Prayers of a Stranger: A Christmas Story Read online

  Miriam said, “Tell me what you are thinking.”

  “It sounds like an autoimmune disorder, which is very rare in infants but not totally unheard of. Has she always been this way, or did it come on her gradually?”

  “The doctors, they all ask the same. And the answer is, from the very first day the little darling has not been well. She could not drink her mother’s milk. So they put her on soya.”

  “Severe allergic reactions to a number of various . . .”

  Amanda stopped talking because the child reached for her.

  It was the most natural thing in the world to take Rochele in her arms. She felt the girl’s arms slide around her neck and one hand take hold of her hair. The little face nestled into the point where Amanda’s neck met her shoulder. Then Rochele sighed. A tiny wind against her ear, and she went still.

  For one as creased by time as Miriam, the old woman had a most remarkable smile. Her mouth shifted only a little, and yet every line on her heavily wrinkled face turned upward. “This one has a new friend.”

  Amanda patted the girl’s back and breathed in the sweet smell.

  “She never lets anyone hold her,” Miriam said. “Me, the one you saw cooking, her mother. No one else.”

  The cook must have heard them, for she popped her head into the living room. Her eyes went wide, and she called out the door and gestured. The other young woman came running, and she too stood amazed. They jabbered at Miriam, who said, “The one you see by the door, she has been with me since the first day Rochele arrived. Never has she been allowed to do what you are doing.”

  Amanda knew she should be asking and observing. But just then only one thought came to her. “I lost a child.”

  The creases resettled into their familiar lines. “When was this?”

  “Almost exactly a year ago. She was stillborn.”

  “Did she have a name, this one?”

  “Martha.” With a start, Amanda realized it was the first time she had spoken the name since the day she lost her. The sense of release was so strong, she said it again. “Martha was the name of Christopher’s mother. Chris is my husband.”

  “And so you could never hold this child, this beloved Martha. And so your arms are still empty.” The words carried a pragmatic calm. “Rochele feels this.”

  “You really think so?”

  “Those who have hurt and grow from the pain, these are the ones to trust when your burden is heavy. Who is to say that a little child with a golden heart cannot also feel another child’s absence?”

  Amanda felt the child stir and let her slip down to dangle by her knees as Miriam had done. She kept one finger extended so Rochele could grip it for balance. They were still seated like that a half hour later when Rochele’s mother arrived.

  Alathea was a Sephardic name, rich in Tunisian Jewish heritage. Miriam explained this to Amanda as Alathea cooed over her daughter. Amanda guessed the mother’s age to be in the early thirties, not far from her own. But one brief glance at Alathea was enough to know this woman had carried more than her share of burdens. She looked permanently weary. Her face was being redrawn into lines of hardship. Yet there was a tensile strength to her slender form, a quiet determination to her dark gaze. And the love she showed to her little girl made Amanda’s eyes burn.

  Alathea worked as a cleaning woman in one of the local businesses. Her only son was twelve, and handsome like her late husband. Miriam translated Alathea’s words in a soft murmur.

  Amanda said, “I worked as the chief critical care nurse in a maternity ward. You know, before.”

  The wizened face opened wide. “This is true, what you are telling me?”

  “It was. But I haven’t been back in the ward since last year. I tried. Once. The week before I came to Israel. But I couldn’t enter.” Amanda watched as Rochele walked in place before her mother like she was trying to dance. And then the child looked at Amanda and she smiled. All the pale shadows Amanda had brought with her to Israel were suddenly banished. “I haven’t held a baby since then.”

  Miriam studied her for a moment, then lifted her face and laughed. The sound was so surprising Rochele turned and giggled with her. Which only drew the old woman into louder glee.

  The two ladies entered through the kitchen doorway and spoke to Miriam in Hebrew. The old woman answered in the same tongue. Whatever she said caused Alathea and the ladies to laugh as well.

  Rochele positively loved the sound. She shouted her glee, a musical lilt that caused all the women to laugh harder still, including Amanda. When they quieted, Amanda asked, “What am I missing?”

  “You know the prayer you carried for me to the Wall, yes?”

  “It was about this child.”

  “So what happens, but the tourist from America who does me this kindness, who is she? A woman trained to help the sickest of babies. And then you come into my home. And this angel of my heart, this little one, she trusts you, and she comes to you.”

  “I was that nurse. No more.”

  Miriam waved that aside as if it were of no importance whatsoever. “You have come because the Holy One willed it. You will heal her.”

  Amanda protested, “If there was something detectable, the local doctors would have certainly found it by now.”

  This only caused Miriam to laugh louder. “What part of this miracle frightens you more? That you may be right? Or that you might be wrong?”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  When the phone call came, Chris was so asleep he could not filter the jangling from his dream. He struggled up as from the depths driven by the fear that something was wrong and he was too far away to do anything about it. He knocked the clock to the floor before he found the phone and said, “Amanda?”

  “No, it’s me. Frank.”

  “What time is it?”

  “I don’t . . . Chris, can you come?”

