I opened the Bible at random, thinking, My eyes are going to land on the perfect, applicable verse to comfort me.
But no, it didn’t work that way. So I flipped pages and searched for verses I liked, ones such as in Psalms, chapter ninety: “. . . and under his wings thou shalt trust. His truth shall compass thee with a shield: thou shalt not be afraid of the terror of the night.”
The terror of the night.
Yes, I thought, that’s what this is. Never-ending terror of the night.
Then I found myself searching for the story of David and Goliath. I located it in Kings, and read with interest, envisioning Abner as the giant and Clay as David. But before I finished reading, a thought hit me, and I spoke without thinking. “Were you Catholic once, too?”
Looking up, I saw Clay’s eyes were still closed. I had forgotten he was sleeping. My gaze dropped and I returned to reading.
“Yes,” he answered unexpectedly. I looked up to see he had opened his eyes. “What makes you ask?”
I touched the Bible. “Your reference to David and Goliath. That and—” I hesitated— “I guess the fact that if Abner grew up as a Catholic, I thought you probably did too. Were both your parents Catholic?”
“Yes, but my ma was the only one who went to church regularly.” He crossed his arms. “Go ahead. Ask. I know you want to. Why’d I abandon the faith, right?”
I felt my face flush. “You don’t have to talk about it.”
He shrugged. “Might as well. Nothing else to do.” He stared past me. “With a ma like mine, you’d think I’d have the best chance in the world of turning out right. But you’ve got to figure my dad into the equation, too.” He cleared his throat. “You already heard the abridged version of this story. Here’s the full version.
“It was a Friday in June. I was seven. My dad came home from work, drunk, and began roughing up my ma. Abner joined in, trying to defend her. Yeah, Abner—can you believe it? He was seventeen at the time, made it a fairly good fight, but still, my dad won. He was a big, strong guy. Ma escaped and went to Mass. That was always her solace. Pray, go to Mass. Never call the cops.”
He ran a hand over his rough chin. “She thought I was gone at a friend’s house, but I wasn’t. If she’d known that, she would have taken me with her. My dad caught sight of me, and I guess he still had some anger to work off, ’cause he started in on me. My ma had taught me from a very young age not to resist. To take it, and turn instead to God, to pray things like, ‘My God, my fortress, my refuge, deliver me.’ ” His voice scoffed. “It didn’t work.
“This time, though, it wasn’t too long before my dad passed out on his bed. So I’m lying there on the ground, looking up at my ma’s little Blessed Virgin altar—the Mary statue and vigil candle—and stupid kid that I was, what did I do? I lit the candle and said a prayer for my ma, and even my dad.” He paused. “That was the last time I ever made the sign of the cross.”
I tried to picture him as a little boy and saw a thin kid with unruly hair, a face that would have been cute but for the traces of sorrow, the shadows of fear.
“Afterwards, I left the room and went to bed. Next I knew, I was waking up to smoke. Thick, choking smoke. The house was on fire. I thought I was a goner for sure, but then, who comes crawling through the smoke to find me?”
I held my breath.
“Abner. Abner dragged me out just in time. He saved my life. When the fire department arrived, it was too late. They couldn’t rescue my dad.”
His throat worked. I could tell he was trying to recount the story in a detached manner, as if it no longer affected him, but it obviously did.
“The cause of the fire was a candle,” he said woodenly. “The vigil candle. What an answer to a prayer, hey? I thought I’d blown the thing out, but obviously I forgot.” He spread his hands. “So there you have it. I killed my own dad and I lost the faith at age seven. Seven! Most Catholic kids are barely preparing for First Communion at that age. They’re fresh with innocence, hope, and zeal. Not me. Those things died in me that night.”
He lowered his eyelids. “My ma missed my dad, despite all his faults. Of course she told me she didn’t blame me for the fire, but she never looked at me the same after it happened. I tried to stay Catholic, tried to please her, but it just never worked. Maybe because deep down, I was glad that my dad was gone. I’d have these nightmares of him, though. He’d appear at the foot of my bed, burning like an inferno, cursing, screaming at me that it was my fault he was dead, and I was going to burn with him in hell.” He chuckled stiffly. “Every once in a while, I still have that dream.”
