A Love So Strong

He tossed the three-quarter-length tan coat over a chair, explaining, “I’m going out again in a few minutes. I just want to grab a few video games from David’s office.”

David Calloway was their part-time minister of youth. Marcus hoped to introduce him to Beau very soon.

“You shouldn’t be here at all,” Carlita reminded him in her tart, Spanish-tinged English. “It is Friday.”

The single mom of four children and several years his senior, Carlita was prone to mother him a bit. He didn’t mind. Having someone care about you was not an onerous burden.

He knew that Carlita and his sisters thought he worked too much, but he liked his work. Besides, some weeks emergency calls and visitation kept him out of the office, so Friday might be the only day he had to catch up on things, like picking up supplies he’d failed to have delivered with the regular monthly order.

Even as he rifled through the stack of video game discs on a shelf in David’s tiny office, Marcus mused that he had no reason not to work. What use was a day off if it was spent alone? It was good to have the prospect of company, any prospect of company. Even if Beau Archer proved less engaging than his sister, Marcus would be grateful for the companionship.

It had been almost a year since Connie and Russell had moved out, but he still missed them. Not that he would have changed anything. They were happy as could be with Kendal and Larissa. It was just that he’d never been much good at living alone. The parsonage was small, but it could still feel lonely for one person.

In the early years after their mother had disappeared, he’d missed his sisters terribly, but at least he hadn’t been alone. His foster parents had looked after a houseful of boys. Then when he’d first gone off to college he’d lived in a dorm, and after that he’d shared apartments or houses with various buddies.

He’d spent a few months on his own after the church had called him, but that had been a very busy time. Then Connie had gotten out of prison and she and Russell had come to live with him.

Those had been good months, especially after God had brought Vince into Jolie’s life and spurred her to forgive him and Connie for removing Russell from her custody. Now the family was not only together again, it was expanding.

His sisters’ happy marriages had seen to that. If it felt as though something was missing from his own life, well, he expected God to put that right one of these days, too. He was trying not to be impatient about it.

Unbidden, an image of Nicole Archer standing in his sister’s foyer came to him, and he resolutely pushed it away. Nicole was an opportunity to minister, not a prospective spouse. The very idea was ludicrous for a number of reasons. Besides, she needed his help, not his desperate, misplaced attentions. She probably had a boyfriend, anyway.

The thought made him wince, and he resolved to put it firmly out of mind, unwilling to picture Nicole flirting and smiling with some boy and managing to do so just the same. He was forced to admit that he couldn’t see her with a boy. Some guy like David was much more her speed. Thankfully, er, fortunately, the young minister of youth was engaged, a matter of no little irony to Marcus’s mind.

Not even out of seminary yet and already engaged to be married. It was enough to make a mature, older man just a tad envious.

Marcus strolled past Carlita’s desk, tossed on his coat, pocketed the game discs and moved toward the door again, saying, “I’m gone now. Have a good weekend.”

“You, too, Pastor,” she called as he pushed through the door.

The winter air was bracing, and the weather forecast predicted sleet in the wee hours of the coming morning. Marcus stood for a moment and inhaled deeply, clearing his head of unwanted thoughts. He hoped the prognosticators were correct about the timing of the coming sleet storm.

February always brought at least one ice storm to north central Texas, and it invariably shut down the entire Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex area for a day or more. For the sake of road safety, it was better that it happen on a weekend than a workday, even if it meant that church attendance would be down this Sunday.

Marcus let himself into his sedan and started up the engine, warm inside his coat. Lots of the kids around here routinely walked to and from school, regardless of the weather; Marcus was glad that Beau wouldn’t be one of them, at least for today.

He was curious about Nicole’s brother. Actually, he was curious about everything having to do with Nicole Archer. After only one meeting, he’d known that she was a very unusual young lady. Something about her had stuck with him since their initial meeting two days ago. In fact, he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind. That, no doubt, was because God was calling him to perform this service for her and her family, this and others to come.

Marcus was glad to do so. That’s what his life, his calling, was about. God would take care of everything else in His own good time.

