Both Ways

  “It sounds like she’s in good hands out there,” Judy said, trying to calm him down.

  “That’s what he said. I don’t know, I just... I’m torn, you know? I want to finish, and I just know I’ll get on that plane and fly out there and she’ll be fine, and I will have screwed up my one chance.”

  “Not to mention the rest of tonight,” she said as she began to rub his tense shoulders.

  “This may be hard to believe after last night, but making love is the farthest thing from my mind right now.”

  “I understand. But it might help to just let me hold you. If you are going to stay, you might as well stay here. You’ll rest a lot better. I guarantee it. Do you need to call anybody?”

  “No. They have my cell number if anything comes up. And I told Dr. Cross that I would only call if I was leaving.”

  “Then come here.” She sat back on the bed with her back resting against the headboard. She patted her chest and held out her arms. “Therapy.”

  Madison slipped out of his Nikes and lay down on the bed, laying his head gently on her shoulder. She pulled him around to her breast. He didn’t object. She rubbed his back and ran her fingers through his hair. Madison barely moved. Her smell was entrancing, her body soft, yet firm. He fell asleep in her arms. Judy reached over and clicked off the light after half an hour and she, too, fell asleep.

  Steve Franz gave up his watch at 4:00 a.m. He clicked one more frame to give himself a time stamp, which he had done every five minutes since the door closed four hours ago. “I couldn’t have spelled it out much clearer to the man. He’s making an unfortunate choice,” Franz said to the empty hotel room as he undressed for bed.

  Chapter 90

  At 1:45 am, Dr. Penquay came into the waiting room and told the group that Jill’s condition had weakened to the point of grave concern and that she was not strong enough to work through an induced labor. He asked someone to try to reach Mr. Enright to approve an emergency c-section. He turned and left the room as fast as he’d come in. Dave was on his feet dialing Madison’s cell.

  “If he’s in the air, his phone’s not going to work,” Greg said.

  “I don’t know if they’re letting people turn them back on after take-off now or not,” said Pastor Dan.

  “It’s ringing,” Dave said.

  Madison awoke from a deep sleep in the dark room. He heard his phone, but it took him a moment to compose himself enough to find it in his pants pocket and sit up on the side of the bed. “Yeah?”

  “Madison? Dave. You in the air?”

  “Uh, no. Couldn’t make it out, what’s up?” Madison cleared his throat and struggled to focus his eyes on the bedside clock. It was 4:05 am.

  “Jill’s bad. Doc’s asking for permission to perform an emergency c-section. He needs your go-ahead. Hold on.” Dave was already making his way to the nurse’s station. He covered the phone speaker, “Dr. Penquay?” he said. A nurse motioned for him to follow, and Dave walked into the pre-op room where Dr. Penquay was preparing Jill for surgery.

  “Madison Enright,” Dave told the doctor.

  “Mr. Enright, Dr. Penquay. Wish you were here, my friend.”

  “Sorry, Doctor, What can I do?”

  “I need your permission to perform an emergency c-section. Jill is in no condition to help us right now. She is fading - very weak.”

  “Is she going to be all right?” Madison pleaded.

  “Mr. Enright, I need your permission. Give me that, and we’ll have the baby out in five minutes, Jill’s condition is touch and go. I’m sorry to have to say, but we are doing the best we can.”

  “Go. Do it!”

  The doctor tossed the phone back to Dave Bean and prepped for surgery.

  “Mad, you there?”

  “Yeah, Dave, what in the world?”

  “She just took a nose-dive. We don’t really know.

  Terry said she might just go into labor no matter how much they got her body to recover. Something about when it’s time, it’s time. And Jill is just too weak, I guess, to go through the delivery process. She looks pretty bad, buddy, to be honest. Where are you, you’ve really got to get out here.”

  “I’m getting on the first plane out, landing at 8:00 a.m. Please call me when they get out of surgery.”

  “Yeah.”

  Madison booked the flight, then left a message for Dr. Cross and Dr. Culbert with the front desk, “I don’t want to wake them, but they need to get this message at 6:00 a.m. sharp. Promise me.” They did.

