The night was white as Rilla tried to get Clara back in bed after her dreams—nightmares that only started after her impromptu trip to Ken's office.
1941 had rung in without much fanfare. They had stayed up to midnight, Clara only made it to ten o'clock before falling asleep, leaning against Ken as she did. The older kids played their games, Jimmy and Connie and the baby were over for the evening, and Mrs. Clarke made what she could for the family in the usual allowances of war, and sat with her sherry as her friend from down the street came over for company as well.
Now it was February, cold and windy as the city froze and Rilla was comforting her youngest who was crying about home—Toronto being targeted. Suddenly the planes that flew over the city in the sky were bad people. No matter how many times Rilla tried to tell her that the war was far away, that men and even women fought in it because they were helping the allies as part of the Commonwealth. Germany wouldn't make it over here, no not even the submarines, the U-boats wouldn't dare come this far.
Rilla could only hear the far-out uncertainty that Ken tried to make it sound like there was no way they could when he was home when she told him Clara's fears turned into a nightmare.
"I told you this wouldn't end up good," Rilla tells his pillow tiredly crawling into bed wanting, hoping she could get back to sleep before the kids would be up for school. "But you are never here to see it, you never are." She sighs.
She drinks coffee as the kids race about to get ready for school. Oliver who is still coughing here and there takes the keys from the ring now that he has passed his driving test before his seventeenth birthday. He has an old beater of a truck, that he bought from Uncle Carl who finally invested in a new truck the previous year. He had saved birthday and Christmas money from family for years for that moment and even got a job at the grocery store down on the main road on the weekends to pay for gas.
It was old, but it worked and got him places and taught him responsibility. He was never a practical person in terms of fixing things, but he spent the day in the garage with Ken learning how to change the oil and found he didn't mind the messy mechanical side of auto ownership. It wasn't new, but the bed of the truck was large enough for friends and if they went out of the city down old dirt road…well a little dust would hurt it or anyone come summertime.
"Drive safe, and slowly it's icy on the roads," Rilla tells him kissing his cheek. She goes back upstairs sighing. A day off, and Ken was supposed to be home but had been called away for something or another. She lays down once again, only finding herself awakening a few hours later as the clock struck ten am.
She does morning chores and tidies the magazines on the table before Gloria and she looks over the grocery list to make it up for the next week.
The house was quiet when Jimmy came through the old familiar back down, shaking snow off his jacket and wiping his boots. Under his jacket is Bertie, wrapped up in knitted sweaters, leggings, little mittens and his bonnet. The kids were at school."
"Let me take him?" Rilla says reaching her grand-baby. "Oh you are all bundled up," she says sweetly, beginning to peel back the layers as the house was warm.
"No, Connie?" She asked when Jimmy went for the coffee.
"She's at home, sends her wishes but wants to get some sleep and cleaning done," Jimmy tells her. "This one refused to sleep last night when I was working," he says in a sing-song voice to his son who only laughs and kicks his legs about. "I used to hate night shifts, but at least if I'm working get home at six am, we can get a few hours each, or she'll take him to her mothers, and then we switch off and she can catch a few minutes before we even think about attempting dinner?" Both of us are tired, but at least it's more manageable if we're both not sleeping?"
"He'll get better in time," Rilla tells him as she picks up the infant and cuddles him. "Infants usually have a four-month regression in sleep, it will get better."
Willow comes and takes him occasionally as well, or comes over with Fleur and just lets us sleep. Honestly, I don't know how she did, escaping occupied France, with an infant that isn't even hers. She didn't even have a way to feed the tot, and yet she managed"
"Makeshift formula," Rilla tells him. "Same with I fed you, evaporated milk, sugar, water, even added cream occasionally if I wanted you to gain weight in the very beginning," Rilla told him. "Mother milk is always preferable, but not every woman can do it, make enough for a child to thrive, formula recipes have helped immensely."
"How is the hospital?" Jimmy asks her next, taking out a bottle of expressed milk for his son before he forgets it was in his pocket.
"I'm a glorified secretary most days, but it's good? Some days are better than others like most hospitals," Rilla tells him with a shrug of her shoulder that wasn't in use holding the baby. "It's hard to gain their trust for the ones who need help the most, and the others well, they love to ignore the wedding ring."
"I would offer to come by in uniform, but the military probably has better ways to discipline men who overstep," Jimmy says with a light chuckle.
"Most likely," Rilla agrees and Bertie grizzles into her shoulder. "Oh! What is wrong little wrong, so opinionated for someone so little? Your Papa was never quite this opinionated, then again he was threatened to be shipped off to the orphanage, so he must have been on his best behaviour." She jokes.
