Meeting her own eyes in the mirror, Valerie continued the internal debate. She had zero desire to go to this church service. However, she and Buddy had such a great time yesterday at the game. He’d loved on her in a way that made her feel like no strife had ever existed between the two of them. If going to this service would please him in some way and served to make the man who had given up his youth to raise her feel happy, then she’d do it. Even if she didn’t personally understand it and even if she personally thought the entire thing was a waste of time, Buddy deserved her respect.

She could see the determination on her face, but she could also see the frown. Why the frown? Shouldn’t making Buddy happy make her happy, too? It’s not like she didn’t know the church or the people in it. She’d grown up there just like her mother and Buddy had. Everyone she knew there had always treated her well, with love and kindness.

She supposed the hesitation came from entering a “house of God.” She’d told Brad that she didn’t believe in God anymore; however, she knew that didn’t really encompass what she truly believed. Maybe some part of her believed in some kind of a god. Maybe not. She hadn’t examined it for a long time. However, she certainly didn’t believe in the God of her uncle, the One for whom her parents had abandoned her. If He existed, a big if, then He certainly didn’t deserve any regard from her, did He?

But most of her didn’t believe in any kind of supernatural being. Most of her believed in nothing. Nothing protected her in her relationship with Tyrone. Nothing healed her. Nothing helped her feel safe and secure inside the walls of her own home.

Walking into the church did not mean she had to give up her belief in nothing. Walking into the church meant she loved Buddy desperately and wanted to make him happy in a way she had the power to do. No one forced her or manipulated her. She would walk in with eyes wide open and try to keep her words polite.

Pep talk completed, she stepped back from her dressing room mirror and surveyed her outfit. She wore a light blue, sleeveless top with a black lace collar and a black and white striped skirt. Heeled sandals the color of her shirt and a thin black sweater complimented the outfit. She added black and light blue earrings that dangled, and pulled her hair up, letting the ringlet curls fall where they may.

The heels would hurt her hip if she stood too long in them, but she knew most of the time she would sit. Instead of wearing them out to the car, she carried them by their straps, intending to put them on in the parking lot, and wore flat black dress shoes out to the car.

In no time, she found herself driving toward the church. The last time she entered that building, she’d received her graduation gift from the congregation. How many people that she knew still went here?

She found a parking space and took the time to secure her heels, then grabbed her purse and walked toward the building. As she walked up the steps of the sanctuary, she heard someone call her name.

“Is that little Valerie Flynn all grown up?”

Turning her head, a grin spread across her face at the sight of Mabel Cunningham, her fourth grade Sunday school teacher. “Miss Mabel,” she said, accepting the hug from the rather stout woman, “I am so happy to see you!”

“Girl, you look amazing. I can’t believe how beautiful you are.” They walked in together and somehow, Valerie felt very much at home. “Let’s find that uncle of yours.”

They stopped and talked to half a dozen people Valerie remembered from childhood. The telltale signs of age surprised her in a way. In her memories, this building had stopped in time and everyone remained exactly the same, which clearly did not reflect reality.

When she entered the sanctuary, she noticed they’d replaced the pews with chairs and the carpet beneath her feet was new. Modern electronics graced the sound system and screens adorned either side of the large stage. Mabel led her in that direction, down the aisle of chairs and scattered congregants to the stage, then out a door to the side of it. She found herself in the administration hallway. They passed the pastor’s office, and next door, Mabel stopped at the door marked “Pastor’s Study.” She rapped on the door with three quick knocks of her knuckles then opened it.

Inside, she saw Buddy, Phillip, and a young black man she didn’t recognize. When Buddy looked at her, his eyes widened and his grin lit up the room. “Well,” he said on a breath, “look at you. Come in. Come in.”

She looked at Mabel and thanked her, then went toward Buddy, hugging him then hugging Phillip. “I couldn’t stay away today. Thank you for the invitation.”

