Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins 

— 1 Peter 4:8

Jimmy gave me a garden and a car. A ring and a child to come. The garden is growing lush. 

Virginia is hot and summer is coming. 

We moved to a small house with plenty of land, though it’s a thirty-minute drive over the mountain to the grocery store—a drive I take weekly with the child in my stomach making me sick over the curves. 

History teacher and baseball coach at the high school, Jimmy understands things I can’t. He teaches classes that give kids college credit. At school functions, he’s friendly and confident with our old teachers like it’s nothing. 

“So I wanted to bring something up, something about Jimmy,” her voice hushes. 

I get tired in the heat. The hour-long drive to my secretary job outside of Floyd weighs down my eyelids—and I miss the coffee and Diet Coke that used to get me through the days before the pregnancy. Jimmy is ending the school year now. Showing the kids Gone With the Wind instead of teaching. 

Julie calls on a Tuesday. She has a home way down the gravel road and teaches science at the high school with Jimmy. When the phone rings, I’m doing the dishes and half listening to The 700 Club on the TV in the living room. 

“Hey, honey, how are ya?” she asks in her chipper tone. Jimmy wants me to be less shy so I answer honestly. I’m good, a little bored with no work but I keep busy. I talk about the garden. She responds with a polite disinterest. I trail off and there is silence. 

“So I wanted to bring something up, something about Jimmy,” her voice hushes. 

“He didn’t get detention, did he?” I laugh and she doesn’t. I’m sitting at the kitchen table, on my cell phone, eyeing the unfinished hand washing in the sink. 

“Well, it’s actually serious.” she says, as though to soften the news. “There’s a girl—a freshman—she’s in both our classes and said some things about Jimmy that have me worried.” 

“Like what?” 

She paused in a way that made me nervous.

“It’s not so much what she said but how much time they spend together.” 

“He’s her teacher, isn’t he?” I try to sound innocent. 

“Honey, she’s staying after school in his classroom and I had another girl say she went with him to his car.” She sounds nervous. 

“Julie, I stayed behind with teachers when I needed tutoring.” 

“She’s a bright girl, I can’t imagine—” 

“Oh, come on now.” 

“It’s not right. The girl is fourteen. I’d encourage you to remind Jimmy of that.” The sweetness in Julie’s tone is gone. 

“Who else have you talked to about this?” 

“Just you…for now. But her parents—the Taylors, you know them, right? They’ve been worried about her and I don’t know, I’m concerned.” 

“It’s the Taylor’s girl?” She went to our church before the family moved closer to town. “We’re friendly with them. There’s nothing to worry about. You have a nice day now.” 

“You too.” 

We say our goodbyes and she waits for me to hang up. 

The radio is still on the country station where
Jimmy had left it. “Red Dirt Girl” is playing.

I turn off the TV and finish the dishes. The radio is still on the country station where Jimmy had left it. “Red Dirt Girl” is playing. 

I scrub the pans from last night’s dinner. Emmylou Harris sings about Alabama. My ankles are swollen. I watch bubbles go down the drain. Jimmy is out with friends and won’t be home until one or two. I watch TV and I’m asleep by the time he gets home. 

Lord Jesus, hear me now and walk by my side. If I am to obey my husband as I am to obey You, am I at fault? Have I brought this daughter, this child, into our family to be torn apart and damaged? 

I wake around five, Julie’s warning from last night echoing in my mind. I make the coffee, slowly, methodically. I make it strong. 

I pour it down the sink, and remembering I can’t drink it with the baby, inhale the aroma. It disappears down the drain quickly. 

If a man of God will hurt her without repentance, what will stop her from seeking comfort in the arms of the devil?

In the early light, I walk to the edge of the woods on our property. Barefoot but looking down. At Mama’s old house by the creek I stepped on a garden snake barefoot once. I wish she still lived there. 

The grass is dewy and the early morning air makes me shiver. A low fog clings to the tall grasses past our property line. What Julie said turned in my mind all night. I turn my back to them and kneel. 

