Wood shavings curled and flew through the air and fell to the floor as Chad scraped the slowly rounding corner of the headstone.  Every thrust of his arms sent a new shower of wood curls all over the workroom.  While Chad awkwardly manipulated the plane, Luke sanded the roof of a dollhouse.
“Hey Luke?”
“Hmm?”  Luke didn’t raise his eyes from his project.
“Do you think I’ll have trouble getting on the Rockland force?”
Luke grabbed the tack cloth and wiped down the roof carefully.  “If they’re hiring and you have a recommendation from your chief, I don’t see why.”
Something in Luke’s voice caught Chad’s attention.  “What?”
“I didn’t say anything.”
Grabbing the nearby sanding block, Chad started sanding the corners.  “It’s what you didn’t say that speaks loudest.”
“I just never understood your deep desire for the RPD.  What brought it up, anyway?”
“Willow.”  A knowing look on Luke’s face irritated him.  “Not what you’re thinking Luke.  She was at my apartment Sunday and we were talking about my plans and why I haven’t furnished it and stuff.”
“and.. and… and…”
“Grammarian.”
“Run-on-again.  My mama would make you rephrase that ten ways and you know it,” Luke teased.  “She’s right, you know.  There is nothing in your apartment to make you want to be there.”
“I’m there all the time,” Chad protested.  “I do have to sleep you know.”
“But are you there when you’re not sleeping?”
Chad thought for a moment.  “Well, I have to eat you know, and I do stuff with the church.  I like to go to the lake or play video games with Martinez when we’re both off.”
“In other words, you aren’t there unless you have to be.”
Chad picked up the plane and worked on a squared edge of the corner carefully shaving off thin layers until it looked better.  “I am just busy with work, church, and now I’m at Willow’s more than I’d like-”
“Sure you are.”
“Luke!”
“Chad,” Luke began seriously. “I really think you need to consider that Willow has a valid point.  Who wants to come home to an empty apartment, a lumpy couch, and nothing that inspires you to want to be there?”
“Who wants to be alone no matter how comfortable the surroundings,” Chad muttered under his breath.
“Do you have any idea what it is like in a big city?”
Animated, Chad talked about high-speed car chases, armed robbery, stalkers, and no walking a beat on the streets of the city.  “I’ll be in the crunch of things.  I can make a real difference.  Here, I just put out sparks.  In Rockland I can fight the raging fires.”
Luke crossed the shop and leaned against the workbench.  “Chad, do you have any idea of what it is really like?  In Fairbury, you are respected.  Your authority isn’t questioned.  In Rockland, you’re going to be the enemy.  You’ll deal with gangs who would rather shoot you than see you.”  He lowered his voice, clearly pained at his next thought.  “Chad, you’ll be in danger not because of the situations you confront but because of the badge on your chest.”
“So everyone should just abandon the city?”
“Not what I said.  You know me better than that.  I just know you.  You’re not as hardened as you like to let yourself think.  I don’t want to see your heart seared because of a misplaced dream.”
His eyes smoldered as he considered Luke’s words.  His cousin didn’t think he could hack it.  “I never knew you thought I was such a wus.”
“I don’t Chad.  Let me ask you a question.  What will you do the first time you are propositioned-”
“You think I haven’t been?” Chad protested.
“-by a man,” Luke continued.
“Oh Luke-”
Sighing, Luke tried again.  “I know it can happen anytime- anywhere but I also know it will happen in the city.  Repeatedly.  You’ll be called to bars.  Can you love these people?  Can you serve them even as they trample values and beliefs you hold dearly?  Can you turn down a lost man as gently as you would a woman you weren’t interested in?”
“But Luke-”
“What about a family,” he continued.  “You’ve always wanted one.”
“I can’t have a family now?”  Chad’s voice bordered on the belligerent.
“I didn’t say that.  What I was going to ask is if you wanted to rear a family in the city?  Do you want your kids in the Rockland schools?  What about your wife?  Will she want to send her husband off knowing that his chances of coming home alive is significantly lower than the officers in the rest of the greater Rockland area?”
A sinking feeling was spreading through his gut.  Some of Luke’s questions weren’t new.  His mother, grandfather, and even Joe had all asked them.  Others he’d thought of and stuffed aside as less important than the mission.  Some he’d never considered.
“So the answer is to bail on the cities?  If Christian men don’t fill the jobs in the city, who will?  We need-”
“I agree.”
Now Chad was thoroughly confused.  “Then I don’t get it.”