Chapter Three

When Marcus walked into the school, he was instantly recognized by the attendance officer and the vice principal, Joyce Ballard, who was a member of his church. He greeted both by their given names and stated his purpose for being there.

“I didn’t realize you knew Beau,” the vice principal observed nonchalantly.

A tall, thin woman, she looked older than her forty-something years and could be very stern, but Marcus knew that she genuinely cared about her young charges.

“Actually, we haven’t met yet. I know his sister.”

“Some of our parents could take a lesson from that girl,” Joyce said.

“She does seem devoted to her brother.”

“No doubt about it,” the woman said, going back to the paperwork she’d been doing when he’d entered.

Marcus removed his coat and sat down to wait for the bell to ring. As she worked, the vice principal gave him the rundown on some of their church kids. One had done very well in a University Interscholastic League competition that week. Another had been out ill with a cold, and a third had recently won the lead role in a school drama. Marcus made the appropriate mental notes and was about to ask about another youngster when the bell rang.

Instantly, kids spilled out into the hallways. Noise swelled, happy voices punctuated the sounds of heavy footsteps and the slamming of locker doors. Rising, Marcus reached for his overcoat just as a group of youngsters swarmed into the office, talking loudly. Among them was a solemn boy with medium brown hair and dark brown eyes. The vice principal singled him out at once.

“Beau, this is Pastor Wheeler. Your sister sent him to pick you up.”

Marcus stuck out his hand, saying, “Hello, Beau. I’m Marcus.”

The boy hesitated, sizing up this newcomer. Marcus openly returned his regard, patiently keeping his hand out.

Beau’s blocky build and squarish face had nothing in common with his sister’s. Though of only average height at present, he was destined to make a big man. Only his coloring was similar to Nicole’s, if reversed. Where her hair was dark and her eyes lighter, the opposite was true for Beau.

Unlike his sister’s, his choice of wardrobe was mundane: athletic shoes, a maroon T-shirt that was a bit too small and faded, baggy jeans. What struck Marcus most, however, was the wariness in Beau’s dark eyes. Marcus had seen that wounded, haunted, uncertain look before. He’d seen it far too many times, in fact, most often in the mirror.

Finally Beau shifted his bright blue backpack to the other shoulder and shook Marcus’s hand. Marcus let his smile broaden.

After a farewell wave to the adults in the office, Marcus followed the boy out into the busy hallway. The boy didn’t appear to have a coat, but Marcus said nothing, all too aware of the prickly pride of a thirteen-year-old boy whose parents didn’t live up to their responsibilities. Instead, he folded his own coat over his arm and headed for the wall of doors at the end of the hall. If Beau was going to suffer the cold, Marcus would, as well, not that Beau seemed to notice.

The boy seemed uninterested in conversing. He sat hunched in the passenger seat of Marcus’s sedan, his attitude clearly wary and defensive. The only reply Beau made to Marcus’s explanation for why Nicole hadn’t picked him up and to the series of polite questions about what he’d like to do that evening was, “I’m hungry.”

So Marcus took him to the closest fast-food joint, where he ordered a hamburger and a cola. Marcus said nothing about the possibility of him ruining his dinner. He knew from experience that boys the age of Beau could eat their own weight three times a day and still be hungry.

When Beau pulled a couple of bucks out of his pants pocket, Marcus politely ignored him, ordered a milk shake and fries for himself, neither of which he really wanted, and paid for everything. The food came quickly, and they carried it to a corner booth where they sat in silence for several minutes.

Marcus picked a fry from a tiny paper bag and munched it, turning sideways on the bench to stretch out his legs. Having allowed the boy to eat undisturbed for some time, Marcus adopted a nonchalant tone and prepared to gently prod.

“So tell me about yourself, Beau.”

“Like what?” came the doubtful reply.

Marcus said the first thing that came into his head. “Do you have a favorite subject in school?”

The boy bit off a huge chunk of hamburger and studiously chewed it. Marcus figured it was an excuse not to speak, but then the boy surprised him.

Marcus discovered that Beau was an indifferent student with a passion for music. He was not, however, in band classes, either because he couldn’t afford it or he didn’t like the band director. Or both.

