“I should have faced a family who lost their one and only daughter, a family who was already torn apart and only needed me to further mess up their lives. But I couldn’t face them. I once wrote them a letter apologizing, asking if I could see them, but they sent it back to me. So I just went on with my life. I never even tried contacting them again.
“Remember the beating? Remember those bruises on my face from the fight I couldn’t tell you about? This is why, Gen. I couldn’t say anything because they came from Amy Larsen’s father. After all this time, he tracked me down. And he had every right to do it. He has a right to beat me up again.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about all of this? Why didn’t you tell me early on?”
I let out a cynical chuckle. “I didn’t know how to tell you, Gen. I didn’t know where to begin.”
“Then why here, why now? Why after all this time?”
I ran my fingers through my hair, wondering briefly what I must look like. Probably bloodshot eyes, a runny nose, an unshaven beard, messed-up hair, pale and scarred skin, body too lean. Whatever could Gen be seeing?
“I kept telling myself that I would tell you, that you would understand. But after Mike Larsen beat me up—that made everything seem like it all happened yesterday. All my hope sort of flew away when I was lying there getting the tar beat out of me. I thought of you and about all the baggage I was bringing into this relationship and decided I couldn’t do it. I didn’t dare do this to you. Not when you were moving so soon and not after things were going so well with us.”
“So why did you do it now?” Gen repeated, not in an angry tone but in more of a bewildered, curious voice.
“Because of Erik. I never told him, either. I kept telling myself that eventually I would tell him, that I would try to shed some insight on what had happened and maybe help him see where he might be heading. But I had no insight. I had made a huge, horrible mistake and yet could not admit it to anyone or ask anyone’s forgiveness. So I was stuck with my secret, and now look what’s happened.” I paused for a second. “I’m sorry, Gen. For everything.”
She just kept looking at me, her face impossible to read. “I guess I still don’t understand why you thought you couldn’t tell me.”
“But don’t you see?” I said. “It changes everything.”
“How?”
I stared at her, not believing the words she said. “What do you mean?”
“How does this change anything? You’re still the same guy I met in that theater that one night, right? The same one who got to know me and took me out and allowed me to have a wonderful night on top of the Sears Tower and who wrote me that incredible song.”
“I’m also someone who did this—this horrible thing I can never take back. For years I’ve kept it stored away. I’ve been afraid to talk about it with anyone—even those who know what happened. The one and only love of my life—the girl I thought I was going to marry—left me because of this. And she loved me! How could I expect any different from someone like you—”
“I would hope you think a little better of me than that,” Gen replied sharply. “I just wish you could have trusted me enough to tell me all of this months ago. It wouldn’t have changed anything, except maybe allowing me to understand you a little better.”
I couldn’t believe the words I was hearing. I thought of the many so-called Christian friends I had known during college, the ones who I never heard from after the accident. I thought of my serious girlfriend back then, who had always done the right thing. Was leaving me the right thing, too? She could never be with someone like me—we had both known this. How could I expect to be with someone like Gen?
“I don’t deserve you, Gen.”
“I’m really getting tired of your saying things like that!” she snapped. “Please, just stop it. It’s not a matter of deserving anybody.”
I didn’t really know how to answer that, so I didn’t try. Instead, I made a stab at telling her what had happened to me back in the chapel. “The thing is, I’ve been afraid of asking for God’s forgiveness. Afraid of thinking it could actually come.”
“All you have to do is ask.”
“I have. I just don’t know if I deserve it.”
Gen took my hand. “None of us deserves anything God gives us. But he’s already given us so much. He gave us life, Sheridan. That time in fourth grade, the time you surrendered your life to him—you didn’t deserve to be saved, but you were. And nothing can take that away from you.”
“I haven’t been what you’d call a Christian role model, especially not the last eight years or so.”
“But don’t you see? You’ve been given another chance. God gives us so many chances after we fail him—that is what forgiveness means. All that stuff we read in the Bible and hear in church about how our sins are washed away? I believe it’s true. I wouldn’t have any hope at all if I didn’t.”
“But how can you be taking all this so calmly? How can you be acting so—”
“So what?”
“So… loving?”
Gen squeezed my hand. “Because I do love you, Sheridan. In the short time I’ve gotten to know you, I believe I’ve come to love you in a way I can’t fully understand—it’s like a gift I’ve been given. You’ve got so much tenderness in you, and you’re a lot stronger than you think. You might not think you’ve changed, but I think in many ways you’re nothing like the guy you were when that accident happened.”
“I’ve had a hard time moving on. It’s like—I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like I’ve been stuck for a long time.”
“Then get unstuck. Sheridan, I know I could never understand the pain you’ve gone through, and the guilt. But you have to look forward. You’re different than you used to be. I know you are. I can sense it. God’s still working with you, just like he’s working with all of us. And I believe that God can use anything—even a horrible accident—for his glory.”
