Page 5 of Love Story
Father, what’s wrong with me? Why did I let her go? Twice?
An ocean wind from the other side of the mountain range drifted through the scrub brush and cactus plants that dotted the mostly barren mountainside. Cody stared at the vast sky.Are You there, Lord? Do You see me?
I see you, My son. You’re never alone. I am with you. Always.
Peace flooded Cody’s veins. There it was, the familiar voice of God. The sureness that no matter how quiet and lonely the nights, Cody was never truly alone. He let the assurance wash over him like sunshine on a winter day. God would see him through this season—no matter how long it lasted. Riley ran up to him and shook off the stream water, dousing Cody, head to toe.
“Thanks, Riley.” Cody laughed and wiped his face with the back of his hand. “Let’s get home.”
He and Riley jogged back and Riley found a cool spot on the bathroom floor while Cody took a shower. Like he did every day after his late afternoon run. “Just you and me again tonight, buddy.” Cody wrapped a towel around himself.
Once he had changed into sweats and a T-shirt, Cody found the most comfortable spot on the sofa. Maybe Baylor was right. Maybe it wasn’t too late for Andi and him. He considered it for a minute and then dismissed the thought. No way. It was definitely too late. Things couldn’t be worse between them.
Not just the broken first engagement, but his recurrence of post-traumatic stress disorder. ThePTSDwas like a snake in the grass, ready to strike at any moment. And so their relationship had suffered deeply. His episodes of anxiety and moodiness were something he hadn’t explained to Andi. Didn’t want her to know he was still struggling. A misstep for sure. A mistake. Cody sighed. If he had it to do over again, he would be more honest, more open.
But there was no going back now.
God had shown him so much since then, ways to handle the terrifying flashbacks and phobic fears that almost always came without warning. A guy at church had told him about a group for wounded soldiers that met at a home close to Cody’s. For five months he attended two meetings a week and over time Cody learned how to deal with the episodes. How to live with them.
So why not call Andi and explain the situation? How messed up his mind had been and how much better he was doing?
He thought about it but after a while he let the possibility die and settled in with his book. She would never pick up. Not if he texted or called. In that way, there was nothing different about this night compared to the others. Riley lay on his feet as Cody read three chapters in C. S. Lewis’sMere Christianityand then the entire book of James in the Bible. Cody kept theTVoff and turned in early. Like most nights lately as he fell asleep he saw the blue eyes of the girl he still loved. The one he missed with every breath—even if there was no chance he’d ever see her again.
The eyes of Andi Ellison.
2
Andi Ellison carried a box of wrapped turkey sandwiches into the temporary shelter set up for flood victims. Heat sweltered against her skin, and her white T-shirt clung to her back, but with every breath Andi knew this much:
She was right where God wanted her.
“Over here, miss. We’re hungry! Please!” A woman in a torn dress waved her down. Huddled beside her were three young children. “Help us, please!”
“I’m on my way.” Andi hurried toward her. “We have lots. More bottled water on its way, too.” She stooped down and handed sandwiches to the kids. Then she locked eyes with the woman. “I’m sorry... for what you’ve been through.”
“We... we lost everything.” The woman was shaking. She looked small and lost, as much like a child as her little ones.
Andi kept her voice gentle. “Would you like me to pray for you?”
Tears filled the woman’s eyes. “Yes. Please.” She struggled to speak. “We have nowhere to live.” She shook her head, despair hanging from her like a cloak. “A police boat rescued us from the roof. Our house is gone. Everything inside it. All of it.” Her voice broke. “I don’t know what to do.”
It was the same story Andi had heard over and over again.
“He sees you.” Andi believed that with everything in her. She took the woman’s hands. “God says that His Word will be a light unto our path. Let’s just pray for that.”
The woman nodded and hung her head. Beside her, the children held their wrapped sandwiches in silence. Andi prayed that the Lord would extend mercy to them in this terrible situation, that He would lead them to whatever was next.
As Andi talked to God, the woman nodded. Tears streamed down her pale, weathered face. “We were still coming back from last year’s floods.”
No words could make sense of the disaster. Andi squeezed the woman’s hands. “I need to pass out the other sandwiches. I’ll be around if you want to talk.”
For the second year in a row storms had parked over the Gulf Coast and created mass flooding in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. The entire region had again been declared a state of emergency. Andi Ellison had been dispatched to the area as part of a relief team that handled national disasters.
This was Andi’s life now. She had taken a job with the Christian organization after she ended things with Cody. She couldn’t stay in Southern California, couldn’t risk running into him again and being reminded of their second failed engagement.
She hadn’t been good enough for Cody Coleman. Before she broke up with him she found a live YouTube performance by country singer Hillary Scott of Lady Antebellum. She was singing “I Can’t Make You Love Me,” and every line... every single line had spoken straight to Andi’s heart.
I can’t make you love me if you don’t...
