The speech was followed by a good half minute of silence. Next, the youth group leader spoke up. “Lord, I pray for the recovery of my mother, Angie, following her knee surgery.”
Another man behind John spoke up. His voice boomed and he had a heavy German accent. “Help us at the next town hall meeting so that we can build a memorial for those who lost their lives in the storm.”
Just as John thought the prayers were going to wind down, a woman in her early twenties lifted up her hands in the air and addressed the congregation. “I just heard a word from the Lord,” she said with her eyes closed.
John kept one eye open to observe the reaction of the congregation. Most had their eyes closed, and a woman to his left let out an audible sigh. He watched Madeline tighten her grip on the folding chair in front of her while Pastor Anbusch beamed. It was then that he noticed the woman wore a flower-print dress and had a daisy stuck into the side of her hair. She wore several silver bracelets on her wrists that clanged together as she moved her arms about.
The woman charged ahead in an authoritative tone. “Hear the word of the Lord. This place will bloom with flowers. Flowers of peace, unity, and joy.”
In days past, the declaration would have been followed by applause or shouts of excitement. Instead, there was somber silence. The pastor thanked the woman quietly and continued on with the rest of the service. While the pianist at the synthesizer played a contemporary song, the woman slipped out the back of the gymnasium and avoided any eye contact.
* * *
When the service ended, John, Madeline, and Evelyn exited the gymnasium. John glanced back to see simple conversations and the ushers methodically folding up chairs. There was a somber feel to the proceedings, as if it was a cleanup after a funeral.
Back in John’s truck, Evelyn spoke up. “Sure isn’t like it used to be in there. Feels like a never-ending funeral with Jared gone.”
“I think there are a lot of signs of hope, Mom. What do you think, John?” Madeline said.
“Yeah. It’s hard because you’re still so close to the event. People’s emotions are always really raw for awhile.”
Evelyn picked up an object in the backseat and leaned forward. She held it out for John and Madeline to see. It was a wirefly from Dr. Ferganut. “Where did you get this?”
John reached back and took the device from her. He set it on the dashboard. “It’s a wirefly. From Dr. Ferganut.” He looked in the rearview mirror to study her reaction.
A smile swept across Evelyn’s face. “Right, but what are you planning on doing with it?”
“He gave me a few of them. I was hoping to use them for research.” John did not know how much Madeline shared with her mother about their recent encounters with Dr. Amalynth. He chose his words carefully to avoid spooking her mother.
Madeline crossed her arms and gave John an intense stare. He learned enough over the past few months on how to read her body language and this was not good.
“What?” John asked innocently. “Is this a bad time?”
“Yes,” Madeline said.
“Maddie, it’s okay. You saw him, John?” Evelyn said.
“Saw him? I met him the other day. At his house in Valentine. Captain and I were on a chase and we thought we’d drop in to say hello. Turns out he had a few of those to spare. I want to write a paper about him.”
If the last stare from Madeline was cold, the one that followed approached absolute zero. If he was not careful their entire relationship would freeze to a stop. She ground her teeth together and then stared straight out the front window.
John kept his focus on the road and pulled into the driveway of Evelyn’s home. He glared at Madeline. “Look, I don’t know what he did, but have you ever thought about forgiving him?”
“He’s right, Madeline,” Evelyn said as she unbuckled her seat belt. It was apparent to John this was not the first time Madeline and her mother had discussed this topic.
“No, he’s not, Mother,” Madeline shot back.
“I’m not going to fight with you again on this, Maddie. Take care, John.” Instead of getting sucked into an argument, Evelyn left the vehicle without another word.
John could not help but snicker for a moment.
“It’s not funny,” Madeline barked. “And can you put that thing away?” She pointed to the wirefly on the dashboard.
“Sure.” John picked it up and set it back into the backseat. He did his best to hide a grin.
After they left Evelyn’s house, they rolled past the remains of the Spirit of Grace Church. The grounds were swept clean of debris. The basement, which survived the tornado intact, was covered by a series of tarps and sheets of plywood. Two signs posted onsite by a contractor and an architectural firm indicated reconstruction would begin before winter.
A collection of faded flower bouquets, teddy bears, and knee-high white crosses stood as a makeshift memorial on the front lawn of the property. Behind that a large sign was posted requesting donations for a memorial to those who lost their life in the storm.
In other areas of the city roofs had been repaired and the sounds of hammers and circular saws competed with warblers and chickadees. The holes in the skyline from the missing trees would take years to fill but John was sure quiet signs of newfound revival would soon take their place. He thought back to the woman at the church service who declared the place would bloom with flowers and pondered what form that might take.
As they exited the town and drove back toward Sioux Falls, John spoke up again. “I started reading my Bible again last night.”
Madeline still had her arms crossed. “Good for you.”
“Your Dad said I should probably work my way through Matthew. Or John.”
“Good for him. Can we talk about something else? Or nothing at all? How about nothing. Let’s just practice being quiet for a while.” She spoke to him like a grade school teacher scolding a child but he was unsure what lesson he was supposed to learn.
