Lydia headed into the dining room which easily seated the three hundred to four hundred crew members. A slight smile graced her face as she listened to the low hum of the breakfast audience. Every once in a while, the hum would be punctuated by a boisterous laugh from the Chief Engineer. “Our four hundred seventy crew are the heart and soul of Mercy Ships!” Chief Tom pounded his fist on the table with enthusiasm. Without missing a beat, Lydia could join him in his speech that he gave to every new person who sat down at his table. “Our surgeons couldn’t help the people of Africa without the dedicated engineers keeping the lights on. The dear nurses couldn’t speak comfort to a scared baby with the cleft lip if it wasn’t for our faithful dining room stewards keeping the dining room clean and serving us food. Yet more importantly, Mercy Ships would only be another organization stitching people up if it wasn’t for the crew’s whole hearted commitment to LOVING GOD!” No need to look, Lydia raised her right fist into the air shadowing Chief Tom’s motions. “LOVING AND SERVING OTHERS, being people of integrity in all we say and do, and being people of excellence!” Since Lydia worked in the dining room, she had heard the loud spoken chief engineer give that speech countless times while making coffee, sweeping floors, or wiping down counters.

“Uhhh...” a small nervous cry escaped her lips when she glanced at the clock mounted on the glass wall that divided the dining room into halves. She could sense the second-hand ticking. She scurried over to the food and drink lines. The way the lines were set up created a horse shoe in the front of the dining room. She quickly made herself a peanut butter sandwich and sat at one of the front tables to scarf it down. She had the sandwich finished in a surprising amount of time for such a sticky substance.

She walked in behind the horse shoe and into the dish room where she found one of her teammates stacking the plates in the shallow, pronged crate. “Mar-ty!!!” Lydia sang in a goofy voice. She set down her breakfast plate on the stainless-steel counter trying her best not to reveal her jittery hands.

“Morning Lydia, how are you?” The bald chaplain from San Fransisco asked as he hosed down the dirty plates.

“Scared and overwhelmed by the prospect of going to screening today,” she finally admitted. There was no use denying it. She was in desperate need of prayer. The small, Minnesota, country girl inside her desperately wanted to run back to her cabin.

“Oh,” Marty stated in an understanding tone.

Lydia had been with Mercy Ships for almost two years, and had yet to be at a screening day. Screening Day...Lydia was thrown into thoughts that she wasn’t quite sure how to put into words…A day that for many had been long awaited. It was a day that had been advertised for weeks. It was a day that could very well launch a person into a new beginning, one that would be of living and not just surviving. Children who couldn’t walk to school because of painful club feet and had to forlornly watch from the sidelines as their friends played games that they couldn’t join because their clubbed feet prevented them from running. For some, even, it was a matter of life or death, a matter of being given a better life, or dying a slow, excruciating death of starvation, suffocation, and rejection. Men, women, and children suffered rejection because others thought they were cursed or possessed with a demon because of facial tumors that made it impossible to eat or breath.

Belle stumbled backwards to the wall and then slid down it to the floor. Her eyes not leaving the little contraption in her hand. She closed her eyes tight a moment, hoping she was just imagining the word on its digital screen. She opened her eyes again and groaned. That word came whistling into her mind and then exploded. BANG! PREGNANT!

How could this be? We were so careful! she thought to herself. "NOOOOOOO!"

"Belle, Are you all right? What's wrong?" Patricia, Belle's mom asked knocking on the door.

"Shoot!" Belle whispered before hollering, "I'm fine, Mom. I just accidentally dropped my ring in the toilet. I'll be able to get it out though."

Pregnant! Pregnant! Evil little monkeys chanted dancing around the bombed out wreckage of her mind. This can't be happening! I have two more years of high school, college, and then residency.

She grabbed the towel from the rack, wadded it up, and screamed into it. Then she gasped for breath and screamed again. "This can't be happening!" She muttered to herself. For a long time Belle stared at the painting hanging above the toilet. It was of a magnificent landscape. A regal range of mountains stood stoically in the background. They were robed in trees of every shade of green, with some of them changing to their autumn glory. A meadow lay before the mountains with clusters of lilies and blue belles in the foreground. Yet all Belle really saw were the evil monkeys chanting, "Dirty diapers, violent vomit, ceaseless screaming!"

"Belle, are you sure you're ok?" Patricia asked through the door.

"I'm fine, Mom!"

"Well than hurry up! Yedi is waiting for you in the living room."

YEDI? Suddenly Belle saw hot red light. Roaring, crackling flames sprang up in her chest. A bull was huffing and snorting. It pawed against her chest before charging, bellowing as it ran. She bolted up, yanked the door open, and charged down the hallway toward the living room.

In the living room, Yedidyah sat in on of the tan Maserati lounge chairs with his hand resting on his ankle. "Congrats on the game, Son! You, guys, gave those Lakers a proper thrashing!" Mr. Larson boomed coming into the living room. He handed his navy blue business jacket to the maid before taking his cardigan with the Aztec design on it from her.

"Thank you, Sir! If we beat the Beavers next week, we will go to state!" Yedidyah smiled as he nearly shouted the news.

Suddenly, Yediyah's conscience pinched the back of his brain. He jumped out of his seat, and unsure of what to do with his hands, he stuffed them into his leather jacket pockets. "Mr. Larson," he forced himself to look the middle age man in his piercing blue eyes as he apologized, "I came to apologize to Belle, Mrs. Larson, and to you. I should not have left Belle in St. Paul, the way I did. It was cowardly and wrong!"

