“We were just talking about trying to get together for coffee sometime,” one of them said. “I know how rough it was when I first moved here, until I found some friends.” She pulled a pen from her purse and began to write on her bulletin. “Here’s my phone number and email address. Give me a call anytime; I stay home with our sons, so I’m always around.”
The other women added their information, and when Ed came by to tell Marcus they were ready to start the service, they all gave Amelia a hug. Marcus was psyched for the new connections she’d already made, but as soon as the women left for their seats he saw the animation in her face die out completely.
“What?” he said quietly as the choir filed onto the risers and Ed welcomed the congregation in his jovial way.
Amelia tucked the bulletin into the back of her Bible. “I just doubt I’ll have anything in common with any of them.”
“You never know.” He stood with the rest of the church as the congregation began to sing along with the choir.
Amelia remained seated for a moment, but then stood slowly with her eyes fixed on the choir. “It doesn’t matter, anyway,” she muttered just loud enough for him to hear. “I’m not going to be around for long.”
Marcus continued to sing, but his heart and thoughts were conceding defeat. She wasn’t even going to give the place a chance. She really preferred being in LA even though it meant being separated from him. Was it the depression? Or was there another man?
These were not the kind of thoughts he needed right now. He wished she had just stayed home.
The rest of the morning was one frustration after the other. Marcus had looked forward to Amelia finally seeing the church. He’d hoped Amelia would see the things he loved about it—the preference for hymns over contemporary choruses, the beautiful sanctuary with its stained glass and polished oak pews—and would find herself starting to like them too. But as the service unfolded around them, he could tell she wasn’t engaged at all. She didn’t even bother pulling out a hymnal so she could sing “Nothing but the Blood” and “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” along with the choir. She stared glumly ahead when Ed stood at the front to receive and pray over the offering, not even joining in on the “amen” at the end. And the one time he allowed himself to look at her while he preached, she wasn’t even watching him. She was slouched in the pew looking totally zoned out.
By the time the service was over, Marcus’s sympathy was wearing thin. “I know it’s not what you’re used to, but this service was just as powerful to these people as our church in LA is for you.”
“I don’t doubt that. I’m sure it’s great for them. It’s just not my thing. I’m sorry.”
“I know it’s not the kind of service you’re drawn to, but you could at least show some respect for the holiday and God while you’re here.”
He saw her lip quiver and didn’t know what to do. “Ames, I’m sorry—”
“No, you’re right. I was totally rude. I’m sorry.” She blinked rapidly and busied herself with rearranging her Bible and purse in her arms. “I’ll go back to your office while you do … whatever it is you have to do.”
His anger was dampened some by her contriteness. “It’ll be another ten minutes or so.”
“Okay.” She gave him a peck on the cheek and headed up the aisle without him. He followed, trying to shake the irritation and frustration from his spirit. He didn’t like how angry he was, but he couldn’t help it. He knew she was depressed, but that didn’t mean she had to close herself off to Wheatridge and the church. Didn’t she care at all about how that made him feel?
He smiled and shook hands and blessed and embraced as strangers and steady attenders filed out together to finish their Easter Sundays. When he’d realized Amelia would be there for the holiday, he’d envisioned introducing her to the congregation, standing with her at these doors and greeting people together. He’d imagined spontaneous invitations to dinners of honey-baked ham and green bean casseroles with members who were charmed by his wife’s engaging personality and eager to welcome her to town. He hated that she was hiding in his office like some scared little girl.
A few families remained in the sanctuary, chatting in the aisles and the pews, but everyone else had gone. Ed shook Marcus’s hand and said good-bye, and Marcus went to his office to collect Amelia. “We can go now,” he said when he entered and found her playing solitaire on his desktop computer.
Amelia followed him to the doors, where they stopped short to let an elderly woman through ahead of them. “Happy Easter, Pastor Sheffield,” the woman said as she reached out to pat his arm.
“Happy Easter to you, too, Mrs. Sawyer.”
“And who is this?” she said, reaching out a wrinkled hand to Amelia.
Amelia shook the offered hand with a small smile. “I’m Amelia, Marcus’s wife.”
“Oh!” Mrs. Sawyer’s face lit up. “It’s lovely to meet you, dear. Just lovely. I don’t know how I’ve missed you all these last weeks since you all moved here.” Marcus was about to explain just how that had happened when Mrs. Sawyer gave a little cluck of her tongue and said, “And congratulations on the baby, dear. How exciting that must be.”
Marcus let out a surprised laugh, but it died in his throat when he saw how the color had drained from Amelia’s face. “Oh, Mrs. Sawyer, I’m sorry … but … she’s not pregnant.” He expected Amelia to add an emphatic response of her own, but she looked stricken.
He also expected Mrs. Sawyer to apologize for her mistake, but instead she shook a finger at them and chuckled. “I was a midwife for forty years. I know a pregnant woman when I see one.” She patted Amelia’s arm, then cocked her head and said with a measure of authority, “It’s a good thing, dear. Trust me.”
