by Chris Fabry
“No.”
“No,” Thomas repeated, somehow absorbing the pain and showing his words had never been an accusation. He now spoke slowly, with compassion.
“For someone who knows the Lord, you’re acting like somebody who doesn’t. Which makes me wonder. What have you allowed to define you? When you lost your team, it didn’t just disappoint you—it devastated you. Something or someone will have first place in your heart.”
John stared at Thomas. There was a feeling of freedom here. He realized no matter how he responded, Thomas would accept him. With his next words, Thomas’s face changed, like he was seeing something new—something John couldn’t even grasp.
“But when you find your identity in the One who created you, it will change your whole perspective.”
Thomas’s eyes moistened and John saw life in the man. He was sick, he was dying, but he was also expressing something from a deep well of his life and offering it as a gift.
“You’ve given me a lot to think about,” John said, moving the chair back and standing.
Thomas stuck out his hand and held it aloft. When John took it, Thomas squeezed tightly. “I hope I didn’t come down on you too hard, John Harrison. And I have a confession.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ve been praying for you ever since you stumbled into my room. I pray for everybody who comes in here. And I’m going to keep praying for you. I wanted you to know that.”
John walked out of the room and took the stairs, slowly making his way to the first floor and out a side exit. In his truck, the emotion came. He saw the truth now. Thomas and Amy had seen something and were trying to help pull back the curtain, but only God could open the eyes of the blind.
John had tried to follow God and live well. But somehow he had made life about what he could accomplish. And Thomas had challenged him to a new perspective. He had shown him the emptiness of chasing success.
John put his hands on the steering wheel. He’d never felt further from God and at the same time closer to God. Layers of his life were peeling away and showed what he really trusted.
The only words he could say were “I’m sorry.” And instead of judgment and condemnation, he felt an embrace.
“I’m sorry, Lord. You’re first. You are first.”
As cars pulled out around him, John thanked God for His kindness and for revealing what was most important. That hospital parking lot became a new starting line to his life. God had used a blind man to show him what he couldn’t see. That made John smile through his tears.
CHAPTER 18
Hungry and exhausted, Barbara walked through the door with a handful of bills. It felt like every time she paid one bill, two took its place. It was like trying to plug a hole in a boat already filled with water. She put down her purse and saw the disarray in the kitchen. The trash overflowed, so she wrapped it up and got it to the curb.
She returned to a sink full of dirty dishes. There were more on the counter. The dishwasher had stopped working a year earlier and she couldn’t even afford the trip charge for the repairman to diagnose the problem, so the dishes had to be done by hand. Why couldn’t her granddaughter do her part?
“Hannah?” she said loudly.
No response. She was probably in her room with music blaring in her earbuds. She had warned Hannah about damaging her hearing, but lonely didn’t care about decibel levels. Or sometimes Hannah studied with the television on. Hearing voices on the television, she said, helped her not to feel alone. That pierced Barbara’s heart, but what could she do?
Barbara took a deep breath as if diving underwater for sunken treasure and cleaned the counter. She hated leaving Hannah alone while she worked, but the girl was too old for a babysitter. Their neighbor, Mrs. Cole, checked on her and gave Barbara a report every now and then. Hannah spent time in school and ran cross-country and there was the Y program. All of that was to keep her busy and out of trouble.
There was always more Barbara could do. She kept a mental list of things she ought to do to keep Hannah from becoming . . .
The old wound again. It didn’t take long to return there, to wander back to her ground zero of pain. The only good thing about memories like these was it made Barbara move faster and get more done. Keeping busy pushed the hurt away and kept it at a distance. The harder she worked, the easier it was to sleep. But her last waking thoughts were usually regrets. Things left unsaid and undone and the guilt that lingered.
Hannah’s backpack sat on the table and her shoes were by the front door, where she’d kicked them off. She’d told the girl to hang her backpack on the hook she’d installed by the door instead of slinging it onto the table or the couch. The unzipped pack fell open when she grabbed it to clear the table, and something caught her eye. She lifted the flap and among the notebooks and papers and textbooks was a man’s watch with a black band.
Her heart sank. The air went out of the room. She pulled out the watch and studied it. “Oh no she didn’t,” she said to herself. Then she raised her voice. “Hannah!”
No response.
She stomped toward Hannah’s room, each step stirring more hurt. Her heart beat wildly. If Barbara had an anger tank, it was full to overflowing.
“My cup runneth over,” she thought.
She stood in the open bedroom door and saw the girl on her bed, earbuds in, reading a running magazine. Her biology and history books sat like lonely soldiers on her nightstand. Barbara yelled Hannah’s name with such force it surprised even her.
Hannah looked up, doe-eyed and frightened. She’d been lost in what she was reading and listening to.
“Where’d this come from?” Barbara said, holding out the watch.
Hannah removed the earbuds. “I didn’t know you were home.”
Barbara held out the watch as evidence, like a prosecuting attorney, and shook her head. She wasn’t going to let the girl change the subject. Before she spoke, she noticed what Hannah’s earbuds were plugged into.
