Max nodded to him. “Thanks.”
“Anything else I can get for you?”
He looked at Sadie.
She glared back.
“I guess we’re OK for now.”
As soon as the waiter retreated, Sadie pushed her plate to the side, shook her hand when she burned her fingers, and leaned forward. “Don’t quote scripture to me, Max.” She propped her elbows on the table and rubbed her temples.
“I know things look bleak—”
“Of course you think God is for you. Look at your life, with your perfect little nuclear family, your happy, perfect, sane parents. You, your brother, and your stupid dog. Of course, God is on your side. But He doesn’t seem to care about what matters to me. I’ve never felt like He was on my side.”
“Sadie—”
“I need to be with someone who will support me.”
The words hung in the steam of their untouched meals. “If you’re asking me to go against what I think God’s leading me to do, I can’t do that. I’ll never be able to do that.”
“Well, then, I guess we’re through.” She stood and grabbed her coat from the hook.
He stood with her. “Just let me get the check.”
“Forget it. I’ll take the bus.” She headed to the door.
Max slid to the edge of the booth and rushed after her.
“Sir?” The waiter stopped him with a hand on his forearm. “Do you need your check?”
Max brushed past. “I’ll be right back.” He pushed out the door, looked around and ran after her. He caught up to her and wrapped his hand around her arm. “Don’t leave like this.”
She wheeled, yanking her arm away. Tears dripped over her cheeks and off her chin. She swiped at them with the sleeve of her wool coat. “Leave me alone, Max.”
“Look, I understand you’re angry with me, and—”
“I’m not. I’m just...I don’t know what I’m going to do.” She took a deep breath, blew it out. “I shouldn’t have asked you for the loan. You don’t owe me anything.”
“I wish I could help you. And I’ll do anything else I can. Really...”
But she was shaking her head. “Forget it.”
His eyes tingled, and he prayed he wouldn’t cry, though seeing her tears broke his heart. “I don’t want this to end.”
She hugged her coat tighter. The wind pushed her hair across her face, and she brushed it back. “There’s nothing to end, Max. We had, what? A meal, a soda, and a fight.”
Three dates. His magic number. He really wanted a fourth this time. “I can’t lose you again.”
“I have to deal with my house right now. I don’t have time for this.” She looked beyond him. “You’d better go back before they call the police.”
He turned, saw a burly man standing at the restaurant’s door, watching him. “Let me go pay, and I’ll drive you home.”
She nodded once, so he turned and jogged back to the restaurant, pulling his wallet from his pocket while he ran. He pulled money from his wallet and handed it to the man. “That should cover it. I’ll come back for my jacket later.”
The man’s stern expression softened as he looked over Max’s shoulder. “I think you should get it now.”
Max turned just as Sadie stepped onto a city bus.
11
Sadie drifted in that state between awake and asleep, listening to her father.
“Ah, my sweetheart.” Her father’s voice was Old Man River deep. It carried through the thin walls, and the rare days he was home, Sadie would try to stay awake, just so she could hear him.
“Shh, you’ll wake Sadie.” Her mother’s voice didn’t carry so well, but Sadie could pick up the words and imagine the amused, stern look on Mom’s face.
Dad would be smiling. He was a big man with a happy, round face and bright green eyes. His brown hair was longer on this visit. Mom had tried to cut it after dinner, but Dad got spooked about the scissors. Dad was always doing stuff like that, getting scared of things that even Sadie didn’t think were scary, like scissors and ambulances and the lawnmower. But tonight, he was happy. His laughter carried through the wall from her parents’ bedroom, and she cuddled under her pink blanket and let Dad’s voice lull her to sleep.
She blinked, saw the light peeking around her blinds, and squeezed her eyes closed, wishing she could go back to the dream world where her father was home and healthy. Well, home, anyway.
