S2:Ep.2 "Behind the 8 Ball"
Ep. 2 of Season 2 of That Other Flock
The events of this episode take place immediately after S2:E1 “Only Pregnancy Fans.” If you haven’t read the previous episode or any other other episodes, you can find them here.
The 8 ball was sitting on top of 9 donuts in the Duncan Donut box.
“Is that cocaine?” Leon was adjusting his reading glasses to get a closer look.
Brian whipped his head around and stared. It was sorta amusing since he’d just said he hadn’t seen Jared’s passionate speech coming and here was something else he hadn’t seen coming.
Our group shifted, shuffled, and muttered in confusion.
A clear plastic baggie of a white powder had magically appeared on the table. The bag was small, maybe an inch wide and a couple of inches tall. It was sealed with the tried-and-true zip lock top.
The powder inside looked like baby powder.
I was pretty sure it wasn’t.
It had been already been quite a morning, I’ll tell you. They don’t teach you to deal with anything like this in seminary. Porn. Ethical dilemmas. Now illegal drugs…on a donut.
Brian leaned in to examine it. Without touching it, he said, “That’s an 8 ball. That’s a coke. Where in the Land of Goshen did that come from?”
Everyone was looking at each other like we were characters in an Agatha Christie cozy mystery at the moment the killer is revealed.
“Land of Gos…Land of what? Eight ball?” Eve somehow was more distracted by Brian’s comment than the coke (if I was the detective in this story I would have noted she wasn’t surprised by the appearance of illegal drugs in the church kitchen…was it hers?).
“Land of Goshen, my mom used to say that,” Brian answered. “I have no idea why I said it. That size bag of coke’s called an 8 ball. Took me by surprise.” OK, so moving Brian down the list of suspects. Wasn’t Leon or me. Probably wasn’t Brian. Jared was too busy confronting me over my moral flexibility regarding porn and his ministry job. That left Eve…but she’d been in the middle of our little three-way ethics debate. Maybe she backhand flipped…
“Look, we all do things to make it. Funny how I don’t want Eve to sell herself on Only Fans and yet, I sell 8 balls to stay alive and support my habit.” It was Betty. She pulled her hand out of her Levi jacket pocket and dropped a handful of little bags of incredibly illegal white powder onto the church kitchen table among the donuts. 7 bags…plus the one before. My brain did a weird short circuit and all I could think of was that there were now “8 8-balls on 9 donuts on the table.” Weirdly Dr. Seuss, I know.
I couldn’t read her emotions. She had her hands in her pockets. Shoulders hunched forward. Her face was… calm.
“Betty, what are you talking about?” Leon leaned toward her, but she swayed away from him.
“No, no,” Brian was talking fast and looking over his shoulder. “Pick that up.” He was holding his arms wide, trying to keep us back.
“Betty? Coke? You?” Eve was moving around the table toward Betty as she spoke.
Jared had shifted to stand beside me. Eyes were wide. He couldn’t stop staring at the table. With a nudge, he whispered to me, “Do something. Do something now.”
Gently moving a little baggie off of a donut, Toby picked out his chocolate covered and said, “Wow, I thought Brian was the coke head.” Nodding at Brian, he said, “Sorry man.”
Brian said, with almost no heat or anger, “Fuck you, fat boy.”
Toby shrugged and took a bite.
“Betty, how about you tell us what’s going on.” This was all I could think of to say. I was stalling for time and guidance.
“No.” Brian interrupted me. “No talking. First pick up the coke. You can’t leave 8 balls lying around. This is how you end up in prison.”
Betty shrugged and started gathering the bags. Putting them in her pocket, she said, “I’m tired of hiding this. I’m tired of scrambling to survive. I’m just tired.”
“That’s a felony in your pocket,” Brian said with some heat. “What’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t know.” Betty said. “It’s just a little to get by.”
Leon looked around at our group and said, “What’s wrong with us? I thought we were kind of normal.”
