PRESENT DAY
MULVANE, KANSAS
Wren opened her eyes. She was still on the sidewalk holding the green index card.
She took a deep breath.
She was alive!
Not in the past, but right here, right now, in the present.
She exhaled slowly.
That’s when she noticed her dad. He was on his hands and knees in the middle of the street. Red lights swirled around her new world like the misty arms of an alien who had come to take her and her father to another world.
Then the painful memory came back like a tidal wave. First the bus turning on her street. Then the fire engines.
Wren took another deep breath and wiped her face. She exhaled once more and stood up. She reread the verse on the index card:
“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
Somehow, in some weird way, she now understood the truth of those words. She knew it was true. With God’s help she had just fought a giant. Wren had witnessed David take the giant’s life with a sling and a stone.
She put the card in her pocket and ran back down the street, not a broken, hopeless child, but something different. Someone changed.
She ran to her father. God had given her the faith to see things in a whole new way. If young David could stand up to the mighty giant named Goliath, then she could rely on God to get through the “giant” of her mother being gone and their house destroyed. And whatever else might happen in the future.
“Dad!”
Her father took his hands from his tear-stained face and looked at his daughter. “Wren. I’m so sorry, baby. I can’t believe this. I cannot believe this junk keeps happening to us.”
She thought back to what she saw in the Valley of Elah. The Israelite army looked at the problem called Goliath and cowered in fear. But David showed up with a totally different attitude.
David showed up with God.
David thought about God, and not the outcome.
All David cared about was stopping the giant from mocking God.
The whole Bible experience made Wren realize that she shouldn’t focus on the problems, but she should focus on God. Period. End of discussion.
Just God.
“Dad, don’t say you’re sorry. This stuff is just stuff. We’ve got this.”
Her father considered his daughter’s words and looked at her like she was someone else. He shook his head and gave her a hug.
“I’m so sorry about your book,” he said.
“Dad, what did I just tell you? Stop saying you’re sorry.” Wren remembered being in the giant’s steel grip and looking down at David with just his sling and the stones. She remembered finding peace in the fact that God was in charge of the outcome!
“I just feel terrible, sweetheart. All these bad things keep happening to us, and I feel helpless.”
“Trust me,” she said. “Let’s start following God’s lead. Believe me, He knows what He’s doing.”
Her father was speechless. He looked at Wren like her face was covered in some horrible skin disease.
“I mean it. It’s time we start becoming followers.”
Wren stood up and helped her dad do the same. She took his hand and led him to his truck.
A handful of neighbors came over and offered their homes if they needed a place to stay. They offered money and food too. It was all very generous, but Wren whispered something in her dad’s ear. He nodded and quickly helped her get into the truck’s passenger seat. He jogged back around and hopped in behind the wheel. They shut the doors.
“Dad, things are going to be a lot different now.”
“I know, baby. The house and—”
Wren turned to face her father. “No, Dad. I’m not talking about the house. I’m talking about us!”
Her dad shook his head and rubbed his face. He turned in his seat to face her. “I don’t understand. What’s happened to you?”
“You can’t imagine! Now, come on. Let’s go take Mom a flower.”
The Eternal Rest Cemetery spread out before her like an unwanted, uninvited dream. Going there would never get easier.
Tiny roads branched off the main drive like little black rivers leading cars of people to places where questions never get answered. To places where grave markers display names and dates and maybe an angel or two and perhaps even a cross.
Wren hated it, but she had no choice. She would go because she knew how much it helped her dad to have her there beside him.
“Thank you, honey. Thank you for coming with me.”
“Sure, Dad. We’ve got this.” She heard the optimism in her voice and was surprised.
Wren’s father pulled the truck to the edge of the road and stopped. He sat there with the engine running for a while. The time behind the wheel, waiting to get out, shortened with each visit.
Life was not the same—never would be the same—without her mother in it.
She took another deep breath and exhaled.
They got out and made their way through the grave markers.
So many lives.
So many stories.
After a few minutes, they stopped in front of the one they came for.
RACHEL EVANS
Beautiful Mother and Wife
1980–2018
Wren grabbed her dad’s hand. “We forgot the flower.”
