Holy War

Jodi called me the other day.

My sister and I haven’t spoken much over the last several years, and every time we do reminds me why it doesn’t happen more often.

Not only that, she had the nerve to call me at work. If she and I were close, she would have known how I felt about takin’ personal calls there. But she didn’t know, so she called me up and gave me the third degree.

Like my sister has any place giving me the third degree!


Maybe it wouldn’t have upset me so much if I hadn’t run into Ella Radford at the post office. I had some bills to mail, but no stamps, so I had to make a special trip on my lunch break. It didn’t come as any surprise that I see somebody I know at the post office—we do live in a small town, after all—but of all people, why did it have to be Ella? I tried to avoid her, but she spied me before I could get out the door.

“Jamie? Why Jamie Forrest! How are you doing today?”

“Just fine, Ella. How are you?”

“I’m just fine, sugar. How’s that boy of yours?”

“He’s all right, I guess.” I wasn’t about to let her know I hadn’t heard from Chad in over a year, much less why.

“That’s good to hear. I was talkin’ to Steven the other day, and he asked about him.”

Oh, no. Here it comes, I thought to myself.

“You know, Steven’s been doing so well since he moved to Houston. All that fussin’ and frettin’ we were doin’, and things are just going great for him.”

“Really? That’s wonderful!” Must be nice to have a son who turned out right. I know it’s a sin to be jealous of your neighbor, but this was just too much for me to help.

“Well, Jamie, I’ve gotta run. Got a million things to do today.”

“All right. Good seein’ you. Guess I’ll see you in church tomorrow night?” Like Ella Radford would miss being seen in church on Wednesday night for anything.

“You bet, sugar! I’ll see you later. Take care!”

With that, she was out the door, and all her saccharine sweetness with her.

I stood there in the lobby, my bills still in hand and my mouth growing tighter every second.

I know it ain’t right, her bein’ a friend and all, but sometimes that woman just makes me sick.


Ella was still on my mind when the phone rang.

“Good afternoon, Williamson Contracting, can I help you?”

“Jamie?”

I tensed at the sound of her voice. “This is Jamie.”

“Hey, sis. Jodi here. How’s it going?”

“Jodi, what are you doing? I can’t take personal calls here.”

“Sorry, sis, I just couldn’t wait.” Sis. We talk once or twice a year, and she acts like we’re the best of friends.

“Wait for what?”

“I saw Chad today.”

God, I prayed, give me strength. “You did, did you?”

“Yes. I did. He asked me if I heard from you or Tucker.”

“And you said?”

“I told him I hadn’t heard from you in a few months now.”

“Well, that’s the truth, I guess, isn’t it?” This was going somewhere eventually, and I could tell I wouldn’t like where it was going to end up. “So, where did you run into him?”

“I knew he was living here in Austin, so I looked him up and took him out to lunch.”

Leave it to my sister to conspire behind my back. “Jodi, what’s this all about?”

“Jamie, he’s my nephew. Just because you refuse to have any relationship with him, doesn’t mean I have to.”

“You know what? Fine. Do whatever you want. Just leave me out of it.”

“Jamie…”

“What?”

“He’s your son. Don’t you think this has gone on long enough?”

“You know what? You’re right. It has gone on long enough. You, him, the whole thing. Look, it isn’t my fault that the whole world has gone completely crazy. You and Chad may go on livin’ the way you do, but that doesn’t mean I have to give in and pretend there’s nothin’ wrong with it.”

“What’s wrong with it? Jamie, your son told you the truth. Would you rather he lived a lie?”

“He is living a lie, Jodi. He’s lyin’ to himself pretendin’ that it’s okay to be doin’ what he’s doin’.”

“Jamie. He told me he misses you. Tucker too.”

“Okay. You know what? I’ll tell you what you can tell him, Jodi. You can tell him, whenever he’s ready to turn his life around and be the man Tucker and I brought him up to be, we’ll be here. He knows where he can find us. You tell him that, all right?”

“C’mon, Jamie. You act like this is something he can change.”

