LITMIR.BIZ

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and tired and hungry. They have no place else to go.”

      “I’m not the one you’ll need to convince.”

      She smiled. “You know, once upon a time I had a really great job. I got to dress up every day and stand in front of a camera and tell stories. I’m trying to remember why I gave that up.”

      “You still get dressed up and tell stories, only different ones. And sometimes those stories change people’s lives forever.”

      “Every single day I tell myself it’s the process in ministry that’s important, the way we reach decisions and learn better ways to communicate with each other and with God. And really, I believe that most of the time. Things don’t always have to go my way, just as long as everybody’s learning something.”

      “This will be different.”

      She nodded. “It will. Because the Church of the Covenant will never recover if things go wrong here. We can never again pretend we’re a true religious community with anything important to say if we toss these people out on their ear.”

chapter five

      THEY WERE FINALLY GONE. The woman Ana and the man Ethan. Shiloh hadn’t paid much attention to last names, considering that the best she had hoped for was that these strangers wouldn’t call the police. She hadn’t expected that she would need to remember anything about them.

      Ana was pretty, with hair so dark it might even be black, and blue eyes so pale they were kind of startling. The man was older, but Shiloh wasn’t good at guessing people’s ages. His hair was turning gray, and Ana’s wasn’t—at least she wasn’t letting it—but he had a kind face that was easy to look at. He and Ana weren’t married. Neither wore a wedding ring.

      Whoever they were, whatever their last names, they had turned over this apartment to her family as if it meant nothing. Just like that, like Cinderella’s fairy godmother helping her get ready for the ball. All in a day’s work.

      And yet, as strange as everything was, now the Fowlers had a home for the night. A kitchen. A bathroom with a shower and a tub. Real beds, even if there were no sheets, but who cared? She had used her sleeping bag for so long that it felt like home to her. No matter where they had to sleep, she could crawl into her bag or, on a bad night if they were forced to sleep in the car, she could cover herself with it and pretend she was in her own bed.

      “Aren’t you hungry?” Dougie stopped chewing long enough to direct his question to her. He was working on his second turkey sandwich. Shiloh was glad Ana had brought up a loaf of bread along with everything else. It was easier to portion out the turkey that way. Otherwise Dougie might have eaten it all, although if Belle had been feeling better, she would have been sure to take her own share.

      “I ate,” Shiloh said, and she had. A turkey sandwich, some dressing, a dab of cranberry sauce, green beans. Everything had tasted so good, the way food had tasted in Ohio when it was cooked in a kitchen with lots of pans and plenty of time to make sure everything came out the way it was supposed to.

      “Daddy ate, too, but Mama doesn’t want anything.”

      Shiloh had noticed, and she knew what that meant. Belle was happiest when there was food in her mouth. If she wasn’t eating when so much good food was available, it meant she really was sick. Shiloh tried hard to find good things about her mother, but one she didn’t have to make up was that Belle rarely complained.

      “Maybe she’ll feel hungrier after she takes a shower.” Shiloh could hear the water running in the bathroom. Man was helping Belle because coughing made her weak, and once she had just fainted dead away. Nobody wanted her to drown.

      Dougie pointed. “I could eat another slice of that pie.”

      “No, you can’t, because I’m not going to let you. We’re saving that for breakfast.”

      Dougie was as used to eating strange things at the wrong time of day as she was, and he didn’t argue.

      “I would like to live here,” he said through the final bite of his sandwich.

      “Don’t talk with your mouth full.”

      “Who cares? It’s not full all that often, is it?”

      “We can’t live here, so don’t get used to it.”

      “Maybe they’ll let us if we clean it up real nice.”

      “They said this was just for tonight, and tomorrow they’re going to help us find another place.”

      “I liked camping under that bridge.”

      “It’s getting too cold to camp.” Shiloh was sorry they had to talk about this, but Dougie was irrepressible. If she told him to stop, he would talk louder and longer.

      “We could buy more blankets.”

      “With what?”

      That shut him up for a while, then he brightened. “I could get a job delivering newspapers.”

      “You have to live somewhere to get a job like that.”

      “We could pretend to live somewhere.”

      “And when they sent you your check, the people who lived at that address would get it, not you.”

      “I would stand by their mailbox and wait for the mailman.”

      She gave up. “Carrier. Mail carrier. Women can deliver mail, too.”

      “Then why don’t you get a job delivering mail, and you can make sure I get my check!”

      She had to smile. Dougie had a funny little mind. He couldn’t sit still long enough to read a book or even a paragraph, but he was always working out solutions to problems. That was probably some kind of smart, but not the kind that would get him through school. Of all of them Dougie was the least affected by their life on the road. He didn’t like being cooped up in a car, but once he was outside, nothing made him happier than exploring new surroundings.

      “When Mama gets out of the bathroom, you need to take a shower, brush your teeth and change for bed.”

      “Who made you the boss?”

      God. But it had been so long since Dougie had been to a church—unless they’d been forced to go by some preacher to get a free meal—she wasn’t sure he remembered or understood the concept.

      “Do you see anybody else asking for the job?” she said.

      Dougie was nine, not stupid. He had seen the way Man and Belle had slowly closed themselves off as the months went by, rallying when they absolutely had to and ignoring problems when they didn’t. Shiloh was the one who kept things moving, and as much as Dougie disliked that, she thought deep down he was glad somebody did.

      They would never be a normal family again. She had come to terms with that months ago. The balance of power had changed, just like it did between countries after a crisis like a war or famine or an influx of refugees. She remembered that from one of her classes when she’d still gone to school. She had loved history and government, any kind of social studies. She tried to stay current with world events even now, picking up papers in trash cans to scour the headlines. But all her reading had only led to one conclusion.

      After big changes, nothing was ever the same again. New leaders arose. New systems were set into place. Life went on, but it wasn’t always better. Sometimes it was much, much worse.

      Belle and Man emerged, Man helping Shiloh’s mother into their bedroom. She was wearing the same nightgown she’d worn for weeks, but at least it was clean. A few days ago they had crammed everything into a Laundromat washer.

      “You go next.” Shiloh pointed to the bathroom door. “You know it may be a long time before it’s easy to take a shower again. Don’t forget your pajamas.”

      Dougie

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