~~~Chapter Two: Rivers and Blackouts~~~

December, 2005

Staring into the hardened face of a Shari Fergaphon fighter was the scariest thing I'd ever done in my life.

Well, one of them, at least.

It didn't help that I was alone in the Shari mountains with only a round-bellied taxi driver to protect me; or that I was wearing a skirt and heels, which would make running impossible; or that I'd suddenly forgotten all my Shari and couldn't even remember how to say my name, let alone plead for mercy should my interrogator pull out that handgun strapped to his belt and point it at me.

I sat shivering in a hard plastic chair, my knees stuck together and my hands in my lap. It was one of those gray, rainy days so uncharacteristic of the climate, just cold enough that my lightweight jacket was insufficient. I tried not to stare back at the Fergaphon officer who sat across from me, but his gaze was so penetrating I couldn't break away.

Finally, after a full minute of intimidation, he glanced down at my papers.

I didn't know if I ought to be nervous or not, or if playing the shy and innocent card would work to my advantage. I'd never been interrogated before, but I did know I was an oddity among immigrants to Sharghistan. What was a single young woman doing traveling all by herself in an unstable, recently war-torn country? I squared my shoulders, hoping to appear confident though my heart pounded in my chest. What was I supposed to say again?

"Ta Shari sprenta?" The officer eyed me harshly over a long nose and thick mustache.

I nodded quickly, affirming that I did in fact speak Shari - or a little bit of it, anyway.

"Passport?" he asked gruffly.

I handed over the small blue booklet, praying it would clear and I could soon leave the stuffy confines of this concrete ice box I was sitting in.

The guard took his time comparing my papers to the data on my passport. "Your name, please?"

"Ally Shepherd." I tried to keep the tremor out of my voice.

"Your father's name?"

"Randall."

"Your city of birth?"

"Lexington, Kentucky."

He scrunched his eyebrows together as he struggled to read the tiny print on my passport. He'd probably never heard of Lexington before, and wasn't sure yet if he could trust me.

He looked up sharply. "Why are you coming to Sharghistan?"

I froze at his question. My real purpose in entering Sharghistan was to share the good news of Jesus with the suffering Shar people. But I couldn't say that, and it was a good long pause before I remembered my second reason for coming.

"I'm going to work at the Aleti School of the Arts, in Salena," I spoke slowly, trying to pronounce all the words correctly.

His mouth twitched ever so slightly, and I didn't know if that was good or bad. "Have you finished university?"

"Yes."

"What did you study?"

"Business management."

His expression remained unreadable. "What are you bringing with you in your bags?"

"Oh…um…"I thought for a moment. "Clothes, personal things, books, a laptop computer…" I cringed as he scribbled furiously on my papers. He seemed to write more than he ought to have if my answers were acceptable.

But then he shoved the papers inside my passport, slapped it shut, and stretched out his arm to hand it back to me. "Very good. You may proceed."

Relief washed through me. I stood and took my passport, nodding respectfully as I backed away. "Pa bashavel."

If he acknowledged my goodbye at all, it was imperceptible. Already he was pulling open another file and leafing through it.

My taxi driver waited for me outside. A stout, jovial man with a penchant for speeding, he had been commissioned by my fiancé Nate to drive me safely across the Sharghistan border. After four hours of struggling to find something to say to me, he'd finally given up and now we walked together toward the visa office in silence.

A half hour later, another Shari officer stamped my passport and allowed us passage across the great, foreboding bridge between Turkey and Sharghistan.

The mountains were breathtaking, even in the fog and drizzling rain. The nearer ones shot up jaggedly into the gray sky, while those farther away stretched so high they touched the clouds. The road on which we traveled was narrow and tortuous, full of potholes and puddles, but the nature of it discouraged my taxi driver from speeding - or at least, from driving more than 120 kilometers an hour as he'd done all the way through Turkey.

