The Envelope

  So she said “yes,” and was so excited she could hardly sleep. She floated through the next couple of days, and was positive her students were wondering what was wrong with her, that she was smiling and laughing so much. She even laughed at the antics of Edgar, the class clown, when before she would have stuck him at the time-out desk.

  Saturday night, Hank picked her up and took her to one of the finer Italian restaurants in Dallas. At first, she felt so nervous she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to eat, but Hank had her at perfect ease within minutes and she was able to finish a plateful of white lasagna.

  Throughout dinner, they’d discussed quite a few topics, but by the time their server had picked up their empty dishes, they still hadn’t broached the subject most heavily on Sheila’s mind. She decided if Hank wasn’t going to bring it up, she would.

  “What exactly did you tell Miguel to get him to come back and tell Medina the truth?”

  Hank lowered the napkin he was using to wipe marinara sauce off his mustache. “Come again?”

  “There’s still a smidgen right here.” Sheila pointed, resisting the urge to reach across the table and clean the spot on his cheek herself. “Did you really tell him that you liked me?”

  “I never went to see Miguel.” Hank furrowed his eyebrows as he wiped his face once more. “I was going to, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like it would just cause you more trouble. When you showed up I thought Medina had decided not to believe him. Or something.”

  Sheila hadn’t bothered to tell Hank about her conversation with their principal before now, figuring that he had talked Diana’s father into coming clean. Now as she reiterated Mr. Medina’s brusque apology and explanation to him, he looked as puzzled as she was.

  “Strange,” he said. Then he shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, well, you’re back and that’s the important thing, right?”

  Sheila frowned. “Come on. You’re not the least bit curious about what changed Miguel’s mind?”

  “Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  He paused for a long moment, gazing at her in a way that made her tingle down to her toes. “Because you’re back,” he said, his voice husky, “and that’s the important thing.”

  * * *

  Miguel was ashamed at what he’d done. What had he expected, anyway? No self-respecting professional would stoop so low as to go out with a menial laborer who had just spent time in jail. He’d known the chances that Diana’s teacher would have any interest in him were slim, and he certainly hadn’t intended for his daughter to repeat to Miss Carson the words he’d spoken in a moment of desperation.

  But Diana had, and worse, Miss Carson had made a reply. An unfavorable one. And he had lost it. He had enough on his plate without having his masculine pride injured on top of it.

  Miguel took another swallow of beer, ignoring the loud laughter and off-color comments of the men around him in the bar. He stared at the bottle, grimacing. This is what did it. If he had been sober at the time that Diana relayed her teacher’s lack of interest in him, he would have just shrugged it off. But he’d had enough to drink to let his emotions get the better of him.

  “Hey, hombre, you’re awfully quiet over there. Got a woman on the mind?”

  Miguel narrowed his eyes at his friend’s ribbing. Yes, but not like you think. He didn’t need a woman to be his companion or lover anymore. He needed a mother for his daughter. Or soon, Diana would have no one.

  And he’d have no chance with Miss Carson now. She’d know that he was the one that got her into trouble with the school. He would be lucky if she let him into her classroom for parent-teacher conferences, and he doubted she would care that he went back to tell the principal that it had all been a lie.

  Besides, he hadn’t gone back for Miss Carson’s sake. Not really. After he charged into the office of Roosevelt Elementary, accusing Miss Carson of all kinds of vile acts, Diana had spent the next two days in tears, wondering why her teacher had suddenly left. It broke his heart. He had to go back and try to get Miss Carson back in her classroom. Her absence was devastating his daughter.

  She must be one special woman.

  And, no matter what logic told him, the very kind of woman he was looking for to take care of Diana. Even if she was too religious for his taste. Besides, her faith in God most probably made her the kind of woman who believed in giving people second chances.

  But only if he made every effort to clean himself up.

  “Amigo, where are you going?” another friend asked as Miguel set down the money for his beer and stood up. “The night is still young.”

