Lead Me Home

by Stacy Hawkins Adams

  He nodded, and she continued. “My goal was to someday be a professional flutist, and to travel the world sharing my music. So I won this fellowship, which allowed me to spend a summer in France.”

  All of the boys looked surprised.

  “You’ve been to France? And you never told us?” Omari was stunned.

  Shiloh gave him a wry smile. “Yes, son, I had a life before marriage and motherhood, and in one season of it, I had a wonderful opportunity to study abroad. I went to Paris for ten weeks. I lived in an apartment with a French family, and I studied and practiced with some of the best flutists in the world, at a university based there.”

  Lem sat back on the sofa and shook his head. “Wow, Mrs. Smith almost winning that pageant last night has nothing on you.”

  Shiloh smiled at him, but continued. “There were also other college musicians from around the world studying that summer, and I became special friends with a young man from Spain named Armando. We really liked each other, and we wound up dating exclusively the whole time we were there. He had never dated or even been friends with a black woman, and I hadn’t dated much at all, maybe once or twice before that. Anyway, I thought he was something special, and I thought what we had together was special, so … after a few dates when he wanted to … go all the way … I agreed.”

  Lem turned his head and Omari and Raphael wrinkled their noses.

  “Mom, please,” Omari said.

  “I know, son,” Shiloh said, “but I have to tell you all everything. Long story short, I wound up pregnant, but by the time I found out, the summer program was about to wrap up, and Armando and I had already said our goodbyes. I decided that I was too young and had too much going for me to keep a baby, especially a biracial one that would have to be raised in Alabama.”

  Shiloh took a deep breath and Randy squeezed her hand in support.

  “Boys, I set aside all I knew about how God cherishes life, and I thought only about what I wanted at that time, at my age. I killed that baby before I left France, as if it was no big deal. I had an abortion.”

  Silence engulfed the room, and David, who was still standing next to her, peered at her, as if in shock.

  “Did you understand what I just tried to explain?” she asked him.

  He nodded and stepped back. “You said it: You killed your baby.”

  “Because it was inconvenient,” Raphael said. “Oh, wow, Mom.”

  “So I’m really not your first child,” Lem said and glared at her. “At least I shouldn’t be.”

  Shiloh nodded. “If I’d had the baby, it would be seventeen years old now—a year older than you, Lem. I think about that often. Who or what would he or she be doing; how would he or she have turned out?”

  “That might have been the daughter you’ve never had,” Lem said. “What were you thinking?”

  Chills ran through Shiloh. She hadn’t known what to expect from her boys, but Lem’s third-degree interrogation was unsettling. How would he handle the rest of what she had to share?

  “And you never told the guy?” Omari asked.

  Shiloh shook her head. “There was nothing to tell after I had taken care of it.”

  “But it was a baby, Mommy, a person,” David said. “I can’t believe you did that.”

  Shiloh peered at him for a long while before speaking. “I can’t believe I did it, either, David, but you know what? Lots of people do it every day, and it’s legal. I’m guessing a lot of them believed like I did that if they just ‘took care of it’ and moved on with their lives, it would soon be forgotten. Truth is, it hasn’t been that way at all. There’s not a day that I don’t ask myself ‘what if’; and every time I enter a hospital, I remember how terrible and disgusting I felt when I did that in France.”

  She almost told them about the annual commemoration of that child’s life that she held every year, on the date of her abortion, but she hesitated. Doing so might come across as her making an excuse, or trying to show how she had redeemed herself. But telling them about her sin wasn’t for the purpose of justifying her actions or making herself look better; she had to let the truth out, and let them chew on it and process it however they needed.

  “So why are you telling us this now? What gives? Did Armando show up in Milwaukee or something?”

  Shiloh tried to smile.

  “No—at least not to my knowledge. I’m telling you because … because just like Mrs. Smith stood on that pageant stage last night and shared one of her truths, I might need to share this information with the St. Stephens Baptist congregation, to help some people in the membership.”

  Lem grew angry. “This is about that Monica girl getting knocked up, isn’t?”

