Angels Walking (37 page)

“The doctor had warned him. He’s telling Tyler now.”
His voice was serious again. “Pray for him. He could use it.”

“I will. And I’ll be watching the World Series. You’re going to win it all, Marcus. I believe that.”

“I hope so. An LA car dealer’s going to build the kids a new gym if we win.”

Cheryl smiled. “Proud of you, Marcus. Really.”

The call ended and for a long time Cheryl stared out the window trying to come to terms with this change of events. Out back Chuck and the granddaughters were working on a vegetable garden they planted—in memory of their great-grandmother.

Didn’t I hear You right, God?
Cheryl sighed, suddenly more tired than before.
I could picture him in uniform, Lord. I could see him pitching again.
She leaned into the cool glass.
I trust You, Father. I do. But could You be with Tyler Ames right now? When he’s getting the worst news of his life? Give him a reason to believe in You. Please.

Precious daughter . . . I work all things to the good of those who love Me.

The answer whispered across Cheryl’s soul, and chills ran down her arms. It was a verse from Romans she’d read that morning. Now it was as if God had spoken the words straight to her soul. He worked all things to the good for those who loved Him.

So what about Tyler Ames?

Cheryl imagined how the young man might be feeling at this moment, knowing that his dreams of pitching were over. Forever. She pictured him lying in a bed, his arm bandaged, the pain of the surgery just setting in.
Where’s the rest of Tyler’s miracle, Father? What happened?

She waited, hoping for some sort of response, some spotlight of understanding so the verse from Romans would make sense in Tyler’s situation. But none came. Instead, gradually, an image began to take shape in her mind. Tyler hadn’t been at the hospital alone. He’d been there with his parents. The parents he hadn’t talked to in years.

Nearly every conversation between her mother and Tyler was about family and staying close, forgiving one another. Tyler had told her once that the talks made him miss his mom and dad, made him see the way he was at fault for the break in their relationship. He would’ve done things differently if he had it to do over again. Cheryl’s mother had taught Tyler that.

Now that’s exactly what had happened. The course of events was uncanny, really. Tyler busts his shoulder and winds up homeless. He slips into a church and some stranger points him to Merrill Place, the retirement center where Cheryl’s mother lived. At the exact time when Cheryl and Chuck were praying for healing and peace for the woman. The bedside talks, the childhood connection with Marcus, the trip to LA.

Every single one of those events had to happen for Tyler and his parents to be reunited. For a reconciliation to happen.

The light in Cheryl’s soul grew brighter, the dawning more complete. Tyler wasn’t going to play baseball again, but so what? They had asked God for a miracle and they had gotten one. When the reality of his situation fully hit him, he wouldn’t be alone.

His parents would be there.

Which was maybe the greatest miracle of all.

SAMI TOOK THE
worn tray from Mary Catherine and added a scoop of salad and a couple of cookies to the plate. She passed it to the person on her left and took another one from Mary Catherine. The LA Freedom Mission was where Sami spent a great deal of her social time lately. Volunteers staffed the place, serving dinner to the city’s homeless every day of the week.

Mary Catherine had heard that the mission was going to be short a few volunteers for the next two weeks. The two of them didn’t hesitate. A week into the work and they knew most of the regulars on a first-name basis.

“Don’t like the cookies. I’m a diabetic, remember?” A grizzled-looking man with a ragged plaid shirt and gray dreadlocks waved a gnarled finger at Sami.

“Gotcha, JT.” Sami winked at him. “Double salad for the diabetics. Sound good?”

“Thatta girl.” He returned the wink, took the tray from the end of the line, and headed for the cafeteria.

Sami didn’t recognize the next few people. She swapped a smile with Mary Catherine and thought about how much her life had changed. Arnie hadn’t called once—though her grandparents still shared dinner with him every week or so.

“He’s a good man, Samantha,” her grandfather had told her when he called yesterday. “You’re walking out on a great opportunity.”

Love could never be an opportunity. The very idea made Sami slightly nauseous. She loved her grandparents; she always would. They had cared for her and raised her and they deserved her respect. But she could never agree with their view of life. The way good things seemed earned and opportunities were meant to be exploited.

Sami would never go back to that thinking again. She had her Bible now. That was what she relied on. She had pulled it out of the box in her closet and dusted it off. Every night she became a little more familiar with Jesus. The way He lived and loved. The way He forgave and served people.

His grace.

“Connie, hello! No salad, right?” Sami flashed a smile at the woman in her late sixties, next in line. “Extra cookies?”

“You remembered!” The woman gave Sami a thumbs-up and limped to the end of the counter for her tray.

Sami watched her go. This was love. Sami wasn’t used to it or good at it, but she was trying and she liked how it felt. This weekend a few of the volunteers were going to paint a home for some foster kids.

It was after nine by the time she and Mary Catherine got back to their apartment. Her roommate was seeing a guy now, someone she met at church. He was the chief fundraiser for a ministry that worked to rescue kids from sex trafficking. Oh, and he loved to laugh. They’d been going to church together for the past three weeks.

“Nothing like talking about a sermon to see if the guy you’re starting to like is real.”

Real.
Sami loved that. It was Mary Catherine’s way of describing people who lived their faith. Broken, regular people who had discovered grace and wanted to spend the rest of their lives acting it out. Real people. Living in hope that other people would become real, too.

