Then she looked toward me.
I had never seen that much fear in a child's face.
“Come on,” I whispered through clenched teeth as I continued compressions. “Come on, buddy. Stay with us.”
The little girl kept signing.
And I realized something that would haunt me for the rest of my life.
She had been surrounded by dozens of adults.
Store employees.
Customers.
People carrying groceries.
People holding phones.
People who could speak.
People who could shout.
But she had needed help and couldn't make herself understood quickly enough.
So she'd looked around the store.
Found the biggest, strongest-looking man she could see.
And grabbed him.
She had chosen me because her father was a big man, and in her six-year-old mind, saving him required somebody even bigger.
I was sixty-one years old.
My left knee was artificial.
My right shoulder had been repaired twice.
And I had spent forty-two years riding motorcycles, losing friends, making mistakes, and learning that looking tough didn't mean you could protect everybody.
But that afternoon, a little girl who had never spoken a word decided I was strong enough to save her daddy.
And I wasn't about to let her down without doing everything I could.
Then the manager returned carrying an AED.
The machine's case hit the floor beside me.
Someone opened it.
A recorded voice began giving instructions.
The pharmacy clerk looked at me.
Her eyes were filled with tears.
“Please,” she whispered.
The little girl watched.
Her hands stopped moving.
For one terrible moment, she sat completely still.
And then the machine instructed everyone to stand clear.
I lifted my hands.
The manager stepped backward.
The pharmacy clerk pulled the little girl safely away from the immediate area.
The device analyzed the man's heart rhythm.
A shock was advised.
The room fell into a silence I will never forget.
Then the machine delivered the shock.
We resumed CPR as directed.
Someone shouted that paramedics were coming.
I looked toward the little girl.
She was holding the pharmacy clerk's hand.
Her pink shirt was damp with tears.
She was staring at me with a desperate, impossible question written across her face.
Is Daddy going to wake up?
I couldn't answer.
Because I didn't know.
And for the first time in many years, I found myself praying to a God I hadn't spoken to properly since my wife died.
Please.
Not in front of his little girl.
Not today.
My name is Raymond Dawson.
Most people call me Ray.
And if you'd met me that Saturday morning, you probably wouldn't have imagined I was the kind of man a frightened child would trust with her entire world.