Kevin gets his chance to be normal on his p-day the next day when he, Arnold, Mafala and Nabulungi go for coffee.
"Glad to see you back, Elder Price," Sister Kimbay says, handing him a mocha latté.
"Aw, heck, just try keeping me away," he says, grinning. He feels a moment's unease when she grins back. Since Arnold mentioned his unwitting disregard for rule 77 a few days ago, he's tried not to flirt. However, she's acting no different with him than normal, so he figures that she's just being polite.
Sister Kimbay's smile dims. "May I ask you a question, Elder Price?" At his nod, she continues. "I spoke with a young woman yesterday in Yunna. Her mother is sick with AIDS, she has no father, and she has five younger brothers and sisters. She kept asking me how the Book of Arnold could help her. Elder Price...I could think of nothing to say but 'God loves you.'" She shakes her head sadly. "What do you think I should have said?"
Kevin perks up. This was what he'd trained to do for years. "You spoke from your heart, Sister Kimbay. There aren't any better words than those. You're a farmer throwing out seeds. Some will land on stony ground, some in fertile soil. You may not have gotten a placement, but she'll have those seeds now. The rest is between her and God."
Worry clears from her expression like storm clouds disappearing after rain, showing a glowing sun. "Thank you, Elder Price! All night, I was so angry at myself for not knowing what to say."
"Just do your best. That's all you can do."
She nods. "My best, however, can always be improved...Do you think you could go over some of the Book of Arnold with me after my shift?"
Kevin glances behind him at Arnold. "Elder Cunningham and I would be happy to help."
For some reason, Mafala chuckles. Nabulungi shares a glance with Arnold, then says, "Sorry, Elder Price, but I need to borrow Elder Cunningham to help me with the church's letter to the Red Cross."
"Looks like it'll just be you and me then," Kevin says to Sister Kimbay, who grins.
Kevin gets out of line and heads to the table, only to stop when Mafala advises him, "Swirl your coffee around, Elder Price!"
Confused, Kevin does.
"Don't drink it if you ever hear something solid. That'd be the dried tip of a goat's penis."
"Baba!" squeals Nabulungi, giggling, while Kevin blushes at the thought. Sister Kimbay thumps Mafala in his upper arm and calls him many colourful names; Kevin can't be sure if she's faux-angry or real-angry.
Mafala laughs heartily at Kevin's expression, then explains, "Some people in this village believe it's a love potion."
"I don't," Sister Kimbay assures him, smacking Mafala's arm once more. "I'm Church of Arnold through and through."
"Of course," Kevin replies. He glances at Sister Kimbay, who can't hold his gaze for long, but smiles that smile lots of girls seem to get around him. He smiles back, and she giggles as if he's just said something funny. She looks pretty. Surely he can't be asexual if he knows she looks pretty.
They get together later that day. Kevin has all his books with him, from Sunshine for the LDS Teenage Soul to The Theological Foundations of the Mormon Religion. Sister Kimbay naturally wants to get out of the coffee shop, so they go to the mission.
They talk as they walk. Sister Kimbay's family is almost as big as Kevin's: she has an older brother ("I had another, Mawe, but he joined the LRA and no one's heard from his since.") and three younger sisters. Both her parents are still alive ("Which makes me the luckiest girl in the village.") though, like her older brother, they're both working in Kampala ("They can only get time off work to visit once every month or so."). Kevin talks about his own life—his mother who doesn't need to work, his family all living in the same house, his biggest concerns being good grades and godly living—and it's never sounded so foreign.
"I just realized I don't know your first name," Sister Kimbay says.
"Kevin."
"I'm Effu." She rolls her eyes. "You can imagine how many jokes I got about that!"
She has a deep, infectious laugh, and Kevin can't help but laugh along with her.
They reach the mission and sit side by side on the couch. Elders Neeley and Church are playing checkers nearby, and Elder McKinley is humming a showtune of some sort in his office, which means he's doing the mission's paperwork.
"Okay," Kevin says, "let's start with the big question: Why does God allow suffering?"
