Nothing Sacred

Her arms were braced for the shaking to start. Her heart for the cries of denial.

She wasn’t at all ready for Ellen to pull out of her arms, to push a strand of hair from Martha’s forehead. To look at her mother with tears glistening in her eyes, but a compassionate smile on her face.

“Ellen?” she asked, truly frightened. “Did you hear what I just said?”

“Yeah.” Ellen’s voice was as soft as her glance. “I’m not surprised, Mom. I’d kind of already put two and two together. It was just too weird that he’d been able to figure everything out just by visiting that dealership.”

“Well, I got that, too,” Martha said. And then she told her daughter about the inner city church that had been David’s first calling. About Jeb he’d said the incident had happened exactly as he’d described. When he was ordained as a minister, he’d asked to be assigned to that neighborhood, so he could help some of the people who’d been part of Shane’s scheme—the lower-level contributors and the “girls” themselves.

Ellen shook her head. “I had more to go on,” she said, as though she had some secret Martha had been denied. If not for the fact that the girl had been completely rational moments before and was still calm, Martha would have panicked. As it was, she felt completely confused.

“I have to tell everyone tomorrow morning. He can’t get up and preach another sermon with—”

Ellen interrupted her with a shake of her head. “If I tell you something that it’s not my place to repeat, will you at least consider it before you do anything?” she asked.

At a total loss, Martha nodded.

Ellen settled back against the pillows, holding her mother’s hand as she began. “That night I…was…attacked…” The girl swallowed. Took a deep breath. “David told me something he’d never told anybody before.”

Some emotion inside Martha closed down. A vulnerability she couldn’t afford to feel…

“One Friday night, when he was fifteen years old, David was on the couch with his girlfriend. They’d been dating for months, but he’d never done more than hold her hand, or put his arm around her at the movies. He didn’t have a father, and his mother had never talked to him about the birds and the bees.”

Ellen squeezed her hand, and Martha knew she was remembering the time Martha had broken the news about the facts of life. She’d taken her to Phoenix for a rare outing, just the two of them. Ellen had been eleven at the time. They’d bought new outfits, eaten lunch at a fancy restaurant and then, at a park in the city, Martha had answered all of Ellen’s questions. She’d been dreading the outing for weeks, certain it was going to be a disaster, that Ellen would get embarrassed, refuse to listen. Instead, it had turned out to be one of Martha’s most precious memories.

She’d repeated the process with Shelley. Who’d been embarrassed. Thought her mom was stupid. Didn’t ask a single question.

“He was fifteen,” Ellen continued. “Far too old to ask his friends or a teacher what to do, or how to get started, anyway.” Martha could hear the smile in Ellen’s voice, coming through the sadness that shadowed her telling of this story. She had a feeling that David, in his retelling, had made at least this part amusing.

“Anyway, after months of wanting to kiss her, on this one Friday night he’d finally worked up the guts to give it a try. He said the attempt was more awkward than anything else. Every time he tried to get his lips to meet hers, one of their noses would get in the way, and then after they figured out that part, every time they tried, one or the other of them would start laughing. They’d finally managed to connect…and—” Ellen sent her mother a sideways glance with a wry grin “—found out it was worth the effort. That was when his mother burst in on them.”

“Must’ve been embarrassing.” Not understanding the mixed emotions flogging her as she heard about David’s first kiss, Martha reminded herself to remain detached.

It took her a second to realize that Ellen had stopped talking. Turning, seeing Ellen’s face twisted with distress, Martha pulled at their clasped hands until her daughter was once again resting her head against her mom’s shoulder.

“What?” she asked quietly.

“The woman was crazy,” Ellen said, her voice soft but with such an undercurrent of emotion it was almost as if she was recounting a memory rather than telling a story. “She was crying hysterically and screaming, too.”

“Screaming what?”

“David didn’t say, only that they were horrible things. She grabbed a wooden pl

ant stand, spilling the plant on the floor, and started hitting him with it. She told him to get out of her house. Said she was calling the police.”

“Why?”

“That’s just it, he had no idea. Then.” Ellen’s words were muffled as she burrowed against her mother.

“What about the girl?” This was nothing to Martha. And felt like everything.

“His mother grabbed her away from David and told her to run. To get out of there.”

Martha held her daughter, rubbing her shoulder. Wishing she could hold a young frightened man. A boy, really.

“And then—” Ellen’s voice broke. She sniffled. And without even knowing what was coming, Martha felt her own eyes fill.

“She told him something that’s affected the rest of his life, Mom. Something that’s colored every decision he’s ever made. It doesn’t have to, but I don’t think he gets that.”