ON MONDAY, two days later, John was back home. The very next morning, Taryn was pleasantly surprised when she answered the door to see him standing there. Except for the broken arm which was still healing in its cast, there was no visible sign that anything unusual had happened to him.
He smiled at her. “Hi.”
She smiled back as her heart started to flutter. “Hi.”
“If you aren’t too busy, could I come in for a few minutes?”
Would she ever too busy for him? She led him into the living room and they sat down on the sofa.
“I wanted to thank you for coming to visit me so often,” he said. “In all the confusion, I’m not sure I even mentioned it. Of course, I had no idea you were there, since all I did was lie in the bed and sleep….” he stopped and chuckled… “but I do appreciate it.”
So much for the theory that comatose patients understood what was being said. Maybe it was better in this case. She’d gotten really personal in her one sided conversations with him. “I wanted to be there, John.”
“I’ve done a lot of thinking since I’ve been home.”
She waited anxiously. Had he been thinking about her?
“About the ministry.”
She shouldn’t have been disappointed, but just the same, she was.
“I came close to dying,” he went on, oblivious to her thoughts. “But for the grace of God, I would have. I won’t be able to work until this arm heals, and it’ll give me lots of time to spend studying the Bible. How can I be an effective spiritual leader if I don’t gain as much knowledge as I can? The class I’m attending is wonderful, but I want to go deeper into the scriptures. I was wondering if you would like to study with me.” His eyes met hers quizzically.
The question surprised her. If he was making such a request, he must believe she would be interested. If he thought that, he must see something in her to make him feel that way. She couldn’t help becoming excited. “I’d like that.”
He smiled and so did she.
“You’re really beautiful, Taryn, especially when you smile like that. I don’t think I ever told you and I should have done it a long time ago.”
A blush crept onto her cheeks.
He laughed. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you, but I’m going to do it some more. You are beautiful, not only on the outside, but on the inside as well. You didn’t have to make all those trips to Asheville to see me, but you did. You didn’t have to spend all those hours sitting beside my bed talking to me, in the hopes your voice would somehow wake me up. I wish I knew what you said. I guess you’re going to have to start all over and say it all again.”
Say it all again? She’d love to be able to tell him how much she loved him for the rest of her life. “It might take a long time.”
“That’s okay. I have all the time in the world.”
Silence ensued as they sat there looking into one another’s eyes. Still, about the time her emotions started surging, she was surprised and disappointed when he suddenly turned away.
“I’m sorry,” he said then. “I didn’t come here to - I really like you, Taryn, but……”
But. That little word that could mean so much or so little. She waited.
“I really care for you, but there are things in my past….”
“I know about your son.”
His eyes widened.
“I’d like to help you find him. I can’t begin to imagine how your heart is hurting, but I’d very much like to help it heal.”
“How did you find out? Josie?”
She started to mention the picture Suzi had told her about but remembered how Suzi had been afraid he’d think she was snooping if he’d known she’d seen it and stopped the words. “It doesn’t matter.”
“How much do you know?”
“Only that you have a son named Ricky and you’ve been trying to find him.”
“And you aren’t curious to know more?”
“If you want me to know, you’ll tell me. No matter what happened, it won’t change the way I feel about you.”
He waited, his eyes locked with hers. “How do you feel?”
“I --- love you.” Once the words were spoken, she couldn’t believe she’d said them and quickly looked away.
He smiled. “Oh, you are such a beautiful person, Taryn, but so very naïve. You have no idea what I’ve done. You know nothing about me. I’m afraid if you did, you’d regret saying those words.”
“Your past doesn’t matter to me. I know you now, and the ‘you’ that I know is the ‘you’ that I love. And because of the way I feel about you, I will have no trouble loving Ricky, too, when we find him.”
“When we find him.”
“I said it before and I mean it. I have some money saved. All I’ve done is work and put my money in the bank. I want to use it in the search.”
“I could never let you do that. I’ve spent almost everything I made in the last year and still came up empty handed. The only thing I didn’t do, until the last few months, was ask the Lord for help. I just became a Christian last June. Until that time, I wasn’t a person the Lord would’ve even liked, let alone helped.”
“God is no respecter of persons. He loves us all, no matter what we’ve done.”
“But He might think I don’t deserve to have my son back.”
“Maybe He just knew the timing wasn’t right yet.”
“He might be better off with his mother. No matter what happened between us, she eventually grew to love him. She was a better mother than I was a father when she left.”
She didn’t want to ask but needed to know. “Did you love her very much?”
He sighed. “If I had, I’d feel a little more deserving of the Lord’s help right now. We never loved each other and we never married, but it didn’t stop us from having a child together. God had to have really frowned on that.”
“No more than He would frown on the rest of us who do so many things He doesn’t approve of.”
“If she’s become a Christian, and I do find Ricky, I can’t just take him away from her. She hurt me deeply when she did it to me. I don’t want to do the same thing to her.”
“Because you’re a good person, John. To hear you say such things makes me love you all the more.”
