Unlikely Praise Read online

  “I’m sorry, Shade, but you have to understand. I suddenly had a baby to think about. I couldn’t take any more chances, or hold on to any more promises that never seemed to mean anything.”

  Anger raced through his system and cancelled out the shock. “Who’s gonna raise my baby?”

  “It’s not like that.”

  His heart monitor bleeped double time. “When’s my baby due?”

  “Late October.”

  His nurse hurried in and gave Jess a dirty look.

  “I’m going.” She leaned in again. “Look, Shade, I would never, ever, keep you away from your child. But if you want to be a part of this baby’s life, you need to be well. And you know what I mean. It doesn’t have anything to do with your current injuries...”

  Yeah, he knew what she meant back then, and he’d already decided to change his life.

  The blast of a horn startled him as a huge, paneled delivery truck rumbled past. The rush of wind it created blew through his open window and scattered the pages from his seat. He stretched to retrieve the map from the floor and started the truck.

  1227 Acorn Ridge. He made the second left and drove past the row of older brick homes on oversized lots, and around the bend, where mature oaks canopied the entrance to the subdivision’s playground. He slowed to pass the morning walkers and the friendly neighbors who lingered to visit in driveways with mail tucked under their arms. Everyone waved, though he didn’t know a soul.

  1223... 1225...

  He gently pressed the brake and prayed that just this once the truck would cooperate as he took a fleeting glance at the home where his nearly six-month-old daughter hung her booties.

  He held his breath. Front bay window, dented mailbox, neat front lawn. He exhaled and drove on because this wasn’t the day to stop and knock on the door.

  Instead, this was the day to allow more reality into the puzzle of recovery that had become his journey. This was the day to take another step and see how it felt. He imagined her eyes were bigger and bluer than the last picture his mother sent.

  It felt great.

  ****

  Candi found a table near the window of the coffee shop and waited for Shade. One by one, the caffeine addicts streamed in for their early morning fix. Being no different, she set her own cup on the table and leafed through the sweetener packets until she found her favorite.

  Shade appeared through a sea of groggy faces. “Good morning.”

  “Hey.” She pasted on her best seven-o’clock-in-the-morning smile and ripped the top off the fake sugar. “Thanks for coming.” She glanced out the window and over her shoulder. “Where’d you come from? I’ve been watching for you.”

  He nodded toward the front parking lot. “It’s crowded out there. Thought it’d be safer to park the Del Rio Destroyer at the strip center next door. I came in through the back.”

  She tapped the stirrer on the side of her cup. “Del Rio Destroyer?”

  “Yeah, it’s what I call that truck I drive. Long story, but it’s now an official danger to all living creatures. Let’s just pray I can get something new soon and leave it at that.”

  “Sure. You drink coffee?”

  He dropped a notebook on the table. “Oh, yeah. I’ll be right back.”

  “Take your time.”

  He headed for the counter amidst the others who toted laptops and plucked newspapers from the stand by the bar.

  Candi tried to organize her thoughts and her music, but instead spent much of the time analyzing Shade’s appearance. But why? It’s wasn’t as if the parade of students she saw every day at school didn’t push the envelope of fashion and logic.

  What was it about his ragged, paint-splattered work jeans and his plain, white v-neck tee that irritated her so? Nothing. It was that floppy ponytail and the pesky lizard tattoo that sent her over the edge. Mercifully, he wore a white collared button-down over the tee to cover his arms. She guessed it was how he “dressed up” the look to meet with potential clients. She reached in her bag for her pen. Were any of these thoughts necessary? No.

  He placed his cup on the table and paused. “You need anything else?”

  She looked up.

  There was that brilliant white smile, intense hazel eyes, and magnetic personality she’d read about on some Dead Lizard Highway fan blogs. Apparently, in concert, those things incited normal, well-behaved women to breech the security barrier and hurl themselves onto the stage while Shade played his way through a twenty-eight measure solo from one of the band’s biggest hits. If, that is, the blogs were true.

  Thank goodness she was impervious to his charm. “I’m fine, thanks.”

  He slid into the wooden, ladder-back chair. “What’s up?”

  She passed him a stack of music. “Pastor Charles wanted me to meet with you to discuss your role on the worship team.”

  “Sounds official. What exactly would that role be?”

  She tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. “He’s been a little vague, but I think he’s concerned about the rapid growth of the church and the need to expand the music program. He feels someone with your experience can be a leader in the group and add another dimension to our worship.”

  He leaned back and crossed his arms. “I’m no praise and worship leader. I told him that. I don’t know the first thing about it. Besides, you’re the leader.”

  His last remark hit the raw nerve she’d been nursing for two weeks. She didn’t feel much like the leader after all she’d been left out of, but it was nice of him to acknowledge that fact. In the same breath, he’d confirmed her worst fears. He was a total stranger to praise and worship.

  She turned her cup in her fingers. Round and round it scooted on the table. “I understand that, and no one’s asking you to jump in and do anything you’re not comfortable with. But Pastor Charles thinks a lot of you and your talent, and he’d like for us to work together and see what happens.”

  He nodded and took another swig from his extra-large cup.

