One Prayer Away (24 page)

Chris's words cut to the marrow of Mitchell's bones. To think that Chris thought he was capable of attempted rape was almost as painful as the ache in his stomach. And for Chris to wish him such defenseless torture behind prison bars just added salt to the wounds. The last sentence, Mitchell found degrading. Finally on his feet, Mitchell tried again to defend himself, but Chris's voice cut him off before he could even form his words. Although there was anger in his voice, Mitchell could hear an overtone of hurt and betrayal.

“Man, I can't believe you played me like that. You know how I feel about Lisa. We're getting
married
, man! All the women in the world, and you had to go for mine? You were supposed to be my friend.”

“I am your . . .”

“You ain't no friend of mine!” Chris interrupted, throwing a look that said he was insulted that Mitchell would even try to convince him otherwise. “You ain't never been my friend. Now, I'm gonna say this one more time. Get your stuff and get out. And I never—and the operative word is
never
—want to see your face again.”

Twenty

B
everly sat at her desk at the Houston Center for Women and stared at the beautifully decorated card in her hand. Had she known what it was before she broke the seal, she would have tossed the mail out, unopened. Now, instead of throwing it in the garbage beside her, Beverly couldn't stop looking at it. She'd read the words at least ten times, but ten times just didn't seem like enough.

“It's a shame that anybody could be so cruel,” she said through a heavy sigh.

It was five days before Christmas, and after the time she'd spent talking privately to Mitchell on Saturday night, Beverly had been in a festive mood. She hadn't known the man for more than a few hours, but he'd found a place in her heart, and she could only pray that Virtue would give both of them a second chance at happiness. Beverly had gone out after work on Monday and purchased a few items to decorate her office. This morning, before any of her appointments had arrived, she set up her tabletop Christmas tree and hung the colorful wreath on her door. Everything
was good until she sorted through the mail that had been dropped in her box while she was away for lunch.

The invitation was exquisitely adorned in silver script writing on purple metallic card stock. Beverly knew that Dondra and Lester didn't really want her at their nuptials. In fact, she had doubts that they'd even had knowledge that the invitation had been mailed to her. Her instincts told her that the receipt of the announcement of the upcoming celebration had been orchestrated by Renee Bell.

For the life of her, Beverly couldn't figure out why Renee was so hateful toward her. Any altercation they'd ever had had been initiated by Renee, and Beverly had made it a point not to let the young twenty-something-year-old get under her skin. At least, she didn't let Renee
know
that she was succeeding in doing so anyway. Beverly had to admit that there were times when she wanted to grab the little troublemaker by the throat and squeeze until Renee's eyes bulged out of their sockets. But one thing Beverly's late mother had told her was never to reduce herself to the level of an idiot. And in Beverly's eyes, Renee personified Webster's definition. Sending her this invitation, Renee had reached her limit. Beverly didn't think she could take much more.

Finally loosing her fingers from the corners of the invitation, Beverly allowed the expensive paper to fall to her desk. She hadn't quite mastered the art of taking her eyes away from it, though. Beverly continued to stare at the words and the date that was set for Christmas Eve. Since Lester and Dondra had been seeing each other for quite some time with no marital plans, Beverly supposed that the pregnancy was what had put them in the sudden rush. It was hard for her to believe that this was the same Lester Oliver who wooed her for months and then stole a suit from his uncle so that he could look good when he took her out on their first date. That Lester, the one she had fallen in love with more than thirty years ago, didn't seem capable of being so wicked and deceiving.

When Lester's sins had first been revealed and Elder Bradley stripped him of his ministerial collar, Beverly remembered how horrified she'd been. She wasn't just hurt by her husband's blatant disregard of their marriage vows; Beverly was drowning in humiliation. She was ashamed for many reasons. For Lester to leave her for another woman was one thing. But for him to leave her for a child was another. Legally, Dondra was an adult. But compared to Lester, she was still a baby. Not only that, but many times Beverly had opened her house to Dondra.

When she thought about the many times that she'd gone so far as to feed her when she'd come over for one of the “meetings” that she needed to have with Lester, it almost made Beverly sick to her stomach. Lester had been the preacher who headed the activities ministry at the church. With her being over the dance ministry, Dondra's need to periodically meet privately with him had raised no red flags with Beverly. Now she had to wonder what had really gone on behind the closed door of Lester's office when Dondra was inside.

Beverly sighed. It was water under the bridge now, but that didn't stop her from wondering what had pushed Lester to step outside their marriage for satisfaction.
Could it really have been about my barrenness?
This wasn't the first time she'd mulled over that thought. Renee's malicious remark had struck a tender chord with Beverly, but she refused to let the woman know it. That would have been just what Renee wanted, and Beverly wouldn't dare give her the satisfaction.

That was one of the reasons she'd been so forgiving of Mitchell. He hadn't wronged her personally, but as close as her relationship with Virtue was, it had felt like it. It had taken him a while, but Mitchell had come back to Virtue and apologized. In Beverly's eyes, the cases of Mitchell and Lester were very different. Not only had Mitchell not claimed to know Christ during his time of wrongdoing,
but he hadn't even gone to church. All of his abusive behavior had taken place during a course of time when he was a dysfunctional alcoholic.

