2
When Sarah backed her car out of her parking spot in the back, ready to go to church, and not even late for Sunday school, she was thrilled (she wasn’t) to see a Chevy truck with Tennessee plates just ahead of her in the alley. Either her neighbor was going to get coffee or maybe he was going to church. Hopefully not her church.
She squelched that ungenerous thought.
Then she had to squelch a lot more because though their routes did diverge, he stopped completely at every stop sign.
Yeah, it had been an adjustment for Sarah when she moved into her grandma’s neighborhood to find that everyone practiced a rolling stop, but she had adjusted very quickly. Mark had not yet figured this out. How long had he been here? Had he said? Anyway, because she was a Christian, she wasn’t going to be the person that honked, sped around him, and gave him the bird, but she kinda wanted to. Well, someone would surely initiate him soon. Good thing she was going to church. He turned off at the major street a few blocks up, and she kept following her “secret” route to church that had fewer stop signs.
Like a good church member, she parked in the drugstore lot to leave more spaces closer to the church open for visitors or disabled folks. As she walked the length of block to get to church, she saw it. A big ol’ truck with a Tennessee plate, badly parallel-parked a few houses down from the church. He was just a little bit in the road. And yes, Mark was at her church, on time for Sunday school.
She cracked her knuckles and rolled her shoulders. Everything cracked and popped. She couldn’t be a dick to somebody who went her church. Well, she shouldn’t be a dick to anyone. She was going to have to apologize. Dammit. But they didn’t have to be friends, right?
He was still in the foyer, talking to the greeter while she headed up the stairs to the Sunday school room. She kept her head down, hoping they’d both not notice her.
Nope. “Hey, Sarah! How’s it going?”
The greeter was a too-friendly seminary student who was apparently a morning person. Not too friendly like icky too friendly, just too happy for nine o’clock on a Sunday morning.
“Hey, Sam. I’m great.” She tried to just nod at Mark while she walked away. It didn’t work.
“Oh, I didn’t realize this was your church.” He was just a little beautiful, his wavy brown hair, fresh out of the shower, and sparkling brown eyes a one-two punch, and his slightly gleeful smile lit up his face. Shit. Her chagrin was probably showing.
“Yeah, we didn’t talk about that at the dumpster.”
“My buddy from high school went to seminary in St. Louis and went to this church while he was here. He said I had to go here.”
“Oh, what was his name?” She’d been at this church for a while—she probably knew him.
Mark told her. Right. She’d been really good friends with that guy’s wife while they were in seminary. The way his eye corners crinkled when he smiled as she told him that—shit shit.
The topic of Sunday school was “Loving our Neighbors.” Mark rolled his eyes. He could think of at least one church member—a short, cute, grumpy white woman, not to name names—who could use the lesson.
He really didn’t get it. He was trying to do good things, to help, both with the dumpster and his new occupation, but Sarah didn’t seem to think much of him. The USAteach recruiter had been so compelling. “You’ll change the lives of underprivileged children. With what you’ve got on your resumé, your application will go right to the top. You’re exactly who we’re looking for—a veteran, male, excellent college grades.” He’d been itching to go forth and do, and hadn’t been able to stomach the additional schooling he’d have to do to use his psychology degree. It’d been great for helping him process his military life, but he needed action next. So he’d ended up in St. Louis, and he thought he was ready and prepared to love his neighbor.
Actually, it wasn’t a terrible lesson, and Sarah spoke up a couple times to make people really think about who was the neighbors and who was getting centered and not, all the stuff they talked about in that Facebook group for racial reconciliation he was in. But didn’t hear much in his regular Memphis life.
He knew the catechism answer was “all my fellow men are my neighbor,” but the teacher, a white-haired, white man with a rumbly voice, really expanded on it, and what being a neighbor meant. Mark entertained himself for a while thinking about what the reaction of the folks back home to this would be. Bust them out of their fun white bubble. Yes, the immigrants and refugees are our neighbors, the homeless are our neighbors, we are our neighbors.
He soaked it all up: Sunday school, the wild kids running around during the transition to the church service—at least that was universal. He was glad his friend had warned him about what to expect at the service because they sang in different languages, and a little girl in the front straight up danced in the pew. The whole service was alive with the sound of kids, and when they gathered around the edges of the sanctuary for communion, he was looking at African and Asian as well as white faces. Church wasn’t exactly like this back in Memphis.
He ended up going to eat with some seminary guys who’d overlapped with his friend who’d told him to come. Sarah came too—she was friends with all of them. They went for Mexican on Cherokee Street, and it was so amazing. If he understood the explanation right, it was like the Main Street for Latinx people in this part of the city. There was a Mexican restaurant or two on every block. And for once, he wasn’t the only person driving a big truck when he was on this street. So different for this to be, like, an ethnic section of town to be held up as a cool place to be instead of a slightly shady place only ventured into because of the food’s being good. And only a few blocks from his house, too.
When the waiter brought the chips and salsa out, he tentatively pushed his salsa bowl towards Sarah, and she smiled at him and used the one of the person on the other side of her. Well then.
At least his tacos were delicious. St. Louis was just throwing him all the curveballs. This woman had years in the game in being a true neighbor to all, and he assumed, particularly to the underprivileged children at her school, but instead of seeing him as a teammate, she thought he was competition? He was trying to do the same kind of good! He also thought she was cute, with those snapping brown eyes and full lips. Kinda like the salsa she wouldn’t share with him—delicious, addicting, spicier than expected. He wasn’t really sure what to do with his interesting neighbor.
When everyone left, it turned out he had to follow her all the way home. She appeared to view the stop signs more as suggestions than real laws. She actually stuck her hand out her car window to wave at him when she turned into the parking spot of her house. His truck bumped over the ups and downs in the alley before he turned into his parking spot. He was thinking about his neighbor as he locked up his truck and went to struggle with the locks on his back door. He still wasn’t used to the keys and deadlock combination.
He definitely liked Sarah, all grumpy and opinionated and rolling stops. But unless she changed her mind about him, he’d have to like her from afar.