Have you ever noticed that sometimes we have to go back to go forward? It may be that something very important has been left behind. It may feel like looking for a needle in a haystack or treasure somewhere in the rubble. It may feel like looking for clues amidst the belongings of a lost loved one – clues that perhaps not all has been lost. It may take place anywhere, even in the office of a therapist.
“I’m thinking about quitting church,” Dana said.
“What is it about church that you want to quit?” her therapist asked.
“It’s all nonsense!” Dana said. “The pastor preached on the love chapter, you know, 1 Corinthians 13: ‘If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but do not have love, I am only a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. If I give my body over to be burned, but do not have love, I gain nothing.’ Yada, yada, yada. Nonsense!”
“How is it nonsense?” her therapist asked.
“You know, the fire,” Dana said.
“Yes, the fire. You mentioned a fire last week near the end of the session. Tell me more about it,” her therapist replied.
“I really don’t want to talk about it,” Dana said.
“Okay, that’s okay, you don’t have to talk about anything you’re not ready to talk about.” her therapist replied.
Dana seemed somewhat agitated, turned a bit pale, as if she was about to vomit, and then she did, only with words. “Okay,” she snapped with an irritated tone. “We woke up in the middle of the night suffocating and choking on smoke. It all happened in seconds. We didn’t have time to think. Suffocating and choking doesn’t afford you time to think. You just have to react. We jumped up. My husband Brian went to the room of our teenage son David, opened the window, David jumped out, then Brian. There was no time for Brian to double back to help me get our younger kids out. We agreed. We both acted at the same time. While he was getting David out, I went to get Emma and Ethan out. They were still sharing the same room. I couldn’t get their bedroom window open, so we had to hurry back to my room. We formed a train, I took hold of Ethan’s shoulders to steer him, and Emma grabbed onto my pajamas from behind like the caboose. I was the engine of the little train that could and I pushed Ethan and pulled Emma to my room. I felt Emma’s hands on my pajamas the whole time. We made a beeline for that window. I opened the window, Ethan jumped out first. He was scared so Emma helped him jump. He broke his leg but saved his life. The next thing I remember is waking up with my head hanging out the window. They said I was choking and suffocating on smoke and passed out in the window, but since my head was hanging out the window, I was evidently able to take in enough air to regain consciousness. I didn’t know how much time had passed, but they told me it had been just a few seconds. I heard everyone calling me to jump, Brian, and all three kids, David, Emma and Ethan. I was just so happy that everyone had gotten out alive. Seeing everyone alive on the ground was the happiest moment of my life. They told me that I passed out again after that. We were all taken to the hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation, and of course Ethan was given a cast for his broken leg. I was so happy that we had all escaped with our lives.”
“What a traumatic ordeal,” her therapist replied, “and nothing short of a miracle that you all made it out alive!”
“Yeah, right!” Dana snapped back. “Then it all went to pieces!”
“What happened?” her therapist asked.
“I don’t know,” Dana answered.
Dana’s face morphed from a look of irritation to a deepening sense of frustration and bewilderment.
“No, I do know!” Dana said. “We made like a train. I took hold of Ethan’s shoulders to steer him. Ethan is just 9. I love him more than I love myself, but I always have to stay on him. ‘Time to get up Ethan.’ ‘Time to get out the door for school.’ ‘Do your homework.’ ‘Wash your hands for dinner.’ ‘Brush your teeth.’ ‘Turn off the video games.’ ‘Get in bed.’ I had to take hold of his shoulders to steer him, to push him to my room, to that window. You have to believe me. Emma grabbed onto my pajamas from behind and we were off. I felt her hands on my pajamas. I pulled her all the way to my bedroom window. I felt her hands the whole time. She even helped Ethan jump out of that window. Then I passed out in the window. When I came to, I heard everyone calling me to jump. I heard everyone. Brian, David, Ethan, Emma. I swear to you that I heard Emma yelling the loudest. When I saw them all on the ground, I was just so happy! We all escaped with our lives. I was just so happy!”
“What happened that it all went to pieces?” her therapist asked.
Dana looked as if she had seen a ghost. “They told me that Emma didn’t make it out,” she said.
“Wait, what?” her therapist asked.
“The fire was downstairs,” Dana said. “The firefighters explained that when Brian opened the window in David’s room, the open window created a backdraft that sucked superheated air upstairs right when we were passing the stairway on the way to my bedroom window. They told me that Emma must have taken a breath right at the stairway, and that the superheated air instantly melted the tiny air sacs in her lungs. They said she must have stumbled backward onto her bed. That’s where they found her. Lying on her bed.”
Dana’s eyes became round as saucers. “You have to believe me when I tell you that it didn’t happen like they say it did” she pleaded.
“How did it happen?” her therapist asked.
“You probably think I’m crazy too, right?” Dana probed. “They all looked at me the same way when I told them how it happened. The doctors, the firefighters, even my husband. They said my brain was probably deprived of oxygen, that I was hallucinating, delusional. That I was just seeing and hearing what I wanted to see and hear. That I was just wishful thinking, and comforting myself with hallucinations and the delusion that my daughter was with me the whole time, that she got out alive with the rest of us. Is that what you think too? Do you think I’m crazy?”
“I don’t think you’re crazy,” her therapist said.
“Was Emma already dead?” Dana asked. “Was I experiencing something supernatural?”
“I don’t know,” her therapist replied. “Can you tell me again about your experience of Emma being with you the whole time?”
“I’ve already told you!” Dana protested. “It feels like we’re going in circles! It happened like I said!”