“It is something he can change, Jodi. He can change it if he prays for it.”

“Here we go again.” My thoughts exactly, I wanted to say to my sister. “Listen, sis, when are you gonna get your head out of the sand?”

“My head ain’t in the sand, Jodi. It’s you who won’t face reality. I live my life in the fear of the Lord, and if you or Chad can’t deal with that, then you might as well just forget it!”

“You know what, sis? You’re right. Just forget it.” The phone clicked in my ear.


Mother just about died the first time Jodi got pregnant.

Two years into college, and she had to drop out and get a job so she could support the child. Now she has two kids and is living in sin with a man who is not their father.

I’ll never know how my parents managed. My sister and I grew up in a strict Southern Baptist home with old-fashioned values. Our father was the head of the house. Mother stayed at home, cooked, cleaned, and looked after Jodi and me when we got home from school. We were expected to get good grades, respect our elders, go to church, and avoid such things as smoking, drinking, loud music, and boys and girls who weren’t “brought up right.” These included Catholics and children whose parents didn’t go to church. Considering all this, I can understand how upset my parents were when Jodi turned out the way she did.

Even more so since the same thing happened to me. I figured, if I stayed in school and out of trouble, things would turn out all right for me. And at first they did. I married a good Christian man, settled down, and started a family. Tucker and I were married for two years when we had our son. After Chad was born, though, life began to turn out differently than I had expected. For one thing, we found out that I couldn’t have any more children. Then Tucker got laid off and had to take a job that didn’t pay so good. A friend of ours from church was a contractor, and I started working in his office to make ends meet. Still, we went to church every Sunday and Wednesday, and managed as well we could with our lives. It just doesn’t seem fair that so much went wrong when we thought we were doing everything right.


Steve Radford surprised his parents when he decided to move to Houston after graduating from high school. They had expected him to stay home and settle in town, like his two brothers had done. Ella had told me how much she worried about her youngest son living in “The Big City,” and Buck even bought him a revolver before he left home. A couple Saturdays before Steve was to move, Buck had come into the kitchen where Ella and their son were still eating breakfast.

“C’mere, son, I got somethin’ for you.”

Steve followed his father into the garage. Buck pulled a package out from under the workbench and handed it to his son.

“Your mother and I thought you might need a little…well, a little insurance when you moved to Houston.”

Steve opened up the package and pulled out the shiny black revolver.

“What’s this, Dad?”

“You know, son, your mother and I have been thinking a lot about this. You remember your uncle Jerry? The one that got shot in Houston back in ’78? Well, we were thinkin’ you oughtta have something to, well, we thought you oughtta have some protection. In case you needed it.”

“Dad, I’ve never fired a revolver before.”

“Nothin’ to it, Steven. Not a whole lot different from them shotguns you go huntin’ with.”

“I don’t know, Dad. A handgun—I mean, goin’ deer huntin’ is one thing, but this is for shootin’ people.”

“Don’t think of it that way, son. Think of it as a way to keep other folks from shootin’ you.”

“Dad, you’re not worryin’ about anything happenin’ to me like what happened to Uncle Jerry, are you?”

“Well, Steven, you never know. It’s a whole different world in the big city. Listen, it’s not like you’re gonna leave it lyin’ around or anything. You’re gonna keep it locked up and all. Just take it. It’ll make your mother and me feel a lot better, knowin’ you got something like that in case you ever need it.”

Ella told me that Steve did exactly that. When he moved to Houston, he locked up the gun, unloaded, and all but forgot he even had the thing. Truth be told, it wasn’t so much for his protection as their peace of mind. Buck and Ella were sure he would never need it, but it was a good thing to have if he ever did.

Turns out they didn’t need to worry much about him at all. Once Steve moved to Houston, he found himself a good church to go to on the north side of town, not far from the machine shop where he worked, and even bought himself a house through some man in the church he had met soon after joining. He kept himself so busy in that church that there never was any temptation to get into trouble, and besides that, Steve was the kind of young man who could be trusted never to get into that kind of trouble if he was tempted.

Sure wish I could say the same thing for Chad.


