thirteen

Mara

“Musical houses!” Mara exclaimed after Hannah finished sharing with the Sensible Shoes Club what she and Nathan were prayerfully considering. She glanced over at Charissa, who was lying on her couch in a pair of striped linen pajamas. “Crazy to think that both of you could end up living in Meg’s old houses.” That hadn’t come out quite right. “I mean . . . that you would move into places where Meg lived.” She hated using past tense for her friend. She would always hate it.

“I know,” Hannah said. “You’re right. It is crazy. But please don’t say anything to Becca about it if you see her. There’s still a lot for us to think through. I know from conversations with Meg that the house is in pretty rough shape, that it needs lots of repairs and significant updating. So it would be a huge project.”

“Well, I know a great handyman who could do some of that work,” Charissa said, smiling at Mara.

Now, wouldn’t that be something? “I bet Jeremy would love it,” Mara said. “He loves old houses, always has.”

“Well, if this is where God is leading, Nate and I are going to need someone like that. I don’t have a clue about remodeling. No idea what would be involved. But something about this feels right. We’ll wait and see where it all goes.” Hannah removed her Bible and journal from her bag. “I’m glad it worked out for us to be together tonight. There’s a lot to think about. Pray about.”

Charissa nodded and said, “Let’s pray for Becca right now.”

They did. They lit the Christ candle and prayed for God to comfort her, reach her, rescue her, and reveal his love for her. They prayed for the seeds Meg and others had planted in Becca’s life to sprout, grow, and flourish. They prayed for all the places of death and despair to be transformed into life and hope. They prayed fervently for Meg’s child as if she were their own. And when they finished praying for Becca, they continued in prayer with the Bible story and exercise Mara had selected for them to ponder together.

MEDITATION ON JOHN 21:9-22

Embracing the Call

Quiet yourself in the presence of God. Then read the text aloud a couple of times and imagine you are on the beach with the disciples and Jesus. What do you see, hear, smell, taste? Pay attention to the thoughts and emotions that are stirred within you as you listen.

When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn.

Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.” (He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, “Follow me.”

Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them; he was the one who had reclined next to Jesus at the supper and had said, “Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?” When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?” Jesus said to him, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!”

For Personal Reflection (45-60 minutes)

1. 1. Imagine you are one of the disciples having breakfast with Jesus. What would you dare to ask Jesus? What have you come to believe about him?

2. 2. Imagine you are Peter. How do you feel when Jesus keeps asking you if you love him? How do you feel about what Jesus asks you to do to demonstrate your love?

3. 3. To what places and experiences have you been taken where you have not wished to go? How has God been glorified in these kinds of deaths?

4. 4. In what ways are you tempted to compare your path of following Jesus to someone else’s?

5. 5. What is your response when Jesus says, “Follow me”?

For Group Reflection (45-60 minutes)

1. 1. In what ways is Jesus calling you to demonstrate love for him by loving others?

2. 2. In what ways are you being asked to die to yourself as you walk with Jesus?

3. 3. What does it mean for you to keep your eyes focused on Jesus without comparing your journey to someone else’s?

4. 4. How can the group pray for you as you embrace his call to follow him?

Mara had always loved Peter, a fellow open-mouth-and-insert-foot-er. Peter gave her hope because when he failed—and he failed miserably—he got up again. She liked that about him.

Peter’s frustration was something Mara also understood. Jesus had asked her the same questions over and over again too. Sometimes she felt frustrated, not that Jesus asked the same questions but that Jesus needed to ask the same questions.

Mara, do you love me?

Yes, Lord. Of course she did. Not as much as she wanted to, not as much as some other things in her life sometimes, not as much as some other people loved him, maybe, but yes.

Mara, do you love me?

Yes, Lord, but . . .

Mara, do you love me?

Yes, Lord. She loved him. As much as she was able to, she loved him. And she wanted to love others well too. Even if she didn’t like where that path led. Because when Jesus talked about loving others, he wasn’t just talking about the ones who loved her back. That was the hard part about love, about “going the extra mile,” like Charissa had been talking about the past couple of months. Because you didn’t get called to walk the extra mile with people who made it easy to walk it. That was the hard part.

She stared at her shoes. In the past few weeks her bitterness against Tom had found different forms of expression: her desire to win, to punish, to play “gotcha” games with him. She had told herself it would be a miracle if both Brian and Kevin became fellow allies in a battle against a common adversary. But was that really the miracle she wanted? That her boys would turn against their dad and develop and nurse their own bitterness and resentment to equal hers? Is that what she wanted?

There was an awfully wide gap between her honest answer to that question and what she knew was the “right answer.”

Help, Jesus.

