Goodness and Mercy

by Vanessa Davis Griggs

  The light turned green. A car behind her honked its horn. She lifted up her head, and drove away.

  Chapter 22

  Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him.

  —Romans 14:3

  “Is something wrong?” Zachary asked as he and Gabrielle sat in the restaurant. He noted how she was using her fork like a hockey stick to shuffle her food back and forth, vacillating between her salad and the food on her plate. “Is yours not good?”

  Gabrielle looked up. “No. I mean, yes, my food is great.” She speared a piece of lettuce and a cucumber with her fork and carefully placed it in her mouth. She smiled.

  “I suppose you’re still feeling the effects from earlier today at church. Ministering is something. One preacher told me that after he preaches, sometimes he has to take a nap to get his energy back. I hear that ministering can take a lot out of you. It’s the adrenaline, hormones released in anticipation, that stimulates the heart rate, dilates blood vessels and air passages, things people associate more with fight or flight. . . .” Zachary stopped speaking. He leaned down to look up into her face, which remained down. “Hey? Hey? What’s wrong?”

  Gabrielle raised her head. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I suppose if you wanted to go to dinner alone, you could have done that, huh? I just have a few things on my mind right now. I apologize. I guess I’m not being great company.”

  “Would you like to talk about what’s bothering you? I’m a pretty good listener.”

  She shook her head. “Not really. I just need to shake it off, that’s all. You know how things can be. You’re excited about what God is doing in your life, but at the same time . . .” She leaned her head back, then back down before spearing a grape tomato with her fork and placing it in her mouth.

  “At the same time, the devil seems to be intensifying his attacks on you.”

  She smiled and tilted her head to one side. “Sounds like you’ve been there.”

  “I know how it can be. Although I’ve not been attending church regularly lately, I still take time out to spend with the Lord. Occasionally, I read my Bible during breaks at work. And I pray often. In fact, I don’t know where I would be had it not been for the Lord.” Zachary sat back against his chair.

  “I just got saved this year,” Gabrielle said. “January fourth. It’s been a wonderful blessing. Honestly, I don’t know if I could have handled some of the things I’ve faced here lately were it not for the Lord on my side.” She drank some of her Dr Pepper.

  “May I offer a bit of advice?”

  “Sure.”

  “Turn it all over to the Lord. Do what you can, but ultimately you really do need to give it to God. Cast your cares on Him because He really does care for you.”

  Gabrielle smiled. “You’re right, and I have. I’ve found that there’s only so much I can do anyway no matter how hard I try other wise.”

  “My definition of faith is to act like you believe God’s Word is true. That’s something my father drilled into me early on. If you believe, if you truly trust God, then you have to believe not only that He will handle it, but in how He chooses to handle it. We often pray, but then we want to tell God how He should bring it to pass.” Zachary took a sip of his lemon water. “And preferably, we would appreciate it, if we didn’t have to suffer at all along the way. Make it the straightest and shortest way possible, Lord.”

  “The shortest distance between two points. But that’s not realistic, though, is it?”

  “No, it’s not. There will be some things that will cause us to want to turn around and go back to what we know, even if what we know wasn’t that great or in our best interest. But at least—we rationalize—it was familiar to us,” Zachary said, glancing downward, then back into Gabrielle’s awaiting gorgeous brown eyes.

  “I get the impression that might have been as much of a Word for you, as it was for me,” Gabrielle said as she shyly blushed.

  “I love your smile,” he said. “A man could get spoiled, think he’s special, blessed beyond blessed waking up to a smile like yours each and every morning.”

  That caused her to blush even more. “Stop that,” she said.

  “Stop what?”

  “Stop making me forget about my troubles and having me concentrate on what I have right now, which truthfully is not so bad at this moment.”

  He hurried to chew the green beans he’d just placed in his mouth as she was speaking. “Do you know what I really like about you?” he said.

