Say something...

My friend Jen invited Teage to go to her preschool three days a week. She knew it was a way she could help him . . . and it did. It got him out and involved in something. He enjoyed it, and more and more often, he came home talking about what they were doing and about his new friends. Teage had never gone to preschool away from home before, so it was all so new and exciting for him. At the end of the session, Jen invited him to participate in the end-of-the-year performance for all the families to come and see what the children had learned throughout the year.

Teage talked about it for days—how awesome it would be to get up with his class and sing all the songs they had shared with him. He anticipated the day of the program and couldn’t wait to go up and show me all that he had learned in his few short months of preschool.

The day of the performance came. As he walked toward the door, he was so excited, he was skipping. He couldn’t wait to stand up in front with all of his friends and sing his heart out to me. We went inside, and began talking with some of the other parents and kids. After a few minutes, I could see that ‘look’ coming into his eyes. He started glancing around the room like he didn’t know where he was, his eyes shifting quickly back and forth. He was no longer skipping and jumping around with all of the other kids. He didn’t move anything but his eyes . . . and they circled the room . . . while his body remained still. I sat there wondering what he was thinking about and what had taken away the enthusiastic smile he had worn the whole way there. Finally, he came and stood by me and grabbed my hand. I looked down to see if he was okay. He had tears in his eyes. I knelt down beside him and said, “Hey dude . . . I can’t wait to see you sing your songs. Is everything okay?” Alligator tears came streaming down his cheeks. “So Mom . . . why am I the only kid in this room who doesn’t have a dad?” He let go of my hand and ran into the bathroom and slammed the door.

I followed. I knocked on the door. He didn’t answer. I knocked a few more times . . . but no reply. So, I slowly turned the handle. As I peeked inside, I could see him lying on the floor sobbing. I shut the door behind me. “Hey bud . . . I am so sorry,” I said. “I can’t do it, Mom!” he replied. “Why isn’t he here for this? Why can’t he just come and watch? He can go back in the box after it’s over . . . but I am not going up there unless he is here to tell me how proud he is of me.”

I lay down on the floor next to him and stared up at the ceiling. I could see all the texture in the paint. I could hear all the dads laughing out in the hallway. I so wanted to just pick Teage up and make him go up and sing for ME . . . but instead, we just lay there together. “It’s okay, buddy. I would much rather lie right here with you tonight.” He grabbed my hand and we lay there quiet and still. We listened to all the songs the kids sang. We could hear the dads clap and cheer as each song ended. We could hear them saying how proud they were of their children. I could feel Teage’s hand squeeze mine tighter every time a song ended . . . and his eyes continued to leak like a faucet. Every once in a while, I would take my hand and wipe away his tears. We didn’t say any words to each other . . .

With Teage’s hand in mine, I longed to tell him that everything was going to be okay . . . even that I could understand what he was going through . . . but I couldn’t . . . so I didn’t say a word. Emmett wasn’t there. I couldn’t hear him outside the door cheering. I couldn’t see his hands clapping for Teage . . . but I could feel that he was looking down on us, watching as our tears fell onto the tile and knowing that our hearts longed to hear his voice. It was as if Teage were waiting for his father to come and pick him up and say all the words he longed to hear.

There is a song I have recently come to love. It has many meanings to me . . .

Say Something [1]Composed by Ian Axel, Chad Vaccarino and Mike Campbell.

Say something, I’m giving up on you

I’ll be the one, if you want me to

Anywhere, I would’ve followed you

Say something, I’m giving up on you

And I am feeling so small

It was over my head

I know nothing at all

And I will stumble and fall

I’m still learning to love

Just starting to crawl

Say something, I’m giving up on you

I’m sorry that I couldn’t get to you

Anywhere, I would’ve followed you

Say something, I’m giving up on you

And I will swallow my pride

You’re the one that I love

And I’m saying goodbye

Say something, I’m giving up on you

And I’m sorry that I couldn’t get to you

And anywhere, I would have followed you

Oh-oh-oh-oh say something, I’m giving up on you

Say something, I’m giving up on you

Say something

I can almost picture Teage’s little heart singing that song as he lay frozen on the cold bathroom floor that day. He was waiting for Emmett to say something . . . to remind him that he was there watching him. He was waiting for his father to show up and clap for him. He longed to hear Emmett shout out—when a song ended—that he was proud of him. But instead of waiting out in front of the audience where Teage could watch for him . . . we waited on the floor with the door shut. He knew his dad wouldn’t be there that day . . . but he waited anyway. As loud as Teage’s voice could sing—even if Emmett could have heard the words where he was—he would never be coming that night. We both knew it . . . but hand in hand, we waited to hear him say something.

