All Aboard Andi's Dream

©

2024 Duleigh Lawrence-Townshend. All rights reserved. The author asserts the right to be identified as the author of this story for all portions. All characters are original. Any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. This story or any part thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the expressed written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review or commentary.

All Aboard Andi's Dream

Chapter 15

A Time of Preparation

Paul Jarecki woke to a sound he hadn't cared about in a long time. Now it was returning as a major part of his life once again. It was the radio down in the kitchen. A modernized echo from his past, once the most important part of his morning, just like every school child's morning in Western New York. When you wake up in a world of silence, all normal sounds of traffic and commerce muffled due to a thick, white blanket of snow, you turn on the radio and listen. For Paul and John, it was Danny Neaverth on WKBW who brought them the news. It didn't matter who the morning DJ was, the content and the pattern was always the same:

"The following schools will be closed, Arcade, Franklinville, Machias-Lime Lake, Freedom Elementary will be closed, the high school will open one hour later. Ellicottville, all public and parochial schools will be closed. Gowanda, East Otto, Collins Center, and Woodside schools are closed. All Springville schools will be open on time today with the exception of Our Mother of Grace Academy that will open one hour late. Again, the following schools will be closed, Arcade, Franklinville..."

"Aww!" One of the twins banged her spoon against her cereal bowl.

"Collins Center always closes," pouted one of the twins. "They never close Springville." Paul chuckled at that outburst. Their school career covers three and a half months, and they already have the school closing mantra memorized.

"No," said their Uncle John. "They never close Cheektowaga Central. Never. Right big brother?"

"That's right," said Paul, coming up behind the twins. "We had to walk uphill in the snow in our pajamas and flip-flops, both ways," said Paul. Their elementary school was two blocks away, so any "In my day..." stories regarding the walk to school were generally listed as a fable by Macy and Andi.

"PAPA!" shrieked the twins. They jumped up from the breakfast table and dashed to Paul and wrapped their selves around him. "When did you get home?"

"About ten minutes after the storm ended. See? I even shoveled the driveway so Miss Yi will be able to drive you to school." He was about to crouch down and kiss them, but they dashed off to look out the bay window to check the status of the driveway. It was clear of the two and a half feet of snow that fell last night and now had a light dusting of about an inch from this morning's gentle flurry of snow.

"Come on girls, eat!" snarled Andi. "You're going to be late!" Everyone who spent the night in the house was now in the kitchen. Andi and Macy were sitting at the breakfast table breast feeding Danny and Katarina. Heather, Howard, and Kit Mays were sipping a cup of coffee, and John was feeding Cholly oatmeal sprinkled with brown sugar. The little guy couldn't get enough of that.

"Going to work boss?" asked Yi, breaking Paul's reverie and handing him a cup of coffee.

"I understand that I have my work cut out for me here in town."

"You need to reacquaint yourself with your chickens, they've missed you," said Andi.

"I've only been gone a week!"

"Poor chook chooks," said Sandy. "They miss Papa too." That got Madeline giggling.

"I had better get going," said Paul. "I'll have to clear the driveway..." Paul leaned over to kiss Andi.

"I was just teasing, we got the girls yesterday, and Trevett Road is probably closed.

"Ok, what's the battle plan?" asked Paul.

"Harold and I have childcare duty," said Heather. "We'll be watching Danny, Katarina, and Cholly."

"Cholly is good with that?" asked Paul.

"He'll stay with anyone as long as Wonka is near," said John. It looked to Paul like a mutual attraction was blossoming between Cholly and Wonka. Wonka was sitting next to Cholly's highchair and occasionally Cholly would take some oatmeal from his bowl and hand it to Wonka, who licked Cholly's hand clean.

"Macy, Kit and I will be checking on Amelia with Lucy. John and Gus are in charge of everything else," said Andi.

"Amelia?"

"The landlady," said John.

"I'm going to shovel out your vehicle," said Paul. "Santa Claus missed it last night."

"Santa doesn't shovel driveways," said Sandy.

"Eat!" said Paul and Andi at the same time.

Paul had John and Macy's van shoveled out before Sandy and Madeline trooped out to go to school. "Not fair," pouted Madeline. "Collins Central always closes."

"I thought you liked school," said Paul as he and Yi buckled the twins into their seats.

