Consequences, Sandy Ch. 02

As Janice and Sandy served dinner the conversation was divided. Other than seating logistics and a request to use a bathroom the pastor and his congregants spoke only with each other. We let them pick any seats they wanted at our big table.

The pastor and his wife sat together in the middle of one side of the table. Mr. Albert Parker and his wife Jennifer sat next to them. Mr. Ben King and his wife Brenda sat across from the pastor and his wife. Mr. Jenkins sat next to Mr. King. John sat at one end of the table and Janice and Karen sat together near John. Sandy sat next to the pastor and I sat at the end of the table nearest Sandy and the pastor.

When everyone was seated the pastor bowed his head and spoke a prayer.

"Heavenly Father, we are grateful for the food set before us and prepared for our use. We ask that you bless it and help it to give us the strength we need to deal with the decisions before us. We are mindful of our obligation to let our light shine as a beacon unto others. We ask that you bless all those less fortunate than ourselves that they may know the joy of your love and the peace that is possible from living the gospel. We ask all this in the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

Food was passed clockwise around the table and appreciative noises were made as first tastes were had of the various dishes. A platter of baked chicken pieces made the rounds and Martha noted that they were baked without skin and that was good for her diet. There were green beans cooked with bits of garlic and onion, steamed broccoli, mashed potatoes, and a green garden salad. Compliments were given to the chefs for the wonderful preparation and tastes.

When the plates were pretty well empty the conversation stopped being about food and the topic turned to Love. I began with a question.

"Ben, if I may, I'd like to ask if you have any siblings."

"I have two brothers and a sister. I'm the second child."

"And, do you like your brothers?"

"I do. They live quite a ways from here but we talk at least once a week."

"Would you go so far as to say you love your brothers?"

"Sure. I love my sister too."

"Good! Does your wife have any brothers or sisters?"

"She has two sisters, both younger than her."

"Mrs. King, do you like your husband's brothers?"

"Yes."

"Would you go so far as to say you love them?"

"Yes, I love them."

"How is that different from liking them?"

"Ahh, I feel connected to them at a deeper level that when I first met them. I care about them."

"I like that. Pastor, do you have any siblings?"

"A sister, five years younger than me."

"Do you love her?"

"Yes, but not the same way that I love Martha."

"What is the difference?" I asked.

"My love for Martha includes sexual attraction, for one thing."

"Is Martha the only woman you have felt sexual attraction for?"

"When I was younger and before I met Martha, I felt attracted to other women. But not since."

"What was the basis for the attraction you felt for other women?"

"The basis?"

"Was it that they had brown hair? Long legs? A great singing voice?"

"It may have been those things. Martha has long legs and I like that about her. She has brown hair."

"Did you date anyone before Martha?"

"Yes."

"Did you love any woman before Martha?"

"I thought I did. But, what I have with Martha is stronger, more committed and more alive than what I had with anyone else. What's your point?"

"You admit that you have loved other women than Martha. You admit you have been sexually attracted to other women. I'm wondering how you shut that off when you married Martha."

"I made a commitment to her when we got married."

"And no woman has looked or behaved attractively in your eyes since that day?"

"No."

"So Brenda King is not attractive?"

"She is attractive, for Ben."

"But, because she's married to Ben you don't see her as attractive?"

"Right! I see her as a congregant, a soul striving towards heaven and I ignore whatever else may be there."

"Is the same true with Jennifer? She has long legs, like Martha. I remember dancing with her in high school and she was very attractive then. Her hair is brown. She isn't fat. Do you see her as attractive?"

"She is attractive, for her husband. For me, I look beyond her physical body to her soul."

"Albert, do you see anyone at the table as attractive?"

"There isn't an ugly woman here." Albert said as he scanned the people seated around the table.

"So, I'd like to know where we draw the line between liking someone and loving them. Think of the people you love and the people you like. Where is the line?"

Sandy spoke up. "If I like someone I want their life to work for them. I want them to have their needs met. If I see room for me to help in having their needs met, to be personally involved, I can choose to love them at that level of involvement."

