The Other Side of Darkness (28 page)

The girls are chattering with excitement as we get ready to go. I know I don’t have enough cash to make this purchase, but that’s only because I have been so generous at church. Just the same, I know it’s the Lord’s will that we find this keyboard today. And he has assured me, as Sister Bronte and Brother Glenn always assure us, that what we faithfully give in the offering at church, he will repay many times over. Plus I know that music is a way to bless the Lord, and Mary is definitely gifted. So purchasing a musical instrument should be, in itself, a blessing to the Lord. Besides that, the girls will be starting homeschool in just a week. Things like music will become part of our curriculum.

Rick and I keep a special credit card that is to be used only for emergencies. We’ve both agreed on this. But this is a spiritual emergency. We need this keyboard now! Really, I am simply taking a step of faith here. I will trust the Lord to provide for the cost of the keyboard in due time. I open the bureau drawer and dig into the back, where an envelope holds this secret card. At first I’m dismayed that the lightweight envelope feels empty, and I wonder if Rick has already taken it, perhaps even used it for himself and his own earthly pleasures. But then with a rush of relief, I realize it is still safely there. I pull it out and examine it. Still shiny and new. I don’t think it’s ever been used. I replace the envelope at the back of the drawer and slip this card into my purse.

I overhear Mary and Sarah talking as they change their clothes. Mary has somehow gotten the idea that I sold the hall tree and those other things and am using that money to buy the keyboard for her. I
must admit, I wish I’d thought of that possibility myself. But then wouldn’t the money be tainted from the transaction? And wouldn’t that taint the new keyboard? No, I decide, this is better.

We drive over to Music World and go inside. The girls are excited, and I feel a little giddy myself. But as soon as a salesman approaches, I feel nervous. I wonder if this is a mistake. I wonder what Rick will say. Will he be angry?

“May I help you?” the gray-haired man asks politely.

I’m about to say, “No, we have to go,” but I see my daughters’ eyes, so full of hope and expectation. We hardly ever do anything like this. How can I deprive them? So I quickly explain to him that we’re looking for a keyboard for Mary. “She’s only started taking lessons, but her teacher says she’s coming along really well.”

He smiles. “How nice.”

“We don’t need the top of the line.” I suddenly see a staggering price tag on an actual piano and worry that we’re going to be in way over our heads. “Just something for her to learn on. Not too expensive.”

The salesman gives us a quick tour of what’s available. Mary tries out some, and I find one that’s less expensive and ask him about it. But he tells me it’s used, and suddenly I imagine tiny demons popping out from between the keys. “What do you have that’s new?”

“New?” He looks surprised. “This is actually an excellent instrument, ma’am. Trust me, you’d pay a lot more for something of equal quality if it were new.”

“I don’t care. I want to buy a
new
keyboard. Can you show me something you think is appropriate for my daughter?”

His eyes light up, and before long I’ve purchased a brand-new keyboard that costs twice as much as the used one. But it is new. With
the keyboard snug in its case and safely loaded into the trunk, the girls and I get back into the car.

“Thanks, Mom,” says Mary.

I let out a sigh of relief, glad that’s over. “How about if we pick up a pizza to take home?” I pull out of the parking lot. “To celebrate.” Naturally, they don’t argue. They also don’t ask to go inside to dine. The girls know I don’t like eating in public restaurants. So we order a medium pizza and wait until it’s done, then head for home.

It occurs to me that this keyboard might help make up for the lack of television in our quiet house. Mary has complained numerous times, saying we should take it in to get it repaired and reminding me that “Daddy said it was okay to get it fixed.” Later in the evening she and Sarah seem quite happy to entertain themselves with the keyboard. I know I made the right choice as I hear the two of them practicing music—Mary playing and Sarah singing. Really, I don’t see how Rick could disagree with something as sweet and as good as this.

Yet I feel uneasy after the girls have gone to bed. I feel guilty about using the credit card and guilty for still owing my mother five hundred dollars and guilty for sneaking money from Rick. I pace around the house and wonder if perhaps I’ve made some mistakes. How will I explain this keyboard to him? What if he throws a fit? I can’t let him see it tonight. I can’t handle the stress.

