“Was the guy with the shorts and the Goodwill tag there?” John asked when Charissa picked him up from work at five o’clock.
“No,” she said. “They haven’t seen him again.” But there were so many others. So many needs. “You should see Mara in action, John. You should see how she treats everybody that comes in, almost like they’re royalty. It’s the perfect job for her.”
“I’m so glad,” John said. “She needs something to go right for a change. A place where she’s appreciated.”
“Exactly. And they love her there.” Charissa flipped on her right turn signal. “It got me thinking today, how she and Miss Jada can go home knowing they’ve made a difference in somebody’s life. And I leave the classroom wondering what difference I’ve made.”
“You had that student, the one whose mom—”
“I know. But that was just a one-off deal. I mean, I’m glad I was able to pray with her and give her some grace, but . . .”
“You’re still learning the ropes, Riss. Look at Dr. Allen, what a difference he’s made in your life. Not just in the classroom, but all the ways he’s impacted you. We all have teachers who’ve done that for us, even if they might never know about it. You’ll have the chance to invest in students’ lives, to make a difference. Like Mara. We all have our callings, right?”
Right. And maybe she needed to think about hers in a different way.
February 20
You’d think I’d spend more time writing notes in this journal about my life with God. Instead, the weeks slip by, and I forget to take the time. Hannah and Meg fill pages in theirs. I need to do a better job with this.
“Teach us to number our days.” That’s the verse that pursues me. Haunts me. Purges me.
I was convicted by some of the papers the students submitted. Even the ones who wrote about wanting to make a difference in the world wrote in large part from a self-centered perspective. They want to do something great in order to be remembered, to be honored, to be celebrated. I recognize myself in their words, and I despise the mirror.
I need to get my head around the reasons I want to teach. Am I doing it for myself or for the students? Self-centered or others-centered? That’s the plumb line question for me.
Why am I teaching?
I thought I knew. Now I’m not sure. The uncertainty terrifies me.
Teach me to number my days, that I may gain a heart of wisdom. Amen.
Meg
Time was running out. In less than twenty-four hours Simon would return to Kingsbury from Chicago. In thirty-six hours Becca would return to London. And Meg would need to summon the courage and strength to let her go.
As difficult as the shock of Jim’s death had been—as much as she would have given to have had one more day together, or at least a few hours at a bedside to say goodbye—a prolonged farewell took its toll. The only way Becca knew how to cope with the shadow of sorrow was to ignore it. Or deny it. Doctors are wrong all the time, Becca had frequently insisted. She had read plenty of stories online. She had a college friend whose dad had been given six months to live, and that was three years ago. Don’t worry, Mom. We’re gonna have lots of time together. I just know it. But whenever Meg tried to steer the conversation toward faith, Becca swiftly changed the subject.
They were running out of time.
“Do you want to come with me to prayer group tonight?” Meg asked.
Becca looked up from her book. “Is it okay with you if I don’t?”
“You don’t want to see where your dad and I lived?”
Becca shifted in her seat. “Do you want me to?”
“No—I mean, I thought maybe you’d want to take a look inside, hear some more stories about him. That sort of thing.”
“I think it would just feel weird for me, Mom. But if you want me to go with you—”
“No. It’s okay. I don’t want you to feel awkward.”
Becca returned to her book.
If Becca didn’t want to see it, then maybe Meg didn’t want to see it again, either. Maybe it would be too emotional to be there, especially after Charissa and John had moved in their own furniture and done some remodeling. Once was enough. Once was a gift. And besides. She had already shown Becca lots of pictures of her life with Jim. She had already shared many stories, and Becca had listened with interest—or maybe forbearance—asking many questions without once accusing Meg of trying to turn her against Simon by describing a man who was truly kind and generous and full of love.
“Maybe I’ll ask the group to come here instead,” Meg said. “Would that be okay with you? You’d get to meet Mara and Charissa. I’d love for them to meet you.”
Becca shrugged. “Okay with me. But I don’t want to sit in on whatever you do together, okay?”
Okay.
Becca responded to the disappointment on Meg’s face by saying, “I think it’s awesome that you have your faith, Mom. I do. It’s cool that you have friends who share it with you. And I know it must be really hard for you to restrain yourself, but thanks for not trying to force it down my throat this week. It’s been really great just to be with you, just to have fun together.” She put her book down on the floor and stretched. “Want to watch a movie or something?”
“Sure.”
“Cool! I’m in the mood for something funny.” Humming, Becca went to the kitchen to make milkshakes.
Two more hours without any significant conversation.
They were running out of time.
