Promise of Safekeeping : A Novel (9781101553954) by Lisa Dale Page A

are first and foremost sounds.

C HAPTER 5

    Arlen hadn’t wanted to meet the woman who would one day be his wife—not at first—though he’d heard all about her.
A sweet girl,
his mother had told him as she stirred big pots of peanut soup on the stove in her house.
And you need to get yourself a girl, Arlen. I won’t always be around to keep you in line.
    Arlen found that the best way to get his mother off the subject of this Eula person was to not respond, to let his mother just burn herself out. With each new description, Eula became more beautiful, more intelligent, more generous, more everything. She was a good cook, and Arlen’s mother wanted a girl who would cook for him since he’d never so much as lifted a finger to butter bread. Eula had ambition too—she was a senior in high school and she made top marks, especially in her computer classes. Plus, she towed the line when it came to religion; she was the daughter of a deacon at his mother’s church. Arlen, who had to listen to his mother’s monologues about the endless talents of Eula Oates while he was scarfing down dinner, sometimes asked polite questions,sometimes changed the subject, and sometimes told his mother, flat out,
No
.
    Eventually, when his mother grew tired of waiting for Arlen to show interest, she arranged for Eula to come over to the house to help her with canning the peaches that grew in the far corner of the property. Eula, who wasn’t exactly dutiful but who didn’t mind helping either, had walked into the house while Arlen was drinking straight from the milk carton with the refrigerator door open and his oldest pair of work jeans on. When he turned to her, he felt as if he’d been hit in the chest with a basketball, the breath knocked out of his lungs. He asked her out that day, sure that she’d come to the house in secret pursuit of his affection, because she and his mother were obviously in on the scheme together. But Arlen’s mother hadn’t known Eula as well as she’d thought: Eula hadn’t fallen on her knees in gratitude that Arlen had asked her out—not by a long shot. She’d finished stocking the jars of fresh preserves in the pantry, and then she’d said,
Maybe. But I don’t know.
    The summer storms came and went, and for two months, Arlen did his best to win Eula’s attention. He started going to church again; he ironed his own suit because his mother wasn’t getting the pleats exactly right. He dropped by the drive-in movie theater where Eula collected ticket stubs; he saw the same three movies half a dozen times. When he could stand it no longer, he found out from Will that Eula was quite possibly seeing another guy.
    First he was angry. Then beaten. He avoided the drive-in. He began to mope. His mother dropped his plate of eggs and bacon down on the table with an accusing thud. “Didn’t I raise you to be better than this?” she asked him, jabbing her pointer finger. “You want something, you gotta fight for it. You can’t give up.”
    Another week passed before he dragged himself back to the drive-in, where he was probably the only person in the field under the giant screen who watched the film alone. He was adjusting hisradio when he heard a knock on his window, and when he turned his head, a man he didn’t know was there scowling at him, bending down.
    “You Arlen?”
    Arlen rolled down the window. “Who’s asking?”
    Eula was running up from behind the man a moment later, breathing hard, her eyes wide with panic. She wore an orange shirt and little shorts that showed off her curves. She took the guy by the arm. “Don’t. Leon, don’t. Please?”
    Leon shook her off him, so violently and condescendingly that it made Arlen fume. “No, no, no,” Leon said. He tugged the door of Arlen’s car open. All around them, people had started rolling down their windows, paying attention to the drama that was unfolding under the big screen. “You said this is the guy who’s been coming around bothering