Jeremy S. Loomis - Writing Portfolio

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I suppose the reader who requires a happy ending can never be comfortable with the concept of eternity. We are each a part of a story without an ending, a clock that never stops. The history of man has been a long and sad story, full of choice and consequence. I live not for the end but for the resolution.

My message is hard on the eyes of those who await a ‘happily ever after.’ The spiritual realm is not a nebulous dream state—you can’t remove God from reality. Now begins forever, and you get to choose how you’ll invest the time you’ve been given before you make the move to your final home. Decide now. You can park yourself in the middle of the road and wait to be rescued, or you can walk with me. Where I’m going, happily ever after isn’t somewhere long ago or far away. Happily ever after is from now on.

preface

hebrews 12:1

A project submitted to Mrs. Rachel Hozey, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the course CO 421, Commercial Writing Portfolio Exhibit, at Pensacola Christian College, March 2008.

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wake up on the gojust like old times

contents

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...now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation

nearer than when we believed.

romans 13:11

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wake up

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Alli threw her Rollerblades behind the passenger seat and slipped her feet back

into her shoes. “You have the most awesome hills!” she told her brother.

“Surprise surprise,” said Cayman. “I know, right? I barely moved half an

hour away, but I hardly knew about this town until last year.”

“You haven’t had me over till yesterday,” Alli said, cocking her head with her

green eye squinted and her golden eye open. “You better not be having me over

to clean your apartment.”

Cayman’s eyes left the road only long enough to deliver a glazed and unim-

pressed older-brother look: the rolling of the eyes without the rolling, the glare

without the knitted brow. “This is for Mom and Dad. They wouldn’t enjoy them-

selves this week if they had to worry about their daughter being looked after.”

“I’m 15 now,” Alli reasoned. “I don’t need a babysitter.”

“No,” Cayman agreed. “You don’t need to be alone either.”

Alli gave him a dead stare with those mismatched eyes. He didn’t have

to look to see. He bounced her head against her headrest with his free hand.

“You’re a mutant,” Cayman told her. “You’re lucky you’re adorable, or I wouldn’t

put up with you.”

Alli looked at street signs. “This isn’t the way we came. Where are we going?”

“Get you something to eat,” said Cayman. “You skipped breakfast, you ras-

cal.”

“There wasn’t anything.”

“There was. Did you check?”

“Yes,” she said, with a loud sigh. “Not the right places, I guess.”

“I guess not. You could’ve asked, anyway.”

Cayman felt her giving him a little-sister look. “I take it back. Child, you are

too much like me. I’m going to have to leave all the cupboards open, or just make

breakfast myself. Come on. Lunch. Where do you want to go?”

“What’s the place where—” Alli started. She sighed again. “What’s the place

with the smile—”

“Huh?”

“They have the smile, and they have—I remember, um—”

“You’re talking nonsense,” Cayman said. “That can be anyplace.”

He saw a McDonald’s and an Arby’s ahead. “All right. Keep it simple. Pick

the “M” or the hat. He looked at her again. Her eyes were closed. “Alli.” He spoke

firmly.

No response.

Cayman turned right and parked in the Arby’s lot. He examined Alli. She

should not be sweating that much in an air-conditioned vehicle. As he moved to

check her pulse, she started twitching.

Cayman strapped himself back in and swung around to the exit. He still

didn’t know this town very well, but he’d seen a hospital only half a mile back.

The motorist ahead of him was in no hurry to catch the green lights. At the

first red light, Cayman drummed his fingers, then strangled the steering wheel

till he was sure the traffic lights were on the fritz—

Green.

He wished for an empty road. Or his own siren. But he flew through a yellow

light and finally turned in to St. Walter’s Hospital.

It was long enough when the emergency room admitted Alli. The afternoon

crawled by like a tarantula—an eerie, unnatural pace. To keep him occupied in

the waiting room, Cayman sat with Alli’s pink gym bag and a Walkman cassette

player. Alli hadn’t unpacked yet, and she’d brought tapes from when they were

both little when they produced “radio shows.” He hoped her voice would help

him stop replaying the events of that early afternoon. He’d shut off all senses

except for hearing. Afternoon passed into night, and still no one had given him

any information beyond her room number. He was ready to let himself into her

room. The staff would not like him by the end of the day. Hmm. It already was

the end of the day.

Cayman stood, slung the pink gym bag over his shoulder, and crossed the

room. He walked the bright grey corridor to room 241. As he turned into the

doorway, a stranger bumped into him. Cayman steadied him with a hand on the

shoulder, then let go.

For the moment, there were no doctors hurrying about. Cayman wanted to

be still

1st Place: Original Narrative Fiction PCC Commencement Contest 2008

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take that as good news, but he hated watching all this equipment. He didn’t trust

it. There lay the 15-year-old form, now assisted by an IV, heart transcribed as a

green line on a dark screen. She wasn’t sweating anymore. She looked so still. He

rested a hand on her face. It felt cold.

He touched her neck but he couldn’t find a pulse. That heart monitor wasn’t

doing its job. As the rise and fall of his own shoulders quickened, he thought to

check hers. No movement. Cayman dashed into the hall. “She stopped breath-

ing!” he called. “Somebody!”

A nurse behind him entered the room with calm efficiency, found Alli’s

pulse, and asked him to return to the waiting room.

Cayman then remembered that he’d still had nothing all day, save the coffee

in the lobby—a full-bodied brew, but he needed something substantial, some-

thing that would stop the jitters. He’d seen a Wendy’s earlier, just around the

corner on that same floor, but it was closed for the night.

A vending machine stood at the very end of Alli’s hall. He fed it a dollar and

hit D6 for a Milky Way. The coil turned but didn’t drop the candy. A couple

dimes tinkled in the coin return. “This is the wrong place for a halfway job,” Cay-

man said with a growl. He smacked the side and shook the machine. No good.

Another dollar in. D6. The first one came out. Cayman left the extra change for

the next lucky contestant, turned and nearly plowed down another nurse.

“Mr. Howard?” she asked, stepping back. “Cayman Howard?”

“What can you tell me?” he answered, tearing open the wrapper.

“I don’t have all the answers you want right now,” she offered. “Your sister

had an episode of hyperglycemic ketoacidosis. Has she been diagnosed with

diabetes before?”

Cayman fumed. “I have a feeling I would have told you that half a day ago.

What’s happening to her?”

“Alli’s pancreas shut down around 10 o’clock. We’re giving her insulin since

her body can’t produce it anymore—”

“Anymore?” Cayman went blank for a moment. “But you have her stabilized

right now? Can I see her?”

“The doctors still have a lot to help her with right now,” said the nurse.

“We’ll send for you when it’s all right to come in. Right now she wouldn’t be able

to respond to you anyway.”

Cayman held his tongue.

“She’s comatose.”

Build an appetite all day just for two words to take it away again. Cayman

chewed what was left of his Milky Way in sharp defiance. If he were also predis-

posed to low blood sugar, he wasn’t about to let his parents return from their

second honeymoon to find both kids in critical condition. Why—why did Mom

and Dad still not have cell phones?

Cayman decided on their Christmas present as he returned to the waiting

room. He remembered only now that he had packed a simple breakfast of energy

bars, that he’d even put them in Alli’s bag for her.

Zip. He acknowledged the bars in a cool rage, wondering if they could have

saved Alli from the hospital, had she noticed them. Cayman pressed his earbuds

in and started a new tape. This cassette was more coherent than the one before.

The segments of the show were all still disjointed, but Alli had grown enough be-

tween recordings that all her words came through clearly. Cayman couldn’t help

but smile now. He had taught her how to speak clearly—after she came to him in

frustration, unable to follow her own radio program.

In this performance, Alli was interviewing “Bing Crosby,” played by 12-year-

old Cayman. He had tried to sound so grown up, so authentic; alas, his voice had

not yet changed.

As the interview ended, Alli gave her typical closing, “Everybody, give Bing

a hand!” Two hands gave several seconds of distorted clapping on the mic.

“Thanks for coming to our radio show.”

“Buh-buh-buh-bye,” Bing replied, bowing out with effortless style, and imi-

table grace.

Cayman could hear that the tape had been stopped, and that wherever the

new set of acoustics were, Alli was clunking her big tape recorder by her side. He

couldn’t make out her words for a couple seconds, because she’d introduced a

new section in a squiggle voice.

He remembered when she figured out how to record that way. She’d been

trying to interview a mourning dove, and on her way back down the tree, she

dropped her tape recorder and the tape door broke off against a root. He’d

watched from a window as she tried to reattach the door. When that didn’t work,

she threw the tape door into a patch of daylilies and walked around the side of

the house. By the time she entered the front door, she’d discovered how to ma-

nipulate the pieces that made contact with the tape, and from then on, the show

included squiggle voices. Impractical. Often unintelligible. Such fun. Cayman

was so proud.

The next segment was a special concert (Alli singing a capella from the hym-

nal Cayman kept at Dad’s piano). “Be still my soul, the Lord is on thy side,” Alli

sang.

Cayman let out his breath. He loved to play that song while she sang; he

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didn’t get to play much now that he lived in an apartment. When the first verse

ended, Alli went on with that second verse that never gets sung in church. Cay-

man realized he’d never memorized the words.

“...All now mysterious shall be bright at last...”

He had never known what it was to be moved by the voice of one too young

to appreciate the depths of a lyric. The third and final verse began.

“Be still my soul, the hour is hastening on, when we shall be forever with the

Lord.”

Cayman tightened his throat.

“When disappointment, grief and fear are gone,” she sang, “sorrow forgot,

love’s purest joys restored—”

The play button popped up. He flipped open the cover. The Walkman had

chewed the tape.

“Old-school piece of trash,” Cayman hissed.

Across from him, a white man in his mid-40s with a semi-conservative afro

and a well-trimmed mustache looked up from his newspaper and seemed deeply

hurt.

Cayman wondered why, but nothing came readily to mind, so he let the mo-

ment pass. As he pulled gently at the cassette, the tape began to release, so he

tugged a little more. The Walkman let out a foot-and-a-half long string before

the tape snapped. Cayman growled and tried to pack his mess neatly back into

the gym bag. He stood once more. Slung his sister’s bag onto his shoulder.

Crossed the room.

Advancing into the bright grey, he saw another young man, likely later 20s,

standing across from Alli’s room, hands in his pockets.

Cayman could tell from the sounds inside that there’d be no getting in. He

stood beside the stranger.

He’d known all night, but he hadn’t realized that Alli was on the edge. He

sensed her presence in the next room, but he had no sense of how long it might

remain.

“What’s yours here for?” the man asked.

Cayman allowed the question. “She had a seizure this afternoon. Now she’s

in a coma.”

“See it coming at all?”

Cayman shook his head no.

“Your sister a fighter?”

“A light that bright doesn’t snuff out all at once.”

The man sighed.

Cayman set his teeth.

“Now we wait,” said the man.

Cayman nodded. Yes. More of the same. Perhaps much more.

He couldn’t justify any of this. On the other side of the door, Alli lay in a

state of limbo. His little sister, who burned with energy, who glowed with com-

passion for strangers, who had built a reputation for evangelizing her friends

and, when she was little, even their pets.

Cayman prayed silently, with his eyes pointed downward. God, I’d bleed

myself dry to trade for this. She’s already been more use to You than I may be

from here on out. Don’t take her now.

“Are you afraid?” asked the man.

Cayman kept watching the floor, wondering how it could possibly be his

business. Slowly he made himself phonate, stretching the word through his

teeth. “Yes.”

“I don’t know if you’re a praying man,” asked the stranger, “but I’m gonna let

you know I’ll be praying for you and your sister.”

Cayman nodded. “I’m not as much as I should be.” He looked at the man.

“Thank you.”

He felt that Alli’s presence was trying hard to leave.

“Would you know,” Cayman whispered, ‘the last line to the last verse of “Be

Still, My Soul?’”

The man quietly hummed through the verse and then sang softly, “Be still

my soul, when change and tears are past, all safe and blessed we shall meet at

last.”

Cayman dropped large tears. This was not what he’d hoped for. He began

talking just to be heard. “I’ll miss her,” he said, “singing over all my mistakes at

the piano.” His voice shook. “I’ll miss feeling her voice in the same room.” He

could barely make himself heard. “I’m going to miss being close by a faith that’s

so much stronger than mine.”

The door opened.

“Cayman Howard?” a doctor asked.

Cayman entered.

“We’ve done what we can for now. I’m not going to lie—she may pull through

and she may not last the night. You should be with her now.”

Cayman wiped his face as he approached his sister’s bedside. I can’t stand to

see her stuck like this, he prayed. Don’t let her be useless.

Cayman watched her cool face as his vision blurred again. He prayed slowly,

checking his sincerity, and wishing he didn’t have to mean what was coming out.

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Take her home. You can take care of her from now on.

The calm rhythm of the heart monitor twisted Cayman’s stomach. He stood

by the bed and began humming the tune to the old hymn. He forgot the rest of

the world, and he hoped that she might hear him. He hoped that she would re-

member his voice the next day. And the day after that. And however many days

it would be before he too would go home to meet her, forever safe at last.

“Cayman?” a small breath sounded.

He blinked hard and looked down to see a flicker of gold and a sliver of green

returning to tired eyes.

“Can we go home?” Alli whispered.

“Soon,” Cayman smiled.

“How soon?” another shallow breath demanded.

“Not today, baby girl,” Cayman answered, with his hand in hers.

demolition crew“Nigel?” Emory called from across the construction yard.

“Well, what is it?” Nigel answered, aware the work bell was getting ready to

ring. He wanted to get home to play video games.

“I value your opinions,” Emory said, running to meet him, “What you think.”

“Couldn’t be proper best friends if you didn’t.”

“I’m glad you feel that way. I’ve been hard put to try to speak my mind

lately.”

Nigel frowned hard with his eyebrows. “You didn’t eat Monday at lunch

break.”

“No.”

“I know because I had your lunch,” Nigel remembered. “Are you eating bet-

ter now?”

“As I find the opportunity I am. Well, eh—”

The workbell rang and Emory lost his balance.

“Now, I don’t wake up hoping to see you like this,” Nigel complained, chuck-

ing his bump cap down. “You had better tell me.”

Emory’s hands twitched. He resembled a squirrel, but it would have to be

a squirrel with people trouble, like taxes and grumpy in-laws. “Is everyone else

gone?”

Nigel looked about the construction yard, keeping a comfortably inconspicu-

ous pace, as Emory faced the ground. “They are,” he answered, pulling a Slim

Jim from his shirt pocket. “Come. It won’t be so bad when you finish it. Besides,

it’s nothing we can’t find an answer to. I’m not a banking man, but if I were, I’d

take it to the bank.” He tried to open the wrapper at one end—it didn’t give.

Emory cast a faint smile in front of the dying sunlight. He gripped Nigel’s

shoulder and confided, “I know I can tell you anything. What I say, I mean with

both our best interests in mind.”

Nigel raised expectant brows. And tried the other end of the wrapper. It

gave. He took a bite.

“I wouldn’t take myself seriously enough to ignore what you had to say on

anything that pertained to either or both of us,” said Emory. “Oh Nigel, you

know I wouldn’t!” He let go and put his cold hands into his jean pockets. “I can’t.

But I need to ask you for help, for support in a pursuit that I can’t make on my

own. I need your understanding, and your wisdom, and I need your blessing.”

Nigel had over-chewed by now. Cupping his hands on the sides of his mouth,

he closed his eyes and spit a mouthful of plasticky meat remnant into the dirt.

Stood back up. Wiped his mouth. “Don’t make this hard, now,” he said. “As you

go on, I’m getting less and less of a clue what you’re talking about.”

As if by an angel’s embrace, Emory finished shivering, and met Nigel’s eyes

with such transmittable peace. “Nigel, I’m in love with your girlfriend.”

Nigel frowned at the dirt, stood for a moment, curled his toes until they

crackled, and raised a boot to resume walking.

A moment passed. Rather, time passed within the moment. This moment

stayed quite put. “I- stopped talking in hopes of your responding,” Emory said.

“Will you at least tell me what’s going through your mind?”

“Many things,” Nigel said. “Memories. The good times. The best times.”

“With Sharon?”

“Not all of them with Sharon. Funny, the implications. Here, let’s find—” he

pointed westward, “that stump.”

“Oh! I found it already,” hurried Emory, as Nigel sauntered to the shared

forest chair for a quick heart-to-heart. The brightest of the stars began to show

above.

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“We have an issue,” Nigel explained. “You are in love with my girlfriend, and

I- am not in love with my girlfriend.”

Emory’s expression encouraged Nigel to shock him some more. “I am

proud,” he continued, “of the maturity you displayed just by even asking.”

“It’s not as if I thought it would be best only for myself.”

“Oh, I know that,” Nigel muttered, biting off another bit of Slim Jim, and

swallowing it immediately. “I’m not worried by it. There’s just a single problem.”

Crickets listened.

Nigel gave Emory a dramatic look. “How can we persuade her that she’d do

better with you?”

Emory’s eyes picked up as much moonlight as they could hold. “I’m glad you

thought of that!”

“Here,” Nigel began, holding his head, “just tell her about how finding some-

one is not about odds, and that people are tailor made for one another. You’ll

show you trust her by giving her time to process the information and reach her

own conclusion.” He dropped the remainder of the Slim Jim into Emory’s shirt

pocket. “It may be a lot for her to take at once.”

