Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: The Game of Life (09/11/08)
-
TITLE: Jackie's Solemn Sod | Previous Challenge Entry
By Jennifer Weiley
09/18/08 -
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE
SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT
ADD TO MY FAVORITES
A reddish sun peeked through the hazy valley as a slow hush draped over Jackie’s sacred soil. She’d come to sit on this stump every month, on the twenty-second day, for the past year. It used to be about 500 feet from her front door. She’d come to remember and sing a lullaby.
Today marked one year since the fire consumed her inheritance: a two bedroom trailer home upon an isolated, quarter acre plot. She remembered it like yesterday.
She was a single mom who worked two jobs. By day, she was a caregiver at the daycare; by night, a third shift waitress at the local truck stop. On the night of the fire she was particularly happy because she and her oldest son, Brendon, had thrown Jacob a makeshift birthday party.
There were balloons, streamers, and countless games of Ring-Around-the-Rosy. Jacob took a deep breath and blew out his candles. He looked surprised as the three wicks glowed, then blackened. “I did it,” he clapped.
Brendon, a high school senior, bathed Jacob and put him to bed while Jackie got ready for work. Brendon and Jacob shared a full-sized bed, but on that night he opted to sleep in his mother’s unoccupied pallet. Usually, Jackie barely made it home before Brendon’s bus arrived. Typically, she’d wake Jake and leave for Miss Marney’s Kinder Care. But, not that dreadful day.
Instead, Jackie was greeted by a dizzy array of flashing lights, sirens in the distance, and a blaze that burned. Her strong, motherly instinct drove her to the front door.
“You can’t go in there, Ma’am,” protested a firefighter. His broad body blocked the entrance, arms opened wide.
“My sons. My sons.” It’s all she could muster through her hyperventilated breaths. She’d tried to wrestle the man in his thick, rubberized poncho. “My sons. My sons,” she echoed.
Firmly, but gently, the firefighter locked his wrists around her thin waist. She kicked and screamed while she called their names. Swiftly, exhaustion and shock paralyzed her body. He took her to that old, maple stump. “We found your son. An ambulance took him to County Hospital.”
“Two sons. Have two sons,” she rasped.
“Another?” He sprinted and left her to stare at the flames and smoldering embers. As she gazed through the rage of orange flames she had a vision. She saw—as real as a mother can see—the soul of her son ascending toward heaven. He’d flashed a quick smile as he waved, embracing his angel’s teddy bear. Her thoughts turned toward Brendon.
The hardest thing she did was convince her numb body to slip off that stump. She forced herself to feel the steering wheel as she blankly drove on a black, hypnotic road of faded painted lines. Accusing voices chanted louder than her quiet, mournful thoughts. “Breaking rules in the game of life deserves God’s out lashings and strife.” She didn’t argue with the voices. They were true. She’d dropped out of college to raise Brendon on her own. She didn’t marry Jacob’s father either. Her father’s old, hunting shack is where she’d escaped from past mistakes to do what was right; raise her sons.
Desperate prayers bled from Jackie’s shattered heart. What she wouldn’t have given to be with both her sons, but the moment smothered her to choose only one.
Jackie sat silently on that old, faithful stump. As she sipped her coffee she blew condensation like smoke. Weeds grew where love once bloomed. In her mind there wasn’t a single, wet kiss remembered in vain. Tenderly, she walked to the exact place Jacob’s tiny, bedroom closet once stood. In slow motion she squatted, kissed her hand, and touched her solemn sod. Slowly she stood and hummed her lulla-bye to the tune of “Jesus Loves Me This I Know.” And she did know.
She also knew as she held closing papers, the deed to her father’s plot, that it would become State Forest territory. One day hikers would tread upon the unkempt grasses of her hollowed ground. She was ready for time and nature to take their course, for God had drunk her bitter tears.
The opinions expressed by authors may not necessarily reflect the opinion of FaithWriters.com.
If you died today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to heaven? You can be right now. CLICK HERE
JOIN US at FaithWriters for Free. Grow as a Writer and Spread the Gospel.
Excellent work.