|
Sarah shifted clumsily
atop the toilet seat as she maneuvered the test
strip through her urine stream. She was only
two days late, but two days and a guilty
conscience had sent her rushing down to the
campus drug store for an “in-home” pregnancy
test kit. She had lied to Mark about taking the
birth control pills, and was about to come face
to face with the consequences of her deception
and irresponsibility.
Gingerly, she removed
the urine-soaked strip from between her legs and
placed it on the bathroom sink. After zipping
her jeans, she returned to the instructions and
continued reading while attempting to steady the
tremor in her hands that threatened to overtake
her entire body. Satisfied that she hadn’t
missed any steps, she tossed the paper aside,
anxiously straining to glimpse the result.
Almost imperceptibly,
a second line was forming in the indicator
window, signaling a pregnancy. She stared at
the strip in disbelief. Her eyes focused
intently, as if frozen by the horror of the
truth. Denial was her instinctive defense,
perpetuated by guilt and fear.
Grasping the strip
once again, Sarah held it up toward the bathroom
light. She observed the newly formed lines from
different angles, as if to try and make them
disappear, yet they only became clearer and more
defined with each passing moment. Her mind
searched for alternative explanations, unwilling
to accept the truth.
Stunned and pale, she
sunk lifelessly back down to the toilet seat,
propping one arm against the vanity for
support. Closing her eyes, she fought for
control, suddenly bombarded by the implications
of her situation.
A loud, urgent
pounding on the bathroom door jolted her
frenzied nerves, reminding her that she still
had to face Mark with the results.
“Come on, Sarah! How
long does it take?” he groaned impatiently.
Mark! His
voice sounded gruff and irritable, his behavior
irreverent. She’d temporarily forgotten he was
waiting for her in the living room. How could
she face him now?
“I’m, I’m almost
finished,” she stammered, raising her voice to
penetrate the bathroom door. “I’ll be right
out!”
The girl stood up
again, catching a glimpse of her panic-stricken
reflection in the bathroom mirror. How could
I have let this happen? I knew better
than to become sexually involved with Mark!
What am I going to do now?
|
Mitchell Bransun was awakened suddenly in the
night by the mournful tones of his wife’s
guttural sobbing. He instinctively rolled over
to face her, adjusting the bedcovers and his
eyesight in doing so. He was still half asleep,
yet the hauntingly familiar scene that lay
beside him nearly made his heart stop. Swathed
in moonlight, Beverly laid tangled in the
bedclothes, still asleep, her legs writhing and
arms outstretched, as if reaching for something
she couldn’t quite grasp. Chunks of matted
blond hair clung to her face, salty from her
sweat and tears.
Now fully alert,
Mitchell attempted to subdue his wife by placing
his left hand over her knees while wiping her
brow with the pajama sleeve on his right arm.
“Bev! Honey, come on, wake up! It’s just a bad
dream!”
Beverly moaned and
continued to thrash, unaware of her husband’s
pleading. Her subconscious mind only had one
matter to deal with, and this time nothing would
stand between her and her baby. Beverly would
get her aborted child back, no matter the cost,
if only she could find all of the pieces.
. . .
For a brief
moment Mitchell considered leaving the bedroom.
He had a pretty good idea what had been causing
Bev’s recent nightmares, but he wasn’t in the
mood to face the past at four o’clock in the
morning. She hadn’t had any of these particular
types of nightmares in more than a decade, and
he didn’t understand what was causing them to
resurface. She’d been having them for several
months now, and even though she hadn’t said
anything to him about them he knew eventually
she would confide in him—and then the fighting
would start all over again.
Suppressing his own
thoughts for the moment he called out to Beverly
once again, lifting her upper torso off the bed
in an attempt to wake her. Finally, she awoke
with a start, confused and upset.
“Bev, honey, are you
okay?”
Beverly squinted at
Mitchell through narrowed, puffy eyes as she
struggled to make the transition from the horror
in her mind to the reality before her as she lay
in the arms of her husband of thirty years. The
words came slowly.
“I’m just fine,” she
offered vaguely, her emotions too raw for any
further confrontation. “I’d like to wash my
face, though,” she managed, smoothing the hair
away from her neck. “My eyes are sore.”
“All right hon’, I’ll
be right here if you need me,” Mitchell replied
tenderly, grateful that he’d evaded what could
have been an explosive argument.
Beverly escaped to the
bathroom and turned on the hot water as she
grabbed a washcloth from underneath the sink,
the graphic images from her dream still fresh in
her mind. Calm down, breathe slowly!
The washcloth
felt good on her face and smelled of fabric
softener. She inhaled deeply, focusing on the
present and tangible sources of reality around
her. She sat for a long time on the bathroom
floor, thinking of nothing in particular except,
perhaps, how the shade of blue in the bathroom
tile matched her daughter Tracey’s eyes.
Would it have matched your eyes,
too?
It never occurred to
her to pray. But finally, she did remember how
much preparation she still had left to do before
Sunday, as the leader for her small group at
church. Eventually she stood up, retrieved her
robe from the bathroom door hook, and slipped
quietly downstairs to busy herself with work,
leaving Mitchell to snore loudly for three more
hours.
|
Lauren’s heart leapt as she placed the receiver
back on the telephone handset and penciled in
the name “Sarah” under the appropriate date and
time on the oversized desk calendar in front of
her. “Oh Lord!” she prayed fervently,
“Please be with Sarah during this difficult time
in her life! Bring her safely to the Center so
that she may have the opportunity to hear truth;
that she and her baby could escape the
devastating consequences of abortion!”
No matter how many
abortion-minded callers Lauren had spoken with
over the past five years as a volunteer at the
Pregnancy Help Center, the conversations never
ceased to weigh heavily upon her heart. She
felt deeply for each and every woman, with
empathy and understanding that only comes from
first-hand experience. She knew how the initial
feelings of panic, denial, fear, shame and
vulnerability that often accompany a crisis
pregnancy situation could persuade a woman to
have an abortion if not properly counseled.
It had happened to her
many years earlier, yet Lauren had finally
accepted God’s forgiveness for her sin, paid for
through Christ’s death on the cross. In the
measure that God’s mercy had been extended to
her, so was Lauren’s thankful heart overflowing
with love and compassion for the two lives that
are at risk in a crisis pregnancy. The Lord had
called her to the Pregnancy Help Center to work
with their clients and share her testimony in an
attempt to stop others from making the same
mistake she’d made. There was an exhilarating
freedom that came with God’s grace, one Lauren
had never before known.
|
