XLII

THERE SHALL COME IN THE LAST DAYS SCOFFERS, WALKING AFTER THEIR OWN LUSTS

(2 PETER 3:3)

SEVEN SALLIE (FATHER OF SEVENIA SALLIE GIRL PROPHETESS)

“Hi, Uncle Six,” my daughter said cheerily as she burst through the back door of our house.

“Hey, Rag Muffin,” my twin brother replied. A relieved look appeared on his haggard face. The last month had been hard on him. Not only had his wife been murdered, he was the main suspect for a week or two. It also had been made known during the ordeal that he and his wife had an open marriage.

It turned out that one of his wife’s lovers was the killer. It also turned out that one of Six’s lovers was the mother of Sevenia’s very best friend, Anna. A girl who had died due to leukemia at the incredibly young age of fifteen, two years previous. This poised my brother’s visit to be awkward between my daughter and him. Especially since Salena, Anna’s mother, was four or five months pregnant with Six’s child.

The potential for awkwardness between my brother and me stemmed from my own relationship with Salena. She was my first serious girlfriend when we were teenagers. She and I had even talked about marriage. But right about the time we graduated from high school, she broke up with me to marry someone else. He was a wealthy, older man who was going to take care of her impoverished family. He died around three years ago, about a year before his daughter Anna.

Although she and I became reacquainted shortly after her daughter died, Salena and I couldn’t rekindle the spark. Around the same time she also became reacquainted with Six, who she knew from the year she and I dated. Apparently there was a spark between Salena and my brother. When he found out that she and I were not romantically linked, the spark seemingly turned into a fire. This fire became so heated, there was now a bun growing in the proverbial oven.

Ironically, this sorted affair sprang from Bible studies my skeptic brother was having with my ultra-conservative, former girlfriend. At least that’s how I viewed her. Not to sound judgmental, but maybe it would be safe to at least remove ultra from the conservative label. To be fair, I didn’t understand the circumstances of their relationship. He was just beginning to divulge information about his twisted intimate life to me when my daughter Sevenia bounded into the kitchen.

My daughter gave my brother a hug. This cheered my heart. I knew my daughter was beyond bothered by the revelation of Six’s romantic life. Both his marriage arrangement and also his relationship with a woman my daughter looked up to as a spiritual pillar and mother figure.

“When did you get here?” Sevenia asked her uncle happily.

“Oh, a half hour or so ago,” Six replied.

“How long are you staying?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Six said, looking at me with a lost expression. “I’m kind of in limbo.”

“You’re welcome here as long as you like,” I told my brother. “I’ve got the guest room  ready for you.”

“Thanks,” he said and then sighed. “I just needed to get away.”

“That’s understandable,” I replied. “Who’s been managing the death business while in your absence?”

I immediately regretted the way I referenced his gothic funeral home, given the situation with his wife. Yet he didn’t bat an eye, and immediately replied. “Trisha Monson, our long time assistant. As a matter of fact, she and her sister are going to buy the place from me. The whole kit and caboodle.”

“Even the 59’ Caddy?” I asked, referring to the old hearse he had refurbished. It was his pride and joy.

“I have no need of a corpse wagon if I’m no longer a mortician,” he said with a shrug.

“I see.”

“So,” he said with a big sigh. “I thought I’d stay in this neck of the woods long enough to see why you and Brock love it here so much. Then I think I might move to Florida.”

“Well, once you find out why he and I ended up in rural Iowa, you’ll never leave.”

“Yeah, right,” he said sarcastically. “Is this heaven? No, it’s Iowa.”

“I’m not a movie buff,” I replied. “Was that from a League of Their Own or something?”

“No, you idiot,” my brother laughed. “Field of Dreams.”

“Heaven’s found within you,” Sevenia said sweetly as she kicked off her blue converse sneakers, sat down, crossed a leg over the other, and then primly pulled the hem of her light blue summer dress over her knee. “To be precise, Jesus refers to it as the kingdom of God.” (Luke 17:21)

My daughter was big on modesty, and often looked like an Amish girl, minus the bonnet. Yet she also almost always wore converse sneakers. She occasionally wore cowboy boots, and at fellowship low heel pumps. But today the light blue dress that I had never seen before was made of some clingy material and was form fitting to the first flush of her womanhood. The hem of which she had tugged over her knee had retracted back over her knee and she was unmindful of it. I resisted the urge to pull it back over myself.

“Is that right?” Six asked mildly, but I could see the hostility on his face, but he held it in. Whether due to not wanting to offend his sweet, beloved niece, or feeling humbled by the events of the previous month. Probably both. “So is this kingdom of God lurking within me somewhere?”

“I believe it is,” she replied as she thankfully uncrossed her legs and with both hands yanked the dress below her knees.

“Was this kingdom of God in Salena when she invited a married man into her bed?” Six asked matter of fact.

I felt my toes curl as I noticed a look of surprise in my daughter’s eyes. I guess I wasn’t the only one in the family that was prone to an unbridled tongue. She recovered quickly.

“It is written,” she said. “Every person is tempted when they are drawn away of their own lust and enticed.” (James 1:14)

“Is that a no?” Six asked as he crossed his arms and frowned.

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)  She replied and then continued. “If anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” (1 John 2:1).

“Is that a yes?” Six asked tauntingly.

“Uncle Six,” Sevenia said calmly and with the dignity of a woman years beyond her seventeen. “When you asked if I would study the Bible with you, was it as someone seeking truth or as someone longing to mock and ridicule?”