Effu, clearly thrown, takes a moment to reply. "Because of the Prime Directive." Kevin waits for her to explain it. She says, "Um, God cannot interfere obviously, otherwise there would be no point to faith. 'If I do things right,' God tells Joseph Smith, 'people won't realize I've done anything at all.' Right?"
It departs from the doctrine of original sin—More than it should, Kevin thinks, before he remembers that, if God exists, He probably doesn't care—but it seems to work for the villagers. Kevin nods, and Effu relaxes.
"Very good, Sister Kimbay—except, hmm. It kinda makes Heavenly Father sound mean, doesn't it?"
"Um..."
"What's so great about this free will stuff? If God has all this power, if He can stop all the suffering in the world, why doesn't He anyway?"
"Because...because..."
He smiles so she doesn't feel too stressed. "Take as long as you need."
Effu opens her copy of the Book of Arnold and begins searching through it. Kevin reaches into his backpack, pulls out a highlighter and hands it to her. "Here—I've found this helps."
"Thank you. I wish I had more time to read this. I got in trouble the other day for reading when the cafe was empty." She keeps searching for a few more minutes, then stops with a sigh.
"Because the Bridge Builder, Jesus Christ, died for our sins?" she guesses. "Can't I see how you do it, Elder Price?"
He'd like to make her find her own way to answer his question, but he can tell she's getting frustrated. "Sure. We'll do it just like we're proselytizing, okay?"
She nods, and he pretends to ring a doorbell. Her raised eyebrow makes him remember that he's not at the missionary training center anymore—he mimes knocking.
Effu frowns. "What do you want, white boy?"
Kevin beams at her. "Hi, ma'am. I'd like to take a moment of your time to talk to you about a very special book."
"A book? A book? My brother just got gunned down in the street, my husband is dead of AIDS, and warthogs trampled my baby!" For all he knows, warthogs have trampled some villager's baby—so he thinks until Effu chuckles, anyway. "Relax. That was a joke! Warthogs would eat a baby instead of trample it."
Pumbaa, noooooo! Kevin's inner child wails, but Kevin forces a short chuckle.
"I'm sorry to hear what's happened to you and your family. The Book of Arnold is for people just like you: hurting people, who need help and don't know where to turn."
"I know where to turn—left and walk for five miles to the nearest Red Cross."
He grins. "Well, if you ever need a little extra help..." He begins with his standard recap of the story of Joseph Smith, though a part of his soul still shrivels at what he has to say. Really, Arnold, you couldn't think of anything better than "he lay with a frog"?
"...land of Salt Lake City," he finishes. On a whim, he adds something he's been working on, "In God's care, there is love; in God's love, there is strength; in God's strength, there is peace. The biggest lie of this world is that this isn't true."
Effu's face glows with the light of the Lord. She tries to put on her disbelieving persona, but can't quite manage it. A male voice murmurs, "Wow." Elders Neeley and McKinley are staring at him with various shades of awe. Elder Church, Kevin notes with concern, is staring intently at the checker board. Either he wasn't listening, or what Kevin said didn't touch him at all.
Rob has a particularly large grin on his face. "OM-gosh, that was amazing, Elder Price."
"Heck, it was nothing." He shrugs the way he always did whenever someone praised him before Uganda—and clutches those words to his heart the exact same way. He finds himself thinking, I hope Heavenly Father noticed how incredible I just was...
If He exists, his new self adds, which deflates his ego quite quickly. What would everyone say if they knew how little he believed his words? Like a Pharisee, I'm a whitewashed tomb; beautiful on the outside but full of bones and rags within.
He looks from Rob's shining face to Effu's. It works. That's all that matters.
He runs through his exercises with Effu, sometimes playing the villager, sometimes playing the church member. She improves dramatically: soon, she has a ready answer for most of the major questions. It's a great start—they can work on the finer points another day.
Effu glances at the clock: it's almost 11:00 PM. "Oh! I should get home."
"I'll walk you back."
Rob says, "Elder Price, have you forgotten about mission rule 38?"
How convenient that they're suddenly enforcing the rule that no missionary may leave the premises after 10:30 pm. Rob meets Kevin's suspicious gaze without flinching, looking the soul of innocence.
