Wings of Glass (27 page)

BESTSELLING AUTHOR
Gina Holmes is the founder of the influential literary site Novel Rocket, regularly named one of Writers Digest’s best sites for writers. Her debut novel,
Crossing Oceans
, was a Christy and Christian Book Award finalist and winner of the Carol, INSPY, and RWA’s Inspirational Reader’s Choice Contest awards, as well as a CBA, ECPA, Amazon and
Publishers Weekly
Religion bestseller. She is also the author of
Dry As Rain
, a Christy Award finalist, and
Wings of Glass
. Gina holds degrees in science and nursing and currently resides with her family in southern Virginia. She works too hard, laughs too loud, and longs to see others heal from their past and discover their God-given purpose. To learn more about her, visit
www.ginaholmes.com
.

1. Penny gets angry and defensive when her friends try to confront her with the truth about Trent’s behavior. Have you ever reacted that way when someone tried to tell you something you didn’t want to hear? How can we learn to be open to friends who try to “speak the truth in love” to us?
   
2. Trent repeatedly says—and occasionally shows—that he wants to change. Was Penny right to believe him? Did you believe him? What more could he have done if he was sincere about wanting to become a different (healthier) person? What do you think the future holds for Trent?
   
3. Callie Mae, a loving and godly woman, struggles with the habit of smoking. And she accuses the woman who confronts her about it of gluttony. What are some other habits or lifestyle choices we sometimes develop that are bad for our health—and may compromise our
   ability to reflect Christ to others? What are some ways we might work on overcoming them?
   
4. There are a few times when Penny actually seems to
   want
   Trent to hurt her. “I think I wanted him to beat me then. Feeling the physical pain was so much better than the anguish eating me up inside” (ch. 20). And “I realized then I was trying to provoke him, but I wasn’t sure why. Maybe because deep down I thought I deserved to be beaten. Maybe I enjoyed being the martyr. Or I was just addicted to the making up that was sure to follow” (ch. 35). What could make a woman feel that way? What are some ways she could get help for whatever it is that’s causing those feelings? What are some other self-destructive patterns you see in your life or the life of someone you love?
   
5. Fatimah and Callie both tell Penny that if she wants things to change, she herself must change. Do you agree with that statement? Why is making changes in our own lives and behavior often so difficult? What holds you back from making a positive change in your circumstances?
   
6. Callie Mae tells Penny, “You’re addicted to an abusive man.” Do you agree with Callie’s assessment? Why or why not? What are some other things—besides alcohol or drugs—that a person can develop an unhealthy dependence on? What does it take to break the cycle?
   
7. For a long time, Penny says she doesn’t want to leave Trent because being with him is better than being alone. Why are familiar, though unpleasant, circumstances often more attractive than the unfamiliar and the unknown? What relationships or circumstances are you clinging to, just because they’re familiar, when you might be better off without them?
   
8. Callie Mae helps Penny reframe her situation by asking, “If you had a daughter, and she came to you and told you her husband was treating her the way Trent is treating you, would your advice be to stay with him?” (ch. 23). Why is it sometimes easier to see what’s going on in a situation involving someone else than in our own situation? What’s going on in your life right now that might benefit from some reframing? Who has God placed in your life who can help you do that?
   
9. Pastor Harold asks Penny, “Why isn’t grace enough?” and Penny herself wonders why it isn’t. How would you answer that question for Penny? Is God’s grace alone sufficient for all life’s challenges, or does God’s grace sometimes require a response or action from us? And if it does sometimes require a response, how can we tell if a given situation is one of those times?
   
10. Callie tells Penny that God will not manipulate someone into doing something the person doesn’t want to do, even if other people are begging for his
    intervention. Have you ever pleaded with God to change a loved one? What was the outcome? Why do you think God allows people to have free will even when it means other people might get hurt?
    
11. With the support of a friend and her pastor, Penny stages an intervention with Trent. Do you think that was a good idea? Why or why not? What might Penny have done differently that could have led to a better outcome? Have you ever tried to confront a loved one about a serious problem in this way? How did—or would—you go about it?
    

NOTHING DEEPENS
a stream like a good rain . . . or makes it harder to cross.

Just a few hundred feet away from the home I’d sworn never to return to, I sat on the smooth surface of a boulder. With my jeans cuffed and toes wiggling in the cold water, I reflected on how recent rains had caused these banks to widen and swell.

Perhaps a decent relationship with my father might also rise as a result of the storm we’d endured. Much could happen in six years. Maybe my absence had, as the adage promised, made his heart grow fonder. Maybe my homecoming would be like that of the Prodigal and he’d greet me with
eager arms. Together we’d cry for all that had passed between us—and all that should have but didn’t.

Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

It’s going to go just fine,
I told myself as I traced the slippery surface of a moss-covered branch with my foot.

“What’s funny, Mommy?”

Isabella’s voice startled me. I didn’t dare admit that what my five-year-old interpreted as mirth was really a grimace, because then of course she’d want to know what was the matter. “Nothing, sweetness.”

She threw a pebble at the water, but it dropped inches from its goal, clinking against slate instead. “You were smiling like this—” She bared her teeth in a forced grin.

Gently, I pinched her cheek.

“You’re beautiful, Mommy.”

“Thank you, baby. So are you.”

“Yes, I am.”

I smiled at that. I smiled at just about everything she said and did.

“Mommy, why’d we drive here ’stead of Cowpa’s house?”

