Super long one shot! As some people know I've been having a real rough time with my writing lately and writer's block. I'm trying to ease my way back. So I wrote this very long one-shot that contrary to how things usually work out actually got longer and longer when I rewrote/edited it. But I do really hope you read and enjoy it.

There are some 'spoilers' (oooh exciting!) for readers of my other stories, so if you have any questions or if anything is confusing, please let me know! :)

1992

Tulsa is flat country but Soda's house is situated on top of the closest approximation to a hill for miles in either direction. I walked up the driveway past Soda's black Ford pickup truck, his wife's Pepto-Bismol pink Cadillac, and the empty space covered in oil splotches where his son usually parks his grey Honda Accord.

Soda lollygags on his porch; his feet perched up on the porch railing, a blue Tulsa Driller's baseball cap pulled down so that the brim almost reaches his nose.

"You desperate fucker," I mouth to him, my arms crossed, head shaking. The smart ass smirk stays on my mouth as he saunters his way towards me, hands to his side and shakes his own head.

Soda called me over to his house because he needed help replacing his kitchen sink and despite the fact that my handyman skills catapult between 'nonexistent' and 'mediocre' Soda insisted that I come over and try to help him.

"Looks like I get what I pay for. You bring your tool kit?" He drawled.

Cocking my eyebrow I look back at my car parked along the curbside, "was I supposed to? Ain't that included in the package deal? Along with the beer you promised me."

Cracking a laugh, Soda takes a step to side, revealing a six pack of Miller Genuine Draft lying on the first step of his porch.

"Come on Pone, before we start," Soda takes a bottle out of the carton and waves it in front of me, enticing me with the pendulum swing of golden sustenance, or as it is more commonly referred, beer.

Even if I wasn't thirsty it would be hard to say no to Soda, he has an almost hypnotic affect over people, even when it came to matters as trivial as drinking a beer. Forced by time and life to scrape away the layers of pure adoration and see my brother in a more unvarnished light, even at forty-one I still felt and desired his pull.

I usually don't like to drink before I work on a project, not that fixing Soda's kitchen sink was rebuilding the Hoover Dam, but I tend to get a bit sluggish after just two beers, unlike both of my brothers who have a remarkable ability to transform their bodies into ever expanding masses capable of guzzling down bottle after bottle of malted barley without so much as a stumble or glazed eye.

But it was one of those late August evenings where the crickets whistled and chirped and the air crackled with the first few lightening bugs of the evening. My stomach rumbled as the faint scent of charcoal and hamburgers wafted through the air. The air was dry and clean, one of those perfect summer nights we usually don't experience until mid-September.

The only thing ruining the Norman Rockwell picture was snarled bark of German Shepard leashed to a tree while three teenagers, two with Vanilla Ice haircuts, tried to tease him by popping wheelies close, but unfortunately not close enough, to his post.

"Hope he bites those assholes one of these days," Soda says a slight growl to his voice as he hands me the icy-cold beer.

We sit on the top step of his front porch, the carton of beer between us.

"Why didn't you call Darry?" I hand Soda back his bottle opener and he tosses it behind him.

"Sheeeet," he drawls out, "Mr. Fix It? I decided to give the old man a break. Gotta do something nice for the senior citizens you know." Soda shoots me a cocky grin and rests his elbows behind his head.

"Sure thing, Grandpa," I smirk as Soda pours his beer into the "World's Greatest Grandpa" mug he got for Father's Day.

I still can't believe my brother has grandkids. Patrick has two boys of his own, Curt, 4 1/2 and the baby, Cash.

"What can I say, we're advanced in my family," Soda shrugged all while the corner of his mouth moved into a barely contained grin when he first told us that he was going to be a grandfather.

Soda chuckles and under the trembling porch light I can see the deep lines on his forehead, the crow's feet along his eyes and the grey of his goatee.

Darry, for what it's worth, is 47 but manages to look younger than he did at 20. We were convinced that Darry would be the first of us to lose his hair or turn grey, but nope, that handsome bastard still has a full head of dark hair and not a wrinkle in sight.

I swear there's a picture of Dorian Grey up in his attic.