She rubbed at her chin, her fingertips finding a couple of wiry whiskers. The real miracle, she knew, would be to have her heart changed toward Tom. The real miracle would be for her to long for Tom to turn to Jesus and be rescued. The real miracle would be for her to pray for that. She snorted and then covered her mouth. What a miracle that would be.

Charissa

Charissa smoothed her pajamas and tried to find a comfortable position for writing in her notebook. Thirty weeks. She had made it to almost thirty weeks. But oh! the days were tedious. She stared at the handout. To what places and experiences had she been taken where she had not wished to go?

That was the easy part to answer. It was the second part of the question that was harder: How has God been glorified in these kinds of deaths?

She had no idea.

What she’d glimpsed of the glory of God had been revealed through others laying down their lives to love and serve her well, not through her own yielding and dying to self. Much as she affirmed the principle of cruciformity as a way of life, in practice she continued to resist. I understand that, Hannah had said one day when Charissa voiced her resentment over her enforced rest and her guilt over feeling resentful. Love for Bethany ought to translate into a willingness to embrace the cost, right? Instead, she caught herself griping. Constantly. And when she considered all the blessings she had been given, she felt even more guilty for complaining.

Follow me, Jesus said. And like Peter, she was looking over her shoulder to see how other people were doing it and objecting if their way looked easier. Especially now. But it was none of her business what discipleship for others looked like, none of her business whether others were called to die in painful ways or whether they lived fruitful, comfortable lives of ease. None of her business.

What is that to you? Jesus asked, exposing her heart.

Nothing, Lord, she responded. But in reality, it was something.

How hard was it to lie at home and rest? John tried to understand and be patient, but she could tell he wasn’t entirely sympathetic. “Think of all the books you can read or the movies you can watch,” he’d said multiple times. Though she had tried to devote more time to Scripture meditation and prayer, as the end of the semester approached, her thoughts drifted to chronic rehearsing of what she had laid down, some of it forced, some of it chosen, all of it hard. She wished it weren’t so hard. She wished the cruciform way were something she embraced more readily, more enthusiastically. Her sorrow, she realized, was not that Jesus asked multiple times for an affirmation of love; her sorrow was that she kept failing to demonstrate it. After all the ways he had loved her, all the evidence of grace in her life, could she not pick up her cross and follow without chafing every step of the way?

“Pray for me,” she said to Mara and Hannah when they shifted toward the group discussion time. She didn’t want to die.

But die she did, daily. Most days blurred together without anything remarkable to note. Daily Charissa chronicled gratitude because that was the one spiritual discipline that helped her press forward: thanks for a good night’s rest, for white blossoms on a Bradford pear tree in the front yard, for a thoughtful card or meal offered in kindness, for visits from friends, for the opportunity to devour literature for pleasure rather than productivity, and for one more day of Bethany being safe. At John’s urging, she joined him in reading about their baby’s development day to day, week by week, giving thanks for tiny fingernails growing in secret and elbows that poked her ribs, even as she tried to give thanks for heartburn and every other kind of discomfort that reminded her that she was still pregnant and that she was grateful to be so. Thanks to Mara’s help and the convenience of online shopping, she also supervised the decorating of the nursery, including John’s assembling the crib, which took three times as long as the instructions claimed.

She was browsing a baby clothing website one morning when her inbox dinged with an email from the Academic Affairs office. Evaluations. If she had remembered that she would be receiving student evaluations, she would have daily monitored her inbox for them. Charissa clicked on the attached document, the first part of which was a summary report assessing “teaching effectiveness” in such categories as “establishing rapport,” “stimulating student interest,” and “classroom experience.” The second part contained student comments.

She skimmed the numerical grades first. On a scale from one to five, five being high, rate your instructor in the following areas. The more she read, the more agitated she became. Though it would have been naïve to think she would receive perfect fives all the way across, to consistently receive mostly threes made her heart sink, especially when her averages were compared to the “overall averages” of other faculty members. It wasn’t just Justin and his back row posse that had graded her harshly. In categories like “explained course material clearly and concisely,” she had received mostly ones and twos.

She skimmed the comments page. “Lectures too much” was one of the kinder remarks. A few students wrote that though they were sorry Ms. Sinclair had gotten sick, they had benefited from having a “real professor” finish the course.

Charissa closed her inbox, overcome by heartburn not caused by pregnancy.

“These aren’t as bad as you made them out to be,” John said when he got home that night. He stared at her computer screen. “Look here: ‘Ms. Sinclair assigned writing themes that helped me think about life in new ways.’”

“That would be from Ben. Or from Sidney.” Both of them had responded thoughtfully to the memento mori exercise she had given months ago. “Those are probably the only two who even gave me any fours.”

