Lead Me Home (22 page)

Shiloh took another deep breath.

“So I’m going to share this soon in church, and I wanted you to know so you can ask me whatever questions you need to, and so you’ll have time to prepare yourselves for whatever may happen after I tell everyone.”

“I’m not going to be able to show my face,” Omari said and hung his head.

“Yes, you will, son,” Randy told him. “If someone tries to make you feel bad or says something negative about your mother, you tell them to go home and sit down with their parents, and ask them to share details about the things from their youth that they’re most ashamed of. We’ve all got something. Just do that and see if that won’t shut them up.”

Shiloh wanted to hug Randy. As hard as he was taking all of this himself, he was standing with her. She looked at all four of her handsome young men, each of them miniature versions of Randy, with different haircuts, shades of brown, and heights.

“There’s more, boys, and it’s just as bad.”

Lem sat back and groaned. “Mom … really?”

She looked at him and her heart ached. This was going to tear him to pieces.

Shiloh dove right in, before she lost her courage, and before the boys could ask another question about her first transgression.

“That fellowship I mentioned, the one that allowed me to go to France? Well … I stole it.”

Lem sat forward again and frowned. He looked pained. Omari, Raphael, and David exchanged glances.

“Are you going to jail?” David asked.

Shiloh was grateful for the comic-relief question. “I guess the only good news of the day is, no—I’m not going to jail. But again, this is another case of me feeling like I committed murder.”

She released Randy’s hand and walked over to the sofa on the other side of the coffee table and sat next to Lem. She wanted to hug him, but he radiated anger and hurt. So she sat there, close, but not touching, and spoke directly to him, but loud enough for the others to hear.

“Lem, I had a college roommate at Birmingham-Southern named Leslie Hamilton, and she was a gifted flutist.”

Lem sat up and stared at her. “Hamilton? You’re kidding me.”

Shiloh shook her head.

The other boys frowned.

“Can you stop talking in ‘Lem language,’ Mom; we don’t get it,” Omari said.

Shiloh continued. “I had a roommate named Leslie Hamilton, who was from Birmingham, but lived in the dorm as part of her music scholarship. She was from a well-to-do family and respected
throughout campus because of her good looks, athleticism, and of course, her ability to play the flute. We were often competitors, with the two of us routinely flip-flopping between first and second chair in our classes,” Shiloh said. “It was often a toss-up between the two of us when community groups or organizations on campus wanted a solo musician to play for an event, and it got to the point where if I couldn’t make it, I’d recommend her, and vice versa.

“Well, when the flute fellowship opportunity came around and we found out there was only one spot going to a Birmingham-Southern student, the competition was on. It put a strain on our friendship as we sought to find the best song to impress the judges and practice nonstop so we’d each be ready for our audition. It was hard, because it meant we couldn’t practice in our room after hours, since we’d hear each other’s piece, and also how good each other was.

“One weekend, I went home to Atchity to practice the song I had selected, and I was feeling pretty confident about it. But that Sunday, when I returned to campus and stepped off the elevator onto my dormitory floor, I heard the sweetest sound flowing from our room. It was absolutely beautiful. Leslie had discovered a breathtaking melody that I’d never heard before, and she was playing it with heart-wrenching power. I was blown away. I sat there in the hallway and listened to her play it over and over, until she nailed it without flaws. I knew if I went into the room she’d stop practicing and put everything away, so I wouldn’t know. But at this point I did know, and I knew if she played that song with that level of skill and emotion, I could forget it; the fellowship was hers.”

The boys were riveted, even Lem. Shiloh got up and walked over to the piano in the corner of the family room and sat on the bench, with her back to Randy and her sons.

“I heard the phone in our room ring and while I couldn’t hear the entire conversation, I heard Leslie tell someone she would take a
break and come down for just a few minutes, so she could get back to practice. I trotted down the hall and hid in the bathroom until I felt like she was out of the hallway, then I went into our room, and there was her music, splayed on her bed. The title of the piece and its author were there in plain view.

“I thought about taking it and tearing it up, but realized how silly that would be; she’d just get another score, and she’d know I was the one who did it. But something came over me and I decided that I would perform that same piece, but do her one better. I’d figure out how to play it on both of my instruments—the flute and the recorder. I’d have to figure out how to smoothly transition from one to the other, but if I pulled it off, I could win this fellowship over her.

