Jesus Freaks: Sins of the Father(2)

From the outside, I have time to note because Mom has slowed the car significantly, the building looks like a state house with brick and pillars assembled to make your jaw drop before you enter. “Makes it easier for them to spoon feed you Jesus,” Mom had sarcastically remarked earlier in the summer. “Cram him down your throat” is what she’d actually said, but I talked her down. I’ve only seen the inside from pictures and TV, but I know it has a Colosseum-like appeal with rows upon rows of stadium seating focused on a stage where the Message is presented.

“Do you think he’s in there now?” I ask, momentarily forgetting our plans for the day.

Mom sighs yet again, growing more flustered by the minute. “I hope not, since he’s supposed to be coming back from Africa tomorrow, and that’s why he can’t meet with us in person before you start.” She grows quiet, and I ignore the comment. For now.

New Life’s charismatic pastor has, for the last three years, changed lives, rallied the spiritual troops, and gleamed brightly from the camera in the studio/sanctuary each week. His name is Roland Abbot.

And he’s my birth father.

At least once a year, Pastor Roland looks ashen as he takes the pulpit and discusses the mistakes of his sinful youth. I’m one of those mistakes. Kennedy Sawyer.

I don’t mean to sound dramatic; he’s never called me a mistake. Rather, the circumstances surrounding his college girlfriend—my mother—getting pregnant and Roland signing away parental rights before I was born have always been in his once-a-year confession. I wasn’t ever bitter about it when I was younger, and neither was my mom. They were young and stupid, she’d always reminded me. No, she was never bitter about it until he called one day, out of the blue, talking about finding Jesus and begging for forgiveness. My mom was so shocked by the phone call, she hung up on him and mumbled something like, “His repentance isn’t my responsibility.” I was eight, and didn’t hear anything more about him for another couple of years.

The difference in our last names and the court orders in place that have prevented him from parading my name or picture on TV are the only things I’m holding on to as a social buffer between me and the televangelist who is regarded as a celebrity among the co-eds and most people who clutch their Bibles tighter than their iPhones. We look so much alike it is frightening. My mom can pass as a friend or babysitter, but if Roland and I are ever compared critically, the recognition will be instant, I’m sure of it.

“You know,” I say, hoping to cheer her up. “I have half his genes, and half yours, but I have one hundred percent of your environmental upbringing. I’m just…examining the twenty-five percent of me I don’t know.”

She sighs. “A quarter is a lot, Dee. Try sitting down for dinner with a chair that’s had a leg sawed off.”

I look away from her and back out the window. I know how she feels and don’t need to see it pinching at her face.

Despite the sporadic meetings we had through my pre-teen and high school years, Roland will certainly know less about me than I do of him. He hasn’t watched me on TV every week for the last five years as I have him. Sometimes twice in a day if I bother to log in to the live sermon feeds. Mom knows I watch some of them, but cautioned me early on not to confuse watching him with having a relationship with him. I shift in my seat, flattening out the front of my skirt.

“Are you comfortable?” she asks, filling the sudden silence that’s overtaken the car.

An odd question from the outside, sure, but not from where I sit in my casual (but nice) plain navy blue t-shirt and knee-length khaki skirt. It’s an outfit I might wear from time to time at home, but at Carter this will be a regular ensemble. Their dress code is strict, focusing on modesty—skirts mustn’t be above the knee, shirts should cover the chest, etc. The whole affair is essentially business casual. While the rules are relaxed only slightly on move-in day to allow for all students to wear jeans—which are usually only permitted in residence halls during non-class time—I’ve decided to play it safe. I have enough red flags pinned to me already.

Mom turns the car left and we pass through the gates of the main entrance to the university. Excitement triples inside me as I swallow the beauty of the grounds. I visited probably ten public and private universities between the ages of sixteen and eighteen, and nothing was as shiny as this campus. It’s so perfect I can’t even believe it’s real grass, and I almost ask Mom to stop the car so I can touch it.

I grin as I plan one more gentle act of rebellion from the passenger seat of the car. Reaching forward, I press the “6” on the stereo, and suddenly the sounds of Casting Crowns—a wildly popular Christian band—fill the car. Mom’s eye-roll once she hears the lyrics, and her turning down of the volume elicits a laugh from me.

She hastily pushes another button, and Boy George serenades us. I laugh harder, and she finally joins in.

“Kennedy,” she says in a moment of seriousness when the song ends, “I don’t understand how you’re being so calm about all of this. There isn’t even anything here you want to do.”

I lean my head back on the headrest. “No, Mom. There’s nothing here that you want me to do. I’m undecided, remember? Anyway, I don’t know why you’re being so insane. I’m an adult.”

“These kids…” she starts in a wide-eyed whisper as if we’ve taken a detour onto another planet.