“That’s not possible. You got mostly fours in the ‘demonstrated importance of subject matter’ category. Look.”

She leaned forward and shut the screen. She was tired of looking at it. “I’m obviously not cut out to be a teacher.”

“Don’t say that. It was your first semester, with lots of extenuating circumstances.”

“I’m not going to make excuses for myself. It is what it is.” She covered her eyes. “Maybe I should just withdraw from the whole program.”

He pried her hands from her face. “You’re kidding, right? All your life all you’ve ever wanted to do is teach.”

“For my own selfish reasons. And this just shows how foolish it all has been.”

“I don’t buy it. And I bet if you talked with other faculty members—I bet if you asked Nathan, he’d tell you he’s gotten plenty of lousy evaluations over the years.” He picked up her phone and handed it to her. “Call him and ask.”

“I’m not going to call and—”

“Call him, Charissa. He’s your advisor. Call him.”

She exhaled loudly and stared at the phone. She could tell by the look on John’s face that he wasn’t going to let it go. “Fine,” she said, and dialed Nathan’s number.

Regardless of what the students had indicated on their forms, Nathan said, he had worked with them for three weeks, and he had seen the fruit of her labor among them. Not only did they write reasonably well for freshmen, but they were thinking critically and asking good questions. “So don’t be discouraged by this,” he said. “Believe me, I’ve read plenty worse about myself over the years.” Teaching, he said, was a daily exercise of failure, an ongoing practice in humility. And it might be exactly the right profession for her but not for the reasons that had initially drawn her to it. “You’re gifted, Charissa, and you know me well enough to know I tell the truth. Don’t give up over this, hard as it is.”

Okay, she promised him. She wouldn’t make any rash decisions. She would continue to move forward at whatever pace was necessary with an infant and explore her vocational call in spite of this setback. She would trust that somehow God was at work to shape her in the midst of it, hard as it was. Hard as everything was.

When Charissa hung up the phone, she lay back on the couch, palms resting open on her abdomen, and tried to practice letting go. Day after difficult day, she practiced letting go.

Becca

Sleeping on a childhood friend’s futon was an adequate arrangement when that friend was single. But two weeks after Becca moved into Lauren’s one-bedroom apartment with a duffel bag, Lauren started dating a guy from her office. “Sorry to kick you out,” she said to Becca as they ate their ramen noodles one night, “but Dan and I . . .”

“No, I get it. Of course. You’ve already done way more than you needed to.” Maybe she could afford a small studio apartment for the summer. Or find another friend eager to share rent for a few months. Quite a few of her high school friends still lived in Kingsbury. She ought to be able to work out something, anything to get her away from the house. Each hour spent there made her more resolute: she wanted it cleared out and ready to sell by the end of summer.

So she started purging one room at a time. When she wasn’t working extra hours at the café, she was on her knees at the house, dividing everything into three categories: pitch, save, give away. Her aunt, at least, made it easy for her. Rachel had already taken everything she wanted, she told Becca on the phone one night, and she wanted nothing to do with anything else. “Unless you find something worth a fortune,” she’d quipped, “and then we’ll talk.”

But apart from photos and mementos from her childhood, there weren’t many things Becca desired, either. Her plan was simple: box up the treasures she wanted to keep and then host an estate sale before she went back to college. Let the vultures descend and do the work of stripping the carcass down to nothing. Whatever didn’t sell could be donated to Goodwill. “You’re sure about all of this?” Hannah had asked multiple times.

She was sure. By the end of May the only bedroom she hadn’t yet sorted was her mother’s. Many nights she entered the room with the intention of packing it up, but all she could do was bury her face in her mother’s clothes in search of her familiar scent, or weep over blonde strands of hair still caught on the bristles of a hairbrush, or cry herself to sleep on a mascara-stained pillowcase she couldn’t bear to wash.

As the fragrance of lilacs drifted in through the open window one evening, Becca sat cross-legged on her mother’s bed, studying a sketchbook she had left on her desk. Gnarled and twisted trees filled many of the pages. Flowers too. “Amaryllis, flowers in winter,” the caption read beneath a particularly detailed rendering. The last sketch was the one she had drawn of Becca a few days before she died. Becca traced her finger over the nose ring in the picture. Her mother hadn’t approved of the nose ring, but she’d included it. Beneath the drawing were the words, “My beautiful girl.” Becca closed the book before tears splattered and ruined the page.

It wasn’t just the drawings that made her sad. It was the blank pages at the end of the book, too many blank pages. She set the sketchbook in a box along with other things she knew her mother had treasured: a box of love letters, a small wooden cross, and a framed sketch of Jesus holding a little lamb, all of which were on her nightstand when she died. Draped on the nightstand too was a burgundy shawl. A prayer shawl, her mother had told her, knit by someone from Mara’s church.