"Naw," he continued, swirling his mug in his hand, "he and Cathy are dropping C.D. off at college this weekend. Karen's on some hiking trip through the Rockies, but Billy and Tommy are with them."

I shake my head and let out a low laugh, thinking of my smart ass, occasionally pain in the ass, nephew being accepted into Harvard of all places after almost getting expelled from Will Rogers for leading a 'riot' his second week.

"Christ, man," Soda said to me at the time, "least I managed to stay through my Sophomore year before droppin' out."

But C.D. has an intelligence to match his attitude and he shocked us all by managing not only to get straight As and a nearly perfect score on the SAT and the ACT, but maintained a round the clock schedule of student council, swim and a part time job.

His father assured us with rolled eyes and a heaving sigh that in spite of his round the clock schedule, C.D. managed to fit in plenty of 'extra-curricular' activities that designated him the Wavy Gravy of the wealthy and bored youth of Tulsa; which led to his father counting down the days C.D. had left at home with anticipatory zeal.

Soda, as he has for decades, reads my mind; "maybe some separation would do those two some good. Man, I love both of 'em to death, but I ain't really fixin' on spending another summer being their damn counselor and referee, I got enough problems of my own."

He did have a lot on his plate, but I also knew that despite Soda's protestations he would always be willing to serve as sounding board to Darry and C.D.

"You know C.D. gets his 'my way or the highway' attitude from Darry," I shake my head. "You think C.D. being accepted into Harvard would make Darry so delirious with happiness he'd let the kid get away with murder."

Soda let out a guffaw, "shit, Pony, that honeymoon period barely lasted a week, the two of 'em were going at each other in their fuckin' driveway while they were packing up the car, some shit about C.D. not wanting to pay for a speeding ticket. Man, that kid is one stubborn fucker," Soda shakes his head with admiration, strokes his goatee and smiles gleefully at me. "Can you imagine those two sharing a small, enclosed space for two days? That's like Clark Griswold meets the Menendez brothers."

I snort, causing the beer to go up my nostrils and burn my chest and throat, clean line of snot running down my nose and my eyes stinging with tears. I assure you, it was as attractive as it sounds.

"You okay, Pony? Talk about bein' a lightweight," Soda teases as he pounds my back, playfully placing his arm around my shoulder and squeezing.

The sun was just starting to set, the pink and purple horizon giving way to dusky bluish-grey. Soda picked a ladybug off his arm and set it down on the step below.

"We better get to work," Soda stands up and stretches, carrying the remaining beers in his hand.

I walk in the house greeted by a wall of family photos and religious iconography (not to be confused), including a cross made out of Heineken Beer caps. Almost every inch of Soda's living room wall is covered either in pictures, crosses or posters.

I have to admit it is a bit strange seeing my college graduation photo boxed in by a bunch of pink and day-glo green crosses.

Above the fireplace, at the focus point of the living room, Soda built a glass display for Mary's Cosmetologist diploma and license. Like Soda, Mary dropped out of high school, but she went back to get her GED, completed Cosmetology school and continues to take classes at Broken Arrow Beauty College where she's taking classes to be a certified Esthetician.

Between the crosses, the mismatched Salvation Army furniture and the diplomas there is very little of "Soda" in the living room; save for an end table with legs fixed like two actual human legs covered in blue jeans wearing cowboy boots; and the display print of a Colt Revolver.

There is nothing related to Soda's military service on display. "Shit," he told Darry and me, his brown eyes dark and haunting, "y'all think I want a fuckin' tattered up flag above pictures of my woman and kids? I don't need no medals or pictures to remember Vietnam."

And he's right, he doesn't.

Years ago the doctor told Mary and Soda that her past drug use rendered her virtually infertile. That medicinal wisdom turned out to be not true because curled up like a kitten on her mom's skull covered armchair was my seven-and-a-half year old niece, Hazer, greeting us with a small wave.

She is playing with the Game Boy her brother Patrick got her for Christmas.

I can't help but grin at her, I know the hell her parents went through to have her.

After Hazer's birth Soda wrote an angry letter to the doctor who initially told Mary she couldn't have children, telling him politely where he can stick his medical license and enclosing a photo of one-week old Hazer being burped by her mother.

If Patrick is the spitting image of Soda, than Hazer is Mary's clone, except for her the curls in her dark brown hair which come from her father.