"I remember so little from those years but, watching Rowena these days I cannot imagine her taking care of a baby at her age," Jimmy says after a moment. "I remember visiting dog Monday, and when your friends would make a fort out of the cotton you were sewing with during meeting."
"You were so young," Rilla says with a sad smile. "I loved you dearly, and hurt so much to hand you over, but you weren't mine."
"It all worked out in the end," Jimmy says, reaching to take his son. "So, Connie thinks she is pregnant again," he says exhaling.
"Pardon?" Rilla finds her mouth dropping. "He's four months, take away eight weeks of that for recovery…"
"Oh I know," Jimmy says sighing. "No need to tell me."
"I need to," Rilla says sarcastically. "I thought you would be better than that?"
"It was literally once, and she just feeling off, it's hard to tell since it's not like she has had a cycle since last year…" Jimmy tells his mother looking in his coffee mug.
"Am I interrupting something?" Shirley says from the doorway of the kitchen. "Lillian sent me over with some things Rowena she fixed for you?" He says holding up a bag.
"No, just an afternoon visit with Bertie to let Connie have a peaceful two or three hours?" Jimmy says shaking his head.
"It sounded like you were in a predicament?" Shirley says with a grin.
"Just a small hiccup," Jimmy says simply.
"Irish twins are not hiccups," Rilla gives him a look. "This one knows all about that, isn't that right Shirley?"
"I got Irish triplets thank you very much," Shirley says to his sister before looking at Jimmy and sitting down in the empty chair.
"Look no matter what my sister says, I wouldn't change a moment of Jasper and Lunette's entrance into this world. Was it hectic with Elodie only being a year, yes, but it was manageable. Hiccups happen to married people all the time, and really, it just makes you more of a Blythe than you realize. I mean Jem and Walter who you don't even remember were only a year apart, and before Jem, there had been Joy who didn't make it the June before. So just hang on to your braces, and embrace it if it happening, and if not…well…have a drink and breathe a sigh of relief and don't make the same mistake twice when the baby is sleeping."
"This one doesn't sleep," Jimmy tells him not knowing what else to say.
"And yet you are still worried about new little ones," Shirley chuckles. "Such is life, you always find ways around such things when the magnitude of love is a strong pull."
"When did you become a poet?" Rilla looks at her brother with a raised eyebrow.
Shirley grins and shrugs. "Thanks for the chat, I have to run a few errands before dinner tonight." He says getting up, he squeezes Jimmy's shoulder and stoops down for a moment to see the baby in his father's arms. "Such a petite cochon," he says with a grin.
Rilla shakes her head but watches her brother leave like he came.
Jimmy heads home half an hour later after the bottle of milk had been finished, but he would be hungry soon enough.
"Don't ask—," he starts.
"I won't say a word, or even ask unless you bring it up," Rilla tells him, hugging him tightly. "Though you really should have known better, that is neither here nor there now," Rilla tells him and kisses his cheek and then Berties who was bundled up to go back out of the car's basket seat.
She was upstairs when the door opened and she heard the familiar footsteps.
"I thought you wouldn't be home until tomorrow?" She says from the top of the stairs.
"I wrapped it up early and drove home," Ken says with a sigh. "Probably shouldn't have, but I did," he adds as he drops his bag on the floor before falling onto the bed.
He pulls her close, breathing in the scent of her hair and just lets himself relax.
"Did I miss anything?" He asks after a quiet moment.
"Clara had nightmares again, if I wasn't exhausted I would probably be more angry," Rilla tells him. "Ollie took the girls to school, I'm getting worried about his lingering cough. I should take him to the doctor, I thought it would be gone by now?"
Ken nods his head thinking for a moment.
"I need you to ask for two weeks' vacation this summer," Ken says to Rilla.
"What do you mean two weeks off? I can't ask for a holiday in the middle of a war Kenneth!"
"Considering they pay you, and even soldiers get two to three weeks of leave, yes you can," Ken reminds her. "Two weeks, preferably in July if you can, I got an offer to go to this resort in Michigan, Mackinac Island, it still doesn't allow automobiles, but the Grand Hotel is magnificent and I think everyone can use a break and just swim and relax, and we get a discount if I give them a lovely review in the magazine."
"Can't we do that on the island?" Rilla looks at him raising an eyebrow.
"Sure, but is not the same as somewhere new, just ask please?"
"I will ask, but I'm not sure what the protocol is for this sort of thing," Rilla tells him "Rest, I will go run some errands," Rilla says kissing his forehead and moving to roll off the bed.
"Stay," Ken reaches for her. "For a little bit if you can?"