Well, it hadn’t worked.

Her mother had worn it every day of their visit together. She had wrapped herself in it when they watched movies and when they sorted photos into albums and when they drank milkshakes in front of the fireplace.

It hadn’t worked.

Becca fingered the yarn and pressed her face against it, searching for a scent. Nothing.

She folded it and set it in the box, her gaze lingering on the picture of Jesus nuzzling the little lamb, a picture her mother said gave her comfort because she saw herself as a little lost lamb that Jesus had found and rescued. Becca stared at the lamb, an expression of contentment and rest upon its face. Oh, to be safe and securely held like that. To be loved and cared for, a little lamb with someone to watch over her.

Her mother had trusted Jesus to watch over her, to protect and love and care for her, and look what faith had done for her. Nothing.

That picture provoked her. Much as her mother had loved it, she couldn’t bear to keep it. Maybe Hannah would like it. The prayer shawl and the cross too. Those were things Hannah would probably appreciate receiving as gifts. Becca set them aside in a separate box, scrawled “For Hannah” across the lid in permanent black marker, and left the room.

Mara

Comfort food, Mara decided. After weeks of fussing over fancy menus and elegant dishes, she decided that the real gift to the Crossroads patrons would be to make them feel like they were enjoying a home-cooked meal. So she casually worked into conversation questions about favorite childhood foods, and then she composed her list: macaroni and cheese (the real gooey kind, Billy said), meat loaf and mashed potatoes (several of them echoed agreement with Constance when she gave that answer), and chicken and dumplings. When Mara said that her grandmother had made chicken and dumplings for her when she was little, Ronni got a little teary and said, “Me too.”

“Can I skip school and go with you?” Kevin asked the night before the big day.

Mara eyed him from across the dinner table. “Because you want to serve or skip school?”

He half-smiled and shrugged.

“You willing to work?”

He nodded and took a second helping of pork tenderloin.

“Work hard?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. You can come. I’ll write you a note.”

Brian, who had actually joined them at the table to eat, scoffed at this. “How come he gets to and I don’t?”

Mara was going to answer, Because he’s served there before and knows everyone, but instead she said, “You want to serve at the shelter?”

Brian stirred his mashed potatoes and green beans together on his plate. “Yeah, okay.”

“It’ll be lots of work. You don’t get to go and just sit.”

“Okay.”

“You’ll need to welcome the guests, treat them nicely and—”

“I said, yeah. Okay.”

Okay. Mara took a spoonful of applesauce. “I’ll write you a note.”

She thought she heard him mumble, “Thanks.”

“Pray for us,” Mara said to Charissa on the phone that night. “I can’t believe this is actually happening.” Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined both boys would want to come with her to Crossroads. “I’m not naive; I know they just want a day off school, but still.”

“It’s still incredible they want to go,” Charissa said. “I’ll definitely keep praying. Wish there was more I could do.”

“That’s plenty. All the good that’s happening right now, I know it’s only because people are praying. So thank you.” She switched her phone to the other ear. “And what about you? How are you?”

“Still here.” Charissa sighed. “And that’s a gift. I know it’s a gift. Almost thirty-four weeks now.”

Mara whistled. “You’re getting there. Just hold on, little Bethany. Almost there.” Kevin entered the kitchen and stood waiting, hands behind his back. “Hang on, Charissa.” She pressed the phone to her shoulder. “What do you need, Kev?”

He held out a piece of paper. “I thought maybe they might like it if they had menus and stuff, like they could order at the table and Brian and I could be, like, the waiters or something.”

She stared first at him, then at the sheet of paper. Crossroads House Restaurant, it read at the top in fancy script. Below was a list of all the food she had mentioned she would be cooking.

“You’re a genius! Can you print out fifty of these?”

“Yep,” he said, and left the room.

Mara waited until she heard him reach the top of the stairs and then said to Charissa, “Wait till you hear this.”

Hannah

Had she ever seen Mara looking so happy, so at ease? While Hannah watched her friend bustling around the Crossroads kitchen, managing the chaos with joy, she marveled over the beauty of someone flourishing in what God had called her to do. Not only that, but Brian and Kevin were both taking instructions without arguing. At least, not verbally. Brian rolled his eyes every once in a while but for the most part was cooperative, not only with his mother but with the other volunteers. “A miracle,” Mara whispered to Hannah as she slid large casserole dishes into the oven. “Keep praying.”

When the doors opened just before noon and the patrons entered a room with cloth-covered tables, flickering votive candles, and fresh flowers, Hannah and other volunteers were poised and ready to greet them. “What’s all this?” Billy exclaimed, arms extended wide. “A party?”

