Ch 49- The Christmas Show

December 1971

"Come on love it's raining!" Jude pled, trying to get Emma out from under the porch.

"But Mommy I wanna keep it!" Emma cried, evading her mother's waiting arms.

"No Em. Em. Honey we gotta…" She struggled, trying to grab her daughter.

"But Mommy it's raining and she's cold outside!"

"Mew!" The kitten meowed.

"Honey Mommy can't afford ta feed…."

"Please!" Emma begged, her eyes welling with tears.

"Alright." Jude sighed, picking up her little girl, who held the tiny kitten in her arms. Jude was worried Dr. Arden's dog Asta, who'd really become her dog, would try to hurt the cat, maybe even eat it.

"Mommy I'm gonna name it!" Emma squealed excitedly as they went inside the house.

"No Em I don't know if that's a good idea…"

"But Mommy he has ta have a name!"

"No, no he doesn't."

Emma had been drawn to a stray kitten that had been wandering around the property for several days and once it had started to rain she ran outside to get it, and Jude had gone after her. She sighed. This would make a cat, a dog and a rabbit, the cow, her calf and several chickens she couldn't feed in addition to three children and herself.

"Mommy she's got stripes! Mommy can I call her stripes?"

"If ya want." She remarked, taking the little girl's boots off.

"Can I call her Elsa?" She asked.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because not everything can be named Elsa." Jude giggled, watching as Lyla came over to investigate the new kitten. She clapped excitedly before poking its face, mumbling something to herself about the family's new addition.

"You got your kitty!" Alex was excited; Emma nodded.

Jude watched anxiously as the dog came over and sniffed the kitten's head, the children seemed unaware that this might be a problem.

"Asta…" She warned. Instead of biting or growling the dog rubbed its head lightly against the wet kitten's and started washing it's head. Emma giggled when the dog licked her. "Asta, come here girl." The dog obeyed expediently.

Jude did not understand that Asta, who'd once been abandoned herself, understood the tiny kitten's plight and as a kind soul, wanted to take care of her.

"Mama where will the kitten sleep?" Alex asked, Jude sighed.

"I don't know we'll find a place far her. Maybe a basket in the laundry room, huh?"

Jude decided to give in. Her three children needed some joy and they were all clearly excited about the cat. Besides, how much could it possibly eat? Not more than Asta and the cow.

"Do you wanna sleep in the laundry room, kitten?" Emma asked.

"Mew!"

"I don't wanna." Emma pouted.

"But ya have ta." Jude insisted.

It the middle of the afternoon, just after school and Jude had just received an interesting note from Emma's teacher. The little girl sat at the dining room table pouting about her news. She did not want to do it.

"Mama, can I build the fire?" Alex asked hopefully as Jude read.

"No, no honey let me do that."

Alex was upset about his parent's absence still, and frustrated about his inability to fill his father's shoes as the man of the house. There were things he felt he should do, like build the fire, and Jude would not allow it. As an adult, Alex would reflect back on this time and thank heaven for his wonder stepmother who'd done everything she could to love him as her own and preserve his innocence. To grown Alex, and even teen Alex, Jude would be every bit his mother too.

"Mommy please don't make me." Emma begged.

"I don't understand what is wrong with it."

"Mommy no sing!" Emma pouted.

"They want ya ta sing?" Jude inquired as Emma nodded.

"They do!" Alex chimed, recalling his teacher's enthusiasm over his sister's voice, earlier in the day. "Mama, teacher says she's good, really good, the best in the whole school."

"Oh Em, Mommy's proud of ya." Jude smiled, touched that her daughter had received her own gift.

"No sing." Emma pouted. "Pwease Mommy."

"Em it's a privilege." She interjected, not understanding why her daughter wouldn't want one of the things she'd once loved most in the world.

"Then no thank you." She crossed her arms and shook her head, turning away from her mother.

Jude grabbed her daughter's chin, directing her gaze back at her.

"Em?"

"Mommy I don't want to!"

Alex paused, stopping the art project he'd been working on and watching as his sister cried. Jude stopped, wondering what to say to her daughter, and unable to understand why she protested this so vehemently. 'Your Daddy will be proud.' She wanted to say, 'do it for him,' but didn't, thinking her adverse reaction might really be about Timothy's not being there, and not about stage fright. Jude would later find she was right, mostly.