The pastor turned and aimed at Sandy. "You mean you saw John hurting because his best friend Bill got hurt, you choose to love him and comfort him?"

"That was be part of the consideration. Part of it would be to see if his needs for affection, caring, nurturing and support were already there for him. I would not offer him something he already has in abundance."

She took a breath and added, "And, if he had love, affection, caring, and all that in his life and wanted to include me in that circle, I would be flattered, complimented and just might choose to open my arms to that and say yes."

I injected, "So, loving is a choice, a decision, on your part."

Sandy responded, "Yes. I choose to love people. When Bill got hurt I realized that I had already made the choice to love both Bill and John, I had just not expressed it very well. I don't think either of them knew I loved them."

John spoke up. "I thought Sandy, Karen and Janice loved Pete, not me. They treated Bill and I like brothers and that was wonderful but it also held us at a distance. When Karen and Janice put up the signs in the BC I wanted to apply. I didn't because I was afraid it would hurt the relationship we already had. I lived from my fear rather than from love."

The pastor asked, "Who did you love? Janice or Karen?"

"Both. I never chose between them. After Bill got hurt I discovered that I also loved Sandy but had been suppressing it since Nick came home and married her."

Martha, the pastor's wife asked, "Do you love Sandy now?"

"Yes, Ma'am. It's like I love her as a woman, as my sister, a close friend and sometimes even as a mother. The best part is that all of that is Ok."

"Thank you, John." Sandy said.

The pastor sensed the conversation wasn't going the way he wanted it to go. "May I ask some questions?"

"Certainly." I answered.

"Aren't there different kinds of love? The Greeks identified three kinds. Love of family, erotic love and love of humanity."

There was a pause and I realized they were waiting for me to respond.

"I read that too. I have felt all three types of love at different times as I'm pretty sure almost all adults have. When I really dove into thinking about the three I discovered something I didn't see the first few times I read about love. The three can be separate and they can exist together. In fact, researchers have found that young children have erotic love fantasies about their parents, school teachers and even clergy. Most parents teach distancing in their relationships with their children, cousins, and other family members."

"Incest breeds birth defects and idiots!" Albert added.

"The statistics prove your statement correct. But there are lots of other factors that produce birth defects at higher rates than incest." I said. "Getting pregnant under seventeen or over thirty-five is a higher risk factor for having a child with Downs Syndrome than any other factor we know about."

"Are you saying you're in favor of parents having sex with their own children?" The pastor asked.

"No. The term incest in many people's thinking includes lots of relationships that aren't parent-child. It's thought of as incest if someone has sex with an adopted sibling in many people's minds. Others think that if my Dad was married to one of three sisters and I have sex with an adult grandchild of one of those sisters it's incest."

Ben spoke up. "Isn't it incest if the two people are blood related in any way?"

"It certainly is." The pastor said.

"By that definition you live in an incestuous relationship, pastor."

"I do not! Martha and I are related only by marriage."

"Aren't you both blood related to a single ancestor?"

"I don't think so. Martha's family traces back to England and Wales. My ancestors came from Norway and Sweden."

Martha nodded.

"And before there was a Sweden, a Wales, or countries?"

"No one knows. There are no records."

"There is one. You quoted from it last Sunday in your sermon. The Bible says Adam and Eve are our ancestors. That makes all of us blood related... if we believe the Bible."

"The relationship needs to closer than that to be incest." The pastor said.

"Then the question becomes how close is incest? And, if I don't know my family tree how can I ever get married and raise a family?"

"You don't know where Pete's family came from?" Ben asked.

"When I was in college my roommate one year was a man who grew up in foster homes. He was left, as a newborn, on the steps of a church. The courts gave him a name and a birth date but no one knows anything about his blood parents."

"It gets complicated." Ben said.

"I love him, as a friend, a brother, a colleague and family."

"You believe it's Ok for a man to love more than one woman romantically?" Martha asked.

"Yes! You have two children don't you?"

"Yes."

"If you read a rule that said you should only love one of your children, which one would you stop loving?"

