Me: Hola!! I appreciate all the reviews I'm getting, except the flamers but
oh well.....those won't bring me down!! Sorry about changing the title of the
story so much. I just couldn't make up my mind. I went from The Blizzard to
When Tragedy Strikes to When He Didn't Come Home and then back to The
Blizzard.....I just didn't know what fit best so I just changed it back to
the original and left it. It's more of the story that counts not the title
anyway. Anyway, I don't own anything because if I did I wouldn't be writing
this....you know this people, come on! I'll see ya after mis amigos!
Chapter 3
Tim woke up what he thought was five minutes later. He looked at the hotel's alarm clock and saw that it was nearly noon. As he sat up quickly, his muscles ached with pain. He was sore and in the mirror he could see bruises all over himself. The skin on his body was paler than a newborn baby's. He quickly went to his clothing that he had laid over the heater the night before. His hands touched their warmth as he tested to see if they were good enough for him to wear. They were so he slid them on slowly. He could see that his left rib cage area was swollen and bruised. Also, his right ankle looked the same. After getting dressed in the very warm clothing, he limped his way to the telephone and dialed his home again. He needed to talk to Jill. Before the phone even rang it gave a dead signal and Tim gave a big sigh.
"Guess I'm just going to have to surprise her." He said to himself and started collecting the few things he had. Within minutes he was downstairs and checking out of the hotel.
The snow outside was thick and freezing. It was still falling from the dark, sunless sky. The day seemed like it was going to be a cold one so he zipped his coat even higher than it already was and started limping down the sidewalk path.
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Jill sat on the couch with her eyes wide open. Brad and Mark were lying on the floor by the fire asleep while Randy was in the chair across from her also asleep. Wilson was the only other one awake and he was sitting at the dinning room table. Jill maybe slept two hours at the most that night. She was so worried that he wouldn't come home or that they would find his body frozen under the lakes icy surface. Her mind played the scene out like she was planning it to happen. When she heard Brad mumble in his sleep, she snapped back to reality and shook her head some. Wilson coughed behind her and she turned to look at him.
"Hey." She said quietly and got up. Jill approached him and took the seat across from him at the table.
"How are you?" He asked politely.
"Umm.....scared.....heartbroken......worried. All things I normally wouldn't want to feel." She paused. "I can't help but picture strangers telling me that he didn't make it. Telling me that they found his body and that he's dead. And it just scares me so much more Wilson."
"Don't picture that then." He responded.
Jill looked at him somewhat surprised. She was expecting more than just a single sentence that told her not to do something she couldn't help but do.
"Think about the past Jill. Think about your lives together, both good times and bad."
She thought. "Both good times and bad." She repeated his words. "We had a lot of good times and a lot of bad times. I remember in our first year of marriage...some of the fights we had....." She trailed off and made sure the boys were sleeping. "You know sometimes we would just pick a fight so we could make up and.....well you know."
Wilson chuckled at her and continued just to look in her direction after quickly glancing at the rest her family.
"Now we pick a fight just so the other one will sleep in the other room..." She continued and laughed at herself. He laughed with her. "Some of the fights we had..." She repeated and shook her head. "Some were so stupid and some were actually serious even though he joked about them. The fight we had the other day-I wish it never would have happened."
"Understandable." He noted and let her continue.
"The last real thing he said to me was..... 'I glued wood to my head today.'" She laughed. "You know how he does that....the whole making you feel sorry for him because of something stupid he did earlier. That's what he was doing then." She said and thought a moment. "And then...the last real thing I said to him was......" Her face scrunched up in tears. "'Why do you always find some way of making me just want to strangle you.'"
Wilson looked at her with sympathy.
"It was a stupid fight about this weekend. A stupid fight that should have never happened. I should have understood that he was doing this promotional thing for his job and that he didn't mean to hurt me by it."
Wilson was silent and she wasn't quite used to it. He noticed that she felt that way and decided to speak up. "Do you remember the time we played that Halloween joke on Tim?"
"Which one?"
"The one with my girlfriend being a witch. Remember?"
She laughed. "Yeah, I remember. He was so frightened."
"Did you feel sorry for him at all when we did that?" Wilson asked curiously.
Jill paused. "Mmmm..nope." She answered and laughed. "He had played so many jokes on me over the years and I just wanted to get him good at least once. Halloween was always one of his favorite times. That and Christmas."
"Ahh...Christmas. Those stupid looking decorations he put on the roof." Wilson noted and shook his head.
"He was so competitive."
"He still is." Wilson said and it made her stare at him. She realized that she had been using his name and qualities in the past tense, which meant she assumed that he was no longer with them.
