Grace Will Lead Us Home by Jennifer Berry Hawes

Author:Jennifer Berry Hawes
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

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Each year, upon December’s onset, the city of Charleston looks as if peace has indeed come to Earth. Snow remains a stranger most years, but red bows adorn wrought-iron gates outside of its historic mansions and single houses. Evergreen wreaths cling to streetlamps as white lights outline gnarled oak limbs and pointy palm fronds.

One night around 2 a.m. a couple of weeks before the first Christmas since the shooting, Steve woke with an urgent desire to get a tree. He and Cynthia usually bought two trees every year, one for their home, one for his mother’s. This year, without his wife, Steve needed someone else’s company. He called for a cab and told the dispatcher he’d be lying in his porch swing, in case the driver needed to rouse him. The tattooed seaman, his head shaved bald, yanked on a jacket and went outside to wait. In his porch swing, he listened to the night’s silence and dozed. Cynthia’s voice entered his dream.

“I got you. I’m your number one fan.”

“I know, girl,” he answered.

He awoke with a start; the cab driver stared down from the darkness.

Once he reached the car’s warmth, Steve directed the man to drive to a nearby twenty-four-hour Walmart. They talked about fishing, about Emanuel, about the holidays. They talked about Cynthia and the shooting. It was nice to have company. When they arrived, Steve hustled inside and picked out a Christmas tree. The taxi driver helped him load it on top of the cab before they drove to Steve’s mother’s house. He woke the eighty-seven-year-old and said he’d be right back to set it up.

“Just wait for tomorrow,” she suggested.

“It’s already tomorrow!”

Steve asked the driver to return to Walmart, where he bought another tree. They loaded that one up, too, and drove to his house. After the cab driver left, Steve hauled the tree from his front porch to a corner of his living room. Then he walked the eight bone-cold blocks to his mother’s house. He was the baby of his family, and her health was ailing. But before seeing her again, he needed the silence. He didn’t want to drive and hear his favorite radio station, which paused several times a day to remember the Charleston Nine and recite each of their names. “Charleston doesn’t forget,” the announcer would say.

When he arrived, it was 3:30 a.m. He woke up his mom again, put up her tree, and headed out. She didn’t like him walking alone under darkness, but her protectiveness only irritated him.

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