Soda's kids may have different biological mothers but they had in many ways different fathers.

My nephew Patrick didn't meet his father until he was ten and the two of them are bonded as much as by their shared experience in Vietnam as they are by blood; but Patrick also experienced both the best and worst of Soda; his complete emotional devotion to his children, his generosity, his flashes of rage and his frightening flare ups of nightmares and PTSD.

It was Patrick who helped his father heal the dark inner wounds which festered within him for over a decade, while Soda helped Patrick with his own night terrors. Even now Soda's eyes will spark with a mixture of admiration, love, gratitude and guilt when he talks about his firstborn.

Hazer has avoided the magnificent highs and soul churning lows of Soda's personality. She experiencing Soda as someone the rest of us never have, a relatively calm, dare I say, normal, guy.

Sometimes I hardly recognize Hazer's father as my brother.

Soda gives Hazer a huge grin and pushes her hair back, "hey there Hazer Land, whatya been up to?" Hazer shrugs and gives her father a small yet serious smile, "nothin'."

"Aww, you ain't no fun. You wanna help me put together a sink?"

Hazer gives her father a look which, as the father of two girls myself, I have seen many a time, the look daughters have given their fathers since the Cavemen; a look that says: are you shitting me?

She turns on the T.V. and I take a step back as the opening theme song to "Family Matters" blares through the living room.

"You guys got Curt tonight?" I ask as I gaze over at a pair of small blue and red Reebox shoes. Before Soda can answer, my heart jumps into my throat, and I lean towards him so Hazer won't hear, "shit, is Cash alright?"

Fear rushes through me and I feel guilty for not even remembering about Cash until this moment. Because I see how my brother's casual grin straightens into the closest approximation to a despondent stare I have seen in over a decade and I know that Cash weighs heavily on his grandfather's 190 lb frame.

Cash was just diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy, and although he has a 'moderate' form of the disorder the doctors already told Patrick and Casey that he won't ever walk without the aid of braces, crutches and walkers.

Sodapop looks down at his shoes, speaks a low and somber voice, "he's having some digestive issues which might be caused by his CP, the doc don't think he'll need a feeding tube, but they want him there for observation for a 24 hour period. Poor baby's been cryin' non stop."

He bites his lip and winces as he runs his fingers through his hair.

I close my own eyes. To say that you 'can't imagine' something is such a trite turn of phrase that not even the makers of Hallmark Greeting Cards would include on their cards; but I cannot imagine what Patrick is going through.

I place my arm on Soda's shoulder and hold it there for a second or two, giving it a tight squeeze. I don't tell him "we're here for you," or "whatever you need," because he knows that I would do anything for him, and there are times where there is nothing you can do but be there and help in your own way shoulder their pain.

Soda gives me a tiny nod and takes a deep breath. "Thank you," he tells me, his eyes filled with sincerity and gratitude.

I can still see the porch light flicker through the kitchen, forming a prism of a shadow on Soda's angular chin, while the light continued to shine on the rest of his face.

In the kitchen, I pretend to be useful by organizing pipes by sizes, while Soda uses a wrench to remove the garbage disposal.

"Ugh," Soda says as he plugs his nose at the putrid smell of decaying food, "smells like a skunk died in here. Haze, you wanna smell something disgusting?" He cheerfully calls out to the living room.

"Nope. Why do I wanna to do that?" Hazer replies over the sycophantic laugh track that followed one of Urkel's lines.

Urkel was doing something 'amusing' because even Hazer was giggling while the studio audience sounded like they were convulsing in a muck of canned laughter.

"Hand me that Swivel P-Trap," he orders. "It's so much worse watching Patrick, you know? Seeing him trying to be strong and keep it together for Casey and Curt, while I know it's cracking his heart.

Got the trap adapter, Pony?"

Soda needed to be doing something tangible to feel useful, but he already helped Patrick and Casey more than he realized just by offering an empathetic ear, not to mention free babysitting.

It was the same way Soda and Mary allowed C.D. to live with them for a few days last year while he was in a rare fight with not just Darry, but both of his parents.

He gives us everything he has.

Right now though, all my brother was giving me an anxiety attack.

