Forty-five
Peter
“Uncle Peter, isn’t my dress pretty?” Nora chirped as we meandered down the sidewalk.
“Stop asking him stuff like that. He can’t see it, Nors.” Izzy reminded her with a whisper.
A smile toyed at my lips as I enjoyed how the two of them bantered.
Nora exasperated Izzy with her sugar-hyped energy and endless chatter.
And Izzy wouldn’t dream of missing an opportunity to correct her little sister.
We walked through downtown Comfort—if you could call it a downtown.
It was the only area where shops were pushed together, their storefronts facing the sidewalk.
The community was tiny compared to the big city back home, but the people were friendly and loved the fact that the one and only Meadowbrook Ranch called Comfort their home.
It was the Saturday before Halloween and Comfort’s annual Scarecrow Invasion where the businesses set up scarecrows all over town and provided a community trick-or-treat.
The kids kept laughing and pointing them out, entertained by the funny scenes the shopkeepers put the scarecrows in.
We went inside each store so the kids could get candy and every person we met along the way had something to say about Meadowbrook making the pros.
It was nice, being together without working for once. Tag, Jesse, and Cody were out of town, but my sisters, their children, Cooper, and I were doing Halloween festivities with the kids tonight since actual Halloween fell on a school night.
Nora pushed closer to me, her layers of tulle brushing over the side of my jeans. By the way her voice directed up at me, I could tell she was looking in my face. “Touch it,” she said.
I reached down and rubbed the back of my hand over the tulle that Nora was holding up. It was bristly and couldn’t be comfortable. “It feels pretty.” I said.
“It’s hot pink.” She informed me.
“I love that color.”
“Do you really?!”
Chuckling, I smiled down at her. “I really do.”
“Can you remember what it looks like?”
“Yeah. I can.”
“Uncle Peter, what’s your favorite type of candy?”
I hummed. “That’s a tough one. I like chocolate. Probably Twix.”
“We are twins!” Nora exploded.
“No way. Is that your favorite too?”
She monologued about heavenly Twix for a solid two minutes, so I took that as a yes.
The girls were dressed up as princesses and Cade just wore his cowboy hat, saying that kids all over the US dressed up as cowboys on Halloween so he’d just arrive as himself and say it counted.
Wren had wire fairy wings over a little lace dress and she woke up from her nap on the wrong side of the bed, grumping and whining every few minutes.
Bea pushed her in her stroller, placating her with apple juice.
“There’s the playground.” Nora said, probably pointing. “Across the street.”
“Does that mean we’re at the end?” I asked her.
“Yep. We only have two more shops.”
Just before we entered the final shop, a lady stopped us with coos of admiration.
Hollie and Bea got sucked into conversation. The kids, still discussing their favorite candies, debated about the superiority of Starburst over all other fruit-flavored candy, trying to convert Cooper out of the Skittles camp.
But Wren was angry that we had stopped moving. Her little shoes made a tacky thap-thap-thap sound as she stomped on the foot rest. Bea had moved away from the stroller and Wren wasn’t too happy about being ignored. Crouching down next to her, I said, “What’s wrong, Wren?”
She whimpered and shoved something in front of my face. Thinking she was handing me something, I reached out and found her pointer finger extended in the general direction of the playground across the street. “Oh,” I said, “You want to go play?”
“Pay!” She said, confirming.
My awareness pulled down the road, taking note of an engine humming, accelerating. The traffic had been so light and infrequent that every passing car had stolen a bit of my attention.
“We’ll play really soon.” I reassured her. “We’re almost done.”
“Pay!” She whined louder, kicking harder.
It was almost dinner time, so maybe a snack would help. Bea had snacks somewhere in her diaper bag—surely I could find them. Propping my cane against the back of the stroller, I found the bag’s strap over the handle and unzipped it, gently rifling through the contents.
The engine grew louder, about to pass us.
My fingers found a crinkly plastic bag and gave it a shake. Probably Goldfish or something.
But before I even opened the crackers, the stroller jutted backwards against my leg, knocking my cane to the ground, as Wren’s thap-thap-thap made a beeline for the playground.
Panic sliced through my chest.
I dropped the snack. “No! Wren!”
Trained on the sound of her undeterred footsteps, I bolted after her, leaning down.
