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David Vega had been sitting at home, awash in anticipation, when the doorbell rang. Oddly, as he got up from the couch to respond to the doorbell, his mind turned to pondering what it meant to serve.
To serve. That had been a driving motivation behind David Vega from his earliest memories. Community work in Florida, where he was born, through his stint in the military, he'd always wanted to help out, to contribute, to serve his community. And always, the results had been mixed.
Like how his time cleaning up beaches as a boy was hard work that he felt was well spent, until he realized how many people just didn't care. Two days of work could be undone in one day during spring break. It had broken the young mans heart.
Later, when he joined the army, part of his GI bill to pay for collage, he realized how much he enjoyed building things, homes and dams and whatever other projects the military sometimes does to help others across the world. But David again saw how those with power could just come in and take from the communities he'd helped out, and it made him mad. Worse, it made him understand. So he mustered out to go to collage, his plans on being an officer in the core of engineers dashed for the simple fact that what people needed was protection from those who didn't care about the law. David Vega would be a police officer.
His time on the force was a mixed bag, lots of good done, but also loads of bad. They solved a decent number of crimes, brought a lot of criminals to justice. However, during that time, he got to see how the powerful could avoid justice, while the poor and disadvantaged would suffer. Worse, even though every city has their outreach programs, and the police work hard to help communities protect themselves, many in the poor communities, those with the worst crime problems, hated the police. David had learned the hard lesson of who was blamed for the bad choices of a few, including those in power, and those who worked for the powerful.
As soon as he could, David transferred from being a beet cop, where he maybe made a difference in the day to day lives of people, to community outreach. This was his best choice, the place where he quickly found some small measure of success. Or, at the very least, he discovered how he could help the people better understand the police, and the police better serve the people. It had become his career, his passion, what made him proud to serve in his uniform. Ironically, the job of making that uniform respected had taken him out of uniform and placed him in suits. David didn't much mind, the better pay and perks helped him raise his own family.
However, as much good as one man could do in this world, he'd discovered it was never enough. It took a community, the people he worked with, to make the city livable. So he'd shifted the focus in his personal life away from the big goals that often dominated his working days, and focused instead on the smaller, more attainable achievements, like the haunted house he'd helped put together. The one that was sponsored by a youth anti-drug group, a church that managed to avoid being preachy, because many of the kids they'd help weren't religious, as well as sponsored by the police. David was notable proud of that place. It was his goals, community and police coming together for a common good. David smiled and finished his trek to the door, ready for this next bit of service.
"Trick or Treat." the sound of children brought another smile to his face. Maybe it wouldn't change the world, but for a few precious moments,. The candy he handed out would bring a smile to each kids face, and for David, after all these years, that was enough. For now.
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This is the start of a very short anthology. Please, feel free to give thoughts about this set of stories.
