Waiting for the Flyers. Pt 12 Rifts

Early on a Sunday morning Sophie and Rachael arrived with a wheel chair to take me back to my house. I was a bit put out, I wanted to try walking but Sophie insisted. Rachael carried the box containing my diaries, except the entries I carried in a separate file for David.

Almost as soon as I entered my house the memory of the last meeting with the family – the time when they told me about David – came tumbling back. Realising I’d lost myself in the conversations with him, and the search through my diary notes, I felt angry and embarrassed about my self-indulgence. I had no idea of what had been happening over the last weeks. I’d even forgotten how many weeks. ‘Alright, what’s been going on?’ I said with hardly a thought as to why I asked.

The girls glanced at each other clearly at a loss as what to say. Sophie said, ‘We’re going to have a family moot. We were thinking you might want to wait a few days until you settle in after so long away.’

‘I don’t need time to settle in, Sophie I need to know what’s been happening. Something big’s gone down hasn’t it? If nothing has then I know zero about my people. . . . I wanna see Jess.’

‘Jess?’

I could see from the fright on Rachael’s face Jess was likely at the centre of whatever was occurring or at least he was involved in some way.

Sophie tried her doctor’s bedside manner on me, ‘Ma don’t get wound up, you’ve had a difficult— alright,’ giving up the pretence she continued, ‘Ma we have some problems, but not just with Jess. OK? It’s probably better if some of us explain first before you contact Jess. I’ll ask Alan to come here this afternoon.’

‘Tell him to bring Jess.’

‘We’ll arrange something, but you need to talk to Alan first.’

‘Well in that case, I’ll fix a meeting with Jess after I’ve heard what Alan has to say. . . Soph, you go see Alan.’

I asked Rachael to stay. She was filling out and I wanted to know how the pregnancy was going and if she’d been in contact with Jess.

‘How many weeks now?’

‘Not sure exactly Ma. Twelve, fourteen weeks.'

‘Does Jess know?’

‘Of course. He used to visit regularly until Burnalham. Now he sends notes.’

‘Do you love him?’

‘The child is the most important to our community. He knows that.’

‘That’s not what I asked.’

‘It’s not important. Jess and I agreed I should stay here with Doc Sophie and Junior. Being with Jess is too risky.’

‘Why doesn’t Jess come back? Did he tell you?’

‘He says we should tidy up the Burnalham and make it into a separate community. He thinks because it was a viable village with good amenities it would be a good base to start expanding to other areas. It’s surrounded by land that was farmed which should be developed.’

‘So he has plans to start out on his own.’

‘No, Ma. He thinks this place should be the centre as we spread out. Like an anchor, he calls it.’

‘Do you agree with his ideas?’

‘I wasn’t sure at first, but with the lower fields . . .’

Rachael stopped speaking and turned red, her expression like she’d divulged a secret.

‘What about the lower fields?’

‘Alan wants to explain. He knows more than me.’

‘Rachael!’

‘. . . they are flooding, we’ve lost a lot of crop, and a lot more is rotting. It’s the river.’

‘The river? The weather is dry.’

‘It just keeps getting higher. The old guy, David? He said it’s probably because there’s no power now and the pumps used for draining low land and fens won’t work. He said it’ll most likely get worse. That’s partly why Jess wants to set up in Burnalham.’

‘Where are the pumps, Does anybody know.’

‘Many kilometres away. David said that’s why it’s taking so long for water to get here.’

‘What’s Alan and Jack doing about it?

‘Alan says we have plenty and it’s not a problem, but Jack disagrees. He thinks Jess has a point and we should be helping Jess to prepare land around the village. It’s a problem, Ma. The boys are split on what to do and Alan totally refuses to work with Jess. He says Jess is cheating.’

‘Listen, go tell Sophie forget the damn moot I want to see Alan and Jack right now. This can’t happen.’

But it had happened. After Rachael left I knew the thing I dreaded was coming. Dissent among my family could destroy our community, which clearly was more fragile than anybody realised.