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Sally knew they were planning something, she just didn't know what. They were always so predictable, she always knew when they were sneaking around behind her back and plotting some mischief or another but, for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out what it was.
It didn’t seem to be anything bad, she was getting no sense of impending doom, fear for her collectables or shenanigans of any kind. Yet there was something off that she couldn’t quite put her finger on, but it was definitely there. She knew her boys inside and out, as well she should after so many years.
***
Nothing could ever prepare you for motherhood, you could read all the books, watch all the birthing videos and have your carefully constructed birth plan in place but all of that means nothing when you have a son that refuses to comply with your schedule.
Jefferson Peter Tracy was born three weeks early on the 2nd of January at 3:27am. Sally had been one night away from starting her maternity leave, having been determined to work as close as possible up to his birth. She wasn’t one for nesting or preparing a house, she had a prominent career as a trauma surgeon, was well on her way to becoming a consultant and wasn’t prepared to let a little thing like growing a human in her belly stop her.
Jeff, it transpired, had other ideas. He came barrelling into the world after a relatively short labour of just under three hours. He was a little small but perfectly formed and had evidently decided that waiting patiently while his mother finished sewing up a man's chest cavity was far too boring. He wanted out, and he wanted it now. This set a president for his life, wanting to be the first to do everything and to get there in the fastest time possible. Jeff Tracy waited for no one, not even his own mother.
Jeff was four and running the babysitter and his father ragged on a daily basis when Sally made her decision. Her shift at the hospital had already overrun by an hour, the run ragged babysitter was threatening to quit and Sally was halfway out the door with her bag when a woman had been rushed in. Stretchered in by a harassed ambulance crew her notes had been thrust unceremoniously into Sally’s hands and just like that her wellbeing and duty of care had been passed over. The woman was unable to speak a word of English, her terrified eyes and pained grunts, her hands desperately clutching her rounded stomach, were the only way she could communicate the fact that she was in heavy labour.
The birth itself was far from smooth, complications seeming to arise one after the other from a mix of pre-eclampsia, malnutrition and lack of vitamins. Most of which could have been prevented with proper antenatal care and regular check ups. The woman’s life had hung in the balance more than once, as had the baby's and Sally had had a fight on her hands from start to finish.
Now the woman was sleeping off the emergency caesarean, the baby was in the premature baby unit and they were still no closer to knowing anything about them. The woman had no identification on her, no passport, no paperwork. Her prints weren’t in the system and she wasn’t awake to be able to tell them anything, even if they could work out her nationality and engage an interpreter. It was very obvious what had happened. Illegal immigration was an undeniable fact of life, many choosing to risk their lives in the search of a proper home, decent medical care and the chance to live without fear. A quick examination of the patient further confirmed the theory, a number of scars littered her too thin body, a body so dirty it was clear she’d not had a roof over her head for some time.
Sally looked around the hospital waiting room as she left four hours late and weary down to her bones, seeing that the number of people there for self inflicted problems far outweighed the genuine cases. There were the usual drunken people arguing with the staff, the entitled ones that were complaining that they had had to wait longer than an hour and the ones there wasting the medical staff’s time for things that weren’t even necessary. All because they could.
“Ungrateful,” she muttered, pissed off and unable to get the image of the poor mother out of her head. She was still thinking about it as she arrived home, still thinking of the tiny baby who would have undoubtedly died along with his mother if she hadn’t have helped. The image of that child was still front and center of her mind as Jeff raced down the hallway to throw his arms around her. Her mind was still at the hospital as she ate dinner with Grant after Jeff had finally gone to sleep.
Unable to settle for the start of a much needed long weekend she broke her cardinal rule and called her department for an update. The news that the mother had died less than an hour ago had not been entirely unexpected but broke something inside her nonetheless.
“This shouldn’t still be happening,” she raged to her poor husband who just wanted a quiet life. “In this day and age we should be doing more to help, doing more to ensure that women like her aren’t losing their lives needlessly just because they aren’t getting the care they need in their own country. We should be stopping this. This shouldn’t be normal!”
Grant shrugged in that mild mannered way he had, his laid back attitude the calm to her storm. “Then do something about it, Sal.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. You know how things work in this life, you can’t expect people to just do the right thing for you, you have to set an example and take the first step.”
“Really? And what exactly do you suggest I do about it, hmm? That’s what I’d like to know.” she crossed her arms, staring him down.
“Go and help,” he said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
She laughed, unable to stop herself.
“Me? The woman who is already rushed off her feet trying to hold down a full time job while parenting? What about Jeffy, I don’t get to spend enough time with him as it is. At this rate he’s going to grow up thinking that Grace is his mother, not me.”
“Priorities, love, priorities.”
“You and Jeffy are my priorities, that and my job, the hospital. I wouldn't find a position like that elsewhere and I won't risk messing up and endangering someone's life because I didn't pay attention, my mind being elsewhere. I don’t have time for anything else. What else can I do? I'm only human, I'm not superwoman."
Grant relaxed back against the couch, stretching out his legs to put his slippered feet closer to the fire, refusing to be drawn into her dramatics.
“What you have to ask yourself, is why is the job so important to you? You could have taken that consultant position over a year ago and had regularly scheduled work hours and less stress but you haven’t.”
“Because I want to help people,” Sally sighed. “I work better on the front lines, not sitting in an office picking and choosing who to see.”
“Then the answer is simple,” Grant told her. “You need to take your help to the front lines, go where you’re most needed.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do,” she groaned, sitting down heavily on the couch, the exhaustion of the last few shifts coupled with the emotions still riding her getting the better of her.
“Not here, Sal, there.”
“Where?”
“Wherever you’re needed most. Join a charity, volunteer. We don’t need the money, the farm is established enough that it can run itself, the business is doing well since we partnered with Williams and we can afford to take some time off.”
“We?”
“You didn’t think I’d let you go alone, did you?” Grant reached over to take her hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze. “We’ve always done everything together, we're a partnership."
“You’d come with me? But, what about Jeff’s school? He’s due to start soon.”
“Learn by doing, what better education than travel?”
“He’d need more than that,” she argued, frustrated that her husband was dangling such an enticing carrot, painting her such a beautiful picture when it was so impractical.
