A Soldier's Heart

Changes (Dave)

I have always been so proud of my son. Yes, he was raised in a Christian home and had lessons from the Lord's words all his life, but the goodness and kindness in him didn't just come from that. They were in his heart the day he was born.

The way he took care of little Beth, for instance. He was no bigger than a minute himself, but he took it on himself to shelter her as best he could. His body was small, but his spirit was boundless. I hope it isn't sacrilegious of me to say this, but I think our Lord must have been much like him as a child.

The day he came home from an overnight camping trip with Beth, I knew something had changed. He looked like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. He sat down at the kitchen table and put his face in his hands. Anne was hovering nearby with food. She thought he'd be hungry after his trek, but he showed no interest in it. She gave me a worried look.

I sat down opposite him. "Is something wrong, son?"

He lifted his head. The lines of his face drooped.

"Everything's wrong."

I waited. At last it came out.

"Beth's dad is making her marry Bo. She's pregnant. She's only seventeen, and he's so wrong for her."

Agony made his voice tremble and dragged lines down his face. For a brief moment, I considered asking him if he would rather she married him, but I was afraid of the answer. I prayed the idea would not occur to him. He was right. She was too young, and Travis was too young, to be tied down in a marriage. He had so much promise.

Travis didn't go to the wedding. I doubt if he was asked. He told me both Beth and Bo continued to go to school, but we didn't see her any more. Presumably she now got her husband or his parents to help her with her homework. For a few days Travis would come home after school, sit at the table to do homework and look around like he was lost. After that he took to doing it in his room.

A month or so after the wedding, he mentioned that Beth must have a cold or something because she hadn't been at school. A couple of days after that, he came home at ten in the morning. Anne was out shopping, and when the door slammed I thought it was her returning and shutting the door with her foot, as she did when her arms were full. It was a loud slam, though, and then I heard heavy footsteps running up the stairs, and bangs and crashes coming from Travis' room, like he was throwing things around. Travis had never thrown temper tantrums, like a lot of kids do. The only thing I'd ever seen him throw was a baseball.

Dread froze my chest. I climbed the stairs and knocked on his door.

"Go away!" came a muffled voice. I broke my cardinal rule of respecting his privacy and opened the door.

Travis' room looked like a bomb had struck it. Books were scattered around, spines broken and pages bent. Some of his treasures were on the floor, broken. Travis himself was lying face-down on the bed, shaking with sobs.

I sat beside him and rubbed his back. Gradually the shaking stopped and Travis rolled onto his back, d then swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat up.

"She lost the baby, Dad." A fresh paroxysm of sobs shook him and I could hardly make out what he was saying. "She lost the baby. She didn't need to marry him after all. She lost the baby."

I held my son in my arms while he cried his heart out. I had no idea what to say, what possible comfort I could give him. My heart ached for him.

He didn't go back to school that day, or the next. Then came the weekend. Travis was gone when we woke up Saturday morning. His camping gear was gone too. I guessed he had gone to the hills to heal. I spent most of the day praying for solace for him. Solace for myself, for that matter. No pain I have ever felt was worse than seeing my son's pain.

Travis ended up staying out for a week. When he came home, he acted like everything was normal. He went to school and worked extra hard to make up for the time he had missed.

When he wasn't studying, he busied himself with something else. He made Eagle Scout. He spent all his savings on flying lessons and went up every chance he could. And he graduated high school.