“You’re so quick on the draw, my brother,” said Emory, vibrating with antici-

pation. “Did you really just now fabricate that plan?”

“No,” Nigel replied, scanning the sky and finding Mars between clouds

before reestablishing eye contact. “I’ve been waiting for this moment. It’s been

weeks.”

Along the river walkway, Aiden moved as one who’d just stopped running. Noth-

ing but leftover momentum. He was so exhausted he couldn’t remember how

he’d worn himself out. But it wasn’t by running—his breathing was undisturbed.

A Riverfront Books shopping bag swung on his wrist as he struck another

match on his little matchbook, licked his thumb and pointer, and pressed out the

little flame. He smiled, and ignited another. As he licked his fingers this time, the

wind put out his match. He stood still, frowned, then laughed aloud. He leaned

against the handrail, lit a match once more, and raised his arm. The wind put it

out so completely that it barely had a whiff of a match’s memory to blow over the

river.

“Good,” Aiden said with a chuckle. “Good. I’m smarter than I thought I was.”

He turned toward the dark water below him. He’d heard of past civilizations who

worshipped rivers. He was ashamed of anybody impressionable enough to deify

a body of water, but on this brisk November afternoon, as he tried to search the

darkness below, he felt a kind of sympathy toward such foolishness. There was

no end to the river’s mystery, and no challenge to its power. Its pattern of move-

ment was complex, yet consistent in its constant change. Judging from here, it

might as well be 50 feet deep, even if it were only ten.

He startled as a tackle box clanked on the sidewalk to his right. A little kid in

a camo jacket was setting up for a cold lesson in patience. Aiden turned to walk

away, and caught sight of a small diner, just up the incline through the parking

area.

The bell jingled as he opened the door. The nicely waxed floor was check-

ered black and candy apple red. He unzipped his black suede jacket, tapped his

shoes on the welcome mat, and glanced around.

Patrons filled the booths along the windows facing the river. Aiden chose a

table in the middle of the floor. His right side would be open if he wanted to see

the TV above the counter, and he’d still have a good view on his left. He pulled

his bag off his hand and lifted out his book. Slipped his jacket onto the back of

his chair. Stuffed the empty bag into his pocket.

Sunlight stole his eyes for a moment. The final rays cast an unreal glow on

still waters

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the river walkway as the warm pink lampposts lit up together. A father and son

baited hooks and cast their lines together. A young mother and her two toddlers

threw their last slices of white bread to a family of ducks. An older couple sat

hand in hand on a bench.

I wonder what it is to have someone, Aiden thought. To need someone.

Deep hues of blue replaced the light, and soon the people outside were gone.

His attention returned to his new book. The bright yellow cover showcased a

half-rendered drawing of two cartoon characters: a boy and a little girl. The little

girl stood in the foreground, cowering in fear of something that lurked beyond

the edge of the page. She was all colored in. The boy was running to her rescue

from a black-and-white background with an orange border. His outstretched

arm was painted, but his half-drawn body blended into the background. “They

did a tight job,” Aiden muttered, admiring the print quality on the glossy cover.

He turned to the first page.

“Good evening!” came a voice.

Aiden’s head sank, then he stiffened as he looked up.

“What can I get for you today?” asked the over-fat manager, pushing a

broom around.

Aiden sighed aloud. “Tea. Earl Grey.”

“All right sir,” he bubbled back. The manager picked up his broom and

started to turn away, but he stopped. “Hey. That’s the Still Waters anthology!

That’s already out now, huh?”

“What?” A lazy voice called from the windows, as the body it belonged to

stood.

Aiden took a deep breath and counted to ten.

The oppressor on his left came closer and recited the book’s title, slowly.

“Still Waters, Vol. 1: ‘Two Deep’ (All the Daily Strips from 2006-2007)” He gave

the last date a nice little arrogant flourish with his voice. He must have thought

he knew a good bit about the cartoon.

“You didn’t know this was out, did you?” Aiden challenged.

“I knew it was today. I had to work this morning,” the man responded, casu-

ally, “and straight through the afternoon. I figured Riverfront would sell out

before lunch. Were you just there?”

“Yes,” Aiden answered, laying his arms across the top of the book.

As the manager lumbered off to boil Aiden’s water, another young man came

up alongside. He had a calm way about him that Aiden didn’t much care for.

“Cool,” he said. “Did you know that Billy Larson wrote the preface?”

“That’s so great,” said the working man. “Larson’s my favorite, well, af-

ter Toves. You mind if I see this, real quick?” he picked up the anthology and

searched the front matter.

Aiden leaned back and crossed his arms.

“Wow, yeah, this is about a chapter long, this opening.”

“What’s it say?” asked the younger guy.

“It’s a psychoanalysis!” said Worker Guy, skimming through. “That’s some-

thing. Hey, am I the only one who doesn’t know anything about the author

besides his name?”

“No,” the young man said. “Nobody online knows who Slithy Toves really is.”

“That name, it’s from—Carroll. One of Lewis Carroll’s poems, right?”

“Yeah. Jabberwocky,” said the young guy. “The name originally came from

Alice in Wonderland.”

“British satire,” said Worker Guy. “I wonder if there’s a lead in that.”

“There’s not,” said Aiden.

“Well,” said the kid, “he’d have to answer to a lot of fans if he were known.”

“Maybe Slithy Toves doesn’t want to leave Wonderland!” quipped Worker

Bee.

“You know he’s probably just a normal guy who just happens to speak his

mind,” said the kid. “I mean I can barely believe how artfully he promotes the

family bond. No one else is doing that! Every page, Aiden Waters will do any-

thing to keep Julie out of trouble.”

“He cares for her more than he cares for himself,” said the Drone. “It’s actu-

ally unnatural. That’s the spectacle of it, I think. That’s why it got so big so fast.”

“Look, it’s—it’s just a funny comic strip about a girl who can’t take care of

herself,” Aiden said.

“An artist can set out to entertain, and still say more than he even meant to,”

added yet another voice. This voice belonged to a young woman, and she seemed

nice enough. “That’s what makes it art,” she said. “It speaks to people.”

“There, see?” Aiden said, snatching his book back and motioning toward the

new voice. “Listen to her, huh? That’s what I’m saying. Sometimes there’s a mes-

sage, and sometimes you just assume things, so why are we talking about it?”

The girl’s one flicker of wisdom must have deflated the intellectuals’ banter,

because they left the tableside, and the atmosphere grew quieter as before. Aiden

finished with the back cover and got halfway down the first page of the preface,

when he realized that she was still there. She was sitting across from him. He

could see her shoes.

“So what makes you a fan?” she asked. Now that he paid attention, her voice

sounded very young, in a grown up way. And weak. Not like she had a cold,

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though. Probably she had a breathing condition.

He didn’t look up. “Oh it’s—kind of different for me,” Aiden stumbled.

“Different?”

“Yeah, I bought this for the preface,” he said, flapping the thin section back

and forth with his thumb and pointer. “Larson really is the best.”

She was silent. He didn’t usually feel obliged, but, “What about you?”

“I like the characters,” she said. “And the design. Aiden looks awesome.”

Aiden smiled. “I based that character on—” he closed his mouth.

She clapped her hands. “I knew you weren’t just a fan!” she whispered.

“No,” Aiden groaned, rubbing his eyes with one hand. “I’m afraid I’m not.”

“You’re Slithy Toves,” she said in celebration. “I won’t tell anyone. I really

won’t.”

Raindrops began to patter on the windows, as the manager returned with

Aiden’s tea, laid the receipt down, and hurried back to the counter. The news

was playing on TV.

“That was close,” Aiden complained, studying the floor.

“He didn’t hear me,” she said. “So tell me how it all started! So much of you

went into this, I can tell. You don’t mind, do you?”

Aiden didn’t know why he trusted her. He wasn’t happy with himself for

that, and yet, he chose to empty his head. “I used to be embarrassed of this—now

it doesn’t even feel like I’m talking about me if I say it.” He got comfortable in his

chair. “When I was a kid, I felt insecure. I think that’s common, but I’ve never

felt it should be normal.”

“Did that influence the characters later on?”

“No, that influenced the characters right away. I started drawing them in

high school. You’re not going to believe this—to help me focus, I had to separate

myself—into layers, kind of?”

He still wouldn’t address her to her face; he was back to admiring his pref-

ace, but he sensed her undivided attention. “I had to, to get by. I was an only

child, but Mom and Dad, I guess, didn’t really—I don’t know ‘cuz I hardly

remember now, but I don’t feel like they ever helped me establish confidence of

my own. They kind of let me figure things out by myself, and I got beat up a lot.

At school and wherever. I thought they were negligent parents—wow, I really

was a terror to Dad—but, you know, looking back I’d have to say I’m grateful to

them, in a funny way. I think lessons mean more when you teach yourself. Any-

way—Aiden Waters was a model of all the qualities I knew were worth keeping,

and Julie—”

“—Was everything you wanted to leave behind,” she whispered.

“Easy, huh?” Aiden said. “No, it wasn’t easy at first, but when I got the hang

of associating weaknesses with little girls, it was easier to shed thin skin—defi-

nitely easier to become a man. I think I got there early. And I started getting

pushed around less.”

A moment of silence. Except for the rain pelting the windows.

“I—didn’t mean any offence toward girls.”

“I know.”

“So I decided on my ideals,” Aiden went on, “and measured out my ‘femi-

nine side,’ and deleted it. Just like that. And that’s how I grew up and that’s how

I sold comic strips. I’m working on a new series now. It’s a superhero satire.

Everybody knows his identity, but nobody talks about it. I’m finished with Still

Waters. I don’t need it anymore.”

Palpable silence. And then—

“No. No, Still Waters is your brainchild!” she insisted. “Can you really—you

could just abandon the whole thing?”

“There will always be other cartoons,” Aiden said. “I did it full time long

enough for, well, this anthology, but the characters themselves? It’s been six

years.”

“It’s been seven.”

Aiden looked up from his book. Oh, she looked familiar.

“This December,” she said, “Will be exactly seven.” She tried to compose

herself. “That was the worst Christmas break I ever had.”

Not possible. That black hair, so smooth it was almost liquid, with the strik-

ing blue sheen, those wispy brows—she looked older than he’d ever drawn her,

but seven years would make a difference. And the fear in those lime green eyes.

Aiden looked away. The news was delivering live coverage on a downtown

fire in an apartment complex. Hmm. Flames poking out of a window on the little

screen. He remembered that window. He vaguely remembered emptying a case

of beer onto a tumbled stack of sketchbook paper, not too long ago.

“How did that happen anyway?” Julie asked, with a clever glitter in her eyes.

“I thought you didn’t drink.”

Aiden’s heart rate shot up. There was no way. “I didn’t drink it, you drank

it!” he said.

“I didn’t.”

“Well, it was all over you today,” he retorted, gaining a bit of ground. “What

were you doing, all piled up in the middle of the carpet?”

Julie froze. She saw the fire on TV and looked suddenly broken, as if her

dearest memories were being removed from her mind. “All our family pictures,”

she said.

��

Aiden held up the anthology. “This is the souvenir,” he said. “It took me

until now to realize I never really made a clean break. I kept the original archive

around. No more scrapbooking,” Aiden said, slapping the book back onto the

table. “No more Still Waters. And it’s fine, because the fire begins and ends with

my apartment. It can’t get farther that that. I left the window open, and this rain

is going to get harder and colder as the night goes on.”

“Why did you buy the book?” Julie asked, leaning forward for air.

“I told you—” Aiden recoiled, his hand leaving the anthology. The book still

owned him. He drew a deep breath. “I don’t believe in you, Julie.”

Julie leaned across the table so Aiden could see his watery reflection in her

eyes. “Really?” she sobbed. “Then why have you been spending the evening talk-

ing with me?”

She blinked, and two tears dropped beside Aiden’s hand. Now he’d prove she

was imaginary. He ran his fingers across the table, and—they became wet. What

now?

The manager gaped at his TV screen. “The fourth floor of the Cherrywood

apartment complex has collapsed!” the reporter clamored. “The third floor is

expected to follow!” The reporter went on to mention how many tenants were

yet to be accounted for.

Julie’s pink lips quivered as she began to quake. “Where are we staying to-

night?” she asked.

He hadn’t really thought about accommodations. He was fully occupied now

just trying to return to his senses. How to tame an imagination? On panic’s bor-

der, he found his final defense.

“Diane and Tommy Falbrooke never had a baby girl!” he shouted, standing

back from the table, eyes squarely focused on his apparition, demanding that

it account for itself. But even as he spoke the words, he recognized more. The

Falbrooke family nose. The check bones and jaw line matched his own, convinc-

ingly, now that the baby fat was gone.

“Tommy Falbrooke?” she appeared legitimately confused as her fearful eyes

rose to meet his. “Dad’s name was Aiden—wait. Aiden’s my brother.”

And then, something in her eyes commanded empathy.

“Aiden? Am I your—who am I?”

Helpless. Confused, and without identity. This was painfully familiar.

He might have had a sister. There really was a lot that his parents had never

told him.

The rain drove on, skating in sheets across the parking area outside. Every-

one else was gone now. The news reported a third floor fatality.

“I have to close for the night,” the manager called from the counter. “I’ll have

to ask you to move along.”

“Don’t cry now,” Aiden turned to Julie. “Come with me. Let’s go.”

“No, I have to close up shop sir,” the manager insisted. “You go on by your-

self. You can use the phone if you need someone to get you.”

Aiden looked into the undisturbed cup of tea, now cold and dark. He

plopped in a sugar cube and watched it disappear.

Oh yes! Paying the bill. He felt his pockets. “I—left my wallet at home,” he

said, glancing at the manager. “I’m sorry.”

The manager seemed upset, but not surprised.

Aiden looked at Julie, and then at the book on the table. “Oh!” he said, grab-

bing up the anthology and approaching the counter. “This is worth more than

the drink. Will you take this?”

The manager swapped his disappointed expression for a look of satisfied

shock. He nodded without a word, as Aiden motioned for Julie to follow him out.

“Why did you give him our stories?” Julie whimpered by his side.

“A collection of your fears,” Aiden whispered. “There’ll be better memories.”

Aiden set his jacket on Julie’s shoulders and rested his arm across her back

as they left the diner’s warmth to brave the streets.

The manager called after him. “You’re going to need that jacket tonight, sir.

It’s not safe.” How insensitive.

It had become quite cold. They walked for a few minutes, till Aiden realized

they were only expending energy with no destination. In an open-ended alley,

they sat, Julie on a crate, Aiden in a puddle.

Aiden was beside himself. Too much to process in one day. His ears ached,

his lips were already numb, and his teeth chattered uncontrollably; but as deep

down as he could feel, he thought himself warm. He had someone to focus his

ambitions on now. The rain was its own auditory shelter, shielding him from the

voices outside of Julie and himself. She was breathing steadily now, although

she continued to shiver. He leaned against her side, tugging the side of the jacket

forward to keep his sopping shirt from making her wet.

He was sure he’d work out a solution to this problem, like he did all the oth-

ers. And Julie would be safe. Julie would always be safe. That’s the way his story

always went. By this time tomorrow, these problems would be forgotten. All he

needed now was sleep.

��

Summary:

The “Beginning Writer’s Answer Book” (Writer’s Digest Books, 1993), with

founding editor Kirk Polking, defined writing field jargon (such as “kill fee” and

“potboiler”), shared many resources that writers have found helpful (i.e. the

“Subject Guide to Books in Print”), and offered a great deal of troubleshooting.

The theme of the book was to make the reader more conscious about how to

approach the field of writing, from fiction to journalism, and from freelancing to

collaborating.

The first section, called “How Do I Know if I Have What it Takes?” showed

some truth that would separate the sheep from the goats. The chapter is part dis-

illusionment and part antidote for self-doubt.

A navigable book, the scope was too broad to be fully treated in a summary,

but the table of contents laid the chapters out simply in mini-summaries. For

instance, the entry for chapter 15: “What is Style?” says, “What is ‘pedestrian’

writing? How do editors handle the he/she problem? Where to research the style

appropriate to certain age levels of children’s books? What editors mean by writ-

ing ‘naturally’.”

Some other chapter subjects include the following: whether higher education

is essential for a professional writer; what supplies are necessary in pursuing

writing; how to generate ideas; how to handle quoting from the works of oth-

ers; how to conduct successful interviews; making good impressions in one’s

correspondence to publications; what legal protection is available for one’s own

writing; how to sell specific types of writing (i.e. novels, short stories, songs, and

magazine articles); writing for children; submitting a work to multiple publica-

tions; dealing with rejection; and finding writers’ alliances.

Evaluation:

The preface opened with the quotation, “I’ve been guided by the maxim that

if you ask a question you may seem ignorant for the moment; but if you do not

ask questions you may be ignorant forever.” The information was presented

with the assumption that the audience knew nothing of the writing field. This

approach is helpful. This book was also helpful in presenting many research

sources, enabling any serious reader to connect the dots, because with no insight

on a proper starting point, finding productive sources is difficult.