John gave her two minutes of conversational freedom and did not look at her. Then: “I still love you. Even if you’re mad at me.” He reached out and grasped her hand.
She let him hold her hand a few seconds and then pulled away. “Then why are you trying to make me do something I don’t want to do?”
John leaned forward and looked up through the windshield. “God, help her to forgive.”
“Don’t bring Him into it. Just. Don’t.”
“Why? You did it at the restaurant.”
“That was different. I don’t want His help with this.”
“Oh, okay. So now it’s God-on-demand. Just push a button and…”
If there was ever the possibility of reaching absolute zero on Earth, he just discovered it. She gave him the coldest stare he had seen up to this point and even he knew that maybe it was time to let it go. She then turned to look out the side window and avoided eye contact altogether.
“Does this mean we’re not going to the carnival?” John asked several minutes later. He knew he had a lot of nerve to ask her the question but the thought of mini-donuts stayed on his mind.
“Why are you asking me that? No, we’re going. You owe me a bag of kettle corn now.”
John breathed a sigh of relief. After all, he missed mini-donuts. He looked up into the rearview mirror and noticed his eyes were just a little brighter than the last time he looked at them.
* * *
That evening John reclined alone on his bed and churned his way through the next fifteen chapters of Matthew. Some of the material was familiar but other parts he never recalled hearing about in church as a child or as an adult. It puzzled him why so much ground remained uncovered no matter what church he attended as if some preachers were so cautious in their approach to readings for services that it was as if they consistently underestimated the abilities of their congregations.
By the time he made his way to verse twenty-one of chapter eighteen, he knew he reached the best place to stop for the night. The title of th
e section was the “Parable of the Unforgiving Servant.”
He was vaguely familiar with the parable but what irritated him was the timing of it. For the first time tonight he felt a sense of heaviness surround and press in on him as if the walls of the room felt closer than before. Thoughts of his debate with Madeline about forgiving her father, the anger in Dr. Amalynth’s eyes, and reflections on the grudges he personally held whirled together into an electrical storm of agitation. Like Dr. Amalynth, he also had a long memory and often kept a list of rights and wrongs regardless of what he told Madeline. The wrongs were not motives for revenge but rather points of pain that in one situation would give him strength and in another instance sap his energy.
He forged ahead through the text anyway unsure of what he was going to find. What struck him more than anything about the parable was the fact that the servant had been forgiven a great debt but chose not to forgive another’s debt. The servant even got physically violent about it and threw his fellow servant into prison. The master, of course, found out and had the servant delivered over to the torturer until the debt was repaid in full.
John looked up and closed the book. He stared at the picture of a sailboat on his wall but his thoughts became as unsteady as the wind-tossed waves in the picture. He set the Bible on his nightstand and turned off the light. Although he did not feel tortured, he knew exactly what the parable was getting at. Then, like a true researcher, he searched his own thoughts to see if there was anyone in his past or present on whom he could test out this concept.
The first person who came to mind was Jared Wyckham, the wayward preacher who beguiled an entire flock, along with Rebekkah, into a pasture full of weeds, thistles, and wolves. To some, the man became a martyr and a hero but to John he was a stubborn man who lost his way and did not care who he took down with him. A part of him wondered if some of the memorial money would be used to idolize Jared and all that he stood for by erecting a statue in honor of his dubious legacy.
John’s feelings toward Jared had changed over the past few weeks from anger to begrudging acceptance. What good does it do me to hate a dead guy anyway? John thought. “I forgive you,” he said under his breath. He tried his best to say it from the heart. After the words left his lips he waited a minute. He felt nothing. Undeterred, he said it again for good measure.
Still feeling nothing, he forgave the counselors and psychologists who misdiagnosed Rebekkah’s depression. Following that, he forgave Dr. Wendt, the brash young medical doctor who wanted to throw nothing but pills at her condition. He then thought about Mrs. Knopf, the well-meaning professor in his first year meteorology glass in college that tried to broach the subject of God with him after one of her lectures. Although he held no grudge against her he did remember walking out on their conversation.
Next, he turned his attention to Miss Benson, the fourth grade teacher who once told his mother that her son “wasn’t all that smart”. The teacher then spent the rest of the school year trying to prove her point despite John scoring high on a mid-year intelligence test.
The last person he thought of was himself. Could he forgive himself for the final breakup with Rebekkah? Was there a remote chance that such inner conflicts created the friction in his relationship with Madeline? The key it seemed was getting at the truth of the situation. Or was it? Which had to come first anyway—truth or forgiveness?
He had no clue what led Rebekkah to enter uninvited into Jared’s home. The truth about their relationship was that it was unstable right before the end. Ultimately, it did not matter. She was long gone now and the only one harboring guilt was him.
In that moment of epiphany, he stumbled upon something. He found the past few minutes strangely freeing. When he tried to conjure up the emotions associated with the people he forgave, it was as if any feelings connected to them were whisked away supernaturally. The harder he tried to bring the pain and anger back, the more the emotions were replaced by resolve and more importantly a sense of peace.
