Strongholds

by Vanessa Davis Griggs

  “Oh, you’re going to get some shut-eye all right. First off: where’s your money from your Thursday paycheck, Edwin?”

  “You know what?” He sat up straighter and looked boldly at her. “You have some real issues. All you think about is money. In case you’ve forgotten, I worked for that check. It belongs to me. And I can very well do with it as I please. Normally I bring almost all of it home to you. But there’s nothing written in stone that says I have to do that. And I’m about tired of you taking me for granted. Do you know how many women wish they had a man like me? Maybe I’ll just keep my entire paycheck this time so you can learn to start appreciating me better.”

  “Where’s the money, Edwin?”

  “We can talk about this in the morning when we wake up.”

  “It’s already ‘in the morning.’ I’m up, you’re up, so let’s talk. Let’s get it on.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it now,” Edwin said. “I’m tired, Desiree. I don’t feel like doing this right this minute. When we wake up, we can discuss this like two civilized human beings.”

  “Well, we could have discussed it earlier this evening except you decided to leave and go to the track. Is that why you don’t have the money from your check? Did you gamble it away at the track?”

  “I’m telling you, woman. If you keep this junk up, I’m going to get up and find me somewhere else to sleep. I’m tired, and I’m not in the mood for this.”

  Desiree made a short, crazed, laughing sound as she started nodding her head. “Okay, so I’ll take that as a yes. You gambled away your paycheck you received this week. Next thing: the overdrawn checking account.”

  He slumped a little, but tried to still act confident. “I told you, the checking account is your baby now. If you can’t balance the checkbook any better and you have checks bouncing all over the place, you can’t blame me.”

  “Uh-huh. Well, now. I’ve already checked with the bank. Right after you left.”

  “You did?” He sounded surprised, but quickly composed himself. “So.”

  “So I learned something very interesting. According to them, there seems to have been a rather large check written and cashed on Monday from our account,” Desiree said.

  “You write the checks. And last I heard, that’s what a checking account is good for—to write checks. If you have a point, I really wish you would hurry up and make it. It’s really late, and I’m really tired.”

  “Oh, of course. How inconsiderate of me to keep you up when you were out so late already.” She cocked her head to the side. “Anyway, it appears that a check for two thousand dollars was written to, signed by, and cashed by you this past Monday.”

  “Couldn’t have been me. Must be a forgery or something. I don’t have access to the checks anymore, remember? If I need a check written, you are the one who usually writes it now. You have the checkbook, wherever you have it hidden these days.” He rubbed his forehead. “I don’t have a clue where it is.”

  “Edwin, you took a check out of the checkbook, I can only assume, before you turned all the checks over to me.”

  “That’s not likely, because you would have noticed if a check was missing.”

  She clapped her hands. “Very good. You are so right. I would have noticed if a check was missing, except you are way too smart for me.” She reached over on the nightstand and picked up a piece of paper. “Here’s a copy of that check.” She handed the paper to him. “Well, aren’t you going to look at it?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t need to see a copy of some check. I told you it couldn’t have been me because I don’t have access to our checks anymore.”

  “Oh, you should look at this one.” She shook it at him. “The bank went to a special effort to get a copy of this for me to see so quickly. Take it and look at it.”

  He looked over at her and took the paper from her. “Looks like my signature, but as I said, I didn’t have access to our checks so I couldn’t have done it. I suggest you file some kind of a report with the bank and let them know somebody has accessed our account and that they are counterfeiting checks. You may need to close that account until things can get straightened out.”

  “You know, I don’t think you really want me to do that. You see, you could go to jail for perjury if the law has to get involved. Although, seriously, they can’t charge you with robbery since you actually stole from us.” She picked up a new pad of checks.

  Edwin started to get up out of the bed.

  “Where are you going?” Desiree asked.

  “I’m tired, and I’m going to sleep on the couch. Anything to get away from you with all your ridiculous, paranoid accusations.”

