She wonders if Bo will head home too. He seems invested in seeing it through to the end, maybe because he is a retiree with nothing better to do—this will probably be the highlight of his year, or at least his month—or perhaps because he is genuinely concerned about the outcome. No matter how much she tells him to stay with her, he keeps wandering toward the post office, questioning the personnel closest to the building about what’s going on inside. For now she has him corralled in Brower’s car.
“You know it snowed here,” Bo says. He is talking to her but watching the post office through the windshield. Hope has learned that he’s not fond of prolonged silences and is prone to talking just to talk. But it helps pass the time. Suspects aren’t the only ones who get bored and tired during a negotiation.
“Not this past January but the January before. Newspaper said it was a once-in-a-lifetime event. This area doesn’t get much, or really any, snow. So you can imagine that it shut this whole placedown. Everything closed. Our neighborhood amenities closed. No one dared go anywhere at all.”
He clears his throat loudly, which Hope has also learned he has a habit of doing. “The thing is, that’s the way it is in a town like this. They’re not outfitted for snow—and why would they be? It’s a lot of expensive equipment to have on hand for something that will likely never happen.” He gestures at the scene in front of them: the ambulances, the fire trucks, the clusters of cops milling around waiting for something to happen. “Makes sense they wouldn’t have everything they need for something like this either.” He holds up his hands. “Why would they? This is a once-in-a-lifetime event too.”
Hope can’t help but chuckle. “I’m sure everyone in this parking lot hopes you’re right.”
He nods. “Pretty sure I am.”
He pauses, but she knows he is still thinking. She can almost hear the old gears of his mind grinding away. She never knew her grandfather, but her mother used to talk about him, and from how she described him, Hope imagines he would’ve been like the man sitting beside her. It would’ve been nice, she decides, having a grandfather like Bo.
“You know,” he adds, “the thing about that snow was that it was so unexpected. When they first started forecasting it, no one believed it would happen. Then when it did, it made everyone feel inspired. Like, if this can happen, then anything could happen. That snow gave us hope.” He elbows her. “Get it? Hope?”
“Yes,” she says. “I get it.” She points at a car slowly approaching, the little sign strapped to the top indicating the pizza delivery. They can see the driver’s head swiveling as he negotiates the phalanx of emergency responders. She picks up her phone and hits Redial, putting the phone on speaker for Bo. She watches the supervising officer greet the delivery person, taking the pizzas so they can bugthe boxes before turning them over to Hope and Bo. Now they will at least have ears on the hostages. More progress.
Tommy answers quickly this time. “Your pizzas are here,” she says. “So we need to go over how we are going to get them to you.”
“Okay,” says Tommy.
Hope looks to Bo, and he nods his assent to their plan. “We’ve got a retired officer out here who has volunteered to take the pizzas in himself. But he will be surrounded by other officers for his protection.”
“Am I supposed to just—what?—walk out there and take them from him?”
“No,” says Bo, speaking up. “Not you. We need to make contact with at least one hostage. We need to get eyes on someone who’s been in that room, or we can’t leave the food.” He gives Hope a half smile at this fib. They could leave the pizzas by the door just like they’re going to do with the water. But she sees what he’s doing: making Tommy engage with both law enforcement and his hostages through this transaction, stretching his boundaries just a little further.Smart, Hope thinks.
Bo continues. “So you’ll need to send out one of the hostages.” He thinks about it for a moment. “Send the old lady out. She’s the least likely to attempt anything sudden or risky.”
Hope wrinkles her brow at this. The old lady? Why put undue stress on her when there are younger, more agile women in there? But Hope doesn’t argue. It’s not what she would’ve done, but it does make an odd sort of sense. Two old people exchanging pizzas seems harmless.
“The police will first leave the waters by the door,” Bo continues, “and once they’ve done that, I will enter the vestibule, hand off the pizzas, and leave.” He pauses. “I don’t expect any funny business from you in the meantime. Even a hint of something goingany differently than what we’ve discussed and this is over. No pizzas. No waters.”
Then Tommy says something that surprises Hope. He says, “Yes, sir.” They end the call, and then it’s time for Operation Pizza Delivery.
Hope sees the signal from the supervising officer that the bugs have been attached to the undersides of the pizza savers in each box. If all goes well, pretty soon they will be hearing what’s going on inside that post office in stereo. Before they climb out of the car, she looks at Bo one more time. “And you’re sure about this?”
“Trust me,” he says, patting her on the shoulder. “I’m the least threat to him, which means I’m the safest bet to go in.” He points at the post office. “That kid in there isn’t going to shoot an old man. I’ve been doing this a long time, and I know it. Now, let’s go deliver some pizzas.”
Inside the post office a little zing of anticipation ripples through the women as they watch the approach of a cadre of law enforcement officers from the front windows. At the center of the escort is an older gentleman with a determined expression carrying the three boxes of cheese pizza.
Tommy and the women move from the front windows to the side windows as the ensemble enters the building. Sylvie takes a step toward the door as she has been instructed to. She didn’t understand why they chose her, but she wasn’t going to argue about it. She was in favor of an excuse to escape the confines of the room they’ve been in for hours, even if for a moment. But now that she can see the old man who is walking the pizzas in, she understands fully.
She goes to take another step, but Tommy stops her. “Hold on,” he says, his hand on her shoulder.
Together they watch as, on the other side of the glass, the officers enter the vestibule, guns drawn as they survey the area. They come to a stop in front of the post office and peer into the glass, their eyes locked on the hostages and their captor. One officer slides a case of water bottles across the floor like a hockey puck across the ice. It thunks against the post office door. The officer with the largest rifle nods over his shoulder. It is all very serious and very tense.All this for some pizza and water, Sylvie thinks.
Tommy’s phone rings, and he answers. They have moved from the post office line to his personal line, and this is its own kind of progress.
“Tell them I just want the old dude in here,” he says to Hope. “None of these guys with guns.”
Sylvie thinks this is ironic considering he is holding a gun even as he says this. But the rules don’t apply to Tommy today, just other people. She wonders if, when he thinks back on this day, he will remember it fondly, if this moment in time will be his apex. That would be quite the tragedy if so. He is, she decides, too young for this day to define him for the rest of his life.
Standing so close to him, she can clearly hear Hope speak. “They’re just clearing the area, making sure it’s safe to send in the civilian. They won’t all stay in there, but I have to leave a few to guarantee his safety.”
“Fine,” says Tommy, knowing when he’s bested. “Once most of them have left,” Tommy says, “I’ll pull the waters in and send the old lady out.”
“My name is Sylvie,” grumbles Sylvie. “Not the old lady.” She has never been called old this much in her life, and she’s getting sick of it. Until today she didn’t really think of herself as old. Older, maybe. But not old. Her neighbor across thestreet is approaching ninety. That, she thinks, qualifies as old. It is funny how the older you get, the more old age becomes a moving target.