  Miguel gave the other man a hard, cold look. “The night may be young,” he said, “but I’ve gotten old.”

  He walked out of the bar and into the cold January night air, shutting the door on the jeers that followed him.

  CHAPTER 15

  Evelyn replaced the receiver with a sigh. Perhaps a wiser woman would just let go. Perhaps if she quit calling and leaving messages, Sheila would eventually call her when she was ready to talk.

  But Linda seemed not to be improving, and Evelyn feared that there was little time left for her two daughters to reconnect and release the past. She had to keep trying.

  As she turned to stir the leftovers warming up on the stove, she glanced at the calendar. February nineteenth. Five months and twelve days since Linda’s diagnosis.

  No, Evelyn couldn’t let go. She would call again tomorrow. She had to keep trying.

  * * *

  Hank wished he’d said no.

  That was going to be his first answer when Sheila asked if he’d go with her to her church the last Sunday in February. Raised to believe in one’s loyalty to his home church, Hank rarely strayed away from his home church of Agape Fellowship, and never on a Sunday morning. But he couldn’t say no when Sheila invited him to hear a guest preacher at her church. If it was any sign that she was beginning to take an interest in him beyond friendship, he wanted to encourage her. Besides, they’d been going out for a month and a half by then, and he was beginning to spend most of Sunday morning service distracted by thoughts about Sheila, wondering if she missed him as much as he missed her on the days they spent apart.

  Barbara was quickly becoming a memory. He hadn’t heard from her since she’d asked him for prayer about a job, and the more he got to know Sheila, the more he was convinced that his feelings for Barbara had been misguided and that their relationship would never go beyond a friendship. And the more strongly he believed his growing feelings for Sheila were from God.

  So he said yes to her invitation, and went.

  And regretted it for weeks afterward.

  But when he first arrived at her church, Abundant Grace, he walked through the glass doors, whistling a tune, eagerly anticipating the day. Sheila stood against the wall a few yards away from the entrance, waving to him as he waded through the throng making their way into the church. When he walked up to her and saw her blue eyes shining with excitement, it was all he could do to keep from kissing her.

  While she lifted up her voice in song during praise and worship, he had trouble focusing on the Lord. During the offering he made himself pay rapt attention to the church’s senior pastor so that he wouldn’t begin to have thoughts he would have to repent of. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Sheila glance at him from time to time, but he didn’t dare look at her. He hoped she wouldn’t take his inattention the wrong way.

  The guest speaker was incredibly gifted. Hank had not heard of the man before, but Sheila was right. He knew the Word of God better than most—and Hank had heard some of the best, including his own father and his current pastor—and presented truths with a dramatic flair that set the congregation on fire.

  “There is a time,” he began after reading from the third chapter of Ecclesiastes, “for everything. There is a season. The church needs to get a revelation—” his voice rose in volume— “of the season she’s in.”

  “Yessir!” a man
responded behind Hank.

  “Too many times I hear this scripture taken out of context. ‘But Brother Rodney,’ they say to me, ‘God’s got me in a dry season. So many things are going wrong in my life right now. God must have me in a season of death.’ But they forget what Jesus Christ has done.” He paused for several shouts. “Am I talking to a living, breathing crowd this morning? If you are a believer in Jesus Christ you are in the season of abundant life.”

  A wave of “hallelujahs” swept through the congregation, and Sheila surprised Hank by jumping up as she shouted, “Yes!”

  Brother Rodney continued in the same vein for an hour, preaching on God’s love, and what it meant in the life of a Christian. His inspiring words and contagious enthusiasm compelled even Hank, who was not the jumping up and shouting type, to stand up as a witness to the truth the man was feeding them.

  As he concluded, he said, “Some of you are just a little excited. Sit down for a minute. But there’s one string attached for anyone wanting to live the abundant life, to reap all the blessings of this victorious season God has brought us into through His Son.”

