Soon, the big night arrived. All that day I had felt sick to my stomach, nervous that showing up would be just Charles, Dr. Emory, and myself—the three stooges. I was sure the event would be a failure. The event was scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. We opened the doors at 7:00 p.m., and nobody was around. I stared at the empty courtyard. All of this effort was wasted. Nobody was going to come.
At 7:25 p.m., I was sitting in the front row with my head in my hands. The lonely microphone dangled above me like a hangman’s noose. Charles and Dr. Emory were standing in the back, waiting to welcome the masses.
I looked up as the clock struck 7:30, and just as it did, the first people walked in. Slowly, ever so slowly, they began to trickle in, a tiny stream struggling forward into the unknown. I watched spellbound as they dribbled in, filling up the chairs. Near the end, I saw Julia slip in. She gave me a quick wave and took a seat with a couple of her friends. By the time Dr. Emory took the stage, we had quite a crowd. He stood behind the mic, calm and quirky.
“Good evening, students. As longtime chair of the English department and a lover of storytelling, it is a joy for me to be here hosting this event. I welcome you not only to listen but also to take part. I hope that some of you have brought your own stories to share. For those feeling bold, some of your fellow students have written anonymous pieces, which we would love to have read, and we invite you to speak on their behalf. Tonight is about you. Tonight is about growing up and finding your voice. Tonight is about being human and all that entails. Without further ado, I would like to welcome to the stage a very good friend of mine: Tom Weston.”
There was a polite round of applause as I climbed the stairs to the stage. I felt my legs shaking. After all, I was not a speaker; I was a writer. There were so many things that I lacked, but all of those inadequacies had led me to this very moment. Together they had dragged me to this stage to stand in front of my peers, ready to wet myself with nerves. All of these things were true, but I pushed them aside. Courage is not the absence of fear but the ability to proceed in spite of it. I cleared my throat of amphibians and glanced at my script.
“Hi. My name is Tom, and this is my story.” I took a deep breath, pushing back the frogs and continued. “I was born in a small town and spent my days playing outside in the great outdoors. When I was thirteen, my mother died …” I lost myself in the rhythm of the words and the cadence of the story. I began to weave with words, spinning a tapestry of captured moments and feelings and senses. I left my body standing there on stage and drifted to days gone by. I re-visited the winding woods and stared at myself weeping over my mother’s cold corpse. Everything passed before my eyes as if I were in a trance. I invited the crowd to peer into the window of my soul and experience my life. It was not a story of triumph or intrigue. It was not meant to win the pity or the wonder of the crowd. It was merely simple and humble. It was human. Finally, I returned to the stage through snapshots of laughter and tears and boredom, and again felt my fingers and toes, remembering that I existed in the present. I took a deep breath, then spoke softly into the mic. “My name is Tom, and this is my story.”
My last words drifted up toward the ceiling, leaving in their wake a deep silence. Visions and spirits breathed to life and summoned through story now floated in the air. We watched them whirl among us until, at last, they too drifted up into the night sky, leaving behind a rough somberness. Silently, I folded my paper and stepped down. Three long minutes slipped by, and the stage remained barren. The empty mic hung there, alone, bathed in a pool of dim light.
Then, a slender girl took the stage and stood up, tall and awkward. She pulled from her pocket a well-worn piece of paper. She looked out at us and smiled with thin lips and wavy black hair. “My name is Laura, and this is my story …”
After Laura, there were no more pauses. There was an opening and an awakening as, one after the other, people rose to share. Some had scripts, while others spoke off the cuff. Some told their own stories, inviting us to gaze into their windows, while others gently read the anonymous tales of our classmates. Each story was a distinct kind of gift. Each story was uniquely beautiful. Many were heartbreaking. We mourned with those who mourned, and we rejoiced with those who rejoiced. There was a time for everything under the sun. By the end of the night, the air was filled with visions dancing like the northern lights. They melded together, blending and swirling about. We breathed them in until they got into our blood and coursed through our veins. We gorged ourselves on story, hungry for more.
When the air seemed as if it would explode from the fullness of our tales, Dr. Emory arose from his seat. The wise sage with the walrus mustache stood before us. “All good things must come to an end, and so our evening has disappeared in the blink of an eye. But I hope that the stories shared here in this sacred space will long remain burned into our memories. I am an old man, and my story is in its final chapters, but I look out at all of you and know that most of yours are just beginning. You have so many more stories to make and so much more life left to live. As you go out from here tonight, remember that in the midst of all its peaks and valleys, life is a precious gift. Don’t waste that gift. May God bless you all. Good night.”
I watched the people flow out just like they flowed in. Julia squeezed my hand as she flitted away. Small groups of friends disappeared into the night, but I knew they were not the same people who had walked through the doors just hours earlier. We were all different. I could see it in people’s faces when they looked at each other and in the hugs between old friends. For just a night, we had peeled back the layers of lies to find the beautiful, disgruntled humanity underneath. We stared at each other naked and raw, and we loved each other—scars and all. It was truly an amazing thing.
I felt like I was walking away from my first real church service. There in a hall with a group of strangers and an old mentor to lead us, we had worshipped. There in the most unlikely of places, God showed up—not through stuffy rituals or the off-key singing of a sweaty, red-robed choir; not through the browbeating or mechanical mumbling of an ordained minister; not with our fancy clothes and freshly polished shoes, but in our brokenness and in our pain. In our questions and in our wanderings, God descended upon us, reminding us that we were not alone, and that life was worth the living. It was nothing short of a miracle.
We herded the few remaining stragglers out the door and flipped off the lights. Charles, Dr. Emory, and I stood outside, staring up into clear night sky. There were a million things that could be said, but instead we soaked in the silence for a few precious moments. There had been so many words spoken already. All that was needed now was the presence of friends. Dr. Emory squeezed my shoulder and said softly, “Gentlemen, I’m afraid to say I’m not as young as I used to be, and it’s long past my bedtime. I will not soon forget this evening. And on that note, I bid you good night.”
