Leaving Fishers (18 page)

He directed them to sit in a circle on the floor, each one facing the next person’s back. Then they put their hands on each other’s shoulders. Dorry could feel Zachary’s thin, bony shoulder blades through his shirt. She couldn’t see the boy who touched her.

Mark turned out the light. “Now, massage,” Mark commanded. “And repeat, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me.’”

They sat for nearly an hour like that, in the dark, chanting and rubbing each other’s backs. Dorry felt the words were engraved in her mind, on her back, on every inch of her skin. When Mark finally said, “Okay, stop,” her brain barely recognized words that weren’t, “I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me.”

“That passage is key to evangelism,” Mark said. He spoke so softly Dorry had to lean in to hear him over the sound of her own breathing. “You must repeat it for an hour every day, for the next week. Then you’ll be ready for your first evangelism trip.”

“What are we doing?” someone had the nerve to ask.

“We’ll discuss that next week,” Mark said, his voice receding as though he were walking away.
He flipped the switch on the wall and everyone blinked rapidly, blinded by the sudden light.

Dazedly, Dorry stood up along with everyone else. She was suddenly bone weary, tired beyond words. How could one hour of sitting in the dark exhaust her so completely?

Everyone was subdued, gathering up coats and murmuring good-byes. Dorry heard a couple of people slip into “I am the way . . . ” almost unconsciously, as if barely aware of what they were saying. Angela actually had to take Dorry’s hand to lead her out of Mark’s apartment.

When Dorry got home, she fell asleep immediately, her chemistry book left unopened on the desk.

Chapter

Nineteen

DORRY GOT A D ON HER CHEMISTRY TEST. In a panic, she hunted Angela down after the tests were handed back. The halls were crowded and Dorry bumped into several people. Angela was at her locker, leisurely combing her hair.

“I can’t do so much Fishers stuff,” Dorry said. “Look.”

Dorry held the red-marked test up to Angela’s face. Angela’s blue eyes flickered briefly toward the paper. “I have to do better than this,” Dorry said. “My parents will kill me if they find out. Remember . . . remember what I told you about wanting to go to college?”

Dorry’s voice was squeaky and panicky. She’d been up until two the night before, praying and doing homework after Bible Study. Then she’d gotten up at five-thirty to get in her hour of morning prayers before school. She’d practically fallen asleep in history class, and even now, jolted awake by the chemistry results, she felt too tired to think straight. She could feel the beginning of tears threatening at the back of her throat.

Angela took hold of Dorry’s shoulders. “Dorry,
calm down. Remember your priorities. So what if you got a D? ‘Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal.’ Matthew 6:19 and 20. Focus on your heavenly grades, not something that’s just going to pass away. Tor where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.’ Matthew 6:21.”

In her exhaustion, Dorry had to look at her chemistry test to be sure it wasn’t already crumbling and turning to dust. It wasn’t. The big red D was fresh and crisply formed. “You used to be proud that I got good grades,” she whimpered.

“That was before you were a Fisher,” Angela said. “It showed you could work hard. Now you have more important work to do. God’s work.”

Dorry began to cry, right there in the hall. Other kids sidestepped her, some pointedly not looking at her, others staring. Dorry heard someone whisper, “—one of those Fishers—” Dorry worried about the witness she was giving. Being mocked for God’s sake was holy. But she was only crying for herself.

Angela sighed and took a Kleenex from a small pack in her locker. She gently wiped Dorry’s eyes
and helped her blow her nose. It made Dorry feel about five years old. Dorry liked that.

“There, there,” Angela said. “Cry. It’s okay.”

The halls began clearing out around them. The bell was going to ring soon. Angela put her arm around Dorry’s shoulder and guided her back toward her chemistry class, for lab.

“Think about I Corinthians 13:11. Paul wrote, ‘When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways.’” Angela said. “You must do that, too. Before you were a Fisher, you needed people to make you feel good about yourself, to praise you. You’ll learn how to do that for others in the E Team. Then when you were a new Fisher, you had to be treated as gently as a baby. But now you’re Level Two. You need to stop thinking about yourself.” Angela gave her a little shove, and Dorry ended up inside the classroom door just as the bell rang.

“To your lab station, Miss Stevens,” the teacher said. “Pronto.” The look he gave her was not mean, but somehow that made her want to cry harder. What if she explained to him why she’d done so poorly on the test? What if she told him—or
someone,
anyway—about Fishers? She didn’t want to describe the good “You should be converted” version of it. She wanted to tell somebody the way
she felt now: I hate it. It’s ruining my life. I don’t even feel like me anymore.

