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Chapter Forty-three
Love is Always Brave
"Be thou strong and very courageous."
~ Joshua 1:7 ~
"Charity never faileth."
~ 1 Corinthians 13:8 ~
 aggie
was so excited about the upcoming wedding on Friday, that she spent Thursday night
tossing in bed, making Vera lose more than a little sleep. Charlie slept soundly
on the living room couch until she was awakened by the anxious bride at about half
past four in the morning.
"Charlie," she whispered, shaking the young woman's shoulder. "Charlie,
please wake up! I have to talk to you."
"Just thirty more minutes," pleaded Charlie, still half-asleep, for she
had opened one eye and looked at the clock.
"But," protested Maggie, impatiently, "I have to ask you something
important."
"Nothing is important at four thirty in the morning!" groaned Charlie,
turning over to shut her eyes once more.
Then Maggie bent over and whispered something in Charlie's ear that made the young
woman sit up with a start.
"You mean, you don't know?" cried Charlie in disbelief.
"Shhhh!" hushed Maggie, abashedly. "The others will hear you!"
"You're almost thirty-two, and you still don't know about sex?"
reasoned Charlie in a lower voice. "Didn't your mother or father ever give you
the old birds-and-the-bees speech?"
"No," replied Maggie. "Did yours?"
"Now that you mention it, no," recalled Charlie, thoughtfully. "Daddy
never even broached the subject, so I had to find out from my friend, Donna."
"Charlie, I'm getting married, today! Shouldn't I know this?" asked
Maggie, a little frantically.
"I wouldn't be too concerned," smiled Charlie. "Jeff's been married
before, and what you don't know, he does. After all, his little girl didn't just
drop from the sky!"
"Won't you give me the speech?" pleaded Maggie.
"ME?!" cried Charlie, dropping back onto her pillow.
"Just tell me what Donna told you," begged the woman. "Please?"
The teenager looked at her for a moment and sighed heavily.
"Let's go into the kitchen where no one can hear us," said Charlie, getting
up and leading Maggie into the next room.
There, Charlie repeated the birds-and-the-bees speech that Donna had given her, years
ago in Montana. At first, she wasn't sure how much of it Maggie understood, but by
the end of the speech, the look on Maggie's face told Charlie that she had comprehended,
after all.
"Are you sure you're not just making this up?" asked Maggie, a little
uncertainly.
"Would I make up a thing like that?" responded Charlie, with a laugh. "Believe
me, Maggie, that's how everyone in this world was conceived. God set it up that way.
It's the 'natural use of the woman,' as the book of Romans puts it."
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