I shivered and cast a quick glance through the shadows, as if expecting a burning phantasm to appear.
Clay raked a hand through his hair and the brown strands stood up in all directions. “So I lost God, lost my parents . . . all in one night. All I had was Abner, and now he’s gone too.” He peered up at the dirt ceiling. “Sometimes I think he should have just left me in that burning house.”
I bit my lip. “God obviously had other plans for you.”
“Plans? Like what? To live like an atheist and be pushed around by my older brother for the rest of my life? To watch my ma die in agony?”
“God—”
“Cut the God talk. I don’t have patience for Him. Where was He when my ma was sobbing herself to sleep for years? Where was He when I was trembling in fear of my dad’s fists? Where was He when I was lying on the floor in pain after a beating, crying my eyes out?”
“He was there,” I whispered, “crying with you.”
“Bull.”
“I’m sorry if—”
He held up his hand. “Don’t,” he said harshly. “I see that look in your eyes. Don’t pity me.” He drew his back up stiffly against the wall. “I only told you because you wanted to know why I left your precious religion. Now you know, let’s change the subject.”
“Fine.”
But apparently, neither one of us had anything else to talk about. We fell into a brooding silence, and though I kept staring down at the still-open Bible, I couldn’t read it. My vision was blurry.
* * *
At some point I realized Clay had turned his body so he was facing away from me, facing the wall. Feeling powerless, I watched him discover the metal spoon that Max had half immersed in a pile of dirt. My heart faltered a moment, then picked up its pace as Clay took the spoon and, with no questions, began digging where Max had left off.
I observed him silently for a long time before I crossed the room to see he had already made noticeable progress. His forehead glistened as if he was actually working up a sweat. I watched him for a few minutes, then asked something that had been on my mind. “Why didn’t you tell me Abner used to be in the seminary? Back when you were giving me his life story?”
“Force of habit,” he grunted, still working. “Abner never brings it up. And it’s been so long, I tend to forget. He was a different person back then.”
I nodded slowly and was quiet a few more moments before saying, “Thanks for digging. It’s a long, slow process, isn’t it?”
He nodded.
“I hope Abner doesn’t find out. You won’t—”
He whirled and chucked the spoon across the room, startling me. “No, I won’t tell Abner! Seriously, Charlene—you think I’d do all this work just to turn around and tell him?”
I backed away from the anger snapping in his eyes. His gruff voice resembled Abner’s, and it sent alarm shooting through my veins. I retreated to my blanket, picked up the crucifix, and set it in my lap.
Blinking rapidly, I was glad for the dark. “That’s not what I meant.” I was going to say you won’t ever know how much your help means to us. But I couldn’t say that now. I took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. “You didn’t let me finish.”
His features turned contrite. Thankfully, he didn’t ask me what I’d meant to say.
“I’m sorry I overreacted.” He spoke sadly. “Abner’s just getting to me. Y
ou don’t know all that he’s threatened, the things he’d do. Not just to me, but to others. My ma. You.” He sighed and crossed the room. I almost thought he was going to sit down beside me, but he simply retrieved the spoon and went back to work.
* * *
According to my watch, it was four in the morning on Friday, January second. Neither Clay nor I had slept all night. Clay had quit digging about an hour ago. He admitted it would take at least another day of digging before we could break through.
So we sat on opposite walls, trying not to look at each other. Neither one of us put our heads down. I was tired, dead tired. But my mind wouldn’t let me sleep.
“There’s one very important thing that we still haven’t discussed,” Clay spoke up, “and that’s what we’re going to do when Abner comes back. He doesn’t make idle threats. And I know I don’t need to remind you what he threatened.”
Somehow, my blood ran colder than it already was. “He’ll have no way of knowing,” I practically croaked.
