The Unfinished Gift (28 page)
Read The Unfinished Gift Online
Authors: Dan Walsh
“I know why, Daddy,” Patrick said.
“You do?”
“I prayed harder than I ever prayed. And I told God I didn’t care if I got anything else for Christmas except you. And look what he did. He gave me you and the only other thing I wanted . . . the wooden soldier Grandpa made.”
New Year’s Eve, 1943, 10:45 p.m.
Resting on a doily, perched atop a hardwood end table, a General Electric table radio connected the Collins’s living room to the big events now underway in New York City. The radio announcer, in that familiar drone, relayed his observations to millions of listeners nationwide. In the background, a big band played a slow dance number.
The crowd in Times Square is growing by the minute, already numbering in the tens of thousands. The multitude is happy and peaceful, yet somewhat subdued from years past, considering we are a nation at war. And because we are, it’s been decided—now for the second year in a row—that the Big Ball will not descend from its post high atop the Times Tower to ring in the New Year. Still, come midnight, we do expect the cheering throngs to scream, the chimes to sound, and church bells to ring throughout the land. But all the while, not far from anyone’s mind, will be thoughts of a husband, a son, an uncle, a brother. And for every cheer, two prayers will likely be said. God, keep him safe. God, bring him home.
Shawn Collins looked down at Patrick’s angelic face, sound asleep on his lap, and smiled. Patrick had spent the better part of the day pleading to be allowed to stay up till midnight. Each time he drifted off, Shawn had nudged him, and each time Patrick replied, “I’m not sleeping,” and sat right up. This time, though, Shawn knew, he was down for the count. His father had already conceded defeat and went upstairs about thirty minutes ago.
But Shawn didn’t mind spending New Year’s Eve in this quiet place. He’d take it any day over the fear and terror he’d known and lived in almost every day this past year. He still found it hard to believe he could go to sleep and not worry about waking up to bombs exploding, machine guns firing, and flak cannons going off in his ears. He was glad to just be sitting there not wearing a uniform. Not having every second of his day regimented and on a schedule.
He looked at the radio, then his eyes drifted toward the Christmas tree. His father had agreed to leave it up until tomorrow. Even that, Shawn thought, so unlike him. The change in his father was still holding, one week later. He still didn’t understand all that had transpired to bring it about. They hadn’t talked anything through yet, but it was clear all the animosity between them was gone. He’d picked up some of the story from Mrs. Fortini and Miss Townsend the day after Christmas; which reminded him, he needed to try and reach Miss Townsend to thank her again for taking such good care of Patrick. One of the most surprising parts of the tale they told was how his father had pulled out all the stops to find Patrick, even paying out ten thousand dollars in reward money.
Shawn smiled . . . another shocker. His father was rich. One might even say . . . filthy rich. Shawn had no idea.
He knew his dad had sold his business when his mother became ill, but he assumed it provided just enough money for him to retire in some comfort. Yesterday, his dad had told him about the deal he’d made with Carlyle Manufacturing and then asked Shawn if early in the new year, he’d meet with his banker and lawyer to sort out his affairs, to “make sure these uppity types aren’t robbing me blind.” Even before meeting with them, Shawn could do the math in his head. The deal with Carlyle was made before the war. The money had been pouring in ever since, and the interest had just kept compounding.
Shawn thought about this morning. He scratched the last item off his checklist for the week. He got to personally meet with the policemen and firemen who’d searched for his son, and thanked them all for their hard work. But he especially enjoyed meeting and thanking Ezra Jeffries, the black man who’d actually rescued Patrick from the snow and kept him safe until the storm let up. Shawn couldn’t imagine how he’d survive if he came home to find he had lost Patrick too.
He smiled as he remembered the look on Patrick’s face that morning as they drove up to the Jeffries’s apartment. Shawn wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen a bigger or brighter smile than what he saw on Ezra Jeffries’s face that day. Ezra shook Shawn’s hand almost a solid minute and refused to hear anything about what he did for Patrick being anything special. “Just did what anyone do,” he’d said. “You do the same for my young’uns.” Shawn said that he surely would. Then Ezra brought him upstairs and, while Patrick played with his two boys, told him all about how he and his wife Ruby were going to use the reward money.
First he showed Shawn all the presents under their tree. “Hadn’t but one apiece ’fore your daddy gave me all that money.” He went on to explain how early in the new year they were going to open up a little corner store and restaurant one block away, specializing in foods colored folks like to eat, food he’d bring up from the South. “Stuff our folks can’t get up here no more.” Shawn told him it sounded like a wise plan and wished him well.
Just then, Shawn heard a loud bang outside, jarring him from his thoughts.
He tensed up until he heard sounds of laughter and drunken singing. That’s right. It’s New Year’s Eve . . . not someone trying to kill me. He looked down, but Patrick didn’t bat an eye. How he wished he could have Patrick’s outlook on life right now. So simple and secure. They both shared in common the same uncertain future. But Patrick enjoyed such a simple faith, made even stronger now that “God brought his daddy home from the war.”
He relaxed a little farther into the couch. The guy on the radio had stopped talking for a bit. Shawn closed his eyes, listened to the music, and stroked Patrick’s hair, trying to get in touch with what everyone else seemed to be experiencing. He knew God had certainly brought him home from the war like Patrick said; no other explanation could explain the events that unfolded after his plane had been shot down. But how would God help him face the new year without Elizabeth? Did he even want to try?
But he must. For Patrick, for their future.
God, he prayed, help me find your will and see the good in all this, to face this new year and find some kind of way to be happy again . . . without her.
“What, Daddy?”
Shawn looked down to see Patrick’s eyes staring up at him. Had he prayed aloud? “It’s nothing, Patrick, I was just praying.”
“Praying about what?”
“The new year.”
“Did I miss it?”
Shawn laughed and rubbed Patrick’s head. “No, silly, you didn’t miss it.”
“Is it midnight?”
Shawn looked up at the clock on the mantel. “Not yet.
You awake?”
Patrick sat up. “I think so.”
He moved next to Shawn on the couch. Shawn put his arm around him and drew him close. “Then let’s go through the new year together.”
“I like that idea,” said Patrick. “Daddy, I’m so glad you’re home.”
Dan Walsh is the senior pastor of Sovereign Grace Church
in Daytona Beach, Florida, a church he helped found 23 years
ago. Walsh lives with his family in the Daytona Beach area.
This is his first novel.
Don’t miss the sequel to
The Unfinished Gift,
coming June 2010!
a division Baker Publishing Group Available wherever books are sold.
www.RevellBooks.com
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a division Baker Publishing Group Available wherever books are sold.
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