“It’s a special day.” He took her hand and led her to the younger man. “Danny, this is my niece, Valerie Flynn. Valerie, our pastor, Danny Brown.”

The door opened again, and a blonde woman entered the room with a caramel-colored baby against her shoulder. She rhythmically patted its back and it snuggled against her neck. “Fifteen minutes, honey,” she said to Danny.

“Great. thanks.” He took the baby from her and she adjusted her shirt. “Madison, this is Valerie, Buddy’s niece. Her parents are being honored today.”

Madison’s eyes widened and she turned to Valerie with a smile. “Oh, I wish I’d known you were going to be here. I would have made sure to include you.”

Valerie held up a hand. “Please, no. I didn’t know I was coming until this morning. I don’t need to be included.”

“Well, know that you are so very welcome here.” She looked at her watch. “I need to get. Praise team is waiting. I’ll see y’all later.” She rushed out and Buddy put a hand on Valerie’s waist.

“Let’s get you settled before all the good seats are gone.”

She waved at the men remaining in the room and let Buddy guide her back into the sanctuary. There, she saw Rosaline and all the Dixon brothers sitting in the third row, center aisle. He led her that way. “Rosie, look!” he said, grinning. “Val’s here!”

Valerie hugged Rosaline and said hello to each of the brothers. It took a second for her to pick who was whom, because they all three wore shirts and ties. But she managed to get it right. “Hi, Ken. I heard you finished a house last week.”

His eyes widened, as if surprised that she recognized him in a suit outside of work. “I did. It went on the market Monday morning.”

“That’s fantastic.” She looked at Jon. “Jon, I’m surprised to see you.”

He smiled crookedly. “I’d do almost anything for Buddy.”

“Oh? What does he have on you? Must be pretty good.”

Jon’s grin showed some teeth. “I’ll never tell. You look amazing, by the way. Beautiful as always.”

“This old thing?” She teased, holding the skirt out. She felt a little nervous flutter in her stomach when she turned to Brad. “Hey, Brad. Thanks for inviting me.”

He stared at her for a long time before he said, “Welcome home.”

It felt natural when he ran a hand down her arm and took her hand long enough to lean forward and brush his lips over her cheek. She found herself closing her eyes and breathing in the smell of his aftershave. When he stepped away, she smiled up at him. “It sure felt like home when I came through the doors. Lots of changes, but so much the same. I even saw Miss Mabel.”

Jon’s eyes widened. “I loved Miss Mabel.”

“Everyone loves Miss Mabel. I was so jealous you two had her.” Ken gestured toward another part of the church. “I think she’s the regional favorite.”

Valerie settled into her chair next to Brad. She looked up as a screen lowered and covered the stage, then a series of photos filled that screen and the ones on either side of the stage. She recognized her parents, Buddy, Rosaline and Phillip Dixon, and the three other members of the team who had gone on that mission trip. Those three had returned. Her parents had not. Newspaper headlines came after the photos and the auditorium grew quiet.

“MISSIONARIES GUNNED DOWN IN DRIVE-BY”

“SUSPECTS IN CUSTODY IN FATAL SHOOTING”

“GANG VIOLENCE DOESN’T STOP FOR GOD”

“LOCAL CHURCH GRIEVES AS MISSION TURNS TO TRAGEDY”

Valerie expected to feel ambivalent about it. It’s not like she could remember her mother’s voice or her father’s laughter. Her entire life consisted of Buddy and the Dixons. However, as the music played and the photos and headlines appeared, a well of grief inside her heart broke open as if it had lain dormant for twenty-seven years just waiting for release.

Brad’s arm came around her shoulders as the tears poured from her eyes. She found as much comfort in his touch as she’d hoped, and she leaned into him.

The center screen rose, and, on the stage, she saw the musicians. In the front, holding a mic, she recognized Madison Brown. Gone was the disheveled nursing mom she’d met twenty minutes earlier. In her place stood a well-groomed, beautiful woman in a trendy outfit, sparkling jewelry, and well-applied makeup. She started singing a slow song to match the somber tone set by the headlines and photos. Out of the shadows of the stage stepped four other singers, but she alone remained in the spotlight.

