"Whisper of the Wind"

Chapter 53 - Epilog

"Passages"

Mountain View - 2070

Gresham:

It's late. And I'm long-winded, I know.

These things had to be said. People need to know who he was, what he was. They need to know about the legacy he left that caused an entire race of people to look upon humans as something other than selfish, grasping fools. He caused an entire alien race to actually like us!

Twelve years ago I asked the kids if they thought it would be appropriate to build a balcony up here on the roof … a "thinking place", if you will. Somewhere to come when a long, hard day is over, and just let all our cares drift off into the breeze.

They agreed. So now we have a balcony that follows the roofline all the way around the building, and blends in with the original architecture of the mansion. The walkway is gunmetal grey. So are the top and bottom railings. The spindles between are white, just like those that surround the front porch at ground level.

You can lean on the top rail and look out over the lay of the land all the way to East Lansing and beyond to the runway lights at the airport. If you keep walking around to the back, you can see the little grove where three carefully tended graves rest quietly under a canopy of green.

These are special. Gregory House, James Wilson and Whitney Travis are together down there. Jimmy is getting to know Whit, and he has House back at last. They are the ones who started it all, and we honor them. Time marches on, and there will be more of us out there one day, myself among them.

Mountain View has been expanded twice over the past thirty-five years, and its staff has expanded likewise. We now have a capacity of five hundred patients, most of whom are not here to die anymore. They are here to live. It takes a long time, this new recovery process, but they're doing it. They have crossed the invisible barrier from "vegetative state" to "minimally conscious" to "waking state" to "ambulatory and articulate". And they have a life again.

Without James Wilson … 'Whitey' … and the devotion of his friend Leather, the research would never have gone forward, would never have begun to gain favor in the first place.

Without Whit and Billy Travis … and Whit's crazy messing around with things that were dangerous beyond measure … we would not have Uzal and Naya and Bem and Stran and the rest of the kids chasing things down to find out what the hell was going on.

Comedy of errors?

Curiosity beyond all reason?

Divine intervention?

Probably all three. Who knows? But it's wonderful … and here I am in the middle of it.

Gregory House was responsible for getting me here, while at the same time, trying to figure out the quickest possible way to get rid of me!

Ah Leather … for all your wit, for all your sarcasm, and all your genius … because you couldn't quite squelch the love of the kid from Pennsylvania … you may have saved the whole damn world from itself!

We still don't know much about the Boam. The Boam keep a very low profile. Maybe someday they can figure out how to completely stop global warming. They're trying. The same way they figured out how to run cars on compressed air and take us on our first journey to the "fourth rock from the sun".

But they know all about us! They like us, and we can't figure out why … because very few of us even like each other!

I received my M. D. in record time and went on to do my internship and residency. My parents died years later and left the farm to me. I sold it to Penn State and used the money for the Mountain View expansions, and invested the rest. I will be amply provided for forever. Even if I hadn't had my long life in medicine as reward enough.

In 2034 I returned to Mountain View to see Uzal. We had a long-standing agreement. When he asked me whether I would like to be the mother of Leather's boy-child, I was so happy I cried.

"The Gift!"

Gregory Leather Gresham-House was born in the spring of 2035 and has been my greatest joy. He was a tall, straw-headed kid with an inquisitive bent and an eye for detail. He is now a strapping chestnut-haired, blue-eyed handsome man, who finished college with honors and works beside the "little green men" in the laboratories.

Gregg Junior is adored by staff and patients alike. He plays a mean piano, and has a sarcastic streak that would make his father laugh out loud with snarky pride.

When Whit Travis died of natural causes ten years ago, I took over as director of this place. I work with the patients and their families, and am constantly amazed to see comatose people wake from their trauma and gradually return to their former lives.

It is an age of miracles … and The Boam. I only wish these wonders had been in time for James Wilson. It might have made such a difference in Leather's life. And mine.

Well, maybe not …

Realizations like this assure me that the avenues of destiny are better left un-messed around with!