It’s best that this book focused on approaching the writing field, and not so

much on approaching the art of writing. The Beginning Writer’s Answer Book,

“Completely Revised and Updated,” was fraught with typos, or, one might say,

“fragrant spelling erorrs.” From made-up words, such as “enlose (7),” “marte-

rial (43),” and “realease (69),” to omissions, such as, “Contemporary Authors...

can be used find home addresses,” to offensive structural jumbles, such as,

“Correspondence courses provide one-to-one contact with and critique from

an instructor, as well as provide a stimulus for writing (12),” and—to place

the cherry gently on top—a missing quotation mark on page 46, this book was

entertaining for the wrong reasons. The impression left by these oversights is

like the impression left by the kid who let on that Susie had her eyes open during

prayer—the same kid who picked his nose and swallowed the findings right in

front of you.

These errors whir hialrious, but a writer can feel insecure knowing that a

Writer’s Digest book is so poorly edited. Wasn’t this supposed to be the experi-

enced publication with all the clout? The ally that would teach the beginner to

become the professional?

In fairness, the book gave good troubleshooting, even if it was poorly trou-

bleshot. The information on researching markets and sending queries was help-

ful in saving the aspiring writer from wasting money on surefire failures; and

although this book’s editor may well have slipped in and out of rapid eye move-

ment while finishing the manuscript, his finished product did serve to bring the

beginning writer to new consciousness in the brave new world of writing.

Concluding Analysis:

I loved how easily I could find what I wanted in this book, especially because

my writer friends have been unable to clearly answer some of these seemingly

simple questions. For raising a writer’s awareness in the field of writing, Begin-

ning Writer’s Answers Book was an excellent source of information; but it was

also an unfortunately excellent example of how not to edit a book.

the self-aware writer

��

I wasn’t even looking at Beth when I realized something was wrong. Having

known her for only a couple of weeks, my intuition surprised me; but that eve-

ning at church, as I held the hymnal for both of us, I lowered my head and asked

if she was all right. She smiled sheepishly and asked, “Is it that obvious?”

It was obvious to me; she’d been thinking too loudly.

I don’t pretend to know the ins and outs of communication, but I believe

that the Lord has equipped mankind with perception beyond the five senses.

He made us sensitive so that we could care for one another, and yet our three-

fold cord is breaking. 1 Marriages are being put asunder. The ties that bind are

fraying. How can we sustain unity when we can’t understand one another? I am

confident that the majority of obstacles in interpersonal communication can be

overcome, but only with a teachable spirit (Prepare yourself. The answers are so

simple you may want to reject them).

In I Corinthians 14:33, Paul told us that “God is not the author of confusion,

but of peace.” Confusion is a dark room, and clarity waits outside. The key to

clarity is in I John 1:7. “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fel-

lowship one with another.” In the very next verse John warns, “If we say that we

have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” John understood

that our wicked tendency to pass the buck ruined relationships. We don’t want

trouble, but we don’t want to bear responsibility for it either. The room is dark,

but at least it’s familiar.

The door swings open wide. Light stings our eyes, and even as our vision

adjusts, this new clarity intimidates us, because the sight seems unreal. All these

people are taking pains to show they care, yet their earnest attempts are frustrat-

ing one another. In God’s light, we see through their eyes and identify the source

of confusion: we have been expressing love in ways that our loved ones can’t

perceive.

The language of the heart has multiple dialects. For instance, my primary di-

alect is words of affirmation. Whether by letter or by voice, words have power to

build me up or tear me down. My secondary dialect is quality time. When I see

my friends making an effort to spend time with me, I know they care. The dif-

perceiving with 6 senses

ficulty is that we express love in our natural dialects, often forgetting that many

hearts can’t interpret our love. Some perceive love by gift-giving, some by physi-

cal touch, and some by acts of service. For a deeper study in heart-speak, Gary

Chapman has written an excellent book entitled “The Five Love Languages.”2

By now our eyes have finished adjusting. We can see patterns everywhere,

and among the strangest is this: everyone needs love, but while women crave

love, men seem to need respect even more. 3 Take my friend Jon, for instance.

“I’ve always been of the opinion that love only had to go one way,” he said. “I

don’t think I have to be loved, that I have to be understood. For me, love is

sacrificial. That’s why what Jesus did was so incredible.” Jon finds self-respect in

sacrifice because men instinctively provide. As I Timothy 5:8 says, “If any pro-

vide not for his own, and especially for those of his own house, he hath denied

the faith, and is worse than an infidel.” This is a code of conduct written on the

hearts of men.

While men are providers, women are nurturers.4 The marriage relation-

ship exemplifies both instincts at their best. Jon shared the story of a man who

feared he had critically failed in providing for his wife. “He invested $20,000 in

the stock market,” Jon said. “The company he invested in went belly up. He was

sitting down crying at the horrible mistake he’d made. If he were her, he would

leave himself. His wife came up behind him and put her hands on his shoul-

ders, and she told him, ‘you don’t smoke, drink, gamble, or go out with strange

women. You have saved so much more money by abstaining from those things,

and I still think you’re the finest man I’ve ever met.’ After that, nothing on earth

would ever make him leave that woman. With that one statement, she won him

for life.” Her trust enabled him to move forward.

The dark room of confusion is behind us. Now that we have light, we realize

that we’ve been in a prison of fear this whole time. Freedom waits outside two

doors marked “his” and “hers”. Tender affection unlocks the woman’s door, and

trusting confidence breaks the lock off of the man’s door.

Tender affection gives a woman strength to face that which would otherwise

overwhelm her, and trusting confidence gives a man the power he needs to suc-

��

ceed. The solution is there, but people have trouble accepting what they need.

Dr. John Gray has said that “women are afraid of receiving,” and that “men are

afraid of giving.”5 Gray said that the woman is “commonly afraid of needing too

much and then being rejected, judged, or abandoned. Rejection, judgment, and

abandonment are most painful because deep inside her unconscious she holds

the incorrect belief that she is unworthy of receiving more.”6 Gray also says that

man “wants to give but is afraid he will fail, so he doesn’t try. If his biggest fear is

inadequacy, he naturally is going to avoid any unnecessary risks.”7 It falls on us

to accept affection and earn trust.

You cannot keep any meaningful relationship without making yourself vul-

nerable. You must invest to gain. In Matthew 16:25 Christ said, “Whosoever will

save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find

it.” We cannot afford fear. The Lord has us here because He wants us to lead His

enemies to make peace with Him. As Christ said in John 13:35, “By this shall all

men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”

I John 4:18 reminds us that “there is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth

out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.”

Perfect love doesn’t allow us to jump to conclusions. We must give people the

benefit of the doubt, because we can easily misinterpret messages even within

familiar modes of communication.

For instance, women send each other silent messages. I asked my friend

Whitney for an example. “Our communication level is more intense,” she said.

“You don’t even have to be close necessarily.” To an outsider like me, the effi-

ciency of this language is impressive, but Whitney admitted that reading be-

tween the lines can cause trouble. One woman might assume that another was

angry or hurt based on unintended signals. In truth, the poor girl had allergies

that day, but now the assuming woman has made an unfair character judgment

because it seemed obvious.

Dr. Gray has said that “men are sensitive to feeling that they have failed

when a woman talks about problems. This is why it’s so hard for him to listen

sometimes. He wants to be her hero. When she is disappointed or unhappy over

anything, he feels like a failure.”8 The feeling of failure is unfounded, but it takes

much self-reminding to overcome assumptions.

Although we better understand how to communicate, there’s still interfer-

ence in our relationships. We’re speaking the right heart dialects, but people

aren’t responding. This may be the hardest part. We left a dark room and broke

out of prison; now we have to stand still and wait for others to move. We have to

practice patience.

I cannot overemphasize the importance of patience, because years ago my

own selfish impatience jeopardized my two dearest friendships, and I almost

didn’t learn my lesson in time to fix things. Good communication has become

so vitally important to me that I’m pursuing communications as my life’s work.

Now you need to prove, if only to yourself, how much you value communica-

tion. Just as it takes two people to communicate, it takes two people to remove

interference, and you may be the only one who cares to make your relationship

work. If your spouse has given up on “for better or for worse”, if your friend has

forgotten what “friend” means, or if you are trying to introduce a living Savior to

an unresponsive and cold soul, remember that a watched pot doesn’t boil. If you

give Him time, God can use your endurance to melt the freezing heart.

One more point of advice regarding patience: it is more important to be

available than it is to offer advice, even if you have every answer your loved

ones need. Tell them you will always be there for them, and then let them come

to you. This is a preventative measure, because men typically want to work out

problems alone,9 and women usually need a listening ear long before they want

instructions.10 You are not giving up on them by giving them space. To the con-

trary, you are giving them room to breathe.

Remember that you cannot change hearts. But never forget that you have

direct access to the One Who cares for your loved ones more than you do. Keep

them in your Father’s ear. In James 1:6,7 we are told to “ask in faith, nothing

wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and

tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.”

Your first five senses are not reliable. If you want to make a difference, you have

to put your spirit into action. Work on your relationship with the Lord. And

expect results.

��

The night is breezeless, and the clouds are few. I kneel and run my fingers across

the gnawed waistline of a white birch. Poplars stand in water under the full

moon. I remember a time before the beavers came, when this was barely a pond.

I need the stillness of this land. Hunters have been helping themselves to

rabbits and deer. A 20-acre wood offers ample hiding places; that’s why it’s

hard to control the trespassing. It’s too bad. The neighbor’s dog Orio goes into a

frenzy whenever he hears shooting within our woods. I hope the gunshots won’t

drive the beavers to leave; for now they sleep, safely hidden in their expertly-

constructed lodge. Enviable, the beavers’ sense of architecture. I try to find their

tiny island in the moonlit pond, but it’s too far in.

I step back into the trail, cautiously, because a ditch-like stream flows on

either side. This lump of land is narrow, and the stream is too deep and over-

shadowed with bramble to glitter back at the moon. On the other side, the open

path is easier to follow. Bushes and trees line my left and my right as I retrace

my winding trail by the light of the moon.

I hear a sound. Nearby. Something like a dog sneezing. It seems to come

from within the Staghorn sumac patch to my left. Did Orio get his collar off

again? I hold a sumac trunk and lean in, but I’ve no light to see by. Perhaps the

sound wasn’t so near; my hindered vision is just heightening my other senses.

“Orio.”

I whistle for him once. Nothing. Oh well. I stand straight again. A thin cloud

has just finished passing the moon. Darkness still shrouds the trees, but at eye

level within branches, something glistens white. I probably set a cup of tea in

the crotch of a tree. I would be absent minded like that. But this is jagged, like

broken glass.

No. Like teeth.

Run. Dashing across open space, I realize I’m an easy target. I can’t hear

anything behind me—I can’t hear my own sneakers squeaking on grass. My head

pulses and my ears know only the air rushing past. Gasping, I inhale a mosquito

and look ahead to keep the path.

What am I running from? I almost want to know. The biggest thing around

betrayed by

moonlighthere is the deer. No bears. No sasquatch sightings—a little farther north maybe.

Even then, no sighting is ever backed by evidence.

An apple tree stands as a landmark in the path. My choice is left or right, but

I remember another tree on the other side of the beaver pond. It looks the same

as this one. I think I take a left from that one, and a right from this. I don’t know.

Veer right. I should stumble through about 10 feet of sumac and blackberry

bushes. Then I’ll be in the clear. I’ll see Dad’s woodshed, and I’ll know I’m not

far from the house.

I tackle the brush, but my arms don’t stick on anything. No blackberry

bushes. Sumac and tall grass go on, thicker than I expected. I have to crawl.

Now I hear everything. The movement behind me sounds as confused as my

own. A rabbit runs from me, terrified out of its sleep. Do I hear a mole scratching

beneath the dirt? I wish I were him. Be still and you won’t be found.

I collide with a sumac. Lowering my head I wipe my left eye with the back of

my hand. I try to keep my pace, to focus, but my mind plays tricks. I suddenly

wonder if sasquatches bury their dead.

I’m stuck. Something’s caught my ankle! I don’t feel a grip, just a pull, just

resistance. I struggle forward until my jeans tear at the heel. I’ve escaped a

pointed stump.

Finally, I sprawl out of the brush, and my feet fly. Where am I? The edge of

the woods is on my left. A group of maples ahead of that. Thinner trees in the

sky to the right. It would look different in the light. I’ll follow this path, and if it

doesn’t take me home—

A dark figure enters my peripheral vision. From the edge of the woods, a

silhouette is heading me off. Is it the one I saw before? My brain won’t take a

break. Are sasquatches nomadic? Are they intelligent? Have they developed

any primitive technology, maybe basic tools or weapons? What do they hunt?

Do real witnesses ever get the chance to report the sighting? Stop, stop, stop! It

must be a bear. Some comfort that would be. I won’t turn my head, that would

stop me cold. Already my hamstrings are tight. I know I won’t run much farther.

Dad’s woodshed lies ahead. I know it’s locked, but I also know I’m coming

��

up on the hill above my house.

Oh.

The house door is also locked. Dad would come to the door if I knock, but

there won’t be enough time. There won’t be enough time.

I speed down the hill, into one last field of freshly mown grass. So many stars

tonight. If I turn I will see everything before my night ends; all I care to see is

this growing yellow rectangle of light on my front step.

I turn my head just enough to listen, and I hear nothing. My foolish mind. I

am running from nothing. And I’m a fool for playing it safe. I am within 30 feet

of my doorway, and there is nothing behind me but tranquil night. A beautiful

night to be alive. My imagination needs a good night’s sleep.

The summer silence dies with the noise of tearing flesh.

An arrow appears before me, stuck at an angle in the frame of my doorway.

What? I feel a splash on my back. It’s not my blood. I haven’t been scratched.

Turning once, I make out a form on the moonlit ground. The size of a tiger. The

shape of a man.

A hanging thermometer by the door reminds me not to shiver, and I have

the presence of mind to check behind it. My father has left a spare key.

I twist the key, slip inside and lean hard against the door, my thumb and

finger on the lock. I tumble into the bathroom and flip the switch to check the

mirror. I’ve never seen myself this white. Starting the shower, I peel off my tank

top and examine the blood splash; it is black, but it hasn’t dried at all. I will find

a place to keep this. I don’t expect any evidence to remain outdoors till morning.

Only my stubborn curiosity will keep me from sleep. I’ve never known any-

one to practice archery in this region. It’s a skill I’d like to learn, if ever I have

the opportunity. The common trespasser is less than conscientious about clean-

ing up his mess; I’ve found empty bullet casings resting in the path and hiding

in grass beyond the beaver pond. Perhaps archers, at least, cover their tracks. I

don’t know why hunters always pick our land without asking. I don’t know why

an archer should show up, of all times, the night I was being chased—and now

that I consider it, I don’t even know if I was the one being chased.

It was Valentine’s Day when he first met Jaime. He couldn’t speak. He could

only point her fingers to the letters of his name: H-E-N-R-Y. After that, he called

himself “H”. Jaime had had invisible friends when she was younger, but H was

the first invisible friend that turned out to be real.

Jaime’s mother had been involved in Wicca before finding faith in Christ.

“I felt like Satan was chasing my little girl,” she said, “because there was always

someone trying to lead her that way.”

Jaime spent her childhood with her mother in Arlington, Washington, some-

times visiting her father on the Tulalip Indian reservation. From the age of nine,

Jaime remembers seeing a “dark ghost” in his kitchen—a man’s shape in midair.

She learned later that her great uncle had passed away in that kitchen.

“My mom taught me spiritual warfare,” Jaime said. “I don’t remember this,

but I’d say I saw things all the time. She told me that if I ever saw something, say

‘in the name of Jesus, go away’. She said they couldn’t handle that.”

But a girl can’t repel spirits if she’s following them. The spirit world fascinat-

ed Jaime, and Dad’s house was only the beginning. Her next door neighbor, Bob,

worshiped crystals and made glass pyramids. He paid special attention when he

heard Jaime describing angelic imaginary friends. Bob asked Jaime’s mother

if he could teach Jaime crystal healing. After she said no, he tried to bribe her.

Regularly. “He tried to teach me a couple times,” Jaime said. “I’d leave.” But the

different spiritualists that she met all said the same things: “You should look

into this more. I think you’ve got something.” “You have a really strong aura.”

Many classmates in Lakewood High School were Wiccans. “There was

always that pull,” Jaime said. “I stunk at sports and academics. Being good at

something sounded really nice. Finally it seemed like a good enough idea.

“At least with black magic, you know that what you’re doing is wrong. Wicca

is ‘white magic’; you only cast spells to help people.”

Her stepmother’s sister, Carol, had taught her to read tarot cards. “I be-

lieve it was originally a Wiccan practice,” Jaime said. “There are guidelines, but

you’re supposed to interpret by instinct. Later, when I was 18, my friend Crystal

showed me again in depth, tapping into the spirit world to get answers.”

invisible friend

��

Jaime’s childhood dream was to become an actress. After a school play in

spring 2001, Lakewood held a cast party at Denny’s. Another cast member had

brought a friend named Beth, a witch with long black hair. Beth and Jaime were

discussing important dates, when Jaime mentioned that her birthday was Sep-

tember 22. Beth’s eyes grew wide. “You were born on the equinox?”

That was the first time Jaime had heard about witches’ holidays. “That had

an element of destiny in it,” Jaime said. “She really wanted to train me. She be-

lieved that I had greater potential. Beth went off to college, but she said, ‘when I

come back, we really need to get together’. She was the one who showed me how

to make an energy ball.”

After high school, Jaime spent all summer partying with friends. But by

Jaime’s 18th birthday, the party was over. “My friends disappeared, Dad wasn’t

calling, my older brother was a cocaine addict, I had a bad relationship with my

mom. No boyfriend, no job, no future.”

