Changing Her Heart (4 page)

Out of the corner of her eye, Lacey noticed that Bryce and Randy filled their plates quickly and quietly, then disappeared back into the bedroom together.

Since they were obviously occupied, Lacey returned to the kitchen, where she found Susan, sitting at the table with her head bowed, picking more than she was eating.

Lacey sat beside Susan, speaking quietly and softly. “What's wrong?”

Susan pushed at a mushroom cap with her fork. “Same ol', same ol',” she grumbled.

What was wrong didn't take much imagination. Eric had obviously been drinking again, and done something to hurt Susan. The only unknown was that
Lacey didn't know if this time he'd spent too much money, dipping into the mortgage money to buy drinks for his friends at the bar, if he'd damaged the car, if he'd done something to hurt Susan's feelings or all of the above. Since it was the weekend, it wasn't likely that he'd lost another job because of his uncontrollable drinking habits. Unless he'd been out with his supervisor and started a fight with him.

Lacey didn't want to ask, so she remained silent. She only wanted to be there for Susan, regardless of what Eric had done.

Susan started to sniffle, but she didn't raise her head. “Do you remember Grampa's old violin?”

“Yes. Especially when he used to put on that old hat and play those funny songs, just to amuse us. But I also remember times he played those sad, haunting melodies. I've never heard anyone play a violin like Grampa.”

Susan sniffled again. “You know that I've got his violin, right?”

Lacey nodded, her stomach dropping.

“I had it in the china cabinet, so when the kids are old enough to appreciate it, maybe they might take lessons.”

“That's a sweet idea.”

A big, fat tear rolled down Susan's cheek. “I don't know why he did it, but Eric took the violin out of the cabinet this afternoon. I knew he'd been drink
ing, so I told him to put it back. He just laughed and started fooling around with it, pretending he was playing it. But it slipped out of his hands, bounced off the coffee table and then he accidentally stepped on it.” More tears flowed down Susan's cheeks; a few dripped onto her plate of untouched food.

Lacey's gut clenched. “Can it be fixed?”

“I don't know. Even if it can, we don't have that kind of money right now. Then, when Eric saw how upset I was, he got mad at me. He said I was trying to make him feel guilty. I told him it wasn't his fault.” Susan sniffled again. “But he didn't calm down. We had a big fight in front of the children, and I said a few things that I now regret. That's something I told myself would never happen.”

Lacey held back telling Susan that regrets or not, whatever she had said was probably right. Lacey also wanted to tell Susan that Eric was never going to change, but that wasn't quite true. Eric
had
changed in the past ten years. Every year he became steadily worse.

“I don't know what to say.”

“I can't take it anymore. I think I'm going to go to counseling.”

Lacey leaned across the table and rested her hand on Susan's arm. “That's good, but you're not the one who needs counseling. It's Eric.”

“He won't go. He says he doesn't have a problem. He says he can quit anytime he wants.”

Lacey bit her tongue. She couldn't count the number of times Eric had quit drinking, but it was exactly the same number of times he'd fallen off the wagon. And every time it was Susan who landed with a thud. His drinking was ruining Susan's life and their marriage. It wasn't good for their two children, either.

A couple of verses from Proverbs 23 that her mother had quoted when Susan had said she was going to marry Eric once again echoed through Lacey's head.

Indeed, Eric had poisoned his life, and he was poisoning the lives of his family. He didn't seem to care what his drinking did to anyone; he only continued to drink himself deeper into a hole.

Most days, Lacey tried her best to pray for him, and every day, she tried not to hate him.

She opened her mouth to tell Susan that she had to do something more than just counseling for herself, that no magic solution was going to fall from the sky, but before she could speak the sound of footsteps clicked on the tile floor behind her.

Bryce's voice broke the silence. “Lacey, have you seen my MP3 player? Oh. Hi, Susan. Thanks for contributing to the computer. It sure was a surprise.”

Lacey quickly spun around in the chair to see that Bryce wasn't alone; Randy was beside him. She looked at both men and tried to signal Bryce with her eyes to leave the room. Bryce took the hint and walked out as if nothing was happening, but instead of leaving, Randy moved closer and leaned toward Lacey's face.