With that, she walked out the door, leaving Marcus and Amelia alone in the foyer. “Amelia?” He didn’t know what else to say.
She swallowed hard. “It’s true.” Her lip quivered as she turned to look at him with eyes bright with tears. “Marcus, I’m pregnant.”
Amelia could tell Marcus was reining in his excitement because of her own obvious grief.
“You’re positive?”
“Yes.”
“When—”
“At the doctor’s office on Wednesday.”
His face fell. “You’ve known this long and haven’t told me?”
This was the part she’d been struggling with, and this moment was what she’d been dreading. “I … I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because.” She lowered her eyes, unwilling to see his expression. She dropped her voice to a whisper. “Because I wasn’t sure I was going to keep it.”
The silence was agonizing. Her gaze was glued to the worn carpet as she waited for Marcus to unleash his anger. When his arms came around her the grace was too much to bear. She began to cry.
“No wonder,” Marcus said.
Amelia sniffed. “What?”
“Just … the last few days. The crying, the distractedness … I knew something was going on.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I never would have guessed it was this, though.”
He took her hand and helped her up and out to the car. She was grateful he didn’t grill her for more information while they were still at the church. They drove home the same way they’d driven to church that morning—in silence—but this time it was more open, more companionable. He was right, as always. She should have told him sooner.
When they got home, Marcus brought her a glass of water and joined her on the couch. “So,” he said, sounding uncertain. “When are you due?”
“Early Octoberish.”
“So you’re …”
“About three and a half months.”
“Wow.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I always figured it was going to take a lot of medical intervention for us to get pregnant.”
“Me, too.”
“Guess God had different plans.” A giant smile spread across Marcus
’s face as he ran his hands through his hair and linked them at the back of his head. “Holy cow. We’re gonna have a baby.”
The words were arrows in her heart. “I’m still not sure.”
The smile dissolved into a puzzled look. “Sure of what?”
Why was he making her say it again? It had been hard enough to admit the first time. “Whether or not I … I want to.”
He looked blank. “Want to what?”
“Want to keep it.”
His arms dropped. “What? You can’t be serious.” His eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute. Is it … someone else’s?”
She clutched a hand to her chest. “No! No, Marcus, it’s definitely yours.”
He visibly relaxed, though a guarded look still clouded his face. “I thought … given what you said this morning …”
She groaned. “No. I … no.” She shook her head emphatically.
“All right,” he said, “but then what reason would you have to not want the baby?”
She set the glass of water on the table so hard its contents sloshed over the sides. “Do you really not know me well enough to know how I must feel about this? About how devastating this is for me?”
“I know you didn’t want kids this soon, but I always figured once you were actually pregnant you’d feel differently about it.”
“Well, I don’t.” She stood and paced as agitation ramped up her anxiety. “This depression has set me back enough already. I’ve lost my job. I’ve lost the small amount of time I had to build up enough money to move once Jill and Dane had the baby. I’ve flaked out on what few connections I made in LA that could have gotten me better work. And now a baby? There goes my chance of a career. ” She threw her arms out in an all-encompassing surrender. “So there it goes. No more career. All that money, all that time spent over the years—totally pointless. Instead I get to sit around at home in Nebraska with a baby I have no idea what to do with and have playdates with women who probably went straight to the altar after high school graduation and never had aspirations beyond the borders of this crummy little town.”
“Hey!” Marcus’s tone was sharp. She hadn’t heard that from him before. “If you’re talking about the women who were kind enough to reach out to you at church today, then you really need to just stop. I don’t know where this condescending attitude is coming from, but the people here are just as intelligent and accomplished as people are in LA. Choosing to live in Wheatridge doesn’t mean they’re stupid, or incapable of doing better. Just because it’s not what you would choose doesn’t mean it’s a lesser choice. But that’s all completely beside the point.”
Marcus stood, but his arms were crossed and his stance told her to prepare to be schooled. “The bottom line is that it’s not your decision what to do with this baby. It’s ours. Because regardless of whether or not you want there to be, there is still an us. You still have a husband, and as your husband I am going to defend the life of the child that is just as much mine as it is yours. And come to think of it, even that isn’t the bottom line. The bottom line is that you’ve stopped trusting God. You don’t trust Him to lead you. You don’t trust Him to have a plan for your life that you’d actually love. You seem to think your future success rests solely on your own efforts. What happened to you? What happened to your faith?”
It wasn’t a rhetorical question, and she knew it. The force of his words had driven the fight out of her. She leaned against the wall that her pacing had brought her to and shrugged. “I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t think I ever had any.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“I don’t know what else to say.”
Marcus ran a hand over his face. “So now what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Please tell me that you won’t get an abortion.”
She knew that everything he had said was right. This was as much his baby as hers. Especially now that he knew about it, there was no way she could ever live with herself if she had terminated his child’s life. “I won’t,” she finally said.