Mr. Larson grinned thumping Yedidyah on the shoulder as he stated, "That is big of you, Son. No need to worry! Belle will get over it." He plopped his almost six foot frame into the rose colored with gold floral print cocktail chair. "Sit, Son, no need to be nervous. So, you went and got yourself a new religion! What was wrong with the old one? Did it finally break down after five thousand years!" Mr. Larson threw his head back, laughing at his own joke. He thumped the arm of his chair. Yedidyah took a deep breath and swallowed hard, trying to check the heat that was clamping on his chest and quickly flowing to his brain. "Well you see Sir..." he started to explain, forcing himself to keep his voice even.

"Yedidyah Cohen! I can't believe your nerve!" Yedidyah turned to see Belle charging toward him around the corner of the hallway.

She was wearing a baby blue tank top with purple, pink and white flowers and yellow shorts that were frayed at the ends. Her auburn curls were flying everywhere. Her jaw was set rigid and her eyebrows were knit together.

"Princess!" Mr. Larson raised his hand entreatingly to his daughter as he crooned, "Give the lad..."

"Daddy," Belle shouted, swearing, "Shut up!" She grabbed Yedidyah by the arm of his jacket.

Before he really could realize what was happening, he was being dragged down the hall and into Belle's room. She shoved him onto her bed before slamming the door. It was covered in posters of boy bands. On the dresser opposite the bed was a huge mirror and dancing competition trophies arranged neatly. A flower makeup bag rested against the mirror. A gentle breeze blew in from the open window and the sunflower curtains danced.

Yedidyah involuntarily shook his shoulders as he could feel the thorny vines of his past with Belle creep up his back from the rose print, cotton sheets. He quickly stood up and held his ground when Belle tried to push him back down. "Belle," He held his hands up in surrender, starting in a calm voice, "You have every right to be angry. I under..."

"ANGRY! Oh I'm past angry, Yedidyah Cohen! I'm furious, irate, livid!" She again tried to shove him down, but he stood solid. "You have some nerve! You promise me a life free of religion, you get me pregnant, than you decide you need religion in your life! You run out on me! Now! Two months later you feel the need to apologize!?"

Yedidyah sank to his knees as the fuchsia walls began to spin extremely fast. Belle pregnant!? He gasped for breath but the room seemed void of air.

YOU WORTHLESS SINNER! WHAT AN IDIOT TO THINK YOU COULD BE FORGIVEN AFTER GETTING BELLE PREGNANT! An evil voice cackled in his ear.

"Are you certain?"

"You got to be kidding me right now!" Belle screeched at the top of her lungs. "You are just trying to avoid responsibility right now!"

Yedidyah placed his hands into the soft blue strands of the rose latch hook rug. He made himself think about the day he gave Belle this latch hook rug kit. It has been a cold wintery day and the two of them had curled up on the couch watching chic flics while Belle worked on it. Odd, she kept it if she hated him so much now. He took a deep breath as he slowly rose to his feet, fighting the heat that was quickly rising again. It hadn't fully receded from Mr. Larson's joke. "BELLE," he started in a voice that was louder and more forceful than he intended. He closed his eyes and took another deep breath.

Across from him Belle watched as he slowly let his breath out. She could smell the sharp freshness of spearmint on his breath. Something about the familiarity of the smell caused a switch to flip in her brain. All of the anger quickly drained from her.

She burst into tears, falling against him. He wrapped his arms around her. His chest heaved out with a heavy sigh.

His chest heaved again as he breathed deeply in through his nose. His heart was beating rapidly against Belle's cheek. She rubbed her cheek against his leather jacket and inhaled deeply the woodsy smell of his cologne.

"Belle, I was wrong to leave you in St. Paul. I was wrong to not come apologize to you sooner. I am truly sorry! I hope you will forgive me." He cupped her cheek in his hand and gently brushed at the tears sliding down her rosy cheeks.

He let her go, closing his eyes. Yeshua, please would you forgive me of this sin, he silently prayed.

"How long have you known?" Yedidyah asked looking into her watery blue eyes. She rubbed hard at the tears with the palm of her hand. She then held up her other fist and opened it revealing the home pregnancy test. Yedidyah stared at it long and hard. He closed his eyes and opened them again. It still lay in Belle's hand.

Av is going to kill me! Eema is going to die of shame! he thought to himself as he shook his bowed head. Oh Adonai what have I done?! he prayed.

Belle stared at the evil contraption and then back at Yedidyah's bowed curly brown head. DIRRRR-TEEE DIIIAPERRRS! NO SSSSSLEEEEEP! CON-STANT CRYING! Say good-bye to your dreams! This fetus will....The evil monkeys taunted Belle, dancing around the ruins of her grand neurosurgeon dreams.

"I want an abortion!" Belle declared and Yedidyah's head shot up, "And you will..."

"NO!" Yedidyah interrupted, his brown eyes grew big. His hands shot up to Belle's shoulders. "PLEASE BELLE! Don't add this sin to our shoulders!"

Belle jerked away from him. "SIN?" She shoved him in the chest again, but he didn't budge. "Abortion is my right! Not a sin! You got me into this mess! You...."

Yedidyah interrupted Belle once more, "Belle, please, I will support you and the baby. Don't put blood on our hands."

"Yedidyah Cohen, there is no 'me and the baby'. This is a clump of tissue that I want gone!"

"Belle, that isn't true! That is..."

Belle went on her tiptoes to put one hand at the nape of his neck and one hand on his mouth. She looked him square in his brown eyes, with a vicious fire burning in her blue eyes. "You...WILL... PAY...FOR...THE ABORTION!" She annunciated every word.

His eyebrows knit together and he glared at her as he shoved her hand away. "I will do no such thing!"

He stepped around her and yanked the door open. He stormed down the hallway, through the living room.

"Yedi, my boy..." Mr. Larson called out, but Yedidyah didn't even pause as he slammed the front door and ran down the porch steps.