"Ya know." Jude began, whispering quietly to her little girl. "I know it might be scary to get up there and sing to the whole school by yar self, but mommy will be there, and Alex will be right behind ya, and ya know what else?" Emma shook her head, hugging her doll tight as she cried. "Ya'll be just like Elsa." She giggled. Emma looked up hopefully.

"Like Elsa?" She asked.

"Yeah."

Jude smiled bittersweetly, wishing more than anything that she could tell her daughter that she'd inherited her gift, not Elsa Mars', but for now, Jude didn't feel it was appropriate to tell her little girl much of her past.

"I want ya ta marry me." Kit said. "Sooner rather than later."

Mary had snuck away from the hotel she was staying at to see Kit in private. He observed that his fiancé was not in good spirits and seemed to have lost too much weight since he'd seen her just a few weeks before. He was concerned for her well being and when he first saw her that day, felt an old impulse begin to kick in: the instinct to run. He found he had this desire to break her out, to free her from this place and situation just as he had with Grace and Briarcliff.

"Kit… what happens if I go away?"

"That isn't going to happen."

"I don't know… Timothy and I just don't know. And I thought we would in time for Christmas." She sighed. "We were supposed to in time for Thanksgiving."

The DA was held up, it had proved to be a complex case with more parties and variables than Mary, Timothy and Arthur could've ever imagined as a result, time was passing quickly with no concrete answers being supplied to anyone.

"You miss him." Kit spoke of Alex.

"So much." Her eyes welled with tears and he took her hands in his own.

"I still want to marry you." He pressed. "Soon."

She looked up in surprise, her eyes flashing. "Even if…"

"Even if." He nodded. "I've been thinking. I wanna move ta Maine."

Mary's eyes brightened when he said this. She'd yet to bring it up, but she didn't want to separate her son from his father, sisters, stepmother and home, and really they were her home too and she didn't want to leave them either.

"The kids and I… we've had a lotta pain in Massachusetts life is okay but… I think we could use a change, fresher air, no stigma. Leave the past behind ya know?"

"I understand all too well." Mary told him. She paused for a moment, realizing this man was going to be her husband and yet she'd never told him of her horrible past, her pre-Briarcliff past. Jude and Arden knew bits and pieces, and she didn't know that Mother Claudia knew something horrific she'd never revealed to anyone.

"Lana'll come up to visit anyway and other than that, I don't care about many of my other relationships. Timothy and Jude have been so welcoming ta me that…"

"And they will welcome you as family." She smiled.

"I love you Mary Eunice." He whispered. "And I know that yar scared but look what we've been through befare. I promise everything's gonna be okay and even if it isn't I'll be there with you every step of the way."

"Oh Mr. Walker I love you too." She whispered, stopping when he started to kiss her.

All the kids at school were yapping endlessly about what Santa would bring but Alex and Emma Howard were sick of hearing talk about the bike their classmates had been promised or the doll they wanted desperately. All the Howard children wanted that year was their father (and in Alex's case, his mother and father) home safe and sound.

"Alex I'm sorry." Emma pouted as they sat together on the top of the slide.

All the other kids ran around together frantically, but the Howard children remained quiet and close together. It was rare the siblings left each other's side. Their teacher, who'd been anxious to separate them weeks earlier, had given up all hope of that end, noting the two seemed to shut down when not in the other's company.

"For what Em?"

"About your mommy; I know ya miss her and I have my mommy." Emma bit her lip; she understood that this hurt her brother a lot and confused him. Truthfully she missed Mary very much as well.

"It's okay. We need your mommy." Alex mumbled, swallowing the lump in his throat.

"Brother?" Emma asked.

"Hum?"

"Why do you call my mommy, mama, now?"

Alex didn't answer verbally and simply shrugged.

"Why?" Emma pressed.

"Cause."

"Cause what?"

"Cause…" Alex didn't want to confess even to his sister. "Cause she's your mommy…and she's married to our Daddy and she cares about me…and she's the only mommy I have right now."

Emma paused, considering this for a moment. She kissed her brother's cheek.

"What was that for?" He was embarrassed she'd kissed him in public.

"I love you brother."

"I love you too sister."

…..