"I love them both and I wouldn't stop!"

"Good! Someone wrote a rule saying you should only love one other adult as a spouse. When we were younger we loved other people and when the relationship didn't meet our needs or theirs we said we didn't love them any more and we went looking for someone else. All because we heard lots of people telling us that was the way it should be."

"And, you say?" Mr. Jenkins asked.

"I say I still love every person I have ever loved. The relationships may change in form or substance but the love remains. In that way love is like a hole."

"A hole?" Janice asked.

"If I cut a hole in the tablecloth and say it is a symbol of my love for Sandy. Right next to it I cut a symbol of my love for Janice, and next to that a hole for my love of Bill, what happens to the hole?"

"It gets bigger and bigger." Martha said.

John added, "Until the tablecloth is gone and all that's left is love."

The room sat quietly for a little while. Maybe less than a minute, but it was a pause for thought.

"The church teaches that marriage is between one man and one woman."

"Go back five hundred years, in Europe. Every town didn't have a church or clergy. How did people get married? They did it by declaration. They stood before their community and said, "I marry Sandy." Were they married? I say yes. In places the rules said that if I was married and I died my wife became the wife of my brother, even if he was already married."

"That's in the Bible." Jennifer added.

"So, right there in the Bible we read that the law was in place that allowed a man to be married to more than one woman."

"By God, he's right!" Mr. Jenkins said.

"The Bible also has concubines and others who become as married without a ceremony."

"I cannot condone you all living like this. It goes against every bit of what I learned to prepare me to minister. You make good points but it's just wrong. What if one of the women you aren't married to gets pregnant?"

"People who have closed their hearts to love will call the child a bastard. The rest will know that he or she was conceived in love and will be raised in love by a big family. Think about growing up in a family where you have Momma Sandy, Momma Janice, Momma Karen, Daddy John, Daddy Bill and Daddy Nick. Will he or she get enough attention? Enough care, nurturing, supervision, and help with homework?"

"Won't that be confusing?"

"I don't think so. The most confusing part will be when he or she discovers that all children don't have six parents. He'll wonder why."

Martha looked at Sandy and asked, "Is six where it stops?"

Sandy looked at her and said, "No. Imagine a community where everyone loved everyone else. Where the community acted like a loving family. Imagine the emotional security the children would feel. Imagine how all the people would treat each other."

"It would be like what Nick said to Mr. Wilkins. I don't want customers. I want friends I do business with." Ben said.

"Speaking of business, how soon can I reopen our business pastor?"

"Why ask me?" His face looked ashamed.

"Because you made lots of phone calls telling people they would be funding Satan if they bought things from the Builder's Center. The nearest other BC is eighty miles from here. Shall I sell my inventory to them and close up the Builder's Center? You will be making the gas stations mighty happy if your answer is yes."

"Who told you about phone calls?"

"Do you deny them?"

"No."

"Are you going to make follow-up calls telling all those people that it's Ok to spend their money with us?"

The silence lasted a long time. Finally his wife turned to him and said, "If you won't make those calls, I'm leaving you. These people are more Christian than you are. All they want to do is love each other. You want to be right. Not righteous, right. I won't stay with a man like that."

The silence lasted again. Martha picked up her purse and looked at John. "John, would you be so kind as to drive me home?"

John stood and said, "Yes, Ma'am. It would be my pleasure."

Martha stood and moved to the front door without even a look at her husband. John opened the door and said, "Nick, after I take her home I want to go visit Bill."

"I'll see you at the hospital."

He held the door and Martha walked out. Then the pastor called after her. "I am your husband. I am the head of our family."

She came back inside. "Even as Christ is the head of the church. You aren't Christ. I will follow the head of a family led in love and gratitude. You want to be right and to have everyone follow your way. I won't live like that. I love you but at this moment I don't even like you. Do not come home until the calls are made, and you made them. If you aren't home by tomorrow night the children and I won't be there."

