Chapter 7 - The Gathering at Pier 14
The morning mist was burning off the Elizabeth River when our staff car passed through the security gates of Naval Station Norfolk. The base was alive with activity. Ships’ whistles blew colors, diesel tenders chugged across the grey water, and the massive flight deck of the USS Ronald Reagan—currently in port for scheduled maintenance—dominated the horizon like a steel mountain.
Pier 14 was flanked by two thousand sailors in pristine dress whites, formed into four rigid battalions.
The pier was dressed in full bunting—red, white, and blue swags draped along the gangways, the national ensign snapping smartly in the crisp autumn breeze from the halyards of every vessel in the basin.
At the head of the pier stood a raised wooden grandstand. Seated upon it were the highest-ranking naval officers on the eastern seaboard: the Fleet Forces Commander, the Chief of the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, dozens of captains, and in the center, Secretary of the Navy Arthur Vance and Admiral Judith Carrow.
As our car came to a stop behind the formation, the junior officer of the deck stepped forward and opened my door.
"Commander Alden," the young lieutenant said, his eyes reverent. "The Secretary is waiting."
I stepped out onto the asphalt. Beside me, Lieutenant Ross took his place as my personal escort.
From the edge of the crowd, near the civilian spectator enclosure behind the security barriers, a murmur rippled through the gathering. Word had spread through Norfolk like a brushfire since midnight. The story of the gala, the torn dress, the four-star jacket, and the unsealing of the Reagan files was on the lips of every petty officer and chief on the waterfront.
I looked toward the civilian barrier.
Standing near the front, clutching the chain-link fence, was my father.
He wore his civilian suit, but it hung loosely on his frame, his tie slightly crooked. He had not been permitted onto the official dais; his credentials had been downgraded to general admission. Beside him stood my mother, her face wet with tears, holding his arm not for support, but to keep him from collapsing.
My father looked at me across the fifty yards of open pier.
He saw the three gold stripes on my sleeves. He saw the white combination cover set cleanly above my brow. He saw the posture of a commander who answered to no man’s petty pride.
He raised his hand slightly, an agonizing, silent plea for recognition.
May you like
I held his gaze for two seconds. In that look, I gave him neither hatred nor forgiveness. I simply let him see me as I truly was—not the daughter who had failed his standards, but an officer who had transcended them.
Then I turned my back to him, faced the grandstand, and began my march down the center of the pier.
