Adelaide Piper by Beth Webb Hart

Author:Beth Webb Hart
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

11

End of Summer

The next day I drank a cup of Juliabelle’s water with my breakfast, and an hour later I found myself in the Harvest Time pastor’s office (which in its previous life had been a bathroom for the barbecue restaurant that the building once functioned as). The Pelzers had laid down some pieces of scrap carpet and hung a few cheesy sunset and rainbow posters on the tile walls, but there was still a floor drain in one corner of the office and a random sink beside Dale’s desk.

“C’mon in, girls,” Darla said to Shannon and me as she popped her bright blue chewing gum and patted the place beside her on the secondhand couch while Dale pushed his swivel chair from around his desk to face us.

“Hi there, Adelaide.” Dale extended his hand, and when he smiled, I could see that he needed braces something awful.

He popped a mint-flavored toothpick into his mouth and began to gnaw on it, and I could just hear Mae Mae whispering, “What terrible manners!” (I mean, these folk could give the Bizway diamonds a run for their money in the etiquette department.)

After a lengthy prayer in which Darla supported Dale’s words with several moans of agreement, Dale straightened out his blue jeans and leaned in toward us, saying, “Now, Shannon tells me you’re a thinker, and that’s a God-given blessing. You ask me your questions, and Darla and I’ll try to answer them the best we can. We’re not the sharpest tacks, but we believe we have the answer to life’s most important question. What’s been revealed to us is the truth of the Almighty, and it’s good news indeed, Miss Adelaide! As Christ Himself said in Matthew 11:25 and 26, ‘O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, thank you for hiding the truth from those who think themselves so wise and clever, and for revealing it to the childlike.’”

Darla offered a four-syllable “Amen” and began to roll her cheap beaded bracelets back and forth across her wrist as I found the right place in my journal.

What am I doing here? The sharp thought suddenly nipped at my mind as I looked down at my questions. Do I belong next to a lady who wears sparkly eye shadow at ten in the morning and a man who chews on mint toothpicks while he prays? Shouldn’t I have gone to St. Anne’s to ask these questions first before heading to this barbecue bathroom office?

Though it took me a little by surprise, something in me was utterly repelled by Dale and Darla’s evangelistic eagerness, and I had half a mind to just stand up and walk out. I didn’t think I could contain my disdain for whatever their message was and whatever they expected me to do about it.

This newfound contempt was a surprise. It was so real and forceful that I could hardly speak. I suddenly recalled this same kind of repulsion when I was ten and attending my last year at St. Anne’s vacation Bible school.

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