“That is not the iPod that you were supposed to be taking back . . .”
Hannah stared at her, caught in her own trap.
“I’m not doing this, Hannah,” Barbara said, feeling at the end of her patience, the end of her ability to love. “I cannot do this by myself. I’m doing everything I can to support you, and you keep doing things like this.” Her knuckles turned white holding the watch. “Why?”
Barbara felt transported to another bedroom years earlier. She had used the same passion and words with Janet. And here she was again, repeating herself, walking the same tightrope over a canyon so deep she couldn’t see the bottom.
Quietly, softly, Hannah said, “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” Barbara said, her eyes like fire. “Baby girl, let me tell you something. This is wrong! You know better than this.”
Hannah stared, unmoving. Fear and shame had a hold on her.
“Girl, you’re going to fool around and get your behind locked up and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
That was Barbara’s greatest fear. Hannah would be sent to juvenile detention. Or her luck would run out too late and she’d be caught and tried as an adult.
Barbara glared at Hannah, holding her gaze, then tossed the watch on the bed beside the girl and walked out. She wanted to scream. She wanted to handcuff Hannah and keep her from doing one more stupid thing with her life. She was going to get expelled from that new school. And then what would Barbara do with her?
She wandered into the kitchen and sat at the table and put her head in her hands. Her hunger had given way to frustration and despair. The hopelessness she felt almost drove her to pray.
Almost.
CHAPTER 19
John found Ethan alone at the Brookshire gymnasium and watched him from the shadows. Ethan had such a pure shot. And he had a way of seeing so much of the court. He anticipated the movements not only of his own teammates but his opponents as well. It was the kind of thing you couldn’t coach. You just shook you
r head in admiration. Now, watching Ethan shoot, John remembered Thomas’s words and his perspective on life.
John walked past half-court as Ethan sank a sixteen-foot jumper.
“You know, you can still be a walk-on somewhere.”
Ethan put the ball on his hip, his cheeks flushed, his forehead sweaty. “That won’t pay for college.”
John nodded. “So earn it. Lots of guys get a scholarship when they’re already on a team. Or make the grades.”
Ethan stared at the ball, then looked up, something in his eyes. “What if I can’t do it?”
John looked away, hearing the doubt in his son’s voice. He wanted to give him confidence. “I’ll help you where I can. But you may have to get a job and work your way through like most people.”
Ethan looked down the court and John thought of all the games they’d shared in this gymnasium. He wanted to say something profound, something his son would remember years from now. Instead, he put up both hands, requesting the ball. Ethan rifled a pass to him, the Wilson pinging in his hands.
John held the ball and turned it, studying the craftsmanship. Then it came to him. Echoes of what Thomas had said. He looked up at Ethan.
“If you never play in college at all, I love you. And I’m already proud of you.”
Ethan drank in the words. He looked into John’s eyes and nodded like he’d received them and filed them away for future use.
John slapped the ball with a hand. “But to keep you humble, I’m about to tear you up in one-on-one.” He bounced the ball to his son. “Check.”
A big grin. “Come on, Dad. Don’t do this to yourself.”
“Give me the ball. You’re going down.”
Ethan bounced the ball to John. “You can’t beat me.”
John took a quick twenty-footer just beyond the three-point arc and sank it. “Oh, you’re going to let me do that right in front of you?”
Ethan got the rebound and took it to the back court.
“No, no, no, it’s make it, take it. Give me the ball.”
Ethan shook his head. “Are you serious?”
John got the ball, and this time Ethan was on him, swiping at the ball, pushing his shoulder as he tried to drive toward the basket.
“Foul,” John said, still dribbling.
“No foul!” Ethan said, moving his feet and protecting the basket.
John threw up a turnaround jumper that miraculously went in and he gave a whoop and lifted both hands in victory.
“It’s a long way to twenty, old guy,” Ethan said, laughing.
John took the ball out and drove again, this time Ethan stripping it from him, the ball bouncing off John’s knee and out of bounds.
“My ball, top of the key,” Ethan said. “Let’s see your defense.”
It was a game John would never forget. Something had lifted from his shoulders talking with Thomas, and he was passing that to Ethan in a way he couldn’t explain but felt keenly.
At dinner, John and Ethan recounted the matchup playfully. Amy wanted to know who won. Ethan said he did but John countered with the number of fouls Ethan had committed.
“Dad, you taught me to be aggressive.”
“Yeah, but not against me,” John said, deadpan. “I’m your dad—you’ve got to respect your elders.”
Amy laughed. “It sounds like he beat you.”
“Well, in some ways I kind of feel like I won,” John said.
“Hey,” Ethan said. “You said that feelings don’t determine facts.”
“You did say that,” Amy said.
John stared at his plate of spaghetti. And after a long pause he said, “Yeah, he won.”
Ethan beamed. “Thank you.”
As they finished the meal, John sat back and looked at each member of his family. It was time to put words to what had happened inside. “I need to say something that’s been kind of gnawing at me. Losing the basketball season was disappointing. But it shouldn’t have crushed me. I think it’s because I’ve had some things out of order.”