“Well, thank God for that.” He collapsed on the couch and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Okay. One thing at a time.” He looked at her, and the sadness in his eyes wrenched her insides. “Do you still want me?”
It wasn’t the question she’d expected. “Wh-what?”
“Do you still want me? To be married to me?”
“Of course—”
“No, not ‘of course.’ You’ve made it clear you want to go back to LA as soon as you possibly can. I was miserable without you. I couldn’t wait for us to be together again. And if you felt like I felt, then you wouldn’t be so eager to leave again. So what seems obvious to me is that you … you don’t love me.”
She began to panic. “No, Marcus—I do, I swear I do.”
“Then how can you even think about leaving again?”
Her mother’s words came back to her, along with her mother’s pain, her mother’s lost years, her mother’s compromises. Hadn’t Amelia always vowed not to make the same mistakes? Hadn’t she promised herself she’d never let anything get in the way of achieving her dreams?
Then why did she get married?
Because she loved Marcus, pure and simple. She loved his stability and his intelligence and his balanced demeanor. He gave her things she’d gone without when growing up, and her life was better with him in it. And because she’d loved him, she’d made a promise to him—and to God, though right now that promise didn’t mean as much, since she wasn’t entirely sure what she thought about Him anymore. But her promise to Marcus, her love for him and his for her—those mattered. Still, she knew that they also put her at a fork in the road. Would she forever hate herself for giving up her career for her man, like her mother had done? Or would she forever hate herself for giving up a man who loved her this much, even when she acted so selfishly?
In the light of the child they’d created together, even though they hadn’t meant to, she knew with a clarity she hadn’t felt in months what her answer needed to be.
“I won’t leave.”
Marcus blinked, as though seeing her more clearly would help her words to sink in. “You won’t?”
“No.” A cavernous ache opened in her soul as she felt herself give up the last vestige of hope for success that she’d clung to. “I won’t.”
Marcus was up off the couch and wrapping his arms around her faster than seemed possible. And even though she felt numb, she couldn’t help hoping he was right when he whispered, “It will all be better than you think.”
CHAPTER 9
Marcus had a fine line to walk, now that he knew about the baby. He had to balance his euphoria with his consideration for how much Amelia was struggling with this new turn their lives had taken. He tried not to bring up the pregnancy or birth too often, and when he did it was with as much tact and care as he could. But when he was alone, or on the phone with Dane or talking with Ed, he let his true emotions out. He was going to be a dad, and he was thrilled.
A few days later, Amelia gave Marcus permission to tell his family. His mother’s reaction was exactly what he’d been expecting: She gushed over the idea of another grandbaby, and offered to come when the baby was born since Amelia’s own mother was gone. “What a year it’s been since you graduated,” she said with a laugh. “New wife, new job, new home, new baby. What amazing blessings God’s giving you. How is Amelia doing?”
“She had some morning sickness, but it’s gone now. She’s doing great.” He wasn’t about to tell her about the antidepressants, or about how much she didn’t want to be pregnant in the first place. That wasn’t the kind of thing his parents needed to know.
He appreciated his mother’s enthusiasm, and hoped his father would have some as well. He wasn’t home when Marcus called, of course, and the childhood rule about not calling him at work unless there was an emergency was still burned into his brain, so he emailed him with the news instead.
Great news, Dad: Amelia’s pregnant! She’s
due sometime in October. It’s a total miracle—we really never thought this would happen naturally. Obviously God is to thank, eh? I know how much you love Eddie’s and John’s kids—it’ll be fun having more of them to be proud of, won’t it? Isn’t it fantastic?
He’d achieved the trifecta: accomplished wife, esteemed job, and a child. This had to be it, what his father had been hoping for his youngest son. Marcus sent the email and waited eagerly for the response.
He was working on his sermon before lunch when his computer chimed the arrival of an email. He clicked over immediately, and smiled. His father had written back.
Marcus,
Congratulations. I hope Amelia is well. Have you discussed how many children you’ll have? You need to do that sooner, rather than later. When a couple is not in agreement on that, or have not discussed it thoroughly, there can be unfortunate results. Children are expensive and require a great deal of time and attention. It has always been my belief that two is plenty for any family; anything more than that is a burden, especially on a ministry income. God’s work is of the utmost importance, and anything that detracts from that should not be tolerated. I’m sure you’re discovering this in your own life, given your new job. Tell Amelia we are happy for the both of you and look forward to meeting our new grandchild.
—Randall
Marcus had to read the email twice—he was sure he’d missed something that explained where this diatribe was coming from. Instead, the words finally sank in and dissolved the film of neediness through which he’d viewed his father all these years. For the first time he saw with crystal clarity how his father truly viewed him, and finally their relationship made sense.
His father hadn’t wanted him.
He picked up the phone and called his mother. “Mom, was I an accident?” He didn’t care how abrupt it sounded. At this point, he had a pretty good idea that his mother would know exactly what he meant.
Composing Amelia Page 17