Hannah
Hannah was shopping at the mall for honeymoon shoes and clothes (“Comfortable and casual,” Nate had said) when her phone rang. “You ready for this?” Nathan asked. “Are you flipping ready for this?”
Hannah unlaced some sneakers that were too tight and put them back in the box on the shelf. From the sound of Nathan’s voice, she was not ready. She took a deep breath and braced herself.
“Laura called,” he said. “They’ve finally gotten themselves settled into their new house, and she was calling to make arrangements to meet with me to discuss the visits she wants with Jake.”
Okay. So far, no new information. They had known this transition was coming. But with everything else going on, Hannah hadn’t been thinking much about Laura.
“So I told her I’m getting married, and she’s going to have to wait until after our life settles down a bit, that Jake can’t take all that upheaval all at once.”
Hannah said, “Agreed.” It would be difficult enough for Jake to adjust to the daily presence of a stepmother without trying to simultaneously navigate the return of his mother, a mother who—Hannah reminded herself as she shifted the phone to the other ear—had abandoned her marriage and her son for her own self-centered pursuits. “I’m with you completely on that,” she said.
“Well, I’ll spare you her diatribe about the two of us getting married so quickly—I didn’t tell her we’re old friends—but when I happened to mention our trip to the Holy Land, she threw an absolute fit. Said I had no right to take Jake out of the country, to somewhere ‘that dangerous’ without consulting her first.”
It was Hannah’s turn to be livid. “You have got to be kidding me.”
“Nope. Wish I were. So here’s what she suggested: the two of us can go off and have our Holy Land trip, and she’ll come to Kingsbury and stay with Jake for the three weeks we’re gone.”
“Are you—” Hannah caught herself before she blurted out something stronger than “kidding me?”
“No. I’m completely serious. And then she clarified herself: she wasn’t asking to stay in our house, but would pay for a residential hotel or something. Magnanimous, huh?”
“Unbelievable.” Hannah paced the aisle of women’s shoes. “So, now what?”
He sighed. “I already talked to a buddy of mine who’s an attorney—not a family law guy, so he’s not speaking definitively—but he says she could have legal grounds. Our arrangement gave me full physical custody of Jake, but we had ‘joint legal,’ at least
on paper, and her husband has deep pockets, some international finance or tech mogul or something, so if they want to argue that I should have included her in this type of decision, then—”
“Did you remind her she’s the one who walked away?” Hannah’s whole body trembled with anger. “She’s the one who gave you custody when she decided she didn’t want to be a mother anymore!”
“I said that, in so many words. And she still threatened to get her attorney involved.”
Hannah sank down onto a bench, elbows on her knees. “Nate, I—” She wasn’t even sure how to finish the sentence.
“I didn’t see this one coming,” he said. “Never saw it coming. If our relationship had been different, if she’d been involved at all with Jake’s life the past few years, then of course I would have talked with her about it, given her the courtesy of a conversation. But this?”
“Jake wants to go,” Hannah said.
“I know.”
“He’s excited about going,” Hannah said.
“I know.”
“This is not okay.”
“I know. She’s taking this away from him over my dead body.”
Hannah winced. Probably not the best choice of idiom right now. But she shared the sentiment.
“Okay, how about this tactic?” Hannah said. “How about if you tell her you’ll have a conversation with Jake and make it crystal clear to him that his mother is threatening to take something very precious away from him, and see how she reacts.”
“She doesn’t care about Jake. She just wants control.”
“Yeah, well. She’s not getting it. We’ll fight her together.” Hannah paused and stared at her engagement ring, soon to be joined with another permanent symbol of their commitment to stand as one. And a threefold cord? Laura would soon discover it wasn’t easily broken.
“Did you find some clothes?” Meg called from the music room, where she and Becca were huddled together beneath a blanket on an antique loveseat, watching a movie on the small television set.
“No. Nothing.” Hannah kicked off her shoes. She wasn’t going to interrupt their mother-daughter time with an account of Laura’s ploy to seize control.
“Oh, sorry,” Meg said. “I’ll go with you next week. We’ll put together—what do they call it for a honeymoon?”
“Trousseau,” Becca offered, reaching into a large bowl of popcorn.
“Right, trousseau.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Hannah said.
“Come join us!” Meg motioned to the recliner.
“Thanks, but no. I’ve got some work to do for the wedding.”
“We’re going to meet here tonight instead of at Charissa’s,” Meg said.
Hannah immediately read the subtext: Becca wasn’t interested in seeing her parents’ old house. She hoped Meg would be able to process that disappointment. “Okay, sounds good.” Hannah gestured toward the television screen. “Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt.”