"Soda," I ask nervously, "you turn the water supply off?" Soda slams his palm against his forehead and grins with embarrassment, "man, I knew I had you around for a reason."

"What, it ain't just my sparklin' personality and debonair good looks?" I call out.

Soda returns with a megawatt smile, "good job Pony, you prevented a flood and only cost me one beer."

"Yeah, it's like if Grandma Curtis was a plumber," I note dryly, referring to our severely religious, teetotaler grandmother.

Soda bends and scrunches up his arms and in an almost frightening transformation becomes our grandmother. "The LORD is COMING for YOU CHILD! He's running after you like my pantyhose done run down my legs!"

I laugh in spite of myself, feeling guilty for making fun of 1) our grandmother and 2) a dead woman; but if I close my eyes I can almost see the orthopedic shoes, old lady knee highs, judgmental eyes and fire and brimstone tongue slashing and burning through the crevice of my mind.

I can tell Soda feels a bit guilty as well because he straightens up and places his fist over his mouth. He turns from me and makes a brief sign of the cross.

If Grandma Curtis knew her grandson became, at least nominally, a Catholic, she would have flagellated herself with the whips of her own narrow minded fury and self-righteous rage.

"She didn't like me," Soda said in a casual tone, "I reminded her too much of Dad." He puts his fingers on his chin and strokes his beard, "she kinda liked you though."

"Yeah, wasn't I the lucky one," I say my lips curled into a smirk.

"Can you imagine if she ever met C.D.? She'd have a fuckin' heart attack."

I chuckle at the thought, "man, she turned into an Atheist in a split second. Hell, that kid could make Gandhi join a paramilitary unit."

Soda face grows serious, "you know Pone, I really wish mom and dad coulda met all of our kids, they would have loved them so much." He eyes Curt's drinking cup with wistfulness.

Surrounded by pieces of pipes and metal spread out on towels I feel once again the pain not of losing my own parents a grief which I have learned to ride along with, but the grief of losing my daughters' grandparents.

I can give my daughters everything I am, but I can't give them two people who would have been almost as crazy about them as their mom and I are, and though I know there is nothing I can do, I can't help but feel a twinge of sadness.

Soda laughs, "I don't think I'd ever seen Grandma Curtis drink anything harder than milk and even then she wouldn't drink milk on a Sunday. Remember how Dad would hide the beer and Mom would hide all of her cigarettes that time she came to visit with Uncle Pat? Their bedroom looked like a damn liquor store."

I chuckle at the memory.

My mother was a compulsive smoker and growing up I don't think I can remember a time when she didn't have a cigarette dangling from her mouth. I still remember sitting on her lap, her slender fingers wrapped around the cigarette, her hand wrapped around my chest, her fingers spread out across my heart, gently tapping my heart beat in the Morse Code that belonged only to us.

I imitated her by blowing on my bubble wand, watching as my bubbles popped while her smoke lingered in the air.

Of course, knowing what we do now about second hand smoke there is a fog clouding that otherwise sweet addictive memory. My daughters made me stop smoking, but damn if I don't still on occasion seek out the tobacco stained air of the smoking section of restaurants.

It may put me in an early grave, but it's my mother's scent.

"You never stop parenting your kids, even when they're 24 and have kids of their own. It's worse though, because you see 'em suffering and there's nothing you can do but watch like of those damn paparazzi photographers. It's killing Patrick and Casey to see Cash in so much pain," Soda continues.

My stomach twists like a balloon animal, my fingers form a 'V' holding onto a non-existent cigarette.

Soda lifts his head up from underneath his sink; Patrick and Casey aren't the only one in a world of hurt.

Sitting crossed legged, Soda, presses his thumb against the sole of his shoe, "I haven't told Mary or Patrick this, but when Cash first got diagnosed I was afraid that his CP was my fault. I read about Agent Orange in something called JAMA at the library, course couldn't understand half of the medical jargon they used, but I know that lots of Vets, their kids had birth defects related to them serving in 'Nam. What if Agent Orange skipped over Patrick and hurt Cash?"

My eyes slightly widen at the news of my brother who doesn't read anything but the T.V. Guide, and whatever I write; reading the Journal of the American Medical Association. But Soda would do anything for his family.