There will be days when we feel like we might as well just give up . . . when we know darn well that the voices we long to hear or the words we seek will never come. We give up on our dreams . . . and give up on ourselves. We give up on others we hope will change. There will be moments when we are lying on the bathroom floor waiting for someone to hear our cries . . . or waiting for someone to speak to us. Maybe we’re hoping our Heavenly Father will be listening. Our souls are crying up to Him . . . “Hey . . . please say something! I am starting to give up on you. Please come and give me answers to all that I’ve been begging for. Please let me know you are here . . . ‘cause I feel so alone. Please say something . . . because I’m beginning to wonder if you care.”

Maybe we are just waiting for a sliver of relief from a physical pain that overwhelms us every minute of every day. For some, we wait for the life we feel we deserve. Some of us have goals we are waiting to attain. Others wait for exam results to determine what their future plans will be. Sometimes we wait for someone to encourage us . . . when we feel we have no more fight in us to keep going. We will all have to wait . . . sometimes for ourselves, sometimes for the people we love, and sometimes, we will be waiting for God.

In those moments, we plead to hear what we’ve been longing for. I think there are days when Heavenly Father looks at us in the same way. “Hey . . . you. I’m starting to lose hope that you’ll ever say anything to me. I’ve followed you everwhere. I am not giving up on you . . . but please say something! Ask me for what it is you need. Let me know what you are thankful for. I don’t care what you say . . . but I am here . . . just say something to let me know that you know that . . . I am here.”

We are all going to feel alone. We are not going to reach all of our goals. We are going to stumble and fall. Sometimes we are going to feel alone lying on a bathroom floor while everything around us moves along perfectly.

Teage was probably waiting for me, in a lot of ways that night, to tell him all the words he needed to hear . . . but those words never came. We sat in silence . . .

Sometimes we will be blessed with the words to say, and other times . . . we will be blessed with the peace to just lie down and be there for someone.

There were a few people who showed up at my house the day after Emmett died who did just that for me. They didn’t come with grand words or marvelous insights to try to help me find my way. They just held me and cried with me. But their silence spoke volumes to my soul. Their arms around me gave me strength to reach out to the next soul who came to find some light from me. Their silence whispered love to my heart, and brought peace to my mind.

Silence can feel scary. But sometimes, as we shut out the sounds around us . . . those are the moments when we feel true beauty. We feel real peace. When darkness tries to settle in your heart . . . shut off the noises all around you . . . and listen to the silence. Let your heart feel the calm, and without words, you will feel God’s love. He will grab you by the hand and lie down on the cold hard floor with you. He will wipe your tears. He might not come with mighty words . . . or the answers you seek . . . but He will send his love, and in that moment, you will know, without a doubt, that He is real.

Sometimes the moment when you are waiting for Him to say something . . . is actually the time when silence brings true peace to your soul.

Say Something

Bailed OUT

It was a Tuesday, I think . . . late March. My mother encouraged me to get out of the house for a change of scenery. For the first time since everything had happened I was alone in public . . . at a bookstore trying to find a book on grieving children. It felt weird and awkward walking around inside the up-beat store. Everyone looked so happy and calm. They seemed to be enjoying the quiet and their own thoughts. Not me! I hated being alone with my thoughts, and especially in a public place where any minute I could lose control. I peeked around the corner of the next aisle . . . checking my surroundings carefully so that I could venture forward and hope to remain alone. I had no desire to run into anyone I knew . . . and I especially didn’t want my first time in a public place alone to be the time I ran into HER.

