Page 16 of Ewing

Rolling to the floor, leaving Billy on the couch, he took one of the cushions off the other end and put it on the floor, too. Just in the event that he rolled himself over and off the couch. He was getting really good at surprising them about his development.

“I hope that it’s you, Grannie, that is watching over Billy. I miss you so much but just to think about him being able to meet you makes me hurt a little less that you’re not here any longer.” He watched the corner that Billy had been staring at the most. “If it’s you Mom and Dad, I’m glad that you’re here too. I don’t remember you all that much, couldn’t even pick out your picture if not for the ones on the walls here but I’m happy to know, or think I know that you’re here for my children.”

He sat there for the longest time. Not really thinking about any one thing but thinking about his family. Ewing had been told his entire life that things were the way that they were because they had to be. But glad that his parents were gone hurt him to think about. He just wished he’d had longer with them than he had.

Ewing had been the youngest of all the brothers. He’d been about six months old when his father had died with his mom. Grannie had never thought that they’d done them right, leaving them in a house without food or water to care for them. Oftentimes, he thought perhaps that they had hoped that they’d died too to be with them in a sick sort of way. He’d never told his brothers that nor his grannie but that was how he felt about them.

If not for Grandda, they might have gone on thinking that the two of them, his parents, had died together. But it wasn’t so. When his mom found out that their father was gone, she thought that she could leave the mountain. But being saddled with six children, all of them younger than his own kids were at the time, didn’t appeal to her. Or something like that, he thought. He had never wanted to think of her as being selfish but having his own family now, that’s all he could think about. Is how selfish she’d been in not being a part of their lives. His father had had an accident that resulted in his death, and his mother had taken her own life. He could never do that to his own children, even for as much as he loved his Trinity.

In order to keep the land that they had lived on for all their lives, a Cross had to be living there even if they were the last man standing, so to speak. If not, then it would revert to the park, and more than likely, everything that they had would have been left where they left it, including farm equipment and the like.

He couldn’t see anyone leaving the land willingly. They all had enough money of their own, and they invested too in the towns surrounding them. And when it was necessary they would pitch in whatever help was needed when the town needed them too. It was a win-win as far as he was concerned.

They could come and go as they pleased; they didn’t have to occupy the mountain twenty-four-seven. Just live here. He knew that he would. Simply because it was the best place that he knew of and an even more wonderful place to raise kids. They had freedoms that city children would never have. The freedom of all the outdoors.

~*~

Trinity loved working outside. Even though it was snowing and fairly cold, she still loved being out where she could have the sunshine on her face and the warmth of it as well. As she was making her way to the barn, having only just been able to get a milking cow, she let the chickens out and told them to be careful. Yes, she thought to herself, she was talking to the barn animals.

“Mom?” She smiled at Patty. “I was wondering if you think I’m old enough to learn how to milkCaroline.”

“I don’t see why not. I mean, she’s a good old girl, and her temperament is fine. We’ll give it a try. If your hands aren’t big enough, we’ll try again later.” She sat her daughter—oh, how she loved the sound of that coming from her mouth—on the stool that she usually used and showed her how to get Caroline ready.

“If your hands are too cold, she’s going to object to you touching her. Just be careful.” After getting her hands washed up and disinfected, they did the same to the udders. “Now, I’ve shown you before how you have to milk her from the top to the bottom. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll wonder what all the fuss was about. Go ahead and get started.”

The first spray of milk coming from the cow had Patty squealing with delight. But it upset Caroline a bit, so Trinity showed her how to talk nicely to her, and she’d be fine. It was a rare treat for her to see Patty so determined to do something around the farm. Of late, she’d been blowing off her chores in favor of reading books. It was hard to tell her to put them down and do her work, but they were working around that, too.

Caroline was milked, although a little later than normal, and they took the fresh milk into the house. After it was set up and put away by the faeries, the two of them, with the other girls went out to gather eggs. They didn’t get many this time of year, but they still gathered what was in the nesting bins. They were all shocked when they found a tiny chick, about four or five hours old, huddling up to her momma in the warm barn. They decided to call her Snowball.

