✞ J U L I A N W E S T B R O O K ✞
THREE YEARS LATER
Julian's eyes peel away from the crowd of people leaving Disciples of Truth with big smiles and he turns away, feeling mocked by them. Even with such a powerful sermon delivered by him, he still couldn't find any uplifting characteristics within it. And that would apply to all his previous sermons for as long as he could remember, though the congregation didn't seem to notice.
He departs to his office and starts collecting the papers thrown on his desk. All of them are either from the day before or the month before— he doesn't care enough to clean up anymore.
His office door pushes open and he looks over his shoulder, no longer in excitement like he used to. Even though he's faced with the kind expressions of Mama Ruth and Nyomi, he has trouble finding peace with them. He turns his attention back to his desk.
"I think we need to stage an intervention for him or somethin," Nyomi mumbles loudly. It's obvious she only said it to make him laugh, but her attempt fails miserably.
Other than the sound of rustling papers from Julian, silence falls in the office. After a moment, Mama Ruth touches his shoulder and makes him face her. "You're comin to celebrate the twins' birthday right?"
Julian glances at Nyomi. He knows how bad she wants him to celebrate his nephews' birthday, but he can't bring himself to want to go. He shrugs his shoulders. "I'm not sure."
"Well, we plan on goin out to eat before the party. Will you join us then?"
He sighs. "Nah, I'm good."
Mama Ruth's intense stare nearly burns a hole in him. She huffs after a moment and puts her hand on her hip. "Nyomi, give me and your brother a second alone, please," she says, her eyes not leaving Julian.
Nyomi does as she's told and the second the door closes behind her, Mama Ruth begins to speak. "What's wrong with you?"
"Nothing's wrong with me, Mama, I just-"
"Julian, quit playin with me. What is wrong with you? Have you been thinking about Celai again?"
He shrugs his shoulders and then nods. "Yeah."
Her face grows soft and she shakes her head slowly. "You're gonna see her again, Jules, stop stressing out. I can see it all in your face when you're preaching and Nyomi sees it too. Pretty soon, you're gonna be affecting the whole church with your bad attitude. Look, I know you miss her, but it's been a good while since then. You can be sad for a moment, but don't forget that God is the one who provides you with joy, not her."
"I know that, but-"
"If you know that, then why are you walking around like you don't? Out of all my years with Johnnie, there are two things that stuck with me: one, you keep God first even when the love of your life is in the room; two, you keep God first even when the love of your life isn't in the room. God didn't bless you with Celai so you can spend your every moment thinking of her instead of Him."
He nods his head again just to show her he understands. In reality, he's had this talk with her pretty much every other day, just in different words. He truly does take in what she tells him, but sometimes, there were moments where it was harder to bear than others.
"I gotta go," he tells Mama Ruth.
She backs off. "I'm assuming you're not going to the boys' party?"
He grabs his bag and slings it over his shoulder. "I'll see."
He and Mama Ruth part ways and Julian is secretly glad. While he loves her, he knows he just needs a moment alone. The car ride to his home is short and quiet. He doesn't have much to say without an interference of sadness washing over him.
After he pulls into his garage and leaves his car, he goes inside, letting Blaze free from his crate before sitting on his couch.
With the quietness of his home, it fills Julian with a pain he finds hard to describe. He stares off into space and sighs hard. "I miss her, God."
"I missed you too."
He whips around, the voice being criminally familiar, and he faces a grinning Celai. He doesn't waste a moment to jump over the couch and embrace her immediately.
"Stoppp! You're squishing me!" she yells through her laughter.
Julian doesn't care though. It had been three long months without seeing his wife in person. He starts to plant kisses all over her neck, face, and lips before he pulls away. "What are you doing here?" he questions, getting a good look at her.
"We finished filming earlier than expected so I got the earliest flight back and thought I'd surprise you." She puts a hand on her hip. "But we have things to talk about. I heard you've been cranky because I haven't been here. What's up with that?"
He sighs as his confession begins to spill from his lips. "I-I can't do this long-distance thing, Celai. I know you're out in California working on TV shows, establishing your agency, all this stuff, but I just can't do it. My heart won't let me. I'm too clingy. I must admit, every night I thank God that I'm one day closer to seeing you before anything else. I just can't do it."
"Well, did you think it was easy for me? You had your family, I had no one. When I came home, I teared up because I saw Blaze; I thought I was gonna be an absolute train wreck when I saw you. But you wanna know how I managed while I was away?"
Julian sucks his teeth. "I already know it."
"Jesus," they both say.
"Exactly. So why is Mama Ruth calling me to get me to put you in check? Why have you been snapping at her and isolating yourself from everyone? You knew I was coming back," Celai says.
"I don't know, I think I'm just losing it a little bit."
"You're losing something, but it's surely not God. Mama told me she thinks she's losing her grip on you because we're married now; that's why she asked me to talk to you. So to rephrase what I know she told you: you can't put me or our marriage above God. He established it, He must be the center of it."
"I know," Julian mumbles.
