You can adopt landscaping standards.
You cannot command people to trust you after you secretly store keys to their homes in a cabinet and send armed men after anyone who refuses.
That is why Cedar Grove had to start over.
And maybe I did too.
For months after the shooting, I checked the camera every time somebody approached.
Delivery driver.
Neighbor.
Utility worker.
My pulse changed before I recognized them.
I hated that.
Eventually it stopped.
The human mind adapts.
Quiet returned slowly.
One ordinary morning, maybe two years after everything, someone knocked.
I was in the kitchen.
I checked the camera out of habit.
Teenage girl.
Cookie boxes.
Fundraiser.
I opened the door.
“Hi, sir.”
“Morning.”
She launched into a speech about school athletics.
I bought two boxes.
She thanked me.
Walked away.
I closed the door.
Then I realized I had stood in the doorway the entire conversation without thinking about Darren once.