T
he devil plays games, and I find I must play games too. Just to keep up. But the rules keep changing, and sometimes I’m not sure who is winning. I wake up very early the next morning. It’s still dark out, and I can’t see the alarm clock, so I’m not sure what time it is. I’m not even sure whether Rick has come home from work yet or, if he has, whether he’s come to bed. So I just lie quietly listening, trying to hear over the pounding, pulsating sound in my ears, until I finally think I can hear him quietly breathing beside me as if he’s asleep—although I can’t be sure. I can’t be sure of anything. My heart is pounding harder and harder as I lie here, trying to decide what to do next. But I have to do something. Somehow I have to make up for this mess I may have created.

I had meant to return the credit card to its envelope in the drawer last night before I went to bed, before Rick got home. But after taking a very long shower and praying until I finally fell asleep, I completely forgot. Now I feel certain that Rick will go straight for the drawer and take out the empty envelope and my mistake will be discovered. I have tried to think of a way to quietly get up and put it back, but I will surely bungle it, and Rick will find me, and I’ll be caught red-handed. Oh, why did I do that yesterday? What could I have been thinking? What is wrong with me? Normal people don’t act like this.

As I lie here, it occurs to me that today is Thanksgiving Day. Not that there is any consolation in this fact, but perhaps this is my chance. Maybe I can make it work for me, using the activities of the day as a smoke screen to cover up my recent mistakes. If they really are mistakes. And to be honest, I can’t tell yet. Maybe the devil is just trying to trick me into questioning myself again.
O Lord, please show me what to do. Show me if I’ve done something wrong. Please help me. Help me. Help me
.

I silently slip from bed, retrieve my clothes from the closet, and go to the bathroom down the hall to dress. All this to make sure I don’t wake Rick. As I dress, I quickly devise a game plan. Or, more likely, it’s the Lord who is devising this plan. He’s the one guiding me. I am in desperate need of guidance.

I go to the kitchen and write two notes. One is for the girls, which I leave in their room, explaining that I have to run errands this morning and that I put their new keyboard away so they wouldn’t get up and start playing and disturb their dad. I remind them that he needs his rest and ask them to be quiet. The other note I leave in the kitchen, telling Rick that I have to go to the store to get some things for Thanksgiving dinner, which I also explain we will be celebrating with my family at Jeff and Lynette’s house. I figure that should make everyone else happy, even if it does make me miserable. And it will also delay the inevitable of telling Rick about the keyboard. Perhaps the Lord will show me how to deal with that before then.

I hunt until I find my turkey platter, tucked deep in the back of a lower cupboard. And as I’m putting it into a brown paper bag, I wonder why I haven’t gotten rid of this platter already. Of course, it was out of sight … out of mind … but even so. Even so.

I double-and then triple-bag the bulky ceramic platter. Not
because it’s so heavy and I’m afraid it will break, but because I don’t want to handle it, to be defiled by it. After it’s safely covered in layers of heavy brown paper sacks, I set it aside, then wash my hands with dish soap, over and over, scrubbing them with a scrub brush and rinsing them in scalding water from the kitchen faucet. I finally dry them with several paper towels before I realize I’ll have to touch that brown package again.

I look around the kitchen, trying to think of a way out of this, and even consider just throwing it into the trash, washing my hands all over again, and being done with it. But then Lynette will ask why I didn’t bring it, and I don’t really want to go there with her. Finally I spy oven mitts. I put on my coat, get my purse and keys, stick my hands in the mitts, and then carefully pick up the disgusting parcel, take it out to the car, and put it in the trunk.

As I drive across town to the only grocery store that’s always open, I remember the Thanksgiving when my dad gave me that turkey platter. I’d only been married a few years. Matthew was a toddler, it was my first year to host all my family at our house, and I was very nervous. I had explained to Dad earlier in the week that I was worried my dinner wouldn’t be as grand as the family was used to—I knew our house wasn’t as big and nice as my parents’ or even Lynette’s—but I also told my dad that I really wanted to do this. He said he had confidence in me, and then he stopped by our house on Thanksgiving morning to deliver a large, flat box from Williams-Sonoma, a store I had only been able to window-shop in but one that my mother and sister frequented. Inside the box was the best turkey platter I’d ever seen. I still remember how I hugged my dad, thanking him with tears in my eyes for giving me this.

