The Sunday after the cops visit, I walk in a white robe to the front of the church, take the mic, and say, “I accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I accept His calling to be a disciple, and with this baptism I give Him my very life.” Serious words for a serious event. Well, God must’ve accepted this transaction in spades because those detectives never come back.
I know I’m not off the hook, though. My probation officer is scheduled for a home visit in a few days and is well aware of the investigation, and I figure cops will come with him to take me in. On the morning he is scheduled to visit, I’m pacing around the house, scared shitless. When the doorbell rings, I take a deep breath and go to open it. A rough looking man with kind eyes and a very long Uncle Sam goatee is standing on the front porch. “Nicholas Bush?” he asks. I say yes, totally confused, and he tells me he’s my new PO [parole officer]. I can’t think of anything else to do, so I invite him in.
“So, how are you today?” he begins, trying to converse pleasantly with me. I tell him to cut the shit and ask what’s going on, where my usual PO is, and if he’s taking me in by himself. The pressure that’s been building up in me over the past few weeks bubbles up and breaks through the surface. I had expected there would be other guys with him, handcuffs, and a free ride to prison ready and waiting. The man cocks his head to one side and gives me an odd look. “I don’t think there’s anyone else coming,” he says.
“What?” I yell unintentionally, and then, “I mean, yeah, I just thought, well . . .” I clear my throat, “Never mind.”
“I guess I’ll cut to the chase then,” the man says.
Of all the miraculous things in the crazy story of my life, of all the things that may sound hard to believe, let me say that what he tells me next is the best thing to ever to happen to me. It’s amazing to the point of being unbelievable, but it did happen.
“Your PO was transferred downtown and he must’ve taken your file with him, or it’s possible that it was shredded, and I’m sorry to say that the latter is more likely. You see, whatever he left behind gets shredded and . . . ” My ears go deaf, my eyes widen, and my mouth gapes open. For years to come, I will still vividly remember the shock I feel. I hum, “Mmhmm,” and nod as if it all makes sense. The new PO then tells me that I’m up for discharge soon, so he needs to know my plans for the future, addresses where I may be found, and phone numbers to reach me, “all the usual stuff.” I tell the man I’ll be doing missionary work.
Later, after I tell Kurt what happened, he tells me he’s not surprised. I laugh and tell him, “I am!”
“Listen, Nick,” he says, “this isn’t a get out of jail free card.”
I cut in. “Well, you see, Kurt, it really sort of is.” I tell Kurt I’m going to dedicate my life to serving God and helping others. Kurt met his wife in the missionary program Youth With A Mission and I decide that working for this program will be my next step. Finally, a plan.
After my first mission to Africa, I know I’m not ready to go back into the real world quite yet, so I raise money and form partnerships with churches around northern Wisconsin and back in Green Bay in order to stick around and become a staff member. It’s during this time of touring around the state to raise financial support that I find myself back at the Russos’ house. I haven’t seen them in two years, and it’s my first time at the house since getting baptized.
I arrive in the early evening, just after 6:00. I’ve been held at gunpoint, I’ve spoken to detectives, and I’ve been in a courtroom on several occasions to speak with a judge, not knowing each time if he would send me to jail, but I’ve never been more clueless as to what might happen next than I am when I go to see the Russos again. There has always been an open invitation to return to them, something I very much appreciate and always have. When I have contacted them, it always turns into, “Won’t you come over for dinner? When are you coming over?” I have a feeling that their recent reach-out and my decision to go see them is part of a plan made by God because He wants me to show them the new me and tell them what He has done to help me.
On this occasion I don’t use a key to get in, as I’ve done on so many other occasions, but instead knock. I am let in by Greta, who greets me with a warm hug. The family pit bull instantly attacks me with loving licks, barks, jabs, and scratches; Francesco shakes my hand; and Giovanni comes upstairs to give me a “Hey” and a smile. Adriana isn’t home. I hang up my trench coat, and we shoot the breeze casually, exchanging gifts of wine and ashtrays.
For the first time, I feel completely at peace with this family, the one who took me in at fourteen and whom I have always respected and at times feared. This time, they are the ones who seem a little nervous with my presence.
Greta asks me to sit and says they need to talk to me, and then Francesco jumps in. With an accent even thicker than I remember, he says that while I may think I’ve vanished, they’ve been watching me. This raises the hair on my arms and I want to stop wherever he’s going with this. I tell him that I have nothing but love and gratitude for them, that they treated me like a son, and that I won’t ever forgot that. Then before they can go any farther, I take control of the conversation and tell them that I’ve become a missionary for Jesus Christ and that I took a long road to get here. They stare at me intently, quizzically as I talk.
I tell them about how Allison appeared to me in a vision a few months after she died and said, “Love Christ,” how it made me angry to know Christ is so real, yet He let my sister die and allowed me to throw away so many years of my life. A part of me even blamed Him for it. I tell them about how even after the vision, I continued to rebel and do whatever the hell I wanted, but at the same time I learned more about God and could not deny His existence and power after a second incredibly vivid vision I experienced. I also tell them about my relationship with Kurt—whom they know from when we were teens living in the fast lane—and how he and his wife taught me about life in the Kingdom of God and are the ones who suggested I get baptized and dedicate my life to Jesus.