He closed his eyes. In the morning he would test the concept again in hopes the freedom really did stick. Before he drifted off to sleep he looked over at his nightstand. There, in the red glow of the alarm clock, sat two of the wireflies Dr. Ferganut had given him.
Instead of sleeping, he sat upright and turned on the light. With renewed interest, he fired up his laptop computer. He plugged in the flash drive Dr. Ferganut had given him. A few clicks later he installed the tracking software for the wireflies and plugged in the portable antenna to pick up their signals.
He connected a cable from his cell phone to his computer and downloaded the images from Dr. Amalynth’s lab. He also downloaded images of Dr. Amalynth’s white pickup truck. His finger hovered over the enter button on his computer and for a moment, he thought about sending the wireflies on a test flight to find the truck. After witnessing the multiple attacks on Dr. Ferganut a part of him wanted justice and he wanted it tonight. He thought, too, about forgiving Dr. Amalynth like the others. Unlike Jared, Dr. Amalynth was very much alive and capable of changing his actions. To John it did not matter because Dr. Amalynth did not deserve to be forgiven at this point.
John unplugged the flash drive, closed down the computer, and set the laptop computer on the floor for the night. He set the wireflies on top like two miniature planes ready to take off from an electronic aircraft carrier and like a ship captain he readied his mind for the next battle.
Chapter Eighteen
The following afternoon after her shift at the flower shop, Madeline stopped by her mother’s home for dinner. Her mother’s home was beautiful on the inside and Madeline always had fond memories of certain areas of the house. One of those areas was the kitchen, with its hardwood floors and numerous cupboards full of exotic spices and smells. Although her mother favored Italian and Mediterranean cuisine, almost every week her mother would find a way to experiment with a new recipe.
While Evelyn carried a plate of seasoned breaded pork chops to the table, Madeline paused to survey the books in her mother’s bookcase. Her mother still clung to several of Jared Wyckham’s books despite her best efforts to explain the issues with them. She frowned and picked up a ceramic dish of buttered green beans and brought it to the table.
As they sat down and began to heap portions onto their plates, Madeline spoke up. “Mom, when are you going to get rid of those books?”
“Which books? I love my cookbooks.”
“I meant Jared’s books.”
Her mother let out a loud sigh. “I’m not ready to part with those.”
“I can help you park with them. Here, let me grab a garbage can.”
“Please. Don’t touch them. They still mean something to me. If it makes you feel better, I am reading my Bible more. At my own speed mind you.”
Despite Madeline’s initial hunger for the food she piled onto her plate, she found her appetite waning as time went on. She picked at her green beans until her mother took notice.
“It’s because I browned the butter isn’t it? I knew I should have set the timer,” her mother said.
“It’s not that, Mom.”
“What is it then?”
“I don’t understand why people don’t listen to me more.”
“Like me?”
“Or John. I told him he should have gone storm chasing somewhere else.”
“John didn’t know who your father was. Besides you never told him, Maddie.”
“He doesn’t get why I feel the way I do. It’s like you, I’m not ready.” There was a sarcastic undertone to Madeline’s voice but she did not care and let it fly anyway.
Her mother rolled her eyes. “Will you ever be?”
They both ate for a moment in silence, although Madeline was much slower about it. She glanced up at her mother and then out the living room window.
“What are you afraid of?” Her mother asked. “Losing control? I remember when you were a little girl and you stood on the doorstep when storms came in. So many times you wa
nted to go with your Dad on a chase, but he didn’t want to put you in danger. When you finally got to go you were so excited. Did you ever go with him after our divorce?”
Madeline turned back to look at her food. “No.”
“Is that why you’re really mad at John?”
“Are you saying I’m jealous? Please, Mom.”
“I know I’m one to talk, but ever since the divorce you’ve buried yourself in your books. You’ve built these walls around yourself but things have moved on.”
The conversation irritated Madeline and out of spite she threw her fork onto the plate. She took one look at the door and hoped her mother got the hint. She felt another surge of sarcasm rising to the surface. “So tell me. Is Dr. Minton real, Mom?”
Her mother drew back. “What made you think of that?”
“Something I read.”
Her mother helped herself to another dinner roll. She buttered it, took a bite, and then dug in. “I remember seeing him once or twice. Your father would talk about him and how he had to keep us safe from the guy. One time we were at a gas station and he pulled up on a motorcycle. Your Dad and him got into this unbelievable argument. You were really little at the time. But I guess I always thought all that was related to your Dad’s gambling addiction.”
Madeline began eating again with a little more enthusiasm. “Does he still gamble?”
“No, I think he only gambles with his inventions now. Wish he would have stuck with that instead of the other thing.” Her mother let out a slight smile as if there were some feelings there, deep but frozen over like a landscape covered in snow.
Her mother continued. “I do think you’re being awfully hard on John, though.”
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