A Mother's Gift (Love Inspired)

by James, Arlene

  “Almost three,” Dixie amended. “Three in early July.”

  “Still, even for a three-year-old, he’s a tall one.”

  “Swing,” Clark said. “My swing broke.”

  “That’s too bad. A boy needs his own swing.”

  The man gave Clark his full attention, and Dixie watched with dismay as her little boy honed in on that, like a sunflower that lifts its head to the noon sunlight. Perhaps her mother was right and Clark did need a fatherly influence beyond that of his grandpa. Was that what God was trying to tell her with her dream?

  It could not be anything else. Still, this man’s resemblance to the fellow in her dream was a figment of her imagination, nothing more. She was quite sure of it. In fact, she refused to believe that the dream contained any message at all. And yet, as she hurried him away, her son looked back at that stranger on the bench with undisguised longing.

  Certain programs and organizations provided wholesome male influence for children, didn’t they? Dixie made a mental note to check out what might be available in the Lawton area. Mark would not want their son to suffer for lack of male attention and guidance any more than she did.

  Then again, Mark would want to be the one to give him everything that he needed.

  Oh, Mark, she thought, I’m so sorry.

  Her parents were waiting in the foyer when Dixie led Clark, in his new Sunday best, through the door of the church where she had grown up, found Christ, been baptized, married and buried her husband.

  “How handsome!” Vonnie exclaimed, dashing tears from her eyes as she stooped to embrace her grandson.

  “Thank you, sugar lump,” Sam whispered, wrapping his arms around Dixie for a quick hug.

  Vonnie straightened Clark’s clip-on bow tie and brushed the buttons of his checked shirt with an adoring hand before Sam swept the boy up, posing with him so Vonnie could compare their navy-blue bow ties. Sam’s had a stripe of red running through it. A collection of crazy bow ties was Sam’s claim to fame, so of course Dixie had chosen a sedate version of the same for her son. Vonnie was still gushing over them when the outer door opened behind Dixie.

  Vonnie turned, exclaiming, “Bess! And Joel. My, how wonderful you look.” She moved forward for hugs. Dixie turned to encounter the top of a dark head of short, inky-black hair. Even before he moved back from the embrace and lifted his face, Dixie felt her skin prickle with gooseflesh.

  “You!” she gasped. “You’re Joel Slade!”

  “Dixie? It was you in the park!” he exclaimed, his smile as wide as his face. He put out his hands, patting the air as if hunting for the boy. “And my little buddy,” he said. “That would be Clark, yes? How wild is that?”

  To Dixie’s horror, two things happened at once. Clark launched himself at Joel Slade, his “friend” from the park, and she realized what had escaped her before—Joel Slade was not only the man in the park and, arguably, the man in her dream: Joel Slade was also blind.

  Joel laughed, hugging the warm little body tight. So this was Clark. Clark!

  “You’ve already met,” Vonnie Wallace said.

  “Imagine that!” his mother chimed in, excitement in her voice.

  Despite his sternest warnings to himself, Joel couldn’t help sharing her excitement just a little. To think that it had been Dixie Wallace and Clark in the park! It seemed unbelievable.

  Correction, not Dixie Wallace. It was Dixie Stevenson now. Why had he never learned to think of her by her married name? Maybe because he’d last seen her in person almost a decade ago. He smiled, picturing her at seventeen.

  She’d been a fresh beauty back then, with her long hair hanging down her back in a rich, rumpled swath of browns, golds and bronzes, her gently arched brows slightly darker. The widow’s peak at the top of her forehead had emphasized the heart shape of her face, with its narrow chin, plump lips and large, dark eyes. He hadn’t been able to tell their color from across the parking lot, but he knew from her school photos that they were an unusual shade of spruce-green. She had been pretty enough back then to make him wonder if he was doing the right thing by joining the Marine Corps. Had it not been for the tall, slender fellow on whose arm she had hung, Joel might even have tried to attract her interest back then, as his mother had always urged him.

  Joel’s senses had told him several things even as he’d accepted the boy’s weight. For one thing, the boy hadn’t come from the direction of his mother’s voice. For another, a fond, familiar odor, like clean leather and fresh motor oil, had touched Joel’s nostrils. He’d noticed it the first time they’d met since his return home. Joel smiled again, shifting the boy so he could put out his right hand.