Lester, on the other hand, wasn't under the influence of any type of controlled substance. He had put on a suit every Sunday morning and taken his place in the pulpit among the ministerial staff as though all was well with his soul. Lester had preached several times during the course of his lengthy affair, teaching on the evils of sin when he himself was entangled in a web of deceit in its worst form. And he'd never made the attempt to apologize. Mitchell's apology would have come earlier had he known of his ex-wife's whereabouts. Beverly still lived in the same house that she and Lester had shared for more than twenty years. He knew exactly where she was and had made no attempts at asking her forgiveness.

Now, he was about to marry his mistress and have a baby who would no doubt be mistaken for his grandchild. When Beverly thought of it, she almost laughed.
By the time that child grows out of diapers, Lester will be wearing them.
It was an exaggeration, but the image in Beverly's mind made for a good pilot for a comedy series. Her smile faded when she looked down at the invitation again. She took in a deep breath and then slowly exhaled. Believing that God had allowed her to endure the failure of her marriage so that she could counsel the women of the HCW with the compassion that they needed was what kept Beverly going. Before her own abusive situation, she'd only had textbook knowledge to use when she counseled them. Now she was living proof that experience was the best teacher.

A knock at her door tore her eyes from the invitation once again. Ripping the card in half, she disposed of it in the can beside her desk. Then she stood to greet her early arriving client.

“Come in.”

“Hey,” Virtue said as she opened the door and ducked her head inside. “You're not busy, are you?”

“Not for another twenty minutes,” Beverly said with a grin. “Come on in.”

Beverly knew the purpose of Virtue's visit even before she began speaking. She had no doubt that God had answered Beverly's only constant prayer when He placed Virtue in her life. She'd almost given up on the hopes of having a daughter when she met Virtue. It hadn't been in God's plan for Beverly to give birth in the traditional sense, but she'd gotten her daughter anyway. And just like natural mothers and daughters, she and Virtue had their quarrels from time to time. Last night had been one of those rare occasions when it had turned from a heated disagreement to an all-out war of words.

“Would you like something to drink?” Beverly offered as she walked in the direction of her water cooler.

“No, thanks.”

She filled a cup for herself and then carried it back to her desk, where she drank a few swallows and then took her seat. The stillness that covered the office for only a few seconds felt much longer.

Beverly was tempted to speak first, but she chose to wait so that she could get a feel for what was going through Virtue's mind. She'd been quite upset last night, and Beverly understood why, but she still disagreed. She'd told Virtue the details of her private meeting with Mitchell, or at least she'd tried to. Virtue had become so irate at the very onset of the conversation that Beverly had little opportunity to explain anything. The short but overly heated confrontation had ended with Virtue storming out of the house. She had returned at some point during the night, but Beverly had long since lost her battle with trying to stay awake to wait for her. Now was the first time she'd seen Virtue since the argument ended.

“How does he look?”

Thrown by Virtue's peculiar question, Beverly didn't immediately understand. “How does who look?”

“When I ran into him in Dallas, I saw him, but I didn't really
look
at him. I was so caught off guard and frightened; plus everything happened so fast that I can't even remember what he looked like. Then last weekend, I couldn't force my eyes off of the table. There were a couple of times that I actually wanted to look at him, but I couldn't. So I feel like, although I've been in his presence twice in the past few weeks, I still haven't seen him in seven years.”

Beverly's lips parted in a broad smile. “Well, I don't know what he looked like as an alcoholic, but he cleans up real good,” she said.

Virtue's eyes wandered, scanning the wall of the office and coming to a stop, fixed on a potted green plant on a stand in the corner behind Beverly's desk. When she spoke, she kept her eyes locked there as if she could see a slide show of her past.

“He used to be a handsome man who wore his hair in the neatest fade that I'd ever seen. He went to the barbershop early every Saturday morning and got it trimmed. He was clean-cut and had the darkest eyes and the brightest smile around.” She paused and wrung her hands together, but she didn't break her stare. “Then when he started drinking, he stopped caring about everything, including his appearance. He lived for his next drink. Even his skin reeked of liquor. After a while I couldn't stand for him to touch me, not that he was trying to anyway. At least not in a good way. His hair grew thick, and he hardly ever combed it. Just covered it with this dingy old baseball cap that I would have thrown away if I wasn't so scared of what he might do. He grew a beard, and before long, he was looking much older than he was. He looked like an old drunk.”

Beverly could detect the sadness in Virtue's eyes, but at least this time she wasn't crying. It was a small victory, but it was a definite sign of strength. When Virtue didn't offer
any further information, Beverly assumed that it was her turn to speak.

“That was the old Mitchell, Virtue. None of us is built of stone. No matter what shape or form a person is in, God is able to remold them and make them into someone new. That's what He's done for Mitchell. That's what He did for all of us who, at some point in our lives, chose to walk with Him. We were all sinners who deserved nothing but death and eternal damnation. There aren't any good sinners and bad sinners. A sinner is a sinner, and the same destruction that awaits one, awaits all those who reject Christ. The Bible tells us that when we come to God, old things are passed away and all things become new. No matter how offensive, downtrodden, or even violent a person may have been at one time, God can forgive him and turn his life around. Mitchell has come a long way, Virtue. You want to keep envisioning him as that unkempt, intoxicated abuser who you left behind. But who he is now is far better than even the clean-cut man who you remember marrying.