15 October 2001 – Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas

“I borrowed a couple beers at dinner, Terrance. Please excuse me while I step down the hall and return them.”

The sound of Terrance’s laughter followed Jeff to the latrine. While returning to their room he heard Terrance bark, “Hey! Put that down, Zambrano!” Turning into the room Jeff found an unknown man there holding the picture of Jeff’s family from his desk.

“Who’s the slope, Terry?” that other man asked Jeff’s roommate.

First impressions are difficult to overcome. The mystery man now faced a hard time getting on Jeff’s good side, especially after opening his mouth again.

“I bet she sucks a mean...”

The mystery man didn’t get the opportunity to finish his statement. Jeff snatched the photo out of his hand and startled him. He hadn’t seen or heard Jeff come in.

“Terrance? You gonna introduce me to this asshole?” Jeff glared down at the man who’d been going through his stuff. At five-foot-eight the other man craned his neck up to look at Jeff’s six-foot-two frame.

“Frank Zambrano,” Terrance answered. His tone of voice made it clear he didn’t consider Frank Zambrano a friend.

“Get out of my room, Francis. Don’t ever touch my shit again. Better yet, don’t come back again.”

Jeff made no move to get out of Zambrano’s way. The other man glared back. Neither moved for nearly a full minute. Zambrano blinked first: he snorted and left the room. Jeff kicked the door closed.

“Sorry, Jeff. He came in uninvited, and I didn’t think he’d start pawing through your stuff.”

“You called him on it, Terrance,” Jeff replied, waving off the apology. “That’s what matters. You just meet him, too?”

“No, he was in my Basic Training cycle at Fort Sill.”

“Lucky you.”

“Yeah, just my luck he followed me here, too.”

“That’s one off the list,” Jeff muttered while placing the family photo back on his desk.

“What list?” Terrance asked.

“The list of personalities you find in a barracks. Now that I think about it, I’m not sure if that guy is the barracks asshole or the barracks bully.”

“Yes.” Jeff raised an eyebrow. Terrance explained. “You asked if he was the barracks bully or asshole. The answer is yes. He seems to have the ability to be either or both when he wants to be.” Terrance shook his head. “Enough about the asshole. How long have you been in?”

“Four years, but like I said that was over a decade ago, Terrance. For the past ten years I’ve been an EMT and paramedic back in Massachusetts.”

“Are you an American Association for EMS paramedic?”

“Yes.”

“If you’re an AAFEMS paramedic why didn’t they let you skip part of the training?”

“They gave me the option but I decided against it. AMEDD’s still revising the AIT schedule to account for AAFEMS certification. Up until less than a year ago, AAFEMS certification wasn’t on their radar. If I skip, they reassign me to a different cycle. Eventually they say the EMT class will be first so they can just start you when the Army-specific stuff starts.”

“You’re gonna be bored as hell during that part of the class.”

“I’ll still need to pay attention, Terrance, since AAFEMS has agreed to count AIT towards my re-certification in two years. I’ll need to pass that portion to get the credits.”

“How are you, my husband?” Keiko asked. “Are you settled in there?”

“I am, yes, Keiko. How are the kids?”

“The children still do not quite understand your departure, though Alexander has a better grasp on the circumstances behind it than the younger two.”

’I’m not sure I have a firm grasp on why I left, either,’ he thought. “Yeah, concepts such as terrorism, religious hate, and collective fear are not something I’d expect kids under five to understand. I’m not sure I understand them all that well myself. How are you, Keiko?”

“I already miss you, my beloved,” she sighed. “I have grown quite used to your presence beside me at night over the last seven years. Your absence is palpable.” Jeff said nothing for several seconds. “I do not say that to upset you, Jeffrey. ‘It is what it is,’ as you are fond of saying. What you are doing is important. Please make sure, however, you are one of the Rangers you help to return home safely.”

“I’m going to do my best on that score, don’t worry. What’s going on with that ‘Patriot Act’ stuff we heard about before I shipped out?”

