Now it might not seem like a big decision, but really, it can be a decision of life or death, because if you end up in the wrong place, at the right time, you are going to be right in line for temptation. And temptation, when acted upon, leads to sin.”
Madison had the attention of the congregation, and as he paused for effect, he drew them in further with a personal anecdote. “You might think I am different than you when it comes to temptation. After all, I’m the Pastor, I must be above such things. And I want you to know that I’m just like you, just like King David, just like everyone else - I am tempted to sin each and every day. Just this week there were two or three situations in which I was tempted to let my guard down.” His mind quickly sent forth images, as if on cue, first of the internet sites he had “stumbled onto,” then the indelible picture of the battered but beautiful Dawn Neilson as he watched her walk down the hall with Dan & Julie. He let that image linger a few extra moments before proceeding.
“It’s easy to let the excitement of a temporary thrill cause you to forget that there is a battle being waged against you by the enemy of your soul.” Madison could feel people leaning forward as he disclosed his struggle. “I had the choice, I sat at the same crossroad David did. Would I go out and lead the troops into battle as Kings did in the springtime? Or would I follow my selfish desire and walk headlong into a trap of sin? I am happy to report that this time, I was able to get on my horse and ride, and I avoided the rooftop trap.” That, of course wasn’t the complete truth, but it was close enough, in Madison’s mind at least, to get the point across. “But it’s a constant struggle. And, friends, if you are at that same crossroad, deciding between God’s way, and the way of the flesh - you are at a critical juncture. Don’t get caught in the wrong place at the right time.”
As the congregation bowed to pray, Madison slipped out the door at stage left as Pastor Dan led the congregation in prayer, followed by a few announcements and a rousing closing chorus from the worship team. Madison walked up to his office via the private stairwell, dropped off his Bible, and grabbed up a cup of coffee on the way past the staff lounge, making his way down to the Chapel courtyard at the front of the building about the time the first people started filing out the six sets of double doors. He was so fast it looked like he disappeared from the stage and reappeared in the courtyard holding a cup of coffee. Some didn’t know how he did it and thought it was a little eerie.
Madison began greeting people, making each one feel like the most important person in the world, listening to their needs, amassing their praise. When Dave Bean appeared in front of Madison with his hand outstretched and a big smile on his face, it was so unexpected that Madison could hardly place him. In sixteen years, Madison could count on one hand the times his best friend had visited the church. If he hadn’t seen him earlier in the week he probably wouldn’t have recognized him at all. “Green? What are you doing here?”
“Oh, thanks a lot!” Dave said with a touch of sarcasm, “Everybody’s welcome but old Green the heathen, ‘What are YOU doing here?’ - give me a break.”
“No,” Madison said, smiling and grabbing his hand, “I meant, did you stay up here the rest of the week, or what? You could have stayed with us you know. It’s great to see you!”
“Naw, I went home and sat around for a day or two and thought I’d just shoot back up here for the weekend, you know, check out the Pastor, see if he’s as good as all the hype.”
“And?”
“Jury’s out,” Dave said, not wanting to add to the nearly insurmountable ego standing in front of him. “But the music was pretty good.” He smiled, “Hey, I’ll call you later, huh? I’ve got to do a few things.”
“Dave Bean,” Madison thought as he mindlessly greeted and hugged and nodded to more people he didn’t remember ever seeing before. “What is up with that guy, sheesh.” Suddenly he felt a familiar tug on his khakis and looked down at the distracted expression of his son who clearly wanted to be running around the sidewalk like the other kids and not standing here wasting his life trying to get his dad’s attention. “Excuse me,” Madison said to a couple he had been talking to about their upcoming vacation. “Hey Leroy, how’s it going.” Madison had nicknamed his towheaded son after Gary Busey’s character, Leroy the Masochist, in his favorite old beach movie, “Big Wednesday.” It was so far removed from William, Bill or Billy, that it made no sense whatsoever to anyone but his Dad who had drawn the connection to the wild blond surfer in the movie. Billy didn’t care. In his mind, nobody else called his dad “Daddy,” either, which gave them each a special name. It drove Jill crazy, but to the boys, especially the big one, that was part of the charm.
