“Hello?” she answered in a whisper.
“Jaime! This is Marilyn. Marilyn Steffey. From Sears Portrait Studio. Listen, I spoke to my boss who spoke to her boss who spoke to the store manager, and we’re willing to offer you a promotion if you’ll come back. You can be the studio manager.”
“But . . . you’re the studio manager,” Jaime whispered.
“I’ve been promoted too! I’m going to be the district manager.”
“Oh,” Jaime whispered.
“Aren’t you thrilled? This is highly unusual in a dismal economy. You should be thrilled!”
“I am. So, so thrilled,” Jaime whispered.
“Then why don’t you sound thrilled? It’s a boost in salary, Jaime, from being an associate. You’re on a career track.”
“Sorry. Laryngitis,” Jaime fibbed. “Could I call you back? On Monday?”
Marilyn was disappointed. “I suppose.”
“I’ll talk to you Monday. Merry Christmas, Marilyn. And thank you.” Jaime hung up. So, she had her job back. She leaned back and rested her head on the top of the couch, staring at the ceiling.
The grandfather clock eked out another hour. This announcement was mercifully short: three o’clock. When Mattie heard it, she knew she should get downstairs in case the men came back soon. She wiped away her tears, splashed cold water on her face, and smoothed her hair. Down in the kitchen, she was pulled to the window, as if Sol and C.J. might already be turning into the yard with Danny. A layer of ice coated the glass.
Jaime joined her by the window. “Maybe we should go feed the animals. So when the men come back with Danny, they don’t have to go back out.”
Mattie nodded, grateful for something to do. Grateful for Jaime’s brave optimism. They put on their coats and Jaime wrapped up Mattie’s face with a scarf as if she was the mother and Mattie was the child. Jaime walked ahead of Mattie, shielding her from the wind the way Sol would do. In the last twenty-four hours, she and Jaime had switched roles. Jaime was the strong one now. Mattie was the weak one.
Mattie had lived in Stoney Ridge all her life, but she hadn’t known it could snow this hard or be this cold. It seemed the wind blew the stinging, biting flakes right through her, as if she were invisible. The horses stood in their stalls, hunched and sad against the wind that slashed through the cracks in the barn walls. Mattie’s hands were as clumsy as clubs, her arms and legs stiff, as she pitched hay to the horses and broke the ice in their water buckets. But every time she drew a breath of the icy air, it felt as if a knife were sliding into her chest. She was that cold, inside a barn. What was this wind doing to a small boy in a thin coat?
Mattie was measuring out grain for the horses when Jaime came into the feed room.
“I’m sorry, Mattie. I didn’t mean to offend you earlier. I feel terrible that something I said made you cry.”
Mattie was genuinely surprised by that comment. She finished filling the bucket, closed the wooden lid, clipped it to keep out mice, and sat down on it, facing Jaime. “You didn’t offend me. Just the opposite. You were right. I went up to my room and asked the Lord to forgive me for being so fearful. For ever doubting him.”
It was more than just that. Back in her room, as Mattie prayed, confessing everything to God, withholding nothing, telling him all of the thoughts—even the ugliest ones that kept swimming through her head—something broke inside of her. She felt peace within her swell and grow, connecting her back to the world. She grew calm, became again that wide tranquil river, accepting the world and carrying it easily on her currents. Danny belonged to God, not to her. If she truly believed that, why was she living as if she could control all the circumstances that surrounded him? She couldn’t. She never could. She exhaled a stream of breath she had been unconsciously holding on to . . . for how long now? Four years? Five? She felt lighter. She felt centered. She felt like her best self.
The mystery of prayer! The ability to commune with the Lord God! It never ceased to astound Mattie that God would want to know her every thought. To think she had tried to hide her dark thoughts from God, to stuff them down, to pretend they didn’t exist. It shamed her to think she could. She had never considered herself to be an overly prideful person, but pride was sneaky; it had so many twists and variations to tangle a person. Listening to Jaime talk about her mother’s death, seeing the anger she harbored toward God for not preventing it—why, Mattie recognized herself in Jaime! She was angry with God for denying her a child. She assumed God had turned his face from her—without cause or explanation. Without love.
