Chapter 4: Reassigned

There were months in which the countryside around Independence, Illinois, was beautiful. March, thought Jen Blake, was definitely not one of them. She’d just come back from visiting three different homebound parishioners; her hair was damp, and her shoes were soaked. Her internal state was no better than her external one.

The phone rang. “Independence United Methodist Church,” she said into it.

“Reverend Blake, please.”

“Speaking.”

“This is Terry Metzger. I’m superintendent of the Northern District.” Jen knew who Metzger was; there were only seven district superintendents, after all. But she’d long-ago learned that people whom it was easiest to recognize identified themselves thoroughly; men you’d met once -- and that was a year before while passing through a reception line -- said ‘This is Joe.’

“Yes, Reverend Metzger. What can I do for you?”

“Your letter said that you wanted to move from Independence and preferred an urban church nearer to Garret. How does Evanston Aldersgate sound?”

It, really, sounded like heaven. “That would be delightful.”

“I warn you that it is an equitable-salary church.” That meant that she would get as little salary as the Conference allowed for people of her years in the Conference. And that would only be three years.

“That isn’t one of our worries.” David drew a good salary, but the commute to Independence was killing him.

“Then how about Thursday, in two weeks? Sixteen days, really.”

“Where should I meet you?”

They set a time and a place.

“Guess where we’ll be next year?” she greeted David when he came home.

“Moline?” Her husband was in as bad a mood as she had been in before the phone call. Moline was about as far from Chicago, and from Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston where he taught, as was possible in the Conference.

“Close. A three-point charge on the Mississippi south of Moline.” This got her a smile. “However, Aldersgate is likelier.”

“Aldersgate? In Evanston?”

“In Evanston. The one in London is taken.”

“Darling. You’re so kind to me.” Why the assignment by the cabinet was a kindness on her part, she couldn’t tell. But he kissed her before she could frame that question, and the kiss was thorough. His hands roamed her back before settling on her rump and squeezing. His tongue entered her mouth to meet hers.

“It isn’t decided yet, you know,” she said much later. “I’ll meet their Staff-Parish Committee two weeks from Thursday.”

She’d cooked dinner, and he took them through a session on Romans before she rushed off to the church for a meeting of the Finance Committee. When she got back, David had cleared the table and washed up. The kitchen was neater than she’d ever kept it. He was upstairs reading while he pedaled away on his exercycle. He had arranged a contraption to hold the book open on a board in front of him without the use of his hands.

“Love you,” she said poking her head in.

“Love you,” he responded. She knew she wasn’t going to get anything more until he finished the chapter. But he soon came into the bedroom. He stripped off his track suit and slipped into bed beside her. “Mmm,” he said after the kiss, “I do love you, and in Evanston -- if we’re there next year -- I’ll have the energy to show it.”

She reached towards his groin to touch his erection. “You mean you’re planning to wait four months to use this?”

“Nope! I have energy enough to show my lust, just not enough to show my love.” She thought he showed his love every day.

David left her no time to consider that, though. He was too busy showing his lust. He stroked all over her body while he was kissing her. As his mouth left hers for her breast, his hand concentrated on the inside of her thighs. She spread her legs in welcome. He stroked her lower lips as he kissed all over her left breast. Finally, his lips reached its peak at the same moment his finger reached her clitoris. “Oh, David,” she said, reveling in all that sensation, “oh, yes.”

After some time, though, that sensation wasn’t enough. She reached for his erection again. David paused to kiss her right nipple while kneeling between her knees. Then she guided him to her center. “Oh, love,” he said just touching her there. Then he slid inside smoothly.

He filled her, spread her, pressed her down on the bed. She rubbed her hands down his back to hold his rump. The sensation of his muscles working under her hand was pleasant, as was his chest just brushing over her nipples. But the important sensations were from her groin where he was gliding in and out rubbing all of her most important parts.

She felt each separate sensation. Then she felt only a heightened excitement. Finally, that excitement peaked, and she spasmed around him. “Jen!” he shouted at the moment that his spasm joined hers.

When she was next aware of the world outside her body, he was lying over her gasping in her ear. She hugged him to her by his rump. He was too heavy, though. When she released her hold, he moved aside before collapsing beside her. One of his arms pulled the covers back across her before draping itself over her belly.

A few minutes later, she readjusted the covers -- one foot was still out in the air and felt quite chilly. She turned on her side and snuggled back against him. David turned on his side, too. He curled around her in the spoon and hugged her. She felt guilty about pressing the cold foot into his ankle, but his only response was a tighter hug.

Since David was already in Evanston Thursday, they met there for dinner before her appointment with the Staff-Parish Committee.

She talked with Metzger for a few minutes before they went to the church for the meeting. She became quite conscious that this was only to guarantee that she wouldn’t be late; they had nothing to talk about. “When David and I went to Reverend Campbell for counseling,” she told Metzger, “he commented that the couples he -- David -- had counseled were always nervous; and he could never understand why. Then he found himself being nervous before the first session with Reverend Campbell. The Committee at Independence was really sweet during the interview, although there was congregational resistance to having a woman pastor. Now, though, I find myself nervous again.”

Metzger chuckled. “That’s perfectly natural. The committee members are probably nervous, too. After all, you have done this once before. I doubt if any of them have. Bob Lawrence was here for years.”

He may have been right. The committee members didn’t seem to have many questions. Nancy Hashimoto, one of the two women on the committee, seemed to be more worried about Jen’s accepting them than about judging her. (Hashimoto was obviously a married name; she didn’t look Japanese.)

Bill Pierce, the chairman brought up David. Metzger intervened then. “Jen is the person you’re considering. Her husband would have no duties in the church. He might not even attend.”

“I know that,” said Pierce, who looked like he was hearing it for the first time. “But is this the David Blake who preached here once?”

“It is,” said Jen.

“Good man,” said Pierce.

“I don’t consider myself as good a preacher as he is,” said Jen. “I think my greatest strength lies in pastoral care.”

“Our last pastor stayed quite a long time,” Rich Davenport said. It wasn’t a question, but Jen treated it as one.

“Well, that is the Cabinet’s decision. I’m what we call a traveling preacher. But I’m not thinking of this church as a steppingstone, if that worries you. Mr. Pierce mentioned my husband; he teaches just down the street.”

“You’re not dreaming of a big suburban church?” asked Joan Oliver, the other woman on the committee.