Her chest hurt.
“Is there anything I can do for you, Meg? Anything at all?” Meg had seen a similar look of pastoral concern frequently crease Hannah’s face.
No, her brain said. Nothing. But her soul spoke aloud, with tears.
Dave motioned toward his office. “My next appointment canceled,” he said. “Come sit for a while. Will you?”
“Okay,” she said, and followed him.
Dear Jesus,
I didn’t expect to pour out my sorrow about Becca to Pastor Dave, but he listened with compassion, and I’m grateful for that. I had forgotten that he and Sandy experienced heartache with one of their sons a few years ago, with drug abuse. It’s a gift to know I’m not alone, that other parents have agonized in all kinds of ways over lost children.
We talked a long time about waiting with hope, and he gave me some lament psalms to pray that have been helpful to him. He said they give him words when he doesn’t have any.
I don’t think I have any new words to offer You about Becca. Maybe it’s okay that I keep praying the same ones. Help me trust You, Jesus. And rescue her. Please.
Love,
Meg
Hannah
When Nancy’s number appeared for the third time on Hannah’s caller ID Tuesday, Hannah excused herself from the dinner table. “That’s Nancy again. There must be something going on at Westminster. I better take this.”
“I’ll eat your pie,” her father teased.
Hannah gestured I’m watching you and picked up the phone. “Hey, Nancy!”
“Hi, Hannah—got a minute?” Nancy’s voice was pinched.
“Sure, what’s up?” Hannah retreated upstairs to the guest room and seated herself in the floral print armchair by the window. Heather would have called if something had gone wrong at the house. She hoped there hadn’t been another death in the congregation or—
“I saw Sally De Graaf-Haan at Bible study this morning.”
Ahhhh. She should have told Nancy about Nathan, should have given her the courtesy of—
“I wish you had told me you were heading out of town, Hannah. I just got off the phone with one of the neighbors, and he said he’d keep an eye on the cottage for us, especially with bad weather coming. Those pipes can freeze. We had an awful mess a few years ago when we didn’t shut the place down for the winter. Then he mentioned he hasn’t seen your car there very much the past month, wondered if maybe you had moved out. And Sally said she saw you with someone at the airport—assumed it was romantic, the way you were sitting together. And I’m sorry, but you know the way rumors get started. So I need to ask: Have you been staying with a man in Kingsbury?”
“What? No! Of course not!”
“Because when Sally said she saw you with someone, I honestly didn’t think much of it—figured you would have told me if you’d met somebody. But then when the neighbor said you hadn’t been around, I started to put two and two together and—”
Came up with five! Hannah inwardly protested. After all their years of friendship, did Nancy think so little of her personal integrity?
“I met a woman at the sacred journey group who lives in Kingsbury,” Hannah explained, using her practiced, forbearing pastoral voice, “and we’ve become good friends. She was out of town during December, and I stayed some nights at her house. I’m sorry. I didn’t think to tell you about that.”
She shouldn’t have to defend that to anyone, shouldn’t have to account for her whereabouts.
“Oh, okay,” Nancy said. “Sorry I asked. You know me”—light, airy, awkward laugh—“I don’t like to beat around the bush.” She paused. Hannah knew what was coming next. “And the man you were with . . .”
“Is a friend. A very dear friend. We knew each other years ago in seminary, and he lives in Kingsbury. We happened to run into each other at the New Hope Center last fall and have reconnected. As friends.” Maybe if Nancy hadn’t jumped to such a ridiculous and judgmental conclusion, Hannah might have confided the truth. But not now. Not after this.
“Oh,” Nancy said. “My mistake. Guess I was hoping Sally was right about that part. She said you looked well, that you seemed happy. That he was nice.”
“He is nice. Like I said, a close friend. Maybe you can help quash any other rumors for me.” Even as Hannah said the words, she felt the sting of her betrayal. Sorry, she said silently. To God. To Nathan. Sorry.
“I will,” Nancy said. “I’m sorry. I’m sure I’ve offended you.”