She grabbed her cell phone from the nightstand and checked the time, ignoring the little missed calls icon on the top. Her mother called every day, but Sadie let the calls go most of the time. How many different ways would the woman ask her to give up? How many ways were there to say no?
And then there was Max. After their argument two weeks earlier, he’d called daily, leaving long, detailed messages. He’d offered to help do some of the work on her house, offered to take her to dinner, offered to do whatever he could—short of loaning her money. After a few days, he simply begged her to call him. Lately, though, he wasn’t leaving messages. She’d watch the phone ring, see his number, his name, on her screen. She couldn’t answer. She’d call him back as soon as she had some good news.
She glanced at the space heater and wished it had a remote. She never ran it when she slept, afraid it would somehow ignite and burn the house down with her in it. So every morning, she awoke freezing in her bed. Her eyes opened later and later every day, and even now, at ten-thirty, she wished she could fall back to sleep. Anything to avoid facing her life. The truth rammed into her. Today was the day.
For two weeks, Sadie had applied for jobs, sometimes had two or three interviews a day. And for two weeks, she’d been turned down repeatedly. She couldn’t even get a seasonal job selling toys. The Christmas buying season was almost over, and the jobs were all gone.
The insurance settlement had dwindled. After she’d paid the electrician and had the plumbing serviced, she’d spent the rest trying to survive. Food and transportation, always telling herself that it was all right. She’d get a job and replace the money and fix the house and...and nothing.
She was down to her last fifty dollars.
Sadie let the tears fall onto her pillow as her dream of finding her father faded. If she ate at the shelter, she could hold out for a few weeks, maybe, until the utility bills came due. And then he’d be lost for good.
O God, how will Dad find us if the house is gone? How can I sell, knowing I have no other connection to him?
And what about Barb? Yesterday, the moving truck had loaded the last of their things.
Sadie had plucked up her courage and walked down the street to say goodbye.
Barb’s belly had enlarged, the circles under her eyes darkened. “If that last holdout doesn’t sell, we’re in deep trouble,” she’d said. “The bank will foreclose.” She’d looked at her little yellow house, at the two toddlers playing in the front yard. “Who knows if we’ll ever be able to buy another home?”
Sadie had walked back home, heavy with guilt. She was wrong if she sold, wrong if she didn’t. Time—and her need for food and shelter—had answered the question for her.
Now, wrapped in the comforter, she flipped on the space heater. She showered and dressed, and then sat crossed-legged on the floor in front of the heater, eating a cold breakfast tart and drinking a cup of Earl Gray tea. The food sat like lead in her stomach. She grabbed her coat and the last of her money and left the house.
She caught the eleven-thirty ferry and landed on Manhattan just before noon. From there, she caught the subway to the stop nearest Don Boyle’s office, trying not to think about what she was doing. Thinking about it hurt too much.
She’d heard plenty of sermons over the years about surrendering to God. It was supposed to bring peace. That’s what they said. She didn’t feel peaceful—she felt battle-worn and defeated.
She couldn’t fight God. Today, He seemed like a schoolyard bully, and she, His weak, friendless victim.
Merry Christmas.
&
nbsp; The cold wind blew. She lowered her face and pushed through it until she reached the address on Don Boyle’s business card, the one she’d found crumpled on the floor in her living room a few days earlier. She’d expected him to work in some fancy high-rise. Instead, she found his office in an old brick building in Midtown. Sadie took the wooden staircase to the second floor, her footsteps echoing off the bare walls.
Her heartbeat quickened in a way that had nothing to do with climbing the steps. What was she doing? She had to turn around. She couldn’t sell her house to this guy, not with her father still out there. She’d get a job, she’d survive and fight. Or freeze to death or starve.
And then she saw the photographs.
The upstairs hallway was painted a soothing taupe color, and black and white photographs hung along the walls leading to a glass-paneled door with the words Boyle and Son Construction etched on them.
Was Don the Boyle, or the son? Of course, she didn’t care, did she?