  “Edwin, the check on this copy matches the check that happens to be missing from this group of checks.” She got out of the bed and stood in front of him. “You took a check out of here because you knew it would be months before I reached that check number.”

  “Yeah, okay. So I took the check. I’m tired of being broke all the time! I’m tired of you trying to tell me what to do with my money. There’s no harm in me gambling. It’s not a sin. Yet I have to listen to your mouth all the time about it. I’m tired of it, Desiree!”

  “There’s no harm in you gambling? Is that what you just said? Edwin, you stole a check out of our checkbook—”

  “I can’t steal what already belongs to me, remember? That money in the bank is just as much mine as it is yours. We have all these bills, and it’s like I’m working for other people. Every dime I get my hands on goes into someone else’s pockets. Working out there in the hot sun, laying bricks day in and day out, having some dumb guy I happened to have trained trying to boss me around and tell me what to do. Then I come home, and what do I come home to? You with all your nagging and your ‘honey do’ list of things you want done or you don’t like.”

  “I am not like that. Once again, you’re trying to steer the subject away from you and what you’ve done. You have a problem, a serious problem, Edwin. Not only are you taking money from our household to gamble with, now you’re thinking of ways to steal money so you can go gamble. My ring…the one I couldn’t find last year, did you take it and do something with it to get gambling money?”

  Edwin started to walk out of the room. Desiree ran and stood in front of the door.

  “Move out of my way,” Edwin said with a scowl.

  “No. You answer me. I turned this house upside down looking for my ring. You know how much that ring meant to me. Did you take my ring and pawn it?”

  “Pawn it? No,” he said with an even meaner look.

  “Edwin?” Desiree turned her head up slightly and frowned at him. “Please tell me you didn’t do it?”

  “Tell you I didn’t what?”

  “Tell me you didn’t sell my two-carat diamond ring,” she said through clenched teeth.

  He snickered. “Well, you wanted to do this now, so I suppose we can just do this.” He took a few steps away from her. “Okay, I sold your precious ring. Are you happy now?”

  She wanted to hit him. It took all she could to hold back her fist, but in her heart she wanted to beat the devil out of him. “How could you do that? And how could you let me look all over this house for a ring you knew wasn’t even here?”

  “Kept you out of my hair, didn’t it? Besides, you didn’t check with me before you bought that ring. That was too much money to spend on some dumb ring that you couldn’t even wear because of all the weight you’d gained.”

  She shook her head as she bit down on her bottom lip.

  “What, Desiree? You want to hit me?” Edwin then laughed. “Go ahead. Hit me. My day can’t get any worse than it is right now anyway. Okay, I gambled most of my paycheck away on Thursday night and the rest of it tonight trying to get back the money I lost from the check I cashed on Monday out of our checking account that I also lost, all at the good old dog track. Which means if you wrote other checks counting on my paycheck to be in the bank, then you’re going to bounce even more checks.”


  “Ugh! I cannot believe this is happening to me.”

  “Why does everything have to be about you? Do you have any idea how it feels to have to come home every day to someone who is so self-centered?”

  “I am not self-centered. How can you stand there and say such a thing? I’m hurt. We have worked too hard to get this house and all these other things. I don’t want to lose what we’ve worked for because you have a problem you can’t control,” Desiree said as she shook her hand in his face.

  “See what I mean. I, I, I. ‘I don’t want to lose.’ ‘I’m so hurt.’” He stepped back from her some more. “Well, what about me? Don’t I deserve some happiness, too?”

  “Are you saying you’re not happy with me?” Desiree looked at him hard.

  “I’m saying that you crowd me.”

  “How can you say I crowd you when you’re never home? We don’t do anything together for you to get crowded by me.”

  “Why do you think I started gambling in the first place?” Edwin asked. He walked back toward the bed and sat down.

  Desiree walked over and stood right in front of him. “I don’t know. Why?”

