Dare to Love (23 page)

“A
LICIA
E
DWARDS
, age ten.” The voice of Mike Cooper, sixth-grade athlete of the year, was subdued as it broke the silence in the auditorium. Andrea watched the young man light a candle, leave the stage and take his seat in the darkened room.

“Molly Schumaker, age seventeen.” The voice belonged to a young girl this time, but the lighting of a single candle, the solemnity of the scene, was the same. She crossed the stage, stepped down and took her seat.

“David Billings, age six.”

“Brenda Williams, age twenty-seven.”

“Brian Henly, age sixteen.”

One by one Doug's students crossed the stage, lit a candle and walked back to their seats, until the auditorium was a mass of glowing, flickering shadows. Andrea had been to many DARE graduations, but she'd never seen a program like this one. She sat next to Doug at the side of the stage, missing him like she'd never missed anyone before, needing him like she'd never needed anyone before. The room was full of parents, students and school personnel, yet as she watched the stage, lonely and afraid, she felt as if she'd been cut adrift. She'd never felt less in control in her life.

“John Doe, age two.”

Suddenly a song began softly in the back of the auditorium. Teenage voices sang about love that ran deep, time that was stolen, bodies that would never hold or be held again. And as the song faded away, a single gust of air extinguished all the brightly glowing candles, leaving the room in darkness—the darkness that comes when a life has been shamefully cut short as a result of alcohol and drug abuse.

Tears filled Andrea's eyes, brimming over to trail slowly down her cheeks. There was so much darkness. No matter how much she pressed forward, there never seemed to be enough light to show her the way. A tear dripped off her chin and landed on her wrist. And Doug's fingers wrapped around hers, bringing them to rest against the solid muscle of his thigh.

The lights came on and the school principal stood up to address the parents.

“We've been telling your young people that there are many alternatives to drug use. Today we're honored to present you with one of them. Ladies and gentlemen, I present you with the award-winning DARE dancers.”

Andrea had seen the DARE dancers before, but she still felt the same thrill of excitement as they bounded out onto the stage. Her tears were forgotten as she watched the young girls, dressed dramatically in black-and-red bike clothes, performing an amazing jazz routine to the DARE theme song. Their attitudes said it all. Even the little five-year-old abounded with positive energy as she danced against drugs, her steps as well executed as those of the older girls around her. Andrea noticed Doug's hand tapping the beat of the music against his thigh.

The dancers finished their numbers and ran offstage, back to their seats. Andrea looked out at the mass of young faces and saw the empty seat that was supposed to have been Jeremy's. Doug's students were not all graduating. One had already made the wrong choice.

“And now I give you DARE Officer Doug Avery.”

Andrea felt a very private pride as Doug stepped up to the microphone. He looked stunning in his full dress blues, every inch a man, but it was the person living inside his handsome body that Andrea had grown to love with all her heart.

“Okay, gang. This is it. We made it.” Doug smiled at his Monday kids.

Andrea smiled, too. She alone knew the significance of that “we.”

“And I want you to remember, every day of your lives, that we did it together. We all have value, and rights, and choices. And we all need each other. Don't ever think that what happened here these last couple of months was just a job for me, or another lesson for you. It was life, folks, and I signed on with you for the long haul. If any of you ever find yourself needing a friend, I'm available—always.”

One by one Doug called the names of his graduates, and one by one they crossed the stage to receive their DARE T-shirt, their diploma and a hug from their DARE officer. Andrea felt a peculiar mixture of heady joy and great sadness. Doug had completed his journey. He didn't need her anymore. Her job was done.

As the last student left the stage, Doug looked out over the sea of smiling parents. “Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the graduating—”

A door at the side of the room creaked open, letting in the afternoon sunlight. Heads turned as a little blond boy entered the auditorium. All eyes watched as the boy, skinny but clean, approached the front of the room. He hesitated, looking at Doug, as if asking for permission to continue.