“I just feel so—so messed up,” I said. “My roommate might die tonight, you know. Everyone around me always ends up leaving me, and for good reason.”
“Sheridan,” she said, “look at me. Please.”
I looked at her, unsure of what she was getting at.
“Look at me,” she repeated. “I’m still here. Can’t you see?”
I saw, but I still couldn’t keep myself from asking, “But for how long?”
A slight smile tugged at the corner of her mouth, and she gave me the look of someone who was being patient with a stubborn small child. “Well, who knows, Sheridan. I just might end up leaving you. But guess what—God will never leave you. He is the one definite. He never leaves us. Never.”
“I left him. Years ago I ran away.”
“But he stayed with you. You’re one of his children. He wasn’t going to let you go. You tried running away, but bit by bit he’s been drawing you back to him.”
I knew she was right. I guess part of me had known it all along. But I wasn’t quite ready to talk about it, so I changed the subject. “What can I possibly say to Erik?”
“Just be there for him when he wakes up. Be a friend, like he was a friend to you after you were beaten up. The words will come in time. You don’t have to go out and try to save the world. Maybe all you need to do is show some love to a guy you can probably easily identify with.”
I nodded. I couldn’t believe that Gen was sitting there, across from me, after what I had put her through. “So where does that leave us?” I asked Genevie.
“I don’t know.”
“Gen, I love you.”
“I know, Sheridan. But it’s not that simple. Even tonight—this isn’t enough.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just admitting what you did doesn’t change things. Self-pity and guilt don’t equal repentance. You have to move on—not just for me, but for you. You have to deal with the consequences of what happened. There are things you have to do.”
“What?” I asked, unsure where she was going with t
his.
“I can’t tell you that, Sheridan. I just know that I can’t be with someone who’s all hung up on the past and refuses to do anything about it. It’s not that I don’t love you. I just can’t live that way.”
“I’m going to try.”
“Then start tonight. Start by being there for Erik and being his friend. Tell him the things he needs to know. Open up to him. The rest of it will come to you in time.”
“I can’t believe you’re here, being so kind to me—”
“Believe it,” Gen interrupted. “Look, it’s going to be a long night for you. I think it might be best for me to go.”
I nodded, not wanting her to go. “Could we see each other tomorrow?” I asked. “Or maybe sometime this week?”
“Maybe. Why don’t you call sometime?”
“You’ll answer the phone this time?”
She grinned and nodded. We stood, and I hugged her again, this time a longer hug, a more hope-filled one. She smelled like strawberries, and I found myself wishing that spring could be upon us already.
Then I remembered: She will be leaving in the spring. “Thank you, Gen.”
“Let me know if anything happens to Erik.”
“I will. And I’ll call you—”
“No,” Gen interrupted, then paused and smiled. “I’ll call you. I promise.”
I nodded and walked her out to the opening glass doors of the hospital. Then I stood watching her tall figure disappear into the early morning darkness of a city over which she had cast such a huge light.
March 12
Dear Amy,
I told Gen what happened and couldn’t believe the compassion in her heart, the acceptance. I still can’t believe it! It boggles my mind that my heavenly Father would allow someone like her to come into my life—that he would not only forgive me, but continue to bless me. But that’s what’s happening.
I don’t know what the future holds. All I know is that I somehow found my way back into the arms of a heavenly Father who hadn’t forgotten about me. I was the one who had forgotten about him. I don’t know what he has planned for me. But I don’t want to fail him again.
What that means right now is that I have some work to do. I have to try and face the past—to attempt to make amends for what I did to so many people.
For what I did to your family.
For what I did to you.
Sheridan
twenty-one
I tried to make out the directions I had scribbled down an hour earlier after looking up the address on the Internet. I drove through the suburb of Palos Heights, trying to find the right street. Vangelis played on the car stereo, a soothing piece of background music I appreciated. Soon I found Lexington Street and turned onto it, driving slowly.
I reflected on the past month and a half. It’s amazing how easily the blanket of despair can be lifted from your life. I had been walking around afraid to confess my mistakes and failures to anyone, especially to God, and then found myself opening up and receiving something I never really expected—forgiveness and hope.
Forgiveness and hope. Two words that sound good on my tongue.
It was a second beginning of sorts. I had started to change earlier in the fall, in part with the help of Genevie. But this time I was on my own. I was finally moving ahead on purpose, trying to make peace with my past while moving toward my future. For the first time in many years, I wasn’t afraid.
It didn’t hurt, of course, that April had finally arrived. That in itself was a source of hope. I think sometimes that the only reason I can endure Chicagoland is that the springs are so glorious. I’ve always loved the spring, when the snow finally melts away and the grass turns green and the trees and flowers begin to bloom and the sky opens up in a panorama of azure beauty. When we finally remember what it’s like not to trudge outdoors bundled up in sweaters and gloves, only to scrape away the icy covering that had encased our cars overnight. When we could walk outside in short sleeves and open the car’s sunroof and drive down the road breathing the air and feeling new. Whole again. Like things were beginning all over again.
