Broken Things (Faded Photograph Series)

by Andrea Boeshaar

  Logan showed him to a seat, then excused himself, stating he needed to fulfill some pre-service duties. Jack sat down and made himself comfortable. In the past, he’d walked into countless situations and hadn’t ever been afraid to face the unknown, but somehow he felt anxious and a tad self-conscious and he waited for things to begin. Even so, he sensed the Lord wanted him here today and Jack wasn’t about to ignore the prompting. In the past few days, Jesus had made Himself real again to him, and Jack mourned the decades he had gone without hearing the Savior’s voice.

  Jack decided to take his mind off his discomfort. He took in his surroundings. No pews lined the aisles, but instead the congregation sat in padded seats, similar to those found in theaters. Down in front, tubs of flowers graced the space surrounding the pulpit. Behind the colorful floral arrangements, the choir quickly filled up their designated area and Jack spotted Marilee among the members. Narrowing his gaze, he watched her for several moments. She was a pretty gal with a sweet disposition and a desire to honor Christ. Jack had no doubt that she would make Logan happy.

  And they’ll make me a grandpa. Jack winced. He hadn’t thought about that. He didn’t feel old enough to be a grandfather!

  “Jack! I don’t believe it. Logan said you were here, but I thought he was kidding.”

  Steve stood in the aisle to his left. Jack grinned at his younger brother. He figured his return to church would mean that he’d have to swallow that proverbial “humble pie” around his family members. But he also figured they’d find it in their hearts to forgive him and welcome him back into the fold.

  Nora had tears in her eyes. “I don’t believe it.” She shook her head. “Jack, it’s so wonderful to see you here. Steve and I pray for you every night.”

  “Looks like it paid off.” Jack stood and indicated to the seats beside his. “Plenty of room. Want to join me?”

  Nora nodded. “Of course we do!”

  Jack moved out of the way and she went in first, followed by Veronica who gave her uncle a tight grin. Ricky scooted in next, then Rachel and finally Steve.

  “So…”

  Jack glanced at his brother.

  Steve let out a puff of air. “Man, I’m so flabbergasted, I don’t even know what to say!”

  “I know. I’m a little flabbergasted myself.” Jack stared straight ahead.

  “Jack…what happened? I mean…” Steve blinked. “You’re probably going to say it’s none of my business, and you’d be right, except I can’t help it. I’ve got a ton of questions.”

  “Maybe I can answer those questions later…after church.”

  “I feel like I’ve finally got my brother back.” Steve’s eyes grew misty.

  Jack turned away, tamping down his own emotions. “Knock it off, will ya?

  Nora sat forward. “Jack, will you join us for lunch? I put a roast in the oven before we left.” Her hazel eyes held a caring light.

  He marveled at all the offers she made over the years. Christmas dinners, Easter, Thanksgiving…Jack had always declined and, instead, volunteered to work. It just seemed easier to patrol the streets of Oakland Park than allow himself some measure of happiness with his family. In hindsight, Jack realized he’d been serving a self-imposed sentence, instead of accepting God’s grace and forgiveness. But as far as family was concerned, it was a wonder Nora even spoke to him, let alone continued to invite him over.

  “Sure, I’ll come for lunch,” he replied at last. “Thanks for asking.”

  “I always ask.”

  “I know.” He swallowed a chuckle. “But I have to warn you, Logan wants Marilee and her parents to join us.”

  “The more the merrier. Is Allie here?”

  “Haven’t seen her.” Jack sat back and gazed at the pulpit. Moments later realized he was clenching his jaw. He forced himself to relax. He glanced back at Nora and decided to come clean. “As of Friday night, Allie and I are…just friends. Nothing more.”

  “Doesn’t sound like it was a mutual decision,” Steve said.

  “It wasn’t.” Jack crossed his leg as music began to play. “But we’ll discuss that later, too, okay?”

  “Okay,” Nora replied.

  Murmurs from the congregation subsided till all was quiet. The music director raised his hands and the choir began to sing…

  * * *

  After attending service with Lisa Canton, her coworker, Allie insisted upon treating her and her family to lunch. The Cantons were a sweet family who made Allie feel like she fit right in. Leah, the youngest, talked her ear off about the books she’d read and Tim impressed her by listing his accomplishments in both academics and music. Lisa and her husband Mike were doing a fine job raising their children.