“My only question is if you, Chad Ezekiel Tesdall is the one, called by the Lord, to fill this particular spot or is someone else called?  Will you take the place of someone who knows city life but can’t get in because your application got there first?”
“But Fairbury,” Chad groaned.  “I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in Fairbury.”  He paused.  “Actually, that’s not true.  I wouldn’t mind living there but I don’t want the FPD as my career.  I’m not Joe.  I hate walking a beat.  I don’t like getting cats out from under houses and searching for truants because there isn’t anything else to do.”
“I always saw you as a Sheriff.  You might want to consider it.  There’s more to it than writing tickets and breaking up bar fights.”
“Yeah, we had a class on county law enforcement and the responsibilities of a sheriff and his deputies in college.  It’s something to consider.”
After picking up his plane once more, Chad asked his last question.  “What is the main thing that made you doubt my plans for the RPD?”
“You’re a country boy.  You love people and you come out of your shell when you’re on the job, I’ve seen it, but you love the woods, the streams, and the open fields of the country.  I think you’d smother in the city.”
Nodding and shaving once more, Chad missed the knowing twinkle in Luke’s eyes.
***
“I can’t go Chuck.  I’d love to but I just can’t.  I’m too busy.  This fall and winter I’ll have more time for a movie or something but right now, I’m fighting to get the work of two women done alone.”
Willow ignored Chuck’s protestations.  She was determined not to lose any momentum on winter preparations and that meant no time for movies with Chuck.  A thought occurred to her just as he started a new train of thought.
“You could always come here and help.  I’ve got enough canning to last forever.  Come pick berries with me.”
“I don’t know anything about canning.”
“Who has to know how to pull berries off a bush?  I’m going out tomorrow, come on over and pick instead of seeing the movie.”
An uncertain tone crept into Chuck’s voice.  “Are you asking me because you feel like you have to, because you need the help, or because you really do want me to come?  You know, you want me to come because I’m me.”
Compassion flooded over Willow.  She’d been impatient and she knew it. “I need the help Chuck.  I won’t pretend I don’t.  However, I want your company.  Just come and talk to me if you prefer.”
“I’ll be there Saturday morning.  Thanks Willow.”
***
Bill hung up the phone.  She was coming.  Wednesday.  He glanced at his calendar and ticked off the days as he counted as though hoping to shorten the time.  Six days.
“If she’d only come tomorrow.  Maybe she could have stayed overnight-”
He shook his head.  That wasn’t going to work.  He’d have to remember not to pressure.  His eyes strayed to the calendar again and he punched the button for Mari’s phone.
“What’s on the calendar for next Wednesday?”
With a little rearranging, he managed to clear the afternoon’s appointments.  He stared at his ten o’clock.  If he was willing to sacrifice a Saturday and tickets to Rockland stadium, he could clear the morning as well.  With a sigh, Bill called Mari and told her to invite Mr. Nugent to the game on Saturday and buy the tickets if he agreed. Bill hated baseball.
A new debate raged within him.  Did he surprise her with his free day or was he presuming once again?  Unsure, he picked up the phone and redialed.  Sheep bleated into the phone as Willow answered.
“Hey, that didn’t sound like the goat!”
“It wasn’t.  That’s one of the lambs.  I’m not sure which since neither have names.”
“I didn’t know you had sheep too.”
“I don’t.”  Willow’s voice betrayed her distraction.
“Well, I just wanted to see what you had planned for Wednesday.  I cleared my schedule in case you had time to do something.”
She had planned to meet him at the Department of Motor Vehicles, get the paperwork completed, stop by Boho, and then jump on the next bus back to Fairbury.  Irritation began to well in her spirit but she remembered his kindnesses and that this was a perfect opportunity to repay him.
“I’d like to take you to lunch then.”
“Well actually, I was hoping-”
Her tone turned menacing as she threatened, “If you don’t let me take you to lunch, I’m getting on the first bus back to Fairbury once we’re done at the ID place.”
“I’ll make reservations for you.  Where do you want to eat?”
“Pick something good and I’ll love it,” she assured him.  “I have no idea what’s available so it’s silly for me to choose.”
Bill fingered her thank-you note as they chatted.  The opening line “My Dear Mr. William Franklin,” had amused him; her genuine appreciation and delight in his gift had touched him but the signature tugged at his heart in an entirely new way.  As she described her lambs he reread it once again, “Most cordially yours, Willow Anne Finley.”