  The people sat down and quieted.

  “That string is a hard word. It’s the O word. Do I dare say it?”

  “Preach on!”

  He did. “Obedience. This isn’t even in my notes, but I feel there’s some of you in here that need to hear it.”

  Hank felt his jaw tighten as a heaviness came over him. In his gut he felt as though alarm bells were ringing loud enough for everyone to hear, and he tried futilely to tune them out. What’s going on? I’m all right with God. I’m not living in any kind of sin.

  “Maybe you keep running into snags.” The preacher paused to take a sip of water. “Could be trouble in your family, your marriage, your job, your finances.”

  None of that applies to me.

  “Or maybe you walked away from the call of God on your life. Maybe you went through a painful trial years ago, and gave up on God’s plan for you.”

  Oh, Jesus. The feeling in Hank’s gut overwhelmed him to the point of nausea.

  “My sister, my brother—” the preacher looked directly at Hank— “you may not have felt the consequences of your disobedience yet, and I didn’t come here today to preach gloom and doom, but the Holy Spirit would have me to say to you—” he broke eye contact with Hank, who let out his breath— “you’re about to let a great gift from God slip through your hands because of your willful rebellion.”

  The words, though spoken in a near whisper, cut into Hank’s heart, which beat like a bass drum in the utter silence of the room. Was the message really for him? He cringed as a boy caught in an act of wrongdoing.

  A soft sound on his right drew his attention away from himself. Sheila wept, her shoulders shaking and her head in her hands. Although he was uncertain as to why she cried, he yearned to put his arm around her and pull her to his side, to speak gentle words of comfort.

  “Now, some of you are in just a transitional state,” the preacher was saying. “You’re in one place, but you feel God’s calling you to another. You don’t want to move unless you know with certainty the next step God wants you to take in your life.” His eyes scanned the congregation. “If that’s you, come down to the altar right now.”

  Without a word, Sheila was up and past Hank and moving down the aisle as fast as she could go without running. Hank stared after her, perplexed. They had had numerous long discussions over the past several weeks, and in none of them had Sheila even hinted that she wanted to leave teaching.

  Then again, a calling could be just more than a job. It could be a place of service in the church, other volunteer work, being single versus being married—

  Could that be it? The shroud of guilt that had descended over Hank dissipated with the shocking thought. Is she going down because of me? Because of us? He’d never heard of anyone answering an altar call in order to decide whether they wanted to get married or not, but he’d been raised in church, and stranger things had happened.

  He watched as Sheila joined several others in the front, most of them women, and most of them crying. Sheila was standing right in front of the preacher, her face in her hands.

  The preacher placed his hands on her shoulders in a gentle, fatherly way. “Sister,” he said, “God sent me here today to tell you that He holds nothing against you.”

  Sheila let out a wail. Hank squirmed. What on earth would such a precious, sweet woman believe that God might be holding against her, and why had Sheila never told him about it?

  Why haven’t you told her about the plane crash?

  Instantly, the guilt cloud returned. I’m going to tell her. When we get to know each other a little better. When the time is right.

  “. . .give her peace about where she is to go, and help her to recognize that peace as the leading of the wonderful Holy Spirit. In Jesus’ name.” The evangelist released her shoulders and moved to the next person in line. Sheila stood there for a full minute, her hands now extended in front of her in a prayerful manner, then turned and walked back to her seat.

  Hank wanted to ask her a dozen questions, but the only one he could verbalize was, “Are you all right?”

  Sheila gave him a slight smile and nodded. Then she turned away and closed her eyes, and didn’t open them until the service was dismissed and the sanctuary half-empty. She smiled at him again, more brightly this time, and Hank hoped it was a sign she was ready to talk about whatever God had just done in her.

  He waited until they were in the car, then said, “You’re feeling a call to do something different with your life.”

  Sheila nodded again as she clicked her safety belt.