Shortly thereafter we arrived at a small border city called Lakat. My insides twisted with anticipation, for Nate had promised to meet me in Lakat and drive me back to Salena. It had been months since I'd seen him, and each day had been more impossible than the one before. After years of hopelessly pining for him, I still had trouble believing we were actually engaged - but then I would recall the memory of his proposal, as real and intense as the day it had happened, and I could not but lift up my heart in thanksgiving.

Wow, God. Just…wow.

My driver pulled into a paved lot outside a restaurant whose roadside sign bore the name Lulu Snak, and whipped out his mobile phone to call Nate. I scanned the lot with my eyes, searching for the big white truck Nate said he'd be driving. It didn't take long to spot it, and I was out of the car and hurrying across the pavement before my taxi driver could finish dialing his number.

Nate stood outside his truck alongside two of his teammates - Heath and Megan Rutledge, I supposed - his dark eyes lighting up with joy to see me striding toward him. He met me halfway, flushed with excitement, barely restraining himself as he came to a stop before me.

It took all the self-control I possessed not to leap into his arms. I was well aware that overt displays of affection were considered shameful, and despite the dozens of times Nate and I had discussed this very thing, I still found myself impossibly frustrated that I could do nothing more than smile and take his hand.

But take my hand he did, and to feel him again, to know it wasn't all a dream, and to hope against all hope that now at last we could be together, was truly a gift from God. I drew in a breath, tingling all the way to my toes.

"Ally..." he breathed, eyes trailing across my face. "Hi."

"Hi yourself," I returned softly, admiringly, for he looked as wonderful as I remembered - tall and lean, a young, striking face with big brown eyes and ridiculously curly brown hair. His manner was easy, his air confident, his expression now full of joy as he gazed down at me.

"God help me," he murmured, releasing my hand. "I could kiss you right now."

"Nate…" I blushed, glancing behind him in search of some distraction, even as his words thoroughly delighted me. "We're already being way too obvious. Aren't you going to introduce me to your friends?"

"Oh, you don't want to meet them," he teased, eyes sparkling. "They're a handful. Can't keep my eyes off them for a minute before they're into trouble."

Heath and Megan approached as he was speaking, and apparently having heard everything, the woman scoffed at Nate's words. "Hey, just because I married the guy doesn't mean you can accuse me of being his partner in crime. I've been very well behaved."

"It's true, she has," Heath acknowledged, clapping his hand across Nate's back. "And I never do anything dangerous unless you're along for the ride, buddy."

I frowned at Nate, half wanting to open my mouth and reprove him even as I knew it wouldn't do any good. "It's nice to meet you finally," I said, offering my hand to Megan. She took it gladly, then pulled me into a hug of such warmth I felt wholly undeserving of it.

"We're sisters now," she whispered in my ear, then stepped back. "It's great to have you here."

Heath likewise shook my hand. "I've been counting down the days till you arrived, my friend. I'm afraid Nate gets awfully cranky when he misses you."

Nate threw Heath a look. "Seriously, you can't say anything remotely nice about me, can you? Ally, don't listen to anything he says."

I smiled, enjoying the banter and the wonder of having finally arrived in a place that had for so long seemed out of reach.

After paying the taxi driver and transferring my suitcases from one vehicle to the next, we all piled into Nate's truck - Heath and Nate in the front, Megan and I in the back. The loud engine combined with the bumpy road made it almost impossible to communicate between front and back, but I caught a fair share of Nate's glances through the rearview mirror as I conversed with Megan.

"So…how does it feel to finally be here?" she asked, eyes wide and interested. She was a cute, waifish redhead with almond-shaped blue eyes, and exuded a serene, maternal air that made her seem older than her twenty-five years.

"Wonderful," I answered, readjusting my blue headscarf that had slipped back toward my ponytail. "This country is so wild and undisturbed - it's almost like stepping into an adventure novel or something."

