“Thank you, Mrs. Turner,” Mrs. Dykstra said. “Next to share is Elie’s dad, Darren Turner.”
Elie spun around in her desk. She looked not only surprised, but a bit worried too. Darren gave her a reassuring smile as he walked to the front of the class and sat on the stool in the middle.
“Thank you for accepting my invitation, Mr. Turner,” the teacher continued.
“My pleasure. Hey, kids.”
All the kids in unison gave him an animated, “Hi, Mr. Turner.”
“So I work at the Millstone Nursery. And I’m in charge of the trees, the plants, and the flowers.” Darren glanced over to Heather. “Flowers like chrysanthemums.”
Elie shifted in her seat, still looking nervous.
“There’s a lot more I was planning to tell you about that, but I think my lovely daughter would like me to talk about something else. Until just a few months ago, I was a chaplain for the US Army.”
“And he’s a brave soldier and a hero who saves whole families,” Elie blurted out.
Darren grinned. “Thank you, sweetheart. But I don’t think I’m a hero at all . . .”
He stood up to talk to the kids properly, to make sure he had their full attention.
“But it’s true that every soldier who serves in a war comes home with medals. You just can’t see them all, because some are on the inside.”
Sitting in her chair, Heather wiped away a tear.
“Soldiers believe so strongly that good people deserve to be safe and free, that they risk losing the most valuable of all things to go help them.”
He picked up the box he’d brought and crossed the room to where Heather sat. The kids were all looking, wondering what was inside. Quite a few probably thought it was a gun of some sort.
“To me, some of the biggest heroes are the soldiers’ families,” he said as he neared his wife. “Who also have medals pinned to their hearts. I know my family does.”
As he stood beside Heather, he opened up the box and pulled out the bouquet of chrysanthemums. He gently offered them to her, noting her flushed cheeks and complete look of surprise. All the kids in the class giggled and gave ooohs and ahhhs. Meanwhile, Elie simply beamed in her seat.
“Thanks for having me, kids,” Darren said as the teacher started a round of loud applause.
Elie sprinted over to him and gave him a hug as big as the one she’d given when he first returned home.
3
It was a start. Heather knew that every good thing needed to start somewhere.
She sat next to Darren, their chairs facing Chaplain Rodgers. It was their first meeting with him, their first official counseling session. She hoped it wouldn’t be their last.
“I think the kids understand that you’re sorry for how you treated them,” Chaplain Rodgers explained to Darren. “They believe you.”
Heather saw relief on her husband’s face.
“But for the two of you, I’d like to suggest you start reliving good memories,” he continued. “Remind each other of what you had before you try to build new ones. So Heather? Can you pick one?”
“Sure . . . I guess . . .”
Even though she knew Chaplain Rodgers fairly well, Heather felt awkward about sharing with him. She glanced over at her husband, sitting in a chair only inches away from her, yet still so many miles removed from her life. She forced a smile as she turned to the chaplain.
“The day we met,” she began, “I was taking photos on campus when he drove by, looking at me, just as he ran his motorcycle into my shot of the chrysanthemums. And ruining both the photo and the flowers! He just kept going too, and I thought, Who is this hotshot? But later that day I saw him again. It turned out he was the guest speaker for Campus Ministries, and as he shared his mission work, I saw a man with a heart for God. And he was hot, so—”
“What do you mean, was hot?” Darren shot back, the first sign of any amusement from him during this counseling session.
“Hey, don’t push it,” she said.
Chaplain Rodgers gave her a steady nod and grin. “Okay, time—Darren? What have you got?”
Her husband’s silence felt like nails pounding into her, one after another. She looked at him, waiting, willing him to say anything, watching him trying to find an answer but unable to say a single, simple thing.
“And this is where we are,” she finally said. “Anything that truly matters—he shuts down.”
Darren tried. “Memories have just been . . . I mean, every time I try to think back, what I don’t want to remember takes over. Like there’s a wall in my timeline, or . . .” He didn’t finish.
Heather closed her eyes, swimming in the familiar emotions she wakes up to and falls asleep with. A lonely and drifting sensation, bobbing up and down in the middle of the ocean, with no land in sight and nobody around to hear her cries for help.
“That’s very normal, Darren,” the chaplain said. “And Heather, post-traumatic stress is a mind inhibitor that requires time and intentional rebuilding of the muscles and tools we use to control our thoughts.”
“But I’m pretty much outta time,” Darren said.
Heather never could have imagined such words of defeat coming from her husband, much less hearing the tone in his voice. But he’s right. They have run out of time.
She hoped—no, she desperately needed—the Darren she fell in love with and knew so well to come back home.
“Darren, I’m not putting a clock on this,” she protested. “That’s not fair.”
Chaplain Rodgers motioned for her to calm down and wait. Eventually Darren opened up again.
“I mean, what do you want me to say? I was angry. At God. At myself. Afraid of the pain. Of how I’d treat my family when I got home. Afraid that I’d become some imposter because my faith let us all down.”