  “Sam? Is that you?”

  The older man’s burly mitt grasped Joel’s. Stiff and dry, calloused from years of toil, it conveyed a genuine welcome, as had Vonnie’s hug.

  “How you doing there, Joel? Glad you could make it.”

  Joel turned his head slightly to dampen the sounds of people passing through and gathering in the foyer: footsteps, voices, sniffles here and there, gusting breaths, the rustle of fabrics. “It’s good to be back, Sam. I’ve missed this church.” He caught the sound of gulping and trembling breaths nearby. Dixie? Almost certainly.

  He knew then that he had shocked her with more than just his identity. She hadn’t realized that he was blind. He’d wondered about it that second time in the park. Given the way she’d reacted at their first meeting—the stunned silences, the gasping and gulping, the swiftness of her subsequent movements—he’d thought that she’d realized that he’d lost his sight and was repelled by it. After the second meeting, though, he’d wondered. Something about her reaction at that time had made him think that she had missed the signs. If he had known who she was, he would have told her, but even after two years he wasn’t comfortable baldly announcing his blindness to every stranger, not that she’d given him much opportunity for that.

  The boy’s arms tightened about Joel’s neck, and he felt that little head lower to his shoulder. At the same time, he felt her move closer. He was sure it was Dixie. He recognized the floral smell of her shampoo and wondered how long her hair was. She had worn it very long as a girl, but it had barely touched her shoulders in the last photo he’d seen. Was it the same length or had she cut it even shorter, as so many busy moms seemed to do?

  Shutting off that line of thought, he concentrated on the boy. That warm little body cradled against his chest made gladness rise inside of Joel. The worst part of blindness for him was the isolation. He had never been so aware of his own skin as he was once he could no longer see beyond it. He literally craved touch now.

  Patting the boy’s back, he said, “How are you, buddy? Been to the park lately?” A nod against his shoulder. Joel winked in the general direction of Sam. How many times since he’d been back had Sam proudly told him that his grandson had been named after him? “I think it’s time for an actual introduction.” He found the boy’s right hand with his and gave it a shake. “You are Clark Samuel Stevenson, and I am Joel Andrew Slade.” A piano began to play. Joel instantly shut it out. “You can call me—” The boy was plucked abruptly from his grasp. “Joel,” he finished.

  At the same time, Dixie said, “Mr. Slade doesn’t need to stand around holding you, Clark. Besides, it’s time to go in.”

  Mr. Slade. Joel felt a flash of angry disappointment, even though he’d assumed that his blindness would repel her, which was one reason he’d foolishly asked his mother to keep it from her. He’d first told himself that it was because he was nothing to her and then because a mourning woman didn’t need to know of anyone else’s concerns. The truth was that he hadn’t wanted any strikes against him before he even showed up in person.

  Why it should matter, he didn’t know. It was just that he couldn’t get that face out of his memory, those two faces, one of them glowing with happiness, the other tiny, wrinkled and newborn. Some days he wished he’d never seen that photo of the two of them in that hospital bed.


  His mother’s arm slipped through his, giving it a supportive, encouraging squeeze. He returned it, plastering a smile on his face. Assuming that they were all about to move into the sanctuary, he stepped forward, only to feel a variety of warm presences. Sam. Dixie. Now Vonnie. Where, he wondered, was Clark? Murmurs and whispers told him that Dixie’s parents had flanked her, one on either side.

  “Ready?” Vonnie.

  “Just think about today.” Sam.

  “We’re right here.”

  They moved off, and Bess urged Joel to follow.

  “A time for worship and celebration.” Sam again.

  “Take my hand.” Vonnie.

  “Gotta happen sooner or later, sugar lump.”

  “Clark.” This from Dixie. “Remember what I told you. Best behavior.”

  “Okay, Mommy.” Joel pinpointed the voice. Clark was walking along in front of his mother.

