“I don’t know what I would do without my mom. God, please protect her and watch over her,” Ashleigh continued to pray. Then it suddenly hit her what she was doing. ‘Did those words just come out of my mouth?’ she thought to herself. Suddenly all the speeches Lance had given her about God…how he could bring peace and comfort to her life flooded her mind. Tears began to stream down her face. All this time she had been pushing God away and now she had a longing to reach out to Him. She was confused. Ashleigh’s hand immediately reached out for her cell phone. She quickly hit the speed-dial to Lance’s house in Florida. The phone rang three times and Ashleigh was just about to give up on Lance being there when his voice abruptly filled the air.
“Hello?” Lance answered out of breath. He and Monica had been out on the back porch grilling burgers and had forgotten to take the phone outside with them.
“Lance…” Ashleigh sighed when he answered the phone. She had never been happier to hear his voice then she was at this moment.
“Ash? Ash, what’s wrong?”
“Lance, my mom was in a car accident,” she sobbed.
“Is she ok?” Lance said, his voice full of concern.
“I don’t know.”
“Ash, calm down. Tell me what happened,” Lance said.
“I don’t know what happened. I had to go to Brookhaven for a doctor’s appointment and as I was leaving my dad called. He said that my mom had been in a wreck. She’s in the hospital. Lance I don’t know if she is ok or hurt or what. I’m scared.”
“Where are you now?”
“I’m in the car about half way to Jackson.”
“Ok, you need to calm down. The last we need is for you to have an accident as well.”
“I know.”
“Gosh I wish we lived closer together. I hate it when you are upset.”
“I know.”
“I wish there was more that I could do for you over the phone. I’ll be praying for you though,” he encouraged her.
“I already have been, but I don’t know what else to do…” Ashleigh admitted.
He was about to say something else when what she said hit him. She’d been praying. Lance was shocked by the words that had just left his best friend’s mouth. It was a bittersweet moment for him. He wanted so much to congratulate her for taking the first step towards God, but he knew now was not the time. They needed to focus on her mom.
“Well, keep trying to stay calm and give me a call when you hear how she is, OK?” He asked.
“Definitely,” she replied. She clicked her phone off and tried to focus on the road. ‘At least I have someone else praying for my mom,’ she thought.
Lance walked back outside where his wife was still manning the grill. Monica turned and smiled at him as he walked toward her. Her smile slowly faded when she saw the look on his face.
“Who was that on the phone Lance? What happened?” She asked, her voice filled with concern.
“That was Ashleigh. Her mom was in a car accident,” he told her, his face still filled with the dazed expression.
“Oh no!”
“Yeah, she doesn’t know how she is, so Ashleigh’s been praying for her.”
“She’s been what?” Monica asked. She didn’t think she’d heard him correctly.
“She told me that she’s been praying for her.” He paused for a moment and then gave a small laugh. “You know, that’s just like Ashleigh. She wont come to God for herself, but when she’s worried about someone else, she’ll pray.”
“She is a stubborn girl, huh?” Monica said.
“Yeah, but I wouldn’t want her any other way.”
The hour-long drive seemed to take an eternity. Finally, after what seemed like hours, she pulled into the parking lot of the hospital. She rushed into the emergency room and scanned the room. Finally she spotted her father sitting in a chair across the room.
“Dad!” She called out.
He lifted his head and when he saw her he stood up and enveloped her in his arms.
“How is she? Have you heard anything yet?” She asked him when they finally pulled away.
“No, they haven’t told me anything yet,” he told her.
“Well I want some answers.” She turned on her heal and marched up to the nurses’ station.
“Excuse me, I want to know how my mom is doing,” she told the plump woman sitting behind the counter.
The woman looked up at her with an annoyed expression on her face. “You need to sit down and wait with everyone else. When the doctor has a moment he will come find you and update you.”
Ashleigh’s eyes narrowed at the woman. “NO! I’ve just driven an hour to find out how my mother is doing. I am NOT going to go sit down and wait for another hour. You’d better go find the doctor and tell him to get his butt out here right now or things are going to get ugly!” Ashleigh told the lady; her voice continually rising.
The woman appeared startled by Ashleigh’s outburst. She looked the young woman up and down and determined that she wasn’t bluffing. Rather than causing a scene the woman said, “Wait here please,” and walked through the double doors that led into the emergency room.
Ashleigh stood by the desk with her arms crossed, tapping her foot impatiently. A minute later the woman returned with the doctor in tow.
“Are you Mrs. Reynolds’ daughter?” He asked her.
“Yes, how is she doing?” she asked as her father walked up to join them.