“It’s whack,” Beau grumbled. “Mr. Placid doesn’t like guitar. Says there’s no future in it. Like there’s a huge future in tuba and xylophone. Truth is, he just doesn’t know squat about it.”

Marcus was familiar with that term whack. In the parlance of the modern youth it meant the opposite of cool, but he had no intention of trying to demonstrate his grasp of current teen lingo. Kids were quick to spot a patronizing adult. Instead, he played it straight down the line.

“So you play the guitar, then. I’m envious. It’s all I can do to follow along in the hymnal.”

“My grandpa taught me when I was a baby,” Beau said softly, and Marcus instantly picked up on the significance of that.

“Yeah? Does your grandpa live around here?”

Beau shook his head before explaining that his grandfather had died the same year as his mom.

“Tell me something good you remember about him,” Marcus urged.

A light shone in Beau’s eyes. The sullen, wary teenager had gone, and in his place sat a simple boy who had lost too much.

“He had this cabin up in Oklahoma. We used to go up there in the summertime. It’s right on the river. You ever been on the Illinois River?”

Marcus shook his head and swung his legs around to sit facing the boy again. “No, I’m sorry to say that I haven’t.”

Beau began a monologue on an old canoe that they’d kept at the campground at the bottom of the bluff below the cabin and all the times he and his grandfather had taken it out.

“There’s these pools, where the water’s still, and that’s where you get the most fish,” he said wistfully. “I wish I could go back there for good.”

“What about your grandmother?” Marcus asked. “Doesn’t she still live there?”

Beau shook his head. “She lives up in Seattle with my great-aunt. Her mind got bad even before my mom got sick, and she pretty much forgot everything. When Grandpa died, Nicole wanted to take care of her, but Aunt Margaret said she’d do it so Nic could go to college.”

“That was good of your great-aunt.”

“Yeah. She’s pretty old herself.”

Marcus wanted the boy to know that he was blessed despite all of his losses and problems, so he made a confession. “I don’t have any great-aunts or anybody like that, and I don’t have anything good to remember about any of my family except my sisters.”

Beau furrowed his brow at that, asking, “How come?”

“My grandparents died before I was born. They didn’t have any family except my mom. I never knew my dad’s family or anything about them. My dad wasn’t around much, and he split when I was about four. Then my mom took off a few years later and was killed in an auto accident.”

“That stinks.”

“It sure did. My foster parents tried to make things fun for the boys who lived with them, but there wasn’t much money and my foster mom was crippled up pretty bad with arthritis. Besides, it was kind of hard to have fun without my little sisters there. All that’s changed now, though.” He sat back, aware that he had Beau’s full attention. “Everybody’s good now. My sisters are both married to really great guys. They both have nice homes, and I have a nephew and a niece with one more on the way. Plus, there are the Cutlers.”

“You know the Cutlers?”

“My sister Jolie is married to Vince.”

“No kidding?”

“That’s how I met your sister.”

“Nicole says the Cutlers are like a tribe. There are so many of them, and they’ve got all these rituals and stuff, like football, and everybody’s always hanging out together. Man, that’s gotta be bananas.”

Marcus laughed. “Close.” He pushed the milk shake over, saying offhandedly, “Want that? I’m not as hungry as I thought I was.”

Beau drained his cola in one long swig and reached for the milk shake, asking, “So how come you’re not married?”

Marcus was a bit taken aback. “Been wondering that same thing myself. Just haven’t found the right woman yet.”

Talk turned to other things. Beau never once mentioned his father, but he obviously depended on his sister for everything. Marcus hoped Beau knew how blessed he was in that sister of his, but he wasn’t sure that a thirteen-year-old was capable of understanding how unique Nicole was.

Most young ladies her age were all about guys and friends and accumulating things, not providing stable homes for their younger siblings. Marcus understood her motivation better than most, but Beau likely took her somewhat for granted, which probably was as it should be. Someday, though, Beau would look back and understand what his sister had done for him. At least Marcus wanted to think he would, for Beau’s sake as much as Nicole’s.

Beau finished his “snack,” including what was left of Marcus’s French fries, and allowed Marcus to lead him outside. As predicted, clouds had swept in on a new pressure system, obscuring the sun and dropping the temperature into the twenties.