  Joel heard people greeting Dixie and her parents. It became clear that Dixie had not been around the church in some time. She’d been part of the youth group when this had last been his regular church home, which meant that they had attended separate services, not that he had been all that faithful. After high school, he’d floundered a bit, halfheartedly attending junior college with no real idea of what he wanted to do with his life before settling on the Marine Corps.

  Someone thrust a paper into his hand. A man called Bess by name.

  “My son, Joel.” She gave his hand a furtive tap, and he lifted it, felt it grasped, shaken. “Son, this is Emmitt Lively.”

  “How do you do?”

  “Good to meet you.”

  They entered the larger room. Joel felt a moment of uncertainty as he sought to get his bearings. A guitar had joined the piano, but the sound seemed to be coming from different directions. Then he realized that the guitar was miked. Voices, movement and smells swamped him from every side. His mother smoothly steered his progress until they came to a halt. She reached out, making sure that his hand fell upon the end of a pew at the same time hers did. Then she gave him a little nudge on the hip. Another touch showed him the area through which he would need to move. Turning, he edged his way into the pew and kept moving until he sensed another body.

  He felt behind him and sat, hearing a little voice say, “Joe?”

  “Shh.”

  “Joe?”

  He leaned forward, bumping shoulders with Sam, who said, “Come here, pal.”

  “Make him keep still,” Dixie muttered.

  There was a tussle, and a little shoe knocked against Joel’s knee.

  “Joe?” Clark said again. Joel smiled in the boy’s direction, against a background of hushing sounds, and then a man’s voice welcomed them to the service. After a few remarks, he asked everyone to stand for the opening hymn. Music swelled, live music from the sound of it, many more instruments than the old organ and piano that he remembered. Joel started to rise and found himself nearly knocked back down by a small body.

  “Whoa,” Sam said. Joel chuckled, gathering the boy into his arms once more. Dixie hissed from the other side of her father, but Sam just put his head next to Joel’s and muttered, “Looks like you two are already old buddies.” Joel nodded, smiling, as the congregation began to sing. “What?” Sam said, apparently talking to Dixie. “He’s fine. Kids always go for the new face in the group.”

  Clark touched Joel’s mouth then, as if asking why he wasn’t singing. “Not a song I know,” he explained softly.

  Next to him, his mother’s smoky alto lifted in praise. It was a beautiful sound to Joel, all those voices and instruments, with his mother’s voice next to him. He pressed a hand between Clark’s delicate shoulder blades and inhaled deeply, every cell aware that he stood in the house of God. A sense of peace, of true homecoming, crept over him, followed by the gentle elation of gratitude.

  I am still a man, he thought, feeling that small body pressed to his, and God is still God. No disappointment and no challenge could overcome those two facts.

  Dixie maneuvered past her father as the song ended and everyone once more took their seats for announcements. Sam grumbled, but he slid over when she motioned.

  Ignoring her, Clark found something interesting about Joel’s ear but then quickly moved on to his jaw, muttering, “Pop-Pop’s jaw picky,” as he patted Joel’s chin.

  Joel chuckled, and with a deep breath Dixie fought down a rising sense of irrational indignation. Sam’s jaws were bristly and prickly even when freshly shaved, so it was no wonder that Clark was fascinated by Joel’s smooth face, though given the blue-gray shadow beneath Joel’s skin, Dixie couldn’t imagine that he would stay freshly shaved for long.

  Mark’s beard had glistened rusty-brown, she remembered with a shock. How long had it been since she’d even thought of that? She glanced at the altar, a plain, heavy, oblong table of pale wood, and the vacant space before it. She closed her eyes, expecting horrific images of that day. When they did not materialize, guilt and resentment assailed her. She immediately pulled Clark into her lap.

  Joel Slade frowned, and Clark looked at her curiously, his slender brows drawn together tightly.

  “Be still,” she whispered. He babbled something she couldn’t quite discern. Ignoring it, Dixie fixed her gaze straight ahead, prepared for grief and sadness.

  Not thirty seconds later, Clark attempted to crawl over into Joel’s lap again. Caging him with her arms, she kept him with her, but then the congregation was called to the opening prayer. Standing with Clark in her arms, Dixie bowed her head and tried to concentrate on the poetic words of the pastor, but Clark squirmed and soon became heavy. She dipped slightly, intending to stand him on the pew, but the scamp wiggled away, and when she looked up, he was once more in Joel Slade’s arms. This time he played with the Windsor knot in Joel’s blue silk tie.