Yes, you have. Deeply. But Hannah didn’t say those words aloud. Instead, she forced a chuckle. “Ah, no—no harm done. Glad we got that cleared up!”
Nancy transitioned toward polite inquiries about Hannah’s sabbatical; Hannah made polite inquiries about Westminster. After a few minutes of polite, superficial conversation, they said their goodbyes.
Hannah tossed her cell phone onto the bed. It was exactly what she’d feared, the very reason she had wanted to keep her private life private. She reached for the phone again and dialed Nathan’s number.
“She thought what?” Nathan exclaimed, laughing.
“It’s not funny.”
“It’s hilarious because it’s so utterly absurd. She’s known you how long?”
“Her husband, Doug, was on the search committee that called me. So, yeah. Long time.” Hannah sighed. “And now the rumors are already flying and who knows who’s saying what to whom. And I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lied to her about our relationship, but I was so shocked, so offended that I didn’t want to give her any piece of my heart.”
“Did you tell her you’re upset?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t do that.”
“I know. New spiritual discipline, Shep: Tell her the truth. Tell her she hurt you. Offended you. Don’t let a stupid assumption on her part drive a wedge between you. Not worth it.”
A quiet knock on her open door. “Hold on,” she said to Nathan.
Everything okay? her father mouthed from the doorway. She gave him a thumbs-up. He held out a dessert plate with a piece of pie and mimed like he was going to breathe on it. Hannah laughed. “Did you get your cooties on it?” she asked.
“What?” Nathan said.
“Sorry, Nate—I was talking to my dad. He’s threatening to eat my piece of apple crumb pie.”
“Is that Pinwheel Man?” her father asked.
“Did your dad just call me Pinwheel Man?”
“Yes, Dad; yes, Nate. Here, would the two of you like to talk?” Her face flushed as soon as she realized how that sounded. “Just to say hi,” she added quickly. Before Nathan could reply, she traded the phone for the plate and took a large bite of pie. Her father sat down on the edge of her bed.
As she listened to the one-sided conversation (“Heard a lot of good things about you, Nathan! Yes, she’s pretty special. Right! right. Yes—good time together. Went whale-watching yesterday, did she tell you that?”), Hannah remembered other times he had sat on the edge of her bed. As a little girl she knew that if Daddy sat down on the edge of her bed, he was probably going to give her the news that they were moving again. You’re going to like Colorado! You’re going to love California! Wait until you see Arizona! I know you’ll make lots of new friends. And she would nod and say okay. And he would hug her and say, “That’s my girl. I know I can always count on you.”
Her gaze landed on Brown Bear, her first confidante. That bear had received hours of sorrow poured out—all the things Hannah never spoke aloud to anyone else until she spoke them to Meg. To Nate.
Let it go. Again.
“Who’s he talking to?” her mother asked from the doorway.
Hannah swallowed a bite of pie. “Nate.”
“Oooh—let me talk to him, Hugh.” She wiggled her fingers toward the phone.
Hannah smiled. Her mother had waited years for a moment like this. There had never been homecoming or prom dates. No college boyfriends. No “special someone” to discuss
over coffee.
“Here—Janie wants to say hi . . . Right . . . Uh-huh, yes, of course. Nice talking to you! Yes, me too. Hope so . . . Well, here’s Janie.”
“Nathan!” She spoke his name as if she had known him for years. “Oh, I am sooooooooo happy to talk to you!”
Hannah watched her father rise from the bed. Eyes full of affection, he touched her chin and leaned forward to kiss her cheek. Then, without a word, he took her empty plate and left the room.
Mara
Mara rolled over in bed to swat the buzzing alarm, causing Bailey to stir at her feet. She propped herself up on her elbows and glared at the trespasser. Brian had neglected to put him in his crate. Again.
“Down! Get down.” With a yawn, Bailey rolled onto his side, baring his belly for her to rub. “Don’t think you’re gonna win me over with your cuteness. Not gonna work.” He wagged his tail before jumping off the bed and trotting down the hallway.