“Have you got something in your eye? If you want I can—” Randy's words came to a sudden stop when his attention wandered to Susan, who did have something in her eye. Both eyes. Tears. Which were streaming down her face.

He straightened, and his whole body went stiff. “Is something wrong? Do you need help?”

Susan swiped her arm over her eyes, which only smeared her makeup, making her look worse. “I'm sorry. There's nothing you can do. There's nothing anyone can do. It's my husband. I should go. I'm sorry you had to see me like this.”

Susan stood, but Lacey blocked her path. “Where are you going to go? Is he home? Is he…” She let her words hang. There were times Lacey feared that as the situation continued to escalate, the day might come that Eric might hit Susan. She prayed daily that things would never get to that.

Susan must have thought the same thing at the same time, because she sank back down into the chair and covered her face with her hands. “You're right. He's probably in worse condition than when I left, and I know I'm being a bad wife, but I can't deal with that right now.”

Randy stepped closer to Susan. “What's wrong? Is he sick? Is there anything anyone can do?”

She shook her head without taking her hands from her face. “No. It's not like that. He's not sick. He's…he's…” Her voice shook and trailed off as she raised her tear-streaked face. Lacey moved closer to Randy to tell Susan without words that he was with her, and that it was okay to keep talking. Once Susan figured that out, she looked straight at Randy. “My husband is at home, drunk. He was so bad I told him to stay home, not to come to my own brother's birthday party. That's so wrong. I don't know what to do anymore.”

Lacey didn't know what to say, but somehow having Randy beside her made her feel stronger, and not as helpless as she always did whenever Susan's husband went off the deep end.

Randy's voice dropped to a soothing murmur. “I'm sorry. It sounds like he's got a serious drinking problem.”

“I used to say that he didn't, that he could stop anytime, but I think I was just fooling myself. Yes, he has stopped, but he never stops for long, and every
time he starts again it's worse than the time before.” The tears started flowing again down Susan's cheeks, and her lower lip trembled. “I wish I knew how to make it stop.”

Lacey slipped her hand into his, once again intertwining their fingers. She needed his strength now, more than anything. Susan finally admitting the magnitude of Eric's problem was good. She was glad Randy was with her. Maybe God did sometimes drop people out of the sky because, as always, Randy was a good listener, and Susan was definitely talking.

“Did Pastor Luke talk to him?” Lacey asked.

Susan lowered her hands, and looked up at Lacey with the most woeful expression she'd ever seen. “Yes. Pastor Luke warned Eric that he was going to destroy his family and our marriage. All it did was make Eric drink even more.”

Randy didn't release Lacey's hand, but kept it firmly encased in his own as he lowered himself to rest on one knee so he could speak to Susan at eye level while she sat hunched over in the kitchen chair.

“If you don't mind me saying, he can't stop drinking if he's going to do it for you. I know that sounds harsh, but it's the truth. The only way he's going to quit drinking is if he quits for himself. It's not even a question of motivation. I'm sure you're giving him plenty of motivation. I hate to say this, but you might be making it easy for him to keep drinking by not
making him take the consequences for his actions, and excusing him. Even if he's trying, it's like giving him permission to fail, which is different than accepting failure. It can be a steady downward spiral, and there's only one way out. That's to get help from God and other people who have the same problem and want to overcome it bad enough. He can do it, but he can't do it alone.”

Lacey closed her mouth, wondering how long she'd been standing there with it hanging open. While Randy did have some serious moments, she'd never known him to be so profound.

She looked down at him, remembering the insight he'd shared with people at the drinking and driving public service booth in the mall.

A million thoughts flashed through Lacey's mind. Even though he wouldn't tell her what had happened, she knew that something unhappy lurked in his past.

All of her own past unhappiness had been a direct result of alcohol abuse. She'd dearly loved her father, and as a child listening to her parents argue about his drinking had been a horrible. Years later her mother still hadn't recovered fully, and now her sister was so miserable from the effects of alcohol abuse in her own marriage that she was crying and pouring out her heart to someone she didn't know.