"Please, Elder McKinley, can't he?" Effu says. "At least I won't have to worry about lions on the way home." Kevin has no idea what she's talking about; from the looks on their faces, neither do any of the other ex-Mormons.
Effu grins slyly. "Or was Nabulungi mistaken when she said you returned from the dead after being eaten by lions?"
"Well, that whole resurrection thing is a bit of a blur..." Kevin says quickly. He's never been sure how many villagers believe that story, and isn't about to put it to the test now.
He grabs the flashlight and he walks Effu to the village. It rained while they were in the mission: a chorus of frogs fills the silence. It occurs to Kevin that he's never been alone with a woman before. All his dates were group dates, going to bowling alleys, church potlucks and baseball games, often with parents or other family in attendance.
Kevin wipes his damp palms on his pants. Is it okay to be nervous?
"So..." Effu says. "How did I do today?"
"You did good. Very good. You really stumped me with that evolution question." Kevin makes a mental note to ask Arnold how the church should handle it.
"Maybe God will reveal that truth to our prophet." Effu shrugs. "If not, it probably does not matter how we were created—only that we are here." The conviction in her voice makes Kevin grin. He's helped, and that's amazing.
Their conversation continues, easy, meandering, often punctuated with Effu's deep belly-laugh. She seems particularly interested in what he'll do when he returns to the States. He gives her his standard answer—get a business degree from Brigham Young University—then, feeling weirdly dissatisfied, interrupts himself.
"Actually... I think this is the old, pre-Uganda Kevin talking. Have to say, I'm not really sure what I'm going to do." BYU seems off the table now, at the very least.
"Dreams change." Effu sounds uncharacteristically serious. "The Church of Arnold changed mine. I never had any dreams. Just to make enough money for me and my family to eat regularly."
"Not even a daydream? I find that hard to believe."
She's quiet for a moment, then says, "To do something important for my country. I know, I know, it is very...what is the phrase? Cheesy? Corny? But I always wanted to work for the government—well, once that scum Museveni is gone."
"Who?"
"Um, the Ugandan president?" Kevin blushes at his ignorance. "Because his armed thugs are at every voting booth—when voting booths actually are open—he's managed to be president for 24 years."
"That's awful!"
"I know! If I were president, I'd make Uganda free for democracy!" She pauses, then snorts. "Listen to the coffee-shop girl, talking so big."
"Come on, don't put yourself down like that. What else would you do if you were president?"
Kevin has always tried to be in the world but not of the world; politics has never interested him. It clearly interests Effu. Once she starts talking, he can barely keep up.
Nearby high-pitched hyena laughter cuts her off. For a second, Kevin expects to see Arnold. Then Effu grabs his hand in her sweaty one and Kevin realizes that the laugh came from an actual hyena.
"We might have to run," she whispers. "Depending how big the pack is."
Kevin's stomach plummets. "Oh."
They stand stock still. Bushes rustle to their left. "The light," Effu whispers. Kevin has no idea what she means. She grabs the flashlight from his hand and shines it to their left. Eyes gleam bright green from a furry face—like Scar's eyes, Kevin thinks. But Scar was a cartoon lion, and this is a real hyena, and maybe there are others, and maybe—
The face vanishes. More bushes rustle as the animal moves farther and farther away. Soon, all they hear is the constant calling of the frogs.
Breath wooshes from Kevin's lungs. Effu giggles softly. As he's trying to catch his breath, she hands him the flashlight back. His fingers are too numb to grab hold; the flashlight thuds on the packed-dirt trail. He begins to bend down, but has only lowered himself a half-inch when Effu stops him with her lips on his.
This is it: God's test. Kevin makes his muscles unclench. He will be normal.
Except he won't. Because in his head there's a voice saying, No! Not for me! It's strong, as Satan's tricks tend to be.
Effu begins to pull back; Kevin leans in. She makes a surprised-sounding "Mmph!"—which becomes a low chuckle as her arms encircle his neck.
NO! booms the voice. God used to talk to Kevin Price: even Heavenly Father's voice wasn't this loud. NOT FOR ME! He forces himself to put his arm around her shoulders.
YOU DON'T KISS A GIRL BECAUSE YOU WANT TO BE NORMAL!
Oh, Heavenly Father, what is he doing?