“Some in Congress have finally slowed the adoption of the bill. It appears it was not even printed for review before a certain segment of Congress attempted to have it voted on. Many admitted they had not read it before being ready to vote on it, either. It is currently stuck in committee.”

“I’m glad they weren’t able to ram it through. That’s a bit scary.”

“It is, Jeffrey, particularly when you read some of the proposed measures included in the Act: indefinite detention of immigrants without a trial, designation of any group as a terrorist organization without cause, passing of domestic information to the Central Intelligence Agency in violation of their mandate to refrain from spying within the United States ... The list is seemingly endless and endlessly terrifying in its scope!”

“‘Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.’ Once lost these civil liberties will be gone forever. The Founding Fathers understood that, particularly Ben Franklin.”

“The pendulum is starting to swing the other way now that the shock of the attacks is beginning to lessen.”

Jeff offered another quote: “‘Eternal vigilance is the price of Liberty.’”

“Last night Soviet Chairman Vavilov offered to allow overfly rights to warplanes from the United States during operations against the Taliban,” Keiko mentioned. “He says it is better if the Soviet Union does not reenter Afghanistan given their past history there.”

“I saw that. He also offered any logistical support the Soviet Union could provide, including hosting American planes at their bases in that area. He’s right about them not going back in, though. I doubt any in this country would support returning troops to Vietnam for any reason. This is already going to be a messy fight. No sense adding to the issues surrounding it.”

With the exception of Jeff, Class 02-02’s ranks contained people who volunteered for the military before September 11th. All of the ‘youngsters’ as Jeff called them were stunned by how fast the course of their careers changed. Many were once angry like Jeff once was, though that anger had cooled with time and was now replaced by firm resolve. Others were flat-out scared by what might lie ahead for them. Jeff tried to catch those soldiers alone and help them talk it out on a peer-to-peer basis. One of their classmates – Zambrano, naturally – decided to channel his emotions into harassing Jeff. Jeff did the sensible thing and ignored him.

That only made Zambrano try harder, of course. He took every opportunity to make a snide comment or insult Jeff when he thought the drill sergeants couldn’t hear. Thursday afternoon, after the class drew their field equipment from Fort Sam’s Central Issuing Facility, Jeff approached the lead drill sergeant for their cycle.

“Excuse me, Drill Sergeant?” Jeff asked from the doorway to the man’s office.

“Yes, Knox?” Of all the soldiers in the cycle Jeff Knox was the least needy one, and the last one Dale Chin ever expected to see in his office after only three days. Chin waved Jeff in. “At ease, Knox. What’s up?”

“I’m sure you’ve noticed the treatment I’ve been receiving from one of my fellow soldier medics this week, Drill Sergeant.” Chin nodded with a dark look. “May I ask you to let me handle it tomorrow morning?”

Chin’s eyes narrowed. “That soldier’s not going to have an ‘accident’ in the latrine is he, Knox?”

“Negative, Drill Sergeant! I was thinking more along the lines of a peer-led demonstration during the APFT in the morning, Drill Sergeant.”

“You’re gonna smoke that guy aren’t you, Knox?” Dale Chin asked and flashed a sly smile at Jeff.

“I’m gonna try my damnedest, Drill Sergeant.”

“He’s what? Half your age?”

“Almost, Drill Sergeant, yes.”

“Okay. I’ll speak to the other cadre and give them the heads-up. If tomorrow doesn’t take care of it we will later, understood?”

“Loud and clear, Drill Sergeant!”

“Dismissed.”

0430 came early despite the 2100 Lights-Out call the night before. Jeff and Terrance fell in with the rest of the company wearing their PT gear and marched to the nearby fitness track. By 0515 the company divided into small groups for their first Army Physical Fitness Test at AIT.

Zambrano wasn’t in Jeff’s group but that didn’t stop him from continuing to make comments from the line next to Jeff’s. Jeff continued to ignore Zambrano. The younger man kept it up even as the two got into the front leaning rest position for the push-up portion of the PT test. Jeff rolled his eyes at Zambrano’s evaluator before concentrating on the grass in front of him.