"Yeah." She said quietly and looked at her hands. "I miss him." She said and scrunched up her face in tears again. "I just want him to walk through that front door and be here." She added and looked towards the door. Wilson looked with her and they stared at it for a little while before turning back to look at each other with realization that it might not happen.
----------
Tim walked by the road. The snow was still pounded down hard on his weak body but he kept walking. The woods beside him were dark and there were no cars on the road. There hadn't been for awhile. It looked like he was on some long highway road that connected one city to another. One of those long roads where cars traveled at seventy miles per hour and debris was occasionally flying from accidents. The word accident ran through his mind and he thought back to the lake and his car. His Nomad was completely destroyed by now and it took a lot out of him to leave it behind. After he woke up from that night he didn't even think about police or waiting for them. He knew he had to get home. Something inside of him told him that he needed to be with Jill as quickly as possible. Something said that he wasn't going to let his children go through the same kind of pain he went through when his father died. He wouldn't let that happen and he wouldn't let his family worry anymore than they had to.
He had been walking for hours on end and didn't know when he'd reach the next town. The watch that was always wrapped around his left wrist had broken during the accident so he had no clue what time it was. The sky was getting darker so he figured it was late afternoon. As he thought about his family he heard rumbling noises quickly approaching behind him. He looked to see a car slowing down towards him. He stopped walking and stared into the fog-covered window of the car. After a few seconds the window rolled down and Tim saw the driver. It was a young woman at what seemed around age thirty. She had strawberry blonde hair and was wearing fancy clothing. Tim looked at her in silence.
"Do you need a ride?" She asked him politely.
"That would be nice." He responded.
The woman unlocked the doors and Tim slowly got in. She noticed he was shivering and turned up the heat.
"Where are you headed?"
"Detroit." He answered and remembered the same thing that happened yesterday with his ride into Flint.
"My parents live in Warren. I'm Kathy." She said.
"Tim." He responded and slightly smiled.
"What's there for you?"
"My family."
"Parents?"
"Mother, brothers, wife, kids."
"You're married?" She asked curiously.
"Yeah." He answered. His head was pounding and his body ached. He was so glad to be in heat and to be sitting down but also getting somewhere.
The woman kept silent for awhile as she drove. "I can drop you off in Warren but that's it or else I'll be later than I already planned."
"That's fine. Thank you." Tim said. He didn't feel like making conversation that much but she did.
"What happened to you?"
"Huh?"
"Well, I mean you don't seem like the kind of guy who looks like that twenty four seven.....you seem like the type to drive a nice car with his nice family."
"I normally am."
"What happened?"
"Car accident." He said plainly. "I've been walking and hitch hiking since it happened."
"When?"
"Two days ago."
"Wow...I wouldn't have the strength to do that." She said admiringly.
"Where are we?"
"Umm...a few hours away from Warren."
Tim nodded and looked at the clock on the woman's radio. It said seven. He realized he had been walking for nearly seven hours that day. No wonder he was exhausted.
"Warren is around twenty miles away from Detroit. I could probably make it by foot sometime around midnight to two in the morning." He said to himself.
"Why not just call a cab?"
"No money. I spent it all on the hotel. All I have is a quarter. And if I'm going to call anybody it's going to be my wife. I haven't been able to reach her since the accident."
"Why not?"
"I think the phone's dead or off the hook at our house." He answered. "Do you have a cell phone?"
"Yes. Would you like to use it? I have free minutes." She asked and pulled it out of her purse.
"Thank you." He said while nodding and took the phone. His cold fingers dialed their number but there was still a dead line. "No. Nothing." He noted and handed the phone back to her.
"That's too bad. I bet she's worried sick."
"Yeah." Tim looked straight in front of the car. "I bet she is." He stated and continued to stare at the snow falling in the light of the headlights.
----------
Brad, Randy, and Mark sat around the living room looking at magazines but not really reading any of them. The power had been out for an entire day now and the only thing it did was make them concentrate on the situation at hand more and more. Jill was doing the same as she was searching the fridge and cabinets for something to eat. The food in the fridge was getting warmer and some of it was going bad already. She sighed at the thought of having to clean all of it up once the power came back on. She hadn't been able to receive or send any calls since the night before and she couldn't even turn on the news to see if there was any progress. Her eyes widened as she thought of something she should have before.
"The radio." She said out loud and everybody turned to look at her.
"What?"
"We can listen to the radio." She said again and headed into the garage. There was no light so she came back out and took a candle with her when she went back in. She found a flashlight on Tim's workbench and flipped it on as she set the candle down. The light shone on different objects: his tools, the storage things on the shelf above, and the boxes in the corner. She moved the light to the boxes and walked towards them. She opened the first one and started going through it. Eventually Wilson joined her to make sure everything was all right.
