Marianne didn’t look for work right away. Instead, she spent the days sitting in the house, enjoying the sun streaming through the huge kitchen windows warming the remains of many hurried breakfasts. On the days she couldn’t bear to stay inside, she walked through the streets, visited the stores or sat in coffee shops. When she discovered Cappuccino, she thought she couldn’t get enough. She wrote letters to her friends at IRC that she couldn’t mail and knocked back cups of Cappuccino. There was certainly no coffee even half that good at IRC.
It was on one of those days sitting in Starbuck’s that she ran into Michael. He sat at a table across the room and stared at her. She immediately knew who he was. He had not changed much since childhood. She had taken a book to read and busily stuck her nose into it a little deeper. He walked toward her and greeted her by name so she had to reply but she didn't smile. She wondered whether she should get up and leave. Don't panic, she told herself.
She'd been so busy wondering what he was going to do and expecting him to do something that she'd completely forgotten to do anything herself. She felt like an idiot and this made her smile and she hadn't wanted to. He smiled back, his blue eyes crinkling right up to the blond hair at his ears and making him look , well... nice. Then there was a slap. Her book hit the floor. She bent down and so did he, and they bashed heads.
His hands and her book appeared in front of her eyes. His hands had blond hair on them that glinted in the sunlight. His fingers had to be the longest she'd ever seen. His nails were short and clean.
"May I sit down?” His voice was soft.
The tables were all pretty full so she nodded.
"Have you seen the movie?"
"What movie?” She was totally dazed. From dropping her book and banging her head and everything. She stared at him, then down at the book. "Oh! The DaVinci Code? It’s my mother’s book. I borrowed it.” His smile crinkled up his eyes. "No, I haven't. I barely started the book," she said.
“It would be a good yarn if so many people would not take it as gospel. It’s suspenseful and pretty well written. If you can overlook the gross inaccuracies of history and the heavy handed attempt to smear Christianity. Enough of my ranting. Just remember that it is fiction!”
That's how it started. He asked her a question, nodded when she spoke and then asked another, but thankfully nothing about her ordeal.
After that, they discussed a lot of things. They spoke a little about themselves too. He said he had been engaged when he was twenty but it just didn’t work out.
"Met her while I was at college," he said.
"Was she studying too?"
"Oh, no. That was what attracted me to her. She was...so different."
"What were you like?" Marianne asked.
"Like? Much as I am now. My nose stuck in a book, a bit of a loner. Not very interesting. Not for a live wire like she was."
"Go on," she said.
"She got pregnant. I was very happy until she told me she didn't want to marry me. I thought she'd change her mind as the pregnancy advanced but when I attempted to see her, she told me to leave her be. I was very hurt but accepted her refusal to involve me. A few months later, I heard she had gotten an abortion. I had a very difficult time with it but then decided it was for the best.”
"Was it?" she asked.
"No. The last time I went to try and see her, she'd moved and didn’t leave a forwarding address.”
"So what are you going to have Marianne?" Michael asked, looking up from his menu.
"I don't know." Marianne had barely even glanced at her menu. She knew it by heart. This was her favorite coffee shop.
"Marianne something’s wrong. Other than the obvious. What is it?" Michael reached across the table to take her hand, trying to get her to talk to him. She looked at him, then down at the menu in front of her, then back at him.
"Bitterness doesn't help, Marianne." Michael said gently, sadly. "It just ruins your life."
"What do you know about it?" Marianne almost shouted at him.
“I read, Marianne. I know how much damage bitterness held in our hearts can hurt us. We have to be forgiving about those that have hurt us. And about the hard blows that life hands out to us all.”
Marianne decided on a bran muffin and a refill of her coffee. Michael chose a blueberry muffin and a Latte. When they finished Michael invited her to come to his house. In his room where there were more books than she'd ever seen other than at the library, she began to read the titles.
“Why so many books?” Marianne asked.
“If I read a book, I have to add it to my collection. I reread them occasionally. I'd hate to be without books. They're...friends.”
"That sounds lonely," said Marianne. She turned and pulled out a book. "Are you?" she asked.
"Am I what?"
"Lonely?"
He shrugged. "Not really."
"Not really, but what?"
His voice seemed to come from a distance as he tried to answer her. "I'm choosy about my friends. I don't have a great many real friends. A lot of acquaintances but not many that I could call friend."
Marianne sat down in the armchair.
"My parents were very academic," said Michael. "I was an afterthought, perhaps a mistake even. They loved me in their vague intellectual way but left me alone to get on with growing up. Hence; the books."
"That's lonely, too," she said.
