The Earring

Book 2 Part 5

The plan was for one of us to sleep while the other drove. David started out at the wheel. I was supposed to snooze, but I was afraid to sleep. His grief was so great and his haste so vast that I feared he would wreck us without me awake to backseat drive. I tried praying. I prayed for peace. I prayed for a surcease of panic. I prayed for God to knit David's frayed nerves back together. I even prayed for invisibility in the event we encountered a highway patrolman. All of those prayers were for naught because I determined to hang on to my worry. The Biblical injunction to 'take your burdens to the Lord,' I had down pat. Unfortunately, I was not too good at following the remainder of the command: 'leave them there.'

That night I drank the only complete cup of coffee in my adult life. I gagged, held my nose, and complained in a nasal twang the whole time, but I choked it down. I don't know if it was the caffeine or the worry that wired me, but something did. Neither of us got a wink of sleep. When we pulled into Baton Rouge at 8am the next morning, we had made the trip in record time.

We weren't certain at which hospital his grandmother was a patient. We stopped at a pay phone and called Nicole's office to ask.

David dialed the number. I sat in the car waiting.

I heard him identify himself and ask, "What hospital is Maw Gilbert at?" A slight pause and then, " Candace Gilbert, Nicole's mother."

He let out a wail and dropped the telephone receiver. It hung dangling from the pay phone while he doubled over in agony, a sound like a mortally wounded animal coming from his mouth. I jumped from the car. I tried to put my arms around my husband, but he turned away.

"Hello! Hello? Are you there?" I heard coming from the hanging phone.

I grabbed the offending instrument and rudely demanded, "What did you say to him?"

"I just asked if he meant which funeral home," the voice responded calmly.

"Don't you know who you were talking to? You just told her grandson, who has been up all night driving from South Carolina, that his grandmother is dead."

"I am so sorry, Ma'am," came the apology. "I'm just a temp filling in for the day. I didn't know."

"That's okay," I said. "I'm sorry too. I know it was an accident. It's been a long night. Forgive me. What funeral home was it again?"

While David sat in the car and rocked back and forth moaning, I called the funeral home. The family wasn't there. They had gone home. I drove us to David's house. The anguished, primordial sounds had been replaced by tormented sobs. David had been raised across the street from his grandparents. Maw, as he dubbed her while still a tot, spoiled him rotten. If the food at home were not to his liking, Maw would fix him an alternative. When he was punished, she offered a shoulder to cry on. Maw's ample lap provided a safe haven. No matter what he did, Maw believed in him and prayed for him. She and Paw Gilbert had been the first ones David called after surrendering to the ministry. He'd been looking forward to spending a few days telling them about his spiritual journey. He knew how pleased she was that he'd gotten things straight with God. Now she was gone, and he didn't get to say goodbye.

Maw Lander – the Maw and Paw tradition David started with his grandparents had passed to his parents – needed David to be strong. She was struggling with a sick husband. Paw Lander had been unable to work for several years – the diagnosis was an uncertain mental condition. Daniel was on the road somewhere. His sister, a single Mom, had her hands full juggling her preschool daughter and a full-time job.

After being drugged into much needed sleep with one of his father's pills, David was better able to be the man Nicole needed him to be. During his slumber, a dream tempered his grief. To this day, he believes Maw visited him. When he told me of his vision, it was so vivid that I felt like I'd been there.