Riven (38 page)

Ravinia claimed the same fidelity, though it had been her unfaithfulness that had led to their problems. Ravinia still insisted that Dirk take some of the blame for that—reasonable at some level, Thomas conceded, but probably also the reason they had not been able to repair the breach.

Thomas never hesitated to tell Ravinia that he saw hope for her marriage only if she returned to a spiritual base and became an example to Dirk to do the same. And she seemed to accept that her father’s view would never change and appreciated that he seemed less judgmental all the time.

“In fact,” she said one day, “I suppose I would be disappointed if you weren’t so consistent.”

“Predictable, you mean.”

“Well, you’re nothing if not that. But your weakness is also your strength.”

“Thanks, I think.”

Then the discussion always moved to Summer and what a precocious child she had become. Like her mother, she was full of curiosity, peppering every adult in her life with endless questions followed by more questions based on every answer. The mere thought of her brightened Thomas, and Ravinia never seemed to tire of hearing him repeat, “That one, she’s going to be something.”

Their frequent conversations had so freed Thomas emotionally that he had even taken to letting his guard down and admitting to Ravinia that now, at fifty-nine, he had many regrets. He allowed that his current work—fourteen years being the longest he had ever invested in a single ministry—was the hardest he had ever done. And that the lack of much to show for it wore heavily on him.

Today he was on that theme again, and his daughter seemed to study him. “What were you dreams, Dad, your hopes when you got into the ministry? Did you expect to have some global impact, ‘win the world’?”

“Not really. I think I’ve always been fully aware of who I am and who I’m not. And if I ever wondered, there was always someone there to tell me.”

“Not Mom. She’s always been in your corner.”

“That she has. We’ve always known that the journey is more important than the destination, as they say. I just wanted to win people, you know.”

She nodded. ”Working here has to be awful, then.”

“It’s pretty rough. Some men pretend to listen. Some have even prayed with me and then started a study program with me. But not one has persuaded me in the end that anything took or stuck or that he was serious. Each had his own agenda.”

“And yet you’re still at it. Still singing with Mom?”

“You bet. Those are the most precious times we have these days. Mostly we just continue our love affair with our eyes.”

Ravinia cocked her head and covered her mouth. When she pulled her hand away, her lips were trembling. “That’s about the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

Thomas realized, to his great delight, that after more than a year of these regular meetings, he and his own daughter had become friends and confidants. In many ways this unexpected relationship so late in his life had become an oasis. He looked forward to their every meeting and was disappointed anytime it was postponed.

Ravinia, despite the pressures of being separated and shuttling her daughter back and forth between her husband and her parents, not to mention helping out with the care of her mother a couple of times a week too, also found time to do pro bono work.

Thomas was more than impressed; he knew that work as a public defender—especially regularly defending some of the dregs of society—was not much more than pro bono in itself. She and Dirk had to be struggling to make ends meet, especially with both of them having to pay rent.

Ravinia’s helping with Grace fell into the same category. She could have easily begged off of that or cut way back, citing time pressures, Summer, marriage counseling, whatever. But she never shirked her duty. Whenever she was at her parents’ home, she was cooking, cleaning, waiting on Grace.

Rav would sit with her mother, talk with her, read to her, bathe her, even do bedpan duty. Nothing was beneath Ravinia. Amazingly, when Grace asked, Ravinia would even sing old hymns with her, harmonizing as she had learned as a child.

From the leased hospital bed Thomas had moved into their bedroom, Grace was often too weak to converse. But she would sing softly or hum all hours of the day.

The highlight of her week, however, was Saturday, when Ravinia would bring Summer by to see Grandma before carting her off to Dirk’s. Somehow the rambunctious youngster had come to understand that she had to tone down her enthusiasm when visiting Grace. She would sit still and talk softly and—when allowed—actually crawl into bed next to Grandma and assure her that she was there and that everything would be all right.

Thomas wondered if Summer would always possess that gift of mercy and maybe someday become a doctor or a nurse.

“Grandma,” Summer said, “who watches you when Grandpa is at work?”

