Free Redeeming Heart by Pat Simmons

negotiation?
“I’m conducting a first-time home buyer’s seminar. Do you want to
tag along?”
    “Can’t.” This time James didn’t offer any
reasons why, so Octavia accepted his card, got into her car and
drove off. “Lord, I’m not saying he’s not the one but I’m not
impressed.” She was looking beyond his good suit. What was in his
heart? Many are called, but few are chosen. God whispered
Matthew 22:14.
    How many times had she heard that scripture?
“God, please chose for me a prayer partner for a mate—someone who
knows about Your goodness and mercy…Jesus, please open my eyes to
see the candidates You’ve set before me. Amen.”
     
    ***
     
    “So what you think?” Terri asked when Octavia
arrived at the office for the weekly meeting.
    “I think I should be mad at you for setting
me up without giving me a heads up,” Octavia feigned an attitude
before she laughed.
    “But you’re not because James is handsome,
charming, he has a steady income…”
    “I need more than that,” Octavia said softly.
“You know that. I don’t want my feelings to be so jumbled up in a
relationship that I compromise. Regret is a hard thing to live
with.”
    Their chat was nipped when other agents filed
into the conference room for their Monday briefing.
    As the broker, Terri kicked off the meeting
with praises before she tackled problems. Since her company was the
listing agent on the property Landon had gotten into, Terri
accepted the blame for not double checking after a contractor said
he had secured it. “Okay, here are our current listings. I want to
hear why we’re not selling them.”
    Octavia chimed in, “I am going to re-evaluate
how I have those two houses in Olivette staged. They’re both listed
online. I have that seminar on Thursday, so I plan to showcase
them.”
    Terri nodded and faced another agent whose
buyer’s offer fell through. She brainstormed strategies how to
regroup, and before long, the meeting was over and everyone was out
the door. Octavia made sure she was the first in order to escape
any further discussions about James without knowing where he stood
with the Lord.
    The next couple of days whizzed by, but when
there was a pocket of free time, her mind detoured to Landon. She
bit her lip from smiling.
    On Thursday afternoon, Terri was just
finishing up a call when Octavia stopped by the office to grab
brochures and supplies for the seminar.
    “One of my hardest working Realtors. Tsk,
tsk. Tavie, you could be a broker by now if you’d focus on
different clientele.”
    “I gave up that notion after working here the
first year. Besides, the extra fees and license and the liability
to be responsible for other agents’ mistakes is scary.”
    “I know your heart is in the right place with
these community workshops, but you need to focus on those contacts
you made over the weekend and make some real money,” Terri
said.
    Octavia knew Terri was looking out for her
well-being and wanted to groom her to be a broker and to open her
other agency office one day, but Octavia wasn’t driven by money
alone. She wanted to show Christ in her life, and helping others
was part of it. “I will…I will, but we know first-time home buyers
move within five to seven years to bigger homes. The initial step
is to be informed.”
    Having a place to call home was personal for
Octavia. She was a product of a loving Christian home in a
distressed area in East St. Louis. The home values were low and
businesses scarce, but the minute she and Olivia walked through the
door from school, she felt loved, protected and happy. Why couldn’t
everyone experience the same thing whether it was a two bedroom
house or a six?
    Call her an old soul or a practicing
Christian, but it was her responsibility to serve the under-served
communities and to help them go from renters to buyers, which was
the main reason she joined the National Association of Real Estate
Brokers. As long as racism denied a group of people