Marcus hustled the boy into the car and resumed his place behind the steering wheel. He started the engine and cranked up the heater, hoping that it wouldn’t take long to warm up.

Beau’s lack of a coat was troubling, and Marcus tried to think how to address the situation, finally coming up with a rather obvious approach. “Would you like to drop by your house to pick up your coat?”

Obviously alarmed, Beau exclaimed, “No!”

Knowing what he did about Dillard Archer, Marcus considered that response ominous, but he didn’t want to judge the man unfairly. “Mind if I ask why?” When the boy pressed his lips together sullenly, Marcus explained, “It’s too cold for you to be running around without a coat.”

“Mine’s dirty,” Beau mumbled.

“A dirty coat is better than no coat, Beau,” Marcus pointed out.

The boy suddenly erupted. “My dad threw up on it, okay? He was sloppy hungover and he barfed all over my coat this morning!” He turned his face away, ashamed.

Marcus surreptitiously fortified himself with a deep breath, his heart going out to the boy, and carefully chose his next words. “Your father’s alcoholism is a real problem for you. I’m sorry about that. With my dad it was drugs.”

Beau slid a curious look over Marcus. “Yeah?”

“He overdosed not long before my mom left with her boyfriend. She used it as an excuse, actually. She kept saying that she had to provide my sisters and me with a father, as if my dad had ever really been a part of our lives. I couldn’t figure out how taking off without us was supposed to provide us with parents, anyway.”

“My mom would never do something like that,” Beau vowed.

“I understand she was a fine Christian woman,” Marcus said softly. “You must be very proud of that.”

Beau nodded, whispering, “Before she died, everything was real good.”

“It will be good again, Beau,” Marcus promised. “I’m living proof of that. Now about that coat…”

“He’ll be drinking again by now,” Beau said miserably, shaking his head and staring out the windshield.

“Actually,” Marcus said, “I was thinking about an old coat I have that you can use. Want to go take a look at it?”

Beau hunched a shoulder in a seemingly unconcerned shrug. Marcus took that for assent and headed for the parsonage.

When they turned into the church grounds, Beau seemed surprised. Looking around him quickly, he exclaimed, “It’s almost like a town.”

“A very small town perhaps,” Marcus said, guiding the car past the church offices and day care center.

He explained that the membership had needed to expand the church but they hadn’t wanted to abandon their beloved old sanctuary. The solution had been to purchase, one by one, the houses which had faced the original church on every side.

The buildings were then renovated according to their assigned purpose and linked via covered walkways. In some cases, two buildings had been joined by an addition to form a larger space. Marcus pointed out the education building, the fellowship hall, the youth department and the music center. A house still undergoing renovation would soon serve as a furlough home for missionaries and their families returning to the U.S. on leave or for some other reason.

As Marcus eased the sedan into the narrow garage of the tiny parsonage, Beau pointed out that the “missionary house” was much larger than the home occupied by Marcus.

“Well, maybe someday I’ll get married and need the larger house,” Marcus said, unconcerned. “Then this house will be the furlough house, although we might have to add a bedroom or two.”

Marcus tossed his own coat over the counter that separated the small kitchen from the combined dining and living area, flipping on the overhead light as he did so. He’d forgotten that the place was so cluttered. A necktie, which went with the shirt draped over the back of a dining chair, lay in a snaky heap next to this morning’s unwashed breakfast bowl and an empty milk carton. Books were stacked on the dining table. Today’s newspaper had drifted off the old-fashioned, green vinyl sofa onto the floor, and Marcus wondered suddenly when he’d last vacuumed the sand-colored carpet.

Beau chuckled and commented, “Man, Nicole would send you to your room if she got a load of this.”

Marcus sent him a bemused glance, bringing his hands to his hips before once again surveying the place. “She’d be justified, too.”

He started gathering up his errant clothing. Beau leaned an elbow on the counter and parked his chin on the palm of his hand.

“What’s for dinner?”

Marcus nearly dropped everything he’d gathered. They had just eaten, hadn’t they? Growing boys. “Pizza?”

“I’ll call it in!” Beau exclaimed eagerly. Marcus chuckled and pointed out the phone.

