The Twelve O’Clock Service

This story was written in 2018. I have learned a lot about writing stories since then, but it’s strange what resonates.

At the beginning of June, Charlie asked me to take him to church. Like so many of his requests and instructions it came out of the blue one evening after he had returned home in more of a state than usual. We weren’t watching the news that summer and the radio was unplugged because you could never be sure if a bulletin would pop up on the half hour. Just about everything was upsetting him: potholes; beggars; wildfires; earthquakes; and cyclones and flooding in places he would not be able to locate on a globe. Parliament was going into early recess, but the prospect of one more report on how the government was or was not managing Brexit was enough to send him out the door for another long walk. And don’t get me started on a certain President whose name we had agreed not to say out loud. I would have appreciated more help with our two year old, but I would be lying if I didn’t admit that things ran more smoothly when my husband was out of the house.

‘You can drop me off when you’re going for Boo,’ Charlie said when he asked for a lift to the twelve o’clock service.

It wasn’t exactly on the way.

‘You’ve never been religious,’ I said. ‘And why did you pick that one?’

‘A person can change,’ he said over his shoulder. Twenty seconds later, the door to the study clicked shut and that was me and Boo left to amuse ourselves for the evening.

Well, yes, a person can change. We have to, don’t we – whether we like it or not? It’s interesting, don’t you think, how the people closest to the people who go on about changing have to do quite a bit of unwanted changing of their own? I never asked to be a stay-at-home mum. I didn’t even know what SAHM meant and it’s difficult to infer tone from an email, but I’m sure my sister was passing judgement when she declared that that was what I had chosen. Charlie was right, of course, when he calculated that we would be no better off with us both working and having to pay for a childminder, but why did it have to be me?  I mean, I’m not sure I’d have trusted him with Boo – not all day – but there was no discussion, just as there was no discussion about why he couldn’t drive himself to the church.

‘I’m getting rid of my car. We only need the Volvo to ferry Boo around.’

And just like that, it was sold. It would have been nice, once in a while, to take off on my own in a car that wasn’t filled with baby stuff; I would have loved not to have to remember to brush rice cakes and crumbs and other crap off my shoes whenever I stepped out of the car. But there we have it: the Jaguar was gone and because of something I wouldn’t understand about the insurance, I became the sole and designated driver in our household; one whose responsibilities included taking the breadwinner to the station every morning, our two-year-old to and from nursery and of course, the weekly shopping. On top of all that, I was now required to drop off my husband at Ewell Street Pentecostal Mission for the midday service.

‘Every day?’

‘Yes, at least to begin with.’

‘But what about work? And weekends?’

‘Weekends too. I’m going to work from the study for a couple of months. Maybe three.’

‘Well, you’re the boss,’ I said, jealous of his workforce.

Like I say, I’m used to change and god knows I don’t resist it, but it was so difficult to keep up that summer, never mind the heatwave that had us all out of sorts. Boo had only been going to the childminder for three months, and I had learned to fill those precious two and a half hours – half an hour of which was spent in the Volvo – with housekeeping and meal planning and preparation as Charlie had suggested. Once a week I was able to steal an hour for myself, during which I liked to email colleagues and read up on the latest developments in legal aid and family law. But when Charlie began to work from the study my routine went out of the window. He didn’t like the sound of the vacuum cleaner and the kettle was too loud. Smells from the kitchen were a distraction and I didn’t even bother asking whether a little music, played at low volume, would disturb him. Headphones were out of the question. The best thing for me to do was sit with a book, from the shelf Charlie had filled for me, until it was time to get back in to the household’s remaining car.

If there hadn’t been a sign outside, you might have driven past the Ewell Street Mission having assumed it was a school. It was a square, modern affair, with a car park in front and a second, smaller building squatting at the side. The first time I dropped Charlie off, I drove into the car park and stopped in front of the main entrance. The doors were closed and there were no signs of life, but Charlie said I wasn’t to wait as he didn’t want the childminder charging extra. As I drove off I saw him walking around the side of the church, but the next day he insisted I pull up in the road, so I never knew which door he used. For the next two months I saw people walking through the gates before and after him. No one ever waited to talk to him or to anyone else, which didn’t seem particularly Christian to me; but Charlie never complained. Not about that.

‘They never, ever, start on time,’ he said at half past three one wet afternoon. It was his habit to walk home after church, having insisted he would not put me to any more trouble than was necessary.