“We’ll make sure he keeps up with his schooling, homeschooling is more than doable. Plus we’d be teaching him valuable life lessons, the fact that you should always help people if you can. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want our son growing up as a spoiled brat that thinks of no one but himself. Start 'em young, that’s what I say.”
“I can’t ask this of you,” she whispered, shaking her head but clearly wavering.
“You aren’t asking, I’m offering,” Grant answered honestly. “All I’ve ever wanted was to support you and your dreams. I want you to be the best you can be, but I also want you to feel happy and fulfilled.”
“But we can’t…”
“We can. If this is what you want, if you want to make a difference and help people that can’t help themselves, then you can’t do it here.”
Sally looked at her husband, her partner, the father of her son, really looked at him, trying to gauge how he was truly feeling. Grant was a good man, open and honest, light hearted and calm but with a sensitive side that matched his technical mind. If you looked up the definition of ‘one of the good guys’ in the dictionary she was sure you would find a picture of him there. He wouldn’t suggest this, he wouldn’t suggest uprooting their family for an undetermined amount of time unless he really believed in her.
“We can do this? I can help?” she still wasn’t sure, probably wouldn’t ever be sure.
“It doesn’t have to be a permanent decision, it doesn’t have to be forever, it can be for just now. But I’ve been watching you, I see the way you've come home looking more frustrated, more hopeless, more on edge with every shift. I've watched you put off that promotion and I know why. You have an inbuilt need to help, to put them back together when they are at their lowest, to save them. And you’re wasted here. Out there, in places where they don’t have a state of the art hospital and the latest equipment, where they don’t have the resources and knowledge you do, you can do the most good.”
“You really think I can help?”
“I don’t think, I know,” he answered honestly. He loved his wife and wanted nothing more than to see her happy. Sally had always been one for her crusades as he called them, she was forever adopting people, colleagues at work, neighbours, making friends wherever she went. She had mothered everyone even before she had been one, she dragged people out of their shell and wanted nothing more than to help heal the world. Idealistic maybe, but if anyone was going to succeed in making a difference, it was her.
The second he’d mentioned the idea he’d been pondering for months, he'd known it was the right thing for her. Her face had lit up in a way he hadn’t seen since the day their son had been born. She needed to be doing, she needed to feel useful, she needed to be, as she had put it, on the front lines. She needed to help. Now that he was staring into an unknown future away from the comforts of home and the predictability of their relatively mundane lives, he knew that he’d follow her anywhere.
“No doubt about it.”
Sally took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, her mind whirling. She couldn’t just give up her job, not after she’d worked so hard to get where she was, to gain the respect of her peers and to make her mentors proud. She needed to be certain that they could make this work. That they could essentially drop everything and fly all over the world, into potentially dangerous environments such as warzones or places of extreme poverty, especially if she was bringing her family with her. She couldn't make a decision based on her desire for adventure.
“I could request a sabbatical,” she mused, almost to herself.
“You could,” Grant agreed placidly, knowing her well enough by now. You didn’t push his wife into anything, you could suggest things, but it had to be her decision in the end and she had to come to it on her own.
“Just to see if we can make it work.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Grant replied, casually reaching for his newspaper.
“And the business would be able to continue without constant input? The farm would be alright?”
“Definitely. We already have a competent manager who can hire more workers if needed and the combine side is being overseen by Williams.”
“So we could do it?”
“I wouldn't have suggested it otherwise," he opened the paper.
“We can do this?”
“We can,” he assured her.
"We're doing it!" she squealed, throwing her arms around his neck.
***
As with any mother she had never believed that anyone would be good enough for her son. She wasn’t labouring under the delusion that the sun shone out of his backside, but she was comfortable in the knowledge that they had done good by him, bringing him up right with the same values and care that she herself has been shown. She knew it would take a very special lady to be worthy of him because no man would ever treat her better.
Her son was a bit of a ladies man, his rugged good looks and fearless sense of adventure had made him very popular, earning him a string of admirers and many dates. But none had stuck around longer than a few months and none he’d brought home with him.
Lucille had been a surprise, a strong and feisty female that had instantly launched into helping in the kitchen, chopping vegetables and peeling potatoes without even being asked. Sally had liked her immediately, liked the effortless way she had started conversations, helping while not taking over and her genuine aura of sweetness.
She also liked the way that she looked at Jeff, like he was something special, her eyes never straying far from him no matter where he was in the room. And Jeff was looking at her in just the same way. She could see just how much he liked the look of this delicate slip of a girl with her honeyed skin, silky mahogany hair and golden brown eyes all courtesy, she told them, of her mixed heritage of Native American and European ancestry on her grandmother's side and indigenous Australian on her grandfather’s.
If Sally had loved being a mother she simply adored being a grandmother. Lucille was a natural at motherhood, sailing through her pregnancies with the minimum of sickness, always seeming to be in perfect health.
Sally remembered how she had often felt overwhelmed in the early years of Jeff’s life, when she was juggling work with a baby, but Lucille, as a freelance artist, seemed to take it in her stride. Endowed with endless patience and seeming to possess almost otherworldly senses when it came to her children, she always seemed to know exactly where they were and what they were up to. Nothing got past her.
Lucille had been gifted with a creative streak a mile wide, her talents stretching not only into artistic pursuits but musical too, along with a love of storytelling she had inherited from her grandmother. Lucille didn’t do normal bedtime stories, she never picked up a book but instead told her sons the stories that had been passed down through both branches of her family. Each son had a favourite, the story of the great hare, the blackfoot and the creation of languages, the rainbow serpent, how the water got to the plains and the story of The Thunderboys and the Thunderbird. They never seemed to tire of them, especially little Gordon who was forever begging for one last story before he would sleep. Many a night Sally had pottered around the lounge tidying away the mess of the day while listening to the soft, lilting voice of her daughter-in-law as she settled the boys to sleep. Firm but fair, loving and kind, Sally knew she couldn’t have picked a better mother for her precious grandbabies.
Sally felt privileged to spend long summer weeks with the family while her son was off planet, lending a hand and watching her grandchildren grow. There was a running joke within the family that it was Sally’s willingness to help out with the children, sometimes taking them to visit with her and their grandfather Grant on the ranch whenever Jeff was due home, that led to them adding another child to their brood with such regularity. Not that she was about to complain.
