I slipped into the bathroom of Philip’s private room and cried silently into a skimpy white towel. What have I done? Lee said he loved me! But to insist that I leave with him now when Philip was hurt and broken, to say if I stayed we might as well call it quits . . . it was so unfair!
I heard a nurse come into Philip’s room. “Well, look who’s awake already. How are we feeling this morning? . . . Let’s see, which thigh did they use to give you the Heparin shot last night? . . . Okay, turn over, we’ll do the other thigh this morning.”
Turning on the faucet in the sink, I let the water run so she’d know I was in there. What would I say to Philip when I came out? “I forgive you”? No, no . . . it wasn’t that simple! He’d nearly destroyed me! Was saying he was sorry just a big lie to get my sympathy, like Lee said?
But . . . what if he really was sorry?
That possibility was so beyond comprehension, it would have to be a miracle. But I’d seen some pretty impossible miracles in my own life the past few months. What if God hadn’t given up on Philip yet? What if . . . what if God had allowed Philip’s life to spin out of control to get his attention, like Avis had prayed at Yada Yada? Was Philip paying attention? What he’d said to me not fifteen minutes ago wasn’t the self-confident man I’d married, or the cruel egomaniac who’d washed his hands of me.
He’d sounded like a broken man. A Humpty Dumpty who’d had a great fall . . .
But if God was working on Philip, where did I fit into the picture? Was I ready to take responsibility for my part in our broken communication? To ask Philip to forgive me?
Oh, God, I groaned. I can’t do this. I need time. Time to think. Time to pray. Time to talk to someone who isn’t going to give me an ultimatum.
Washing my face, I took several deep breaths and came out of the bathroom. The nurse was exchanging the IV bag and doing readouts from the machines. She smiled pleasantly and said the doctor would be doing rounds shortly, they’d probably want to do more tests to determine the extent of internal injuries . . . and then she was gone, leaving Philip and me to deal with our unfinished conversation, like a sticky spider’s web filling the room.
His head was turned away, his face still twisted in misery. But as I approached the bed, that Voice seemed to speak to my spirit. Gabby, take the time you need. You don’t have to figure it all out right now. Can you trust Me with all your heart? Can you lean on Me instead of your own understanding?
Startled, I stopped beside the bed. Was God telling me that promise I’d been memorizing was for now? This moment? I didn’t understand how all this craziness was going to work out—so it might as well be now. I took a big breath, then breathed out a silent prayer . . . Okay, God, I’m going to trust You. But I’m going to need a lot of help. But even as I prayed, the “sticky spider’s web” seemed to shrivel and disappear, and the anxious knot in my stomach began to loosen.
I laid a hand on Philip’s leg covered by the thin blankets. “Philip? I’m still here. But I can’t answer you right now. I need time to think . . . and pray.”
He turned his head toward me and his tortured eyes met mine. He nodded slowly. “I know.”
I finally left the hospital late that afternoon, after Philip’s parents arrived. They hadn’t been able to get a direct flight to Chicago and had to wait for a connecting flight in New York. Marlene Fairbanks had rushed into the room crying, “Oh, my poor baby. Who did this to you?!” ignoring me completely.
I’d greeted Mike Fairbanks briefly, gathered up my things, and slipped out as unobtrusively as possible. As I walked to my car in the parking garage, I felt as if someone pulled a plug from the bottom of my feet and all my energy drained out. I couldn’t wait to get home, crawl into my bed, and take a long nap.
Except . . . I’d promised P.J. and Paul I’d bring them back to the hospital this evening after their grandparents arrived. They’d called that morning, wanting to spend the day hanging out at the hospital, but I’d told them their dad had been taken to radiology for some tests and I didn’t know how long it would be. “You can come this evening, I promise.”
Paul had seemed alarmed. “Nana and Grandad are coming all the way from Virginia? Dad’s not going to die, is he?”
“No, no. Didn’t you hear the doctor? Once his injuries heal, he’ll be fine.”