She turned and walked out. John followed her. Janice, Karen, Sandy and I stood and started clearing the table. Jennifer and Brenda helped. The pastor, Ben and Albert looked at each other for a few seconds and the Ben stood up. He followed his wife into the kitchen and after she put the dishes she had carried into the dishwasher he took her in his arms and said, "I love you. I'm glad we were here. I know more about loving now than I did this afternoon."

Ben turned to me and said, "When you open the BC again, I'll be there. There are some things I need to fix up some things for my family."

"Thanks, Ben. I hope you both enjoyed dinner."

Ben held his hand out and I looked at it. "Shaking hands used to be a way of showing we were unarmed and I think we are closer than that right now. Could we hug?"

Brenda asked, "All of us?"

"Yes. All of us. Isn't that what loving families do?"

"Mine never did," she said, "but I wish they had." She turned to Sandy and they hugged. Ben and I hugged, then we all hugged one at a time. When we went back into the dining room the pastor and Albert were gone. We asked Jennifer what she wanted to do and she chose to go with us to the hospital. Ben and Brenda went home. Mr. Jenkins went to his office. I guessed the newspaper would be interesting reading this week.

I drove. Jennifer, Karen and Sandy talked in the back seat. Janice sat next to me and held my arm.

We visited Bill and brought him up to date on the day and evening events. John told us about the conversation he had with Martha on their way to her house. She was angry and hurt.

Jennifer added to that part of the conversation. "I've known Martha for over ten years. She's a strong woman. If James doesn't make the calls she and the kids will move out tomorrow. I hope he's smart enough to know she's serious."

"Where will she go?" I asked.

"The house belongs to the church so she can't throw him out of it. I have no idea where she can go." She paused. "Or, for that matter, where I can go. Albert left me. He didn't even say good-bye. Am I single again? What does he expect me to do?"

"You can call home and ask him."

"He may be with James at the church. I'll call his cell."

She went out of Bill's room and Janice followed her. Karen was sitting beside Bill's bed and asked him, "How's the hand?"

"I moved it a little while ago and I could feel the change in pressure. Donna said that was a good sign."

He got verbal support from all of us and Karen kissed him. Sandy volunteered to stay the night with Bill and said the rest of us should go home and get some sleep. Jennifer and Janice came back into Bill's room and it was obvious Jennifer and Janice had both been crying.

I gathered both of them into my arms and just held on. Jennifer sobbed and held on. Janice cried softly and held on to both me and Jennifer. Everyone else stayed quiet. After a minute Karen and Sandy both joined our hug.

Jennifer looked up at me and said, between sobs, "He called me a whore! He said I was not his wife because I want to love others. He said I was not welcome in his house." Tears flowed down her cheeks and we held her a little tighter.

John spoke, "Do you want our help?"

Jennifer looked at him and asked, "What can you do? He's thrown me out!"

"We have three trucks. We can go get your things tonight. You can move into my place out by my folks house if you want. It's a bit rustic but there's lots of room."

"Or," Sandy said, "You can move in with us. We can still put most of your things at John's until we sort out the details, but I'd like you closer than out at John's."

"Is there a spare bedroom?"

"Not any more." John said. "You'll have the guest room. Donna is probably asleep in Janice's room, that leaves Nick in his bedroom, Sandy here with Bill, Karen in her room and me standing on the porch hoping for an invitation."

After a few seconds Jennifer looked at Karen and said, "Can I share with you? I'd feel strange sleeping with Nick or John tonight. And, John could have the guest room."

Janice said, "Let Donna stay in my room. I'll stay with John in the guest room or with Nick."

"Bill, take care of Sandy for us. We'll see you both tomorrow. For the next couple hours we're helping Jennifer move. Then we'll get some sleep. If you need us, call. We can be here in fifteen minutes."

Bill and Sandy got well kissed and we were on our way. John followed us in his truck and we were in and out of Jennifer's house in less than an hour. She took clothes, bathroom items, kitchen items and keepsakes. Albert kept flattened boxes in the garage and we used them to pack her things. We loaded the kitchen items in John's truck and he took them to his place. Everything else came home in my truck. By midnight Jennifer was moved in. We no longer had a guest bedroom.