I sit on the floor across from him, our knees almost touching, the way we used to talk to each other when we shared the same bed.

He's looking at me with a challenging stare and I meet it with an intense gaze of my own, willing to stop the crap spewing in my brother's mind.

"There's no link between Agent Orange and Cerebral Palsy, besides Cash is your grandson, if anyone is gonna prove the doctors wrong, it's him. You are not to blame Soda, so stop this shit." My voice is forceful but I hope tender because even at our age it throws me off my axis to see Soda in pain.

He's experienced enough to last ten life times.

Soda gives a slight smile and I can see him almost ready to grab onto whatever comfort my words provide. A comfort he has denied himself ever since Cash's diagnosis.

But I'm afraid that Soda will find a bit of warped solace in self-blaming himself for Cash's issues, it was another needle in the vein, it gave him control in an uncontrollable situation.

It's dark outside now, the porch light sneaking in through the kitchen screen door, hitting the space where our knees almost touch.

"Crystal," Soda, speaking in a low voice, referring to Curt's mom, "is working the night shift tonight and Patrick is coming from the hospital tomorrow morning, while Casey stays with Cash, so," he starts in a loud voice as he turns towards the hallway, "I got my best buddy, Curt, with me."

Hazer looks up from her chair at her father, and then looks back down.

On cue Curt Nguyen rushes out of the last bedroom in the hall, a Transformer in his hand. "Zap! Pow! Pow! Pow! I got you Bobo!" he shouts at Soda.

Soda and Mary told me they weren't really the 'grandpa and grandma' type so Curt calls them Bobo and Lola.

Soda puts his arm around me, "you remember my brother, huh Curt? This is Uncle Pony."

Curt starts cracking up, almost convulsing with laughter, "Pony! That's a dumb name for a person. Why did your parents name you Pony?! Did they think you're a horse?!"

Soda, who is trying not to laugh shakes his head at Curt, and in a surprisingly stern tone tells him, "naw buddy, we don't talk like that 'round here. Besides you're gonna hurt Uncle Pony's feelings. That ain't nice, Curt. I know your daddy don't let you talk like that."

"Sorry," Curt says looking down at his socks.

Curt peers at our mess, "what are you doin'?"

Soda grins at him, "trying to fix the sink, Uncle Pony can fix everything." My brother gives me a slight smile and I know he's not talking about the sink.

I smile back at Soda.

"My little brother is broken, maybe you can fix him," Curt looks up at me, pleading.

My mouth opens up slightly but before I can even think of what to say, Soda puts his hand on Curt's shoulder and in a firm but gentle voice tells him, "Cash isn't broken, buddy. He don't need fixing."

Just like that Curt is back to Transformers. "Play with me Bobo! Pow! Pow! I got you again!"

Soda stumbles back, dramatically rolling back his eyes and waving his arms up, "aw man, General Curt, you got me," before adding some very realistic death sounds as he almost crashed into my carefully laid out pipes and sink parts.

Curt puts his hands on his hips, his eyes narrow, "I ain't playin' regular army no more Bobo! I'm leading a mission to kill a bunch of space aliens who captured my planet. I'm Razarclaw and you're Blurr. Now, do it right!" He demanded with a force that would make General Patton blush.

Soda gives Curt a salute, grabbed him and in an over the top mock angry voice yells at Curt, "you messin' with me Razarclaw? You MESSING WITH ME?" Curt laughs so hard he has to hold his stomach, while Soda wrestles him to the ground, Curt's black curly rat's tail bouncing up and down.

"You need to work on your moves there Razarclaw, this is embarrassing," Soda says his foot hovering over Curt.

Mary, her tattoos peeking through her long sleeved Pink Floyd T-shirt, her hair up in a high and messy ponytail, gives me a tired grin and a quick hug. She glances down at her wrist watch and then at Soda expectantly who gives her a sheepish shrug, "sorry babe, didn't realize what time it was."

Fully revved up, Curt kicks and screams his way to bed, "I ain't tired! You can't make me go to bed!"

I can still hear Curt pout about his bed time all the way from the spare bedroom in back, "Grammy lets me do whatever I want," he calls out. Soda scoffs and turns to me, "I bet."