“I told myself I needed it more,” Shiloh said and turned toward her family. “I was the middle child of a preacher, who cared about his church more than his children, it seemed at times. Maybe winning something big like this would make him notice me.”

“Pawpaw?” Lem asked incredulously. “He’s so caring; what are you talking about?”

“That’s another story for another day, Lem,” Shiloh said. “I’m glad that you and your grandfather have a wonderful relationship, but it was different with us girls back then.”

“Back to what you were saying.” Randy gently nudged her.

Shiloh nodded. “I told myself that Leslie was well off enough that if she really wanted to study with flutists abroad, her parents could pay to send her, and plus, I just needed the recognition of winning, of doing something different and better than my smart older sister and pretty, outgoing younger sister. I was tired of being the bland, invisible one.”

“That sounds so lame.” Raphael’s disgust was palpable.

“I agree,” Shiloh said. “You’ve never been a young, insecure woman, so I can’t and won’t even try to explain where my head was. Even so,
all these years later, I know how silly and self-centered that explanation sounds. But back then, it was real, and it was serious, and I just wanted to escape my life and travel to a world where I could be special. When I heard Leslie play that piece, I felt my chance slipping away.”

“So you stole her song and played it yourself, in a better, more unique way and won the scholarship?” Lem almost spat out the question.

Shiloh looked him in the eyes. “I did, son. I did.”

“Why is he so angry?” David asked, looking from Lem to Shiloh.

“Because Leslie Hamilton is the name of Lia’s drug-addicted mother,” Lem said between clenched teeth, glaring at Shiloh. “The mother who gave birth to her, then dropped Lia off on her parents’ doorstep so she could return to a life on the streets, playing her flute whenever she’s not strung out. Sounds like our mother had something to do with that.”

Shiloh dipped her head to her chin and let the tears flow. “I told you, I murdered twice, in the same year.”

“I don’t understand, Mommy,” said David, frowning. Shiloh appreciated his nine-year-old innocence, and his effort to connect the dots. She had to finish the story for his sake—and for Lem, who seemed to feel he already knew the answers.

“On the day of the audition I arrived before anyone else so I could sign up to be the first to go in. The rules were we had to bring two pieces to play, so if we saw our original piece on the list, we had to move to our second piece of music. The judges would give us a chance to play both pieces, but the initial one had to be their first time hearing it.

“I got there first, signed up, and wrote down the name of the piece I’d be playing on the sign-up sheet. When Leslie arrived fifteen minutes later and saw the selection, she knew I had somehow found her music and betrayed her. That piece was so obscure, she’d convinced herself no one else would have it, so she’d poured herself
into learning it and practicing it, and had only skated the surface on learning a second piece.

“Truthfully, if I hadn’t stolen the piece from her, she would have been right; no one else would have discovered it. It was truly unique. But I did what I did, and she was hurt and furious and in her opinion, doomed. For whatever reason, she didn’t rat me out, like she could have and probably should have. She went in and played her second song, which by all accounts was good but not earth-shattering. She went on to play her original choice as her second piece, but I had blown them away already by playing it on two instruments; she couldn’t top that, and I knew it.”

Shiloh tried to reach for Lem’s hand, but he pulled away.

“We got back to the room that morning and she said she knew I’d land the fellowship, due to the music she had hunted high and low for, and that when I arrived in France that summer, I should …”

Shiloh looked at David, wondering if he needed to hear this part, but decided to barrel through.

“She said while I was in France, I should think of her, in her Birmingham home, all alone with a relative who was abusive while her parents were away.”

Shiloh’s revelation sucked the air out of the room. Even Randy, who had heard this earlier in the week, seemed stunned. Shiloh felt like she was having an out-of-body experience. She couldn’t be talking about herself, and her actions.

Lem was pale. “What did she say?” He whispered the question, as if it pained him.

Mindful of her three youngest boys, Shiloh didn’t want to say too much. Some of the answers Lem sought would have to wait until later, for a one-on-one conversation.

“Apparently Leslie worked hard in school and won a flute
scholarship that allowed her to stay on campus to get away from her abusive relative. She never felt like she could tell, because this person held the family’s purse strings. He was the one with the wealth, and her father worked for his company. He had always threatened that if she shared their secret, the whole family would be ruined. Her parents were loving and trusting and had no idea that she was being mistreated. So when she made it to college and got a chance to live in the dorm, she said she had peace and safety for the first time in six or seven years, and she needed to do whatever she could to avoid having to go home for the summer and allowing the abuse to resume.”