  Chris swung his feet to the floor. The drapes were drawn so he couldn’t see across the street. The clock at his feet read just after two. “What’s the matter?”

  “I’ve fallen.” Frank’s voice sounded strangled. “It hurts, Chris. It hurts a lot.”

  The chief paramedic was named Chuck, and he was built like a professional wrestler, low to the ground and immensely strong. Which made his measured pace even more impressive. He told Frank, “Most likely you’ve cracked your hip joint, maybe even severed it entirely. So what we need to do is move you in slow stages, giving your muscles time to adjust to each new position. We’re not going to pick you up, we’re going to nudge your body slowly over so that it just flows as naturally as possible onto the gurney. Clear so far?”

  “Sounds good,” Frank said. His color had improved from the pasty complexion Chris had first seen. He’d located the house key where Frank said, under the potted bird of paradise beside the front stoop. He had found Frank halfway down the rear hall, where he had dragged himself in order to reach the hall phone.

  Chuck went on, “Don’t do anything, Frank. Don’t move, don’t try to help. Just put yourself totally in our hands. Can you do that?”

  “Think so.” Frank’s tight panting breath had eased somewhat, but returned when the two EMTs took hold of his damaged side and slowly, slowly rolled him up a bit.

  “Okay, here we go.” While Chuck held Frank up, the silent young woman slid the stretcher underneath him. It was a narrow flat board with handles and a number of places where straps could be attached. Chuck tightened one strap across Frank’s chest as soon as he was down flat again. “You still with me, Frank?”

  “That hurt.”

  “Probably means your joint is a goner.”

  “I could feel something grind in there.”

  “We’ll let the docs worry about that when we get you safe inside the ER. Now your upper body is stationary, so I’m going to nudge your legs slow and easy into position. Don’t strain and don’t try to help me. Ready?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. Deep breath.” Both attendants wore blue surgical gloves and
handled Frank with an incredible mixture of strength and gentleness. Chris stood in the hall’s far end and watched as the two attendants gradually pressed at Frank’s good hip and thigh, nudging him slowly into position. Frank groaned once, then went back to panting.

  “All done, Frank.”

  “That’s it? Really?”

  “We’re good to go.”

  Frank released a huge breath. “Oh man.”

  Chris asked, “You want me to phone Emily?”

  “No.” Frank almost shouted the word. “You wait until I’m safe in the hospital and everything is under control. You hear me?”

  “Sure thing,” Chris said, using as soothing a tone as he could manage. “Whatever you say.”

  “I don’t want her freaking out. And I need to be able to tell her I’m fine.”

  “Which you will be,” Chuck said. “Okay, ready at your end? We lift on three. One, two, three.”

  When Frank was safely stowed in the back of the ambulance, Chuck said to Chris, “You’re Amanda’s husband, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good to finally meet. Sorry it had to be like this.” He locked the stretcher into place. “We’ve been praying for you.”

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Yeah, we got this group at the hospital, we meet most mornings. Every time she’s there, Amanda asks that we pray for you and the company. Avery, right? The electronics firm over past the airport?”

  “Yes. I knew about the prayer group. But not about the prayers.” From inside the ambulance he heard Frank chuckle. He looked through the door. “What’s so funny?”

  Frank waved a languid hand. “God’s got you coming and going.”

  “Your wife is something else. I don’t know what we would have done this year without her there to watch our backs.” Chuck slammed the rear doors. “You going to follow us over?”

  “Soon as I get on some clothes.” He waved the ambulance away and discovered a pair of neighbors standing on their front step. He walked over in his beach sandals and pajama bottoms and explained what had happened, then hurried home to dress.

  The driver’s words rang in the silent night. No question about it. His wife was something else.

  Chris put off calling Emily as Frank had requested. He entered the hospital and was instantly surrounded by people who treated him with the down-to-earth calmness of old friends. The entire hospital staff seemed to know he was Amanda’s husband and the friend of their beloved Frank. They knew why he was there, and they made him welcome. The hour did not matter a bit. There was none of the sitting around the vacant waiting room while they wheeled Frank up to radiology. They took Chris into the nurses’ station and plied him with coffee they made fresh for him.

  Chris knew most of them by name. He had been in and out of the hospital since before he and Amanda had married. But this was the first time he had been here with a need of his own, except of course for the disastrous night when Amanda had been forced into labor. And from some of the looks he received, sitting there in the comfortable chair sipping from the mug emblazoned with the hospital’s logo, he suspected there were others who recalled that same night. When Amanda had woken in terrible pain and they had rushed over to learn that their baby’s heart had stopped beating.

  Chris found himself suddenly deluged by memories of that night, the urgency and the fear they had all shared, the tense speed that had surrounded their every action, their every breath. The sorrow and the helpless loss, and holding his wife after the birth while she cried herself to sleep. Amanda had been too worn out to give the tears much force. She had cried like a little girl. He had not recognized her voice. He had held her and worried that some fragment of their precious life together had been lost. And there was nothing he could do about it but hold her and cry tears of his own.