I found the section I was looking for and began leafing through the books. They all seemed so long and had way too much information. Couldn’t there just be a Do’s and Don’ts list to skim through? A checklist of all the things I needed to be doing as a mother of grieving children? Of course not. It couldn’t be that easy. I had children who were—on every level of the expression—out of their minds . . . scared of life. There wasn’t going to be an easy fix or a quick pill to dissolve under their tongues. No way to just let us all sleep it off. Every book I looked through made me feel more and more inadequate for this daunting task.

I had just about given up hope of finding a book that felt right for me, when my cellphone began to ring. I dug through my purse hoping to find it before the ringer stopped. Unfortunately, after I pressed the little green button to accept the call and then held the phone to my ear, I wished that my purse had been a little bit bigger, so that I would not have found my phone in time.

“Ashlee . . . hey.” It was a familiar voice from the AG’s office, “ I don’t know if you heard . . . but our judge was out of town today during the hearing . . . and um . . . well the visiting judge allowed Rob’s request for bail to be granted . . .  and . . . um . . . his parents have put down the bond money. . . um . . . so um . . . as of right now . . . he is . . . UM . . . out of jail.” Out of jail! My mind tried to grasp the words that now churned in my stomach.

“What do you mean? How is that possible? What . . . he . . . is . . . how? How can that be an option? …What if he comes after me? …What if he breaks into my house and hurts us? All I know about this man is that he shot and killed my husband a few weeks ago and now you’re telling me that he could show up at my doorstep or at my kids’ school . . . and you are all okay with this? Nobody is stopping it? I have no choice in the matter?” I felt utter despair. I had absolutely no control.

“Well if anything . . . he would just come to your house to tell you he was sorry. See, we found some things in his truck. He knew you had no idea about the affair.” From this conversation, I learned about a letter Rob had written to me as he sat in the passenger seat of his truck the night he shot Emmett. He had addressed it to me. He knew my name. It had our home address. … He knew where we lived! Tucked inside the envelope, the letter talked about all he had found out about his wife’s affair with my husband. How he wanted me to help him figure out how to stop it!

Now I was filled with more questions for Rob, the biggest of all being: then WHY didn’t you just send me the letter that night . . . instead of waiting for my husband with a loaded gun? I was hurting just like he was. Why couldn’t we have worked together to find answers for what was going wrong in our marriages? I had been searching alone. Rob, you weren’t the only one in pain. … I was sitting at home feeling it all too.

In some ways, knowing about the letter made me feel better, but in other ways it just left me with more uncertainty. I was out of my mind by this time. I didn’t want him at my doorstep . . . even if he posted the million dollar bond to my own personal account! I didn’t want anything to do with him . . . and now he was not only out of jail . . . he was headed back to his home, just a few miles away from mine! He just shot my husband in the head and in the heart . . . and now he could be anywhere? It didn’t seem possible that the criminal justice system could allow this to happen.

I don’t recall any more of that conversation. My eyes began spinning around, frantically searching for Rob. My heart was racing. Eventually, I hung up the phone. I hunched over in pain. My body felt like it was going to stop. NOW? Right now . . . I am sitting in this book store . . . alone . . . and he is out of jail? Maybe driving towards me? He could be here any second. What if he is on his way to find me? What if he comes to my house?

With that thought, all fears about my own well-being faded into the background. MY KIDS! They’re at home. What if he’s on his way there? I couldn’t stop pacing the floor. I started dialing my phone. The first person I called was my dad. We had just talked an hour before about the hearing that was to take place. I frantically told him what had just happened. He tried to calm me down and assured me that he would be there for me at any hour of the day or night, that everything would be okay, and that he loved me. It reassured me to know that he would be there for me if I needed him.

I didn’t know what Rob would do. All I knew was that I was scared. … I knew I had to have a way to protect my family. I called one of Emmett’s friends, Weston, who worked for a home security company. I hysterically managed to tell him about Rob being out of jail and how scared I was. He said, “Ashlee . . . we will be there soon . . . and if we have to work until midnight . . . you will have an alarm system in your house before you go to sleep tonight.” And he kept his promise. I think it was around 11:45 p.m. when that alarm system was fully installed and activated for the first time. Miracles of man . . . safety in my heart. I would spend the majority of my time the next few weeks in my house, with the doors locked, the blinds shut, the alarm on . . . and my cell phone in my hand.