Life should have been perfect but, as is so often the case, the hand of fate decided to deal the family a crippling blow. Sally could remember it as if it were yesterday, she could hear the excited chatter of her younger grandsons as they travelled to the mountains for an early christmas holiday, climbing higher and higher with each mile their tyres ate up.
Scott at 17 was in his last year of high-school and cramming like crazy, tucked in the back of the minivan with 12 year old John who just wanted to read his book in peace. 14 year old Virgil was happy enough to be seated between 9 year old Gordon and 2 year old Alan, making sure they didn’t need anything like a potty break or more snacks. Lucille sat in the back with Scott and John while Sally sat shotgun with Grant as they made their way to the cabin in Aspen where Jeff would join them when he returned from his meeting.
Jeff had been busy of late, beginning to limit his trips into space and play a more active role in the company that Grant had cultivated over the years, using his share to branch out from combine harvesters into construction and aerospace hardware, bringing with it a very tidy profit. He’d been putting in long hours supervising the expansion of their construction plant, the development laboratories, equipment testing and training centers. He badly needed some time off to spend with his family, something that had prompted Sally to organise the impromptu family vacation.
The family were fully settled into the cabin by the time Jeff was getting ready to fly out to join them three days later. Sally had taken the boys out for a walk, Virgil wanting to try out the camera he’d received for his birthday on the stunning visuals that the mountains gave them, leaving Grant and Lucille behind, both of them having developed a mild cold over the past few days.
The weather was uncharacteristically warm, although the air was still cold enough to nip at their noses, chill their ears and make their breath puff out in clouds. Alan was wrapped up warm in his little snow suit and tucked comfortably in his carrier on Scott’s back, his little head resting on his brother’s shoulder, fast asleep after wearing himself out playing in the snow, the only part of him visible was a strip of golden hair between his coat collar and the rim of his hat. Scott stood apart from his brothers, tapping away on his phone, no doubt talking to his track teammates, catching up on the hometown news.
Virgil’s eyes darted everywhere, taking in everything the scenery had to offer, snapping pictures of whatever took his fancy, mentally constructing the paintings he would do when they returned home.
Sally and Gordon were busily making a very lopsided snowman, much to John’s dismay. He was attempting to instruct them on the proper construction techniques, starting with a larger round ball at the bottom rather than the smaller one Gordon had managed to form.
They didn’t notice it at first, the fact that the sounds of the woods around them seemed to quieten so gradually. It wasn’t until they were plunged into total silence that it registered.
“What’s going on?” Scott asked aloud, his attention torn from his phone when his family went as quiet as the woods they were standing in.
“I don’t know,” Sally admitted, looking worriedly around like the answer would make itself known to them somehow.
“Shhh,” John whispered, like talking too loud would break whatever spell had been cast over the area. “What’s that?”
A distant rumbling sound finally broke through the silence, like thunder over the plains of home, echoing around the mountains.
“Sounds like thunder,” Scott shrugged. “Maybe there’s a storm coming.”
“It’s not a storm,” Virgil breathed, his eyes fixed on his camera screen, the telescopic lens fully extended. They crowded around, peeking over his shoulders, squishing in close. The rumbling sound was growing louder and with it came something that sounded like a distant waterfall, but hollower somehow, like the water was heavier.
“Is that…?” John let his words trail off, unable to comprehend what they were seeing.
“Avalanche!” Scott yelped, grabbing first the hand of Gordon then their grandmother.
“In the trees!” Virgil bellowed, shoving John in front of him as they rushed deeper into the forest to the place where the trees were densely packed. Scott towed Sally and Gordon along behind him while Alan, awoken by the noise and the panicked shouting, screamed at the top of his lungs.
Sally couldn't say how long they stayed there, huddled together, waiting for the noises to stop, waiting for that eerie silence to envelop them once again. It felt like forever but at the same time like but a moment has passed.
Eventually they ventured out, Virgil holding Alan close to his chest, sheltered in his arms as he worked to soothe the little boy. His tears had subsided into gulping breaths and soft whimpers, his fear fed by that of those around him.
Outside their shelter of trees everything was still, the landscape unchanged, looking exactly as it had before. No downpour of snow had reached them, they had been far from its path. One by one, as if they had been waiting for another to make the first move, the birds that had been in the trees settled, their chirping songs renewed.
"Everyone OK?" Sally asked, the first to break their silence.
Heads all around her glanced towards each other, as if visually checking on their siblings before they slowly nodded an affirmative.
"Good," she nodded, breathing in a deep lungful of the fresh, clean air. Much like after a storm the air felt washed clean somehow, like whatever oppressive atmosphere had settled over it had lifted.
"I'm cold," Gordon declared, speaking up for the first time since they had run for cover. Sally looked at him properly then, seeing the way he was huddled deep in his coat, his arms latched around Scott's waist for warmth, his little body trembling from head to toe.
"Do you think it's safe to go back now?" John asked.
"I should think so," Sally assured him, trying her hardest to inject some light into her voice. "Your Mother and Grandfather must be worried and wondering where we are."
"I'm gonna try calling them," Scott said but, upon checking his phone, he saw that he had little to no signal.
"It's nearly four, Dad should be here by now," Virgil said, looking over Scott's shoulder at his phone.
"Then we should hurry," Sally urged, trying to jostle them along with a cheerful thought. "We don't want him to think that we aren't excited to see him, do we?"
All the boys shook their heads.
"Come on then, let's get moving," Scott pushed, taking charge as he so often did, just like when they were at home. His mother often reminded him that he was the man of the house when his father was away and he took his role as her right hand and second in command very seriously. He always helped out when he could, either by walking John and Gordon to school so she could concentrate on Alan and catch up on chores or one of her commission pieces or by doing chores of his own or helping with bedtime. The others naturally deferred to him, no matter how much they might love and respect their Grandmother and it was his urging that finally got them moving on the slow journey back to the cabin.
"Hot chocolates all round I should think," Sally said half an hour later as they continued to make their slow progress uphill to the cabin. "Why does it always take longer on the way back?"
