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Show Ida's Sabbath 93 Ida thought of her own daughter, Raylene. She didn't have anybody, just a dusty picture of Jody in his fatigues. Raylene, Ida sighed. She won't come out to church anymore, and darn that g i r l , she's starting to look like a penguin. Won't pay any attention to herself. Buys at least three of those chocolate-dipped cones at the Dairy Creme every night. My poor Raylene. I'm trying to help her. I pray every morning, every night. The congregation was singing the second verse of the sacrament hymn, "There was no other good enough..." when Ida's head began to f i l l with white l i g h t , a vacuous, ballooning light. She couldn't see anything, though she kept playing on the keys she knew so well. An eerie whistling penetrated her ears, like the whistling between the timbers of the stripped steeple. Ida shivered. "There is no other good enough...There is no other good enough." She played the line over and over again. Morris looked at her shocked. The unearthly whistling shifted to a drum beat. Ida heard it--the snares, the two big bass drums of the Gardenville High School Band. Ida remembered the county-wide parade, the floats with the pretty g i r l s , suntanned and moon-ripened. Opalescent smiles. Mascaraed winks. Mechanical waves to all the world as i t looked up to see the Peach Day Queen and her court. Louis's gaze lasted longer than the float stayed in sight. Ida perspired in the sun, wiping her forehead and neck with the handkerchief that Raylene gave her for Mother's Day. Ida had nudged Louis. "Those pretty l i t t l e things aren't for you, Louis. Don't go hanging out your eyeballs." She had laughed. Louis had looked at her as he never had before, with a watery stare and wire-drawn lips. |