The Flyers

It was nearly Christmas again, the man thought to himself. Another Christmas without Emily, and this year without any of the family and grandchildren visiting. “I guess we'll just make do this year, Traveler. Yes, just you and me,” he said, as he reached out and stroked Traveler's long coat of fur. It had been three years since he lost his wife, Emily, and to be honest, life seemed stale. If not for the companionship of Traveler, he would probably not have any reason to get out of bed in the morning. 

Traveler had been a birthday surprise for Emily four years ago. She just adored Traveler. The dog had come by his name because the man and Emily had taken a two-week-long road trip when he was a pup. The pup went with them and had been a very agreeable travel companion. Today, the man was noticing a slowness in his own routine, and a numbness in his arm and hand. “Where did I put down my coffee?” he thought to himself. 

He and Emily had married at the usual age for the time, at 18, back in the summer of 1959. The man had worked hard for his dad's menswear and uniform shop downtown called Murray & Sons. He worked weekends and summers, as did the man's older brother, Robert, until tragedy struck the Murray family. Big Brother Robert, whom the man had always looked up to, had died in an accident. He was crossing the busy street running an errand for his dad's shop when he was struck by a large Buick going too fast through an intersection while running a stop sign. The man's father and mother were never quite the same and the man had resolved to focus on the work at hand and be there for his parents. He tried to put the memory of his brother's young life behind him. 

Emily had been instrumental in the success of their chosen life pursuit. In the 1970’s, the man's dad had handed over the reins of the shop, and Emily had helped with merchandise ordering and keeping the books. They had raised up a son and daughter together, and the son had gone into accounting and the daughter had learned the family business. It was just a few months before Emily’s death that the man had handed over the mantle of the menswear shop to his daughter and her husband and had finally retired so that Emily and he could do the little things that they had always wanted to do. 

It wasn't long until Emily was diagnosed and then gone. This, of course, had changed the man in profound ways. He really did not want to do the little things he once did while Emily was alive. The man's day consisted of getting up and dressed, letting Traveler out to take care of nature, and feeding himself and Traveler in the kitchen. “A can of Canine Cookout for you, Traveler, and a buttered everything bagel for me”. It had been steadily snowing out the window all morning. The snow was building up so much that it had triggered an old memory of long ago. 

The Christmas of 1948, the man thought, as he dreamily gazed out at the snow from the kitchen window. “Yes, Christmas, 1948,” he said out loud. That was the Christmas when under the tree were two shiny brand new Flexible Flyer Airline Pursuits; yes, one for me, and one for my brother, Robert. We were just the tender ages of seven and nine. We sledded all the rest of Christmas Day and the vacation week and weekend following Christmas, but little did we know the real treat was to come in the form of the Blizzard after the first of January. Yes, it was just after “ringing in” the New Year, and the town was closed down for a handful of days. Dad really got his money's worth out of the Flyers that week. Robert and I barely came in except for lunch, and even that was just a quick slurp of tomato soup. 

The man chuckled to himself, thinking of when he and his brother were young, innocent, carefree, and had played together in the snow for seemingly endless hours, sledding down a rather large hill behind the house again and again. The man's coffee had cooled to room temperature and Traveler had curled up at the man's feet for a little nap before his fond memory of the sleds and his brother had dissipated. It was at this time that the man had heard an eerily familiar voice behind him. “You know you still have the Flyers in the attic, Charlie.” 

The man snapped around to see where the voice came from behind him. “Robert, can this be?” The man was pale with surprise. “But you're dead. How can you be here?” the man asked with incredulity.  “Well, Charlie you have not had an actual, genuinely happy thought (about me) since I left. Yes, it is true that you had sad memories that you mulled over and pushed back down, but not a happy thought or memory.” 

The man responded, “Robert, your passing was so wrenching for mom and dad, and I guess for me, too.” “Yes, I can understand.” Robert, standing right there in the man’s kitchen against all possibility, stared out the kitchen window at the accumulating snow, and then appeared to have a flash of an idea on his youthful face. “Charlie, why don't we dig out the Flyers and find a hill?” The man seemed uneasy with the notion. “Robert I am old. I can't just go traipsing out into the cold snow and slide down a huge hill on an old rusty relic. I might break something, and I’m not talking about the Flyer.”

“Charlie, I would have never had to beg you to do something adventurous before...,” The man interrupted his brother, “but this is now, Robert, and I can't move as I once did. I am not young anymore.” “Okay Gramps,” Robert said teasingly, “then I will get them out of the attic myself.” Robert pulled down the ladder from the attic and began rummaging. “Golly Charlie, all this stuff!” Robert made his way down a narrow walkway that took him in the direction of a small window on the far wall. With a reflection of the snow casting a white light into that part of the attic, he began to make out the familiar expectant shapes of two old friends of smooth wood and gleaming metal propped up in the corner. Making his way toward the figures, he let out a “Eureka, Charlie, found ‘em! I’m handing them down.” 

Robert wrestled one toward the ladder, handing it down to Charlie and returning for the second Flyer. He slid that one down to his anticipating brother and stepped back down the ladder, noticing as he went that Charlie had also begun to take on a more youthful look than he had before. Robert looked Charlie straight in the eye; “are you ready, kiddo?” Each brother grabbed what then appeared to be a shiny new Flexible Flyer, opening the front door and excitedly walking out to the collecting snow.  Charlie, with a new spring in his step and a youthful gleam in his eye, looked at his big brother and said, “Let’s Fly!”