“Oh, Taryn…….” He looked down.
“You don’t have to say anything back to me. I hope that you’ll be able to love me someday, too, but until then – or even if it never happens - I want to be your friend. And friends help each other. I want to help you find Ricky.”
“I don’t deserve someone like you. I’ve done so many things that I’m ashamed of.”
“It doesn’t matter. When God forgave you, he washed all those bad things away, never to be remembered again. I don’t need to know how you used to be and what you used to do. All I need to know is the man you are now.”
They sat quietly for several moments before he reached out and took her hand into his. “Ottie told me I’d find my son.”
Her eyes widened. “Ottie? How did Ottie know?”
“On that day when we all thought he was going to die, when he was so adamant about talking to me alone, he told me God revealed to him that I would find my boy. Not only that, he said I’d have an unexpected surprise when I did.”
“If Ottie said that, it will come true, John. I honestly think he has a special connection with God.”
“I know he does. I was a complete stranger to him. That was the first time I ever saw him. I’ve never forgotten his words, and I believe them. I believe I will find Ricky – but I can’t imagine what the surprise will be when I do. To be honest with you, I’m wary of surprises when there’s no way of knowing if they’re something you want or not.”
“He gave you no idea at all as to what it is?”
“Not a clue.” John smiled suddenly. “You know what? I’m not going to worry about it either. I want the Lord’s will to be done in my life. I want to be able to accept it, no matter what it is.”
> She smiled, even as her eyes began to blur.
His grip on her hand tightened and he pulled her closer to him. “I can’t help but think God put you in my life. Taryn, I’ve been fighting my feelings for you – because of – because of everything that’s happened in my past.” Inching closer yet, he put his arm around her. “Right now, I just wish I wasn’t wearing this cast, so I could hold you.”
“I’m not in a cast,” she whispered, putting both her arms around him and leaning her head against his chest.
“This feels so right,” he whispered, kissing the top of her head. “So very, very right…..”
∞ TWENTY-THREE ∞
SHE WAS WALKING ON A CLOUD the rest of the day. It didn’t surprise her when she had an urge to visit Ottie. So many times he’d encouraged her when she’d been feeling down on herself. Now that she was suddenly on top of the world, she wanted to share her joy with him.
She didn’t expect to see her sister Marna, her husband Devon and Devon’s Grandfather Conrad in Ottie’s room when she entered. After a round of hugs, they all sat down around the old man in the wheelchair.
“Now, this is the way I like it,” Ottie said, beaming. “To be surrounded by people I love. All we need is a piano for Conrad and it would be perfect.”
Devon looked at his grandfather, his dark eyes twinkling. “I’ll never forget the day you played that boogie-woogie tune for all the patients here, Pops.”
Marna smiled, remembering that had been the day she’d realized she loved Devon.
Conrad grinned. “I’d never have learned to play if you’d had any interest in the instrument,” he said to his grandson. “See what you got me into by refusing to learn yourself.”
“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Ottie said, turning his eyes toward Taryn. “Tell me, Missy, how’s John?”
“Except for his arm still healing, he’s as good as new.” She nearly blushed when her mind silently added ‘but better’. “He told me what you said to him that day, Ottie.”
Marna looked at her sister quizzically.
“John has a son,” Taryn explained. She saw no need to keep it a secret. The truth was, she wanted to tell everybody she met. What if just one person might have some information that could help locate him? “His name is Ricky and he’s eight years old. His mother left with him two years ago and John hasn’t seen him since. Even with the help of a private investigator, he hasn’t been able to find him.”
For a long moment there was silence. Taryn couldn’t help wishing she’d been able to talk to her sister alone, instead of revealing the information to so many others at the same time. She’d have liked to have confided in Marna first and been better able to explain everything to her.
Ottie’s voice broke the silence. “What I said to him was a revelation God gave me. I didn’t even remember saying it until John reminded me later.”
“You told him he was going to find his little boy, as well as an unexpected surprise. Needless to say, he’s elated about the first part but a little frightened about the second.”
Conrad spoke. “No need to be scared when the Lord’s the one making the promises.”
Taryn smiled. “That’s kind of what John said. He’s ready to accept God’s will, whatever it is.”
“It takes a true man of God to think like that,” Devon said softly.
“And it takes a true woman of God,” Ottie added, his eyes directly on Taryn, “to love a man who thinks like that.”
Her own eyes widened suddenly. “Ottie, that man…..”
Everyone waited when she stopped mid-sentence.
“That man,” she said again. “The one that came to see you, the one who said he was Pastor Thomas. John told me about him visiting you and I think he’s the same man who approached me in the grocery store. He started asking me questions about John. Said he was an old friend of his named Thomas Mott, but John says he never knew anyone by that name. Do you suppose he knows something about Ricky? What if he’s been trying to get all this information on John in the hopes he’ll find out something derogatory to use against him, to keep him from ever getting his son? What if he’s working for Ricky’s mother?”
