From The Dead

by John Herrick

  “Emma,” she said and paused for a beat. With a smile, she turned toward him and stared into his eyes. She looked ready to blush. “You named her Emma, because you thought it sounded like the name of a princess.”

  Though he recalled the name earlier, he mocked his recall in a now-that-you-mention-it manner, his vowels drawn out. “Oh yeah, that’s right. Why did I do that again?”

  She leaned in closer. To Jesse, she seemed caught in a bittersweet rush. “You said I’m a princess, so my freckle needed a name worthy of a princess.” They shared a gaze together. At last, the spontaneity passed and Caitlyn broke contact. She turned her head away. “What a schmooze,” she teased.

  From above, they heard the pop of a small firework, though they saw nothing.

  “There they go.” Jesse nodded toward the sky.

  “Just kids. The park up the street holds its display at nine thirty. We can see them from here. What time is it?”

  Jesse aimed his watch to catch a glint of moonlight. “It’s 9:28.”

  The two sat in silence for a while and watched the sky deepen in its shade of blue. Together they listened to the whistles and snaps of neighborhood bottle rockets. Soon the scent of singed firework fibers teased the summer air.

  Then the local park began its fireworks display a half mile away. In the distance, a series of cracks and pops delayed in its arrival as the speed of light rushed past the speed of sound. Above the trees, neon hues of red, green and white burst across the night sky in majestic form. Stars, circles and other patterns, in single colors and combinations, shot forth one after another—some in full force, while others failed in mid formation. As the sky filled with fire and withdrew to darkness between launches, Jesse peered over at Caitlyn. Her face shined in the intermittent glow as it reflected the lights above. She looked beautiful.

  Eleven years ago today: July fourth marked the final time a pregnant Caitlyn had seen him. A few days later, Jesse departed.

  He didn’t need to mention such an anniversary. He knew she remembered well.

  “I called you a couple of times,” he said, his voice hushed.

  “You did? When?”

  He shrugged. “Back in California. I missed you most of my time there. When Jada and I hit rough patches, I’d take a drive in the car and dial your number.”

  “I don’t remember that.”

  “That’s where it ended—dialing the number. I wanted to get back in touch, but as soon as I heard you say hello, the sound of your voice—well, it reminded me that I’d given up on our relationship. I figured you were better off without me. So I hung up the phone and let you live your life in peace.”

  “I wish you would have talked to me.”

  A shower of red and white burst in the sky, followed by another deep boom.

  “Was it tough for you? Wait, what am I asking? Of course it was tough.”

  Enveloped in the sporadic light, she said, “Things got worse. Once you left, everything started to tumble like dominoes. Ten weeks pregnant, I didn’t know what to do. So when I decided to have the baby, I went to my parents. They didn’t know about the pregnancy, of course—nothing showed yet.”

  “How’d they take it?”

  She rested her hand against her temple. “They were furious. You remember how strict they were. But I didn’t have anywhere else to turn. So I came home one night and got them together in the living room. I could barely get the words out, couldn’t look at them, felt so ashamed facing them alone.” She sighed. “I told them what had happened. They were shell-shocked. But really, can you blame them? My older sister had lived a perfect life and graduated from college, everything about our home looked ideal—white-picket fence, the whole deal. Then I disrupted it all. So Mom and Dad sat there without a word. Mom sobbed the whole time. After a few long, never-ending minutes, Dad looked me straight in the eye—I can’t begin to describe the rage in his eyes—and he said in this weird, soft, monotonous tone, ‘We didn’t raise you this way.’”

  Caitlyn’s lip quivered, but she bit down and continued. “He said, ‘How many times did I tell you to stay away from that Barlow kid?’ I told him I was sorry, but he wouldn’t listen. And that was the moment he stopped looking at me—it was the moment I was no longer his daughter. He simply said, ‘I want you to pack your bags. I don’t know where you’re going to go, but I want you out—tonight.’ I pleaded with him but he wouldn’t listen. Mom was scared to death of him and didn’t say a word.”