She remembered a sermon her grandfather Caleb Zook had given once from the book of Job, how he pointed out that Job and his friends assumed the trials of his life meant he had lost favor with God.
“Not true!” her grandfather had said. “God’s favor doesn’t suddenly disappear. He is kind and trustworthy from generation to generation. But our faith in God should never be fastened to circumstances. God promises to never leave us, nor forsake us—whatever our circumstances.”
That reminder was just what she needed this very afternoon. She hadn’t lost God’s favor. He had never abandoned her. He was right in the midst of their lives—of Danny’s disappearance, of her grieving over her miscarriage, of her barrenness. He was there yesterday, today, and tomorrow—with all its unknowns. Emmanuel. God is with us.
Jaime’s head was down. She slowly lifted her eyes to meet Mattie’s. “What if Danny isn’t found soon?” she whispered. “What then?”
Mattie’s breath caught. Not found? Jaime had voiced aloud a fear that had nagged at Mattie all through the long afternoon.
Jaime went over to sit next to her. “Bad things happen. Even to good people like you and Sol.”
“Bad things do happen, but not randomly. Not without purpose.”
Holding her elbows, Jaime leaned forward. “But they do, Mattie. My mother was walking across the street after leaving church and she was killed by a drunk driver! You can’t tell me that’s not random and purposeless!”
“That accident passed through the hands of God. Good hands. It wasn’t random and it wasn’t purposeless. It was your mother’s time.”
Jaime stood up and walked a few paces. “What kind of God is that? This world is so dangerous! So unpredictable! If he can’t—or won’t— protect people who love him . . . what’s the point of having faith in him? What kind of perfect love is that?”
“God never promised us a life without pain or suffering, Jaime. He’s promised to never leave us in the midst of that pain. He promised to bring purpose out of that pain. Emmanuel, God is with us. That was the name given to Jesus. Emmanuel.” She patted the feed bin so that Jaime would sit down again. “That’s perfect love, Jaime. God will never leave you nor forsake you. Not on earth. Not in heaven.”
Jaime sat down next to Mattie and leaned her elbows on her knees, rubbing her forehead as if she had a headache.
Maybe she does have an aching head, Mattie thought. She’s been trying to make sense of her mother’s death without any help at all from God. That would give anyone a headache. She rubbed Jaime’s back in a soothing, circling motion.
How strange, Mattie thought. Minutes ago, she was thinking that Jaime was the strong one. Now they had flip-flopped again. She was feeling brave. It felt so good! She hadn’t felt brave in a very, very long time.
Mattie let out the breath she had been holding. She looked around the barn, satisfied that everything was taken care of. She picked up the bucket of grain with her clumsy, mittened hand. What had she forgotten? The laundry. She needed to get started on the laundry. If she missed a day of laundry, it spiraled out of control.
Zach thought he might love this car. The word car seemed too humble, too ordinary, for this engineering marvel. It should be called . . . The Dream Machine. Sleek, curvy, red like a race car, a V-6 engine with 220 horses under the hood. The thought of all that power in his hands astounded him.
When Jaime first offered to let him take the car, he sat
in it for the longest while before he turned on the ignition. He figured she was just kidding, or would change her mind. But as he watched her in the rearview mirror as she walked up to the farmhouse, she never looked back. When she stepped inside the kitchen, he turned the key. The engine sprang to life. The dashboard was lit up with red numbers and symbols like the instrument panel of an airplane he’d seen in a magazine. Even after this car had spent a night partially submerged in the pond! Thankfully, it was the back end that was submerged. Zach stepped on the gas a few times and revved the engine, to make sure the exhaust pipe spewed out any leftover pond water. He fiddled with the radio and switched stations fifteen times—ah, to finally be in control of something. Anything!
He flipped a few more switches. All of a sudden, he heard some strange noises. The black roof started to lift! Zach panicked and flipped more switches. Too late! The top was folding up like an accordion. He whipped his head around to see if Jaime had seen the top go up. No sign of her. He shifted the car into first gear and inched toward the street. Then, he turned left onto the road. Slowly at first, as if he were driving something made of delicate bone china. As his confidence grew, he pressed the pedal a little harder. No one was on the freshly plowed roads. He pressed another button and suddenly felt his chair grow warm. Seat warmers! What more could a man ask for in life, than a red sports car with seat warmers? Just one more thing. A woman like Jaime Fitzpatrick sitting in the passenger seat.
