Chapter 5 - CALEB’S CHOICE
Two months later, winter set in across the Puget Sound region.
The living room of Penthouse 14B was filled with the warm, golden glow of a quiet fire in the stone fireplace.
The cold marble display tables and white rose arrangements from Victoria’s launch had been completely removed. In their place were comfortable wool sofas, oak bookshelves filled with history texts, and a long wooden dining table where Caleb sat with his high school study group.
Caleb was seventeen now. He had grown two inches over the autumn, his shoulders broadening, his face taking on the firm, honest lines of his grandfather Robert.
I walked out of the kitchen carrying a large wooden tray filled with warm homemade apple turnovers and glasses of fresh milk, setting it down in the center of the study table.
“Thanks, Grandma!” said Maya, a bright teenager with glasses who was working on a college prep history paper with Caleb. “These are amazing!”
“Eat as much as you like, sweetie,” I smiled, patting Caleb’s shoulder. “You children have been studying for three hours.”
Caleb looked up at me, his eyes full of warmth and a quiet pride that needed no words.
When the other students finished their turnovers and left at eight o'clock, Caleb stayed at the table, folding his notebooks carefully into his backpack.
“Grandma?” Caleb asked, looking over at the fire.
“Yes, Caleb?”
“Dad called me today from his new job.”
I paused while wiping down the kitchen counter—a habit forty years of cleaning would never let me break. “How is he doing at the hardware store?”
After his law license was suspended, Julian had spent three weeks sitting in his father’s old house before he finally walked two miles down the road to Tacoma Supply & Lumber. He had hired on as an entry-level inventory stocker—working eight-hour shifts lifting heavy timber, unloading drywall pallets, and sweeping the concrete warehouse floors for fifteen dollars an hour.
“He said his back hurts every night,” Caleb said softly, looking down at his hands. “But he told me he hasn't missed a morning shift in six weeks. He asked if he could come to my high school debate finals next Friday.”
I walked over to the table and sat down across from my grandson. “What did you tell him?”
Caleb swallowed hard. “I told him he could come... but only if he sat in the front row, wearing his work shirt, so everyone could see who he was.”
I looked at my grandson, feeling a tear warm my cold cheek. “And what did your father say?”
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“He started crying,” Caleb whispered. “He said he’d be proud to wear it.”
I reached across the table and squeezed Caleb’s young, strong hand. “Then you gave him the greatest gift anyone has ever given him, Caleb. You gave him a second chance to be an honest man.”