For me, that spring, that’s exactly what was happening.
For one thing, the news about Erik was good; he’d suffered no lasting damage from his overdose. The doctor had confirmed that the mixture of drugs in his body had included something called paramethoxyamphetamine, or PMA, which is sometimes passed off as the popular hallucinogen known as MDMA or “ecstasy.” This is why Erik had ended up in convulsions and almost died. He admitted that he had taken ecstasy before and thought it was fun and harmless. But the PMA he ingested at the party had been far from harmless. Erik was lucky to be alive.
When the doctors released him from the hospital, I had driven him back to our apartment—he had insisted that it be me and not his parents. The silence in the car provided a welcome blanket for my roommate’s cold emptiness. I didn’t say anything to him about my own story—not then. I would find the time for that later. I also wanted to be his friend, the same kind he had been to me.
All I had told him was one thing: “You’ve got a lot of people who care about you.” I’m not sure if those words meant anything to him, but they were the sort I wish I had heard many years ago, after the accident, when I had felt so alone.
The house I was looking for on Lexington Street was not large, but it seemed to loom high above me as I pulled up to the curb in front of it. The walk toward the front door felt prolonged and eerie. I seemed to face the door for ten minutes after pressing the doorbell, which I could hear sounding deep within the house. Each second that passed felt like a second closer to my turning around and sprinting back down the walk to my waiting car. But finally the oak door opened, and a face I had tried to imagine for many years appeared behind the screen door.
“Yes?” the woman asked. She was in her fifties, with black curly hair. She obviously was not ready for company.
“Uh. Mrs. Larsen?”
“Yes.”
“Is your husband at home?”
“He no longer lives here. We are divorced.”
“Oh.” I remembered he had told me that.
“May I help you?” she asked through the screen door.
“I’m Sheridan Blake.”
She stared at me, and her mouth slightly opened.
“I wanted to come by and talk—”
“Talk about what?” she asked, her formerly pleasant face turning cold and losing all of its color.
“I know I can never begin to tell you how sorry I am.”
“Please leave.”
“Mrs. Larsen, I just want a few minutes. Please.”
“You want a few minutes. I don’t think you should be asking for anything.”
“I want you to know how sorry I am. I know I can’t understand—”
“No you can’t. You won’t ever understand a thing.”
“I know I can’t. I should have come and done this years ago. I’ve been afraid to face you and your former husband. I’ve been a coward—”
“You were a coward to hide behind a lawyer all those years ago. You should have gone to jail.”
“I can’t argue with that. But all I can do now is ask for your forgiveness.”
The woman’s eyes narrowed, and I could tell she was clenching her jaw. “I can give you something,” she spat. She shut the door.
I thought that was it, that she was through talking with me and that I had done as much as I could. But a moment later, the door opened again. She opened the screen door and handed me a three-by-five snapshot.
“That’s the last picture ever taken of Amy. I have made duplicates so others can see what an insufferable, drunken fool can do in a second. I want you to take it. I want you to look at this every day for the rest of your life and know that you killed this beautiful girl. I want you to know the pain you’ve caused her family, pain you can’t begin to ever understand.”
“I’m sorry—” I began, tears clouding my guilty eyes.
“
Just because you’re sorry doesn’t mean you’re not guilty. I will never forgive you. Never.”
This time the oak door slammed shut, and I was left there on the doorstep, holding the picture in my hand. It was the same picture I had cut out of a newspaper years ago, the same shot I had seen every day since the accident.
I turned around and walked back to my car, wishing this could have turned out differently, but knowing life doesn’t always work like that. I walked past a row of maple trees that seemed to stand at attention like soldiers do right before they aim rifles at you and shoot.
I wanted to feel sorry for myself. But instead, I simply felt sorry. Nothing I could do would ever bring Amy back to her mom. And regardless of how many words I wanted to express to her, and how many words I dearly wanted to hear expressed back to me, I knew she had every right to say and do what she had. She could have spit on me, and I would have deserved it. But at least I had done what I needed to do.
I prayed a simple prayer as I started my Honda and began to drive away. “Lord, please let me find Mike Larsen now. Let me find the words to say to him. And please be with this woman I hurt so badly. Help her, if she doesn’t know you, to find her way into your healing arms. Show her hope, the same way you showed it to me.”
I could see her alone at a table, reading a textbook while sipping a cup of coffee. The café area in the Barnes & Noble felt unusually empty this evening. I stepped next to her and made a loud enough shuffle to not surprise her. “Excuse me. Is this seat taken?”
Gen looked up at me, her dark hair neat in its ponytail, and smiled. “I think that table over there looks fine.”
“I’d actually like to sit at this table. I’m supposed to meet a beautiful woman at this exact table. I’m running a little late.”
“Would you settle for little ol’ me?”
“Yeah, I think so,” I said as I sat down. “You look pretty good to me.”
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