There was one friend who kept close. “Jessika looked like an anime,” Jaime

remembers. “I don’t know how she did this. We’d walk into Denny’s, and heads

would all turn at the same time. After we ate, she’d ask for the bill and the waiter

would say, ‘Oh, somebody else already paid for it.’ I felt invisible next to her.”

They were best friends, for what it was worth. “The two of us versus the rest

of the world,” Jaime said. They were out driving one day, when Jessika admit-

ted, “I don’t trust you. I keep waiting for you to—”

“I don’t trust you either!” Jaime answered, and they both laughed. “It was

the most bitter laughter you could imagine,” Jaime recalls.

Jessika was a model. She was always smoking, looking bitter, and never

gaining any weight. Jaime’s dream of becoming an actress seemed further from

reach than ever. “I still hadn’t gotten famous,” she says. “I was going to use my

grandma’s inheritance money for plastic surgeries. I had put on a lot of weight.

“Everything from October to April seems black,” Jaime said. “It was just a

really dark time. Brief, but intense. On Halloween, I started purging.”

Jaime’s eating disorder was the least of her problems in that seven-month

stretch. On Valentine’s Day, Jaime sat on Jessika’s inch-deep tan carpet with

Jessika’s cousin Diana. Jessika’s room was plain, except for a few posters of fair-

ies and David Bowie. The girls were talking together about egging happy couples,

when Jessika pulled out a new pastime in honor of the occasion. It was a wooden

board, printed with the alphabet and the words ‘yes’, ‘no’, and ‘goodbye’.

“A lot of people get Ouija boards to talk to their dead loved ones,” Jaime

explains. “There’s a triangular plastic pointer with a magnifying glass in the

center. You don’t press it, you just touch it and it crawls to the letters. There are

numbers underneath if you need to spell out years. You normally play with three

people.” Jessika’s Ouija board was inked in a medieval style, with motifs of hap-

py and sad faces at the corners, so the spirit could easily communicate its mood

and reactions. “The conversation’s over when they say it’s over,” Jaime adds.

That Valentine’s Day, the girls met H. “He was trying to pitch the reincar-

nation thing,” Jaime said. “He told us that in his last life he was ‘Henry’. He

brought up a spirit that claimed to be Jessika and Diana’s aunt, and it gave them

details from the car accident that killed her. Jessika and Diana were crying with

joy. It said things like their aunt used to say. Her sense of humor was the same.

We all wanted to believe it.”

When they were finished with their aunt, H came back. “Hey, that was really

emotional, you guys,” he said.

From that time on, Jaime and Jessika played with the Ouija board whenever

they found a minute. “It got to where the pointer would zip around as quickly as

we cound say the letters.”

Jaime’s friend Micaiah had come to live with her in November. She hated

the Ouija board. “Man,” she would say. “I wish H was alive so I could kill him

again.” H typically snapped back with a ready insult.

The voices began when February ended.

“I was lying in bed,” Jaime remembers, “thinking about the next tattoo I was

going to get.”

“Jaime.”

“It was like a hoarse whisper,” Jaime said, “but it was really loud and dis-

tinct. I could pinpoint where it was coming from, and I knew nobody was there;

you couldn’t close my door quietly, because it would drop on its hinges.”

She stopped sleeping at night. Instead, she watched movies to pass the dark

hours, and she tried to sleep in the day. About a week passed before Jaime was

visited in her room again.

“Hey!” shouted a bodiless voice.

“It was rare enough to be unexpected,” Jaime said. “I realized later that it

only happened when the Ouija board was at my house.”

By the middle of March, Micaiah had gone long enough without paying rent.

Jaime’s mother kicked her out. That night, another high school friend called

Jaime.

“Why have you been telling Jessika stories about Micaiah?” Alex accused.

Something switched on inside. Jaime began screaming, and she kept

screaming until Alex hung up. “I tapped into this whole ocean of anger,” she

said. “Resources beyond what I could imagine.” Jaime left two violent messages,

�0

ran downstairs and screamed to her stepfather, then ran back upstairs to scream

one more message.

“I was so mad, I was terrified,” Jaime said. “It was utter and consuming ha-

tred, so much bigger than me. I could have killed Alex. It was like everything else

was driven from my personality. That’s when I wondered if I’d been possessed.”

On April 11th, Jessika brought Jaime to Denny’s to meet a new friend. Ben

wore glasses and black hair spiked into a flow-hawk. He had a lip ring and a

spike bracelet. He dressed like a punk rocker. “I thought he was so hot,” Jaime

remembers.

Ben witnessed to Jaime and Jessika from 10 P.M. to 2 A.M. “I don’t think

Ben was saved,” Jaime said, “but he was obsessive compulsive. He’d been ob-

sessed with demonology before this. For another month after we met, he was

obsessed with Christianity; then he was obsessed with selling insurance.”

The day after the meeting at Denny’s, Ben drove the girls to his church. “This

is an emergency,” Ben told his pastor. “These two girls need to get saved.”

It was noon when they arrived at the private church, a big white room with a

projector and a blue carpet. Several members of the congregation were present,

playing praise songs. “I started crying right away,” Jaime said. For over half a

year, she’d been used to only darkness. “It was something good.”

The pastor was a middle-aged Asian man with dark hazel eyes and black hair

graying at the temples. He understood that they had been involved in witchcraft.

“You have probably been exposed to some demons,” he said, “and they’ve lied to

you.”

Jaime excused herself.

Digging her fingernails into the vinyl countertop in the closet-sized rest-

room, she felt something inside traveling upward, confronting her in her own

reflection.

“It was the only time they spoke to me with my own mouth,” Jaime told me.

She kindly censored what came next.

“He’s a blankety-blank liar!” the voice warned.

When Jaime returned to the pastor and the church folk, she had to grip her

chair with her jaw clenched shut. “I was afraid I was going to punch him.”

“Are you OK?” asked a redhead named Lindsey.

With all the control that she had left, Jaime shook her head ‘no’.

“We have to start on her right now,” Lindsey told the pastor.

“He started by talking to them,” Jaime said. “I could tell and they could tell.

I’ve never sworn at an older person before. He commanded them to go down. As

soon as I had the floor, I was mostly crying. He tried to bind them in the name of

Jesus Christ. ‘You must leave her alone until we’re done. Speak only the truth.’

They’d start telling the truth, then drift into a lie. ‘Is that the truth?’ the pastor

asked, and they’d say, ‘OK, no—’. One claimed to be Asmodeus. Seriously, how

likely is it that I had a celebrity demon?

“The pastor was finding out what their hold was over me. Areas where I’d

not forgiven, areas where I’d reacted wrong. At the same time, they were inside,

saying, ‘Why would God want any part of your life?’”

The pastor walked Jaime through one thing after another. “You have to for-

give that,” he said. “Surrender that part to the Lord. Now you have to get saved,

or each demon will bring back seven more.”

Jaime had to choose whether or not to give her heart away again, to trust in

a God she had never known, or to have her heart taken again and refilled with

darkness. “No,” she said. “Let’s get saved right now.”

“It was that important to get away,” Jaime remembers. “After I got saved,

the benefits were all just a really really really nice surprise.”

Jessika had accepted Christ by 1:30 P.M., and she spent the rest of the time

praying for Jaime. Jaime’s exorcism lasted until 11 P.M.

With tears streaming, Jaime walked into a cool night with a warm breeze,

and looked at the stars. “It was like I’d just taken earplugs out,” she said, “like I’d

been wearing shades my whole life. Everything felt hotter and colder and bright-

er. Every sense was more acute—like catching a cold, only backwards. Suddenly

I knew what I’d been missing. It was just more real. It felt like it was the first

time I’d ever seen it.”

Jaime had planned to change her identity in June and leave with Jessika to

join a coven. She ended up going on a mission trip to the Cook Islands. Instead

of squandering her inheritance on plastic surgeries, Jaime used the money to

fund her education at Pensacola Christian College. And instead of living to be-

come famous, now Jaime lives to bring glory to her Savior.

There is peace in her eyes now. She has learned to trust, though she had

been deceived for so long. “H won our trust by playing on our weaknesses,” she

said. “He treated us exactly like we expected to be treated. He’d hit on Jessika all

the time and he’d ignore me, or ask me to ‘please stop talking’. Both of us trusted

him because he was believable.

“If he had seemed like he cared for either of us as a person, we wouldn’t have

believed it. It would’ve felt weird. That took the longest to accept when we got

saved. We had reached the point where we were willing to surrender, but we

didn’t expect the love that came—that someone as important as God cared as

much as He did.”

��

Jaime has been growing as a child of God for a little over four years now. The

disillusioned maturity on her face also bears the mark of innocence regained.

The relationship she has with her new invisible Friend is unique because He is

also inaudible. She tried to explain how she listens to Him. “It’s warmer, full-

er—have you ever hugged someone taller, and their voice rumbles through your

whole body? It’s a closer, safer kind of a feeling.

“I was talking to little girls at summer camp about this. ‘My sheep hear

my voice.’ I know the difference between my voice and God’s voice. It’s always

something I wouldn’t say, something that surprises me. The giveaway is there’s

never any guesswork. Any time He tells me something, it’s more certain than I

ever am. There’s always the chance that I’m wrong; there’s never any chance that

He’s wrong.

“It’s a lot easier to trust when you have Someone helping you figure out who

to trust.”

how to operate a timex clock

These instructions will show you how to set the clock, set the alarm, and turn on the alarm function on your battery-operated Timex clock (fig. 1).

CAUTION: DO NOT OPERATE A CLOCK WITH DAMAGED BATTERIES. DO NOT ALLOW A DAMAGED BATTERY TO LEAK ACID ONTO YOUR SKIN.

Fig. 1Back View of the Timex Clock

Set the Time1. Insert one triple A battery into the bottom of the clock. 2. Shift the switch to TIME SET. 3. Press the HOUR button until you reach the correct time. PM is designated

by a capital P on the clock’s face (fig. 2).4. Press the MINUTE button until you reach the correct time.

Fig. 2The Clock’s Face

Set the Alarm Time1. Shift the switch to AL. OFF (fig. 1). (If you skip this step, the HOUR and

MINUTE buttons may not respond when you click them to set the alarm.)2. Shift the switch to AL. SET. 3. Press the HOUR button until you reach the correct time. PM is designated

by a capital P on the clock’s face (fig. 2).4. Press the MINUTE button until you reach the correct time.

Turn the Alarm On1. Shift the switch to AL. ON. When the alarm is set, the bell symbol will appear (fig. 2).

AL. SET AL. ONAL. SET AL. ON

TIME SET AL. OFFTIME SET AL. OFF

MINUTE HOURMINUTE HOURHourHour

SnoozeSnooze

SwitchSwitch

MinuteMinute

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...occupy till i come.

luke 19:13

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on the go

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hurricaneRepainted convertible

Running on fumes

To sanctuary in Stockbridge

Maybe.

Empty gas stations

Uncharitable farmers

Four college boys

Praying while weighing down

An empty car.

We made it.

How?

On the way, I was cold

But the sky was beautiful

And there was nowhere I’d rather be.

We were a tad cramped

Proximity reminded me

Too much

How separate we were

Even as roommates

And how we would grow more distant.

Inevitable

I was cold in the backseat

And really only a little cramped

So I was warm on my right side.

Anyway, thanks for that.

We all reached Geoff’s house

No cafeteria for a couple days

Homecooking.

Thanksgiving

No curfew for a couple days

Second supper

Midnight

The power returns to Pensacola

Oh

Right then

I guess we will too.

“I called Peter. He’s going to drive us,” Stephen said.

“Oh! Good,” I said.

“I have to be back by 3. Think we have enough time?”

I patted my pocket. “I have everything on my jump drive. You should be

able to just slap it onto the site.”

Peter knocked at the door. “Hey guys. Ready?”

I watched the road fly by on the path that we usually had to walk. Please

let us make the deadline, Lord. When we got to Panera Bread, we found a spot

that comfortably sat three guys and two laptops. It was about to happen. A sum-

mer full of programming and animating was about to produce the first online

Haggard Academy episode.

Steve plugged in the jump drive. “So what do you have here?”

“Well, of course the opening toon,” I said. “I finished the final Under

Construction minitoon for the new intro, and—” I double clicked a Flash file,

“this is the new homepage.”

“Do all the buttons work?” Stephen asked.

“I didn’t get to program the action script for those. I thought you could

just cut the images into squares and make HTML buttons out of them.”

“Ooh. HTML doesn’t really work like that.”

Stephen stared at the screen. I remembered other times this had hap-

pened. Every time, my trusty programmer worked through the technical difficul-

ties and saved the day. On April first, when we ran off to What-a-Burger to open

the website, we faced an inordinate number of initial obstacles. Stephen attacked

them all with urgency.

The summer had passed with many a walk to post mini-toons, update

Mr. Haggard’s blog, and check our visitor count. Now it was the beginning of

September, a single day before the deadline I had set for episode one. We both

knew we’d have no time for this once the semester began.

“Let me know when to hit refresh,” Peter said. “I want to be the first one

to see.”

“Don’t hit it yet,” Stephen said, beginning to type.

a haggard site

��

I told myself to calm down. If God would have me to complete this proj-

ect, He would provide the time. I checked the clock on Stephen’s screen. 2:45. “If

you need to go, we can go,” I said.

Why was I nervous? Because in my mind, everything had led up to this

moment. I loved cartooning, even when I was small. In college, writing classes

had taught me scriptwriting, and broadcasting classes had given me experi-

ence in recording and editing. Now all the pieces were in place, but the puzzle

wouldn’t go up on the screen. Father, please let my family see this first episode

today.

Stephen pulled out his cell phone and dialed up a friend. “Hey. Yeah. I’m

gonna be a little late, okay? All right, man. Bye.”

I wondered if Stephen believed in Haggard Academy even more than I

did. This was the farthest I’d ever taken a creative concept. I grew up wanting to

do voices for a cartoon, but until the past year, I’d never believed I might create

one. This project had consumed me. Haggard Academy: a social satire on mod-

ern education. Previous ambitions had produced a few nice visuals. Now I had a

message.

But I kept my feet grounded. Whenever we spoke of goals, I would

always allow that the idea may never leave the ground. “Don’t worry,” Stephen

always answered. “This is going to be big. Trust me.”

I had to keep a level head. The first few days after we opened the site, I

was so charged I thought I needed medical attention. All the same, he could be

right; what if this opened the door to cartoon merchandising? God may have

given me this concept as a way to get me out of debt.

I realized God was the only One to thank for the progress we had already

made. When I had no cash, He’d provided a desktop computer that I could work

on. He’d allowed my tax returns to pay for the professional license of the ani-

mation software. He’d surprised me with a remarkable voice cast, all of them

friends from back home; and I couldn’t have asked for a friend more loyal to

my cause than Stephen was. Everything had come together, really sooner than

I would have expected, until now. If Stephen could just work out how to fix my

mess—

“All right, Pete. Hit refresh.”

Peter tilted his widescreen computer, and we watched as our alter ego

construction workers admired the school they’d just finished.

“How did we do this?” said Cartoon Steve.

“I—don’t know,” said Cartoon Jeremy. But I did know. We weren’t the

ones making it happen to begin with.

The Varsity cafeteria has bridged the hours between meals. “People had been

using their lunch hour to study for tests,” said Amanda McClure (Sr., Florida),

student manager of dining services. “They didn’t have any other time to eat.”

Now students can break for a meal anytime between 7am and 7pm. “At home I

used to eat lunch at 2 or 3,” says Doug Smith (Soph., California). “It’s more con-

venient. More comfortable.”

“Almost all my classes are two hours long,” says Shanon Dunning (Sr, New

Hampshire), “and if I get bored, I can just leave during that ten minute break

and grab something quick for breakfast or lunch.”

“I am so happy that I have time to eat now,” says Tim Ross (Sr., Missouri).

“When I prepare for my first hour class all morning, I can still get breakfast.”

The option of early dinner also helps students to free their evening. “It’s not

as crowded as it used to be,” says Danielle DuCharme (Sr., Florida).

Stephen Watkins (Jr., Alabama) adds, “If you’re going to need to go off cam-

pus from 5 to 7, you can go eat at 3.”

“I’m hungry,” Marcus Bradley (Fr., Wyoming) explains. “It’s more conve-

nient. Especially Saturday, you can just go in and eat your food at any time.”

In college, it is critical to establish a routine. The new Varsity hours encour-

age that routine to include three meals a day.

time to eat

��

��

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��

Ana was missing. No, Rue was missing, and Ana’s absence left him

haunted by a challenge to lead himself. He stopped at the edge of a forest to

check the trees. He’d been through three forests since misplacing his sister, and

each had been full of hanging snappers. If he didn’t exercise caution now, he

may not have a chance to regret it. The snapper would drop from a branch in

silence, its cubit-long teeth closing about his neck.

In the last forest, he hadn’t paid close enough attention. He thought they

were all short trees, an unlikely habitat for all but diseased snappers. He’d been

in far enough to see light peeking through from the nearing end when one fell

straight down in front of him. It caught him off guard, its one huge brown eye

staring through the fur, its hungry round head swinging slightly on its snakelike

body, hung from a high branch. Rue’s first reaction was to look up, then around.

This one wasn’t a threat now that it had missed. A snapper only endangers itself

by spending all its energy on the plunge. For hours, it’s too rattled to return to its

hidden home.

