Steel turned and watched the string band stomp their feet, strum banjos, and bang the drums in rhythm, but his ears fell mute and his thoughts raced. He pondered the case, how they’d matched Jimmy’s DNA with Desiree’s mother’s murder and also with John Fratt and his wife from the struggle wounds. And Jimmy had used the same gun to kill Desiree, Kevin Johnson, Jonathan Herns, and Fratt and his wife.
Steel knew he was going to hear the bullshit from administration and probably get sent in to talk with Internal Affairs, that that process would be a ton of bullshit and paperwork. IAD would have something to say about how he’d let the case turn into a hostage situation, or how he had fired his weapon the wrong way, or that he hadn’t followed the proper procedures in the investigation. It was bullshit—you do your job and then get micromanaged and reprimanded. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, he thought. But he didn’t care because he had worked his ass off on the case and stopped evil from spreading any further, and that’s all he ever needed to know.
A thought broke through and reminded him that there always will be these cases of people who snap or are disturbed. Reality hit him once again that evil will always knock on the mind’s doorstep, will always tempt people, and some will answer in rage and violence—that his job will never be finished. He learned that you could never really know a person—the true depths of their soul—the exterior doesn’t always match the interior. At least he received a life lesson through it all, a reminder to cherish life’s good moments because they’re worth suffering through bad times or setbacks for, sometimes through weeks, months and years of misery, fear, apathy, pessimism, loneliness, hopelessness and depression. But positive times will eventually come if you don’t give up, if you don’t lose hope or faith, he knew, wished Jimmy had realized that before he decided to kill all those people. The concept of hope was tricky to Steel, and he realized that without it people couldn’t carry on. Hope was something he was beginning to embrace in his life, ever since the Thomas Hitchy case had ended last summer. He was working on stopping himself from putting up defenses against being hopeful, and figured those defenses were mainly from fear of never reaching the perfect world he dreamed up as an idealist. People usually have two options in life, he knew, to give up or move forward—and each path will provide different life circumstances as an effect—positive or negative. That was it, two options, so simple in theory, yet so difficult in practicality. Jimmy had decided to give up. Steel would choose to do the latter, to move forward, and figured he might as well put everything he had into it. No more limbo, no more holding back on life and suffering in the present moment because he was waiting for something better or because of past missteps. A thought crossed his mind that if a person spends all of their time worrying about what could be and always looking beyond the horizon, they may miss out on the opportunities in the here and now and wind up never truly reaching goals by never committing to anything.
He was maturing, he figured, growing, and that made him feel good. Just the fact that he had proposed to Marisa and committed himself to something was all the proof he needed. At one time, his idealistic mindset and heightened sense of reality didn’t mix well, a dangerous combination, mostly from being a police officer and seeing the worst of humanity daily and from exceptional observation and analytical thinking skills he developed on the job over the years and also from being a dreamer. Having wild ideas and dreams of a perfect world at times often depressed him when he’d realize that those things weren’t attainable. But he was learning to live in the world he was dealt and do the best with what he had to work with, that life isn’t perfect. He’d live his best life in a flawed existence, make the most of it. And he understood that he had to realize that nobody was perfect, not in appearance, work, love, and so on, that it was okay to have flaws—that sooner or later he had to apply wisdom he learned from life and have the courage to live, even if risking imperfection. It took him thirty-three years to learn to focus on the present moment, but he figured you’re never too old, that each individual’s experiences lend to grow at different stages of life. But having the courage to move forward was the key.
And it hit him that he’d almost lost Marisa twice since he met her, all in the same year. His heart jumped and he said a prayer in his head thanking whoever or whatever deity was listening for sparing her. Life could have taken a drastic and tragic detour for them when Jimmy had pressed that cold gun into Marisa’s head, and he was grateful it hadn’t. Steel left it at that and didn’t think anymore of Jimmy, wanted to push evil away from his mind and soul. He shook his head and whistled.
He walked through the masses, Marisa’s smooth, tiny hand in his own, rolling his fingertips against hers, the touch of her warm, soft skin magnetic. A breeze blew by them and cooled their faces, and she snuggled closer to him, her vanilla shampoo filling his nostrils, her hair brushing against his cheek and tickling it.
She slid her head toward him, and they stared in each other’s eyes as though they’d transcended the physical, as if they were staring into one another’s soul, chills shooting up their bodies, their hearts warming, as if reminding them that together they were perfect, that fate was perfect.
He thought that from this very second he’d cherish life’s good moments, that the simplest of freedoms and things were sometimes the best in our lives. He’d look forward to enjoying a warm cup of coffee with Marisa in the home they’d own someday or a deep or philosophical conversation with her on a random rainy Tuesday night or one day holding their child in his arms on a sunny day in the park. Those were the good times, the richest times.
Intuition or a whisper from the Universe took over his thoughts and reminded him that some things in life are fragile, are easily broken, some ties come undone and never reconnect. But something outlives the most egregious of sorrows, tragedies, fears, depressions and pains—and that’s love.
He thought once again of Jimmy’s horrific actions, and of the lives lost, especially Desiree’s, a woman with so much promise, realized that some things in life are too evil to be explained by man and should be left for the deity to sort out.
He gripped Marisa’s hand tighter and grazed the cold metal of her engagement ring, kissed her hair, and strolled through the parade of smiling faces of friends and families simply enjoying one another’s presence—and he thought, I better enjoy this moment, because it’s one of life’s good ones. And some moments are to be cherished. Some moments are simply divine. Truly divine.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank Rob Bignell, who did an excellent job with the editing: Inventing Reality Editing Service—http: //inventingreality.4t.com/editingservices.html.
And thanks to Robert Morales for designing the book cover image—it captures the theme of the book and looks great: robdraws.blogspot.com.
Thanks to the loyal readers of the Benny Steel series; your feedback and encouragement have been invaluable to me.
About the Author
STEVEN GROSSO is the author of several books in different genres and currently lives in Philadelphia. For questions or comments, please direct them to [email protected]. Comments are welcomed and appreciated. All of his books are available from Amazon.com and other retailers.
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