Courageous (14 page)

This was Derrick’s family now. Why should he even show up at school? His gramma had it all wrong. Why should he want
out
of his life here now that he had such a great opportunity to be
in
?

Images flashed through Derrick’s mind as he slept, feeding his dreams. Flashes of light, tumultuous sounds, and grotesque body shapes rolled past.

He trembled uncontrollably, trying in vain to stop. His mind replayed those Crips who’d fallen, one boy in particular who had looked about fourteen. Derrick hoped he wasn’t dead. He knew as Gangster Nation he was supposed to hope he was. But weren’t they just other kids like Derrick? Had Derrick grown up in their neighborhood, wouldn’t he be a Rollin’ Crip too?

Derrick Freeman felt a lump in his throat. He lay there feeling proud, exhilarated, ashamed, and terrified.

Chapter Fifteen

Emily Mitchell, wearing a white dress, ran toward her father. She looked up at him and extended her arms. Adam lifted her up into a warm embrace. She hugged him tightly, then let go and beamed. Adam lowered her to the floor, and she began spinning and dancing.

Suddenly the little girl disappeared, and Adam found himself looking at Emily, age twenty-two, wearing a wedding dress. Her bridesmaids surrounded her, arranging her dress, her hair, her veil.

Adam wore a tuxedo. Emily looked up, smiled, and reached out her hand. He stepped forward to take it, but his hand passed through her as if she weren’t there.

Adam’s eyes popped open. It was the black of night. His T-shirt was drenched in sweat. Tears streamed down his face. He sat up in bed, then swung his feet to the side, trying to silence his sobs.

“Adam?”

“We’ll never get to see her graduate. I’ll never get to walk her down the aisle. How am I supposed to let her go?”

Victoria sat up and rubbed his back.

“I should have danced with her. Why didn’t I dance with her?”

He went to the medicine cabinet and took a couple sleeping pills.

Unable to bear more sadness, his heart turned to anger. For the next hour he lay in the darkness, imagining scenarios in which he confronted his daughter’s killer. Face-to-face, he would invite the drunk to take one swing at him; then he would beat him into the ground and make him pay for what he’d done.

Of course, how would it help Victoria and Dylan if he went to prison? Adam believed he would never actually hurt the man. But apart from the misery it would bring his family, right now he couldn’t think of a compelling reason not to.

He felt the sleeping pills trying to take effect, but his eyes resisted, remaining wide open.

Adam walked alone through Riverside Cemetery. Victoria wouldn’t come. She couldn’t bear to think of Emily in the cold, dark ground.

A hard wind the night before had strewn new leaves, half-opened blossoms, and small twigs across the lawn. The huge moss-covered oaks, with their long, reaching arms, had governed these grounds for centuries.

He walked past the hundred or so numbered graves, unidentified. Caskets had been washed out, separated from their tombstones, in the Albany flood of 1994.

What would it be like to not know where your loved one was buried?
Yet was it really any better to think of Emily in the grave that bore her name?

Adam walked to the graveyard’s edge.

Some areas were ordered and symmetrical, like a military cemetery. But this particular section seemed to have no rhyme or reason, with tombstones as varied, random, and tilted as life itself.

Adam noted the loveliness of the graveside flowers. Stooping over a purple chrysanthemum, he saw a droplet of water reflect the last gleam of sunlight, turning it into a miniature rainbow.

How could death and life exist in such close proximity? Why did such a living, vibrant world languish under the sentence of death?
It’s all wrong. This is not the way the world is supposed to be.

Adam pondered that if the gospel he’d long believed was true, if the Bible wasn’t lying, if Jesus was right, then God had not made the world like this. In the beginning, He had made a perfect world.

Adam thought about the novels he’d read, the movies he’d watched. Beginnings were often positive, endings triumphant, but in the middle of the greatest stories came death and loss and despair, followed by redemption. Was he living in the middle of the story? If so, he longed for the ending.

God, You don’t know what it’s like to have Your child die.

Ten seconds later the truth dawned on him. The center of the faith he professed to believe was that God’s Son had indeed died. And that He had chosen to do so.

Then if You know how much it hurts, why did You take Emily away?

Adam walked to Emily’s section of the graveyard. He looked down at a small marker along the way.

Eleanor Marie Davidson

Born April 3, 1873, died June 12, 1876

Like Enoch, taken before his time, our daughter is now in the Redeemer’s hands.

Jesus said unto her, “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.”

Adam wondered what his own tombstone would say. Victoria would be kind. But what if she were honest? Would she write, “Adam Mitchell, he was a decent cop but not much of a husband”? What if Dylan were forced to write something? “Adam Mitchell, my father who loved his daughter and his job more than he loved me”?

Finally Adam arrived at Emily’s grave. He had come intending to visit her. But as he stood, he became profoundly aware that Emily wasn’t here. It was a memorial
to
her, not a resting place
for
her. If his faith were false, she had ceased to exist. If it were true, she’d gone to live in another place. Either way, she was not here.

He had never felt it more important to believe that the Christian faith was true. But other than attending church, something he could do in his sleep and sometimes had, he’d invested little time and energy to cultivate the faith he now tried to draw strength from. He’d always been surrounded by the Christian faith but never immersed in it, never filled with it.