A spotlight lands on the two of them. He and Effu break apart, blinking. It's no spotlight, but the beam of a flashlight. Its wielder yelps, then babbles, "Um! Wow. Uh, sorry! Sorry!"
Arnold seeing this is the perfect punishment. Kevin feels filthy.
Without letting go of Kevin's hand, Effu picks up the flashlight. Breathlessly, she says, "Um, watch out for hyenas."
"SURE!" The beam of Arnold's flashlight swings up and down as he flails. "THANKS!"
"Or try to deafen them—that works, too."
Arnold whoops in laughter. "Good one!" To Kevin, he says, "Um, I'll...see you whenever you get back." He opens his mouth to speak, pauses, then changes whatever he was going to say to, "Bye!"
Arnold hurries past them, and Kevin and Effu continue to the village, still holding hands.
"So embarrassing," Effu murmurs. "Hopefully," she nudges him playfully in the ribs, "we used up our awkwardness quota for the day."
We definitely haven't. There's got to be some way he can let her down gently. Fortunately, she seems content to walk in silence holding his hand, so Kevin can wrack his brain without distraction.
Kevin hasn't figured anything out by the time they reach her house. He can't go five seconds without swallowing. He inhales shakily, getting ready to speak.
"I really enjoyed getting to know you," Effu says, squeezing his hand.
"Me too." It's not a lie, but it doesn't mean what she obviously thinks it does.
"I have this Tuesday off work. I would love to join you and Elder Cunningham as you proselytize—if you do not think Elder Cunningham would pass out, that is."
Kevin gulps and finally pulls his hand out of hers. "We should...we should probably clear the air about what happened on the trail."
All he hears are chirping frogs for at least ten seconds. Her, "Oh?" is so quiet that he almost misses it.
"You're a great person, Sister Kimbay—really amazing—but I just don't think of you romantically. I—"
"Oh." Her laugh, like all of hers, comes from deep in her belly, but this one is nowhere near infectious. "Okay. Well. Obviously I misread the signs when you kissed me back then held my hand for ten minutes. Silly me."
Had it been ten whole minutes? He'd been too preoccupied to notice. "I think I was just caught up in a surge of...emotions, and I expressed them very inappropriately. It wasn't right or fair of me. I'm sorry."
Effu chuckles, but it's a tight, angry sound. "So, the air is clear. Watch out for hyenas on the way back." Without another word, she goes inside.
He returns to the mission to find the ex-Mormons involved in a game of darts. So much for rule 123—all missionaries must be asleep by 10:30 pm. Kevin slaps his good ol' Mormon smile on his face. Arnold stands when he sees Kevin, eyeing him intently while trying, and failing, to look casual.
Rob McKinley stands ready to throw. Without glancing Kevin's way, he asks, "How was the walk?" His tone is smarmy and gloating—he always knew Kevin was going to fail.
Kevin glares at his district leader. Rob glances his way, then recoils, eyes widening. It's then that Kevin realizes maybe Rob's tone was all in his head and the question had been perfectly innocent.
Kevin busts out the smile again. "No lions."
Rob's a master at turning his feelings off: his expression seamlessly becomes chipper. "Great!" He turns back to the dartboard and throws. His dart hits the wall.
"ELDER PRICE!" Arnold booms. "I HAVE THE HUNGER GAMES BOOK THAT YOU WANTED TO BORROW! IT'S ON MY KINDLE—C'MON!"
They make a quick but not terribly subtle escape to their room.
"Sooooooo," Arnold says, looking a little bit terrified. "The Hunger Games really is a great series, and I totally will loan it to you if you want, and how did the walk go?, except you might not like the third book; I still have my issues with the ending."
Kevin's anger drains in the face of Arnold's frantic concern. He even manages a small, brief smile. "We're not dating." He sighs, remembering Effu's tight, clipped tone. "I really wish I'd figured that out earlier."
Arnold winces. "Yeah, that part...kinda sucks." He squeezes Kevin's shoulder. "Tomorrow is a latter day, buddy." It's a stock phrase for him, but right now Kevin feels a glimmer of hope. A latter day: a chance to do better, a chance to make things right.