Tracie Peterson (13 page)

“Ruth?” Her husband’s voice made her feel even worse. He would see her crying and know that she was sad. She had tried so hard to keep her pain from him.

She dried her eyes with her apron as Marion came into the room. He looked at her for a moment and then at the room. Nodding, he came to sit beside her. He put his arms around her and pulled her close. The tears fell anew and Ruth felt her strength give out.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

“Sorry for missing Kenny?” he questioned.

“No, I’m sorry for crying in front of you. It just sort of came on me.”

“Ruthie Bennett, I’m your husband,” he said in a tone that suggested chastisement. “If you can’t cry in front of me, what good am I?”

Her shoulders shook as she sobbed. “I wanted to be strong for you. I know how much this hurt you.”

He lifted her chin gently and gazed into her eyes. “Ruth, we’re one. When you hurt, I hurt. I’ve seen this coming for a long time now. You had to deal with being so angry.”

“I don’t want to be angry.”

“But you are. You’re angry at me for not being able to keep bad things from happening to our son. You’re angry at Kenny for dying, and you’re angry at God for taking him away from you.”

She nodded because he was right. She could see it now. “He’s really gone,” she cried. “I just kept hoping it was a mistake. I kept praying he would come back home. Then David showed up and I knew Kenny was gone forever.”

“No,” Marion said, touching her cheek lightly. “Not forever . . . just for a time.”

Ruth knew the truth in his statement. Maybe it only felt like forever because she had loved him so very much. Maybe it felt like forever because she was tired of battling this with her own strength.

“I’m sorry if I took this out on you, Marion. Here I thought I was being so brave and helpful.”

“You were all of that and more,” her husband assured. “God understands how you feel, Ruth. He knows what it is to sacrifice a son for a greater cause.”

She nodded and drew a deep breath. “But He’s God,” she smiled ever so slightly. “He can handle anything.”

Marion wiped away her tears. “Yes, He can, including this. You don’t have to bear this alone, Ruthie.”

She knew he was right and in that moment her pain began to subside just a bit. More importantly, the anger seemed to drain away.

“David needs us.” She offered nothing more than that simple statement, but it was enough.

Marion nodded in understanding. “I think we should ask him to stay for as long as he likes.”

“Not as a replacement for Kenny,” she said, knowing that she had seen him as such when he’d first arrived.

“No,” Marion agreed. “We’re going to do this for David.” He offered her a hint of a grin. “And for Rachel, too, if I don’t miss my guess.”

Ruth hugged her husband close and felt her strength returning. Healing in full would take time, just as Grandpa Bennett had suggested, but pain was not so fierce in the face of true love.

Later that morning, Ruth made her way to the flower shop. She wanted to make sure that everything would be all right for a couple of days. She didn’t plan to come back until after Christmas and hoped that by taking care of things now, she could have a nice leisurely time later. Just as she reached the shop, however, she stopped. To her surprise, David waited on the bench outside the door. It was as if he had expected her to come.

“Hello, David,” she said.

He smiled and seemed more at ease than she’d ever seen him. “I figured,” he began, “that it was time for me to put aside my anger. I’d like to see life like you do. Instead of just black and white, I want to see it in all its colors and contrasts and know that each and every one has a purpose and reason for being here.”

She felt her heart leap for joy and knew that God had dealt with both of them that day. She reached out and took hold of his hand. “Maybe we can help each other,” she said softly and led him toward the door.

Spending Christmas Eve night in a merriment of feasting and song, David found the hardness of his heart begin to soften. By the time they sat down to open gifts, David knew that the prayer he’d prayed with Grandpa Bennett had forever changed his outlook on life. There were still questions, still a great deal of anger, but now he knew where to take it.

“Here, the last present is for you,” Helen said.

David smiled and took the gift. “Well, thank you, but you certainly shouldn’t have gotten me anything more. The gloves and scarf were more than enough.” He looked around the room at the Bennetts. How he wished he could express his gratitude. Not just for the material things they’d given, but for the emotional and spiritual as well. They’d already given him a reason to go on with life. They’d shared their home and their hospitality, but most of all they’d given huge doses of unconditional love.

“It isn’t anything big,” Ruth said, “but we wanted you to have it. We have something else to give you, but it can wait until you unwrap that one.”

David raised a brow, then smiled. “This family is just full of surprises.” He unwrapped the package and opened the box. Inside, he found a brown leather scrapbook. Opening the pages, he found pictures of Kenny and the Bennetts. His eyes teared up and unashamed he looked up to meet Ruth’s motherly smile.

