Chapter 3

Cassie

It didn't matter what I thought, Yirmeyah Hudson was our pastor and I had to live with it. I pouted for a while – I guess I was a bit of a child still – and tried to find everything wrong with him, and it wasn't all that hard to do. He did talk like a hick, and his name was impossible, and he still walked all over the platform and sometimes off the platform, waving his Bible and shouting and banging on the pulpit. He was the kind of hellfire-and-brimstone wild preacher that I'd disliked all my life. Or so I told myself.

Daddy disagreed. "Have you listened to him, Cassie?"

"Why should I listen to him? He's a hillbilly!"

"Maybe he is, Cassie, but his doctrine's sound."

"I don't care about his doctrine!" I was being sullen and knew it and didn't care, because I knew that a sad little puppy dog face could always get to Daddy's heart. "He's the most uncool preacher I've ever seen and I want someone else!"

"But the church wants Brother Hudson."

"Maybe so, but I can't even say his name. What kind of name is that anyway?"

"Hebrew, I think. He said something about it once, but I was just passing by and didn't catch everything."

"Well whatever it is," I said with a whine in my voice, "it's a stupid name and I hate it and I wish we had another pastor."

"Cassie, darling, you're acting like a baby." He put his hand on my arm. "You may be 23 years old, but you're acting like you're three."

"Daaaaaadyyyyyyy!"

He shook his head. "Cassie, honey, I'd love to fix things for you, but this is something I can't do anything about. The church has voted, and Brother Hudson is our pastor, and you're just going to have to live with it."

And I knew he was right. Not just that I'd have to live with Yirmeyah Hudson being the pastor, but about me acting like a baby. I knew I was, and I wasn't sorry, not much anyway. I know I'm good looking, and I know how to get men's attention, and how to make Daddy do what I want. I've never been so successful with Mama, who's just as pretty as I am and knows what I'm doing, probably because she can do it herself. I wonder what Mama was like when she was my age. I bet she twisted men around her finger back then, the way I can twist them now.

Not that I ever did a lot of man-twisting. I'd been in church all my life and I knew what was right and wrong, and I never wanted to have men hanging off of me much less crawling into bed with me. It's one thing to look at a guy so that he goes red and turns away. That I never minded doing. But I never did want to be a slut or anything like that. I know that if I wore revealing dresses and put on garish makeup I could have flocks of men, but I never did want that. Maybe I was a baby in some ways, but at least there I'd always been intelligent.

At that, I never could twist Brother Hudson. I never really tried, because he was the pastor and no matter how much I wanted someone else, you don't touch the Lord's anointed. But I'd look at him the way I can, or talk a little flirtatiously, or wear a dress that I knew flattered me very well. And he treated me just like he treated Mrs. Socorro, who was at least 70 years old and showed it. I was so angry! I didn't want to catch him – that hick? – ha! I'd as soon catch one of the homeless people who sleep on the bench in Wal-Mart. But I did want to have some power over him. I wanted to find a weakness in him, some way I could put myself above him. I wasn't just a baby in those days, I was a pretty wicked woman in my way.

But I could have been Jezebel in all her paint and finery and Brother Hudson would never have done more than compliment me on how nice my dress looked. I could have been Bathsheba bathing naked in the open air, and he would only have said, "Ma'am—" he really did say "ma'am" "—you ought to get yourself dressed." He was the most frustrating man I'd ever met. How could that hick treat me like I was just another woman!

Mama knew what I was going through. "Cassie, you need to understand that he's a man of God. To him God is first, and everyone else is second. Even if he fell in love with you, God would always have first place. You're just going to have to realize that this is one man who's immune."

That wasn't the news I wanted to hear. I was a baby, and I was wicked, and I was very stubborn in those days.

Yirmeyah