Marna looked at Devon and Devon looked at his grandfather. They all three then turned to Taryn and then to Ottie, all of them clearly wondering what in the world she was talking about.
The look Marna gave her sister was an assurance that the two of them needed to have a long talk and very soon.
It was Ottie’s next words that hit her right in the middle of her heart. “What if he’s working for John and not against him? What if he’s checking John out – whether for the boy’s mother or somebody else - to see if he thinks he’s a father worthy of getting his son back?”
She thought of what he’d said several times as the day passed. In a way, she wanted desperately to believe it could be true. Anyone checking John out wouldn’t find anything that would leave any doubt that he was a changed man from the way he used to be. There was no way he could be considered an unfit father. Then again, if Ricky’s mother was behind it, why was she going to such trouble – unless she wanted John back in her life?
“I have to trust you, Lord,” Taryn breathed as she tried to concentrate on an ad she’d started when she arrived back home. “I’ve come too far to start having doubts.”
The ringing of her phone interrupted her and she answered the minute she saw John’s number on the caller ID.
“I need to get back to work,” he said and she could hear the smile in his voice. “I’m bored. Maybe the company of a pretty young lady would help me out.”
She laughed. “But where in the world can you find a pretty young lady?”
He laughed, too. “Have you noticed what a beautiful, warm day it is? Would you like to take a little walk?”
A few minutes later they were strolling, hand in hand, up the deserted mountain road behind Taryn’s house. They talked easily and freely about anything that came into their minds and the minutes flew by.
“You know,” he said as they started back down the hill much later, “I love being with you. I don’t care if we aren’t doing anything but walking and talking, or even if we’re just sitting around and saying nothing.”
She felt exactly the same way.
“I know we barely know each other,” he continued, “and I know there’s a lot of bad stuff in my past, but…….”
She waited.
He stopped walking and turned to look at her. “I told myself I wouldn’t do this, but……” Pulling her to him with his one good arm, he started kissing her.
She encircled her own arms around him and inched closer, fervently returning the passionate kiss that was setting her entire insides on fire. When he pulled his face away after a very long time, he took a deep sighing breath and kept holding her. Neither moved, except for trying to inch even closer to each other when they were already as close as they could get.
The moment was shattered abruptly by the ringing of his phone. He looked at her and smiled. “I don’t think I’ll get any reception up here. I’ll check it out later.”
“You might want to try, just in case.”
Pulling away just enough to retrieve his phone he answered.
The voice on the other end came through clearly. “Is this John Winston?”
Not recognizing the voice, he pulled the phone back enough to look at the caller ID. Unknown Caller. “This is John. Who am I speaking to?” Ordinarily, he wouldn’t have said anything, assuming it was a prank call or a spam, but for some reason, he felt led to see what it was about.
“You don’t know me, John. We’ve never met. My name is Matthew Cantrell.” The voice paused.
Cantrell? John’s inquisitiveness deepened. He didn’t know anyone named Cantrell.
“I’m Sheila’s father.”
His eyes widened and his heart started racing. Sheila’s last name was Evans, not Cantrell.
“I need to meet with you, John,” the voice on the other end c
ontinued as if nothing unusual had happened. “It’s very important. If it’s convenient with you, I’ll fly to North Carolina this week end, and I’ll call back to set up a time and place where we can get together.”
John‘s senses were quickly returning. “Is this about Ricky?”
“It is definitely about your son and…….” Matthew Cantrell stopped.
“….Sheila?”
“Yes?”
“Are they both all right?”
“I can’t talk about anything over the phone. I just wanted you to know that I’m coming. We’ll talk about everything when we get together.”
“How did you know how to contact me?”
“We’ll talk about that, too. Good-bye, John.”
“Wait….don’t…..” It was too late. The call disconnected. In a frenzy, John tried to redial, only to receive the ‘no service’ signal. He looked at Taryn, his eyes wide. “I don’t believe this! His call came through as clear as crystal but now I have no service.”
She couldn’t help overhearing, but all she remembered was when John said the names Ricky and Sheila. Was Sheila Ricky’s mother? John had never mentioned her name. Her heart was beating way too fast. Just moments before, it was pounding with excitement. Now it was hammering out fear. “John?”
He told her what the man had said.
“It must be very important if he’s coming all this ways to see you,” she commented, hoping the trembling in her voice wasn’t as apparent to him as it was to her.
He started walking again. He didn’t take her hand or put his arm around her. All he did was walk.
“Did he say when he’s coming?” she asked.
“This week end.”
“Did he say if he’ll have Ricky with him?”
“No, and he didn’t give me time to ask. I never met him, Taryn. Sheila never had anything good to say about her parents and didn’t want anything to do with them. She didn’t even use their last name! I had no idea who this man was until he told me he’s her father. I can’t imagine why he’s coming here to see me, how he even knew about me or how he found me.”
“It had to be through Thomas Mott. He must’ve been working for her all along.”
Above the Fear Page 13