Back in the room and nestled in bed, I was unable to sleep. There was something unsettling in the back of my mind that I could not quite pinpoint. Tired of gazing at the blank ceiling, I tossed off the tousled sheet and went for a walk. I paced along the lake, watching the waves dance underneath the bright moonlight. The air was filled with a cascading cricket chorus punctuated now and then by a hooting owl or a churning car. On my second lap around the lake, I found the source of my discomfort.
Somewhere in the telling and the hearing of stories, I realized there was a large part of my story waiting for resolution. A critical character continued to wait in the wings, drifting in the dark corners of my existence. It was my father. Of all the things in life I desired, there was none I longed for more than reconciliation with him. The role of the prophet was not just to show the people that things were broken. Most of them knew that already. The prophet came to show them the way out. He came to provide hope. I knew in my heart of hearts there was only one path to healing, and it was leading me home.
In my memories, my father stood tall, dark, and handsome. His hands were strong and coarse like sandpap
er. I remembered the smooth contours of his face when he held me as a toddler. But as I turned the pages of my memories, those hands became cracked, and rough stubble appeared on his cheeks. I watched the sad transformation as my father was slowly whittled away before my very eyes, leaving behind a disheveled heap of flesh and bloodshot eyes. I had tried to escape this scary figure. I had hoped to leave him locked away in his small town. But our fates were intertwined. I understood that now. No amount of learning would allow me to forget him. He was a part of me: whiskey, whiskers, withered hands, and all.
CHAPTER 31
Home
I LEFT JULIA A NOTE telling her we would have to reschedule our dance, but I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. I just packed up and left. Some things you can’t explain; you just have to do them. I caught the early morning train and soon found myself standing outside the front door of my house. Father was at work already, and the house was unlocked as always. I stared at the old building with its sagging rafters and peeling paint. Weeds were growing up through the cracks in the front walk, and the fence was missing planks left and right like an old hockey player with missing teeth. The house was but a shell of its former glory. Like so many other things, it had been let go for far too long. While I stood there staring at the front windows, an idea suddenly struck me.
I ran into the garage and began rummaging through dusty boxes all neatly marked with permanent marker describing their contents. I knew the items I sought were in here somewhere. I found them hidden away, tucked under an old folding table, unused ever since Mother’s death. Grabbing two large boxes, I stumbled outside excitedly. It was time. I carted an old ladder around from the back of the house. I only had a couple of hours before Dad came home. It would be nice to have Charles here to help, but I needed to do this on my own. I opened the first box and fished inside to pull out a long string of Christmas lights. I swore I heard my mother’s voice calling to me from inside the house, telling me to wait for her before I started. I’d waited too long already. I blew her a kiss and climbed up the ladder.
After a few hours, I stood back, tired and sweaty, and turned on the lights in the fading afternoon sun. The house lit up, and for a moment, I forgot about the slumping eaves and missing shingles. I saw Mother standing in the front yard with her hands clasped in sheer joy at the sight. Father stood with a little grin at the sight of Mother’s reaction, and I was there in the middle, soaking it all in.
I stood there for a long time as the sun slowly sank beneath the forested hills and the first stars began to appear. I watched and waited for Father. At last, I saw his figure deliberately trudging home, his feet beating their usual path. Then I saw him look up and notice our house glowing. Suddenly, he began to run with hurried, labored strides as he pushed toward me. I stood waiting for him. Before I could say anything, he whispered cautiously into the night as he stared past me, “She always loved putting up the Christmas lights. It was her favorite day of the year.”
I stepped beside him and whispered gently, “I know. The lights are for her.”
Large, heavy tears like raindrops from a spring monsoon slowly began to roll down Father’s cheeks. His shoulders began to shake like an earthquake, and he collapsed to his knees—the great oak falling to the earth after years of standing strong.
I sank beside him, sitting silently at first, and then I too began to sob. There, on a clear October night under the glow of the red and green Christmas lights, we held each other and grieved. When there were no more tears to cry and our eyes were red and our shirtsleeves were wet from wiping, we rose to our feet and stood side by side.
I spoke gently. “So, do you want to have a smoke?”
I saw him smile ever so slightly. “Sure. I guess I owe you one.”
“Good. I have two cigars I’ve been saving for the occasion.”
I spent three days at home with Father. I wish I could say from that moment forward things were perfect, but years of old habits die hard. Like two boxers, we began to feel each other out. We had lived under the same roof for so long, but we were strangers. We both had deep wounds, and they would take time to heal. But we needed to heal together.
That following spring, Father and I stood outside of the house again. I had convinced him to sell the old place and, with a little help from Dr. Emory, move up to Locklear and start a small store. The Christmas lights were still on the house, a final farewell to the woman we both loved.
Before we left, I made one last trek to the woods. Eventually, I found my way to the ancient oak. Leaning against its trunk, I listened to the bubbling of the brook. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of the sun’s rays filter through the leaves and dance across my face. Sitting there bathed in light, I felt peace. In the middle of a chorus of crickets and chirping birds, I looked back on my story and, for the first time, I noticed God’s fingerprints. From the very beginning, He’d been at work, and like a blind man now given sight, I could see. He helped me get out of Greenwood, brought me Charles and Dr. Emory to be my family when I was most alone, and even more miraculously, he’d given me my father back. God was indeed a great mystery, and his ways were far beyond me, but I knew somehow that he was not aloof and silent as I’d long thought. There in the shadow of the ancient oak, I felt the tiny seed of faith, long dormant, begin to grow once again.
P. S. I finally got my dance.
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