Doug motioned the boy toward the seat that had been empty for most of the ceremony. But Jeremy didn't join his classmates. Instead, he stepped up on stage, to the microphone.

He pulled a wrinkled piece of paper out of the pocket of his blue jeans.

“I, uh, I know you guys read your essays last week in class so you could graduate today. Since I wasn't here, I figured, maybe if I—well, anyway, here it is.”

Jeremy looked down at his paper, his voice muffled as he started to read.

“DARE is good. It teaches kids that life isn't always all bad. It teaches them that they actually have choices, and even teaches them how to make some right ones. DARE gives courage, and maybe, if you don't waste it, it might give friends. DARE is about life. It pro'bly saved mine.”

Jeremy's choppy words slid softly into Andrea's being, soothing her wounded soul. She might not ever be able to atone for the sins of her past, but at least she was contributing to the future. She was helping to make a difference. Peace settled over her, a kind of tentative truce that had eluded her for four long years.

Jeremy stepped back from the microphone with his head bowed, as if he was embarrassed to have exposed himself in front of the classmates he'd shunned all year, as if he expected rejection. He turned to head off the stage, but he didn't make it three steps.

Doug waylaid the boy with a hand on his shoulder, handed him a DARE T-shirt and hugged him like he'd never let him go. Jeremy wrapped his skinny arms around Doug's waist, holding on so tightly that his fingers turned white.

And suddenly someone in the audience was clapping, followed by another and another until the whole auditorium thundered with applause. Jeremy turned to face his classmates, looking incredulously out over the sea of smiling faces, and a grin split his own face—a grin so big, so happy, so innocent that it lit up the room. For the first time since she'd met him, Andrea thought, Jeremy Schwartz looked like a little boy.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the graduating DARE class of Filmore Elementary School,” Doug hollered into the microphone, but even then his voice could barely be heard over the cheering.

The sixth-graders raised their arms, donned their DARE T-shirts and sat back down, several parallel rows of black and red.

Andrea watched the children, sharing in their joy, satisfied that another group of young people were well armed to face the world they were entering. She couldn't help sneaking a peek at Doug, too, wishing she had the right to share this moment with him, wishing she knew how to take what he was offering.

Doug was looking at her, too. His gaze was hungry, and strangely pleading as a sudden hush fell across the room. Confused, Andrea looked to the side of the stage, toward a commotion she'd been only vaguely aware of, and saw another young man stepping up to the microphone. But this boy wasn't alone. He was accompanied by her mother.

Doug saw the color drain from Andrea's face, and knew a moment of unadulterated fear as he considered the possibility that he might have made a terrible mistake, that he might have overstepped his bounds. He moved to sit beside her, sliding his arm around her waist, and prayed that the next several minutes would not be her undoing.

“I'm here today to tell you all about the reality of drug abuse,” the young man said into the microphone, looking straight out at the sixth-graders in front of him.

“My name is Scotty. I was a cocaine addict.” He paused, took a deep breath. “To most of you the lessons you've learned these past weeks didn't touch you personally. I'd bet that most of you think they never will. That's the mistake that'll get you. And before you know it, it's too late.”

Doug listened to Scotty, pulling for the shy young man who'd been willing, at his bidding, to stand up in front a roomful of strangers and give his very private testimonial. He glanced at Andrea, worried by her pallor, by the tears streaming openly down her face. He pulled her more solidly against him, reaching for her hand with his free one. Her nails dug into his fingers.

“It happened to me at school, a school just like this one, where the kids were clean-cut and there weren't any gangs or anything. It started out as a dare, and I buckled. Cocaine made me feel invincible and I was stupid enough to believe I was. I lost my friends, Little League, my scout troop—everything. There was only one group of guys left who wanted me, but they didn't really care about me, only about the money they could make off me.” Scotty reached to push his glasses up his nose. His hand was trembling.

Doug's muscles clenched as Andrea swayed, leaning her head against his shoulder. Her tears dribbled down to soak his shirt, her lips trembled, but she didn't make a sound. Her gaze was still glued to her little brother.

