Between the Lines
BETWEEN THE LINES: a Mother’s Love
It’s never too late to do the right thing
May 13th, 2022
Chapter 6: AFTER – the Recall
Ephesians 3:20, ‘Never doubt God’s mighty power to work in you and accomplish all this. He will achieve infinitely more than your greatest request, your most unbelievable dream, and exceed your wildest imagination! He will outdo them all, for His miraculous power constantly energizes you.’ (TPT)
Zachary awakened with a jolt. Drenched in sweat, his chest was stuffed with panic, erupting like hot lava into his throat. His heart pounded like a drum beat at the hands of a tribal warrior. He was afraid he wouldn’t be able to take another breath so he held onto it for as long as he could until he gasped for air. Out of the ink of the night and the shadowy disturbance in his head came the strains of a catchy little song.
‘Skinamarinky dinky dink, skinamarinky doo, I love you…’ He had had this dream before. ‘Skinamarinky dinky dink, skinamarinky doo, I love you…’ Numerous times before since he was old enough to first remember. ‘I love you in the morning and in the afternoon; I love you in the evening and underneath the moon…’ He had heard it in his dreams so many times, he knew the lyrics by now. ‘So skinamarinky dinky dink, skinamarinky doo-ooo, I love you!’ And also the tune.
What was strange: he had never sung the song, nor been taught the song nor had it been sung to him. He’d never heard it in a class or on a television show or cartoon. Yet it was buried in his memory and came to the surface more and more frequently. Along with the trace of a floral perfume and a slight caress that made goose flesh rise on his skin. He was sweating profusely now and was chilled by the bumps that now glittered his body. He needed to breathe before he hyperventilated.
Zachary pulled himself into a small ball, wrapping his goose-fleshy arms around his knees which were drawn to his chin. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and he could make out familiar things in his room. That soothed him. There was no woman next to his bed singing to him; he hadn’t been taken from his room and he wasn’t waking up someplace foreign to him, near a stranger singing him a lullaby. He started rocking gently to and fro, an action bringing him great comfort, self-soothing practices he had taught himself. For so long Zachary couldn’t function like a normal kid and he hated his life. He was an old soul and had wisdom beyond measure, but he couldn’t communicate what he thought and felt, and all his meltdowns erected a wall between he and everyone else so sturdy and insurmountable for anyone to get to him and for him to overcome to get away from himself. Zachary had seen more head doctors than he could recall, but eventually, a wonderful person came into his life who ‘got him’. She was just like him! Had the same deficiencies and brilliant mind, medical track record and hurdles to conquer as he did; Midge (for Midget) was just older so she’d already been through it and had surmounted it and then went to school so she could help others. Zachary was her project, she said with a grin. And he was killing it.
Except right now, in the dark of the night, with the cobwebs cluttering the corners of his mind, scant remembrances he couldn’t quite grasp or recall. It unsettles him, this voice and this person whom he knows but has never met; this memory that snatches his peace while at the same time giving it. If it weren’t 3 o’clock in the morning, he’d call Midge, but Zachary doesn’t want to burden her with his dream. No reason for the both of them to be awake. Instead, he begins to pray.
That is another gift Midge gave him. She gave him Jesus. And Jesus is his best friend. Even more best than Midge. See, Zachary had been going to Sunday School and then church services with his family since they chose him, but he didn’t understand what they said there in that place. And to be truthful, Zachary had been so disruptive none of the other kids were able to understand anything the teacher said either! Midge just had a way of making the complex so simple even his perplexed way of thinking could conjure her illustrations to make sense. He had been completely rescued and set free from himself, and Zachary believed, from Satan who had wanted to control Zachary’s mannerisms and actions and keep him stuck, lost, self-absorbed, in his own mind.
Midge had been the only person who Zachary had sang his little tune to, the only person he’d ever trusted with the technicalities of his dreams. She was the only trusted confidante (until recently) who he had shared about the ache deep within him that longed to find and know his real parents. Midge had helped him to realize perhaps he could not move on into the future until he let go of the past and reconciled the broken and missing pieces that bore the memories of his parents. Just as he was convinced it was his real mom who used to sing the ‘Skinamarinky Dinky’ song to him when he was an infant, he was just as persuaded that an image of his real dad was just on the other side of a mental wall he hadn’t broken through to yet. He had a fuzzy outline, but he knew there was more locked inside of him; his mind just wasn’t convinced he was ready for the specifics quite yet. Midge had taught him how powerful the mind is, just how creative and complex God made the human brain, but also how God protects us often from our own thoughts when we just aren’t ready yet for what has been hidden from us.
That’s why he had taken the article he saw in an archived newspaper his class was doing a study on to his parents. His now parents. The parents who chose him when the other ones didn’t. It had been a shock! Thumbing through the paper, listening to his teacher instruct them on how to effectively do research for their upcoming book report, worth fifty percent of their grade this quarter, and suddenly there was this face staring back at him he knew that he knew that he knew. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the guy. It was if there were a magnetic pull, a force so intense he was rendered helpless to look away. Zachary couldn’t help himself, as he carefully extricated that page from the newspaper, cautiously folding it and folding it again and again until he could fit it neatly inside his backpack, into the zippered pocket not easily accessed, where no one would find it in case he decided to contemplate it by himself.
That same magnetism that caused him to take the article with him was the same irresistible power beckoning him to his dad yesterday, the rectangle of newsprint held firmly in a shaky hand. His dad had known just by the flimsy way his eyes wavered as he asked for his help that it was important to Zachary. ‘Why do I know this person, Dad?’ And suddenly he watched the color drain from his father’s face.
“Boy Charged as an Adult, Sentenced to Life Imprisonment; Sexual Assault of Children” read the headline and an unkempt kid stared back at Zachary and his dad. ‘Where did you get this, Zachary?’ his dad asked firmly, his mouth like a straight line drawn by a pencil. The article read: “Last month, the Court found Jessie Clune, a seventeen-year-old, guilty of numerous counts of sexual assault on children, and today at his sentencing, the judge ordered life imprisonment, and agreed to sentence Clune as an adult.”
‘May I have this please? I’ll give it back to you. But I need to show this to your mom. I promise, I will give it back to you, Zach. Let Mom and I discuss this, and do some research ourselves, and we’ll get you some answers, son.’
Zachary just stared at him until his heart began trickling from his eyes. Hope for Zachary was fragile, and he felt it begin to vanish quicker than it had appeared. Who would want this person for a father anyway? a thought niggled Zachary. But still…people change, Zachary thought.
‘You trust me?’ his dad asked. And very slowly, almost imperceptibly, Zachary nodded.
Psalm 139:23-24, ‘Search me, o God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.’ (NIV)
Between the Lines is based upon a true story. What does God’s faithfulness truly look like? Is it the same in every situation? He is wholly trustworthy; therefore, there is victory, even if it doesn’t resemble everything we imagined.
