Unauthorized Affair (Unauthorized #1)(9)
Hunter shook his head and tried to clear it of these thoughts. Nothing was final yet. He had a job to do here. The whistle sounded, signifying the start of the test and the first number was called. He settled in to watch.
***
Jen burst through Jerry’s front door, exuberant at having passed the physical agilities test. Jerry followed, smiling indulgently at her. She hadn’t stopped pinching herself since she crossed the finish line. Jerry had never seen her this excited about anything, especially not anything requiring hard work and dedication, at least since high school sports.
“I did it Jerry! I’m going to do this! I’m sure to pass the lie detector. Call Sara! She said she wanted you to call her right away if I passed.”
“OK, I’m calling her right now.”
“When is she coming back?” Jen called over her shoulder, already halfway to her room, intent on hanging up her passing times for the physical agilities test on the wall right next to her passing score for the written test.
“Not till next week.” Jen heard the sad note in Jerry’s voice. Sara had been gone only for three days, but Jerry already missed her a lot. Sara was in Sacramento, doing secret government stuff. Jerry was going back to work in a few days, so he hadn’t tried to accompany her.
For a moment, Jen’s thoughts lingered on her brother, but they couldn’t stay there long. She’d passed the physical agilities test, slam-dunked it actually, coming in with 23 seconds still to spare, and she was that much closer to becoming a police officer. It had been seven weeks since she’d first made her decision and she still felt just as strongly about it. But even the decision seemed to be working magic on her. She already felt stronger, more sure of herself, and less naive. Two weeks ago Adam had even texted her and said he was sorry for what he did and could she forgive him. She’d thought about it for a long time, weighing the pros and cons of at least replying. On the plus side maybe she’d get her stuff back. Maybe he’d even send her half of the money he’d taken out of their bank account. But she could read the subtle subtext of his message. She’d bet anything that he was girlfriend-less and maybe even homeless right about now. And what he was really looking for was to see if she would take him back. Suddenly she was extremely glad that she had packed up and left San Francisco. If she were still there, nursing a broken heart, how would she have responded to his text? Would she have taken him back? She liked to think no, no way. But she couldn’t be positive. As it was, she had stared at the text for a long time. Thought about it hard. And then deleted it. Even the money wasn’t worth having to deal with him right now. Besides, she was more than half way to a starting salary of $52,000. She’d get that money back in one month.
Jen tacked her paper on the wall, flopped down on her bed, and stared at it. The physical test had been hard. But she and Jerry had been running through it three times a week for the last seven weeks. Plus he’d been taking her to the gym twice a week. She’d grown muscles in places she didn’t know she had. He also had talked her out of getting a job, saying he’d be happy to support her until she finished the police applicant process. And Sara had been giving her self-defense classes in the yard, as well as taking her walking through the tougher districts in town. She could now easily distinguish between a person high on seven different kinds of street drugs. And she could spot the signs of concealed weapons. Better yet, she was beginning to be able to spot the difference between what Sara called Hawks and Doves. Hawks were dangerous people — willing to fight to the death for what they believed in, or what they thought they needed. If you rolled up on a Hawk on a traffic stop or responded to a domestic dispute and found a Hawk, you’d be better off pulling them off to the side and handcuffing them immediately, before you ended up rolling on the ground with them, their hands trying to pull your own gun out of its holster to shoot you with. Doves, they were almost never dangerous. They were the type of people who either don’t believe in physical violence as a means to any end, or were too cowed for whatever reason to attempt it. Doves could be sat down on the couch and interviewed without fear. And then there were Pigeons. Pigeons were normally doves, but for whatever reason, they had turned to Hawks for a short time. Drugs, being pushed too far, mental unwinding. Pigeons were the most dangerous, because you never knew what a Pigeon might do. A Pigeon might jump off a roof while wrestling with you, just for the pleasure of pulling you to the ground with them.
Before Sara left, Jen had a hesitant question for her: “Sara, am I a Hawk or a Dove?” certain in her heart that Sara would say she was a Dove. Before Sara even answered she had her next question all lined up: Are Doves ever good at being police officers? But Sara had surprised her. “You’re a Hawk, Jen, you’ve just never known it till now. You can thank Adam for waking you up to your true nature. There’s nothing wrong with being either a Hawk or a Dove - it’s just the way you were born - but there’s a lot wrong with thinking you are a Dove when you’re not. It’s stressful.”
Jen had thought about this for days. In fact she was still thinking about it. Her true nature? Really?
She heard Jerry yell from the other room. “Come on, Jen, Sara says congratulations and says we should celebrate!”
Celebrate. That sounded great. She got up and ran to the kitchen to make plans.