Out of the Blue Bouquet (Crossroads Collection)

by Amanda Tru

  Angry tears streaked down her cheeks, hot and scalding. Acidic, like the bitter sorrow in her heart, the gnawing emptiness that only grew each year in spite of everyone’s pat promises that time would heal her wounds.

  Sometimes Jolene felt like she was the only human being in the entire world who still remembered her daughter. Still felt as raw and shocked and wounded as the day Chelsea died. Time heals all wounds? Maybe for everyone else. For her ex-husband, who waited a full three weeks (if you were to believe his timeline to begin with) from his daughter’s death to the start of his affair with the busty intern. For Mena, who was so outrageously in love with her super saint of a fiancé that there was no room for any sorrow. For all of Chelsea’s old friends from high school and college, the ones who’d cried their eyes out at the funeral and hadn’t spent a moment at Chelsea’s grave, hadn’t shed a tear in five straight years for that girl who was doomed to remain twenty-two perpetually in everyone’s memory.

  Everyone’s memory but Jolene’s. She still celebrated each and every birthday. Celebrated by locking herself in her room and throwing on music meant to drown out her bitter cries.

  Each year served as a reminder of what Chelsea hadn’t achieved. What her daughter would never accomplish.

  This is the year you would have graduated from grad school.

  This is the year you might have gotten married.

  This is the year you might have become a mother.

  Maybe that’s why Jolene had distanced herself from some of the other women at church, women who were busy traveling across the country to visit grandchildren and new additions to their happy families. What reason did Jolene have to travel? What reason did she have to celebrate? This trip to Seoul was her first time out of Orchard Grove in two and a half years. She spent her life now in a little bubble with a fifteen-mile radius that encompassed her home, the grocery store, and church when she wasn’t too tired to attend. No wonder she felt so overwhelmed here in a city this huge.

  She’d been so stupid to come here.

  A mistake she didn’t intend to repeat.

  She’d seen enough. Finding her way to the top of the mountain, making it all the way to the tower that was responsible for her daughter’s death was nothing but salt in wounds that were supposed to have healed years ago.

  Wounds that had no reason to be so gaping and raw and exposed.

  Wounds that might kill her if she didn’t find a way to pull herself out of her misery, find peace with what had happened to her daughter, and manage to move on with her life.

  Finally. From the top of the mountain, Joseph stared down at Seoul. Nothing much to speak of, to be honest. The city sprawled outward instead of upward. A mess of winding roads, congested traffic, and huge office complexes where men worked hundred-hour weeks to the detriment of their families and their mental health.

  Joseph could readily admit that he was a workaholic. It was a label he wore with a hint of pride. But even his career ambition paled in comparison to most of the men in the South Korean offices. If Jolene thought he was a negligent husband, it was nothing like here, where workers weren’t even allowed to stand up from their cubicles before their bosses left for the night. Where company dinners and drinking sessions kept them past midnight several times a week.

  What was he doing? Even if he hadn’t wanted to get to the airport early, now he’d have to backtrack all the way to his hotel, pick up his suitcase, then ride the bus for the hour ride to Incheon. At least he’d be home soon. He’d never been more ready to get to Seattle.

  Around him, young couples walked hand in hand. He’d always known the tower was a tourist trap. He hadn’t realized it was also where all the local couples flaunted their young love. He walked along a fence with colorfully engraved locks attached to each link. Most of the Sharpie scribbles were in Korean but were full of enough hearts that he could get the general gist.

  Great. He’d come to the Korean equivalent of a high-school dance and was here with a bunch of teens and tweens who pretended to be a decade older.

  Who pretended to have the slightest clue about true love.

  Whatever dysfunction had seeped in and ruined his relationship with Jolene, he still loved her. Even when he was sleeping with Denise, sick as it might sound, he had never loved anyone but his wife.

  At least not in the same way.

  As he strolled aimlessly along, he indulged in one of his most masochistic mental pastimes. Wondering what life would be like if Chelsea hadn’t died.

