Gail Sattler - Changing Her Heart

Lacey released Randy’s hand and stepped back. “I should go help in the kitchen. Everyone is probably starving.” She pressed through the crowd and hurried to the kitchen, where her mother and her sister were busily removing the canapés from the oven and setting them on serving platters.

“Mom. Susan. It looks like we’re almost ready. Things are going really well.”

Her mother stopped fussing with the food, and straightened. “He was so surprised! And there are so many more people here than I expected. This is wonderful. But this means there are more people to feed.”

That so many had been invited was no surprise to Lacey. The rented home was small, the furnishings were worn, but everyone was always welcome, and her mother had a habit of being generous when inviting people for a celebration that involved food.

There had been many times in their family’s history when God had provided for them when they couldn’t provide for themselves. Now that their family was doing better, her mother did her best to provide for others, despite her humble means.

Lacey swept one hand through the air, above the table, which was covered with trays of food. “You still have enough for double the amount of people here. I don’t know why you do this.”

Her mother grinned, and reached into the oven for the second tray. “I can’t let anyone go home hungry.”

Lacey turned to Susan, who was pressing the candles into the cake. “I was thinking about putting the cake in the middle of the dining room table, but I don’t know if there will be enough room.”

Susan spoke without raising her head. “I’ve al ready moved the centerpiece. It’s fine.”

Lacey froze. Susan’s voice had been too quiet, and too controlled. Added to the fact that Susan hadn’t looked at her when she spoke, it gave Lacey a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach that had nothing to do with hunger.

“Susan, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Susan answered quietly without looking up, which was all the answer Lacey needed. Something was definitely wrong, and it could only be something to do with Eric.

Lacey struggled to remember if she’d seen Eric in the crowd. She hadn’t.

Lacey helped carry the food into the dining room. Her mother called everyone to eat, and after one of the men from her church paused for a prayer of thanks, the guests descended on the food like a swarm of locusts.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lacey noticed that Bryce and Randy filled their plates quickly and quietly, then disappeared back into the bedroom together.

Since they were obviously occupied, Lacey returned to the kitchen, where she found Susan, sitting at the table with her head bowed, picking more than she was eating.

Lacey sat beside Susan, speaking quietly and softly. “What’s wrong?”

Susan pushed at a mushroom cap with her fork. “Same ol’, same ol’,” she grumbled.

What was wrong didn’t take much imagination. Eric had obviously been drinking again, and done something to hurt Susan. The only unknown was that Lacey didn’t know if this time he’d spent too much money, dipping into the mortgage money to buy drinks for his friends at the bar, if he’d damaged the car, if he’d done something to hurt Susan’s feelings or all of the above. Since it was the weekend, it wasn’t likely that he’d lost another job because of his uncontrollable drinking habits. Unless he’d been out with his supervisor and started a fight with him.

Lacey didn’t want to ask, so she remained silent. She only wanted to be there for Susan, regardless of what Eric had done.

Susan started to sniffle, but she didn’t raise her head. “Do you remember Grampa’s old violin?”

“Yes. Especially when he used to put on that old hat and play those funny songs, just to amuse us. But I also remember times he played those sad, haunting melodies. I’ve never heard anyone play a violin like Grampa.”

Susan sniffled again. “You know that I’ve got his violin, right?”

Lacey nodded, her stomach dropping.

“I had it in the china cabinet, so when the kids are old enough to appreciate it, maybe they might take lessons.”

“That’s a sweet idea.”

A big, fat tear rolled down Susan’s cheek. “I don’t know why he did it, but Eric took the violin out of the cabinet this afternoon. I knew he’d been drinking, so I told him to put it back. He just laughed and started fooling around with it, pretending he was playing it. But it slipped out of his hands, bounced off the coffee table and then he accidentally stepped on it.” More tears flowed down Susan’s cheeks; a few dripped onto her plate of untouched food.

Lacey’s gut clenched. “Can it be fixed?”

“I don’t know. Even if it can, we don’t have that kind of money right now. Then, when Eric saw how upset I was, he got mad at me. He said I was trying to make him feel guilty. I told him it wasn’t his fault.” Susan sniffled again. “But he didn’t calm down. We had a big fight in front of the children, and I said a few things that I now regret. That’s something I told myself would never happen.”

Lacey held back telling Susan that regrets or not, whatever she had said was probably right. Lacey also wanted to tell Susan that Eric was never going to change, but that wasn’t quite true. Eric had changed in the past ten years. Every year he became steadily worse.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“I can’t take it anymore. I think I’m going to go to counseling.”

Lacey leaned across the table and rested her hand on Susan’s arm. “That’s good, but you’re not the one who needs counseling. It’s Eric.”

“He won’t go. He says he doesn’t have a problem. He says he can quit anytime he wants.”

Lacey bit her tongue. She couldn’t count the number of times Eric had quit drinking, but it was exactly the same number of times he’d fallen off the wagon. And every time it was Susan who landed with a thud. His drinking was ruining Susan’s life and their marriage. It wasn’t good for their two children, either.

A couple of verses from Proverbs 23 that her mother had quoted when Susan had said she was going to marry Eric once again echoed through Lacey’s head.

Do not gaze at wine when it is red,

when it sparkles in the cup,

when it goes down smoothly!

In the end it bites like a snake

and poisons like a viper.

Indeed, Eric had poisoned his life, and he was poisoning the lives of his family. He didn’t seem to care what his drinking did to anyone; he only continued to drink himself deeper into a hole.

Most days, Lacey tried her best to pray for him, and every day, she tried not to hate him.

She opened her mouth to tell Susan that she had to do something more than just counseling for herself, that no magic solution was going to fall from the sky, but before she could speak the sound of footsteps clicked on the tile floor behind her.

Bryce’s voice broke the silence. “Lacey, have you seen my MP3 player? Oh. Hi, Susan. Thanks for contributing to the computer. It sure was a surprise.”

Lacey quickly spun around in the chair to see that Bryce wasn’t alone; Randy was beside him. She looked at both men and tried to signal Bryce with her eyes to leave the room. Bryce took the hint and walked out as if nothing was happening, but instead of leaving, Randy moved closer and leaned toward Lacey’s face.

“Have you got something in your eye? If you want I can—” Randy’s words came to a sudden stop when his attention wandered to Susan, who did have something in her eye. Both eyes. Tears. Which were streaming down her face.

He straightened, and his whole body went stiff. “Is something wrong? Do you need help?”

Susan swiped her arm over her eyes, which only smeared her makeup, making her look worse. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing you can do. There’s nothing anyone can do. It’s my husband. I should go. I’m sorry you had to see me like this.”