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Reciprocity (1/1)
Catherine was in the playroom with the kids early Saturday morning when she heard a harried knocking on the back door. She made her way to the kitchen and saw her neighbor from three houses up the beach, Tina Haukea, standing outside on the deck looking slightly frazzled.
Tina's husband, Keli, had been tragically killed in a car accident three months earlier leaving Tina to juggle their four children, ages 5 to 11, on her own while going back to work full-time after many years as a stay at home mom. The entire neighborhood had pitched in to help wherever they could but Tina had confided in Catherine one night during a tear-filled conversation that she hated feeling like a charity case.
The plan was for her mother to move from the mainland to help out but that was going to take several months. In the meantime, Tina was left to handle things mostly on her own.
"Is everything ok?" Catherine asked as she slid the door open.
"I really, really hate to ask," Tina said apologetically, her eyes damp with unshed tears of frustration. "My sitter got her times mixed up. She thought I didn't need her until noon today. I have to be at work in…" she glanced at her watch, "twenty minutes and I have nobody to watch the kids until she gets here."
"Bring them here," Catherine said with a warm smile. "We'll be happy to watch them. Steve ran out to grab a few things from the grocery store but as soon as he gets back we're planning on going swimming."
Tina breathed a sigh of relief. "Are you sure it's not too much trouble?"
"It's no trouble at all," Catherine assured her. "We love having them around."
"I can't thank you enough." Tina brushed a stray hair out of her eyes. "I don't know what I'd do without such great neighbors. I'll send them up with their swimsuits and tell the sitter to come up and get them as soon as she can."
"Tell her to take her time," Catherine smiled. "We've got you covered."
"I need to run down to Tina's and borrow a casserole dish," Catherine said a few days later as Steve and the kids sat in the living room building a giant tower of blocks.
"Don't we have lots of dishes?" DJ asked, his brows furrowed in confusion.
"They in the cupboard beside the sink," Angie said, never taking her eyes off the structure in front of her.
Catherine and Steve shared a knowing look. "I need a different kind of pan," she explained. "I'll be right back."
When she returned 20 minutes later she was carrying a pan that looked very much to DJ like lots of the ones they had in the cupboard. He became even more confused when he watched his mother place the dish on the counter and then proceed to cook chicken nuggets on a flat baking sheet.
"What did you need Miss Tina's pan for?" he asked later as he helped clean up the dinner dishes.
"I'm … ummm…gonna make lasagna in it," Catherine said.
"What about the pan we normally make lasagna in?" he asked.
Catherine ruffled his hair. "I just decided I needed to use a different pan this time."
Steve was sitting at the table the next morning drinking a strong cup of coffee after a long night of rounding up suspects in a gang murder. His plan was to grab a quick breakfast and a few hours sleep then head back to the office for a meeting with the governor over lunch.
He had arrived just in time to kiss Catherine and the kids, wish them a good day at work and school, and see them out the door. As he placed his cup in the sink and headed for the shower his phone buzzed with an incoming text.
It was from Tina Haukea.
"I called Catherine and she said you haven't left for work yet."
"I haven't," he replied. 'Is everything ok?"
"My car won't start. I'm not sure what's wrong. I think the battery might be dead."
"I'll be right down." Steve continued to hype as he headed for the garage. "If it's the battery I'll get it jumped and if it's something else I can give you a ride wherever you need to go."
"I really appreciate this. I hate to ask. I wasn't sure who else to call this early."
"Not a problem." Steve grabbed his jumper cables. "I'm on my way."
"Thank you!" Tina said gratefully as her car engine turned over. "You're an absolute lifesaver. I'm so sorry I had to bother you. Catherine said you were out on a case all night."
"No problem." Steve smiled. "In fact, I was gonna ask you if it might be possible for me to borrow that large socket wrench Keli always kept in the garage? I need to do some work on my car and I can't find mine."
"Oh definitely," Tina said. "Take whatever you need. I don't know one wrench from another so I'm certainly not using them."
"Thanks." Steve smiled. "I'll get it back to you in a few days."
"Take your time." She smiled back at him. "Keli would be glad it's getting put to good use."
It was a quiet afternoon so Steve decided to head home directly after his meeting with the governor and told the entire team to do the same. When Catherine and the kids got home a few hours later he had a salad made and fish ready to go on the grill.
Catherine nodded at the wrench laying in the middle of the kitchen island. "Are you keeping your tools in the house now?" she teased.
"That's not mine." He kissed her hello. "It's Tina's. I borrowed it. I need to take it back tomorrow."
"You have a wrench just like that in the garage," DJ pointed out.
"It's the clicky one," Angie added. "I like the sound it makes."
"Did yours get lost?" DJ asked worriedly. "Why did you need to borrow Miss Tina's?"
"Mine is just fine," Steve said. "Nothing to worry about. Why don't you guys go get washed up for dinner and after we eat we'll all go out for shave ice."
Any further discussion was cut off by Angie and DJ's cheering.
Later that evening as his parents were tucking him into bed DJ said, "Can I ask a question?"
"Of course," Catherine said.
Steve smiled. "You can ask us anything, buddy."
"I don't understand why mommy borrowed a lasagna pan from Miss Tina when we have a whole bunch of pans already. And then we didn't even have lasagna."
Catherine smiled. DJ was a very observant little boy and he took notice of everything that went on around him.
"Then Daddy borrowed her socket wrench when he has a couple of wrenches just like it in the garage?"
"That's true," Steve admitted.
"If it's grown up stuff that I'm not supposed to know about you can just tell me that but I was just wondering because I don't get it," DJ said.
Catherine and Steve shared a smile and then he nodded at her to go ahead and handle the explanation.
"Well," Catherine began, "You know that Miss Tina has needed a little extra help since her husband died."
DJ nodded. "That was very sad."
"It was." Catherine kissed his forehead. "So Daddy and I want her to feel like she can come to us whenever she needs help with anything at all."
"Her mom is moving here from Iowa to help out," DJ said. "Trey told me that the other day when they came over to go swimming."
"Yes, she is," Catherine said. "But until she gets here we want Miss Tina to know she can count on us to help."
"I still don't understand," DJ said. "What does that have to do with borrowing things from her that we already have?"
"Sometimes people don't like to ask for things they need because they feel like they're being a bother or a burden," Catherine said. "We never want Miss Tina to feel like that because she is neither of those things."
DJ smiled. "We like doing nice things for people."
"We do," Steve agreed.
"Sometimes, it's easier for people to ask for things they need when they feel like it's a two way street," Catherine explained. "Do you know what that means?"
"Kinda," DJ replied unsurely.
"It means that she will feel better about asking us for things she needs if she feels like we also ask her for things sometimes."
DJ tossed the concept around in his head for a few seconds then his eyes lit up. "I get it." He smiled. "It's like doing favors back and forth."
"Exactly." Catherine kissed his forehead. "That way she won't hesitate to ask whenever she needs something. And that's really important for her until her mother gets here."
"Hey, aren't we baking cookies Saturday morning for the bake sale at Angie's gymnastics school?" DJ asked.
Catherine nodded. "We sure are."
"Maybe we can ask her if she has any extra cookie sheets and then when we return them we can send some cookies too," DJ suggested.
"You are a very sweet boy." Catherine tucked his covers in. "And that is a very good idea."
THE END
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