Chapter 36
Thirty-Six
Maudra went to church on Wednesday evening.
I couldn’t make myself. I couldn’t face everyone.
I didn’t think they would attack at church, but I wasn’t completely sure they wouldn’t.
Maybe they would revert back to an Old Testament stoning.
Things had actually been better than I thought they would.
There had been a few hateful phone calls to Maudra’s house, telling me to leave town, name-calling, a couple of threats, but most people had left well enough alone.
Either the town had progressed more than I had given it credit for, or they were all saving up for one massive onslaught.
Jed stayed with me while Maudra went to church.
He held my hands and prayed for Donnie as he led one last youth group.
I couldn’t pray with him. It didn’t feel right to ask God for favors.
I kept asking Him to forgive me for how I had been with Iris the day before and help me not turn into my mother, but I didn’t feel anything.
The whole experience was making me question the reality of what I had believed over the past many years.
Maybe I was deceiving myself. Maybe I really didn’t have a relationship with God.
Maybe He wasn’t okay with me being gay. Maybe that’s why things happened in Denver, why they were happening here, to get me to wake up.
I hated thinking such thoughts. That would mean I would have to choose. Either God or Jed. I couldn’t leave Jed. I wouldn’t know how to survive without him, I wouldn’t want to. What if I needed to leave him to save him? What if letting him love me was condemning him to Hell?
Such thoughts didn’t seem to penetrate Jed as his prayer went from Donnie and the youth, to Pastor Bron and the challenges he faced, to Mandy and Donnie’s unborn baby, to my mother.
Most of the time, Jed’s prayers brought me peace.
At the moment, all they did was leave me feeling alienated and lonely.
Donnie called as soon as he got home from the youth group.
I could hear the sadness in his voice, and I hated my part in it.
He said a lot of the kids cried. Even some of the boys.
Darwin left in the middle of it; calling his parents in a fit of sobs outside the front doors.
In some aspects, I was glad things had happened like they did, at least from my standpoint.
It was bad enough the kids were losing Donnie.
If I had been there more than a week and they had begun to trust and care about me, it would have been doubly hard on them.
I didn’t sleep well that night, constantly waking up with bad dreams of my mother. I lay in bed, staring at Jed’s face, remembering the first night we met, our first kiss, the first time I’d seen his body, our wedding. Could I really leave all of that if God wanted me to?
Jed was still sleeping at six when the phone rang. I had been awake for hours. At first I thought it was Sister Heinz calling to make plans with Maudra. Another wave of sadness flowed over me as I realized she wouldn’t be calling.
My first thought when Maudra knocked on the door was that the phone call had been about Rose—she’d had another stoke or fallen down or died.
“That was Mandy, Brooke.” Maudra’s voice was a strained whisper. “It’s Darwin. He’s in the hospital. Better wake Jed. The Durkes ’n’ the Brons are already on their way there.”
Mandy hadn’t given Maudra any details; she had just said something had happened to Darwin and we needed to come soon.
It never occurred to me to be nervous or not go to the hospital. All that mattered was seeing Darwin. If I had stopped to think, I probably would have expected the greeting we received. As it was, Mr. Michaels once again caught me unprepared, both in terms of his good looks and his anger.
He happened to glance up as Jed and I stepped through the door.
The curtain was pulled, so I couldn’t see Darwin or the others crowded around his bed.
It took Mr. Michaels a moment to place my face.
I don’t think it registered until he noticed Maudra behind me.
His eyes widened and his lip curled back into a snarl.
“What the hell do you think you are doing here?” The viciousness in his voice was startling, and Jed and I both paused where we were. “Get the fuck out of this room. How dare you show your face! This is all your fault!” He started toward me, his fists clenched at his side.
A shocked sounding voice came from behind the curtain. “Craig, your language! Who are you talking to? You’re going to scare Darwin!”
Mr. Michaels paused but didn’t take his eyes off me.
I noticed the sand-colored curtain rustle as a pretty woman moved it out of her way.
Her brown eyes looked at me in confusion.
She glanced at Mr. Michaels and then back at me, this time certain of who I was.
“Mr. Morrison.” Her eyes weren’t angry or accusing, only sad. “Please come in.”
Mr. Michaels took another step toward me. “Carrie, I won’t have them in here! I won’t.”
“Brooke?” Darwin’s voice was weak as it drifted from behind the curtain.
“Get out of here!” Mr. Michaels’s face was so contorted in rage that he no longer looked handsome, barely human.
“Brooke!” Darwin sounded both excited and desperate as he called my name.
The pretty woman walked over to Mr. Michaels and laid her hand on his chest. She was dwarfed by her husband and looked like a lovely mouse attempting to quail the stampeding of an elephant.
“Craig! Get ahold of yourself.” She glanced over at Darwin.
“We’ll be right back, darling. All of us.
” She turned and walked toward Jed and me. “Please come in the hallway with us.”
We followed her halfway down the hall to a waiting room. I hated turning my back on Mr. Michaels as he stormed along behind us, but I managed not to look over my shoulder.
“You can call me Carrie.” She motioned for her husband to sit next to her. To my surprise, he did. She extended her hand to Jed. “And you are…?”
He took her hand. “I’m Jed, Brooke’s husband.”
“Nice to meet you both.”
“You too, Mrs. Michaels.” Jed managed to smile. I continued to stare at Mr. Michaels.
“Thank you so much for coming to see Darwin. I’m sure it will help. We found him this morning—”
“Carrie!” Mr. Michaels sounded more under control but was on the verge of slipping into a rage. “We are not discussing this with them. They are not welcome here. They are not going to see Darwin.”
