In Your Embrace (18 page)

Hannah chuckles as she reaches out and easily opens the door for them to walk through.
 It takes a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dim lighting that filters in through the stained glass windows.  Reds, yellows, and blues cast a magical glow on the newly laid beige carpet.

In his arms, Hannah sighs and looks all around.
 “Would you mind setting me on the steps up there?”  She points to the altar.

Draven moves down the narrow aisle, careful not to bump her legs on the pews.
 He places her on the bottom step and moves back, shoving his hands deep into his khakis and waiting.  He has no idea what to do with himself.  Should he leave?  Should he kneel down beside her?

Silence fills the room as Hannah stares up at the wooden crucifix hanging behind the altar.
 Draven grows increasingly more disturbed.  This place has an odd feel about it.  He feels as if he’s being watched by eyes filled with accusations, as if the wooden statue is saying
I know what you did.

That’s ridiculous
, he scoffs, and yet he can’t shake his growing unease.

He has only been to church a few times in his life, mostly for Christmas candlelight service or the odd Easter service.
 Church has by no means ever been a part of his life.  Perhaps that is what drew him to Hannah in the first place—that she was so confident and so sure of her beliefs, whereas most people know how to quote scripture but many times don’t seem to really believe or even understand it.

Draven is startled out of his thoughts by the sound of Hannah crying.
 Her head is bowed low to the carpeted stairs, her hands clasped before her.  He looks around, unsure of what to do.  Does he go and comfort her?  Isn’t there supposed to be someone here to do that for him?

He is just about to go to her when her whispered words root him in place, shaking him to his very core.

“Father, I thank you for allowing me to return to this church.  I thank you for the blessings you have poured out on me and my family.  I thank you for Draven, for his help and kindness these past few weeks.  I thank you for Timothy, for the friendship he has given me when I was without a friend.  I thank you for allowing me to be part of your plan, for sparing my life so that I might have a chance to share my story.  Thank you for your forgiveness and for loving me when I do not deserve it.  I am grateful to know that I can always rest in your embrace.”

She whispers Amen but Draven hardly hears it.
 His knees threaten to buckle under him as the weight of her words fall around him.  The air feels thick, laden with humidity that clings to his skin.  Confusion mingles with anger as he considers the girl before him, broken and abandoned by her God, and here she sits thanking Him for His blessings.

What sort of sick God would require this sort of obedience?
 To force someone as beautiful as Hannah to go through such darkness?

Her God didn’t spare her this pain.
 He didn’t protect her during the storm.  He let her endure months of therapy and for what?  So that she could return to Him thankful for His blessings?

And what about the woman Draven killed last Christmas?
 Was that all part of God’s twisted plan too?  Is that why he got drunk that night?  Why he hopped in his car for a joy ride and has been trying to drown out the memories of that night ever since?

Draven feels like being sick all over the aisle.

“Are you ok?”

He blinks, shaking his head rapidly as Hannah turns to look at him.
 “No,” he chokes out as he stumbles backward.  He can’t look at her.  Can’t stomach the sight of the cross over her head.

“Don’t leave,” she whispers as he falters back a few more steps.

“I…” he clears his throat and risks a glance at her.  “I’m sorry.  I can’t do this.”

He can see the sadness in her eyes but it doesn’t matter.
 Not right now.  He can’t be here.  He needs to get away.

“Is everything ok out here?”

Draven turns at the sound of a man’s voice.  He takes in the casual clothes and metal brace around the man’s leg.  He has a pair of crutches tucked under his arms.

“Pastor Justin.
 It’s been so long.  I’ve been hearing all about your recovery from Jonas and Mark.  They said you were getting around a bit better now.”  Hannah lifts her face to the light of the stained glass windows and smiles.  “You’ve done an amazing job with the rebuilding.”

The man limps forward slowly.
 Draven steps back, unsettled by the preacher’s presence.  “Timothy’s been spearheading the renovations.  I don’t know how he manages to do it, especially with a girl like you waiting to see him each day.”

