Under the Light - By Laura Whitcomb Page 0,37

the print, through prayers and Scripture quotes and hymn titles, following my lead, and we shared (I hoped) a poem of my constructing: I – will – protect – thee – let – not – your – heart – be – sorrow.

When I couldn’t find the phrases I needed, I placed my finger on the white space in the middle fold of the bulletin. Jenny’s finger glided into the blank place between my finger and a staple and stopped. She stared at the page, her breaths coming in shallow puffs.

Leaning toward her ear, I whispered, “Please forgive me for leaving you alone in such a dark place. I’m here now, and I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

Her whisper was so soft, Cathy couldn’t have heard her unless she’d pressed her ear to the girl’s lips. “Is it you?” Jenny asked.

“Yes,” I whispered. I couldn’t find the word in the bulletin. I wrote the letters gently on her arm. Yes.

Jenny nodded ever so slightly.

“Ghost,” she whispered.

Again I wrote with my finger on the back of her hand a Y for Yes.

She shuddered, I thought, with equal parts fear and joy. My spirit answered in kind, flickering with nervous excitement.

I thought I felt someone watching me, which is an uncommon sensation for a spirit, but when I turned I saw that the woman across the aisle was studying Jenny. Her gaze went right through me. Behind this woman’s eyes I saw an unsettling mix of concern and pleasure. And under her eyes, a shadow.

At the end of the service Cathy took Jenny’s hand and tried to hurry out the back way before anyone spoke to them. A plump woman with a Noah’s ark sweater blocked the side door and began smothering Cathy with sympathy. I paced around them, impatient to be alone with Jenny. The woman asked Jenny to volunteer in the babies’ room so she could take Cathy to the ladies’ lounge for a talk.

“Oh, here’s Brad,” said the woman. “Honey, why don’t you walk Jennifer to the nursery?”

I stayed between this boy and Jenny, though he seemed perfectly harmless. He was thin and dressed as neat as a missionary. He chatted, oblivious that Jenny was not listening.

“If you ever need anyone to talk to,” he said. “Or pray with.” Jenny didn’t seem to have heard him. “Do you think you’ll want to go to the Harvest Dance?” he asked.

“What?” She didn’t appear to comprehend.

“I should ask your father if I can invite you.” Brad realized his faux pas. “I mean your mother, I guess. I think my mom already talked to her.”

How I wanted to swat him away as I would a horsefly. Jenny swung open the half door under the sign CHERUBS’ NEST and slammed it shut without inviting him in.

“I could come by your house,” he told her, leaning on the door shelf, but Jenny only smiled at him weakly and turned away. “I’ll just call.”

The nursery was full and loud. A dozen babies under the age of two sat, crawled, rolled, and toddled around the rainbow carpet. Half were laughing, half were fussing. No one napping. My heart clutched at the sight—every round face reminded me of my own child.

A tiny woman with thick spectacles was taping a torn page in a picture book. “Are you helping with second service?” she asked Jenny. “You’re a lifesaver.” She came over and put an arm around Jenny’s waist, gave her a squeeze, and whispered, “I’m so sorry about your father.”

News travels swiftly among the church ladies—some things never change.

The woman adjusted her glasses. “The usual sunbeams are here. Russell’s got a runny nose, but everyone else is full of spunk. Darryl Ann needs changing. Would you be a dear?”

A dimpled one-year-old waddled over to us, glanced at me without interest, and wrapped her arms around Jenny’s legs, grinning with four tiny teeth.

Jenny sighed. “Come on, you.” She swung the baby onto her hip and headed to the next door in the hallway. A utility closet had been remade into a diapering station with paper diapers in three sizes, boxes of wipes, powders, lotions, and a large lidded trash can.

It might have been the way the child held the back of Jenny’s dress in her fist, or the way her leg swung as it dangled, or the size of the closet, but I imagined I could smell the baby’s sweaty hair and milk-sweet breath. I felt the weight of her, the warmth of her on my side, though she was