“Go!” came the command from the company first sergeant.

Part of Jeff’s brain registered the count of his push-ups increasing with each repetition while he continued to knock them out. Part of it noted that Zambrano’s count remained at nineteen for three repetitions before increasing again. This meant Zambrano wasn’t meeting the standard for the exercise and those repetitions didn’t count. Jeff grinned and kept pushing. After two minutes Jeff’s count was one hundred two to Zambrano’s fifty-five. The results were almost the same for the sit-ups: one hundred eight to sixty-three.

Zambrano’s taunts dropped off after hearing how the old geezer did. Still, he believed he’d best Jeff during the two-mile run.

Jeff lined up far to the outside of the track when their turn for the run came around. Zambrano snorted, thinking Jeff would have to run much further on the outside, rather than along the inside rail. One of the cycle’s young women joined Jeff at the far end of the starting line. They nodded to each other before the command to start.

Before the first turn Jeff led the pack and settled into a pace just off that of his sprints. Only the toes of his shoes came into contact with the track’s surface while his long strides ate up the quarter-mile oval. He flew down the inside lane, passing the slower runners of his group by the end of his fourth lap. Jeff didn’t spare a glance or a breath for Zambrano when he passed him.

During his sixth lap Jeff noticed he was being shadowed. Sparing a glance over his shoulder he saw the young lady he nodded at earlier matching his pace. That was no mean feat since he was almost a foot taller than her. Jeff saw the other groups begin to line the edge of the track hoping to catch a glimpse of the developing race. The rest of their cycle began cheering them when they entered their final lap. Jeff knew he’d be tested by the woman pacing him by the end of that final four hundred forty yards.

She began her kick on the final backstretch, trying to pass him. She pulled even with Jeff and forced him to try and increase his pace as they entered the final turn. Jeff drew on what reserves he still had and searched for his normal sprint’s rhythm. The unlikely pair crossed the finish line at the same time.

Jeff wobbled to the outside of the track to begin a cool-down walk. He turned back to the starting line at the first turn and approached the woman who’d given him so much trouble. The dark-haired teen gulped lungfuls of air while holding her hands above her head. Jeff smiled and held out his hand.

“That was a hell of a run,” he said.

“Thanks,” she grinned back. “Mishka Gupta.”

“Jeff Knox. Track star?”

Gupta nodded. “Three thousand meters.”

“Shit, a ringer!”

Mishka smiled. “I’d have had you if my strides were as long as yours.”

“Damn right you would have! What’d we just run? Six-minute miles?”

“Just off that. I think I heard ‘twelve-thirty’ when we crossed the line.” She gave him a sidelong glance while they walked back to the scorers at the finish. “I’ve been hearing Zambrano give you the business all week, calling you ‘old geezer.’ Do you mind if I ask how old you are?”

“I turned thirty-two in August.”

“You just crushed that run! How did you do on the push-ups and sit-ups?”

“Maxed out on both.”

“A three hundred? Shit. The push-ups are always my weakest event. I usually top out at thirty to thirty-five, which is seventy-eight to eighty-eight points for me. I haven’t managed to crack two-ninety yet.”

Staff Sergeant Chin conferred with Jeff’s evaluator, Sergeant Donna Markoff, as the two runners approached.

“I think you took care of the problem, Knox.”

“We’ll have to see, Drill Sergeant. He really doesn’t concern me any longer. I’m aiming for my Whiskey-One ASI, so that’s all I care about right now.” A Whiskey-One Additional Skill Identifier would earn Jeff the chance to become a Ranger medic.

“You no longer mind because he no longer matters?”

“Something like that.”

Jeff sat at the desk in his barracks room over the weekend studying the standards for common medic tasks. Terrance was out doing extra running to augment their regular PT sessions. Music from Jeff’s iPod played softly over the small speaker on the desk. His foot tapped out the song’s rhythm of its own accord while he read.

Terrance stepped into the room with his t-shirt soaked in sweat. He closed the door behind him before noticing the music. He stood at the door trying to place the song.