She slid one of the boxes to him. "See if you can find a portable radio in there." She said and continued searching through her own box. She saw old picture frames and things that belonged to her husband.
Wilson found household items in his box and at the bottom he came across a radio. He tapped on Jill's shoulder and she saw it. She stared at him and the radio for a few seconds and then took it from him and headed back into the kitchen.
It was an old radio that they had bought for emergencies. She flipped it on but nothing happened.
"Batteries." She guessed and opened the back. Wilson found some batteries that matched and handed them to her. She put them in. By this time, they had attracted the attention of Brad, Randy, and Mark. The guys jumped up from the couch and Jill took the radio to the dinning room table. They all sat down as she flipped it on again. There was static. Jill played with the dial to get a different station but there was still nothing but static.
She sighed as Randy took the thing from her hands and played with it. After a few minutes he finally got something that was similar to talking. It sounded fuzzy so he reached for the antenna and pulled it up. He also walked to the back door and held the radio in its direction.
In a few seconds they could hear a man talking clearly.
"Don't miss this all new event coming to the stages of Michigan. Meatballs: The Musical is said to be the most smashing hit of the year. Tickets on sale January 31st."
Randy looked at the radio like it was an idiot. "The only thing we know about the outside world right now is that Meatballs: The Musical is coming to town. Ohhh...yeppie!!" He said sarcastically.
Jill sighed and rested her head on her arms over the wooden table. "Just turn it off. There's no use." She mumbled.
Randy went to turn it off but stopped when he heard a screeching sound. They all looked at it strangely. It sounded like sliding tires and screeching brakes. A man's voice came on.
"Have you ever been in an auto accident? Do you have the right insurance for your family? Come to-"
"TURN IT OFF!!!" Jill yelled and Randy quickly did what she said. Her breath had increased in amount and she was letting a single tear roll down her cheek untouched. She looked around at their frightened faces, grabbed the flashlight off the table and ran towards the upstairs.
----------
She slammed the door to her bedroom shut and locked it. The room was dark so she flipped on the flashlight and looked around. The bed was unmade from the morning he left and one of the dresser drawers were open from him packing. Her tears started to spill heavier when she came across the framed photo of her and Tim that was sitting on the dresser drawers. They were hugging tightly and smiling. She could feel the love in the picture and it made her heart fall. She sunk onto the bed and stared at the picture in the light shining out of the flashlight.
"I'll do anything." She said and tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. "What do you want from me?!" She asked and moved her glance from the photo to the ceiling as if she was talking to God again. "HUH?!" She yelled. "ANYTHING YOU WANT! JUST NAME ANYTHING YOU WANT AND I'LL GIVE IT TO YOU. ANYTHING!" She continued and lowered her voice some when she spoke again. "I just want to see him again. Just to see his face again and touch his skin. To hug him and to kiss him. Please....." She begged. "That man is the love of my life and I don't know what I'm going to do if he doesn't come home. I don't know if I can live without him." Her tears spilt onto her lap and she now hung her head down with the brown curly locks falling around her soaked face. After a pause, she lay down on her side of the bed and then grabbed his pillow. Jill squeezed it tightly as she turned over and then turned off the flashlight so the room was nothing but pure darkness.
----------
Around five hours later, Jill woke from her nap and walked down the stairs. She had just been sleeping but still felt exhausted. The only light in the house was the fire and when she walked into the living room, her three boys were asleep on the floor. Wilson was sitting on the couch and staring out the back door. She approached him and then sat down next to him.
"Thank you."
"For what?" He asked curiously.
"Being here with us." She responded and semi-smiled at him.
"I'm here for you just as much as you're here for me."
She nodded. "I'm sorry about my outburst earlier."
"Don't be. It's perfectly natural. I remember a good professor of mine said once that the best way to live life is to do so naturally."
"Meaning?"
"You're outburst was a natural emotion that was held inside you from the start of this whole thing Jill. To not let it be expressed would be unnatural and it's not healthy to do so either. Grief and sadness are a part of life and we just have to face them when they come. Shedding tears and yelling about something is all a natural expression of that sadness and grief."
"So what you're saying is that I shouldn't hold back my feelings when they're built up this much and that I had a right to yell and cry in front of my kids." Jill stated.
Wilson nodded. "You're much easier at understanding my information than Tim is." He noted.
She looked at Wilson and semi-smiled again. "You should get some rest. I haven't seen you sleep in over twenty four hours."
He nodded. "I guess so." He agreed.
Jill got off the couch and let him lay down in her place. She slowly stepped around her children and sat on one of the cushions next to the fireplace.
