Silent Cry

by Dorothy J. Newton

  I called Tré. “Your dad’s in a rage,” I began. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but as soon as I get home, I want you to take your brother upstairs. Your dad is following me home. I’m not going to let him in. I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

  When I pulled into the driveway, Nate was no longer behind me. I hurried inside and sent King up to shower. Maybe Nate decided not to come after all. I hoped so. I let out a sigh of relief.

  Bam-bam-bam! I jumped. Nate was pounding on the door.

  “Let me in, Dot!” Nate shouted, still banging on the door.

  “Don’t let him in, Mama!” Tré called out from upstairs, “Don’t let him in!”

  I went to the door, double-checking to make sure it was locked.

  Bam-bam-bam-bam-bam! Nate was pounding on the door so hard that I feared he would break the hinges and knock it down.

  “If you pound on the door again, I am going to call the police. Do you hear me?” I shouted. “I will call the police. Go away. I’m not letting you in here like that.”

  “Dot, I just want to see the kids,” Nate said much more calmly. “I want to apologize. Please, just let me in. I want to talk to King.”

  I stood there, my hand on the deadbolt. I hesitated.

  “Mama, don’t,” Tré begged.

  “I just want to apologize, Dot,” Nate repeated.

  King was on the stairs, crying. “Let him in, Ma; let him in. Please.”

  “King, baby . . .” I began.

  “Ma, please, he just wants to talk to me,” King pleaded, tears streaming down his cheeks.

  Tré was shaking his head no. “Don’t,” he mouthed.

  King was crying, and Nate was still pleading with me to let him in. Slowly, I turned the deadbolt and cracked the door. “You are going to be calm or I am going to call the police. Do you understand?” I knew if I called the police, it would mean a certain return to jail for Nate. He didn’t have any room for a parole violation, so it gave me confidence that he would behave.

  Nate pushed past me. “Tré, King,” he called up the stairs, “come down here, boys.”

  Reluctantly, the boys came down the stairs, their faces betraying their apprehension.

  “Nate,” I warned, “you said you were coming in to apologize, remember?”

  “I bought that bat,” he said to King. “Why were you using someone else’s bat?” His voice was very loud and thick with anger.

  “This isn’t working out,” I said. “You’re too mad to talk right now, and that doesn’t sound like an apology. I think you better leave.”

  “Why were you using someone else’s bat?” Nate shouted, and slammed his fist down on my marble table. The table broke.

  “Get out!” I shrieked. “Get out, now!”

  I opened the door and gestured for him to leave. “Now!” I said. I was shaking uncontrollably.

  Nate left. I shut the door, and King ran over and hugged me.

  Tré was furious.

  “Why are we still having to deal with this?” he shouted as he punched the wall.

  I had never seen him do anything like that, and it scared me. For the first time, I was scared for Tré. I saw the potential for anger to grab him like it had grabbed Nate, and I was terrified for him.

  “Tré, baby,” I said, crying. Oh, God, why can’t this be over?

  We’d had plans that night with Ingrid and Monte, but I was too upset to go to dinner. I called Ingrid and told her we couldn’t come. I asked Monte if he would come over. Tré needed him.

  Monte took Tré out and spent time talking to him, like he often did. Monte and Ingrid treated Tré like one of their own and gave him the opportunity to travel extensively with their family. It was good for the boys to be around functional, loving families — families with a mom and dad who respected each other, treated each other kindly, and poured out their love freely. I was very blessed to have these amazing people in my life. Monte spent lots of time with his boys, and I was grateful that he made time for mine too.

  We also had Lynn and K-Mart. They had moved away in 1993 but returned in 2002, shortly after Nate and I were divorced. They found a house in nearby Keller and were wonderful friends to us, like family. Their son and Tré were just five days apart in age, and all I ever had to do was pick up the phone and they were quick to help out with my boys. Any time I called, one of them would ask, “You bringing the kids over?” I never had to ask — it was like they knew I had a hard time asking for help, so they made it easy on me and just offered.

  There were more angry episodes with Nate. Even in public, he was quick to verbalize his anger and speak to me disrespectfully. He often showed up for the kids’ sporting events, which were mostly the times when they saw him. It was never nice between us, though. It seemed like just being around me stirred up the worst inside of Nate. Whatever he felt toward me, he didn’t know how to express it in any way except anger.

  CHAPTER 28

  Give and Receive

  There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.

  Thomas Aquinas

  It was August 2005. We were active members of our church and had made many wonderful friends there. Tré was involved in youth group; I led Bible studies; and things in our family had settled into a comfortable routine. Nate was still the wild card, and we never knew exactly what to expect, but we had learned how to deal with things, and we were strong and stable.

  My extended family still lived in Buras, Louisiana, sixty miles south of New Orleans, where I grew up. When Hurricane Katrina hit in August that year, my mother, siblings, and aunts and uncles lost everything. There was nothing left, so the entire family took refuge at my house.