  Chris found himself aching for his wife. Not for then. For now. What it must mean for her to come through those doors and face those memories every day. How much she must love this place. It was not a job. It was not a place filled with sickness and injury and fear. It was her calling. And not even desperate loss would keep her away.

  He was so proud of her he could have wept.

  “Chris?”

  “Dr. Henri. How are you?”

  “I should be asking you that.” The man’s skin shone softly in the fluorescents. He wore his customary surgical blues and stern expression.

  “I was thinking of the night. You know, when—”

  “I suspected as much. Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No,” he decided. “There really isn’t anything to be said. It happened. We’re dealing with it.”

  Dr. Henri walked to the coffeemaker in the corner and poured himself a mug full. “It’s a shame that life does not give us a time free of other worries when we can heal.”

  Chris huffed a humorless laugh. “You can say that again.”

  Dr. Henri settled into the chair across from Chris. “I suppose you have family who think you should have left it all behind by now.”

  “Yes, actually we do.”

  “Among my people, we talk about the cycles of life. That grief has its own season. And being impatient for it to pass is as futile as arguing with winter.”

  “Your people sound very wise,” Chris said.

  “About some things, perhaps.” Dr. Henri gestured toward the door. “We have a prayer meeting that starts in twenty minutes. Would you like to join me?”

  Chris looked at his watch. “It’s ten past six.”

  “That is correct.”

  “I’ve been sitting here for almost three hours.”

  “You have indeed.”

  “Do you have any news about Frank?”

  “The surgeon has arrived. Frank is being prepped. They are going to replace the joint.”

  “I need to call Emily.”

  “You could,” Dr. Henri solemnly agreed. “But she is in Israel, is she not? With your own good wife, I believe.”

  “Yes.”

  “So is there an urgency in calling and making her worry? In three more hours Frank will be out of surgery, and you can call her with the good news.”

  “If it were me, I’d want to know now.”

  “You might. Then again, you would suffer through three hours of frantically trying to get back home, worrying over things out of your control.”

  The man had a straightforward way of puncturing Chris’s logic. “Maybe I should wait.”

  “I would advise it.”

  “If I catch it for not telling her sooner, I’m going to blame it on you.”

  Dr. Henri might have smiled. It was hard to tell. “It would not be the first time.”

  The hospital’s large public cafeteria had a smaller room off to one side. And off this was yet a smaller room, where all the tables were clustered together and clearly intended as a sort of informal conference area. They filled all the chairs around the table and drew in more so that people lined the side and rear wall. Chris was given a place of honor at the front with Dr. Henri. To his right was a glass wall overlooking a narrow strip of green and medical office buildings beyond. A number of people came over and said hello. Their concern and warmth were both touching and a little surprising. They all knew about his company’s troubles and appeared genuinely concerned about his own well-being.

  Dr. Henri led them in an opening prayer, asking for Frank’s peace and healing, and then prayed for Emily. Then he prayed for Amanda on her journey and for Chris and for the company. He spoke of them with such an easy familiarity that Chris knew this was far from the first time he had made such requests. There was no reason why he should be so moved by the simple words. He knew Amanda was greatly loved here.

  When Dr. Henri went silent, one voice after another spoke briefly, encircling the room with reflective harmony. Chris sat with his eyes open and his heart full. The light was strong now, another beautiful December day in Florida. Chris stared out the window and wondered at how many lovely dawns he had been blind to o
ver the past months. A cluster of gulls swooped past, and he felt his own heart take wing.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Amanda arrived back at the hotel filled with genuine misgivings. Her concerns had not truly surfaced until she was on the bus and headed toward Jerusalem, but they continued to mount until she felt that every voice surrounding her as she passed through the bus terminal was accusing her of arrogance. How could she, a stranger to this land and these people, hope to discover what ailed this child? She had two days. The doctors had been working on her for two years. The miracle that Miriam had spoken of was nothing but a mockery. A false hope. Amanda wasn’t even a nurse anymore.

  She felt like the sun was trying to beat her into the pavement. Her footsteps grew increasingly heavy as she walked the mile back to the hotel. Climbing the front steps required a huge effort. She endured the security check and entered the hotel’s cool air-conditioned wash. She was almost to the elevators when she realized the desk clerk was calling her name.

  Amanda walked back over and was greeted by smiles from all the staff. Even the manager appeared in the doorway to her office and watched as the senior clerk reached behind and lifted a vase of roses from the table holding guests’ mail. “We will be sorry to have these go upstairs with you.”

  Amanda made no move to take them. “There must be some mistake.”

  “A secret admirer,” the manager almost sang the words. “There, see the card? It came with the flowers.”

  Her hands shook slightly as she opened the tiny envelope, pulled out the card, and read For my darling, thank you for the gift of your love. Chris.

  Amanda said numbly, “They’re from my husband.”

  “Ah, now you have spoiled my day,” the manager said, pretending to be upset. “I will go home and there will be no flowers waiting for me, no sweet note. Like every day. Only this evening, I will miss them.”

  “You are married to a saint of a man,” the desk clerk told the manager. “I should be so lucky as to find a man like yours.”