Toby said, “Leon, my man, this is normal. If you don’t think this kind of thing is normal, you’re the one who’s not-normal.”
That brought Leon up short. He blinked. Then took off his glasses and cleaned them with his shirttail. He put them back on with care. He was lost in thought.
“OK Betty, tell us what you want us to know.” I said. “You’ve made your point. You have our attention. Now what?”
She took a deep breath. “Yes. I need you to know. It’s wrong.” She jutted her chin at Eve. “And Only Fans is wrong. Working for an evil man at a bad church is probably wrong.” She didn’t have to point at Jared. Everyone looked at him. I was proud of him. He didn’t duck his head. He held her eye contact. “But it’s what I do to survive. It’s how I get through the day and how I’m close to having enough money saved to buy a new truck. If…when my truck finally dies, if I can’t replace it or fix it, my business is toast. Then what happens to me? And more than the truck, how will I ever have a future?” She nodded at Leon. “I’ll be old in a few years. I’m already struggling to do the physical labor this job requires. Then what?”
A flash of emotion finally showed up on her face. Her steady determination faded to doubt…maybe regret.
“I don’t feel hopeless when I use.” She said this with a hint of defensiveness. “I like that feeling a lot. I can get through my day. I just use it in the afternoon.” She paused a moment and glanced at Brian. “You know, you know the lift…the energy. I feel like a new woman.”
“OK,” Brian nodded, “But you’ve got more than just a bump there. You’re dealing, Betty, you’re selling.”
“Yes, but not a lot and not to kids. Only adults and mostly people I know. Not addicts.” Betty was oscillating between defensiveness and hostility.
“How long? You helped me stop using blow. You helped me stop the powder.” Brian was rubbing his head and his fists were clinched. “You told me I had to stop!” This was a nearly shout. “Why did I have to stop? How long?”
“A month or so. A few weeks. During a big job, I finally got the chance to work for a big-time land developer. He needed some quick help.” She’d crossed her arms across her chest. “We had to clear, mow, and prep his new development. His regular crew got the flu or Covid or something and he hired me temporarily. I don’t know. It was some kind of deal where he had to start building and couldn’t start until we cleared it, I don’t know. Don’t care.” She smiled and shook her head, clearly revisiting that time in her memory. “We worked like crazy, working before the sun came up and we mowed by headlamp. I worked 20-hour days for a week and a half. But we did the work, and I managed to keep my regular customers…and he’s going to hire me again. Plus, I made more in those 10 days than I did the previous month.”
“But mowings a long way from this?” I gestured at the stash now safely back in her pocket. “Using is different from selling.” I paused, “You’re selling now, right?”
She nodded.
Brian muttered, “Oh, no.”
Eve said, “That’s so bad Betty.”
“How’d this start?” Brian asked her.
“He, the Developer guy, came by one evening to check on our progress. I was dragging. He said he had just the thing. I didn’t want to offend him and if it helped me run that tractor a few more hours, then I was good with it. So, I tried it. Wow! Nearly took the top off my head. I felt 20 years old again.” She was looking around at everyone. “He kept me supplied to help get it all done. And I did.”
“And the dealing?” Funny how I’ve never said those words before. This was my first time talking about dealing drugs with a drug dealer…who was my friend…in a church kitchen.
“Yeah, the developer. Or, rather, his guy. I was out of cash one time and he fronted it for me.”
Brian interrupted, “And then he said, if you wanted to make enough to pay for yours, all you have to do is sell these 6 bags. Right?”
Betty looked him square in the eye and said, “Yeah. In fact, he started sending his crews to buy from me. It was easy. And safe. I’m getting ahead. I finally have some money in the bank.”
Eve said with some suspicion, “So, why this…this confession?”
Betty nodded her head at Brian. “I’ve felt like a hypocrite for a long time. I encouraged Brian to stop using. I’ve been hard on some of you for things in your life and now I’m the one sinning and using.”
“Makes sense. Religious people are hypocrites.” Eve said this in her ‘just stating a fact,’ voice.