  The combination of sky-blue silk against a slightly paler shirt was stunning with Joel’s blue-black hair and black suit. Dixie wondered if Bess had chosen them for him, and just the fact that she wondered about something so personal irritated and perturbed her.

  When they sat down again after the prayer, she pulled Clark back onto her lap and tried to occupy him by taking out an envelope and letting him draw on it with a pen. He kept leaning over to show it to Joel, who had no idea what was going on. Embarrassed, she tried to pass Clark to Sam, but Clark put up a noisy fight, which she had to curtail by giving up and placing a hand lightly over his mouth. That was when Joel Slade reached over and literally commandeered her son.

  Dixie’s mouth fell open at his high-handedness, and because he couldn’t see her glower, she closed it with an audible snap. She spent the rest of the entire first half of the service fulminating, especially as Clark sat quietly on Joel’s lap, his back to Joel’s chest. Anytime he became restless, Joel whispered something into his ear, and Clark instantly quieted. Dixie could not control her resentment, telling herself that it wasn’t fair.

  That should be Mark, she thought. That should be Mark.

  When the preaching started, Clark became restive again. She produced the paper and pen as inducement, but once Clark had them, he moved right back onto Joel’s lap. Not content to simply scribble by himself, at one point, Clark offered the pen to Joel, poking him in the chin.

  Mortified, Dixie hauled him onto her lap, cupped a hand over his ear and whispered, “Stop it, Clark. Joel can’t see what you’re doing. He can’t see at all.” In an effort to help him understand, she placed her hand over his eyes. “Joel can’t see.”

  Joel frowned at Dixie, and none of it meant a thing to Clark, anyway. He shrugged off her hands and slid to the floor, banging up against Joel’s knees. By that time, Joel had produced a small metal object about the size of a credit card. Taking a hardback hymnal from the pew pocket, he placed it on his lap. Then he found the open envelope on the pew next to him and flattened it atop the book, running his fingertips over it until he somehow located a clean spot. He placed the metal card on the paper, and Dixie saw that a sm
all rectangle had been cut out of the center of the card, with tiny notches marking the long edges, top and bottom. A whisper in Clark’s ear got Joel the pen. He then very carefully, using both hands, wrote Clark’s name inside the rectangle.

  Clark reclaimed the pen and spent the next twenty minutes leaning against Joel’s knees while he scribbled inside the tiny rectangle, moving it every time he’d filled the spot. The paper was practically black by the time they rose for the closing hymn.

  Dixie plucked the pen from Clark’s grasp, but before she could pull him into her arms, Joel had set aside the book and paper and taken him up. Fascinated by the fact that Joel actually sang this time, the hymn apparently being familiar to him, Clark stared into the man’s face. After a moment he reached up and touched Joel’s eye with his finger. Joel flinched, but then he smiled and actually bowed his head for Clark’s exploration.

  “They’re there,” Dixie heard him whisper to the boy. “They just don’t work anymore.”

  Dixie gulped, pity and embarrassment mingling with her feelings of resentment. She hated that Joel was blind, but she also very much disliked the fact that he had so entranced her son, against her wishes, and that she couldn’t even call him on it! How, after all, did she challenge a blind man? The most she could do was take back her son as soon as the service ended.

  “Come on, Clark. We don’t want to burden Mr. Slade. Time to go to Nana’s birthday dinner.”

  Joel Slade’s mouth tightened as he released the boy, but he smiled and said, “Yeah, I’m looking forward to that myself.” Even as his mother laid a hand on his forearm, though, he bent his head and spoke softly to Dixie, his breath stirring the hair over her ear. “And you don’t have to worry about burdening me. I’m blind, not weak. Or stupid.”

  With that, he yielded to his mother’s silent entreaty and followed her out of the pew, leaving Dixie with her face burning while her son followed him with hungry, worshipful, heartbreaking eyes. She was halfway up the aisle before she realized that she had hardly thought of Mark’s funeral at all.