pages over. “I took notes. Thought it might be important, because we should get a restraining order for both of you. The lawyer can see to that, but it’d be good to have notes. So I waited some more, still not answering, and he said, ‘Where have you put her?’ I still didn’t say anything, and he said, ‘Still a coward, then. Still running. You can’t run. I know where you live. But I don’t care about you anyway. If I had, don’t you think I’d have come to get you? I want my wife back. I know you talked her into this. I know you put that device in her to keep her from being blessed. The other women couldn’t wait to confess what you’d done, how you’d tried to damn them, too. You’ll burn in hell, but you’re not going to take Fruitful down with you. She’s my wife. She’ll stay my wife, and I won’t stand by and watch her be damned with you. Or Obedience, who’s ready to be joined. You’re keeping both of them from salvation, and the Prophet won’t let you. The Prophet will fight you, She-Devil.’”
He paused. “There was some more along those lines as well. He’s two sammies short of a picnic, if you ask me. I told him a few things as well. He was surprised it was me at the other end of the line. Put it like that.”
Fruitful—Frankie—was looking at her plate, all her joy in her new name and new clothes and new life ripped away. Gray said, “Sorry. Could’ve been better not to tell you.”
“No,” she said, looking up again with an effort. “I’m glad you did. It tells me … I’m not mad for leaving. Or … wrong. Am I?”
Gray’s face gentled, and he said, “No. You’re not mad, and you’re not wrong. That’s not how a man’s meant to treat his wife. You did the right thing, and so did Daisy. So did Obedience—Oriana.”
Oriana said, “I wasn’t going to marry somebody like that, though. I was going to marry Loyal Standfast. At least I think so. I hope so.”
“And wear the pink dress,” Gray said.
“Yes,” she said.
“You can buy yourself a pink dress,” he said. “You can find something you want to do, and do it. Find somebody to love who’ll love you back, and not have to hope you get the right one. Have the wedding and the flowers and the babies. All of that happens out here too, you know.”
“How will I know, though,” Oriana asked, “if he’s the right one? If nobody chooses him for me?”
“You’ll get to know him,” Gray said. “You’ll talk to him and meet his family and spend time with him. See how he treats people. And by then, you’ll have met heaps of boys. Heaps of men. You’ll be able to judge for yourself.”
“See if he laughs at your jokes,” I said. “That’s the best test. And like Gray says—if he’s kind to people he doesn’t have to be kind to.”
“Do you have to …” she said, and trailed off.
I wanted to hear some more about the phone call—what Gilead had said after that, what else Gray had told him—but this was important. Whatever one of my sisters asked, both of them were here to listen to the answer. “Do you have to what?” I asked.
“Do you have to have … sex?” she asked. “Before you’re married? The Prophet says people Outside all have adulterous sex. And that they’re … you know. Drinkers and fornicators. So is all that … required?” Her cheeks were dark with embarrassment, but she’d asked it.
“No,” Gray said. “It’s not required. You don’t have to drink unless you want to, and you shouldn’t have sex at all until you’re ready to have it. If that means you wait until you’re married, that’s a choice. If you want to do it sooner, and the fella wants to as well, and you use, uh, birth control …”
He glanced at me, the words, “I am not going to explain condoms” right there to read on his face. He cleared his throat and went on. “Right. If you want to, and you’re, uh, protected, that’s another choice. Most girls aren’t having it when they’re sixteen, though. Boys either, for that matter. Takes a bit longer, normally. To be … ready, I guess. Heaps of other things to do in the meantime, though. School and job and sport and all that. Important things.”