Blueprints
by Jules

Alan Eppes regarded the blueprints and photos in front of him with interest. He'd chosen the quiet Sunday afternoon for a bit of consulting work he was doing lately, mainly for the fun of it and not so much for the money he earned with it. This was extra work, not something contracted over the business he had with his longtime friend Art Stanley.

Outside, birds were singing, the sprinkler in the back garden was distributing water with soft, regular motions and the voices of his two sons were wafting in from the hoop by the garage.

"Seven to two. Don, you're slacking."

"I haven't even begun yet, Chuckie."

"Don't call me names, brother dearest. Better watch your game. Whoops, eight to two."

Just like old times, Alan thought with a smile. He loved those quiet, unhurried afternoons, especially when both his sons were there. Which hadn't been much the case lately. He'd tried to reach Don a couple of times over the last week, finally giving up when he was forced to leave the third message on his voice mail, threatening this time with feeble humor that he would disown Don if he wouldn't call back immediately.

"I'm sorry, Dad," Don had said tiredly half an hour later when he called back, "you know how it goes."

"No, Donnie, I don't," Alan had answered. "In my line of work, we go home at night to sleep."

"I'll come by Saturday, I promise," Don had continued and the extreme exhaustion audible in his voice had Alan worried more than just a little bit. "We have a really hot case right now and things are little wild around here."

A small conversation with Charlie hadn't shed any more light either. "No idea, Dad. Haven't talked much to Don either."

And Charlie was busy with his own work, preparing a conference where he was going to lecture and teaching all day. Resigning himself to waiting, even if it was hard, Alan had waited for Saturday to roll around. And yes, around 9 in the evening, he'd heard the soft rumble of Don's car as it was steered into the driveway.

After he'd waited inside for 15 minutes, listening for the soft jingle of Don's key-chain that wouldn't come, Alan had wandered out to take a look and see what was going on. And found his oldest son fast asleep behind the wheel. In an almost amicable display of restraint--at least he thought it was amicable, given the worry he'd felt--he'd woken Don up and ushered him inside. He'd tried to pry gently for details while not trying to think about how many miles Don had been driving around while practically dead on his feet, but Don had just waved a tired hand, downed a bowl of chili and fallen asleep on the living-room couch during his coffee.

In the dim light, Alan had watched with a certain fondness only parents possessed as the worry lines in Don's features smoothed out while sleep took over. And he'd realized, for the first time in a long, long time how much Don resembled his mother. That had brought an unwelcome pang of melancholy and he'd shaken out a blanket over Don, switched off the light and left his son to his hopefully pleasant dreams while he went to bed himself.

Now it was Sunday and during the course of the morning, he'd watched Don become awake and more alert proportional to his coffee intake. A wonderful rebound quality granted by youth, but Alan was not going to tell Don that it wouldn't be always like this. That it would become harder the more time went by. He'd contemplated shortly if he should pry any deeper about that case that had had his son so wrapped up all week, but had decided against it in the end. With a little luck, he might read about it in the paper. And maybe, probably, possibly, he was better off not knowing at all.

With a soft sigh, Alan busied himself with his blueprints and photos again, listening to the fraternal bickering in the background. He angled one of the 8" by 10"s slightly, taking a closer look. What now was a construction ground, ready to be converted into a very modern and ambitious mall and living complex used to be the central office of the Pacific Life insurance. And one of his first construction projects, back when he'd started out in his profession. Time sure was flying, he could remember the constructional engineering process as if it were yesterday.

"Hey, Dad." Don was strolling in, his face slightly flushed from the exertion, but he looked ways better than he had the night before. The bounce in his step was back and Alan watched him as he ambled over into the kitchen and came back out with a bottle of water, leaning against the side of the table.

"What are you working on?"

"Ah, just a little bit of consulting work. A new project in Glendale. Cross-generation living, you know? Apartments, condos, a couple of businesses in various sizes, shops of all kinds. Day care facilities and nursing homes, all wrapped up in one big heap of steel, glass and concrete. The new way of urban living."

"Doesn't sound very inviting," Don muttered and took a long swallow of water.