Valerie found herself pulled into the music. Madison Brown clearly had a gift for singing and entertaining and Valerie caught herself clapping, singing along, and losing herself. They sang songs she didn’t recognize but enjoyed, and an old hymn she could have sung from memory.

As the congregation stopped to pray, Valerie did not bow her head but instead watched Danny come through the wings of the stage. He carried the baby, now dressed in a frilly pink dress with a sparkly bow somehow placed on her bald head. Madison scooped the baby out of his arms and gave him a gentle kiss on the lips before walking off the stage and taking a seat in the front row.

He straightened his suit, checked his mic, and picked his Bible up off one of the music stands. By the time the prayer ended, he stood in the center of the stage next to a glass podium.

“Today, we’re honoring a team of missionaries who left Atlanta to minister to a very poor neighborhood in our own country. We worry and pray for missionaries in countries hostile to our God, but it never occurs to us that the danger could find us here at home. Twenty-seven years ago this week, while serving in a mobile hospital in Los Angeles, Dr. Cecil Flynn and his wife and nurse Alison were gunned down in a drive-by shooting. Some teenagers affiliated with a gang had come to them seeking medical care. A rival gang chose that time to attack them while their guard was down. Cecil and Alison were inside the trailer with the teens, and they both sustained fatal wounds.”

The screens flipped to a muted newsreel video shot live at the time. Behind the commentator, the scene was one of carnage and bloodshed.

“It’s hard to reconcile that. Deuteronomy tells us that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, minds, and strength. Jesus affirmed this and added that we are also to love Him with all our souls. From everything I’ve ever heard about this couple from everyone who loved them, if anyone embodied a love for God more than Cecil and Alison, I’ve never met them. Their tragic deaths seem so senseless and unfair.

“We ask questions. How do people who love God so much get gunned down in the street? How do they leave a toddler to be raised by a grieving brother? How does that happen?”

He paused and Valerie caught her breath. She’d asked those questions all her life. Was he about to bring her revelation?

“It’s so hard for us to come to terms with death and tragedy. In our culture, especially, we treat death like it’s some kind of rare thing that almost never happens. Oh, so-and-so died at the young age of ninety-one, or did you hear that so-and-so lost her baby? And everyone who hears the news looks shocked and appalled as if no one is supposed to ever die. You say somebody died? That’s unheard of!

“The reality is, a hundred percent of us are going to die. Ten out of ten. Listen. Everyone who is born of woman dies. Even our Savior died on the cross that day on Golgotha. He died, church. I’m not talking about what happened a few days later. Now, keep up. I am talking about his human body bleeding and dying on the cross. Church, consider that for a moment.”

Pastor Brown set his Bible down and looked out into the congregation. In a low voice, he continued.

“When God created the world, He created perfection and harmony. It was Adam’s job to tend the garden with the woman—I said the woman, that’s right—the woman who had not yet been named Eve. At this point there’s no Eve. She actually received that name Eve, which means life, after they had been kicked out of the garden. At this point, they are still in the garden. So, when the serpent tempted the woman, the Bible tells us Adam was ‘there with her.’ You hear that? There with her.

“A lot of people—mostly men, I’ll admit it—a lot of folks want to pretend Adam was off somewhere working and doing what he should have been doing. But scripture is clear. Adam was right there next to the woman and he was not protecting her from the serpent. And when the woman gave in to temptation, Adam went into it with her and did not step up to protect her and protect the creation God had charged him to husband and steward. The result was the fall and the destruction of that once perfect world. The fall is our inheritance, and this fallen world now groans under the weight of sin to this very day.”

Valerie had heard the story of creation since a very young age. She didn’t really know where Pastor Brown was going with this.

