Name, Never, Today

What's in a name?

I had just landed a job as assistant manager for a large apartment community. Chloe and I were moving into a beautiful apartment on the gardens with a fireplace - lovely.

The stairs to the second floor were not so lovely for moving in. My Dad and I and not so much Chloe trudged up and down and up and, you get the picture.

Then came the sofa. My dad is stronger than three men, but three men would have had a hard time getting up those stairs and around the balcony corner with that sofa. Dad and I both kind of folded our arms because truth time had come. We couldn’t do it.

Our neighbor with an adjoining balcony came home smiling his always smile. About 20, handsome, boundless energy and friendly.

“I’ll help you move that! Just a sec, my dad’s home and he can be the third man.”

The providence of perfect timing didn’t occur to me until just now.

The good-looking one returned with his dad, Grumpy, in tow, and up and in went the sofa. So fa, so good!

And so I met my neighbor, Matthew. Grumpy had already disappeared behind a slammed door. I made a huge note on my to do list: bake Matthew some cookies! It was number one on my list.

Then we rushed inside to wrap up the day and be ready for the morning and the new school and the new job. That’s a lot for one single mom and my to do list was already growing and somehow number one 'bake cookies' was moving down…. Rush, rush, rush, rush, rush, pretty normal.

Nearly every morning and every evening, as I rushed and rushed, I said ‘hello’ to Matthew standing on the front balcony to smoke. He always had that great smile, never a down moment with him. And I always thought of those unbaked cookies!

Guilt and cookies don’t go together.

And neither go with great intentions, I hadn’t even bought the chocolate chips.

But my prevailing thought was always to take the time to make a friend of Matthew, return his kindness, and share a moment with him. Just not at this moment. Soon. Really, really soon.

One noontime Matthew and I passed each other in the parking lot, Matthew driving home, waving wildly and smiling. Me driving the half block back to the office. I waved and smiled – what was he so excited about? Just a fun, fun guy. I had never seen him driving before.

Soon it was time to rush and pick up Chloe from school. As quickly as I could, I was back in my office in the elegant, renovated old house and situated my daughter at her home school desk adjacent my office.

The office closed at six o’clock or as soon as possible after and we drove the half block back to our apartment. Then picked out the clothes for tomorrow as dinner cooked. By a quarter after seven we sat down for dinner, both needing bed more than food.

As we began to eat, a horrible, horrible pounding from next door. Someone was pounding so hard that our walls shook.

“Chloe, stay here! No matter what you hear or what happens, sit here! Mama will come back.”

Was it a robbery? Domestic violence?

I rushed out the front door onto the balcony and there was Matthew’s dad leaning on the wooden railing in the night.

“Have you come for Matthew?” Grumpy asked flatly. It was too dark to see his expression, but for some reason he didn’t know that it was me, his neighbor.

“Yes.”

“He’s right in here,” Grumpy said as he led me into their apartment. Then he motioned behind him as he continued to the living room.

There on the bedroom floor was Matthew. There was a spoon with cotton in it, some matches, and a needle in Matthew's arm. It was too late to check for a pulse and I really didn’t want to touch the body. His face was hidden behind the bedroom door where Matthew had fallen. Were his eyes open or closed?

Pretty soon a policeman arrived through the open front door. I pointed the way “He’s in the bedroom.”

That horrible, horrible pounding noise was the sound of the dad, Gary, "Grumpy", finding his dead son and beating on the walls, screaming.

The policeman stayed awhile but the scene was pretty obvious and needed a coroner rather than a cop. The policeman told us that he’d called the coroner, "It might take awhile". He wrote the number for grief counseling on a piece of paper. All I knew to do was sit at Gary’s feet in the living room holding his hand.

“Well, that’s all I can do for you, but you have the number for grief counseling there,” and the policeman left.

I just sat there with Gary. Sometimes I kissed his hand, sometimes I patted it. I just didn’t know what to do.

“Gary, I’m going next door to put Chloe to bed and I’ll be right back.” Which I did, then I was.

Returning, I knelt again by the lazy boy and held Gary’s hand. Now, Gary talked.

And for three hours, until the coroner and his helper arrived, Gary talked about how much he loved his son. Matthew had had problems with drugs and that’s why he’d moved in with his Dad, to do better. He was attending Mt. Hood Community College, getting his GED.

“He was doing real good! He went to his classes, he was home early. I thought he’d make it. I gave him $15 today for a math book, I should never have given him the money. He bought heroin with it.” Dad moaned and cried some more as the coroner arrived and went in to meet Matthew.

After a brief moment the coroner returned to the living room as his helper went back out and down the stairs again.

“He died of a heroin overdose. He was dead before he hit the floor. We’ll take him to the Multnomah County coroner’s office and you can call them with your instructions.” The coroner was a very nice, compassionate man but dead is dead and there’s nothing else to it.

The coroner handed us his card, then he and his helper, who’d returned with a black package, put Matthew’s body in the bag and zipped him up. Then they carried his stiffening body out and around the corner and down the stairs with great difficulty. In fact, it was more difficult than Matthew getting my sofa up and in.

Now it was eleven. I brought over some dinner for Gary. I had the gall to pray over the dinner and Gary had the honesty to cuss God out; he hated the notion of God. I waited a bit before leaving for the night.

Three o’clock in the morning and I’m wildly awake.

“Oh, Father! God!! If only I’d baked him those cookies and spent time with him. I just waved and thought ‘tomorrow’. And there is no tomorrow! O, God! I’m so, so sorry. O, my God. It's too late now.” I kept seeing Matthew's dead body and dead is dead, there’s nothing else to it.

“WHAT KIND OF NAME IS ‘MATTHEW’?”

“It’s a Bible name.”

“RIGHT.

“DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY GENERATIONS HAVE PRAYED FOR THEIR CHILDREN AND THEIR CHILDREN’S CHILDREN IN THIS FAMILY?

“Is he with You, Lord?”

“YOU DON’T KNOW. I KNOW.

“YOU DON’T KNOW THE TIMES, THE PLACES, THE PRAYERS,

OR MY PLAN.

I DO.

AND NOW YOU KNOW, NEVER AGAIN SAY ‘TOMORROW’.

“Wherever you go,” Matthew 16:15