Break Away: A Perpetual Love Story of God's Faithfulness

Dedication

This faith-based novel is dedicated to:

Richard, Wendy, Stacy, and Kristy, the four loves of my life.

Thank you for your love, support, encouragement, and willingness

To read and reread my first novel over and over again until it was completed.

I also wish to dedicate this work and all of its accomplishments unto the one person whom has demonstrated his love for me far above all I could have ever dreamed or hoped, my personal and loving Savior, Jesus Christ.

And the Word Became Flesh and Dwelt Among Us.

I John 1:14

Contents

Dedication

Chapter One

A Perpetual Love Story

Chapter Two

Sweet Sixteen

Chapter Three

The Blind Date

Chapter Four

The Awakening

Chapter Five

Mysterious Calls and Cozy Castles

Chapter Six

Finding Answers and New Friends

Chapter 7

Spring Fever and Graduation

Chapter 8

Where to Go From Here

Chapter Nine

Plans of Mankind

Chapter Ten

A New Beginning

Chapter Eleven

A New Town…A New Life

Chapter 12

Baby Makes Three

Chapter 13

A Familiar Love…A Friend’s Love

Chapter 14

When Death Calls

Chapter 15

Life’s Pathway

Chapter Sixteen

God’s Purpose and Plan

Chapter Seventeen

The Call to Serve

Epilogue

Full Circle

Author’s Note

Chapter One

A Perpetual Love Story

Mrs. Avery, I just hung up the phone from speaking with a representative from the embassy. The coroner’s office has delivered Dr. Avery’s body to the airport. You only have a short time before you must leave.

Yes, Elisabeth. I’ll get my purse and scarf from the closet. Please have Edwin to bring the car around to the front of the house. I’ll be waiting.

As Elisabeth turned to leave the room, she suddenly heard Amanda Avery call out, Oh no! How clumsy of me. I dropped both my purse and scarf. She stated.

Mrs. Avery! Are you hurt? Let me help you. This is all so awful. Elisabeth responded in her distinctive British accent.

No, no. I am fine Elisabeth. I just accidently stumbled and somehow tripped over my scarf as I was reaching down for my purse. Elisabeth, my purse slid across the floor. Would you mind getting it for me while I recompose myself? Amanda Avery requested as she reached out to take the aging arm of her now deceased husband’s longtime housekeeper, Elisabeth Freemont.

Mrs. Avery, you don’t have to be so strong for me. I know how much you loved Dr. Avery, as well as your love for the missionary work you both had here in Kenya. How the tribal people love you. You have taught them so well about God and his wonderful mercy. This may sound selfish of me, but I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do without the two of you. Dr. Avery and you have been my life for these past twenty years. Elisabeth softly spoke as she handed Mrs. Avery her purse.

Elisabeth, I know we talked about this earlier, but I feel you must reconsider my request. Please, please come back with me to America. I just can’t bear to leave you alone here in Kenya. As I told you earlier, you can live with me at Mitchell’s aunt’s estate in Georgia. There is more than enough room in that big empty house. I don’t think that I can bear losing both you and Mitchell at the same time. Want you please, for my sake, reconsider your decision?

Mrs. Avery, dear sweet Mrs. Avery. Thank you for asking me one more time. In hopes that you might ask me again, I packed my belongings last night. I also called the embassy earlier this morning to update my passport. Thankfully, everything is in its place. So, yes, I will go with you.

The two ladies lovingly embraced.

I don‘t want to stay here without you or Dr. Avery. Thank you for asking me to come one more time. Elisabeth tearfully added as the two ladies tenderly consoled one another.

No, no, it is I that must thank you, Elisabeth. I feel so much better with your coming with me. Well, to be honest, as much as I can possibly feel better under these circumstances. But, we must hurry before we both miss the plane. She softly smiled. I’ll ask Edwin to get your belongings, and then I’ll meet you at the front entrance in about twenty-minutes. I just need some more time to spend here in this beautiful room before we depart for the last time. She added.

As Elisabeth left the room, Amanda Thomas Avery slowly turned around and tearfully looked at the portrait hanging above the mantle of Dr. Avery and her on their wedding day. It was a precious wedding gift to them from one of the tribal leaders when she had first arrived in Kenya twenty years earlier.

My, how handsome you were Mitchell Avery even at fifty-two years-old. She spoke softly to herself.

She could somehow still see his handsome, youthful, eighteen- year-old eyes dreamingly looking into the distance with a look of hope for the future, their future together.

Oh, Mitchell, it took thirty-five years for us both to arrive here together. Now…now you are gone. Oh, Mitchell, I love you so. I will miss you so much. How will I ever go on with you? She mournfully sobbed.

Amanda Avery clutched the arm of the plaid covered winged-back chair placed slightly in front of the picture window where only days earlier Mitchell, her husband of twenty years, had sat discussing plans to return to America for a time of sabbatical and to visit with their adult children and grandchildren. Neither one could have known that an aneurysm had silently formed inside the brain that would take away his life within hours of that last, fated conversation.

Mrs. Avery, Elisabeth softly calls. I’m sorry to disturb you, but Edwin is waiting for us. He has the car in front of the house as you requested. It’s so hard to leave, but we really must go.