“We already know this. God didn’t create that sin. God didn’t force us into it. God didn’t create that darkness. In the beginning, God said ‘Let there be light’ and there was light, church. This darkness was not God. This was sin. Sin is filthy. Sin is darkness. But, oh, church, sin is seductive.

“Sin brings about the type of coveting and hate that creates groups of young people who war with other groups of young people. Throw in drugs. Toss in fornication and other vices. Rationalize it all with a secular worldview that makes each one his or her own god. Layer on some poverty, deep poverty that spans generations. The kind of generational poverty that winks at theft and deceit and a little bit of violence here and there ‘cause you gotta do what you gotta do to survive when you’re that poor. Right? Add racial tension. Add some grandstanding politician claiming to make this better when all they really want to do is alchemy. They just want to turn blood into gold; turn a profit off the misfortune of others. What does all that give you when you mix it all together?”

Pastor Brown bowed his head for a heartbeat then looked up and proclaimed, “You get a hot mix of explosives stored in a room full of sparks. Someone lit a spark that day twenty-seven years ago, and four people died just to end the lives of two with as much fanfare as possible. It leaves us all shaking our heads, sad and confused.

“But that was not God, church. God is not the author of confusion. That was darkness and sin. The Bible tells us that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. We are the followers of God, and He created this world. We Christ-followers, we here in this church today, we are the ones who run counter to this world of sin and darkness. We aren’t the norm. We’re swimming against that dark tide.

“Satan is a roaming lion seeking whom he can devour, and there are masses and masses whom he has consumed since the very day the woman ate of the fruit and Adam stood there with her just watching it happen.

“We can try to stop the darkness, but Christ Himself tells us that there will always be war and rumors of war. He said, ‘in this world you will have trouble. But, take heart, I have overcome the world.’

“We are going to have trouble. It’s unavoidable. But it’s what we do with it, how we react, how we process it that determines if the darkness is going to suck us in and devour us, or if we’re going to continue to be followers of the light.”

Valerie found herself wrapped up in every word he said. She held her breath, waiting to see what would come next. Her heart pounded as if she’d run a mile, and she felt sweat on her temples. Around her, people murmured in agreement with the things he said. Occasionally, someone clapped one or two loud claps, or shouted, “Amen!”, or “Uh, huh!” It took all her self-control to sit still and not lean forward, trying to get as close to his words as possible.

Danny continued. “The Bible is wrought with strife and death, pain and despair. Humans on this fallen earth are not immune to the darkness. Followers of God, Christians, still suffer, still grieve, still hurt. And we still die in violent ways, in ways that seem unfair, in ways that leave the living grieving and wounded and deeply hurt. It is part of the human experience.

“But church, none of it is for naught. Romans tells us that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. All things. Not just good things. He can take all your experiences and turn them to good if you embrace the love He has for you. If you let Him love you the way only He can.”

Valerie’s forehead tightened in a frown. She did not seek this answer! Bad things happened and nothing could explain them because some man who supposedly lived thousands of years ago didn’t protect his wife from a talking snake? That didn’t resonate with her.

Even as she thought the words, she felt an ache in her heart. She clenched her fists, refusing to give in to the well of emotion that surfaced. She told herself that she only reacted to the day, the memories, the pictures, and it had nothing to do with the preacher Danny’s words.

He concluded his sermon. “Today, we’re dedicating a building to these two who loved God with all their hearts and served Him with everything they had. Their deaths left our church hollow for a long time, orphaned a little girl who was just a few years older than my infant daughter, and launched a bachelor brother into unplanned parenthood.

“Dr. Flynn went on a mission to heal and the very sinners he wanted to help cut him down. But he knew the Great Physician, church. Nurse Flynn went on a mission to comfort and nurture and nurse those who were in pain. She left this world clutching her husband’s fingers. But she left this world and went on to glory, church. It is well with their souls. How’s your soul doing today? Is it well? Is it hurting? Is it broken? I know a mighty healer who can make you whole. He made the lame to walk again. He made the blind to see. He loosened the tongues of the mute. He cleansed the disease from the lepers. He can heal you. He can make it well with your soul. You just have to let Him.”