Dorry was surprised by the force of the bitter words running through her head. How could she think like that when Fishers had saved her—from loneliness, from sin, from hell? She didn’t know. She couldn’t think. Which thoughts were hers, and which were the Devil’s?

Dorry stood at her lab station utterly lost. She let her lab partner do all her work for her.

Chapter

Twenty

THERE WAS ANOTHER FISHERS PARTY that Saturday night.

This time, since Dorry wasn’t an outsider or a new Fisher, she wasn’t supposed to enjoy it, Angela told her sternly at her Thursday discipling session. She had work to do.

“I can take care of the snacks,” Dorry said eagerly, trying to show she was going to be a good sport about it. Having just confessed her anger in chemistry, she knew she needed lots of virtuous acts to make up for her sins. “And I won’t eat any of them. Honest.”

Angela shook her head. “Sorry, Chocolate.”

The nickname brought the familiar, bitter taste of guilt into Dorry’s mouth. Dorry winced, as if Angela had hit her.

“Really. Food doesn’t matter to me now—”

“This isn’t about that,” Angela said. “You can’t help with snacks because you have an E-Team assignment.” Angela filled her in on the details: Dorry was supposed to help evangelize a girl named Kayla Spires, a freshman at Crestwood.
Kayla was very insecure and shallow and needed to be led gently

“Over there,” Angela said, as they stepped into the now-familiar apartment-complex clubhouse.

Dorry followed Angela toward a petite, blond-haired girl. There wasn’t time to admire the balloons and Christmas decorations, or to listen to the soft music enveloping them. Angela stopped a few paces back and whispered in Dorry’s ear: “Remember your instructions?”

Dorry nodded and began reciting. “Smile. Be friendly. Show how happy I am to be a Fisher.” Dorry gulped, a rebel voice in her head asking,
What if I’m not happy?
Was she the only Fisher who wasn’t? What was wrong with her?

“And?” Angela prompted.

“Above all, focus on Kayla, not myself.”

“Good.” Angela nodded approvingly. “You’ll do fine.”

Dorry stumbled forward.

“Kayla?” Angela was saying with a warm smile. “I’m really glad to see you here tonight. I’m Angela and this is Dorry.”

“Hi,” Dorry said.

Kayla turned to them with a jerk of her head. She reminded Dorry of a hummingbird, all nervous energy and fluttery motion. “Hi,” Kayla said. “Are you guys new, too? I didn’t know—I hate parties
where I don’t know people, but Lisa said everybody was nice.”

Dorry recognized the other girl standing with Kayla from several Fishers functions. Kayla’s future discipler, Dorry thought. There was a guy there, too—Brad. He only glanced at Dorry and Angela, giving them the barest of nods.

“We already performed our human sacrifice for the night, so you’re safe,” he said in his familiar joking voice.

“Brad!” Lisa said. “What if she believes you?”

Kayla giggled. “I don’t. I can take a joke from a cute boy.” She smiled at him, and Brad smiled back fondly. Dorry remembered that smile.

“So you’re a freshman?” Dorry said awkwardly. She glanced at Angela, hoping she’d asked a good question.

Kayla nodded. “I was terrified of starting high school, and then my dad got transferred over the summer, so I really had to start over. But I’ve made some good friends already. There are lots of nice people here.”

“I just moved here, too—” Dorry started to say, but was silenced by a look from Angela. “You’ve already made friends?”

“Oh, sure. It’s not that hard,” Kayla said with a giggle.

Maybe for you,
Dorry wanted to say bitterly.
Unbidden, another evil sentence formed in her head:
The only friends I could make were just interested in my soul.
She pushed the thought away as if it were the Devil himself trying to set up camp in her mind. Which, of course, it was.

“Between your charming personality, your vivacious wit, and your vast beauty, naturally people are flocking to meet you,” Brad was saying. “Just look at us right now.” He waved his arm to indicate the circle around Kayla: himself, Lisa, Angela, and Dorry. “If you weren’t here, I might have to talk to one of them,” he added jokingly. He gestured toward the other girls. Dorry told herself he didn’t mean to point directly at her.

“You’re such a flirt,” Kayla said, with a flirty little laugh of her own. She all but batted her eyes at Brad.

Dorry felt a stab of jealousy. She could never have given Brad a look like that without appearing totally ridiculous. He was probably sincerely interested in Kayla. And she had to face facts: He’d only been pretending with her.

No, no, she told herself. Focus on Kayla. Devil, begone!