by Janet Spaeth
“I didn’t have anything to forgive,” Lily demurred. “But I do think you’ll feel better if you clear the situation with the church.”
“They’ll hate me!” Victoria said, and Lily could hear the panic in her voice.
“It’s got to be an improvement over the way it is now,” Lily pointed out. “How do you want to do it? Do you want to talk to Ric, or do you want me to?”
“It’d be easier if you did it,” Victoria answered. “But I think I should do it. I’ll come in tomorrow morning and get this whole thing straightened out.”
“And we’ll see about getting Edgar settled in, too,” Lily promised.
Victoria looked at her in amazement. “I thought it was full!”
“Well,” Lily said, “we can get him in for at least two weeks. He can take Todd’s place. Todd’s visiting his grandmother and won’t be back for a couple of weeks, so Edgar can use his slot.”
“Two weeks?” Victoria wondered. “How are you going to bear it?”
A wave of loneliness washed over Lily. She knew it was just the first of many. “I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “I really don’t know.”
As she closed the door behind Victoria, Lily glanced at the church. A light glimmered from a window. Ric was at work.
Ric. Along with so much else, she put him at the back of her mind, too.
There was no time for love when you were fighting for your life.
Chapter 10
The initial chords of the processional were beginning, but Ric was on his knees, not in front of the altar but in front of a sink, a wrench in his hands.
The faucet in the men’s bathroom had been dripping, and his fumbling attempt to fix it had resulted in a cascade that had soaked the floor—and him. Luckily he’d been able to crawl under the sink, and after wrestling with a recalcitrant valve, he’d managed to get the water turned off.
He backed out from under the sink and wiped his forehead, then he groaned as he stood up and surveyed the damage. Not only was there water all over the floor, but there was water all over him.
The water on the floor was easily remedied—there was a mop in the janitor’s closet just outside the door—but how was he going to deal with the soggy trousers?
He mopped up the floor and swabbed his pants as dry as possible with handfuls of brown paper towels that seemed to do nothing except add a thin layer of tan lint to the wet cloth. He glanced down at his trousers and shook his head. Now he not only was waterlogged—he also looked as if he were covered in dust.
In other words, he was a mess.
If only he had time to put his clothes in the dryer that was part of the day care! He chuckled as he thought of what the members of the congregation would think to see their youth minister running through the hall pantsless.
Too bad he didn’t have a pastoral robe like some ministers did. It would cover this quite nicely.
There was nothing to do but go into the church, wet trousers and all. He was lucky it was August, when the heat would dry the material quickly.
The service was well underway. The congregation was standing for a hymn, and no one noticed the condition of his slacks.
He saw Lily at the end of a pew on the side, and he tapped her on the shoulder. She moved down to let him in beside her.
She looked at him inquiringly. “Everything okay?” she asked under the cover of the anthem.
“Plumbing problem,” he whispered. “It’s all fixed now.”
“Good,” she mouthed back to him.
The song ended, and they sat, so close that her perfume drifted over to him. She was wearing a dress the color of red roses, and the sun through the stained glass made dancing designs on the fabric.
This was God’s hour, though, not Lily’s, and he needed to focus on worshiping the Lord. He spread his hands over the wettest parts of his attire and turned his wandering attention to the front of the church where Pastor Mike was beginning his sermon.
“Why do bad things happen to good people? We often ask ourselves this question, and I wish I had an answer to give a grieving mother or to share with patients who have just heard the word ‘malignant,’ but I often find myself stammering and trying vainly to find the words of comfort.
“It often seems as if it’s personal, as if God has some kind of vendetta. It often seems as if that’s the only possible answer. And that’s why I’ve called today’s sermon, ‘Why Me, God?’ ”
Ric sneaked a look at Lily, but her gaze was steadfastly on the minister.
He had told Pastor Mike what was going on with the day care and Lily. Although his own family problems had called him away during the week, he was still the head of this church and had the right to know what was going on.
Of course, the sermon could be about the senior minister’s own situation, having to deal with a flooded community and the life-threatening illness of his elderly mother in a town five hours away.
The topic could be about any of them, Ric realized, looking around the sanctuary. The man in the third row was battling depression. The couple behind him was struggling through a rocky patch in their marriage. The teenagers clustered together on the side had talked to him about their own difficulties with peer pressure. The older woman in the back of the room had near-constant headaches, and the young man across from her had confided in Ric that his brother had been charged with theft in Arizona.
Truly, the sermon’s topic touched them all.
He turned his attention back to the words Pastor Mike was delivering.
“—and so we ask for His understanding as we question whether we have been forsaken, and we find comfort and heart’s ease as we realize that we are never alone. We are always with the One who watched His Son die, and we know that He, truly, is the One who understands. Amen.”
Well, that was swell. He had managed to miss the entire sermon, but he had heard enough to give him something to think about through the day.
At least his pants were dry. That was one thing to be thankful for as he and Lily stood at the benediction.
“Lily—,” he began, but a touch on his arm interrupted him.