Still, for Zach, today would always be his best day. Life just could not get any better than this! He was driving a convertible—fire engine red!—and he had just been kissed by a beautiful English woman—practically on the lips. He relived the kiss for a moment. It was, quite possibly, the most exquisite kiss he had ever been given. Apologies to Susie Blank, the only other person he had kissed—and Susie was a first-rate kisser. But this Jaime Fitzpatrick! It was like your first cup of Starbucks coffee when all you’d ever tasted was Folgers. Not that he was much of a coffee drinker, but he did take Susie to Starbucks once in his Toyota Corolla, just to see what everybody was talking about. Then he went home and tried Mattie’s coffee. No comparison. None!
If only that kiss with Jaime had lasted longer than two seconds. What could it have meant? Was it possible she was attracted to him? Was it her way of letting him know she was interested? That she might be available? Okay, this was bad—a bad thought, a bad series of thoughts, a bad, bad path he was going down. Unspeakably bad.
For over an hour, he’d driven the car slowly up and down every plowed road he could find, not straying too far from the house. Snow was starting to pile up on the seat next to him. He scooped up handfuls of it and tossed it over the side before it melted on Jaime’s leather upholstery. He pressed the button to close the top, admiring the convenience of this mechanical task. He couldn’t wait to show the car off to his friends—and yet . . . he was in no hurry to find them. He felt a prick of conscience, like a small pebble in his shoe that he could ignore if he wiggled his toes. Maybe he should turn this car around, go back to Sol and Mattie’s, find Jaime, and try to act like a normal person. Set things straight.
He definitely should turn back. It was time he grew up. Turning around would be the wise, mature thing to do. The right thing to do. It would be the first step in the long direction of mending his ways.
But before Zach was quite ready for that, he pressed on the gas just a little more, then a little more. Something caught his eye out the window—a golden eagle soaring in the sky. He wondered if he could clock how fast that eagle was flying. The long stretch of road ahead looked clear, with just a dusting of snow. He pressed on the pedal a little harder. 25 miles per hour. 35 miles per hour. 45. Amazing! This was as fast as his 1983 Toyota Corolla could ever go—that old beater started to shake at 44 miles per hour as if it might splay apart.
As Zach zipped along at speeds he’d never traveled—faster than the snow dropping from the sky—his thoughts were filled with the wonders of the automobile. 50 miles per hour. 55, 60. Had any invention changed the world more than the car? The miracle of modern machinery! 70 miles per hour, 80. The car was driving as smooth as velvet. Astonishing!
Up ahead, he saw a bend in the road. He pushed on the brakes, tightening his grip around the leather steering wheel to anticipate the turn. He was halfway around the bend when suddenly, inexplicably, illogically, he knew where Danny might be.
He pushed harder on the brakes to turn around. Instead, the car started to slide toward the snowbank.
Down in the basement of the farmhouse, Jaime helped Mattie wash the clothes in the washing machine. It was such a simple machine—an agitator fed by gasoline. It got the job done nicely. She thought of the washing machine she had picked out from Sears last year—all kinds of bells and whistles. Literally. The sounds drove her crazy. Dozens of choices—wash with warm, rinse with cold, hot with hot, cold with cold. Were her clothes any cleaner than Mattie’s? She doubted it.
Mattie and Jaime hung the clothes on the indoor line that Sol had rigged up, quiet for a few minutes, their elbows occasionally knocking together as they worked, until Mattie said out of the blue, “What’s on your mind?”
The sadness Jaime had been trying so hard to suppress oozed to the surface. “I envy you.”
“Me? Whatever for?”
Where to begin? After Mattie had come back downstairs, Jaime could see she had been crying. Her eyes were swollen, her skin was blotchy. But she radiated a calmness that was almost palpable. “So many things, Mattie. For your home, your family, your faith.”