I still had the phone to my ear when Kelly Williamson came into the office.

“Someone on the phone?”

I looked at him blankly before registering what he was talking about. “What? Oh, no. No, Kelly. It was my sister.”

“Your sister? What was she doing callin’ up here?”

“She doesn’t know how I feel about takin’ personal calls at work.”

“No worry, Jamie.” It was more my policy than Kelly’s. Guess I felt guilty about how good he’d been to Tucker and me. “How is that sister of yours? I ain’t seen her in years.”

I really didn’t want to get into it all over again. “She’s all right, I guess. Just called to pick on me. You know how sisters are.” Kelly had two sisters, I knew he would understand.

“Yeah, Jamie, that is certainly something I do know.”

I sure was lucky to be working for a man like Kelly Williamson. He was a good Christian man, married to one of my old friends from school. He knew my sister, and he knew why we were at odds. He also knew about the hard times Tucker and I were going through, and he paid me more than he would have paid someone more qualified to run his office.

It was about quarter after five when I shut the lights off in the office. Kelly was under the hood of one of his dump trucks when I ducked my head in the shop.

“I’m gone if you don’t need anything else, Kelly.”

“That’s all right, Jamie. You have yourself a good night. And tell that husband of your’n I’ll be seein’ him tomorrow at church.”

“You got it, Kelly. Don’t stay too late.” He already had his head back under the hood, his arm went up in acknowledgment.

Men and their toys.


On the way home I got to thinkin’ about Jodi’s call, and that got me to thinkin’ about Chad. I missed my son, but in a way he wasn’t my son anymore. It was like I never really knew him after all. I mean, I was brought up a certain way, and even if my sister didn’t live like that anymore I wasn’t about to give in to the ways of the world. Things weren’t always easy for Tucker and me, but the Lord had been good to us through it all, and I wasn’t going to walk away from that. Sometimes it seemed my faith in God was all I had left. If I had to choose between my Lord and my son, I shouldn’t have to apologize for the choice I made. Still, it hurt to know I’d lost my only son.

The twenty-seventh Psalm kept running through my head. One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life. And the twenty-fourth chapter of Joshua. As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. I prayed there in the car that God would bring my son back to me, that he would find Jesus again and turn back from the life he was livin’.

That morning at the post office came to mind, and I had to fight off the bitterness. I tried to be happy for Ella that Steven had turned out all right, but I couldn’t help wishing that Chad had done the same.


Tucker’s pickup pulled in the driveway as I was settin’ the table for supper.

The look on his face left me cold as he pulled the back door to. “What’s wrong, honey?” I asked.

He dropped his keys on the countertop and looked out the kitchen window. “Buck Radford called me just before the shop closed.” He turned to me. “Steve’s dead.”

I felt my face go white. Ella. My God. “No. Tucker.” I put down the forks that were in my hand and went to my husband.

“Shot himself, Jamie. Buck just heard from the sheriff’s department this afternoon. Neighbors hadn’t seen him in four days or so, and the shop hadn’t heard from him. Cops went in and found him in the bathroom, his face blown off with that pistol Buck had given him.”

“Oh, no!” Poor Ella, I was thinking. A flood of guilt rushed over me when I remembered seeing her at the post office. I almost hated her for rubbing it in how well Steve was doing, and now my skin felt like it was on fire. “Does Ella know?”

“Yeah, she knows. She and Buck went down to Houston to ID the body. Buck didn’t want her to go, said he was afraid she couldn’t handle it. But she insisted. Said her boy needed her.”

“You mean they left already?” I was getting dizzy, how fast all this was happening.

“Yeah. Said they’ll probably be back tomorrow. They’re bringin’ him home with ‘em too, if he’s ready.”

I couldn’t imagine Ella goin’ through anything like this. Nothin’ bad ever happened to her. I could feel tears well up in my eyes, wonderin’ what must be on her mind.

Tucker came closer and put his arms around me. “I know, Jamie. I know.” I fell into him, dropped my head on his shoulder. My own son came to mind, and Jodi.