"It's hard to imagine how people actually live on the other side of the world until you get here, isn't it?"

"For sure." I peered out the window, stunned anew by the rocky mountains and reddish hills with clusters of villages in the distance. "How long did it take you to stop admiring the scenery?"

Megan grinned knowingly. "Stop? I still do."

Dusk was beginning to fall as we passed through a security checkpoint and entered the city limits of Salena. Traveling the length of a broad valley, I was able to look up around me and marvel at the tightly-woven collage of rainbow-colored houses that lined either side of the road, giving a stadium-like feel to the city. Breathtaken, I could hardly do anything but admire the creative genius of God as seen through the earth's many and varied cultures.

Navigating through the chaos of afternoon traffic on tiny, crowded streets might well have given me a headache, but Nate worked his way through the obstacles with practiced ease. A heavier rain descended as we drove higher in altitude, arriving at last on a quiet street, behind which stretched the first towering angles of the mountains.

"This is where I'm going to live?" I asked in astonishment.

Megan popped her door open. "You bet. Come have a look."

A tall cement wall painted grassy-green obstructed my view of the house, but when we stepped inside the doorway, there opened to me a quaint little garden - obviously dormant, but with promises of greenery and flowers come springtime. A tiled porch led up a staircase to the kitchen doorway, where we stopped to knock.

"Coming!" Yelled a young, feminine voice - the voice of one of my roommates, though whether it was Brooke or Courtney, I couldn't tell. The sound of padding feet and splashing water preceded the jiggling of the lock. Then the door swung open to reveal a tall, grinning girl in an ethnic woolen nightgown. It was bright pink. And covered in sequins.

"Hi Ally! Hi Megan!" she greeted exuberantly. "I'm Courtney. Watch out for the floors. We're still cleaning. We thought you weren't coming until six."

"Yeah, my taxi driver sped the whole way," I explained.

"They tend to do that. Here, step into these plastic shoes and come in! It's cold outside." She waited until I slipped out of my heels and into the flip-flops, then caught my arm and guided me through the doorway.

She wasn't kidding about the floor. Half an inch of water covered the entire bottom surface of the kitchen, and at the hallway entrance stood another girl with a water hose in one hand and a squeegee in the other.

"Hi guys," she welcomed softly, smiling beneath wisps of frizzy brown hair that obscured her face from view. She pushed the wisps back with a swipe of her hand. "Sorry about the floors."

I stared wide-eyed at the scene before me. "Are you hosing down the inside of your house?"

All three girls laughed out loud, and I gathered they'd had much the same reaction when they'd first seen it. "It's way more fun than sweeping," Courtney assured me, giving me a half hug and guiding me through the river to the back rooms.

"I bought you a mashi," she continued as we walked from one cold, cement room to the next. "It's blue. I didn't know if you liked sequins so I got one without. You can wear it around the house in case the neighbors come over. They probably will tonight - sorry. I accidentally told them you were coming today and they're dying to meet you. Especially Hakkija, our landlord downstairs. She's deaf in her right ear so you better talk loud."

"Is she the one who wanted the anti-wrinkle cream you asked me to buy?"

"Yup, that's her." Courtney laughed. "The Shars are so funny about their wrinkles. That's all I ever hear about. That and white skin. They're gonna love you." She patted my cheek, and I grimaced at the not-so-subtle reminder of my unfortunate genes.

"Thanks," I murmured.

"Ha, no worries. You're going to be a spectacle anyway - there's no getting around that no matter what you do." She pushed open a door at the far end of the sitting room and stepped inside. "So…this is your room. It's pretty empty right now but we'll go shopping tomorrow and get everything you need. We all sleep in the living room anyway, since it's warmer in there."

A knock on the door brought us both around, and we stepped back to make room for Nate as he rolled my two suitcases inside.

"How on earth did these make the twenty kilo per bag limit?" he complained, rolling them onto their sides so I could easily access them. "You brought every single book you own, didn't you?"