"Yeah," said Sandy. "But snow days are awesome!"

"I know the feeling. Maybe we'll go ice skating when you get home."

"YAY!"

"Be good for your teachers," said Paul as he kissed them.

"Mama already told us that," said Madeline.

"Ok, let me put it this way," he made a fist and touched it against Madeline's nose. "Be really good for your teachers."

"You silly," said Sandi, and Paul climbed out and they were off.

Paul folded down the rear seat of the White Whale and loaded up several tool kits and power tools, and some assorted hardware that's commonly needed for general jobs around the house, then Paul went into his house. "You coming with me General?"

"Yeah, I think I'm ready," said John. Just then Wonka walked through the kitchen with Cholly walking behind him, holding his tail. Cholly was laughing with an ear splitting squeal. "It's good to hear him laugh," said John. "He still cries for his mother, but Macy is taking her place."

"It's only been a couple of days," said Paul.

"I know, but it feels like I've been his dad his entire life, it's like... when Amelia brought him to me, that's when his life started."

"How does Macy feel?"

"We confronted that. At first it was like I brought a pet home without permission, then when she saw the wounds and his terror at getting in the water she felt sorry for him. But when the doctor took his temperature rectally he begged us to stop, and he promised to be good over and over... it was horrible." John took a deep shaking breath, then wiped the tears from his eyes and said, "I pity anyone that dares lay a hand on Macy's son."

"Believe me, it won't happen. If somebody hands you a piece of paper, don't take it. Tell them to serve your lawyer. I read it before you do, ok? And if someone says, "We have custody" or anything like that, you call my personal number immediately. I'm sure this will all settle out completely in six months at the outside. Until then, nobody touches him unless both you and Macy know them personally."

"You're an awesome big brother," said John as he drew a calming breath.

"I'm not talking as your brother; I'm talking as your lawyer. I'm not the Paul Jarecki that you locked yourself in the house with ten years ago, I'm a lawyer now. I don't play nice. Not when I have my loved ones depending on me. Now let's go fix a house."

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Paul found himself under a house laying on a sheet of ice that was several inches thick, looking at a water pipe that was leaking in three spots. The drips of water created three ice stalagmites that were strategically positioned to be in his way, no matter what he did. "Turn it off," he called.

A few moments later, John called, "It's off." Eventually, the slow drips stopped, and Paul had to use a chalk to mark the points of the leaks because the cracks were actually quite small. "We should replace this entire length of pipe," said Paul.

"Are you willing to do it in the freezing cold with people needing the water turned back on now?" asked Gus from inside the house.

"Just sayin'. You know the code better than I do." He got two clamps on, but the third one was hard to get to because of the ice stalagmites. Paul huffed and tried to move within the cramped space he was in. He used a rag and wiped down the pipe and took a piece of chalk and drew a circle around the crack where the pipe was leaking. He was preparing to put the sticky rubber wrap on it when his cell phone rang. It was Monica Rand, his head of HR. He completely forgot that on Thursday he made an appointment to meet with her regarding Min Zhong Sun's promotion to company C.O.O.

"I'm sorry Monica but I'm working on site today... yes I know we have to straighten this out... no I can't get free, why don't you come out to Springville, I'll be able to talk while I work... I'm not going to run off, that would be quite impossible... No, not my house. Seven oh five Argentine Road... yes it does exist... really, it does... Ok, see you in thirty minutes... yes, I'll be here." Paul Jarecki hung up his phone and put it in his pocket. He knew he owed his HR manager Monica 30 uninterrupted minutes, but this was an emergency.

"Are you done talking? Can we get back to work?" called Gus from inside the house.

"Hang on a second, let me tighten this sleeve," said Paul. He wrapped the last leaking area of the pipe in rubber, then put a metal clamp around it. The clamp had four carriage bolts to tighten to insure a tight seal. "Ok, try it," said Paul.

His brother John turned the main water valve back on and they waited. "Is it on?"

"All the way," said John.

"It looks good to me," said Paul, who didn't see any leaks. "Do we have any heat tape?" John threw him heat tape, a long rope-like heating element that keeps pipes from freezing and cracking. The underside of this house wasn't well insulated, so Paul wrapped the heat tape around the entire length of the water pipe he repaired, then he wrapped fiberglass insulation around that. When everything was set, Paul plugged the heat tape into an outlet that Gus had wired under the house just for the heat tape they installed.