“My sister called me up this afternoon. Said she saw Chad.”

He tensed up when I mentioned Chad’s name. Sometimes I think our son disappointed Tucker more than he did me. Of course, what father wouldn’t be disappointed by something like that? “Jamie, I don’t know if I even wanna think about that right now. Let’s just sit down and eat, all right?”

“All right.” I shouldn’t have brought it up. Our own family troubles seemed irrelevant at the moment. We sat down at the kitchen table and joined hands, and Tucker said the blessing. His voice faltered just a little when he thanked God for the food and asked Him to keep us in His Word.

Then we ate in silence.


Next day, Buck and Ella weren’t at church. They’d been in Houston all day, and even if they were back in time they were probably too exhausted, physically and emotionally, to do much of anything. Tucker told me that Steve’s body wouldn’t get to the funeral home in town till sometime tomorrow.

We just about prayed the paint off the walls in that building, for Buck and Ella, for Steve, for his brothers and sister. I offered up a silent prayer for my own son and for Jodi.

Westside Baptist is the kind of church that prays for everything under the sun. We kinda got a reputation over it, some of the folks at the other Baptist church in town look down their noses at us because they think we spend too much time prayin’ and not enough time hearin’ the Word. Says it makes us more Charismatic than Baptist. Course, I don’t see what the big deal is, it isn’t like we put our hands in the air and start dancin’ around the room when we pray. Mother and Daddy would have a fit if they thought Tucker was takin’ me to that kind of church.

Truth is, we do hear the Word in our church. But isn’t it part of that Word to pray without ceasing? I don’t think there’s anything wrong at all with bein’ a prayin’ church. Besides, that’s what Wednesday night is all about. It’s a prayer service. And that night, Buck and Ella needed our prayers more than they ever had.


Kelly let me off early Thursday so Tucker and I could go to the funeral home. Tucker was already at the house when I got there, to make himself presentable and all. It didn’t take me as long to get ready. Guess workin’ in an office doesn’t mess you up as much as workin’ in a machine shop will. I did put on one of my Sunday dresses, and with that, we were ready to go.

We rode in my car into town. Tucker drove. I’m not one of those women’s libbers who takes it personally when the man of the house wants to drive. In fact, I rather enjoy the break. Tucker’s always a lot more careful driving my car than his own pickup. I don’t know if he’s afraid I’ll start nagging him, or if it’s that he’s just not used to driving a car. Too close to the road, I guess.

We turned down the street that the funeral home is on and couldn’t believe how many cars there were. The parking lot was full, and cars lined both sides of the street for quite a few blocks. Tucker parked on one of the side streets, and we walked silently towards the old brick house that had been a funeral home for as long as I could remember.

We knew just about everybody who was milling around in the lobby, so it took us a while to get lined up to sign the book. Tucker went around the shakin’ hands with every man in the room, while I wandered over to the corner where a group of women from church had gathered. One of the older women, Velma Parrish, broke from the group and turned to me.

“How’re you doin’, Jamie?” She reached out to squeeze my hand.

“Oh, I’m doin’ all right, I guess, Velma. Have you seen Ella?”

“Yes, I have, Jamie. She asked about you.”

“Probably wonderin’ if I was gonna be here. Sure is a shame, isn’t it?”

“Sure is, Jamie. How’s your boy doing?”

I was hoping to avoid any conversation about Chad that afternoon. “He’s fine. My sister Jodi said she saw him earlier this week.”

“’S good to hear. Jodi. My, I haven’t seen that girl in ages. When she comin’ back to see us?”

“Couldn’t say, Velma. You know how she is. She got her eyes on the city and ain’t never looked back.”

“Well, you tell her I said hello next time you hear from her, y’hear?”

“I sure will, Velma. I’m gonna go get Tucker and see about goin’ in.”

“All right, sugar. You be good to yourself.”

“I will if you will.” I smiled at her before I turned to look for my husband.


Buck and Ella were sittin’ on a dark blue sofa in the parlor with Steve’s casket. They stood up when they saw me and Tucker coming in the room. I went up and put my arms around Ella. She just about fell into me, and I could feel her starting to sob on my shoulder.