“A big party,” Hannah said.

“What kind of party? Birthday party?”

“No, not a birthday party. Miss Mara just wanted to throw a special party for all of you.”

“A ‘just because’ party?”

“Yes. Just because.” As Kevin, Brian, and others showed guests to their seats, Hannah returned to the kitchen. “I think you estimated about right. I counted fifty-two.”

“Good. We’ll have extras. ’Cause I prepped for sixty just in case.”

“Put me to work,” a voice called from the doorway.

Mara spun around. “Jeremy!”

“Or, I should say, put me to work on my lunch break. Can’t stay long, Mom. Sorry.”

“I’m thrilled you can’t stay long! Another job?”

“Boss says we got a couple of big contracts, so it looks like we’ll have some jobs to keep us busy for a few months, thank God.”

The way he said those last words, Hannah thought, it didn’t sound like a throwaway line. Mara motioned toward the dining room. “Well, your brothers are here.” Jeremy raised his eyebrows. “I know, both of them, and they’re gonna be out there taking orders at the tables and then delivering food.”

“I’ll help them out.” Jeremy kissed his mother on the cheek. “And I promised Abby I’d take pictures so her mom can see.” His eyes brimmed with emotion. “It looks amazing out there, Mom. I’m so proud of you.”

“Well, you haven’t tasted anything yet”—the timer beeped and Mara grabbed her oven mitts—“but thank you, honey. Thanks for coming.”

Hannah was dishing generous portions of macaroni and cheese onto plates when her cell phone buzzed with a text. She decided to wait to check it. “Is that you or me?” Mara asked.

“Me,” Hannah said. She handed two plates to Kevin.

“Oops! Mine too,” Mara said. She set down her spatula and reached into her pocket, her brow furrowing when she read the screen. “It’s John.”

Hannah whipped her phone out of her jeans. Strong contractions. Heading to hospital right now. Pls pray.

“Two more meatloaf,” Brian called out, entering the kitchen, “and an extra large chicken and dumplings.” He looked at Hannah. “Please.”

Mara was typing on her phone. Hannah loaded up two plates and told him to come back for the third. “I’ll take that one,” Jeremy said, reaching out his hand for the third order.

Mara shoved her phone back in her pocket and wiped her brow. “Guess we don’t make a prayer announcement here, right?”

“Right,” Hannah said. Charissa wouldn’t want that.

“So, deep breath,” Mara said. “And help, Lord Jesus.”

Charissa

Charissa had hoped to make it farther. She had hoped to make it another month. But what more could she have done? She’d been doing nothing—nothing!—for seven weeks. “You did everything you were supposed to do,” John kept repeating on the drive to the hospital, and the nurses echoed that after she was admitted to the labor ward. Threshold, they said. She had made it to a significant threshold as far as the baby’s health risks were concerned.

She ought to be grateful she had added almost fifty days to Bethany’s life inside the womb. And she was grateful. She just didn’t like being told she ought to be grateful—not by John, not by nurses, not by the voices inside her own head. She also didn’t like the thought of their baby having to stay in the neonatal intensive care unit for a few weeks of monitoring after birth. The logical part of her brain reminded her that it could be worse. Others had it worse. She had seen pictures online. She had read their stories. Their horror stories had motivated her to fight temptation and do as close to nothing as possible as she ticked off the slow days of waiting.

She stared up from her hospital bed at the fluorescent lights. As soon as the nurse finished putting in the IV line, she was going to get up off that bed and walk around. Or kneel. Or rock. Or scream into a pillow. The contractions could be her excuse to shout or cry loud and long about everything that had not gone according to plan.

John rubbed the blanket. “You warm enough? Too hot?”

“No, I’m okay.” Well, not okay. She winced and tried to hold still as she breathed her way through another contraction.

“All set,” the nurse said, pressing the tape gently around the needle. “The anesthesiologist will come by soon to talk with you.”

“I don’t want an epidural,” Charissa said.

“You might change your mind about that, hon,” John said, and the nurse nodded her agreement.

“Stay open-minded,” she said, “and play it by ear.”

“I said, no epidural.” She didn’t have control over much, but she was going to have control over that. She would have a natural childbirth. The way Bethany had been eagerly trying to get things rolling the past few weeks, there wouldn’t be long to wait.

Mara

Mara glanced at the clock above the microwave. Seven. John had called more than seven hours ago. She decided to text again. Nothing yet, John replied. She called Hannah. “Still no baby. I don’t want to keep bugging them, but I can’t help feeling a little worried about everything.” None of her babies had required the emergency care little Bethany would need. But at least Charissa had a husband like John alongside. That was a gift. Tom had been more of a hindrance than a help in the delivery rooms, demanding and obnoxious to nurses, who weren’t amused by his crude jokes or sexism.

