Fiction

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His dark, curly head was bowed from exhaustion, while small drops of water slid down his straight nose to the drenched ground below. Surrounded by the musky scent of newly fallen rain, George Walter kneeled on the grass and rubbed his large hands over his tired eyes. In the house behind him lay his wife, her shallow breath struggling to keep her alive. His perfect wife.
Kendra, with her small hands and deep, brown eyes, was enchanting. At parties her quick wit would entice other members into comfort and friendly banter, and at hard times the weight of life was effortlessly carried by her emotional strength. Walter had easily fallen in love with Kendra when she was seventeen, and after some awkwardly entertaining moments, friends diagnosed him with the terribly wondrous fate of love. He became Kendra’s closest devotee, and spent every free moment by her side, reveling in the splendor of her perfection. Where he was rash, she was accepting. Where he was guarded, she was open. Where he was the disbeliever, she was the epitome of faith. As Walter courted Kendra, he began to attend church outings, bible studies, and local services. They married when Kendra turned twenty; to Walter it was an out of focus blur behind the sharp, poignant memory of Kendra in white, holding delphiniums. Kendra believed them to be promise flowers, saying that a promise made with a delphinium was specially made. Walter laughed at the old child’s riddle, thinking that Kendra looked more like a daisy, her petite, white frame crowned with darling, golden hair. He gave her a delphinium every year on her birthday, but planted daisies in the garden around an iron bench where he often read.
Walter lifted his head and stared beseechingly at the gray sky and strained his ears to the heavens Kendra believed were somewhere above. When Kendra had been diagnosed with tuberculosis, she had prayed for God to give them guidance, Walter had prayed for their deliverance. Now as she lay sickened he once again tried to placate God. She was his love, his breath, and soul. For days he had been begging on his knees in front of God, and slowly the answers had come and squeezed into his ears. The first, a simple statement,
‘I am the almighty, I created you’.
Walter had fumed, he knew this, there could be no creator but the Lord God. He had furiously asked why God told him simplicities when Kendra’s life faltered. He could not let her go, why did God tease? Later, an insistent voice had whispered,
‘I created you to worship me. I love you’.
Then his breath had grown ragged. Worship. This word was so complex, so deep. He stood in respect every Sunday, lifted his voice in awe. He read his Bible, his eyes picking up the words from the white pages his hands held. His body performing the ordinary tasks, but would not God demand more? His innermost mind told him that God expected not the tasks, God expected his heart. How could he give more, when his heart belonged to Kendra? Then loud as the hardest thunder,
‘Why do you worship your wife instead of your God?’
The echoing voice had circled in the midst of the storm Walter had watched from his window. Its vibrations had still resounded in the musky scent of newly fallen rain that he kneeled in now, his head bowed in repentance. There was a hole in his heart that had not been there before, a hole that Kendra could not fill. He wanted this God. He wanted this God’s love. Slowly he sank to his belly in the wet grass and mumbled,
“Lord God Almighty, I am a sinner, I have never truly accepted you. God, I wish to serve you, to love you, and to worship you, to admit you into my heart through Christ Jesus. Everything I have is yours, I trust you. I pray for Kendra’s health, but I know her life and mine are in your hands.” The clouds still hung over the house, fiercely gripping the sky with fingers of lightning. Yet, the storm that rampaged inside Walter was slowly beginning to dissipate. His God loved him.
Hesitant footsteps breached the warm silence and Walter glanced up into the tear stricken face of a nurse. His stomach dropped, and he rose from the ground. She murmured with her eyes lowered mournfully,
“Mr. Walter, Kendra is slipping…sent for the doctor, but I’m afraid he won’t make it. I came for you because we know you want to be with her when she….”
Walter ran past the nurse into the house, racing up the stairs that led to the master bedroom. Bursting through the door, he looked upon a woman with darling, golden hair and small, white hands. Kendra slowly raised her deep, brown eyes to Walter and he gently gathered her in his arms. Her weakened hands feebly held his as he whispered in her ear,
“I’ve found God, ‘lovedy’. I told Him that I trusted Him. I prayed for you.” Kendra’s breath grew shallower and Walter could hear it rattle in her chest, but still a victorious smile slid across her face as she closed her eyes and relaxed against him.
Walter spent the rest of the evening with Kendra. Doctor Brown came and confirmed that these where her last moments, yet Walter remained determinedly by her side. He read to her of love poems, and sang popular songs from their marriage year, but mostly he prayed with her. Thanking God for the terribly wondrous fate of love.
That night, Walter felt her drift away. Her fingers grew lax in his, and her face took on an immovable quality. Walter kissed the corner of her mouth one more time. Stumbling down the stairs, Walter told the maid to contact the pastor and say that Kendra was…gone. He impulsively walked back to the garden and sat unseeing on the iron bench surrounded by daisies. Sobs began to rack his body and he fell into the patch of flowers, oddly comforted by the light, nostalgic smell. His heart was ripped and his insides bruised, his mind reeling in pain. Lying in the garden he fell into a fatigued sleep.
Sunlight deepened the tranquility of the sky and forced warm light between the puffy eyelids of George Walter. For a time he laid on the ground, his weary limbs cushioned by the daisies. Then he rolled to his knees and let fresh tears wash his face, but shocked he fell in front of a small flower that had not been there the night before. A delphinium.
Walter gently scooped the weak flower into his large hands, and kissed its many blooms. The promise flower. He had promised God everything, and now this promise was in his hands, faltering between life and death. Bitterness stood outside the door of Walter’s heart, along with blame and detriment. But he shut them out, snuggling the delphinium into the grooves of his hand, he walked to the house. Storms may come, but in everything he had the promise of a God greater than all.

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