lived, everyone in the family gathered around the hospital bed and prayed over that little girl. We sang and celebrated her.”
Ernie’s face softened. “That’s sad.”
“Before the birth, my aunt knew her baby was sick. She and my uncle were ready.” Tommy kept his eyes on the man’s. “My aunt had come to believe the miracle was even getting to hold her little girl at all.”
“Yeah. That’s what people tell themselves.” Bitterness colored the man’s tone. “I say the little girl should’ve lived. That is… if God was watching over her.” He looked off. “If people were praying.”
Tommy thought for a moment. “I guess it’s all in the way you look at it. If God isn’t real… then what?”
The door opened and a different tech wheeled an older woman into the waiting room. She had shoulder-length silver hair and her eyes immediately turned to Ernie. Tommy hurried to hold the door. At the same time Ernie was on his feet, moving to her wheelchair. “Was it better this time… less scary?”
Tommy wanted to watch the two of them, love personified. But he had an idea. He grabbed a piece of paper and pen from the receptionist and scribbled down his email address. Then he waited not far from where Ernie was still helping his love, Etta, get situated.
The man started to push her wheelchair toward the door when he seemed to remember Tommy. He turned to him. “I take it you are a praying man, then?”
“I am.” Tommy handed the slip of paper to Ernie. “I promise to pray for your wife… if you’ll let me know how the test comes out.”
The man hesitated at first. But then he found that lopsided grin again. “I’ll do it.” He took the paper and patted his wife’s shoulder. “Etta, this is Tommy. My new friend.”
“Hello.” She looked back and smiled. “You seem like a good one.”
When they were gone, Tommy did what he’d told the man. He asked God to give Ernie and Etta a miracle. For two reasons. So Ernie would know that God was real and that He cared about every person, every prayer.
And so that the man might have a little more time with his girlfriend.
Tommy checked the time on his phone. Still another fifteen minutes before Annalee’s test would be finished. If he married her the way he planned to, one day they might be back in an office like this and Tommy might be talking to some young gun about his girlfriend of fifty years.
His Annalee.
He had never planned to have a serious girlfriend through high school. Tommy had been too focused on sports, too busy with his peers and his family. Back in middle school, guys his age with girlfriends always seemed to be pretending. Acting older than they were. Back then the girls towered over the boys and no one could drive.
Made more sense to spend his free time dribbling a basketball.
But all that changed his first day at Northside High.
Tommy leaned back in the waiting room chair. He had taken theater class because it counted as a music elective. That and two of his buddies from the team had also signed up. The rowdy social kids sat in the front that day. Ms. Elmer told them they were going to do a production of Annie Get Your Gun, and she expected everyone to participate.
Singing was something Tommy had gotten from his mother. They sang church songs and country favorites around the family piano. But that was it. Tommy was just okay—not the sort of gifted it would take to make a career. Which was why most of his friends didn’t know he could sing at all.
Not until the first day in theater class.
That morning, his group flirted with a few girls, all of them joking about being the leads. Ms. Elmer taught them the first verse of one of the songs. Then she asked students interested in being a lead to sing the verse solo at the front of the room, one at a time.
Tommy had never been afraid of much, so he was the first to raise his hand. If he was going to be in musical theater, he might as well let the teacher know what he could do. He sang that day with the confidence of someone who had been performing all his life.
His buddies gave him a standing ovation, high-fiving him and hollering over the fact that Tommy could do more than shoot baskets. Ms. Elmer nodded her approval. “Very nice.