Lucille

Lucille got up and began to move. Stumbling in the darkness down the broken back steps of the parsonage she righted herself and glanced towards the light in the church basement window. He was there and would be there until he was ready for tomorrow. Shivering she reached in her coat pocket for the keys. He does not know I am leaving she thought.

Everything familiar passed by her as she slowly drove down the narrow road. She did not stop and no one saw her. She took the turn off and followed the dirt lane down to Miller pond. When the headlights fell on tall dry grass she pressed the brake and stopped the car. She looked straight ahead and her eyes rested on the small ripples of the pond. Time, how much time has gone by she thought. I am 64 years old. She fumbled for the knob and turned off the lights.

She laid her glasses on the car seat beside her. I shouldn't lay glasses there she thought. She felt for her wristwatch, undid its' plain brown band, and laid it beside her glasses. A burning heat moved up from her belly to her face. "Darcy, how could I have said that to Darcy". She remembered another watch, Darcy's beautiful new watch, gold with sparkling stones around the delicate face. Its beauty had taken her by surprise and the words had lashed out. "Darcy, God knows that in your heart you love that watch more than you love him. It's vain, you can't wear it at church, it's wrong". She saw Darcy's lips tighten, her body shrink back. "I'm here to visit and pray with you Darcy. How can we serve God and the devil too?".

Lucille opened the car door and walked down the grassy slope to the pond's edge. "I will never say words like that again. I will never hear words like that again". She took off her coat and clothes; folded and laid them in the grass. She stepped out of her shoes and into the cold water. She had been here so many times before in the summer heat, praying and shouting as her husband dipped church members in holy baptism. His words came back to her. "I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Jesus will wash you white as snow".

"I will never say words like that again, I will never hear words like that again"... She moved more deeply into the burning cold water..."I will never...ever..."

Three days passed. The church basement was full. A luncheon was served. The pastor stood to the side and did not console. It was hard to sit. A group of women worked in the kitchen. "Some pastor's wife" said Esther. "First of all, she spends three weeks going around to everybody apologizing for thirty years of telling us not to do things we know very well are sinful, and then she goes and commits the most hateful sin against the spirit out there in the pond". Darcy's eyes filled with tears, she looked to her watch, "I wish I had told her I forgave her".