Desert Wives (9781615952267) by Betty Webb Page B

lay there, trying to make sense of the words.
Wife? Time to prepare breakfast?
This was one crazy dream.
    Then I remembered.
    â€œComing,” I muttered, crawling out of bed and staggering to the door. I leaned into the frame and hissed, “I told you, Saul, I don’t cook!”
    â€œBetter act like you’re at least trying,” he hissed back. “Ruby’s already in the kitchen. You don’t want to make her suspicious, do you?”
    â€œAll right, all right.” I wrapped my housecoat around me, unlocked the door, and shouldered the grinning Saul aside as I darted past him into the bathroom. I showered in record time, then returned to my room, where I strapped on my gun and donned a granny dress made from a gray on gray print even drabber than the one I’d worn yesterday. Except for my face and hands, the dress covered me completely, with not so much as a pleat or ruffle to soften its severity. As I braided my hair into a tight plait which made the scar on my forehead stand out in bright relief, I stared at myself in the mirror: The well-dressed sister wife. I looked like puke.
    â€œSister Lena!” Saul’s voice. From the kitchen. “The Lord is telling me that you are taking time for vanities.”
    Although I knew he said this for Ruby’s benefit, it still ticked me off, a warning sign. The perfect sister wife displayed no impatience or temper. Her mind held no thoughts for anything other than the Lord, her husband and her children—in that order. She was a breeding machine, nothing more.
    Gritting my teeth, I stuffed my feet into my Reeboks—for some reason not forbidden—and headed toward the kitchen.
    Ruby waited by the stove, her dress and hairstyle mirroring my own. She did, however, look less pale today. Her cheeks were pink. “Sister Lena, how come breakfast wasn’t ready a half-hour ago? The Lord hates sloth!”
    Unless my radar had gone awry, Sister Ruby simmered in a jealous snit. I looked over at Saul to see if he’d noticed.
    He sat at the head of the table with his back to her, oblivious. “Oh, Sister Ruby, our dear Sister Lena has lived on the Outside all her life, so she has much to learn.” His voice carried enough conviction to scare me, but then he winked. “Now Sister Lena, I want three eggs sunny-side up, three strips of bacon, two slices of white, buttered toast, and a big glass of milk.”
    Cholesterol heaven. I doubted if a Godly wife corrected her husband even when it was for his own good, so I said nothing.
    I did my best, but breakfast, after Saul led us in an obligatory prayer from Solomon’s
Gospel
, proved disgusting. Cooking by myself with little assist from Ruby, I had somehow contrived to cook the egg yolks granite hard while keeping the whites runny. I burnt the bacon and cremated the toast. Even the milk seemed to curdle in my inexpert hands. Saul, obviously the possessor of a cast iron stomach, ate most of it, albeit with a pained expression. Ruby pushed the runny eggs around on her plate with all the enthusiasm of a full-bore anorexic, while I confined myself to a pear I’d found on the window sill.
    â€œFruit is good for you,” I said. “It has a lot of fiber. Keeps you regular.”
    â€œFiber?” Ruby knitted her brow as if the concept of a healthy gastrointestinal tract was altogether alien. “Our husband likes eggs and bacon. It’s what he likes that counts around here, not what you think.”
    Meow
. But I decided that the woman, who probably saw herself as shunted aside in her husband’s affections, deserved sympathy, not sarcasm, so I didn’t tell her that pleasing a husband by blocking his arteries was an odd way to show affection. Aloud I said, in a respectful tone, “Perhaps you can teach me how to cook, Sister Ruby. When I lived in the outside world I never cooked, other than to heat up TV dinners.” No lie there.
    She gave me a quick