It was always gentle, the touch, almost as though the touch was a memory. At the first time Gator was surprised, astonished, and did not know who was touching him. He turned and did not know what to say. There was no one there but he knew he was to be never the same Gator. Years upon years passed.

The story of the spoken words, five words with the touch. A healing touch and Gator’s life changed. Another five words decades later. A confirming and a beginning of knowledge and his life was now further to destiny. The fire within fanned into flame to show where the small fire began to glow.

Gator was running at the start, always running away from the pain that would not leave. All his life that pain and absence of love was the matrix of his heart. No one would ever get in again, it was too obvious that no one really cared. Gator took it for truth that he was beyond all that. Trust was only a word about banking somehow or contracts for an exchange of some kind.

There was a betrayal of an attempt of love, love lost and cast away as a raft on the ocean far from land. No compass nor sextant nor even a chart to show what was ahead. Just adrift and always in the middle of the ocean once land went beyond the horizon. No hope and only death to look forward to. It was what Gator put away in a lock box in his heart, thinking out of sight, out of mind. The lock-box was transparent. Most could see in it through Gator’s eyes. Gator knew it was there somehow.

So, adrift in the ocean of pity, Gator did not know where he was going but he knew something was happening to him. He was getting fed something good and drinking clear good water. No idea where these things were coming from.

Finally a meeting was available to see the one true love that betrayed him. She was in a bad way, in a hospital of recovery from her own trauma. Drugs used to dull the pain, similar to a path Gator chose before the five words began the small fire in his heart and saved him from a bad end.

Bluffing his way into the hospital as a priest, Gator was able to see his lost beloved before him. She was in a haze of other recuperative drugs perhaps as she sat up on the bed in her room, clothed in hospital scrubs. Dazed, confused and finally focusing on the one she betrayed. Discarded the love they had. Just like so many times before in Gator’s life. This time was different. She awakened a bit and recognized Gator and asked him; “Why are you here?” Without hesitation, Gator spoke the words of healing for him, perhaps for her too. “Because I love you!” He said it loudly and then left soon thereafter. The small fire in Gator’s heart was being fanned into flame.

The burning one with fire in His eyes gave Gator the knowledge he was, indeed loving and worthy to tell others of his discovery within his heart. The lock-box was open and Gator has never been the same since. The flame is beginning to burn bright with the Fire in the eyes of Christ. It’s pretty good.

Jack Gator