Stevie.
"I mean, what did you think of the blessing he gave you?"
"Fine," said Stevie.
"Let's not quiz him," said Step to DeAnne. But what he was really thinking was, Do you have to remind him of how inadequate my blessing was?
"Sorry," said DeAnne, her feelings hurt a little.
"Nothing to be sorry about," he said.
Stevie spoke up from the back seat. "Dad?"
"Yes, Door Man?"
"You said that I'd bring joy and peace to my friends."
"And family," said Step.
"Well I don't know how," said Stevie.
"But that's what the gift of the Holy Ghost is for," said Step. "To show you how."
"But what if the Holy Ghost doesn't tell me?"
"Then maybe it isn't time for you to do anything about it yet. Or maybe you just haven't learned how to hear what the Spirit of God is saying. Or maybe you aren't supposed to do anything yet."
"Oh," said Stevie. A moment passed. Stevie said, "I'd really like to."
"Like to what?" asked DeAnne.
"Make them happy."
"Make who happy?" asked DeAnne.
You know who he means! Step wanted to shout.
"Jack and Scotty and David," said Stevie. The imaginary friends. Only now there were three.
"Stevie," said DeAnne. "Who is David?"
"Just another kid we play with," said Stevie. "Me and Scotty and Jack."
Stevie might have been confirmed, and the Lord may or may not have given Step words to speak in his confirmation, but the fact remained that Stevie was still living in a world where invisible friends came to play with him. And today he had added another. Or was it today?
DeAnne asked, "Did David just ... move in or something? I don't remember you talking about him before."
Move in, yes, that's a good one, thought Step. Let's pretend that these friends actually live in the neighborhood and have families and new ones just "move in" from time to time.
"He's been around for a while," said Stevie. "I think he was born in Steuben cause he talks southern and I can't understand him all that well yet. I mean I can, but I have to listen slower."
All right, DeAnne, thought Step. You were right. He needs to see a psychiatrist or somebody, anyway. I've never heard him talk about his imaginary friends this way. As if they had real lives. He must be spinning out their biographies faster than Step was coming up with code for Hacker Snack on the 64. You knew this, DeAnne. You've heard this sort of thing before. No wonder you were so upset. No wonder you insisted. This is too much for us alone.
When they pulled into the driveway Bappy's pickup truck was out front. "On Sunday?" asked Step.
As if he had heard the question, Bappy came around from the back yard. "Y'all at church?" he asked. "I come by at about four thinking you was bound to be back from church but nobody was here."
"We had a special meeting," said Deanne. "Stevie got baptized today."
"Well that's something," said Bappy "That's really something. So y'all don't baptize babies either, eh?"
"Are you Baptist?" asked Step.
"Well, my daddy was a Pentecostal minister, and he was a real dunker, he put 'em all the way under and held 'em down till the sins were all drownded and so were the ones who found Jesus, I'll tell you. Why, some of
'em came up with a mouthful of mud, he pushed 'em down so far!" DeAnne and Step joined in Bappy's laughter, but Step was thinking, I don't like making light of baptism, not today, not in front of the kids.
"Well," said Step, "anyway I'm sorry we weren't here. Have you waited long?"
"Oh, I didn't wait at all," said Bappy. "I figured, I know I oughta ask 'em first, but here I am and there's the tent flies in the back yard and I gotta do something about 'em, and it's not like I'm gonna make a mess that I don't clean right up."
"Is that what those cobwebby things on the trees are?" asked DeAnne. "Tent flies?"
"Them eggs hatch and the worms can eat every leaf right off the tree," said Bappy. "So I bag 'em up and prune 'em off. Got my truck mostly filled now, and you won't have any more of them wormy things dropping off on your kids under the trees."
"Yay!" shouted Robbie. "Those are really icky!" He charged around back, Betsy hard on his heels.
"Well I got 'em all," said Bappy. "Or almost. I will have 'em all by the time the day's over."
Step wasn't comfortable having Bappy doing yardwork on the Sabbath. But he