“He’ll know.” Clay shook his head. “Even if I lie, he’ll know. He’s always been able to tell when I’m lying. Any ideas?”
“He’ll have to kill me first,” I whispered.
“What?” The tone of his voice told me he had heard perfectly.
“I said he’ll have to kill me first. He’ll have his gun. I’ll fight him, scratch him, rip his hair—anything to make him mad enough to kill me.”
“No.”
“Yes. It’s the only way out for me.”
“I won’t let it come to that.”
Right. You’ll stop him, like you’ve done before. But I kept my mouth closed, suddenly aware that I was living the last hours of my life.
“The crucifix,” he said. “We can use that as a weapon.”
I didn’t envision it working, not against the gun, but agreed anyway.
“Hide it behind your back,” he continued, “while I try to reason with him.”
Reason? With Abner? I swallowed a wan laugh.
“It may not come to it,” Clay said, “but if it does, I’ll attack him. Then you can join in. Together, we just might take him.”
My front teeth pressed into my bottom lip. “But when he comes down, he’ll tie the ladder up so we can’t reach it. Like before. What good is taking Abner down if we can’t get out of here?”
He let out a long breath, thinking. “The hole. We finish digging through to the cellar and escape that way.”
A new thought worried me. “If Abner comes down here, he’s likely going to see the hole right away and know what we’ve been up to. It’s so much more obvious now.”
We were silent while we mulled over this new complication. Suddenly, Clay began tossing armfuls of dirt back into the cavity. “I’m just filling it loosely. With the shadows, I don’t think he’ll notice it. But it’ll be easy enough to toss this stuff back out when he’s gone.”
I eyed the spot critically. “Maybe it will work.”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Let’s both move to the base of the ladder, against that wall. Then when he comes down, he’ll focus on us right away and turn his back to the rest of the room.”
“Good idea.” I moved immediately, bringing the crucifix. While Clay finished with the dirt, our light blinked out. “Uh-oh.” I felt blindly for the small flashlight. “Batteries must be dead,” I concluded after several attempts to turn the light back on.
“We should keep it dark down here anyway for when Abner comes. The less light, the better if we don’t want him to spot the hole.”
“True.” I shivered. I felt so much more vulnerable in the pitch blackness. Closing my eyes, I imagined sunlight and blue skies. Warmth.
“But until then, we could always light those candles.” Clay fumbled in the dark, searching for them.
“Do you have matches?”
“No, but didn’t Abner toss some down with the Bible and crucifix? They’ve got to be around here somewhere.” But after searching on hands and knees for several minutes, we both gave up.
I brushed dirt from my hands. “Maybe Abner snatched them back on his way out.”
“Must have.”
We made our way slowly, by feel, to the wall near the ladder, trying not to bump into each other. Then we settled back to wait for Abner.
* * *
My head rested against a firm shoulder, my face lay close to warmth and a musky male scent. I snapped my head up, ripping myself from the fog of sleep, alarmed to realize I’d been slumbering against Clay. I edged away from him, hoping he was sleeping and that he hadn’t been aware the entire time.
Time. What time is it? My watch pulsed away, strapped against my wrist, but I had no heart to check it. Death would come to claim me soon. What more did I need to know?
Nearby, Clay breathed steadily. The rhythm was deep, reassuring, bringing to mind that brief moment between sleep and reality when I had nestled against him and felt safe, secure.
But I would have no more moments like that. I was awake now. Facing death. I sniffed back the pressure of tears, blinked away the prickling in my eyes. Fought the rising sorrow in my throat.
“Charlene?” Clay’s voice came through the darkness, hushed, but not sleepy. Had he been awake all along? I tried to steady my trembling breath.
“Charlene,” he repeated, “are you crying?”
I didn’t want to lie, yet I didn’t want to admit my weakness. “I don’t know . . .” I gave a small laugh. “I’m being stupid. It’s just—there’s so much I haven’t done. I’ve never written a poem. I’ve never read Gone with the Wind.” A wave of remorse crashed over me. Never been in love, never kissed a man. And now I never will.
