CBN.com – Inspired
by the Book of Ruth and other biblical wedding stories, this modern-day
parable with its outrageous cast of characters will make you laugh
until you cry, then cry until you laugh again.
Best-selling, award-winning author Sharon Ewell Foster invites
you to join Naomi and Anthony as they find themselves entangled
in a wedding party that includes some reluctant sistah-girl bridesmaids.
Get ready to take your seat amid a bus-load of unlikelies from
as far away as Jacks Creek, North Carolina, Washington DC, and
even the tiny kingdom of Lesotho in southern Africa. Read an excerpt
below.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Bodega Bay, California
Naomi stepped off the bus and dragged her suitcase from the gaping
belly underneath. This was not the California of fast cars, movie
stars, and Beverly Hills. The Sonoma County Valley was quiet.
Verdant hills and lowlands, some planted with rows of grapevines
that looked to her like small trees, sloped gently into the bay.
Instead of highways and stoplights, what she had noticed, once
she had left the L.A. and San Francisco airports behind, were
farms and fences surrounding grazing herds of black and white
cows and flocks of cottony sheep. There were hardly any cars on
the road. No one seemed to be in a hurry. There were even deer,
which picked their way, nibbling at plants, seemingly unafraid
of people they moved near. She smelled the salty bay water, her
lungs opened, and she breathed.
Her suitcase wheels bumped over the pebbly blacktop as she headed
for the boardinghouse the bus driver had pointed out to her. She
stopped to look out over the bay. It was nothing like the Baltimore
Inner Harbor. Whether they were tourists or locals, the people,
like the bay waters, were peaceful.
Gently bouncing, the water was sometimes green but mostly gray
with sparkling flecks of light like she had seen in magazines.
Naomi set her suitcase upright and moved closer to the water.
Fat, beautiful seals rolled in the water, swimming and diving.
When they leapt from the water, the sun arched over their sleek
backs. In what looked to be a family, they barked and played as
if they were free, as though no one had told them they should
be performing with beach balls in aquatic centers or that someone
might want to bash them over the head. They were casual.
Birds--ducks, sandpipers, and others she did not recognize--dived
in the water and danced on marshy land peeking through the bay
waters. People with sun-bleached hair and sun-baked skin walked
barefoot on the beach, carrying fishing rods and pails. None of
them looked as though they were worried about time, or meetings,
or HMOs. She wasn't going to have much use for her suits; everything
here was casual.
Seagulls flew overhead, calling in high-pitched squawks and plopping
cigarette-sized droppings wherever they chose. Naomi looked up
and the sun hit the tip of her nose, washed warmly over her face,
and slid down her shoulders.
She didn't think she was ever going home.
The houses along the way that could, backed to the water; decks
jutted out from their rears, over the bay. From a distance, they
looked like stones planted in the green hillsides. The houses
on the other side of the street faced the water, their window
eyes wide open to the sun. Their exteriors were wind-washed shades
of blue, brown, or white with white trim, and near most of the
houses were small boats with paddles, or kayaks. Dog tails, ferns,
and purple, yellow, and white wildflowers grew near the houses
and on the beach, stretching their heads and arms toward the water.
When she stepped up on painted concrete blocks that formed the
steps, she saw a girl sitting on the porch of the house on Lanyard
Street. Seashells and starfish hung from the screen that wrapped
around the porch.
The young woman's hair was the lightest brown and stringy; it
may have been blonde when it was clean. One bare foot was on the
bottom of the chair, while the other dangled over the rail of
the metal fan-back chair. She wore two T-shirts: one yellow underneath,
and one longer, blue, tie-dyed shirt on top. The girl, who looked
to be in her early twenties, looked at Naomi as though she was
sizing her up. In her lap was a bowl of cooked shrimp. As she
peeled them, she dropped the shells into a bucket next to her
and popped the shrimp into her mouth.
Normally the shrimp would have smelled, but here their aroma
blended with the smells of the bay.
"Hey." She nodded her head toward the door behind her.
"You movin' in?"
Naomi nodded and gave a noncommittal smile. "Yes."
She didn't know if the girl was a burnout or a beach bum.
"Good." The girl popped a shrimp in her mouth. "This
place will be good for you."
Naomi wasn't sure if she should be insulted. "Really?"
She smiled. "Yeah, it's cool." She pointed with her
thumb. "I live upstairs."
Naomi looked at the note she held to check the address.
"You know what apartment?"
Naomi looked back at the girl. "First floor."
"That's what I thought," the girl said. Holding a shrimp
in her hand, she pointed toward the front door. It was white with
four rectangular panes of glass--two on top and two on the bottom.
"Just push the door open. Look to your left and you'll see
the mailboxes. Then you'll see a little table there with a metal
box shaped like a treasure chest. When you lift the lid, inside
you'll find keys for your place. You'll be able to tell from the
little tag that hangs from the ring."
Naomi looked at her piece of paper again. "Is Mrs. Dovecheck
here?"
The girl shook her head. "She's never here, man."
"Well, what do I do about my lease? About signing and doing
an inspection?"
The girl tossed her hair out of her face and laughed. "I
told you this place would be good for you. Just hang loose."
She smiled. "Did you talk to Mrs. D?"
Naomi looked at the girl, at the door, at the piece of paper,
and then back at the girl. The place had been one of the few that
she could afford when she had looked in the paper. Maybe she was
being too hasty.
She had called her realtor already in Baltimore and asked him
to check into renting out her place. In the meantime, she'd tried
to find someplace quickly so she wouldn't use up the money she
had in hotel charges.
The girl was still peeling and popping shrimp, patiently waiting
for her response.
"Yes. Yes, I spoke to Mrs. Dovecheck."
"Then everything's copacetic. Mrs. D wouldn't have let you
have the place if she didn't get a good vibe from you. A good
vibe will beat a piece of paper any day."
Copacetic? A good vibe? It might be smarter to back
out of this before she got in too deep.
"It's gonna be okay," the girl said. "Just relax.
Float, okay?" The girl wiped her shrimpy hand on her blue
tank top. She stuck it out. "I'm Ruthie."
Naomi switched the note to the hand that held the handle of her
suitcase, stepped closer, and shook Ruthie's hand. "Naomi."
She would have to wash her hand right away. "Well."
She stepped back and then shifted from foot to foot. "I guess
I should go inside."
"Yeah," Ruthie said. "Take a load off."
Naomi pushed open the door. The smell of cedar and pine oil rushed
out to her. The air inside was as fresh as the air outside.
"Hey, Naomi?"
Naomi leaned her head back out of the door.
"Do you know Jesus?"
Naomi felt nervous and wondered why she always felt that way
when people asked her. Maybe it was that she worried they would
be fanatics, harass her with Bible tracts, or play the I know
Him better than you do game. She avoided those people and even
ran from them. It felt funny not to trust people who believed
the same thing she did, but that's how it was. She spoke softly.
"Yes, I do."
"Good," Ruthie said and nodded firmly. "'Cause
He's a friend of mine."
Excerpted from Ain't No
Valley by Sharon Ewell Foster, Copyright © 2005, published
by Bethany House Publishers.
Used by permission. Unauthorized duplication prohibited.
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