“Keep me in the loop if you hear anything,” Hannah said.

Mara knocked on the window to get Kevin’s attention outside. She mouthed, Dinner, and then said, “Okay, I will. And thanks again for helping today.”

“My pleasure. It was wonderful, Mara, a wonderful success.”

Yes, it was. The whole thing had come off without any hitches, which was, Miss Jada had said, truly remarkable. You did real good, she said afterward.

Mara couldn’t have been more pleased. Not only had the guests raved about the food, but Kevin’s idea of serving them restaurant-style had given Miss Jada some ideas about how to regularly make their patrons feel valued and cared for, ideas she was confident the board would approve. “I think it’ll be the first of many,” Mara said. “Who knows? Maybe with some fundraising we can do something like that once a month.”

“Well, count Nate and me in. He’s already said he wants to help out next time. Jake too.”

Maybe even Brian. When Mara asked him in the car on the way home if he’d had a good time, he’d shrugged and said, “Better than school.” Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but she’d take it.

After Kevin entered through the garage a few minutes later, Mara and Hannah said their goodbyes. “Call your brother for dinner, will you, Kev?” She tucked her phone in her pocket. Better keep it close in case John called.

“He’s riding his bike.”

She sighed. She had told Brian they would be eating at seven because Tom was picking them up for the weekend at eight. “Okay, we’ll eat without him.” She removed some of the leftover meatloaf and macaroni and cheese from the oven. “So what’d you think of today?”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Just okay?”

“Good. It was good.”

“Your idea was amazing, Kev. Did you see how happy everyone was?”

He spooned a large helping of mac and cheese onto his plate. “Yeah. Billy said he hadn’t eaten in such a good restaurant since he was a little kid. He was in the Marines, did you know that?”

“Yeah. Did he talk to you about it?” She poured two glasses of milk and followed him to the table.

“Yeah, he was telling me stories about these secret tunnels that the Viet Cong used to hide out from the Americans and . . .”

Mara didn’t have to ask any questions to keep him talking. Twenty minutes later when Brian came in, Kevin was in the middle of telling a dramatic story about Billy stalking an enemy sniper in the jungle. Brian loaded some mashed potatoes and meatloaf onto a plate and shoved it in the microwave.

“Did he get him?” Brian asked.

“Yeah. And the Viet Cong put this bounty on him because he kept killing off their men.”

Brian looked impressed by this. “How many confirmed kills?”

Mara made sure she didn’t sigh out loud. The boys played way too many Call of Duty games. “Dunno,” Kevin said. “Lots, probably. I’ll ask him next time.”

“Or you can ask him, Brian,” Mara said. Might as well seize any open door for conversation.

The microwave beeped, and Brian brought his plate to the table. He didn’t reply, but he also didn’t roll his eyes.

“Billy’s got lots of cool stories,” Kevin said.

Brian took a bite of mashed potatoes. “Not as cool as Leon.”

“Yeah, definitely as cool as Leon.”

“Leon’s a boxer, like a heavyweight champion or something.”

Kevin scoffed. “He’s not a heavyweight, no way.”

Mara let them argue. If they were determined to fight about who was the coolest patron at Crossroads, she wasn’t going to interrupt. She rose from the table, put some snickerdoodles on a plate for them, and sat down again to listen.

Charissa

“You’re holding steady at four centimeters,” the nurse said after checking Charissa’s dilation progress.

Nine hours of intense contractions, and now Bethany was going to take her time? Not okay. If she thought she could do jumping jacks without fainting, she would. Charissa fiddled with the laces on her hospital gown and tried not to cry.

“You’re doing great,” John said, and stroked her forehead. She swiped his hand away.

Hannah

“What was it like for you when Jake was born?” Hannah asked Nathan as they got ready for bed. When he didn’t reply right away, she said, “I’m interested in all the details. Anything you remember.”

“Really?”

“Really. The unabridged version.” She sat down on what had once been his side of the bed and watched his reflection in the bathroom mirror while he squeezed out toothpaste. These moments of observing him in the mundane details of his daily routine—brushing his teeth, combing his hair, shaving—these were the sort of unguarded, familiar moments that reminded her of the gift it was to share life together.

He caught her gaze in the mirror and smiled. “I remember I was a nervous wreck,” he said, “drove like a maniac to the hospital when we thought it was time. False alarm, and they sent us home.” He brushed vigorously, then spit into the sink. “Next day, same thing. Race to the hospital, and they say nothing’s happening and send us home. Third day, race to the hospital, and they say, yes, she’s at three centimeters.”