“Sorry to break in to your conversation here,” Marnie said, “but apparently there’s no water in the men’s room. Do you think you could take a look?”
He laughed ruefully. “I already did. That’s why there’s no water there now.”
“It sounds like you’re needed elsewhere,” Lily said with a smile.
“That’s the life of the youth minister,” he said. “Always being called to the restroom!”
Lily went to the narthex where the coffee line was set up. It was her turn to serve.
Pastor Mike approached her in the line, and she began in a voice barely above a whisper, “I think you and I should visit. I need to tell you—”
The gentle minister held up his hand. “Is it about your problem with the organization in Chicago?”
Fear washed over her. “Yes.”
“Ric has already filled me in. He tells me that he believes you and so does Marnie. So, until I learn otherwise, so do I.”
“But you barely know me!” she protested.
“I know Ric, and I know Marnie. And”—he lowered his voice—“I have also talked to someone this morning who has told me that you provided her with some very wise counsel last night, and to my way of thinking, anyone who resolved that long-standing issue is blessed by the Lord indeed. Thank you.”
Before she had the chance to recover from her astonishment, he left. She saw him greet a few other congregants and then slip into his coat and leave.
What a burden he must be bearing, she thought. The pressures of his own family illnesses combined with the needs of a disaster-stricken church would be overwhelming for most people, but he seemed to be bearing up well under the strain. That must have been the source of his sermon.
A movement to her side caught her attention, and she saw Marnie hug Victoria. Over her shoulder, Victoria caught Lily’s eye and gave her the thumbs-up signal.
God was good.
She cleaned the kitchenette and put the coffeepot away for the next week’s service and went to say good-bye to Ric.
Ric was doing some last-minute straightening of the sanctuary, picking up the stray papers that were left and putting hymnals back into their holders. He stood up and smiled when he saw her.
“Would you like to join me for lunch?” he asked. “I understand Todd’s gone, so we could go someplace where you don’t get a toy with your dinner.” He smiled winningly, and she almost gave in.
“I don’t think I’d better,” she said, not daring to look at him as she spoke.
“Can I ask why?” His voice was guarded.
“I—until this, um, matter is settled, I don’t think I should …” Her voice trailed off.
He took her by the arm and led her to a pew. “Let’s talk a minute. Do you know how I feel about you?”
She nodded then shook her head. “Yes. No. I mean, I hope I know how you feel, but I don’t really know. I can guess, somewhat that is, but it’s just—” Her words broke off, and she looked at him. “I’m babbling, aren’t I?” she asked ruefully.
“Let me put it this way: I have my answer,” he said. “So, to dispel any doubts, let me tell you how I feel, right here, in front of God.” He motioned toward the altar. “I really like you. My feelings are getting stronger every day.”
“But until—”
He laid a finger over her lips. “Shhh. Tell me, are your feelings like mine?”
She nodded. “Yes.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “But—”
He shook his head. “That’s all that we need to say now. We can put the rest of this on hold until your heart is clear to go ahead. Just as long as I know and you know that there is a possibility, that we share this kooky feeling.”
Why did she feel so miserable when he had just declared what she had wanted to hear? Life was so strange.
“And now, let’s go to lunch.” When she started to object, he interrupted. “As friends.”
“Okay,” she said at last. “As friends.”
It was good to have a friend like Ric. She hadn’t realized until they were at lunch how lonely it was going to be to go on with life as normal without Todd there.
She mentioned it to Ric while they were seated again in Star City, this time at the little café crowded with after-church diners.
“Todd told me that at Shiloh you taught we’re all God’s friends, and as such we have a kind of network obligation to God’s other friends,” she explained to him as they waited for their sandwiches and coffee.
“I said that?”
“Well, it’s gone through the filter of Todd’s mind; I interpreted it, sent it through the filter of my mind and out of my mouth. Let’s go with you said something like that.”
“I’ll take credit, although I don’t think it’s all rightly mine. Todd’s a good kid.”
“He is,” Lily said. “And I miss him already. I don’t know how I’m going to get through two weeks without him. He’s been my anchor for so long.”
“You said his dad died.” The sentence fell into the conversation a bit awkwardly, and Ric immediately apologized. “I’m sorry. It’s none of my business, I know. I’m sorry.”
“No, no, that’s all right. It’s just strange because Victoria asked about him last night.” She immediately clapped her hand over her mouth in an involuntary motion. She hadn’t meant to tell anyone about their conversation.
“She told me about it,” Ric said reassuringly. “She thinks the sun rises and sets on your happy little face now, I hope you know.”
Lily rolled her eyes. “All I did was listen. And pray with her. I just did what anybody would have done.”
“But no one had done,” Ric pointed out. “She’d held herself off for so long that we’d all given her up as virtually untouchable, but she said you made her realize the church would welcome her back, that we were in the business of forgiveness. You accepted her and welcomed her. We’d kind of missed the boat on that one, and I personally don’t feel really good about it.”