All the animals that they used on the farm had names, thanks mostly to do with her daughters. And each animal was addressed by their names daily and the girls would act like they’d missed them through the night too. It was silly, she knew, but it also brightened up her day to know that the kids cared so much for the animals that they were in charge of.

Not only did they have cows and chickens but they had pigs and goats too. The animals that were around rarely bothered the animals that were in pens, so she was glad for that. If one of the animals came up missing, it was because whatever had taken it must have been starving, as the mountain animals had a deep respect for the Cross family and wouldn’t do that unless there was a reason.

Once all the outdoor chores were finished up, they’d gotten about a dozen eggs this morning, she started on breakfast for the girls. It was something that she enjoyed more than anything she did with them as they talked to her and each other, and that was how she found out the most interesting things.

Ewing came in the back door when she was ready to put the plates together. He’d gone out with his brothers to find a missing child. It happened all the time around the mountains for one reason or another, and all she could think about was the little boy whose parents had tossed him over the side of one of the many falls to kill him off. Their plan was to sue the park for negligence, but the Rangers, all of them had been park rangers for a long time, and he was safely taken from his parents as well as the other children in the home.

Trinity only had to look at Ewing to know that it hadn’t gone well. She sent him up to get Billy so that he could have some eggs with them as well. It would do Ewing a world of good to be around the little boy as he wouldn’t comment on things but would just jabber away about whatever baby talk he was using.

“Billy said that he wants to go into town and see the Christmas lights tonight. Who wants to go with him?” Of course, the girls wanted to do that. She was surprised that he even had to ask.

They’d taken the trip to see lights several times so far in the season. The first time they went, there weren’t as many lights up as there were decorations around the storefronts. But each time they went, they saw more and more lights, and it was so much fun to see the animatronics working, too. There were a great many of them depicting bears climbing one thing or another.

After getting them off to school and Billy down for his early morning nap, she went to her office to take care of the paperwork that the president had sent her to go over. He would send her his speeches early enough that she could go over them, clearing up anything that didn’t flow well and anykind of comments that he made that he shouldn’t have.

Finishing up after a few hours, she went to the kitchen for a much-needed cup of tea and something to tide her over until lunch. Mae came to tell her what was going on in the household, little things like they’d need shampoo for one of the girls. There was a leaky window in one of the bedrooms.

Usually, they took care of those things themselves, the faeries having so much magic, but today, she’d run into a problem that she’d never encountered before. Following the little person up the stairs, she entered the big room that had been set aside for just the faeries and knew immediately that it was something that she was going to need help with. One of the large windows had broken when a large limb from the tree next to the house broke off and crashed into the room.

“We can make the large limb disappear, but it would be someplace we’d not need it to be. The glass is easy enough to fix, but the faeries aren’t sure what sort of glass you’d like to have in it. They seem to think that making it colorful will be fine with you.” She said that it normally would, but she’d have to check with Ewing. “He is back now from taking the children to school. Oh, how I wish I could go with them. Don’t you think it would be fun to be able to learn all day long?

She doubted very much any learning would be done if a bunch of faeries showed up to class and were flitting about the room. No, she thought, it would not be fun to go to school all day with the faeries.

When Ewing looked over the mess that had been made, he was upset about all the breakage. Not that they could have foreseen something like this happening, but two of the little people had been hurt, and he felt responsible for it. Getting the limb out, they were surprised then by how much damage had been done to the house, too.

“I’m going to tell you how we’re going to get this done. Nothing nor anyone is to deviate from the plan, all right?” Ewing was trying his best not to laugh. The faeries were nearly vibrating the house off its foundation by the way that they were energized to work with him. After doing the steps, removing the glass one piece at a time, he then went out of doors to survey the damage there. After giving the little creatures a list of things that they’d have to do and in order of them being done, he allowed them to make the windows in this room all colorful if they wished. So long as everyone had a chance to do something to some part of the windows.

The two of them left before the windows were finished being decorated. They were nearly down the stairs when he felt Sunny show up in the room. She’d just bet that she was having a fit over something, or she was making sure that the two little faeries were all right. For as much as she was a hard ass, Sunny was about as soft as she could be when it came to all her domain.

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