  “You mean besides my ‘wake up to’ smile?” she teased, then she held tightly her bottom lip with her teeth to keep a full laugh from escaping. She then playfully rolled her eyes at him as she batted them a few times, her way of making fun of his comment.

  “You see, now your eyes are messing me up. I’m trying to tell you something about your personality, but you have me falling into those beautiful brown eyes along with your beautiful smile. I’m really trying hard not to be superficial over here by only complimenting you on things like your warm smile, your striking brown eyes, the way you wriggle your cute little nose.”

  “I don’t wiggle my nose.”

  “I didn’t say wiggle, I said wriggle. Wriggle, you know, like this?” Zachary wriggled his nose to demonstrate.

  She laughed. “Oh, now, that was nice. You should do that more often.” She pulled her laugh under control. “Okay, now what were you about to say before you started becoming so patently superficial?”

  He shook his head, then brushed his perfectly trimmed mustache with his thumb and index finger, making an expression as though he were trying to readjust his mouth.

  “What?” Gabrielle said. “What? Will you please stop gawking and start talking?”

  “Oh, so now I’m gawking?”

  “Just say what you were going to say. All right?”

  “Bossy, too. Real management material. I bet you’re a supervisor on your job.”

  “No.”

  “Okay, I know. I know. You own a business?”

  “No.” As flattering as this was, she was becoming a bit uneasy with where this conversation might lead. “I work for someone else, and I’m proud to say that I’m good at what I do. Now, will you quit stalling, and tell me what you were going to say?”

  “Okay, okay, Miss Boss Lady. What I really like about you is that you’re real.” His tone became serious. “You and I have sat down together and talked twice: once at the Inaugural Ball at church that night and here today. And what you just said earlier spoke to the type of person you are. Most folks don’t want people to know they’re having a hard time or a bad day. ‘How are you? Fine.’ Not true. But you . . . you were real and honest without managing to depress the person you were talking to—me. That’s refreshing. I’m tired of phony people. I just wish people would be real with each other. Show their scars. Acknowledge what’s going on.” He sat back. “I like talking to you. I really do.”

  “Thank you. I like talking to you, too. You make it easy for me to be myself. And it doesn’t hurt that you know something about the Bible.”

  “Oh, that’s because you couldn’t be a member of our family unless you knew something about the Bible, as well as the one Who inspired the words written. My father was one of twelve children. He and my mother had four children of their own—two girls and two boys. My oldest sister is deceased. I was named after my father. That’s why they call me Z. W. My father was actually named Zechariah. He later started calling himself Zachary and named me that. My father’s mother was quite religious, as evident in all of her children being named after people in the Bible.”

  “Interesting. Very few people have that many children these days.”

  “Yeah, I know. But it was real common in the old days. And my aunts and uncles are extremely close. I had one aunt who lived in Alabama years ago. Our family would come down once a year and visit with her when I was little. But she was in an accident some years ba
ck. She tries to talk, but sometimes it’s difficult to make out what she’s trying to say. My father is still holding out for a miracle, her full recovery. He truly believes that one day she’s going to come back to us and be the way she was. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but she has to have the will to do that. So far, nothing we’ve done has pushed her effectively in that direction. As I mentioned before when we talked, I moved to Birmingham a little over three years ago. I like it here. This is home now.”

  “You mentioned earlier today that you hadn’t seriously dated in five years.”

  “And it’s true.” He put a forkful of cheesy mashed potatoes in his mouth.

  “Yeah, well . . . quite frankly, I find that difficult to believe. A handsome man such as yourself, appearing—at least from all I’ve seen so far—to have a lot going on for yourself. So, what’s the real story with you? Tell me, Zachary. What’s wrong with you?”

  He laughed. “What’s wrong with me?” He leaned in closer, as much as the table would allow him to press in. “What do you mean what’s wrong with me?”