“Your mother was very lucky. Had she been in a smaller vehicle things could have been far worse for her. She’s only suffered minor scrapes and bruises. There appears to be no internal damage, but we’re going to keep her overnight for observation.”
Ashleigh let out the breath that she’d been holding. Her mom was going to be OK. Relief washed over her.
“Can we go see her?” She asked him.
“Sure, she’s awake right now. But you can only stay for a few minutes. We want her to get some rest. Follow me.”
The doctor turned and walked down the hallway. Ashleigh and her father had to walk fast to keep up with him. Finally they rounded a corner and he led them into a room. There, lying on a bed with an IV in her arm, was Ashleigh’s mom.
Ashleigh rushed over and grasped her mom’s hand. “Are you OK?”
“I’m fine sweetie,” her mom said with a light smile. “I’m afraid I can’t say the same about the car though. I think it will have to be in the shop for a long time.”
“Forget about the car, it doesn’t matter,” Ashleigh’s father spoke up. “We’re just glad you’re alright.”
As the trio continued to talk Ashleigh smiled to herself and thought, “Thank you God, thank you.”
By the time Ashleigh finally walked in the door later that night she was exhausted. She and her father had spent the day at the hospital with her mom. Being that close to possibly losing her mom reminded her how special her family was to her. She didn’t want to leave her mom at the hospital, she wanted her family to be together.
She’d just begun to trudge up the stairs to crash on her bed when she remembered she needed to call Lance. Knowing him he’d be waiting on pins and needles for her call.
She walked into her room and put her purse on the dresser before sitting down on the bed and picking up the phone.
She waited as the phone rang, debating in her mind whether it was too late to call him. Finally, just as she was about to hang up she heard him groggily say hello.
“Hey Lancie, how’s it going?”
Lance quickly shook himself awake. He’d been waiting for her to call him back all day. He had continually fought the urge to call her to see what was going on, but he knew she’d call him as soon as she had a chance. “Things are fine here. The real question is how are things going there?”
“Really good. My mom is going to be fine. They said she was really lucky. She managed to only get some scratches and bruises.”
Lance let out the breath he had been holding. “Thank God. I was so worried.”
“I know, me too,” Ashleigh said. The line went quiet for a moment or two.
“So, how are you doing then?” Lance finally asked.
“I’m fine. This has been a really emotionally draining day though.”
“No doubt,” he replied. A moment later he finally asked the question he’d been dying to ask her. “Uh Ash, when you called me earlier you said that you’d been praying for your mom…”
She sat there for a moment, unsure of how to answer. “Yeah, it’s the first thing that popped in my head to do when I found out my mom had been in the accident. I felt so helpless. I didn’t know what else to do.”
“I know what you mean. I pray when I feel like that too.” Silence filled the lines once again. “So I guess that means you believe in God then?”
“Lance, I don’t think I ever didn’t believe in him. It’s just so hard to believe when all these awful things are going on around you.”
“You do know that God is not the cause of all of it right? You know that it’s people who have the free will to make their own decisions, but chose them poorly are the ones at fault?”
“Yeah, but what about me? What did I deserve to get cancer? Nobody made a wrong decision to cause that!” She exclaimed.
“That’s a hard one Ash. God didn’t give you cancer though, I know that for sure. He doesn’t want you to suffer or be in pain; that’s why He’s there for you, if you want Him to be. He wants to be there to comfort you and to give you a shoulder to lean on when you feel weak. One thing I do know is that you’ll never have so much on your plate that you aren’t able to handle it all. He wants to be there for you, all you have to do is ask.”
Ashleigh inhaled and let out a deep sigh. “I want Him to be there Lance. Will you pray with me?”
“You know I will,” he replied. “Here, I’m going to say a prayer, you can either repeat it after me or just pray it silently. It’s called the sinner’s prayer.”
Ashleigh bowed her head and closed her eyes and a moment later Lance’s voice filled her ear.
“So that’s it huh? Are you sure that’s all there is to it?” Ashleigh asked.
“Well did you pray it with sincerity and believe it with your heart?” He asked her.
“Yes I did.”
“Then yes, that’s all there is to it,” Lance said with a smile his friend couldn’t see.
Silence fell between the two again. “You know,” he finally spoke up, “It’s just like you for it to take someone else being in trouble for you to pray and believe!” He chuckled at his friend.
“I know I know. I guess I’ve always felt I was in control, I didn’t need to ask for help because I didn’t need it. At least I didn’t think I did. This was the first time where I’ve realized that I’m not in control. I knew I needed help from someone far more powerful than little old me.” She laughed along with him.
“Well Lance, I’m really tired, it’s been a long day. I’ll talk to you later alright?” she said with a yawn.
