Chapter 9 - A family reunited
Caleb Ray Hollis arrived at the VA 2 hours later, still in his work jacket with grease in the creases of his knuckles. He was 44, thin with his father's pale eyes and none of his father's certainty. In his pocket where his hand kept going, was a small bronze coin with a two on it. He stood in the doorway of his father's room and didn't come in. "Hey, Dad." "Raymond." They looked at each other across six years and one funeral.
"I haven't seen the kid since Dana's service," Ray said. "I don't know what he eats. I've got a one-bedroom over a tire shop. I'm not..." He stopped. "I'm not enough for this, Dad." Walt was quiet for a while. "Neither was I," he said. "Did it anyway."
What happened next was not fast and it was not magic. It was paperwork done by people who worked on Christmas. A background check, a fingerprint appointment the county opened up on a holiday because one case worker made a call. An emergency home visit to the one bedroom over the tire shop where a woman with a clipboard checked the smoke detector, the windows, the lock on the medicine cabinet and the bed. There wasn't a bed. Not for a child.
"I can buy..." Martin started and then stopped himself so hard he almost bit his tongue. Ray looked at him. "Nothing with money," he said. "I mean it." "Okay." Ray hesitated. "You know how to put together a bunk bed? Church thrift store has one. 40 bucks. I can pay 40 bucks. I just can't do it alone in one night." "No," Martin said. "I don't know how, but I can read instructions."
So, on Christmas night, a man who owned eight states worth of bread sat on the floor of a one-bedroom apartment over a tire shop with an Allen wrench in his hand, while a mechanic read him the steps out loud, and the bunk bed went together crooked the first time, and they took it apart and did it again.
On December 26th at 9 in the morning, a judge with reading glasses on a beaded chain looked at the file, looked at Ray Hollis, and looked at the letter Walt had signed from his hospital bed. Temporary kinship placement with the uncle pending review. A legal aid attorney at the VA had helped Walt sign something else, too: a standby guardianship naming his son so that if his heart ever stopped, there would be no strangers, no lounge, and no binder. There would only be Ray.
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Outside the courtroom, Sandra Greer stood beside Martin by the window. "You did good these last two days," she said. "I did nothing these last two days." "That's what I mean." She buttoned her coat. "A judge can sign a placement in an afternoon, Mr. Gray. Trust takes a lot longer than that."
There was one more thing. On the morning of the surgery, December 28th, Walt asked Martin to come close.
