Chapter 2
Admiral Chegwidden had retired as JAG six months ago and General Creswell had only been in the position for a short time. Chloe Madison didn't know if one or both of those things, or something else all together, had her 'big sister' Colonel Sarah Mackenzie so depressed lately or not, but she did know that she was going to get to the bottom of it!
She had a four day weekend off of school because of Thanksgiving and after convincing her grandparents of Mac's need to see her, she called her big sister to tell her she was coming for a visit.
"Chloe! What a surprise!" Mac said when the young girl delivered the news via a phone call.
"I know! Isn't it just great? I'll come down on the train on Wednesday night and if you can't pick me up, I'll grab a cab from the station."
"Of course I'll pick you up, but are you sure you want to be here with me instead of your grandparents? I don't have anything special planned…"
"I'm with them all the time! I want to spend time with you, even if we only have turkey TV dinners!"
"Well, I think I can do a little better than that!" Mac protested.
"Really, I don't care, as long as we can spend some time together! I really miss you Mac!"
"And I miss you too, kiddo! I will see you at the station Wednesday night. What time do you get in?"
They made the arrangements, talked for a few more minutes, and then ended the call. Both of them were looking forward to seeing each other in just a few days.
At work the next day, Mac didn't mention the call from Chloe to Harm because he was still hurting over Mattie's recent move back in with her father.
She was so glad that the four day break was only two days away. Tensions at the office made her days almost unbearable. Between avoiding General Creswell as much as possible, because of the Okinawa incident, Harm moping about Mattie, and the strained atmosphere between Sturgis and him, left over from when Sturgis was acting JAG, it was certainly not a pleasure to be there. Added to all that, Mac missed seeing Admiral Chegwidden and Harriet every day. With those two gone JAG no longer felt like a family, it was now just a work place and not even a friendly one any more.
Mac stopped at the market on her way home from work to pick up the makings for Thanksgiving dinner. Looking in horror at the size of the whole frozen turkeys, she instead purchased two Cornish game hens. The store even had some that were already stuffed! She put a ready-made cherry pie in her cart and dithered over getting a can of the jellied cranberry sauce. She hated the stuff, but didn't know how Chloe felt about it. In the end she got it because the story had them on special for thirty nine cents and even if she ended up throwing it away, she hadn't wasted much money. Then there was the question of rolls, the last time she had tried to make one of those tubes of crescent rolls, she had burnt them to a crisp, so instead, with a resigned sigh, she chose a pre made package that she would only have to warm up. A tub of cool whip for the pie and she was done with her shopping.
So, now she was as ready for Thanksgiving as she could be, but honestly, Mac felt that she had very little to be thankful for this year.
To be continued…..