At exactly six forty-five that evening, Carla’s doorbell rang. Carla went over to the small table set for two and rearranged the little bouquet of flowers. Then, glancing around her small apartment, she opened the door.
“Hello,” Marc said, holding out to her three beautiful red roses.
“Hi,” Carla answered. “How beautiful! Thank you,” she said as she took the flowers.
“Oh, come in,” she laughed, somewhat nervously.
“Mmm. Something smells terrific!”
“I hope you’re hungry.”
“I’m always hungry when there’s a home-cooked meal.”
“Hmm.” Carla commented, closing the door as Marc walked inside. “Does that mean you don’t cook very much yourself?”
“That would mean exactly that.” He took off his sport coat and laid it down. “Nice place. How long have you lived here?”
“Almost three years.” She gestured in the direction of the window as she put the flowers into a vase. “I like it because I can walk to the grocery store.”
“Shop and exercise at the same time?”
“Exactly.” Carla smiled. There was an awkward pause.
“Mind if I sit down?”
“Oh, please. Would you like something to drink?”
“Just some water.”
“Ice?”
“Sure.”
Carla stepped into the kitchen and put ice in a glass. In a moment, the stove timer started beeping, and she reached over to shut it off, setting down the glass at the same time. Pulling a couple of hot pads from a drawer, she opened the oven and turned the hot casserole around on the rack.
“Ooh, that looks good,” Marc said, now standing over her shoulder.
“It’s chili relleno casserole.” She pushed it back into the oven, smiling as she closed the oven door again. “I hope you like Mexican.”
“I do. Mexican and Italian are my favorite foods.”
Carla reset the timer and proceeded to finish getting the water glasses for Marc and herself. “Want a lemon wedge with your water?”
“No. It would be too much like a restaurant,” he explained, smiling, as they both sat down in chairs by the table. “I’ve been looking forward to a home-cooked meal ever since you invited me. Nope. No lemon. Eating out gets old fast.”
“It’s not gotten old for me yet. I’m sure you eat out a lot more than I do.”
“How often do you go to a restaurant?”
Carla thought before she answered. “Oh, I don’t know—maybe twice a week—fast food, I mean. A nice restaurant—maybe every couple weeks.”
“Yes, I eat out a lot more than you. I’m not much of a cook,” Marc admitted.
“I don’t particularly love cooking. It’s just that I know I get a lot better food for a lot less when I fix it myself.” She shrugged. “So that’s what I do.”
The oven timer went off again, and Carla jumped up. So did Marc. “It must be ready,” he said. “It sure smells good.”
“I think it is. Would you mind getting the grape juice out of the refrigerator?”
“OK.” Marc walked over to the refrigerator close to the stove while Carla opened the oven door. He looked for the juice, opening the door wider and wider, until he discovered it in the door. Meanwhile, Carla had lifted the casserole carefully and was balancing it on the half-open oven door with one hand while she pushed the rack back into place with the other.
Marc stepped backwards to give room for the refrigerator door to close. But it was a fraction of an inch too far. In the small kitchen, he bumped into Carla, and, with a thud, the casserole fell to the floor.
Marc spun around in time to see Carla’s mouth agape, a look of dismay on her face. “Oh, no! I’m sorry,” was all he could say. “I didn’t realize…”
Carla’s hands flew to her face. “It wasn’t your fault,” she said. “I shouldn’t have tried to balance it.” She glanced up at him from the kneeling position she’d already assumed on the floor. Marc knelt down also.
“At least we didn’t get burned. It’s all right here in the dish—but it’s broken.” He looked at her questioningly. “I hope it wasn’t special—an heirloom or something.”
“No, don’t worry. Just a casserole dish.” She shook her head. “Whatever!” she exclaimed, and started laughing. “Can I take you out to dinner?”
Marc’s grin was one of relief, and he laughed, too. “No. I’ll take you to dinner. But it won’t be as good as this would have been.” He stood up and reached out for her hand to pull her up off the floor. “You’d better let me clean this up. How about if we have some juice to get us through until we can eat, and then we’ll find a dish to replace this one?”
“Oh, don’t worry about the dish.”