By the time he’d dumped his load and reached into his closet for the coat he had in mind for Beau, the pizza was on its way.

Made of quilted gray nylon with snaps up the front and ribbed cuffs, the coat was a couple sizes too large for Marcus, having once belonged to his foster father, which meant that it would swallow the boy. Marcus counted on the inexplicable teenage fixation with oversize clothing to make the coat acceptable to Beau, and it did exactly that.

“Über!” Beau exclaimed, pushing up the sleeves to expose his hands.

Marcus recognized the German word for super. “You can keep it if you want,” he offered. “I never wear it.”

Beau looked pleased, then doubtful. “Nicole may not like it. She says we have to do for ourselves.”

“I don’t think she’ll object.”

Still unconvinced, Beau peeled off the coat and laid it across the chrome-banded, wood coffee table.

“Well, you can return it later, if you want,” Marcus said lightly. “How about a video game?”

It was glaringly obvious long before the pizza came that Marcus was no competition for the boy at all, but that didn’t seem to matter. As the pizza swiftly disappeared into the boy’s mouth, Marcus silently marveled, remembering well when he, too, had eaten like a human garbage disposal. It seemed long ago now.

When they finally turned off the game, Marcus was surprised to find that the evening news was just signing off.

“We’ve got to get you home!”

Beau didn’t argue, just popped up and tossed on his borrowed coat. Marcus grabbed his own coat, and the two hurried out.

The winter night was brittle with cold, but the clouds had unexpectedly cleared away, leaving the city lights to sparkle and glow against the pitch-black backdrop of the starry sky. Their breath puffed out in little fogs until the car warmed up, which wasn’t long before they reached the Archer house.

A long, low, red brick ranch-style built on a generous lot at the top of a cul-de-sac, the home of Beau and Nicole Archer and their father had a welcoming air, despite overgrown shrubs, broken tree limbs and the wildly canted mailbox at the curb. Though an older home, it appeared to be a good place to raise a family and boasted a large, double-car garage that Marcus could easily covet.

He parked his late-model sedan behind an aging pickup truck.

“Thanks for everything,” Beau said, yanking open the passenger door and reaching toward the floorboard for his backpack.

“I don’t see Nicole’s car,” Marcus pointed out.

“She parks in the garage when it’s cold. Otherwise her old heap won’t start in the morning.”

That wasn’t surprising. “I’ll just walk you to the door,” Marcus said, “I’d like to speak to her.” In truth, he wanted to be sure she was all right.

The interior light of the car clearly illuminated Beau’s worried gaze. “I could have her call you.”

Marcus signaled his understanding with a smile. “I won’t antagonize your father, I promise, Beau, but I’m going to walk you to the door and be sure your sister arrived home safely. Okay?”

Beau muttered something under his breath and climbed out of the car. Marcus followed suit, and together they walked to the front of the house. A motion-sensitive light flicked on as they drew near the multi-paneled door, and almost at once it opened. Nicole stood there, framed in the open doorway.

Marcus couldn’t help smiling at her outlandish clothing. Something about her propensity to costume herself like this was rather endearing. The stripes going in every direction did make him want to cross his eyes, but at the same time for some reason his heart seemed to climb up into his throat and lodge there. He knew he should say something, but she smiled at him, and his mind went completely blank. The words that seemed to roll so easily off his tongue from the pulpit were simply nowhere to be found. It was perhaps the scariest moment of his life.

Nicole smiled at Marcus and reached out a hand to her brother, who attempted to slip past her into the house. Only then did her mind register what her eyes were telling her.

“Hey, where’d you get this coat?”

Marcus coughed, cleared his throat and rasped, “It’s an old one that I had in my closet.”

She looked at Beau. “Where’s your other coat?”

“In the hamper,” Beau mumbled, turning to Marcus. “Thanks for everything.”

“My pleasure.”

Beau escaped into the house, his backpack bumping Nicole and rocking her sideways. She looked to Marcus with her brows arched in question.

He cleared his throat and croaked, “Uh, if he doesn’t want it—the coat, that is—maybe you can give it to someone else. I never wear it.”