  For the next three weeks, Tré, King, and I shared our home with seventeen people. It was total chaos. They sat up all night, glued to news reports, trying to find out about the damage. As dawn approached, one by one they fell into restless, fitful sleep. Their days and nights were completely backward. They were in shock, trying to cope with the loss of their property and personal belongings. Time stood still for them.

  The boys were in school, and I was working every day. Every square inch of our home was occupied. The bathroom was never empty. There were pillows and blankets and clothes and shoes strewn everywhere. Just making sure there was enough food to feed everyone was a full-time effort. I had tremendous support from my church and from friends. They donated money for food and clothing, and the church helped us get my relatives into temporary apartments or houses. We received donations of cash and groceries, and the organization I worked for helped out by providing free health care. We also needed help with transportation. Friends pitched in to shuttle everyone to agencies to replace essential documents. They needed absolutely everything, including birth certificates, social security cards, and bank records — everything had been destroyed in the storm. It was a nightmare.

  The whole family was trying to figure out what to do next. The news was on all the time. Every moment of any broadcast about the storm damage found them watching in horrified attention. I felt their sadness and anxiety and wanted to help in any way I could. But there was lots of laughter too. The circumstances were horrible, but having my family around was wonderful.

  My family is resourceful. They researched sources of help and were able to access available supplies. I was proud of them. They didn’t give up, and they didn’t quit. I saw their strength and admired their tenacity. Eventually, everyone moved back to Louisiana to rebuild and start again. Only my mom decided to remain in Texas. She moved nearby, and I was glad she stayed.

  Once again, I was reminded that no matter what we have to endure, we can live a blessed life. God surrounds us with a blanket of love. He touches every area of our lives and makes sure we have exactly what we need. Even when things are bad — in the valley of the shadow — he is with us. He is always with us.

  During Tré’s junior year of high school, he started looking at colleges, and colleges started looking at him. He w
as an amazing athlete, and several schools expressed interest and made offers. He wasn’t interested. Tré would not settle. He was determined to attend either the University of Texas at Austin (UT) or Notre Dame, but all he had gotten from them was an invitation to visit their campus on their Junior Day. After arriving at UT for Junior Day, we signed in at the registration table, and a little while later, we were summoned to Coach Mack Brown’s office for a personal chat. At the end of our chat, Coach Brown offered Tré a scholarship to play football at UT. We had no idea they were even interested in Tré — and here they were offering him a full scholarship while he was just a junior in high school!

  Tré wanted his dad to be part of his decision, and he asked Coach Brown if he could call Nate and talk to him about it. “Of course,” Coach said.

  Tré called Nate and asked him if he would be interested in coming to Austin to see the place and give his input, and Nate drove for three hours to meet us on campus. When he arrived, he and Tré talked about the offer, going over the pros and cons. My main goal that day was to find out more about the faculty and staff Tré would spend time with and whether he would be positively influenced both academically and spiritually. Football was definitely Nate’s area of expertise. I felt it was best to defer to him in decisions related to where Tré would get the best football opportunity. I would have been happy with any choice Tré made.

  Tré decided to accept the scholarship, which he did that same day. When we returned home from the UT visit, we canceled a planned trip to visit Notre Dame. In Tré’s heart, the University of Texas had been his first choice. There wasn’t a need to look any further.

  Tré graduated in December 2007, a full semester early. He was eager to begin college and didn’t want to wait, so in January 2008, he began his studies at the University of Texas.

  This was a difficult time for King. He was in the sixth grade when Tré left for college, and everything changed for him. Tré’s leaving was hard for both of us. We had become an inseparable family unit and cared deeply about each other. We loved each other. When Tré left, an emptiness hung over the house. Nothing was quite the same.

  One of King’s teachers gave him an assignment to write about something that affected his life. King wrote about Tré leaving home to go to college. He talked about Tré being the person he looked up to for everything and how he was his best friend. It took King a long time to adjust to Tré being in college. Somehow, it didn’t feel quite right being just the two of us. Something was missing.

  One evening I had dinner with my friend Rayne. She said to me, “Dorothy, I see you reach out to a lot of people. You have helped me through a very difficult time in my life, but I don’t feel like I know anything about you.”

  I froze. I hadn’t expected this.

  “How do I get to know you?” she asked. “You never share anything about yourself. How can I find out more about you? Can you be open and honest with me? I want to have a transparent relationship so I’ll know what you need as much as you know what I need.”

  Rayne and I had been friends for a long time, and her observation surprised me. I was also touched that she was offering this kind of close friendship to me and felt overwhelmed by her generosity of spirit.

  “I feel stuck,” I began, pausing, not sure if I should continue. “Right now, things are very strange in my life. There are things I believe I need to talk to someone about, but it is really hard for me to trust people. It isn’t that I don’t love you . . .”

  “You hurt me when you won’t let me help you.” Rayne said. “You are always giving, but you are not willing to receive. You won’t let me in. Quite a few people have noticed that you have a wall built around you. As nice as you are, as giving as you are, you won’t let anybody inside your space.”

  “It’s hard for me to trust,” I said. “But I want to. Will you be patient with me? I need time to figure things out.”