A blush rises along the neckline of Hannah’s shirt and Draven turns away.
 With her attention diverted, he dashes down the aisle and doesn’t slow until he hits the front doors.  He slams through them and then sinks down onto the front stairs, his legs far too unstable to hold him.

He rests his head in his hands as he tries to control his breathing.
 He tries to tell himself that he doesn’t care about Hannah’s prayer, about the Pastor’s recovery, or the feeling he got when he looked up at the cross.  
None of it matters. I’ve been doing just fine these past few months on my own.  I don’t need them.  I don’t need any of this.

But even as the familiar bitterness rises up within him, Draven realizes that there is a new void in himself that wasn’t there before.
 A hole that Hannah slowly chiseled open that now sits like a festering wound in his chest.  
I do need her
, he thinks as he groans and clenches his eyes closed.  
I need her far more than I should.

He knew better than to get involved with Hannah Green.
 She was all wrong for him.  Certainly the farthest thing from his type he had ever met, and yet he had been drawn to her.  Then a random thought hits him,
maybe it wasn’t just her that I was being drawn to?

He looks up at the sound of approaching footsteps. Timothy stops in his tracks, looking more than a little confused.
 “Draven?”

“Yeah.”
 He wipes his nose, trying to play off the fact that he has tears on his cheeks.  He slowly rises and leans against the railing.  Timothy still looks floored.  Draven laughs, and it sounds gravelly but a bit more like his old self.  “Don’t look so surprised.  I have actually been to a church once or twice in my life.”

Hannah’s friend clears his throat.
 “Sorry,” he mutters, rubbing the back of his neck.  “I didn’t mean to look so startled.”

Draven waves off his apology.
 “Don’t worry about it.  If you’d told me this morning that I’d be standing here right now I’d have told you to get a brain scan and bill it to my step-father.”

“So…” Timothy lets the silence lengthen, “why are you here again?”

“Hannah.”  He jerks his chin back toward the closed doors.

“Ah.”
 He nods in understanding before leaning back against the opposite railing.  “She has a way of making you do things you never dreamed before, huh?”

“You can say that again.”

“Like stealing her from the hospital so she could evade every doctor and nurse who is being paid to keep her safe so you can drive her here?”

And here I was starting to think I could like this guy,
Draven scoffs, rolling his eyes as the tension in Timothy’s voice shines through.

“Hardly. That was all me.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

Draven pushes up off the ground.
 “Because we both know she’s not like that…and I am.”

Timothy stares at him for a moment, no doubt trying to size him up.
 When he speaks, his question catches Draven off guard.  “How is she?”

“Don’t you go to visit her often?”

“I know you have a special bond with her.  I can hear how much you mean to her when she talks about working with you in the therapy room.”

“Really?” Timothy nods.
 Draven can tell it’s not an easy thing for him to admit.  “Well, in my opinion, she’s confused and quite possibly delusional.”

“What makes you say that?”

Draven snorts and looks away as the memory of her praying at the altar washes over him.  “She thinks that being paralyzed is a blessing.”

Timothy says nothing.

“I don’t get it,” Draven says, turning to look at Timothy again.  “She is young, beautiful, and her entire life has been taken away from her.  How can she be happy about that?”

“She’s not,” he responds simply.

“Well you could sure fool me by the way she was in there praying!”

Her friend purses his lips, appearing to be considering his words.
 “You know as well as I do that Hannah struggles with her injury.  Who wouldn’t?”

Draven shrugs in response, knowing how angry and bitter he would be if roles were reversed and he was the one who’d been injured.

“She once told my pastor something that seemed so profound at the time, but it took a while for her words to really sink in.  She said, ‘it’s ok to admit that you’re afraid because that is when you realize that you can’t do it on your own.’  I didn’t want to listen to her, to admit that she was right.  I’m not really too good at putting my faith before my mouth.”

Draven smirks but remains silent as Timothy continues. “The point is, things happen.
 We can’t control them.  The only thing we can do is determine how we want to react to them as they come.  Hannah is one of those people who chooses to look at the blessings in life for what they are.  You look at her as broken, but she is simply grateful to be alive.”