Take this husband of mine off his pedestal, show him the punishment of his sin, and allow him to repent. He has strayed from Your path to the temptations of a Jezebel. Let the girl and my husband repent, may You allow for the evil spirit of Eve to leave them both.

I am still. 

I have been nothing but faithful, why do You send me this test? I have made it my mission to spread Your word, my mission to follow this man of God I married. Why am I tested now? This girl, this daughter that she is, how does she tempt him to break his vows? I know he is not weak. Is it me? Have I failed as a wife?

 I break my back and bruise my knees to serve him and You. I am carrying his life inside me. Is this not enough? How can this not be enough? I have abstained from sin, repented those I have committed. 

Back home, I tend to the garden, eyeing the house while pulling weeds to see if the bedroom light goes on. 

Jimmy sleeps until eleven. He hasn’t shaved and when he sees me in the kitchen, he wraps his heavy arms around me from behind. I feel the pressure of his forearms hurting my collarbone but stay in his embrace. He makes my body feel small. 

He mumbles “Hey baby” in a deep, morning voice, devoid of the thicker twang he puts on in front of everyone else. He asks for breakfast. 

I make scrambled eggs and toast with jelly. We say grace.

Have I brought this daughter, this child, into our family 
to be torn apart and damaged?

At the kitchen table in the late morning light, he looks like an angel. Unshaven and slowly sipping his coffee, he looks just like an angel. I remember how young I felt when I first saw him. 

I have made him my family now and You my compass. How can I blame this daughter for trying to take the same path? How can I blame her for believing that he is Godly and to be obeyed? That is all she can know. Does she even understand what he has, what he does to her? 

“Julie called me yesterday.” I resist the urge to avoid looking at him. I focus on the shadows under his eyes. 

“Oh, my,” chuckles. “I’m sorry.”

I laugh a little too. “Oh it was fine. She just had something to say about you.” 

“Of course she does.” 

I look down at his coffee. “She says there’s some girl, something about her parents…being worried about you.” 

He looks at me and holds his gaze. It’s quiet before he speaks. 

“The principal talked to me…it’s just a rumor, you know? You know how girls are with gossip. I guess Julie hasn’t grown out of it.” 

“Baby, I know. I know.” I want to get up and rub his shoulder but I stay seated. “You know what girl she’s talking about?” I say this looking not at him, but down.

“Yeah. She needed help with a test last week so I helped her. It’s my job. And some kid saw me drive her to the library and spread stupid fucking rumors.” 

He has his hand on the side of his face and mumbles a quiet “bitch.” His silver, plain wedding ring catches the light. 

“You drove her to the library?” 

He nods.

“Jimmy,” 

The midday light comes in through the window and lights the kitchen in a golden, heavenly glow. 

“Baby, why didn’t you go to the library at the school?” 

He leaves the table and slams the back door on his way out. The truck door slams. I don’t see him again until dark. 

Lord, I ask for Your guidance. I feel You in our trees and in this house and in my dear husband. Lord, I know You must be listening. 

I tend to the house while he’s gone. Dishes, laundry, sweeping, dusting. I organize his clothes and I call my mama to talk about nothing. 

Jesus, my Jimmy cannot know what he does. He has followed in your footsteps so long. He is a holy man. 

I’m in bed when he comes in, but not sleeping. My white lace nightgown is covered by cotton sheets. I hear his clothes come off in the dark and then feel his weight on me. 

“I’m sorry” he whispers, quietly moving over me. 

Jesus, I ask You to forgive me for leading my husband astray. To forgive the Taylor girl for her whoredom. Cleanse my husband of this Jezebel. 

“I know, baby,” I say, stroking his hair. He doesn’t pray before he falls asleep. He holds me through the night, his warm skin on mine. 

When Jimmy is still and sleeping, I can hear something moving in the garden. Something to come take what I’ve grown. 

~~~

Mae Oetjens is from southwest Virginia and currently lives in Richmond, VA. She graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a Bachelor’s in political science in 2023. Her Instagram is @maeoats. This is her first published fiction.