Thursday Visiting Teaching Drive Through Smithfield

Greta Smith set out on her Thursday round of visiting teaching in the family Corolla, later than she had intended after a poor night's sleep. She collected Evelyn Baker from her gate shortly before ten. Evelyn came out in the thin pale blue cardigan she wore every winter, made light of the cold and of Greta's warning that she would catch her death, and set about cheerfully cataloguing what the glovebox lacked.

On the way through Smithfield's back streets, Greta handed over the laminated, colour-coded schedule she had typed the night before. It listed four sisters to visit. First came Sister Gwen Trenerry and her slow-healing leg wound, then Sister Melanie Henderson, with a note to leave by half past eleven before she kept them for the rest of the morning. Evelyn read it aloud with mock ceremony. As Relief Society President of Playford Ward, she knew these sisters well and shared Greta's concern for them, but she reminded her that visiting teaching was not a race. Greta answered more sharply than she meant to, insisting that organisation was love made practical and that without a plan people got missed.

The edge in Greta's voice owed more to her worry over Paul than to anything Evelyn had said. Evelyn did not argue or press. She let the silence sit, as she tended to, until it settled of its own accord.

The exchange touched a difference Greta felt keenly. The two women shared the same calling and the same list of names, but Evelyn's warmth came naturally and people were drawn to it, while Greta's was built from effort and checklists. Greta envied her that ease without resenting her for it. The friendship between them was long and close, and Evelyn's teasing, including a remark that even Greta's spontaneity was planned in advance, was meant and taken with affection.

Greta mentioned that the finished dress for Shayna was on the back seat, to be dropped off once the official visits were done, and Evelyn was glad of it. As they neared Sister Trenerry's street, Greta's mind was already running ahead through the rest of the day, down to what she would cook for dinner.