'Author's Note: I don't own Grease nor Grease 2 or any of the Character. The only thing I own is the plot to the story and a few characters of my own
Summary: Grease 2 Au. One Shot. What if the T-Birds and Pink Ladies hadn't turned up just as Michael was about to reveal the true identity of the 'Cool Rider' to Stephanie? How would that have changed the course of the movie?
AN: Alright here's Chapter 32. Thank you to those that reviewed the last chapter.
Chapter 32
15th November 1969. Rydell California.
Rain hit the windshield of the Peterbilt as I drove through the main street of Rydell. The windscreen wipers made a steady rhyme with the radio playing in the background.
I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like if I hadn't moved to America or broken things off with Sarah. I knew no doubt that I would have been unhappily married to a woman I loved but wasn't in love with.
I stoped at a red light. I pulled down the sun visor and looked at the photos I kept there. The worn and a little faded photo of Steph I had kept with me during my basic training along with when I had been assigned to Camp Pendleton with 2nd Battalion 4th Marines and later on those three years I was in Vietnam at Chu Lai.
. I placed the photo back next to the one I had of Connor, Rebecca and BJ. Connor was going to have another younger brother or sister in six to five months time. The light changed to green. I slowly moved through the gear as the Peterbilt picked up speed and momentum.
Lightning and Thunder lit up the early morning sky. I pulled out the front of the house. As a large bolt of lighting struck the ground a maybe a mile away. I grabbed my gear from the Peterbilt.
The phone started to ring just as I walked through the back door. I dumped my gear on the kitchen table before going to answer the phone.
"Carrington Residence "I said as the storm raged on outside. Another lot of lighting lit out the early morning sky.
"Michael. I'm sorry for calling so early" I heard my mum on the other end of the line.
"It's fine mum. What's up" I asked.
"It's your grandfather Seamus. He died yesterday "My mum said. I though back to the last time I had seen him which had been when I had graduated from Basic Training for the Marine Corp at San Diego.
18th November 1969: Perth, Western Australia, Australia
Frank McCabe glanced over at his two sons. Sam and Tom. His older sister and two of his nephews where flying over from California for the funeral. Frank looked up and spotted an older version of his older sister Millicent. He had not seen Millicent since Christmas of 1958. The taller of the two boys was his eldest nephew Michael.
Frank could tell that Michael had changed a lot in the eleven years it had been since he had seen him last. The one standing next to Michael had to be youngest boy Billy. Billy had been a short and lanky nine years old when he had seen Billy last.
"Frank" My mum said greeting my uncle Frank I had not seen for eleven years. The two boys standing beside him where my cousins Sam and Tom.
"Millicent it's been a while" My Uncle Frank said attempting to break the ice. I grabbed my bag and handed Billy his bag.
"Tom, Sam give your cousins a hand with the baggage." Frank said as we walked towards Uncle Frank's car.
Uncle Frank was tall man of thirty nine. His dark brown hair cut closely to his head in the old army style hair cut that I had also worn during my time in the Marine Corp.
I Can't Help Falling in Love with You by Elvis Presley was playing on the radio. I lent my head against the window of the car and let my thoughts wonder. The hours began to dwindle. It was starting to get dark when Uncle Frank turned the car into a long driveway.
We went off the graded road to an ungraded driveway heading towards the main house of the family property. We where four and half hours north east of Perth. Uncle Frank pulled the car up next to the house.
Dogs where barking on the ends of their chains when we got out of the car. Billy was asleep on the driver's side. I shook him awake to tell him that we had arrived.
I grabbed my bag from the trunk/boot of Uncle Frank's car. Billy grabbed his own bag and Mum's few bags.
"You boys can either stay in the main homestead with us or the old homestead a few miles away with Tom." Uncle Frank said as he opened the front gate to the path that lead up to the front porch/veranda of the homestead.
"Come on I'll show you to where I'm staying." Tom said as we walked in the fading light. Tom unlocked the front door and pushed opened the door. The doorway was dimly lit as we walked inside.
"You guys can take the two back rooms. The bathroom the third on the right down the main hallway. The dunny/shitter is near the back of the house," Tom said as he placed his hat on the hat rack and kicked off his work boots and headed towards his room.
I grabbed the bigger of the two back bedrooms. I started unpacking my gear from my bag into the beat up chest of draws and wardrobe. I walked across the hall to Billy's room.
I knocked on the door. I heard a muffled it's opened. I pushed open the door. Billy was unpacking his own stuff.
"Hey Mike. You finished unpacking already" Billy asked as he closed a draw on the chest of draws.
"Yea. I'll go see what Tom's up to then. "I said as I walked further into the house. I checked most of the house and couldn't find my younger cousin anywhere. I walked outside and walked over to the stables of sorts.