Timothy's heart hurt and his body ached for the warmth of his wife. While Mary went out with Kit, he snuck away to do some Christmas window-shopping. Everywhere he went he saw men his own age going about their lives, leaving work for lunch, meeting their wives, playing with their children. He envied each of them, wishing with all his being that he could have his family at his side. Part of him wished he hadn't left the hotel, but he had to get out and at least pretend he was living a bit of life, or else he'd go crazy.

Timothy stopped, watching this man as he lifted a little girl into his arms, beginning to show her something in a window. His heart ached at the sight, the child reminding him very much of his own Emma, who he missed particularly that day.

'You're blessed no matter what happens.' A voice reminded.

Timothy shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked on, recalling that he'd not always been one of these men, he'd been a priest, with no family, no wife. Perhaps, he wouldn't be in this legal mess if he'd never left the priesthood. Brother McKennon never would've risen to power and implicated him and Mary in all of these heinous things. But would that really be better?

Timothy sighed, running his fingers through his hair as he walked into the park, seeing a little boy, his own son's age playing football with his father. Tears came to Timothy's eyes as he watched the father and son. The man tackled the boy, picking him up, causing the child to laugh uncontrollably. Timothy could feel his whole being sigh, just when he thought his heart couldn't break much more.

The whole thing was bittersweet for him and he who wondered how he could've better protected his family and if he'd ever be home with them again. It was strange, to have the freedom to roam Boston, but not to go home and see his kids. Timothy hated the feeling found the longing reminiscent of his own fatherless boyhood in a way he could not stand to even think about. Timothy's mind went too far and in an instant he realized his own children were feeling the same way.

'Enough!' He thought angrily, trying to quiet his own desperate mind.

Walking out of the park and back onto another street with a lot of shops, Timothy decided to send his family nice presents, as he didn't know what else to do.

'Pathetic.' He thought. 'Like gifts could make up for what they're going through.'

He walked along, desperate to shut out his thoughts as he made his way down the street. The cheerful men and their families crushing him and making him uncharacteristically jealous in a way he didn't know how to deal with. Suddenly the song the carolers were singing in the distance changed and Timothy felt tears sting his eyes and total sadness pierce his heart as they started to sing:

'I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams.'

"Lana?" Kit questioned, calling out her name when he got home.

He had just picked up the kids from school and was surprised to find her car there when he arrived. Not knowing what to expect, he sent Thomas and Julia to the basement to collect some of their Christmas decorations and went into the house to look for his friend. He finally found her sitting at his kitchen table in the dark, a hot cup of coffee and a stack of papers in front of her at the table. The reporter sat in silence, staring off into space.

"Lana?" He asked more quietly this time.

Lana had been in horrible spirits since Thanksgiving. She'd tried to help so much with the trial, to set Timothy and Mary free but was certain she'd failed: she did not tell Kit that. And then there was her own personal problem: McKennon had blocked her from finding her son.

"It's all here Kit every bit of everything." She said, taking a puff of her cigarette but not turning to face him.

"What do you mean?"

"He's in these papers." She gulped, flinching as she reached out to touch them.

"Who is?"

"My son." She whispered. "Whoever he is."

"Oh." He understood. He pulled out a chair and sat down next to her, putting his hand on her shoulder. "I know yar scared but yar doin' the right thing: I promise."

She nodded through her tears. "I'm terrified. Of him… of his father haunting me." She whispered, beginning to cry harder. "But I… I need him. I long for him, giving him up was a horrible mistake, I just don't know if I…"

"Lana Winters is strong enough to do anything." Kit promised.

"Even raise the son of bloodyface?"

"Yeah but here's what yar forgettin' he's the son of that fearless reporter too."

Friday, December 17th, 1971

"Hello my little loves!" Jude cried, getting on her knees to hug Alex and Emma.

She kissed each of their cheeks and held them tightly as they greeted her. No one else greeted their children in such a loving way. The other mother's took notice of her closeness with the children, some of them puzzled and others deeply touched. Lyla clapped from her place in the wagon, happy to see her big brother and sister. While she'd had some relief, money was still very tight and Jude still walked to and from school everyday in the hope that she might have enough money for presents.

"Hi baby!" Emma squealed, excited to see her little sister.

"Alright, the two of ya inta the wagon."

Jude placed each of the kids in the wagon and began the long treck home. It was cold and each of them quickly wrapped themselves in one of the big wool blankets Jude brought with her. Lyla joined her sister under the blanket and sighed, happy to rest in the five year old's much larger arms. Emma leaned down and kissed her baby sister's cheek softly.