Now I saw a look of surprise come into my brother’s eyes. Then I watched them harden into a glint of steel. “I’m not gonna lie, I’m a skeptic. But when I was studying with Salena, she was winning me over to possibly becoming a follower of your Jesus. Then everything went haywire.”

“What went haywire?” Sevenia and I asked at the same time.

“Well,” Six sighed and looked at me. “I know both you and Sevenia know about the marriage arrangement between Charley and me.”

“We do,” I replied.

Six hung his head and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Don’t worry, Uncle Six,” Sevenia smiled sympathetically. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23) You’re still my favorite uncle. Even if you are a pervert.”

“Wow! Tell me what you really think.”

“Okay, I…”

“No, don’t,” he said as he put up a hand to stop her. Then he laughed. “She’s definitely a Sallie.”

We all laughed. Then Sevenia asked him to explain everything going haywire.

“First of all,” he replied. “I’m in love with Salena.”

“Then why does it seem like you’re avoiding her?” Sevenia asked.

“Because I am.”

“What?” my daughter and I inquired at the same time. “Why?”

“Because I’m no good for her. Because my involvement with her caused my wife to be killed.”

“How?” my daughter and I again asked at the same time.

“To make a long story short,” he sighed. “Charley and I never discussed our relationships with other people. Only that they existed, period. By the way, you’re right Sevenia, I am a pervert.”

“Uncle Six, I never should…”

“No,” he interrupted. “I am. I always had a thing about married women. You know, the forbidden. I’ve always loved the challenge of seducing them. I know Salena wasn’t married when I began my quest with her, she was widow. But I had never tried to seduce somebody so religiously devout, or put so much effort into it. In the process, I somehow fell in love with her. After we were intimate, she said she made a mistake and we couldn’t have sex out of wedlock ever again. But once I had a taste of Salena, I wanted more. Not just the sex, but the intimacy. The bonding, the love.

“Anyway, I told Charley I was in love with Salena and wanted a divorce. To my surprise she became extremely jealous. She suggested that she break up with her paramour, we renew our wedding vows, and we become monogamous. Realizing I was no good for Salena, and that I still loved my wife, I agreed. But her current boyfriend was a rich playboy that was used to getting his own way. After he beat her to death, he staged a car wreck to cover.”

There was a along moment of silence as Sevenia and I digested this information. Then my daughter spoke. “So your Bible studies with Salena. They weren’t genuine, the were just a means to seduce her?”

“They were genuine,” Six acknowledged. “But to be honest, seduction was the initial motive. But I became interested in the Bible along the way. I kept seeing her twice a week, even when I thought sex was out of the question. But then something shifted.”

“What?” my daughter and I, yet again, asked at the same time.

“Salena subtly started to dress sexier,” Six replied. “She always used to wear long skirts and dresses, like you used to Sevenia. Then she started wearing shorter, more form fitting dresses. Like yours now, Muffin.”

“I told Amy I didn’t think this dress was my style,” Sevenia blurted as she abruptly stood and yanked the hem down. “I should have known for sure when Branch’s eyes bugged out when we had lunch.”

Now my eyes bugged out. The last I knew, Sevenia had ended her courtship with the fine young man Branch Cromwell. She always expressed frustration with my lack of revealing romantic intentions. I guess I know how she felt. “You and Branch are an item again?”

“I don’t know, I guess so, maybe,” she shrugged. “But I do feel, I don’t know, out there in this dress. More revealed. I’m gonna change.”

“Sevenia,” Six said. “Maybe I’m not the one to ask, but you still look wholesome. For the most part.”

“What’s for the most part supposed to mean?” my daughter asked indignantly, with a frown between her brows and hands on hips.

“You look fine, Sweet Pea,” I said. “But your current attire does show your womanliness more than your typical, um, style.”

“Daddy!” she barked. “Don’t say I look womanly, I’m your little girl!”

“I know, I know,” I replied. “But lets keep to the task at hand. Six, do you or do you not want to study the Bible with Sevenia?”

“I do.”

“Sevenia, will you study with him?”

“I will.”

“I now pronounce you student and teacher.”

“Weird!” Sevenia spit, but then giggled. “But Uncle Six. Why me and not my dad, or Brock, or Destiny?”

“As much as I love and trust the people you’ve mentioned,” Six said. “You’re the girl prophetess, or so I’ve been told.”

“Oh, please,” Sevenia said. She was genuinely tired of being called that.

“Seriously though,” Six said. “With the questions I have, I want somebody I trust, but also won’t be offended.”

“You’d be offended by my instruction?” I asked.

“Mr. Know-it-all?” Six laughed. “The arrogant broadcaster and podcaster. Of course I’d rather learn from your sweet daughter than you.”

“Fair enough,” I shrugged.

“Oh, you’re gonna concede that quickly?”

“Sure,” I shrugged again as I put an arm around Sevenia. “I have no problem admitting my daughter is smarter and wiser than me.”

Both my daughter and my brother looked at me with surprised expressions.

“I am not, Daddy,” Sevenia replied meekly.

“Don’t argue with him, Rag Muffin,” Six said with a chuckle. “I think he’s right.”

Forgive me if this is wrong. But I had a two way mirror set up between my bedroom and the study room my brother and daughter would be utilizing for their studies and possible conversations. I didn’t like the things I had discovered about the man I shared a womb with for nine months. A father can’t be too careful, can he?