Bea screamed behind us.
My fingers slipped around her shoulders, clamping down.
Tires screeched.
I yanked Wren off the ground without breaking my stride until my feet stumbled over a curb.
Unable to right my footing in the dark, we went down—one of my hand’s squeezing Wren to my chest, the other furrowing into a bed of wood chips.
My knees struck the concrete curb, and some sort of bush scraped my face. Wren started to wail.
The vehicle door flew open. A woman’s voice shrieked with near-hysteria. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t see her! I’m so sorry!”
I slowly sat up out of the flower bed and situated Wren on my knee. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”
She buried her tears in my shirt and I patted her back, completely numb with shock.
The woman driving was the first to reach us, kneeling down on the curb, crying her eyes out as she put her hand on my back.
It was only then that I realized where the vehicle had stopped.
Past us.
The door ajar ping was a couple feet beyond me.
She would’ve hit Wren.
That was when I started shaking, the gush of adrenaline warming my veins.
“Wren!” Bea’s rushed to our side. Wren’s hands immediately lifted to her mama and Bea scooped her up as a terrified sob lifted from her lips. “Oh my goodness—thank God. Wren, I’m so sorry—” Her words choked off. “Are you hurt, baby? Are you hurt?”
Wren’s cries evened out, sniffles taking their place.
Hollie was suddenly there, her hand on my shoulder as she brushed mulch off my pants. “Are you okay?”
My tongue stuck in my dry mouth as I swallowed. My voice was shaky and breathless. “Yeah, I’m good.”
“What happened?” She asked.
I shook my head, trying to remember. All of it happened so fast, in only seconds. “Wren—she wanted to go to the playground. She ran. And I heard the car.”
“So you ran after her?” Hollie’s voice held a note of awe.
I nodded, confused. My brain had a hard time believing it. For a few beats I wondered if I’d momentarily regained my sight or something. Because I knew where Wren was. I knew where the car was. And I didn’t think or question my ability or doubt my intuition.
I just…ran.
The slightest misjudgment and we both would’ve gotten hurt.
Our party moved back to the sidewalk and the woman moved her truck out of the road.
Everyone gathered around, asking questions and demanding I tell the story again.
My sisters kept acting like what I did was a big deal, but I could barely hear them.
Every interaction warped as my brain dissected what happened.
A blanket of mental fog dimmed my awareness of my surroundings as I tuned in to my body.
And how grounded it felt.
After months and months of barely surviving, I felt so alive.
Maybe that change had gradually crescendoed but I didn’t realize until I hit the apex—Wren running into the road—or maybe she woke me up somehow. Whatever it was, something had happened in me.
Before I knew it, we were heading to the park and I was pushing Wren on the swing. While life carried on, I got stuck.
Wren running. Me running.
I kept reliving it, marveling over one particular thing.
It was a sightless memory.
That might not have seemed ground-breaking to anyone else, but it tilted my entire world. For so long I had tried to anchor my sightless experiences in imaginations of what could be around me—constantly exhausted with visualizing everything so I didn’t feel lost.
But that didn’t happen with Wren.
She ran. Then I ran.
Pushing Wren on the swing, I cycled back, trying to imagine what her wailing might’ve looked like. What the vehicle behind us looked like. What Bea’s face looked like as she held her baby. What the flower bed in the median looked like.
But I couldn’t conjure anything up. There was nothing.
No, that wasn’t right. There wasn’t nothing.
There was a lot, and that’s why I couldn’t stop reliving it.
It was my first sightless experience that didn’t feel like a half-moment or a fuzzy dream.
Even in the inky blackness, there was sensation, space, and audio.
The way Wren’s open crying mouth pressed into my chest and her terrified fingers wound through my shirt, pulling it tight across my body.
The way she stretched, lengthening as she reached for Bea.
The mulch grinding into my hands and the warm concrete striking my knees.
The way the bushes dragged over my face and neck as we fell into them.
Hollie’s hand on my back as she helped us up.
I could go on forever.
There was so much. All of it sharp, a dialed-in lens.
Even as we meandered around the park, I tried to visualize the sky above me, the playground equipment, my nieces and sisters, even Cooper. But the images brought to mind were dull. Boring replacements for real experience.
