Bluegrass Courtship

What have You got going on with her, Lord? he prayed as he slumped down farther into the couch, sleep starting to overtake him. In his experience, that kind of full-out honesty grew out of some experience with deception. He wondered if that were true with her. Where did all that suspicion come from? Any plans on doing away with some of it while we’re here?

Why was that his problem? Sure, she was a “hostile,” and that instantly put her on Drew’s radar. But somehow Janet Bishop wasn’t the ordinary “hostile.” With most of the reluctant types, Drew just cared that they liked the show. It was more personal with Janet. Mostly because she was somehow making it personal. While she’d never really voiced it, he got the strong impression that she was not so much suspicious of Missionnovation as she was suspicious of him. Unconvinced of his integrity.

That was it, wasn’t it? He could handle anyone’s suspicions of the show—he had a thick skin where Missionnovation was concerned—but it was bugging him that Janet Bishop wasn’t willing to take him at his word.

And that was a sore spot, because he was feeling the squeeze in the integrity department lately. Success was a funny thing in this business. Instead of making things easier, it made things more complicated. Bigger deals had more strings. Success bred expectations of more success. You could mess up when you were small potatoes, and people would just brush themselves off and go on. Trip up when everyone’s watching, and suddenly the mishaps grew harder to put behind you.

As the projects had met with success and the show had grown over the first three seasons, people began to take notice. Media people had recognized that Missionnovationwas on to something. So it wasn’t new that a network had shown interest. Last season, they’d gotten a solid offer or two, promising visibility, production budgets and backing. But all of them made subtle requests for Drew to “dial down the God.” To use the word faith instead of Christianity—things like that. As far as Drew was concerned, that was nonnegotiable. Missionnovation was about renovating the places where worship happened. And that meant Jesus would be present and accounted for—every episode.

Drew laid his forearm across his face, shutting out the strong afternoon light that came through the bus window. With Kevin’s music not on, he could hear the birds. It felt like months since he’d been able to lie down and listen to birds. His life was so full of noise lately that some days it was hard to think straight. To listen. He shut his eyes. Keep me on the straight and narrow, Jesus. The view’s getting fuzzy from up here, and I don’t ever want to stray from Your plan for this. Just make it work.

Make it work…. He prayed over and over as he drifted off.

Chapter Eight

Some unknown time later, Drew felt an insistent tapping on his boot. He opened his eyes to find Annie standing there, clipboard in hand. He wasn’t surprised to find a worried look on her face—Annie didn’t wake him up for just anything.

“Annie, I know that look,” he sighed, pulling himself upright. “Trouble?”

“Depends on your point of view.”

Drew rubbed his eyes at the enigmatic answer. “What’s up?”

“When you didn’t check your e-mail, Charlie sent a fax. Big network meeting next week.”

Drew sat up straight when he read the fax. “Next week? He knows I don’t leave the site, ever.” He stared at the column of names at the bottom of the fax, listing the people to be at the meeting. Names he didn’t recognize, but titles that indicated they were dealing with HomeBase’s top brass and network heavyweights.

Drew pulled out his cell phone and hit the speed dial for Charlie’s private line at the California production office.

Charlie picked up on the first ring. “I knew I’d get your attention with a fax.”

“What gives? You get all those bigwigs in one place and you make it the week I can’t show up? You sure you can handle all that influence in one room without my supervision?”

“Bingo, Drew. There’s a lot of power on that list. Three seasons of huge exposure, huge resources. They have schedules that would choke mere mortals like us. You need to be here.”

Drew didn’t reply. He thought his own schedule was bad enough, but never did understand the subtleties of the network deal—that was Charlie’s territory. It probably took Charlie months to set this thing up.

“I know it’s not how you’d like it,” Charlie continued. “I know you’re going have to give a little on the project to be here, but you know me. I wouldn’t ask you if it weren’t important. Seriously, Drew, we’re looking at a once in a lifetime shot here. You need to be in L.A. when this happens.”

Drew began pacing the bus. “There’s got to be another way. If you’ve got them all together, and it’s that important, let’s just spend the money and fly them out here. Let ’em see Missionnovation firsthand. This one’s a dream—it’s the ideal episode for that kind of thing—they’d eat it up.”

Drew heard Charlie sigh. “I thought of that already. I proposed it. I even told them I’d charter their flight directly into Lexington and have them home by dinner—eight hours from top to bottom.”

“And…”

“No go. It’s L.A. or nothing.”

Drew ran his hands through his hair. “I hate this. Don’t do this to me. Don’t ask me to cut corners.”

“No one’s asking you to cut corners. I can have you in and out in twenty-four hours, and you know you’ve got people who can handle the site. Drew, we’ve talked about this. As Missionnovation grows, you’re going to have to step back a bit from the day-to-day stuff. That’s leadership. You’ve got to be out in front so your people can follow.”