"Mommy she sounds much better!" Emma cried.

"Yeah, the coughing stopped." Alex said quietly.

"Isn't it wonderful?!" Jude asked. "She's feelin' much better. And I'm so happy ta have ya both home from school far Christmas now." Jude explained and Lyla clapped.

Alex's stomach hurt. He was confused and upset that his mother and father weren't home and there was no word on them. It was going to be Christmas; he'd thought that for sure they'd be home by Christmas. Even so, he was happy to be going home and to not have school. It was a confounding place for a little boy to be he could not sort out his emotions.

"It's going to be a big night tonight." Jude reminded.

Alex and Emma squirmed nervously at the reminder. Alex wasn't scared about the play, only upset that both his parents would miss it. Emma was apprehensive, but Jude had managed to make her nervous-excited with her talk of how she'd be like Elsa when she performed. Even so, Emma felt a lump begin to form in her stomach every time she remembered her Daddy wouldn't be there and it made her want to run away. Alex could tell Jude was tired and got out of the wagon, trying to take the handle from her.

"Honey get back in. I don't want ya ta walk, it's such a long way."

"Auntie let me pull the wagon." He said, wanting badly to be of help to her. Something within him remembered his days at Briarcliff with his mom and he knew this was nearly as hard on Jude as that life had been for his mother. He wanted to be the man of the house: to help her in a real way, but didn't fully understand why.

Jude smiled and got on her knees. "You're my little gentleman aren't ya…just like yar fathah." Jude kissed his forehead. "I appreciate yar wantin' ta care far us. But, I'm the mommy, and yar the little boy, got it?"

"Okay." He nodded, disappointed.

"Okay." She kissed his cheek and picked him up, placing him back in the wagon. "A-Alex…" She protested when he got out again; this time he ran around to her side and took her other free hand. She smiled realizing that he just didn't want her to have the burden of pulling all of them. "Okay my baby boy, that's perfect, ya can walk with mama."

Alex sighed, comforted by Jude's hand and began to walk along side her as his sisters fell asleep in the wagon. Jude looked down, feeling him tug on her arm as he wrapped both hands around her hand, and rested his head on her arm. He sighed.

"Mama."

"Yes my baby."

"Mama will you watch me in the concert too?"

"Of course my beautiful boy!" She giggled, stopping the walk suddenly and getting on her knees to face him. "I know ya've heard me every time I've said it." She said. "I love you Alex, and I know it's hard for ya; it's Christmas time and yar Mommy and Daddy are still gone and we still don't know what will happen…"

"I don't understand." He cried.

"I know ya don't my baby, and I'm tryin', I'm tryin' ta explain the best I can, but I want ya ta at least understand that no matter what happens ya still have a parent here who loves ya, just far ya, not because I'm married ta yar daddy, or because I love yar mommy, or that yar sisters are my little girls. I love ya and I would even if it were just ya and me." She wrapped her arms around him and kissed his forehead. "And so of course I'll be watching far ya. Yar going to make me so proud."

…..

"Hold still Em." Jude whispered as she brushed Emma's hair, putting it into curly little blonde pigtails.

The child's eyes remained transfixed on the television screen. She was nervous about the performance, her stomach twisting in knots even as she watched Elsa on the screen and her mother lovingly did her hair.

"Okay, turn around my darling." Jude whispered as she placed a sparkling gold crown on the child's head. She smiled, cupping her tiny cheek in her hand. "Oh ya look beautiful." She whispered.

"Mommy I'm scared." Emma whispered.

"There's no reason ta be scared, Mommy's little angel." Jude giggled, her bright smile comforting Emma instantly. "Just remember, ya'll be like Elsa, okay honey?"

"Okay." Emma was still uncertain and began to suck her thumb.

"Lyla, its time ta change honey, it's cold and ya can't wear the tutu." Jude reminded softly.

"MMM NO!" Lyla yelled and began to pout.

She'd been trying to persuade her toddler to change out of the tutu for a while and every time she did she was met with a near screaming match with the little girl. Lyla had been this way for days refusing to leave the house without wearing the tutu. Jude sighed.

"Well, I suppose yar only two once."

…..

