One Tuesday Morning (2 page)

Thanks, also, to my editor at Zondervan—Dave Lambert. I am blessed beyond measure to have the privilege to work with you in this novel. The book it is today is proof that you are gifted in what you do. In that same vein, a thanks to the others at Zondervan, and especially to my amazing cover designer—Kirk DouPonce of Uttley-DouPonce Designworks. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. People judge a book by the cover, and I can only pray the story measures up. You are amazing!

A thank-you to my agent, Greg Johnson. There isn't enough space here to adequately thank you for all you do, Greg. I treasure our friendship, trust your judgment, and easily leave my career in God's hands and yours. I'm still grateful beyond words for that CBA luncheon when Terri Blackstock told me about you. Nothing has been the same since.

Thanks also to my special friends—the ones who encourage me and pray for me. Sylvia and Walt Walgren, Anne and Ron Hudson, Vicki, Joan, Kathy, Melinda, John, Robyn, Rick, and many, many more. Please keep praying, friends. I need you now more than ever. A special thanks goes to my family as well for understanding the extra hours I put in on this novel. I believe the end result has been well worth it … and I look forward to the time we'll have together in the coming weeks. You guys are the best!

And, of course, a special thanks to my parents and my sister, Tricia, for helping me down the stretch while I edited
One Tuesday Morning
. I am grateful for your servant hearts in helping me through what would otherwise have been an impossible time.

Finally, a special thanks to God for giving me the story of
One Tuesday Morning
. When I wrote the last page, there were tears on my face, and I raised my hands upwards. Because a novel like this one could only have come from Him.

A N
OTE TO THE
R
EADER

To write a novel rooted in truth, an author must take certain liberties. I did that with
One Tuesday Morning
. Certain events—for instance the funeral of the unnamed probational firefighter detailed early in the book—were changed for the purpose of the story line. In reality firefighter Michael Gorumba, twenty-seven, suffered a heart attack and was remembered on September 1, 2001, at a St. Charles Catholic Church service in Staten Island, not on September 2, in Manhattan as my novel depicts. Other such changes to true events occur in a minor sense only.

For the most part I've tried to write my novel within the confines of the tragic reality of the events that took place around September 11.
One Tuesday Morning
does not pretend to be a novelization of the tragedy that happened in Manhattan that terrible day. Too much of what took place with the terrorist attacks is not covered in this novel for that to be the case. Rather, I drew from hundreds of firsthand accounts, news stories, personal interviews, and other research. In the process I created a story that truly could've happened, given the multiple cases of amnesia caused when the World Trade Center collapsed.

One Tuesday Morning
is my way of grieving through all the events of September 11.

Out of respect for the New York City Fire Department and the real heroes who fought and in many cases died on September 11, I've created for the purpose of this novel a fictitious fire station, along with fictitious Engine and Ladder companies. Any similarities to actual FDNY firefighters or fire stations is purely coincidental.

O
NE

S
EPTEMBER
2, 2001

There were too many funerals.

Jamie Bryan locked eyes on the casket anchored atop a specially fitted slow-moving New York City fire truck, and that was her only thought. Too many funerals. So many that this one—like those before it—was steeped in tradition: the haunting refrains from fifty bagpipes, the white-gloved salute, the lone bugler sounding taps, the helicopter passing overhead. Jamie knew the routine well. Hundreds of dignitaries and several thousand uniformed firefighters lined Fifth Avenue outside St. Patrick's Cathedral, the same way they'd done five times already that year.

A sad melody lifted from the bagpipes and mingled with the early September wind.

“I hate this,” she whispered without moving.

Her husband stood a few inches away, tall and proud, his blue uniform pressed crisp, right hand sharply at attention near his brow. He squeezed her hand. No words came, no response to her statement. What could he say? Funerals were part of the job. Sometimes ten a year, sometimes twenty. This year was the lightest yet. Only six so far—six men like Jake who went to work for the FDNY one morning and never came home.

The funeral music swelled, and Jamie Bryan could feel the walls, feel them growing and building within her. The first bricks had been with her since the beginning, back when she first considered marrying a New York City firefighter.

