One Summer Night

By David Sinclair Turner

One Summer Night is the title for my story about how two people met and fell in love. However, as it sometimes does, life can throw you a curve ball that you don't expect and are not prepared to deal with. This story is about how these two people went about dealing with the unexpected things that happened as they attempted to find each other no matter how long it took or where it took them to. I guess what I wanted to tell the reader is that no matter what happens in our lives, God will always have a hand in helping us as long as we never lose our faith in him. The best way I can describe it is by a picture I have of Christ reaching down into the water where I am struggling to survive and not drown as I reach up and look into his smiling eyes. Then I take his hand in mine, and he pulls me up into his arms. The only way to best describe that is with the term "divine intervention."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9781098000448

Book preview

Chapter 1

One Summer Night

San Francisco, California, 1960, 12:30 a.m.

In a four-story walk-up in South San Francisco, a small boy named Jimmy lay awake in his bed, unable to sleep because his stepfather had been yelling at his mother for more than an hour. For some time now, the relationship between his stepfather and his mother had gotten much worse. Every night, his stepfather had come home late and drunk. Then he would start a fight with Jimmy’s mother. The noise always woke him up, and his mother went to him to comfort him, which only seemed to aggravate his stepfather even more, sending him into a deepened state of rage; and in his drunken state of mind, he threatened to get rid of that lousy kid once and for all.

As young as he was, even Jimmy could see that he was a hate-filled angry man. The simple truth of the matter was that he was a coward, whose life had not worked out the way he wanted it to; and so he took his revenge out on anyone who, in his opinion, was weaker than he was and too helpless to do anything about it, especially his wife and her irritating son. The added pressure for him at work, brought on by his coworkers’ many complaints regarding his foul mouth and his unreasonably bad temper, had jeopardized his job, which, when added to his failing relationship with his wife and stepson, only made matters much worse for them.

Jimmy’s mother, Virginia, or Ginny as everyone referred to her, had come to seriously regret ever having met this miserable excuse of a man; and when he threatened her son, it unleashed in her a fierce and formidable foe that shook him to the core, as she let him know just how she felt. While it was true that she was frightened by his unreasonable temper and ugly words, her strong will and firm devotion to her son brought out an unbeatable resolve in her that truly shook him to the bottom of his feet, and she proceeded to tell him in no uncertain words that he would have to kill her first before she would let him even touch her son.

When this spineless coward saw the look of pure determination and anger in her eyes, it caused him to immediately back down. Then as usual, he fell asleep on the couch, and as she watched him lying there in his drunken heap, she vowed to leave him once and for all. But as she stood there staring at what she once thought was a decent man, she clearly understood the dire situation that she was in, causing her to see that there was absolutely no place for her to go.

However, rather than let depression take over, she simply turned around and went back to her son’s room. Sitting next to him on the edge of his bed, she lovingly ran her fingers through his hair; and with her thumb, she gently wiped away the tears from his cheeks. Once again, she saw just how much he looked like his father—which only proceeded to bring tears to her eyes and caused her heart to ache with that renewed pain that had never gone away, not since that day nearly ten years ago when she heard that horrible sound of someone knocking on her front door. As she opened the door, she was greeted by two military men in their dress uniforms. The sudden sense of fear gripped her heart like nothing she had ever felt before as they politely removed their hats and introduced themselves to her. Slowly, she opened the door and invited them into her house. The fear that gripped her heart stopped her from asking why they were here as she pointed to the couch and asked them to have a seat. At which point, the one older officer put his hand out to shake hers, and as he did, he said, Please, Mrs. Turner, we are so deeply sorry to have to inform that your husband, James P. Turner, was killed in action in North Korea. Obviously, he had done this before, because he was ready to physically support her if she started to faint, and while tears began to fall from her saddened eyes, he was moved by her unbending strength of character. For several minutes, they simply stood in silence together as they waited for her response. After a long moment of quiet, the younger officer reached out and handed her a folded American flag. Slowly with both hands, she accepted it and motioned them to please have a seat as she turned and sat down on her reclining rocking chair.

She remembered sitting there, caressing that beautiful flag while at the same time thinking that she didn’t even know where North Korea was. Life for her would have been over right then and there if it were not for their little baby boy lying fast asleep in the bedroom down the hall. Her husband was the love of her life, and he was so happy when she wrote to tell him that she was pregnant. In his letters to her, he told her of how he could not wait to come home to them. In their letters to each other over the next few months, they spoke of their plans to build their lives together after the war.

