The Me You See (24 page)

There was a quiet knock at the door, and then it opened
just a crack.

“Pastor Walter?”

It was my secretary, and I’d never been more thankful for
an intrusion.

“Your three ‘o clock is waiting for you,” she said. “Do you
want me to tell them to come back?”

“No,” I said, standing up and smoothing my khaki slacks.
“Send them down.”

She closed the door quietly, and I turned back to Stefia
with an apologetic look.

“Looks like our conversation is over,” she said.

I nodded, and she rose.

 “Stefia, I’m not going to judge you,” I said. “Only you
can make this decision. But I know you. I know your heart. I know that you will
choose the right thing.”

“I know what’s right, Pastor,” she said. “I knew before I
got here. I just wanted to talk to someone about it.”

“Everything will be okay,” I said, opening the office door
for her. “I promise. You will get through this.”

“It’s just like a new show, right? Like…another
performance. Come one, come all to see
Stefia and the Baby…
”

“I’m sure you’re in for a standing ovation,” I smirked.

“Yeah,” she said, with a grin. “Maybe.”

**

People are expecting words of wisdom. People are expecting
me to approach the pulpit and recite some pat answer for how there is a reason
for everything and God doesn’t make mistakes and we will all get through this,
let us pray, amen.

And I don’t know what to say.

I’ve been praying for the right words. But the boxed up
answers, the usual verses, the assurance that the people desperately crave that
life is going to be okay isn’t there this time.

I don’t know what to say.

Sometimes we make the words so complicated. We rely on the
fancy phrases. The things we’re supposed to say. The things people are
accustomed to hearing.

But sometimes people need to hear the truth.

I wish I would have said something different when Stefia sat
across from me in my office. I wish I wouldn’t have blathered on about how
talented she was or how much everyone loved her. Why did I say all the same
things everyone else had told her forever? She could have heard that from
anyone.

But she came to me.

I should have said she mattered because she was a child of
God.

I should have said she mattered because God loved her.

I should have said the things she did or didn’t do made no
difference.

No.

What I should have simply said was that she mattered. Not
because she’d helped build a theater in a tiny town. Not because she was
beautiful. Not because people would admire her for keeping the baby and doing
the right thing. I should have told her she mattered, just because she did.
Because everyone matters. Any person above her on the ladder of fame and every
person she might have stepped on during her climb to the top. Every person who
died on that stage with her down to the person who mopped up the blood and
patched up the bullet holes. They all matter.

Just because they do.

The truth. That’s what Stefia wanted to hear from me. Not
the nicely packaged thing that looks like truth, but the real truth. The sour
one that stings and screams and bleeds.

Perhaps that’s what the people sitting in the sanctuary
need to hear. Not that life is great and that God is good. What they need to
hear is that, more often than not, life stings and burns and knocks out your
front teeth. Life begs you to keep going while It ties your laces together and
throws sand in your eyes. And yes, God is there, God is always there.

But that doesn’t mean the sand in your eyes doesn’t sting.
It doesn’t mean you won’t trip over your laces.

Things need to be acknowledged. People’s pain. People’s
mistakes. We need to stop washing over it all with a milky film that blurs our
vision and messes up our path.

So why don’t we?

Why don’t we tell the truth?

I’ll tell you why.

Because the real truth is there were not just six souls
that were taken in the tragedy at the theater, there were seven. And somehow when
Stefia gave me the power of knowing that, she took away my desire to say
anything about it. Now I am bound by a truth that only I know.

Dear Lord, I must respectfully disagree with you. Because
in this particular instance, knowing the truth has
not
set me free.

I once read a book that focused on how life’s smallest
decisions can have the longest lasting effects. It’s ironic; huge earth
shattering events starting with one seemingly insignificant choice.

Decisions matter. Every single one of them. Don’t let
anyone tell you they don’t.

On a gut level, I think we know this—that the big things
are made up of little things and that every choice affects something else. And
yet we can’t make that our focus. We can’t let it paralyze us into not being
able to make a decision at all.

Mindy and I had been dating for five months. We had a
Thursday night off together—a rare occurrence for the horrific work schedules
we kept—and we planned a special night out. I asked where she wanted to go and
she surprised me by answering opening night of
What You Can’t
See
at the Crystal Plains Theater.

“A show?” I asked. “At Crystal Plains?”

“You don’t like theater?”

It’s not that I didn’t like theater. I liked theater just
fine. I just wasn’t a fan of Granite Ledge. I decided not to tell her
that—because decisions matter—and bought tickets for the upcoming show.

At 5:30 that Thursday night, I knocked on her door. She
giggled like a schoolgirl at the sight of me standing on her front step holding
a rose.

“You know, you don’t have to knock on my door. You can just
come in.”

I smirked and handed her the flower.

“But,” she said, taking the bloom and pulling it to her
nose, “you can bring me one of these anytime.”

 She coiled her arms around my waist, hitting the butt of
my gun. Her lips turned down in a disappointment that she was getting lazy
about hiding.

“Do you have to bring that with?”

It wasn’t that I had to. It was that I never went anywhere
without it. Habit, I guess.

“We’re not heading to the big city, Gage. It’s Granite
Ledge. Population, like, ten people.”

