Nodding, Madge lowered her gaze. “She said I was the best friend she ever had in the whole wide world, but it didn’t make any difference. No matter what I did or how hard I tried, I…I couldn’t save her. I was her best friend! I should have done more. If I’d done more, maybe…”
Andrea sighed. “You couldn’t save Sandra. You can’t save me, either. That’s not your job. That’s God’s job. It’s His plan, not yours, and certainly not mine. You can’t blame yourself for Sandra’s death.”
Madge laced her fingers together and rested them on the tabletop. She looked into Andrea’s eyes. “About a week before Sandra slipped into a final coma, she…she told me something. I haven’t been able to tell anyone what she said before now. Not even Russell.”
Andrea drew a deep breath. “Do you want to tell me now?”
Madge nodded. “We were alone in her living room. Sandra was stretched out on her couch, and I was sitting on the floor rubbing her feet. She liked that a lot.”
“I remember,” Andrea whispered.
“She was in a lot of pain,” Madge went on. “She spoke so softly, I had to strain just to hear her. She talked about Dan and Frank a lot and told me stories.” Madge shook her head. “I’ll never understand why she married either one of those men, not if I live to be a hundred.”
“She had a one-track mind,” Andrea murmured. “Unfortunately, when it came to men, she always got on the wrong track.”
“She knew that, even before she came back to church,” Madge countered. “Just like she knew she was going to die. She told me she was ready to go Home, but she felt guilty for wanting to leave her children behind and all of us, too. You know why?” She leaned toward Andrea. “She said she wanted to go Home because no one here on earth ever really loved her…and she knew He would.”
Chills coursed through Andrea’s body. Sassy, spirited Sandra. She hadn’t lived life; she’d torn through life on her own terms, practically from the day she had learned how to walk. She had dated young, abandoned the faith her family embraced, married twice and divorced both husbands. A gifted artist, Sandra had been Teacher of the Year at South Jersey Regional High School, and a few years later, she was named Adjunct Faculty of the Year at the nearby community college. She had raised and educated two children, one from each of her marriages. Sandra’s elder daughter, Lindsay, had also become a teacher. She was now serving with the Peace Corps in Africa, and her sister, Samantha, was an Army nurse stationed in Germany.
Surrounded by love and success, but with no faith to guide or sustain her, Sandra had felt alone and unloved. Only months before her illness had been diagnosed, she had rediscovered and reclaimed her faith—an answer to prayer for all of her family. Andrea and Madge and Jenny had stood by Sandra’s side when she was welcomed back into their community of Believers. Little did they all know how soon He would call his prodigal daughter all the way Home.
Madge’s words echoed in Andrea’s mind. She was not sure, but she felt that the experience of facing her own mortality, ever since her first dance with cancer over a year ago, gave her the insight to understand Sandra’s meaning and to help Madge to understand, too. “I think all Sandra wanted to know was love,” she whispered.
Madge leaned back and looked down at her lap. The burden she had carried for nearly a year was etched in her expression. “I thought our love would be enough to make her want to stay—and to fight harder. It wasn’t. It should have been.”
Andrea shook her head. “Our love sustained her to the end of her life. In your heart, you know that. But it was her soul that craved to be reunited with Him for eternity. If you believe He plants the seeds of desire in our hearts, then you also have to believe He called her Home. His voice whispered to her heart so she could go to Him willingly, even eagerly. That doesn’t mean she didn’t love us or want to stay with us. She just loved Him more.”
Madge toyed with one of her earrings. “I never thought of it that way.”
Andrea held silent and watched faith and relief ease the troubles from her sister’s expression. When Madge finally looked up at Andrea, her eyes were clear. “How come you’re so smart and I’m so…not smart?”
Andrea grinned and picked up her fork. If it made Madge happy to see her sister eating a salad, then she might as well do so with a smile on her face. “’Cause I’m the oldest.”
Madge grinned back. “Yes, you are. By twenty-one months. And don’t think for a moment I’ll ever let you forget it.” She glanced down at their salads and back up at Andrea. Her expression was solemn. “You’re not ready to leave us yet, are you?”
Andrea dropped her fork, which bounced on the table and fell to the floor. “No, I’m not ready. Of course not.”
Caroline arrived, set two glasses of iced tea on the table and retrieved the fork. “I’ll be right back with a new one. Oh, I forgot your box. I’ll bring that, too.”
“Hmm. Make it two boxes,” Madge suggested with a sudden twinkle in her eye. “We’re going to take the salads home. Bring us a couple of double bacon cheeseburgers, well-done, fries and a side order of onion rings. That okay with you, Andrea?”
Laughing, Andrea nodded her approval.
“Good. Now, while we’re waiting, I have to tell you about the meeting I had with the pastor and Eleanor Hadley about the Shawl Ministry. We organized the ministry several months ago, but it just hasn’t caught on as quickly as we thought it would.”
Andrea fixed her caffeinated iced tea and drank a full glass while Madge recounted her meeting, in more detail, no doubt, than what was in the official minutes. By the time she stopped talking, the meal was nearly finished.
“I have to admit that I’d never heard of anything like the Shawl Ministry before,” Andrea said, genuinely intrigued by the idea of women gathering together to pray and knit a shawl for someone suffering from anything, whether a devastating illness or simply old age, sudden tragedy or merely loneliness.
“It is taking a little longer to get it started then we imagined,” Madge reported, “but we all think it’s something we have to do. We have the community center. We have the need, and Eleanor has been doing her best as the coordinator. Unfortunately, we just haven’t been able to get enough women to join, so we came up with some good ideas about publicizing the ministry more.”
Andrea nodded and checked her watch. She did not bother to remind Madge, yet again, that some women, Andrea, in particular, did not have the luxury of spending their days doing volunteer work. Not when they had to earn a living. “It’s after two. I’m showing the Campbell house at three. Call me later, and we’ll work out the calendar for my appointments,” she suggested.
Madge’s eyes widened. “I forgot! We were supposed to go over your chemo schedule so I could put it on my calendar.”
“I’ve got to run,” Andrea said, taking some bills from her wallet to pick up the lunch tab.
Madge snatched the check away. “This is my treat. Go ahead.”
“Love you. Thanks!” Andrea was in a rush to get back to her office for a file she needed. If she was lucky, Madge would be so involved with her latest volunteer activity, she’d forget to call, and Andrea could drive herself to her chemotherapy appointments but that was probably too much to hope for. Standing at the curb, waiting for the light to change, Andrea mulled over the idea of the Shawl Ministry, and an image flashed through her mind of the bags and bags of yarn and knitting needles she’d seen yesterday piled next to Jane Huxbaugh’s rocker. Andrea was far too busy and too preoccupied with her health to even think about getting involved with the Shawl Ministry, but getting Jane involved was another matter…although perhaps a little like thinking you could lead a horse to water and make it drink. Getting other people to welcome Jane Huxbaugh into a ministry presented another problem, and inspired such a clear image of horses stampeding in the other direction that Andrea dismissed