His letters were so long and detailed that she told him it was like receiving a love story in each envelope. She loved him so very much.

Sitting on the bed next to her son nearly ten years later, she was so moved by the strong resemblance there was to his father. She had to smile at how messy his room was as she looked at all the drawings he had on his bed. Yes…my boy…you are your father’s son, ’cause you have definitely inherited his ability to make a mess. As she stared at all of the drawings of the monsters he loved, she couldn’t help but think just how proud his father would be if he could only see his son.

When she was sure that he was sound asleep, she got up and went to her room where she laid down and cried herself to sleep, as she did almost every night. Unbeknownst to her, later that night, her drunk and disgusting husband woke up and stumbled to the bathroom to relieve himself. After he finished, he went to the boy’s room. He was sick and tired of that little brat getting all the attention from his mother and ruining his life by always being in the way.

So tonight, while his wife was sleeping, he decided to put an end to all of this by taking the steps necessary to eliminate the boy from their lives. He had thought about it for quite a while now, and he finally came up with a plan that would make it look like an accident. He had convinced himself that without that little brat in their lives, she wouldn’t get so high-handed, and maybe they could have a life together again. He was sick and tired of her always telling him that he was so self-centered. The twisted smile on his face was starting to shine.

His wife, on the other hand, saw things from a different perspective. When they first met, he was actually very sweet, but once they were married, she saw a different side of him. It had taken her quite a while to finally understand that an egotistical, narcissistic man would not make a good husband. But adding alcohol to the mix, as in his case, really made things horrible.

As he entered the boy’s room, he saw him sitting up in bed holding that stupid scrapbook of his, with all those pictures of his father, the great war hero. With a twisted smile on his face, he glared down at the boy. Then in his raspy ragged voice, he said, Not so great a hero that he couldn’t keep himself from getting killed, though, uh, kid?

Jimmy hated this man because of the way he treated his mother and because of the mean things he said about Jimmy’s father. But what could he do? He felt so helpless.

This man was bigger and stronger than he was. As he sat there watching this ugly excuse of a human being standing there in the doorway of his room, he knew he was in big trouble, but even so, he was determined not to let this creep make him cry. So he sat up and looked his stepfather right in the eye. He stared at him with such intensity and boldness that it actually startled his stepfather to the point that he stepped back, which caused Jimmy to fully understand that this poor excuse of a man was simply and truly a coward clear to the bone. And even though Jimmy was only nine years old, he recognized that fact immediately, and that brought a smile of supreme satisfaction to his face.

Even though his stepfather was drunk, he realized that the boy saw him for the coward that he really was. That fact alone pushed him over the edge. You’re just like your mother, aren’t you, boy…? Well, I’ll show you who’s in charge around here. He was just a few feet away from the boy, and as he lunged for him, his plan was to pick him up and toss him out the window where the old fire escape was. After all, he could say that he’d warned the boy a thousand times not to go out there. That way, it would look like an accident.

Jimmy could see that twisted smile on his face and those slimy yellow smoke-stained teeth of his. But as his stepfather got closer to Jimmy, he was struck by the fact that the boy didn’t seem to be at all afraid of him. In fact, he just sat there looking him right in the eye. He had no way of knowing that there was more manhood in that tiny little boy than he could ever hope to attain. Because of his arrogant self-centered conceit and atheistic rejection of God, he had no idea of the power of prayer or the simple fact that divine intervention actually existed. But he was about to find out, for Jimmy had been praying to the Lord for help, and it was about to arrive in a most astonishing manner.

Just as his stepfather was reaching out to grab him, something happened that he could never have imagined. For out of the dark corner of the bedroom came a growl, but it was no ordinary growl, and it was certainly not human. It was so deep and guttural and frightening that in all his drunkenness, it brought him to an instant state of sobriety, causing him to freeze in his tracks; and as he did, he began to turn around just in time to see a huge arm with an enormous hand reach out and grab him by the neck and lift him high in the air.