“You can have all of those things. You have all those things.”
Jaime shook her head. “My father says that nearly every marriage is tainted in some way. Either one or both parties settled, or someone is dissatisfied, or someone is cheating or at least considering it. And he should know. He’s been married a number of times.”
Mattie rolled her eyes. “Rubbish.”
“It’s true! Maybe not for you and Sol, but for the rest of us.”
“You and C.J. have a good marriage.”
Jaime shook her head. “He’s involved with another woman.”
Mattie lifted her eyebrows in disbelief.
“A woman he works with. Eve. They have a connection that we just don’t have anymore. I can tell. He’s slipped away from me.” She bit her lip, and her eyes stung. “Everyone I’ve loved has disappointed me. My father never even wanted a child—that’s why he left my mother. I was six months old and he walked out the door. Then my mother died! And now C.J. is giving up.” She bit her lip to hold back tears that stung her eyes.
Mattie didn’t say a word. Her face didn’t change expression in the slightest way. She finished hanging a small blue shirt that must have belonged to Danny, and let her hand graze it gently. She put the bucket that held the clothespins back on the shelf, then went upstairs to the warm kitchen.
Didn’t she hear me? Jaime thought as she trotted behind Mattie. I just spilled my deepest, most gut-wrenching secret, and she acted like it was no big deal! Like she knew it all along! It suddenly occurred to Jaime . . . maybe she had already known. Had C.J. told her, this very morning?
Mattie took out a large bowl and placed it on the counter. Then she gathered flour, Crisco, salt, and measuring cups. Business as usual.
“Mattie? Don’t you have anything to say?”
Mattie poured a cup of flour she had measured into the bowl. She turned to face Jaime. “I see your husband’s determination to find my son. He’s not going to give up. I doubt he would give up on his marriage either.” She went back to measuring out more cups of flour. “But you. You seem to give up pretty easily. Just because life can be hard, it doesn’t mean you give up. Maybe you’ve been influenced by the way your father gives up on things. Like your marriage—you’re giving up on that without a fight.” Mattie spoke slowly, out of the beautiful calm she seemed to wear like a coat. “Maybe you’ve even given up on God.”
Jaime sat at the table, watching Matt
ie fold the Crisco and flour together with a large fork. She moved with lightning speed, yet she never hurried. It amazed Jaime. Coming from anyone else, Mattie’s pointed comments would have sounded like an admonishment, a scolding, but from Mattie, it just sounded like the truth, gently spoken. Was it the truth? About Mattie’s insight to C.J.’s nature, Jaime had to agree. She’d never seen him give up on anything.
“What about Eve?”
“Have you ever asked him about Eve?” Mattie stopped folding the ingredients and looked at Jaime. “Have you ever talked to him about all that worries you? Really talked?”
Jaime closed her eyes. No. She had been too afraid of the answer.
Was Mattie right? Do I give up too easily? Even worse . . . am I like my father? She covered her face with her hands. She was. She was just like him! Starting things and never finishing them. Jobs. School. People. Jumping from one thing to the next. She folded her arms on the table and clunked her head on it.
Mattie put her fork down and sat at the table next to Jaime. “Jesus told a story about a good shepherd who had ninety-nine sheep in his fold, but one was missing. He left everything to go look for that one lost sheep.” She paused to let it sink in. “What if you’re that lost sheep, Jaime? What if God brought you here this weekend, and let your precious car slide into the pond, and permitted a snowstorm to change your plans? All of your plans! And what if Danny’s disappearance is part of God’s plan to bring you into his fold?” She placed a hand on Jaime’s arm. “And what if God brought you to me this weekend to help remind me that the Bible is true? That God’s Word will stand forever.”
Jaime lifted her head. She hated to ask this question, but she had to. “Even . . . if things don’t work out the way you hope they will?”
“You mean, if Danny isn’t found?”
Jaime gave a quick nod.
Mattie squeezed her eyes shut. “I will deal with that if and when I have to. For now, I have a pie crust to finish.” Then she rose to her full five-foot self. “Two kinds of pies, I think I’ll make. Apple and pumpkin.”
A Lancaster County Christmas Page 15