Hearing Hannah’s friend speak like this makes Draven pause.
 
Is that really how she looks at it?  I guess that makes sense, but to go so far as to thank her God for the pain she has endured?  It just doesn’t seem right!

“Things happen in our lives for a reason.
 I won’t pretend to understand them, cause frankly I’ve got a few of those that I’m trying to figure out myself, but Hannah has taught me something…she has taught me that it is through our pain we grow stronger.”

“But what if she can’t overcome this?
 What if she’s stuck in that stupid chair forever?”

Timothy looks pained as he glances toward the door.
 “Then I have faith that she will seize the opportunity and find some way to turn it around to benefit others.”

Draven snorts, bobbing his head. “Yeah, that sounds like her. Always the martyr.”

“No.”  Timothy shakes his head emphatically.  “Not a martyr.  You know as well as I do that she does none of this for attention.”

Guilt needles Draven as he is forced to agree.
 His pent up bitterness is tainting his thoughts, leeching darkness filth into his mind.

He glances over at Timothy, surprised to see the man openly appraising him.
 “Have you ever stopped to consider another reason for all of this?”

Draven’s brow furrows with confusion as Timothy continues.
 “Many events led Hannah to this point.  The invitation from her aunt and uncle to help restore their home.  Her decision to come and then stay to wait out the storm.  The chance encounter I had with her.  Her decision to follow me to the church instead of staying behind with her aunt.  Her injury and then finally meeting you.”

“What do I have to do with this?” he asks with no small amount of annoyance in his tone.
 He crosses his arms over his chest, not liking one bit that he’s been included in this timeline.

A hint of a smile crosses Timothy’s lips.
 “If Hannah had never been hurt, she would never have met you.”

Draven surges to his feet.
 His nostrils flare and his hands clench at his sides.  “Are you trying to say that I’m the reason Hannah is stuck in a wheelchair?  How dare you!  You think her God would take away her legs just so He could get in touch with me?  Like I’m too thickheaded on my own so he had to find a new way of grabbing my attention? What kind of sick God do you serve?”

He shakes out his hands as the urge to hit something overcomes him.
 Draven paces back and forth, unable to stand still or risk doing just that.

“I’m not trying to imply that you—“

“Yeah?  Well you did.”  Draven turns once more and looks to the door.  He’s had enough for one day.  He could really use a cold beer.  “Can you make sure Hannah gets back to the hospital safely?”

“Of course, but maybe driving isn’t the best idea right now.”

“I’ll be fine,” he growls.  “I always am.”

He turns and runs down the path, away from the girl who has captured his thoughts, from the God who keeps messing with his life, from the past that refuses to stay buried.
 He runs away from everything and does what he is best at…he doesn’t look back.

EIGHTEEN

Letting Go

Letting go is something Timothy never thought he would have to do.  At least not for a great many years.  He had a bright future with Abby.  Big dreams and a willingness to sacrifice for them.  They were happy together. Not in that annoyingly blissful way that makes everyone want to gag when you are around them. Their love was sweet. No frills. No need to make a bold statement.

From the first moment he laid eyes on her in grade school, he knew she was the one.  Not the one he was meant to spend the rest of his life with, but the one who would make his life miserable.

Those initial days of courting on the grade school playground began with the usual rockiness—fights over the swings, toads left in Abby’s desk at school, tugging on her ponytail just to annoy her.  Those things were just expected between two enemies, and in those days, Abby was the worst enemy he could find.

It was her smile that got him in the end.  Grade school grudges soon turned into silly antics, vying for her attention.  Later he suffered sweaty palms and an unsettled stomach as he worked up the nerve to ask her to the prom.  He never dreamed that Abigail Renalt would one day accept his hand in marriage not long after leaving school, but it was the happiest day of his life.  Timothy used to be able to think about their lengthy past and smile, but these days it’s just too painful.

Timothy sighs and tucks his leg under as he sits on the bottom step of the altar at his church.  He hasn’t spent nearly enough time here recently.  He’d like to say it’s due to his crazy work schedule, but the truth is…he’s afraid.

