Chapter 19: The Church Hall

The church hall held two hundred folding chairs, and by six o'clock all of them were full.

I had been cleared by my doctor on Thursday, and I wore the green dress I had not fit into since August.

Jonas stood beside me in a dark suit I had never seen, with his hands in his pockets.

He looked like a man at a funeral who intended to start a fight.

At the door a woman with a name tag handed us each a program.

On the front was Dennis's photograph, and the words Forty Years of Faithful Service.

"County commissioners are in the front row," Jonas murmured. "Two judges. The mayor. Half my post, in plain clothes."

"Your commander?"

"Fourth row. With a plate."

We walked down the side aisle to the third row.

Halfway there, with a crowd of strangers pressed on every side, Jonas bent his head to my ear.

"You were cleared on Thursday," he said, in a perfectly polite voice.

"I know."

"When we get home tonight, I'm going to put you on your grandmother's kitchen table."

My feet kept walking. I don't know how.

"I'm going to take that dress off you with my teeth," he said, "and I am not going to be gentle, and I am not going to be quiet."

A woman in a church coat smiled at us as we passed.

"Evening," Jonas told her, pleasantly.

My face was on fire. I could feel the scar under my dress.

"You can't say that here," I whispered.

"I just did."

I sat down in the third row, on the aisle, with my knees pressed together and my hands on the program.