‘Just One Thing Wrong’

There’re crying. ‘We don’t know where Father is,’ they say. ‘He might have been burned to death.’ What an idea!—anfisa

Sunday morning, Graça and I woke early and got ourselves ready for church. Marianne was on the phone with the door closed, with no sign of emerging, so we walked up to the Benson building. New snow covered everything in sight with a fluffy white blanket, and Graça’s and my feet made new footprints on the sidewalk. Nyx Hastings was waiting for me outside of the auditorium where we have sacrament meeting.

“Gotta ask you somethin’,” she barked as she turned and stalked around a corner. I pulled up the neckline of my rose-colored sweater, followed, and raised an eyebrow. Nyx patted the sharp spikes of her maroon-black hair. “You goin’ out with Cole Douglas?”

“W—well, not officially,” I stammered.

“He likes you, y’know.”

I squeaked joyfully, “Really?”

She shook her head and her spikes wobbled. “You’re a nice girl. Rebekah Cardim. I’d stay away from Cole if I were you.”

I stamped my foot, but my snow boots only issued a slight thump on the industrial carpet. “Why?” I revised Cole’s impression of Nyx and realized that she probably had a crush on him.

“Just—”

Bishop Ramirez started welcoming everyone in the auditorium. “We need to get inside,” I muttered.” Nyx shrugged, and I hurried to find a seat beside Graça. Derek was nearby with his large fan club—today he was wearing a taxi-yellow blazer with a white shirt and blue and yellow tie. Derek smiled at me.

The prayer had just ended when the auditorium door creaked open. Bishop Ramirez paused in the middle of the sustainings and scowled as Marianne stumbled up the stairs to an empty seat far away from everyone. Her flounced white skirt was wrinkled, with an orange juice stain down its front, her ruby shrug twisted around her strong shoulders, and her curls looked like they had barely survived a tornado. Her eyes shone like sea-green glass, and they were rimmed with red.

Marianne disappeared the second sacrament meeting ended. I followed Derek out of the auditorium. A wiry hand grabbed my shoulder from behind, “Bekah!”]

I took a deep breath and turned to face Marianne’s pale face.

“I need to talk to you, Bekah.”

“I—I have to teach Sunday School, Marianne.”

She was already leading me by the shoulder to the parking lot. “Derek will take care of it. I need to talk to you now.”

We stood behind her Jeep, out of view of the building, and Marianne took a brush out of her purse and commenced ripping her curls with it. They got wider and frizzier. I shivered. Finally, I spoke up, “Marianne, I’ve known you for ten years, and I have never seen you this upset since—” Suddenly remembering, I gasped.

Marianne nodded; a tear leapt off the ledge of her cheekbone. “You probably don’t even remember him,” she shrugged. “My family had just moved in. He only lived in Joshua’s Ravine for a month.”

I shivered and pulled my sweater sleeves over my fingers. I could not even say what I thought—it was too horrible. “Is your dad, did something—happen—to him?”

Marianne scoffed, wiped a tear, and punched the Jeep door. The hollow clang echoed from the low grey clouds and bounced off all the cars in the parking lot. “No, Bekah, Christian Miles Senior is doing just fine in Albuquerque living his alternative lifestyle.”

Eleven years ago, I had been a shy outcast struggling through a friendless summer. My brother, Rock, and his buddies had been beating each other up in back alleys, and my sister, Ruth, had been experimenting with her first boyfriends in the beds of their Rangers. My mother had worried that my dad would stop loving her if she got too fat, so she and I had been taking long walks around Joshua’s Ravine. One golden day in July, we had passed an upscale home with a moving truck outside. Marianne’s mother, Sister Miles, as she was then, was clear and cold in my memory. I only remembered Marianne’s father as a blur of fiery hair with blue flames for eyes. Marianne and her twin, Christian, were only identical bursts of blond energy in my memory. A week before school began in August, my mother dropped me off at Marianne’s for a sleepover. Marianne’s father and twin brother were gone, never to be mentioned again. “Your brother, then?” I asked now.

My best friend nodded.

“What’s wrong with him, is he—has he passed away?”

Marianne punched the Jeep again, this time denting the smooth creamy panel. “No, he’s not dead!” she growled. “I wish he were dead! Then he wouldn’t be comin’ to live here.”

“Oh, Marianne, you don’t mean that. He’s your twin brother. Maybe this will be good.”

She kicked the hubcap of the Saturn next to us. It popped off and rolled across the parking lot before settling on a storm. “Bekah! Is it too much to ask for you to be on my side for once?! This random guy whom I happened to share a uterus with is completely evil.”

Marianne probably meant nothing by it. All I could remember of Chris was a strong, curly-haired boy with a love for Cops and Robbers. He also enjoyed pulling my hair. None of that was an accurate basis for an accusation of devil worship. “Marianne, you don’t know what he’s like now—you haven’t even spoken to Chris for ten years.”

Marianne’s eyes flashed. “He’s a traitor, and if you can’t understand that, then I don’t know why we’re friends. When my sperm-donor went psycho and left the Church and went down to Albuquerque, Chris abandoned me to go with him. Chris didn’t have to go, but he did. Christian Miles Jr. has his father’s name and his disloyalty.”

I sighed. Poor Marianne, every man in her life, including her boyfriend, had disappointed her. “Um,” I began, “this may sound like a weird question, but why is he coming, why now?”

My best friend brushed the hair away from her face and started drawing it behind her ears again and again. “I don’t know. My mom just called this morning to say Chris was coming on Friday, and we should let him live in the basement.”

“But why?”

“It’s her condo. She’s even coming this weekend to ‘see his transition goes smoothly.’”

“Oh, Marianne, I’m so sorry. What can I do?”

She sniffed and took a deep breath, “Make his life miserable.”

“What!”

Marianne and her mass of hair loomed over me. “When you wanted to ask that cripple to the Winter Ball last year, who told you how?”

“Charlie wasn’t crippled yet—”

“Whatever. When you need a ride to work every friggin’ day, who wakes up early to take you? Who takes you to all of the good parties in Provo?” She stepped back and slumped against the Jeep, looking very small. “I do a lot for you, Bekah—please, please do this one thing for me.”

I hugged her long and hard, “Of course, Marianne. I’ll stick by you through this and everything.”

Marianne went home to change, and I hurried as fast as I could go across the icy pavement to get back to my waiting Sunday School class. By Relief Society, Marianne was back—perfectly dressed and perfectly coiffed, smiling and kissing Trevor as we left church. Only Derek sent concerned glances her way between brooding over his open scriptures.