  Jesse reached out, but she pulled away.

  “I’m sorry,” Jesse said.

  She waved her hand as if to brush away the need for consolation. “It’s over. Besides, that would’ve happened whether you’d been here or not.”

  “Where did you go? That night, I mean.”

  “I stayed with my sister. She and her husband lived in an apartment further south. I lived there a few months until I realized I’d have to press through on my own. And by then, my sister and her husband were ready to have their place back to themselves.” In apparent afterthought, Caitlyn reached for her iced tea. She took a sip; the ice had melted but had kept the tea chilled. “I went through a deluge of emotions during that time: confused, scared, hurt, betrayed, humiliated, you name it.”

  As a decade of repressed anger seemed to rise to the surface, tears seeped through her eyes. Jesse wanted to comfort her, but he felt the least worthy person to do so. He hated to see her in torment. If only he could wrap it around himself like a cloak, a personal purgatory.

  She drew her other leg against her body and sat huddled in her chair. It became clear to Jesse that she was stronger than he ever realized.

  “Anyway,” she continued, “I got an inexpensive apartment and a data-entry job.”

  “You wanted to go to Duke and study psychology. You always made terrific grades.”

  “Yeah, well—priorities shift when you’re a single mom. I didn’t know what I was doing or how I was going to do it, but I knew I had to start somewhere. So I did.” She scratched her knee. Jesse heard her fingernail as it bristled against her skin. “I couldn’t sort through my perception of you: One day you were the only person I’d ever wanted to fall in love with, but the next day you were a cruel, selfish person who left and never looked back, never called … never seemed to care.” She turned to Jesse in earnest. “I loved you with my whole heart, Jess. I know we talked about your move to L.A. I know that I encouraged you to pursue your dream, but it didn’t stop the pain of losing you. You and me—that was my dream. So when I realized it was a lost cause—” Caitlyn tightened her lips, shook her head. “I tried so hard to hate you. I felt hurt and angry, did everything I could to despise you for not coming back.”

  Jesse nodded. “I can’t blame you for that,” he said, a mere whisper because he felt it was all the sound space he deserved to occupy.

  “But here’s what made it so frustrating: For whatever reason, a piece of me still loved you because I knew you weren’t cruel or selfish—not in your heart.” She paused. “You were scared.”

  Jesse gripped the arms of his chair.

  She was right.

  Scared to death. He’d never realized it before, but …

  After all this time, he had never stepped back to ask why he took off. At first, he had tried to ignore his personal plight. Then feelings of guilt had resurfaced and consumed him, dominated his attention. Always faced with one distraction or another, he’d never sought an answer to why.

  Stunned, he shook his head in awe. “You’re right,” he said and sifted through the revelation. “I know that doesn’t begin to justify my self-centeredness, but life closed in and … I’d panicked when the pregnancy happened.” He turned toward her. “How did you know that?”

  “I knew you better than anyone. I knew your responses, how you react to situations that overwhelm you. And I knew, when you felt scared, you went into hiding—not literally, but in your own way. That’s why you loved those high-school plays—you could hide behind the characters. But
when you reach your limit, when there’s nowhere to hide—you try to escape. So you ran to California to escape as far as you could. To escape from your dad’s shadow, from your relationship with me—maybe even to escape yourself. Maybe you didn’t like who you were.” While her words hung in the tranquility of the air, the fireworks finished. Then she broke their silence, her voice in a search. “Is that why you came back home? Are you escaping something? Please tell me …”

  Jesse remained silent, unable to attach words to what he wanted to say. He felt vulnerable and transparent. In her own tender way, Caitlyn, the girl he had loved, had now cut to his core. She had drawn to the surface who he truly was, forced him to confront himself in all his naked weakness. He was scared right now: nowhere to run, no mask to hide behind.

  He was Jesse. She was Caitlyn. And in their moments of honesty, this was who they were together—they were at their best when together.

