Antipodes by Holly Goddard Jones

Author:Holly Goddard Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
Published: 2022-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

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We had all sensed, when Lauren sent the sudden Evite out about the get-together at her house, that we were going to be on the receiving end of a sales pitch. Lauren liked having Church folks over to her beautiful home, but usually only on the holidays. This sudden Evite went out in late July to only some of the church’s adult women and—so far as we could tell—no one from the Empty Nesters class. And it followed weeks of vague Facebook posts—mostly hot pink-on-white inspirational quotes, like I’M GOING TO MAKE THE REST OF MY LIFE THE BEST OF MY LIFE and ANYTHING WORTH DOING IS A RISK. So, you know, we knew. But Lauren is a force, and no one wanted to get on her bad side. As for me, I guess I was desperate enough for a night out that I even found myself sort of looking forward to it.

The other weird thing about this get-together, once we arrive, is that Lauren is offering us all wine. Now, there are people in our congregation who drink a bit, and the big scandal last year was when it came out in the papers that David Pemberley had gotten a DUI out on the road to his farm, but drinking is something you do, if you do it, entirely away from Church folks. I mean, I don’t feel too bad when my husband talks me into getting a daiquiri at our monthly Outback date night, but if someone from Church were to happen over to our table and spot it, I’d probably die. So when she holds up the green bottle with the weird foreign-sounding name and asks if she can pour me a taste, I am about as shocked as I would be if her usually pristine house were a mess or if she’d come to the door wearing a sweatsuit and a baseball cap. It’s a tricky situation, because I don’t know what would be worse here: accepting the drink and what that implies about me or turning the drink down and insinuating something about Lauren. So I say, laughing uncomfortably, “Oh, just a taste,” and Megan, who drove us both over, says, “Me, too.” When Lauren hands us the Solo cups, there’s a full three inches of golden liquid in each of them. I think I’ll take a tiny sip and then just pour the rest out when I can get to a sink, but I’m surprised by how delicious the wine is. This isn’t the stuff I tried a long time ago on my honeymoon, which was more like vinegar than grape juice. It is sweet and alive-tasting, like the tiny bead of nectar you get when you pinch the string out of a honeysuckle flower.

When Lauren hurries off to welcome another guest, I turn to Megan and say, “Oh, this is dangerous.”

She bugs her eyes out at me and nods. “If I drink this whole cup, I’m gonna be flat on my back. We’ll have to call Cal to pick us up.

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