She let out an exasperated sigh as she faced him. “So just—tell me that stuff then! Anger, doubt, fear . . . I can handle those things. What I can’t handle is the distance. You pushing me away, shutting me out. That’s what hurts so much and scares me to death.”
The toxins that leaked out of her surprised her.
This is supposed to be about Darren and his issues. Right?
“You’re my best friend, but you’ve been treating me like a stranger,” she said. “Why? Why the distance, the silence with me when you can just walk in here and lay it all out for him?”
“Because I’m ashamed! I don’t want to admit to you that I’m angry! And afraid! I know I’m failing you, and I want to make it better, but I don’t know how!”
His jaw clenched as he turned his head sideways toward the window, wiping his eyes before looking at her again.
“Heather, I loved those men, and He took them away, and I’m supposed to be okay with that, but I’m not. I’m angry and terrified now, because I love you and the kids so much more. More than I can bear sometimes. So what if He takes one of you away next? What then?”
As he leaned over to squelch his uncontrollable emotions, Heather leaned toward him, wanting to simply touch some part of him. Instead of jerking away, Darren moved and wrapped her in his arms. She felt his sobs moving against her like the swells of ocean waves.
As they held one another in silence, Heather didn’t even notice Chaplain Rodgers ambling out of the office, perhaps realizing the sacred space it had suddenly become.
4
Not far from the building where they’d met with the chaplain, Darren and Heather sat on a bench next to a large lawn. Fort Stewart was busy on this bright afternoon. The sun felt good to Darren, and so did holding Heather’s hand.
“Well, that was fun,” he said.
They both let out light chuckles. After simply holding each other in the chaplain’s office as the universe suddenly stood still, they had just let the moment sit. Now in the clear light of day, Darren knew it was time. Heather had seen his anger for months, but he had finally given her an insight into his grief back there in the office.
She needs to know and
understand.
He pulled the journal out of his jacket pocket along with the mini dv cassette tapes, then handed them to her.
“Some light viewing and reading material,” he said. “When you’re up for it.”
The flicker in her eyes told Darren she knew. She realized he was trusting her again.
“Thank you,” she said.
5
There were so many journal entries. Too many, in fact, to read in one sitting. After getting the kids to sleep and giving herself a little more time just to make sure they were, Heather started to read Darren’s journal. Not his online posts, but the personal thoughts and feelings he had written on the pages in ink. They were his heart and soul, spoken from the man she married and not from the official army chaplain.
They were also words written for her and the kids.
All penned in the event of something happening to him.
Leafing through the pages, the Darren she had fallen in love with spoke to her. Whispering and laughing and lamenting.
It didn’t take long before she began to weep as she read.
The last hour I was at the PB, some locals hit an IED and two perished immediately. A third person in the car, a lady in her thirties, barely survived. It was terrible. She was barely recognizable as a person. I helped the medics get her into the aid station and briefly spoke to her through an interpreter. She made a few moans. I could smell her burnt flesh. It’s awful, I know. When the bleeding stopped, they flew her to the big hospital in Baghdad for more proper treatment.
The young medics were absolutely destroyed. They stood there, silent, staring into space. So did I. They knew they’d helped her stay alive, but they were also trying to deal with what they’d just experienced. So someone called to me to “talk with them and make sure they were okay.” I worked a lump out of my throat and asked the same rhetorical questions: how are you guys doing, etc. It felt so forced. I felt like they could see straight through me, see the fear and revulsion I was carrying just like them. Soon I stopped talking and just patted them on their shoulders and looked them in the eyes. We all knew that’s all that could be done in that moment.
As I got back in my waiting Humvee and started back down the road toward the main base, past the point where the bomb went off, I began to weep. It was a long, quiet ride back.
This entry was all the way back to July 23.
He’s been dealing with this from the start, she realized. All by himself, never sharing it with me.
The journal wasn’t all hopeless and sad. There were many quotes from Scripture and from the books he had read and enjoyed. Yet time after time, a tragic story was told in detail.
Soon the entries began to focus on Heather and the kids.
I miss Heather more than a simple fifteen-minute conversation can ever begin to sum up. I miss her smell and her soft skin and her smile. I miss the way she prefers talking one-on-one with people for long periods of time rather than talking to lots of people for a short time. I miss how well she can read people, and her good intuition. I miss how well she knows me.
That’s the part I’m a little afraid of, to be honest. Coming home. She’s going to know what this place has done to me. And she’s going to ask too . . .
Darren wrote about missing the children, about feeling guilt over not being there for events and not seeing special moments. He understood his calling and that he was serving, but it still gutted him to not be with them. As the months progressed, she could hear his longing come through on the pages louder and louder.
More horrific stories and grisly details. A woman raped. Children abandoned by parents. A sniper killing one of their men. The soldier who told him he’d almost committed suicide that day. The men sharing details about their failing marriages. One after another after another.
All this sadness and pain piled on top of him.
She couldn’t take it anymore. Closing his journal, Heather decided to watch one of the tapes. She connected the recorder to her computer, pressed play, and began to watch the digital recordings Darren had made in his office on the base. With each word, she felt the last ten months since he’d been back start to break down and crumble in front of her.