"We're not Grammy," Soda rolls his eyes at me and mutters 'thank you Jesus.' "I ain't messin' Curtis, go to bed."

Although Soda tries to sound like he means business, his barely contained grin tells me that he's enjoying this give and take.

I can hear Curt slam into the bed, the sound of the coils bouncing with every slam, "ahh!" he screams as he jumps on his bed, Mary telling him to stop and Curt yelling, "don't tell ME what to do! I ain't tired!"

I shake my head, "pure Shepard you got there."

Soda shakes his head with a laugh, "yeah, who woulda thought my grandson and Angela Shepard's grandson would be a handful."

"I can't believe Angela has him call her Grammy…"

"Yeah," Soda rolls his eyes "Shit, that ain't nothing, in one of her intoxicated states she tried to get Curt to call her 'Gramgela' but the kiddo said no. Don't forget about Unkie Tim."

"Fuck it," I whisper as I hand Soda a wrench, "I'd pay good money to hear Curt call Tim Shepard "Unkie Tim."

"Considerin' he has Angela Shepard and Patrick's mom for grandmothers," Soda begins thoughtfully, "I'm surprised he ain't plain nuts. Besides he's a kid, he's supposed to energetic. And really, when you consider me, Anna, Angela and Ted Jones, the fact that Patrick and Crystal turned out to be such great people is a damn miracle."

Taking a gulp of beer, Soda swings his arm around Mary who strolls into the kitchen, "and don't forget this demure and reserved little lady I got as a role model," Soda says with a laugh.

Turning slightly so Hazer won't see, Mary gives Soda the finger and they both burst out laughing. Mary is a woman who shows her love through four letter words as much as anything else.

Mary turns on the radio, lowering the volume and adjusting the dial finds the station she wants. "This is our song," she says in a whispered tone as "You Can't Always Get What You Want" plays.

Before I know it, Soda grabs Mary and looks at her with a penetrating stare that makes me blush. He grabs her hand and she jumps on the chair. She sways from side to side, closing her eyes while Soda looks up to her with adoration.

As the music continues, the two of them move without constraints, moving to a beat much more wild and forceful than even Keith Richards and Mick Jaggar could have envisioned in their wildest drug induced orgiastic dreams.

Watching them I feel like I'm interrupting a make out session and though I want to give them their privacy there is something magnetic about watching them tear it up, shaking and moving around, not giving a shit what anyone else thinks.

Forget what I said about this Soda being 'calm' and 'normal.'

Hazer walks in to the kitchen, looking completely unfazed by her parents climbing up on the furniture dancing while her Uncle sits crossed legged in the corner trying to read instructions for putting together a sink.

"Come on, join us," Mary reaches her hand out to Hazer and gives her daughter a warm smile.

Hazer gives a shy smile and sways slightly from side to side. "There ya go baby, rock it Hazer!" Mary claps and calls out, even though Hazer looks embarrassed and is barely moving.

Soda holds a hand like a microphone out to her and Hazer sings, "…you might find, you get what you need," in a soft, but surprisingly good voice. Soda has no singing talent whatsoever, although he can dance like no one's business.

Hazer stands back against the kitchen wall watching her parents dance, but when "Smells Like Teen Spirit" starts playing and Mary and Soda begin to fake mosh each other, Hazer jumps up with excitement, runs to her parents and with a Soda like grin on her face, joins the 'mosh pit.'

It was one of those sites you kind of had to see to believe. If it was anyone else I would have either cracked up laughing or rolled my eyes. But watching my brother dance in his kitchen I can almost see the stress caused by Cash's diagnosis drain out of his body.

Dance is the flood of release he needs, and there's no one he'd rather dance with on a Friday evening than his wife and daughter.

Who else but Soda turns his kitchen into a silent mosh pit with his seven-year-old daughter leading the way?

Soda takes a deep breath and grins at me and shrugs an apology, "we gotta finish the sink. Okay Hazer, Hazer, my star gazer, time for you to get to bed."

"And pick up your toys in the living room," Mary says as she gives Hazer a small kiss on top of the head.

Hazer crosses her arms, "those are Curt's toys, you should make him pick them up."

Arms on her hips, she gives Hazer the look, "Hazer Land Curtis, does it look like I care? Someone's gonna trip over 'em and get hurt. At least move the toys the corner."