“What’s that song, Jeff?”

Jeff looked up. “‘Would?’ by Alice In Chains.”

“Who?”

“Alice In Chains. They started out as a grunge band in the mid to late ‘80s but they’ve been drifting away from that. They’ve been sort of quiet over recent years due to their lead singer’s drug issues.”

“Jeff, I turned eighteen before my graduation in June. I wasn’t born until the early ‘80s!”

“I think we’ve already established I’m old, Terrance.”

“And you’re still the PT stud of the class, despite your age.”

Jeff shrugged. “If I make it to Ranger Indoc, the Special Operations Combat Medic course and Ranger School, I’ll just be a face in the crowd at those places.”

“Yeah, okay, old timer,” Terrance chuckled, grabbing his shower stuff. He cocked his head. “Do you have that song on repeat?”

“Yeah. There’s this one part of the song I really identify with right now: ‘So I made a big mistake / Try to see it once my way.’”

“You’re talking about your reenlistment, aren’t you?” his roommate asked, drawing a nod from Jeff. “But you don’t see reenlisting as a mistake despite what your friends have said, do you?”

“No,” Jeff said, a sad smile on his face. He turned back to his studying.

The cadre introduced the skills of an Army medic in the time-honored fashion of crawl-walk-run, also referred to as ‘hear one, see one, do one.’ For the majority of the class the information was new. For Jeff it was about half and half. The medical side he’d seen many times before but mixing it with the tactical environment was new. Tactical EMS was an idea that was just beginning to interest him in the civilian world before his departure from it. Also new was the idea he may need to care for up to four patients at once in the back of a Humvee ambulance, twice as many potential patients than as a civilian.

Many of Jeff’s fellow students approached him for clarification on class topics once they heard he was a civilian paramedic. He was able to explain things while also explaining that how they needed to be able to evaluate and treat a casualty – in a tactical environment – was new for him.

His classmates also wanted to hear his war stories of civilian EMS. Jeff cautioned them that pediatric casualties would be the hardest ones to face. When the others reminded him there weren’t many pediatric soldiers in the Army his friendly demeanor evaporated.

“So none of you think you’re gonna deploy after the attacks in September?” Jeff asked with an edge to his voice.

“Well, some of us will, sure,” replied Altti Niklasson, a nineteen year-old farm boy from western Minnesota.

“And you don’t think there will be kids caught in the middle of the fighting, Al?”

The others sat back when they saw a look settle over Jeff’s features. The friendly, outgoing man they came to know since the start of AIT vanished in an instant, replaced by one who looked drawn and tortured. The visitors left his room as fast as they could. Terrance stared at his roommate while the others left. Jeff looked much older than the thirty-two Terrance knew him to be.

“When?” he asked once they were alone in their room.

“Two summers ago,” Jeff replied in a hollow voice. “It was the call that pushed me off the road and into the office. I needed counseling afterward and I was doing okay with it until now.” He scrubbed at his face. “Shit, it just hit me like a damn hammer while we sat here.” Jeff looked at the young man across the room.

“The part that unnerved me the most at the time, Terrance, was that my kids were the same age as the two we transported that day. Those two little girls were severely beaten by their mother’s boyfriend while she was at work.” Jeff looked down the hands which he’d begun to wring during his explanation. “Their mom worked at a coffee shop our company’s ambulances frequented. She was a favorite of the customers for her upbeat and friendly personality.”

“Did the girls make out okay?”

Jeff didn’t respond at first, staring at the wall without seeing it. Terrance waited him out.

“The younger sister, Ruby, did. She started preschool this year at the same place where my kids go, though she’s in a different group.”

“And the older sister?” Terrance asked a minute later.

Jeff sighed. “Liliana Josette Sepulveda was pronounced dead on 15 July 2000, minutes after my partner and I got her to a hospital in Boston. She was laid to rest a week later in Medford, Massachusetts. She was three, Terrance, the same age as my two sons at the time. My daughter is Ruby’s age.”