"Are ya happy my Lyla?" Jude asked, looking down at her excited toddler who happily perused the room from her place on her lap, pointing out things and trying her best to talk about them. Jude had allowed her to wear the tutu and Lyla was very excited, Emma had also worn ballet clothes obviously and the toddler wanted to be just like her big sister in everyway she could.

Lyla sucked on her fingers as her mother held her tight. Jude never imagined she'd get to the play and suddenly feel as insecure as the children had the two weeks leading up to recital. She hadn't thought of it before, but she was there, alone without her Timothy, the only single parent in the room, and she felt like all eyes were on her. Jude had been putting her feelings aside for the sake of the children as of late, and it wasn't until then that she'd really fully considered the fact that it was Christmas and he was gone. Jude took a deep breath, taking a moment to let the crushing blow sink in before turning back to her baby.

"Now when ya see big brother and sister ya can't say hi, understood?"

Lyla paused for a moment. "Hi!" She burst.

"No, no honey ya gotta be quiet shu!"

"Shu!" Lyla repeated.

"No you silly baby." Jude teased, a mother a few seats away giggled, smiling at Jude. "Shu, look love, the lights are goin' out, the show's about to start."

"Hi!" Lyla yelled.

"Timothy…" Mary sighed, putting her head down. "I like the idea it just… I don't see how it's feasible. It'd take a miracle and…"

"Well it is that time of year and you were a nun." He reminded.

Timothy was sitting on the edge of Mary's bed as she paced nervously. They'd been told there was a chance they'd get some news of their fate that night and were sitting by the phone, waiting while Arthur went to get them all dinner.

"I've missed too many Christmases with my son already Mary, I'm unwilling to miss another. I have to make it home somehow, and so do you."

"Oh… oh I know you have Timothy, but if you…"

"Mary." Timothy bit his lip, he didn't want to say it, or put it out there but he felt he had to. "I've come to a decision."

"Oh?" She asked nervously. "About Christmas?"

"About everything. I'm willing to plea, and I'm willing to sacrifice myself if it means your freedom."

"No!" Mary protested, her eyes growing wide.

Arden was outside and about to open the door when he heard Timothy say this. He stopped, pressing his ear against the door, intrigued.

"No! No Timothy you can't do that!" Mary cried. "You're innocent, you've got…"

"Mary, you are the most innocent soul I know or have ever known." He told her. "And I will not have you go to jail under any circumstances. It would ruin you forever. I will not let it happen."

"Why hasn't the phone rang?" She asked, turning away from him and nervously beginning to bite her nails.

"Because it's not going to." Timothy informed as Mary turned back, her eyes flashing in fear.

Arden stood outside, his eyes closed as he rested his forehead against the door, he made a fist with his hand, moving it about in the air a few times, stopping just before he slugged the door. Life had never been fair to Arthur Arden, but of course, it wasn't like he'd ever been fair to anyone else either. He took a deep breath, gathering himself as he made his way inside the hotel room with their take out, starting to sing I'll be home for Christmas as he made his way inside.

"Not that song." Mary muttered, tears in her eyes as she looked outside.

"Could you not?" Timothy inquired sharply; he could feel his anger rising unchecked as Arden continued.

The old Nazi smiled as he put dinner on the table in the corner.

"Oh cheer up Monsignor." He grinned. "It's Christmas."

Emma Howard had never contended with such mixed emotions in her little life. She felt an appreciation that her idol, Elsa Mars, had craved the whole of her life, as well as a bittersweetness, and longing that had haunted the German all her days. Jude had always had some idea that her little girl could sing, but she had no concept of the fact that she could sing so spectacularly. The five year old had gotten a standing ovation that night, the enthusiasm of the crowd and the power of her own gift totally overwhelmed her, moving her to tears of joy… but there was just one thing missing.

Throughout the whole play, Emma and Alex looked out into the audience, time and time again, hoping against all odds that their father would show up. Alex knew that this was unrealistic, but Emma had really almost believed it would happen and so, the little girl went home half crushed, and half overwhelmed by the enormity of her gift and everything that had happened.

People had said lots of things to her that night that she didn't fully understand and would not for a long time; like that she could easily be famous, that she could make a record, or that no one would ever forget that night even when she was grown up. One strange lady had even commented that this, singing, was what Emma would come to be known for. That remark hit Jude in an odd way, at first she was proud, then horrified, and then finally she realized she needed to set the record straight. Emma didn't totally see what the big deal was; all she'd done was sing I'll Be Home For Christmas.