  He wouldn’t have had the affair. At least, that’s what he told himself. He’d still be with his wife. They would have worked out whatever tensions or struggles had weighed down on their marriage. Without the drinking … No, who was he kidding?

  It took Chelsea dying, Denise dumping him, and his wife divorcing him to bring Joseph to the point where he was ready to stay sober for good.

  As much as he hated to face the truth, if Chelsea were still alive, he might very well still be caught in the clutches of his alcoholism. Maybe even dead by now, killed by a car accident or liver disease.

  Why did God use tragedies to make people rely on him? Why couldn’t he teach Christians what they needed to know before they were forced to learn all their lessons the hard way?

  During his impromptu Bible study after that day’s fundraising luncheon, Joseph had read a verse in Proverbs that still now pricked at his conscience. A person’s own folly leads to their ruin, yet their heart rages against the LORD.

  How much energy had Joseph spent over the past five years blaming God for Chelsea’s death and everything that happened afterward? Even if the accident wasn’t Joseph’s fault, the affair certainly was. Same with the drinking that ruined his marriage.

  And yet he was still so ready to blame God.

  I will restore the years the locusts have eaten. The words of that speaker still replayed in his mind. He didn’t know what that restoration would look like, but he wanted it.

  Wanted that sense of hope and purpose and belonging he’d heard in the young man’s speech.

  What did he need to do? How could he ever find that peace?

  God, I’m sorry for all the times I’ve blamed you for what happened to Chelsea. It wasn’t your fault.

  The words were hard to choke down. Hard because if it wasn’t God’s fault, then whose was it? In a world ruled by God’s sovereignty, there wasn’t such a thing as an accident, was there? But how else could he explain his daughter’s death? How else could he explain why Chelsea was no longer with him, enjoying the life she’d been so excited to lead?

  I will restore the years the locusts have eaten.

  It was a bold promise. But maybe Joseph would find the faith one day to take God at his word.

  Maybe he’d find the courage to trust again after all.

  Nope. She wasn’t going up that mountain. Not just because she was dog tired. But because she didn’t have to. Trekking up to Seoul Tower, visiting the sites her daughter wanted to see the day she died—what good would that accomplish?

  She was done. What time had Mena said they were meeting for dinner? Whatever it was, Jolene didn’t want to be late. Unwilling to try her hand at the Seoul subways again, she decided to find a hotspot once she got off the trail and call an Uber.

  She shook her head as she made her way back down the path. She’d been stupid to come here. Stupid to think that she had the emotional fortitude to visit the site of her daughter’s death.

  Then again …

  What use was there in running away? What good had that ever done her?

  She’d been so quick to run early on. Run from her grief.

  In so many ways, she was still running. From her ex-husband who so inconveniently showed up in Seoul. From her ex-boyfriend who apparently still refused to take no for an answer.

  Always running.

  Maybe that’s why she had all but stopped going to church. It’s possible. Something had been stirring in her heart since she heard Mena’s fiancé and his
impassioned speech. If Jin-Sun could overcome all the sorrows he’d experienced growing up in North Korea, if God could bring him comfort and peace after those tragedies, maybe it was possible for her too. But where to begin?

  You may be a thousand steps away from God, but it’s only one step back.

  She couldn’t remember where she’d heard the pithy saying. A church sermon maybe? Or something from one of the women’s Bible studies she used to attend? Whatever it was, the words ran through her head relentlessly.

  You may be a thousand steps away from God, but it’s only one step back.

  Here she was complaining that God felt so far away, but maybe she was the one who’d moved, not the other way around.

  Maybe she was the one who turned her back on him when all this time it felt like he had deserted her.

  Only one step back …

  It sounded cute and inspiring if you were listening to a motivational speech. Not quite so helpful if you didn’t even know how to get yourself back on the right path. Where should she even start?