Afraid of facing the pain head on.  Of finally admitting that Abby is lost to him.  He is terrified of the thought that there is a chance for a future without her.

Looking up at the wooden cross that hangs just above the baptismal, Timothy can feel the familiar ache in his chest.  Nearly a year since he laid Abby to rest, and he still feels on the brink of a panic attack every time he thinks about hearing the news for the first time.

Life altering.  Shattering pain.  These words hardly come close to the desolation he felt when the truth sank in that she was gone forever.  Hanging his head, Timothy allows the tears to come as he thinks about the fact that he never got the chance to say goodbye, to tell her he loved her one more time.  Usually he fights against the tears, tries to ignore their presence, but today he lets them fall.  That is why he’s here after all, isn’t it?

“I guess you know I’m still trying to figure things out, huh?” he asks the empty room.  The sunlight that filters down through the stained glass windows is far warmer than what he felt while trudging here through the blustery winds that fought to hold him back from his mission.  Winter has arrived and with it a sense of impending doom and no small amount of gloom. 
Can it really have been a year ago today?

He supposes he should have gone to her graveside instead of the church, taken her a bunch of flowers or something, but it didn’t feel right. His wife isn’t there.  Not really.

“I know that I can talk to you whenever I want to,” he begins but is forced to pause and clear his throat.  It tightens on him, constricting his words.  “It’s not like it used to be, though.  I remember when we would sit on the front porch for hours, just chatting about nothing at all while we watched the thunderheads build out to sea.  Half the time I never even knew what you were talking about.  Something about your day at work or some new project you were going to be helping out with here at the church probably.”

“I just liked to hear you talk.  Always did.”  He wipes away fresh tears.  “I miss your voice.  Some days, when I first wake, I can almost remember what it sounded like.  Others I’ll catch a hint of flowers on the air that remind me of your perfume.  You always did smell nice.”

Timothy sinks off the step and leans over the stair, pressing his forehead to the carpet.  “I miss you, Abby, more than I ever thought possible.  You took a part of me with you when you left.”

His lips grow moist with the salty tears that roll down his cheeks and chin.  “I spent those first few months working.  I’m sure that doesn’t surprise you,” he chuckles weakly.  “I always hid behind my work.  As long as I was busy all was right with the world.”

Fists clench beside his head as anger begins to simmer low in his belly at the thought of all of the hours he spent on the job when he could have been home.  Back then he’d been a fool.  Money had meant everything to him.  Making sure they had a good home, a decent car, and a business that could hold its head above water.  He felt responsible for so many things back then.

Now he knows there is so much more to life than work.  Than seeking after things that you can’t take with you once you pass on. 
Time, that’s what I would wish for if given the chance.  Time to lie in bed, wrapped in each other’s arms, and enjoy a late morning.  Time to finish the house renovations.  Time to take the honeymoon I could never find time to take. Time to spend with our unborn child.

He has never wanted to blame Abby for keeping this secret, choosing instead to believe that there simply hadn’t been enough time for him to hear of her pregnancy.  The doctor said she was only four months along at the time of the accident.  Maybe she didn’t even know herself.

He unclenches his fists and wipes his nose as he lifts his face and stares up at the cross.  “Would our child have been a son?  You know I always wanted one, don’t you, Abby?  We used to dream of creating a nursery together, of buying clothes and books and gobs of toys that he would never need, but we’d do it anyways because it’s what excited parents do.”

His voice breaks and his shoulders slump.  “I lost more than just you that night,” he whispers.

A footstep on the carpet behind him startles Timothy.  He whirls around to find Justin standing several feet back, his hands clasped atop his cane.  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

Timothy wipes at his eyes and rises.  “No, it’s fine.  I was just rambling, really.”

Justin gives him a look of understanding and motions toward the pews. “Would you mind if I sit with you for a while?”

He pushes up off the step and sinks down onto the front pew, moving aside a box of tissues and a stack of song books so that Justin can sit.  The pastor sinks down slowly, groaning as he falls the final foot.  “I keep thinking that’s going to get easier but I feel as stiff as an old log.”