  “Besides,” she added, while trying to quash her own doubts. “It’s not about us. It’s about God’s will for our team. All we can do is have faith and pray about it.”

  He pulled his chair closer to the table and flashed that smile again. “I can do that.”

  “Good. So tell me, did Pastor Charles give you any idea as to what he specifically wanted you to do?”

  “Not exactly. He implied you were going to be real busy and could use some help. He said something about you starting a children’s choir. He also mentioned a mid-week youth service, but that’s all he said.”

  Candi rubbed her forehead. This was the first she’d heard about the children’s choir. Wonder when Pastor planned to tell her about that? “Yeah, he’s wanted to start that youth service for a while now. I thought Kevin and Kelly could develop their leadership skills there, but they need guidance, as I’m sure you gathered the other night.”

  “I was meaning to ask you about that. Are you sure they’re in college?”

  She laughed. “I’m sure. They’re academically and musically gifted, but what they have in brains, they lack in social skills.” She paused to toy with her napkin. “You’ll love the band. They’re very talented, but diverse. Max has been a Christian since he accepted Christ as a little guy in his grandmother’s church, and I’m convinced he’ll go to seminary and have his own church. Carol Ann has more faith than anyone I’ve ever met, even though she has it rough at home. Rocky is the epitome of the power of positive thinking and overcoming obstacles. He hasn’t been a Christian very long. You’ll meet the others soon.”

  “I’m looking forward to it.” He leafed through the stack of music and held up a page. “This is just lyrics. Is there a chord chart?”

  She leaned in to take a look. “Uh...no. Kevin and I are trying to decide who’s going to sing it so it’ll either be in E or A. I’ll get a chart when we know for sure. I put that there because we’ll be working on it soon. You can look up the video.”

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nbsp; He worked his pencil out of the spiral binding on his notebook and started to write across the top with his left hand.

  Candi paused with the cup at her lips. “You’re left-handed.”

  He met her gaze but didn’t say a word.

  “But you don’t play a left-handed guitar.”

  “That’s because I’m not truly left-handed, I guess.”

  She snatched the paper off the table and looked at the perfectly formed letters in the note he wrote for himself. “This is great penmanship for a guy. C’mon, what gives? Are you ambidextrous?”

  “I don’t think so, but when I used to work with my dad in construction he would say I could hit my thumbs with a hammer equally well with both hands.”

  Her sudden bark of laughter just missed being a snort.

  “I’m glad you think it’s funny. Do you know how hard it is to play guitar with busted thumbs?”

  “Sorry. But, tell me. I’m only interested because I’m a teacher and have to decode most handwritten assignments.”

  He fidgeted in his seat and curled his coffee stirrer until it resembled a coiled snake. Candi recognized the look. It was the same shadow that crossed his face at least twice the other night in practice.

  “Never mind, Shade. I was just curious.”

  He shrugged as though he’d decided it was all right to share. “I was in a car accident last year. I injured my right hand and wrist. They had to put the exposed bones back together and sew up some nasty lacerations.” He ran a finger along a thin white scar on the outside of his hand. “They said I had nerve damage and pretty much guaranteed it would never return to normal. The doctor suggested I learn to use my left hand, and the physical therapist made sure I did.”

  He pushed the coiled snake around the table with his right index finger.

  “But you’re using it right now. Did it turn out better than expected?”

  “I was laid up in the hospital a long time so that meant a lot of physical therapy. It helped. That and prayer.”

  “So you had other serious injuries?”

  The shadow darkened. “It was a bad accident.”

  Pastor Charles said to get to know him and she tried. Sadly, the first interesting tidbit she stumbled upon was connected to a horrible memory that backed him right into a corner. He wasn’t even fighting to get out. He just shut down.

  She scrambled to set him free. “Well, if you have any lingering problems I sure couldn’t tell by the way you played the other night. You sounded great.”

  His smile was half its usual brilliance. “Thanks.”

  “On to business.” She crossed her arms in front of her on the table. “I have a music question I think you can help me with.”

  “Shoot.”

  “What do you know about click tracks?”

  “In what way?”

  She pulled out two articles she printed from the Internet and another from a magazine about church worship. “From what I understand, you can run a click track through your sound system and straight into the band’s ear monitors. The clicks can be set at whatever tempo you want and all the band has to do is stay with the track. The band can hear the clicks but the congregation can’t.”

  “Why are you interested in that?”

  “Well, Max is a good drummer, but he’s not a great drummer. He’s learning, and I have him working with a percussionist at the college, but he often loses the tempo in the middle of the song. He speeds up, slows down, whatever, and when it’s his responsibility to start the song we never know what we’re gonna get.”

  Shade leaned back and hung one arm over the back of the chair. His smug grin made her feel stupid before he even opened his mouth. “C’mon, Candi, you know that’s a universal problem with drummers.”

  “Of course I know that, and believe me, he takes a lot of heat about it.”

  “He’ll get better with time and practice. You don’t need a click track.”

  “But it might help. The experts I’ve been reading say it creates a more polished sound.”