Hazer sighs and I can see her throw the toys in a corner, managing to make an even larger mess, albeit a mess that won't result in someone crippled by the end of the night.

"So unfair," she sulks.

"Your daughter," Mary mouths to Soda, shaking her head.

Hazer continues, "this sucks," she sighs.

"Your mouth," Soda mouths with a wide grin to Mary.

Hazer is in bed and we're back to working on the sink.

"How's the newspaper treating you Pony? How are your girls, Pony?" Mary asks while pouring herself a Sprite.

Soda stops tightening the bolts on the new pipe and turns to give me his full attention.

I smile, thinking about my daughters, Paige who is fourteen and Daphne who is twelve.

"Aimee has them for the week, she took them up to Vancouver to visit her mother."

Seven years ago Aimee and I divorced each other.

Our divorce was particularly tough on our eldest daughter.

I have no poetic language, no dry sarcasm, no literary references to how I felt seeing my then seven year old's face crumble when we told her the news. That primal urge that first emerged when Aimee told me she was pregnant, that animalistic urge to protect and even kill for my daughters without hesitation, clawed its way back to the surface as I wanted to hunt the person who was hurting my daughter.

But this time the enemy wasn't monsters under the bed or stranger danger, it was Aimee and myself.

For Daphne the adjustment was much easier, but my youngest daughter can make her way through anything.

A few years ago during a particularly rough winter, Paige and I got up early to watch the sunrise together. That's our thing, our holy moment, our Sermon on the Mount. We are bonded by a love of nature as much as by blood. As we silently watched the first cuts of light hit the trees encapsulated in white icy tombs and the early spark of the sun's rays flicker on the thin layer of ice under which rested thick layers of fresh snow; Paige told me that she could tell Aimee and I were heading for a divorce even before we did.

"I felt so miserable, and even though you and Mom never argued in front of us, I could feel internally that something was wrong and off kilter. But later I realized that I felt your pain and mom's pain as my own."

My daughter, even as a little girl, takes on everyone's pain as her own, drinking the nectar of sorrow that was never her burden to partake.

Her eyes flinched, and I could see my past flood through her startling green eyes. Paige pulls me into a hug, "I love you so much."

She looked up at me and beamed, her smile melting a layer of guilt I carried with me for years.

And in that moment I did something which I haven't done since the night we told them about the divorce, I cried in front of my daughter.

I'm delirious with pride in both my daughters, and Aimee, she adores the girls and she will always be the smartest person I will ever know. I'm proud she's their mom.

Soda gives me a look of empathy without any judgment or pity; he knows all about Paige's struggles and my guilt, "tell the girls when they get back Mary and me want to see 'em, we miss having them around, you know. Hazer keeps on asking if Paige can babysit her."

I snap out of my kitchen in the winter of 1988 and back into Soda's kitchen in the summer of 1992.

"Can't believe I forgot to tell you, Daphne is going to be in "Fiddler on the Roof."

It was Daphne's first successful audition with a 'real theater' and not just the children's theater. I have no idea how Aimee and my daughter ended up being such an extraverted ham. I have already heard her belt out 'Sunrise, Sunset' enough times to make me hallucinate that every knock on the door is the Czar's secret police to take me away.

"Yeah, we already know, she called us up and demanded we buy tickets. Quite a little saleswoman you got there," Soda gives me a pointed grin.

I smirk to myself, "yeah, and I bet Uncle Soda and Aunt Mary was a real hard sell, huh?"

Soda hands me a nut, as if I should know what to do with it, "what can I say Pone, she's got me wrapped around her finger."

"Come on, Muscles," Soda instructs me as we lift the new sink and faucet into empty space. Afterwards, Soda cringes and rubs his back.

"You okay?"

Soda gives me a tongue in cheek grin, "yeah, my back just feels like a tank ran over it, no big deal though."

Our conversation is sliced by an ear piercing scream. Without any hesitation Soda and Mary run towards Curt's room I run after them, feeling the fear of the unknown.

Curt is sitting straight up on his bed, screaming his lung out, his legs straight in front of him, his hands crossing his chest, as if trying to comfort himself.