  Madison fell backwards onto the bed. He should have left four hours ago. Now he was forced to wait an eternal three hours till the next flight out. Judy rolled over and put her head on his chest. Looking up into his eyes, she said, “I’m sorry.”

  He smiled, “You don’t have anything to be sorry about. You’re one of the good things in my crazy life.”

  “Do you mean that?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

  She got to her hands and knees on the bed and brought her face over his, then slowly leaned down and pressed her lips against his, softly at first, then harder, longer. Slowly she pulled away, she licked her lips and sat on the edge of the bed. His eyes adjusted to the darkness, Madison couldn’t take his eyes off of her. She was everything he had never had. She was the dream, and she was his for the taking. But not like this.

  “You should go,” she said, pulling up the zipper on her hoodie.

  “Yeah.” He stood and slipped on his Nikes walking to the door he paused, turned and said, “Judy?” She looked at him, her eyes moist. He wanted to say something meaningful, something that made sense, but nothing would come to mind. “Bye,” he finally said.

  Her lips turned up at the edges in a slight grin, and he left. Madison dropped the rental car off at the Hertz lot at 5:30 a.m. and got a call from Dave Bean while he was on the shuttle bus headed for the DFW terminal.

  “Dave?”

  “Mad. It’s a girl. You’re a daddy!”

  “Hey! All right! How’s Jill?”

  “She’s in ICU, Mad. Doc said her body was just too weak for this.”

  “She’s gonna be okay though, right?”

  “He said he’d know more in an hour, after they get some fluids and junk into her that they couldn’t do while the baby was inside. I don’t know what all he’s doing. I’ve got to tell you though, man, it’s been touch and go for a while. Pretty scary.”

  “I’m glad you’re there.”

  “Well...”

  “Look. I’m at the airport, I’ll be landing at 8:00 a.m. so I should be there by about 8:30 a.m. I’m so sorry about this, Dave.”

  “I’ll be by her side the whole time, Mad. And, if not me, one of the other Jill Enright fans that has been here all night. Just get here, okay?”

  “Yeah, okay. See you soon, tell everybody thanks.” Madison didn’t feel like the conquering hero. He didn’t feel like the big-time senior pastor or national conference speaker. He felt like the jerk that just about lost his wife because of his selfish pride and lust. He didn’t make eye contact or speak to anyone on his long walk through the terminal. At 6:30 a.m., just before boarding, he called the Hyatt and asked for Dr. Cross’s room. Leon answered, and Madison explained the situation. Cross said that Dr. Ray was waiting in the wings for just this purpose, not to worry about it and to give Jill their love. The grace of the old gentleman didn’t sooth Madison’s guilty conscience. He dialed the Hyatt back and asked for room 613 but hung up after the first ring. He’d said goodbye, he needed to leave it at that.

  Chapter 91

  Steve Franz stopped in at the main session to listen to Madison’s final address and heard the news, by way of announcement from the podium, that Mr. Enright had returned to California for a family emergency. Franz stepped out of the hall and changed his flight home. He called Paula Stone on the way to the airport. It was 8:45 a.m. PST.

  “Hi, Franz,” Paula said, stepping into the hall outside th
e waiting room.

  “Hey, Paula, how you doing?”

  “Spent the night at the hospital with Jill Enright. She had a girl.”

  “Good for her - and the daddy?”

  “Just arrived, he’s in with her now. Had a hard time getting a flight out of DFW or something. You okay?”

  “I’m fine. We’ve got to talk, today if possible.”

  “I’m on the clock till about 8:45 p.m., Pastor Dan’s preaching tonight. I’ve got to be in-the-zone by about 5:30 pm, can we talk afterward?”

  “I miss you.”

  “You don’t sound right, Franz.”

  “Just disappointed, I guess. Trying to figure out what to do with some information. I need your help on this one.”

  “You want me to call in, meet as soon as you get here?”

  “No. Go ahead and do your thing. The place would fall apart without you. After is fine.”