  “And God talked to you about it.” He knew she wasn’t taking a nap after she returned from receiving prayer.

  Another nod.

  Hank looked at her in exasperation. “Well, are you going to keep me hanging or are you going to tell me what this was all about?”

  For a split second, he was terrified that she would resent his prying and refuse to answer. Relief flooded through him when she turned to him with a smile wider than the Gulf of Mexico. But the relief lasted only for a nanosecond.

  “God’s calling me into full-time missions.”

  She didn’t just say that. Lord, tell me she didn’t just say what I think she said. He tried to return her smile, but couldn’t get his lips to make the slightest upward turn. How could he? His heart had just plummeted to his feet. He felt the rising hope of the past few months dash to pieces against the rock that was her confident, even joyful, announcement.

  Sheila’s jubilant expression faded into disappointment, and he was sure she was reflecting what she saw on his face. “Hank, what’s wrong? I thought you’d be happy about that.”

  Finally, he managed a tight-lipped smile. “Sure. That’s exciting. I mean, if you’re sure.”

  “Why shouldn’t I be sure?”

  Oh, Lord, now she’s mad. And why shouldn’t she be, sitting in the car with Mr. Wet Blanket? Why couldn’t I have just pretended I was thrilled? Would it have taken that much effort? “It’s just, well, uh, from what you said earlier I thought you felt that teaching was your calling.”

  Sheila frowned at him. “You’re not being straight with me.”

  “You’re right. I’m not.” He turned to face her. “It’s just that being a full-time missionary isn’t in my plans.” He paused, knowing that if Sheila felt an iota for him of what he felt for her, his words were stabbing her deep in her heart. “Not ever.”

  Sheila’s features contorted with pain for a few seconds. Then, the muscles in her face relaxed into a look of resignation.

  “Oh.” She turned from him to look out the window. “If you don’t mind, I just want to go home.”

  “What about lunch?” Not that he actually expected her to still have an appetite. Not that he still had an appetite.

  “Take me home.” Her adamant tone dared him to try to dissuade her.

  He
started the car, and they rode home in an awkward silence. Hank’s blasé, “See you tomorrow” when he dropped her off sounded lamer than a horse with three legs.

  As he drove himself home, he suddenly felt like the loneliest man on earth.

  * * *

  Margaret was nothing but thrilled when Sheila told her what God had showed her during church. “No wonder you’ve been so frustrated with your job.” Margaret stood at the cupboard above the sink in her classroom, smearing her face with Oil of Olay. “So, what does Hank think about all this? You told him, didn’t you? At least over lunch?”

  Sheila, sitting in a tiny chair at one of the short-legged tables in Margaret’s room, lowered her eyes. “There was no lunch.”

  Margaret raised an eyebrow as she tightened the cap on the jar. “Ohhh.” She sat down across from Sheila. “You want to tell me about it?”

  “What’s to tell?” Sheila picked at a piece of tape stuck to the table. “I feel like a derailed train. I took a risk in getting to know a man, and letting my feelings. . .” A sob caught in her throat, and she choked it down. She’d spent most of Sunday afternoon crying, on and off, and wasn’t going to burst into tears when she had to pick up her kids from breakfast in ten minutes.

  She felt Margaret’s warm hand cover hers. “He didn’t like the idea of full-time missions?”

  “That’s the understatement of the year.” She looked up. “I guess the whole thing was an answer to prayer. I’ve been praying for God to show me if Hank was the one. I didn’t want to fall in love with somebody if, well, you know. If he wasn’t.”

  “Wow.” Margaret released her hand and sat back. “I knew that Hank had developed strong feelings for you, but I didn’t realize that you—”

  “He was—is—just a good friend. It’s just that I thought, maybe—” Sheila cocked her head. “How do you know Hank had strong feelings for me?” She knew that Hank liked her enough to spend time with her, but he’d been so gentlemanly that she hadn’t even considered that he might be—dared she think it?—falling in love with her.