“That’s the demon that’s chasing you, isn’t it?”

“One of ‘em. I’m on reasonably good terms with this particular one now, so it should retreat now that I’ve acknowledged it tonight.”

Jeff turned back to his desk and closed the books on it. There was no way he’d get any more studying done that night.

The AAFEMS EMT upgrade portion of Jeff’s AIT class began the week before Christmas 2001 and would stretch for four weeks, until January 18, 2002. He and the rest of his class would have the week of Christmas off, then return. Not ideal from a teaching standpoint but from a personal one it was. Jeff would take a chartered jet home from San Antonio’s Stinson Municipal Airport the morning of the twenty-second. He’d return on the thirtieth. Staff Sergeant Chin pulled Jeff aside after the end of PT before the first day of class.

“Knox, you know we’re starting that EMT upgrade class this morning, right?”

“Yes, Drill Sergeant?”

“The instructor AAFEMS sent is not the same person we’ve had here before for the last two classes. It’s someone new and we cadre aren’t familiar with this person. Don’t let them constantly call on you. Let your classmates answer the questions. Some of them need the help, and the spotlight turned on them, before they fail out.”

Jeff’s eyes widened. “I don’t know why I’m surprised, Drill Sergeant, but there’s a bell curve in every class isn’t there?”

“That there is, Knox, and I’m sure you can guess where you fall on that curve.” Jeff and his fellow students were always being evaluated.

“In the middle, Drill Sergeant?”

Dale Chin’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining, Knox,” he said with a chuckle. “You know where you rank in this class. Go get your nasty ass cleaned up. You have twenty-five minutes to get ready for chow.”

“Roger, Drill Sergeant.”

The biscuits and gravy Jeff selected for breakfast wouldn’t help him stay awake but they tasted so damn good. They and the grits he chose would mean an extra few laps on the track tonight. Given that he scored another three hundred on the most recent PT test he wasn’t too worried about a few extra calories. He almost convinced himself the two fruit cups he ate offset the other items, too.

By 0800 Class 02-02 filed into a classroom their cycle hadn’t been in before during AIT. The room’s walls boasted AAFEMS training posters instead of the Army ones they were used to after two months of training. Jeff and Terrance talked in low voices while seated at the back row of tables waiting for the instruction bloc to begin.

“ATTENTION!” SSG Chin’s voice cut through the chatter and everyone shot to their feet. Jeff saw Captain Caroline Mag Uidhir stride to the front of the room out of the corner of his eye.

“TAKE SEATS!” she called. At five-foot-one Captain Mac’s diminutive stature wouldn’t normally evoke a sense of obedience if one passed her on the street. Anyone who spent any time around her, however, was soon struck by her ‘command presence.’ While she told them to call her Captain Mac because it was easier, woe be unto the soldier who misinterpreted that latitude. Her drill sergeants would be all over that soldier before the captain could even raise an eyebrow. The EFMB on her uniform told folks she knew how to do the job.

“Good morning.”

“GOOD MORNING, MA’AM!”

“Today you will be starting one of the newest modules in the field medic AIT course: the American Association for Emergency Medical Services’ medic-to-EMT bridge program. This course is designed to give Army field medics the opportunity to obtain civilian EMT certification. For the past two classes this module was being evaluated to see how it fit with our training here. Students were not required to pass the EMT upgrade while it was being tested.

“As you were told when this cycle began in October that is no longer the case. If you do not pass the skill and written tests at the end of the module, you will not move on with your class unless you pass a retest. If you do not pass after retaking the test, you will be recycled into another class, allowed to retake the module, and be given two more attempts to pass. If you do not pass after retaking the module, you will be reclassified into another MOS.

“I urge you to pay attention. If you’ve made it this far you’re meeting the standard but this module is pass/fail. If you find yourself falling behind, talk to the instructor, the drill instructors or your fellow soldier medics. Staff Sergeant Chin?”