"I don't know," Scott frowned, checking the time on his phone again. "We should be almost there by now, or at least on the path."
"Are you sure we're going the right way?" John asked, his own brow creased in an almost identical expression of confusion.
"Yes, I'm certain," Scott assured him, pulling his scout compass out of his pocket and checking the direction.
"We should be half way down the path already," Virgil said quietly, his eyes roaming the terrain around them. "I remember taking a picture of that tree near that rock formation on the way out."
They looked down at their feet, seeing nothing but a carpet of snow. Realisation dawned on them all at almost the exact same moment. Scott scooped Gordon up in his arms and took off at a run, Virgil pelting after him, leaving John to accompany Sally.
They stopped dead in the clearing where their cabin had once stood so welcomingly. The only thing visible now was the part of its pitched roof that was still attached to the one freestanding wall, the chimney had been reduced to rubble, as had most of the top floor of the structure. The minivan was on its side, crumpled against a small copse of trees, partially buried in the snow.
"Mom!" Virgil yelled racing forward. He collapsed to his knees, his fingers already digging into the snow, his sudden motion snapping Scott out of his daze.
Scott quickly put Gordon down and dragged Alan's carrier off his back.
"Listen to me, Gordy, I need you to go over there by the van, take Alan, don't let him go and stay clear, do you hear me?"
Something in his brother's tone told him not to even think about arguing, all he could do was nod and do as he was told.
Gordon moved aside, holding his squirming baby brother so tightly he squeaked. He watched with wide, terrified eyes as his middle brother and their Grandmother made it into the clearing.
The sound of his Grandmother's piercing scream was something he'd never forget.
He watched as they joined his older brothers in their frantic digging, handfuls of snow flying through the air but making barely a dent.
It was there that Jeff found them, his hired SUV screeching to a halt. Jeff stood paralysed for a moment, his eyes unable to take in what they were seeing. The situation didn't register, like he'd stepped onto an alien landscape. His ears buzzed, blocking out everything, his head swimming for a second.
The blissful ignorance of shock left him quickly. Panicked screams, frantic scrabbling, yelled orders and terrified sobbing of his younger sons all combined into an explosion of sound that kicked him into gear.
Before he even realised he was moving he found himself on his knees, in the snow, working with his family in a fruitless attempt to save those that were already gone.
It was more than two hours before mountain rescue arrived, their limited equipment having been called to work elsewhere in the valley, the avalanche small but devastating nonetheless.
The Tracys had fought to the last, trembling with cold and exhausted beyond belief, their hands so numb that frostbite was a very real concern for the paramedic that attended. They only moved when they were on the verge of collapsing, only then were they able to be bundled into the back of the rescue vehicles, numbed, in a state of shock.
They sat in silence, their voices worn hoarse by the desperate instructions called to each other and to those buried beneath the snow, calling in the fruitless hope that they would receive an answer. The thought that they, their bodies, were out there still, cold in the snow, haunted them.
Huddled in space blankets on the hard benches they stared into space. Alan was curled up on Sally's lap, fast asleep having cried himself out, cold, hungry, exhausted, scared and missing his mother.
It was Gordon, sandwiched between John and Virgil, tears still trickling their way down his cheeks, who finally spoke. His voice cracking as he asked the one question that had been rattling around his head since they had first run from the avalanche.
"Why didn't it protect them?"
"Why didn't what protect them, dear?" Sally asked when no other family member could rouse themselves enough to do so.
"The spirit. I heard it, the thunder, the beating of its wings. It's supposed to mean protection and hope, that's what Mom told us."
Tear filled eyes locked onto hers as he demanded an answer to a question she couldn't give him.
"So why didn't the Thunderbird come?"
***
Sally had never expected to be a full time mother again, not after so many years and not for so tragic a reason. Yet here she was, trying to comfort and yes, still parent, her son as he dealt with his grief in the worst of ways, whilst trying to look after her grandsons. All without the steady, calming support of her own rock.
After more than thirty years together, more than half her lifetime, and he was no longer there. How did one just deal with that? How did you come to terms with the fact that the person you were used to seeing first thing every morning, the person you were used to talking everything through with, was not a part of your life anymore. And through no fault of your own or theirs. There was no one to blame, and somehow that just made it harder.
She felt like a car missing a wheel, like half a person, because her partner was no longer there to hold her hand and to talk things through. She was used to him being the one to help her make sense of the world when it went to shit. Now she was on her own.
A mental breakdown was the term used, and she'd always hated it. It sounded so clinical, ironic coming from a trauma surgeon, but that was the truth.
It sounded so simple, it made you sound like you were a car that just needed a part replacing and then you'd be on your way, no longer stranded at the side of the road. Free to continue your journey.
What her son was experiencing was not a breakdown, no matter how much they chose to call it so, because the missing and broken part was his wife and father, and the grief that had replaced them was holding him firmly in its grasp.
He said he needed time to work through it, to gradually repair himself. He needed to deal with things and pull himself up as best he could. He did that, shutting himself away to think, to blame, to ignore. She herself didn't have that luxury.
"Why hasn't Daddy come home again?" Gordon asked, coming into the kitchen where she was trying, unsuccessfully some would say, to cook them dinner.
"Daddy is busy working," she told him, pouring another packet of ramen into a saucepan. Honestly, hungover college students could make this with one eye closed yet she, a woman with far too many letters after her name, was failing. Grant had always done the cooking, or Lucille whenever Sally had stayed with them. Sally had always been too busy to cook, or had too erratic a schedule, plus she hated it. Grant on the other hand had loved everything about the kitchen, it was one of his happy places and he'd been known to shoo her out whenever she tried to help him. Now she was standing in what should have been his space, his domain, and not only was she taking over, she was screwing it up.
"He's always at work," Gordon grumbled, not hearing the little snort of disbelief that came from Virgil who was supposed to be acting as her sous chef but was more like the main man. He continued to chop up salad vegetables, insisting that his brothers needed something more nutritional than just noodles. Honestly, at this rate they would be lucky if they got any noodles at all.
"Where's Scotty? He promised he'd tell me the story of Tiddalick the Frog."
"Scott's still at training," Virgil told him. "Why don't you take Allie and go find John and get him to read to you?"