“Daddy, can I ride home with you? ‘Cuz mom has to go and I want to stay and I’ll just ride home with you, if you say yes. Can I ride home with you?” Billy said, squinting up into his daddy’s sun-shrouded face at the last moment when his own mind registered the request. Madison knelt down in an attempt to gather his son’s full attention.
“You want to ride home with me? Sure. Now, go straight over there and tell your mom that I said it is okay - and tell her to come talk to me so she knows it’s okay with me. Go straight over there, okay?”
He watched as his son tore off in a direct path to his mom, veering off momentarily to kick a ball away from some other kids, and almost go chasing the ball, but then catching himself, correcting course and skidding to a stop at Jill’s side, instantly tugging at an available elbow. Madison kept his eyes on the scene until Jill turned towards him from across the quad, and he knew the message was delivered in some fashion. She broke away from her conversation and began making her way towards him as Billy ran in the general direction of the kids with the ball. “Mad,” she whispered, “that was awesome today. Made me all tingly.” He looked at her curiously. “Not that kind of tingly, you perv.” She slapped him on the shoulder in play. “It was just really good. Convicting, you know?”
“Thanks, Honey. I’ve got Leroy.”
“Okay - I’m heading out fast, got dinner on. Come soon, ‘kay?”
“We’ll be there in a few minutes. Did you see Green? He was here.”
“Really? Why didn’t that turkey stay with us? I’m gonna jerk a knot in that boy’s tail.”
“No, he went home, then flew back for church. Weird, huh?”
“Well, I hope I get to see him this time.” Jill waved as she scurried to catch up with a couple walking to their car, walking and chatting with them on the way out to her Xterra.
Watching her walk away Madison wondered why he would ever look at another woman. “I’m a fool sometimes, Lord,” he prayed quietly.
Chapter 11
Olive Garden was crowded after church on Sundays with hundreds of hungry customers seemingly content to wait the hour or hour and a half to get a table. Dave cringed at the thought, but, since he was on something of a mission, he requested the section in which he wanted to be seated and found a piece of wall to lean against.
A table for one came open a little sooner than expected, cutting his projected two hour wait in half as the larger parties held out for tables of six or eight. Moments after he sat down, the hostess returned with a cold glass of water and informed him that his server would be with him momentarily. Across the room Dave could see the cute and courteous Shani Andrews working her other tables and thought that he had picked a terrible time to see her again. But, almost as quickly as his mind finished the thought, she was standing in front of him. “Good afternoon sir, waiting for anyone else?” she said, her mind not registering the fact that they had met days earlier in Section A. Then, seeing something familiar in his face, she said, “Hey, aren’t you Pastor Enright’s friend? Dave, wasn’t it? Yeah, Dave - how are you?” She grinned happily, as if he were the only person in the room. He melted. He was instantly glad he came. Dave had been wondering if the feeling he had when she first approached their table, back on Tuesday, was just a by-product of being introduced to a cute young woman, or i
f they had made a connection. He was hoping for the latter.
“Fine. Good. I was hoping you were working today.”
“Sadly,” she said, “I’d much rather be off, but I rotate Saturdays and Sundays, so I can catch church one day or the other. Franny and I went last night.” She was happy to see him, but, also aware of the other customers, some of whom were piercing her back with their stares, no one more impatient than a hungry guest, she thought. “Hey, what can I get for you today?”
“Uh. Hadn’t thought about it, really. Mmm, I guess that pasta dish Madison and I had the other day. Yeah, that’d be good.”
“Coming up.” She smiled at him as she turned to go. She worked on him like chocolate for the blues.
Dave spent the next thirty minutes mindlessly sipping water and picking at the spaghetti Shani had brought. Each time she walked by he became more and more entranced by her grace and style. “What am I doing here?” he thought.
“Giving up after only one bowl?” she said as she approached the table after his meal.