“Ella. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”

After a moment or two she answered, “I know, Jamie. I sure do appreciate you and Tucker comin’ this afternoon.”

“It’s no problem. No problem at all.” I felt myself rocking her in my arms.

Tucker come up and reached his hand out to Ella’s husband, then pulled him closer and gave him a pat on the back. “Buck, I sure am sorry about your boy.”

“Thanks, Tucker. Sure do appreciate it.”

“If there’s anything me or Jamie can do, you just let us know. All right?”

“Sure thing, man.”

Ella pulled away from me and dried her eyes with the kleenex she held in her hand. “I’ve got something I wanna show you, Jamie.”

Buck started. “Ella, honey, we don’t need to get into that here.”

“No, Buck,” his wife answered, “I think now’s as good a time as any.” With that, she led me out of the room.


I followed her out to her car in the parking lot. She opened the back door and rummaged through a pile of what I imagined was some of Steven’s things and pulled out a black, leather-bound Bible. “I wanna show you this.”

We went out into the lawn in front of the funeral home, to a bench that sat beneath the stately old oak trees. We sat down next to each other, and Ella handed the Bible to me. “The deputies gave this to us. It belonged to Steven.”

I took the Bible from Ella’s hand and opened the cover. The inscription said, “To Steven, from Mee-Maw, on the occasion of your Baptism in Christ Jesus.”

“This is beautiful, Ella. I can’t believe he hung on to it.” Ella’s mother had passed away a few months after Steve was baptized.

“It is beautiful.” She took the book from me and started flipping through the pages. “I wanted to show you something.” She found the page she was looking for and handed the Bible back to me.

There, on the page Ella had opened up to, a verse had been highlighted, underlined, and circled twice in heavy black ink. Arrows were drawn in the margin pointing to the verse, and the words had been copied several times in dark capital letters around the margins. The marks were so heavy that they creased the pages. I just stared at that page without moving a muscle.

Suddenly, my hands began to tremble. “Ella, what’s this mean?” I closed the Bible and handed it back to her.

“Don’t you see, Jamie? This is what it’s all about. The cops said Steven didn’t leave a note or anything, but on the way back home I found this. I showed it to Buck, and we both realized that this is why he did it.”

“You don’t mean, Ella—“

“That’s exactly what I mean, Jamie. Neither one of us knew that any of this was going on. But if you could have been there, if you could have seen the house. Jamie!”

“What is it, Ella?”

“My son was fightin’ a war neither Buck nor I knew anything about. A holy war, even. He was fightin’ with the Devil for his very soul.” Her lips trembled into something of a smile.

I could feel my face going white, and I was starting to get really sick to my stomach.

“Ella, he’s your son. How could you say a thing like that?”

“But it’s true, Jamie, it’s true. He was fightin’ with the Devil, and he won. He won, Jamie.”

He won? It was like she forgot her son was dead. “Won what, Ella?”

“Can’t you see? He won his soul. It cost him his life, but he saved his soul. Praise the Lord! That’s what I say, praise the Lord!” Tears were streaming down around the smile on her face.

I was horrified to hear this woman talking about her own son like that. I got up to leave.
“Where are you going, Jamie?”

“I’ve got to go, Ella. I’m gonna go get Tucker. We gotta go home.”

Ella stood up and threw her arms around me. “I’m glad you came, Jamie. I’m glad I could talk about this to someone. Buck doesn’t want to talk about it, and he doesn’t want me to talk about it with anyone else, either.”

With good reason, I thought. “Ella, if there’s anything you need, anything at all, you’ll call me?”

“I will. Thanks, Jamie. You’ve been a really good friend to me. I don’t know if I could stand all this if you weren’t here.”

“It’s all right, Ella. It’s gonna be all right.”

“You know, Jamie. You’re right. It is gonna be all right.”

I fought the urge not to run back into the funeral home to fetch my husband and get out of there.