  “Has to be something wrong with you. You haven’t had a date in five years? Are you mean? Paranoid? A jerk? Oh, wait a minute. I know what it is. You’re a perfectionist, and you haven’t been able to find a woman who can live up to your high expectations. So, you decided to become a priest. No, wait, a monk. And you went off to a monastery until you could find a way to drive those perfectionist demons out of your life.”

  Zachary tilted his head and stared intensely at her without cracking a smile. “How did you guess? Wow, I can’t believe you know. Is it that obvious? What gave me away? Oh, wait a minute. I know. You know someone who knows me? Okay . . . who told you?”

  “Are you serious?”

  He broke his stare and started laughing. “No, I’m not serious. But I had you going there for a minute, didn’t I? Truthfully, I’ve been sort of locked away a bit, buckling down with college and stuff. It hasn’t been easy. I really didn’t have time to date or anything else for that matter. Not if I wanted to finish up.”

  Gabrielle sliced into her steak. “Oh, so you were kind of slow in college, huh?” She took a bite, her eyes rolling back as she let out a sound to indicate her delight.

  “No, in fact, I graduated the top of my class. It’s just, if you’re going to do something, you should do it right and with all your might. I still had a little fun on the side. But I had and still have goals that I’m serious about reaching. Too many folks have sacrificed for me to be here. There are a lot of people who have carried me on their backs, some literally, although I’m too big for them to carry me now. But in all seriousness, I do stand on the backs and I sit on the shoulders of many who gave much for me to be where I am today. And all they’ve ever asked in return was for me to do my best and to not forget where I came from.” He cut into his steak and placed a piece in his mouth. “This is good,” he said as he chewed, then briefly closed his eyes to savor the taste.

  “So was what you just said,” said Gabrielle. “What you just said . . . that was good.”

  “Okay . . . your turn. What’s your story?” Zachary said.

  “Oh, it’s the standard Cinderella tale. You know, one parent dies when the child with so much potential is merely a baby. The other parent becomes indirectly responsible for aforementioned child ending up in the hands of a wicked stepmother. Only in my case, not so wicked or my stepmother, but not all that nice of an aunt and uncle along with their four children. This said child becomes responsible for cleaning up after and taking care of the other four. A child who—incidentally—is left at home to sweep the chimney, clean the house, while the others get to play games and attend balls.”

  “Interesting story so far. So, who’s the fairy godmother ?”

  “What?”

  “Cinderella had a fairy godmother,” Zachary said. “Who was yours?”

  “If we’re to keep in line with the story, I guess I would say it’s the person who taught me how to dance. She took rats and a pumpkin and turned them into a coach and coachmen. Eventually, I dressed in fine attire and came before people of great nobility and wealth, although most of them were pure sleazeballs, if you want to know the truth about it. Are Christians allowed to call people sleazeballs?” she asked.

  “If the mitt fits, I don’t see why not. A sleazeball by any other name is still a sleazeball.” He cut more of his steak and continued to eat while she continued to talk.

  “Broken from the mistreatment and the coldness of the world one day, she found herself sitting before the King of kings. He stood with His arms open. And without uttering a word, He let her know that He understood what she’d been through. And that it was time for her to stop trying to go this journey alone. He had plans for her life—big plans. And she was not walking in her God-given gifts the way He’d created her to do. It was time for her to step in to her rightful place; time for her to come home.”

  “Is this a real story, or are you just spinning a yarn . . . a tale, as we in America call it?” Zachary placed his chin on top of his fist as his elbow steadied him. He gazed into Gabrielle’s eyes.

  With her fork, Gabrielle speared a slice of her steak, placed it in her mouth, and began to chew. She held up her hand to let him know she would answer him shortly. Swallowing, she smiled, then said, “Aren’t all tales based on some measure of the truth?”

  Chapter 23

  My brethren, count it all joy when we fall into divers temptations.

