Chap­ter 64 of If These Wings Could Fly begins with a charged atmos­phere as the pro­tag­o­nist and a younger fig­ure stand out­side a small house, bathed in the red and blue flash­ing lights of police cars. The cold, bit­ing air seems to seep into their bones, but despite this, the nar­ra­tor grips the small­er hand tight­ly, an unspo­ken promise of pro­tec­tion. Both are dressed in flan­nel paja­mas, bare­ly suf­fi­cient to shield them from the harsh win­ter chill, which only height­ens the feel­ing of vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty that hangs in the air. This phys­i­cal dis­com­fort mir­rors the emo­tion­al strain they are under, adding a lay­er of ten­sion to the already fraught scene. The arrival of Offi­cer Bill DiMar­co brings with it a wave of anx­i­ety, as the pro­tag­o­nist is left won­der­ing whether their father will be allowed to go free again, as he has in the past. How­ev­er, this time, the out­come is different—Officer DiMar­co makes a deci­sive move, arrest­ing their father and plac­ing him in hand­cuffs. His actions are car­ried out with a dis­turb­ing detach­ment, as though he has no per­son­al con­nec­tion to the man being appre­hend­ed, rein­forc­ing the grav­i­ty of the moment and the emo­tion­al dis­tance between them.

While Offi­cer DiMar­co moves to escort their father to the police car, anoth­er offi­cer arrives quick­ly, tak­ing the moth­er aside to explain the process for obtain­ing an emer­gency pro­tec­tion order. Due to the hol­i­day sea­son, the for­mal court hear­ing for this order may be delayed, but the offi­cer assures the fam­i­ly that a tem­po­rary order can be issued in the mean­time, offer­ing a tem­po­rary shield from their father’s return. This tem­po­rary pro­tec­tion order is of immense impor­tance, as it will legal­ly bar their father from enter­ing the house and will require him to sur­ren­der his firearm with­in 24 hours if he is released. The sig­nif­i­cance of this order can­not be overstated—it rep­re­sents a cru­cial step in the effort to reclaim their safe­ty. As the offi­cers con­tin­ue their work, Offi­cer DiMar­co approach­es the nar­ra­tor and, with sin­cer­i­ty, express­es his sym­pa­thy for their dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tion. He men­tions the essay that the nar­ra­tor had writ­ten, one that he found deeply painful to read, reflect­ing the emo­tion­al weight of their family’s strug­gles. The nar­ra­tor, emo­tion­al­ly drained and fatigued from years of ten­sion, responds with frus­tra­tion, express­ing weari­ness with the hol­low apolo­gies offered by adults who have failed to pro­tect her fam­i­ly in the past.

The moth­er, how­ev­er, remains res­olute, her deter­mi­na­tion to pro­tect her chil­dren unwa­ver­ing in the face of the tumul­tuous events unfold­ing. Offi­cer DiMar­co reas­sures her that he will per­son­al­ly ensure the phys­i­cal copy of the pro­tec­tion order is deliv­ered to their home, allow­ing them to move for­ward with a sense of secu­ri­ty. The weight of the night’s events slow­ly begins to lift as the fam­i­ly feels, for the first time in what feels like for­ev­er, a glim­mer of safe­ty. This moment marks a shift for the nar­ra­tor, who begins to feel a sense of empow­er­ment that had been absent for so long. The relief that fol­lows the arrest and the pro­tec­tion order sig­ni­fies a turn­ing point, a small but sig­nif­i­cant vic­to­ry over the con­stant fear that has dom­i­nat­ed their lives. For the first time, they have been heard, and a sense of con­trol is begin­ning to emerge, how­ev­er frag­ile. The nar­ra­tor reflects on this new­found sense of secu­ri­ty with a com­bi­na­tion of hope and dis­be­lief, real­iz­ing that this moment might be the first real oppor­tu­ni­ty to escape the grip of fear that has kept them teth­ered to an unsafe envi­ron­ment for so long. While the future remains uncer­tain and there are still many chal­lenges ahead, this night sym­bol­izes a shift toward some­thing more pos­i­tive, where the pos­si­bil­i­ty of safe­ty is no longer just a dis­tant dream, but a real and attain­able goal. The chap­ter encap­su­lates both the emo­tion­al exhaus­tion and the qui­et empow­er­ment that comes with moments of change, pro­vid­ing a sense of clo­sure to the imme­di­ate dan­ger and a hope­ful out­look for what lies ahead.