Perhaps that was why he felt unable to find more comfort in it now.

Adam often cleaned his gun in the bedroom, away from family. Today, as he ran a cloth over it, he thought about how much better off Victoria and Dylan would be without him. How much better off
he
would be without him. He could make it look like an accident.

“He was cleaning his gun, and it went off.”

Do it now,
a voice seemed to say.
The pain will be gone.

He decided to load the gun with a round. Just one.

In his mind’s eye, he saw himself raise it to his head. He seemed to actually feel the muzzle against his right temple.

“Adam! What are you doing?”

Startled, he looked up at Victoria. He hadn’t actually pointed the Glock at himself, but somehow she sensed his thoughts.

“Just cleaning my gun.”

“Are you all right?”

“No.”

Victoria didn’t leave the room until she watched him put away the gun, packing it high in the closet.

That voice in his head troubled him. He’d never had such thoughts before. But then, his daughter had never died before.

He thought about his old partner Jeff with more empathy now.

Adam wandered into the living room, tried the TV, found nothing, then aimlessly flipped through hunting magazines. Maggie whined and scratched on the door.

“Could somebody shut that dog up?” he said, louder than intended.

Victoria called, “I’ve tried.”

Maggie was inconsolable. She’d hardly eaten anything. Now she whined incessantly. Sometimes she’d let out a mournful howl, as she did that very moment.

Adam strode heavily to the back door and opened it. “Shut up!”

Maggie squealed as if in pain.

Adam saw in her eyes what he felt in his heart:
Where is Emily?
The poor creature didn’t understand.

Welcome to the club.

Adam sat on the back porch steps. Immediately Maggie buried her face in his shoulder.

“No, get down, Maggie! Get down.”

She backed away, cringing.

“Sorry, Maggie. It’s okay.” This time he let her come. She pressed her nose into his ear and licked the side of his face.

Soon Adam was lost in reflection, Maggie a safe conduit of his thoughts. Finally he got up to go inside.

He turned and watched Maggie’s eyes as he closed the door. Silence lingered for only a moment before the dog let out a small whimper. Adam looked around; not seeing Victoria, he opened the door. Maggie dashed in before he could change his mind. She ran down the hallway to Emily’s room and turned quickly into it, bumping off the doorjamb like a billiard ball.

Victoria heard the commotion and strode quickly into the hallway. “Maggie . . . outside!”

“No, it’s all right,” Adam said. By the time he arrived, Maggie lay on Emily’s bed, her head on the bedspread covering the pillow. Adam sat down by Emily’s bed, as he’d often done since the accident. Maggie settled in close to him. The first time she licked his face, he fought it. Then he tolerated it. Then he enjoyed it.

Her rhythmic breathing and occasional contented sigh soothed him. She looked at him with soulful eyes. It occurred to Adam that she didn’t just want him to console her. She wanted to console him.

Victoria came to the door and saw Adam with Maggie’s head resting on top of his, both of them looking more at peace than Victoria could remember in this hellish string of days.

“It’s okay, Maggie,” Victoria heard Adam say. “It’s okay, little girl.”

Chapter Sixteen

“Everybody knows this isn’t a date! All we’re doin’ is sittin’ in the school parking lot, listenin’ to music on this fine stereo, eatin’ Taco Bell. I drove to get it; you didn’t even leave the school! All you did is walk to the parking lot. If that’s a date, then I’m LeBron James!”

Jade laughed. Derrick was in a better mood today, not so preoccupied and stressed out. She pushed away her guilty feelings.
What’s wrong with listening to music in broad daylight on a beautiful spring day?

Derrick stared at her, wanting a response.

“I just want to be able to tell my parents I’m not dating. I’m glad you’re not mad about that.”

“I’m not mad. I’m just sayin’, you respect your parents’ right to live their lives, they oughta respect your right to live yours.”

Jade finished her chicken chalupa and looked at her watch.

“We got twenty minutes,” Derrick said. “What you wanna do?”

“We can study for the economics test.”

“I don’t care about tests.”

“But you’re the one who beat me on that first econ test! Then you got a C on your last test, and you didn’t even turn in your paper.”

“That was then. This is now. I’m into some new things now, important things.”

“What things?”

“We can talk about that later. Right now, let’s mellow, huh?”

He asked her questions about Atlanta, why she’d moved, who her friends were there. She vented about having to leave them behind. It didn’t seem fair for her parents to drag her away. Derrick asked about Atlanta gangs, which she knew little about. She wondered why he asked.

As they talked, Derrick reached over and held her hand. She seemed tentative at first but adjusted. He squeezed and she squeezed back. Nice. He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek.

“Derrick!” she said, but she could have turned away. And she wasn’t mad.

“Now that wasn’t so bad, was it?”

She glanced down. “I guess not.”

“You
guess
not? Come on, give this guy a little respect, huh?”

Jade looked at him. “No, it wasn’t bad.” She opened her door.

He opened his, and they headed to their classes.

As they walked, he put his arm around her briefly. When they came to the hallway where they had to part, she waved good-bye. He glanced over his shoulder, and she was still looking at him.