Oh, Elisabeth, I can’t believe he’s really gone this time. Amanda cried. There are no more dreams of his ever returning to me again. But, I can go to him, yes, I can go to him. Oh, Elisabeth, I waited practically my entire life to be Dr. and Mrs. Mitchell Dale Avery. I waited patiently, from the time I was sixteen years old, for our lives to be as one flesh. Elisabeth, it was so worth the wait. These past twenty years have been nothing short of heaven for the two of us. Serving one another in matrimony and serving our Lord together. Oh, how I will miss him. How our love for one another survived a life-time of pain, heartache, and separation. But, I will hold to the one fact that we will be together again. Yes, one day our entire family will be together again. And, this time, there will be no more separations in God’s Kingdom. Today, more than ever, I long for that eternal day. She cried.

Mrs. Avery, now, now, more than ever, you must hold on to your faith. Your faith will see you through this just as it did all those years you silently waited for Dr. Avery. Elisabeth tenderly spoke as she escorted Mrs. Avery outside and towards the vehicle.

Elisabeth, wait. Before we leave, let’s pray. I must pray for strength.

Both ladies stopped and bowed down side by side as Amanda Lynn Thomas Avery prayed to God:

"My precious Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I fall on my

face before you, Lord, as one of your children and your

servants. Gracious Father, God, hear my cry as my heart

is so badly broken into over the events of the past several days.

You have seen fit to call home your own child and servant, Mitchell.

You lovingly guided him to your destination of service through the

storms of life and through the joys of life. Today, I give you my grief

for it is too painful to bear on my own. O, Lord, you promised that

you would never leave nor forsake your own. I enter into your rest

and into your strength as I face these most difficult and troublesome

days ahead. Unto your sweet Spirit I cling. In the name of the Father,

Son, and Holy Spirit, I pray. Amen.

Not another word was spoken between the two grieving friends until they boarded the plane bound from Kenya Africa to Dr. Mitchell Avery’s final resting place, the tranquil mountainous town of Cassville, Georgia.

As the plane taxied down the runway, Elisabeth Freemont turned towards Mrs. Avery who was sitting next to her. She had never seen Amanda Avery’s face so wrought with grief.

Mrs. Avery, I want you to know that before boarding the plane I checked with the flight attendant. She stated that Dr. Avery’s coffin is secured and safe aboard the plane. Just remember, Dr. Avery is only resting in the arms of our Lord as the three of us fly home together. She then added, Mrs. Avery, since the flight is so long, I brought you some books and magazines that I thought you might like to read.

Elisabeth, thank you, but I can’t read, not now. And, I can’t sleep. If you don’t mind what I would like to do is tell you the beautiful story of how I came to meet and fall in love with Dr. Avery when I was only sixteen years old.

Oh, yes, I would so love to hear the story. We have plenty of time and what better way to spend it as we fly home. It will have even greater meaning and purpose, now more than ever. Elisabeth sweetly responded.

As Amanda Avery began to speak her words became ever clearer and more pronounced. It was as if she was actually reliving every second of her life as each thought entered into her heart, mind, and soul. A warm radiate beam from the sun’s rays danced across her brow as she recalled each scene, one by one, of that fateful autumn when she first met the distinguished, handsome, and youthful athletic scholar, Mitchell Dale Avery.

As Mrs. Avery tenderly recaptured her and Dr. Avery’s life together, the gentle hum from the plane’s engines provided a soothing and tranquil affect to their perpetual love story that had become an enduring story of passion, tragedy, hope, and triumphant love. But, most importantly it was a celebration of man’s enduring hope in God’s love and His everlasting faithfulness and purpose for his children.

Chapter Two

Sweet Sixteen

It was an unusually brisk and windy early autumn’s day in the small mountainous town of Cassville, Georgia. Mindy Thomas, or Amanda Lynn Thomas as her father so often called her, was taking her last steps up the well-beaten path that led to the top of Cass Mountain. Lady, her ever faithful, yet aging miniature tan and white collie, was now panting at her heels.

The view from the top of Mt. Cass could take a first time visitor’s breath away, but after all these years it still dreamingly took Mindy’s breath away. There was no better place in the world for a blossoming, soon-to-be sixteen-year-old girl to dream of her own pot o’ gold at the end of the rainbow than the zenith of Mt. Cass.

On this most picturesque day, the mountains were a kaleidoscope of explosive fall colors: bright reds, tangy oranges, warm yellows, and dark ruby wines. Looking downward, one could see the ageless swaying patterns cut out by the cool drifting waters of the celestial Grapevine River. It was so relaxing to trace the river’s path as it wound its way in and out of the foliage through and beyond the borders of Cassville knowing of its final resting place somewhere in the warms waters of the Gulf of Mexico. On that particular day, it seemed as if the swaying waters of the river were under the majestic spell of a divinely gifted conductor.

When Mindy reached her favorite resting spot atop the mountain, she took off her backpack and lowered herself to the ground. Taking in a deep breath of fresh mountain air, she pulled out a thermos of water. She noticed that Lady had wandered