When they ask why I didn’t come to them and ask them for help when I was struggling, why I instead disappeared for two years, I tell them about how my life spun out of control during the six months after Allison passed. I explain that Allison’s death left a void that nothing could fill, not even my relationship with them, not even drugs. I also fill them in on the miracle with the detectives.
I tell the Russos how in the days that followed my meeting with the cops in my parents’ kitchen, I got baptized at Kurt’s church, not knowing what to expect afterward concerning the detectives. I don’t hold anything back when I tell them how desperately I wanted to stay out of prison, how desperately I wanted to stop running and change my life, once and for all. I knew I was pinned down by the detectives and fully expected to be taken into custody. In my mind, the fact that this didn’t happen was nothing short of a miracle. “Jesus literally set me free.” I tell them. “I got a fresh start, a clean slate.”
“No charges?” they ask, stunned. Their surprise is apparent, but I see something else in their eyes too; they can tell something in me is different, that I’m telling the truth. After all the years of avoiding the truth, sidestepping and manipulating, I’m being straightforward and honest, like a changed person. In just a short half hour, I tell them everything.
Then something else incredible happens: Francesco says his family needs a miracle too. He explains that Giovanni is in a similar situation with the law and that heroin addiction has ruined his life and his girlfriend’s life, and now even Adriana is starting to go down the same path. That while it destroyed my life, they had been able to prosper for a little while, to avoid the cops even, but now they were consumed by addiction and investigations, and they were falling apart. They leave the details to Giovanni, who is now being hounded by detectives.
I tell them I had a miracle and that they might have one too. I can feel their anxiety, frustration, and anger, emotions
I instantly recognize, as they tell me how the tables have turned on them. Beyond Giovanni and Adriana’s struggles, Francesco is having his own. Apparently his liver has been severely damaged. I wonder to myself if he’s been abusing drugs and alcohol.
When they say a mere glass of wine might kill him, I give a small chuckle and apologize for bringing them a bottle of red wine. They don’t laugh—in fact they never laugh—instead they say it’s the thought that counts. Then Francesco looks me in the eye and says, “You show us respect and we do the same. But you know who we are.” And then, seemingly out of nowhere, he says, “I am like the devil.”
At one time, his words might have shaken me to the core, but this time they don’t phase me. I remind him how much love I have for his family and tell him I will pray for all of them. I tell him that prayer makes good things happen. I can tell they’re intrigued by this, but Francesco tells me he doesn’t need the paradise I speak of.
Francesco had been a very successful hustler. His family never explained what exactly he did, only that he “hustled,” and it was clear that whatever he was doing had made him very successful. At one point, Giovanni said that Francesco started his life in organized crime by growing and smuggling marijuana in the foothills of Italy in the late sixties.
If true, this could explain why there was such a strict “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy under the Russo roof regarding how they made a living—the reason behind all their secretive behavior. You see, they never used the words, mafia, La Cosa Nostra, selling drugs, or anything else along these lines—but it was all in the book Francesco gave Giovanni and me. So while few shady things were ever spoken of, they always felt subliminal, omnipresent just under the surface, but somehow very clear. I would never have pried because these people meant everything to me. And now fate has come full circle, and addiction is tearing them to pieces. I want more than anything to help them.
After dinner, Giovanni tells me that the next morning we need to go to a doctor’s office two hours away to get Suboxone, to help control his addiction, but will come right back after. I’m fine with this and agree to spend the night and go with him the next day. I still have a room at the Russo house.
The next day, just a few minutes into the drive, I can clearly see what looks like a bleak road ahead for Giovanni and his family. He opens up to me about how drugs took over his life completely and he became a slave to opioids. He tells me that his sister is doing a short stint in prison for distributing heroin and that he narrowly escaped a similar fate by cooperating with the police.
Word on the street is that he has become an informant; two of my main weed dealers told me this. It seems like he’s forsaking his conscience and the code he once swore to live by, but he desperately wants to get Adriana out. He’s a wreck, and he also reveals that Francesco is leaving the family to start a new life on the West Coast; apparently he’s so desperate to remain clean that he needs to get away from everything and is going to work in the organic food industry. Greta, for her part, is struggling to cope with the reality that their family has fallen apart. She is working on becoming a certified substance abuse counselor and has been pouring everything into the recovery community.
Since Giovanni is confiding in me so bluntly, I open up even further to him than I did to his parents the night before. I tell how I contracted hepatitis C from needle use and that nerve damage from an overdose paralyzed my dominant arm. I share the good developments too: that what might have been permanent ailments were miraculously healed during prayer with Christians.