Scotty shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and back again. “See, the thing is, what happened was my fault. Just like you, I'd been taught never to accept things from strangers, but I did. I knew that drugs could hurt me, but I took them anyway. I wanted to fit in, to be cool.” The children's gaze never left Scotty.

“And if you guys think it's never going to happen to you, if you think no one's ever going to offer you some dope, if you think you won't ever be at a party where you might look like a geek if you don't at least try it, then you're fooling yourselves. I thought that, too, and I paid for it big-time.”

Scotty paused, looking like he was trying not to cry. Gloria stood in the shadows behind him. Her own cheeks were wet with tears, but she kept her distance.

“I got ahold of some bad crack because I couldn't afford the cocaine I needed. I almost died from it. Sometimes I wish I had, ‘cause I lost something almost as precious as my life over it. I lost my big sister.”

Andrea jerked upright, rigid as stone, her gaze fixed on Scotty as if bracing herself for what she might hear next. Doug let go of her. He figured this was something she had to get through on her own. But he stayed close beside her.

Scotty looked out at the audience in front of him. “See, my sister's a cop. How do you think it made her look, having a kid brother hooked on drugs? How do you think it made her feel? I let her down big-time. She used to think I was the greatest. But I made her the laughingstock of the whole police force. I hate to think what she went through because of me, what the guys at the station put her through. And I hate most to think of what she thinks of me now.” The room fell silent. Scotty stood at the microphone, his mouth working as if trying to form words, but nothing came out. The children in front of him sat as still as statues, watching him, waiting for him to continue.

Andrea jumped up from her seat, moving toward the stairs that would take her up onto the stage.

“You can't sit around and wait for your parents to take care of you, to catch you doing something bad and make you change. ‘Cause when someone loves you that much, they believe the best of you.” Scotty was still looking at the children in front of him. Doug had a feeling that he was afraid to look toward Andrea's seat, afraid of what he might see in his sister's eyes.

“My sister loved me that much. While I was busy snorting coke, knowing I was getting in too deep, waiting for her to come down on me, she never even considered, for one second, that I might be on drugs.” Scotty stopped, adjusted his glasses again and then rushed on. “That's what I lost—her unconditional love. Your parents probably love you that way now. Don't blow it like I did.”

Scotty turned away from the microphone, looking for Gloria, his shoulders straight and stiff. Behind him, Andrea moved up onto the stage. Her short blond hair was standing on end where she'd run her fingers through it, her dress blues were creased, but she looked almost ethereal when the stage lights glinted off her badge.

She put her hand on Scotty's back. And as she took her baby brother into her arms, he buried his face against her and wept.

* * *

“Y
OU GET THAT
Christmas shopping done?” Doug asked Andrea as they left the empty auditorium. Gloria had taken Scotty back to his own school to finish out the day, but he and Andrea had a date for later that evening. Brother and sister were going to shoot baskets at the high school.

Andrea looked at him, as if surprised by the innocuous question. “What?”

“That Christmas shopping you were supposed to get done last weekend. Did you do it?”

Andrea shrugged. “Not all of it. Doug, can we, uh, go someplace? You know, so we can talk?”

“I really need to get my Christmas shopping done.”

Her step slowed, losing a little of its bounce. “Oh. Well, then, I guess I'll see you later.” She started to veer off toward her car, but not before Doug saw the hurt cloud her eyes.

He snagged the sleeve of her police jacket. “You could come with me.”

Her gaze locked with his. Doug tried his best to look reassuring, when he really felt like hightailing it to the next century. If she turned him down again...

“Okay. I've still got a few things to pick up. Where do you want to meet?”

“I'll pick you up at your place in half an hour. Will that give you time to change?”

* * *

D
OUG TOOK HOLD
of her arm as soon as she climbed out of his car in the mall parking lot. He propelled her forward to the door, into the mall and through the crowd.