  Caitlyn’s eyes narrowed. She eased back. Neither angry nor offended, she seemed to understand his inner conflict. To change the subject, she chuckled and said, “Once Drew was born, I felt unprepared. I had no idea what to do with a baby. I only knew I wanted him.”

  “I’m glad you made that decision. I can’t imagine him not here today.”

  Each of them stared at the sky, its hue in full darkness now, and counted stars. The smoky Fourth-of-July haze formed a screen across the stars and moon.

  Touched, Jesse turned to Caitlyn and whispered. “Thank you, Cait.”

  She met his gaze. “For what?”

  He scratched at his chair, then returned to her eyes again. “For believing in me,” he said. “For believing the best.”

  By this time it was too dark to tell for sure, but Jesse thought he caught a flicker of a smile from her. His gaze lingered with hers a bit longer before she turned her attention back to the sky.

  In the distance, several neighborhoods away, an isolated firework popped, but it proved faulty, its yellow sparks sparse and lacking.

  CHAPTER 41

  “Don’t you ever leave for lunch?” Jesse joked as he poked his head into Chuck’s office. Bagged lunch in hand, he made his way inside.

  Chuck peered up over his reading glasses. “I have a couple of hospital visits this afternoon, so I’ll break away in a bit. Are you headed outside?”

  “Yeah, just figured I’d check in on you.”

  “That’s nice. Any particular reason?”

  “No.”

  “What’s for lunch?” Chuck gestured with his head to Jesse’s plastic bag.

  “PB and J—the meal of champions.”

  Chuck gave him a look of parental concern, one which a parent never seems to outgrow, no matter how old his kids are. “Are you sure you’re eating enough? You’ve got cash, right?”

  “Don’t worry about it. You’re forgetting I survived on the coast.”

  “Right.” Chuck eyed his son. “So, how are you and Eden getting along sharing her place?”

  The bag rattled as Jesse shifted it to his other hand. “You mean, have we managed to refrain from strangling each other? Sure thing! We take turns making dinner, plus she delights in having me as her personal maid to keep her house clean.”

  Chuck laughed. “It’s good to see you two hang out together. I know she enjoys having you back.”

  Jesse watched as his father set his reading glasses aside. Chuck cleared the paperwork in front of him and rearranged a pile on one side of the desk. On the other side, a hardcover Bible commentary lay open, as did a Bible itself. Behind closed doors, the books served as evidence of what Jesse already knew: The minister that people saw in public operated with equal dedication in private. Despite the differences between Jesse and his father, Jesse respected the man’s commitment to his beliefs. He admired Chuck’s determination to weave those beliefs into his daily walk as he preached to his flock and encouraged those who, it seemed, wouldn’t step through a church door. But to Jesse’s surprise—and sometimes to Chuck’s as well—some of those random acquaintances did indeed step through a church door eventually.

  Yes, his father had caused himself headaches as a result of his own dedication. Jesse recalled when Chuck’s faithfulness to his scruples had spurred problems with those who disagreed with what he preached or how he testified to God’s goodness in his life. And, sad to say, sometimes those disagreements came from churchgoers with good intentions. Many forgot that, unlike Chuck, they had never walked in the shoes of a minister and lacked awareness of the considerations that came into play. Jesse could remember one such encounter, when an angry community alderman yelled at Chuck. The alderman’s face looked as if blood boiled beneath the surface. After the encounter, Chuck tightened his jaw and went for a long, brisk walk around the church.

  With regard to his critics, Chuck guarded his tongue and chose to avoid negative speech. Jesse remembered how he would hide and watch as his father escaped by himself to an empty field near their house. In such times, he’d see Chuck fall to his knees, lift his arms to heaven, and ask for guidance. Then his father, still alone, would start to worship in the field, just between God and him. Chuck always returned refreshed.

  From across the desk, Jesse peered at Chuck’s handwritten notes. “What are you working on?”

  “I’m preparing for my sermon this weekend.”

  Since Chuck had always cooped himself up in his office to prepare his messages, Jesse had paid scant attention to his father’s process. He’d seen Chuck preach but hadn’t cared how it all came together. “Do you write them out word for word, and then memorize them?”