Michael grinned. “I do have a few people that I get together with on a somewhat regular basis. I was just going to invite you to go with me to youth group. The group is pretty small and everyone is friendly. Some of them are kids we used to play with and some you haven’t met. I thought you might want to meet some people."
She wanted very much to go. But although she was no longer nervous, she wasn't sure if she was ready to meet new people. "No thanks. I'm not ready to socialize yet." She sighed, what would it be like to go? Some of them knew she had been in prison. Would they still be nice to her? She didn’t know but then Bill did say she should learn to rebuild her life. Could this be a starting place?
“I will take you. If you’re uncomfortable we can leave.”
The church wasn't very big. Marianne figured only about one hundred and fifty people probably attended there, considering the size of the building. "Here, Marianne. You might need this.” He handed her a book as she got out of his truck. She stared down at it. It was a worn, brown leather bible. “Thank you,” she said quietly, then turned and started for the double church doors. The first person she noticed was the pastor. He was standing on the far side of the lobby, talking to two girls about her age. One had curly auburn hair that hung just to her shoulders, the other was short with long red hair almost to her waist. The pastor glanced up when he heard the door shut, but quickly turned his attention back to making the girls laugh. His head shot back up almost instantly when he realized who was standing there. He looked surprised, but quickly smiled, said something to the two girls and then started towards her. Both girls followed, with smiles and looks of curiosity on their faces. "I'm glad you decided to join us after all.” Pastor St. Claire smiled then introduced the two girls. "This is Heather and this is Connie. Girls this is Marianne.”
"Hi! Oh, this is so great! Finally another girl! The guys have outnumbered us for years and it's time we made a comeback!” Heather started right in, her curly hair bobbing in her enthusiasm.
"Michael, go away. We'll take care of Marianne.” Connie put in, pushing him away playfully before they grabbed her arms and pulled her towards the youth room. She could hear Michael chuckling as she allowed herself to be led away by the two bubbling girls.
“Michael told us he was going to bring someone, but he never mentioned you.” Heather laughed as they headed for a private corner of the room. "So how old are you? Do you have any cute brothers? Are you a Christian?" Connie asked all in one breath before they both fell silent to wait for her answers.
"Twenty-one, no brothers, cute or otherwise. I have a step brother but I don’t know where he is.” Marianne hesitated over the last answer. “I believe in God. I don’t know if that makes me a Christian.”
"Well, that's too bad about your brother, but I hope you'll still hang out with us anyways.” Heather smiled after an awkward silence. "Me too." Connie added. "Now let's see. We'll point everyone out to you. That's Ian, Matt, Todd, Andrew, Tim, and Darren over there.” She pointed towards a group of rowdy teenage boys. "Matt and Darren are my brothers, and Heather has a crush on Darren.” "I do not!" Heather blushed, giving herself away. "Yeah you do! You've had a crush on him from day one." Connie teased, before going back to pointing people out. "That's Melissa, Heather's sister, Mikayla is Ian's sister, and Jessica and Julie are twins.” "They're Ian's cousins," Heather added. "And that's Zach, Alex, and Heather’s little brother Isaac."
"Hey, Abby, over here." Connie called to a short-haired blonde who entered the room followed by someone who looked like he might be her brother. The young man immediately went to join the three younger boys. "And that's Chad." Heather told Marianne as Abby came over to them. "Abs, this is Marianne. Marianne, this is Abby."
"It's nice to meet you, Marianne." Abby smiled gently at her. She had pretty green eyes but they weren't nearly as green or large as Heather's. Marianne didn't think she had ever seen anyone with eyes as pretty as Heather's. "You too." Marianne smiled back, forgetting she didn't want to be there. She liked these girls. "Okay, people! Chop chop! Let's go, come on, sit down!" Michael clapped his hands loudly as he and a slightly older man walked into the room. The teens hurried around until everyone was sitting in the rows of chairs. The guys on one side and the girls on the other. Marianne counted heads quickly, there were seventeen young people there altogether. She was glad it was a small group. "I guess you all noticed we have a new GIRL here today. Guys they're catching up," Michael teased the rowdy guys. "Do me a favor everyone and introduce yourselves afterwards." With that Michael stepped off the small platform in the front and the older man stepped up instead. "So who's ready for some fun tonight!?”
"That's our youth leader, Donny. Zach is his uncle." Heather explained, over the shouts of the excited teens. "Ok, we'll have a short Bible study before we hit the van." Donny grinned. "We're going bowling," Michael whispered in her ear from behind her, it made it easy to do since he was sitting in the back row. "Do you need a Bible?" Donny asked. Marianne held up her worn Bible so he could see it, without looking at him. The gold lettering on the front of the Bible had almost been completely worn off and the pages were well marked with underlined verses.