“Wonderful friends from church,” Grace said. “They love Jesus and they love me.”

“If they ever can’t come, I will.”

43

Adamsville County Jail

Brady Darby was being processed out after his longest single stretch ever behind bars.

A black girl with a look that said she had seen and heard it all sat behind a computer and passively gazed at him, perched on a chair with one of his knees bouncing. He needed some meth, and he wasn’t likely to get any before arriving at the halfway house in his new civvies with a modest amount of cash in his pocket.

Thirty years old, and that constituted the extent of his worldly goods.

“Anybody need to be informed of your release?” the girl said, long, ornate nails poised on the keyboard.

“Haven’t heard from my ma since I been in here,” he said. “Maybe my aunt Lois.”

“You got a phone number for her?”

“No, but I remember her address.”

“Let me have it and we’ll try,” she said. “You know where you’re going, right?”

“Some Hug-a-Thug place is all I know.”

“Serenity in Addison.”

“Addison, really? That’s where I grew up.”

“Mm-hm.”

Well, that clearly made her day.

She gave him a thick manila envelope and instructed him to follow a colored line on the floor to a waiting area for a van. A corrections officer used a wand to scan the bar code on his envelope, and Brady was directed out a door that led to an underground garage.

As he joined half a dozen others waiting for the van, Brady shivered in the cool air. A couple of the others chatted, but Brady avoided eye contact. He just wanted to get aboard and see sunlight for the first time in years.

When the van finally emerged at street level, Brady shaded his eyes, and when he grew accustomed to the light, he didn’t recognize the area around the county jail. Everything had changed. Five years before, he had arrived at a facility that seemed isolated in an industrial park. Now the street was crowded with chain restaurants, shops, and condos.

The first parolee was dropped at a Greyhound station and greeted by a couple of thugs who would no doubt have him back in the joint within twenty-four hours. The same would be true for Brady if not for this program.

He was cautiously hopeful. He had a craving for dope and a woman and any kind of excitement he hadn’t had for five years. But he was going to give this thing a chance. Still, he’d learned not to turn over any new leaves or even make any unrealistic promises to himself. His only goal was to never get himself busted again.

Brady knew he wasn’t ready for total freedom and might not be for a long time. Accountability, Lieutenant Dale had emphasized. Well, if that’s what it took to transition a guy like him from the joint to sobriety and then to real outside freedom, Brady could handle that. He wanted that.

Two more men were dropped at the airport, met by men in suits. Brady had no idea what that meant. Relatives? Friends? Someone who had promised them help or jobs? Flying somewhere—that sounded cool.

“Next stop, Serenity!” the driver called out.

Brady glanced at the other three parolees. Maybe they’d be program mates.

“That where you’re goin’?” one said.

The others nodded.

“Me too,” Brady said, and they all traded fist taps.

“Should be interesting,” the first said.

“I’m not expecting much,” another said.

I am,
Brady thought as he peered out the window. The van cruised past his old haunts on Touhy Avenue. He felt like an alien.

And the old trailer park? It was now the Addison RV and Camper Resort, jammed with row after row of all manner of the same, hooked up to power and water for the weekend or for a few weeks. Looked like a nice place to live, only no one lived there longer than a few days at a time anymore.

Adamsville

One Saturday Ravinia insisted on coming back after dropping Summer off.

“You don’t have to do that, Rav,” Thomas said. “You know I can manage.”

“No, I want to talk to you. I’ll be back.”

Thomas did not understand how Grace slept through the night anymore, after having been in bed most of every day. Even now, as he sat in the living room watching for Ravinia’s return, he could hear Grace’s deep breathing.

When Rav arrived, she strode from her car with a look that evidenced a serious purpose. What was it that could not wait until their next meeting at ASP? Bad news about her and Dirk? Thomas hoped not. He believed the best chance for Rav and Dirk spiritually was for them to come back together.

Ravinia breezed past her father with a “Be-right-with-you-do-you-want-anything?”

He shook his head and heard her making herself some tea. Something felt right about his daughter treating their home as her own.