Bryce had different struggles. Their father had been tough on Bryce because he was a boy. Being the
youngest, Bryce had been the most helpless when their family troubles were at their worst. But because he had been so young when their father died, Bryce didn't have the same vivid memories, or nightmares, as the rest of them.

Randy knew so much, but there had to be a reason he wouldn't talk about his past. She didn't want to think that he'd suffered, too. She liked him too much for that.

“How do you know so much about all this stuff?” she choked out.

He turned his head up to face her, but remained kneeling in front of Susan.

“I know because I've been there. I'm an alcoholic, too.”

R
andy didn't think it was a good sign when the second the words were out of his mouth, Lacey went rigid. He wanted to tell her not to worry, but his words caught in his throat as all the color drained from her face.

Before he could move, Lacey yanked her hand out of his and stepped back.

Randy scrambled to his feet. “It's not what you think. I haven't had a drink for six years. I'm fine.”

“Eric says he's fine all the time. He's far from fine.”

“That's different.”

“You can't say that. You've never met Eric.”

“No, but I've met lots of people like him. Maybe I could even have been like him at one time. But I have God in my life, and everything is different now.” He pressed his palm over his heart. “With God's con
tinuing grace, I'll never have another drink until the day I die.”

Her wide eyes and pale complexion told him she didn't believe him.

“Lacey…please… I'm telling the truth.”

She stared at him, her eyes still wide. “I know you're thirty-one now. How old were you when you became an alcoholic?”

His gut clenched so bad, he felt like he might throw up. “I started drinking heavily when I was fifteen, but I don't know exactly when I crossed the line that I could have been labeled as an alcoholic. The important thing is that I quit the day after my twenty-fifth birthday, and I haven't had a drink since.”

Her face paled even more, and she shuffled back again. He reached out his hands toward her, but she stepped back and hid her hands behind her back.

Her sudden fear cut into him like a knife. In order to push away the hurt, he turned to Susan. “I'd like to talk to your husband. Maybe I can help him. Of course, that will only happen if he wants to be helped.”

“What can you do?”

“I can talk to him as someone who knows what he's going through—someone who has been there, and has overcome it. He can lean on me when he needs someone to talk to, and I can guide him when he needs guiding. I lead a small group for alcoholics
who meet at my church every Saturday morning. Leaning on God and trusting in Him is the biggest source of our strength. Eric is invited to join us.”

Susan didn't reply. But Lacey did.

“I thought you went to a men's group at your church on Saturday mornings.”

“I do. It's for men who don't go to regular AA meetings anymore because we wanted something more God centered. We meet at my church once a week, away from the rest of the general membership. We talk, we pray and we help each other deal with issues and problems, like any other kind of support group. Other times we just take a break and do something fun—but whatever we do, everybody goes. For example, a few weeks ago we went golfing. Except I'm not really a golf fan, so I snuck in one of those exploding golf balls.”

Randy's lower lip quivered, and he broke into a grin thinking of that day. He hadn't realized how completely an exploding golf ball would shatter. The whole group of them were rolling on the ground laughing long after all the dust cleared, including the guy who'd actually hit the fake golf ball. “It couldn't have been more perfect. I don't know how everyone knew it was me who brought it, but you should have seen when…” Randy let his voice trail off.

Lacey wasn't smiling. She wasn't even mildly amused.

Her voice came out in a little squeak. “You lied to me.”

He could almost see the wall going up between them, brick by brick. “I didn't lie. I just didn't tell you all the details. I can tell you about myself, but I'm not supposed to tell you the exact nature of the group. Then you'd know that every one of them was an alcoholic, and that would be a breach of trust and confidentiality. I hope you'll be discreet when you meet everyone, now that you know.”

“I don't even know who they are. Just that you go. Why didn't you tell me?”

“It's not the kind of thing that works its way into a normal conversation. I guess I was waiting for the right time.”

