Let Me Call You Sweetheart Chapter 1, Page 8

Sunday service was full as usual. Dee led the children's choir with Amazing Grace. Angela and Timmy had practiced on the piano as did Allie and Robert who were playing guitar with the help of lessons from Bill or Nathan. Karen and Opal were enjoying vocal lessons and it showed. All the children had been practicing and did better than Dee expected.

Pastor Joseph always gave an uplifting and inspiring homily and today was no different. Referring and quoting from the Gospel of Matthew he really hit home for Emily, Archie and Nathan. He started with Matthew 6 quoting 14-15: "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive our trespasses", followed by Matthew 18:21-22, "Then Peter came up and said to Him, "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times". Emily was becoming very uncomfortable listening to his homily, but then she listened intently.

Pastor shared with them how hard it was for him to forgive the doctors that refused to treat Angela and because of that she became blind.

"Forgiveness is far from my mind, believe me. I was so angry that because of their narrow-mindedness my daughter, who means the world to me, lost her sight. I begged God to let me get even, but he told me, as he tells all of us, that revenge is not ours, it his His. Look at what he did for us. He became a human being and died on the cross for us and do we deserve it? No. He is all about Love, my brothers and sisters. We must learn to be more like him. That doesn't mean we can forget being wronged. Jesus never told us that, but he did tell us to love our enemies. If you hurt someone, you must lose your pride and ask for forgiveness also. Saying I'm sorry can be the hardest words to ever say, but doing so, can repair your relationships and heal the soul. So,with His word on our hearts and minds, let us all stand and say the Lord's Prayer together letting each word of the Our Father sink into our souls."

Nothing was missed by Archie either. The pain he caused his family reverberated throughout his body. He was deeply sorry now as he remembered when he left them.

The adult choir sang O Precious Savior with Rosemary, Elizabeth, Molly, Ned, Mike, and Sam. Again, Dee was very proud of her "students".

As the congregation was filing out, Dee quietly talked to Nathan and suggested she not come home with him but instead take Allie with her to Faith's house to talk about what Allie might want to wear to the engagement dinner party and who she wanted to invite etc. Nathan agreed that was a great idea and he would see them both after his parents and he were done. He asked Pastor Joseph to say a special prayer for his family this afternoon, and Pastor reassured him, he'd be praying.

Nathan, Archie, and Emily walked in silence to Nathan's home. They were trying not to look at eachother, but what they just heard at the church service was ringing in their ears. When they got to Nathan's home, Archie waited for Emily to go in first.

"All right Ma, please have a seat at the head of the table, Dad, at the other end, and I'll sit in the middle." Nathan directed. "Anyone want a cup of coffee?" They both shook their heads no. "Okay, I know this isn't going to be easy seeing as we haven't been together, in too many years to count, so I'll just start. First of all, what I feel now as an adult is different from what I felt as a young boy." Nathan looked directly at his Dad, "When you left us, I refused to believe it was going to be permanent. Forever seemed cruel and I didn't think you'd do that to us." Archie shifted in his seat and looked away.

"Dad, what you did by leaving us, forced me to lose most of my childhood as I was now the 'man of the house.' Colleen, tried to include me with all her friends and I'm mighty grateful for that as now I am marrying one of my best friends, Dee. That might have happened anyway, so I'm not thanking you, I'm thanking Colleen. We saw Ma work very hard to run the farm by herself. She had to sell the cattle and just hire helpers to work the fields and plant the crops. Ma got up early every day to milk the cows and collect the eggs to sell. Both of us had our chores before and after school which made for long days for all of us. Life was what we made of it, which was hard being poor, but we loved eachother and Ma always did whatever she could to take care of us."

Emily spoke up, "I never wanted you or Colleen to feel obligated to work the farm. I felt it was my responsibility, but your help always made it easier. We became a team, didn't we?"

"Yes, Ma, no one could ever say we were lazy." Nathan smiled.

"Look," Archie began, "I know it doesn't seem like it, but I was thinking wrongly when I left you. I was embarrassed that I couldn't provide better for my family and I let pride get in the way." He looked at Emily, "I should've gone to you and shared my frustration, but I had hoped I could spare you the worry and instead, I tried to make money gambling and you wouldn't have to carry the financial burden."

Emily retorted, "That's all fine and good now isn't it? I wound up carrying the burden and all by myself for all these years!"

Archie just hung his head not knowing what to say.

Nathan took in a deep breath. "Ma, I feel your hurt, your anger, your frustration, and I can tell Dad does too. I think you and I need to accept the fact that Dad is a gambler and one thing led to another. Soon, he was stealing just to have something to gamble with because he wound up getting further and further in debt to crooks. Look, we just had Wyman here swindling people left and right, but he gets away with it, and off he goes to another town to find more gullible people. It's a web of deceit that I've seen too many times as a Mountie."

"Archie," Emily looked with tears falling down her cheeks, "why didn't you ever just come back? Why? Didn't you miss us, didn't you love us?" and with that she began to weep.

Archie put his hand over his face and he too began to cry. It had been all bottled up for so long, "Emily I never stopped loving you. Ever. I've never been with another woman. I just couldn't bring myself to see you because I had failed you as a husband, and the children as a father. I'm so sorry Emily, I'm so sorry!"

Nathan grew misty-eyed seeing both of his parent's pain so devastatingly real.

They were both sobbing and it broke his heart, but it was cleansing at the same time. He watched as his Ma slowly looked up and through her tears told Archie she forgave him. "I'm doing this so we can get on with life. Nathan and Dee are in love and they have a whole new life in front of them, I will forgive you, but I can't forget. All I can do is allow peace to enter our family. It's best for Nathan and it's best for Allie."

Archie heard her words of forgiveness, that he thought he'd never hear. He wiped his face of all the tears and smiled tenderly at Emily. "Thank you Emily, thank you. I promise I am going to try to make this up to you, Nathan, and Allie."

Nathan went over to his Ma and thanked her giving her a long bear hug. She looked up at her son, "Nathan, you were right, we need to get on with life, whatever we have left, God-willing. I love you dearly, my son!"

"I will always love you too Ma, always!" Nathan reassured her.

"Archie, what you did to us, always promising to do better and winding back in jail is a pattern that I'm afraid you might repeat. Please don't make us go through this ever again!" Emily said with a trembling voice. "I want to trust you, but you have to prove it."

Looking then at his Dad, he walked over to him, and hugged him too. "Dad, you will keep your word. I'm holding you to it. Thank you for coming here today. I know it's been hard for both of you, me too, but it's worth it. Right?"