Then he noticed a series of boards nailed to the floor joists. They were under the apartment end of the house and it looked like the boards were a wooden box seated between the joists. He gave the boards a tug and saw that they were held in place with quite a few dry wall screws. Lots of screws. Interesting. He pulled himself outside and brushed off the dirt. Amelia Hernandez shouldn't have to worry about her water line freezing on a cold Springville evening ever again.

"Who was on the phone?" asked John.

"That was HR."

"HR?" grinned John. "You're in trouble?" He grinned and asked, "what did ya do now?"

"I'm in trouble," sighed Paul. He frowned. He

needed

an assistant. He doesn't have time for all this nonsense. Even his dad, with one location, had an assistant (his mom). Paul has fifteen sites now (actually twelve locations and three supercar sites) and he just promoted his executive assistant away. From inside the house, he could hear Andi and Macy singing:

City sidewalks, busy sidewalks, dressed in holiday style.

In the air there's a feeling of Christmas...

Soon all the busy workers were singing "Silver Bells" as they worked. Every one of them. "Do they have to do that?" asked Amelia Hernandez.

"We can do The Old Rugged Cross," said Macy as Lucy tried to listen to Amelia's lungs with a stethoscope.

After her coughing fit calmed down, Amelia said, "No, it's a sin to waste a hymn on me."

Lucy didn't look happy after that coughing fit. "Do you have a nebulizer?"

"I brought it with. You never know with our seasoned veterans," said Andi. She was sitting on a stool at Amelia's feet while the old nurse's feet soaked in a tub of hot water and Epsom salts.

"Did you bring some albuterol?"

"Yep."

"You're an angel doll." Lucy leaned over and kissed Andi's forehead, then she looked through the equipment Andi brought until she found the nebulizer. She tussled Andi's locks like she used to when they were residents together in Denver, then set up the machine.

"Are you two going to be taking warm showers together?" asked a grouchy Amelia.

Andi just laughed and returned to scrubbing Amelia's feet with a pumice stone while Lucy set up the nebulizer. She broke open the small vial of Albuterol, poured it into the nebulizer cup, turned on the air pump and put the mouthpiece in Amelia's mouth. "Breathe," she ordered.

"For how long?" demanded Amelia.

"Until I give you permission to stop and die. Now take a deep breath." Lucy has learned how to care for cantankerous veterans.

Outside, Paul and John replaced the hatch in the house's skirting that he had crawled through. The chill air was motionless, so the white clouds of their breath hung before them in the crisp December air. Gus leaned out of an open window and asked, "Are you done yet?"

"Hell yeah. Can we mark this job off the punch list?" Paul asked.

"Already marked it off. Have you ever replaced a sash cord?" said Gus with an evil grin. He knew the answer.

"Not since we redid every single window in every upstairs room in my house," said Paul.

"Then let's get on it!" said Gus with a grin.

Paul turned toward the front, but John steered him away. "Kenny, Ernie and the boys are leveling up the front porch. Follow me."

They entered the house through the back, the apartment entrance, and the house was a beehive of activity. So many people turned out to help a woman they didn't know. People were scrubbing every surface and corner. A couple of guys were hauling the refrigerator outdoors while the new replacement waited on the front stoop. The floor under its location had to be scrubbed first. When Paul entered the house, Gus handed him a large spool of sash cord and a heavy duty painter's knife. "Save the bedroom for last. Andi, Macy, and Lucy are working with Amelia in there."

"Gotcha," said Paul and he headed back to the rear of the house where the apartment that Séraphine Lévesque died and her baby, Chamonix, survived with a dead woman for three days. Four windows needed his loving attention because they all leak like a sieve. He shoved the bed out of the way and noticed that there was a square carved in the floor's linoleum. He knelt down and tried to pull the square up, but pieces of the floorboard came up with it.

He lifted the floorboard pieces up and he realized he was looking down on a gunmetal gray cashbox. That's what the boards underneath were for. Somebody made a secret compartment. He tried to lift the cashbox by the handle. The latch wasn't latched, so the lid tried to open as he lifted the box. He finally got it up. It would be wonderful for Amelia if this cashbox were full of money, but it wasn't. It was full of small envelopes full of white powder and lunch bags full of pills. If that were fentanyl, there were enough pills in there to kill the entire village of Springville several times over. What to do... what to do... He's a lawyer, he should be able to figure out how... then it came to him.