But snappers know enough to cluster, so if one takes a premature drop,

another can make up for the error. They only require high limbs with plenty of

dropping space. Now Rue knew that snappers wouldn’t threaten him here. The

trees were bushy and short.

He hoped Ana was faring well. He imagined a kind farmer taking her in

as a hireling. Maybe she was sheltered, well fed, and rested. And why not? Such

a turnabout would only be as unlikely as the fire the other day, and being driven

from their home, separated from their parents, and now scattered, forced to hide

in a bigger world, where unfriendly strangers knew their faces. He couldn’t help

but believe they were being hunted. By whom, or what? Rue hoped he wouldn’t

be alone when he found out. And he hoped Ana wouldn’t find out alone.

A noisy stream cut across the path. Rue stooped for a drink, and heard

rustling. He snatched up a stick and turned to see a fuzzy, warm grey tail hide

behind a rock. Just rodents playing games, he thought. He turned again to his

water, but he gave up as he looked down. He held not a stick, but a bone!

Rue spun around to find a single eye watching him from behind the rock.

rue’s petHe threw the bone at it and leaped across the stream. Up a muddy incline, a few

boulders sat in a heavy moss padding. A rock formation on the left made a tiny

cave. He could crawl in if he needed to hide. He went on.

What had he seen? Rue tried to remember which creatures had just

one eye. This was too small and mobile to be a snapper. He’d heard stories of a

creature with one head-sized eye which supposedly lived under the sea; this was

not near the sea, and that was too small a rock. There was one more creature,

though. His father had cautioned him against it. Ana knew, but she wouldn’t tell.

What was it?

Rue reached the forest’s edge and surveyed the open land. This wood be-

hind him stretched for miles on the left. The meadow ahead reached the horizon.

Maybe this forest was the best route to follow for now.

He rehearsed Ana’s instructions. We have to find a valley. To the east.

Sheep will be grazing in blue grass. Their fold is in the side of the hill. The shep-

herds don’t know who we are, so we won’t have to hide.

He would try to keep east, while cutting across the forest to see the other

side. He might find a distant valley, and if Ana had kept the course, she might be

there waiting.

Rue turned back into the trees and froze. From a branch about four cu-

bits above, a fuzzy one-eyed creature watched him. It was warm grey with darker

grey markings about its powder green eye. He remembered what his father had

told him. He’d spoken of a creature much like a snapper, but small as a cat. It

looked soft and harmless. Instead of one immobile arm, it moved about on four,

all of them snakelike. Father never revealed why it was dangerous.

Rue set back into the wood at a brisk pace. If he hurried, he might reach

the other side and find a valley before finding any more of these- what had his

father called them? He hadn’t even shared the name.

Rue met another stream. He turned, hoping to recognize where he’d

been before, but in his excitement he’d spun off course, and the previous stream

was hidden in deep tree covering. Resolving to reach the other side before sun-

set, he ran. In such a place, he told himself, the only animals he would startle

�0

would be the kind to fear him. With the exception of the bone, there were no

signs of recent human life.

Rue stopped in a circle of berry bushes. He didn’t recognize the berry,

but he smelled one, tasted it, and found it safe and sweet. The berries were

plump and red, nearly black, and they made the bushes droop.

Rue sat and crossed his legs. He would stay long enough to gather his

strength again. He wanted to take some berries with him, but he had no bag.

The forest was hot. Since Ana wasn’t there to complain, he slipped off his

shirt and ate some more berries. He looked down at the pile of white cloth, and

considered its integrity. If he folded the bottom corners up to the shoulders with

a bunch of berries inside, he probably wouldn’t even lose any juice.

Rue listened as he filled his shirt. From the time he entered the forest, he

had heard a sound that he could not place. It was more drawn out than a bird’s

melody; it was quieter and sadder than any animal call he’d known. He felt at-

tached to the song, as if he might hum harmony unconsciously as he walked. He

reached for another berry, but pulled back his hand. Another small hand was

reaching for the same spot.

Rue balled up his shirt and rose to one knee. The hand hovered in place.

It wasn’t reaching for the berry. He squinted through bushes at a dull green eye.

He’d always been told that dogs don’t smile, but he never believed it; people said

that animals don’t cry tears, but this was close enough to change his mind. He’d

been taught to stay away. He imagined Father’s advice coming from supersti-

tion; countless people withholding compassion from a creature they refused to

understand.

Rue sat on his ankles as the creature slipped around the bush and into

plain view. It was fuzzy and warm grey with dark markings. Could it be the same

one, or did they all look this way? Rue didn’t believe that this thing had the abil-

ity or reason to follow him so far, so swiftly.

He held out his hand, and the creature pressed its head underneath it.

Rue offered a berry. The creature looked down at the berry then back up at Rue.

No mouth. How strange. Now he was sure that he faced no danger. This small

animal was alone, like himself, and it wanted company.

“How do you eat?” Rue asked. The creature reached up with tiny black

fingers. Rue took the hand and lifted the creature against his left hip. Its other

three arms wrapped around him like a belt. The fuzzy fur was coarser than it

appeared. He lifted his shirt-satchel and set out again, but night came quickly.

Rue only gained a half-mile before the light was spent. He dropped to his knees

beside a tree, brushed pine needles aside, and dug two arrows in the dirt, one

where he was walking, and another where he judged to be east. He lay down

with his berry satchel at his knees and the animal at his left arm.

Rue awoke before dawn, with energy that surprised him. He gathered

the corners of his berry shirt, felt the ground for his arrows, and started running.

Travel was cooler now, the breeze working more effectively without so

much fabric to pass through. Rue ran and ran until he saw the dawn breaking

through the last of the trees.

He approached the newly discovered forest edge with caution. He hadn’t

been afraid of being found before, and he didn’t know why he was afraid now.

The forest still covered him. No sounds suggested that anyone was nearby.

Almost all he heard now was that melancholy forest song. It felt no louder than

before, only closer; a thought rather than a sound.

Rue wondered if there might be water nearby. He was a sweaty mess.

Oh! He’d forgotten about the creature. It was still asleep, wrapped around his

left arm. He looked closer. It had attached itself to him! Tiny black fingers were

all within his skin, two hands in the forearm, and two hands in the wrist. He

clenched a fist and opened his fingers again. He didn’t feel so much as an itch.

He wasn’t exhausted either. He may as well have dreamed the last two

hours of running, but here he was at the edge of open country, half clothed in

red sunlight. He took off running again, just to test his limit.

Rue passed hills and flower fields, all of them a blur as the sun slowly

rose to its peak. He came upon a wide stream and decided to jump it. He ran

to the edge then stopped. He was hungry. Watching beneath the surface of the

rushing water, he thought to try diving for a fish. A silly notion, he told himself,

but there was an urge. There was a voice; words to a song. He looked at his right

arm. The creature was awake, watching to see if he could hear it.

Rue plunged into the stream, and found it deep with swift current. He

saw everything clearly, various fish darting about as he was carried along. After a

minute or two of riding the flow, Rue thought, have I been breathing water? He

hadn’t. He had been holding his breath, and he believed he could continue in-

definitely. He waited until he finally saw a fish he liked, a cream colored fish with

orange fins. He whipped out his right hand and dug his fingers into its slippery

scales, giving the fish no time to struggle.

Rue surfaced and gripped a root by the water’s edge, threw the fish onto

dry grass and climbed up after it. The voice told him not to wait for firewood. He

bit into the cold scales and took off running again.

Rue had lost all the berries, but he still had his shirt. He put it back on.

It would dry faster that way. In spite of the stream’s chill, his energy overheated

��

him.

Looking around and then behind, Rue found the stream had wound in

so many directions that he had no point of reference. He didn’t know where he

started, and now he couldn’t guess where he was going.

By the time he finished his fish, Rue had returned to what he assumed to

be another edge of the same long forest. He still judged himself safer traveling

within cover of darkness. His vision was a bit cluttered with white spots, he as-

sumed from so much direct sunlight, but he decided which way was east, and he

walked for the rest of the day.

That night Rue didn’t sleep. He walked the woods to see what he could

see. The night before, he’d have seen nothing. Now he saw shadows. Once

or twice when he was young, he saw shadows dancing in moonlight from the

window in his room. He had never been scared of them, only curious. These he

feared. They were everywhere, but nothing was there to cast them. They didn’t

dance in mirth. Many walked restlessly, as he did now, and some sat deadly still,

with head in hands.

While the quiet song never stopped, Rue heard yet another sound. The

snarl of a wild dog. Had it been tracking him? He hadn’t confronted such a thing

before, and he’d always hoped for clarity of mind when the time demanded it.

He could climb a tree, he even felt he could outrun a dog, but a melody com-

manded him otherwise.

The dog appeared before him. It must have thought itself invisible, but

he could see its eyes, and he didn’t fear its teeth. As Rue reached his left hand

into a tree and twisted off a low branch, the dog hesitated. How foolish it was,

trying to savor the moment! The dog leaped at Rue’s left arm, but never got a

taste. Instead, it met the club of death. Rue beat the wild dog to jelly, then picked

it up and hurled it deep into the shadows.

A small part of him felt uneasy, but a large part felt pleased and accom-

plished. Rue didn’t notice when one of the creature’s arms released him and

reached out toward something else.

He felt himself being pulled into a ring of single eyes. His pet had joined

hands with another of its own kind. That one was linked to another, and that

to another. Rue heard more voices clearly than he ever could at once before;

all of them melodious, all of them related but altogether discordant. He filled

with memories that he wouldn’t call his own. He felt the pain of experiences he

wouldn’t say he’d earned.

Two more arms loosened as the creature stood among its kinship. Across

the ring Rue met a blue eye that watched through goldenrod hair. He didn’t

know the words to its song, but it seemed to play an apology. Rue felt tiny fingers

on his right arm, a brown arm making ready to seal the ring. Rue grabbed the

arm and pulled as hard as he could from the one remaining arm of his clinging

pet. The arm wouldn’t loosen. He stretched the brown arm to the grey one and

prayed they would accept one another.

As the last arm released him, Rue jumped away, and for the next hour he

ran. His arm felt as if it were being cooked. He could barely breathe, he kept hit-

ting trees, and the white spots brightened in his eyes. His shirt had dried com-

pletely, but he shivered now, more alone and more stuck than only days before.

At last he could no longer run. Rue dropped against a tree, an open patch of

sky shining down on him. He felt safer in the light. As he massaged his eyes, a

couple of tiny spots disappeared. He vowed never to act in doubt of his father’s

words again. The headache was almost unbearable, but it was worse to see those

spots with closed eyes. He opened them again and looked upward.

Rue gasped. Four spots remained in his vision, matching the position and

brightness of four stars, an arrow in the sky. East. With nothing left but hope, he

stood again, and walked on.

In deepest night, Rue spotted the glow of embers within a barricade of trees.

He almost missed it, but his white spots were fading. He hadn’t found the valley,

or even remembered to watch for it, but perhaps now he could seek directions

from a stranger.

As he entered the edge of fire light, the midnight camper stood. It was a

young woman. Ana! She ran, he hobbled, and their hearts embraced. A longer

night than this had ended.

��

never changeA hidden message in your eyes

Told me that we would never change.

I flew into a swift sunrise,

And so began a brand new day:

One meant to leave; one meant to stay.

A hidden purpose herein lies,

For Providence will not arrange

A path that leads where all hope dies;

And yet, the wound is fresh today.

It hurts to laugh. It’s hard to pray.

Our time ran out. It’s no surprise;

But rather, it’s an odd exchange.

The young one laughs. The grown one cries.

And then, the sadness slips away.

Inside, “We’ll never change,” we say.

a new chapter begins

Two weeks only lasts a snowball’s throw.

Vacation to a town I used to know.

And I love winter there

Even when the ground is bare.

(The day before I had to leave,

I woke expecting darkish green,

But night had set a different scene.

A new snow covered everything.)

In years past, in opposing ways,

Your voice wove into all my days.

You held your ground each time I swayed,

And when I left, you stayed.

I slipped through what I thought were binding ties,

And wondered long what they’d been severed by,

Old age is not the way a good thing dies, but

You hadn’t done the changing- it was I.

So long I feared your silence wouldn’t end,

And I had questions I could never send,

But now I know you never left me, friend.

The other day, my home found me again.

Now, as before, we live two different lives,

And we don’t talk much anymore, but I

Remember reuniting in your eyes

That hold me still, that never fed me lies.

Can’t say when I’ll be back this way again.

Keep the vintage memories inside.

I cannot think of anybody else

I’d rather go on being haunted by.

��

the silver citizen

Mike had just finished rubbing a sauce stain out of his electric blue Pepsi t-shirt.

He had barely touched his Big Mac, and he was already making a mess. To free

his arms, he had twisted the strap of his computer bag around the right leg of his

favorite loose-fit blue jeans. Any would-be thieves would be inconvenienced at

the very least.

Mike examined his ticket again. Flight 116, departing at 4:43 PM. He still

couldn’t believe he had mistaken the flight number for the departure time. He

had rushed out of the house so quickly that he had nearly forgotten his portfolio.

Why did he pack his portfolio for such a short vacation? He brought it because

he thought the folks back home would enjoy seeing what he did for a living. Yes,

out of the goodness of his heart he chose to take his work home. ‘Home?’ He

could hardly call it that anymore.

He checked his Citizen watch for the eighth time in as many minutes.

1:35 PM. “Some help you are,” he muttered to his silver companion. “You never

tell me what I want to hear.” Mike felt around for a bargaining chip. “Speed up

just this once, and I’ll let you have the rest of the sandwich. You know I missed

breakfast, so you know I mean business.”

There sat the truly professional Mike Stevens, trying to make a deal with an

equally professional wristwatch. He believed that if the timepiece had possessed

a mind of its own, it would have called his bluff. Anyone who spent that much

time chained to Mike’s wrist would know he never ate when he traveled. He

never slept the night before either. He was lucky if he slept at all on the plane,

and he could usually count on being too tired to sleep when he finally reached

his destination.

Mike hated being too tired to sleep. The feeling made no sense, and he

felt it frequently. He was becoming seriously frustrated now, partly because of

his insomnia, but mostly because of something else that made no sense. The tile

design of the floor made him uneasy. The orange shapes upset the flow of the

green swirls. The fire orange clashed with the mint green. The mint green was

nauseating to begin with, but it was the one thing that offered some sense of

connection between the floor and the rest of the restaurant.

With a deep breath, Mike reminded himself that he was in advertising

and not interior design. This problem was not his own. Besides, this place had

nabbed at least one customer who knew better. Perhaps a professional establish-

ment really could make its mark without a professional appearance. Then again,

the tile pattern did repeat once every square foot. That was one obnoxious cry

for help.

Maybe it was best not to look at the floor. After another quick glance at

the time and the ticket, Mike reached for his Big Mac. His heart sank. The box

looked so much better before they changed it a year ago. He remembered a time

when buying a Big Mac was a magical experience. Did no one have good ideas

anymore? In all fairness, he understood dry spells. He was experiencing one.

All the same, the wrappers and the toys were different when Mike was growing

up. In those days, a designer put his heart into his work. Those days were not so

distant.

Mike hoped that the problem was reversible. He hated to think that his

heart might lack the capacity to recapture the charm of classic advertising. But

he knew inspiration could not be forced. Inspiration came and went without

warning. Nothing could hasten its arrival or prolong its stay.

Mike shut the Big Mac box and rested his face in his hands. His cold sweaty

palms surprised him. Why was he nervous? He was finally going to see home

again. Maybe the fresh country air would decongest a creative reservoir plugged

by agents, deadlines, fluorescent lights, and business in general. Mike tried to

feign a relaxed slouch, but his tense muscles defied him. Why had he taken only

three days off? He clenched his teeth, checked his pulse, and wished in vain that

he could make a deal with the silver Citizen. The time now was 1:42 PM.

��

brethren,i count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing i do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before...

phil 3:13

��

just like old times

��

Balancing barefoot on cool smooth stones, Mike watched the sun melt into a rip-

pling lake of gold. This marked the first time he could remember doing nothing.

He still believed that a self-sacrificing work ethic had its place, but that place was

not here. For a few short days, no deadlines.

Car engines grumbled. Folks were leaving, although he couldn’t guess why.

In this town, getting home took no longer than ten minutes for anyone. Well,

anyone except for Mike. It had taken him nine years.

A tug on his shirtsleeve made him jump. Mike spun around to face the deep-

est brown eyes he’d ever forgotten, and the warmest hug he could remember.

“Roma!” he said. “Look at you! Last time I saw you, you were-”

“Ten years old,” she said with a sad smile.

Now Mike seriously wondered what had kept him away for so long. “It’s

great to see you!” he said. “Although I don’t know how I missed you in the

crowd.”

“We came late,” she said. “I had to help my dad with the strawberry picking,

but we weren’t about to miss Jay’s party.”

“Yeah. It’s crazy,” Mike said. “Mom calls and tells me my little brother is

graduating from high school. I figured I was due for a visit.” Mike caught himself

staring, glanced back at the sunset, got bored, and stared at Roma again. “Wait.

Strawberry picking? At the farm, half a mile from my house. Do you still live

next door?”

“Yeah,” she said, keeping eye contact. “I guess some things never change.”

He knew she could read him; she was learning that some things had changed.