  Shiloh’s eyes grew wide. How had he heard about this? Monica attended school in Sherman Park, in the city, and Lem was in the Mequon school district thirty minutes away. Was the rumor started and spread only at church?

  “It’s all over Facebook and Twitter, Mom. They say Trey Holloman got her pregnant and then dumped her. He’s going to get a big college scholarship to play football, and he doesn’t want to be tied down with any baby mama drama.”

  Now it was Shiloh’s turn to be stunned. Social media was dangerous. If that’s how the news was circulating, Monica surely knew what was being said.

  “Monica’s having dinner with us tomorrow, Lem; please don’t tell her what you’ve been seeing about her online; none of you boys say anything about her, or her circumstances, you hear me?”

  The grim-faced boys nodded, including Lem, who looked angrier than she’d ever seen him.

  “So now you’ve got to do a tell-all confession in front of the church,” he said. “That’s just great. Next thing you know, all my business is going to be all over Facebook and Twitter, and I didn’t even do anything.”

  He stood up and headed toward the door to leave the family room, but Randy called him back. “Son, I know this is hard. It’s hard for your mother to even tell you all this, let alone the world. You need to be respectful and come back and sit down, though. You have to hear her out. You need to know what she has to say.”

  Lem reluctantly returned to his seat on the sofa across from his parents, but hung his head.

  Shiloh felt numb by this point, but continued. “I am just as uncomfortable as Lem with the thought of standing up at St. Stephens as the First Lady, and putting all of my business on Front Street,” she said. “But when God puts something on your heart and challenges you to be obedient, you have to honor that call, or you’re sinning again. I have to do this, boys, to honor how far God has brought me, in spite of that grave sin, and to help someone else who may be struggling.

  “When I came back, your daddy and I started dating seriously, and got married. I dropped out of college because I felt so guilty. I believed that if I gave up everything earthly that mattered to me, God would know I was truly sorry, and he would forgive me. I feared that like some people who’ve had abortions, I would never be able to have children, and yet he soon blessed me with Lem, and then the rest of you.

  “Your dad has been gracious in allowing me to take the lead in naming each of you. It’s by design that, put together, the letters of your first names spell LORD,” Shiloh said and smiled at her sons. “And as you know, each of your names—Lemuel, Omari, Raphael, David—means something biblically significant. I haven’t taken for granted that God has smiled on me and granted me unusual favor with four healthy sons. So I need to share this painful and shameful part of my past so others can see how God can move them forward, whatever they’ve done, even if it’s something as murderous as this.”

  “You keep calling it murder,” Raphael said. “But it’s legal, right?”

  “It’s legal in the eyes of many countries, Raphie,” Shiloh said, “but I try to live by God’s principles, and I knew way back then that God considers even the seed of life sacred. So the minute I got the idea in my head to do this get-rid-of-it-quick scheme, I knew I was premeditating something that wouldn’t please God. The fa
ct that it was so easy, and so affordable, made me feel okay about it, leading up to the act. And even as I cried my way through it, I couldn’t help feeling that I was snuffing out a life, just because I could.”

  Shiloh took another deep breath.

  “So I’m going to share this soon in church, and I wanted you to know so you can ask me whatever questions you need to, and so you’ll have time to prepare yourselves for whatever may happen after I tell everyone.”

  “I’m not going to be able to show my face,” Omari said and hung his head.

  “Yes, you will, son,” Randy told him. “If someone tries to make you feel bad or says something negative about your mother, you tell them to go home and sit down with their parents, and ask them to share details about the things from their youth that they’re most ashamed of. We’ve all got something. Just do that and see if that won’t shut them up.”

  Shiloh wanted to hug Randy. As hard as he was taking all of this himself, he was standing with her. She looked at all four of her handsome young men, each of them miniature versions of Randy, with different haircuts, shades of brown, and heights.

  “There’s more, boys, and it’s just as bad.”

  Lem sat back and groaned. “Mom … really?”