Retelling Leslie’s horrific revelation made her shudder.

“When she told me, I pleaded for her forgiveness, and I offered to go to the fellowship committee and tell them what I had done, so she could have another chance. I should have done that anyway, regardless of what she said,” Shiloh said. “But I was scared at that point that if I told the truth, I’d be kicked out of college and I’d never get my degree or recover from the shame.

“Leslie told me she’d figure something else out. She’d never speak to me again, but she would find a way to do what she needed.”

Shiloh looked heavenward. “God forgive me, but I listened to her. I heard what I wanted to hear, and I moved on and let the school praise me and honor me and do all of this great stuff for me for landing this prestigious fellowship, and Leslie watched from the wings and never said anything.

“On the last day of the spring semester, before school ended for the summer, she left a note on my bed and told me to find a new roommate for junior year, and good luck in France. I never saw her again after that day, but I left her a note on her bed that simply said ‘I’m sorry.’

“I don’t know if she ever got it,” Shiloh said. “I went on the fellowship, made the stupid mistake with Armando, and came home grieving about that. Your dad and I started dating soon after, and one
weekend we went to Birmingham for a music festival. When we drove through downtown …”

Shiloh began to sob and dropped her face in her hands. Randy walked over to her, rubbed her back, and continued the story for her.

“We drove through downtown that evening, looking for a place to eat, and when I stopped at a red light, your mother looked over at a woman sitting on the corner,” Randy said. “I didn’t know who the woman was, but I noticed that she had a flute in one hand, and a bottle of liquor in the other. She was barely clothed, and she looked out of it. Your mother took one look at her and got sick in the car. I asked her why later, and she just played it off as being a stomach virus.”

“That lady was Leslie Hamilton, wasn’t it?” Lem asked.

Shiloh nodded. “It was, and I realized that night that I had ruined her life. She had chosen to live on the streets rather than go home to her big pretty house with her loving parents, because she dreaded further abuse.”

Lem broke down in tears, and turned away from his mother. Shiloh could barely breathe. But when she looked up to console Lem, she saw that all of her sons were crying, and so was Randy.

This … this moment here was her ultimate penalty, the most painful consequence for what she had done all those years ago. If she’d had the ability back then to see into her future, and witness how following temptation down a path she knew was wrong would affect those she loved the most, she would have moved heaven and earth to make everything right. How shameful that she hadn’t moved heaven and earth anyway, knowing all along what was right.

“I don’t think Lia knows,” Lem finally said, in a small broken voice. “She doesn’t know all of this. She thinks her mother just left her because she was a young college student interested in the party life, which led her into drug addiction. You have to tell her, too, Mom. She deserves to know.”

Shiloh’s heart sank. The ripple effect of the pain she had caused was unfolding before her. She had planned to wrap up today’s confession by asking her sons to forgive her, in their own time, and to learn from her mistakes. But she realized just now that this wasn’t going to be the end of it. She would have to face Lia and ask her forgiveness, and maybe Leslie too.

The entire family moved through the rest of the afternoon in a daze, not watching TV, answering calls, or even gathering for dinner.

Everyone had eaten leftovers from the fridge, including the pizza they’d almost devoured the night before. Finally, at bedtime, Shiloh had mustered enough strength to corral the younger three boys, who had settled on the sofas in the family room to watch ESPN with little commentary or interest, and get them into bed.

“We have church tomorrow,” she reminded them.

They hadn’t argued or delayed, as they usually did on Saturday evenings. Shiloh wondered what they were thinking of her, and whether they hated her, but she was afraid to ask.

As she tucked David in and told him to say his nightly prayers, he stared at her, as if she were a stranger. “Mom, were you afraid to talk to God after you did all that stuff that summer? Do you think he still heard you?”

Shiloh sighed and a lump filled her throat. “I think he heard me, David, but yes, I was very afraid to talk to him. And I felt like I needed to do something drastic to show him how sorry I was. So I didn’t finish school … I dedicated my life to serving him as a good wife and mom, and I hope I’ve done that.”

David stared at her for a long time before answering, then he stroked her face. “You’re a good mommy, and even though you did some very bad things, I still love you. I guess that’s how Jesus felt when he was hanging from the cross for us.”

