AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Standing outside the front door, Levi watched the movers drive away with a huge tractor trailer filled with everything in the Jacobs’ family home except for Maggie’s own things.
He shivered slightly in the late morning sun, wearing only a thick flannel shirt layered with a turtleneck. His jacket was inside the house, but it had been warm indoors all morning when he helped Maggie with the movers.
His chest constricted.
He had only felt this way three times in his life: at the funerals of his mother, Aunt Marie, and Uncle Melvin.
Uncle Melvin had probably died of a broken heart because he couldn’t live without Aunt Marie, who had passed away months before he had. They had been high school sweethearts and were married for seventy-six years before the Lord took them home in the same year.
Now Levi felt that pain in his chest again, a certain feeling of grief, a fear of losing something he could never regain.
Never?
The one he felt he would miss was still inside the house behind him. Quickly, he made his way back into the house, locking the front door behind him. The living room was bare saved for a sleeper armchair that turned into a single bed at night for Maggie now that even her bedroom furniture was on its way to Lakeside, Florida.
Nearby, Maggie was staring out the side window, where sunshine shone into the living room floor, covered with dust now that the old furniture pieces had been removed.
Levi went to her and stood by her. He wasn’t sure what she was looking at. Outside, the trees had shed their leaves. December was as cold as it could be in Atlanta, sans snow.
He said nothing because nothing needed to be said. He knew Maggie well enough in the last three years to know that his presence was all she needed.
He made her happiest when he spent quality time with her. They didn’t have to do anything fancy. In fact, she’d rather stay at home and do hardly anything. Not even watching television. They might listen to hymns or church music, but not today.
Today it was all silence.
Christmas was precisely a week away next Saturday, but Maggie had chosen not to play any Christmas music this morning.
It felt funereal, this impending parting between two friends, but Levi held his feelings in check.
“You know, I’m going to miss this house.” Maggie sighed.
Levi said nothing.Let her talk.
“Sure, I have God with me wherever I go, and I know that this world is not my home, but I grew up here.” Maggie pointed to the sidewalk beyond the brown grass. “Skinned my knees on that cement over there when I learned to ride my bike. Climbed up that tree over there with my brother and got him grounded.”
“Malachi was outdoorsy?” Levi asked. “I would never have known.”
“Nowadays he spends a lot of time in his study, preparing sermons, but back when he was a kid, he was kind of wild. Often got into trouble with my parents.” She laughed. “Mom said he knew better than to teach a five-year-old to climb trees without a harness and a net to catch us if we fell.”
Levi raised an eyebrow.
“That’s my mom for you. You haven’t met my parents, have you?”
“Once in Miami during a disaster relief. Should I visit them again?” Levi wanted to go there, but Maggie apparently didn’t catch his drift.
“And…the day Malachi went to college, I cried. I was only a freshman in high school, but I didn’t want him to go clear out of state for school. I missed him terribly, but he was going to Bible college to learn to serve God in a pastoral ministry and I had to let him go.”
“Understandably.”
“Yet, I lived from school break to school break, waiting for Malachi to come home to spend time with me in this house.” She turned away from the window. Stared at the mostly empty living room and beyond, to the small kitchen.
“When I went to college, I decided to pick one in town so that I could commute from home,” Maggie said. “Every day I could go to class and still come home to my own room and Mom’s home-cooked meals.”
Levi tried to recall if Maggie ever told him her family story, but then again, prior to last year, they had only been casual friends in church. In the last year, he had been full of himself and his own worries. He felt sorry now that he had taken up so much of Maggie and Malachi’s time—to the point that he had forgotten they also had lives of their own.
“In my sophomore year, God called my parents to serve as missionaries in Europe. Dad quit his job and entered the ministry. Next thing I knew, they were gone—first to training and then to the field—and I didn’t see them again for the rest of my college years.”
“I know that story.” Levi felt good that he had paid some attention to the Jacobs siblings who had taken him in. “Only Malachi showed up at your commencement.”