Dana took a moment to gather her composure. “I felt her hands grab hold of my pajamas from behind and I felt her pushing me and Ethan all the way to my bedroom window. I saw her helping Ethan jump from that window. Then I passed out. After I came to with my head hanging out the window, I heard everyone calling for me to jump. Brian, David, Ethan and Emma. I heard Emma calling me to jump just like everyone else, just louder. I saw her on the ground with everyone else. Then I passed out again and woke up at the hospital.”
As if choking on phantom smoke, Dana coughed and cleared her throat. “You have to believe that I never would have left Emma behind! I’m momma bear! She was my cub! I never would have left her to die! I would have given my body over to be burned for her! I should have died in that fire, not Emma! You have to believe me! When Emma was pushing me and Ethan to my window, I swear to you with everything I am, with all my heart, mind, soul and body, I was determined that both Ethan and Emma would survive! Not me! I should have died in Emma’s place! I can’t imagine going on living without her! She was my daughter!”
Dana’s face took on a faraway look and her tone softened as if she had been transported back to better days. “I love my two sons, but they are more like daddy’s boys. Emma was my girl. We did girl things together. We loved shopping together. She was only 10, but she knew where all the good stuff was. She could shop me under the table. We loved getting our hair and nails done together, watching chick flicks. You know, girl stuff.”
As if waking up from a sweet dream to her living nightmare, Dana aimed her eyes toward the ceiling and lashed out at the empty space above her. “I should have died in that fire, not her! I feel cursed with having to live!”
Dana then turned her teary eyes toward her therapist. “Brian tells me it would hurt our boys and hurt him, if I died too. ‘I know Brian!’ It’s just that night after night, after the nightmares, after I finally get some restless sleep, I awaken at the top of the same horrifying roller coaster going straight down, and my first thought is ‘Emma is dead.’ I swear, waking up to that each morning is the nightmare I can’t wake up from.”
“I’m so sorry,” her therapist sighed with tears in his eyes and a loss for words.
“I get that you’re sorry,” Dana replied. “I get that everyone is sorry. Is that all there is? None of this makes any sense. Do you know how many times I’ve heard ‘I’m so sorry’ from people at church while their kids are running around laughing? I don’t mean to be an ungrateful ice queen, but people who say that sound to me like noisy gongs, clanging cymbals. Emma is still dead. Listen, I’m not paying the church people. I am paying you. You went to school for this, right?”
“I have no words,” her therapist replied.
“You have no words,” Dana echoed as she rolled her eyes and took a deep breath. “You have any daughters?”
“Yes,” her therapist replied.
Dana leaned forward in her chair and looked directly into her therapist’s eyes. “If one of your daughters died in a fire while you were cursed with living, you think you could stay out of a psychiatric hospital?”
“I, I don’t know,” her therapist stuttered.
“You think you could keep from killing yourself?” Dana asked.
“No parent ever wants to outlive their child,” her therapist replied as if grasping for something therapeutic to say.
“You didn’t answer my question,” Dana replied. “Who is the therapist and who is the client? Can you remind me of why I’m coming to see you?”
“I’m confused,” her therapist mumbled.
“Doc is confused,” Dana uttered sarcastically. “Tell me all about it. You can pay me for a change.”
Dana’s therapist paused for a moment and adjusted himself in his chair, as if struggling to pull himself back together. “You said Emma was pushing you and Ethan all the way to your bedroom window.”
“Yeah. That’s what I said,” Dana replied.
“Well earlier you said you were pulling her to the window,” her therapist reminded her.
“Okay,” said Dana. “Where you going with this?”
“Which one was it?” asked her therapist. “Were you pulling her? Or was she pushing you?”
“I don’t know!” Dana scoffed nervously. “If I could have died, and she could be here, you could ask her!” she snapped.
“Just sit with it,” her therapist said. “What does it mean that she was pushing you?” he asked.
“I don’t know! She was pushy!” Dana said. “Emma parroted me! ‘Get up bubby, time to get ready for school.’ ‘Eat your breakfast.’ ‘Get your shoes on.’ ‘Brush your teeth, bubby.’ ‘Do your homework.’ ‘Get in bed.’ ‘Go to sleep, bubby.’ Emma was a mother hen. She was pushy, just like her mom. ‘Bubby, look both ways before you cross the street.’”
“What does it mean that she was pushing you?” her therapist asked.
“She wanted her bubby to live,” Dana whispered.
“I believe you,” her therapist said. “What does it mean that she was pushing you?” he asked.
“No, that was not her place! That was not her responsibility!” Dana said sternly while becoming increasingly agitated.
“What does it mean that she was pushing you?” her therapist asked.
“I was momma bear! She was my cub!” Dana cried with an increasing sense of desperation.
“What does it mean that she was pushing you?” her therapist asked.
“Dog with a bone!” Dana snapped sarcastically while looking at the door as if she was on the verge of running out of the room.
“What does it mean that she was pushing you?” her therapist asked.
Dana appeared to freeze, as if she didn’t want to think her next thought.
“What does it mean that she was pushing you?” her therapist asked.
“She wanted me to live!” Dana said.
A strange silence stilled the room. “Emma wanted me to live,” Dana whispered. Something else filled the room. Love. Pure love. Unconditional love. Undying love.
We have no guarantees in this life. Homes may go up in flames. Our faith, our hope, our dreams may be burned to the ground. Loved ones may be lost. Love is never lost. Even when all else is lost, love can be found in the remains. We may have to momentarily go back and search for it, but love can be found in the remains. Because love perseveres. Though the object of our love may be lost, love always perseveres. Love carries us forward.
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