"I don't want to," Gordon pouted. "John only reads from books, he doesn't tell Mommy's stories the way Scotty does, besides, he's locked his door again and isn't answering me."
Sally sighed, giving up on the noodles which had gone from refusing to soak up any water to absorbing everything in the pan so fast that they were now welded to the bottom, a congealed mass of crap she didn't know what to do with.
She lifted her eyes to the heavens, wishing beyond anything that Grant was here with her. She had never parented on her own before and now, not only was she responsible for her grandsons, but also her own son who was no doubt halfway down a bottle of scotch, drowning himself along with his sorrows.
A bang sounded from the lounge, fast accompanied by the pained screams of Alan.
She rushed out of the room to see what disaster the boy had gotten himself into now, leaving Virgil to put the noodle pan in the sink to soak and dig through the rapidly dwindling contents of the freezer for dinner.
Scooping the little boy into her arms she kissed his boo boo's better, soothed him with soft words and hugged him tight, all the while wondering just how her daughter-in-law had managed to do it all by herself.
A hastily thrown together freezer tapas of nuggets, fish sticks and potato wedges, most of which Virgil had stuffed into slightly stale bread rolls, made up their dinner and it was a subdued family that went to bed later that night.
The sound of hysterical screaming dragged her from a deep sleep only a few hours later. She jerked upright, disorientated, exhausted from too little sleep and too long a time. She was too old to survive in such a way but her instincts forced her upright, a habit formed from her days as an overworked intern.
"Boys?" she called out, fumbling for the light switch and dragging on her dressing gown. Another terrified wail was her only answer.
As she stepped into the hall a flash of lightning lit it up almost as bright as day, bringing with it the deep bass rumblings of thunder and another panicked scream from the direction of Gordon and Alan's room.
Scott was already there, hugging Alan tightly as he walked him up and down, trying unsuccessfully to soothe him. Virgil was sitting on Gordon's bed, his arms around his little brother, who had his head buried in Virgil's chest, his little body trembling in fear.
"Why won't it stop?" Gordon wailed, far too hysterical for Virgil to cope with.
"It's just a thunderstorm, Gordy," his brother soothed. "There's no need to be scared."
"Where's Daddy?" Gordon sobbed, clinging to his brother's flannel pyjama top like he wanted to crawl inside it with him.
"Your daddy is still at the office," Sally lied, hating herself for it but finding it easier to hate herself for her falsehoods than to hate her son for not being there, for choosing the inside of a bar over his family's home. "He'll be home soon."
"What if he doesn't come home?"
Virgil moved over to make room for her to sit beside them.
"He will," she promised him.
"Mommy hasn't," Gordon whispered, his damp eyes lifting to spear her straight through the heart. "The thunder came and took her and Grandpa."
Sally did her best to hold them all together, to wait out the storm and to settle the youngest back to sleep but, when she eventually returned to her own bed, sleep was a distant memory.
She needed to do something, she needed to take charge. She was a mother after all, and that's what mum's did. They made things better, they fixed the problems as best they could with hugs and kisses when possible but dispensed tough love when it was needed. And now was the time for tough love.
Picking up her phone she dialled the number she had been putting off for too long. It rang three times before it connected, filling the room with the quietly comforting voice.
"Dr Michaels."
"Frank, it's Sally Tracy."
"Sally! Good to hear from you. How are you all doing?"
“Not great,” she admitted. “Look, I was wondering if your offer was still good?”
“Of course it is,” Dr Michaels answered instantly. “Just get him to give me a call, I’ll make space for him as soon as it’s needed.”
“Thank you,” Sally answered gratefully, breathing a sigh of relief. It wouldn’t be easy to talk her son into calling a therapist, but she knew it was the only way forward and he was going to do it, even if she had to stand over him and force him.
***
“Mother, I’ve had an idea,” Jeff said the moment she picked up the phone.
“You have?” she asked warily, in pretty much the same tone she had used when he had announced that Dr Michales had suggested he take a trip to get away from the stresses of work and family life, leaving her at home to keep picking up the pieces.
“I met up with someone-” he started but she interrupted him.
“Someone who?” It had only been nine months since the tragedy that had taken the lives of their partners and she had been the one holding everything together, unable to fully come to terms with her own loss because she was focusing all her attention on her family. And now he was just casually announcing that he’d met someone while on his restorative trip that could almost be called a vacation?
“A man by the name of Kyrano,” Jeff continued, ignoring the insinuating tone in his mothers voice.
“Oh, of course,” Sally sniffed, refusing to back down and admit that she had jumped to conclusions. “How did you meet this man and what gave you an idea?”
“I met him at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama back in ‘34. He was working with NASA developing new ways of preserving and packing food for space stations, I was being examined in the lab as part of their space radiation study. They had developed a chamber that created and mimicked the cosmic rays that were created with every solar flare.”
“The sun spot chamber?” she recalled.
“That’s the one. The sunspots were not only producing enough radiation to negatively impact any astronauts in the vicinity but frying their communication circuits too.”
“I remember my father telling me that, back when he was a boy back in the early 1970s. It was a very hot summer and everyone was staying indoors in an effort to keep cool. He recalled that there wasn’t very much on the Television programme wise and what little they did have kept being interrupted by the picture breaking up, all caused by sunspots.”
“Yes, that’s exactly it,” Jeff answered. “The same thing applies in space but to a higher degree, and obviously communications are our lifeline. Kyrano was in and out of the chamber with another member of the team, helping to set up an experiment with some of his latest culinary creations. They wanted to test if the packaging was secure enough to deal with a high dose of the rays and not let them penetrate into the food where it could be ingested by the astronauts.”
“Because that would be bad,” said the doctor who had worked with radiation in the form of medical scans and X-rays all her career and knew the dangers of them far too well.
“Indeed. Everything was going fine until it wasn’t. No one knows what went wrong or how the chamber’s sealing failed but it did. Myself, Lee and another member of the team were outside watching the monitors. I managed to alert Kyrano and drag him out of there and into the protective anti-chamber before the seals failed completely but his team mate wasn’t so lucky. He was taken to hospital but there was a lot of damage done.”
