Glenn watched in silence from the shadows at the back of the auditorium. It had been almost two years since he'd cut and run, leaving his second life behind just as he had the first one. Only this time he'd left more than just his new life, he'd left the one person he'd ever truly cared about since the death of his parents eighteen years previously. Now, at the age of thirty-six and counting, he was once again wondering if he'd made the right choice.
He smiled to himself when he saw Joey standing with the rest of the police academy graduates, head bowed for the ceremony's opening invocation. Glenn's heart beat a little faster when the invocation was finished and Joey glanced around for a brief moment, undoubtedly looking for his family who were seated three rows back among all the other friends and families of the graduates.
Joey had matured during the last two years. Now he was definitely a young man, not the kid that Glenn had considered him to be when they'd first met. But then he knew that already. He had followed Joey's progress from afar. For a while the young man had seemed to bury himself in the town and the coffeehouse after Glenn's departure.
'Departure my ass, I ran like the hounds of Hell were after me.' Glenn though, angry at himself when he once again tried to blunt what he'd done, as he always did. 'It was for the best, but I was still a coward.'
He pulled his attention back to the proceedings, smiling with pride when Joey's name was called and he walked forward to get his diploma and shake the commissioner's hand. "You'll be a damned good cop," he whispered, and grinned when Mary jumped up to cheer. Apparently she agreed with him.
Then, silently, he slipped out of the auditorium. He had things to take care of which meant there was a plane to catch. A quick check told him he didn't have much time so he was glad when a cab appeared to drop off a passenger. He grabbed it, gave his destination, then rested his head back and closed his eyes.
* * * *
Joey shook his head in amusement when he heard Mary's voice above the applause. He dearly loved his half-sister but there were times when she seemed to do her best to embarrass him. She had definitely come out of her shell in the last two years. It had taken time and his mother's wholehearted attention but slowly and surely Mary had been able to put the past, and the terrible things that their father had done to her, into perspective now that the man was dead and buried; buried by Joey after Glenn's inexplicable disappearance.
With his heart in pieces, Joey had transferred his despair into action. No matter what, no matter how much he hated Glenn in the days that followed his disappearance, Joey still had to follow through and bring a final end to the bastard who had been his father. He’d gone out to the farm late the following night and put all his pain and rage into digging a grave to hide his father's body. When he dragged the corpse from where Glenn had secreted it and dumped it into the grave he imagined there were two bodies, his father's and Glenn's. That was how deep his anguish and pain went.
Now, two years later, he had come to accept that Glenn was no longer. Not literally, he was certain the man was somewhere in the world, doing… actually he had no idea. Perhaps the security work he had given up when he moved to Joey's hometown, if that really was what he had done before. Joey finally believed that he'd never see Glenn again and had moved on. Now he had become what he'd always dreamed of being, a police officer. Not only that but he would be one in the town where he'd grown up. He needed that; he needed to be with the family who loved him.
Life was perfect. Almost. He shoved the almost back where it belonged, deep in his mind where all his emotions were buried.
'Life IS perfect!' he told himself as he walked over to where his mother and Mary, and the rest of his family were waiting.
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