He finished brushing, spit one last time into the sink, and wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand. “I think it was three centimeters. Anyway, she suddenly started dilating fast, went from three to ten in half an hour or something crazy like that”—he rinsed his hands under the faucet—“and tells me she needs to push. I run to get a nurse, grab the first one I find and yell, ‘She’s pushing!’ So the nurse grabs a wheelchair and races down the hallway because we’ve got to get her into the birthing room. We get her there, and I’m helping her up onto the bed when her water breaks all over me. And the next thing we know, Jake’s crowning—right there—and the midwife, who’s literally just entered the room, puts on rubber gloves and basically catches him.” He dried off his hands. “Nurse, looks at me—she’s as shocked as I am—and says, ‘Can I get you a towel?’” He laughed. “True story.”

Hannah scooted up against her pillow as he slid into bed. “Incredible,” she said.

“Yeah.”

“And then what?”

He rolled over to face her, propped on his elbow. He was silent a moment and then said, “It’s like people say, you don’t have words. You try, but you can’t describe the feeling of wonder and awe and relief you have in that moment.”

She could see him mentally debating whether or not to say anything more. She reached for his hand. “It’s okay,” she said. “I want to hear everything. Promise.” She wanted to participate somehow in his moment of becoming a father, wanted to enter into the birth narrative of the young man she was growing to love as her son.

“I was overcome,” Nathan said, “utterly overcome by love. And overwhelmed with gratitude for the gift she’d given to us. To me.” His eyes brimmed with emotion. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.”

No. She was glad he did. His speaking the truth was what she wanted, what she needed. “If you hadn’t loved her in that moment, Nate, what kind of man would you be?”

He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear and murmured, “Thank you.” The depth of love and devotion in his eyes—adoration, even—spoke more profoundly than any other words.

It was good, Hannah thought as she rolled over and turned off the light, it was very good that Jake was spending the night at a friend’s house. Though she would never share the intimacy of childbirth with her husband, there were other intimate moments of communion they could share. And enjoy.

Charissa

Forget natural childbirth, she wanted drugs. Every flavor of drugs. “I want an epidural,” Charissa said. John looked up from the chair where he was typing on his phone.

“Are you sure? You said—”

“I know what I said! I changed my mind.” She glared at his phone. “And whoever you’re bringing into the delivery room with us with your texting or Facebook or whatever, stop.”

John stowed away his phone.

Charissa watched the monitor as another contraction seized her. A big one. “Epidural,” she hissed as she breathed her way through it. “Now.”

Becca

Nighttime was the worst part of the day, that moment when Becca, weary after a ten-hour shift on her feet, would stumble through the front door and hear only the jingling of her keys and the echoing of her footsteps on the hardwood.

She tossed her name tag onto the kitchen counter and made herself a cup of chamomile tea. She might as well pack up some more boxes. She hadn’t yet done any work in the music room or in the parlor, and since the music room was still filled with too many reminders of her mother’s life and death, she decided to purge the parlor.

All the furniture would go into the estate sale, and if there were fans of Victorian and early-twentieth-century decor who descended on the house, they would score plenty of treasures. The few things in the room that had been her mother’s she would keep: some framed photos, the snow globe from Harrods, and a china tea service they had used on special occasions. Becca had always loved the weekends when her grandmother was out of town. That’s when her mother was willing to break the strict house rules about toys staying in bedrooms, and they would have tea parties with Becca’s dolls in the parlor. Becca had found pictures in a box: she with her cockeyed pigtails, surrounded by dolls and beaming impishly from the settee. She wished her mother were in the pictures. But there had been no one else to take photos.

She picked up a magazine from the coffee table, its pages open to sample bridal bouquets, and tried to think of something other than Paris or Simon. He hadn’t contacted her after she’d refused his offer her last night in London. Some nights when she lay in bed by herself, her thoughts drifted toward him, and once she typed a text to say hi, and she nearly sent it—she was so close to sending it—but then she remembered the betrayal and how he had never loved her but loved using her, and her anger kept her from opening that door.

She put the magazine into Hannah’s box, covering the face of Jesus and the little lamb.

Maybe she would change her number so she could stop wondering if she would ever hear from him again. Cut the cord, shut that life down, change her email address too. Claire was the only one who had written to her since she’d been back in Kingsbury—kind notes to say she was “thinking of her,” which probably meant she was praying. Whatever. As weary as she felt, Becca would take whatever help the universe was willing to throw her way, which most days didn’t seem like much.

She was on her way out of the room when she spied a small book lodged between the seat cushion and armrest of a chair in the corner. Her mother’s journal. She had seen her writing in it the last week they were together, but then she had forgotten about it.