“Michael gave it to me. I never had one of my own,” she mumbled. “Only a fake one a friend made for me.”
The bible study lasted nearly an hour and a half followed by a lot of excited discussion about what they were going to do next. They all agreed that bowling would be the most fun.
Marianne didn’t know how to bowl but her objections were overcome by Heather and Michael’s insistence that it would be easy and they would help her.
They chatted happily in the car, with no suggestion of anything unusual.
They pulled up at the bowling alley.
"This is gonna’ be so much fun" Heather said excitedly.
"That it is." Michael smiled back at her.
Despite being a very good player, Abby was very much off her game, she fumbled and failed, but giggled and took it well. Heather, on the other hand, played embarrassingly well, and took it fairly poorly. By the end of two games they'd both had enough of bowling.
"You know I let you win"
"I doubt it!"
"You should, I'm lying!"
"I know" Abby pushed her playfully, not at all expecting the harder push she got back.
"You know what we should do?"
"What should we do?
"Pancakes! We should find pancakes!"
"Oh, Sweetie, I'm not sure that we can get pancakes at this hour"
"I am! I'll lead the way!"
Marianne happily submitted to being pulled down the street toward a very nice looking 50’s style diner. They were seated in a booth and, quite quickly, the waitress brought pancakes. They were all packed into two booths with Michael quite close to Marianne. Ooh, his leg just brushed against mine! Did I just jump nearly out of my seat? Have to not do that! Pretty sure he didn't notice. Wow, if I don't get my heart rate down, I'm gonna’ have to blame the coffee...Now that's a good idea, blaming the coffee.
Marianne attacked hers hungrily while Michael was more polite. Coffee and conversation flowed easily, but in the back of Marianne's mind was a totally different narrative.
Oh god, he did it again. He can't know he's doing that, surely. Even if he doesn't know, I wish he'd do it more! Oh, my chest goes all tight when he looks at me. I’ve never felt like this before.
After coffee and casual conversation started to get old, they all slowly began to leave. Even though she had a lot of coffee Marianne was getting sleepy.
"Um...Marianne? I noticed you yawning. Are you really sleepy ?"
"I am actually, why do you ask?"
"I wouldn’t mind having a little time to talk to you in private. Of course, if you don’t want to I can take you home." He put his arms around her and kissed her forehead.
He was so sweet, Marianne decided to stay. “I think I can stay awake just a little longer.”
After they had settled back into the booth he turned to her and placed his hand over hers. “Marianne, I can’t believe it’s really you!”
“It’s nice to see you again, Michael. We’re all grown up.”
“Now that’s an observation! We’ve all grown up but you, you look great,” he said. “Can I get you some more coffee?”
“I’m sorry, I’m all coffeed out. I probably will stay awake all night long from all the coffee I’ve had.”
“Find a boring book to read. That usually puts me to sleep.”
The waitress came by and asked if she could get them anything. Michael explained that they were old friends and would like to spend a few minutes catching up on old times and asked her to bring two waters with lemon if she wouldn’t mind.
“I’m so glad I ran into you, Marianne,” he said. “Mom told me she saw you but I wasn’t even sure you would remember me. We had some good times back when we were kids didn’t we?”
“We did! How about the rest of the kids? Are you still in touch with any of them?” Marianne asked.
Taking a sip of his water Michael said after she “went away” they had all just grown apart. “We just all went our separate ways. Johnny is working at his father’s law offices and wants to become a lawyer, I sometimes run into him at the health club. Brian wants to become a detective like his dad. Julie is married and has two kids.” He stopped for a moment and played with the frost on his ice water making lines through it with his fingers. Then he turned to Marianne. “How about you? Do you have any plans for your future?”
“I took some computer courses and would like to find a job working with computers. Right now I’m just trying to get reoriented a little then I will look for work. I don’t know where to start. Everything seems a little overwhelming right now.”
“I can well imagine,” he said.
Michael placed his hand over hers, cleared his throat. “That was such a long time ago, Marianne. I never forgot about you. I think I have always been in love with you.” He took a few sips of his lemon water and went on. “I was heartbroken over what happened to you. I tried to visit you but they wouldn’t let me in to see you.” He shifted his position a little, took her hand again. “I know I’m probably moving a little fast for you. How about this…can we pretend we just met and get re-acquainted as adults?” He turned and looked at her, his eyes full of questions. “How about dinner tomorrow night. Someplace nice. I could pick you up about 6:30 tomorrow evening. I just need to dash home after work and change clothes first.”
Marianne’s heart skipped a beat and she hoped her face was not red.