  Maybe some people were just better at living out the Christian life than others. Maybe Jolene’s spirit was too riddled with sorrow and heartache and bitterness …

  Bitterness. Why did the word turn her stomach sour like that? What was this sloshing unease in her gut? Guilt?

  Why should she feel guilty? She wasn’t the one who’d betrayed her spouse of twenty-five years when some perky intern came to town. She wasn’t the one who went on a drinking binge every night of the week, lying through his teeth about trying to become sober. Joseph had ruined her life. He had ruined it long before she set her mind to finally divorce him. As if she was just supposed to roll over and forgive him …

  Was that what all this was? Was this about how she was still bitter toward her ex? Seriously. How many times do you have to pray and tell God you forgive your husband when he cheats on you and ruins your daughter’s life and breaks your heart every single time he drags that cursed bottle to his lips?

  There comes a point when you have to stop enabling. Have to admit that the problem’s never going to disappear. That’s why Jolene finally left him. And now she was the one feeling guilty as if she were the one to blame?

  She thought about her run-in last night with Joseph, about the way he barged into her room smelling like beer. That man would never change. And Jolene shouldn’t feel guilty that she was trying to move on.

  She charged down the path, ignoring the bursting in her lungs and the burning in her thighs. There was a little souvenir shop at the base of the trail. She’d check for wifi, call herself a car, and get herself far away from Seoul Tower and the torturous memories that haunted it.

  There was a lightness in Joseph’s spirit he hadn’t experienced in years. Or maybe in his entire life. He couldn’t pinpoint the change, at least not exactly. If he were trying to walk a coworker through the steps he’d just taken to finally feel at peace, he wouldn’t know where to start.

  But here he was.

  Able to accept the fact that the accident that had claimed his daughter’s life was a tragedy, but that it was still possible to hold onto a belief in a powerful and loving God.

  Able to somehow understand, even if he couldn’t wrap his mind around it in any logical way, that even though God could have kept Chelsea from dying, he bore no guilt for his daughter’s death.

  In one way, it didn’t change anything. Chelsea was still gone, destined to live in his memory now as a perpetual twenty-two-year-old. She would never give him grandkids, never see how far he’d worked to overcome his addictions.

  This rebirth in his spirit wouldn’t change the past.

  But in another sense, it changed everything.

  Maybe now Joseph could move on. Instead of living perpetually in his regrets, pining for a wife who’d given up on him years ago and a daughter he’d never see again, maybe he could start looking ahead to the future without the ghosts of his guilt tying him down like dead weight.

  He turned around. Made his way toward the trail that would take him back to the city. He didn’t need the view from the mountaintop anymore. This change, this reawakening in his tired and weary soul, wasn’t dependent on his altitude or his position on the globe. He could carry it with him wherever he went. He just hoped that he could walk in such a way that he wouldn’t lose this feeling.

  He was already starting to make plans to solidify his commitment. Get more serious about attending Chuck’s Thursday morning men’s prayer breakfast. Buckling down and making Bible study a priority, whether he was at home or in his office or traveling the globe. If God could do this work in his heart, if he could teach Joseph to finally forgive himself after all that had happened, then he was worth carving out a little extra time for in spite of his busy schedule.

  It wouldn’t atone for all the mistakes of his past, but it was a start.

  He hurried down the trail, rushing for no apparent reason other than the joy and energy that surged through his being.

  And then he saw her.

  “Jolene?” He called her name. She didn’t hear. She was too far down the trail. “Jolene?”

  Maybe he was mistaken. Maybe it wasn’t her.

  But wouldn’t he recognize his wife anywhere?

  “Jolene!” He didn’t know why he was running toward a woman who probably didn’t want to talk and certainly wouldn’t be happy to see him. Didn’t know what he’d say to her once he did catch up. But his legs propelled him forward as if they had a force and a gravity and a will of their own.

  She was so far ahead. If he didn’t know her that intimately, he would have never been able to recognize her. But there she was. The wife he’d loved, the wife he’d hurt so badly.