After calling Weston, I found my way back to my car. Somehow, I managed to drive home. I had to tell my kids! The last thing I needed was for a major event in this case to be told to the girls the next day at school. Unfortunately, they didn’t handle the news well . . . and I questioned my decision about telling them.

For every moment of panic and fear we had experienced in the past three weeks, there were a hundred more now! Taps on my shoulder in the middle of the night. Tears of fear at three a.m. Outbursts of anger towards each other . . . and at me. Nightmares . . . endless nightmares. Mine usually startled me awake with the sound of a gunshot.

For one week, Rob didn’t even have any stipulations put upon him. He just went home and spent an entire week with his family. The judge had opened up the option for bail, unaware of the fact that it would be taken that very day. No ankle monitoring bracelet . . . no boundaries . . . no rules. Thankfully, a week later, Rob was ordered to wear an ankle monitor, and an order was issued for him to have no contact with me, or the only eye witness at the scene of the crime . . .  his wife. Boundaries were set around our house and my kids’ school. At one point, I called the detectives begging for monitoring devices to be put on both me and Kandi so that they could call me if I happened to get in the vicinity of either one of them. That way, I could go about my life without the constant fear of running into them wherever I went. They said that wasn’t possible. They probably thought I was crazy for asking, but that made the most sense to me. That would have helped me feel safe in my own skin.

Every time I left the house now, I not only imagined that I would see Rob’s mug shot in the crowd, but my heart truly believed he was always close behind me. The picture of his face haunted me in the darkness of the night. I left lights on everywhere and kept the blinds closed. I had nightmares. In one, I woke up in the night to feed the baby, and he was sitting outside my window . . . watching me. I saw his reflection in the glass of all my windows every time I looked out. This man . . . this person I didn’t even know . . . somehow had complete power over me. I had no control . . . and I hated it. I felt helpless. I felt alone. I felt scared that my fate would be the same as Emmett’s . . . that this “bad guy” whom I pictured in my dreams, would find me in the dark of night in some vacant parking lot. I didn’t leave my house at night . . . hardly ever. While everyone else was asleep, I spent many hours shaking and sweating in full-blown panic attacks. The fear of the unknown once again plagued my soul.

Rob would end up being out of jail until September. The end of March until the middle of September! Six months . . . wondering if I would see him on the streets. Twenty-five weeks . . . every day leaving the house with a prayer that today wouldn’t be the day we would meet. I was always prepared inside for it to happen . . . but I wasn’t prepared for what I might do.

I learned a lot about patience during those weeks. Patience with the law. Patience for what felt unjust. Patience for my own fears. And patience for the new normal that had been created for me. Patience for a life . . . I still longed to have. Patience for the day I would be once again be blessed to have the ‘normal’ I craved. Patience for my mind to work properly. I waited for my heart to stop pounding out of my chest. Patience for the joy I still hoped to find again. I waited for the trial . . . I longed for it to come, so it would be over. So we could finally look at each other face to face. Maybe he would say all the words Emmett never could. I also learned about patience for the Lord’s timing. In my life, He always seemed to be telling me to “be still,” and now it was not only a gentle whisper . . . it was a mandatory plea. I had no choice. I had NO control. Patience would have to become one of my strongest virtues . . . a quality with which I had not had a lot of experience in my twenty-eight years. Through those six long months . . . I saw and felt the refining fire of the virtue of patience. Patience in my hope, endurance in my faith.

Sometimes, Heavenly Father sends us little reminders of how we can change to become more like Him. Sometimes, He shouts them from the rooftops. He wants us to become like Him in every way. Submissive, patient, full of love. He has asked us to withstand the challenges of this life with all of these virtues, even when every fear we have ever feared comes true in two shots of a gun. It is definitely more easily said than done. He wants us to surround ourselves with opportunities and with experiences that refine us a little more . . . step by step. I thought the hardest part of my life came the night of Emmett’s death . . .  but it didn’t. It wasn’t just that night that I had to stand tall in my closet . . . I had to continue to stand tall through the years that followed. It wasn’t a one-time event that would shape my character and mold me into the woman that He needed me to become. He needed me to not only say that I would stand tall . . . He needed me to accept it as a part of who I was.

