Page 98 of The Secret of Emerald Cottage

I regret being gone so much over the years, and I’d like to get to know you better …

“You had thirty years to get to know me, Dad, and you blew it.” Hurling the second letter aside, he forged on, grunting and shaking his head throughout each one, his animosity growing at the shallowness of his father’s regret. The audacity of his pretense in driveling on and on about his life and how he wanted Brec to be a part of it.

“You had your chance, Pop,” he mumbled almost an hour later, grateful he was almost through the stack, each dated further and further apart until they had stopped coming altogether. Picking up the final envelope, he blinked, surprised at the absence of an address or postmark, with nothing more than Brec’s name carefully written in a script that bore no resemblance to his usual scrawl.

Dear Brec,

You returned all my letters over the years, so I gave up writing them, but this is one I know you will read eventually because it will be my last.

You see, son, I have cancer, so by the time you read this, I will be gone. But before I go, I want to tell you that I have many regrets in my life, but losing both you and your mother are two of my most heartbreaking. That aside, the biggest regret of all is turning away from God because it was that decision—that sin—that greatly damaged me, my marriage, my family, and my life. It’s too late to change that now, but it’s not too late for you.

That’s a lesson I finally learned from Aunt Lilly, who insisted on taking care of me in my final days at Lake Loon. She was kind enough to try and contact you, too, during that time, but she received no response, so I don’t know if you ever got her letter or not.

“I got it,” he whispered, eyes weighting closed as moisture stung at the back of his lids. He remembered all too well the day he’d returned to his apartment after being on the road, only to find a letter from Miss Lilly and endless messages from her on his answering machine. She had begged him to come home because his father was sick, she said, and he had—for her alone—but he’d been too late. His father had passed, and he cringed now that the only regret he’d had at the time was the pain that he’d caused his aunt.

Aunt Lilly has been a godsend,caring for me in these final weeks, both physically and spiritually. It is a debt I can never repay, but in this letter, son, I’m certainly going to try. Because you see, I love that woman and I love you, and her heart will break along with mine if you travel the same path as your father, turning your back on God.

Like you, I was raised at Aunt Lilly’s knee, nurtured with the same faith she nurtured in you growing up. She endowed me with a faith that was so alive and real as a child, that it’s hard to believe how easily it could slip away. But as you have, no doubt, experienced by now, the world lures us away with temptations and pleasures that diminish that faith if we let it, and I certainly did.

I loved your mother, Brec, with everything in me, but when the job demanded I travel as much as I did, temptation finally led me like a lamb to the slaughter. I was unfaithful to her, putting me on the path to destruction of everything I held dear: my faith, my family, my life … and yours. Instead of clinging to that faith for strength, I ignored it, convincing myself that I was justified because of your mother’s propensity for depression, her suspicious nature, her relentless nagging.

But God has opened my eyes that I was the one who drove her to those things, the one who drove her further away from her faith when one affair became two and then two became too many to count. And, I confess with a broken heart, that I am the one whose infidelity and indifference drove her to take her life. Me, not you, son, so if you bear any guilt at all, please—let it go. I have asked forgiveness from God and from Aunt Lilly and now I’m asking you, Brec, to forgive me for so many things. For my failure as a father and role model, my failure as a husband to your mother, and my failure as a man who should have demonstrated honor and strength.

Even though you likely won’t read this until I’m gone, I want you to know how sorry I am and that deep down, beneath all the pain and poison of sin, I loved you, son, more than you will ever know.

I left this earth with a clear conscience and a clean heart, but only through the grace of God and the Blood of Jesus Christ. I had bottled up so much over the years—a lifetime of guilt and bitterness—that I didn’t realize the damage it had done, the trap it had laid, and the path it would take me until too late.

What I’m saying, son, is instead of dealing with the guilt and bitterness from my youth—giving it to Christ—I buried it, ignoring the relentless ticking of a bomb deep down in my soul. A ticking so persistent, that I tried to drown it out with pleasure—adultery, alcohol, and even drugs—seeking my solace from the world instead of from my family and my God. My sorrow and regret knows no bounds, not only for what I did to your mother and you, Brec, but what it will do to you in the future … if you let it.

I know you hate me. I know you are bitter that I destroyed our family. But I also know that very bitterness and hate will destroy you as surely as it destroyed me. And so, son, I am asking you to give it over to God—that hate and bitterness—and forgive me even though I don’t deserve it. Not for myself—but for you, your life, and the family I hope you have one day.

Well, I guess there’s not much more to say except for something I need to confess that I’ve never told another living soul, not even Aunt Lilly. But it’s time.

My guilt and bitterness—the sins that set me on the path to destruction—began long before I married your mother, and even longer before I turned my back on God. You see, as a young man, I was part of a conspiracy involving Greg Schulte’s death, one of the Lake Loon Lads Aunt Lilly often told you about. I’ve kept it a secret all these years because of a promise I made to some of the Lads who were there the night Greg’s body was dumped into Lake Loon.

Let me preface it to say that Greg’s death was accidental. You see, Alan Murray dated Marla all through high school and college, and even though everyone knew Marla was Alan’s girl, Alan was still jealous of the friendship Marla had with Greg. But when she finally broke it off with Alan for Greg, Alan fought with Greg, hitting him so hard, he fell and hit his head on a rock, killing him instantly. In shock, Alan enlisted the help of Pete and Roy to wrap Greg’s body in a tarp and bury it in Emerald Cove since that was the most private cove on the lake.

After Roy’s parents went to bed, Roy stole cement landscaping blocks from his mother’s garden to tie them to the body and sink it. I kept watch on Aunt Lilly’s dock with a flashlight to signal them if anyone came and Pete did the same on Roy’s dock. But when Roy and Alan got to Emerald Cove in Roy’s father’s boat, they discovered they’d forgotten the rope, so they tied the blocks on with their belts and Greg’s instead. Although the police questioned us all at the time, no one ever suspected.

Even though Miss Lilly pounded it into our heads, I learned too late just how true the Scripture, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” I want you to experience that freedom, Brec, not only in learning the truth about how your own bitterness and hate will destroy your soul, but how guilt and bitterness destroyed mine. Please, son—don’t let it happen to you!

My final words are difficult because they will not be easy for me to say or you to hear, but I’d like you to give this part of the letter to the authorities so that Greg’s death—and the guilt of everyone involved—can finally be put to rest. And the person who can verify all of this is someone who needs to be set free more than anyone. The best friend I swore secrecy to who was also there that night …

Pastor David Pritchett.