Touch of Grace

Twenty-three years later, New Orleans "Dead!" Head still foggy from a nightmarish sleep, Ian Car-penter pushed up on one elbow. He tried to shake himself awake enough to think straight. Someone had discovered a dead girl on the grounds of Isaiah House. Heart jump-started by the horror of such a thing, he squinted one eye at the red digital alarm clock. Six-fifteen. After combing the streets of the French Quarter most of the night, he'd been in bed less than three hours. Whatever happened had gone down in that brief time. Sometimes the futility of what he did was over-whelming. Through a throat filled with gravel, he said, "I'll be right down." In five minutes flat, he had showered and dressed in his usual jeans and T-shirt. He shoved on the new pair of Nike Shox he'd purchased yesterday, finding little joy in them now, and tiptoed down the squeaky wooden stairs of the old three-story mission house. Soon enough, the ten in-house residents would begin the day and he would be expected in the chapel with a word or to play the saxophone. Ian both loved and hated his calling. He loved the people. He loved ministering and counseling. And he especially loved when someone's life was turned around by the power of God's love. But he hated times like these when the dark side won. In the predawn September morning, he opened the back door out into the courtyard, a beautiful, lush green sanctuary where he often prayed and sought answers to the myriad problems of Isaiah House, the mission he'd started three years ago on faith and a few hundred dollars. God had called him to this place of beauty and de-bauchery before Hurricane Katrina. Since the disaster, his work had more than tripled. Originally a small haven for runaways, Isaiah House now did whatever it could for any and everyone. True to the scripture that served as its cornerstone, the mission was a hand extended to whoever needed it. Sometimes that hand was stretched pretty thin. This morning his courtyard sanctuary was hushed, the willows weeping condensation onto the cobblestone walkway as if mourning what lay just outside the mis-sion walls. Beyond the dripping-wet elephant ears and lemon-scented magnolias, yellow police tape vibrated in the twilight stillness. The stark contrast wasn't lost on Ian. He'd worked the streets and slums of various cities all over the coun-try since junior high school when Mom and Dad signed him up for summer missions' work. Now, at twenty-eight, he'd come to understand all too well that beauty and tragedy coexisted everywhere. Sometimes he felt overwhelmed by his need to make a difference and the utter numbers of despairing mankind. Ian leaned for a second against the rough bark of a moss-draped oak and squeezed his sleep-gritty eyes He hadn't even heard the sirens. No surprise. They went on all night in this part of New Orleans. Sirens and reveling. And the desperate meanderings of runaways and drug addicts. "Grace for today, Father," he said simply. "To do Your work." And as always peace descended. He pushed off the giant oak, opened the lacy black iron gate and walked toward the buzzing hive of police activity inside the yel-low tape. "You the reverend?" an ebony-faced policeman, dressed in city blues, asked. "Yes, I'm Ian Carpenter." He had never been com-fortable with the formalities of his profession. He was a street missionary, plain and simple. As his mama liked to say, "There but for the grace of God go you or I." He was no better or more holy than anyone else. Reverend might fit some, but not him. "What happened?" "Looks like an overdose." Even in the early morning, with the sun only peeking above the horizon, sweat beaded the officer's forehead. Death was hard work for anyone. "You think she was comin' to your place?" "Possibly." "You mind having a look, see if you know her?" tunately, in his line of work, thiGoodnight, Linda is the author of 'Touch of Grace ', published 2007 under ISBN 9780373874262 and ISBN 037387426X.