----------
Tim made his way down the road again. The nice woman he had been riding with dropped him off in Warren and after he gave his thanks he immediately headed for Detroit. It was dark now and the only thing guiding him were the streetlights. He had to get home even if it meant arriving in the middle of the night. The snow had lessened somewhat as he limped down a road. In the past he had driven to Warren for business and things so he knew which way to go even in the dark. When he had gotten out of the car it was around eleven and he knew he had been walking for at least two hours. Everytime he felt like giving up, images of Jill and his children flashed through his mind. He was determined to get to her, to them. It would just take him a bit longer on foot than it would by car. It surprised him how much a human could go through when they have the complete mind set of determination. Never in his whole life had he imagined that he would be walking in a blizzard and hitch hiking with no money on him and his body weaker than ever. Even against his better judgment he thought that nothing that bad could happen to him.
Thirty minutes passed by and he arrived in his neighborhood. With his heart pounding he could squint and see his darkened house down the street from the moonlight. The streetlights were out and there were no lights from houses around him.
"Power problem?" He guessed to himself and continued walking. He found his house and limped to the front door.
Inside Jill stared into the fire and then turned her gaze to the blank front door. "Walk through the door Tim." She said out loud but in a whispered. "Please, come home." She gazed at the door for a few more seconds in total silence. When nothing happened she turned back to the fire and more tears rolled down her cheeks. She didn't remember ever crying this much in her life.
Tim's breath increased and he went to open the door. The warmth from inside hit his body and he could see the light from the fire. Jill heard the noise and stood up quickly. She walked around their children to see who it was. She couldn't make out the face but the feeling in her stomach told her that it was him.
"Tim?" She called.
"Jill." He responded and limped farther into the foyer. She ran to where he was and saw that it was in fact him. He was there. He had walked through the door like she prayed he would.
Jill's tears poured harder than ever as she looked at him and then reached out to touch him. When she felt that he was real, she threw herself into his arms and started kissing his face and neck.
He grunted in pain. "Gentle." He said softly from the small space between their lips.
"Oh, Tim you're freezing." She noted and looked into his eyes. He was paler than she had ever seen him and he was cut up and bruised. "Oh my gosh." She said at the sight but still held onto him. "You're weak." She noted and loosened her grip some. "Sweetie." She said plainly.
Tim reached up and touched her face. She jumped at the feel of his frozen fingers but let them stay on her skin. Her heart rose as he slowly wiped away her tears and stared into her eyes.
"It was you." He whispered.
"What?"
"You were the only thing I could think about. Your face was the only one I could see and your voice was the only one I could hear."
Jill sobbed and stared back at him through more of her tears. "I thought you were dead. I prayed that you weren't but something just made me lean towards....being a widow. I didn't know what I would do without you Tim."
"I love you so much." He added after taking in her words.
"I love you to." She responded and slowly leaned towards his face. Their lips met and didn't let go. He wrapped his arms around her despite all the pain. A feeling shot through both of their bodies. The kind of feeling that lifts you off your feet and just surrounds your heart with joy. A feeling of endless love that is something everybody always dreams of.
"I was so scared." He admitted.
"Me to." She said and went back to staring into his eyes. "God, I love you." She added and kissed his face in various spots quickly. "I'm so sorry about what happened before you left. It was a stupid fight and it shouldn't have happened."
He smiled and motioned for her to help him into the living room. "It's ok and I'm sorry to. I should have remembered about our plans."
"Let's just not fight anymore." She paused and looked down at his feet. "You're limping." She noted.
"Yeah, that's what happens when you get your foot stuck between the floor of the car and seat as...the car....is sinking." He responded.
"Oh my god. What happened?" She asked.
"The bridge was out....I couldn't see the road."
"Oh Tim." She said and lead him closer to the fire. He looked down at his three sons and smiled. She helped him sit down at the dinning room table and pulled up a chair next to him. "We need to get you to the hospital."
"Eventually, right now....I just want to be with you." He said and took her hands in his.
They sat next to each other for a few minutes before all the lights in the house flickered on suddenly. Jill's eyes widened in surprise and the brightness woke everybody else in the room. Brad, Randy, and Mark sat up and looked around through squinted eyes. They all three noticed Tim and their mouths opened slightly in relief.
"Dad." Mark said and got up. Brad and Randy copied his move. Tim gave each of them a hug and then gave Wilson a look as she slowly rose himself from the couch.
Jill and Tim continued to sit right next to each other with their sides touching as Brad, Randy, and Mark pulled up chairs and the two cushions from the fireplace. Wilson also pulled up a chair and placed it next to Jill. Tim looked around at his family and smiled. The love emerging from the room was enough to warm his entire body and fill his heart with joy. Jill wiped away her tears and ran her fingers through Tim's hair as he told the story of his survival. She loved him so much it made her speechless and he felt the same way. From then on, Jill would always give him a hug and a kiss goodbye before he went anywhere. Always leave loved ones with loving words because you never know when it will be the last time you'll see them.
