“Yes.”
Ava Claire looked toward the plaque.
Then the ocean.
“Are you scared when I take pictures here?”
Daniel thought.
“Yes.”
She turned.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want me to stop?”
“No.”
“Why?”
He smiled.
“Because my fear is not automatically an instruction.”
She considered that.
“That sounds like therapy.”
“Family disease.”
Ava Claire lifted the camera.
Photographed the sunset.
Daniel watched her feet.
Could not help himself.
Both safely behind the rail.
She noticed.
“Grandpa.”
“What?”
“You’re checking.”
“Yes.”
“Stop.”
“No.”
She laughed.
Compromise.
They walked.
At the place where Sergeant Kessler had grabbed Daniel’s harness decades earlier, nothing marked the confrontation.
No plaque.
No memorial.
The wooden wall had been replaced.
Businesses changed.
People passed.
Good.
Not every painful place needed designation.
Ava Claire asked:
“Is this where the policeman grabbed you?”
Daniel stared.
“How do you know that?”
“Dad showed me the video.”
“I am disinheriting him.”
She laughed.
“Were you scared?”
Daniel thought.
“Yes.”
The answer surprised her.
“You look mad.”
“I was both.”
“Did you think he was going to arrest you?”
“For a moment.”
“Did he?”
“No.”
“Did the lady save you?”
Daniel groaned.
“The internet has poisoned this child.”
“What?”
“No.”
He pointed toward a bench.
They sat.
“Melissa did something important.”
“She recorded.”
“She corrected her old statement.”
“But people had already started filming.”
“Kessler eventually released me.”
“His body camera mattered.”
“My own behavior mattered.”
“His later choices mattered.”
“Nothing was one person saving another.”
Ava Claire looked disappointed.
“That’s less cool.”
“Most accurate things are.”
She thought.
“Did you hate him?”
“For a while.”
“Then?”
“I stopped spending enough time on him to know.”
She smiled.
“That’s cold.”
“Efficient.”
They watched the ocean.
Then she asked the question Daniel had spent decades answering differently.
“Did Aunt Ava climb over something?”
Daniel looked toward the new railing.
“No evidence shows that she did.”
His granddaughter frowned.
“You don't just say no?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because the photographs tell us what they tell us.”
He looked at her.
“They show the permanent rail was missing.”