  She looked at him and her heart ached. This was going to tear him to pieces.

  fifty-eight

  Shiloh dove right in, before she lost her courage, and before the boys could ask another question about her first transgression.

  “That fellowship I mentioned, the one that allowed me to go to France? Well … I stole it.”

  Lem sat forward again and frowned. He looked pained. Omari, Raphael, and David exchanged glances.

  “Are you going to jail?” David asked.

  Shiloh was grateful for the comic-relief question. “I guess the only good news of the day is, no—I’m not going to jail. But again, this is another case of me feeling like I committed murder.”

  She released Randy’s hand and walked over to the sofa on the other side of the coffee table and sat next to Lem. She wanted to hug him, but he radiated anger and hurt. So she sat there, close, but not touching, and spoke directly to him, but loud enough for the others to hear.

  “Lem, I had a college roommate at Birmingham-Southern named Leslie Hamilton, and she was a gifted flutist.”

  Lem sat up and stared at her. “Hamilton? You’re kidding me.”

  Shiloh shook her head.

  The other boys frowned.

  “Can you stop talking in ‘Lem language,’ Mom; we don’t get it,” Omari said.

  Shiloh continued. “I had a roommate named Leslie Hamilton, who was from Birmingham, but lived in the dorm as part of her music scholarship. She was from a well-to-do family and respected throughout campus because of her good looks, athleticism, and of course, her ability to play the flute. We were often competitors, with the two of us routinely flip-flopping between first and second chair in our classes,” Shiloh said. “It was often a toss-up between the two of us when community groups or organizations on campus wanted a solo musician to play for an event, and it got to the point where if I couldn’t make it, I’d recommend her, and vice versa.

  “Well, when the flute fellowship opportunity came around and we found out there was only one spot going to a Birmingham-Southern student, the competition was on. It put a strain on our friendship as we sought to find the best song to impress the judges and practice nonstop so we’d each be ready for our audition. It was hard, because it meant we couldn’t practice in our room after hours, since we’d hear each other’s piece, and also how good each other was.

  “One weekend, I went home to Atchity to practice the song I had selected, and I was feeling pretty confident about it. But that Sunday, when I returned to campus and stepped off the elevator onto my dormitory floor, I heard the sweetest sound flowing from our room. It was absolutely beautiful. Leslie had discovered a breathtaking melody that I’d never heard before, and she was playing it with heart-wrenching power. I was blown away. I sat there in the hallway and listened to her play it over and over, until she nailed it without flaws. I knew if I went into the room she’d stop practicing and put everything away, so I wouldn’t know. But at this point I did know, and I knew if she played that song with that level of skill and emotion, I could forget it; the fellowship was hers.”

  The boys were riveted, even Lem. Shiloh got up and walked over to the piano in the corner of the family room and sat on the bench, with her back to Randy and her sons.

  “I heard the phone in our room ring and while I couldn’t hear the entire conversation, I heard Leslie tell someone she would take a break and come down for just a few minutes, so she could get back to practice. I trotted down the hall and hid in the bathroom until I felt like she was out of the hallway, then I went into our room, and there was her music, splayed on her bed. The title of the piece and its author were there in plain view.

  “I thought about taking it and tearing it up, but realized how silly that would be; she’d just get another score, and she’d know I was the one who did it. But something came over me and I decided that I would perform that same piece, but do her one better. I’d figure out how to play it on both of my instruments—the flute and the recorder. I’d have to figure out how to smoothly transition from one to the other, but if I pulled it off, I could win this fellowship over her.

  “I told myself I needed it more,” Shiloh said and turned toward her family. “I was the middle child of a preacher, who cared about his church more than his children, it seemed at times. Maybe winning something big like this would make him notice me.”

  “Pawpaw?” Lem asked incredulously. “He’s so caring; what are you talking about?”

  “That’s another story for another day, Lem,” Shiloh said. “I’m glad that you and your grandfather have a wonderful relationship, but it was different with us girls back then.”

  “Back to what you were saying.” Randy gently nudged her.