It took a while to settle in after they got home and because it was a special night Jude decided to let the children stay up very late. Alex was watching a show in the living room with Asta and Lyla had fallen asleep on her mother's bed, but Emma retreated to her own room where she'd crawled into bed with a doll and just stared at it, thinking. Being so little, she was having a very hard time sorting through all her complex emotions and didn't even know how to begin to phrase the feeling to anyone.

"Hi, can mommy talk ta ya far a while?" Jude asked, knocking on the door. Emma nodded, sitting up in bed and Jude went and sat beside her. "Mommy's real proud of ya far tonight, but remember what she said about Elsa's gift?" She asked, taking the doll, whose name was also Elsa, in her hand and beginning to look her over. Emma didn't answer she simply nodded once more.

"Well, it's not exactly Elsa's gift, did ya know that Em? It's mommy's."

Emma looked up her eyes flashing with surprise.

"Befare mommy knew daddy she used ta be a singer, did ya know that?" Emma shook her head no, making it obvious to her mother that she couldn't believe any of it.

"You can sing like me?"

"No, I can't sing like ya." Jude laughed. "Not anything like ya. Em, yar an amazing, very gifted little girl. I just wanted ya to know that… and that yar gift isn't Elsa Mars' it comes from mommy." Emma nodded slowly.

"It's Judy Howard's." She whispered.

"That's right." Jude smiled, grabbing her daughter's cheeks and kissing her forehead. "Mommy's so proud that you were such a brave girl." She paused.

"I wanted my Daddy to see it." Emma pouted, beginning to cry.

Emma didn't care how good she was, that her gift made her, at five years old, on par with Elsa Mars, or that it had really come from her beloved mother, or that the whole school adored her, or even that she was secretly very happy about all this. In truth, she just wanted her daddy, and to see him pleased with her and happy to have heard her sung.

Jude hugged Emma tightly, trying to hide that she was crying too. Over the past few months things had been so difficult, Jude had actually stared to ignore the strange looks and the whispers she encountered now that it seemed that she was a single mother, but the concert had brought all that back. Worse, it was Christmas and he was gone, it was too much to bare and too much like her fatherless childhood. Jude found, as of late, that if she dwelled on it too much, she'd be taken right back there, to the time of the baby squirrel. That had been why she'd started drinking again, and ever since she'd stopped a second time, she'd found that reality was sometimes too much for her to contend with.

"Daddy is proud of ya too, and proud they made his little girl the star because she can sing and because she's so pretty." Jude soothed, wrapping her arms around her little girl and kissing the back of her head.

Jude and Emma laid there and cried in silence, looking out the window at the stars, sparkling in the crystal clear, black night. Alex, feeling left out, crawled into bed with them and Jude took him in her arms as well. In Boston, Mary Eunice and Timothy did the same thing, lying in their perspective beds and staring out at the cold, starry night, wishing without hope, they were somewhere else.

"Ya remember." Jude choked. "That God sees the moon."

"And God sees you." Timothy closed his eyes, tears streaming down his cheeks as he thought of his kids.

"And wherever we are." Mary whispered to herself, clutching her pillow as she struggled not to cry again.

"And wherever we are: Daddy, mommy, me, you and Lyla." Jude soothed, holding Alex and Emma tight. "Wherever we are we're all together." She choked. "Looking at the same moon."

"And that way." Mary whispered the family's nursery rhyme, trying to get herself to sleep, but beginning to sob again. "We'll always be together no matter what."

"And we're together right now." Timothy whispered, pausing as the feeling of the words rolled off his lips and tongue.

He missed his wife and children so much that he even craved just the mere mention of them. He laid there once it was done and dwelled on the poem for a moment, it'd be come something of a family mission statement over time and felt loved in knowing that he wouldn't have have been the only one to remember it in this time. Timothy felt desperate and closed his eyes as he cried; doing the only other thing he knew how to do.

"God sees the moon and God sees me." He bit his lip as he cried into his pillow. "Please God, oh Lord God who sees my guilt, and my innocence, and above all, my heart. Oh Lord God who sees me, end this horrible mess, take control and give my family a miracle, please God!" Timothy cried out, weeping and praying himself to sleep.