She gazed out the window at six inches of new-fallen snow clinging to the trees. Though it was quicker to check her email inbox or text messages, Mara preferred the suspense of watching the list of school closings scroll along the bottom of the television screen.
As a little girl Mara eagerly anticipated snow days, knowing that when her mother had to work, Nana would come and stay at the house, knitting needles in hand, and Mara would sit at her feet and sound out words in dog-eared books while Nana clicked away at creations that would become socks or hats or even sweaters. After Nana died, snow days lost their charm. Then Mara would spend long days at the factory, trying to be invisible in the corner of the smoke-filled break room while listening to her mother’s coworkers gossip about who the bosses were sleeping with—and realizing that sometimes the woman they were whispering about was her mom.
Allegan County. Barry County. Calhoun County. Eaton County. Hopewell County.
There we go. A . . . B . . . C . . . D . . . H . . . Kingsbury Public.
Crap. The boys would be home.
The next-door neighbors’ plowing service was already scraping their driveway clear. Forty-five seconds and done. There was no way she would be able to shovel hers, not with the lingering stiffness from her fall. She would have to persuade Kevin to do it. After she let him sleep in. Tom had always plowed with the snow blower, which, she had recently discovered, he’d taken with him to Cleveland, even though he was living in an apartment. She’d offered some choice words about him while she shoveled that day. She muttered them again.
Bailey barked from downstairs. Mara put on her robe and limped down the hallway toward Brian’s room. “Brian, your dog needs to go out.”
Brian wrenched the comforter up over his head.
“Brian.”
No answer.
She shuffled over to the bed and tugged at the corner of the blanket. “C’mon. Get up. You’re the one who wanted a dog.”
He flung an arm toward her; she swerved in time. Bailey barked again.
She backed farther away and yanked the cover off the bed. “Now. I’m not cleaning up another mess in the kitchen.”
Brian grumbled something.
“If you’re not interested in taking care of him, I can call the shelter. No skin off my back.”
Silence. No movement. And then Brian thrust his leg out from under the sheet. “Fine. Coming.”
Good. For a moment she was afraid he was going to call her bluff.
“Why doesn’t Brian have to help?” Kevin whined.
Because you’re the more agreeable one, Mara said silently. Because I know I have a better chance of getting you to cooperate. “Get Brian to help you. That’s fine with me. Or the two of you can rotate. You can do today, he can do the next time. You work it out.”
“Fine,” Kevin said as he grabbed his boots. “He has to do the next one. And I hope it’s a blizzard.”
“Don’t forget to shovel the porch and the walkway!”
He slammed the garage door behind him.
Mara removed a roast from the fridge and put it in the Crock-Pot with some potatoes, carrots, and onion soup mix. She would make Kevin’s favorite peanut butter blossoms for dessert. For appeasement.
She rummaged through the pantry, searching for the bag of Hershey’s Kisses she had just bought. No sign of them. The boys had probably polished them off already. Okay. No peanut butter blossoms. Plain peanut butter cookies.
“Mom!” Kevin called from the front porch.
“Just a minute!” She took the jar of creamy peanut butter from the cupboard and opened it. Empty. Which one of them had put an empty jar of peanut butter back on the shelf?
“Mom!” More emphatic this time.
“What, Kevin?” She rubbed her hands on her jeans and shuffled to the front door.
He was holding out a plastic grocery bag tied in a knot with a note rubber-banded around the top. “This was by the door,” he said.
She read the unsigned note: Clean up after your dog or get a fine!
Heat surged through her body. She didn’t need to look inside the bag to know what it was. Whoever left it on the porch was probably watching her from a window, waiting for a visible reaction. Screw them. She wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction. Not today. Without looking around at any of the nearby houses, she gave the bag back to Kevin. “Put it in the trash, please, Kevin, would you?” she said, and closed the door, clutching the note in her trembling hand.
“Brian!”