I looked up from the jigsaw Boo was working on. It was sheep and cows and little fluffy clouds. ‘I suppose God has all time in the world,’ I said with a smile. Boo chuckled, not at my joke, but the response was appreciated.

‘And it always runs over,’ Charlie continued, as though talking only to himself.

He was right about that. It did run over. It was a forty minute walk – and Charlie was not a dawdler – but he never got home before three o’clock and often it was later. I knew enough about Pentecostalism to imagine a bit of shouting and singing and maybe even speaking in tongues, but a midday service was surely meant to cater for the faithful on their dinner hours. Whatever they were doing in there, it gave me enough time to get Boo home and fed and to catch up with the chores rescheduled from the morning. A few times when he got home, Charlie actually sat down and played with Boo before the study called, but mostly he went straight to the kitchen and drank two or three glasses of water. He never asked for any lunch and I assumed they fed him at the church as he wasn’t the type to eat on the move. By mid-July though, he had lost quite a bit of weight and by the beginning of August I had to say something.

‘Aren’t they feeding you?’ I asked as we pulled up to the kerb outside the Mission.

‘What?’ he replied, as though I had broken a dream. Our fifteen minute journey had long since been a silent schlep.

‘In the church. Don’t they feed you?’

‘At a meeting? Why would they?’ He stepped out of the car and closed the door without looking back. ‘Don’t be late for Boo.’

I lowered the passenger window and leaned over. ‘When was I ever late for Boo? Make sure you get some food. You’re losing weight.’

I knew that would get his attention. He stopped as though picked off by a sniper. I relaxed behind the wheel as he took his turn to lean through the window.

‘I am not losing weight,’ he said between his teeth. From the tone of his voice I knew that he knew he was fooling neither of us.

A council van almost took the front wing off the Volvo as I eased out on to Ewell Street. Even so, I couldn’t help but grin to myself in the mirror. Meeting was an odd word for a church service, but that didn’t occur to me as I was too busy flitting between the novelty of having got one over on my husband and the guilt I was sure I was meant to feel. I was also wondering what to feed Boo, and composing a reply to Sally’s latest taunts. When Charlie hadn’t returned by teatime, I strapped my little man into the car seat and drove to the Mission. The double doors were open. A man in a suit was walking between rows of chairs, placing what I imagined were hymn sheets and prayer books on each seat. Boo was in the middle of a singsong with his finger puppets, so I got out of the car and walked into the church. I stopped and cleared my throat under a huge wooden cross which was swinging from the high ceiling on a fine metal cable. There was an A-Frame to one side, on which there was a photograph of the man in the suit, with arms outstretched. Pastor John McClenahan welcomes You to Ewell Street.

‘Good evening, sister,’ said the voice of the man in the suit in the photograph.

Not being used to such friendly tones, I blurted out ‘I’m looking for Charlie.’

‘Only me so far,’ said Pastor John, ‘but not for long.’

‘He probably left ages ago,’ I said.

‘I’ve only just opened up,’ said the Pastor.

‘From the twelve o’clock meeting.’

‘Oh. The twelve o’clock meeting.’ He sucked his lips over his teeth and pinched his nose between thumb and forefinger.

‘Did you see him? Did you see Charlie?’ I asked.

‘I think I know Charlie,’ he said, ‘but the meetings are separate. Not mine. And sometimes they can last a little longer. If it’s who I’m thinking of, he sometimes sits in here.’

‘Doing what?’

‘The meetings are next door. In the meeting room.’ He pointed towards the double doors. He said something else which I didn’t hear.

I unbuckled Boo and lifted him out of the Volvo. We held hands as we walked around the side of the church. The finger puppets made my palm itch. The meeting room doors were wedged open, but we had to pass through a second set before we could see Charlie at the far end of the room, sitting with his back to us in a circle of people. A woman in a puffa jacket was mumbling to her feet; she looked up and pointed at us. She was right: we shouldn’t have been there.

Charlie says that a person has to want to change and then a person has to do it for himself. He also says I have enough to think about with Boo and the house without him bothering me with his problems. We’re lucky because with some couples only one of them can drive and if that had been the case, where would we have been when he lost his licence? I understand – I really do – how someone might turn to drink with everything that’s going on in the world, never mind a business to run and a mortgage to pay and a toddler that won’t stop growing. But I’ll never, ever forgive him for turning his back on his son and shouting at me to get that bloody child out of the room.