The accusation was in jest, and I smiled at him. "Half of them are for you, so you might thank me for lugging them five miles through the Istanbul airport instead of complaining that you had to carry them that really long wayfrom the car to the house."

Courtney laughed, Nate bowed his head to hide a secret smile, and I triumphantly unzipped the nearest suitcase to see what was inside.

"Oh, pictures!" Courtney grabbed the photo album lying on top and flipped it open. "Wow, is that you on a horse? I didn't know you liked horses. I used to ride when I was a kid but then I hit puberty and buying new clothes with my allowance seemed a lot cooler." She glanced up sheepishly. "Don't worry, though. I'm reformed. Now I only buy new clothes when they're on sale."

"Which, seeing as you can haggle the price of anything here, is always," Nate pointed out.

"Oh, shush." Courtney waved a hand in his direction. Then her eyes caught sight of a picture of me and my favorite horse, Legend, saluting the judge at a dressage show. She gasped and pointed to it. "Oh, wow, you went to dressage competitions? I volunteered at one of those when I was ten and I was completely fascinated. Could you get your horse to do that thing where he trots in place and holds his legs up really high?"

I chuckled at her description of what was technically called a piaffe, and shook my head. "I only showed Legend once at first level. We would have gone further but my boss sold him before I could buy him myself."

"Oh, that's too bad. I'm sorry." She flipped through a couple pages, scanning the various pictures of Legend. To see him again and remember all I had given up to come here made my heart clench, but the pain was dulled, softened by the fact that I was full of the comfort and presence of Jesus, and that in giving up lesser joys, I had only gained greater ones. I looked to Nate for reassurance, and he nodded slightly as if to acknowledge I was exactly where I belonged.

"No, don't be sorry." I sighed, reaching for a stack of books to sort through. "I wouldn't trade this for anything."

Nate came around and squatted beside me. He scanned the titles of my books and picked one up - A Hunger for God. "Oh, hey, I was hoping you'd bring this. I want to do another study on fasting this next year."

"Yeah, it's amazing how no one talks about fasting in the American church." Courtney shut the photo album. "But for some reason when His people fast and pray, God moves."

"I'll say," Nate murmured, catching my gaze. "If I hadn't fasted those two weeks I doubt I ever would have heard God's voice telling me to marry Ally." His shoulder was pressed against mine, his head tilted down, and as the butterflies whirled in my stomach I wondered if it was possible to recall in exact detail the feel of his kiss and yet at the same time have no idea what it would feel like if he did it again.

"That sweet," Courtney mused, though I was barely aware of her presence. I hadn't spoken to Nate face-to-face in so long. I had finally entered his world, finally walked among the people who moved him heart and soul, and all I wanted to do was block out that world, curl up next to him, and talk until there wasn't anything left to say.

Well, maybe that wasn't all I wanted to do.

Someone cleared his throat, and we all looked toward the doorway where Heath stood, arms crossed over his broad chest. "Speaking of fasting, lovebirds, who's hungry?"

"I am!" Courtney raised her hand. "Are you picking up dinner? 'Cause I could cook some spaghetti, but as cold as it is tonight the water might take a half hour to boil."

"I'll run by Chikona and pick up some rice and beans. You coming, Nate?"

I wanted to protest such an idea but knew that if Heath left the house Nate couldn't stay. Culturally it was unacceptable for a single man to be in a house with single girls unless a married couple was present. So if we wanted to live honorably in the eyes of the locals, that pretty much meant Nate and I would never be alone.

Not a terrible trade-off for getting to see him every day, but still….

The girls helped me unpack while Nate and Heath ran off to buy dinner. I tried to focus on the task before me, but found myself suddenly drained of energy. After two days of traveling, I rather doubted I could stay awake long enough to eat, let alone to converse with anyone. Already my interest in the stories Courtney and Megan were telling was fast fading, and the initial thrill of seeing new sights had worn off. My eyelids felt like led, my head pounded, and it certainly didn't help that the temperature had dropped to an uncomfortable forty-eight degrees inside the house.