Drew caught sight of his reflection in the bus windows. He couldn’t quite picture the scraggly lad in front of him doing deals with all those network and corporate heavyweights. This felt more like being backed into a corner than being out in front, leading. Drew had a long history with Charlie, though; long enough to know Charlie only made demands when he had no other choice. “You’re not going to ask me to wear a suit or anything, are you?”

Charlie laughed. “Do you even own one?”

“The last suit I wore was to my father’s funeral, Chuck. I don’t associate them with happy occasions.” Drew only used “Chuck” when he was making him mad or pushing his limits. This definitely qualified. Charlie had probably known this was going to be a “Chuck” call before he sent the fax. And he’d sent it anyway. That was Charlie—ready to be “Chuck” if that’s what it took to get the deal done. He had to respect that in his longtime partner. “I don’t like this,” Drew sighed into the phone.

“Welcome to the big leagues. Everything costs a little more up here.”

It felt wrong.

“Can I let you know?” he said wearily into the phone. “I need to think about this.”

“Think about it. Pray about it. You’re free to do whatever it takes to get your head around this. Just as long as you do it in the next twenty-four hours.”

And that was television: ponder all you want, but ponder fast. “I’ll call you, Chuck,” Drew said, and snapped his phone shut.

“What do you think, Annie?” Drew called as he walked to the back of the bus where she’d gone to give him some privacy. “Should I stick it to The Man or do the deal with him?”

“Charles signs my paychecks, but I work for you. I’ll back you whatever you decide.”

“So you’re not going to tell me what I should do?”

Annie pushed her glasses up on top of her head. “Do I look like the kind of girl to take God’s job away from Him?”

Janet stood on the church steps watching the government types get back into their car. “You’re very smooth, I’ll grant you that.”

“You know,” said Drew as he put a rubber band from his pocket around the blueprints he’d rolled up, “when you say that kind of stuff, it never sounds like a compliment. Can I pour on the charm to move a project forward? Yes, I can. All I did was sell the project to their needs and sensibilities. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Janet planted her hands on her hips. She would have stuffed her hands in her pockets, but she’d taken the care to put on something nicer than overalls for a meeting with state officials. It’d been weeks since she’d worn a skirt anyway, and she was looking for an occasion to wear the new boots her mother had bought her for her birthday last month.

It was a brilliant idea to propose the rainwater collection system for a government grant—she’d wished she thought of it herself. Drew, though, had clearly also pushed the project’s new TV visibility. It felt like an unfair edge. What about all the other worthy ecological projects that wouldn’t get funded just because there was no celebrity to play the high profile card? “You can’t seriously believe your celebrity status and the presence of a television camera didn’t affect the outcome of that meeting.”

Drew looked at her as she started down the steps. “Well, of course it did. But don’t you think I’d be foolish not to use that? I didn’t deceive anyone—or knock anyone else out of the running for that grant. Everything I said in there was the absolute truth.” He began tapping the tube of blueprints against his open palm. “Did I use every asset at my disposal? Sure. Every gift of gab and insight into human nature God’s given me? Absolutely.” He stopped at the bottom of the steps and turned to look back up at her. “You know, I never did buy into the concept that deep faith turned you into some kind of doormat. That you had to sit around, contemplating the Biblical truths of the universe, waiting for God to bring life to your doorstep. I count on God as much as I know how for this. But I think that includes working as hard as I can to meet the goals I believe He’s set before me. Besides—” he started across the sidewalk “—if you must know, I checked, and there aren’t any other viable applicants for that pool of funds right now.”

Janet followed after him. “Hey, look, I didn’t mean to start a fight.”

Drew paused, shut his eyes for a moment, and pushed out a breath. “Sorry—I hadn’t even realized you hit a nerve there. I’m overreacting here, aren’t I?”

It made Janet laugh. “You’re wound a bit tight, yeah.”

“I think it’s part of the job description. Actually, it might be the majority of the job description. You need to be a little bit wacky to do what I do.”

“Well, you got the church a full rainwater retrieval system and a new roof—so maybe wacky’s got its uses.” She pointed to the blueprints. “But this is a whole church roof now, not just the preschool roof. You’ll follow the specs, won’t you? Take the time to get all the details done right? Roofs are serious. Roofs are supposed to last decades. I’d hate to see the church dealing with leaks in two years’ time because someone cut a few corners to make their television deadline and you’re long gone into another blockbuster season.”

“You can supervise the installation yourself, if you want to. You seem to know more about the rainwater part than anyone else.”

Janet crossed her arms over her chest. “Some of us have to earn our living the un-televised way. You know, minding the store, all that day-to-day boring stuff?”