Page 18 of To Bring You Back
“Why don’t you play with the worship team?”
“I help with the kids during the service.” Not every week, but often enough.
He nodded slowly. “You used to love playing.”
“I haven’t touched a bass in years. Not to play it, anyway.”
Now, he was the one to look away. He seemed to take inventory of the file cabinets, the photocopier, the shelves of colored paper they used for bulletins. “This isn’t where I expected to find you.”
“You’re here for another reason?”
“No, I knew you were here today. I called to make sure of it.” He leaned forward, placing his forearm on the corner of her desk. “What I mean is, I didn’t expect your life to turn out like this.”
What right did he have to judge? To think her less-than? “What do you know about my life?”
“I know you’re not using your degree. You’re working two jobs and barely getting by. You quit music, even though you loved it.”
He left so much out, all the good she did for this church and this community. How much Drew and Asher depended on her. The magnificent view she had from her own front porch.
The rotting porch that others offered to fix because she was a charity case.
The unsteadiness of emotion seeped into her chest. “You don’t know me.”
“But you think you know me.”
Shedidknow him. Why did she always bite when she saw something about him in the tabloids? And if an entertainment show mentioned him, why could she never change the channel? She couldn’t get enough news of him, even though everything she heard and read and saw left her lungs stinging with anger. He joked around onAudition Room, obviously enjoying his life while dating beautiful women and probably behaving with them the same as he had with her.
The only thing she’d managed to resist was Awestruck’s music. His voice struck her too deep.
“I know you much better than I’d like to.”
He nodded, mouth tight. “I’ll give you that. What happened when I came home that year never should’ve—”
“That’s not what I mean.” She spoke quickly, though doing so added gas to the fire blazing in her throat. “I mean, that too, but I’m sick of seeing you in magazines all the time. All the interviews and the awards and the TV show.”
He hung his head and pushed what looked like tense fingers into his hair. When he sat back again, he leveled his gaze on her. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about that night, and I’m sorry that in my guilt, I fired Fitz instead of facing him. God and I dealt with my sin a long time ago, and I told myself that was enough, but it wasn’t because my actions involved you too. I never acknowledged that because God … I knew He’d forgive, but you, after Fitz died …”
“You thought God would absolve you free and clear.”
He cleared his throat and studied his hands. “He did. Jesus Christ died so that God can forgive us when we repent. Free and clear.”
If we confess our sins, He’s faithful and just to forgive.
But what about the sins that were too bad to put into words? “So, just like that”—she snapped her fingers—“everything’s good again.” Her voice came out rough, as if she’d inhaled smoke.
He lifted his face. “I’m still a sinner. But I’m forgiven. And, Adeline …”
He believed he was forgiven.
It wasn’t fair.
Her eyes were hot, and she caught herself holding her breath to keep from adding air to her smoldering throat.
When he didn’t continue, she met his gaze.
“All you have to do is ask, and you’re forgiven too. Without doing anything. So if that’s what all this is.” He circled his hand, indicating the office or maybe the city. The life. “If you’re trapped in some effort at doing penance, you’re wasting your time and your potential. It’s not what God wants for you, and it’s not what Fitz would’ve wanted.”
A tear fell, and she hated that show of weakness. Hated how much she wished he was right, how transparent her motives were to him. But there was no way Fitz, let alone God, wished her well. “How would you know?”