Billy Travis will probably retire soon. He's an old man now, but he still keeps his hand in around the floors, and everyone loves him. He and Shirley Appel and Jeremy Elton remain devoted to the patients and the staff, and they are morale boosters and tall-tale tellers and good-will ambassadors. Ask anyone.

Funny thing … when I finished out my year off after Leather died, I decided to return to our work in the Spider Banks. I still needed to pay for my education and I had left much undone, and a lot of history still to be retrieved and catalogued.

During the second year back, I came across a heavy, dusty box full of research notes and odd lab papers, all crammed together in sloppy notebooks with lollipop wrappers and gum wrappers for bookmarks. Chewed pencils, dried-up pens, odd coins, rotted rubber bands and rusty paper clips. Nothing was in order or dated or identified in any way, except for a scribbled "GH" at the top corners of a looseleaf sheet here and there.

The writing was precise and accurate, the research meticulous. I gasped when I realized they were Leather's. So I sorted them, page by page, reading each one so I could keep them straight and attach page numbers. His work was brilliant. Some of it was so far beyond my ken that I knew I had to turn it over to someone.

I gave it to Uzal. Sneaked it out of the Spider Banks and took it to the little green men.

They would know how best to use it.

Enough said.

Now I stand at the culmination of my career. I think back to my childhood and remember my schoolgirl crush and the two doctors who captured my heart so long ago.

There is not a day goes by that I don't miss him. Not a day that I don't close my eyes and think of that moment when I first laid eyes on the man with the smoky eyes. I have a talented and handsome son and many friends, and I have been blessed beyond all reason.

So there is it … my story.

And yet …

Leather has been gone from me almost forty-four years now, but during all this time he has been at my side from time to time like a teasing shadow … and I think often of the way he described Wilson as the ghost who haunted his side: the whisper of the wind.

It wasn't always easy, this path I chose to follow. But I knew no other path was possible, once I took the first step.

I've had to stand by a few times and watch some old friends die. But since death is a part of life, and we're all headed in the same general direction, it gets easier to face the inevitable as it draws closer. Looking back over the years, my career has been fulfilling and rewarding. It has been a delight of infinite surprises and infinite satisfaction.

I still see Billy Travis every day. Our friendship is like the trunk of an old tree that has grown over and around a stone buried deep in the Earth. I can still feel his regret deep in my bones that there could never be more between him and me. But he knows where my heart has always been, and he lives with it. We realize it is ancient emotion, left over from another day. Maybe that's why it still gets to me. It won't be long until I am of another day also.

Sometimes when I'm alone at night, after another long day is over, I wander up here to the balcony on the roof. I look over the lights of the city and say goodnight to the three heroes resting under the trembling canopy of leaves out back.

My eyes rise away from Earth's boundaries and I gaze into the grandeur of the stars. My heart takes a strange turn backward … to the Spider Banks, or to the little ugly handicap apartment in Ann Arbor.

I picture Leather and me, walking together slowly across the campus after work. I'm back in the days of my youth … and his wisdom … when the world offered endless possibilities and endless opportunity.

Then I drift back again, and suddenly I can feel the wind as it comes sweeping to gust about me; envelop me with invisible arms of fierce intensity. I'm drawn inexplicably toward its center … like a cloud caught in the eye of a hurricane … surrounded by turbulence, yet unharmed.

I'm certain of his presence nearby, and I can feel his tenderness and laughter gathering around me like a pair of strong, gentle arms about my shoulders. I experience the warmth of his smile and the jazz music of his voice.

Wispy clouds high above Earth form the face with the beard and the mustache and the beautiful eyes with their shaggy brows … and the snarky grin.

He is with me … and he is not.

"Gregory House" to eternity.

"Leather" to me.

Just like The Whisper of the Wind …

I don't have to see him to know he's there.

The End –

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

I can't begin to tell all of you who read and commented on this story, how I have loved communicating with you. I knew I was taking a chance by killing off the two characters we all love so much, but you stuck by and continued to the end. I thank you so very very much!

Bets;)

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