"Do you really? Because as the lead pastor of a forever-growing church, that can't be a surface level lesson. You have to live by that."
He sighs. "Yeah. Mama has been getting through to me, but after that first month of you being gone, I started thinking back to when you were in the hospital... how I almost lost you. It just bothered me so much how all of that could've been avoided if that one doctor didn't take back what he said about your heart. And because of him, you were close to dying from another cardiac tamponade. Even though all of that lasted for less than a day, it felt like a lifetime waiting for you to pull through. And I guess you being gone put me in that same headspace."
Celai cups his face and presses a kiss against his lips before chasing it with another one. "That was a very scary time for all of us, but remember that it wasn't man's plan as to what happened to me, it was God's. I still don't know why He allowed that to happen, but it doesn't matter now since I'm still here and I'm still living for Him. Both of us are."
Julian nods as his eyes tick between her hazel ones. "Sometimes I feel like the Holy Spirit speaks through you and directly to me."
"And sometimes I think you forget that one of the things we got out of that hospital situation was a whole lotta money." Julian chuckles and she continues. "I'm so glad my mom and Brian sued the heck out of that hospital. We can afford our dream home now."
"But we're saving that until we have kids first, right? There's nothing wrong with the starter house that we just bought," Julian says sternly.
"Mmm," Celai hums. "Follow me."
He reluctantly follows her to their office and she sits at her glass desk. Julian gets déjà vu looking down at her drawn out plans of their future home on a tablet.
"Last time you saw this, I had just drawn in your man cave. I added some more stuff while I was out in LA though," Celai says.
Julian smiles. It's just like his dreams from years ago. Celai doesn't recall her distrust in his dream, but Julian does, and he smiles every time he's in the same predicament.
He scans the blueprints, now seeing a few more rooms for more children and a guest house. "Does that say a guest house for Jayelle?" he chuckles.
His eyes glance up and freeze on the object laying above the blueprints. "Wait..." he says.
He picks it up slowly and catches Celai smiling hard below him. In his hand, he holds a positive pregnancy test. "You're pregnant?"
"Surprise."
He starts to smile before he stops himself and raises an eyebrow. "Wait a minute. How are you pregnant? It's been three months since I last saw you."
"Yeah I know. But do you really think I was sneaking around while in LA? Ever since I took my first test, I've been taking prenatal pills, so hopefully our little one is alright."
He stares at the test, believing his eyes are playing tricks on him. After a moment, it starts to register and he turns his attention back to Celai. "Why didn't you tell me earlier?"
"Well I didn't realize until it was already a month and a half that I was working. And then after that, I thought to wait to tell you until I got back. Honestly, that was a bad decision on my part, but I can't go back on it. Don't be upset with me though."
He shakes his head. "I'm not, I just..." He looks back down at the test and a big smile creeps on his face. "We're about to have a lil Julian running around. Or a lil... Juliana."
Celai laughs as she stands up and falls into his embrace. Her eyes stare at the test too. "Very soon. My first appointment is Tuesday. Will you be there? I know you usually train Jaida on those days."
"I can cancel. I'm not missing this for the world." He presses a kiss on her forehead as he starts to imagine a life with a child made from God's love. It almost brings him to tears.
"Julian?"
"Hm?"
"Of course, I'll slow down with the long-distance traveling, but if I do leave again, I don't want to hear back that you're letting the absence of my presence alter your mood. Let God fill you with joy."
"I hear you," he says. And he means it.
"So, to make up for all you did, we're gonna go to Nyomi's twins' birthday party, then I'm gonna go to Jayelle's dress fitting while you are at Wes and Tyler's tux fitting, and then after that..."
Silence fills the room and Julian looks down at her. "After that?"
"I'm not sure. We'll leave that to God."
He pulls her impossibly closer. "We'll leave everything to Him. He'll guide our steps."
"I know He will."
| ✞ |
Celai stayed true to her promise to Julian and decided to cut back on her distance from work, even after giving birth to their first baby girl, Nyla Ruth Westbrook. However, she soon landed a business contract to start her own agency at age twenty-eight, naming it At Home. It grew to be a first-choice for many that decided to have their homes decorated by God Himself.
In the midst of her agency getting off the ground, she gave birth to her and Julian's second daughter, Aria Genesis Westbrook. Julian, on the other hand, worked hard and surprised Celai with not only their dream home using the same blueprints she started in college, but also Julian's promotion to Bishop. The title fit perfectly with Disciples of Truth, which was moved to a bigger sanctuary for the growing congregation.
Afterwards, they went on to have two more children, their first and only son, Abel Julian Westbrook, and their last baby girl, Paige Eden Westbrook. They were able to successfully raise them in a loving two-parent, God-centered household, despite neither of them being able to grow up the same way.
With their success coming quickly and early in their lives, it was a constant thought of if there would or should be more coming their way, good or bad. However, throughout their years together and lessons taught by God, they learned to not let it be the focal point. Just like in their marriage vows, they promised each other and God to let Him work and to not look in the future or the past, but in the present.
In all their years together, it was the best decision they could have made.
THE END
✞