“I’ll treasure it forever,” I promised him. But that was before I
knew
. Everything has changed now. I firmly shake my head from left to right, trying to repress or maybe even shake away the memory of that night when Bronte and Cynthia prayed for me, exorcizing the demons associated with the sexual abuse from my father—the sexual abuse I had never consciously remembered.

I know it’s wrong, but part of me wishes I had never learned about it. And I don’t fully understand how it was that I didn’t remember something this abhorrent. How was it that I loved my father so much, that I grieved so deeply when he died? But then Satan is the Prince of Deception and the Father of Lies. So why should I be surprised that I was so easily tricked? Even so, it is frustrating to remember this now. To be so painfully aware that the defiled turkey platter is riding in my trunk, a contaminated reminder of a past that I would rather forget.

Why, why, why?
I ask myself as I pull into the parking lot of a grocery store that I would normally avoid. Why is my life so complicated, so hard? Is it really all the devil’s doing, or am I partially to blame? I get out of the car and shiver in the damp morning air as I stare up at this megastore. I cannot stand this godless place. It’s always disturbed me that they remain open on holidays like Christmas and Easter and every other day of the year. But that’s not what’s making me crazy right now.
Why, why, why
am I agreeing to spend the day with the family that has hurt me so badly, the family that holds absolutely no regard for my Lord and his divine purposes?

For starters, I remind myself as I trudge across the rain-soaked parking lot, there is my mother,
my oppressor
, the woman who has always made me feel that I am worthless, hopeless, useless, inferior … And then there is my divorced sister, who claims to be a believer but lives more like a heathen. Then there’s my worldly brother. Not only
does he embrace every New Age trend that comes along, but he proudly claims to be an atheist. All this combines with the suppressed memory of my father’s sexual abuse when I was too young to even remember. I stop in front of an oil-soaked rain puddle and consider just turning and running—escaping everyone and everything as I ask myself once again,
Why, why, why?

Help me, dear Lord
. I force myself to continue walking, entering the small glassed-in foyer, smelling the stench of stale tobacco smoke that comes from the big ashcan where customers have hastily extinguished their cigarettes before entering the store. I press through the next set of doors and pull out a grocery cart. I can’t stand the greasy feeling of the infectious plastic handle beneath my grip. And the first thing I place into this filthy cart is a large bottle of hand sanitizer and a roll of paper towels—to use later. Then I hurry to the produce section, where I hope to pick out what I need to make the casserole. And even though I’ve made this casserole year after year, I can’t remember exactly what it takes.

I stand for a long time just looking at the bins of fruits and vegetables, trying to decide where to begin and wishing I’d brought a list. I finally pick out some sweet potatoes and then pause and look at the yams. Which do I normally use? Or does it make any difference? I can’t remember. Finally I decide to get both, filling two bags of each. Then I can’t remember what kind of apples to use. It takes forever, but somehow the ingredients find their way into my cart. And when the cashier tells me the total, I am stunned. How could it possibly cost $69.57 for one casserole?

“Is that total right?” I feel desperate, but I can tell by her scowl that not only is she sure of the total, but she doesn’t want to hear any questions as she waits for me to fork over the cash. And suddenly
I think I see a demon sitting on her shoulder. Why would that surprise me?

I silently pray as I divert my eyes to look in my wallet, where I find, as expected, only one twenty-dollar bill and some change. But this lady and the demon on her shoulder are both glaring at me as if they’d like to devour me, or perhaps she’s considering whether or not to call for help. Maybe she’s about to get her boss down here to deal with me, and maybe he’ll call the police and they’ll haul me off to jail. But what would be the charge? Stupidity?

Then I notice the credit card from yesterday and reassure myself that this too is an emergency. My hand shakes as I give her this card and then nervously wait as she runs it through the machine. Part of me wants to bolt and just leave the groceries behind, but then I would leave my card behind as well. I’m sure they’d trace it back to Rick, and he would think that I’d lost my mind. Maybe I have. Finally I sign the receipt, and pushing the grimy cart out the automatic doors, I escape that store as quickly as possible, promising myself never to shadow their doors again. What was I thinking?