  Shiloh nodded. “I told myself that Leslie was well off enough that if she really wanted to study with flutists abroad, her parents could pay to send her, and plus, I just needed the recognition of winning, of doing something different and better than my smart older sister and pretty, outgoing younger sister. I was tired of being the bland, invisible one.”

  “That sounds so lame.” Raphael’s disgust was palpable.

  “I agree,” Shiloh said. “You’ve never been a young, insecure woman, so I can’t and won’t even try to explain where my head was. Even so, all these years later, I know how silly and self-centered that explanation sounds. But back then, it was real, and it was serious, and I just wanted to escape my life and travel to a world where I could be special. When I heard Leslie play that piece, I felt my chance slipping away.”

  “So you stole her song and played it yourself, in a better, more unique way and won the scholarship?” Lem almost spat out the question.

  Shiloh looked him in the eyes. “I did, son. I did.”

  “Why is he so angry?” David asked, looking from Lem to Shiloh.

  “Because Leslie Hamilton is the name of Lia’s drug-addicted mother,” Lem said between clenched teeth, glaring at Shiloh. “The mother who gave birth to her, then dropped Lia off on her parents’ doorstep so she could return to a life on the streets, playing her flute whenever she’s not strung out. Sounds like our mother had something to do with that.”

  Shiloh dipped her head to her chin and let the tears flow. “I told you, I murdered twice, in the same year.”

  “I don’t understand, Mommy,” said David, frowning. Shiloh appreciated his nine-year-old innocence, and his effort to connect the dots. She had to finish the story for his sake—and for Lem, who seemed to feel he already knew the answers.

  “On the day of the audition I arrived before anyone else so I could sign up to be the first to go in. The rules were we had to bring two pieces to play, so if we saw our original piece on the list, we had to move to our second piece of music. The judges wo
uld give us a chance to play both pieces, but the initial one had to be their first time hearing it.

  “I got there first, signed up, and wrote down the name of the piece I’d be playing on the sign-up sheet. When Leslie arrived fifteen minutes later and saw the selection, she knew I had somehow found her music and betrayed her. That piece was so obscure, she’d convinced herself no one else would have it, so she’d poured herself into learning it and practicing it, and had only skated the surface on learning a second piece.

  “Truthfully, if I hadn’t stolen the piece from her, she would have been right; no one else would have discovered it. It was truly unique. But I did what I did, and she was hurt and furious and in her opinion, doomed. For whatever reason, she didn’t rat me out, like she could have and probably should have. She went in and played her second song, which by all accounts was good but not earth-shattering. She went on to play her original choice as her second piece, but I had blown them away already by playing it on two instruments; she couldn’t top that, and I knew it.”

  Shiloh tried to reach for Lem’s hand, but he pulled away.

  “We got back to the room that morning and she said she knew I’d land the fellowship, due to the music she had hunted high and low for, and that when I arrived in France that summer, I should …”

  Shiloh looked at David, wondering if he needed to hear this part, but decided to barrel through.

  “She said while I was in France, I should think of her, in her Birmingham home, all alone with a relative who was abusive while her parents were away.”

  Shiloh’s revelation sucked the air out of the room. Even Randy, who had heard this earlier in the week, seemed stunned. Shiloh felt like she was having an out-of-body experience. She couldn’t be talking about herself, and her actions.

  Lem was pale. “What did she say?” He whispered the question, as if it pained him.

  Mindful of her three youngest boys, Shiloh didn’t want to say too much. Some of the answers Lem sought would have to wait until later, for a one-on-one conversation.

  “Apparently Leslie worked hard in school and won a flute scholarship that allowed her to stay on campus to get away from her abusive relative. She never felt like she could tell, because this person held the family’s purse strings. He was the one with the wealth, and her father worked for his company. He had always threatened that if she shared their secret, the whole family would be ruined. Her parents were loving and trusting and had no idea that she was being mistreated. So when she made it to college and got a chance to live in the dorm, she said she had peace and safety for the first time in six or seven years, and she needed to do whatever she could to avoid having to go home for the summer and allowing the abuse to resume.”