I shoved my hands into my jeans pockets when I walked into the stable. Tom was mixing up feed for the dozen or more Clydesdales with their heads hanging over the stale doors.
"Hey you want ta give me hand with theses guy's feed." Tom said as he went to feed a few of the horses in the stable.
I merely nodded and went about mixing up the feeds like Tom had just done. We finished doing the feed about an hour later. Billy was sitting at the kitchen table with a beer in hand.
"So what you blokes want for tea. Steak, Pork or Lamb" Tom asked grabbed a beer for himself.
"Pork sounds good," I said as I caught the beer that Tom threw to me. He nodded and grabbed what I though to be Pork Chops.
18th November 1969, Rydell California
Stephanie had her hands full with an ill tempered almost three old Connor. The twins where starting to teething again. Michael had left two days ago to fly over to Australia with his mum and Billy for his grandfather's funereal.
The phone started to ring from the hallway.
"Carrington Residence" Stephanie said answering the phone.
"Hey Babe" She heard her husband's voice on the other end of line.
"How was the flight"?
"It was about average. A lot more comfortable when I was flying from Camp Pendleton to Chu Lai on a C-130." He said. Stephanie could hear faint voices in the background.
19th November 1969, Morawa, Western Australia, Australia.
Even though it was mid-November the temperature was in the mid thirties. Tom, Billy and I had gone into Morawa to get the weekly supplies from Stock and Station agent earlier.
"So you've lived in California for nearly nine years now" Tom asked as we rode along checking the fence line of the boundary.
"Yea pretty much. Even though I was stationed over at Chu Lai in Vietnam for a bit over three years" I said.
"Three year shit. And if I do get called up, which is a highly possible. I'll only being going for a year at must." Tom explained as we rode along. I nodded and rubbed the back of my neck.
"I'll tell you this Tom. It anit no picnic of beer and skideles over there" I tried to explained as we rode through a washed out gully.
"I didn't think it would be. But what worries me is that Sam may get called up in a couple of years." Tom stressed.
"Tom. I can understand your worry about Sam. Billy was over there for nearly a year when I came home in May of last year." I said trying at least to put his mind at ease.
"Ah fucking hell," Tom cursed under his breath. He urged his horse into a canter. I followed after to him to see what was wrong.
One or two of the lambs in the paddock we where checking had been killed. Most people would have gagged at such a sight at the two lambs with their guts and intestines ripped out.
"Bloody wild dogs. Mongrels got about twenty lambs last month." Tom said in frustration
21st November 1969 Morawa, Western Australia, Australia
The funeral for Seamus Patrick McCabe was starting a few mere hours. The man whom had taught me a lot about being a man. A man who had lost two sons to a war.
I glanced at the worn leather bond diary my grandmother had given me to read. It had belonged to my grandfather during his service during the Great War in 4th Light-Horse Brigade with the 12th Light-Horse Regiment.
He survived the horrors of Gallipoli and the charge for Beersheba on the 31st of October 1917. The hours ticked by. Those that had come to attend my grandfather funeral there had to be at least a hundred people there if not a hundred and fifty people.
Uncle Frank went to stand in front of the crowd to read his eulogy.
"Seamus Patrick McCabe was born here on this property on the 30th April 1896 to my grandparents Seamus senior and Elizabeth McCabe. He enlisted in the 12th Light Horsemen Regiment in Liverpool New South Wales. He had gone to New South Wales with a team of Drovers. He was almost nineteen when he enlisted.
He survived the four years he was enlisted. It during that time that he met the love his life Claire in August of the same year at Gallipoli. They married in December of 1918 almost a month after the war ended.
When our father returned to the family property here in August of 1919 with our mother. Together they raised nine children. My two older brother James and Patrick are no longer with us.
I know when my older brothers James and Patrick died it took a part of my father with it. I will never forget something my father told me when I told him I was going to enlist in military when I was seventeen.
"Life is like a war some battles you win, some you lose but you never stop fighting for what you believe in!"
My father Seamus Patrick McCabe was a man of few words. But when he did speak it was worth listening to. Rest in Peace dad." Uncle Frank said as he finished his eulogy.
I, Billy, Tom, and Sam went to lower the coffin into the grave. As we finished lowering the coffin. I looked across at the two grave stone that lay next to the grave. They read: In loving memory of Patrick Michael McCabe, Loving Son and Brother. 12th February 1921 to January 1943. In loving memory of James Seamus McCabe, Loving Son and Brother. 13th September 1919 to 21st May 1941. The two uncles I had never gotten to know. Nor had any of my other siblings. My grandmother was trying to hold in the tears as two of the stockmen that work for Uncle Frank and she began to fill in the grave.