Rob’s release from jail was just that for me. A moment when I had to stand in faith. I had to know that Heavenly Father was going to help me be safe, that He knew I could be strong, and that He was begging me to be still. To truly put my life in his hands. And once I let go of all the control I had left . . . He was always there with me. He continued to give me the words to comfort everyone around me. He reminded me when I got frustrated, to just sit and hold my grieving children. He sent me Angels in the darkest times of my test of patience. And He bailed me out of the pain I thought would destroy me.

Sometimes, no matter how loud He is crying for us to hear His words . . . we will miss them. We will make mistakes, and we will fall. I know I have made mistakes every day, in one way or another. But when we are as low as we can go, He will bail us out. He bailed me out on the way home from the burial when he sent my Aunt Diane to volunteer to drive us back. He paid my bond when I walked into church and someone was always there for me, willing to hold a baby or color a picture with my kids. When I was at all of my lowest points . . . He always sent the payments of love I needed at the very moment I needed them. He knew I had forgotten how to cook and clean . . . and He sent inspired willing hands to wipe my tears and clean the fear off my countertops.

Just like Rob’s parents, our Heavenly Father sees our potential. He sees our worth as His sons and daughters. He will beg our judges to give us one more chance . . . He will sacrifice for us if it means that we will come a little closer to Him . . . if only to let us know that we are loved, He will pay our bond even when we don’t deserve it. He knows that we not only need Him, but that we can’t make it through this life without Him. He will do whatever it takes to bail us out of our past. When we let Him in, His son Jesus Christ will take upon Himself our sins and our pains . . . and He will teach us how to survive through our fears. I know that as He has watched me in patience . . . I have also grown a little on my own.

Some questions we have in life will only be answered after we show we have the faith to endure. Some may never be answered at all before we die . . . but no matter who we are . . . He will always bail us out and carry us when we cannot stand alone.

Alone

Well. It came. The day when everyone returned back to their normal lives. I hadn’t realized that the world was still turning. I wasn’t ready, not even a little bit. I knew this was the night I would put my kids to bed, and I would go to bed, alone. My mother had to go back home. Everyone had to get back to their own lives . . . back to the normal they had always known.

My neighbor Auna was like a second mother to me through everything. Just weeks before Emmett died, I had shared with her my fears about what was going on with him. And then when he died, I texted her just hours after I found out about what had happened. She was nine-months pregnant, but she came over in the middle of her sleep. She made food for everyone who was already gathering. She sat and rubbed my feet. And every day since Emmett’s death, she had checked on me.

Now on this day, she said she would be coming over to get me off the couch and work out with me. As soon as my kids were in bed, she was at the door, ready to break a sweat. I didn’t feel at all like working out, but I did appreciate the thought that she could help me get through some of the hours I would be spending alone in the silence.

We started our workout. Auna turned on the TV and noticed that I had a few episodes of the television comedy The Office that were recorded, and hadn’t been watched. She selected the first recorded episode.

The minute the theme music from the show began, my mind went back four years to the first time Emmett and I had watched The Office. Teage was just a few days old, and my stepbrother Grant and his wife Heather had loaned us a copy of the show’s first season. While trying to get Teage to sleep in the early evening hours, we would turn on an episode and laugh and laugh. We had found a new favorite show.

At every family get-together, and every other chance we got, we tried to “sell” the show to everyone we knew. They just had to become as obsessed as we were with the best show ever! We exchanged The Office souvenirs with my siblings for Christmas. I even did a Dundee Awards ceremony one year with actual “Dundees” I made from bowling trophies from Deseret Industries, our goodwill store. The Office was our show, and we never missed it.

Every note of that opening theme-song was like a flashback of the hours Emmett and I had spent sharing the show. I couldn’t enjoy it without him there. I didn’t know how to watch it without him. I didn’t want to watch it if he wasn’t with me.