“Oh, no. I feel bad enough for ruining a home cooked meal. For sure I’m going to replace the dish.”
“Well, OK.” Carla smiled. “I’ll be ready in a minute.” She looked at her handsome boss, scooping up glass and chili relleno casserole with the spatula she’d given him. “We’ll just take it out to the garbage on our way out, and it will be as if nothing had ever happened.”
When she came back into the room, Marc had it all cleaned up.
“The casserole was delicious, by the way,” he said, handing her a glass of juice. She looked at him in surprise.
“I couldn’t resist.”
“I hope you didn’t crunch glass,” she replied, with a happy smile.
“And it shouldn’t take us long to find a casserole dish; I know just what to look for.”
“OK. I’m ready to go.”
Marc exhaled an exaggerated sigh. “Do I get a rain check?”
Carla’s face showed her delight. “You get a rain check,” she reassured him.
It was at least an hour later, as they sat enjoying their food at a small Mexican restaurant, that Carla decided to broach the subject she’d had on her mind all week. The morning’s events had only made it easier to do so.
“I saw Rita Helgessen this morning.”
Marc looked at her without smiling for just a moment and then said in a voice firm to the point that it made Carla feel almost uneasy.
“I’m interested, but only if it’s not shop talk.”
“Well, I suppose it doesn’t have to be.”
“Good.” The tension seemed dissipated. “Where’d you run into Rita?”
“At the abortuary.”
“The what?”
“The abortion clinic out on 27thAvenue.”
“What were the two of you doing there?”
“I think Rita was there partly to check up on Nancy and me.”
Marc turned his head ever so slightly and looked skeptical. “This isn’t shoptalk?”
“No, sir, it is not.” Carla let herself slip into a subservient role for just a moment, subconsciously suspecting that it would help her boss move out of the role of superiority that Carla knew he didn’t want to project. It worked.
“Please don’t call me ‘sir,’ Carla,” he asked. The tone of his voice was more reproachful than demanding or commanding, and Carla felt a twinge of remorse, but still justified.
“All right.” She took another mouthful, to buy time while she considered whether she really wanted to continue this discussion. After all, she originally had wanted to include some “shop talk” regarding Rita’s rude aloofness toward Nancy. There was a moment of silence, during which it occurred to Carla that Marc’s no-shop-talk policy perhaps stemmed from his not wanting to be subjected to any form of company gossip.
“Well, are you going to tell me what the two of you were doing at the—‘abortuary,’ did you call it?”
“Yes, that’s what we call it. Well, we three—my brother Michael, Nancy, and myself, have been picketing the abortuary for over a year.”
“Picketing? Why?”
“I think we all do it for different reasons.”
“What’s your reason?”
“Well, obviously I disagree with what they’re doing.” She looked at him and hastened to add, “I haven’t always, but shortly after Nancy started working at Transton, she invited me to her church, and it wasn’t long after, that my views changed on a lot of things, including abortion.”
“Must be some church.”
“It is a good one, but it was actually a guest speaker that impacted me most.”
“Oh yeah?”
“He was a former abortionist who talked about forgiveness and how he came out of the abortion industry. It was really interesting.”
“Mmm. I’d like to have heard him.”
“You should, if you ever get the chance. I can’t remember his name right now, but it will come to me later. I think he goes around the country giving a behind-the-scenes look at abortion.”
“So what do you do at the clinic?”
“Oh, we carry signs and try to talk to the girls—and guys—going in, trying to dissuade them from having their babies killed. A few people strictly sidewalk counsel, talking to any parent or parents who will let them. The rest of us are there for that same reason, but also to protest the clinic itself and every person who makes a living off the deaths of the children brought there to be killed.”
“They must like you people a lot.” Marc’s smile contained a grimace.
Carla smiled wryly. “They absolutely love us,” she said facetiously.
“Are you really successful, or what’s the point of going out there?”
Carla looked at Marc and held his gaze as she answered. “Have we been able to close down the clinic? No. We haven’t been able to stop them—yet. But we won’t let them kill those babies in peace. We tell them what they’re doing is wrong. We tell the parents, we tell the clinic volunteers, the employees, and we tell the abortionist. We tell them over and over again.” She looked at Marc. “Sometimes a mom and dad will have the courage to turn away and let their child live. Abortion is final and fatal, you know.” As soon as she said the words from Midge’s sign that had popped into her mind, Carla wished she could have taken them back, remembering that for Marc the final and fatal was still very fresh.