While they resumed their movie, Hannah trudged upstairs and sat down in Rachel’s old room. She wondered which exercise Meg had chosen for them, wondered how many more opportunities the four of them would have to pray together.
From downstairs, Meg and Becca’s laughter floated like music while Hannah wept a quiet counterpoint from behind a closed door.
thirteen
Meg
The Sensible Shoes Club sat in Meg’s parlor in front of a crackling fire, chairs from the kitchen gathered into a circle. “It’s nice to meet you guys,” Becca said to Mara and Charissa after a few minutes of friendly introductions. “And congratulations on the baby.”
“Thanks!” Charissa tucked the pink shoes back into her purse. “Great to meet you too!” Mara chorused the same.
“I’ll be in my room, Mom,” Becca said, “if you need anything.”
“Thanks, honey.”
Becca would probably spend the next two hours on the phone with Simon. To her credit, she had spent very little time texting or talking with him whenever she and Meg were together. But at night, after Meg went to bed, she could hear Becca through the wall, her voice animated with infatuation.
Meg waited until she heard Becca’s bedroom door close upstairs. Then she looked around the circle at her friends. “I’ve been meditating the past week on some of the stories about the end of Jesus’ life—not to be morbid, but to watch his love. The prayer exercise I chose for tonight caught my attention because it shows him with his friends, loving them.” She passed around the handouts and then retrieved from beside the fireplace a pitcher, a basin, and a towel, which she set in the center of the circle next to the Christ candle. “I wanted to do this together because—because I wanted each of you to know that I love you. I’m so grateful God brought us together. And even if we have months—years—left, I didn’t want to miss a chance to do this. To remember Jesus together.”
Mara blew her nose.
“I also chose it because I still have some important things I need to work through, and this seemed like a good way to do it.” Meg paused. “So, how about if I light the Christ candle, and then we can pray.”
As the others watched, Meg lit the candle, then poured water into the basin.
Inhale: Emmanuel.
Exhale: You are with us.
Even to the end.
Meditation on John 13:1-15, 21
Loving to the End
* * *
Quiet yourself in the presence of God. Then read the text aloud and imagine you are there in the upper room with Jesus and the disciples on the night before he is crucified. Use all of your senses to enter the story.
Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you.” For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, “Not all of you are clean.”
After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” . . . After saying this Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, “Very truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me.”
For Personal Reflection (45-60 minutes)
Imagine Jesus kneeling before you, looking you in the eye, and reaching for your dust-covered, unwashed feet. Do you offer your feet to him? Why or why not? If you resist, what is behind your resistance? Offer your thoughts and feelings to God in prayer.
Picture the person you find most difficult to love and serve. Watch Jesus kneel to wash his or her feet. How do you feel? Offer your thoughts and feelings to God in prayer.
Now Jesus rises and hands you the basin and the towel. He invites you to kneel and wash the feet of the one who has betrayed you or made life difficult for you. How do you respond? Offer your thoughts and feelings to God in prayer.
Is there any concrete act of love and service that Jesus is calling you to und
ertake in his name?
For Group Reflection (45-60 minutes)
What most stood out for you in the time of personal reflection?
How can the group pray for you?
Conclude your time of prayer by washing one another’s feet.
Mara
Not just my feet, but my head and hands too! That’s where Mara found herself in the story: not wanting to miss out on any part of what Jesus offered her. When he reached for her foot, she gave it to him. Gratefully.
But she had never noticed before that Jesus also washed Judas’s feet. She opened her Bible to read beyond their text, to confirm that Judas was still there. He was. Jesus knew his betrayer was in that circle. He knew who the betrayer was. And still he stooped to wash the feet that would soon leave that room and walk straight to the authorities to turn him in.
How? How could Jesus do it?
She imagined Judas offering his foot, the fixed smile on his face disguising all the deceit in his heart. She wanted to jump up and tell Jesus not to do it—not to show love to the one who did not love him. But Jesus lingered with Judas, tenderly washing those filthy feet, holding them in his hands before gently drying them with a towel.
And then he rose to his feet and looked directly at Mara. “Remember what I have done for you,” he said. Eyes lit with love, he handed her the basin and the towel.
The disciples disappeared from the scene, and chairs appeared in her imagination. There were so many people in her circle, it looked like a pedicure salon. Some of the people she had already worked to forgive. When Kristie and the other girls who had bullied her stuck out their feet, she griped inwardly but knelt and washed them, Jesus’ hand on her shoulder. You are the one Jesus loves, she heard herself say to each one of them, and she saw his nod of approval.
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