The Lake of Dreams - Kim Edwards [41]
I wanted to see the window again, to see if there was anything I’d missed. Keegan had already gone, however; the door to the vestment room was locked. I probably could have eased it open if I’d tried, but the eyes of all those rectors lined up along the wall made me too uncomfortable. I had a sense, also, that I should not trespass, which echoed the feeling I’d always had growing up that the mystery of this place was ultimately sealed against me, no matter how much I might long to enter. I was a girl, and so my picture would never look like the long line of men whose faces lined the wall and whose domain this seemed. Though in the Episcopal Church women were regularly ordained starting in 1976, Suzi was the first female priest I had ever met. Likewise, in my family, the stories never had women at the center, which was one reason why the discovery of Rose—an ancestor I’d never heard of before—felt so astonishing and intriguing.
I walked on. The sanctuary was very still, my footsteps echoing on the tiles. Near the front doors, at the end of the aisle, I paused and turned. Light filtered through the stained-glass windows, muted and serene. Each one told a story, invisible in darkness, taking life only when the sun rose and filled the colors, and each was the story also of the people who had given it, long dead now, whose names ran along the bottom in gold letters. In honor of James, Hannah, Our Beloved Mother, The Evans Family, Sarah, Virginia, child of Susan and Samuel. What had Joanna said in the office as she handed me these papers? It gives you chills . . . all these people . . . standing right where we are now . . . living out their lives. My father had grown up in this church, and his father. My great-grandfather Joseph had walked these aisles before anyone alive today was born.
And Rose. She had stood here, too, decades before the chapel on the depot land was built yet somehow connected to it, holding her infant daughter, trying to soothe her perhaps, tucking the edge of blanket closer against the coolness radiating from the stone walls, even in May. Then she had walked out into the world and disappeared.
A door fell shut; footsteps sounded on the choir stairs, and then the Reverend Suzi emerged into the sanctuary.
“Ah, Lucy,” she said, looking momentarily startled. “Still here? Can I help you with something?”
“I’m just leaving. I just wanted to stand in the church for a minute, I guess. I hope that’s okay. I was thinking about all the people who’ve stood here before me. I haven’t been here since my father died,” I added.
“Of course it’s okay. I heard about his accident,” she said. “I’m sorry. It must have been very hard.”
I nodded. “It was. But it was a long time ago.”
“Some moments resonate in powerful ways,” she said.
Our voices were soft amid the stone walls, the wood. I didn’t know what else to say, and anyway my throat had thickened with the memory. Suzi let the silence gather for a moment.
“You’re Evie Jarrett’s daughter, aren’t you?” she asked, finally. “How’s your mother doing? How’s her arm?”
“She’s fine,” I said. “Better than I could have imagined, actually; she’s even got a date this afternoon.”
Again, Suzi didn’t respond right away, which made me really have to think about the words I’d spoken, to hear the sharp edge my tone had carried.
“You know, your mother’s very glad you’re here,” she said. “I went to see her after the accident and she was so excited that you might come. It must be a little strange for you, though. Are things very different?”
“Oh, very! Everything has changed so