  “I needed to get away from all our problems. You wanted a baby right after we got married. I didn’t because I knew things were already tight with just the two of us,” Edwin said.

  “Well, you got what you wanted. I haven’t been able to have a baby even after you reluctantly agreed it was okay for us, no matter how hard I’ve tried.”

  “There you go again: I.”

  “What do you want from me, Edwin? You complained about my smoking after we were married. I quit smoking. It was hard, but I did it.”

  “Yeah, well, I didn’t know giving up the cancer sticks was going to cause you to eat yourself into oblivion.”

  “You are so cruel. Why am I not ever good enough for you? Why? Why can’t you love me enough to want to spend time with me the way you spend time with those dogs at the track? Oh, you can leave here at five in the evening and not come home till almost two o’clock in the morning. But when it comes to spending an hour or two with me, you act like you’re being nailed to a cross or something.”

  “That’s because I don’t feel like anything I do pleases you. I go to the track and to the casino because I need to feel like I’m worth something to somebody. Don’t you get it? I don’t make enough money to please you. Whatever I do is never enough. At least when I go to the track, I feel like somebody thinks I’m important. At the casino, people actually smile at me and make me feel like they’re glad to see me coming, as opposed to here.”

  Desiree got closer to him. “I don’t believe you. I work just like you do to help out. I’ve told you how much I love you and how much I appreciate you. Deep down, Edwin, you’re a good person. But just like those little white sticks called my name and made me think I had to smoke them, that’s what gambling is doing to you. It’s the high you seek.”

  He stood up and grabbed Desiree by both her shoulders. “No! I gamble because I like feeling like I beat something for a change. I like the feeling of winning, since I don’t ever seem to win when it comes to you.” He flopped back down. “I like it when people treat me nice because they think I have something to offer! I like it! Okay?!”

  Desiree sat down next to Edwin. She took his hand in hers. “You already have something to offer, Edwin. You have the love of a God who thinks you’re so special He sent His Son to die on the cross for your sins. That’s how much you’re worth to God.”

  He took his hand out of hers. “Please, let’s not bring God into this conversation. If God loves us so much, then why haven’t you been able to have a baby? You’re the one who wanted one so bad, and I know you go to church and stuff on a regular basis. You pay your ten percent. Why hasn’t God given you what you wanted the most?”

  She took his hand again, and lifted it up, and pressed her lips against it. “I didn’t know you felt this way about things. Why haven’t you ever said anything before now?”

  He looked into her eyes. “How can you be so loving to me right now after all I’ve done and said to you? We don’t have any money in the bank. The credit cards are maxed out, so we can’t even float ourselves a loan by taking an advance off them.” He dropped his head down. “I even took the money we had out of our savings account, not that there was that much still in it. So we can’t even use our savings to tide us over until I can straighten this mess out.”

  Desiree touched his face. “You’re a good person in spite of all these horrible things you’ve done. You just need some help. But don’t you see? You can’t get help if you refuse to admit you need it.”

  “I went to that church altar over two months ago to be released from this stronghold. And look at me, I’m worse off now it seems than when I first went up there. At least before, I won sometimes.”

  “That’s because you went back and wallowed in your mess. You were doing so well, but you just had to tempt it by going right back into what you had walked away from. You can’t blame that on God. You have to learn to die daily to your flesh. I have to die daily to my flesh,” Desiree said. “Every day I wake up I have to choose to do the right thing. And I pray to the Holy Spirit to help me. I want a Nutty Buddy bar so bad right now it’s not even funny. I could devour a whole bag of potato chips today, this very minute, if I get started eating just one. Cigarette temptation is not so bad for me now, but I know I can’t try and smoke one because that one could lead me right back to my two-pack-a-day habit.”

