Every Last Mother's Child
Page 87
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The next morning the container that would take their belongings to Home arrived. It contained boxes and other packing materials. They began to pack their home, a home that the couple had lived in for over forty years, a home where they had raised their kids and had allowed their grandkids to stay during school holidays. As April packed up her living room the memories were almost too much. She packed their photo albums that contained the history of their family. She accidently opened one of the digital albums, and saw the picture of her son’s graduation from school she paged through it a while reliving her daughters first dance. She looked up the album her eyes misting over when she relived the time when her son in law took Katie on her first date, and how Nathan had been so scared at meeting Katie’s parents the first time.
She stopped at another photo. A photo of her sons and grandsons dressed with their fishing poles.
As she remembered the memories of her son and grandson coming to pick up Andy to go fishing, her eyes continued to mist over. As turned back to her packing seeing a forgotten decoration from last year’s winter holiday she realized she might never see her kids and grandkids again. That almost brought her to tears. She remembered little Jeff’s first holiday. They had got him a stuffed animal, a dog of some sort, he still dragged it everywhere he went. She did break down and cried, the memories overwhelming her. She was so overwhelmed that she almost went out to the garage to ask Andy if he would rather go with the children rather than pioneering on a new world. She didn’t though as she really was looking forward to pioneering on a new world. She was a school teacher and looking forward to see where and what her new school would be like.
Had April walked out into the garage where her husband was working as he packed up his shop he would have asked her if she wanted to go with the children. He was clearing out one of the cabinets when stumbled on a model aircar that had been his son, Jerry’s when he was his grandson, Josh’s age, Jerry had brought flying aircar over so they could get it running and give it to Josh. He thought about seeing what it would take to fix it then thought better of it. As he carefully put it a box he was making up for Jerry he remember that this the first time he had made repairs to it. He and Josh all of ten years old were flying it in their back yard when he crashed it on the roof and had to get the ladder out to get it off the roof.
As he packed up his tools he was constantly bombarded by memories of his children working with him in the garage. His wife refinishing a hope chest her father had built for her that she was giving to their daughter Kate. As he packed up his clamps remembering the time both his boys were trying to build a curio shelf for their mother, and not wanting Katie to help as it was their mother’s day gift to April, and how reluctantly when they couldn’t do it, and they had to beg Katie, their sister to help. It wasn’t the first time Katie rescued the two boys. Katie was always the better wood worker than the boys. He thought she would follow him, but she had passion for law and was now a lawyer on McKay, Trena’s moon. As he packed, he made sure that there were quite a few tools he didn’t think he would need were in her box.
When it came time to move the big stuff into the container, the kids and grandkids came home to help. Dianna, their newest grandchild, didn’t do much more than sleep through commotion her in baby carrier, while the other grandkids helped as much as small children could.
After the container was packed the family gathered on the patio that had seen many family gatherings. Now they were joined by several of the neighbors saying their good byes to April and Andy. Although the grandkids knew that grandma and grandpa were moving, they had no idea that they would never see their grandparents again. That night they pulled two of the big beds they were leaving behind together that was where the five grandkids slept with their grandparents.
The next morning the container was picked up. They had been told to report to a nearby high school parking lot. They traveled to the lot where about a hundred other people were being processed to board the waiting landing craft. It was when the couple was getting their things to board the landing craft that the grandkids knew what was going on. Everyone was in tears as the grandkids were pried from Andy and April. April was in tears as they processed through the screeners. Once aboard the landing craft April broke down and cried all the way to their transport. She wasn’t alone.