Words stopped coming, Roma kept staring, and then Mike’s cell phone vibrated.

“Sam!” he said. “I’ve kept an eye out, where are you? Big auction today. You

on the way back- okay. Right. Right. How far? No, people are leaving.” Mike mo-

tioned for Roma to follow him back to the picnic tables. “It’s all right, bro. I’ll tell

Jay. I’m sure he’ll understand. Hey, call me later. Let’s do something.”

“That’s really nice,” said Roma.

“Yeah, I didn’t know Sam even knew I was in town.”

“No,” Roma said, pointing to the image on his cell phone. “That’s really

pretty. Where is it?”

“Oh, you like that? That’s h-” Mike paused. “Atlanta. That’s my home.”

That night, Mike was in bed by the time Jay finished brushing his teeth.

“Ouch!” he said. “Jay? Hey, can we keep the light off? My eyes kinda hurt.”

Click.

As the orange in his eyelids cooled to black, Mike heard Jay sliding onto a

sleeping bag and spreading out a spare sheet, and searching for a silent position.

He found one. And a minute passed.

“What time is it?” Mike asked.

“Oh. The clock’s down the hall. Just a second-”

“No, come on,” Mike said. “Don’t get up.” He felt for his cell on Jay’s table-

top, and opened it to make the time glow. “9:50?” he said. “It feels like tomorrow

already.”

“When did you get up?”

“Got up at four,” Mike said with a sigh. “Flight was at seven, but I like to

troubleshoot. You know how airport security is now.”

“Pretty tough?”

“Well yeah, you- when was the last time you flew?”

“I haven’t.”

The automatic glow went dark on the phone. “At all, ever?”

“Haven’t needed to,” said Jay.

“Didn’t we vacation once at the Grand Canyon?”

“No!” Jay half-laughed. “You went with Mom and Dad when you were five. I

wasn’t even a creative concept then.”

At least now Jay was speaking in terms an advertiser could understand.

Mike snapped his phone shut, flipped it back open, and aimed the light at this

stranger who’d given up his bed. Jay was sitting up, shirtless.

“You work out,” Mike said.

“What, is it showing? Most people can’t tell. Yeah, I try to either run or lift

every day when I finish picking strawberries. I have a-”

“Wait, you work with Roma?”

love takes time

1st Place: Original Narrative Fiction PCC Commencement Contest 2007

��

“Well yeah. She works there.”

Suddenly, the Popeye theme sounded. Mike pressed a button on his cell.

“Sam! Right now’s fine! Can you pick me up?”

Fifteen minutes later, Mike and Sam were reliving old times at Dunkin Do-

nuts. “I can’t believe this place is still even here,” Mike said. “These awful chairs

still screech when you shift your weight!” Mike and Sam shifted their weight.

“Do you remember toasting marshmallows over autumn bonfires with my

dad and the neighborhood kids?” Sam asked.

Mike nodded. “Starlit skies. Rosy cheeked eight-year-olds huddling togeth-

er—”

“And hot apple cider,” Sam said.

“Not for everybody, though!” said Mike. “Roma always wanted hot choco-

late, and she always made me toast one marshmallow for it. Said she didn’t like

it ‘plain.’”

“Oh yeah! She was always excited about staying up, but she always fell

asleep! Like before ten!” Sam burst into laughter. “And she made you carry her

home!”

“She didn’t make me do anything. She just fell asleep! And yes, she stayed

asleep. I think she did. Anyhow, I was careful with her.”

“Oh, I forgot,” Sam snickered. “Artist. Steady hand.” He chuckled as he

stirred his coffee. “But she hung on you like you were just for her. Like you were

a brother, or a-” he trailed off.

“That’s it exactly,” Mike said. “You don’t know what to call it either, do you?

I can’t tell what she’s thinking, and- I’m not sure how to feel.”

Sam stopped stirring his coffee.

“She’s- not- ten years old anymore,” Mike stammered. “We’re both all grown

up. But me? I have to go back to Atlanta the day after tomorrow. I don’t even

have time to figure it out!”

Sam masked his surprise with sympathy. “Deadlines and decisions,” he said.

“They don’t stop when you leave work, do they?”

Mike rubbed his tired eyes. “They don’t stop ever,” he said.

“Here,” said Sam, motioning with his coffee stirrer. “You’re the advertiser.

I’m the auctioneer. You make new stuff look good. I make old stuff look good.

Why do we both succeed? Because we live like there are no second chances.”

“Please say what you’re trying to say,” Mike asked. “I can’t follow you.”

“Be careful,” Sam said. “Roma has a life here. You’ve only seen half of it.

You spend your time and energy in Atlanta, making a name for yourself. You’re

looking at a long distance relationship, at best. And I know Roma’s not ready to

make that decision.”

Mike tried not to shake. “But what if she and Jay-“

“They won’t,” Sam said, shaking his head. “Although, if they did get together,

he may be a better match.”

Stunned, Mike asked, “What does that mean?”

Sam scratched his chin. “Well,” he said, “At least they know each other.” He

checked his watch. “Three o’ clock!? Wow, you really are my best friend! Hey, I

need to get home before sunup. Gotta put all my new stuff on eBay.”

Fifteen minutes later, Sam drove off into the darkness as Mike let him-

self back into the house, feeling as if he’d just awoken from a pleasant dream,

minus the rested-up feeling.

He shuffled about in the dark until he found the living room loveseat and

the TV remote. He clicked power and mute, and tried to get comfortable. Study-

ing commercials usually helped him forget trouble. But he thought of Roma.

And he thought of deadlines. For a moment he thought of having a meaningful

conversation with his brother. And then he thought his eyes felt very heavy.

Mike awoke to an empty house. What time was it exactly? The hallway clock

said 2:25. The light outside said PM. Dad and Jay had long since left for work.

Mike, you lazy bum. He faintly remembered stirring while everyone was prepar-

ing for the day. Mom had asked if he wanted to come shopping with her. Oh!

He’d been under the influence of couch cushions. Mike dropped a leg to the

floor, sat up, and rubbed his neck. He made a face at a silent soap opera, pow-

ered off the TV and headed for the kitchen, but something in Jay’s open door

caught his eye.

There are three things that are hopelessly drawn to light sources: flowers,

moths, and graphic designers. It happened that Jay had a wide window directly

above his bed, and the light cast strange shadows. Mike entered the room and

lost his breath.

When he’d retired the previous evening, he did so with the light out. The

room was wallpapered with advertisements. Magazine covers. Greeting cards.

Junk mail. It was a library of Mike’s designs, including the pieces he had forgot-

ten. Suddenly, he needed fresh air. Badly.

Mike snatched his sketchpad from his suitcase, grabbed a half-empty bag

of Sun Chips, and hurried outside. A hill stood between his parent’s house and

Roma’s. Beneath the maple tree at the top, an artist could find hours of inspira-

tion in every direction. There he sat, and there he sketched.

He sketched until the distant climbing trees and the fishing hole made him

think of little Roma. Muddy shoes. Skinned knees. Piggyback rides.

��

No more scenery sketches. Mike realized that he hadn’t doodled in a very

long time. What a fine day to translate some feelings into images. He drew faces.

He drew cartoons. And he didn’t notice when the sun began to set. He didn’t no-

tice when the girl next door trudged toward home with a carton of strawberries

and then took a detour up the hill.

“Got room for a friend?” Roma asked.

Mike dropped his pad and pencil in surprise. “Sure,” he said. “I think this old

tree can still hold both of us.”

Sweat dripped from Roma’s forehead, and still she smelled like strawberries.

She sat against the tree and offered the half-full strawberry carton as she mo-

tioned toward the sketchpad. “Trade you,” she said.

Mike accepted.

Roma turned the pages. “These are really good,” she said. “I like the car-

toons.” Then she looked him in the eye again. “Why do they all look sad?”

Mike leaned over and flipped through a couple of pages. “No no no,” he said.

“Not all of them. Look at that Bassett hound. Tell me that’s not a happy face.”

Roma studied the picture, then studied Mike. “But his eyes are sad,” she

said.

Mike looked again. So they were.

As the sunshine quit the day, the moon rose full and bright. Soon the

Sun Chips and strawberries were gone. Hours passed between them, and Mike

found assurance that Roma’s spirit was just as he’d left it. But when she was a

child, she spoke as a child. Now they were peers.

She opened her mouth to ask a question, then she stopped, and then she

asked. “What’s it like, leaving home?”

Mike had known for at least an hour that she was preparing an impor-

tant question. She would take his answer and keep it forever. “It’s different,” he

said. “You don’t feel ready when it’s time, but then you get used to it. And then,

you know, there’s the self-confidence you gain in knowing that you can take care

of yourself.”

“Can you take care of yourself?” she asked.

Mike looked back into her eyes, returning a profound expression. She

was as tired as he, but she was exhausted from hours of hard work in the sun. He

was exhausted because he couldn’t quiet his mind.

“Don’t stay away so long,” she whispered. Her head fell on his shoulder.

Mike thought for a moment. Then he asked, “Will you miss me?” He

knew the answer. He just wanted to hear it.

But he wouldn’t hear it. Roma was fast asleep. As gently as he could,

Mike lifted her thin form, and descended the hill to her house.

Her father met him at the door with a smile. “Thanks for bringing my

little girl back,” he said, as the sleeping beauty changed hands. “You travel safe

tomorrow, all right?”

When Mike returned home, Mom and Dad were in bed, and Jay was in

the kitchen. Mike sat alone on the loveseat, with two family photo albums. Page

after page showed him a man, a woman, and a boy that he once knew. He tried

to believe that the same people were only rooms away.

Mike finished the first album and opened the second. He started to choke.

There was Dad, Mom, and Jay; Roma, the farmers, and all the little kids. He

flipped through pages, watching everyone age. Something was missing. “Jay?”

Mike called out.

Jay jumped out of the kitchen.

Mike held out the second photo album, his eyes moist and red. “I’m not in

this one,” he said. “Show me what I missed.”

Dear Mark,

So six years of undergrad education approaches an end. I remember my

junior year, when you were a freshman. I didn’t expect we’d become friends, and

I didn’t expect we’d be seniors together. A month from now, we’ll be—where will

we be? Somewhere else. I’ll miss you. But I have to get out of here.

I need to prove to myself that I can hold to my convictions under my own

house rules. I’ve always admired your resolve, your perseverance in what you

know is right. You know the rules and procedures here don’t bother me the way

they did once, but there’s a big difference between compliance and obedience.

Obedience is never a byproduct of convenience. It’s easy to stay out of trouble

when I have no time for trouble. I have a feeling trouble’s about to have time for

me.

Pray for me. I know you will. A brother is born for adversity. That phrase

never used to sound ambiguous, yet we both grew up interpreting it differently,

and I think we were both right. You have been my ally in spiritual adversity, and

you’ve offered adversity at times when I needed to be persuaded of my own er-

ror. As willing as you’ve been to correct me, you’ve been equally willing to listen.

i have to get

out of here

��

Thank you for caring what I think. I want nothing more than to be a good com-

municator, but I often feel that I’m anything but. I am still grateful and amazed

to have friends who wait when words won’t come.

At least I have staying power, right? I think I never gave up because I never

figured out how to. Sticking around seems natural enough; whenever college

overwhelmed me, it was never a question of whether or not to keep plugging

away. He chooses failure who runs from challenge, and he chooses isolation

who deserts his friends. Running doesn’t make trouble go away; running keeps

trouble at an unmanageable distance. And I can’t live in fear. I can’t live stuck.

I’d suffocate.

I’ll miss a lot about being here, but I won’t miss Florida. My lungs will thank

me to leave this humidity. It’s easier to breathe in upstate New York. You should

visit. But come to think of it, make sure I’m there before you visit.

I don’t know if I can go back home. “Home.” I haven’t had one for about six

years. Surprising, that there should be a difference between being with family

and being at home. As an underclassman, I was glad for the “double life” I had in

New York and Florida; it was like a clean slate over and over again, learning how

to be myself instead of being just the person that my habitat has come to expect

of me. When you’re young, you want to prove the old saying wrong and be the

exception; but it’s true—you can always go back. You can never go home.

Every time I return to New York, it seems a few more friends have forgot-

ten me—it almost doesn’t hurt anymore. We all grew up together. Now we all

have separated lives. It’s not so much like a reunion anymore; it’s more like I’m

a surveyor checking every year to see how much property value I’ve lost—is this

the way it works for everyone? To have a home again, I’ll have to make my own,

which is fine; but I don’t understand losing all I thought I had. Some old friends

may never know that I still pray for them. Maybe they pray for me too.

On the subject of interpersonal relationships, I’m going to really miss the

girls when I leave. For the right reasons, I think. You know I’m not easily im-

pressed by looks, and you’d better know by now that I’m not easily impressed

by what I’ve known of the human heart. Four different girls—that I can bring

to mind readily—have actually shocked me, their natural beauty striking, their

hearts glowing for the Lord. I thank God for showing me that such people exist,

because I don’t believe I’ll see them as frequently after I leave. Daily life will be

like a park without birds in the trees.

I can see you reading this. Yes, I know I don’t need a park full of birds.

That’s another mark of maturity for which I’m grateful. In my time here, I’ve

come around to what you’ve lived by all along—I refuse to take part in the Senior

Panic. It’s faithless to search madly for a wife just because God hasn’t yet shown

me a helpmeet. God’s plan beats our guesswork. And His timing is perfect.

Don’t say goodbye when we part ways this May. Brothers never say goodbye.

Send me off with a prayer, and know that we will meet again. Wherever we go

from here, life will not be the same. I think about it every day now. A chapter

ends for another to begin.

I have to get out of here. But I’ll miss you.

From where he stood, no cure could kill the pain,

He said, “When April comes, the clouds will clear.”

But April gave him thirty days of rain.

Refusing to believe he’d hoped in vain,

He dried his face and tried to hide his fear,

From where he stood, no cure could kill the pain,

As blood began to dry in every vein,

He said, “Her Spring-green eyes will bring me cheer,”

But April gave him thirty days of rain.

Internalizing all he could contain,

He smiled and choked, “At least I have her here.”

From where he stood, no cure could kill the pain,

He wept. His weathered roots were on the wane,

He thought she could not care (or would not hear),

But April gave him thirty days of rain.

And as her sacrifice became his gain,

His heart said he could handle one more year.

From where he stood, no cure could kill the pain,

But April gave him thirty days of rain.

30 days of rain (villanelle no. 1)

�0

important datesMay 2002. I had never left home before, I’d never flown before, and suddenly

here I was in Florida. By myself. On the bright side, this summer job would give

me better hours than I had at McDonald’s, and I’d get a feel for the campus be-

fore my freshman year began.

On the second day, I met Johnny, a big old boy with an early silver streak in

his hair. He perceived that I had trouble using my student card in the vending

machine, and I perceived that he’d been reading “The Far Side” cartoons. We

became fast friends.

That weekend, Johnny introduced me to a couple more of his friends. Beka

had dark wavy hair and glasses. She was that melancholy type that seeks to be

overlooked—which, incidentally, caught my attention. Her sister, Rachel, was

a perky blue-eyed blond who loved to be the object of attention, and often was.

She was the American dream girl.

I needed friends, but I refused to be a parasite. I went to meals alone, but

Johnny kept finding me, asking me to fill the empty seat at his table. I’d been ac-

cepted, but I didn’t yet belong. My roots were still 1,100 miles away in New York.

My best friend, Ben, was to come down for the fall semester, but his parents

were paying his way, so he didn’t need a summer job. Ben’s prayers went with

me, but I missed his presence terribly.

A vacuum must remain sealed to remain void. I opened up to Rachel, and

she came in. She was easy to talk to, and she was interested in learning who I

was. Before summer’s end, we had defined our relationship as that of brother

and sister.

All good things must come to—to a change. Summer approached Autumn,

and with September came Ben. I had hoped that he would like my new friends,

especially my second-dearest friend, Rachel. At the time, their reactions were

not expressly stated, which I think was for the best. Ben sized Rachel up as a

busybody. She decided he was arrogant. Furthermore, Rachel’s friends from the

previous school year were back, and as I defaulted to my friend, she defaulted to

her friends.

May 2003. Ben and I finished our freshman year and returned to Oswego

for the summer. I’ve gone back to school many times since then, but I’ve never

learned to enjoy leaving home. I have acquired an eagerness to learn how each

new semester will turn my life upside down. Fall ’03 was a renewal and a begin-

ning for friendships, and we all have Johnny to thank.

Ben, Rachel and I agree that we’ve had few friends as faithful as Johnny

Angell. Although Ben didn’t like Rachel at first, he hit it off with Johnny from

the get go. Over the summer we spent at home, Rachel, Johnny, and some other

friends stayed behind again for summer work at school. Some of Rachel’s school

year friendships had undergone—we’re going to call them—adjustments. As

Johnny remained Rachel’s faithful friend at school, he remained our faithful

friend on the opposite end of the East Coast. And when we all came back togeth-

er, we all came—together.

One day that fall semester, I was talking with Rachel on the phone, and Ben,

in his smoothly brash manner, said, “You should date Rachel.” Heh, heh. Hmm.

The seed was watered too casually for me to notice. I’d shared my favorite

love song, “Two Sleepy People,” with Rachel, and she really liked the thought

of “two sleepy people, by dawn’s early light, too much in love to say goodnight.”