“That’s not fair. She’s not a hypocrite. That’s a gross generality.” Leon said.
I heard Jared mutter softly, “Yep, hypocrite.”
“Religious people aren’t automatically hypocrites.” I said this for some reason. I’m not usually a defender of religion.
“Hypocrite.” Brian said, to settle the argument. “No other way around it.”
Toby had finished his donut. He said, “If it bothers you, stop. Don’t be a hypocrite. Stop and sin no more. Jesus says something like that, right?”
“It’s never that simple, big man, never that simple.” Brian said.
“Are you already addicted?” Leon said this with as much curiosity in his voice as accusation.
“No.” Betty said with a dismissive head shake.
Based on Brian’s facial expression, he had a different opinion.
Betty saw the look and said, “No. I just use it when I need to get through the day.”
My chemical romance was with alcohol. I used it so long to numb that’s it’s been a challenge to stop it. No, “challenge” is the wrong word…it’s been a no-holds-barred death match. But I have 53 days of sobriety that I’m proud of. But cocaine? I’ve heard stories that make alcohol seem like nothing. Betty was telling herself what I’ve said to myself for over 2 years of heavy drinking.
Leon wasn’t taking this big dose of reality well. He looked around, and said, “Porn. Selling underwear. Cocaine. The bully pastor…working for the bully pastor. What’s wrong with us?”
“Money. That’s what’s wrong with us. We have money problems.” Toby said this without a smile or a laugh. He was serious.
“Sure ‘Trust Fund’,” Brian said. “The only guy in the room without money problems thinks we have a money problem.”
“Hear him out,” Leon said. “Toby, what do you mean ‘we have money problems?’”
Toby shifted from one foot to the other. He hooked a thumb into his sweat pants, which caused more of his belly to escape from under his t-shirt which then forced him to make an overall wardrobe adjustment that really didn’t help all that much. He gave his shirt and sweat pants a last tug and said, “Porn’s about money.”
“What about sex?” Brian said with a little laugh.
“And power and independence,” Eve said.
“OK, sure, but you’re thinking about it because of money. Right?” This was a different side of Toby. He was laying out a thoughtful argument.
When they nodded, he continued by pointing at me, “You. You think Worship Boy there should keep working for this church…why? For the money.”
I started to disagree, but then I realized he was right.
Turning to Betty he said, “And your Breaking Bad moment. It started because of money.”
Betty gave a slow nod of cautious agreement.
Toby kept going. I think this was the longest period I’d seen him without food in his hand or mouth. “Think about sin. Sure, there’s sex and power and appetites,” He gestured at his belly with a big smile. “But think how many times we cut corners or make excuses or get ourselves into problems because of money. Or the stuff we want…that we need money to buy…or the security we think we need that we need money to buy. Money. Stuff.”
Jared cleared his throat and said, “One of my seminary professors used to say that Jesus talked about the dangers of money and materialism more than anything else.”
Brian looked at me and said, “That true?”
I answered, “I hadn’t thought about it that way, but yeah, Jesus did talk a lot about how religion, money, and riches are a problem.”
Betty said, “Here’s where someone always says, ‘Yes, but let’s not get carried away. Money’s not bad, it’s neutral’ or something, usually it’s someone rich saying it.”
“Nobody rich down here, ‘cept you ‘Trust Fund.’” Brian said.
Toby ignored his jab and said, “It’s not about how much money. It’s about how you think about it. Money’s never your friend. Money’s never the answer.” He looked around at our group as he spoke.
Things happen in this church kitchen I can’t completely explain. No verifiable miracles that would impress anyone, but the simple profound miracles of connection, community, and clarity.
I had such a moment of clarity.
I whispered my idea to Jared. At first he had a blank, confused look that then shifted to narrowed-eye calculation, and then after a moment of reflection, he said, “You mean, like Star Wars?”
It was my turn to look blank, but then I caught his meaning. Playing along, I nodded and said, “But I get to be Han Solo.”
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