Beneath Devil's Bridge(97)
I see Johnny take Maddy’s hand. He gives it a squeeze, then lets go, a little awkward. I glance at Rachel. She gives me a soft smile and a slight shake of her head, as if to say, Don’t mention it. It’s too fragile.
Later, as Rachel and I walk along the river, she regards me with her sharp, clear gray eyes. Those eyes I remember from the barn that day when I thought that Rachel was everything I had expected or anticipated her to be. Except she looks happier. More peace in her features. Maybe even younger because of it.
“So what’s next in the lineup for It’s Criminal?” she asks.
“They’ve asked me to dig into the Abbigail Chester murder that was never solved.”
“Seems fitting.”
We walk in comfortable silence for a few moments. The sun is warm on my back.
“What about Granger—can you ever forgive him?” I ask.
She inhales deeply and glances up at the peaks around us. “I can’t really forgive myself, Trinity.”
“I forgive you,” I say.
Emotion floods into her eyes, and her mouth quivers slightly. She meets my gaze, and I know she is thinking about little baby Janie on that day she changed my diaper and Luke bounced me on his big knee. I know she is thinking that we can never bring Leena back. Or completely salve the pain of the Rai family.
“What is forgiveness, really?” Rachel asks quietly. “You can’t make right this long-ago wrong. You can’t fix what reverberated out of it. We can’t go back and give you a good father and a decent home life. I can’t take back what happened in my family. Eileen Galloway can’t undo her daughter’s crime.” We walk in silence. “You know, you were the last person I thought I needed in my life, that day you came to the farm.” She pauses, looks at the river, then the mountains around her. Softly she says, “Sometimes we just don’t know what’s good for us, do we? Sometimes we think we are trying our best at the time to get things right, to raise our children, to nurture our families and our community, but we’re really getting them so very, very wrong.” She pauses again. Then gives a wry smile. “All we can do is acknowledge our past mistakes and use what we’ve learned in order to do our best going forward.” Her smile deepens. “And right now, I need to be right here, on this farm, fully present, for my daughter and my grandchildren. I want to grow something for them here. A solid sense of home. Roots.” She continues to hold my gaze. “Thank you for coming that day, to my farm. I believe we all have a lot to thank you for, Trinity.”