Another time, she brought up how interesting it was to hear about happily

married couples who had never expected more than friendship. People who

had been knit at the soul and had come together without trying to impress one

another. That was when I formulated our 10-year plan.

“How about this,” I said. “If you don’t find someone, and I don’t find some-

one, then we’ll just get married?” Rachel took the proposal in good fun. She

wrote it on her calendar.

A couple days later, Rachel and I were in the Varsity cafeteria when I told

her, “I’ve been chuckling to myself whenever I think about our plan.” Our strat-

egy really had put a spring in my step. What if the search for Miss Right were

over? It felt safe, at least, to have each other as a backup plan.

That semester really was confusing, I’m afraid. The more I had to think

about it, the more I felt that we would never be together as man and wife. One

Sunday afternoon, I met Rachel in the commons so I could lay my cards on the

��

table. She wore her daisy dress. Sunshine incarnate.

“I want you to know that I don’t see us becoming something romantic,” I

said, “but that if you were my girl, I would be so proud of you.” I told her I loved

her. Poor thing. She’d been trying to sort out how she could be so important to

me if I didn’t like her that way. I give her points for keeping a generally steady

head. Rachel has never been one to chase a guy who doesn’t like her. She’s al-

ways known better than to waste herself on a one-sided investment.

December ’03. The seed had sprouted. We still didn’t know what kind of

plant it was, but it had outgrown its tiny pot. Before we separated again for

Christmas vacation, Rachel made a serious request. “Please,” she said, “just tell

me one way or the other. I need to be able to forget all about this or move for-

ward, but I can’t keep going this way.” I asked her if she needed an answer just

then. She said soon.

I am living proof that guys can spend hours on the phone. I doubt the act is

typical, but then, neither was my friendship with Rachel. She was working on

her elementary education practicum at home, teaching third and fourth graders,

and I was doing not much. One school night, I called her at 8 P.M. and we didn’t

hang up until 5 A.M. She slept for two or three hours and went to school as the

sun was rising. It’s nice, having someone who will lose sleep over you.

Spring ’04. A new year; commonly seen as a new beginning. It was. I’d decid-

ed by January’s end that I was going to ask her to be my girl. Not just yet though.

You’ve got to time things, or it’s no fun. Ben knew what was up. Best friends get

to know everything. Obviously Valentine’s Day was coming. But another impor-

tant date was coming, and I could not pass it up.

As children, Rachel and Beka had grown up defying superstitions. Whenever

Friday the 13th came around, you could count on them to find black cats to play

with and ladders to run under. On Friday the 13th, I called for her dad’s approv-

al. I’d been made to expect the questionnaire that Rachel’s previous boyfriends

got. Pastor Jackson told me yes.

Saturday the 14th, I stood in the stairwell of my dorm with Ben, overlooking

the spot where Rachel and I were about to meet. “If all goes according to plan,” I

said, “This is the last time you’ll see Single Jeremy.”

With my camcorder on (for posterity), Ben said “Goodbye, Single Jeremy,”

and I left the dorm with a gift and a request. Mark it down: 04/14/04: she said

‘yes’. And we went together to the Valentine’s Fine Arts Series: the Jaffé Fam-

ily Strings concert. For fun, Rachel gave me a white rose (this was the Sadie

Hawkins, so she actually took me on our first date), and I gave her one dozen

roses, six red and six white, to signify that we were stronger together. And we

lasted for almost one semester.

I was never completely settled on the idea of ‘us’. I wanted to protect her. I

tell you I loved her. I hated what my indecision had done to her, and it was for

her sake I decided we’d give it a try.

But our relationship had become a chore. Rachel knew that some of her

quirks got under my skin; when two people feel obliged to spend much time

together, quirks will show, and natural reactions will soon follow. When we were

together, she could only be part of herself without fearing criticism—or silent

disapproval.

Our breakup began early one April morning. When we met for breakfast (I

credit Rachel for helping me establish my breakfast routine), I wasn’t hungry,

and I couldn’t speak. We gave up on breakfast, and I told her I wouldn’t be at

lunch, that I would call her after she finished lunch. Telephone breakups are a

mark of the coward, but for her own sake I knew I couldn’t tell her in person.

Rachel hates when people see her cry. We had nowhere else that offered privacy.

“Do you trust God?” I asked her as I sat on the bathroom tiles.

“Yes.”

“Do you trust me enough to know that I would only hurt you if I had to?”

“Yes.”

My voice tried to give up on me. “I don’t think God made us to be together.”

She couldn’t phonate. “OK,” she breathed.

“I still love you,” I affirmed.

“I love you too.”

There was more. But Rachel hates when people see her cry. You know all you

need to know.

It puzzled me how our friendship transformed when we broke up. It was

better. We had agreed that we cared too much to give up on a friendship just

because it couldn’t be anything else. For the first couple of days, I had to choke

back tears when I saw her, but we still met for breakfast and for lunch, and we

enjoyed each other. We were at liberty to be ourselves again. For a while.

May ’04. Rachel and I stayed at school again for summer work. Ben sur-

prised everyone by staying as well; he and I roomed together, but we didn’t see

much of one another. Our full-time jobs were on opposite ends of the clock in

different work areas, and we were both working on summer classes. These dis-

tractions kept us separate in the same room.

By this time, Rachel and I weren’t talking either. She needed emotional dis-

tance so she could sort out life as it now was. She told me that she didn’t know

what to say around me, that I made her uncomfortable.

��

Of all ways for a good thing to end. Rachel and I got together because we

were afraid of what would happen if we didn’t. Call it ‘planning ahead.’ I imag-

ined her finding a man to spend the rest of her life with; and I believe that when

a woman is spoken for, she shouldn’t keep close correspondence with another

man. Not healthy. As a matter of propriety, I was ready to make that adjustment

in the capacity of our friendship, should the need arise. But I wasn’t ready for

the need to arise.

One of those summer nights, before our third roommate came in to sleep, I

asked Ben if there was something he wanted to tell me. I had lately heard that

Ben was smitten with Rachel’s sister. I found that interesting, especially since

Ben had always imagined a beautiful life of eternal bachelorhood.

“If there’s something you want to know, you can ask,” he said.

Come on. He really didn’t get it maybe. “Sounds like I’m the last person to

hear about it.”

“Jeremy!” he laughed. “What?”

“I was told that you liked Beka.”

“I thought I did,” Ben said. “Now I don’t know. It’s not that simple.”

“What!” I asked. “What is it, you have a crush on two girls? Are they sisters?

It’s OK, I’ve been there. I’m not proud to admit it, but I won’t think it’s weird.”

Ben was silent for a big moment. “It’s Rachel.”

I lay beneath a thick black blanket, but my body started quaking. My best

friend. My ex-girlfriend. Soon to be together.

“I don’t know what to do,” Ben said.

Well good. That made two of us.

I wasn’t mad at God, but I had some questions for Him. I was in a prayerful

panic for the next couple of days.

For anyone who plans to get emotional at inopportune moments, might I

recommend janitorial work? Whether stepping into the lesser-used restrooms,

or sweeping behind corners in the back warehouse to dodge the forklifters’

glance, janitors are able to complete honest labor while making introspective

analyses on their circumstances. I miss that job.

The third day after Ben’s news, it all made sense. And I was counting bene-

fits, that’s the weird thing. I reviewed the misadventures of my time with Rachel,

and I was found wanting. Rachel and Ben had both reached the point at which

they weren’t looking for love, and that’s when love found them.

I firmly believe that you’ve not fully failed until you choose not to learn from

your mistakes. From my failed planning and Ben and Rachel’s joining, I learned

to trust the Lord’s timing.

I don’t believe that God plays tricks on us. And I don’t believe He made me

to live alone, but for now, my relationship with Him is the most important thing

I have to build on. He promised to supply all my needs, and I know He will tell

me when it’s time for me to need someone. When I know she’s for me, I will keep

her.

On New Year’s Day, Ben proposed to Rachel. Mark it down: 01/01/2005:

she said ‘yes’. The following summer, I was their best man (the characters in the

wedding stayed pretty well the same as the original plan, except Ben and I had

switched places). They were joined in holy matrimony on Saturday, the 14th of

May. Coincidence? I used to believe in coincidences.

I like Rachel better with Ben, and they both still count me as a brother. As a

testimony to the Lord’s sovereign ability to work everything for good, I messed

things up and I still got what I wanted. My friend Rachel is under the care of a

man I trust, and she is still my friend. More important, I didn’t get either of us

stuck in a relationship that ‘seemed like a good idea at the time’.

For the three of us, the strangest part of our situation is that it’s not strange

to the three of us. Other people can’t believe we’re all still friends. “Mind you,”

Rachel told me an evening ago, “it was the best breakup I ever had. And you

were by far the best ex-boyfriend.”

Now I check my calendar for every Saturday the 14th, and I wonder what

seemingly mundane happenstance will set up the next important date in my

personal timeline. The first few chapters have held my interest so far, and I want

to know how my story ends.

Let come what may.

��

You are the leaf pressed between my pages,

Preserved, held in place

And holding my place.

When I found you, you were ruby red

It’s why I thought to keep you.

Your surface has changed

To dry

Blood red.

Even when I let you in

I knew that we would change.

But you are pressed between my pages.

I don’t want to collect dust

I want to keep you.

Sometimes in sunlight

It’s like old times

Altogether vibrant again.

I am open, knowing

I was bound to be read.

I am glad to bear your mark.

You help me find the words

Hold in place the memories

And when I start forgetting

That some things stayed the same

You

Are the reason I

Remember.

pressed between my pages

disappearing evidence:

I’ve heard about the Loomis Gang since I was a young boy, and I’ve long won-

dered how I might be related. I don’t understand why so much of my family tree

is hidden after only 150 years. George Loomis, the father of the gang, owned 129

1/2 acres in Oswego County. 1 I grew up in Oswego. So did my father. But my

parents taught me to fear God and keep His commandments. George and Rhoda

Loomis taught their children to steal.

George’s life proverb was “Everybody steals, so why shouldn’t I?” 2 While he

taught his children to harvest berries, tap maple trees, and preserve vegetables,

he also taught them to bribe, threaten, and counterfeit. 3 His skill in these acts

had usually kept him out of jail, in spite of incriminating evidence. He taught his

children to manipulate the law, not to fear it.

Rhoda controlled the Loomis family in the early years. 4 She was one of few

educated women in the 1850s, and she reared ten criminals of exceptional intel-

ligence. 5 She also had influence over many guests. After feeding them well, she

would send them off with these words: “Now don’t you come back without steal-

ing something, if it’s nothing but a jackknife.” 6

George Washington Loomis (“Wash”) was the son who led these guests to

the Loomis homestead to be corrupted. Wash was a skilled judge of character, a

charismatic gentleman with jet black hair and blue eyes. 7 Some have compared

his appearance to that of John Wilkes Booth. 8 Wash was the second son but the

true leader among the Loomis children; Rhoda hoped especially that he would

become a man of influence. 9

Grove, the third son, was the one most interested in his father’s horse-thiev-

ing racket. George taught Grove how to judge horses by visiting farmers. For the

visit, they posed as buyers. After they had closely examined a horse they wanted,

they took it in the night. 10 The Loomises were some of the only people in their

day who could change horses’ markings convincingly. 11 They made white mark-

ings with hot potatoes, and they matched dark colors with dyes. 12 Usually the

owner could not identify his own horse after the changes. The Loomises sold a

horse back to its rightful owner at least once. 13 Grove slipped up once by stealing

a trick horse. After Grove had changed the horse’s markings, the horse’s owner

the rise and fall of the loomis gang

��

came to the farm and accused him of theft. When Grove maintained that the

horse had been purchased from out of state, the owner gave his horse several

commands. By the time the horse had finished dancing, rolling over, and playing

dead, a humiliated Grove sent it home with its master. 14

The Loomises were sometimes caught, but witnesses seldom raised a fuss.

It was bad luck to oppose the Loomises. Barns would burn. More horses would

disappear. But by late 1848, nightly burglaries prompted the town to action. 15

A band of townsfolk with guns drove their sleighs to the Loomis homestead and

demanded a look inside. They found a hoard of stolen goods, and they charged

Wash and Bill Loomis with theft. After he was released on bail, Wash decided to

pursue the California Gold rush instead of showing up for his trial. 16

The reign of the Loomis family appeared to have ceased until Wash’s casual

return two years later. During this stretch of time, Rhoda was losing control

over her rebellious children, and George’s mind was slipping. Within months of

Wash’s return, George passed away, and Wash assumed his position as the fam-

ily leader. 17 By 1852, Wash had assembled 70 gang members, and by 1860, the

Loomis Gang comprised over 200 criminals. 18

Sometimes the Loomis Gang found it necessary to destroy evidence to

protect the family name; but they kept up the appearance of good will toward

their neighbors. Perhaps the most notable example was the night the Madison

County Courthouse burned down. The Loomis brothers had been scheduled for

trial the very next day, but even while the sabotaged fire hose missed the fire and

splashed the people nearby, the Loomises came onto the scene and offered to

help in whatever capacity they could fill. 19

From time to time, a neighbor would ask Wash to help him find his missing

horses. A neighbor once relayed the trek he made with Wash:

“We journeyed southward for four days, far into Pennsylvania. Whenever

we were hungry or needed a place to spend the night, Wash would stop at some

farm or wayside tavern. There was always a table set for us or beds ready for us

to sleep in. No one asked either of us any questions, and we did not pay a cent

out for the hospitality shown us. I sensed it was all a part of the vast Loomis

organization.”

He was right. By 1860, the Loomis Gang had networked thieves from the

Canadian border down to Northern Pennsylvania, and from the Finger Lakes to

Southern Vermont. 20 The crime syndicate might have kept growing had it not

been for the Civil War.

As patriotic men set out and economic depression set in, the Loomises

stayed home and grew wealthier. While the Confederates stole horses from the

Union Army, the Union Army bought horses from the Loomises. 21 The gravity

of the Loomis Gang’s crimes weighed on veterans after the war. Here were op-

portunists who exploited the war instead of joining the ranks, homebodies who

harbored deserters, and cowards who stole from heroes. 22

It was Halloween, 1866, when the secret members of the Sangerfield Vigilan-

tes Committee (a group formed to overthrow the gang) went to bring the Loom-

ises to justice. That night a gang member found Wash’s bloody body beneath the

woodhouse, his skull fractured in several places. Rhoda’s influential leader had

been destroyed, without glory and without honor. 23 But this was not the end of

the gang. Crime continued for months until the Loomises were overwhelmed by

a much larger attack. In a surprise raid, over 100 armed townsfolk smoked the

Loomises out of their home. 24 As the homestead burned, the people delivered

their ultimatum: be gone in 30 days, or forfeit your lives. 25

The people fought fire with fire: a final warning in the only language the

Loomis Gang understood. At last the terror ended. But now it’s as if Wash were

still making evidence disappear. When my Great Grandma House (a Loomis

by birth) was a child, her schoolmates would ask, “Did you ride your horse to

school?” When she asked for an explanation at home, her family said, “Don’t pay

any attention to them. It doesn’t mean a thing.” If it doesn’t mean a thing, I’m

grateful. I may learn someday that Wash’s blood is in my veins, but between his

day and mine, the family name became more respectable. Even though Rhoda’s

children rebelled against her, they lived to fit the mold she gave them. But I’ve

been given a mold of integrity that I can strive to fit. I call that a second chance.

��

inheritanceI believe that our memories are our very own, no matter what else is taken from

us; and I believe that my purpose as a writer is to pass on the wisdom I’ve gained

by sharing what I can remember.

I think the writer’s work is like parenting to some extent, showing stuff to

people and helping them understand how it all works. It’s odd when truths that

seem obvious take so long to register with people, especially when something

simple helps make the connection. For instance, 20 years had come and gone

before I realized that my dad and I look alike. “He looks so much like his father,”

people always said. I knew I looked more like Mom. Yet I remember looking at

pictures of Dad and me from a mountain trip only a couple years ago, and real-

izing that we were the same.

Isn’t it funny how our sense of sight makes us think we’re not blind?

People need vision, and that’s what good writing offers. For uncomfort-

able truths that must be learned, the writer lets himself in through a back door,

teaching a valuable truth through a captivating character.

Through fiction, people will accept much of what they actively oppose in

“real life.” I am amazed by how much value our society places on the imitation of

life. The writers, performers, and consumers alike invest time and money into all

these situations that, in the strict sense, are not real. But we can reach everyone

by telling our stories. Some of our readers are bedridden and some are afraid of

the world outside. All of them need to be made aware of what there is to find. If

they won’t go out and discover, we can bait a hook and lead them to action.

People need to see progress, and mediocrity suffocates progress. I want the

world to remember me as a man who was always content and never satisfied.

See how Hebrews 12:1 calls us to “lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth

so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.”

Along this line of thought, writing should offer comfort, not as a pain reliever

but as a pain killer. A runner doesn’t slather on Novocain when his feet start

hurting. Similarly, writing must edify, leading the reader toward something bet-

ter, instead of only offering a break from a bad thing that will catch up to him.

Escapism is a dead hope.

My dad must have decided long ago that complaining solves nothing, be-

cause he seems unfazed by all the cuts and bruises he picks up on camping trips

and in his workshop. He remains focused on the goal, whether it be reaching

that mountaintop or building that table.

