It was surprisingly warm that May morning on the mountain.
Galen walked over to the calendar and carefully crossed off the previous day’s date: May 7. They all would leave for Richmond just after breakfast so he had to hurry. Everything needed to go perfectly for once in his life.
The warm weather would get even warmer as they headed southeast but the spring chill hadn’t quite vacated. So over his blue-jeans and denim shirt he slipped on his old, navy-blue, button-down sweater, Cathy’s last Christmas gift to him. He found the faded, dark-blue, deer-stalker hat that Leni had placed on his head way back when his hair had been dark brown.
How she had danced around him, a wind sprite who loved him, laughing and calling him her “detective doctor.” His eyes blurred as he remembered his reply.
“Sure you don’t mean defective?”
They blurred even more as his aged body remembered the embrace that followed.
It was still early dawn as he moved quietly to the great oak door, holding his walking stick up so as not to awaken the others. Once outside, he headed down the southeast path, his still-intact hearing picking up the early morning forest symphony of birds, insects and rustling from animals large and small.
He could smell the morning mist rising from the migratory bird pond and the ammonia-scented markings of The Others.
Strange, my closest friends, after Edison, Nancy and Sandy, are the four-legged and feathered creatures that share our mountain sanctuary, our Safehaven.
He rested upon the glacial boulder that had become his meditation seat, his bear-sized body a crude version of Rodin’s “The Thinker.” He watched the light breezes ripple across the pond and heard the vibrato of the bumblebees as they harvested nectar from nearby patches of clover.
He sat still as they slowly came forward from their den, not cautiously or in fear, but with the early morning lupine motion of just-awakened canines. The pack of seven splayed themselves in a semi-circle only a few yards away, the alpha male and his two consiglieres taking the forward positions.
Galen heard the rustling from the forest verge and smiled as Baloo, the old bear he considered his soul mate and totem, waddled into view. He looked up and saw the Great Horned Owl and Edison’s bobcat, Bobby, perched on separate tree branches.
“I’ll be away for several days, my friends. We’re going to see Tonio graduate from medical school. You remember Tonio and Carmelita and Freddie? They’re all grown up now. Hard to believe, isn’t it?”
He stared at the forest creatures.
“Do you feel this way when your cubs, pups, kits and clutches become older and more independent?”
Baloo nodded. Was it in agreement or was he just shaking a fly away from his snout? The wolves peered back through yellow-green, luminescent eyes. One stood up and picked up one of this season’s young pups by the scruff of its neck when it started to wander away.
Galen laughed at the sight of the pup struggling to free itself from the jaws of its mother. Then it stopped and hung in limp resignation until the she-wolf returned it to its place next to her and the pack.
“My two-legged friends, Nancy and Edison, have watched with me as our three adopted children grew and matured. Now the last is ready to go out into the world. Where does that leave us?”
The bobcat stretched languidly then caught itself as it started to slide off the dew-covered branch. Sharp claws prevented a disastrous fall.
“Yes, Bobby, I see what you mean. I guess the three of us are out on a limb. But don’t you all think the kids will still be here for us?”
Galen looked at the Great Horned Owl that Nancy had named Baby. It was staring off into the distance and he had to strain to see three much-younger owls flying away in three different directions.
He sighed and stood up. As he did the alpha male wolf also rose. It walked to the cluster of young pups and nudged one forward.
Galen looked into the eyes of the pack leader and nodded.
“This is your successor, isn’t it, old boy?”
The wolf looked at the pup and then at Galen and understanding passed between them.
“You really think this will work, Bear?”
“Piece of cake, Half-pint.”
“Then we all agree.”
Four gray-haired heads cackled with glee.
“Tony, they’re here!” Sarah called out as she quickly fluffed the pillows on the old sofa and removed the four glasses sitting on the coffee table, rinsing them off in the sink and stashing them in the dishwasher.
Judy plucked several newspaper sections from the living room floor before directing JP to “check the bathroom!”
Slowly the four old timers stepped out of Edison’s RV, the one he had affectionately named Wilma over a decade earlier. As if in concert they stretched and filed up the steps to apartment 1900H.
Tonio had slept late for the first time in four years. He jumped out of bed with a start, quickly pulled on boxers, tee shirt and jeans while muttering, “They weren’t supposed to be here until later.”
He half-hopped down the hallway while pulling on socks and shoes and made it to the door just as Galen had extended his finger to press the doorbell.
“Hey, come on in, folks. You made good time.”
The tall soon-to-be MD hugged the four, one by one, as they entered. Sarah hugged and danced around the floor with her grandmother.