“It’s a family album,” she explained. “We realize that you have no family, and I guess in our own way, we’re volunteering ourselves to be one for you.”

“That’s right,” Marion stated, nodding in complete agreement. “We’d like you to stay on, David. We want you to consider this your home for as long as you like.”

“That’s our real gift,” Ruth said softly. “We aren’t trying to replace Kenny, so don’t even think it. We know nothing and no one could ever do that. But we care about you, David. We want to stay beside you as a family and help you in your future.”

David wiped at his tears, feeling no embarrassment. “No one has ever cared about me like this,” he admitted. He glanced to where Rachel and Helen sat, their faces offering the same compassionate expression as their mother’s. He looked to Ruth and Marion, and finally to Grandpa Bennett. Such a wise old man.

“Yesterday I asked Jesus into my heart—to live inside me,” David said. “It seemed the right thing to do.” Glancing at the open scrapbook and a picture of Kenny in full dress uniform, he felt an overwhelming peace. Kenny’s love had worked. But not just Kenny’s. The Bennetts saw David as worth something when no one else had been able to see it. And because of that—because of them—David was able to see that Jesus felt the same way.

He looked up and realized beyond any doubt that he was exactly where he belonged. “This seems like the right thing too. I’d like to stay,” he said, meeting Ruth’s gaze.

A joyous celebration warmed the house the next morning, and amid presents from the night before and laughter, David Cohen knew what it was to be at peace.

“Come with me,” Rachel whispered in his ear sometime later.

She grinned at him mischievously, and David finally knew his heart where she was concerned. “I’d follow you anywhere,” he replied, getting to his feet.

“Now, don’t you two be gone long,” Ruth said as she headed for the kitchen. “I’ve got a great Christmas breakfast planned and I don’t want it going cold.”

Rachel let David help her with her coat. “We’ll only be a minute, Mom,” she called back.

David grabbed his own coat and followed Rachel onto the front porch. He wasn’t at all sure what she would say or do, but he knew what his intentions were. He loved this woman and he had to make certain that she knew how he felt.

David awkwardly pulled on his coat and, without bothering to
button it, walked to where Rachel leaned against the railing. Reaching out, he pulled her close and gently turned her to face him. “I want to tell you something.”

“I know.”

He stared into her blue eyes for just a heartbeat before adding, “I love you.”

She nodded. “I know that too. But I’m glad to hear you say it. In fact, I’ll be glad to hear you say it over and over and over for the rest of my life.”

He laughed. “Is that a proposal, Miss Bennett?”

She nodded and smiled, then wrapped her arms around him, embracing him as he’d always hoped she would. With her lips only inches away from his, she breathed the words, “I love you, David. Now and forever.”

He had come to Longview to fulfill a promise and instead found the hope of a new promise that would give him a reason for living. “Merry Christmas, Rachel.”

Their lips touched for the briefest of kisses. “Merry Christmas, David,” she breathed, then leaned into his kiss once more—only this time, there was nothing brief about it.

David sighed and let the newness of her love wash over him. This love—and the love and peace he found in Christ—saturated his heart and soothed away the emptiness and pain of a lost man without a single hope. He had truly come home.

South Pacific, December 1942

The sun-drenched warmth of salt air against his body and face might have been pleasant in another time and place. After all, men were freezing their tails off in the Aleutians, and the tropics offered glorious sun and lush vegetation. But none of that seemed important or interesting at the moment. Fighting for his life, First Lieutenant Erik Anderson twisted violently from the risers of his parachute. Suspended some five thousand feet above the earth, with a canopy of jungle green rushing up at him faster than he cared to imagine, Erik didn’t feel at all interested in the lure of the tropics.

Five minutes ago he’d been caught up in the dogfight of his life with a Japanese Zero. Four minutes ago he’d plastered the Zero with .50-caliber rounds. And three minutes ago, as the Zero belched smoke and accepted the earthly limitations given the plane, the pilot had managed to make a desperate head-on pass. A lucky hit from the Zero’s 20mm cannon exploded in the engine of the F4F that Erik piloted. Even the tough Grumman Wildcat couldn’t withstand the damage.

Erik had no choice but to jump out of his damaged plane and pray in his cynical fashion that his chute would deploy. He’d “got the one that got him,” but there were no witnesses to the dogfight. No one could step forward and give credit to Erik for his kill. His first kill. Probably his first real act of heroism for the war effort.