“And you kept in touch with this Kyrano fellow all these years?” If so, why hadn’t she heard about him? It was a well known fact that Jeff was in a much more enviable position financially than he had been back in ‘34 and he was still recovering from his breakdown. There was a very real possibility that he wasn't quite in sound mind and vulnerable to extortion or manipulation. Coupled with that fact that he was sounding far more animated and engaged than he had done in months, and she was starting to worry just what exactly this idea of his was and who had come up with it.
“No, life moved on, I got busy and so did he. He got married, had a daughter and moved to London with his wife, to work at Kew Gardens as a botanist from what he told me. No, we actually met in George Town, Malaysia. As per Dr Michaels instructions I wasn’t allowed to engage in anything work or business related, nothing that would cause stress, just travel that would allow me time to think and to grieve.”
“And what did you and this man talk about that gave you an idea?” Sally asked, trying very hard to keep the suspicion she was feeling out of her tone, striving instead for polite interest.
“He told me he was widowed, bringing up his young daughter on his own, she's about John’s age now and attending a school in England.”
“Oh, I’m very sorry to hear that,” Sally acknowledged, now having a clearer understanding of what must have drawn the men back together.
“It was an accident, he told me, she was caught in a fire and the rescue team couldn’t get to her in time.”
Sally closed her eyes, feeling the deepest of sympathy for the man and the young girl. It was never easy to lose someone you loved, she knew that far too well.
“And that was what got me thinking,” Jeff continued. “I met him at the Kek Lok Si Temple.”
“OK…” that surprised her, they weren’t a religious family by any stretch of the imagination, strictly holiday christians, attending church for weddings, funerals and the odd christmas mass but nothing that equated to any kind of devotion, especially not Jeff. A man of science, he dealt in facts and figures, wanting to know how the world worked, possessing a desire to unlock and explore the mysteries of the universe. So to hear that he had been visiting a temple was surprising to say the least.
“I’ve felt lost,” Jeff admitted, his voice quiet, almost like he was talking to himself. “Helpless. I should have been there, I could have done something.”
Sally sighed, wishing she was there to wrap her boy up in her arms and take this pain away. But it was good, this was the first time he’d spoken to her about his feelings, or about that terrible day at all. He’d shut down, become a shell of himself. She’d reminded him over and over again that he still had them, that he still had his sons and they needed him, but it had been like shouting down into a dark abyss that had swallowed him whole and refused to let him climb out.
“There was nothing you could have done,” she insisted. “If you had been there you would have either been out with us or in the cabin. Nothing could have helped, nothing could be done. Rescue teams were too far out and their equipment wasn’t up to the task, there was nothing that anyone could do to save them.”
“That’s the point,” Jeff mused. “What if there had been?”
“I don’t understand,” Sally frowned, wishing that he had enabled video calling rather than just voice, she wanted nothing more than to see him at that moment.
“I was lost,” Jeff repeated, “I’d tried getting angry, I'd tried drinking myself into oblivion, I'd tried throwing myself into work but nothing helped. Dr Michael told me that I needed peace, I needed to come to terms with it, to find my path again. And I tried, I really did. I visited sacred sites, places regarded by many to be amongst the most spiritual in the world, I went to the Dead Sea, Machu Picchu, Uluru and none of them spoke to me. I wasn’t finding peace there.”
“I can understand that,” Sally offered, not wanting to talk too much for fear of him clamming up as he so often did but wanting him to know she was listening.
“Then I met Kyrano, a familiar face that wasn’t treating me with sympathy, he knew how I felt because he’d been there.”
So did I, Sally thought, but she kept that to herself. Did it hurt that her son had veered into selfish territory so easily, ignoring his sons and his commitments as if they didn't matter at all? Yes it did. Did it hurt that he seemed to have forgotten that she too had lost her soul mate, her partner of more than thirty years but she had carried on, making sure that his sons, his responsibility, had been taken care of? Yes it did. But throwing that back in his face now would make her just as selfish as him.
“He told me that I was looking for peace and purpose in the wrong places. I am not a passive man, much like you I’ve never been good at sitting around doing nothing. I needed to make peace with the fact that, while I might not have been able to do anything to help them, it didn’t mean that I was helpless.”
“That’s good,” Sally nodded, even though she knew he couldn’t see it.
“I’m taking a leaf out of your book,” he told her.
“How so?”
“I’m going to use my skills and resources to help others.”
“That’s great, I know a number of charities tha-”
“No, Mom, no charities, no outsiders, no one telling me what to do or deciding how my money will be spent. I’m doing this for them but also for me. I need this, I need to find my path again.”
“So, what do you intend to do?” she asked, somewhat nervous, she’d admit.
“I’m putting together a rescue outfit, one that's not limited by equipment, funding and local authorities.”
“A rescue organisation?” Had she heard him right?
“Yes, one that doesn't discriminate, one that doesn’t pick and choose who they will help based on race, religion or geographic location. All people need to know is that, when help is needed, they’ll get it.”
Well, she thought, rendered temporarily speechless. Maybe I did teach him right after all.
***
“Gordon! Catch him!” John yelled as Alan, finding himself to be free of their watchful eyes for all of two seconds, seized his opportunity to make his escape in the form of a mad dash for the balcony.
Gordon dived in his baby brother's path, managing to grab his arm as he dodged past, bringing him screeching to a halt.
“What are you doing?” Gordon demanded to know, tugging Alan away from the open edge. “How many times do we have to tell you, you can’t run about out here. Even if the door is open you can’t come out here without one of us with you.”
Alan’s face scrunched up, his bottom lip wobbling and Gordon knew that one of two things was imminent, either an epic pout, or a full on temper tantrum. Although it seemed like his brother couldn’t make up his mind which he should weaponise for maximum effect. Calculating blue eyes stared up at him and Gordon could practically hear the cogs whirling. John was immune to all attempts at emotional blackmail, as was Grandma, Virgil and Scott were the most likely to succumb, while Gordon was the unknown entity, with him it could go either way.
“I want to watch Daddy,” Alan declared, holding out his hand in a peace offering, shelving his arsenal for now.
Gordon feigned reluctance, like it was the most tiresome of requests as he took the offered hand, but secretly he was as excited as Alan.
Sally smiled from her spot on the couch where John monitored the transmission from the hangars.