“ON YOUR FEET!” SSG Chin took Captain Mac’s place at the front of the class after she left the room. “Take seats. People, I want to introduce your primary instructor for the next module. She may not be in the Army but do NOT disrespect her or you will be pushing Fort Sam down to sea level. Am I clear?”

“YES, DRILL SERGEANT!”

“Good. This is our first time meeting this instructor but she comes highly recommended from AAFEMS. I’d like to introduce Ms. Jacklyn Simmons. She volunteered to come here and teach when our regular instructor had to cancel. She’s been a paramedic for close to thirty-five years and worked in the Metro Boston area for most of that. She also used to coordinate one of that area’s most successful paramedic programs. If you have a question, ask. She’s probably forgotten more than you’ll ever know. Ms. Simmons?”

Jeff looked at the tabletop in front of him and hid his smile. Jackie Simmons was his program’s coordinator when he started paramedic school in 1994. He’d been in one of the last few classes of its successful twenty-year existence. Jackie looked almost exactly how Jeff remembered her with the addition of only a few lines on her face, though her once bright blond hair was now silver and contrasted with her tanned skin.

The first half of the class was more about the structure of the module than teaching. Jackie covered basic civilian EMT skills and equipment after lunch: loads, lifts and carries the Army didn’t use, stair chairs, and stretchers. Just before 1700 she ended the class and turned it back over to SSG Chin. He called them to their feet and dismissed them from there.

Jackie Simmons collected her things and began putting them into her bag. A voice called to her while she was bent over.

“Excuse me? Ms. Simmons?”

“Yes, soldier?” she answered in a distracted voice.

“We’re a long way from Wilmington aren’t we, Jackie?”

Jackie whipped around so fast she made herself dizzy. When her vision cleared she saw there was a young soldier standing there smiling at her. Her eyes flitted over the front of his uniform trying to figure out who he was.

“Knox?” she asked. “Jeff Knox? I remember you! Which class were you in again?”

“I was in the medic class that tested in August of 1995. I was very sorry to hear about your father, Jackie.”

Jackie’s father suffered a massive stroke in late July of 1996. He lingered for well over a year while she cared for him in his own home. She refused to put her father in an ‘elderly storage facility’ as she called nursing homes. She all but disappeared from the paramedic program she ran for so long after his stroke. The September 1996 class was the final incoming class of the program. The program staggered along until the following summer when that class tested.

Jackie’s dad hung on until January of 1998. Many said he lived so long because his daughter was the one caring for him. People believed he would have died right after his stroke if he’d been placed in a home. Jackie was the only child of the marriage so her parents’ entire estate fell to her. She took the money left to her and traveled for three years.

Returning home in the spring of 2001 she wanted a change of scenery, so she settled in southern Ohio close to the AAFEMS headquarters. By May she was working for them. Jackie found she enjoyed teaching more now that she wasn’t in charge of a business. She went where she was asked, taught what she was asked, and got paid.

“Thanks, Jeff, and thank you for the card your family sent then. What are you doing here? I remember you working at Brophy back during medic school.”

“Technically I still am though I’m on a leave of absence. They’re holding my position open under the USERRA law. I reenlisted in early October.”

“So you’ve been with Brophy EMS for about eight years?”

“Well my seniority dates to then, yes, though that doesn’t matter given my position with them now.”

“Are you a supervisor?”

“You could say that,” he answered with a wry grin. “I’m the operations manager for their new Shirley division.”

“Ops manager? Wow! That’s a pretty quick rise, Jeff! When did they open out there?”

“Last September. We’re running four non-transport trucks there at the moment, one of which covers Fort Devens. We have eight towns under contract in addition to the base.”

“The base too? With you working in that area you must know the company that developed this class?”

“Sure, it was mine: Devens Medical Defense. Sean Brophy is the one who came up with the entire idea.”

“Sean Brophy developed the class? I should have had him working for me before Dad died. The curriculum is really well put together.”

“Well the concept was his but my training officer is the person responsible for the class itself.” Jeff smiled. “And that person used to work for you.”

“Who?”

“Tara Bergeron.”

“Really? Tara works for you now?”