“. . . Please . . . know how much I love you. And have since the day we met, when I ruined those flowers you were taking pictures of.”
His somber chuckle made her do the same.
“Chrysanthemums, right? Who the heck names flowers, anyway? I miss you more than you can imagine. And I love you just the same. And I want you to know that if anything happens to me . . . that if you’re watching this now and I’m not there, know how strong you are. How strong you’ve been.”
Her sides hurt from the tears, from the ache of realizing all the damage the war had caused. To see and hear about all this hurt and pain and loss . . . It smothered her.
She shut off the tape and closed her eyes, her hands clenched together.
“Lord, I may be hurting . . .” She paused and took a long, deep breath. “But so is the man I love.”
Outside she could hear the pitter-patter of rain. The thought of all the soldiers out there weeping in silence, sometimes never shedding a tear but storing them deep inside a hidden well . . .
“Forgive me, Lord, for judging what I don’t understand. And leaning on Darren when I should be leaning on You. Please help us both to forgive. And help us put this marriage—and this family—back together. Heal his heart. Heal his mind. And lift this burden from him.”
6
The light drizzle falling on top of the red barn suddenly grows louder, the drops pounding away at the tin roof over Darren’s head. He wipes the sweat off his forehead and examines the wooden structure in front of him. Almost. Just a few more finishing pieces.
The storm outside seems to want his attention. He can hear the bellowing thunder, so he heads to the open door of the nursery barn. A wall of falling rain stands right in front of him, with flickers of water starting to splash on him.
It feels good.
Looking up at the sky, he sees a bright streak of lightning. It’s a reminder of the power and might of God.
He steps out into the rain and lets the droplets cover him. He closes his eyes for a moment, feels the water soaking into his clothes.
God doesn’t always have to speak through others or through His Holy Word. He can say so much simply by displaying the awesome glory of His nature. Of the heavens and the earth.
I know You haven’t forgotten me, Lord. And I know You love me. That You’ve always loved me and never let me go.
With his face pointing upward, the rain washing his forehead and cheeks and chin, Darren grins as he opens his eyes.
Forgive me, Lord. Forgive me for forgetting You and trying to do it all myself.
There’s no way he can do it all. There’s no way he can do anything, in fact. That’s not God’s plan.
I need You, Lord. Please help me. Please help our family.
He thinks of the familiar psalm he read this morning. The words took on a new meaning, especially “Create in me a clean heart, O God.”
Darren needed a new heart. He didn’t need a Band-Aid or a crutch for it; he needed a coffin to put his old heart in.
Create a new heart in me, Lord. In both of us. And help us to start again.
MAY 2009
1
“Mom! Mom!”
The cries of both children came from outside. Heather was barely awake. What were the kids doing outside so early? She crawled out from under the sheets and rushed out of the bedroom.
“Mom, you have to see this,” Elie said, opening the back door and popping her head inside. “Come on!”
Heather looked out the kitchen window and couldn’t believe what she saw. She quickly got Meribeth out of her crib and carried her out to the backyard, where Sam and Elie were running around, euphoric.
Right in front of the row of trees, the ones Darren used to sit and stare at, stood a massive wooden playground structure. A house, complete wi
th a V-shaped roof, stood on one side, a carved sign over its door reading FORT BUMBLEFOOT. Hundreds of stones were laid in front of it, making a small path to the door. Next to the house, a climbing wall with rope led up to a little walkway at the top.
Heather couldn’t believe it.
How did he get this here without me hearing? How many guys did he get to help him pull this off?
While Sam and Elie climbed up the wall and ran over to the second story of the house, Heather brought Meribeth close to the sign and put up her hand to feel the grooves in the carved wood. As she walked across the front of the fort, she saw a wooden cross staked into the ground, just like the kind Darren had back in Iraq.
Darren had brought Fort Bumblefoot back to their house. Now it was time she brought Darren something as well.
“Kids! I need your help with something today.”
2
The special delivery order had come to the nursery with very specific directions: deliver the flowers to the gazebo at Freedom Park shortly after dusk. Bob prepared the vase of yellow roses and chrysanthemums and asked Darren if he could handle it.
“Hey, Turner. Delivery guy’s out; could you make Freedom Park gazebo after it turns dark? Special request. Think there’s going to be a proposal or something there tonight.”
Darren usually left the nursery at dusk anyway, and Freedom Park wasn’t far from the apartment he was renting. After parking his truck nearby, he carefully held the flowers as he walked along the path leading to the gazebo. The humidity of the day had simmered down, and he could feel a slight breeze now that nighttime had arrived. As he walked along he was reminded of the many times he’d taken this very path with Heather at his side. He wondered what she and the kids were doing tonight.
As the path weaved through the trees and made a turn, the gazebo came into view. The glow from hundreds of tiny white lights made him squint, and he stopped to look at it. Along with all the hanging lights, the gazebo’s posts were wrapped in yellow tulle with a bow tied around each one.
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