The crazy part? I wasn’t mad about it.
Because the breeze tugged at my shirt. And the scent of pine chips on the playground reminded me of the horse stalls.
And my sisters’ laughter as they came off the adrenaline high made me laugh too.
And Wren’s sticky hand kept wrapping around my index finger, yanking me from place to place.
And I knew where everyone was. And I heard their voices.
And I knew a bird moved from a nearby tree to the top of the playground equipment just a few feet away—it’s song pouring over us.
And I felt gravitational force as Cooper spun all of us—adults included—on the old fashioned merry-go-round.
And I felt my body, present in every second.
Every moment was so full.
Back at the ranch, we roasted hot dogs over the fire for dinner then carved pumpkins.
I didn’t carve my own, but I helped my nieces gut theirs, pulling out the long sticky pulp that smelled a little like crushed leaves until the walls of the pumpkins were dry and bare.
Then I sorted a thousand seeds out of the mess, plopping them in a bowl for Bea.
Hollie and Cooper helped and we laughed together like the oldest of friends.
Then salty pumpkin seeds, fresh from the oven, popped in our mouths while the kids sorted their candy on the front porch.
The night air nipped my bare arms as I swung on the porch swing with Bea tucked against my shoulder.
Just when I thought the day couldn’t leave a heavier impression on me, a big pile of candy hit my lap.
Nora’s breathy, excited voice said, “These are for you.”
My fingers came to the pile, noting the uniformity of each piece. Before I could say anything, she explained.
“They’re Twix.”
Remembering we shared a favorite candy, I said, “Ah, Nora, I don’t want to take these from you. They’re your favorite.”
“You have to.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because you helped Wreny today and this is my thank you. Plus, I worked really hard trading to get all that. So you should be thankful.”
I blinked repeatedly as warmth rose in my eyes. Putting my hand over the gift, I accepted it. “Thank you, Nora.”
Flinging herself at me, her arms came around my neck. “I love you, Uncle Peter.”
Stunned, I froze momentarily, then hugged her back, a fierce lump rising in my throat. “I love you too, Nora.”
With that, she bounded back to her siblings.
A few beats of quiet fell over the four of us as I offloaded the candies onto the wicker table near my feet. Then Hollie broke the silence. “So, Peter, how does it feel to be a hero?”
I shook my head. “I’m not a hero.”
“Well, considering I’d probably be in a children’s hospital if you weren’t with us today, you’re a hero to me,” Bea said.
“I did what anyone else would’ve done.”
Cooper snorted. “That’s kind of the point though, isn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“You did what anyone else would’ve done.”
Hollie and Bea hummed in agreement, but I didn’t get it. The confusion on my face must’ve communicated because Cooper explained, “For a guy who thinks he’s worthless, the words ‘I did what anyone else would’ve done’ should be encouraging, right?”
I didn’t know what to say to that.
Bea added, “He is right. You said you couldn’t help care for a child.”
I did say that. But did I still believe it?
At that exact moment, sleepy footsteps dragged toward the porch swing.
A slow, familiar thap-thap-thap.
I expected Wren to go to Bea, but she didn’t. She crawled onto the porch swing and plopped down in my lap. Instantly, my arms curled around her, holding her steady as my feet launched the swing into a gentle motion. Wren laid her head on my chest and shoved a finger in her mouth.
After a few quiet back-and-forths on the swing, Bea softly sniffled, turning her face up to look into mine. She whispered, “You’ve proven you can, Peter.”
I nodded as that truth wound around my heart.
For the first time, I considered all the things I could do for a family, not the things I couldn’t.
Blinking against the sting in my eyes, my brain flew to Sarah.
Like it always did.
As much as I loved the crew at Meadowbrook Ranch, I needed a debrief with my wife.
Eventually, our party broke up and Cooper and Hollie whisked off to the kitchen to wash up our dishes. As I passed Wren to Bea, I opened my mouth to make a request, but the words lodged in my throat.
Bea paused. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just—I have a weird question. It’s been a long night so it might not be the right time.”
“What is it?”
“Can you show me how you put her to bed?”
Bea’s breath wooshed out, and her voice was tight. “I think that is a wonderful idea.” Then she reached out her hand and grabbed mine.