  “Some ministers like to write them word for word. I’ll jot down some notes beforehand, but I end up straying from them after the first ten minutes. It’s God’s church service; I figure He can take it in whatever direction He wants. When you get down to it, I’m just a guy who rides a motorcycle. Why God chose to use me as a preacher I’ll never figure out.”

  “But how do you know God directs you?”

  “Funny as it sounds, I don’t think of myself as the one preaching. I look at myself as an empty vessel, and it feels like God speaks through me for an hour—God’s words, something special He wants to share with the people in the room. The words seem to rise up, so I speak them. Later on, I don’t always recall the details of what I said, but somehow God causes it to minister to somebody. That’s what I love about it: God uses me as a tool to help people. But when I look in the Bible, I see that God doesn’t to restrict that to preachers—He wants all of His people to carry inside them that sensitivity to His voice.”

  A knock on the door—Jesse forgot he’d left it open.

  “Hi, Pastor Chuck. I didn’t see Maureen outside, so she’s probably out to lunch. But your door was open, and—”

  “Come on in, Bethann.”

  “Oh, you have company! I’m sorry to interrupt. I came to pick up the paperwork for the youth trip. Do you happen to know where she left it?”

  “Next to the fax machine, hidden from view. She said you might swing by,” Chuck replied. He gestured to Jesse. “This is my son, Jesse.”

  With a warm smile, Bethann shook Jesse’s hand. “Oh, how nice to finally meet you! I didn’t know you live here.”

  “I lived in L.A. for a long time. Just came back three months ago.”

  “Bethann and her family moved here nine years ago,” Chuck said.

  Disinterested, Jesse feigned interest and nodded anyway. Jesse had met countless individuals who wanted to be personal friends with the minister; in response, Jesse had developed a habit whereby he disregarded them. After all, he had shared his father with them throughout his childhood.

  Bethann was effervescent, a quality Jesse found genuine for some and a façade for others. Jesse tried to determine which of these he saw now.

  “So tell me, do you plan to be a minister like your dad?”

  Jesse detested that question. What was it with people? Who did they think they were? Why did they try to force their way into his life and expect
him to live in his father’s footsteps? He’d escaped this place to escape his father’s shadow; yet no matter how many years passed, the issue continued to bubble up. Because he was the preacher’s son, he’d felt shoved into a public spotlight, one where people seemed to feel an entitlement toward him, as if he were public property.

  Jesse bit his lip—along with his tongue. Another irritation he endured as a preacher’s son: Any outbursts of anger would reflect poorly on the preacher himself.

  Chuck, with one look at his son’s lips in compression, changed the subject. “We’re content to let him become the next Marlon Brando instead. Thanks for taking the time to grab that paperwork.”

  “Not a problem.” She offered Jesse a parting smile. “Nice to meet you.”

  Jesse painted himself a polite grin and gave her a two-finger wave. Bethann closed the door behind her.

  Jesse still simmered beneath the surface.

  “Sorry about that; she didn’t mean to put you on the spot with the minister-to-be remark. People mean well.” He examined his son, then added, “You know, you have me one-upped: I don’t know firsthand how difficult it is to be a minister’s kid.”

  Jesse pretended to shrug it off. “How do you know she’s not faking it with all the God stuff—the happy face, the serving?”

  “I’ve been her minister the whole time she and her family have lived here. I’ve watched her. I’m familiar with her spiritual growth. When you’re the minister, you keep an eye out for wolves that try to penetrate the flock with harmful intentions.”

  “Isn’t that a form of judging people?”

  “It’s a matter of protecting people. Nobody’s perfect; any Christian who won’t admit they have faults is lying to you. People who seek answers or seek to know God—they’re welcome here no matter where they’ve been in life or what they’ve done. God never turned away the heart cries of people who sought Him. That’s different from people who come to a church with the sole intention of causing disruption—I’ll show them the door myself. As a minister, I’m a shepherd and I’ll protect my sheep. Much like I protect my kids.”