"It's a little overwhelming, isn't it?" Brooke asked when we were finally alone. Megan and Courtney had gone to lay out the plastic place mat and silverware for dinner.

I looked over at her, struck by the calm in her big green eyes and the way her round cheeks made her appear young and innocent. "Yeah, it is. I keep having to blink to make sure I'm really here. I've wanted to come for so long."

"It's funny how God can give people the desire to uproot their lives and settle somewhere entirely removed and unfamiliar." She handed me a pile of long skirts to be stacked in my wardrobe - the only piece of furniture in my room. "Living here is kind of like starting all over again as a baby."

"That's a scary thought," I murmured.

"It's scarier still when there's no one familiar in your life to experience it with you. I didn't know anyone on the team before I came here in August. Megan had Heath, Courtney knew Megan from college, Riley lived here when he was a kid, and you have Nate."

She said it without a hint of bitterness, but I sensed the last few months had taken their toll on her. She'd probably never admit it, never say an unkind word about anyone, but I could tell she was lonely, left-out, struggling silently. And I wondered if on some level I wouldn't be much different than her, because even though I had Nate, he wasn't my husband yet. He wouldn't be mine for another nine months, and I had the distinct inkling that things were going to be very different than they'd ever been before.

I stuffed the last pile of clothes into my wardrobe, pausing to think as I did. "I don't really have Nate, though. Not yet, anyway. And until then, I hope we can be there for each other."

Brooke bit the corner of her lip, eyes wide and glistening as if she hadn't expected such a response, but wasn't completely surprised by it, either. "Nate was right about you," she said simply.

I felt in that moment a strange, kindred bonding that I couldn't have explained other than that it was from the Spirit. There was nothing remarkable about this girl, at least not on the surface, and we'd only exchanged a few emails since my agreement to join the team, but here in her presence I sensed something great, something I could not understand but longed to discover. Something that would change me.

Loud, obnoxious knocking rattled the front door - even in the back room Brooke and I could hear it - followed by Heath's bellowing call for everyone to "come and get it". Brooke and I exchanged amused glances, then left my suitcases half-unpacked and joined everyone in the living room.

"Hey, Al, look who finally straggled in." Heath clapped his hands down on a young man's shoulders, pushing him toward me. "This is Riley."

"Welcome to Sharghistan," the tall, lanky, fresh-out-of-high-school boy greeted, offering me his hand. "I'm really good at fixing internet connections and giving directions, so call me if you have trouble with either."

I smiled at him, charmed. "Thanks, that's good to know."

We sat down to eat, and for a moment I was overwhelmed with the reality of where I was and what I was doing - that I was nine thousand miles from home in a place hostile to Jesus, one of only a dozen Americans in the entire city, barely understanding enough of the culture and language to survive, and having no idea what I was going to do with my life from this point on - other than that I was going to marry Nate. And even that was small comfort when I reminded myself that God might very well take him from me in less than four years - a fate which Nate had relentlessly prophesied since he was fourteen years old. I shuddered at the thought, willing myself not to think about it.

Nate opened the meal with a short prayer that ironically touched on the very nature of what I was feeling.

"Father," he began, "we acknowledge our absolute dependence on You for all things. For our 'days are like grass; we flourish like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more.' But you know our frame. You remember that we are dust. And in our moment of deepest insignificance, You take thought for us. You, the Lord of heaven and earth, think about us. May Your praise always be on our lips. In Jesus' name, amen."

I opened my eyes and looked across the "table" at Nate, thanking him silently for reminding me that God had thought much about my coming to Sharghistan. It wasn't an accident, or a mistake, or a rash, crazy adventure. It was for my good and His glory, and I had to trust in Him, no matter what the circumstances around me seemed to say.