Ethan and Will stared at him. Amy gave a slight smile, knowing more about the process he’d gone through than the boys. His voice trembled a bit when he said, “My faith in God should be the most important part of who I am. I think I let less important things get in front of Him. So I need to say I’m sorry and that I’ve asked God to help me keep my priorities straight.”
John had been nervous about opening up in front of his family. But he received nothing but support. They were on his team. They wanted the best for him, as he did for them.
“I can’t worry about what I can’t control. So I’ve got to trust Him no matter what.”
Will looked at him and said, “Cool.”
“Cool?” John said, smiling.
“Cool,” Amy said.
Ethan looked at his plate, smiling with the others, but clearly he still had questions.
“All right, cool,” John said.
CHAPTER 20
“I wish you could have seen him,” John said as he stood by Thomas’s bed. “Will’s eyes were as big as saucers while he was talking about how to make cross-country a better sport.”
Thomas chuckled. “What did he come up with?”
“Well, he said each runner ought to dribble a ball.”
“For three miles? Up and down hills?”
“Yeah, and get this: when you hit the finish line, you have to dunk the ball in an eight-foot goal, unless you get tackled.”
“There’s tackling?” Thomas said, laughing harder.
“Absolutely! And if you steal someone else’s ball, you get double points.”
Thomas shook his head. “That is one creative kid. Cross-country full contact.”
“You should have seen the look on his face when I suggested you could tackle a person, steal their ball, and double dunk on them. Blew his mind.”
Thomas threw back his head and howled. “And what did you say?”
John looked out the window as the sun streamed into the room. “I told him I liked it. But that I couldn’t make any changes this year. He calls it Tackle Ball Extreme.”
Thomas smiled. “Well, they do change the rules from time to time.”
John sat by Thomas’s bed. “There’s a few schools trying to get earbuds allowed for runners.”
“During races?”
“Yeah, but it won’t happen.”
John studied the man. Thomas was tethered to a monitor. He hadn’t moved from that bed since they’d first met. And he hadn’t complained about his situation. John asked questions, received coaching tips, but today he wanted to thank Thomas and share something deeper than a story about his family.
“So I’ve started implementing your running tips. She’s running intervals now.”
“Good. You should see some improvement.”
John took a deep breath. “I also want to thank you for what you said. I think I’m more of a hypocrite than I’d like to admit.”
Thomas turned his head slightly. “John, that’s true of me, too. Three years ago, God had to let me lose my sight before I could see.”
“You’ve only been a Christian three years?”
“Yeah, I tend to learn things the hard way.” Thomas thought a moment and as he spoke, he seemed to relive the past. “When I was much younger, I found myself in athletics. Then in my job and friends. And it turned into drugs and women. I hurt a lot of people, John.”
John could almost weigh the man’s remorse in a balance. Getting the words out seemed painful, but at the same time, healing. Truth will do that to a person. As Thomas shared his past, John looked away as if Thomas cared about eye contact. Then John consciously chose to watch the face of this man as he revealed his heart.
“It all caught up to me,” Thomas said. “And that’s when I turned to God. Sick and broken. Now He’s all I’ve got. He’s everything to me.”
John recalled something Thomas had said the first day they talked. “You said you grew up here.”
“I did.
I left Franklin fifteen years ago running from all my responsibilities. I had a child with my girlfriend. But we got hooked on meth. And it took her life. I left the child with her grandmother. Then I ran. I just ran.”
John didn’t miss the irony. Thomas was a top-notch runner, and when he couldn’t face the pain he’d caused, he did what he knew best. “Was it a boy or a girl?”
Thomas smiled, his face lighting. “A little girl. She was born on Valentine’s Day.”
Fifteen years . . . Something sparked in John’s mind, the math of Thomas’s past. He was glad Thomas couldn’t see the look on his face. As the story continued to unfold, John couldn’t get past the startling detail about the birth date of Thomas’s daughter.
When he finished, John thanked Thomas for sharing his story and told him he was an inspiration. Then he drove home in a daze, calling Amy before he arrived and asking if they could talk. “I have something I need to share.”
He told her the story when he arrived home and Amy looked as shocked as he had been.
“Wait, you think this man who’s been helping you coach . . .”
John nodded.
“She said that her father passed away.”
“Maybe that’s what she was told.”
“So you don’t think he did,” Amy said.
John shook his head.
“That poor girl,” Amy said. “What are you going to do?”
“Good question.”
CHAPTER 21
Hannah rode with the Harrisons to the next race and they seemed quiet, like maybe they’d had a fight. It could have been something with their sons that had them worried. She noticed little changes like that, the way they didn’t make eye contact. Then she wondered if her grandmother had called and told them about her “problem.” Maybe Principal Brooks had told them about why she was kicked out of Franklin High.
Hannah’s mouth felt like cotton and she took a sip from her water bottle. She lived with the fear of someone discovering she stole things, a dark cloud that hung over her every day. It would have been enough to keep her from ever stealing again, if logic had anything to do with it. Who would want to live with that guilt?