Sometimes I wish Tucker would drive a little faster. It seemed like we took forever gettin’ home. When we finally did get to the house, I couldn’t get in fast enough. I made straight for the kitchen, to the phone.

Tucker followed me in there. “Whatcha doin’, sweetheart?”

“I gotta make a phone call or two. Why don’t you go get out of your good clothes? I’m gonna start supper here soon enough.”

When he was out of the room, I picked the phone up and dialed information. I asked for Austin, but the operator gave me another number to call up. I hung up and dialed the number she gave me.

“What city?” the voice on the other end asked.

“Austin.”

“Name?”

“Chad Forrest.” I was panting with anxiety.

“One moment, please.” In no time, I had the number and dialed.

The phone rang twice before anyone picked it up. “Hee-yellow,” the voice said.

I had almost forgotten what his voice even sounded like. “Chad? Chad honey, is that you?”

“Yeah this is Chad, who is—uh, Mom?”

“Yes, honey, it’s me. How are you?”

“Uh, fine, Mom, everything’s just fine.” I must have caught him off guard. “What’s going on?”

“I just wanted to get in touch with you and see how you were doing.”

“I’m fine, Mom.” He must have forgotten he already said that. “How are you?”

“I’m fine, son.” Then, “No, I’m not fine, Chad. I miss you.”

“I miss you too, Mom. What’s wrong?”

“Chad, I don’t know how to say this, but I’ve made a terrible mistake. I just wanted you to know I’m sorry for shutting you out.” My face was getting wet with tears.

“It’s okay, Mom.” Chad’s voice was starting to shake, too.

“No, it’s not. Listen, could you do me a favor?”

“Sure, Mom. What is it?”

“Could you come home for a couple days?”

He hesitated. “Uh, well, yeah. I guess I could. Is it all right with Dad?”

“It will be all right with him. We just need you here.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

I debated whether I should tell him over the phone. Then again, he’d find out soon enough if I asked him to bring something to wear to a funeral. “Steven Radford’s dead, honey.”

“What! Oh my God! What happened?”

“He killed himself.”

“Oh, God! Are you for real?”

“Chad, you don’t think I would make something like that up, now, would you? Listen, your Dad and I want you to come with us to the funeral.”

“Uh, sure, Mom. You bet. Hell of a reunion, wouldn’t you say?”

“I know, son. I’m sorry about that. I should have called you sooner.”

“Hey, it’s okay. So, you really want me to come up?”

“Yes, I really do.”

“What about the other?”

“What other?”

“Oh, come on, Mom, you know. Why you haven’t so much as called me in over a year.”

Was I really ready to face this? I almost started to regret having called him. But no. This had to be done. I was not gonna end up like Ella. She didn’t choose to lose her son like I did. This was just something I was gonna have to figure out between the Lord and myself. “Chad, I can’t promise that this is gonna be easy, but when you get here I think you’ll understand why I have to see you. When can you be here?”

“I have to call work in the morning, but I can be there by noon. Is that okay?”

“That’s fine, honey. Just be careful.”

“Will do, Mom. I’ll call you when I’m on my way in the morning.”

“Thanks. And, oh, son?”

“Yeah, Mom?”

“I love you.”

“I love you too, Mom.” He was choking back tears just like I was. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”


After I hung up with Chad, I reached for the Bible that I kept in one of the kitchen cabinets. I thumbed through the pages till I found the verse that had demanded so much attention in Steve Radford’s Bible. As I looked at the words, I could see the highlighting, the underlines, the circles, the arrows. I saw the words written several times in the margin in heavy capital letters.

I read the words to myself: If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

So many times I had used those very words against my own son.

I looked up and saw the manic expression in Ella’s face as she went on about how Steve had fought a holy war and won his soul. I wondered to myself, what kind of faith is it that demands such an awful sacrifice? I realized that there would be no easy answers. As much as it scared me to risk losing my faith, the thought of ending up like Ella Radford frightened me even more.

After thinking some more about what had gone on that day, I closed my Bible and put it back in its place.


Then, swallowing the lump in my throat, I reached for the phone again and called my sister.

2003