More than waiting for the right time, he had been afraid to tell her. He didn't know if she'd ever seen that side of life. He knew she hadn't been a Christian all her life, but he doubted she'd ever drunk anything stronger than a glass of wine.

His fears had been accurate. Except she was taking it much worse than his imagined worst-case scenario.

He didn't know what to do.

After he got home from his stint at the drinking-and-driving public service booth on Saturday, he'd spent the rest of the day praying. Not that being at the booth made him want to take up drinking again, but just the opposite. Suddenly he'd wanted to prove
to her how far away he was from the people who had come into the booth not looking for answers, but only to hear what they wanted to hear.

He needed Lacey's respect, as if that validated how far he'd grown as a human being. Lacey's opinion shouldn't have mattered any more than anyone else's, yet it did. He knew he could never be good husband material to any woman, least of all Lacey. But that didn't mean they couldn't be friends. Although, suddenly the unexpected things he was thinking about what he could do with Lacey had little to do with mere friendship.

With that thought in mind, he almost would have welcomed it if Lacey's “boyfriend” did punch his lights out, as he'd told Adrian, because then the lines would be drawn. It would have been over, and the best man would have won the fair maiden.

But Bryce wasn't her boyfriend.

Instead of drawing a firm line that he couldn't cross, from the first words they'd exchanged, Randy had felt an instant bond with Bryce, like they could become good friends.

“Do you have any more nasty secrets?”

Randy cringed. “It's not something I'm proud of, but it's not exactly a nasty secret. You're labeling me as still guilty, and I'm not. I've never been arrested, and I've never hurt anyone but myself. It hasn't cost society a lot of money to rehabilitate me with ques
tionable results. I've done it with the help of God and my friends instead of letting it beat me down.” He stared pointedly into her eyes. “So don't paint me into that corner. I pay my taxes and I'm a productive member of society. I do my best to help others not go down that same path, because I know where it can go.”

She backed up until she pressed herself against the wall. “I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. It's just a shock to find out like this.”

He stared at Lacey. Her reaction hurt him deeply. Part of him was very angry that she was judging him without giving him a chance to prove himself. But then, the reason the conversation started was because Eric was probably everything Randy used to be, except Randy had never been married.

Regardless, there were some things that all alcoholics shared. Like Randy, Eric's drinking had escalated to a point beyond his control, and he was hurting everyone around him, especially those whom he loved the most.

Thinking of Eric, Randy turned back to Susan. “I'm sorry. I forget where we were in our conversation.”

Susan glanced back and forth between Lacey and Randy. “I'm the one who should be sorry. I didn't mean to cause problems between you two.”

The mental picture of the perfect enabler flashed through Randy's head. “That's the second time since we've met that you've apologized for something you
haven't done wrong. If you want to help your husband, the first thing you've got to do is to stop taking the blame for things you haven't done.”

“But—”

He turned and extended one hand toward Lacey, looking at her while speaking to Susan. “Lacey and I haven't known each other long, but whatever happens between us won't be because of anything you've said or done. If you aren't responsible, don't apologize for something you didn't do wrong. Do you understand that?”

He turned back to Susan.

Susan nodded slowly.

He turned back to Lacey. “Can we talk about this later?”

Lacey nodded cautiously.

Randy wasn't encouraged.

Susan picked up her purse, dug through the contents for a tissue and blew her nose. “I just don't understand how you can help. Eric's drinking is ruining our marriage, but he goes out and does the same thing over and over.”

“Do you think he realizes that he has a problem?”

“I'm sure he does. He's quit a number of times. If he makes a point of quitting, doesn't that mean he acknowledges something is wrong?”

Randy nodded. “That's a good start. If you two have had a big fight today, unless he's subject to
blackouts, tomorrow would be a good time for me to talk to him, when he's still reeling from the effects of what he's done.”

“He's got to go to work tomorrow. What about today?”

“If he's drunk now, this isn't a good time to talk. Tomorrow morning would be best, before work and before he can fall into his normal routine. If he'll talk to me tomorrow morning, I can take him out for breakfast before he goes to work.”

“You would do that? You don't even know him. Or me. Why are you doing this?”