Soda turns on the Jiminy Cricket light and although there is a mini fan blowing on Curt's bed, the room is thick with the horrible nightmares and pure terror as Curt shakes and screams.

Neither one of my daughters have had night terrors like this. Slowly, Soda walks towards him and kneels down right beside him, "it's okay Curt, it's okay. You're safe Curt, you're okay."

"Where am I?!" His voice is of pure panicked terror, as he grabs Soda by the shirt.

I can hear my brother let out a small whimper of empathetic pain as he places his hands on Curt's shaking legs, willing that his touch might calm him down.

"I don't know where I am! Where's my Ninja Turtle pillow? I don't got Raphael!" He begins to frantically move his hands along his bed like a blind man feeling for the railing at the edge of a cliff. Mary puts her hand over her mouth and looks like she's going to start bawling.

"Help Me! I want Mommy! I want Daddy! Where am I?!" Curt cries out in terror, letting out another loud wail which tears a hole in my heart.

I can't imagine what this is doing to Soda.

He doesn't look at any of us, his face is red and wet with tears, snot runs down his nose and down his pajama collar.

"You're with Bobo and Lola, baby, you're safe," Mary says in a voice that surprises me with its softness and evenness, her voice sounds calm and soothing like the voice of a therapist or an audiobook narrator. Not at all like my sometimes brash sister-in-law.

Curt whimpers and his little shoulders begin to hunch up, his breathing is short and panicked and I'm afraid he's going to hyperventilate.

Soda holds his hand and talks to him in a low-key voice. But I can see his own back and shoulders hunch up and heave slightly and I know my brother is barely keeping it together.

I step out of the room wanting to give them space, not wanting to see Curt in so much pain.

How can one family endure so much? Anger grips inside of me. I work as an investigative reporter and a writer and I get to deal with injustice by writing about it and naming and shaming the people who are to blame for the injustice.

But there was no one to blame and in that moment I felt completely hopeless . Turns out there are plenty of things, my marriage, Curt's nightmares, that I couldn't fix.

Hazer stands outside her room, her eyes wide open, twisting a chunk of her nightgown in her hand.

"My brother has to take Cash to the hospital so much that Curt spends a lot of time with us, it's really hard on him," she says as she flinches and covers her ears while Curt lets out another scream.

"He's only four, he don't know better, Uncle Pony."

As Mary sings, "You are my Sunshine," I step back through the smoky jaws of time and into my own night terrors, the feeling of delirium and having no control over my body or mind. My mind no longer mine but a hostage victim to the debauched horror twisting within.

How could I wake up from a nightmare that lived inside and outside of me in equal measure?

I close my eyes willing myself to once again leave my past behind.

I figure this can't be easy on Hazer either. Before I can say anything to her she walks into the living room, and without a word begins to pick up Curt's toys from the corner she threw them and place them neatly on the shelf.

Mary walks out of the room, her face heavy with Curt's fears. I give her a sympathetic look and she nods at me, as she walks into the kitchen to pour Curt some water from the new sink.

Soda is still in the room with Curt, holding his hand and instructing him to breathe, I recognize the same pacifying voice that weathered me through my own night terrors after our parents were killed.

Night terrors are a horror I wouldn't wish on anyone, but there's no one like Soda to help you get through an episode. Yet I knew that Curt's nightmares would wear heavy on my brother and once again I felt angry at the unfairness of it all.

I see Soda, holding his grandson in his lap, gently rocking him.

"It's okay Curt, it's okay, you're safe Curt. I love you buddy."

Soda tries to give me a wan smile but his eyes are dark and cloudy.

But Curt, curled up in his grandpa's lap, his hands still gripping onto Soda's shirt, falls asleep.

Soda lifts his hand above Curt's sleeping form and shakes my hand goodnight.

S.E. Hinton owns

I don't own anything you recognize or any pop-culture and real world reference

Brawaha YES THE Angela Shepard is Soda's grandson's grandmother. Ha Ha Ha

Casey, who is Cash's mother, is supposed to be Casey Kencaide the horse trainer who is a character in Hinton's "Taming the Star Runner"

Hazer is a rodeo term, her parents, especially her dad being huge rodeo fans.

Thank you so much for reading, your reviews rock my world and mean so much.