Who Do You Love(119)
Author: Jennifer Weiner

“Praise Jesus!”

“He was kind.”

“Yes, God!”

“He was a father figure to the young men whose daddies couldn’t or wouldn’t be there for them. By example, our friend Clement showed each and every one of them what it was to be a man.” The preacher lowered his head again, as if lost in thought. Then he raised it and looked at the crowd.

“There’s a young man here who’s a lawyer. Another two go to Temple on scholarship. Up front, we got Terrance Parker, who’s a vice president at Comcast. You got a problem with your cable bill, go talk to him.” Laughter rippled through the audience. “In the back, I see a young friend of Clement’s who became an Olympic runner.” Andy froze, mortified, as he felt every eye turn toward him. He hung his head.

“All these men learned how to live their lives, how to make their way in the world, but more than that, even more than that, every single one of them learned how to love.”

The room exploded with shouts of praise, to God, to Jesus, with cries of “Tell it!” and “Preach!”

“They learned how to love,” called the preacher. He raised his hands and, immediately, the din dropped away. “And that, my brothers and sisters, is the true measure of a man. Not money.”

“No, sir!”

“Not success.”

“That’s right!”

“Not job titles. Not degrees. Not even gold medals.” The preacher’s voice dropped to a whisper. “The measure of a man is, does he know how to love. Clement Sills knew how to love. That’s what he did. That’s what he taught every single one of us who were lucky enough to know him.”

In the back of the room DeVaughn was crying. Andy saw the corrections officer hand him a handkerchief, as the pastor invited anyone who wanted to speak to come to the podium and send their friend on.

The young man who’d become a lawyer thanked Mr. Sills for showing him another path, “because I so easily could have walked down the wrong one.” The Comcast vice president talked about how he’d been so shy as a little boy he’d barely opened his mouth in the classroom, and that his teachers thought he was slow until Mr. Sills started bringing him around to antiques stores and restaurants, making him talk to the salesladies and the waitresses until he could speak up a little better.

“When things got noisy in my house, Mr. Sills let me come over and study, as long as I could find room for my books,” one of the Temple students said, to smiles and laughter, as the audience members recalled Mr. Sills’s hobbit warren of a house. A single mom remembered how when her young daughter had broken her leg, Mr. Sills had been there, morning and night, to carry the girl down the stairs, and then carry her back up for bedtime.

Then the preacher called Andy up to the podium, introducing him as “Andy Landis, the gold-medal-winning Olympic runner,” and asked if he wanted to speak.

Andy had gripped the edges of the lectern. He thought about how long it had been since people had looked at him with anything but disdain. Enough time had passed so that, at least in some places, sometimes, he could just be what he’d become—the manager of a home-goods store, a so-so basketball player, a son, a coworker, a friend. “I grew up without a father,” Andy began, “and I wasn’t the greatest kid. I got in fights at school. Threw a brick through someone’s windshield. I almost got sent to juvenile hall for that one,” he said as some of the boys up front nodded. “Mr. Sills saved me. He made me feel like I was worth something. Nothing I did, nothing I had . . .” His voice caught, but he made himself push through it. “Nothing I achieved would have been possible without him.”

Afterward, a few of the attendees came to introduce themselves. More than one told him how Mr. Sills had always talked about Andy, the way he’d run his paper route, how he’d been such a quiet boy, and how he’d flown Mr. Sills first class all the way to Athens, Greece, so he’d be there to watch Andy win his gold medal. “I think it was the highlight of his life,” said the young man who’d gone to law school, and Terrance Parker had nodded and said, “He told me that, too.”

Finally, Lori’s aisle-mate, a tall, stooped man with a bald head and glasses, came over. He stood shyly a few feet away from Andy, the way autograph-seekers once had when they were waiting for a signal or permission to approach him.

Andy knew who he was; knew in his bones, knew from the way the other man was looking at him, and the shape of his face, and his hands.

“Hello,” said Andy. He held out his hand to the man who he’d seen only in pictures and carefully his father shook it.