End Chapter 3
Me: So?? How'd you like the story? This was the last chapter and I enjoyed writing this nice drama. Review and tell me what you thought!
Chapter 3
Tim woke up what he thought was five minutes later. He looked at the hotel's alarm clock and saw that it was nearly noon. As he sat up quickly, his muscles ached with pain. He was sore and in the mirror he could see bruises all over himself. The skin on his body was paler than a newborn baby's. He quickly went to his clothing that he had laid over the heater the night before. His hands touched their warmth as he tested to see if they were good enough for him to wear. They were so he slid them on slowly. He could see that his left rib cage area was swollen and bruised. Also, his right ankle looked the same. After getting dressed in the very warm clothing, he limped his way to the telephone and dialed his home again. He needed to talk to Jill. Before the phone even rang it gave a dead signal and Tim gave a big sigh.
"Guess I'm just going to have to surprise her." He said to himself and started collecting the few things he had. Within minutes he was downstairs and checking out of the hotel.
The snow outside was thick and freezing. It was still falling from the dark, sunless sky. The day seemed like it was going to be a cold one so he zipped his coat even higher than it already was and started limping down the sidewalk path.
----------
Jill sat on the couch with her eyes wide open. Brad and Mark were lying on the floor by the fire asleep while Randy was in the chair across from her also asleep. Wilson was the only other one awake and he was sitting at the dinning room table. Jill maybe slept two hours at the most that night. She was so worried that he wouldn't come home or that they would find his body frozen under the lakes icy surface. Her mind played the scene out like she was planning it to happen. When she heard Brad mumble in his sleep, she snapped back to reality and shook her head some. Wilson coughed behind her and she turned to look at him.
"Hey." She said quietly and got up. Jill approached him and took the seat across from him at the table.
"How are you?" He asked politely.
"Umm.....scared.....heartbroken......worried. All things I normally wouldn't want to feel." She paused. "I can't help but picture strangers telling me that he didn't make it. Telling me that they found his body and that he's dead. And it just scares me so much more Wilson."
"Don't picture that then." He responded.
Jill looked at him somewhat surprised. She was expecting more than just a single sentence that told her not to do something she couldn't help but do.
"Think about the past Jill. Think about your lives together, both good times and bad."
She thought. "Both good times and bad." She repeated his words. "We had a lot of good times and a lot of bad times. I remember in our first year of marriage...some of the fights we had....." She trailed off and made sure the boys were sleeping. "You know sometimes we would just pick a fight so we could make up and.....well you know."
Wilson chuckled at her and continued just to look in her direction after quickly glancing at the rest her family.
"Now we pick a fight just so the other one will sleep in the other room..." She continued and laughed at herself. He laughed with her. "Some of the fights we had..." She repeated and shook her head. "Some were so stupid and some were actually serious even though he joked about them. The fight we had the other day-I wish it never would have happened."
"Understandable." He noted and let her continue.
"The last real thing he said to me was..... 'I glued wood to my head today.'" She laughed. "You know how he does that....the whole making you feel sorry for him because of something stupid he did earlier. That's what he was doing then." She said and thought a moment. "And then...the last real thing I said to him was......" Her face scrunched up in tears. "'Why do you always find some way of making me just want to strangle you.'"
Wilson looked at her with sympathy.
"It was a stupid fight about this weekend. A stupid fight that should have never happened. I should have understood that he was doing this promotional thing for his job and that he didn't mean to hurt me by it."
Wilson was silent and she wasn't quite used to it. He noticed that she felt that way and decided to speak up. "Do you remember the time we played that Halloween joke on Tim?"
"Which one?"
"The one with my girlfriend being a witch. Remember?"
She laughed. "Yeah, I remember. He was so frightened."
"Did you feel sorry for him at all when we did that?" Wilson asked curiously.
Jill paused. "Mmmm..nope." She answered and laughed. "He had played so many jokes on me over the years and I just wanted to get him good at least once. Halloween was always one of his favorite times. That and Christmas."
"Ahh...Christmas. Those stupid looking decorations he put on the roof." Wilson noted and shook his head.
"He was so competitive."
"He still is." Wilson said and it made her stare at him. She realized that she had been using his name and qualities in the past tense, which meant she assumed that he was no longer with them.
"Yeah." She said quietly and looked at her hands. "I miss him." She said and scrunched up her face in tears again. "I just want him to walk through that front door and be here." She added and looked towards the door. Wilson looked with her and they stared at it for a little while before turning back to look at each other with realization that it might not happen.