Her gaze returned to the walls, the photographs. She walked to one, studied it. A white-haired woman with a gap-toothed smile posed beside a shopping cart filled with a blanket, a pair of mis-matched shoes, and a canvas bag.
The next picture showed a Hispanic woman about Sadie’s age with three small smiling children. Their mother sat on the curb, her elbows on her knees, looking exhausted.
Sadie had seen these people before. Not these exact people, maybe, but plenty just like them. The jumble of poorly-fitting clothes, the mussed hair, the tattered shoes. These were homeless people.
Sadie moved from picture to picture along the wall. Like a gallery, only these weren’t Monets or Renoirs. They were real people. Suffering people.
The door at the end of the hall opened. “Can I help you?”
A sixty-something lady was eying her.
That knot in her stomach tightened, but it wasn’t as bad as it should’ve been. Maybe the pictures helped. “I’m here to see Mr. Boyle.”
“He’s in a meeting. It’ll be awhile. Maybe you want to get some lunch and come back?”
“That’s all right. I’ll wait.”
“What’s your name, dear?”
“Sadie McLaughlin.”
The woman’s eyebrows disappeared behind her white bangs. “You’re Miss McLaughlin?” She stepped forward and reached out her hand. “We’ve been praying for you. I’m so glad you came. I’m Karla, Don’s assistant.”
Sadie shook her hand while the words bounced around. We’ve been praying for you. She shook it off. “How long do you think he’ll be?”
“Maybe thirty minutes, maybe even an hour. You sure you want to wait?”
“Yeah. What’s with the pictures?”
Karla smiled proudly. “He’s got such a tender heart for the homeless. Whenever he visits a new city, he spends some time at a homeless shelter. You wouldn’t believe how many he’s supported over the years. He’s a great photographer, isn’t he?”
“He took these?”
“Uh-huh. Every one.”
“Are there any more?”
“Sure. Follow me.” The woman led the way to the door at the end of the hall.
Sadie followed, studying the photographs on each side of the hallway closely before entering the office. The waiting room walls were also covered in pictures.
Karla indicated a coffee table surrounded by a short sofa on the far wall and two chairs catty-corner to it. The table had a lower shelf that was piled high with photo albums. “That’s every picture he’s ever taken of the homeless, all over the country.”
“Seriously? Why?”
“You’ll have to ask him that yourself.”
“Mind if I look?”
“Help yourself. Can I get you some coffee?”
“No, thanks.” Sadie settled into the chair nearest the table and grabbed the book on top. They were simple, inexpensive albums, the kind one could buy at any drugstore, with six clear, slide-in sleeves on each page. Unlike the pictures in the hall, these were in color. Sadie studied them carefully, page after page. When she finished the first book, she set it on the chair to her right and grabbed the next.
She found him a quarter of the way through the third book. She recognized his round face first, and then his green eyes. They sparkled just like she’d remembered them. He wore a brown and white plaid, button-down shirt, and she could see the outline of a small rectangle in the breast pocket.
Sadie reached in her coat pocket and fingered the empty breath mint box.
He was leaning against at tree trunk with his arms crossed. His head was tilted back a little, and he wore a wide smile, as if he’d just been laughing. A bright, coral flower hung in the corner of the picture, part of a bush, most of which was off-camera. Her father looked thinner than the last time she’d seen him, skinny, almost. His clothes were tattered, his hair long and matted. He was the most beautiful man she’d ever seen.
12
She ran her finger along the planes of his face until the tears burned her eyes and obscured the picture. Before she dripped onto the book, she wiped them away and sniffed.
“Looks like you found what you were looking for.” Sadie turned to find Mr. Boyle standing behind her.
“I didn’t hear you come in.”
“I didn’t want to interrupt.”
Sadie pointed to the picture. “Any chance you can remember where you took this?”
Mr. Boyle moved the albums from the chair beside her and took their place. “May I?”
She handed it to him reluctantly.