She kept her arms around me but the snuggle loosened as she
searched my face for some clue I’d take the gun off. But decisions matter and I
didn’t want to lie.

“Mindy, I’m allowed to carry. So I do.”

I carried because decisions matter.

**

I’d scored pretty fabulous last minute tickets because of
someone else’s cancellation so we found ourselves watching the show from the
second row of seats. We settled into the crimson colored upholstered chairs
that looked as though they’d been stolen from an old movie theater. Mindy set
her purse between her feet and paged through the program the ushers had handed
out.

“Aw, I love this!” she said, pointing to one of the pages.
“It’s such a nice touch when they put the actors’ headshots in the program.
It’s kind of neat to see what they look like in real life.”

I wasn’t going to look through it. I could have cared less
what any of them looked like offstage, but out of some desperate desire to seem
interested in things that mattered to my date, I decided to page through.

The smallest decisions set the largest events in action.

I saw her there, a face staring back from a black and white
photo meant to appear spontaneous but obviously posed and well paid for. Her
lips were parted perfectly, her hair falling in wisps around her face…and those
eyes. I’d remember those bottomless but impenetrable eyes anywhere.

I shook my head, wanting to believe it could have been a
twin. It could have been a doppelganger. It could have been my head playing
tricks on me. But then I saw her name—Stefia Lenae Krist—and I knew.

And I remembered.

Because decisions always matter.

**

Two years earlier, I was six months in on my first job as a
cop. I knew my position with the Granite Ledge department wasn’t permanent. I
had been waiting for a job to open up with Becker County where I was originally
from.  But I needed the experience and the money so Granite Ledge was as good a
place to start as any.

It must have been October of that year; the sharp air
caused locals to predict an unusually cold winter headed our way. I remember
the crunch of leaves as I walked from my squad up to her house. The door rasped
when she quickly pushed it open to meet me, her eyes huge and anxious.

“Oh my god, did something happen to dad?” she asked.

“No, no. Everything is fine,” I said, noting the fear on
her face. “I’m here to ask you a few questions. Can I come in?”

She pushed the door open the rest of the way so I could
step inside and immediately invited me to sit at the dining room table.

“God,” she said, as she sat down across from me, “when I first
saw you pull up I was sure dad had been in an accident. Then when you said
questions…wait, is this something about my mom?”

“Your parents aren’t here, then, I take it?”

The report that had been filed said Stefia was fifteen. She
didn’t look fifteen. I knew that blessing was probably a double edged sword to
live with.

 “Dad is at work,” she said, moving several scattered
papers into a pile at the end of the table. “He leaves at 5:30 am and gets home
about 7:30 pm. We don’t see him a lot.”

“And your mom?”

“Moved out a year or so ago.”

She repeatedly squared up the papers, matching the corners
and gently bumping the pile against the table like a deck of cards she was
ready to deal out.

“Oh,” I said. “I’m here to ask you some questions about a…”
I flipped open the notepad I had in my shirt pocket. “Niles Connelly? He’s
your…”

“Neighbor,” she finished.

“And…anything else?”

“He’s the owner of the theater I work at.”

I tapped a pen at my notebook. “I’m here to ask you about
your relationship.”

“My relationship…with Niles?”

**

The house lights dimmed and a hush settled over the
audience like a blanket. Mindy reached over and took my hand. I wished I had
popcorn. Or a beer. I kind of wished I was anywhere else.

And yet, there was something magical about an audience
awaiting a show. You could feel the energy, like a thread of anticipation
weaved throughout the people wanting to be entertained.

Show me something.

Show me something worth it.

Music began from the orchestra pit just ahead of us and it
occurred to me that I knew little regarding the show we were about to see. I
hadn’t asked anything about it when Mindy announced she wanted to go, nor had I
read anything online when reserving tickets. Mindy had only said it was an
intense show that I’d enjoy.

“You know, because you’re intense,” she had said.

“Am I?”

I didn’t really think I was intense. I thought of myself
more black and white. Logical. Matter-of-fact.

“You’re one way or the other,” Mindy explained. “There’s
nothing wishy-washy about you. And that’s intense.”

I had smirked at her then, just like I smirked at her as
she sat next to me, giddy like a little kid waiting for the curtain to open.

Things looked different from the second row. The actors
moved across the stage so closely I could have reached out to touch them. I
could see the microphones wound into their wigs and the powder used to set
their stage makeup. I could even see the mist coming from their mouths as they
delivered lines. Things looked so different up close and I soon found myself
lost in a bubble of spit I saw hanging on the lead actor’s lips.

And then Stefia appeared.

She snaked across the stage in a simple red dress, the
shortness of the hem accentuated by red stilettos she must have taken lessons
on how to walk in. She pivoted on the balls of her feet like she’d switched
directions on a catwalk, then she stopped to stare at the actor she shared
center stage with. Did she know the eyes of every man in the audience were traveling
the length of her legs, willing the edge of her dress to jack up higher?

Mindy playfully smacked my thigh and I realized my mouth
was hanging open so far it looked like my jaw had come unhinged. I squeezed her
thigh and gave a quick smile.

“She’s too young for you,” Mindy jokingly admonished in a
whisper.