----------
Tim walked by the road. The snow was still pounded down hard on his weak body but he kept walking. The woods beside him were dark and there were no cars on the road. There hadn't been for awhile. It looked like he was on some long highway road that connected one city to another. One of those long roads where cars traveled at seventy miles per hour and debris was occasionally flying from accidents. The word accident ran through his mind and he thought back to the lake and his car. His Nomad was completely destroyed by now and it took a lot out of him to leave it behind. After he woke up from that night he didn't even think about police or waiting for them. He knew he had to get home. Something inside of him told him that he needed to be with Jill as quickly as possible. Something said that he wasn't going to let his children go through the same kind of pain he went through when his father died. He wouldn't let that happen and he wouldn't let his family worry anymore than they had to.
He had been walking for hours on end and didn't know when he'd reach the next town. The watch that was always wrapped around his left wrist had broken during the accident so he had no clue what time it was. The sky was getting darker so he figured it was late afternoon. As he thought about his family he heard rumbling noises quickly approaching behind him. He looked to see a car slowing down towards him. He stopped walking and stared into the fog-covered window of the car. After a few seconds the window rolled down and Tim saw the driver. It was a young woman at what seemed around age thirty. She had strawberry blonde hair and was wearing fancy clothing. Tim looked at her in silence.
"Do you need a ride?" She asked him politely.
"That would be nice." He responded.
The woman unlocked the doors and Tim slowly got in. She noticed he was shivering and turned up the heat.
"Where are you headed?"
"Detroit." He answered and remembered the same thing that happened yesterday with his ride into Flint.
"My parents live in Warren. I'm Kathy." She said.
"Tim." He responded and slightly smiled.
"What's there for you?"
"My family."
"Parents?"
"Mother, brothers, wife, kids."
"You're married?" She asked curiously.
"Yeah." He answered. His head was pounding and his body ached. He was so glad to be in heat and to be sitting down but also getting somewhere.
The woman kept silent for awhile as she drove. "I can drop you off in Warren but that's it or else I'll be later than I already planned."
"That's fine. Thank you." Tim said. He didn't feel like making conversation that much but she did.
"What happened to you?"
"Huh?"
"Well, I mean you don't seem like the kind of guy who looks like that twenty four seven.....you seem like the type to drive a nice car with his nice family."
"I normally am."
"What happened?"
"Car accident." He said plainly. "I've been walking and hitch hiking since it happened."
"When?"
"Two days ago."
"Wow...I wouldn't have the strength to do that." She said admiringly.
"Where are we?"
"Umm...a few hours away from Warren."
Tim nodded and looked at the clock on the woman's radio. It said seven. He realized he had been walking for nearly seven hours that day. No wonder he was exhausted.
"Warren is around twenty miles away from Detroit. I could probably make it by foot sometime around midnight to two in the morning." He said to himself.
"Why not just call a cab?"
"No money. I spent it all on the hotel. All I have is a quarter. And if I'm going to call anybody it's going to be my wife. I haven't been able to reach her since the accident."
"Why not?"
"I think the phone's dead or off the hook at our house." He answered. "Do you have a cell phone?"
"Yes. Would you like to use it? I have free minutes." She asked and pulled it out of her purse.
"Thank you." He said while nodding and took the phone. His cold fingers dialed their number but there was still a dead line. "No. Nothing." He noted and handed the phone back to her.
"That's too bad. I bet she's worried sick."
"Yeah." Tim looked straight in front of the car. "I bet she is." He stated and continued to stare at the snow falling in the light of the headlights.
----------
Brad, Randy, and Mark sat around the living room looking at magazines but not really reading any of them. The power had been out for an entire day now and the only thing it did was make them concentrate on the situation at hand more and more. Jill was doing the same as she was searching the fridge and cabinets for something to eat. The food in the fridge was getting warmer and some of it was going bad already. She sighed at the thought of having to clean all of it up once the power came back on. She hadn't been able to receive or send any calls since the night before and she couldn't even turn on the news to see if there was any progress. Her eyes widened as she thought of something she should have before.
"The radio." She said out loud and everybody turned to look at her.
"What?"
"We can listen to the radio." She said again and headed into the garage. There was no light so she came back out and took a candle with her when she went back in. She found a flashlight on Tim's workbench and flipped it on as she set the candle down. The light shone on different objects: his tools, the storage things on the shelf above, and the boxes in the corner. She moved the light to the boxes and walked towards them. She opened the first one and started going through it. Eventually Wilson joined her to make sure everything was all right.
She slid one of the boxes to him. "See if you can find a portable radio in there." She said and continued searching through her own box. She saw old picture frames and things that belonged to her husband.
Wilson found household items in his box and at the bottom he came across a radio. He tapped on Jill's shoulder and she saw it. She stared at him and the radio for a few seconds and then took it from him and headed back into the kitchen.