"Ah, you know, Donnie?" Alan leaned back in his chair and took off his glasses. "I like the general idea of bringing all generations together, of providing means for all needs in an effective setting and this is effective, it's well thought out. The problem is, you can't enforce understanding by building the perfect and most effective structures. We can only provide all that, but if it's supposed to work, the people living in it have to adapt and open up to it and I don't see that happening."

Don let his eyes stray over the photos and prints, his arms folded over his chest. He tapped the water bottle against his lower lip and nodded. "Well, it's not like we're going to have to live like that, right?"

"Well, certainly not me," Alan said and put his glasses back on. "I hopefully grow old here in this house and have my sons around me when I need them. But you on the other hand..."

"Aw, come on, Dad." Don stretched both arms over his head and turned over on his heel, a long-suffering grimace on his face. He let his arms fall to his sides, swinging them a little and turned towards the door.

"I'm not going to get any grandchildren in this lifetime, am I?" Alan called after him with only slightly mocked frustration.

"All in good time, Dad. All in good time."

'Well', Alan thought wistfully as he watched his first-born go, 'don't wait too long, you don't have forever'.

He concentrated on the documents laid out before him again while outside the familiar thumping of the basketball intermingled with his son's brotherly ribbing continued. The project was well thought out, definitely. The planners had taken a lot of things into account, not only accessibility, public transport and parking spaces. They'd broken the structure up at various places, arranged the layout of the living spaces so that they all would have south-west daylight. Offices were oriented to the north so they wouldn't heat up as much. Green corridors were planned in at various spots, roof gardens where it was possible as well, little islands of tranquility. Energy-conscious and modern, no doubt.

And the whole complex wasn't that much aimed at being cost-effective like many others before were either. They didn't plan to draw enough big shops and companies into it to gather as much money as possible. Small supermarkets to provide food and items for daily living, but also art galleries, boutiques, specialty shops. An eclectic mixture, very much opposed to the usual blend of multi-chain stores and electronic markets he'd seen on other projects before.

And yeah, maybe society was able to adapt and make the best out of this. Maybe this generation was going to reinvent itself. When he was young, a lot of families lived under the same roof, three or even four generations, grandparents to grandchildren, caring for each other. Urban living and the quest for individuality and freedom had driven that apart, but maybe the young generation could copy their ancestors.

Alan looked up as Charlie bounced into the living-room, his cheeks reddened and his hair wind-tousled, twirling the ball on his index finger for a moment before he let it slide down into both hands. He watched his youngest pass by and wondered if Charlie knew how much he resembled him. He could prove it, there was a photo of him and Art hanging over the piano, showing them in their early thirties on one of their early construction jobs.

The kitchen door swung a couple of times as Charlie went in and out and he stepped up behind Alan to take a look at what he was working on, the basketball hugged under one arm, a water bottle in the other hand.

"Cross-generation living," he read out loud. "Interesting concept."

"You think?" Alan asked.

Charlie deposited the ball in the nearest chair and leaned against its back while he unscrewed the bottle.

"Yeah, I've read some statistics about that. There are a few model projects in Europe and it's rather amazing. Suicide rates go down, unemployment is lower in those areas, they even did some testing on children growing up in such living environments and their educational backgrounds were significantly higher than those of children raised in more traditional settings."

He folded his arms across his chest and tapped the bottle against his lower lip.

"You know what? I think I still have some documents about that in the garage. I could sort them out for you."

"Yeah," Alan said, "I'd like that." He waved a hand at the ball. "You two done already."

Charlie grinned. "Don wanted to take a break to rethink his strategy. In the deckchair." His grin widened. "I think he's getting old."

"Am not!" sounded Don's voice from right outside the door.

"You sure are." Charlie closed his eyes and stretched his arms over his head. "You finished with your new strategy yet?"

"Come out and I'll show you. I hope you're prepared, I might have a few knacks in store you don't know yet."

Charlie turned on his heel and let his arms fall down, swinging them slightly at his sides. "Oh, I've heard that one before." He scooped up the ball and wandered out again.

Alan looked back at his blueprints and pictures while outside round three of the everlasting basketball competition his sons were fighting out since their childhood commenced. And he smiled.

THE END