  “I’m sorry,” Edwin said to Desiree. “I’m so sorry!” He kissed her. “Oh, Lord, please forgive me. I realize, God, that you desire to bless me with your best. I can’t do this anymore. But I can’t walk away on my own. Please, Father. Please. Deliver me from this hold. I don’t want to do this anymore!” He looked into Desiree’s eyes. “I don’t want to do this anymore. Look at what I’ve become. I’m not sure whether I can ever stop. I really can’t say that I will ever be delivered from my desire to gamble. So what do I do?”

  She smiled. “Yeah, but God can turn things around. We just have to come to Him and allow His Spirit to reign in us. That’s the only way I’ve been able to do this. I told you: I die daily, and I’m refreshed with a new breath of God’s Holy Spirit to lead and guide me.”

  “So,” Edwin said as he stood to his feet. “What are we going to do about this mess I’ve made? And it’s a real mess.”

  “We’re going to have a nice prayer to the Father. We’re going to get in the bed and get some rest. Then after we get up, we’re going to put our heads together and figure something out. With the leading of the Holy Spirit, He will direct us on what we need to do. If we need to go get you some help from outside—counseling, Gambler’s Anonymous, whatever—we’ll get you help. But you have to really want to do this. If you don’t, nothing anybody else does will make a difference. You have to want things to change. It’s on you.”

  Edwin reached down and pulled her up. “I’m going to make a promise to you. I’ll do whatever I need to walk away from this. I just thank you for loving me with the love of the Lord. I know it has to be His love. I promise I’m not going to mess this up.” He pulled her into his arms and held her. “I love you too much, Baby-cakes. And I love God too much. I don’t intend to let either of you down ever again.”

  They kneeled down beside their bed, he took her hand and held it, and they prayed. Really prayed. And before they got up, he squeezed her hand three times.

  Desiree smiled as tears flowed down her face. “Thank you, Father,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

  Chapter 22

  And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

  —Hebrews 2:15

  “Dr. Holden, it’s good to have you back,” Sapphire said when she walked into his office. She had an armful of folders and an electronic gadget on top.

  He smiled. “You don’t have to be so formal when patients aren’t around. Xavier is fine.”


  “Habits are hard to break, you know.”

  “Yes,” he said as he closed a file he held in his hand. “That’s why I was gone for over three weeks. I had to follow our ‘it takes twenty-one days to break a habit’ philosophy.”

  “After you break it, you know you’re supposed to replace it with something better.”

  “True. That’s why I’m making a new habit of leaving this place in a timely manner: no later than five o’clock, no matter what’s going on or who ‘desperately’ needs me. And, I’m not planning any Saturday appointments, no matter how many more people I believe I can help. No more running to the hospital when someone’s in trouble and ‘only Dr. Holden can help me.’ No more taking on other colleagues’ clients at the expense of time with my own family.”

  “Wow, looks like you’re a changed man for real.” Sapphire set the files she had brought back to him on his desk, then sat down in the chair. “Those are the files you asked me to bring back first thing this morning.”

  He picked them up and placed them on top of the credenza behind him. “I’m more of a delivered man now,” he said. “Work had a stronghold on me. But a transfer of power has taken place, and now I’m the one in charge instead of it being the other way around. Where I used to work to live, then live to work, now I live to live.”

  “That’s huge. Really. What a wonderful way to put that. I may have to use that one myself.”

  “So, would you like to bring me up to speed on Trinity?” Dr. Holden asked as he leaned back in his chair and rocked it slightly.

  “I feel bad hitting you up so early after you got back. But I’m getting nowhere, it seems. Charity wants so much for this to hurry up and start moving toward some type of closure. Whatever it is that’s buried deep inside her, truly has her in total disconnect.”

  “What do you think happened to her?” Dr. Holden leaned forward.

  “Naturally, most people would think it was some type of sexual abuse. But I don’t know. Faith, who seems to be the most dominant of the three of them, doesn’t appear to have been sexually promiscuous when she was in charge of Charity’s body. But there does appear to be some kind of a link to what happened and Charity’s grandmother’s death, though.”