“Quite frankly, I don’t think your mother cares.”
They both laughed, and, strangely, it felt good.
After a while of standing in silence, Wren started talking out loud. “Well, Mom, the house just burned down. Other than that, we’re good.”
Wren looked at her dad, and they both burst out laughing again.
Minutes passed, and she looked around the cemetery.
So many people who left loved ones behind.
So many souls…
“Hey, Wren, can I ask you something?”
“Sure. What’s up?”
Her dad let go of her hand and rubbed his face. “I saw a butterfly.”
Wren didn’t get it. Butterflies were a common sight in their little corner of the world.
“In the flames. When I was staring at the house burning, I saw a butterfly right in the middle of the fire. Am I losing my mind?”
Hearing her father talk about losing his mind brought the whole David and Goliath experience back. “Dad, uh, no, I don’t think you’re going crazy. What did it look like?”
“Well, it was this brilliant yellow and black color. Beautiful creature in the middle of the disaster. How on earth did the thing survive the fire?”
That’s when the memory came back to her. She had seen a similar yellow and black butterfly! When she was trapped in the Philistine camp. Some of the soldiers had started a fire nearby, and from where she was being held, Wren could see the butterfly. It looked like the thing was dancing in the flames. Just like what her dad was describing.
“I don’t know, but I’ll tell you something crazy if you promise not to laugh at me.”
“Promise.”
She proceeded to relay her experience and ended with seeing the same type of butterfly as he saw. She thought about the lessons and the hard truths that still remained here in the real world.
David had trusted God and stood up to Goliath. In the end, good conquered evil. But here in the garden of graves, it felt to Wren as though death had won. Her mother was gone, and the concrete cross testified that she wasn’t coming back.
No sooner than she had that thought, a beautiful butterfly came into view. Its delicate wings were painted bright lemon yellow and framed in black. The graceful creature seemed to dance on the air in front of them.
This could not be real. The cemetery. Her dad. The butterfly. Wren shut her eyes and expected to see David and the giant. She felt lightheaded. No, this could not be happening.
But it was!
“Wren, do you see it?” Her dad pointed to the graceful creature that had just landed on her mother’s headstone.
“Yes! I cannot believe it!”
Both father and daughter stood still looking at the butterfly. They didn’t want it to ever fly away.
“It’s like God is telling us that everything is going to be okay.” Wren’s dad hugged her as he said the same words she had in her head.
“Dad, I still can’t believe this.”
“I know, baby. I don’t get it.”
When they finally said goodbye and headed back to the truck, the butterfly took flight and danced across the air. It seemed to follow them for a few paces, then it pumped its wings and managed to get out in front of Wren and her father.
“There he goes,” Wren announced.
They watched the butterfly land on a cardboard box in the bed of the truck. Wren put her hand out, palm up, next to it. The butterfly walked from the box to her hand, its tiny legs tickling her skin as it moved.
“That’s weird.”
“What?” Wren was still transfixed by the butterfly in her hand.
“Well, I don’t remember putting that box in the truck.”
“No?”
“No. Maybe one of the firefighters stuck it in there. I don’t know.”
“Probably,” she said. “You were really out of it, you know, like in shock when I got off the bus.”
When her dad headed for the driver’s seat, the butterfly took off from Wren’s hand and landed back on the box.
“Do you know what’s in it?” she asked.
“No idea. Let’s see.” He lowered the tailgate, reached in, and pulled the box to the edge of the bed. The butterfly stayed on the box.
Wren watched as her dad lifted the flaps.
No way!
She and her dad just stared at each other in shock.
The butterfly took flight and danced in the air over the box before flying away…up over the roof and out of sight.
“I don’t believe it.”
Wren shook her head. “Me neither.”
There in the box was her complete manuscript! Saved from the fire. Ready to be mailed to the publisher.
“How did that get there?”
“I don’t know.” She pulled the notecard out of her pocket and waved it. “But looking at my book in that box helps me believe that God is a lot more powerful than I give Him credit for.”
“Yes, sweetheart. You’ve got that right. Come on. Let’s go see if we can find ourselves a place to live.”