Copyright 2003 by Elizabeth Delayne

For Bailey Freeman, life moved, circled in a fast pace of life and energy. She moved from one city to the next, picking up on the fascinating colors of life, of love, of sorrow. As a nationally-recognized journalist, she saw people in the formal best, real-oyster made pearls and sparkling diamonds. She saw people at their worst, homeless, on the streets, drowning in alcoholism and depression.

Rarely was she able to stop and see life in the middle, unpaved streets that led to old farm houses modernized in the seventies. However, it was the place she knew best. A single home, a single place, a woman who had loved her as if Bailey Freeman was her own. She was—at best—the left over girl from a broken family down the road, informally adopted and ceremoniously cherished.

Bailey ran her hand over the faded Victorian wallpaper as the bright summer sunlight edged from the room. Bess Campbell’s tarnished brass bed was covered in an old quilt, a century old. The room echoed with the sounds of life from the past, children playing, the piano being played at Christmas, merry voices lifted in celebration, memories that would not fade. Inside the room, the silence resounded against the fresh reality of death.

Bailey walked over to Bess’s dressing table and dropped from trembling legs to sit on the padded bench. She looked around the room, remembering Bess. Bailey could only remember her with age painted over her youthful, loving eyes, hands crippled by arthritis, and legs that trembled as she walked.

But it was those hands that had sewn her prom dress, written letters every week as Bailey worked her way through college, and it had been those trembling legs that had walked into the auditorium at Harrison University to see Bailey graduate.

“Bailey?

She didn’t want to look over to the voice, to see Alex, Bess’s youngest grandson. Even though she’d tried to avoid him, he’d managed to remain beside her at the funeral. He’d held her hand, enfolded her in his arms when she wept. She didn’t want to see the sympathy or the shared grief in his familiar face, not now . . . not when she needed to say goodbye.

He ignored her silence, as he was prone to do, and moved to sit on the bed. The old bedside clock ticked through the seconds as they sat, absorbed in the sudden emptiness of Bess’s room.

“Mom wanted to know if you were staying,” Alex said at last, looking up to watch the struggle in her eyes. “You’re welcome to.”

“I need to get back to New Orleans.”

“To run away again?”

Her chin shot up, her eyes dark, stormy, “I have to get back to work.”

“No,” he shook his head, stood, and paced to the closet, still open from when his mother and his aunts had searched through his grandmother’s wardrobe for the white suit she had been buried in. He picked up on his grandmother’s scent, soft and powdery, and turned back toward Bailey. “You’ve never been able to stick. You just always run, like you want to do now.”

“You don’t know anything about me,” she gritted her teeth and stood to face him, to challenge him, and felt the fire die quickly at the understanding in his eyes. He did know her. He knew her better then anyone else—possibly even better then Bess. She turned away, walked to the window and wrapped her arms around herself, willing away the coldness that gripped her heart.

She felt him when he came behind her, struggled with the need for him to place his hands on her shoulders to comfort as he would have at one time.

“You walked away from me two years ago Bailey because you can’t see past the hopelessness that at one time reeked from your life. I see it every time I read one of your articles. Something holds you back—keeps you sad. If you believe, Bailey, as you once said you did, where is the hope, where is your faith?”

Bailey shook her head, not wanting to hear the echo of his words, and lowered her chin as a tear slowly traced a path down her cheek. Alex placed a hand on her shoulder, dropped a kiss at the back of her head, “Leave if you must, Bailey, but everyone needs healing time. Everyone needs other people.”



Bailey stood alone in the room after Alex left and looked slowly around once more. She saw the simple stationary on the writing desk, the old ink pen, vases of silk roses, faded over time, Bess’s bible still opened on her night stand.

She would leave the house, go back to her job, to her life. Bess wouldn’t want her to remain here with the sadness.

You’ve never been able to stick. You just always run.

Bess had always encouraged her to get away, to grow. Bess . . . .

Everyone needs healing time. Everyone needs other people.

And she’d always needed Bess, even in the years since she’d been away. She’d needed and Bess had answered, had encouraged. It had always been easy to believe in God because Bess had loved God, and it had been easy for Bailey to love and worship God in the present, because she’d seen how He’d changed her life.