They were both tired, so they turned in early. Something Sami rarely did anymore. Alone in her room she spotted her laptop on a chair in the corner. Her room was a mess and she
hadn’t been online in a week. Not since the night after Mary Catherine took her boogie-boarding. There was no time for Facebook now. Sami was fast falling in love with life. It didn’t matter if her clothes piled up or if she didn’t know the latest Fox News stories. Twitter was all but forgotten.

Sami was living.

And she loved every minute.

While she brushed her teeth, she thought about Mary Catherine and her views on love. “God’s all for romance,” her friend had said the other night. “I’m the most hopeless romantic there is.” She had twirled her coat in front of her, as if it belonged to the man of her dreams. “Romance is easy. It’s the other part that can be a struggle.” She let go of the coat. “Which is why I’ll probably never get married.” She had dropped to the floor, pensive.

Mary Catherine rarely took herself too seriously, but she was serious about only dating guys who understood love. A guy who was real about his faith. Someone who would roll up his sleeves and serve dinner at a homeless mission or let his heart get lost in a Chris Tomlin praise song. Romantic love would come only after she and her guy—whoever he turned out to be—had first experienced that kind of love.

God’s kind.

The divorce of Mary Catherine’s parents had shaped her, even changed her. She would never settle for the easy existence her mom and dad had shared before their split. Not that Mary Catherine talked about it much. But sometimes it seemed everything she did, her views on faith and her thoughts about life and love and God, all came from watching her own parents fail at it.

Sami looked a moment longer at her face in the bathroom mirror. God had brought Mary Catherine into her life, no question. She ran her hand over the smooth leather Bible on her bed stand. God was Sami’s friend now, close enough to talk to, always available. He was the only one who knew her deepest thoughts.

How much she still thought about Tyler Ames.

The trip to Pensacola had been a disappointment, but that didn’t change the past. And it didn’t change the way he’d looked at her that morning in the park with the gulf a few feet away.

A sigh escaped her. The Tyler she had known had been real—or at least on his way to becoming real. But a game had gotten in the way. Winning and losing and the ocean of pressure that came with it. More than anyone could take.

She sat on the edge of her bed and again her laptop caught her attention. Maybe she should check her Facebook. She was a different person now, and she didn’t need social media to validate her life. But it could be fun to see what her friends thought about her body-surfing pictures. She hurried across the room, grabbed the computer, and brought it back to the edge of her bed.

It took a few minutes to power up, but then she found her way to Facebook. There were two private messages and as she stared at the notices, her heart skipped a beat. What was this? Who would message her? She opened them and felt a rush of shock. One of them was from Arnie Bell.

The other was from Tyler.

She stared at the names long enough to believe what she was seeing.
What in the world, Lord?
She took a slow breath and opened Arnie’s first. It was brief.

Samantha,

I have a favor to ask. You may have thought I was joking when I said I planned to be the president of the United States one day. But I wasn’t. If that happens—when it happens—I plan to say our relationship ended by mutual agreement. It wouldn’t be good for either of us if people think you broke up with me. The press would look for a reason. Neither of us needs that.

Please let me know if this is agreeable—if so, let’s go with that story.

Thanks. Miss you.

Arnie

Her cheeks couldn’t have felt hotter if Arnie had reached through the screen and slapped her. A single laugh escaped from the outraged hallways of her heart.
Really, Arnie? Really?
Of all the nerve. How dare he speak to her like that—even in a private Facebook message. And wasn’t he worried that someone would find the private message years down the road? The whole matter was ridiculous. All Arnie ever cared about was—

The cover of her Bible caught her eye. Last night she’d read about how Jesus wanted people to love their enemies. To pray for those who persecuted them. Sami felt the fight leave her.
Fine, God. I’d like to pray for Arnie Bell. Help him hear Your voice—especially if he’s headed into politics. I pray that one day he’ll be real. Thank You, Lord.

She wanted to delete his message. Instead she did the most loving thing she could do for Arnie. She hit the reply button and typed out her response.

That’s fine with me, Arnie. The breakup was mutual. That’ll be the story. Take care of yourself. I’m praying for you.

Sami

She was about to fix her name. He had never heard her call herself that, and certainly he had never imagined her as anything but Samantha. She felt a smile lift her lips. No. She would leave her name just as it was. She couldn’t pray for Arnie to be real unless she was willing to be real, too.

She hit the send button and then opened Tyler’s letter.

It was much longer. Sami’s heart quickened as she began to read. He talked about how he wasn’t only a janitor at Merrill Place. He was also a friend to a woman named Virginia Hutcheson. Sami read the whole thing and then she read it again.

In the message, Tyler talked about God—something that had never been a part of their relationship back in the day. God and grace and something more. How he was sorry. He hadn’t wanted to be mean when she visited him in Pensacola, but she was with someone else and he didn’t want to get hurt. Basically that’s what the message said. She read the last part once more, though this time the letters were hard to read through her tears.

The truth is, I miss you. More than you could ever know. Especially on nights like this.

Sami let that sink in. Tyler Ames missed her. Especially at night. She smiled even as two tears trickled down her cheeks. Hadn’t she known that all along? Of course he missed her. Who else knew him the way she had known him—that short
time in his life when baseball wasn’t his entire existence? She kept reading, drinking in the words like a person desperate for water.

Forgive me for keeping my heart locked up. Virginia wouldn’t want me to live like that. Now that she’s gone, I don’t want to live like that either. That’s it really. I didn’t want you to think I was only a janitor at Merrill Place, when you see . . . I understand now, God doesn’t define me by my job. Whatever work He gives me. Forgive me, Sami. Keep riding the waves.