Dad has always built stuff. Maybe that’s what intrigued me about creating

stories. I like making cheap paper and ink into something more. I can barely

resist the need to bring things to a higher level of organization. Dad is a consum-

mate woodworking hobbyist. That he relaxes with power tools sounds as strange

as saying I relax with a paper to edit. But we both need a creative vent. And we

both love knowing that others value our work.

To produce a work of value, though, the artist must call upon his experience

while giving the work his personal touch. I hate microwave ovens (please bear

with me), and I’ve found that homemade food is better even when it’s not. Ob-

jectively, it doesn’t always taste better than prepackaged, mass-produced food,

but the personal touch of home cooking reels people in. We can’t always fully

describe the reasons why these things are so, but an experienced writer can use

his voice to establish the mood, the atmosphere, and the familiarity that commu-

nicates what description alone cannot tell. The reader will feel the reasons why.

The writer should always deliver excellence, opening the reader’s mind and

helping him to accept that the truth is better than the lie.

Dad has always loved nature. The quiet countryside. The fragile mountain

vegetation. When I came to college, I didn’t realize that many other kids didn’t

grow up camping like I had. Real camping. With tents and backpacks. And bear

bags. Many of my friends have never climbed a 15-foot boulder to find wild blue-

berries growing on top. They may never be overwhelmed by the simple two-color

beauty of a sunlit forest, with a red floor and green trees. Now I miss camping

more than I miss anything else. Without having to tell me, I guess Dad taught

me what was beautiful. It’s taken me 24 years to realize he taught me that.

I’m already getting foggy, sometimes forgetting what I’m doing as soon as I

begin, and I dread losing my mind, but if someday my memory fails me, may it

at least be said that I handed down some helpful memories.

��

the whittlerWayne tugged the cuffs of his blue-on-black flannel shirt. Why were they riding

up? Customers could have known all day, but he’d only just noticed during the

final hour of business. He stopped adjusting his sleeves when an old woman ap-

proached the register. “I remembered you having jigsaw puzzles here once upon

a time,” she said.

Wayne nodded. “Dad used to do those. I’m afraid we sold the last of his work

a couple years ago.”

“I see,” she said. “Well, we came for Harborfest one year, it was in the early

90s, and we happened into Vance Van Allen’s. Ever since, we try to come in

whenever our travels bring us back this way. We like to get Christmas ornaments

for the grandkids.”

Wayne beamed. “Those have gone over really well. I’ve been pleased.”

“Yes, you have quite a knack for carving facial expressions!” she praised.

“This is the only place I’ve seen little wooden dolls with such personality.”

“They just wait inside me, I guess. This is the only way I know to let them

out.”

“Well, you need to keep it up!” She patted Wayne’s hand and returned to her

husband. Wayne watched for a moment. The grey fellow ran his thumb across

the top of a soldier figurine, as if admiring the detail work, but he never looked

at it. How odd.

“Why do you have that big window right behind you?” asked a small voice.

Wayne looked all the way around, and reminded himself that fairies weren’t real.

Then he thought to look down, and met the hazel eyes of one of the grandsons,

standing with hands in khaki pockets.

“This window here?” Wayne asked. “Because I like to watch the people out-

side. Think of it as an aquarium. I keep the whole world inside.”

“I can’t see you in all the light,” the boy whined.

Wayne stepped out from behind the counter and extended his hand. The

little fellow attempted a firm handshake. “My name’s Mark,” he said.

“You can call me Wayne.”

“Can I learn to make stuff like this?” Mark pointed to a display of animal

figurines.

Wayne leaned hard on the counter. “That depends,” he said. “Whittling’s not

hard when you get used to it. Lots of people just don’t take the time to get used

to it.” He expected Mark to say “O.K.” and scurry off, but the boy kept his neck

craned and his eyes fixed. So Wayne grabbed his whittling knife from behind the

counter, and knelt down on the carpet.

“You want to use a knife with a fat handle,” he said. “Take a look. It doesn’t

matter if you’re little or if you’re big like me. It’ll keep your hand from getting

tired as fast. It also helps to use a short blade, see? Get in close for details. And

you want it sharp. You’re actually more likely to cut yourself if you use a dull

blade.”

The door chimes clinked as a young woman entered, walking with a purpose.

“Hello, Wendy,” Wayne said. She didn’t hear him. Oh well. The sudden weak-

ness in his knees made him thankful to be kneeling already. “Start with spruce,

pine, or fir,” he recommended. “White pine! Yes. Hmm. Oh, you know what,

Mark?” Wayne said, rising. “Looks like I need to take a customer.”

Mark trotted back to his grandparents as Wendy took his place. “Miss Fara-

day,” Wayne formally acknowledged, “That was fast. Did you find everything you

were looking for?”

“Right here,” she replied, setting a double figurine maple masterpiece before

him. It was a chocolate lab in mid-leap, dragging a little boy half his size. The

leash was made of shoelace, but it looked legit. “It makes me laugh,” she said.

Wayne smiled and rang up the total. “$24.84. Seems I always see you in

a suit these days,” he said. Somehow he couldn’t bring himself to directly ask

Where do you work? After this long, she’d think him silly for not already know-

ing.

“Yeah. It’s fine in here,” she said. “It’s almost too hot to wear the jacket out-

side. Almost but not quite, you know? The hotter the better. I’ll be sad when fall

comes.”

“Have a good one, Wendy,” Wayne said, handing over her bag. “Come

again.”

��

“O.K. Don’t stay outside too long in that flannel when you leave.” Wayne

looked down at himself. He wondered if she remembered buying him the shirt,

back when they were just teenagers. It was too big then. Perhaps he had dressed

a bit warm for the day. He never paid attention to the difference personally, even

outside the store, but other people seemed to think he should.

He remembered one hot flannel summer in particular, when the city con-

demned Wendy’s favorite tree. She wasn’t so interested in climbing. Instead she

loved to sit at the foot of that maple. They went through many glasses of lem-

onade together, not doing much. She didn’t know this at first –she was inside

crying at the time- but after they came and cut it down, Wayne sawed himself a

slab and made it into an intricate woodcutting. On the single piece of wood he

whittled a perfect likeness of the old tree, sanded the surrounding surface flat,

and pyrographed a little front yard background to complete the scene. He sent it

to her in a box, but he never got a reaction.

A voice brought Wayne back out of himself.

“I see you’ve made friends with Mark,” said Grandma.

“I believe I have,” Wayne affirmed, returning to his work.

“I’m getting a knife after supper!” Mark said.

“Is that so?” Wayne asked, totaling their purchase. “Then you need to know

just one more thing before you pick one out.” He pointed to a crooked half-inch

scar across the upper knuckle of his right index finger. “Make sure you settle on

a blade that locks!”

Mark’s hazel eyes blazed with a surplus of energy. Wayne wondered if he

could really be this interested, or if he was just excited for attention from a

big guy with a beard and a deep voice. He gave the kind old lady her bag. She

smiled and leaned close as Mark walked his grandfather to the door. “He lost his

eyesight in ’04,” she whispered, pointing to her husband. “Used to like Norman

Rockwell the best. Now you’re his favorite artist!”

Wayne followed them out, locked the shop, and wished them safe travel, as

his youngest brother drove up in the red pickup to take him to the farm. Lang-

ley had a pile of nonsense in the passenger seat, so Wayne scrunched into the

backseat for the hilly ride home. Once they were out of the plaza, white ash filled

the landscape. In February ’03, an ice storm had hit hard in Oswego county, and

many of the broken trees remained.

Miles passed before Wayne realized he was still watching dead trees lean-

ing on the living, wearing down their bark. How do the live ones stand with

the broken ones against them? He wondered. He thought of what Dad taught

him about growing up. “If you’re flexible and you don’t snap,” he said, “then the

rough spots wear down smooth. You’ll only be stronger. The ones who snap only

endanger those around them.”

He tried to reconstruct the scene in his mind. Mom had fallen asleep on the

couch next to Dad, who’d been reading a story to her and Wayne. Dad had said

more. What else had he said? “Things will be taken from you. You’ll feel like a

block of wood being whittled down. You feel that way because it’s true. Eventu-

ally you’re half a person,” Dad said, resting his head on top of Mom’s. “And then,

God sends the other half to make you complete again.” That’s what I want, he

thought. The perfect timing of a divine plan. I don’t want to be able to explain

how it came together. Oh, Dad. I still haven’t grown up.

George had dinner almost ready when they stepped inside. “You got me,” he

said huskily. “Haven’t got the potatoes right yet.”

“Let’s start anyway,” said Langley.

Dinner was fantastic. With salt potatoes pending, George dealt out manly

helpings of steaming roast beef and fresh raw string beans. Langley was the only

one who liked his beans cooked, and he was too small to make a majority vote.

As George stood up to transfer the potatoes to the table, Wayne tried to get him

back into an easy spirit.

“Anything crazy happen today on the farm, Jore? George.” Wayne corrected

himself. The prospect of abbreviating a one-syllable name moved Langley so

deeply that he spewed a mist of coffee all over the potatoes the moment George

set them down. Langley laughed until he stopped breathing, and George red-

dened for his own reasons. When they both returned to their normal color,

George spoke.

“Nothing ‘crazy’ today,” George said, standing with the potatoes. “I think

that was because Lang snuck off again. Left me with the chores. Nothing crazy

had a chance to happen.” He sulked toward the trash can.

“No, come on,” said Wayne. “Look, you haven’t dumped the water. Just boil

it back up for a couple minutes.”

The very idea of spit-speckled salt potatoes cast a rain cloud over George,

but he gave in to his older brother’s counsel.

“It was a nice day,” Langley chuckled.

“Yes,” George said. “It must have smelled nice, too. Outside. In town.”

“Wendy stopped into the store today,” Wayne offered. He only let that slip in

hopes of settling the tension.

“Faraday?” George asked from the stovetop.

“Wendy Faraday,” Langley repeated slowly.

“Yes,” Wayne confirmed. “She came in and bought one of my figurines. It

��

made her laugh, so she bought it. A gift of some sort, I guess. I don’t know.”

“Maybe for her boyfriend,” Langley said.

Wayne loosened his grip on a glass of ice water and rested his face against

his cold hand. He tried to appear interested in his roast beef.

“Wait,” Langley remembered. “Yellow. That was a cab driver, not a boy-

friend. But, I guess-” his eyes darted back and forth. “I guess cab drivers can be

boyfriends.”

“Did you see her when she left the store, Lang?” Wayne asked.

“Actually,” Langley said, sitting forward again. “I did. Yes.”

“You must have been shopping then, I think?”

“Well, I wasn’t playing around all day!” Langley said. “I was pricing pipes!”

“Pipes?” George frowned. “What’s wrong with our pipes?”

“You don’t have to worry about it, ‘Jore,’” Langley said, glancing at Wayne.

“I’m all over it. But- Wayne, can you help me? It’s the plumbing.”

“Well, I didn’t think it was an organ,” Wayne smiled, with the last bite of

beef in his cheek. “Yes, I will. But not tonight, Lang. I need to get some fresh

air.”

“O.K., that sounds good,” said Langley. “I’ll go to sleep early then. Guys, I

don’t know what it is, but that sun takes the energy right out of you.”

Once leftovers were stored, George shut off the lights and lit his reading

candle, Langley tucked himself in, and Wayne took a walk across the field to

visit the forest. He had at least an hour of daylight. In the grassy expanse, an oak

stood to his left. It was the first one he’d ever climbed; it was also the first one

Dad had to rescue him from. Mom had marked his height on that oak from his

first steps to his eighth birthday. A row of maples had stood beside it. George

sent the maples to the mill when he took responsibility for the farm, but at

Wayne’s request, the oak tree stayed.

A fair chunk of land, these 40 acres. The half facing the road was the cattle

area. Barn. Chicken coop. Everything that needed daily tending. The half that no

one saw was the side where the boys raised trees for Wayne’s craft. Wayne had

begun his woodworking career straight out of high school, the only son follow-

ing in the footsteps of the late Vance Van Allen. And Wayne had kept the shop

thriving.

Wayne crossed the natural bridge that ran over the creek, watching the wa-

ter rush, so dark for how shallow it was. He used to fish. Wendy used to fish with

him. She’d be able to see the fish even in that black water.

He’d come outside to empty his mind, not to weigh it down with unsolvable

issues. Maybe I’ll learn to make jigsaw puzzles, he thought. That could be next

year’s big project. He enjoyed brainstorming ways to expand customer interest

toward the store. But I never took to power tools like Dad did.

He recalled how much trouble Dad had, even in his forties, trying to carry on

a conversation without having the other person repeat something. His left ear

had taken it worse than his right. His hearing stopped degrading as quickly after

one Christmas when little Langley wrapped up a container of ear plugs and put

a bow on it. Langley had his hyperactive arms wrapped around a throw pillow,

waiting for the chance to explain the purpose behind the gift. “The man at the

store said, use this while you work. Even your drill will go softer on your other

ear!”

“Son, that’s a great idea,” Dad said, taking the pillow and setting it between

himself and the hardwood bench. His eyes twinkled his approval as Langley

reached under the tree for something else to hold.

Those were times to remember, thought Wayne. He was out of the clear-

ing now. Nothing but ash remained. White ash. Deeper in, there were maples,

a couple stands of poplar, and then scores of blue spruce, too closely packed to

count.

The treetops swayed, rustled, whispered. Something occurred to him.

I’m glad Mom and Dad are still together. He’d never really thought of it that

way before. How many invest all their energy searching for someone who doesn’t

mind sharing life with them, only to be left with nothing but the challenge of

coping with loss. Mom passed on not long after Dad did. Now they were even

happier than they were before.

All that worry for absolutely nothing, he thought. Some of us could be

so much happier to just go without. After all these years, tears still stung his

eyes. It wasn’t just his parents, he knew that. It was everything. Mom and Dad

just primed the pump.

A drop trickled down his cheek. Another droplet broke on his ear. The

voice of rain greeted the heads of the forest. In a moment Wayne’s sleeves were

dripping, and he could hear nothing but the forest-wide waterfall and his own

thoughts. No use turning back now. He pulled the front of his flannel shirt and

found that it offered no insulation for a second layer. Not in a downpour. His un-

dershirt was ready to be wrung out.

He found that the clouds made it appear later than it was. Wayne checked

his watch. 7:15. He didn’t care. He stepped into deeper forest, and then the sky

lit up.

He froze. Then he checked his wristwatch. One, two, three, four-

CRAACKK!!

��

So it was close! Wayne turned on his heels and ran hard. He remembered

another lesson that Dad had taught him. You can’t count on trees for shelter in

an electrical storm. The early darkness confused him as he hurdled boulders and

stumbled through berry bushes. He cleared the creek and discovered how much

flat land kept him from the house.

CRAACKK-KAA-RACKK!

Wayne slowed his pace, and gripped his side. He had to breathe slowly. Of

all times for adrenalin to give up on him. It worked fine when he saw Wendy.

But then, he felt a certain comfort in walking through a lightning storm. If he

sped up again, he’d feel like a moving target, a panicked ant under a magnifying

lens. The rain was a comfort, more so than the dusk. About a quarter mile away,

Wayne saw George’s candle in the window. I have as much keeping me here as

I do waiting for me up there, he told himself; although he wasn’t sure what he

meant by that.

CRACK! CRACKLE-CRACKLE! The oak tree! Wayne’s mouth collected rain

as he watched his climbing tree bow to the power of the storm. It was not a scar,

not just a severed limb; with shooting sparks and flame the tree came down. He

realized that he was now the tallest thing in the field. He kept walking.

Take me. He dared the lightning. He wondered, would Wendy cry if the

storm did take him? Would she even notice he was gone? He remembered yet

another Christmas. She was bedridden with pneumonia and Mom sent him

with a thermos full of spiced tea to warm her up. Wayne didn’t get to see Wendy

that day. She was fast asleep and he left the thermos with her father. But her

bedroom door was open. And that woodcutting, the one she’d never thought to

thank him for, was mounted on her wall.

He thought of a young boy, held captive by the desire to become a whittler,

to be just like him. A boy whose only knowledge of whittling came from what

Wayne had imparted; no doubt, a boy with dreams as well as energy that would

someday need that creative vent. He suddenly felt that all of heaven was weeping

on his flannel. How long had they watched him consistently miss the point?

Wayne pulled off his silver wristwatch and dropped it in the grass. With

side-splitting effort, he sprinted up to the concrete step and snapped open the

screen door. He gripped the inside cedar door and shut it fast. The thunder

continued to boom. Kicking off his boots, he turned to watch the shower cool the

smoking tree in the yard. Tomorrow, he’d examine the remains. He’d take out

whatever could be salvaged, and he would make something beautiful for another

stranger to keep memories in.

Our reunion is coming soon.

I have a family, near and far, in this life

And waiting in the next.

The depth of our bond is enough to bring us back together.

But I want more.

The blood that binds us, still untainted,

Remains undried by history.

One eternal offering is the cornerstone of everything.

The Christ Who died

For me

In hope of being mine forever.

He wants more.

Time itself is deeper that depth can follow.

I have been given time to learn, to perceive, and to build.

Time is always disappearing

But time is never gone.

Potential and opportunity are mine forever

And I want more.

Time will see me home

First sight of a familiar face

I wait to feel the voice that composed the love letters.

How can I know the depth of vision, depth of love, and depth of You

It will take eternity to see all

But I believe in increasing capacity,

And I believe in wisdom:

The diamond depths within Your heart

That we can mine forever.

mine forever

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