"Oh, no. I am not going to church alone."
"That's funny, because I'm telling you right now that you are. I don't have to go; you do."
"I am not walking in there by myself after that little scene I caused yesterday! I can't!" She knew that he was probably joking, but was still nervous. Her feelings of humiliation over crying in front of the shocked rector had been steadily magnifying since the incident, and she was already dreading having to stand in front of the church that night, singing her heart out, and knowing that he would be watching her and wondering about her mental stability.

"Well, what are people going to say? 'Did he beat you?'"
"Don't be a smart-alec."

He had come to the library during her lunch break at one o'clock, so she was too pleased to put up much of an argument. He would come to church; he was just pushing her buttons. They walked into the pizza joint, and he ordered for them: a small thin crust, half with green olives (which she loathed) and half with pineapple (which made his skin crawl). Before placing the order, he looked at her questioningly. "Red meat or no red meat?"

"Easter's tomorrow. We can make it one more day."

Sighing, he nodded. They found a table in the nearly empty restaurant and resumed their earlier discussion.

"Everybody on the lists is arguing over it," she said. "How much have you caught?"
"I saw some of the footage while I was at the hospital this morning for my blood draw. Hey, I told you that the dentist said it wasn't an abscess, didn't I?"
"Yes, you did. So what do you think?"
"Scary. What's everybody saying?"
"Oh, some people are angry about the force used to take him from the home, and some people are just glad that Elian will be back with his dad..."

"But he won't be," he interrupted. "In countries like Cuba, children of a certain age only see their parents a few times a week, and Castro has already said that Elian is going to be placed in a state school in another city for 'deprogramming.'" He shook his head.

"Regardless, he should legally be in his father's custody."
"But Castro will be his guardian more than the father!"

She'd been expecting this, and had been musing on it for most of the morning. "Look at it this way: his father is Cuban. He knows the way Cuban society works, he knows how Elian will grow up. And he's still asking for Elian to come home. I say he has to go. I don't necessarily like it - that "deprogramming" statement scares me - but that's the way it has to work."

"I disagree."
"Well, let's say that I somehow got the idea that communism was the way to go, that U.S. capitalism was a crock. I take off for Cuba with our child, and I die on a plane crash on the way there. Should our kid come back to you, or stay with whatever distant relatives I might have in Cuba?"

They were silent. Finally, he said, "Thorny issues. In custody cases crossing separate countries, should custody go to the closest nearby relative, or to the closest relative, period?"

"If we were living in France with our child, and both of us died, should the kid come back to America to be with our parents, or should she stay in France with a distant aunt she's never met?"

They had finished eating, and the remaining cold slices of pizza went into a box. He excused himself to run to the bathroom, and, lacking a pen, she started working on a crossword puzzle in her head.

Her hands were cold. She had been doing bits of vocalizing throughout the day, but her throat still felt dry and unusable. What she had told her husband had been the truth; she didn't want to be noticed by the preacher for a while, but there was no help for it this time. Her biggest fear was that he would approach her after the service to try to counsel her. Well, perhaps that wasn't the biggest fear; the biggest one would be that he would do just that, and she would start crying again.

Why had she agreed to do this? The director had tricked her! Maybe that wasn't a fair assessment, but it certainly felt better to think of it that way. She tucked her chin and furrowed her brow in self-righteous frustration. For the hundredth time, she rubbed her hands together in a futile attempt to warm them.

Luckily, work provided distraction. Unfortunately, that was largely because he had been going on unsuccessful book hunts all morning. Books that should have been on the shelf were not; catalog listings were inaccurate. The patrons were very understanding, but she herself was getting more and more angry, though she calmed down quickly enough.

She was happy that tomorrow was Easter and she didn't have to work. She would have been happier were Easter traditionally held on a Monday, for she would not have had to work on this Sunday anyway, regardless of the holiday.

"I want to reserve a copy of The Indwelling. I've read all the others, and can't wait for this one."

"Oh. Really?" She began filling out the form. A woman standing close by heard the man's request and stepped in.

"Those are really good books! It's a good thing you're getting your reserve in now."

As she continued to write, she felt her mouth begin to speak before she thought about what she was saying. "Yeah, my husband has read the books, but the first one irritated me so much that I could only make it through the first few chapters." She looked up to see the patrons staring at her. She had to continue, though she did so with a deep blush. "It seemed to me that the authors had a tendency to punt on major plot points, sticking them in long letters that seemed otherwise extraneous."

The male patron nodded and looked away; she quickly looked away herself and finished the form. "Can I see your library card, sir?" The transaction was completed as rapidly as possible, so that everybody could try to forget the conversation had happened.

Later, she prayed that she hadn't come across as rudely as she suspected that she had. Oh, well, she sighed, if I can keep that sort of thing down to once every few months, I'll be okay.