Peter knew it was more than that. Gramps did indeed love to get his hands dirty with digging, planting, and pruning. But he also loved to present Gran with the fruit of his labor. Every morning from spring to fall, he brought her something from his garden. It might be a single rosebud or a full bouquet, but whatever it was, the moment brought delight to them both. Even as a child, Peter hadn’t missed the sparkle in their eyes, nor the lovesignified by the small gesture. His own parents’ marriage had been turbulent, but his grandparents’ intentional nurturing of their relationship had given him hope. Their example was one Peter wanted to emulate one day.
Inside, the tantalizing aroma of one of his favorite meals beckoned them to the kitchen, where Gran was bustling about the stove. Gramps flickered the light, and she spun to welcome them. Her hands flew in greeting, and Peter responded in kind.
Once again, he was grateful for the accessibility ASL offered. Gran was profoundly deaf, and the nature of her hearing loss had excluded her as a candidate for a cochlear implant or any sort of hearing aids. She could read lips moderately well but hadn’t had the resources growing up to master her own speech. Signing, with or without accompanying speech, was much more efficient for all of them.
Soon the three of them were gathered around the small kitchen table, steaming plates of crisply battered fish and golden fried chips before them. Peter took the first bite, aware Gran was watching closely to gauge his reaction.
“It’s delicious,” he pronounced. And it was. Somehow, Gran had managed to find a recipe and ingredients that perfectly captured the essence of his homeland favorite. Gramps echoed the sentiment, and Gran fairly glowed at their praise.
For several minutes, their conversation was leisurely, centering on everyday things—the weather, local news, how many more quarts of tomatoes they intended to can this season. But as they neared the end of their meal, Gramps changed course.
“Any update on what happened to you the other night?”
Peter swallowed his last bite of fish and set his fork aside. “Not really. They still haven’t determined who did it or why.” Yeah, they’d made out with some petty cash and a few expensive watches and such, but they could have cleaned the jewelry shop out. Instead, they’d used up precious time entering offices on the third floor.
Andre had let it slip that they’d caused some significant issues at Pendleton Accounting, which made Peter wonder if that had been their true target, with the other break-ins serving as a distraction. Or perhaps the thefts had been opportunistic. Or the data breaches could have been the distraction. They just didn’t know. But if the data had been the objective, no one had been able to figure out what the intruders intended to do with it.
“Is that what has you so perturbed?”
“I’m not perturbed.” At least, he thought he’d been doing a pretty good job keeping his focus on the here and now. He hadn’t been thinking about the break-in at all. Concern for Hailey, however, continued to linger at the edges of his mind.
There it is again. Gran raised her eyebrows to punctuate her statement.What were youthinking about?
He sighed. No use trying to deny it. Gran was sharp. Gramps too.
“I met a woman at work last week.” He realized his mistake when both his grandparents grinned. “It’s not like that. She’s in trouble, but we don’t know why.”
Are youprotecting her?Gran’s direct question caught him off guard, but it shouldn’t have.
“I don’t do that anymore. I’ve helped her out a few times, but that’s it.”
“You want to though,” Gramps observed. “You care about her.”
Peter started to deny it, but he couldn’t. “I do care. But I can’t offer the protection she needs. If she relies on me, she and her little girl might end up dead.” And it would be his fault.
You’re saying she’s betteroff with no protection?Gran asked.
“No, but I...” He couldn’t find the words for what he was trying to say.
Gran began signing again.You have agift. You have training. You need to use them thebest you can. You can’t let fear keep youfrom doing what’s right.
Was that what he was doing? He turned her words over in hismind while Gran, seeming to sense he needed time to absorb the idea, paused to serve dessert.
As they dug into a fresh blackberry cobbler, he finally asked, “What if I fail?”
Instead of answering directly, Gramps posed another question. “How have you helped her already?”
Peter related the gist of the previous incidents and his response. He couldn’t congratulate himself for his actions. He’d only done what was needed when he had the opportunity to step in.
But when he finished, Gramps nodded. “So what I’m hearing is that you still know how to respond in a crisis.”
Peter shook his head. “When I’m there in the moment, I don’t have to think about it. I just act. But when I know what might be coming, how someone could die if I make the wrong decision ... it paralyzes me. And what if that only gets worse? What if I have to make a decision under pressure, and I freeze up then?”
“We aren’t meant to live in the what-ifs. You’ve trained for these types of situations. You’ve shown that despite your fears, when faced with a threat, you know what needs to be done, and you do it.”
“And sometimes I make mistakes, and my best efforts aren’t enough.” He had the bumps and scars to prove it. Had seen the same sort of scenario play out with one of his colleagues. Memories of arriving on scene and discovering Andy’s lifeless body and that of their client still plagued him—almost as much as his own more recent failure did. Andy had been an excellent bodyguard, but that hadn’t kept him or their client alive. Peter had tried to tell himself it could never happen to him. And then it had, just a few years later.
“No one expects you to be God.” Gramps’s observation pulled him from the past and brought him up short.