  —James 1:2

  Gabrielle’s car was repossessed on Tuesday. She’d gone outside after her shift was over, only to find her car missing. Her first thought was that it had been stolen. Just as she was about to call the police, she received a call on her cell phone telling her the car had been repossessed, where it was, and that she was welcome to come pick up her personal things from inside of the car. She called Fatima and asked her if she could possibly come and pick her up from work. When Fatima arrived, Gabrielle got in the car without saying much more than “Hi” and “Thank you for being there when I needed you.”

  “Are you okay?” Fatima asked after she arrived at Gabrielle’s house. Fatima didn’t know what was going on as Gabrielle sat there without making any effort to get out and go inside of her house.

  “It’s going to be all right,” Gabrielle said.

  “Do you need a ride to work in the morning?”

  Gabrielle smiled. “I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I do need to get to work.”

  “Is your car in the shop? Did it break down somewhere today?”

  Gabrielle began wringing her hands. She sighed hard. “Can you come inside?”

  “Yeah.” Fatima turned off the engine. They got out and went in Gabrielle’s house.

  Gabrielle picked up a stack of opened envelopes and laid them on the kitchen table, where Fatima sat. She picked up each one individually and held it in the air. “This is the notice on my car. They came and got it today.” Picking up another envelope, she tried to force a smile. “Here’s the letter regarding my house note and my house possibly going into foreclosure soon. And these?” She held up five other envelopes. “They’re letters telling me my power bill is in arrears, my charge card rates will now be increasing to more than thirty percent because I was late with another credit card payment. I wasn’t even late with this card’s payments, but they’re raising my rate to loan shark rates just because they can. And the relief from the government for them not being able to do stuff like this anymore doesn’t come until next year after all the damage will have been done. Now, even with me continuing to try to pay on them, only a fraction will actually go toward paying off the principal amount. It’s a racket, a legal racket. And it’s a shame!”

  Fatima looked at the envelopes Gabrielle laid back down on the table before her. “Well, you just need to pray and believe God.”

  “I have prayed. I am believing. I promise you, Fatima, I’ve been believing with all of my heart. I believed I would get the money to catch up on
the car note right up until they came and pulled my car today. I’ve tried doing right. I’ve been deep into the Word. I’ve confessed only those things I desired. I’ve kept a watch over my mouth so I wouldn’t slip and say anything negative that would hinder the Word working for me. I’ve given God everything I have. And still, nothing seems to be working right for me these days.”

  Fatima stood up and hugged her.

  Gabrielle pulled away from Fatima’s embrace. “And do you want to know what the funny thing is? I actually walked away from a job that would have more than taken care of all these stupid bills. And I’ve had the opportunity to go back. But I didn’t. I’ve stood strong. And do you want to know why?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t want to do anything that will reflect badly on our Father in Heaven. I’ve watched so-called Christians profess one thing while they’re out there doing all kinds of stuff that dishonor God. But when I gave my life to Christ, I meant it. I don’t want to do anything that might cause God to be ashamed of me or to cause anyone else to stumble if they’re looking at me and my faith walk.”

  “Yeah, but we all mess up. As hard as we try, all of us mess up. I’ve watched you. I know how much you love the Lord. Gabrielle, I don’t know why God didn’t come through for you. I don’t. And honestly, I don’t know the correct thing to say to you right now.” She looked hard into Gabrielle’s eyes. “Listen, I have a little money. It’s not a whole lot, but I can loan you some.”

  Gabrielle let out a laugh. “It’s not really funny, but it is. My aunt owes me money. And when I call her, she either won’t answer or won’t call me back. But when she needed something from me, she was all up in my face. I appreciate your offer. I do. But no, I’m not going to borrow any money from you. If I don’t have it to pay now, what makes you think I’ll have it later? I’ve done all I know how to do. I realize this is just the devil messing with me, but I can’t help but wonder if God cares, then why is He allowing Satan to lean so hard on me. God has to see what’s going on down here. Has to. Why does He allow Satan to beat us down, especially when He knows we’re trying?”