  Chapter 92

  Jill Enright was still hooked up to a web of tubes, IV bags and monitors when Madison got to her room. The doctor had briefed him before entering that she had pulled through the worst of it. She was strong in spite of her weakened blood, and would bounce back in a few days and be good as new. She reached to him as he entered, her right hand connected, by a light green plastic cap on her index finger, to some kind of monitor.

  “Mad... You made it,” she said in a whisper, her voice was weak. He went straight to the bed and leaned over her, hugging and kissing her. Her lips were dry and her nose connected by a tube to an oxygen monitor. She looked beautiful, considering what she’d come through, and he wondered silently why he had ever left her side.

  “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you,” he said. “I’m an idiot,” he didn’t say.

  “We have a girl. Have you seen her?”

  “I came straight here. Had to see the mommy first. It was scary being two thousand miles away and getting that call this morning.”

  “I’m sorry, honey,” she whispered. “I don’t know what happened.”

  “Doctor said the baby just insisted on having her way. She wanted out and all the relaxation medicine in the world wasn’t going to keep her in there a minute longer than necessary. Since you were too weak for a natural birth, he had to do the operation. You lost a lot of blood.”

  “Mmm...”

  “And your blood wasn’t that strong to begin with, I guess.”

  “Baby just used all the iron, I suppose. It’s all better now though... now that you’re here,” she smiled. “Let’s see her, huh?” With her other hand Jill pressed the nurse’s button, and five minutes later the little one was wheeled into the room in an acrylic baby bed. The name on the tag said, Dawna Jane Enright. She was seven pounds, eight ounces and nineteen inches long, her hair was dark, like her mother’s, and she had long, delicate fingers and tiny little fingernails. The nurse raised her up and gave her to Jill who snuggled her close and introduced her to her father. After a few minutes of family time, Dave Bean came into the room and asked if Jill felt well enough to have some people come in and see the baby. When Jill said “Absolutely.” Dave opened the door for those who had pulled the night shift, praying for Jill and the baby.

  Jill presented Dawna Jane and softly explained the significance the name held to her. Jill handed the baby to Dawn who was the first person besides the nurses and Jill to hold her namesake, and considered it an honor. Pretty soon the attending nurse chased them all out except father and baby. Little Dawna was wheeled back to the nursery, and Madison pulled up a chair and sat quietly with his wife wondering how things had become so complicated.

  Chapter 93

  Steve Franz didn’t make it to Saturday night church, but took the extra time to stop by the Chron. and get some images printed, which he placed in a manila envelope and slid into his briefcase. He checked his office mail and went home to grab a shower before heading back across the bridge to Hershel’s. He arrived at 8:40 p.m. and got a booth. Paula looked a little tired when she arrived ten minutes later, but smiled when she saw him. He stood and hugged her for a long time, which she loved but considered odd, and led to her first question.

  “Steve, what’s going on?”

  “I just needed to talk to you.”

  “But that... seemed....” She didn’t finish.

  “I missed you, okay. Geez. I might not be the heartless reporter you think I am.”

  “I’ve never thought that.”

  “I know.”

  “Okay. This is Paula. I don’t play Twenty Questions. Just lay it out.”

  “Well, I was hoping the trail I’ve been following would lead to a different place. It’s made me kind of sad - that’s not an emotion that is particularly welcome in my business. Reporters are supposed to be purely analytical, but this one has me by the heart.”

  “I assume your alluding to Pastor and the whole Dawn Neilson thing. I’ve thought a lot about that, especially in reference to the church. I even talked to Pastor Dan about it, without naming names, to check myself. And he says I’m thinking right about this.”

  “So, give.”

  “It isn’t my church. And it isn’t Madison Enright’s church. It’s Christ’s church. He’s the leader and head and boss. If one or more of the hired hands screw up, it might be difficult to recover, but it won’t be fatal, because it wasn’t them sustaining the work in the first place. Does that make any sense?”

  “Not really. Sounds idealistic. What I have would, I think, be devastating, maybe even fatal for the church.”

  “I disagree. Maybe for a few people, but not the body - the body belongs to God.”

