alone. As summer approached, however, I had to take action or risk losing her forever.

Hoping for a little guy solidarity, I ambushed my father one night while he was out in the front yard weeding. I brought a small bribe, of course: a glass of iced tea with the perfect amounts of lemon and sugar.

“Hi, Dad.”

He startled, then smiled when he saw the iced tea. Before taking it, he pulled the thick leather work gloves off his hands and the earbuds from his ears.

I handed him the glass and a paper towel with a loaves-andfishes design on it. “What are you listening to?”

“Every word of God is flawless. He is a shield to those who take refuge in him.”

“Oh.” That seemed like a long title for a podcast. Ever since he lost his job, Dad had started sprinkling more and more Scripture into his conversation. It was disturbing at times, but Stony Hill had turned me into a bit of an aspiring Bible geek, so I liked the challenge of interpreting his meaning. “That sounds good.”

He nodded, sipped, wiped his mouth. “Don’t you add to his words, let He reprove you.”

“Yeah. Okay.” No idea what that meant. “The roses look great.”

He nodded again, sipped again.

“So, um, I was wondering. There’s this girl Bailey from Math Cave. You met her when you picked me up from class last week?”

He nodded but didn’t sip.

“I know I’m not sixteen yet, but now that it’s May and Math Cave is almost over for the summer, I was hoping I could still hang out with her. Not, like, one-on-one or anything.” He raised his eyebrows skeptically, and I added, “Well, that is what I want, but I know I can’t do that until I’m a senior, so I was thinking that maybe we could go out in a group.”

This time Dad sipped but didn’t nod.

Instead he looked past me, past the Sharmas’ house on the other side of the street, into the dark woods beyond. But in his mind, he was probably picturing Bailey’s lush, flowing hair and revealing outfits. I couldn’t blame him: It’s what I saw every night when I turned out the lights to be “alone with my thoughts,” as they say.

Finally he got to his feet with a grunt, then shuffled over to a fig-tree sapling, which he knelt beside. “Blessed is the man who doesn’t walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand on the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers.” My father ran his bare fingers through the dark, moist mulch at the base of the sapling. “He will be like a tree planted by the streams of water, that produces its fruit in its season, whose leaf also does not wither.”

“Um. Sorry?”

Dad stood and dusted his hand against his faded blue work shirt. “The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away.”

His meaning started to dawn on me. “Are you saying Bailey is ungodly?” Was it that obvious she didn’t go to church?