Saving the World Read Free Page B

I’ll take it for the battered women’s shelter.” Alma has not told Tera about the cell phone—afraid Richard and she will be consigned to that corrupt circle of consumer hell Tera reserves for people who replace things that aren’t broken.
    â€œTera? Are you still there?” There is an absent sound on the other end. Tera must have given up on Paul and gone off to shut the door herself.
    â€œSorry,” Tera says coming back. “Go on.”
    Alma has already decided she won’t bring up her dark mood. She doesn’t want a reminder about how lucky they all are. Right now, what Alma wants is Band-Aid reassurance, someone reminding her that her fears and doubts are unfounded.
    â€œHave you talked to Richard?” Tera asks when Alma finishes her account.
    â€œHe’s at a meeting. And I just couldn’t concentrate on anything. I had to talk to someone.”
Someone
doesn’t sound like an adequate category for her best friend. “I wanted to talk to you.”
    â€œI wish you weren’t so far away.” Tera sighs. When they lived in the same town, they met almost every day for a walk and talk. Presence is important to Tera. It’s one of her articles of faith: being there. Maybe that’s why she has let herself get so large. More of her bearing witness, marching on a picket line, being there.
    â€œHere’s what I would do,” Tera says in a voice so strong and sure, Alma feels as if her friend’s capacious arms are pouring out of the receiver and wrapping themselves around her. Although they are the same age, Alma often thinks of Tera as older, wiser. “First, you absolutely need to talk to Richard before you get worked up. It sounds to me like this poor, lonely woman got diagnosed with this horrible disease and got piss-poor medical information and counseling and went home and took out her old address book and started calling everyone she even shook hands with or lusted after in high school. Seriously, the health care in this country is just the pits—”
    â€œLike you say, it’s probably nothing,” Alma puts in, nipping Tera’s rant in the bud. If Tera gets started on the Big Issues of the World, Alma’s petty problems won’t stand a chance. “It’s just, oh, you know how down I’ve been, Tera. And this call just reminds me how everything can come tumbling down.”
    â€œYou said it,” Tera agrees. But instead of pursuing any number of corroborating horrors, Tera stays with Alma. Perhaps she senses the desperation in Alma’s voice. “Hang in there. It’ll pass, really. And you got me, babe, like the song says. Are you taking your Saint-John’s-wort?”
    Just the name makes Alma cringe. Unlike Tera, Alma doesn’t believe in all those expensive, alternative tins and jars at the co-op. But it’s more than that. She doesn’t want to take Saint-John’s-wort; she doesn’t want to be on antidepressants; she has stopped going to Dr. Payne. There has to be a place left in modern life for a crisis of the soul, a dark night that doesn’t have a chemical solution.
    â€œI’ll tell you what,” Tera offers. “I’m going to drive down and stay with you till Richard comes home. I’ll give you a back rub, make you some lemongrass tea, whatever you want. I just want you to know you’re not alone.”
    â€œOh, Tera.” Alma feels a surge of guilty love toward her dear, generous friend, whom she so readily lets slip into caricature in her head. “I’m fine. Really.” Richard will be home soon enough. It’s probably best if Tera isn’t here. Richard and Tera, well, they have to work at being friends. Tera’s high-horse antiestablishment takes on everything offends Richard’s bottom-line, heartland faith in the United States of America, the Golden Rule, and not biting the hand that feeds you. But Alma suspects that