Day 835: 5 Minute Freewrite CONTINUATION: Sunday - Prompt: a long white beard

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The man with the long white beard who had been pushed into the street by his colleague waited until the afternoon breaking news had come through, and then smiled as his office phone rang.

“Dad – are you all right?”

“I am, son – just shaken up, body and soul, but I'm fine.”

“What about your knee?”

“Hurting, but not more than usual.”

“What happened?”

“Young was blowing off about the folks driving in, and I gently shared with him what we discussed last night.”

“He pushed you into traffic for that?”

“Son, we'll get into it in detail later, but just understand this part: the people who are doing what they need to do to make sure their families count thought that your family counts as well – they came to my rescue without hesitation and took Young to the ground. But the type of people that don't want those 12,000 families to count also don't think your family counts either.”

“Well, Dad,” said D.L. Garner Jr., interim mayor of Big Loft, VA, “I guess we just got shoved off the fence on this.”

Mayor Garner looked at his desk … a report from the treasury, showing massive revenue losses: losses day by day of the drive-ins, losses since the Ridgeline Fire in general because of the loss of workforce caused by 12,000 people missing that were not being accounted for and thus not generating and spending money, and losses all the way back to the scandal around the Gilligan House Burning and the revelations of the corruption in Big Loft's high places. That corruption had cleared the way for D.L. Garner Jr. to be appointed mayor until the 2020 election, since the mayor and vice mayor had been removed from office!

“I guess the shove was necessary,” D.L. Garner Sr., chief systems analyst for Big Loft, VA, said. “If the traffic had been moving at all, if I had fallen and hit my head on one of those cars … so many ways, and then our family, too, would have been grieving today. But we can easily avenge ourselves. You're the mayor – of course we can. Yet since the 12,000 families kept that from happening, that's yet another reason we need to do right by them in addition to what we read in the Scripture today. You're the mayor, son. Do the right thing, and do it now.”

“Yes, sir.”

After getting off the phone with his son, D.L. Garner Sr. received another call.

“Cousin Donald, are you all right?”

“Yes, Henry, I'm fine … but I must say that you were right. You said that if I sought the Lord about these issues, He would clear everything up for me. He has done it, and I have called my son and gotten him straight too.”

“I am very sorry that you had to find clarity that way, Cousin Donald, but I thank God you are unharmed. I have just talked with Lieutenants Anderson and Longley about the incident, and I understand that 20 good citizens that Big Loft so easily writes off are actually responsible for your rescue.”

“Henry, like I said, God cleared things up for me. I saw who was who today – who is violent and dangerous, and who the good people of Big Loft are. I have it straight now, and because my son and your cousin is mayor, Big Loft from this day forward may be able to start getting it straight too.”

“I would love to pray together with you about that over at the Church in the Midst of Life this evening, since we can't get out of downtown anyway.”

“Henry, I would love to, but I'll need you to come by and lend me your arm … my knee is not liking all this walking around.”

“Cousin Donald, I'll be at the post office by 5:10.”

At 5:15, a senior gentleman with a pearl-pink complexion and long white beard was seen walking through downtown with a younger man – a police officer of marble hue in plain clothes with a similar texture of beard, though his beard was denser and shorter and still mostly black. Had they been out long enough, their family resemblance may have been noted, and many things before and after this in Big Loft's struggle to purge itself of corruption might have become clear … for Donald Lee Garner Sr. and Jr. were both cousins to Captain H.F. Lee of BLPD … .

Photo by Bernard Tuck on Unsplash