“I thought I ate enough Wednesday to last a week, this time I’m sure of it.” He held his stomach and puffed out his cheeks. She raised her eyebrows and grinned.
“Oh, you just picked at it,” she said as she cleared the plate. “Momma would make you clean your plate.”
“Well, it was filling. And good. It was good, too... Hey, Shani, I know you’re busy, but, if I’m not being too forward, could we get together for a coffee later or something?” He blurted it out before he had a chance to talk himself out of it. He even tried to draw it back in, almost apologizing for the presumptive question.
The question caught Shani off guard. Lots of guys flirted with her. It kind of went with the territory, and she was okay looking, she thought, and definitely single. But the last thing on her mind was dating. She had enough problems raising a three-year-old girl. In fact, it had been almost four years since she had had a steady relationship and that one ended abruptly after she became pregnant and the culprit took to the wind. It slowly dawned on her that her Pastor’s friend had probably come to lunch today for this express purpose, and however awkward and ill timed, he had served a ball that was now in her court. Her smile never waned as her mind spun, tilting her head a bit toward her right shoulder, thinking as quickly as possible under the circumstances, and said, “Well...” which bought a few more seconds as she wrapped her head around the thought, “There’s a Tully’s across the street. I can meet you over there around 3:00 pm if you want. I’ll call my mom, but I’m sure Franny can stay with her for a little while longer.”
“Great. Whew, You made that easy, thanks. I’ve never asked anyone out, or, you know, like this, before,” he said.
“Well I’ve never said yes ‘like this’ before, either,” she said, “just so you know.”
Chapter 12
Dave was waiting at Tullys, holding two chairs in the corner when she arrived a few minutes after 3:00 p.m. He ordered their drinks as she sat down for the first time that day.
“Here you go,” he said, setting the drinks on the small round table that separated the two burgundy easy chairs. “So you got ahold of your mother,” he offered, not knowing exactly what to say other than small talk.
“Mmm. Thanks,” she said, sipping the latte. “Yeah, my parents are great. I work odd shifts, maybe 32 - 35 hours a week, and mom has watched Franny from day one. I used to
feel like I was imposing, you know, like it was my problem. I needed to deal with it without inconveniencing everyone around me. But mom kept drilling into me that ‘Franny isn’t a problem, and she isn’t an inconvenience, she’s family, she’s a person, you know, and she’ll never be an imposition.’ I still feel a little guilty now and then, but they sure have made life... well, manageable.” Shani sipped at her cup again and sat back, closing her eyes for a moment. For some reason, she felt relaxed around Dave. Maybe that’s why she had said yes. Dave, on the other hand, was a nervous wreck, preparing himself for the inevitable moment that he would say the wrong thing. He was trying to look calm, sitting back with his legs crossed, holding his decaf. He didn’t like the taste but figured the last thing he needed right now was more voltage. Shani unconsciously slipped off a shoe and crossed her legs, leaning over to massage an aching foot. She was short, maybe 5’1”, Dave figured, not thin, but healthy, athletic looking, like maybe she had been a gymnast in her younger years with strong, squared-off shoulders and a narrow waist. She looked to be about ten years his junior, but, having lived the difficult reality of single motherhood, she was at least as mature as he, probably more so.
“So you grew up around here?” he asked.
“Oh yeah. My parents live over in Orinda, in the same house where I grew up. I went to Valley High, then onto Sac. State on a swimming scholarship. I moved back here about four years ago to be closer to work in the city.”
“Sac. State, huh? You finish?”
“BA in Fine Art.... That’s kind of an odd question.”
“I guess it was. Sorry. It’s just that I didn’t - finish college, that is. I always wished I would have, and I have all the respect for those who do. It’s not as easy as everyone says.” ‘I’m such a dork,’ Bean said to himself. “So, why Fine Art, do you paint?”