“Can we get you anything? It must have been a long ride for you.”
“We’ve got rooms at the motel nearby,” Nancy said, “so don’t go to any bother for us.”
Galen looked at Tonio and laughed a knowing laugh.
“Enjoy your sleep, boy. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
He experienced a vivid memory flash as he gazed at the four young doctors. Four other faces from another time—Bill and Peggy Crowley, and Dave and Connie Nash, the ghosts from his own, long-ago graduation day—stood among them silently nodding approval.
“Tio Galen, are you okay?”
“Uh ... oh, yes, Tonio. It’s just fatigue from the long ride.”
He turned to the others.
“What’s the schedule, guys?”
They sat down in the small living room, Galen and Sandy on the sofa, Edison and Nancy squeezing into the one overstuffed chair, and the four young adults sitting cross-legged on the floor as if in powwow with the tribal elders. As Sarah listed the agenda Tonio suddenly addressed his mentor.
“Tio, are Carmelita and Freddie here yet?”
Nancy saw anxiety in his face.
“Not yet, Tonio. I’m sure they’ll be here.”’
Edison tried to change the subject.
“Why don’t we get a late lunch. Have you folks eaten yet?”
They sat in the same restaurant where four years earlier the two young men and two young women had been formally introduced to each other. Judy sat next to JP and Sarah held Tonio’s hand while they waited to be served.
Sandy studied her granddaughter’s roommate and friend.
“You expecting anyone for graduation, Judy?”
She offered no reply and looked down at the floor. JP squeezed her hand and whispered, “We’ll have each other.”
After dinner, as they were exiting the restaurant, Galen approached his ward.
“Tonio, what was the name of that kid you guys worked on?”
“Sammy Tignor, Tio. Why?”
“Is he out of the hospital?”
“Yes, he made an amazing recovery. I think the only limitation he has is a few more weeks of wearing the head halo. He still tires easily so sometimes he uses a wheelchair, but he can walk now.”
“Whom did he seem to like the most on your team?”
“That’s easy. Judy. I think if he were older he would have been serious competition against JP. Why do you ask, Tio?”
“Just curious.”
The four seniors left their four charges at the apartment and headed to their accommodations. Despite the excitement of the occasion, exhaustion was overcoming them.
The motel’s interior corridor had two rows of alternating rooms, even numbers to the right, odd numbers to the left. Edison and Nancy entered Room 112 as Galen nearsightedly scanned the doorknob and wall next to 114, looking for the old-fashioned electronic key card scanner.
The old engineer snickered and called out, “The room sensor has already recognized you. Just open the door, you old geezer.”
“Hell, Bear, we coulda saved money on rooms,” Sandy chuckled. “Why’d you have to stick me next door in 116?”
She winked at him.
Galen made no reply but shrugged as he swung the door open. He saw the bed and headed for it, but not to sleep. Plopping his suitcase on a chair, he pulled out his phone and, donning his reading glasses, looked up a number in Henrico County. Five minutes later he ended a second call smiling.
The third call would be less enjoyable. He searched the listings for New York City. A short time later, even with the cinderblock walls separating the rooms, Edison, Nancy and Sandy could hear Galen shouting.
“You may have more money than God, Petrie, but you’re not going to abandon that boy. You get your ass in one of your private jets and be down here tonight. If you don’t, I’ll have to release some of the skeletons in your closet!”
Then he seemed to calm down a little.
“All right, but make sure you call me when you arrive at Byrd Field.”
He hung up, lay back on the bed, and stared at the ceiling, a cat-dining-on-canary grin stretched across his face, and the soon-opening door widened it even more.
“Well…?” the trio asked in unison.
“Like I said, guys, piece of cake. Wilma got enough gas in her?”
Edison nodded and soon the four were off in the RV, headed toward Richmond’s west end.
“Sure you have everything you need, Bob?” Nancy asked.
Galen and Edison exchanged glances as both men chuckled.
“Are you kidding?” Galen exclaimed. “If a hardware store needed something they could call
him
.”
An hour later they exited a modest brick home. Edison stowed his tool kit back in Wilma’s side boot and climbed in the driver’s seat.
“Damn, I had no idea you could do things like that,” Sandy said, wide-eyed.
“Piece of cake, Half-pint,” Edison replied, beaming.
FIRE BURN AND CAULDRON BUBBLE
They were exhausted.
Galen padded his pockets looking again for his key card before remembering and twisting the automatically unlocked door.
“Infernal technology,” he muttered.
Now he did want to use that bed. He started to unbutton his shirt when he spotted the knob turning again.