  He burst forward with all his strength, praying to God that he could catch up before she disappeared from his life again, this time for good.

  The man behind the counter leaned toward Jolene. “You want to buy a lock?”

  “A lock?” she asked, thinking perhaps his accent garbled whatever he was trying to say.

  He nodded. “Yes. You buy it and write the name of the one you love then hang it on the tower fence.”

  “I’m single,” she answered. “Do you have wifi here?”

  He pointed to the password that was taped on the counter. “You sure you don’t want the lock?”

  “I’m sure.”

  She connected her phone, wondering how soon she could get an Uber up this way. She hated that she couldn’t remember what time she was supposed to meet Mena, hated to think she might end up late.

  “You want to buy a coffee at the café?” The man gestured toward the tiny cafeteria attached to the shop.

  Jolene sighed. “Sure.” She may as well get something while she waited. According to the app, it would take about ten minutes for her driver to arrive.

  Once she sat, she noticed her piercing headache. She was too old to be running up and down mountain trails like that.

  She ordered her coffee and checked her Uber app for the seventh time in the past thirty seconds.

  “Jolene?”

  No. It couldn’t be. Out of all the stupid souvenir shops plastered around Seoul …

  “Joseph?”

  He was out of breath. Had he been running? In the fluorescent lights from the café, his forehead shimmered with sweat.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  He collapsed into the seat across from her. “I saw you on the trail. I thought we …” He stopped. What was he going to say?

  She was too tired for any of this. With as caustic as she’d been feeling toward her ex just a few minutes ago, she didn’t have the energy to tell him all the reasons why his presence here was so repulsive.

  “Listen,” he panted, “I don’t know why you’re here, and I’m guessing you don’t want to waste a whole lot of time talking to me, and that’s fine. I’m ready to give you space. But first …” He took a few more noisy breaths. How far up the trail had he been? And had he run all the way d
own here just to break her short period of calm and quiet before the Uber car came?

  “I need to apologize to you.”

  His words caught her off guard. Maybe the jet lag was catching up to her. She must be hallucinating. It was the most logical explanation. In their twenty-five years of marriage, had he ever once initiated an apology?

  “I was a terrible father and a terrible husband, and I made your life miserable. I made our marriage miserable. It’s only by the grace of God and some huge miracle that Chelsea …” His voice caught. “That our daughter didn’t despise me with every ounce of her being. The more I think about it, that’s probably because you sheltered her from so many of my problems. I can only imagine what an impossibly hard predicament that was for you all those years.”

  Jolene stared. Did he seriously expect her to formulate some sort of coherent response? What was he thinking?

  “I know I told you last night that I’ve changed, and maybe at first I was mad that you didn’t believe me. Then I realized that I haven’t given you any reason to trust me. None at all.”

  She was about to mention the fact that he’d broken into her room smelling like cheap beer last night while still proclaiming his sobriety, but he was rambling on without any sign of slowing down.

  “I know one simple apology won’t change the lifetime of hurt and heartache I’ve caused you. And believe me, I’m not trying to put you into a position where you’ll ever get hurt again. I’ve caused you too much pain. I recognize that. I’m not asking you for anything except to hear me out. Hear me out, and then I’ll be out of your life again. It’s time for both of us to move on. I realize that.”

  Jolene glanced at her phone. How much longer was that driver going to take?

  “I’ve been stuck in the past. Thinking that maybe one day I could prove to you that I’m a new man. That’s why I was so upset last night when you thought I lied to you. You smelled beer on my breath because I’d gone into a bar, but I didn’t take a drink. I guess I had this childish notion that if I just stayed sober long enough, I might erase all my other shortcomings. I was wrong. Now I want to move on. I really do. I know it’s too late for us to make it work together, but that doesn’t mean we should hang ourselves on past regrets. I made a ton of mistakes, I hurt you more than I could ever expect to be forgiven for, and I’m truly sorry. If Chelsea were here …”