  Steve thought about that for a long time. He felt a strange sensation of faith start to spark in his naturally pessimistic heart, which made no sense at all based on what he had been doing for the past month. He had to attribute it to the amazing, objective, unpredictable woman sitting across from him. He shook his head and said as much.

  “You are truly amazing. Where do you get insight like that? It’s like you’ve already thought things through and made sense of it all in a larger context - how do you do that?”

  “I’m just smarter than you,” she smiled.

  “That’s probably it.”

  Steve took a deep breath and started to reach into his briefcase for the envelope. He hesitated, pulled his hand back and decided to give a synopsis of the story first. In a quiet, measured tone he said, “Paula, there’s more to this than Dawn Neilson. A lot more.”

  She looked deeply into Steve’s eyes. Seeing the weight of concern, honesty and pain he was feeling. She bowed her head and stared at the table, then she closed her eyes and whispered, “What else is there?”

  “He is seeing another woman. He met her at least once here in the Bay Area and then again in Dallas, over the past few days.”

  “At the Family Conference? But...”

  “I was there.”

  “You followed him to Dallas?”

  “I thought this might test our relationship.”

  “Steve, that’s tabloid stuff, that’s under you.”

  “Better me than the tabloids, Paula, trust me on that. I haven’t written anything. I want to figure out how to avoid writing this, if that’s possible.”

  Paula thought about that for a minute. She trusted Steve Franz. “What happened?”

  Steve gave a clear and succinct description of the chain of events. He finished by retrieving the envelope from his case. It was unsealed, he slid it across the table.

  “Her name is Judy Turnbull. She’s from Texas. He was in her room at the Hyatt for a minimum of four hours last night.”

  “Last night? But...” Paula’s temper flared at that one. Last night, she didn’t say, his wife was fighting for her life, giving birth to their child. She clenched her teeth and slipped the 8x10 photos part way out of the folder. They were chronological, beginning with the Marriott. She reached an image of some clothes, “What’s this?”

  “Those are the clothes Mr. Enright was wearing
the night at the Marriott. He dumped them at McDonalds; I happened by.”

  “DNA?”

  “Probably, but this isn’t television. But trust me, there’s enough lipstick on that shirt to make a pretty good case for what they were doing. Can’t really see it in the picture.”

  “And you have this shirt?”

  “Mhmm. Kind of takes it out of the realm of my word against his, I would think.”

  Paula fanned through a few images taken from the peephole camera and pushed the envelope back across the table. She just sat and stared at Steve Franz.

  “It’s over,” she finally said. “We finally turn the corner and there is literally no end to the growth potential, and then he does something stupid like this.” She was venting frustration, yet her voice was soft and controlled, like a seasoned executive. “And his family... Jill...” She shook her head and looked aimlessly around the diner. Tears welled up in the pretty brown eyes of Paula Stone, and she looked back at Steve Franz who offered his hands across the table. She placed hers into his, then drew the left one back to wipe her eyes.

  “Excuse me,” she said suddenly, and got up and went to the ladies room. Steve stowed the envelope and waited for Paula to regain composure. She didn’t return for ten minutes, but when she finally sat down, she didn’t look tired any more, and she had her game face on.

  “So. What do we do?”

  Chapter 94

  Mother and daughter were able to come home from the hospital the following Friday. Madison had been at Jill’s side most of that time. His office hours consisted of a few minutes in the morning to check messages and sometimes late at night on his way home from the hospital. Billy had come back home to stay with Grandpa Billy and Grandma Eerl who had flown in from Oklahoma to be with their daughter and help out. By Friday, Madison had also reconnected with Judy Turnbull via email and had exchanged cell phone numbers so they could speak once in a while. It seemed like the worst had passed and like he and the family could get back to where they had been. Madison invited Billy Boyles to preach in all three services that weekend and informed the church that they were in for a rare treat. Jill joined her mother in the front row of the second service Sunday morning, coming in a few minutes late with Dawna Jane, who made her on-stage debut at the Chapel to the collective ooh’s and aah’s of the congregation. Madison held her for everyone to see, including the cameraman, whose close up of a giant baby yawn was projected of multiple giant screens.