Silent Pledge

“You don’t know.” She fumbled in her pocket and pulled out a shredded tissue to wipe her nose. “You don’t even know what it’s like to feel this way. You save lives and put out fires for a living. Everybody thinks you’re wonderful. They just think I’m useless, like some leech attached to you.”

“You’re the only one who feels that way. I thought we’d settled this a long time ago.” Buck slowed as they drew nearer to the city and more cars appeared on the four-lane highway.

“Why did you even bother to take me out of the car? I’d’ve been out of your way for good then.”

Clarence winced at that and glanced at Buck’s expression in the light from an oncoming car. She’d cut deep on that one. Muscles tensed at Buck’s jaw, and his eyes filled with the quick kind of tears that even the toughest man couldn’t prevent when his heart was being mangled. He didn’t say a word.

Clarence cleared his throat. “Ain’t gonna work, Kendra.”

She sniffed and dabbed her nose and looked at him.

“Nothing’s gonna make Buck stop this truck and turn around and take you home, because then you might try to kill yourself again, just like Dr. Mercy said. And Buck couldn’t stand that. Losing you would tear him up.”

The tears on her cheeks sparkled in the city light.

“Try thinking about how that’d make him feel,” Clarence said, knowing even that would be hard for her right now. A depressed person had trouble thinking about other people.

And then, as he tried to imagine what might be going through her mind right now, another powerful revelation struck him. He was thinking about other people. All those things Lukas told him were true, about loving your neighbor as yourself, about caring for the needs of others, of giving what was in your heart, and how good that could make you feel. Lukas had said living like that was just about the most important thing in life.

Lukas also said there was one thing more important—to love God first. Ivy had said the same thing, and so had Mercy. When you loved God first, everything else fell into place.

And God took your life and made it mean something.

Clarence blinked and looked out his window at the lights of a residential section of the eastern edge of Springfield. The window reflected the outlines of Buck and Kendra and his own dark bulk, as big as both of them put together.

As Buck touched the brake and turned from Highway 60 to Highway 65, Clarence replayed Lukas’s words in his mind. Was God really using him tonight to help Odira and Crystal and Buck and Kendra?

The thought overwhelmed him and brought tears to his eyes.

He sniffed. Kendra turned and looked up at him. Oh, great, here was big, bumbling Clarence crying and getting ready to drip all over the place.

“What’s wrong?” she asked softly.

The compassionate sound of her voice made his tears come faster, and he didn’t really know why. Maybe it was just because all the pain in this truck cab couldn’t help but affect him.

Or maybe it was something else. Maybe God was here with them. What did Ivy put in those chocolate chip cookies?

“Clarence?” Kendra said.

He shook his head. “I’m okay.” He wanted to tell her she would be okay, too, but he didn’t know. Who was he to predict how everything would turn out in the end?

But maybe, like Lukas was always telling him, things could be better. With prayer.

Could he pray?

Out of respect for Ivy, he always bowed his head when she said grace over the meal—even though he barely had enough of a meal to pray over. If she could talk to God for his sake, why couldn’t he talk to God for Kendra’s sake and for Buck’s?

He closed his eyes and felt tears slip down his cheeks. He knew, from those preachers Ivy listened to on TV, that all he had to do was think the prayer.

God, let me help them. Let me show them everything will be okay because You’re here and You care. You are here, aren’t You?

The sudden, soft touch of a hand on his arm startled his eyes open.

“Clarence?” Kendra said. “You sure you’re not sick?”

He smiled and looked down at her. “Nope, but I could sure use a bathroom. Buck? Think you could pull over at that station over there? Looks like the place is open.”

Marla heard Jerod’s tiny baby voice again. She turned toward him on the bed before she even opened her eyes, but a sudden sharp pain caught her in the chest.

She gasped and grabbed at the spot between her ribs. Her breath came in shallow pockets of air, and she could feel her heart beating faster.

Fear washed through her. Was she having a heart attack? Was this what it felt like?

Jerod cried louder. Marla struggled against the pillows and finally pulled herself up.

About five seconds later the pain went away. Oxygen once more entered her lungs, and the sudden relief washed over her in a powerful wave. What was going on?

She took a few more deep breaths and reached for her crying baby, but before she could pull him into her arms, the piercing shaft stabbed her again and forced her backward. She cried out from the shock. “God, help!”

Again the pain subsided and her lungs filled. Was this some weird kind of asthma attack? It didn’t feel like one. And there hadn’t been the usual warning. Still, her inhalers—the ones her doctor gave her for free because she couldn’t afford them—were in the top drawer of her rickety bedside stand. She’d better get them out.

More carefully this time, she reached toward Jerod. He needed changing before she did anything else. She picked up one of the last three clean diapers, and as she did so, she pressed against the new bruise on her right calf.

“Ouch!” She couldn’t hear her own voice over the sound of Jerod’s squalling. And she barely caught another breath before the shaft struck her chest again, harder than before. She dropped the diaper on the floor and gasped. The pain grew worse, and the dim room went black for a few seconds.

But Jerod’s cries brought her back.

She took shallow breaths, willing her heart to slow its beating. She felt weaker now, and she didn’t have the strength to pick up the diaper. She pulled open the drawer and took out both inhalers. While Jerod continued to cry, she fumbled with the sprays. She could barely concentrate on breathing.

Someone pounded from the other side of the paper-thin wall at the head of her bed. “Shut that kid up in there!” came a rusty female growl.

The woman must be a part of that biker gang. Marla wanted to tell her to shut up, but she didn’t have the courage, or the energy.

Another throb in her leg made her grimace. If she’d worn the stockings they gave her, she would have had some protection.

She reached down to unfasten Jerod’s dirty diaper when she felt the hit again. This time the pain shocked her like a kitchen knife jutting through her ribs. She nearly fell on top of the baby before she could push herself away. The room grew blacker. In desperation she slid from the bed to the cold, dirty floor and groped for the telephone, but then she remembered that it had been disconnected.

She had to get help. What if something happened to her? Jerod would be all alone. He could freeze in this room before daylight.

As the pain once more let up, she glanced toward the thin wall. “Help me!” she called as loudly as breath would allow. “Somebody help me, please!”

She heard a muffled groan, and again someone pounded on the wall. “Turn off that TV!”

She closed her eyes in hopeless despair. “No, God, please, don’t let this happen.” With the last of her strength, and the healthy cries of her cheering section, she shoved the inhalers into the pocket of her pajama top, scrambled to the door of the tiny efficiency apartment, unlocked it, and used the threshold to pull herself to her feet.

That was a big mistake. Everything went black again. She dropped to her knees and pushed the door open and felt the bite of winter wind brace her exposed flesh.

“Somebody help me!” she called out into the night. “Please!” As she said the last word the pain came again, and her baby’s cries grew softer as she slumped across the front walk.