“Used to. Seems like a million years ago.” She squinted a little, thinking of the old dream. “I was pretty good in high school, and I started messing around with computer graphics and animation, and all this amazing work started coming out of Hollywood, you know - Aladdin and the Lion King - and I thought, wouldn’t it be amazing to work on something like that, you know, do art at that level...” Her mind wandered for a second before coming back to the point. “Anyway, I just started getting serious about it when I got pregnant. That’s when I was struck by life, I like to say. Had to grow up and figure out how the world works. So I moved home till Franny was born. I really wasn’t that good anyway, it was just a dream.”
“I think dreams are what keep us going when the world tells us no.”
“Maybe so.” She smiled. She liked Dave. This was nice.
“So do you miss it? The creative life, living on caffeine, giving two-dimensional characters heart and soul?”
“Oh, yeah. Sometimes. You know. When it’s 6:00 am and Franny’s got a fever and I’ve got a headache and I just want to take a Motrin and snuggle up with her in bed for the day, but I can’t because we have to get going anyway and head to grandma’s and then on to work. Yeah, once in a while I can’t help but think, ‘How did I get here?’ You know.” She continued, “But then I realize, this was God’s gift to me. He used a mistake and a bad relationship to teach me a hard lesson, and that is that life isn’t all about me.” Shani smiled, raising her eyebrows and grinning that million-dollar grin and sipping her coffee as if she had stated a profound truth that she would rather not know.
“Enough about me,” she said, looking at him squarely. “What’s your story? I mean, did Pastor bring you to Olive Garden to set us up, or what?” That thought hadn’t crossed Dave’s mind, which immediately showed on his surprised face, but he was certain that it wasn’t a set up. That would require way too much foresight from Madison, a man he knew to be singularly oblivious.
“No. I’m sure he didn’t even know you were working. We just go way back, college roomies in Dallas. He got the grades and the girl, and I got the boot. Anyway, we’ve just kept in touch through the years, and I hadn’t seen them for awhile, so I thought I’d shoot up for a day. It’s kind of a transition time for me right now, and Madison and Jill are about the best friends I have in the world.”
“Transition, huh? That sounds a little too serious for our first coffee.”
“Maybe, yeah. But it’s nothing really.”
“No scorned woman trying to hunt you down?”
“No, nothing like that. Nope, never been married. Never really had a serious relationship, actually. I’ve just been a little preoccupied lately.”
“Wit
h what, if I may ask,” she said.
Dave hated talking about his business, he felt guilty for being consumed by it for so long. The truth was that he had poured his life into something that was never satisfied, something that always wanted more of him and, after twelve years, he was ready to forget about that mistress and move on. “Well, I was pretty much addicted to my work. It took a decade of my life to realize that my only steady relationship was with my business - which is pretty depressing, really.” He smiled. “Actually, I became the man I’d always despised, the guy that lived for work, and I hated seeing that in myself. I used to say, I may be slow, but I’m teachable, so I basically got off the merry-go-round.”
“You just quit.”
“It wasn’t quite as simple as that, but, yeah.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Dave laughed and studied the logo on his paper coffee cup. “To be honest, Shani, I haven’t really thought about much past right now.” He cleared his throat to break the silence of the next few moments and set his coffee down, leaning forward. He noticed a subtle change in her facial expression. “Ooh, this is really a serious posture, isn’t it.”
“Kind of looks like you’re going to propose or something.”
“Sorry, like I said, I haven’t had many relationships.”
“Is this a relationship?” she followed.
“Oh man, I can feel myself digging a hole. I knew it would happen. I’m a little socially challenged, I guess.” He sat up and exhaled deeply. “Can I start over?”
They talked for another hour and in the end exchanged cell numbers, making a tentative plan to meet again Monday before her lunch shift. As Dave pulled out of the Tully’s parking lot in his rented Impala, he felt like he was on the right track, for the first time in a long time.
Chapter 13
Nagging images had kept Madison awake most of the night. He finally got up for good at 5:15 a.m., too early to roll out on a day off, but sleep was not to be found. The house was quiet and would be for another two hours until Jill and Billy woke up and started their daily push-pull ritual of getting ready for school - Jill pushed and Billy pulled, and eventually she wrestled him onto the school grounds for another day. Just two more weeks of school, though, and their little towhead would be out for the summer.