  After my conversation with Rayne, I thought about my cousin Scarlette. Until Hurricane Katrina, she was the only family who lived near me in Texas. She was a single mom who was raising two girls, Ariel and Whittney, on her own. I couldn’t remember a single time she had asked for my help. She was an incredibly strong woman. She went back to school and got her degree while raising her daughters by herself. I was proud of her. Though I felt close to her, and I would have been privileged and pleased to help her with the girls, she had never reached out to me for assistance. Maybe this difficulty — this inability to ask for help — was part of our family’s culture.

  As I thought about it more, I realized that my desire to never be a burden to anyone had led me to close myself off, which ultimately made it difficult to seek support, even when I needed it most. I knew I needed to learn how to receive. I needed to learn that asking for help is not a sign of weakness, but it’s a way to give others an opportunity to be a blessing. For the first time, I considered that the ability to receive from others was not somehow of less value than the ability to give to them.

  CHAPTER 29

  Perfect Love

  Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.

  John 15:13 NKJV

  During Tré’s senior year of high school, I had often visited Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas. I loved hearing Pastor Robert Morris preach. I would attend Saturday night services at Gateway and then attend our church on Sunday mornings. I was drawn to Gateway, but as long as Tré was at home, I didn’t want to disrupt things for him. Now that he was in college, I felt like I had a green light to begin attending Gateway regularly.

  At the time, Gateway Church was much smaller than it is now, and Pastor Robert always mingled with the congregation after services. One Sunday, I was visiting with Arnita and Mike Taylor, who were friends of Pastor Robert. He came over to where we were standing and introduced himself to me. Nate had told me a few days previously that he’d had a conversation with Pastor Morris, so I said, “It is so good to meet you. Just last week, Nate mentioned he had seen you and had a chance to visit.”

  “Oh,” he said, “so you’re Dorothy, Nate Newton’s ex-wife? My wife, Debbie, would love to meet you.”

  “I’ll give Dorothy’s number to Debbie,” Arnita offered.

  The next day, Debbie Morris called, and we set a lunch date. This began a series of lunch dates a few times a year. We didn’t get to visit together very often, but when we did, it was an extra-special time for me. Debbie was soft-spoken, tender, kindhearted, gentle — a beautiful example of a godly woman. The church was growing rapidly, and her schedule was very full, so I was careful to respect her time. We texted each other often and managed to stay in touch.

  I always assumed the reason we were friends was that she needed a safe place. By now, Pastor Robert was well-known nationally and internationally, and I knew what it was like to be the wife of a famous husband. I figured Debbie had reached out to me because she needed a friend who was interested in her for herself, not because of who she was married to. I knew all too well what that was like, and I wanted to be a good friend to her, whatever that looked like. Trusting people is very difficult when you’ve got a famous husband.

  It was the end of February 2008, and Debbie and I were enjoying one of our first lunches together in the new year. We had visited for nearly two hours when she said, “Dorothy, I know you’re involved in a lot of things, but what is your passion?”

  I paused for a moment, wondering if I should share what was going on inside of me. “Well,” I began, “as of January, I decided to completely erase my calendar. I have been involved in so many things, and I just don’t want to do them anymore.” I took a sip of tea. My stomach felt like it had butterflies inside.

  “I feel stuck, Debbie,” I continued. “The place I am in right now feels foreign to me. From the time I was a little girl, I felt close to God — like I could always feel him hugging me, and I was hugging him back. It was always personal and intimate. Now, for the first time in my life, I can’t feel him.” I looked across t
he table at her, and her attention was completely focused on me.

  “I have never felt so stuck spiritually, like I can’t grow. For the first time, I don’t want to lead a Bible study. I don’t want to feed the homeless. I don’t even want to go to lunch or spend time with friends. I have no desire to meet their spiritual needs or pray for them. To answer your question, people have always been my passion, and now I no longer have a desire to reach out to them. I just feel numb.”

  Debbie sat there quietly, not interrupting, keeping a steady, loving gaze on my face. She smiled, encouraging me to continue, without saying a word.

  “I’ve always looked forward to opportunities to minister. I have ministered to so many people in the past. Many of them mentioned that they sought professional help. Maybe I need a counselor . . . I don’t know. I’m not sure. I think right now I’m just going to be still and wait. God will reveal it to me.”

  “Well, Dorothy, if you want to see somebody,” she offered, “I have someone I trust that I think you would enjoy knowing and visiting with.” I looked at her, knowing she was sincere.

  “I don’t know, Debbie,” I said, suddenly feeling cautious. “I’ll be honest with you, I have some trust issues. The life I’ve lived — it’s hard for me to know who I can trust.” The faces of all the people I had trusted and then been betrayed by flashed across my mind. I had been disappointed too many times.

  “Actually, the worst in my life is over,” I said, trying to strike a more hopeful note. “It is in my past. I don’t really think I need to talk to anybody. I was just thinking about it, that’s all. I haven’t really decided to do that. I’m fine.”

  “Let’s pray about it,” Debbie suggested. “I have someone in mind you would really enjoy talking to. Her name is Rebecca. I love her, and I trust her. I believe she can help you, Dorothy.”