Devoted (11 page)

And I can't breathe.

I stare at my hands, like they belong to someone else. Someone I don't know but who lately seems intent on making herself known to me, whether I like it or not. They move over the keyboard and open up the email program for my dad's work—the only email any of us are allowed to use.

FROM:
Walker Family Landscape and Tree Trimming

TO:
[email protected]

Lauren,

You probably don't remember me. But I remember you from Calvary Christian. I found your blog, and I want you to know that I'm really sorry about what your dad did to you. And you're not dead to me. You never were.

“He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3

Sincerely,
Rachel Walker

I hit Send. I look up and out the family room windows and imagine the message traveling through the ether and across the night sky, slipping around the twinkling stars on its way to its destination. I picture it floating through darkness until it finds Lauren Sullivan, who opens it and reads what I've written.

 

9

The next morning
when I head downstairs to start breakfast, I see my dad on the computer.

Dad hardly ever gets on the computer. He doesn't like it, and he only agreed to get one when it became clear that running a family business profitable enough to feed a family as big as ours depended on one.

The sight of him hunching over, his beefy fingers gigantic against the keyboard, makes my body go cold. Even though I cleared the history and erased my sent message to Lauren, my dad could be checking the company email. He lets me do it most of the time, but he could be checking it. He could be.

What have I done?

“Dad?”

He turns to look at me, and I catch a glimpse of what's on the screen.

It's his list of appointments for the week. Nothing else.

“Rachel, I'm looking for the address of that new client? The one over in Dove Lake? I've misplaced the printout of the schedule you gave me last night.”

I dart over to the computer, anxious to take control of the keyboard. Still in the chair, my father slides to the side, and I tap away, searching for the information he needs. My heart is still racing, my cheeks still pink. Forcing myself to focus, I print out what my father needs and hand it to him.

“Good morning.”

I'm still so on edge I jump at the voice and turn to see my mother walking down the hallway from her bedroom. For the first time in almost a month she has her hair styled carefully and pulled up away from her face. Her skin is still pale, but there's a slight spark in her eyes that's been missing these past few weeks.

“Mom!” I manage. “You're feeling better?”

“A little, yes,” my mother answers, nodding. “God's wonderful gift of a new baby for this family has made my spirit joyful. He understands the pain of my loss, and he's healed us with this child. God is so good.”

“Yes, he certainly is,” agrees Dad, a smile stretching across his face.

“Yes, of course,” I say, nodding, almost afraid to step away from the computer as if an email from Lauren might pop up the moment I do. Only when Dad gets up from the chair and follows Mom into the kitchen do I finally manage to fill my lungs with air.
Relax, Rachel. You didn't get caught.
I head into the kitchen to start breakfast, serving my mom a cup of coffee first.

Finally, after the frenzy of the morning is over and Dad and my brothers are gone, we settle into the family room for schoolwork, and Mom joins us on the couch so she can watch over the little ones.

“I need to check something on the computer,” I tell Ruth and the twins after an hour or so. “For Dad.” I say it loudly, just in case Mom is listening, too.

“Okay,” says Ruth, barely looking up from her workbook.

There are a few messages from some of Dad's clients and a company that sells us equipment, but nothing from butterflygirl. I frown and then catch myself, correcting my face into a neutral expression that hides what I'm really feeling.

I don't just want Lauren to write back because I want to catch the email before someone else sees it. I want her to write back so I can read what she has to say to me. But what if she doesn't write back? What if she doesn't remember me? Why would she want anything to do with me after what her father did and after the way we made her feel?

All afternoon I check for a response as often as I can, hopefully without drawing suspicion, but there's nothing from Lauren.

“Rachel, what are you doing?” Ruth says from the kitchen table as I quickly click refresh on the computer for the fifth time that day. “Are you sure everything's all right?”

“Yes. I'm waiting on an important email for this payroll software update.” Again I say it loudly for Mom's benefit. Neither one has any idea what I mean, but Ruth nods, and I force myself not to check the email again for another hour.

It's getting so easy to lie to Ruth. So easy to lie and so easy to keep breaking rules I never thought I'd break. That night, long after everyone is asleep, I creep downstairs, pausing every few steps to listen for any sounds that others are awake. When I turn on the computer and bring up the email program, I see a new message. It's in bold text, marked as unread.

It's from butterflygirl.

I reach my fingers to the screen and touch it, like I can read it through osmosis. Then I quickly click it open.

Rachel,

Hi. Thanks for your email. As I type this I keep picturing all these situations where you're not reading these words and someone else is and then you get into trouble. I really don't want that, so I suggest if you want to email me again, you never email me from this address. Can you set up an email address that's just for you? Do you know how to do that? If you don't, let me know and I can help you. Also, I ask that you not tell my parents you've communicated with me. That's very important to me.

I didn't respond to your email right away because I was so stunned when I received it, to be totally honest. It's the first time anyone from Calvary has contacted me since I left. And, so … I started thinking about myself when I was back where you are … not that I don't do that a lot, of course, in this sort of abstract way. But now I was thinking of another girl—you—right where I was six years ago. And it kind of flipped me out. Since you've read my blog, I think you know what I mean.

So I wasn't sure I could write you back, but then I started thinking about all the things I wish I could have told myself back then. That I was a human being. A whole person with a brain and a body that are mine. Not anyone else's. Not my dad's and not Pastor Garrett's.

Why did God give me a body if he didn't want me to run, jump, laugh, dance, and swim in a yellow, two-piece swimsuit?

Why did God give me a brain if he didn't want me to use it to learn about anything I wanted to learn about?