  After lunch, Allie said her goodbyes and made her way back to the hotel. But as she drove by the turn off for Arbor Springs, she decided to stop and visit Cynthia Matlock. Spending the remainder of the afternoon encouraging a dying woman appealed to Allie more than idling the hours away alone in the solitude of her suite.

  Besides, she hadn’t seen the poor dear since Thursday evening. Oh, Lord, she didn’t die over the weekend, did she? I hope I’m not too late.

  She parked and, entering the facility, Allie found the security guard lounging in the lobby watching a football game. He was so engrossed with the TV that he didn’t notice when she walked by. Troubled, Allie considered several hypothetical situations. Anyone crazy person could walk in and jeopardize patients’ and employees’ safety. Something had to be done.

  As she pushed the elevator button, Allie thought of Jack. Would he consider putting together some sort of training seminar for Arbor Springs’ security personnel? He knew the laws and safety techniques, but would he be interested? And would she want to work with Jack in that capacity? His presence at Arbor Springs would mean their paths would cross often―and, at the moment, Allie wasn’t even sure if they were on speaking terms.

  She prayed for the Lord’s guidance as the elevator doors opened to the fourth floor. She stepped off, engrossed in her thoughts. In some respects, Jack reminded Allie too much of Erich. Or had it been Erich who reminded her of Jack in the first place? Odd, but up until this very moment, she’d never seen the resemblance in the two men.

  Allie shook off her musings as she entered Room 8. Cynthia lay in her bed, her eyes closed, but breathing. Relief flooded Allie. Standing at her bedside, she touched Cynthia’s frail hand. Several moments passed before the other woman’s eyes fluttered open.

  “Angel…”

  “Hello.” Allie acted cheerful. “How are you feeling today?”

  Cynthia stared at her for some time, as if trying to focus her eyes. “I…I’ve been remembering,” she rasped, “and I…I know who you are.”

  “Well, of course you do. I’ve been coming to see you for a good part of a month.” Was she delirious again? It had happened before.

  “Do you know who…who I am?” The words came with great effort.

  “Yes. You’re Cynthia Matlock.”

  “Wh-when I was a girl…” She struggled to inhale. “…folks called me Cindy.”

  “Do you want me to call you Cindy?”

  “No…I mean…it doesn’t matter.” She paused to suck in a breath. “Wh-when I left home, I…I changed my name. I…I wanted to be a singer.”

  Oh, not this again. Allie smoothed back Cynthia’s thin, scraggly bark-brown hair. “Shh…just rest now. Don’t talk.”

  “You…you don’t know who I am, do you?”

  Retracting her hand, Allie sighed. How should she reply?

  “I…I remember you. I saw…saw your picture. Allie…I remember you.”

  “Yes, I’m Allie.” What picture is she talking about? Was it here at Arbor Springs? Had she seen me on the news weeks ago?

  “You’re the one…the one Jack couldn’t get over.”

  A taser gun couldn’t have shocked her more. “What?”

  A hint of a smile curved the dying woman’s lips.“Y-you don’t know me, do you?” S
he fought for her next breath. “I…I can tell.”

  Tingles of apprehension climbed Allie’s spine. “Are you referring to Jack Callahan?”

  “Uh-huh. He was my…my first husband.”

  For a moment, the world whirled around and Allie held onto the bedrail for support. She struggled for her bearings. It couldn’t be possible? Really? She peered down at the woman in disbelief. This? This hollowed-out shell of a woman was Jack’s ex-wife?

  “If Jack didn’t…didn’t send you, then you…you must really be sent from God.”

  “Jack didn’t send me.” Allie barely got the words out.

  “I can tell by the look—” She wheezed. “—the look on your face.”