“How’s it going, kid?” she asked, pouring herself a coffee from the pot that Kyrano had placed there.
“Good, they’re almost ready,” he reported. “Brains is doing the last minute flight checks while Dad suits up. Uncle Lee is down there too, just in case.”
Sally didn’t want to think what the just in case might be. Ever since her son had announced his plans for this scheme three years before she had tried very hard to stay positive, refusing to worry about the possibility that something might go wrong. But, equally, she was worried if everything went right, because that would mean that Jeff was one step closer to his goal, to his dream, and then he would be out there, making it happen, putting his life in danger every time he left the island. And taking her grandsons along with him.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the young man who insisted on answering to nothing but Brains, a gifted engineer and designer that Jeff had found while touring universities, looking for the brightest and most ambitious in the field. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing, testing his designs to the limits, going above and beyond the industry standard for safety, but she knew that if something was destined to go wrong, no amount of planning could prevent it.
“They’re ready to fire her up now,” John told her, putting aside his tablet. “Are you coming to watch with us?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” she answered, finishing her coffee. “It’s just a shame your brothers and Kayo had to.”
“Nothing we could do about it since Dad insists on keeping this whole thing a secret. Scott tried to get leave from Langley but was denied, Virg couldn’t leave in the middle of his semester and you know how strict Kayo’s school is about taking time off in term time. But they’ll see it soon enough.” John wandered out to the balcony to join Gordon and Alan who were looking towards the recently constructed runway and the entrance to the hangar.
“Yeah, they will,” Sally muttered under her breath, taking her time in following him. She didn’t want to watch, not really although she would never dare voice that opinion to her son or grandsons.
They were all so excited by it, so eager to help and support in any way they could. Scott, who from a young age had always wanted to join the Air Force, just like he father and grandfather, had already declared that he’d be quitting to join Jeff just as soon as Jeff’s project was up and running. Virgil was currently studying for his engineering degree, wanting to take an active part not just in rescues, but in designing and maintaining the highly advanced equipment that Brains had promised. John had skipped a year of highschool and started an online degree until his 18th birthday when he would start at Harvard the very next semester. He wanted in too, already thinking up ways in which he could streamline the communications side of the operation and team it up with his dream of following his father into the stars.
She was glad that Jeff seemed to not only have strengthened the bonds between him and his sons that had weakened after their mother’s death, but forged new ones. She just worried that they might be too close, too in awe of him, too eager to follow in his footsteps. He was their hero, someone that had taken the most negative of situations and turned it into a positive. She knew that their mother’s and grandfather’s deaths had affected them all much deeper than any of them would ever admit, as had their father’s partial abandonment after and, while it was obvious that they had forgiven, she couldn’t help but wonder if they would ever forget.
A deep rumbling sound started deep beneath their feet, the vibrations travelling through the rock and ore to the platform on which they stood, the boys watching impatiently for their first glimpse of the craft their father had christened the TV-21.
The engines kicked up a gear, growing louder as the plane nosed it’s way out of the hangar and onto the runway.
“Look, there it is!” Gordon cheered, pointing unnecessarily.
There was a belch of smoke, a high pitched whine and then the mighty machine shot forward, racing down the runway. It took less than three seconds, they knew because John timed it, for the nose to lift and the plane to leap into the air.
It sped into the distance, climbing ever higher, the sound of its engines filling the air. The speck in the distance banked sharply and shot back towards the island it had left behind, coming closer and closer.
“Doesn’t it look amazing?” Gordon grinned to John who nodded enthusiastically. “What do you think, Allie?”
Gordon glanced down at his younger brother, expecting to see him bouncing excitedly on the spot, instead he was greeted with the sight of him crouched down, his knees drawn up to his chest, hands firmly over his ears.
“Allie?” John called, noticing Gordon’s reaction, his eyes drawn to the trembling form on the floor.
“Allie, what’s wrong?” Gordon asked again, lowering to his haunches to get his brother’s attention.
“Alan?” John did the same, gently trying to prise one of the boy’s hands away from his ears so he could hear them.
“Nooo,” Alan sobbed, retreating backwards, scooching backwards across the floor towards the open lounge doors. “Thunder.”
The TV-21 roared overhead, now apparently circling the island, each pass bringing it closer and closer to the land and pushing Alan deeper into his hysterics.
John scooped him up, holding him awkwardly as Alan refused to uncurl, refused to uncover his ears.
“Help,” John grunted as Alan began to kick his legs in a desperate attempt to get away.
“Alan, sweetie,” Grandma tried, catching his legs and holding them still, which just made him scream louder.
“Alan!” Gordon yelled, startling the little boy so much that he fell into a shocked silence. “Look up!”
Alan shook his head, still clearly terrified, his arms wrapping around John’s neck in a stranglehold that would have done a boa proud.
“It’s not thunder, Alan,” John promised him, raising his voice in an effort to be heard.
“No, it's not. Look,” Gordon insisted, pointing to the sky above them as the plane shot into view. “That’s not thunder, it just sounds like it.”
“Not thunder?” Alan sniffed, finally starting to calm although tears still streamed down his chubby cheeks.
“It’s Dad’s plane, Allie,” John reminded him, hugging him tighter. “You wanted to see it.”
“Daddy ‘bird?” Alan repeated, using the same phrase he’d heard his older brother’s use while talking to their dad.
“Yep, that’s right,” Gordon grinned, struck with a sudden flash of inspiration. “It’s Dad’s Thunderbird.”
***
It wasn’t the TV-21 that took her son away from her as Sally had feared, but the pain was just the same.
She remembered the utter devastation that had been written across Scott’s face when he'd announced that his dad was gone.
She remembered the way all of her grandsons had seemed to crumble in on themselves, reverting from young men back to the children she had helped through an achingly similar situation just eight years before.
She remembered the silence that took over the house, the hopelessness.
Jeff’s fledgling operation that had been named International Rescue had stalled, rudderless without its captain at the wheel. Without his driving force to push it along.
It had taken six months and a disaster on the news to push her boys back into action again, to motivate them into picking up the reins that had been so unceremoniously dropped and to start moving forward again.