Back when she and Jake Bryan were just twelve years old.

“I'm never leaving New York City.” They'd been playing tag with neighbor kids outside his house one day that summer. Everyone else had gone in for dinner. “I'll be FDNY like my daddy.” Certainty shone from his eyes as they made their way onto his front lawn. “Puttin' out fires and savin' people.”

“That's fine for you.” She'd dropped to the ground and leaned back on her elbows. “When I grow up I'm gonna live in France.” She stared at the hazy humid New York sky. “Artists live there.”

“Oh yeah?” Jake flopped down beside her. “Before or after you marry me?”

She lowered her chin to her chest and raised her eyebrows at him. “What makes you think I'd marry you, Jake Bryan?”

“Because …” He twisted his baseball cap and shot her a grin. “You love me. And you always will.”

That had been it, really. They didn't date until high school, but after that summer Jake Bryan had been the only boy for her.

“What do you see in him?” Her father peered at her over the top of his newspaper the day after her eighteenth birthday. “He'll never be rich.”

Jamie had rolled her eyes. “Money isn't everything, Daddy.”

“But security is.” Her father let the newspaper fall to the table. “You'll get neither from Jake.”

Anger had flashed like lightning across Jamie's heart. “How can you say that?”

“Because.” Her father had rested his forearms on the table, his expression softer. “It's a tough job, fighting fires in New York City. The danger's always there, Jamie, as close as the next call.” He gestured in the direction of Jake's house. “Look at his mother. She lives with the danger every day. It's in her eyes, part of who she is. That'll be you one day if you marry Jake Bryan.”

Her father and Jake's were both Staten Island men, hardworking New Yorkers who made the commute to Manhattan every day. But the similarities stopped there. Jake's father, Jim, was a fireman, a chaplain who always had something to say about God or the importance of faith.

“What good thing has the Lord done for you today, Jamie?” he'd ask, grinning at her with piercing blue eyes that would light up the room.

Jamie was never sure how to answer the man. She had no practice at giving God credit for the good things in life. Small wonder, really. Her father, Henry Steele, was an investment banker who had built a small financial empire with nothing more than brains, determination, and self-reliance. At least that was his explanation.

Their family had lived in the same house where Jake and Jamie and their daughter, Sierra, lived today. In an elite section of Westerleigh, not far from the Staten Island Expressway and the ferry ramps. The sprawling two-story colonial had a finished basement and a built-in pool in the backyard. Back then Jamie and her sister had been friends, just two years apart and living the charmed life of summer beach parties and winter vacations in the Florida Keys.

All of it compliments of Henry Steele's hard work and ingenuity.

God got no credit at all.

“A man doesn't need anyone but himself,” he would tell Jamie and her sister. “Religion is a sign of weakness.” Then he'd shoot a pointed look at Jamie. “Of course, when a person fights fires in New York City, faith might be a necessity.”

And so Jamie waited month after month for something terrible to happen to Jake's father. But in the end it had been Jamie's father, not Jake's, who died the tragic death. One evening when her parents were driving home from the ferry, her father lost control at the wheel, careened off the road, and wrapped their car around a telephone pole. By the time paramedics arrived at the scene, both her parents were dead. Jamie was twenty that year, her sister, eighteen.

Their parents carried a million dollars' life insurance each, and a lawyer helped the girls work out an agreement. Jamie got the family house; Kara got a full ride to Florida State University and stocks. They were both given enough savings to last a lifetime, but no amount of money could stop the arguments that developed over the next few years. An ocean of differences lay between them now. It had been five years since they'd spoken to each other.

Three years after the death of her parents, Jamie remembered her father's warning about Jake's job as she stood by and watched him graduate with his fire science degree. Weeks later he was hired by the New York Fire Department. The next summer Jake and Jamie married and honeymooned on a Caribbean cruise, and since then Jamie hadn't been more than a hundred miles from the East Coast.

But she no longer wanted to travel the world. Sights from a dozen exotic countries could never rival the pleasure she felt simply loving Jake Bryan.