"All right, guys," Heath concluded after a hearty "amen!" "The food's getting cold. Eat up!"

No sooner had he spoken the words when the lights cut out and darkness enveloped the room. I froze in sudden panic - then, immediately reprimanding myself, remembered that power outages were a common occurrence. Indeed, my team members hardly flinched, reaching forward to fill their plates in the dark while Courtney hopped up to switch on a fluorescent, battery-operated light.

I felt so ridiculous I almost laughed. That I should be sitting on the floor wearing a winter jacket and a headscarf, eating chicken with nothing but a spoon and my bare fingers, squinting in the dim light just to find the bowl of heavily-salted tomato paste and white beans, while all around me strangers talked in an unintelligible mix of English and Shari, two of them wearing the most gaudy nightgowns I'd ever seen in my life, was enough to make my head spin so fast I didn't think I could have walked a straight line.

And this was only day one.

The lights turned back on about the same time Brooke got up to clear the dishes. Megan and Heath turned the TV on to watch their favorite Shari soap opera - for strictly language purposes, they assured me - and much to my relief Nate called me back to my room to help me finish unpacking.

"Gosh, I'm exhausted," I murmured, shuffling through the doorway in front of him. "Is it normal that I have no idea what day it is? I feel like I must have jumped way forward in time and I'm pretty sure I'm never going to catch up!"

"You'll catch up." Nate took my hand and brought me around to face him. I caught the spark of intent in his eyes a moment before his hands found my waist and he pulled me up into a sudden, sweeping kiss. I shivered in his arms, delightfully surprised at first, then softening beneath his lips and letting him speak a thousand words to me without voicing a single one.

Exactly how I remembered it, and yet quite possibly like nothing I had ever felt before.

He drew back far too soon, though I sensed it was only a matter of conscience and had very little to do with what he felt. He held me quietly now, forehead tilted against mine as he looked down at me. I loved the way he looked at me, as if I somehow fit into the midst of all his God-given joys and no longer stood outside them.

"I should have married you in September." He took a long breath, willing his emotions to cool. "As if God hasn't already spent the better part of my life teaching me the virtue of patience, now I have to wait another nine months for you."

"Maybe you haven't mastered the virtue, then," I teased breathlessly.

"Maybe not." He kissed my forehead. "But you're here now, and I have much to be thankful for. Does it ever still feel like a dream to you?"

"All the time."

Silence fell between us, and I let his calming, reassuring presence remind me again that God did in fact work all things together for our good. I, too, had many reasons to rejoice.

"Al?" Nate rocked me gently, forehead still touching mine.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry we didn't have much time to talk today."

I leaned back to better see his face, sobered that he had already voiced what I was feeling, and knowing it was only the beginning of many such days. I shrugged. "It's okay. I just miss you."

The lines around Nate's mouth tightened. He looked as if he might speak, then hesitated, and it wasn't until I asked him what was wrong that he spoke. "Can you promise me something?"

"Anything."

His dark eyes seared into mine. "That no matter how many days go by and no matter how many moments you think we've missed, you'll never doubt that I love you completely and forever. And when I say completely I mean there's nothing you can do and there's nothing the world can do to change that. Promise me."

I breathed slowly in and out, unnerved that he, who was far more aware of the reality of life here than I, could already foresee what I found difficult to imagine. But his words were stronger than my fears, and I drank in their sweetness, touched again by his gift of expression. "I promise."

"I'll make it up to you, Al. Every missed day and every missed moment. One by one." He swallowed dryly, and it seemed to me that he didn't even fully understand the weight of what he'd said, only that it was necessary to say it. He leaned down and kissed my lips softly, then drew back to regard me with fierce solemnity. "We won't miss anything."

I prayed to God he was right.

Psalm 103:15-16, 14 "As for man, his days are like grass…"

Psalm 40:17 "But the Lord takes thought for me…"