Finally she sat across from him in the living room, cup and saucer in her lap. “This may surprise you, Dad, but I need to tell you there are things I miss about my faith. Now don’t go getting excited. I’m just saying I miss . . . I don’t know, I guess I miss Jesus. He was the best part of the whole deal.”

“I can’t argue with that. He
is
the whole deal.”

“How I wish that were true, but I’m not here to reignite old arguments. It’s just that I want you to take Summer to church and Sunday school every week, starting tomorrow. I’ll watch Mom Sunday mornings.”

“Oh, Rav, come with us. I can easily get someone from the church to—”

She held up a hand. “Don’t, Dad. I just don’t want to be responsible for Summer missing out on something that was once so important to me. I’m not coming back, maybe ever. I’m not ready, and that’s what I want to talk to you about.”

“I’m listening.”

She had been speaking directly and quickly, as if she had something specific on her mind, and yet now Ravinia suddenly stalled.

Finally she set her cup down. “Dad, you and Mom are the reason I’m no longer on good terms with God.”

Thomas had heard that before, years ago. As it would with anyone, it triggered his defenses. He fought to keep from challenging her, defending if not himself then Grace for sure. He knew what he and his wife were: old fogies, conservatives. Some called him and his kind fundamentalists. And sure, of course they had made mistakes with Ravinia. But she couldn’t, shouldn’t, blame them.

Yet this was as close as they had gotten to any real discussion of God in years. “I’m still listening,” Thomas said.

She raised her brows. “I know you are. You’ve been saying that a lot lately, and I sense it’s true. I didn’t feel listened to a lot as a child, especially as a teenager. I mean, I know I didn’t have much to say, much of value anyway. But you and Mom had an answer for everything. Some verse or some hymn or some platitude. It didn’t have to make sense, as long as it was common knowledge. But you’re listening more and talking less these days, Dad.”

“Glad you’ve noticed. You know, the older you get, the less you’re sure about.”

“Tell me about it. But here’s what I’m saying: your faith is so simple and pure and straightforward that I can’t criticize you for it. My problem is that God seems not to care about you.”

“How can you say that, Rav? Having Summer here is a gift from God. And I have work, a decent income. We love our church. We’re fine.”

“You’re
not
fine! You’ve said yourself that you haven’t seen any results for your labor in years! And it hasn’t been just since you started working at ASP. I don’t see much accomplished there from my efforts either, and I don’t expect to. But what about all your years in all those pastorates? All you’ve got to show for that are horrible, petty people who took and took and took and used you and Mom up, never once giving.”

“Oh, there were those—”

“Of course there were, but they were outnumbered by the ones who wanted you as puppets, to keep things the way they had always been. For as long as I can remember, and even after I had left home, every one of your pastorates ended the same way. In disappointment. In unfairness.”

“People are human, Rav. You can’t expect—”

“You
can
expect better than that, at least once, somewhere along the line. Dad, I saw you give and give. You never quit, and if you ever even got discouraged, you never let on. But how long does the wilderness experience have to continue? Is it literally going to be forty years for you, and then, what, will God still not allow you to enter into any promised land?”

“The only land promised me is on the other side.”

Ravinia sighed. “A nice sentiment, but not good enough.”

“Heaven is not good enough?”

“Well, if you buy into that and it turns out to be true, I’m sure it will be wonderful for you, but I’m talking about the here and now. You should have more than two good decades left. Can’t God cut you some slack, give you a break, let a few crumbs drop off His table? Maybe you can handle this; that’s your nature. But watching from my vantage point just makes me bitter.”

Ravinia was plainly fighting emotion. Was it possible there was more?

“What is it, Rav?”

“It’s Mom. I can hardly bear to see her this way. Why her? What has she done? I mean, all right, if I’m going to be honest, she has driven me crazy over the years. It was as if she never let me grow up, be my own person. She had an answer for everything, and frankly, I never thought she used the brain God gave her. Did she ever acknowledge the other side of any issue? To her there was always one and only one answer to every question. It must be nice to be that sure of everything, and I know she meant well.