“Sit.” Newsome took the brown leather chair on the working side of his L-shaped desk. He had a huge monitor positioned on the short side of the L, which butted the wall. His screen saver was a single 3-D word floating to the monitor’s border then bouncing off in another direction like an unbreakable soap bubble. The word was “Blessed.”

A single incense stick burned next to a fancy gold pen set. A heat ring had eaten it to its slim midpoint. A broken ash snake settled beneath it, and I found it hard to look at anything else when I sat.

“Mr. Rainey!” he said, forcing my attention to him.

I didn’t like when grown-ups called me “mister.” It felt like they were telling toddlers that they’re “big boys.” Still, I said, “Yes, sir.”

“You’re probably wondering what this is about.”

My costume? Maybe someone overheard what I was really supposed to be. Was this the “let me tell you how we do things here, son” lecture Jameer warned me about?

Silently, I awaited my reaming.

Newsome said, “I hear you’re taking that sex class over at the high school. I’m going to need to know more about that.”

Chapter 12

SILENCE STRETCHED BETWEEN US WHILE I processed what I’d heard. “Healthy Living? You want to talk about that?”

“Yes, I believe that’s how they’re referring to it.” He reached beneath his desk and brought out a legal pad and a pencil. “Tell me a bit about what they’re exposing you to.”

Why did he want to talk about Healthy Living?

He said, “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable, son.”

“I’m not uncomfortable.” Lie.

“You and your mother only been coming to service for a couple of months now? It’s so nice that you’ve joined us. We don’t get a lot of new blood, and we’re always happy to see wholesome families grace our pews. Is your father in the home?”

What? “Yes. My dad lives with us.”

“Awesome. I know good stock when I see it.”

I had a hard time figuring how any of this stuff fit together. My dad living with me making me good stock. Healthy Living. New blood in the church. I didn’t really want to talk to Pastor Newsome, in his office, alone, but we were chatting it up just the same.

“Do you like it here at First Missionary, Mr. Rainey?”

“It’s okay.”

“You never had the good fortune to meet our First Lady, Odessa.” He motioned to a framed photo on his desk, turned outward. It was a portrait of a thin, wrinkled brown lady in a bright silver wig. “My wife loved the young people. The Lord never saw fit to bless us with children of our own, so she became exceptionally protective of the youth in our charge—and I don’t just mean my niece Vanessa. In a way, every child at First Missionary became our child.”

Another ashy stub fell off his incense; the glowing red heat ring crawled toward the stem.