Flipping through the pages, her eyes landed on an entry dated the fourth of August, the day she dropped Becca off at the airport. Take care of my daughter, Lord. Please. Watch over her and

Becca closed the book, curled up in the chair, and cried.

Charissa

The epidural did what it was designed to do: it removed the pain. But it also took away Charissa’s sense of control. Now the only touchstone, the only connection she had to her own body and to her baby was provided by wires, a monitor, and the report of medical personnel who regularly checked her progress. “There’s a big one,” a nurse commented as she watched the monitor. Charissa felt only moderate tightness. When her water broke moments later, she felt nothing at all.

“How about a fresh gown?” John said. “And maybe some new sheets?”

Charissa bit her lip and nodded.

Just before dawn the monitor, which had been of marginal interest to the staff during the night, suddenly became the focus of a flurry of attention. “What’s going on?” Charissa asked, the panic rising in her voice as one nurse hurried out of the room.

“What’s happening?” John echoed, leaping up from the chair where he had grabbed snatches of sleep the past few hours.

“OB’s on his way right now,” another nurse said, patting Charissa’s shoulder.

“What’s happening?”

“The baby’s showing some signs of distress,” the nurse said, her voice irritatingly calm.

Moments later a doctor swept into the room and introduced himself. He looked way too young to be in charge. A baby doc. For babies. Oh, God, help. “What’s happening?” John asked again.

“Heart rate’s dropping,” he said. “Baby’s not happy at the moment.”

God, help. Please help.

The nurse fiddled with the monitor and turned up the volume slightly so that the heartbeat was now audible as well as visible.

“I’m going to check and see how far dilated you are,” the doctor said, “and then we’ll see what we need to do.” While John held her hand, the doctor donned gloves and did his exam. Charissa, feeling nothing, watched his face, which revealed nothing. “Okay,” he finally said, “you’re good to go. But your baby’s getting tired, and we need to move fast”—God, help!—“so I need you to focus and push with everything you’ve got, okay?”

Push? How could she push when she couldn’t feel anything?

“You can do it,” John said, his voice taut. “I know you can.”

God, please. She bore down and imagined herself pushing as hard and long as she could.

“Keep going, that’s it,” the doctor said. “Good job! You made good progress there. Take some deep breaths for me, rest a bit.”

“You’re doing great, Riss.” John squeezed her hand and kissed her forehead.

“Where’s the heartbeat?” she asked, trying to prop herself on her elbows.

The nurse moved the ultrasound probe lower on Charissa’s abdomen.

“Where’s the heartbeat?” John echoed.

Oh, God!

The nurse, still maneuvering the transducer in one hand, turned up the volume again. Still nothing. The doctor, leaning sideways around the nurse to check the screen, motioned for her to position the transducer lower. “It’s harder to pick it up when the baby enters the birth canal,” he said.

“But she’s okay?” John asked. “Everything’s still okay?”

“We’re going to get her out with the next push,” he said, his hand on Charissa’s abdomen. “There’s another contraction building now, so take a deep breath and push as hard as you can for me again.”

He hadn’t answered the question. Why hadn’t he answered the question?

John gripped her hand even more tightly as, once again, Charissa commanded herself to do what she could not feel. Chin tucked to her chest, she closed her eyes and with a loud cry, pushed until she thought she would turn herself inside out.

“Keep going, Riss, keep going . . . Please . . .”

“Okay, gentle now, Charissa,” the doctor said. “She’s almost here. Just little pushes, you’re almost there. That’s it. You’ve got it. We’re there.”

Suddenly, there was a flurry of movement between the nurses and the doctor, lots of movement but no noise. Silence. No cry. Why was there no cry? The doctor lifted up a tiny, dusky gray—Was that a baby? Oh, God, no! She stared at a terror-stricken John for some indicator of what was happening. God! And then, after the interminable, deafening, screaming silence there was a whimper, a tiny mew, the most fragile, resilient, reverberating witness to life and hope Charissa had ever heard. “Call neo,” the doctor commanded. John covered his face in his hands and sobbed.

There were moments in the life of a new mother that Charissa did not realize were important to her until she was robbed of them, like the father cutting the umbilical cord or smiling parents cradling a seconds-old newborn and marveling over tiny hands and feet before posing for photos. When Bethany was whisked away for oxygen without any chance to hold her, Charissa tried to tell herself that the Hallmark moments weren’t important, that what was important was that their daughter would be receiving the emergency care she needed over the next few minutes, hours, days, weeks, even. “Go,” Charissa said to John when the nurses invited him to accompany Bethany in her transport incubator to the neonatal intensive care unit. “Go with her. Please. I’m okay. I’ll be okay.” But after John left the room, Charissa lay back on the pillow and let the tears flow.