Stop.
I would ask her. That was the fair thing to do. But first I needed to consider how best to pose the question. For me to ask was major. I wanted her to know I trusted her and believed in her. At the same time, if something had happened that I didn’t know about, some reason she would need that money, then I had to give her the space to explain. How I approached her would take consideration and I needed to mull it over.
“Drew? Church? Problems?”
“Nothing I can’t handle,” I answered, hoping that would be the end of her questions.
Her eyes bored into mine.
She knew.
I could tell simply by the way she looked at me. Right away I detected a subtle change in her. For the first time since I could remember, she couldn’t look me in the eye. My stomach muscles tightened and it felt as if a three-hundred-pound man had climbed onto my back and was pressing me down. I struggled not to slouch forward.
Soon after our brief exchange, she left. For the first time in a very long while, I was grateful to see her go.
What Alex hadn’t said, but seemed to imply, was that each week the amount would rise. The first couple weeks were probably a test to see how much the thief could get away with before anyone noticed.
My heart was sick. It was almost as if I had a case of the flu.
“Daddy?” Sarah said, coming to sit next to me. “Are you sick, too? Like Mark?”
I offered my daughter a soft smile and placed my hand on the top of her head. “I’m not feeling good, either, I’m afraid.”
“Do you have the flu?”
“I don’t know.” How could one explain to a child that what I suffered from was a troubled heart?
I received word via Caden’s attorney that my brother wanted to see me. It took me a long time to make the decision. I knew that after several days in jail, he would be sober. I was stronger now, more sure of myself, and unwilling to risk my future to enable my brother to continue in his destructive lifestyle. This wasn’t the first time he’d asked to see me. Following his arrest, he’d made several attempts to reach me. For my own emotional well-being, I’d refused. I felt ready now.
Monday afternoon, as soon as I’d finished my shift at the café, I headed over to the county jail and put in my request to see Caden. It took fifteen minutes before I was approved. When the clerk returned, she apologized for the delay. I suspected the waiting time was because of my own felony conviction. I was smart enough not to ask.
After another wait of ten minutes or longer, Caden was led out in an orange jumpsuit, wearing slip-on shoes with white socks. He didn’t look at me but kept his eyes lowered. Seeing that he’d been the one who asked to see me, I remained silent, patiently waiting. The last time I’d talked to my brother had been the night he’d shown up at the church apartment. He’d been high on drugs and/or alcohol and abusive, wielding a knife, which he might easily have used on me. With that in mind, I was content to wait him out.
An uncomfortable amount of time went by before Caden looked up. He offered me a sad, broken smile. “Guess you’re mad,” he said.
I shrugged in reply. I certainly had every right to be angry. If not for the counseling I’d received at Hope Center, I would be ranting at him now, filled with righteous indignation, spewing my anger at him. Over the last sixteen months I’d learned how to accept my own responsibility in what had happened, when I’d stolen money from the bank. And with help I’d found a way to forgive him, not because he’d asked or because he deserved my forgiveness. I’d done it for my own peace of mind, to unburden the heavy load of resentment, refusing to cart it around any longer. That didn’t mean I was willing to be drawn back into his craziness, however.
“Why’d you come?” he asked next.
“You asked and you’re my brother.”
“Not much of one, though.”
I didn’t disagree. “I’ve been praying for you, Caden.”
“Praying?” he repeated. “You pray now?” He made it sound like I’d taken up sword-swallowing.
“I do.”
His eyes widened, as if he found this hard to believe. “Next thing I know you’ll become one of those women preachers you see on TV, carting around a Bible.”
“I have a Bible,” I admitted freely, “and, even better, I read it.”
Caden’s mouth sagged open. “What happened?” he cried, as if I’d announced I’d been captured by aliens and been zoomed up to their spaceship.
“I have a new life now.”
“What happened…I mean after you got out of prison? You said you’re a different person, and I can see that you are.”
Condensing the story as much as possible, I relayed how I’d been released from prison with only a few hundred dollars to my name and had walked into the church, where Drew had found me. I went on to explain how Drew had helped me to get into the program at Hope Center. Caden listened intently as I explained what had happened in the time since I’d graduated out of the program.
My brother held my look for several awkward moments while I told him about my current job at The Corner Café, my bookkeeping classes, and my hope of being hired to work at Hope Center in a few months. He didn’t ask questions or speak until I was finished.
“Sounds like you have a great new life now.”
“I have a promising future that’s filled with opportunities I never had before.”
A look of sadness settled over him. “I’m a big loser, Shay…I’m—”
“You’re not a loser,” I said, cutting him off. “You can have a decent future, too.”
“A future in prison, you mean. I stabbed a cop, Shay. They don’t write that off with a slap on the wrist. It doesn’t matter that I was high. I’m looking at some serious time.”
I couldn’t deny his reality. “You’re probably right.” I didn’t want to raise his hopes, but I knew both Kevin and Drew were working behind the scenes, talking to the prosecutor and Caden’s court-appointed attorney, offering alternative solutions to a lengthy prison sentence. No matter what connections my friends had, the bottom line was that my brother was looking at time in prison.
“It’s what I deserve,” Caden whispered, his head lowered. “Especially after what I did to you.”
I wasn’t about to excuse his behavior or write it off, either. “I agree it was low. You threw me under the bus, little brother.”
He chanced a look at me. “Would it help if I told you I regret it? But Shay, I didn’t have any choice. If you didn’t give me the money, they were going to kill me.”
I didn’t want to talk about the past. He wasn’t ready to accept responsibility for his actions and I wasn’t going to rub his face in his mistakes. I’d paid the price for being stupid and allowed him to sabotage my future. But one thing I’d learned through all this was that even the most negative events in my life—prison, nearly landing on the streets of Seattle, homeless and lost—I had turned them all into something good.
If none of that had taken place, I might never have met Drew, might never have received the counseling and emotional healing I needed to become the person I am now.
“I don’t hold any resentment toward you, Caden. I have a new life now. I’ve met a good man. I’m happier than I can ever remember being since Mom died.”
“You in love with one of those preacher guys?”
“I am. How did you know?”
For the first time since we’d started talking, my brother smiled. “Don’t think he could hide it. Protects you like a wolverine. The other guy had to hold him back when I mentioned you were lucky I didn’t take the knife to you.” He glanced up, guilt written on his face. “I…I do crazy stuff when I’m high. I don’t mean for it to happen, but it does.”
He didn’t need to explain, I’d seen the evidence.
He snickered softly and shook his head. “You and a preacher? Really? I find that hard to believe.”
“Believe it, Caden.”
“You going to marry him?”
“It’s too soon to say.” I hoped that was where the future would lead, but I feared we were about to enter a rocky road in our relationship. Time would tell.