I swallowed. “I always thought someday I’d have a family of my own. Kids. I’d be a white-haired grandmother in a rocking chair, with all the time I wanted to read the classics and write poems. But now . . . I know someday isn’t going to come.” Hot tears flowed down my cheeks and dripped off my chin.
“Don’t talk like that. You’ll have plenty of time to do those things.”
I shook my head, scattering tears. “No. There’s no point in fooling myself. This is it for me, I know it. When Abner comes down—”
“No.” Clay’s voice was gruff. “No. We have a plan. He won’t hurt you. I won’t let him.”
A small sob escaped my lips.
I felt a touch on my shoulder, barely perceptible through my thick coat. “I know you don’t think much of my protection, but I swear I won’t let him hurt you again. You’ll be okay. Please, Charlene, don’t cry.”
“I’m sorry.” I choked on another sob. “I want to be brave. I want to believe you, but please don’t pretend for my sake. I need to face this. There’s no point in deluding myself.” A vision flitted tauntingly past me, an image of a yellow clapboard house with white shutters and a lush lawn. But no white picket fence. A fence would be too confining. Like a cage.
In the backyard, a chubby toddler tossed a ball in front of a colorful flower garden, while a baby lay cooing on a soft blanket. As I gazed longingly at the vision, it faded to blackness.
“So many things I haven’t done,” I murmured. “And despite all my talk about God . . . I’m afraid to die.”
“You aren’t going to die.”
“You can’t promise me that.” I sniffed and rubbed away my itchy tears. “I always thought I’d have time to prepare. Now I’m afraid to face God. I’m not ready to be judged.” I squeezed the crucifix. “I pray, but I’m still afraid. I know I’m no saint.”
“But you try, and that’s got to count for something. Everything you’ve suffered—you can’t tell me that doesn’t count for something.”
“It’s all too little, too late,” I replied flatly.
I sensed him frowning. “Listen to me, Charlene.” His hand still sat on my shoulder, and I felt an increase in pressure. “I’m far from an authority on this, but even I know that it’s never too late. You’re not dying today, but if you did, you wouldn’t have to be
afraid. God’s merciful.”
“You’re just saying that.” I sucked in a shuddering breath. “You don’t really believe it. How could you? After everything you told me earlier—”
“I’m telling you now,” he broke in. “I may be a lost cause, but you’re not. So don’t give up.”
I swallowed salty tears. “Then you can’t give up either. Please. You’re not a lost cause. You said yourself that it’s never too late.”
He made no reply, but his hand remained on my shoulder, strong and comforting. As my focus shifted from myself, my panic and fear subsided to a manageable level.
Silent moments passed.
But there was one thing I needed to ask. “Clay?” I attempted timidly. “If I die, will you do something for me?”
“You aren’t going to die.”
“But if I do,” I whispered. “Will you . . . do you think you could, if it’s not too much to ask . . . would you say a prayer for me?”
Not even pausing, he answered, “Yes, Charlene. I promise.”
Chapter Seventeen
The door’s metallic clang startled me. My body went rigid, but Clay squeezed my arm reassuringly. We both looked up.
Abner’s large form lumbered down toward us, gun already aimed, flashlight clamped between his teeth. Dropping to the ground with a tremendous thud, he grinned. His hollow eyes remained on us as he tied the rope ladder up out of reach.
“How’s the blushing new bride this morning? I trust you had a wedding night to remember?” He turned his flashlight on Clay’s face like an interrogation spotlight. “Well, boy? Have you made me proud for a change?”
Clay blinked in the overwhelming brightness.
“Lost your tongue?” Abner swept the light over me. “She doesn’t look too emotionally damaged. In fact, she doesn’t look damaged at all. Boy, I think you’ve failed once again.”
“Think what you want. I did what I had to.” A vein pulsed in Clay’s temple. A warning.
Frozen Footprints Page 18