But it was hard to ask God to help with the hurt and bitterness from her past. It was harder to believe, to understand, when she remembered the pain and the filth.

Where is the hope, where is your faith?

With Bess, her heart cried, and she heard the answer echoed in her heart, shaming her. Bess had always encouraged her. Bess had always been there for her. Bess had been so strong. But Bess stood for something more, something that had always been hard for Bailey to accept.

Bailey reached out for Bess’s Bible, and placed it across her lap. She ran her hand across the cool pages, the small printed words blurring because of the tears in her eyes.

Bess had taught her to go to church . . . and Bailey supposed, to practice religion. It had been so easy to believe in God, because Bess believed. But in living Bess had always encouraged more, known more.

And here, in her tattered Bible, Bess had always found more.



Alex sat in the polished kitchen, alone, and prayed. He’d known Bailey for years, since she’d come at 13 to live with his grandmother. He’d seen her active in the small church’s youth group, had watched her blossom as her hurt had washed away under his grandmother’s influence. He’d fallen in love, eventually, with the woman she’d become.

But the girl she’d been, had torn them a part. She believed in God, he knew she did. She believed in Jesus and in His resurrection. He’d seen her in moments when she was struck in awe, and shamelessly in love with her Savior.

And he’d seen her run, afraid . . . of life, of the future.

It wasn’t an issue of belief, or of trust, he thought, but of strength. So he prayed, knowing that if she left now, there would never be an easy way for her to come back to where Bess had been her influence.

When he heard the soft steps on the wooden stairway that led into the kitchen, Alex panicked slightly and pushed away from the table. If she was leaving, he would fight her.



She came down, carrying Bess’s Bible. She’d read until her eyes hurt in the fading light, and when she’d gotten up to turn on the overhead light, she’d walked out of the room, following her heart.

Alex was in the kitchen as if waiting for her. She stood at the threshold and hugged the old Bible to her chest. They’d stood like this two years ago, separated, achingly quiet. There had been a question in his eyes then, as there was one now.

“You were right,” Bailey said, her throat aching over the words. She swallowed, blinked against tears. “Then and now. I—I don’t know how to let go. There’s something inside me, left over from when—from then.”

She still couldn’t say it easily, couldn’t talk about her life before coming into Bess’s home and heart. Talking about it, praying about it, had always made it seem more real, as if it would happen all over again if she concentrated on those days of abuse, alcoholism and pain.

“You don’t have to face it on your own, and you don’t have to be afraid of the result,” Alex stepped around the table then stopped, leaving several feet of space between them. “Jesus said that whatever we ask for in His name, we shall receive. Ask for peace in your past, Bailey, and He will grant it to you. It may take time, but it will come.”

“How can you be so sure of yourself? Can’t you be afraid of who I am?”

“I know who you are,” Alex saw the confusion in her eyes, and the fear, and closed the distance, “love who you are. Weep for who you were, trapped, helpless. Your past doesn’t stand between us. You ran away. Only you can come back.”

Bailey fought against the panic. She closed her eyes against the urge to run and prayed, God, give me strength to stay.



Bailey went to the cemetery alone, bringing with her Bess’s Bible and a handful of wild flowers she’d absently picked from he roadside. I was a warm day in early summer. The sky was bright blue, dotted with puffy white clouds. The cemetery lawn was covered in fertile green grass.

Nearly a year had passed since Bess’s funeral, a long year of struggling, and counseling, and praying. Bailey had Alex’s ring on her finger, the hard diamond that shimmered in the sunlight a testament to his patience and love. They were getting married in a few hours, in the little church Bess had taken her to years ago.

She stood at her father’s grave, feeling grief for the man he’d been, feeling strong as the woman she’d become. The simple headstone displayed his name and the few years he’d wasted on this earth. Closing her eyes, she thanked God for her father—for the few good moments they’d had, for giving her life.

Then, saying goodbye, she moved away from his grave, and found the newer one, the headstone displaying the name Elizabeth Campbell. She sat down and ran her fingers through the grass that had grown over the grave.

“Thank you, Bess,” she whispered, tears gathering in her eyes, “for giving me everything I needed. For leading me to Christ, for showing me what love is. I never should have doubted you, and I didn’t realized then that I did, but you were right. In everything you lived in your life. You were right.”







Return to Short Stories