Sounds of video game gunfire from the basement.
“Brian!” She wasn’t going to traipse up and down stairs. “Get up here now!”
After a long minute, the back of his red head appeared at the foot of the stairs. He was still maneuvering the video game controller.
“I said, get up here. Now.”
He flung the controller down and stomped upstairs. When he reached the top steps, she brandished the note in front of his face. “This was with a bag of dog crap on the front porch.”
No reply.
“Did you let Bailey poop in someone’s yard and then not clean it up?”
“Nope.”
She waved the note in front of him again. “Then why would someone leave this by our door?”
He shrugged.
“Fine.” She crumpled the note in her fist. “No more video games today.”
“I said I didn’t do it!”
“Well, somebody’s lying.”
“And yeah—it’s me. It’s always me.” He brushed past her. “I hate you,” he hissed. Then he vaulted up the stairs to his room and slammed the door behind him.
Oh, God.
Steadying herself on the back of a nearby armchair, she stared out the window at Kevin haphazardly hurling snow with the shovel.
What am I supposed to do?
No answer came.
Hannah
Hannah exited her parents’ car and eyed the winding queue of travelers inside the airport terminal. People in matching emerald green sweatshirts were making their way through check-in. A church group maybe. Or a family reunion.
“Too fast, Hannah. Your visit went by too fast.”
“Way too fast, Mom. Thanks for a great week.”
“Love you, sweetie,” her father said, his eyes glistening. “Thanks for coming out.”
Hannah bit her lip. She hated goodbyes. She had always hated goodbyes. “Love you, Mom. Love you, Dad. Thanks for everything.”
He wheeled her suitcase up onto the curb. “Call us when you get there.” His voice cracked. Hannah had seen him cry once. Years ago. “And you tell Nathan to take good care of my girl.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck, inhaled the fragrance of his cologne, and kissed his damp cheek. “I’ll tell him, Dad.”
Thursday, January 15
3 p.m.
First leg complete. Made it safely to Salt Lake City after a pretty bumpy flight and a descent that had me praying hard until the wheels touched down. I don’t like flying.
Good visit, but I’m still processing all the
conversation that didn’t happen. Even after that moment on the coast when I heard God invite me to let go and forgive Mom and Dad for the hurt they caused without demanding that they see it and acknowledge the damage, I still kept watching for an opportunity to dive deep with them. It never came. And I need to be okay with that. Maybe it’s enough that we had a good time together, that we relaxed and enjoyed being with each other. Let that be enough, Lord. I went out there hoping for more—even while I said I was okay with less. I feel disappointed. So I give you that, too.
I kept praying with that verse from Ecclesiastes about a time to keep silence and a time to speak. Yesterday I called Nancy back and told her I felt hurt by what she assumed about me. She was apologetic—again—and thanked me for being honest with her. I probably should have gone ahead and told her the truth about Nate, but I’m not ready for our story to be circulating at Westminster. Not yet. Lord, help me lean into everything you have in mind for Nate and me. Without fear.
Nate emailed me some questions and prayer exercises he sometimes gives his students for help with discernment, so I’ve been sitting with those the past couple of days. One of the exercises involves using the imagination: 1. Imagine a friend comes to you with your particular situation and decision to make. What questions would you ask? What would you invite him or her to notice? 2. Imagine you’re at the point of death, and you’re thinking back to this particular moment in time. What decision do you wish you had made? 3. Imagine you’re standing before the throne of Jesus at the end of your life, presenting this particular decision as an offering. Which decision would bring you the most pleasure and joy in offering to him?
I know which decision has brought me pain the past couple of months. It’s the decision I made to walk away from Nate all those years ago. I assumed that faithfulness to Jesus meant saying no to a relationship with him. And though I can be grateful that he ended up with a beautiful son because of the road he took, I have found myself wondering what might have been if I had said yes to his love back then. If we had married, would we have had a child together? Maybe I would have been able to conceive. To be a mother. But those thoughts get me nowhere. I know that.
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