~Blake~
“Decided that she couldn’t be with you, huh?”
Blake took a breath as Tim’s words washed over him.
His first mistake, after leaving Leslie in tears, was coming back home. He hadn’t been thinking, not clearly as least, as he’d driven the distance from her side of town to his, mulling over what he’d done.
It was the right thing. She couldn’t love him. She never really did.
He kept telling himself that as he slammed into the house, prepared to go back to his room and forget everything.
But there was something in the way he was carrying himself, a sorrow that was apparent in his eyes. Tim picked up on it instantly from where he sat in his recliner watching the television, then focusing quickly in on his son’s misery like a shark finding blood in the water.
Tim could do that like no one else.
“What’s wrong with you?” he’d asked, getting up and making his way into the kitchen.
Blake should have told him that it was nothing, that it was fine. But he was so angry about what Leslie had said, about the truth of it, that he was no different than his father, that his life would end up being as miserable.
That’s why he couldn’t keep quiet.
“You’re what’s wrong,” he said, meeting his father’s eyes and practically snarling it.
For all the poking and prodding that Tim had done over the years to instigate this kind of fight from his son, he still managed to look surprised that it had actually finally worked.
“Me?” he asked, quickly getting over that shock and beginning to bow up. “What’s wrong with me?”
“You’re useless,” Blake said, the words coming easy. All those years of holding them in and here they were, flying out so effortlessly. “You’ve never done anything good in all your life, and you can’t even hold onto a job, even when it’s handed to you on a silver platter –”
“A job,” Tim said, smirking. “I know what this is about. It’s about Travis Collins and that job I had, isn’t it? You tried to talk about it before with me. But you were too scared.”
Blake wasn’t scared now.
“That job, other jobs,” he said. “It’s all the same.”
“Or not,” Tim said. “This about that Collins girl? Is that why you’re so mad? Afraid I made you look bad to her brother?” Then, a new idea hit him, a gleeful one. “She broke up with you, didn’t she?”
Tim would assume this, of course.
Blake’s silence was met with laughter.
“Decided that she couldn’t be with you, huh?” Tim asked, laughing harder now. “Because you’re worthless. Just like I’ve always said –”
But Tim didn’t finish his thought because Blake was on him even as the words were leaving his mouth.
They were well matched in size, but what was scarier was how well matched they were in their fury. Rage and anger, the likes of which Blake had never dreamt himself possible of, seemed to radiate off of him as he punched and kicked just as hard as his old man, taking the abuse as well as he delivered it.
Like father, like son. The thought made him only fight harder, right up until Tim landed a punch that knocked Blake right to the ground, his breath gone so forcefully that he could barely gasp.
He stared up at the ceiling, thinking about who he’d said he would be in Christ. A new creation. Sin, repentance, redemption. Yet here he was, worse than he’d been before. He was a failure, just like Leslie knew he would be.
Tim’s head came into view above him, dripping blood from his mouth and onto Blake’s forehead, like some perverse baptism of sorts. He’d kill him now likely, and Blake was prepared to welcome death. There would be grace surely, even for a loser like him.
“Get out of my house,” Tim said before walking away.
And after getting his breath back, Blake did just that, driving away from the trailer with no idea what he was going to do.
He ended up parking at the Collins house.
A dumb decision, but there was nowhere else to go. He watched the house silently, thinking back to another time he’d done this, how Travis had welcomed him in, had accepted him for who he was, had even defended him to Leslie –
He’d wanted to be like Travis Collins. Now, though… well, now…
“Is this going to be a thing now, kid?”
There was Travis, right at his window. Blake hadn’t heard the truck pull up or Travis coming over either one because he’d been crying. Unmanly and pathetic likely, but that was the truth of things.
Travis noticed his tears after a startled moment, his eyes darting over Blake’s swollen lip and his black eye.
“Hey,” he said, the smile falling from his lips. “What happened to you?”
“Leslie and I broke up,” Blake managed, feeling the need to admit this first, knowing that he didn’t deserve the mercy of being invited into the house, not with Leslie there, not with the way he’d had to end things, not with the way he knew he’d beg her to take him anyway if he saw her again –
“Leslie did this to you?” Travis asked, shocked.
She probably could, knowing her.
Blake took a gasping breath, the tears coming harder now. “My dad,” he said. “It’s… I’m a loser. I’m not good enough, and…”
What more was there to say? Blake looked at the house mournfully, his eyes finding Leslie’s window. He wasn’t good enough. He never would be.
That was the truth.
Travis watched him silently, leaning on the window. “Hey, Blake,” he said softly, his voice soothing, “it’s going to be okay.”
“No,” Blake sobbed. “Leslie… Travis, I’m sorry…”
“Blake,” he said again, reaching out and putting his hand to Blake’s shoulder now, strong and reassuring. “You’re okay. You’re safe now.”
Safe. Here. But he couldn’t –
“I can’t go home,” he said. “And I can’t… I can’t…” He looked back to the house.
“You can’t stay here,” Travis said, agreeing with this, concern still in his voice.
Blake wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve. What was there for him now? Where would he go? What would he do?
