He answered hoarsely, emotion burning his throat. “Then get out of this house! Right now! We never want to see you again!”
“I’ll get my things and . . .”
Her father took a step toward her. “You will not get your things. You will leave this house now.”
“My things are mine!” She shouted it in his face. “Bought with my money!”
Edmund Buckels raised a fist. His son, already on his feet and moving, wrapped his arms around the older man, pinning him from behind. “Dad! Dad, don’t do it. You’ll regret it forever.”
The word “forever” took the starch out of his father. His mother, on the other hand, had gotten up without help and attacked her son feebly, succeeding mainly in getting mashed potatoes and gravy on his back. He turned, gripped her shoulders, and firmly but gently seated her back on her chair, where she burst into tears and disconcerting howls. Jenny, deeply shaken, hurried from the room.
A couple of minutes later, Steven Buckels followed. Her suitcase was open on her bed, but she was shaking too badly to pack it. “Hi, Sis,” he said quietly. “Can I help?”
She turned, her expression more bitter than grieving. “And they claim to be Christians! They read the Beatitudes with that—oily righteousness of theirs, and then—” She swallowed, choked, then threw herself facedown on the bed beside her suitcase and wept, fighting the sobs. When she was able to, she sat up and looked at her brother. “How can they be so—two-faced?”
“They don’t know what to do, Jen. They’re afraid. Afraid of the world, of how it’s getting. And afraid for your soul. You’ve always been something of a rebel, you know. To them that’s the great treason, sinful in itself.” He shook his head. “Don’t look for logic in it. There isn’t any.”
Somehow his words dissolved her anger; her pulse even slowed. “Are you afraid for my soul?” she asked quietly.
He chuckled; that helped too. “I know you too well for that. God made this world . . . difficult, and he made us. And he’s a loving God.
“Mom and Dad are the way they are. I have some like them in my congregation. I don’t understand them—I leave that to God—but I’m used to them. I feel for them, and love them. It’s much easier for me. They’re not so uptight about me. I’m male, and a Baptist minister.”
White-faced, she looked at him, seeming to consider what he’d said.
“Why don’t you stop at Barlow on your way to Chapel Hill,” he went on. “It’s not far out of your way, and it’s a pleasant drive if you pay attention to the countryside, instead of . . . this. Spend the night there. Tell Dorothy I sent you, that there was a row here. I’ll drive back in the morning. I need to be here with Mom and Dad this evening.”
Jen looked at him with something like wonder. “You love them, don’t you?”
He nodded. “I do. I’m thirteen years older than you, and have memories of them that you don’t. From when they weren’t so—troubled.” He smiled softly, surprising her. “And thirteen years more practice at living. Getting older can have its good points.”
He carried her suitcase to her car for her, and she drove away thinking of her brother instead of the fight. He’d spend the evening dealing with their parents, and probably come through it without upset. He’s the only real Christian in the family, she told herself. Too bad we can’t clone him.
6
Excerpt from “An Interview with Ngunda Elija Aran,”
in American Scene Magazine, by Duke Cochran.
ASM: As I understand it, you had a very good job as vice president of AAIS, Inc.
NEA: But not the vice president. One of three. I was in charge of theoretical explorations.
ASM: Perhaps we should establish what AAIS stands for.
NEA: Advanced Artificial Intelligence Systems. The acronym, incidentally, is pronounced ace. It’s a major firm in its field.
ASM: After graduating from the University of Toronto in computer science, what came next?
NEA: I went to work with AAIS as a research assistant on an adjusted workweek, while going to grad school part-time. AAIS encourages continuing education. At age twenty I was promoted to research associate, and worked up from there. I became a vice president at age twenty-five. [Chuckles.] I’m afraid I was a workaholic.