Fiction Friday – Hope

I get to host it this week! How exciting is that? So anyway. Here is my story for Fiction Friday. Here is Patty’s explanation for what to do…

Details:
*Simply post a piece of fiction on your blog sometime on Friday. Let everyone know you’re participating in Fiction Friday and post a link to here at Sunny Glade so they can follow the link trail.

*Then come here and at the bottom of my Friday post, which will be fiction, simply add your name and paste in the url of your blog (there will be a Mister Linky’s auto-link widget) and viola! We’ll have our very own Fiction Friday.

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This is just a fun way to post some of the fiction so many of us have written, and a fun way that maybe we can share our fiction with people who like to read, but not necessarily write, so tell your friends!

Oh, and one more thing: This does not have to be hot-off-the-press fiction! Pull something you like off your shelf and post it! (Like an old Faithwriters entry. *Grin*)

That’s Patty’s words exactly (except for changing it to Sunny Glade)! So have fun and be sure to leave comments!

Hope

Kelly grasped the timbers of the ancient bridge with the tips of her fingers. The flood waters jerked her exhausted body and pulled at her relentlessly. A chill seeped into her core and she couldn’t feel the splinters that poked from her hand. She almost didn’t care.

Her house was just the other side of the bridge. The van was slowly being pulled crossways in the churning rapids… right past Kelly’s home.

She concentrated on reaching higher… gripping a firmer hold on the bridge that was her only hope. Kelly’s world became focused… hands clutching a wooden beam she could no longer feel; the foam licking her chin and sticking in her ears; hair matted and wrapped around her face.

“Think about something else.” Kelly refused to look at the water, at her waterlogged van rolling over, at the floating debris. She closed her eyes in spite of the scratchy grit and let her mind drift. So much had happened in the last eight hours.

She and Tim had a rocky start to their day… but that was nothing new. Their rough marriage of six years had culminated in this last year of storms and arguments. As he left for work this morning, Kelly watched him and wondered if there was any love remaining between them.

And her doctor’s appointment. She had been feeling awful lately and even entertained the thought that if it was cancer or something terminal… well… maybe it would be best for everyone.

Kelly’s hopeless world had narrowed to a tenuous grip on a rickety old farm bridge. Grief and pain washed over her like the flood waters. Something inside of her broke in the same way the dam upstream had given way. And the torrent that tore at Kelly’s physical body was no match for the sobs that wracked her now. Maybe… maybe she should just let go… give in to the icy fingers that tried to pull her down into the deep and tumble her around until she was freed.

“Oh God.” The whispered words escaped her and Kelly felt the icy fingers around her soul loosen even as her own frozen fingers tightened on the bridge. “I don’t want to die. I want to love my husband. I want his love. I want You to be our Hope. I need hope, God.”
Her cries were drowned out in the roar of water but a peace settled deep inside of Kelly in a place that hadn’t been touched in so long. A place that even her husband had never been able to touch.

“I give up, God. Whether I live or die, whether Tim loves me or not, whether you give me my dreams or ask me to be content… I choose You. I cling to You as my Bridge in my life’s floods.”

She gathered all her strength and cried out as she thrust her body upward toward a higher beam. Her fingers caught and held. Hope seized Kelly once more and she fought against the sucking waters again. But the beam she grasped was rotten. It broke and she lost her grip. She plunged under the water and felt the hopelessness grasping again. One desperate grab and Kelly again had hold of the bridge.

“I’ll wait for You.” She rested as best she could and clung fiercely to Hope.

Then she felt it. Hands slid under Kelly’s arms and she was roughly lifted from the flood. She looked up in wonder at her rescuer. “Tim.”

Her husband sat with her on the bridge. His arms surrounded her and they were intertwined in a way Kelly had never experienced. The intimacy and love in his eyes made hers overflow with tears again.

“I saw the van… it was rolling over and over. I thought I’d lost you.” His voice choked.

“I think you just found me.” Kelly shivered and coughs racked her body.

Tim read the question in her eyes at the wailing of sirens. “I called 911 when I saw the van. I barely hoped but…” his voice trailed off into the kisses he showered on her face.

“I need to get to the hospital.”

“I know… am I hurting you?”

“No… the baby…” Kelly’s voice trembled with exhaustion.

“Baby?”

She grinned weakly at Tim’s concerned expression. “The doctor says we’re pregnant…”

Kelly watched as the emotions flickered in his eyes… confusion, realization, shock, disbelief… and joy. He crushed her to him and sobbed into her hair.

Seven months later… Hope was born.