In His Eyes(73)

Had she spoken her thoughts aloud? She looked at him from the corner of her eye and nodded, though only because she didn’t wish to speak on it further.

“Do you want to be healed, Ella?”

She stared at him. What an odd question. Who wouldn’t want to be healed? But even as she thought it, she knew the answer. If she fought the healing because she did not want to endure the pain, then the healing would be all the more difficult. She sighed. “Aye. I do.”

“That is good, then.” He leaned back against the tree and stared out into the field, seeming not to be in any hurry to do more.

Ella frowned, then decided merely to do as he did. She leaned back and took a deep breath, watching the way the grass swayed like millions of tiny dancers.

“Who are you?”

Ella blinked, startled by the words. “You don’t know?”

He chuckled. “I know every hair on your head, and have numbered them all. I hold every tear in my hand that has fallen from your eyes.”

Ella plucked a blade of grass and rolled it between her fingers. “Yet, still you ask.”

He looked out over the field again. “Who are you, Ella?”

She drew a shuddering breath. “I don’t know.”

“You know, but you have forgotten.”

The memories she’d seen the last time she came here flashed before her eyes, but didn’t seem to fit. “I am….” Ella plucked another blade of silky grass and tossed it away. “Well, I am not my mother. I was never good enough to replace her. I’m not the boy my father wanted or even the girl he tried to get me to be. I’m not a lady, or really a mother….” Her voice hitched.

“So you are not the things you do or the titles you strive to achieve?”

She considered for a moment. “No. But then, if I am not what I do or say, then who am I?”

“Who, indeed?” He smiled. “Let’s try another way. Who am I?”

Ella froze. Something wiggled in the back of her mind and she narrowed her eyes.

“Do you remember?”

She let her lids drift closed and found herself in another memory. There, somewhere in the far corner was something…something she’d tried to store away. A memory she did not wish to look upon, hidden behind a locked door. Ella walked toward it and paused.

“In order to heal a wound, you must first open it.”

She clinched her teeth and wrenched open the door. She was in her old farmhouse again. The night her mother died.

Ella backed away. The door faded and she blinked at the field again. “No. I can’t.”

He grasped her hand and squeezed, giving her the courage she did not have on her own. She drew a deep breath and upon her exhale came to stand in her mother’s room once more. Ella clutched her white gown and stared at a much younger version of herself crouched by Mama’s bed. Hair wild and dirty face streaked with tears, the child version of herself continued living out the memory as though the current Ella had not walked into the room. The girl cried out, pleading that the wasting disease would not take Mama from her. Ella’s heart constricted as she watched herself cry out for someone to help her.

Mama’s eyes opened, clearer than they had been in days. “Darling, I will not be here much longer.”

Ella whimpered. “No, Mama. You can’t go.” The fire in the hearth had long died, and the chill seeped deep into her bones. She tried to tuck the frayed quilt around Mama’s thin frame.

Mama took a great effort and pulled her hand from the covers so that Ella could grasp the thin bones that were all that remained of the strong hands that had tended her and loved her. Mama rubbed her thumb across the backs of Ella’s fingers. “It is time, my love. He is calling me home.”

She pressed closer. “Who is, Mama?”

“Jesus, baby. I am his and he is mine, and it is time for me to go home to him.”

Ella grabbed the quilt, grasping it so tightly her fingers hurt. “But, Mama….”

“Shhh.” Mama’s eyes fluttered closed, and it took her a moment before she reopened them. “Remember what I taught you?”

Mama had tried to teach her many things. How to care for the house, how to bake pies. She’d taught her to make delicate lace and speak like the fine ladies from the life she’d left behind to marry Papa. Mama had taught her many things, but too much remained that she didn’t know. Who would show her how to be a woman?

“The most important thing, darling.”

She knew what Mama meant…the thing she’d pointed out as she read the Bible and said prayers over Ella each night before kissing her cheek and telling her good night.

Mama weakly squeezed her hand. “Tell me.”

Ella’s words quivered. “You told me that Jesus saves us. That his sacrifice on the cross makes it so that we shed the robes of our transgressions. He allows us to wear the robes of his righteousness, and by him we are saved for eternal life.”

Mama sighed softly. “Good girl. You must never forget that. If you put your heart in his hands, repent of your sins, and let him be the Lord of your life, sweet Ella, then you will never be alone.” She drew a breath that rattled in her chest. “You’ll never be alone, and when the time comes, you will get to be with him for always. Then you will see me again.”