My heart hurt. I wasn’t sure how it could be, but somewhere under all of my pain and anger towards Emmett . . . I still missed him. My chest got tighter and tighter as we did our workout while watching the episode. We must have talked a little bit afterwards, but all I remember is walking her to the door. As the door shut and I turned the lock, every good memory I had of Emmett surrounded me.

I ran to my room. It was quiet. It was empty and cold. I was alone in that room. Nobody was there to pick up the slack that night. I was the only person my children would wake up to when the clock hit seven a.m. the next morning. I fell to the floor, and it jolted me when my face smacked the carpet. It was a physical reminder that all of this was real, and I despised it. This wasn’t a movie. It hadn’t been a dream. The carpet smelled clean. It was soft on my cheek . . . but I couldn’t move.

My heart ached for the man I had married. I yearned to hear his voice. I thought about calling his cell phone just to hear his voice ask the caller to leave a message. Then I remembered the detectives had his phone.

I lay face down on my floor . . . waiting for someone to come pick me up. I cried for all the years that had slipped away. I wept for the man to whom I had given my life. I screamed for the fact that no one was there to hear my anguished cries. I didn’t understand. I was so mad at the man who had taken something so sacred and shared it with another woman, but I still longed to be held by that same man who had shared it with me.

I thought about the day Emmett and I first met. I was just a young twenty-year-old working at the gymnasium at Utah State University. From the first moment we met, I knew this man was different. The first time we kissed, I felt safe in his arms. We had everything going for us. We knew exactly what we wanted, and we were both bull-headed enough to accomplish our wildest dreams. And we had the same dreams. Through the coming years, we watched those dreams come true . . . one after another.

 I remembered the day we got married. We were so excited. We couldn’t wait to be together in the temple. We planned it all. It was exactly how I always thought it would be. It was an amazing day, and we felt a bright future just waiting before us.

I pictured the day Emmett proposed to me. He had the ring in his pocket when he took me to a bridge overlooking the place where his childhood home used to sit. Now, it was just a beautiful field with a stream and a bridge. The bridge was covered with snow. It was freezing that night, but I was so excited, I didn’t care. He got down on one knee and told me all the reasons why he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. He promised that he would give me the best of everything. He assured me that I would always be the woman of his dreams.

I pictured every Christmas we had shared. All the New Year’s holidays we had spent with our good friends Emily and Evan. I thought about every birthday. Every Easter dress Emmett had picked out for our girls. Every Valentines Day card he had ever written.

I pictured driving to the Oregon Coast on our honeymoon. It was a perfect week. I thought about all the choices I had made to keep myself pure. I had saved myself in every way for him.

I thought about the birth of each of our children. The hours he spent holding my hand. All of our babies had picked us to be their parents. They were all so unique, and yet they were right where they belonged. Each child brought something new and exciting and completed us as a family even more.

I thought about watching Emmett on his skis doing flips off a ramp the first weekend he took me to Bear Lake to meet his cousins. He was such a show-off, but he was so talented in everything he did. It was so adorable the way he looked at me to see if I was watching. And I was . . . I didn’t want to miss anything he did, and I wanted to be a part of it. I loved being his partner and feeling like we could conquer the world. That is all I had ever wanted: to love and be loved in return. I thought about all the years I actually lived that dream.

But now, here I was . . . face down on my bedroom floor . . . ALONE.

Memories. That was all I had left. I wanted to text him to remind him of all the things that had made us so special. Remind him of the moments we had shared together . . . but he wasn’t there. On that night, reality hit me like a rock. The man I had loved was gone, and for the first time since his death, I truly allowed myself to miss him. No one was watching. Nobody was there to see. Just me. All alone, missing his love. Missing his laugh. Missing the funny things he said. Missing the moments we stood together. Missing everything about him.

I knew he wasn’t a perfect man when I married him, but I loved him anyway. He wasn’t always the perfect husband, but he was my husband. Even in those months before he was gone, when I knew something was wrong, I never stopped loving him.

The pain in my heart didn’t allow me to get off the floor that night, but the love in my memories filled a little bit of the hole that was left in it. But that didn’t change the fact that I was still . . . alone.