Well, I'm blabbing on like I sometimes do, and I don't want to overwhelm you. Mostly, I want to say that I appreciate your words. I'm glad you remember me. I remember your family and I remember you as a little girl. You didn't talk much but you always seemed so kind. Sensitive. You were a girl with faraway eyes. That's a title to a song you don't know, but trust me, it's a great song.

This is enough for now. I'm doing really well, and thank you for thinking about me. If I never hear from you again, I want you to know I wish you well. But if I can help you somehow, let me know.

xoxo Lauren

I read her words over and over. I can't get enough of them. But soon, I'm hearing Pastor Garrett's voice as he debates her points. I'm hearing my own father's voice as he argues against her.

Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.

I delight to do thy will, O my God, yea, thy law is within my heart.

There are many devices in a man's heart, nevertheless the counsel of the Lord, that shall stand.

But then I realize that the voices in my head aren't mine. They don't belong to me. They belong to other people.

I read Lauren's post one more time and tip my chair back to look down the hall to make sure my parents' bedroom light is still off. Opening up a free email service, I create a new address for myself. It's mine. Just mine and no one else's. My toes curl up at the thought.

I click on the button that says compose message. As I type, it's almost as if I'm typing to myself as much as I am to Lauren. The click clack of my fingers on the keyboard sounds like a pleasant little song that belongs only to me. The words spilling out of me take a weight off my shoulders.

FROM:
[email protected]

TO:
[email protected]

Lauren,

I'm not sure what to say, but first of all, I want you to know that I won't say anything to your parents about you. I promise. And please don't say anything to anyone about me writing to you, okay? Of course you wouldn't, but I know you understand what could happen to me if I get caught.

The first question that comes to mind might make you laugh, I guess. But have you really gone swimming in a yellow bikini? Really?

I can't quite put my finger on why I'm writing to you. It's a risk, like I said. An enormous risk. But lately, I feel like something is building inside of me, and I can't stop it. I don't even know if I want to anymore.

After church last Sunday, my older sister Faith told us she is pregnant with her second baby. She's almost twenty, just a few years younger than you. You probably remember her, too. I'm the quiet one and she's the opposite.

For some reason after she told us, I got really anxious. I had to go into the bathroom to compose myself. I know everyone expects me to be next—to get married and have babies just like Faith. And I really love kids. I love my little sister Ruth, especially. Even though she's not that little anymore. But the thought of having babies of my own in just a few years—I know it's what I should want. But it just isn't.

And it's not only about having babies. It's about … everything. About wondering why I can't find the right words to pray to God. And trying to understand why I keep having all these questions inside of me that no one can answer. About wanting to learn and know things that everyone around me doesn't seem to think I have a need to know.

I feel like I'm failing here. Like I'm doing everything wrong even as I try to do everything right.

I feel like I can't breathe in this place anymore.

I'm not sure exactly what I'm doing writing you this email, but for some reason writing it makes me feel a lot better. I'm going to hit send before I chicken out.

Sincerely,
Rachel Walker

And just like I promised I would, I hit send before I can stop myself. Before any voices in my head tell me I'm making a mistake.

*   *   *

Tuesday morning I'm groggy from staying up too late. Mom comes out of her room again, and this time she even helps feed the little ones. I want to believe she's getting better, but I still wonder how real her recovery is if it's only secured by the idea that Faith is having a baby. I force myself through the motions of breakfast and school, but all I can think about is Lauren's email to me and what I've written back to her. I think about her dancing. And swimming.

My family went to Galveston once, years ago, for a family picnic. We found an isolated part of the beach and put down old quilts, and my brothers and sisters and I ran down to the shoreline and dipped our feet in the Gulf of Mexico. Then my older brothers waded in wearing T-shirts and old denim cutoffs down to their knees, but Faith and Ruth and I just huddled by the shore, waving to them from the edge of the water. There are some Christian-run websites that sell special modest swimsuits, but they're very expensive. Much too expensive for our family. So my brothers jumped in the surf, dunking themselves and one another while the rest of us laughed and cheered them on.

Even though my sisters and I could only get our feet wet, I remember wondering what the ocean floor felt like and what it would be like to be underwater. Maybe it's like time slowing down. Or stopping altogether.

“Rachel, you just finished my entire problem for me.”

I blink. Gabriel is wearing a small smirk on his face, and I realize as I've been letting my mind wander, I've also completed one of Gabriel's math problems instead of letting him finish it.

“Oh,” I say. “I'm sorry.”

“I'm not,” Gabriel mutters. “I don't like math anyway.”

I hand my younger brother his pencil and head toward the kitchen for lunch, pausing by the computer. I've already checked it twice this morning. After yesterday, I sense Ruth and Mom are even more aware of my checks. And with Mom feeling even better, it's just too risky to try and see if Lauren's emailed me back.

My mother's light touch on my shoulder interrupts my thoughts.

“Rachel, help me with lunch?”

“Sure, Mom,” I answer, my eyes glancing back at the computer once more before heading into the kitchen.

We bow our heads in prayer before eating our lunch of hot dogs, pretzels, and cut-up fruit. Instead of thanking God, my mind swims with thoughts of Lauren.

After lunch, I make an excuse to print out Dad's appointments for the next day. It's not something I usually do until later in the evening—and often when Dad is sitting next to me in the living room—but I can't help it. The urge to reread Lauren's words consumes me.

“This will only take a second,” I tell Mom, quickly clicking around to find Dad's files but opening up a second window to check my email.

“All right,” my mom answers from the couch where she's going through infant clothes for Faith's new baby. I think her gaze lingers on me for a moment before she goes back to folding a tiny newborn onesie into a neat square. But maybe I'm just imagining it.