But they were Tracys’, they never gave up, they never backed down, they never allowed their own fears and emotions to stop them doing what they felt they should. Tracys never quit.
At first they followed the procedures laid out by their father to the letter, the constant question of “What would Dad do?” hung in the air every time Brains came to them with a design, an upgrade or just a question.
The spectre of their father hung over them, both a guiding light, a driving force but also an impossibly high standard to match up to.
Scott especially seemed to make it his mission to stick as close to his father's memory as possible, so much so that Sally worried that everything that had made Scott so unique, so him, would be slowly swallowed up, leaving a carbon copy of his father in his place.
She knew how they felt, she had lost him too, but she knew how this would go if she allowed it. She saw their reluctance towards change, not wanting to modify anything that their father had wanted. She had been the same with the loss of their Grandfather, finding it hard to part with any of his things, hard to redecorate even when it needed it, not wanting to paint over his handiwork, like she was wiping him away somehow. She hadn’t been back to their Kansas house in far too long, it no longer felt like home. Too empty, too much of a reminder of that which they had all lost. If Lucille and Grant had still been there, so too would Jeff, for his desire to help people, motivated by his loss and determination to prevent anyone else from suffering the same way, would never have been.
She’d watched her boys like a hawk, her constant worry being replaced by pride as they pulled themselves up, started making decisions that worked for them rather than what would have worked for Jeff, put their own stamp on the dream their father had started and they had continued, showing the Tracy resilience that was ingrained in their DNA. The same resilience that had allowed their father to survive alone in the harshness of space, to overcome every obstacle that was thrown his way. The same resilience that pushed him to keep going and for his sons to never give up hope, to never stop searching for him. The same resilience and determination that allowed them to bring him back home again.
You never stopped being a mother, no matter how old your children were. You still had that same urge to cuddle them close, to kiss their ouchies, to protect them and take care of them when they are sick. And she did look after him, through the long months of rehab, through the highs and the lows where he swung from euphoria to the darkest of depressions. She talked to him when he felt down, reasoned with him when he was unreasonable and knew when to draft in reinforcements when he clashed with his sons.
Throughout it all, she was there. As she had always been, a solid, reliable, loving presence all their lives.
***
“Are you sure she doesn’t suspect anything?” Virgil whispered to Scott.
“She may well suspect that we’re up to something, you know how she is, but she won’t have a clue what it is,” Scott assured him.
“Makes a change,” Gordon grinned. “I can’t remember the last time we managed to surprise her, she usually sniffs out any hint of it and heads us off before we get past the idea stage.”
“The time we got her tickets to that show,” Alan added.
“The flowers for her birthday,” Scott chipped in.
“The weekend break in Tuscany,” Virgil sighed.
“She never figured out about our wedding,” John chimed in smugly. “That’s the difference this time, we have our secret weapon. No one can out plot my wife.”
“True,” Virgil acknowledged, “and she’ll never suspect it two months early.”
“Now we just have to get her there.”
When Selene had told them that she was arranging a mothers day treat for Celia they had teased her, unable to believe that she could be THAT organised. She’d looked confused and slightly insulted until they remembered that England celebrated Mothering Sunday in March as opposed to Mother’s Day in May like their corner of the world did.
It had dawned on them that, if they hadn’t realised the difference, then maybe Grandma wouldn’t either. Maybe this year would be the year that they could actually surprise her with something she honestly knew nothing about. She was a wily old bird, seeming to know instinctively whenever anything was being planned without her knowledge, with the exception of John’s wedding, but they put that down to her being so preoccupied with her own plans that she had simply missed the signs.
They had sidled over to Selene, nosing at her tablet, rifling through and judging her plans like it was actually their business.
“Excuse me, do you mind?” she’d complained as her tablet was whipped away for the fourth time.
“Afternoon Tea at the Ritz?” Scott read.
“A weekend spa break?” Gordon stole the tablet to look for himself.
“Personal shopper session with a £500 budget?” Virgil pondered.
“Yeah, I’m not sure what to pick for her,” Selene sighed, snatching the tablet back and opening yet another search tab.
“Why not all three?” John suggested with a shrug.
“No way am I spending that much time with her,” Selene snorted, making Scott choke on his coffee. “I love Mum but she’d drive me nuts if I was there with her that long.”
“What if you booked all three,” John repeated, placing a finger on her lips to stop her arguing again, “and you didn’t have to go with her?”
“I doubt very much we could convince Adam to do it, he’d spend the whole time complaining about how it’s all capitalism and a ploy by the card companies to sell more products with a made up holiday.”
“No, I don’t think you’re quite understanding what he’s saying,” Scott leant in closer to whisper conspiritally. “We book two of everything and we send Grandma with Celia. You get to be a generous daughter, we get to finally surprise and spoil Grandma without her rumbling us and best of all, you don’t have to go because you know they’ll have a far better time on their own.”
“Oh!” Selene perked up, seeing the potential in his suggestion. “That could work.”
“It’d be win win,” Gordon said, attempting to sweeten the pot.
“So, you’ll make the plans, we’ll pay and then you and John can have a quiet night alone. Deal?” Scott wheedled.
She thought about it for a moment or two then held out her hand. “Deal.”
“Nice doing business with you,” he said, shaking her hand.
***
Sally did a double take when she walked into her room to find a light blue envelope propped against a beautiful vase of flowers and a box of chocolates. It wasn’t her birthday, it wasn’t a special occasion of any kind that she could recall, so why were they there. Unless they had done something bad that they needed forgiving for, that was always a possibility.
Confused, she picked up the card, sitting down on her bed to open it.
"Mother's day?" she flipped it open, her eyes skimming over the words inside.
“Those cheeky rascals,” she smiled when she had finished, blinking back the happy tears that had gathered in her eyes.
Motherhood was never easy, it could often feel like a thankless task and she had certainly done more than her fair share of it over the years.
The course of motherhood never runs smooth, there are bumps and obstacles, happiness and heartbreak but, when she looked at her son and her grandsons, her adopted granddaughters and the assorted friends that had become family, she knew that she had done her job and done it well.
She had helped raise a wonderful bunch of youngsters, selfless, giving and willing to go above and beyond to help those in need.
Really, what more could the mother of thunderbirds ask for?