It was Mrs. Michaels’s turn to raise her voice. However, hers didn’t shake with anger; it seeped with determination. “Craig! Enough! We’ve done it your way enough. For years. Now we’re doing it my way.” She held his gaze, her lips a thin hard line. “If you don’t like that, leave.”
I tried not to look at them. It felt wrong to be party to this conversation, but I couldn’t manage to tear my eyes off of them.
Mr. Michaels’s face twitched. For several seconds I thought he was going to hit her, or use her as a weapon to bash our brains in. After a few moments, he crossed his arms and sank back in his chair with a grunt. His eyes bored into me, seething.
Mrs. Michaels’s voice softened as she put her hand on the arm of his chair.
“It’s going to be okay, dear. We’re not sending him away from God.
We’re not keeping him from being a Christian.
We’re allowing him to be who he is. We’re allowing him to live.
” Tears formed in her eyes as she continued.
“Do we really want to go through this again? It’s not right to ask of Darwin. ”
She wiped her eyes and looked back at Jed and me. “Do you know why Darwin is here?”
I shook my head.
“This morning, around two or so, Craig went to check on Darwin. He’s been so upset ever since the last youth group; then when that horrible article came out and Donnie left the youth group, well, I think it was just too much for him.
He was inconsolable last night. He finally cried himself to sleep.
” She glanced at Mr. Michaels before returning to us.
“Thankfully, Craig just had a feeling and went to check on him in his room. He was still in bed, but he wasn’t under the covers.
When Craig got closer, he noticed a couple of empty aspirin bottles on the sheets and a note. Darwin had taken all of them.”
She paused for a moment to blow her nose.
She fluttered her hands as if to say, “moving on.” “I’ve known Darwin was gay for years, probably before he did.
Craig never could accept it. He kept trying to push him into sports and other activities that would help him have healthy interaction with other boys.
Darwin was always miserable.” Her tears fell more rapidly down her face.
“Then you showed up. Once he finally admitted what he was doing after that youth group, he looked so happy. I couldn’t believe he was actually telling us.
I didn’t think he’d ever really be strong enough to admit it.
Of course, we talked about God and how to overcome such temptations, and how to stay away from people who would lead him into the wrong lifestyle…
.” Her voice trailed off as she started crying harder.
Mr. Michaels’s eyes softened as his wife was overcome with her sorrow. He put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer.
She looked at me with such intensity, I almost flinched. “I want you in Darwin’s life. I want him to have a good Christian role model. One who is like him. One who can show him that God loves him, that he can still live a good life as a gay man!”
It was the last thing I was expecting her to say. I looked at her stupidly for several seconds. “What about the article?”
She waved her hand dismissively. “I worked in a residential treatment facility when I lived in Montana, before I married Craig. I know how that story goes. I’ve heard enough good about you from Pastor Bron and the Durkes to know what the truth is.”
I’m sure there are people who would say I just heard what I wanted to hear, but with those words, every doubt I had been having vanished. It wasn’t Mrs. Michaels who spoke the words. It was God. He knew what the truth was. So did I.
“Thank you, Mrs. Michaels.” I wiped tears from my own eyes. I felt Jed’s hand on my leg; it might have been there the entire time.
She looked at Mr. Michaels and narrowed her eyes. “Are you going to support me on this?”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Craig?”
He nodded, but couldn’t make himself look at Jed and me.
Darwin beamed when I went back into his room. He looked pale and weak, but the doctors had assured everyone he would be back to normal in no time. They were going to keep him a few days for observation, as was typical with patients who had attempted suicide.
“Don’t ever do that again, kid, no matter what’s going on.” I put my hand on one of the bed rails, and he reached out and grabbed it.
He looked at me adoringly. He glanced warily as his dad came in the room. When his mom smiled, he looked back at me. “Really?”
“Yeah, bud. It’s all going to be okay.” I felt like I was telling myself as much as I was telling Darwin.
“So, you’ll come back to youth group?” He looked behind me. “You and Donnie?”
Donnie came up and tousled his hair. “Nah, kid. There’ll be a new youth pastor, but we’ll still be at church, and you can see us whenever you want.”
Darwin’s face fell, but he still looked content. I marveled that such a small, waiflike boy could have such a superhero-type father. He appeared so fragile lying there in the bed, hooked up to IVs and monitors.
Pastor Bron and Mandy left after another half an hour.
Jed and Maudra went home a little before eight.
Jed still had to get ready for school. Sue, Chuck, Donnie, and I stayed all morning.
Sue and Chuck spent most of the time with Mr. and Mrs. Michaels, I’m sure talking about how heartbreaking it is to raise children and assuring them everything would be fine.
By the time we left, I realized I was happy. I had the answers I needed. I was feeling assured of God’s love. I was going to get to work with Darwin, if no one else, and life didn’t seem so purposeless at the moment.
As we reached the car, Sue stopped and caught Donnie before he could duck inside. Through tears, she wrapped her arms around her son and held him tightly.
He had stooped to allow her to get her arms around him. “Mom, goodness, what is it? You’re going to break my neck here.”
She let go as he stood but didn’t move away. “I’m so sorry.”
He cocked his head as he looked at her. “Mom? What do you have to be sorry about?”
“Ever since you told us about the baby, all I’ve done is worry and cry and pester you about making sure you’re right with God.”
His face softened, and his voice cracked as he spoke. “Mom, it’s okay. You’re my mom. You’re supposed to worry about that. I’m so sorry things happened like they did.”
She shook her head. “No! None of us are perfect, and I see God clearer in you than I do anyone in the world. I could never have asked for a more wonderful, loving son. If anyone should know you are okay with God, it should have been me.”
She reached up and dragged his neck down again in a fierce embrace. “I love you, Donnie.”
“I love you too, Mom.”
I looked over at Chuck, who was standing with the driver’s door open. He just gave me a wink.