“Me too, you woke me up earlier.”
“Sorry about that.”
“It’s no problem. It’s great to hear your voice. I’ll talk to you soon Ashleigh, take care.”
He hung up the phone, the small smile still playing on his lips.
“I swear our phone rings more than anyone’s I’ve ever seen!” Lance exclaimed as he dropped the paperwork from FreeLance onto his lap when the phone began to ring. He quickly reached over to the table beside his recliner and picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Greetings from across the street!” Justin’s voice filled Lance’s ear.
“Well welcome home Curly!” Lance’s face softened and a smile formed on his lips. He figured just as soon as he said that Monica would be on him trying to take the phone away. She had been complaining for days that she missed talking to Keeley. When the room remained quite he glanced over at the couch where his wife was. Lance soon discovered that she had fallen asleep while reading. “How was the honeymoon?” Lance asked, turning his attention back to Justin
“It was great. I didn’t want to come home. But I could only handle having no one else around but Keeley so long. You know how she is. She is boring after awhile.”
“I heard that!” Keeley yelled out from the background.
“I’m just kidding babe!” Justin called back. “Anyways, I was just calling to let you two know that we were back and ask if you wanted to come over. You know…we can do whatever it is married couples do.”
“Um...I don’t know if I like the sound of that,” Lance laughed.
“Oh good Lord. That isn’t what I meant! Just get over here!” Justin laughed.
“Ok, ok,” Lance laughed and hung up the phone. He moved all his paperwork out of his lap and laid them on the floor beside his chair. He got up and walked over the couch and squatted down on the floor next to his wife. Lance reached out and brushed a strand of hair out of face before leaning over and kissing her on the forehead. Monica slightly stirred, but didn’t wake up.
“Hey Mon,” he whispered right beside her ear.
“Hmm,” she mumbled and opened her eyes.
“Book’s that good huh?” Lance asked. Monica just giggled. “You sleep more than anyone I have ever seen.”
“Beauty sleep. One of us has to be the good looking one,” she told him as she smiled and winked at him.
“Baby you are already beautiful, you don’t need the extra sleep,” he returned her smile.
“You are such a sweetie.”
“Hey I got a surprise for you.” A mischievous sparkle appeared in his eyes.
“What?”
“Keeley and Justin are home. They want us to come over and hang out.”
A few minutes later Lance and Monica were sitting in Justin and Keeley’s living room.
“So, how was the honeymoon?” Monica asked as she curled her legs under her on the sofa.
“Oh my gosh it was amazing!” Keeley replied as a huge smile formed on her face.
“Yeah, Fiji was great! We rented all the rooms in the bed and breakfast so it was really private. It seemed like we were the only ones there!” Justin told them
“Every morning we just stepped out the door and the water was right there. We went swimming first thing in the morning everyday. The water was so warm and it was the most amazing shade of blue, you should have seen it!” Keeley exclaimed.
“Well I hope you took pictures,” Lance said.
“We took a lot, but we probably can’t show most of them to you. They’re private,” Justin said as he shot them an evil grin.
“Reeallly?” Monica said as her eye brows raised.
“Get your mind out of the gutter girl,” Keeley exclaimed. She reached over and swatted her friend on the leg. “There are no X-rated pictures on those rolls. There’s no way we’d ever take them to get developed if there were. Just our luck they’d be on the cover of the next tabloid.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. When we had our honeymoon pictures developed we made the company sign a confidentiality contract,” Lance told them.
“So tell me more. What did you guys do?” Monica interupted.
“Well we didn’t do too much in Fiji. We just kind of chilled. We laid out a lot and just relaxed. It’s funny, when you are as busy as we are normally, it’s the strangest thing when you actually have time to just sit and do nothing. We didn’t know what to do with ourselves!”
“We went snorkeling and we took some boat rides out and got to watch the dolphins,” Keeley told their friends. “In fact we actually got to swim with the dolphins. It was like a dream come true. I’ve always wanted to do that.”
Monica got up and walked over to Keeley. She picked up her friend’s arm and leaned in to examine it closely. She scrunched up her face and bit her lower lip as she looked the arm up and down. She dropped her friend’s arm and leaned into stare her in the face. “You know, I think you might have gotten a tan!”
“Screw you!” Keeley said as she pushed her friend away. Monica broke into giggles as she returned to her spot on the couch.
“I’m just saying that you are a darker pale than you used to be! Good job girl!”
Keeley just rolled her eyes in response. “Anyways,” she said as she shifted her attention to Lance. “My favorite part of the trip was the second half. Whistler was amazing! Our cabin was in the woods and it was pretty much ski-in/ski-out. The setting was perfect. It was quiet and secluded, but it was right there on the slopes.”