“Yep. As soon as I saw her application she was at the top of my list. The job was hers to lose.”

“Why does it not surprise me to find you chatting with Ms. Simmons like an old friend, Knox?” came SSG Chin’s voice. Jeff whirled and snapped to parade rest. “Knock it off, will you?” Dale Chin groused while waving his hand at Jeff. Jeff relaxed to at ease.

“Ms. Simmons was the program coordinator and lead instructor where I went to paramedic school, Drill Sergeant.”

“Well get out of here and get cleaned up, then. You and Ms. Simmons can catch up over dinner if you want.”

Jeff Knox stepped off his chartered flight and onto the tarmac in Fitchburg, Massachusetts just after eleven in the morning that Saturday. He would celebrate Christmas with his family in three days. Jeff hoped for some snow cover but was disappointed. All he saw were frozen ruts in frozen grass where a vehicle compressed once muddy soil on some forgotten warm day.

His disappointment disappeared when he caught sight of his children in the terminal windows. They could be heard shouting for joy while they bounced up and down. The volume of their shouts increased upon opening the door. Keiko and both sets of grandparents stood behind them smiling.

“DADDYYYYYYYY!” yelled Sabrina before she and her brothers tried to tackle him.

“Hey! I missed you guys!” he said while kneeling to give them a giant hug. “I forgot to pack a coat when I left so I’m gonna need to snuggle with you to keep warm! It’s cold up here!” The kids hugged him tighter.

“I do not need to be in a car seat, Jeffrey,” Keiko said in a throaty voice filled with emotion. “Perhaps you would care to snuggle with me on the way home?”

Jeff’s father threatened to use a fire extinguisher to cool off his son’s reunion with his wife.

“Your mother and I are getting old, Jeff. Our hearts can’t handle that kind of display.” Marisa swatted Joe’s arm while Hiro and Mayumi laughed at them.

Jeff’s week of leave was tightly scheduled. With only seven days back in Massachusetts his family made sure he got to see as many of his friends and other family as possible, though Christmas Eve and Christmas Day cut that time to five days of visiting.

He missed his family’s annual Christmas party at his cousins’ house the weekend before, which saddened him. He needed to take care of so many things prior to his departure in October, Jeff hadn’t been able to get back out to the Enfield area to see his grandmother or most of the rest of his mom’s side of the family. He used his Sunday back home for that purpose.

Before he and his family left the Swift River Valley for Lancaster on the 24th they visited a familiar house in Prescott. Jeff and Jack Jarrett shared a long hug when the Knoxes stepped into the Jarretts’ entryway. Jack led the young family into his living room. Thomas Addison Jarrett II slept in his mother’s arms, swaddled tight in a cotton flannel blanket. Kathy beamed at her old friend while she greeted him and his family.

“Mom and Dad will be by in an hour or so,” Jeff commented.

“It’ll be good to see your parents again, Jeff, even if we see them just about every weekend at The Lunch Car,” Kathy replied.

Jack sat on the back deck in the winter sun looking out over the valley view again two hours later. In addition to the decorated tree and lit menorah in the living room the Jarretts also placed a tree on the deck, wrapped in outdoor lights. Jeff sat with Jack but stared at the tree instead of the vista.

“You okay, Jeff?”

“Yeah, I guess, Jack,” he sighed.

“What is it?”

“Up until now I’ve been holding the weight of what I’ve chosen at arm’s length. Coming home, visiting family, sitting here? It hit me this week: this could be one of my last Christmases. Kinda sobering.”

“Do you really think that?”

“I have to consider it, Jack. I knew what it might mean when I raised my right hand again in October.”

“You haven’t said this to Keiko, have you?”

“She’s a strong woman, Jack, but I don’t know if I want to drop this on her. I’m headed to our lawyer’s office Thursday to make sure my will is up-to-date and air-tight. Our investment with Neptune’s Forge alone will make sure my family is taken care of.”

“Not to get too maudlin but I’ll make sure they’re okay if it comes to it.”

“I know you will, thanks Jack.”