“Don’t let me stop you, Bear.”
“Sandy, how the hell did you get in?”
A sly smile crossed her face.
“Easy. I told the manager I was your wife and we had been bickering so he scanned me for your room, too.”
“For the sake of decency, old woman, get back to your own room.”
“Phooey, old man! It’s nothing either one of us hasn’t seen thousands of times before.”
“Sandy…”
He sat on the edge of the bed, eyes closed in exasperation over the pixie’s machinations. She sat next to him. His eyes opened as she described what she had in mind. As she finished, he hugged her.
“Why you clever old b…!”
“Watch your tongue, you big brute.”
Four friends slept well that night.
The next day began with typical Richmond weather. Galen rose at 4 a.m. and peered out the window to see light rain sprinkling the parking lot as a cool, 60-degree wind circulated outside.
He went to the door and picked up the complimentary newspaper on the hallway floor. The weather forecast: fair and warm, with temperatures in the mid-80s.
He wondered if this was the Richmond he had known—with its unpredictable weather.
If only Mother Nature will cooperate
.
He went out into the hall and knocked lightly on the doors to the two rooms adjoining his.
“Okay, little brother, there’s a nice breakfast shop not too far from here. Think the kids would want to join us?”
“I’ll call them. When are Carm and Freddie getting in?”
Galen’s eyes sparkled.
“I ... uh ... arranged special transportation for all of them. They’ll meet us at the auditorium, which reminds me. Edison, we need to speak with the lighting crew when we get there. You can tell them what to do, right?”
A nod was all he needed.
“I thought Carm and Mike and Freddie and Lilly would be here. I guess their jobs are keeping them busy.”
Tonio looked a bit dejected as he picked at his strawberry pancake. Sarah knew how much it meant for him to see his sister and brother. She leaned over and whispered in his ear. He turned and grinned at her while his face turned red.
Nancy was nervous. It was times like these when Demon Fate caused things to go awry.
“You all have your caps and gowns, yes?”
“Uh-huh,” JP said between swallows of a peach cobbler. “We even have our hoods.”
Nancy shot him a puzzled look, thinking it was a joke, until Edison interrupted.
“They’re not being inducted into the Klan, old girl. Doctoral graduates have a special hood marked with the color of their professional degree. Mine was … geez ... I can’t remember.”
Galen seemed distant at that moment. He was staring off into space, remembering the green-and-gold hood he had worn.
“It was orange, little brother. We should probably get over to the auditorium. I’ve arranged for a taxi to pick us up so we don’t have to try to park Wilma.”
The seniors left the doctors-to-be with their classmates and walked into the large auditorium. Galen motioned to Edison who headed toward the lighting-control booth. A short time later he returned, smiling, and gave Galen an “A-OK” sign.
They moved down the side aisle and took seats midway toward the stage. It wasn’t long before the empty chairs began to fill.
The audience settled down and the processional music announced the entrance of the graduates. They marched in full regalia, two by two down the center aisle, splitting into the left and right rows of seats. As the music ended the group sat down in unison.
Galen’s mind wandered. Maybe it was fatigue from the previous night’s late activities. Or maybe he really was getting senile. In any event he couldn’t seem to concentrate on the speeches, focusing instead on what was to come.
He did manage to perk up when the dean announced the recitation of the Hippocratic Oath.
I swear by Apollo the Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panaceia and all the gods, and goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will fulfill according to my ability and judgment this oath and this covenant:
To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him, and if he is in need of money to give him a share of mine, and to regard his offspring as equal to my brothers in male lineage and to teach them this art–if they desire to learn it–without fee and covenant; to give a share of precepts and oral instruction and all the other learning to my sons and to the sons of him who has instructed me and to pupils who have signed the covenant and have taken the oath according to medical law, but to no one else.
I will apply dietic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.
I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.
I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.
Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all intentional injustice, of all mischief and in particular of sexual relations with both female and male persons, be they free or slaves.
What I may see or hear in the course of treatment or even outside of the treatment in regard to the life of men, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep myself holding such things shameful to be spoken about.
If I fulfill this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honoured with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot
.
The old man kept silently repeating the phrase, “To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him.”
Do the kids look on us as parents? What does Tonio consider me?
Then Sandy nudged him as she quickly rose from her seat and headed to the back of the auditorium. Galen excused himself and did the same.
“Where are they going?” Nancy whispered to Bob.
“Probably need to use the restroom,” he shrugged.
The names began as the new graduates lined up at one end of the stage steps and began their walk into a new life.