They’d moved away from the subject of Todd’s father, and though Lily was tempted to leave it there, there was nothing to be gained by not telling Ric.
“You wanted to know about Todd’s father. His name was Barry, and I loved him intensely. He was killed in an accident shortly after we were married.” She smiled as she thought of something. “We hadn’t even been married long enough to have our first big argument. And certainly not long enough for him to know that a piece of him was living inside me. He died before he found out I was pregnant with Todd.”
“Does it hurt to talk about him?” Ric asked. “You don’t have to, you know.”
“No, it’s okay. There used to be this pain that stabbed deep into my heart whenever I thought of him. It was so real that it felt like a knife slashing right into my chest.” She winced at the memory. “For a while after he died, I went to the emergency room with regularity, convinced I was having a heart attack.”
“It was that bad, huh?” Ric’s voice was kind and concerned.
“Yes. But finally one ER doctor took me aside and said, ‘Yes, there’s something wrong with your heart; it’s broken.’ He held me while I cried.”
Tears gathered in her eyes as she recalled that evening in the hospital, surrounded by the hustle of emergency care, while this doctor took the time to heal her heart.
She wiped her eyes and continued. “Now the memory’s faded, like a yellowed piece of paper, but it’s still there. And to be honest, there are still times when I miss him so much I can barely stand it. Ric, no matter what happens between us, I have to keep that memory. Not only is he Todd’s father, but I loved him.”
She looked at Ric and saw tears pooling in those eyes that were as blue as the North Dakota sky.
And at that moment, she fell completely in love with him.
Ric pushed the papers away from him, sliding them to the far side of the desk. More forms, more questions, more times he had to repeat the same sad statistics.
Ninety-eight percent of the community’s residences suffered damage.
Almost every business was inoperable for at least two weeks, causing great economic loss.
Now, four months later, things were better, but there was so much more to be done. Buildings could be fixed quickly. People took longer.
He was so tired of the flood. The entire community of Wildwood had moved past the initial upbeat “we can beat this” attitude that followed the flood and was now deeply into wearied exhaustion.
They were short-tempered with each other. More than once, one of them had come to him and asked him flat-out, “How could God do this to us?”
The answers he’d learned in seminary that had seemed so easy to say weren’t quite covering what he was encountering now. People were stretched to their limits. Money went only so far. Time went only so far. Patience went only so far.
One of the members of the Parenting with Christ group confessed that she had completely lost her temper with her children over a glass of juice that had spilled. And an older woman had come into his office, shaking because of a grocery-store incident in which angry words had collided.
Marriages were shaken as husbands and wives tried to balance too much. Jobs were precarious as what was called “economic recovery” wasn’t progressing as well as it should, and layoffs were occurring to save businesses. Children, the emotional sponges of the community, absorbed everything that was going on, and Ric heard story after story of nightmares, food refusal, separation anxiety, headaches—the list went on and on.
He’d encouraged the congregation to cry.
Tears are God’s overflow piping, he liked to tell them. When you just can’t take it, have a good cry. It releases the stuff that’s stuck inside and lets it come out.
Usually it was true, but now it wasn’t enough.
They were past crying.
But they were never
past praying.
Lily walked through the house again. It was as charming inside as it was outside. It had been kept in immaculate condition, and as near as she could tell, the basement only needed drywall, carpeting, and furniture.
When she said as much to the agent, he laughed. “Can you imagine yourself saying that, say, a year ago? ‘Only needs drywall, carpeting, and furniture.’ Then it was everything. Now it’s nothing.”
She wanted the house immediately, but she knew she’d have to wait for the outcome of the investigation, and she’d have to figure out what to do regarding the down payment. Lily took the information about the house that the agent offered her and promised to call him back.
“I won’t be able to make a bid on it for a couple of weeks,” she said without elaborating. “But I am interested.”
“I’ll be showing it to others,” he warned, “and I can’t guarantee that it’ll still be on the market much longer. It’s a sweet little house.”
She frowned. That little corner bedroom with all the windows would be perfect for Todd.
“But,” the agent continued, “the market is strange right now. Lots of people want to move, but they’ve got to sell before they can buy. Others want to sell and get out of Wildwood. Some are sick of renting and figure this is a good time to buy. Market’s up and down and around the bend. Go figure.”
“I’ll have to wait,” she said. “I love it, but I’m not in the position to make an offer yet.”
He shrugged. “Don’t wait forever. Sometimes a good thing just comes your way, and you’re a fool not to pick it up.”
She stared at him.
He was talking about a house … wasn’t he?
That night, sleep eluded her. The house was perfect, but could she even think about something like that now? Was she absolutely delusional to even consider it?
She tossed and turned in her narrow bed as questions crowded her mind. Why hadn’t there been any progress on her case? How long would she have to wait before there was a response? And, above all, what would that response be?
It wasn’t just about her and her job. If the day care were to fail, the entire community would feel the effects. They needed the day care so the businesses could stay open and people could continue to be employed.