It was an old radio that they had bought for emergencies. She flipped it on but nothing happened.
"Batteries." She guessed and opened the back. Wilson found some batteries that matched and handed them to her. She put them in. By this time, they had attracted the attention of Brad, Randy, and Mark. The guys jumped up from the couch and Jill took the radio to the dinning room table. They all sat down as she flipped it on again. There was static. Jill played with the dial to get a different station but there was still nothing but static.
She sighed as Randy took the thing from her hands and played with it. After a few minutes he finally got something that was similar to talking. It sounded fuzzy so he reached for the antenna and pulled it up. He also walked to the back door and held the radio in its direction.
In a few seconds they could hear a man talking clearly.
"Don't miss this all new event coming to the stages of Michigan. Meatballs: The Musical is said to be the most smashing hit of the year. Tickets on sale January 31st."
Randy looked at the radio like it was an idiot. "The only thing we know about the outside world right now is that Meatballs: The Musical is coming to town. Ohhh...yeppie!!" He said sarcastically.
Jill sighed and rested her head on her arms over the wooden table. "Just turn it off. There's no use." She mumbled.
Randy went to turn it off but stopped when he heard a screeching sound. They all looked at it strangely. It sounded like sliding tires and screeching brakes. A man's voice came on.
"Have you ever been in an auto accident? Do you have the right insurance for your family? Come to-"
"TURN IT OFF!!!" Jill yelled and Randy quickly did what she said. Her breath had increased in amount and she was letting a single tear roll down her cheek untouched. She looked around at their frightened faces, grabbed the flashlight off the table and ran towards the upstairs.
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She slammed the door to her bedroom shut and locked it. The room was dark so she flipped on the flashlight and looked around. The bed was unmade from the morning he left and one of the dresser drawers were open from him packing. Her tears started to spill heavier when she came across the framed photo of her and Tim that was sitting on the dresser drawers. They were hugging tightly and smiling. She could feel the love in the picture and it made her heart fall. She sunk onto the bed and stared at the picture in the light shining out of the flashlight.
"I'll do anything." She said and tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. "What do you want from me?!" She asked and moved her glance from the photo to the ceiling as if she was talking to God again. "HUH?!" She yelled. "ANYTHING YOU WANT! JUST NAME ANYTHING YOU WANT AND I'LL GIVE IT TO YOU. ANYTHING!" She continued and lowered her voice some when she spoke again. "I just want to see him again. Just to see his face again and touch his skin. To hug him and to kiss him. Please....." She begged. "That man is the love of my life and I don't know what I'm going to do if he doesn't come home. I don't know if I can live without him." Her tears spilt onto her lap and she now hung her head down with the brown curly locks falling around her soaked face. After a pause, she lay down on her side of the bed and then grabbed his pillow. Jill squeezed it tightly as she turned over and then turned off the flashlight so the room was nothing but pure darkness.
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Around five hours later, Jill woke from her nap and walked down the stairs. She had just been sleeping but still felt exhausted. The only light in the house was the fire and when she walked into the living room, her three boys were asleep on the floor. Wilson was sitting on the couch and staring out the back door. She approached him and then sat down next to him.
"Thank you."
"For what?" He asked curiously.
"Being here with us." She responded and semi-smiled at him.
"I'm here for you just as much as you're here for me."
She nodded. "I'm sorry about my outburst earlier."
"Don't be. It's perfectly natural. I remember a good professor of mine said once that the best way to live life is to do so naturally."
"Meaning?"
"You're outburst was a natural emotion that was held inside you from the start of this whole thing Jill. To not let it be expressed would be unnatural and it's not healthy to do so either. Grief and sadness are a part of life and we just have to face them when they come. Shedding tears and yelling about something is all a natural expression of that sadness and grief."
"So what you're saying is that I shouldn't hold back my feelings when they're built up this much and that I had a right to yell and cry in front of my kids." Jill stated.
Wilson nodded. "You're much easier at understanding my information than Tim is." He noted.
She looked at Wilson and semi-smiled again. "You should get some rest. I haven't seen you sleep in over twenty four hours."
He nodded. "I guess so." He agreed.
Jill got off the couch and let him lay down in her place. She slowly stepped around her children and sat on one of the cushions next to the fireplace.
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Tim made his way down the road again. The nice woman he had been riding with dropped him off in Warren and after he gave his thanks he immediately headed for Detroit. It was dark now and the only thing guiding him were the streetlights. He had to get home even if it meant arriving in the middle of the night. The snow had lessened somewhat as he limped down a road. In the past he had driven to Warren for business and things so he knew which way to go even in the dark. When he had gotten out of the car it was around eleven and he knew he had been walking for at least two hours. Everytime he felt like giving up, images of Jill and his children flashed through his mind. He was determined to get to her, to them. It would just take him a bit longer on foot than it would by car. It surprised him how much a human could go through when they have the complete mind set of determination. Never in his whole life had he imagined that he would be walking in a blizzard and hitch hiking with no money on him and his body weaker than ever. Even against his better judgment he thought that nothing that bad could happen to him.