“Jonas might even say you look like one,” Timothy says with a pained smile.  He wipes at his eyes, embarrassed to have been seen crying.

“I reckon he just might.”  Justin turns his gaze upon the cross and breathes out slowly.  “It’s a tough thing to lose a loved one.”

Timothy glances over at him.  “You sound like you know that first hand.”

“I do.”  Timothy notices lines of weariness around his eyes.  Justin is hardly a year or two older than Timothy yet there are initial signs of gray hairs beginning to crop up along his sideburns.  “My parents were both taken from me at a young age.  I don’t really talk about it much.  My grandmother was a wonderful lady.  She raised me from the time they died.  I credit her unshakeable faith for helping me work through the pain.”

“Does it ever get easier?”

“No.”  Justin turns in his seat to look at Timothy.  “It just changes.  What was once a stabbing pain that would take my breath away became a dull ache.  In time, I was able to enjoy the memories that we shared, but pain never truly heals.  It is always a part of us, though it evolves and what once felt like misery can become something healing.”

Timothy looks down at his hands clasped tightly in his lap but says nothing.  He can feel the pastor’s gaze on him before Justin speaks.  “What brought you here today, Tim?”

“It’s the one year anniversary.”

“I know, but I suspect there is more to it than that.”

Timothy blows out a weighted sigh that he feels like he’s been holding for months.  “Hannah’s foot twitched yesterday.”

“That’s wonderful news!”  Justin says with genuine delight.  Timothy knows that Justin has been praying hard for her recovery.

He nods in agreement but feels none of his excitement over this new development.  “She will be leaving soon.  I’m sure her parents will see to it that she is sent back home…”

“And you don’t want her to leave,” Justin finishes for him.

“No…and yes.”  He runs his hand through his wavy hair, feeling small tangles the winds created during his trip from the car.  “I’m confused.  I care for Hannah, probably more than I should, but I feel like revealing that information to her would be betraying Abby.”

“Ah,” Justin scratches his jaw. “I figured something like this would come up.”

“You’ve experienced this one too?”

The pastor chuckles.  “No, not personally, but I’ve been a preacher for enough years to know that this is pretty typical after a death of a spouse.”

“I wish I could say I find comfort in that, but now I just feel sorry for those other guys.”

Justin smiles and pats Timothy on the arm.  “Let me ask you this…do you think Abby would want you to be happy?”

“Of course she would.”

“And do you think she would have liked Hannah if she’d had a chance to get to know her?”

Timothy lowers his head and smiles.  “They would have been great friends.”

“And do you believe that Hannah is someone that you can trust to protect your heart?  To show you respect and honor you, even if things get hard?”

“I don’t see how things could get much worse than what we’ve been through together these past few months.  She’s amazing.  I wish that I could have half her faith and a double dose of her optimism.”

When Justin says nothing, Timothy lifts his head to see the man grinning back at him.  “What?”

“She completes you.  Do you honestly think that is by mistake?”

Timothy leans back, pressing against the pew.  Although there is a cushion against his back, the seat is firm wood beneath him.  “I never really thought about that.”

“Well, perhaps now is a good time to.”

“But what if she doesn’t feel the same way about me?  She’s been spending a lot of time with Draven Young at the hospital…”

“And why is it that you feel inferior to him?”

Timothy shifts in his seat.  He has never been one to really care about looks.  Money no longer holds any sway over him, but what if Hannah is drawn to that?  He’d like to think that her kind heart is not tainted by greed but it’s a possibility.  Is he really willing to put himself out there, to bare his heart and risk being crushed again?

The thought of that happening turns his stomach, but the thought of losing her completely makes him feel empty, as if returning to his barren home one more time might bury him in loneliness.

“I can’t lose her,” he whispers.

“Then don’t.  Tell her how you really feel.”

Timothy looks up at the cross.  “Do you think Abby will forgive me?”

Justin clasps Timothy’s arm and smiles.  “How do you know she’s not the one who helped prepare the way for Hannah to come into your life in the first place?  God always has a plan, even when we are too blind to see it.”