“You’re eighteen, right?” Travis said, pulling his phone out.
What difference did that make?
“Eighteen?” Travis said, looking at him pointedly. “A man. An adult who can make his own decisions, right? Legally?”
“Yeah,” Blake said, not sure what he was getting at. “Yes, sir.”
“Then you don’t have to go back,” he murmured to himself as he searched the call list on his phone. “Trickier if you were seventeen, still a minor.” He glanced up at Blake. “I may know a few things about custody and laws regarding minors. From hard experience.”
Back when his sisters were little. But what did this have to do with anything?
“Pastor John,” he said, talking on his phone. “You got a spare room?”
Blake could feel just a fraction of his hopelessness dissipate as he listened to Travis talking with their pastor. After a few minutes, the two men hung up and Travis took another breath.
“You’ve got a place to stay,” he said. “But I’m driving you over there. Scoot over.”
Blake began to protest, even as Travis opened the door. “But Leslie… Travis, she –”
“Will be okay, kid,” Travis said, meeting his eyes. “And so will you.”
Blake prayed it so again and again as they got to Pastor John’s house, as the pastor and his wife welcomed him in, as they talked him through what had happened, and as they made plans for Blake to stay for the summer.
Before he left, Travis pulled Blake aside and told him just this…
“You tell me if I can do anything for you.”
When Blake nodded, his throat knotted with tears, Travis said it again, understanding in his eyes.
“Anything you need, Blake. You remember that.”
Leslie Collins wasn’t in church the next week.
Not like Blake had expected that she would be, not after the way she’d masterfully managed to avoid him all week long, taking elaborate and baffling means to do so, given the small size of the school and how many mutual friends they had. He’d prepared himself to be cold and unfeeling if and when they ran into one another, just because this was how it had to be. He wasn’t sure he could keep on doing so, though, because his heart was deceitful above all things, still clinging to her even though he knew he shouldn’t. It was for this reason alone that he should have been thankful that Leslie was nowhere to be seen at school that week, apart from a face in the crowds, turned away from him at every possible juncture and chance sighting.
He should have been glad, but he felt the sting of her absence and avoidance as though she’d been the one to dump him.
Stupid, all of it. But her words kept coming back to him, reminding him of what she really thought, how she really felt, how this was how it had to be, how it had to be true because look at the mess he was in now…
She wasn’t in church, though. Leslie never missed church.
Sunday school had been quieter than usual without her giving the answers to all the questions and with everyone staring at Blake’s face, wondering at what had happened to him. Blake had found his mind wandering when it normally didn’t, thinking about her, hoping that she was okay, doubting what he’d done, and irrationally feeling concern for the same girl who had spoken such harsh words about him.
Wasn’t that what love was like, though? Feeling something for someone so deep and real, no matter how they treated you?
His thoughts overrode his good sense and the screaming admonitions his pride was giving as they yelled at him that it was good that she was gone. He ignored it all and pushed his way into the hall as soon as Sunday school was over, determined to reach the junior high class first. Holly had left class halfway through to go and help out in the nursery, so he couldn’t ask her where Leslie was, but he knew that Brooke would be with the other eighth graders. He was the first there, standing outside the door, waiting for her. But he wasn’t by himself for long. There was Jordan Sanders, standing there with him, likely waiting for Brooke as well.
Blake gave him an uncertain smile. They were acquaintances, and Jordan was a nice enough guy. Actually, he was more than nice enough with the way that he put up with Leslie’s youngest sister and her antics, telling anyone who was nosy enough to ask exactly why he did so that she was his best friend and always had been, always would be.
He was a nice guy, in other words. A nice guy who’d been walking with Christ for a very long time, who took on natural leadership in the youth group, and exuded godliness. Blake would have probably been good friends with him, content to learn from his example and become more like him over time, but as it was, the history Blake shared with Ben Sanders left him feeling nothing but guilt when he was around Jordan.
Why would a guy, even a guy who loved Jesus, have anything to say to the loser who had baited his brother into killing himself? Blake, even redeemed and forgiven by Christ, still wore the guilt and shame of who he’d been and what he’d done.
So he avoided Jordan. Not that Jordan knew any of this or ever would.
“Hey,” he said to Blake, ever ready with a smile, just like always, as though Blake didn’t even look like he’d been beaten up. “Are you planning on coming to the pizza party tonight?”
“Oh, that,” Blake said, recalling very vaguely something about both the junior high and the senior high class coming together that evening for a pizza party out at the lake. “I don’t know. I think I’ve got something else to be at.”
He didn’t have anything else to be at, but he couldn’t bring himself to join them. Not when he felt like he did.
“Bummer,” Jordan said. “You should really come and hang out with us sometime, let all of us get to know you better. I mean, you’ve got to eat tonight, right? Might as well come up to the church and eat on the youth pastor’s dime.”
He smiled warmly at Blake, just like he always did with everyone. It didn’t feel fake, though, because it wasn’t. Jordan Sanders was this friendly to everyone, but Blake knew without any doubt that he really meant it, that he really thought Blake should come out more often. His invitation for friendship was real, and it just made Blake feel worse about himself.
