“…that she still cares about you in spite of what you said to her is a miracle.”
Her heart thundered in her chest.
Logan? Here?
Her feet wouldn’t move. Her legs seized up.
Had he slipped past her?
Then her heart sang. Logan was here. Talking to her father. On his own.
“…I want you to know that I don’t deserve her,” he was saying, his voice ringing with conviction. “But you know, you don’t deserve her, either. She has a deep and pure love that I don’t understand. I’m trying because I know that you are not going out of her life. But I want you to know that I’m not going out of her life, either. I’m here. For as long as she needs me, or wants me, I’m here. I love her, Frank. I love her with all my heart.”
Sarah’s breath trembled in her throat. She was running out of air. Was he really saying those precious words? To her father?
“…I need to forgive you, because for now, this is the only way I’m going to be able to be a part of Sarah’s life. You’ve hurt a lot of people and I’m still learning to forgive you for my father and my mother. I have to confess I still struggle with bitterness over that, but I can’t presume to withhold forgiveness when God has forgiven me so much Himself.”
As he spoke his words of absolution, the sorrow and hurt she had been carrying all night slipped away.
“But I may as well be honest,” Logan continued. “I’m struggling even harder with forgiving you for what you did to Sarah. What you said to her. You hurt someone I love dearly.”
“I…love her too,” Sarah heard her father say.
Go inside, a voice urged her. Move.
But she felt frozen and unsure she should intrude on this moment.
“Then show her. For her sake. And mine.”
Sarah finally felt her legs. Finally could force her paralyzed feet to move. She pushed herself away from the wall and walked into the room.
Her father sat in a wheelchair beside his bed, Logan in an armchair facing him. Logan leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees, his hands clasped between them.
He hadn’t shaved. His tumbled hair looked as if he had been running his fingers through it.
And as he turned to see who was coming into the room, his dark eyes looked as if he hadn’t slept in days.
And he looked fantastic.
He loves me, Sarah thought, the words singing through her with all the promise of a Christmas carol.
“Sarah.” Her name burst from him as he got to his feet. Logan glanced from her to her father, a frown creasing his forehead. “What did you…”
“I love you, too,” she said quietly. It was all she could say. It was all she needed to say.
Logan swallowed the distance between them with two strides and dragged her into his arms. His one hand held her head, his other arm wrapped all the way around her, holding her tight, close. Safe and secure.
“Sarah, oh Sarah,” he murmured into her hair. “I tried to call you to tell you that I needed to talk to your father on my own, but you weren’t answering.”
He pulled back just enough to look into her eyes, his own scanning her features as if seeing them for the first time.
“I love you,” he whispered, then, in front of her father, he bent over and kissed her mouth, her cheeks, each eyelid, her hair.
Then he hugged her again.
Chapter Sixteen
Logan stood back as Sarah walked over to her father, leaned over and gave him a careful hug.
Frank’s one hand came up and he caught her around her neck, his awkward response.
When Logan had first walked into this room the change in Frank Westerveld had set him back on his heels. The once proud face hung slack on one side. One eyelid drooped, masking the bright intensity blazing out of his other eye. When he saw Logan, his one eye widened and then he looked away, as if ashamed.
Or so Logan preferred to interpret it.
All the things he had rehearsed on the way here, all the things he was going to say, fled in the sight of Frank’s incapacitated state. This man was not an enemy to be subdued.
But he had come to talk to Frank and talk he did, going where his thoughts and heart led him. He wondered how much Sarah had overheard. Wondered what she thought.
“I’m going to get a coffee,” he said to Sarah as she settled into the chair beside her father. He wanted to give her some time with him alone.
“No. Please. Don’t go,” she said, catching his hand. Her eyes, eyes that shone with love, caught and held his and he couldn’t say no.
“Okay.” He gave her a smile as he knelt down beside her, his one hand on her back for support, his other holding hers.
Sarah turned back to her father.
“Do you know why I haven’t visited you?”
He nodded. “Ted told,” he said.
“When you told me you forgave me for Marilee, I didn’t know what to think, Dad,” she said. “I may as well be honest, I was angry. And I was hurt. I didn’t think I had done anything that needed forgiving.”
“No…I…was wrong.”
Watching Frank struggle to formulate even these simple words created pity for this man. He had so little now.
“I know I can’t judge you, Dad,” Sarah was saying, “but I was so hurt by what you said. That’s why I stayed away.” She glanced at Logan over her shoulder, gave him a tremulous smile, then turned back to her father.
“I was going to tell you that I forgive you for what you did to me, but that I couldn’t pardon what you did to Logan’s family until I heard him forgiving you. And I know I’ve been wrong in staying away, but I needed to figure out who I was apart from you.” She turned to Logan, granting him a gentle smile. “And Logan and I spent time together, finding out where we fit in each other’s lives. And I think I know that now.”
Logan squeezed her hand, returning her smile.
She turned back to her father who was watching them with a look of futility. “But I want you to know that I forgive you, Dad. I forgive you for what you did to me then and what you did to me now.” She squeezed Logan’s hand. Hard. “I was young and I cared too much what you thought those many years ago when you told me to break up with Logan. I should have had the courage to stand up to you, but I didn’t. Thank goodness Logan and I found each other again.”
Frank’s good hand opened and closed. “Sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Then he looked at Logan. “Thought lots. Nothing else to do.” The time it took Frank to work his mouth around these words lent a weight to them. “Please. For your father. Forgive. For Sarah. Forgive.”
Logan looked into Frank’s eyes, held his gaze, his own unwavering. But all he could see in Frank’s expression was brokenness and sorrow.
And suddenly, the feeling of forgiveness he didn’t think he could muster flowed through him like a refreshing stream, washing away the residue of anger and resentment.
Logan was realistic enough to know that when he was away from Frank, away from the brokenness on his face and the sorrow in his expression some of his feelings might return.
Logan had much to be forgiven for as well.
And Sarah, dear, precious, loving Sarah had forgiven her father for what he had done to her. Surely he could do no less himself. God required no less.