  Her shock managed for the time being, Allie became increasingly concerned by Cynthia’s inability to breathe properly. “I’m going to get your nurse.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Jack hadn’t ever been the sort of man to unburden himself to others. He trusted only a select few people in his life with his personal business. But today Steve and Nora joined the ranks as confidants. They’d been granted some time alone since Logan, Marilee, and her folks left to do some shopping. Jack never saw two women so excited about planning a wedding and he was proud of Logan for being such a good sport. Stan Domotor, Marilee’s father, seemed like a pretty tolerant guy too, and that impressed Jack. Any man who could put up with female sensibilities won his instant respect. That was something Jack needed to learn, and it was a long time in coming.

  Glancing at his wristwatch, he realized, and much to his embarrassment, that he’d been blabbering on about himself for nearly two hours. During that time, he’d managed to divulge his innermost thoughts about Allie. He wanted to win her heart. But how?

  “I think you should send her roses,” Jack’s niece interject from the stairwell.

  “Veronica, this is an adult conversation and you were not invited!” Nora scolded her oldest daughter.

  “Yeah, well, I’m hardly a baby.” She stood from the carpeted step on which she’d been sitting and strolled into the living room with a defiant lift of her chin. “You can’t just send me out to ride my bike or play basketball like you did the other two.”

  Irked by her eavesdropping, Jack narrowed his gaze at Ronnie. After a few moments, however, his irritation vanished and he couldn’t contain a chuckle. Her tenacity reminded him of himself. Oh, Lord, it must run in the family.

  Settling back into the love seat, Jack patted the empty cushion beside him. “You’ve got some advice for me, Ronnie? Let’s hear it.”

  With suspicion shadowing her features, she cautiously made her way over to him and sat down. She folded her slender arms tightly, and Jack sensed her discomfort. Perhaps she’d been looking for an argument, a chance to exert her independence and thwart her parents’ authority. Typical teenage tactic, but he’d called her bluff.

  “Well?” he prompted with an amused grin.

  Veronica looked up at him, uncertain at first, but then a challenging spark lit her brown eyes. His pesky niece was blossoming into a very lovely young lady.

  “You don’t have a romantic bone in your body, do you?”

  Steve cleared his throat. “Ronnie, change your tone. You’re to respect your uncle.”

  “Stay out of this.” Jack’s voice took on a facetious note.

  Steve raised his hands as if in surrender, and Jack looked back at his niece.

  “I think romance is overplayed.” He could be brutally honest too. “It’s not real life.”

  “Define ‘real life,’ Uncle Jack.”

  He grinned. “Real as in not depicted in those silly romances you read.”

  Ronnie gave him a patronizing stare. “This has nothing to do with what I do or do not read.”

  “Good comeback.” Jack looked over at Nora and gave her a wink. She likely worried that her smart aleck daughter would offend him. But Jack rather enjoyed the sparing. “All right. I’ll confess. I don’t have a single romantic bone in my body.”

  “Well, that’s gotta change if you want Mrs. Littenberg to marry you.”

  “Who says I want to get married?”

  “Everyone wants to get married.” Veronica’s tone said he was dumber than a stick..“I mean, who wants to be lonely and grow old?”

  “You can take her over your knee anytime, Jack,” Steve offered. “I won’t even call the cops.”

  Jack rolled his eyes. “What are you talking about? I rarely took Logan over my knee, and he deserved it more than Ronnie.”As he stretched his arm out across the settee, his niece seemed to relax.“Do you have a boyfriend?”

  “No. Dad won’t allow me to date.”

  “Good for him.”

  Veronica clicked her tongue. “This isn’t about me, Uncle Jack. It’s about you.”

  “Oh, yeah. Right.”

  “If you want to be more than just friends with Mrs. Littenberg, then you should send her roses.”

  Jack wagged his head. “Too expensive.”

  Ronnie rolled her pretty brown eyes. “You’re investing in your future.”

  Jack chuckled, but considered her suggestion. “Allie wouldn’t be impressed by roses.”

  “I beg to differ,” Nora said. “As much as I hate to admit it, my daughter is right. Women like to be…” She searched for the word. “…pursued.”

  “I don’t know about that. I answered plenty of calls from women who were being…pursued, and they didn’t appreciate it.”

  “There’s a difference between stalking and pursuing,” Veronica said.

