A Sister's Forgiveness by Anna Schmidt

Author:Anna Schmidt [Schmidt, Anna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Amish & Mennonite, Christian, Romance
ISBN: 9781607428503
Google: df4xAgAAQBAJ
Amazon: 1616262354
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2012-04-30T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 26

Geoff

By the time Geoff reached the track, he was already soaked with sweat. He had run full out from the house to the athletic field where he had spent so many good times, celebrated so many victories with his teams, coached and cajoled and parented young boys into the fine young men they had become. This place was the setting for his success. The house he had run from had turned out to be the setting of his greatest failure.

His anger and guilt combined to push him forward in spite of the burning pain in his chest and the heaviness of his legs. He was out of shape. The extra duties as vice principal had cut into the time he usually took to work out at the end of every school day. Work out here with his players, or on off days, run with Matt, who was always hanging around waiting for practice to end and hoping for an invitation to join Geoff in laps around the track.

The kid was an excellent runner, and once he filled out a little, he’d make a good running back. Matt had an instinct for the game of football that was impossible to teach. He had a phenomenal grasp of the intricate plays that often had to be dumbed down for others.

But ever since the funeral, Geoff had avoided any contact with his nephew. After practice if he saw Matt hanging around, he headed back inside the school with his players without so much as a glance at Matt. It wasn’t the kid’s fault. Geoff knew that, and it certainly wasn’t fair to him. But Matt reminded him of Lars and Emma, and that reminded him of Sadie, and that took his mind places that he really didn’t want to go.

It was the same at home. It had gotten so that he had to bite his tongue sometimes to keep from reminding Jeannie that none of this would be happening to them if she had thought before she took Sadie for that learner’s permit. But that was a line he would not cross. Jeannie would be devastated if she knew for one minute that he harbored this thought. At the same time, Geoff suspected that she already carried the weight of regretting that impulsive act with her every waking hour. Speaking the accusation aloud would take their marriage to a place so dark that they’d have no hope of ever recovering, and it scared him to think how close he’d come to shouting that very accusation at her earlier.

He took another lap and focused on his breathing, steady outbursts of air as he pushed his way around the track, quarter mile by quarter mile. He tried to empty his mind, to focus on nothing more than the uniformity of his stride, the form with which he ran. But each puff of his breath came out sounding like Jeannie’s question: “Why?”

Because a child has died needlessly.…

Because our child was that child.…

Because justice demands that Tessa’s death come with a cost for the one who caused it.

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