“Kee, you still need to teach us how to snowboard,” Lance reminded her.
“Anytime! You know I will,” she said with a smile. “We should take you guys there. The snow was amazing! I was really surprised when Ju-ju picked up boarding really quickly. He did a pretty good job.”
“Yeah, but man was I sore after the first day,” he added. “I used muscles I didn’t even know I had!”
“I took care of those sore muscles though, didn’t I babe?”
“Awe guys, come on! We don’t want to hear about that stuff!” Lance said with an evil grin.
Keeley rolled her eyes at him. “There was a hot-tub right outside the cabin. I made him sit in that for an hour and then I gave him a back massage. I remember how sore I was after the first day, so I knew how to take care of it. Anyway, it was an awesome trip, but I’m glad to be home. I missed you guys.”
“We missed you too! There was no one to torment these last two weeks!” Monica exclaimed.
“How did I know that was coming!” Keeley said with a groan.
“So have you heard from Ashleigh lately?” Justin asked, changing the subject. Suddenly a huge smile spread over both Lance’s and Monica’s faces.
“What did we miss?” Keeley asked.
“Ashleigh finally got saved!” Lance blurted out.
“You’re kidding! That is great! What happened?” Justin asked. Keeley and Justin both knew how much Lance had been stressing over Ashleigh’s lack of religion. Lance and Monica began to tell their friends the story of the car wreck and the phone calls. The excitement was present on Lance’s face the rest of the night.
A few days later Ashleigh was lying on the couch resting. She was in the middle of yet another round of chemo. As usual it was draining all of the energy she had out of her body. Her mom had been trying to make things as comfortable as possible for her. Ashleigh felt awful that her mom was waiting on her. She felt helpless that her mom waited on her during every round of chemo. Her mom had been released from the hospital only days before. Ashleigh felt that she should be trying to take care of her mom, but instead here she was stuck on the couch, staring at the ceiling. She had thought about going upstairs and taking a nap but decided that she didn’t have that much energy. Ashleigh was almost asleep when the phone rang. She was about the get up and get it when the ringing abruptly stopped. ‘Mom must have gotten it,’ she thought to herself. About a minute later her mom walked into the room carrying the cordless phone.
“It’s for you. It’s Dr. Thompson’s office,” Katherine told Ashleigh.
“Oh,” Ashleigh answered. Fear washed over her. She had almost completely forgotten about the pending results of the needle biopsy. Her current worries had been revolving around taking care of her mother and getting through her current round of chemo. One phone call brought back everything she had forgotten. Ashleigh tried to sit up, but her mom had to help her. When she was finally sitting up her mom sat beside her and put her arm around Ashleigh’s shoulders before handing her the phone.
“Hello?”
“Hello Ashleigh. It’s Dr. Thompson. How are you?”
“The chemo’s getting to me. I’m really tired right now.”
“I bet so. I was calling to tell you that your biopsy results were back.”
“Yeah, I was afraid of that,” Ashleigh tried to joke. She was sure that she was making more out of it than it really was. The brunette was ready for it all to be over.
“Well Ashleigh, usually I get patients to come back in so I can give them their test results in person.”
“Uh huh.”
“But I know that you live over an hour away. I am sure that with the chemo you really don’t want to drive that far. So I can give you the results over the phone.”
“Ok,” Ashleigh said meekly.
“Ok, I just want to tell you that I sent the test to the lab twice to be absolutely certain that it was correct. I didn’t want you to go through any unnecessary stress.”
“Thank you.”
“Ashleigh I have some bad news.” A single tear slid down Ashleigh’s face as soon as the words had left Dr. Thompson’s mouth. She already knew what the doctor was about to say next. “I hate to tell you this, but the cancer in your breast is back.” Ashleigh didn’t say anything, she sat in shock as she continued to listen to the doctor. “We need to get you back in as soon as possible to run some more tests and find out if it has spread. We will have to start trying to remove the new tumor or tumors as soon as possible.”
“Ok...um...can I call you back later and set all that up? I don’t think I can do that right now,” Ashleigh asked as the tears continued to stream down her face.
“That is totally understandable. Please get back with me soon.”
“I will,” Ashleigh promised as she turned off the phone. Ashleigh couldn’t control it anymore and began to cry uncontrollably. Her mom took her in her arms and held her.
“How bad is it baby?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t know yet. She just said that the cancer was back.”
“It’s ok Ash. We made it through this before. We can do it again,” Katherine told her daughter as she continued to hold her, tears beginning to stream down her face as well.