The Protest

Chapter One

Feminism causes women to abandon their husbands, commit crimes and perversions, and become lesbians.

—Reverend Logan Churlick, 2014

Summer settled with a vengeance on the dusty little town of Rathcreek, a dry August heat eastern Washington was known for, the kind that wrung sweat and energy from everything living. By nine o’clock in the morning, the clapboards of the Crownhart home were seared in dust.

Janey Crownhart Powers stood at the kitchen sink peeling potatoes. A shaft of sunlight bore down on her from the skylight, and the long chest­nut hair shone in a neon halo of copper highlights. Her open face wore mischief like a jaunty hat cocked as if nothing would ever knock it off. The nose, too long and narrow, gave her a knowing look, like a fox. But the look was redeemed by compassionate, almost ethereal eyes.

Janey rinsed off the potato, took aim and lobbed it into a large pot. Water splashed over the counter and dripped onto the floor. She glanced at her sister, Louise, who was chopping onions and wiping her eyes on her sleeve. Except for the musical jingling of the potato peeler and steady beat of the knife striking the cutting board, it was quiet, the practical quiet that accompanies working women when the conversation lulls.

Dragging the peeler across the brown skin of another potato, Janey broke into a mournful, throaty song. “Sum-mer ti-i-i-i-me — and the peelin’ is easy—”

Hardly skipping a beat, Louise belted out, “Potatoes flyin’, cotton soaked with sweat—”

“Eyes are cryin’ ’cause the onion is slaughtered — ”

Louise sang lustily, “You ain’t seen nuthin’ like Weezie’s ’tato salad yet! Oooh-wee! God, I’ve missed you, Janey. Why’d you have to marry that asshole? Oughta leave him, come back here and have breakfast with us every morning.”

A smile touched the corner of Janey’s mouth. She whispered, “Louise, he’ll hear you.”

“No he won’t. He’s watching a church program with Dad. As if they won’t get enough today.” She stepped back and peered through the door­way. “Oh, sure. The asshole who really needs saving is pretendin’ to watch t.v. He’s reading want ads, while Dad, who’s already ’bout as born again as you can get, is overdosing on his evangelical drug of choice.” Her large gray eyes turned squinty. “Son of a bitch! What—? Hell, he’s readin’ per­sonal ads. God awmighty, Janey—with a highlighter.”

Louise slid across the floor on her stockinged feet to block her sister’s charge. “Wait!” She held up her hands. “Joke. Sorry, sis.” A smarmy grin appeared.

“That was not funny, Louise.”

“Mmhmm,” she murmured, back to her onions. “Too close to home?”

Janey stroked sure along the rough hide of the potato, turning it glis­tening white. “I wouldn’t put it past him, you know. To get back at me.”

“Jesus, Janey.”

“We all have our moments of depravity, but most of us don’t pledge allegiance to ’em like some flag.”

Louise glanced sideways. “I tried to warn you. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Know what I mean?” She arched her eyebrows. “The far-flung influence of the CIA.”

Here we go, Janey thought.

Suddenly, Louise squatted and yanked open the cupboard doors. She rotated cans this way and that. “Damn CIA. Puttin’ things in your food, into your head, always tryin’ to get to you.”

She held up a can of beets. “Aha!” Mumbling about red dye, she tossed it into the trash can.

‘You listen to your big sister. Things are not always the way they appear. And you, little sister, are a babe in the friggin’ woods. You gotta understand one thing: there’s Christians, and there’s Christians. You lis­ten to me. The CIA is alive and well.” She gave Janey a nod in her way of conveying mystery out of madness.