He was so unbelievably frightened that all he could do was whimper like a frightened little puppy as that giant hand shook him like he was a rag doll. Then as if he was a baseball, he was thrown across the room with such incredible force that when he hit the wall, it nearly knocked him out. While he was dizzy and badly shaken, he was not hurt, but the fear that he felt overwhelmed him. As he regained his senses and looked up, he gasped and tried to back up as the most horrific scene unfolded before him. What he saw approaching him was a creature so ugly that he knew for sure he was going to be ripped to shreds. Suddenly, the adrenaline that was pounding in his veins gave him the strength to jump up and turn around as he bolted for the fire escape. Because he had already opened the door to it, he simply dove right thru it, grabbing the old rusted railing as he did. What happened next took the last breath that he would ever breath away as the rusted old railing broke under his weight, and he tumbled over the edge, falling to his death four stories below.

Throughout history, there have been many definitions of purgatory and what it might be like. In this particular individual’s case, he got a good taste of what he was about to see firsthand during the long, long fall to the ground below. For not only did he get to see his entire life flash before his eyes, but he also got to see and feel all of the pain and misery that he had caused so many people over the years, especially those two people that he was supposed to love the most.

For some time now, Jimmy’s stepfather has been going off on a vicious foulmouthed tangent that has gotten worse each night. But tonight was by far the scariest, especially with what just happened. He really scared Jimmy; yet somehow, even though he is just a very young boy, he found within him a will to not give in and cry like he used to. He simply stood his ground, as it were, and looked his stepfather right in the eye, without flinching at all. However, after it was all over, all he could do was to sit quietly on his bed and look down at the drawings that he had been working on, and as he did, he couldn’t help but smile at one of the pictures that, to him, had simply been a friendly monster—the kind of monster that a little boy might conjure up as a friend to help him get around and maybe even beat up a bully or two along the way.

As he felt something bump the edge of his bed, he looked up into the face of this huge creature that looked amazingly like the picture he was just staring at on his bed. At first, he thought he must be dreaming; but as the creature leaned over smiling a big-toothed drooling smile, like a kid with a mouth full of candy, all Jimmy could do was to smile back at the biggest friendliest monster he had ever seen. Then almost in a whisper, he said, Thank you… I think you just saved my life.

The monster continued to smile that enormous smile of his while nodding his head up and down as he whispered the words, That’s okay, Jimmy… That’s what I’m here for. My name is Augustine Glombowski, but you can just call me Gus. I’m your very own newly appointed guardian angel.

Then he reached over with his gigantic hand and patted Jimmy on the head as he tussled his hair. As he did, Jimmy felt a sudden overwhelming sense of peace come over him as he crawled under the covers of his bed, puffed up his pillow, then looked up into that unbelievably huge head as he closed his eyes and yawned a big yawn while trying to whisper, You…just don’t look like a guardian angel, that’s all.

The angel then reached over and picked up the drawing that most resembled him and pointed to it, saying as he did, Well…this picture that you drew sure looks like me…and since you really needed a friend tonight, I guess that makes me your very own guardian angel…wouldn’t you agree? As Jimmy closed his eyes and started to fall asleep, his newly appointed angel whispered, I’m here to make sure that no one ever hurts you or your mother again.

All Jimmy could think to say was, Did my daddy send you?

His oversized angel looked down at this tiny little boy and with a very sweet smile simply said, Yes. Jimmy pulled the covers over his face as he smiled a sleepy smile. I knew it. Then he fell asleep as he dreamt of giant guardian angels fighting off enemy soldiers, like swatting flies.

It wasn’t long after the death of his stepfather that Jimmy and his mother moved away. She had been offered a new job in a small town across the bay. Their new home was in the country, and he lived there with his mother until he was drafted into the army in 1970. His mother never remarried.

She often said that she had loved only one man in her life, and after her disastrous second marriage, she had decided that she would be happier alone, with just the memories of Jimmy’s father. Jimmy had no way of knowing it at the time, but this new guardian angel of his was going to be a fixture in his life that he would grow to love and depend on, and more than a few times in the following years, Jimmy would be pulled from danger by those huge loving hands when he least expected it. A perfect example of that would happen the very next summer as Jimmy and his friends were on a camping trip in Yosemite National Park. The boys were hiking up a canyon on a narrow trail when he slipped and fell over the edge. Because of the rocky terrain and steep cliff, no one could see him as he fell. But they were all certain that due to the long drop, he would be killed. The simple truth is that he would have if it weren’t for that guardian angel of his catching him just before he would have hit bottom. Then there was that time when the school bus they were on was about to crash into an oncoming train because the