Cowpa
was her name for grandparents of either gender. I probably should have corrected her long ago, but I found the odd term endearing. Besides, I reasoned, she’d grow out of baby talk all too soon without any help from me. I found myself wondering what other lessons she would learn in my absence.

The thought overwhelmed me, but I refused to cry in front of my daughter. Unloading my heavy burden onto her
delicate shoulders was not an option. I might not be able to control much in my life lately, but I could still protect her. Nothing mattered more.

“This was my thinking place when I was a little girl. I wanted to show it to you in case you wanted to think sometimes.” I breathed in the area’s familiar fragrance—a combination of damp leaves, pine, and earth—and eyed my surroundings. Same trees. Same sounds. Nothing much ever changed in this spot. That, more than any other reason, was why I loved it so much. Especially now.

I’d spent half of my life here, sitting on this unyielding rock, trying to make sense of the world. The loss of my mother. My father’s neglect. The sometimes-sweet, often-bitter, words of my ex-boyfriend, David. It was here I’d first gotten real with God, begging Him not to take my mother. Railing at Him when He did.

Isabella bounced on one foot. “What did you think about here?”

I poked my toes through water, watching droplets glide down my pink toenails. “Well, when I was little, I thought of catching frogs and grasshoppers and wondered whether I would ever have a best friend to share my secrets with.”

“Did you find your best friend?” A dangling pine needle twirled from one of her curls.

Love overwhelmed me. “Yes, sweetness. I got you.”

She gave me one of her endearing smiles, pulled the debris from her hair, examined it, then dropped it in the stream. I scooped a handful of the cool water and let it slip through my
fingers like the life I’d just left behind—my studio apartment that never really felt like home, the corporate ladder I’d just begun to climb, my coworkers who never became the close friends I had longed for. All of it now gone, as though it had never existed at all.

My daughter looked at me askance. “I wanna go.”

The hum of nature faded. The only thing I heard now was the sharp tick of my wristwatch reminding me just how short time was. Standing, I assured myself that I could do what I had come to do. For Isabella, I could do it. I slipped my damp feet into my Birkenstocks and brushed off my rear before collecting my daughter’s chubby hand in my fingers.

I forced one leg in front of the other and made my way past my car, along the winding dirt road.

A familiar picket fence dressed in tangled braids of morning glories came into view. I clutched my daughter’s fingers tighter, feeling more like child than mother.

Placing a hand over my heart, I stopped and took it in. I’d forgotten how beautiful my childhood home was and how much I’d missed it. As I remembered running barefoot through this yard and cannonball jumping into the pond out back, joy pricked at me . . . until my gaze settled on the bare dirt beneath the stairs. How many times had I hidden under that porch, wounded by my father’s words? Too many. My smile died.

Isabella looked up at me eagerly, giving the motivation, if not the courage, I needed to continue. Ghosts of summers past faded as the fragrant scent of roses washed over me,
and with it another wave of doubt so tall and wide, I felt as though I might drown in it.

What if my father wouldn’t receive me? Or worse, what if he didn’t accept my daughter? I felt sure Mama Peg would embrace her, but could he? Accepting me had proven impossible for him, but perhaps a child as charming as Isabella could thaw his arctic heart.

Now on the second stair, I paused to look behind me at the road, feeling a sudden urge to retreat. Isabella bounced on the balls of her feet, anxious to continue.

When we reached the porch, I squatted to her level. “Are you ready to meet your grandpa and great-grandma?”

The longing in her maple syrup eyes needed no words, but she added them anyway. “Jane has a cowpa, Natalie has a cowpa, Carter has two cowpas, and . . .” She gave me a look that said,
Must I continue?

“Okay, I get it.” I stood and lifted a fist to the door. Before I could knock, Isabella lurched forward and did it for me. She tapped her sandaled foot twice, then reached to knock again.

I grabbed her hand. “Give them a chance.”

The oversize wildflower wreath swayed as the door creaked open. An elderly woman with thick gray hair fashioned into a bun stood before us, oxygen tubes protruding from her nostrils. Deep wrinkles fractured her leathery skin. Her eyebrows were bushes, her lips were shriveled like raisins, and a heavy, floral perfume emanated from her.

Isabella gasped, but I beamed. “Mama Peg.”

My grandmother winked at me before turning her milky gaze to her great-granddaughter. “You must be Bella.”

Isabella’s mouth opened and a strange squeal escaped. I don’t know who was more horrified at that moment—Isabella at the sight of Mama Peg, Mama Peg at Isabella’s revulsion, or me at their initial reactions to each other.

Mama Peg broke out in a deep belly laugh, intermingled with emphysemic hacks. Isabella leaped back as though she expected my grandmother and her tank to explode.

I laughed so hard tears streamed down my cheeks. That seemed to calm Isabella, and soon she was grinning too.

“I’m a wretched sight now, little girl, but not so long ago, I used to be as pretty as you,” my grandmother managed through her own amusement.

Isabella looked at me to dispel this ridiculous claim. I could only nod. I should have prepared her for this.

Mama Peg raised an unruly eyebrow at me. “I don’t think she believes me.”

Catching my breath, I wiped my eyes. “I’m not sure I do either.” I added a wink to soften the jab. I knew she had been lovely, of course. I’d seen the proof in photographs. She still was in my eyes—one of the most beautiful women I had ever known, despite the cruel effects of tobacco and time.

An exaggerated scowl deepened her wrinkles. “Genevieve Paige Lucas, you’re still a brat.”

Leaning in, I hugged her with all I had. “I missed you, Grandma.”

“You too, Jenny. You stayed away far too long.”