Using more courage than he had for years, Randy stepped back and reached for Lacey's hand. He intertwined their fingers, just as she had done to him before she learned of his history, and gave her hand a gentle squeeze, taking advantage of the fact that Susan was watching, making it awkward for Lacey to pull away. Again, he looked at Lacey while he spoke to Susan. “I'm doing it because I want to help anyone get out of the grip of the trap of alcohol abuse. It's what God has called me to do. You're also Lacey's sister. So that's two good reasons.”

His heart pounded while he waited, but Lacey didn't pull her hand away. Even though it wasn't the best situation, and he knew he wasn't playing fair, he wasn't ready to let go of her hand. He hadn't had much physical contact in his life until he became
friends with Bob's family and got to know Bob's mother. His head swam with the sensation of holding Lacey's warm hand in his.

“How will you do that?” Susan asked. “Don't you have to go to work in the morning?”

Not releasing Lacey's hand, he turned back to Susan. “Yes, but I work at the mall, so I don't have to be there until nine-fifteen. Most people are already at work by the time I'm just getting out of bed in the morning. I have plenty of time to take Eric out for breakfast.”

Susan's voice shook as she spoke. “I'll phone Lacey later and let her know what Eric says. I should go. It's past time for my daughter's nap, and I really should take her home. Besides, I'm not being very good company.” Susan stood and turned to leave the room, but she only took a single step, froze, then turned to Randy.

“I don't know how to thank you for what you're offering.” Tears again welled up in her eyes, and she sniffled. “I don't even know your name.”

Since Randy was holding Lacey's right hand with his left, he extended his free right hand and enclosed Susan's smaller hand in his own. “My name is Randy,” he said. Fortunately, he didn't have to say the rest to Susan, at least not today. He'd said it so many times it was automatic in certain circles, but here he struggled with the words as he recited the next part mentally.
And I'm an alcoholic.

He released Susan's hand so she could go home. Before she took one step, the same children who'd jumped up on Bryce earlier wrapped themselves around Susan's legs. The boy looked like he was in the first couple of years of grade school and the little girl looked like she was in preschool, which made sense if her mother said she needed a nap.

Susan smiled weakly, and twined her fingers in the little girl's hair. “These are my children, Shawn and Kaitlyn. I guess you'll probably be seeing a lot of them. Kids, this is Randy.”

They clung their mother's legs, stared at his hand joined with Lacey's, then looked up at him with big, wide eyes.

“Hi, kids,” Randy said, not knowing quite what to do. He liked children, but he didn't have a lot of experience with them, which, with his history, was not a bad thing. He'd messed up his own life enough.

“Come on, Shawn, Kaitlyn. It's time to go home.”

In the blink of an eye, the three of them were gone.

Randy turned to Lacey and gave the hand he was holding a gentle squeeze, just to remind her that they were still connected. “Should I leave, too?”

Lacey's voice came out as a rough whisper. “I don't know.”

At least she was being honest, which for now was the best he could hope for.

“I'm still the same person as before, you know.”

“I'm sure you are, but now I see that I don't know that person. This is so hard for me. You probably have a good idea what kind of things I've seen between Eric and Susan because of his drinking.”

Over the past six years, that was exactly the reason he hadn't become involved in a relationship, but from the other side of the fence. He didn't want to be the one who would hurt the other person with his obsessive behavior. However, in offering to help Eric, he realized how far he'd come. He never had any hesitations about helping a stranger, but it was taking a lot of inner strength to step forward in a situation where he couldn't be just an anonymous mentor. This was personal, and he had something personal at stake.

“You've got to remember that I'm different than Eric.”

She paused and drew in a shuddering breath. “It's not just Eric who drinks too much. My father drank, too. He died in a car accident when he was the one who was the drunk driver. Now I know why you knew so much at the booth in the mall. You're one of them.”

If Randy didn't feel sick enough before, he felt worse now. He wanted to say he wasn't that bad, but he had been. There were many times he'd been out drinking and driving, and many times that he'd come very close to an accident. It was only by the grace of God that he hadn't killed someone else, or himself.