  “It also zaps spontaneity and teaches your drummer to rely on that manufactured click rather than the natural clock in his head. He won’t get better. He’ll just learn to respond like one of Pavlov’s dogs.”

  She drew a quick mental picture of that but was too annoyed to stop and laugh about it. “I’m also interested in the additional effects we can add to enhance the music. For example, I would like to add a cello or violin once in a while and, in case you haven’t noticed, I don’t have an orchestra at my disposal. It would be nice to have that option.”

  Shade nodded but didn’t look convinced.

  “I also have Kevin to contend with,” she continued. “If I’m leading the song, he watches me and doesn’t get lost. If he’s leading, he inevitably speeds up. Sometimes it’s like he and Max are in a race to finish. In congregational singing, that’s deadly. I often feel like we have to go back and pick them up.”

  Shade laughed and downed the last of his coffee. “He’s young. He’ll get better, too.”

  Candi leaned in further as the muscles in her shoulders tightened and threatened a tension headache. He was so typically male. It was like talking to the proverbial brick wall. “Do you have any actual experience with click tracks or do you just want to disagree with me?”

  “You asked for my opinion, and I’m trying to give it to you. I realize everyone who has a big stage show now uses them to keep video screens and dance numbers together. Everything has to be perfectly timed. As for me, I’ve only used click tracks in the studio because time is expensive and there’s a lot of dubbing and synching going on. The beat has to be consistent. You’ll also find that the audience has discriminating ears when it comes to recorded music. They listen to the same track over and over and are likely to pick out subtle inconsistencies.”

  “So you do like them.”

  “No, I said I’ve used them in the studio. I don’t care for it in live performance, especially in a small venue like a church. It takes away all the flexibility, and I would think that in worship—of all places—you’d want flexibility.”

  “But I’m also responsible for putting out a good product before God and the congregation. Shouldn’t we present our best polished worship to God?”

  He tossed the coiled snake into his empty cup. “Are you kidding me? Wouldn’t God want the liberty to move through worship without the stifling confinement of a click track?”

  Candi sighed. No doubt this meeting was about over.

  “All I’m saying,” he added, “is that in live music you need the opportunity to do what comes natural. Especially in worship.”

  “I thought you didn’t know anything about worship.”

  “I know that much.”

  She clamped her hands together in her lap and counted to ten. She could tell by his smirk he was having way too much fun. So he wasn’t crazy about click tracks. Did he have to make her feel like a dim-wit for wanting to try?

  And just as she calmed down...

  His cell phone chimed. As he sat back to pull it out of his jean pocket, his v-neck t-shirt shifted. Tendrils of dark blue ink became visible near his collarbone. She turned away so fast the muscle in her neck pulled. That didn’t stop her from stealing another glimpse as he answered his phone and quickly dismissed the caller. Another hint of purplish-blue and possibly green, like a vine, peeked out from around the collar. Whatever it was, it was permanently planted over his heart and crept toward his neck.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Business.”

  Would Pastor Charles be irritated if she asked Shade to wear a turtleneck every time he entered the church?

  “It’s OK. I know we both need to get to work.”

  “About the click track,” he started, “a lot of companies offer a download for a trial period. I’ll find you something suitable to try, but I honestly hate to see the band start that now. Give ‘em a chance to gel and get tight on their own.”

  Oh, she was way beyond the click track. I
n fact, the sudden appearance of the creepy neck and/or chest tattoo had reminded her there was a whole other painting on his right arm she hadn’t seen. She pushed her cup aside and gathered her things while trying to conjure up enough x-ray vision to see through his right shirt sleeve. The best she could muster was the tiny hint of an outline as he stood in the light from the window to push his phone back in his pocket. There were more lines and arcs that came to a point. Were those flames? A second glance revealed something else.

  Horror of horrors, it just might be a skull!

  She stifled a gasp. Was his whole body one big road map to hell?

  He extended his hand as she stood. “I’m glad you called.”

  “No problem,” she squeaked. “Thanks again for coming. Is this a good time for you to meet? I know Pastor wants us to continue working things out and finding the best possible fit for you on the team.”

  “Sure. This is good. Early. Before we go to work.”

  He picked up his notebook and headed for the door.

  “Hey,” she called after him. “Whoever gets here last has to buy the coffee.”

  His riot-inciting smile was back. “Great. Make mine plain ol’ black coffee, nothing fancy, with just enough cream to give the spoon something to do.”

  ****

  Candi chose a tailored navy suit and a crisp white blouse for church. She slipped into her matching heels and grabbed her bag. At the last minute, she traded her usual silver cross necklace and plain hoop earrings for a set of ships wheel jewelry she’d bought from a clearance table at a boutique. She hooked the toggle clasp at her throat and added the bracelet. The earrings would have to go on in the car. She took a quick look in the hall mirror on the way out the door. The dramatic combination kicked it up a notch.

  Shade and Bill were already in the sound booth when she arrived.

  Bill snapped to attention and saluted when she joined them. “Captain.” He thrust his chest forward. “Welcome aboard the U.S.S. Sound Booth.”

  She paused and glanced at Shade who, besides being nicely covered in a long-sleeved blue oxford shirt, sat at the computer with his hand on the mouse.