Embrace Me
EMBRACE ME
OTHER NOVELS BY LISA SAMSON
Quaker Summer
Straight Up
The Church Ladies
Tiger Lillie
Club Sandwich
The Living End
Women's Intuition
Songbird
© 2007 by Lisa Samson
All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meansâelectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or otherâexcept for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a registered trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.
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Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible and from the HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION
®
. © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
Publisher's Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Samson, Lisa, 1964â
        Embrace me / Lisa Samson.
            p. cm.
        ISBN 978-1-59554-210-6 (pbk.)
        1. Women circus performersâFiction. I. Title.
    PS3569.A46673E47 2008
    813'.54âdc22
2007048456
Printed in the United States of America
08 09 10 11 â 6 5 4 3 2 1
FOR BILL, VAL, LIAM,
FAMILY AND FRIENDS
“To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless.”
âG. K. CHESTERTON
“He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.”
âMARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
CONTENTS
DREW: 2002
I
t's amazing how good a priest looks when you've got nobody else to turn to.
The sign says he should be here. The front doors are unlocked and I walk right down the aisle. It feels creepy, despite the white wallsâthat Catholic, old world creepiness cemented by the statue of Mary standing on the earth, stepping on a serpent whose mouth stretches wide in agony.
Good for you, Mary. We've never given you enough credit. Not that we'd overdo it like these guys. I shove my hands in my pockets, looking around at the altar, the stone baptismal font, two pulpitsâone big, one smallâtwo rows of pews, a side altar with a statue of Joseph, I think. The doors at the back, another side altar with the statue of Mary.
But I see no carved wooden booth with a curtain hanging down like they always show in the movies. So I call out, my voice reverberating against the stone walls of the small church. “Anybody here?”
No answer.
Thomas, his stained-glass face eating up the late afternoon sun, looks doubtful of my presence and I can't blame him.
I sit on the front pew, my gaze resting on the rack of votive candles flickering in their red cups and then skating up to the round glass window in the back wall where Jesusâhands spread wide and welcoming, a dove above his head, beams of light shiningâlooks out over the room.
A small man enters the roomâmuch younger than I expected.
“Hello there.”
“Are you the priest?” Great. I'm in the greatest inner crisis of my life and God sends a guy fresh out of seminary who probably doesn't know a thing about the real world. Fitting.
“Yes. Sorry I'm a little late. There's always so much to do before mass begins.”
“I understand. I hear the priesthood is waning.”
“An understatement. Too much to give up these days. Are you here for confession?”
“Yes.”
“Are you visiting Ocean City?” He sits down next to me, laying a comfortable arm across the back of the pew.
“Sort of. Extended stay. My mother and I used to vacation here when I was younger. I'm not Catholic.”
He stares at me, brown eyes calm as he rubs the five o'clock shadow on his chin, then straightens his short dark hair. “Well, God isn't choosy about who's allowed to confess their sins if they are truly repentant. Are you a religious person?”
“I used to be a pastorânondenominational.”
“Oh my. Well, I won't hold that against you.” He chuckles then settles into something more relaxed. I'm not a priest but apparently he recognizes someone else willing to answer a call. “Forgive me. I sometimes say too much. So what's on your mind? And just to reassure you, this will still remain confidential.”
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”
“You're not Catholic. This isn't the movies. No need to go with such formalities.” He waves it away. “But you did say it so heartfelt. I'm not used to that these days. Vacationers. You know, they went out the night before and committed all manner of mortal sin, and they're planning on doing it again. Thankfully, God is the true judge of the heart, not me. I only do what I'm supposed to and leave the rest up to Him. It's all any of us can do.”
“I wish someone would have told me that a long time ago.”
“So, tell me your troubles. I'm Father Brian, by the way.”
Brian?
I smile.
“Yes, I know. The trials of being a young priest with a youthful name.”
“I don't know where to begin.”
“Repentance goes a long way in the saving of our souls. Anywhere is fine. God knows the end from the beginning anyway. Unless, of course, you're an open theist. Are you an open theist?”
“No. That never made any sense to me.”
“Nor to me. Sorry for interrupting. Go on ahead. Just talk to me.”
I try to form the words on my tongue. Nothing comes. I imagine the surf pounding outside. Seagulls circling above a piece of trash. I picture sunbeams and Bibles and Jesus dying on the cross. Even picturing the Resurrection and the anticipated gathering of the nations does nothing to resurrect my tongue from the bottom of my mouth.
He leans forward slightly. “Are you ready for this?”
“I don't know.”
“Tell you what. Write it all down, then come and see me. Be assured that God is waiting to forgive you. He joys in a repentant heart.” He taps the back of the pew three times. “Even if you're not Catholic.”
“All right. That's what I'll do.”
“Then come back. If you make an appointment, I can give you all the time you need. Do you mind telling me your name? I'll pray for you in the meantime.”
“Drew.”
“Good, Drew. Come back soon. In the interim, pray like your life depends on it. And would you pray for me too?”
“I've forgotten how.”
“There's no trick to it.”
“I don't need a rosary or anything?”
“No. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not quite picturing you as the kind of man who's used to asking a woman for anything. Oh there I go again! Forgive me.”
He doesn't realize he just landed a firm punch to my jaw. “Thank you.”
“Feel free to stay and pray.”
“Thanks, but the statuary kind of gets to me.”
He laughs. “A common response from protestants. No worries. Just call me when you're ready.”
The priest rises and walks toward a door at the side of the church. A minute later a young woman stops before a door right next to it. Oh, that's the booth. Her head is bowed, perhaps beneath the weight of her sin, and her hand trembles as she reaches for the knob.
I can't watch another second of this.
I trudge back to my room, stopping at the pharmacy for a notebook and a pack of pencils. Maybe I shouldn't plan on doing a lot of erasing, but I'd like that option.
I came to Ocean City because I couldn't think of another place I wanted to go. Chapel Hill? No way. DC? Definitely not. That town killed me before I ever had a chance.
The Dunesgrass Hotel where I'm staying is scheduled for demolition come spring. My mother and I stayed here for a week every summer, just her and me, tanning to a ruddy brown and reading books on the beach, walking the boardwalk every night, eating caramel corn and pizza or pit-beef sandwiches. Not exactly a vacation that suited the tastes of my father. This hotel smells old now. The sconces that lit the hallways don't work. The threadbare maroon carpeting is curling at the edges.
You can pay by the month, by the day, or by the hour if you're in good with the desk guy who works eleven to seven. Most people live here year round. Four blocks from the ocean, miles and miles from proper society.
I arrange the bed pillows against the headboard, pull the lamp forward to illumine the pages of the composition book, and set the tip of the mechanical pencil against the top blue line of the paper.