Music started somewhere behind him. In the shadows, Valerie could see Madison standing still, microphone in hand, head bowed, no baby in sight. When she started singing, she sang softly. “When peace like a river, attendeth my way….”

People around Valerie sang along with her, softly like her, letting her set the tone. Danny spoke above the music, finishing up his sermon, walking up and down the stage as he addressed different sections of the congregation. That lasted about ten minutes longer, as people sang, went forward to pray, and Danny occasionally spoke.

Finally, the service ended. Valerie didn’t realize how tense she’d gotten until her neck muscles started to relax. Danny announced lunch in the new building. She picked up her purse, anticipating following the Dixons to where she needed to go. Buddy appeared at her arm. “We have a table set up as a head table at the lunch,” he explained.

Inside, she recoiled at the thought. But, outside, she smiled and said, “Great. Lead the way.”

Soon she had a plate of potluck sampling and she sat between Madison and Buddy. Danny joined them late, carrying baby Miriam. “Lila said she ate all of the banana you left her in the nursery.”

“Good,” Madison said, smiling as she took her, “maybe she’ll let me eat in peace.”

Valerie smiled at the little chubby face with the dark chocolate eyes. “How old is she?”

“Six months tomorrow. Hard to believe.”

Miriam reached for Valerie, lurching toward her and almost launching herself out of her mother’s arms. Madison laughed and said, “She loves darker skin. I swear if anyone darker than me is around, she won’t even look at me. My mother-in-law has spoiled her.”

Valerie took her, but didn’t quite know how to hold her. She wiggled around and clutched at Valerie’s collar. After a few clumsy moments, Valerie felt confident as the baby settled against her shoulder and fingered the lace collar of her shirt. “She’s so sweet.” She put her nose against the bald little head and breathed in the smell of baby. “How do you get anything done with her around to distract you?”

“Easy. I just don’t get it done.” Madison laughed. “Actually, that was only true for a couple months. We’ve got a rhythm now, don’t we Miriam?”

Brad approached the table carrying a plastic cup of tea. “You’re a natural,” he said with an enigmatic smile.

Valerie felt her heart rate speed up as she stared at the light in his gray eyes. “I’ve never held a baby before.”

“See? Natural.” He looked at his watch. “Ken and Jon wanted to go fishing today on Lake Oconee. Care to join us?”

Despite her plans otherwise, she was tempted. “I wish I could. Sincerely. But I’ve not been home much this weekend and I have a full week. I need to go home and work some this afternoon.”

He nodded and looked at Buddy. “How are you? That was rather an emotional service.”

Buddy cleared his throat and Valerie glanced over at him, surprised to see the shimmer of tears in his eyes. How had she not asked him? He must have been wrecked by that sermon and the music and the pictures! Suddenly, she felt very sorry and very selfish for going into her own head the way she had. “I thought it was beautiful. I know Cecil would have been pleased. Alison would have, too.”

Valerie reached for his hand. “I’m glad they would have been pleased. And I’m especially glad you liked the service.” She turned and handed the baby back to Madison, then turned her body to face her uncle. “You are so important to me. I don’t think I express it enough.”

“I don’t doubt it, child.” He patted her hand. “You being here was just the icing on the cake. Thank you.”

She stood, hoping to walk out with Brad. “I’m going to go.” She bent and kissed Buddy’s cheek. “Have a good afternoon.”

After telling Danny and Madison goodbye, she tossed her paper plate in the garbage, then grabbed her purse and walked out with Brad and his brothers. The ache in her heart continued and she knew she needed to get alone and give in to a good, long cry. Ken and Jon separated from them in the parking lot, but Brad continued to walk next to her until she reached her car.

“You okay?” He asked, his eyes searching her face.

“It was very emotional, as it was meant to be. I found myself caught up in it.” She cleared her throat and looked up at him. She fought the temptation to step forward and put her head on his chest. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”