He pulled the photograph from the sleeve and flipped it over, then tilted it so she could read what was written there.
Joyman. FH-Miami. 4/16/08.
“What does that mean, Joyman?”
“A lot of people won’t tell me their names. Sometimes they don’t remember. That’s probably a nickname.”
“What about that—FH-Miami?”
“F.H. is Faith House. It’s a homeless shelter.”
“In Miami?”
He nodded, handing her the picture.
Studying it again, she noticed more wrinkles around her father’s eyes. Laugh lines. He’d always been so happy.
“Who is he?”
“My father. I’ve been looking for him...” A sob choked off her words. She swiped her arm across her eyes. “Do you think he’s still there?”
“Come on. Let’s go find out.”
His assistant smiled gently as they approached. Mr. Boyle asked her to find the number of the Miami shelter before leading Sadie through a door to his office. He waved her to one chair and seated himself in the other.
“Mr. Boyle,” she asked, “why do you do it?”
“Don, please.” He leaned forward a little. “My son. He started using drugs when he was in high school. Ran away from home. I’d search for him, bring him back, but he’d always leave again.”
She remembered the Boyle and Son sign on the door. “Is he home now?”
Don half-smiled. “I truly hope so. He overdosed about ten years ago. Died all alone in a crack house right here in New York. I’d been looking all over the country for him, and he was right here, just a few miles away.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you.”
The phone beeped and Karla’s voice asked, “Shall I put it through for you?”
He picked up the receiver. “Please.” He smiled at Sadie. A moment later, he spoke. “This is Don Boyle in New York. Can I speak to your director?”
Sadie glanced around the simple office while they waited. A burgundy chair sat behind a dark wood desk. The walls were lined with pictures of homes and condos, probably some of the buildings his company had built.
“Hi Mrs. James,” Don said into the phone. “Thanks for taking my call.”
Sadie could just hear a voice through the phone, but she couldn’t make out the words.
“Don’t mention it. Actually, I need your help. I’ve got a picture here, dates back to April of oh-eight. I wondered i
f you’d have any information about this guy. I don’t have his name, but he went by Joyman.” Don nodded, then leaned forward and pressed a button on his phone.
A woman’s voice filled the room. “...oh-eight. I think I remember him. Let’s see here.” There was a long pause. They could hear a keyboard tapping in the background.
“Here we go. Mind if I ask why you’re looking for him?”
“I have a picture I took of him in an album in my office. His daughter was looking through the albums and found the photograph. She’s here with me.”
Don looked at her, so Sadie said, “Hi.”
“Hi, hon. I’m Kate James. What’s your name?”
“Sadie.”
“Oh. I thought it might be Joy. Is that your mom’s name?”
“My middle name is Joy.”
“Ah. We called him Joyman because...well, he was usually just as happy as could be. He’d tell stories and laugh and have fun with the kids. Just like a big teddy bear. But sometimes, he’d get sort of pensive, scared, even. And he’d walk around telling everyone he was looking for ‘his joy.’ He’d say, ‘Have you found my joy,’ or, ‘Did you see my joy? I have to find my joy.’ So I just figured he was talking about someone.”
Sadie’s eyes filled with tears. She tried to stop the sobs, but they welled up, choking her. Don placed a wad of tissues in her hand. She wiped at her face and held one to her nose. Don set a box next to her.
“What else can you tell us?” he asked.
The woman on the phone sighed. “I’m sorry. I wish I had better news for you.”
He wasn’t there any longer. Sadie knew it. She’d found a thread, and she’d lost him again.
“Go on,” Don said.
“You say you took the picture in April of oh-eight?”
Don nodded. “Uh-huh.”
“Joyman passed away in his bed on May tenth of that same year.”
Sadie’s breath whooshed out. “Are you sure?” Her words were squeaky, high. Incoherent, but apparently the woman understood.
“I’m so sorry, hon.”
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe.
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