Thirty minutes passed by and he arrived in his neighborhood. With his heart pounding he could squint and see his darkened house down the street from the moonlight. The streetlights were out and there were no lights from houses around him.
"Power problem?" He guessed to himself and continued walking. He found his house and limped to the front door.
Inside Jill stared into the fire and then turned her gaze to the blank front door. "Walk through the door Tim." She said out loud but in a whispered. "Please, come home." She gazed at the door for a few more seconds in total silence. When nothing happened she turned back to the fire and more tears rolled down her cheeks. She didn't remember ever crying this much in her life.
Tim's breath increased and he went to open the door. The warmth from inside hit his body and he could see the light from the fire. Jill heard the noise and stood up quickly. She walked around their children to see who it was. She couldn't make out the face but the feeling in her stomach told her that it was him.
"Tim?" She called.
"Jill." He responded and limped farther into the foyer. She ran to where he was and saw that it was in fact him. He was there. He had walked through the door like she prayed he would.
Jill's tears poured harder than ever as she looked at him and then reached out to touch him. When she felt that he was real, she threw herself into his arms and started kissing his face and neck.
He grunted in pain. "Gentle." He said softly from the small space between their lips.
"Oh, Tim you're freezing." She noted and looked into his eyes. He was paler than she had ever seen him and he was cut up and bruised. "Oh my gosh." She said at the sight but still held onto him. "You're weak." She noted and loosened her grip some. "Sweetie." She said plainly.
Tim reached up and touched her face. She jumped at the feel of his frozen fingers but let them stay on her skin. Her heart rose as he slowly wiped away her tears and stared into her eyes.
"It was you." He whispered.
"What?"
"You were the only thing I could think about. Your face was the only one I could see and your voice was the only one I could hear."
Jill sobbed and stared back at him through more of her tears. "I thought you were dead. I prayed that you weren't but something just made me lean towards....being a widow. I didn't know what I would do without you Tim."
"I love you so much." He added after taking in her words.
"I love you to." She responded and slowly leaned towards his face. Their lips met and didn't let go. He wrapped his arms around her despite all the pain. A feeling shot through both of their bodies. The kind of feeling that lifts you off your feet and just surrounds your heart with joy. A feeling of endless love that is something everybody always dreams of.
"I was so scared." He admitted.
"Me to." She said and went back to staring into his eyes. "God, I love you." She added and kissed his face in various spots quickly. "I'm so sorry about what happened before you left. It was a stupid fight and it shouldn't have happened."
He smiled and motioned for her to help him into the living room. "It's ok and I'm sorry to. I should have remembered about our plans."
"Let's just not fight anymore." She paused and looked down at his feet. "You're limping." She noted.
"Yeah, that's what happens when you get your foot stuck between the floor of the car and seat as...the car....is sinking." He responded.
"Oh my god. What happened?" She asked.
"The bridge was out....I couldn't see the road."
"Oh Tim." She said and lead him closer to the fire. He looked down at his three sons and smiled. She helped him sit down at the dinning room table and pulled up a chair next to him. "We need to get you to the hospital."
"Eventually, right now....I just want to be with you." He said and took her hands in his.
They sat next to each other for a few minutes before all the lights in the house flickered on suddenly. Jill's eyes widened in surprise and the brightness woke everybody else in the room. Brad, Randy, and Mark sat up and looked around through squinted eyes. They all three noticed Tim and their mouths opened slightly in relief.
"Dad." Mark said and got up. Brad and Randy copied his move. Tim gave each of them a hug and then gave Wilson a look as she slowly rose himself from the couch.
Jill and Tim continued to sit right next to each other with their sides touching as Brad, Randy, and Mark pulled up chairs and the two cushions from the fireplace. Wilson also pulled up a chair and placed it next to Jill. Tim looked around at his family and smiled. The love emerging from the room was enough to warm his entire body and fill his heart with joy. Jill wiped away her tears and ran her fingers through Tim's hair as he told the story of his survival. She loved him so much it made her speechless and he felt the same way. From then on, Jill would always give him a hug and a kiss goodbye before he went anywhere. Always leave loved ones with loving words because you never know when it will be the last time you'll see them.
End Chapter 3
Me: So?? How'd you like the story? This was the last chapter and I enjoyed writing this nice drama. Review and tell me what you thought!