Marc looked keenly interested. “How often does that happen?” he asked quietly.
“I’m not sure—maybe once, sometimes twice a week. Sometimes none.” She leaned forward. “I’m not sure how many are saved in a year—but if it’s just one, it’s worth it.”
“Hmm.”
“The number saved is a very small number compared to the number of children who are killed.” Carla pursed her lips, weighing her words before she added, “Most of the people going for an abortion don’t turn back, and their babies are killed. The mother’s still a mother for the rest of her life when she comes out, but she’s the mother of…a dead baby.” Carla’s voice was almost a whisper in her effort to soften the impact of the words.
“Mmm.” A pause. “Why was Rita there?”
“Well, this morning there were no abortions. The clinic was closed for a retirement party for a lady who’s been the director of public relations. She’s proud of what she considers great accomplishments, and we wanted to be there to remind her that every one of her ‘accomplishments’ manifested in the deaths of persons unable to defend themselves.”
“What?”
“It’s an abortion clinic, Marc. The deaths of countless babies—no, I won’t say ‘countless,’ because God knows the precise number that it’s taken to pay that lady’s salary. And the victims are not only the babies, but the parents, too, who oftentimes have to fight depression that can rise unexpectedly throughout their lives.”
“I don’t think every person who has an abortion suffers from depression.”
“You’re right. No, not every one—you’re right.”
“Hmm…” Marc grunted, and Carla was quiet for a long moment before continuing.
“You asked about Rita. She was there at the party for the director. So we saw her, but it wasn’t exactly a social encounter.”
“Doesn’t sound like it.” He picked up his water glass, drank all the water in it, and set it back down. “Why are you telling me this?”
Carla looked at him, a puzzled expression on her face that gave way to calculation, and she replied evenly, “Just for conversation. What did you do today?”
Marc’s face showed an appreciation of his companion’s confidence in conversation. “Not much. I did some things I needed to do—got my car tuned and some laundry picked up. And I always like to read a little on weekends. My day was busy enough, but nothing exciting like yours.”
Carla couldn’t tell if he was being disdainful or not, and chose to drop the subject. She also chose to give him the responsibility for conversation, feeling that she’d uncovered enough of herself and that it was his turn. She reminded herself that if Marc Garman was indeed disdainful of her view of abortion, better to find out earlier than later.
The silence lasted long enough to feel awkward to Carla, but she had the presence of mind not to stop up the blatant gap in conversation with frivolous words. At last Marc spoke.
“Frankly, I’m glad I wasn’t part of the excitement; but I think, if I were, I’d want to be on your side of the fence.”
Carla just smiled, still determined not to speak just to avoid silence; but his words impacted her with profound relief.
“Well, how’s your Santa Fe cordon bleu?” Marc asked.
“It’s delicious. I don’t know how they make it so tender.” She smiled, adding, “I don’t think I want to know, but it sure tastes good.”
Marc grinned. “Glad you like it.”
They finished their meal over small talk, each subject introduced by Marc. Carla had decided that she had said too much already. All things considered, she reasoned, between bites and trite comments, perhaps there was not enough common ground between them to support more than a simple friendship. But what settled in her spirit was the fact that Marc had said he would have wanted to be on her side of the fence on the abortion issue. It was this thought that gave her a peace that somehow transcended her regret of the end of a relationship with Marc that otherwise might have just begun.
Later, as Marc walked her from the car to her apartment steps, he said, “Well, do I get a rain check?”
Carla didn’t try to hide her surprise. “You want one?”
“I do,” Marc said, and Carla knew he was sincere.
“All right,” she smiled. She felt her color rising as her heart filled with hope, but she didn’t care. It was too dark for Marc to see, and besides, she felt like her blood was surging through her veins with a joy she’d never felt before, and she didn’t want to quell it.
“Goodbye,” she replied, still smiling, and turned and ran up the steps.