"Kenny!"

Kenny Johnson appeared "Yes Paul?"

"Do you have a dollar on you?"

"Yes."

"Give it to Amelia, tell her I'll come asking for it."

"I don't get it," said a clearly confused Kenny.

"It's a legal thing, the less you know the better."

"Gotcha."

Paul headed out to the front door where the crew from church were leveling and shoring up the front porch. "Dexter, are you busy?"

"Yes."

"Good, come with me," and they walked out to Paul's truck, where Paul stashed the cash box under the rear seat in the White Whale. They talked for a good ten minutes, then shook hands and headed back to the house. As he passed Amelia's bedroom, he stuck his head behind the blanket that was keeping out the noise and sawdust. "Amelia... who's your lawyer?"

"I don't have one of those parasites," she snapped.

"I'm worried, you had a girl die back there, her family may come looking to blame somebody. Look, give me something then I'll be on retainer and you can call me any time to come take care of your legal headaches."

"All I got is a dollar."

"I'll take it." Amelia handed Paul the dollar and Paul pointed to everyone in the room. "You all saw this, right?"

"Right."

"Ok, I'll have my secretary swing by with the papers on Monday, but if anything happens, my number will be on the fridge. Cool?"

"Whatever," grouched Amelia.

As Paul walked back to the apartment end of the house, he handed Kenny his dollar. "Here's your buck back."

"Glad to be of help."

Ten minutes later, Paul had the first window out of its casing and considered fixing the sash ropes on the upper window on the double-hung window. Most people don't bother with the upper window and only open the lower window, but the best way to vent the heat on a hot August night was to open the top window a little.

He almost had the counterweight cord completely tied off when Kenny and Yi led Monica Rand to him. "Paul, that stove of hers is bad, only two burners are working, and the oven is dead too."

"Are the burner caps seated properly and the burner heads clear?"

"Yes, there's no gas coming out of those burners, and the igniter doesn't work, she uses matches," said Kenny. "I'm going to give Shep a call and see if he can fix it."

Shep had an appliance repair business in Springville. He was a great guy, but winter was his busy season. Paul turned to Kenny and Yi as he tied off the knot in the counterweight cord. "Does the stove work in this apartment?" He pointed to the tiny three burner stove.

"Yes, it works fine," said Yi.

"Ok, go to the big box and get a nice basic stove. No high end machine that would take a team from NASA to set the timer. And get a nice, apartment style washer and drier combo. That set she has sucks."

"What if she likes it?"

"Nobody likes having a separate wash tub and rinse/spin tub. Just get it. And use your black card." Yi carries a black metal card with no discernable writing, but all credit card machines accept it. It's for household expenses and doesn't seem to have a limit.

"This is crazy, what is going on here?" asked Monica, Paul's head of HR, as she picked her way through the uproar.

"Just helping a neighbor down on her luck," said Paul as he lubricated the pulleys with grease and the sash slides with wax. He nailed the molding back into place and the window was done. The painting team will repaint the molding later.

"What's with the news crew?" Monica saw the Action News 7 van out front.

"They finished their interviews and went to get lunch; they may do some more filming as the day progresses."

"You need to come up with a salary for Min."

"Two hundred ninety four thousand per year," said Paul.

"Did you just pick that number out of the air?" asked Monica, which she knew Paul did quite often. But then... he never uses round numbers in business deals. Odd numbers give the impression that he considered his offer for a long time when in reality he's on a fishing expedition.

"Nope, this salary I chose has meaning," said Paul. "Seventeen thousand five hundred dollars for every Ford dealership site, plus thirty thousand dollars for every supercar site."

"Are you considering having her work on expanding the business?" asked Monica.

"No, expansion is my job. I'm looking at her to keep the existing sites open. Sites don't close because of poor sales or poor locations; they close due to poor management. Her job is to keep the sites we have running and if it comes out of her paycheck when we lose a site I'm hoping a lesson will be learned."

"How is that fair?"

"It comes out of MY paycheck too!" insisted Paul. "How is that fair?"