Rilla nods her head and lays back down next to him, curling up to his heartbeat.
The telephone ringing wakes them up and Rilla reaches for it next to the bed over Ken. She answers before letting it drop.
"Ken, wake up," she shakes his voice rising. "Ken!"
"What is it?"
"That was the school, Oliver went into convulsions at school and is at the hospital."
"Where is he?" Rilla says blindly at the nurse's station at the hospital. "Oliver Ford, what happened" she adds on
"With the doctors, he passed out in class and wouldn't wake up when they tried to bring him about," The teacher who had come to the hospital says.
When they do get brought back to Oliver he is sitting up in the hospital, looking no worse than wear, his school uniform is folded on a chair. She kisses his forehead, wondering what she possibly missed.
"I'm okay, I didn't mean to scare you," Oliver says too speaking up, looking to his father, still dressed in his travelling military Jacket. It looked severe for the hospital, and Mother was wearing a pretty dress and had thrown on her jacket that she wears to the hospital with her own rank on the sleeves.
"I know, it's okay," Ken tells Ollie.
"What happened?" Rilla asks the doctor she doesn't know when he arrives.
"I was hoping to further my evaluation before any diagnosis," the doctor says looking at Oliver. "Has your son lost weight recently?" The doctor asks.
Rilla could only look at her son, noticing his cheeks seemed thinner but it wasn't that much. She swore he had just grown again and hadn't caught up to his height. Then again when were they home these days? Sure she made sure she was home after school for kids, for dinner and homework. Clara still needed her greatly and Rowena was
"He was sick a few weeks ago?" She says unsure. "I generally stopped weighing them weekly when they were toddlers?"
"I lost a few pounds," Ollie tells him quietly.
"Have you been feeling thirstier than usual?" He directs to Oliver who thinks for a moment.
"Not that I know of? Just the usual I suppose?" Oliver says honestly.
"Do you find yourself urinating frequently?" The doctor asks not to.
"Depends on how much coffee I drink. I don't find myself pissing any more than usual though?"
"Ollie!" Rilla's voice raises at his words.
"It's all right Mrs. Ford, why don't we talk in my office and let Oliver rest and have the nurses look after him?"
"Of course, come, darling," Ken says nodding his head. Rilla looks at him but lets Ken lead her to the office, following the doctor who sits down in his chair.
"He came after a seizure he had at school, his teacher that accompanied him told us he was fine one minute before he wasn't. Unsure of what was causing the episode, he felt clammy and he was sweating. The teacher gave him some orange juice that he had around and that helped him perk up slightly. It will take some observation, but we think Oliver is diabetic. We'll need to see how his body processes sugars before we know for sure." The doctor tells them both.
"Diabetes?" Rilla says looking at Ken.
"I know it sounds…it's a lot more treatable than before, he had a seizure which can happen if his blood sugar got too low," The doctor explains. "It can happen to children his age with all the hormones from puberty."
Rilla can only nod her head.
"He was born a month early could that have any negative effect on him?" Rilla asks wondering if she had done this to him.
"Most likely not, was he a sickly child?" The doctor asks and Ken shakes his head.
"He was early, but beyond the worry about his lungs, he thrived, a bit smaller than other newborns. By the time he was about a year old, he was pretty much caught up?" Ken says looking to Rilla who nodded her head. "Her father never was worried, he's a doctor. Ollie never seemed delicate, tall and lean but never in a way that hard us worried. He had normal things, chicken pox, measles, colds, and flu, all the kids have, our youngest is seven and is often sick herself these days. It's still only everyday colds and sicknesses?"
"His lungs sometimes bother him, not quite asthma. He sometimes has issues after illnesses with lung capacity or very labour-intensive cardio?" Rilla adds on. "He can run about the soccer field leisurely but anything more impactful is hard for him?"
"We'll go through some tests to see how his sugars react, it may have been something one-off and it's nothing to worry about."
"If it is diabetes," Rilla quietly asks.
"He'll most likely be disqualified from enlistment, but he can do home front jobs and other office jobs that would allow him to serve and maintain his a healthy level of living." The doctor says. "I see that you are…"
"I wasn't asking about the war, I was asking about his life in general, but since you have asked, I am Doctor, a Staff Sergeant at Christie's," Rilla tells him. "I help evaluate patients and make assessments and health plans."
"Intriguing," The doctor says not sure what else to say and Rilla holds back an eye roll.
"How long does he need to be evaluated?" Ken steps into the conversation.
"A few days at the very least, if it appears normal and he doesn't have another episode he will be released but should be looked after carefully. If it happens again we can further evaluate what is happening."