“You don't have to work, you know …” Jamie had mentioned the fact to Jake just once—a month before his first shift with FDNY. “We have enough money.” Jake had bristled in a way she hadn't seen him do before or since.

“Listen. Fighting fires in New York City is part of who I am, Jamie. Deep inside me.” His eyes held a hard glint. “It's not about the money.”

The bagpipes stopped, and a sad silence hung in the air.

A bugle cry pierced the quiet morning, and the lonely sound of taps filled the street. Jamie stared at the coffin again. The dead man had been a proby, a probational firefighter still serving his first year with the department. This time deadly smoke, fiery flames, and falling ceiling beams weren't responsible.

The man's engine company had simply responded to an auto shop on fire. For several minutes the proby worked a massive hose reel at the side of the engine, then he climbed back into the cab. His buddies found him not long afterwards, slumped forward, dead of a heart attack at twenty-seven years old. Just five months after graduating top of his class.

He was the fourth fireman to suffer a fatal heart attack in ten months.

The bugle rang out its last note, and in very little time, the sea of blue began to break up. Jamie and Jake held hands as they made their way back to his pickup truck and headed home to Sierra.

Sierra
…

The image of their four-year-old daughter filled Jamie's heart and for a moment dimmed the deep ache there. Sierra had Jake's blue eyes and Jamie's trademark dimples. No one knew where Sierra had gotten her blonde silky hair, but she was a beauty, inside and out. Days like this, Jamie could hardly wait to hold her, to soak in the warmth and hope of her precious laugh. The girl had held both their hearts captive since the day she was born.

Jamie stared out the truck window.

Manhattan smelled of warm bistros and cabbie exhaust fumes. It didn't have a downtime. The sidewalks teamed with people as much now as they would on a weekday. She keyed on a couple about the same age as she and Jake, dressed for business, walking briskly toward some lower Manhattan destination. The two exchanged a smile, and for a fraction of a second, Jamie wondered,
Do they know about the dead fireman? Do they spend time pondering the fact that men like Jake are willing to die for their safety?

Jamie shifted and slipped her hand into Jake's.
Of course they don't. Unless they know a firefighter or police officer, unless they regularly attend the funerals, why would they?
She leaned back in her seat and looked at Jake. The silence between them was heavy, and words didn't come until they hit the ferry docks.

“When's the last time you had your heart checked?”

Jake glanced at her. “What?”

“Your heart.” She swallowed and tried to find a neutral tone. “When's the last time you had it checked?”

“Jamie …” Understanding flooded his eyes. “I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with my heart.”

“I'd rather have the doctors decide.”

“Honey, heart attacks are part of life.” He worked his fingers a little more tightly between hers and kept his eyes on the road. “Not just for firemen.”

She stared out the window again and let the air ease from her lungs. Did he always have to read her mind? Couldn't she keep even a little fear to herself? He would never be honest with her as long as he knew she was afraid. Every time he sensed her concern, he had the same answer.
Not me, Jamie … I'll be careful … nothing'll happen … And now this. There's nothing wrong with my heart …

They pulled into line at the Whitehall terminal and inched their way onto the ferry. When they'd driven up as far as they could, Jake slipped the truck into park and faced her. His voice was a gentle caress. “I'm sorry.”

She turned to him. “For what?”

“For the funeral.” He bit his lip. “I know how much you hate them.”

A cavernous pit of sorrow welled within her, but she wouldn't cry. She never did, not in front of him, anyway. “It's not your fault.”

“You could stay home next time.” He reached out and loosely gripped her knee. “Lots of wives do.”

“No.” She gave a quick double shake of her head. “I'd rather go.”

“Jamie …” The ferry gave a slight lurch and began to move across the harbor.

“I
would
. ” She gritted her teeth. “It reminds me what I'm up against.”

“Come on, baby.” A chuckle sounded low in his throat, one that was weighted in empathy. “When are you going to stop waiting for something bad to happen?”

“When you work your last shift.” Their eyes met and desire stirred within her. They'd been married nearly a decade, but he still moved her, still made her want to hold on to him an extra minute or two every time they came together.