  Jack turned to her again. “How do you know?”

  She twisted around and swatted his arm. “Stop being difficult! It’s so annoying!”

  Jack looked at Steve. “Maybe I’ll take her over my knee after all.”

  “Be my guest.”

  Ronnie threw her hands in the air. “Oh, forget it. I give up!”

  She stood, but Jack caught her wrist. “I’m sorry. I’ll quit teasing you and I’m a man of my word.” He pulled her back into a sitting position. Maybe he’d send Allie roses just to please his niece. There was just something about Veronica that tugged at his heart―something about her, or the impenetrable look on her face that Jack recognized, although he couldn’t put a name to it. “So you think I should send her roses, huh? What color?”

  Veronica shrugged, acting out her obvious discouragement.

  “I think the traditional red would be nice,” Nora put in.

  “Why don’t you just pick some of those blue things growing in the lot next door and save a ton of money?” Steve suggested with a guffaw that made Jack chuckle too.

  “You two are hopeless.” Veronica crossed her arms.

  Nora nodded. “Yes, they are. And now we’ve agreed on something twice in the same day, Ronnie. What do you know?”

  She bestowed on her mother a rare smile.

  “You’re lovely when you do that,” Jack said honestly. “You should smile more often.”

  Veronica swung her gaze at him. Surprise splayed across her features. For a moment, she didn’t know how to respond.“Thanks, Uncle Jack. That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”

  * * *

  The sun began its descent in the western sky. Allie watched it through the windows in Room 8. She glanced over her shoulder and saw that Cynthia rested comfortably now since the clear plastic tubes containing a flow of oxygen had been placed in her nostrils. Before she’d drifted off, however, Cynthia, also once known as Roxi Callahan, managed to tell Allie more than she ever wanted to know about her marriage to Jack. But there was one aspect of the tragic tale that went ignored. Logan. Cynthia never mentioned the son whom she abandoned, and Allie found herself having little or no respect for a woman who would leave her baby.

  Turning back to the sunset, she fought off the self-righteousness. She knew she shouldn’t judge Cynthia Matlock. They’d experienced similar situations. Hadn’t the woman confessed to being afraid of Jack? Allie, herself, could rel
ate to a degree. She’d been terribly frightened of Erich at times. But where Cynthia had fled, Allie had stayed, and therein laid the difference between them.

  “Angel..?”

  Allie cringed. She wished the woman would stop calling her that! “I’m still here.”

  Cynthia glanced in her direction. “Did you and Jack ever get married?”

  “Nope. We’re just…friends.” Allie hated the terse note in her voice. But she couldn’t seem to help it. Part of her was angry with this woman while the other part commiserated with her. “I married someone else, although my husband is dead now. I have one son named Nicholas.”

  Stepping toward the bedside, Allie continued, “I know you and Jack had a son―have a son. His name is Logan. I’ve met him. He’s a fine man. A youth pastor. He’s going to get married soon.”

  Huge tears welled in Cynthia’s eyes, then spilled down the sides of gaunt face. Allie felt a pinch of remorse for intentionally hurting someone who was so obviously already wounded.

  “My baby…”

  “You remember him?”

  “Of course. I’ve been thinking about him…”

  “Why did you leave him?”Allie whispered as tears of her own filled her eyes.

  “I didn’t mean to. I planned to come back for him, but Jack…” Cynthia sniffed. “…Jack threatened me.”

  Big deal. Erich had threatened Allie plenty of times, and Jack’s temperament wasn’t nearly as formidable.

  “Did Jack ever hit you? Hurt you…physically?”

  A long pause “No, but I was young and got it in my head somehow that he’d hired someone to kill me.”

  “Nonsense. Jack would never do something like that.”

  “I know that now. But you probably don’t believe me. You’re his friend and he always loved you.” It seemed to take every ounce of strength she possessed to speak. “Of course you’d take his side.”

  “No.” Allie shook her head. “I’m not taking sides. I’m merely trying to understand how you could have left your child.”

  “I wasn’t thinking straight. But now…now I know that Jack treated me better than the other two jerks I married. Compared to them, Jack was a royal prince.”