With that, he rolled over and closed his eyes. Shiloh let the tears fall, but caught them before they dripped from her chin and drenched her baby boy’s arms. She’d taken her family through some tough stuff today, and it was going to take a long time to heal. The only thing she could hold onto was the nugget of blessing David had tucked within his comment: he still loved her.

She left his bedside and made a pit stop in Raphael and Omari’s room. For the first time ever, they’d turned out the light without a third or fourth reminder. She wasn’t fooled; she knew they hadn’t yet succumbed to sleep. But she didn’t move past the doorway.

“Omari and Raphael, just want to say that I love you, and I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me. I’m sorry I’ve dumped all of this on you at once, and I hope you don’t think I’m a horrible person.”

Next was Lem’s room. His door was closed and she started to knock, but she’d never done so before and decided against it now. She cracked it open and found him sitting on his bed, scowling at the wall across the room, rather than video chatting on his computer, as usual. Shiloh eased into the room and closed the door behind her. She stood at the foot of his bed with her arms folded, not sure what to say, but knowing she couldn’t go to bed without having a final conversation with him.

“Are you being blackmailed?” he finally asked.

Shiloh frowned. “What? Why would you ask me that?”

“Why else would you tell us all of this crazy stuff all at once, about your days back in college? You had us thinking you were the perfect little Christian all these years, and here you were, having sex, killing a baby, stealing and cheating your way into a program. Who are you?”

Any other time, that bold backtalk would have landed Lem in punishment for the rest of the school year, and it was just November.
She would cut him some slack, because what she had shared was heavy for an adult to wrap his mind around, let alone a sixteen year old.

“Lem, I’m your mother. And I’m human. I’ve made some horrible decisions and some bad mistakes and the time has simply come to tell the truth. I didn’t know someone at church was going to wind up in a situation that might mirror my own and need a mentor,” Shiloh said, trying to tell her son what she needed him to know without completely giving away Monica’s issues. “And I didn’t know that you were going to go to Alabama for the summer and fall in love with the daughter of the woman I had betrayed. When I saw her at the hospital this past week and learned her last name, I knew right away who she was, and I knew that it would be wrong of me to allow you to continue a friendship with her without telling you the truth. That’s all—no blackmail; just God telling me to finally stand in my truth and take off my masks so that someone else can be healed.”

“I might be able to see how your first revelation can help some people at church, but how is this news going to do any healing in Alabama? Doesn’t sound like you’re willing to tell Lia all that you know about her mother.”

Lem still wasn’t looking at her, but Shiloh moved closer to him and perched on the end of his bed.

“Lem, I’ve done enough ‘favors’ for Leslie Hamilton. In her own way and time, she’ll tell her daughter what she wants her to know about their family dynamics and what led her to a life on the streets. I do take the blame for that, and I can share that with Lia, but I’m not comfortable repeating the part about the abuse, because that’s not my place. I’m sorry, son. And I don’t know why God has allowed all of this to happen. He wants me to learn something for sure; I’m just not sure why I’ve had to crush all of you in the process.”

Lem shook his head and lowered it.

“I haven’t called Lia tonight because I just can’t face her. She’ll know something is wrong with me. I can’t tell her that stuff about her mother, or that you helped drive her mother down that path. She’ll never speak to me again.”

“Can you keep it to yourself? At least for a few days? We’re going to Atchity for Thanksgiving now, since Daddy has been sick.”

Lem’s eyes lit up. “For real? When did you decide?”

“Actually before we left Atchity earlier this week; I just forgot to tell you,” Shiloh said. “I’m not asking you to keep a secret, I’m just asking you to hold off on telling her if you can. It’s hard stuff to hear on the phone or via video; I just don’t know if that’s the right thing to do. But I wanted you to know, because I can’t continue to keep secrets and have them eat away at me. I’m not perfect, Lem—far from it. But I do love you, and your brothers and your dad. And I’m grateful God gave me the chance to be your mother, despite all of the terrible stuff I did. I hope you can find a way to forgive me someday, and to see beyond the ugly stuff I’ve done, into the heart that God has cleansed. That’s who your mother is, not the person I was at twenty.”

Lem peered at her, but didn’t respond.

She finally stood up to leave, but instead approached him and kissed his forehead. “Good night, son. I love you.”

Shiloh closed the door and leaned on it once she was on the other side.

Dear God, let them all still love me, like David said, with the compassion of a forgiving Jesus.