The Color of Ordinary Time by Virginia Voelker Read Free Book Online

congregation, and by our garden and chickens. Any money that came into the house — which didn’t amount to much — went right out again to pay for necessities. Anything left over went straight into the coffers of the church. We were going to heaven any day now, so there was no need to save money. In fact, it would have denoted a certain lack of faith to save money.
    Out on my own, I did have a full-ride scholarship at college, but that still left important things to pay for, like clothing and food. That first year at college was a shock to me in many ways. That summer, back at the Brandt’s, I started asking questions of Linus. Patiently, Ivy’s father showed me everything he knew about saving, spending, and budgeting. I took his lessons, and began a methodical budgeting savings crusade. I had a dream. A neat little house, maybe white, maybe yellow, with roses out front; and a pet, maybe a cat. In
my
house the furnace would keep me warm in the winter, and the air conditioning would cool me in the summer. In
my
house the pantry would be full, and serving a guest wouldn’t mean going without myself. In
my
house, if the paint on the walls started to chip I would repaint. There would be money to buy furniture not get it third, or fourth hand, tossing it out when it broke. In
my
house there would be a big, comfortable chair, and a red teapot, and a pretty china cup. I would sit in that chair, and drink my tea, and know that if God didn’t take me home that night, tomorrow the heat would work, the air would work, the lights would come on, and there would still be food in the pantry.
    Silly, maybe. I had almost reached the first part of that dream when Susan’s call came. I had almost saved enough money to have a down payment for a house. Five thousand dollars wasn’t going to entirely clean me out, but it was going to put my plans back at least a year, maybe two, and at a time when I was thinking about going back to school. It was, in its way, heartbreaking. But I couldn’t tell them that. They wouldn’t have understood.
    Susan and I shared a room that night, while Porter took the room across the hall. I was looking forward to catching up with Susan, away from the watchful eye of Porter. It would be nice to hear about what had happened in my father’s ministry, and find out how her mother was doing. We never had the conversation. Susan took a shower, and then I did. When I came out she was sound asleep in her queen-sized bed. So I lay down in my own bed, and tried to sleep.
    I should have slept pretty well. I’ve never been the sort of person bothered about not sleeping in my own bed. I had a horrible night. I did it to myself. I started thinking about how nice it would be to get back to the Brandt’s, and that — naturally — led me to thinking about the next day. What would my father say when we bailed him out? Would he be grateful? Would he be mad that I made him stay in jail overnight? Would he try and save my soul right there in the police station? Around and around my thoughts chased themselves, with each scenario — what I would say, what he would say — coming out worse than the last. Until, finally, I was so exhausted all I could do was sleep. But it wasn’t restful, or enough.
    The next day Porter met Susan and I downstairs for the blessedly free breakfast bar. I had decided by then I didn’t like the look of Porter at all. There had been men in the congregation who never seemed the worse for having come under my father’s sway. Jack Kline for instance. Susan’s late father had been a kind man, who had loved his wife and daughter very much. In my opinion, he would have been very upset that Susan hadn’t gone to college. Saddened, even, to see her still stuck in Charity, and following my father through the south every summer on Crusade.
    Porter did not seem to be a Jack Kline. He’d gone the other way, to my eyes. Almost as if whatever elements of Porter my father didn’t approve of had been erased