“So why are they coming?”
“Because he’s their son and they love him.” I thought about this and realized it was true. “If you lived in another city and got hurt, I’d come to see you in a heartbeat.”
“Oh.” I could almost hear Paul smile. “Okay. But I miss you, Mom. When are you coming home?”
Now, buddy. I’m on my way.
Turning south on Sheridan Road after pulling out of the parking garage, my mind drifted to the way God’s Spirit had spoken to me in that hospital room. And I realized I’d been right to tell Lee that my relationship with God and my decision to become a member of SouledOut did have everything to do with my relationship with him—and with Philip too. The second part of that promise in Proverbs was that if I kept on putting God first in the decisions I had to make, He would lead me in the right path.
That was His promise.
As tired as I was, a smile crept onto my face as I turned into my new neighborhood. In the thirty-five hours since I’d rushed out of the apartment Saturday morning, the six-flat had surely gone through a transformation. Josh and Edesa and little Gracie would be settling in on the third floor . . . Precious and Tanya and their children would be right across the hall . . . and when Sabrina delivered, there’d be a new baby to fuss over!
And that was only the beginning. In the next several months, the other tenants would move out and more Manna House moms would be assigned to the House of Hope so they could create a home for their children . . .
“Oh, Jesus,” I murmured aloud. “What have we started here?” I knew I was in over my head—waaay over—but a sense of excitement and expectancy pushed my weariness aside and I hiked up my speed a few notches, eager to get home and see the beginning of the dream come true.
As I turned the corner onto my street, I saw a cluster of people gathered outside the six-flat, some standing or sitting on the steps, others on the flat concrete “arms” that hugged the steps leading up to the front door. What was going on?
I pulled the Subaru into a parking space along the curb, sorting out faces. Jodi and Denny Baxter sat on the steps, holding their granddaughter Gracie . . . Josh and Edesa Baxter had their arms around each other, laughing about something with P.J. . . . oh my goodness, there was Harry Bentley and his grandson . . . couldn’t miss Estelle, sitting on the “arm” in her latest homemade caftan, braiding Sabrina’s hair . . . and Mabel Turner, of all people, talking with Precious and Tanya . . . and was that Lucy Tucker?! The elderly woman sat like a boulder in the middle of the steps while Paul and Tanya’s Sammy chased a yellow dog in circles around her . . .
Paul spotted me first. “There she is!” he yelled, galloping toward the car, Dandy fast on his heels, tongue lolling.
I climbed out of the Subaru laughing as Paul grabbed my hand and started pulling me up the walk toward the building, while the rest of the crowd started clapping and cheering. “Look up, Mom! Look up!”
“Look up where?” I said . . . and then I saw it.
A large, curved wooden sign had been fitted over the stone arch above the doorway of the six-flat. In twelve-inch high wooden letters, it said . . .
HOUSE OF HOPE
Tears sprang to my eyes. “Who . . . ? How . . . ?” I gasped.
Jodi Baxter came to my side and slipped her arm through mine as I stood looking up. “Denny and Josh made it—been working on it a couple of weeks. I tried to get them to call it The Yada Yada House of Hope—to remind the moms who come to live here that God knows everything about them, like Psalm 139 says—but I was voted down. ‘Three words is enough!’ Denny told me.” She shrugged and laughed. “That’s okay. We know it’s a ‘yada yada’ thing, don’t we, Gabby?”
“Hey!” Lucy yelled from the steps. “Ya gonna stand there all day? Some of us got stuff to do, places to go!”
The people around her cracked up. “She’s right!” Precious waved me in. “Come on! See what the House of Hope looks like from the inside, now that some of us be livin’ in hope again!”
With Paul hanging on one hand and Jodi on the other, I moved through the grinning crowd of friends and family, up the broad steps and through the front door that Harry Bentley— ex-doorman but never ex-friend—held open for me.
And I knew I was coming home.