As if that was even possible.
“They probably don’t pay the youth minister enough,” he murmured.
At this, Jordan laughed as though Blake had told some great joke. He was so likeable, so much so that Blake could feel himself shrivel up a little, maybe soften a tiny bit, hope for more than this solitude he’d forced himself into and expected of himself –
“Praise the Lord that’s done.”
The words had left Brooke Collins’s mouth at the exact moment the door to the junior high class opened.
Her eyes landed on Jordan, eliciting a smile from him at the same time she made a grimaced face.
“Couldn’t be that bad, huh?” he asked, high-fiving her as she handed him her Bible to carry, just like she did every week as Blake watched the two of them walk into the worship center ahead of him and Leslie.
“It was actually much worse,” Brooke answered. “I don’t know what Matt was thinking, leading us through a study of Levitical laws this school semester.”
“All of Scripture is important,” Jordan pointed out. “You should know all of it.”
“I get that, Jordan,” she answered him. “But I don’t think a junior high classroom full of boys is the best place for a discussion of bodily discharges and how they make you unclean.”
Blake felt himself grimace just a little at this as well. He didn’t remember reading that in the Bible, but there was still a lot of the Bible he hadn’t gotten to…
Jordan laughed at this. “Matt actually focused on that in his teaching?”
“No, he didn’t,” Brooke sighed, a smile finally emerging on her face. “But you know those sixth grade idiots in the class. They latched onto that from the reading and wouldn’t let the topic go. I’m ready to move up to the high school class with you.”
“Soon enough,” Jordan said, slinging his arm over her shoulders to steer her towards the worship center.
Blake finally remembered to speak up, his thoughts going from weird sections of the Bible to Leslie in an instant. “Hey, Brooke.”
Brooke stopped mid-stride, glancing over at him, her mouth tightening just fractionally as she took him in.
Oh, that look. What had Leslie said about him? What had she told her family? What had she told Travis, who had been so good to him?
Jordan nudged Brooke so faintly that Blake wasn’t sure that he’d seen it, but the effect spoke for itself, as she glanced at him briefly then turned her attention back to Blake, her features softening.
“Hey, Blake, how are you?”
“Not so good,” he answered honestly, wondering only a moment later if he should have been so transparent. What if she told Leslie? What if Leslie took pity on him? What if everything she said about him was true, and –
“Oh?” she asked, raising one eyebrow.
She looked like Leslie when she did that. Enough that Blake felt rattled but even more purposeful with his words.
“I was worried about Leslie,” he said. “Is she not at church today?”
Brooke shook her head slowly at this. “No, not today,” she said.
Blake could feel his face fall at this, and Brooke must have noticed because her voice was softer, gentler as she continued on. “But she’s at church. I mean, at a church. She went to church with her friend, Ava. That church over on the highway.”
Ava. The church on the highway.
She was avoiding him, clearly. But going so far as to switch churches?
“Travis is okay with that?” Blake asked, not even stopping to consider that this was really none of his business. “With her going to a different church?”
“Well,” Brooke said, shrugging, “I think he’s just glad she’s going to church. She’s eighteen, about to leave for college. Probably thinks she’s ready to make her own decisions.” She looked at Jordan. “Now me, on the other hand… well, he’s not so…”
“Understanding,” Jordan grinned. “Because he knows you’re a mess.”
“Watch it, Jordan,” she said, smiling even as she chided him.
But Blake was hardly listening, his mind on Leslie leaving her church, leaving town, leaving him behind so soon…
Well, good. That’s what he’d wanted, right?
He wasn’t so sure anymore.
There must have been disappointment on his face as he stood there thinking through all of this because he felt Jordan’s hand on his arm.
“Hey, Blake….”
He looked up, surprised by the touch, curious as to what Jordan would have to say to him.
“I think part of Leslie not being here might be because… well, it’s probably hard for her to see you right now.”
“Jordan,” Brooke breathed, her eyes silently communicating reprimand. He was telling something that was meant to be a secret, that Brooke had told him in confidence.
“What?” Jordan asked, his voice gentle even in the face of her opposition. “He needs to know the truth.”
Blake was thankful for the truth, for this undeserved mercy.
“Is she okay?” he asked, pressing his luck, hoping to hear that maybe he hadn’t hurt her as much as he knew he had, hoping to hear that she loved him so much that life would never be the same. His emotions were so conflicting…
“No,” Brooke said. “She’s not okay.”
“But she will be,” Jordan said, reassurance in his voice for Brooke, maybe a little for Blake as well. “She’ll be okay. Eventually.”
This was a small consolation for Blake, but he would take it.
“Thank you,” he managed.
“I meant what I said,” Jordan told him as he and Brooke turned to go. “Come and hang out with the youth group sometime, okay?”
And though he knew he wouldn’t, Blake nodded as if to thank him out loud for being who he was.
As he walked out of church that day, he remembered this, if nothing else.
She would be okay. Eventually.
And maybe, just maybe, he would find a way to be okay one day, too.