I can tell that Giovanni knows he’s walking a fine line and could very well end up dead or in prison and I want him to embrace Jesus, who is serious, powerful, and very real, and ask for help. I burn to share with him and with his whole family the hope that I’d found, despite the thought that they may deserve what they are getting. Sure, some would consider this fair, but countless others who are innocent do not deserve to have their lives ruined by this nationwide epidemic, and in my opinion neither did they, regardless of their past decisions. I put everything out there in order to help him. I finish our conversation knowing that I’ve done all I could.
Before I leave the Russo house, Francesco and Greta make sure that I still have a key and tell me they expect me to visit each holiday. I will later learn that Francesco leaves the family to move to the West Coast and go legit, leaving Greta on her own to deal with Adriana and Giovanni, both of whom are in and out of jail. With time and guidance, Adriana will eventually become a drug court counselor and even get a job with the local court system. Giovanni will quit heroin by taking Suboxone and vitamin B12 injections, and get a real job, as a host at an Italian restaurant. He and I will stay close. About four years after this stay with the Russos, and after Giovanni and Adriana have put their lives on track, Francesco will return and get out of the drug game for good. They respect my life choices, and I respect theirs.
Chapter 14
When I arrive at the campus of Youth With A Mission (YWAM), a missionary organization I’m involved in, in Weyerhaeuser, Wisconsin, elation is pulsing through me, and this time no drugs are involved. I’m twenty-four and something I’ve wanted my whole life is about to happen, something I often thought would never happen: I am marrying an incredible woman. I’m nervous, but so, so happy. I feel like the most excited person on earth.
The campus is a beautiful space situated on a picturesque chain of lakes deep in the north woods of Wisconsin. It’s the headquarters of YWAM where they offer their missionary training program. I first visited the campus a few years earlier, in January 2015, shortly after getting baptized, to take the six-month course. It’s the one Kurt and Christa took and spoke so highly about. It allows and trains you to join YWAM’s missionary excursions. The course is incredible. I am instantly welcomed into a community of warm-hearted people who have one another's best interests in mind. We pray together and serve the community together, and inspirational speakers visit from time to time.
One thing that really moves me is the experience of listening to music together. I love music; it has an incredible power to affect people at a heart level, but I’ve never before enjoyed Christian worship music. With these people, however, listening to it is transcendental. We meet in the morning, listen to a five- or ten-minute worship song, and then pray and talk afterward for about ten minutes. A little later we go to work around campus; students go to classrooms to study and staff go to teach or take part in another activity. Each day feels unique and wonderful, as if God is actually intertwining Himself with it. I feel like I am being awakened to the presence of God and the void in my heart is being filled. I feel happy, truly happy, and I no longer feel the lust to get high.
At the end of the course, we embark on a mission to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where we play with orphans who have HIV, hang out with former prostitutes in a halfway house where they are getting job training, partner with churches serving the community, feed the homeless, and are even featured on African television. After the Addis Ababa mission, I go on one to Athens, Greece, and then on one to the Philippines.
Between the journeys, while on campus in Wisconsin, I learned how to perform maintenance tasks and harvest wood that is used for heat during the winter. It burns in the massive fireplace in the main building’s lodge and in smaller buildings elsewhere on campus. While there, I work with other members of the organization to host youth Bible camps and also to prepare other young adults for missions. I find that I am really good at survivor tactics, both in the wilderness and in urban areas. I can lead a group out on intermingled trails on 160 acres strewn with live bear traps and keep them safe; I can also negotiate my way through a red-light district, converse with pimps there, and preach to the women with total ease.
I think about staying on campus or going on missions as a permanent lifestyle, but a burning desire overrides this. I want desperately to have a life partner, and I start praying to find a wife. I know I couldn’t just get
one on my own overnight, so I ask the big man upstairs for help every night before I go to bed. And guess what? When the next batch of students arrive, there she is: Amanda Rose. Everything I asked God for is encapsulated in this incredible woman. We are immediately comfortable with each other and fall for each other quickly. Amanda is gorgeous, yet humble, with a beauty that shines out from within. I admire her in many ways, but I particularly admire her heart.
Students aren’t allowed to date during the course, but we both know we’ve met the one and marriage is on the horizon. Amanda and I go on the trip to Athens together and end up spending hours talking one-on-one. When we get back, I write her a poem, which she still has, and take her on a walk to a hill in the woods overlooking Potato Lake. It is just six months after we met, and we sit side by side on a bench as the sun sets. I read the poem and then get down on one knee and pop the question. She says, “Of course it’s a yes!”
We are so eager to take the next step that we start planning the wedding right away. We know we want to get married on campus and we find out that many older couples in the area have done the same due to its beautiful location and large lodges. We shop online for decorations in a frenzy, and since we have basically no money, we do our best to cut costs where we can. I used my newly acquired lumberjack skills to chop down trees and make benches, an arch, and a lampstand, so we don’t have to rent them. Amanda goes with her girlfriends to Minneapolis, a couple hours west, to try on dresses and figure out what she wants, and then orders a look-alike dress sold cheaply from China. Our community of friends in missions cheers us on and helps us out, and plenty of ministers offer premarital counseling. Everything comes together perfectly.
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