In Our Autumn Years Part 10

He had decided to walk back into town. Even if Ted insisted that he could ride his bike with Norma, the old man had refused. If he was about to meet his brothers again the last thing he wanted was to show up on that, since he may end up tripping over himself. He hadn't heard their conjoined laughter in over 42 years now, and he certainly didn't want to hear it now at his expense.

How old would they be now? Seventy three, at least… yes… seventy three. He would never have thought they would get this old, all of them, much less himself. He had once been so full of life, so full of spunk. Now he was slower on his feet than he'd care to admit, and the pains and aches in his joints made him sometimes so mad he'd just glare at the world and pout like a child.

Driving alongside him was Ted, Norma riding on the back.

"How'd they show up?" Once-ler asked as he walked, arms bent and swinging with purpose.

"I don't know," Ted explained. "I just got home and Ma had these two guys there. She said they were her… well. Uncles, and they wanted to know where you were so I came out here super fast."

"Did you get a good look at 'em?" Once-ler asked.

"Not really…"

He wondered what they looked like. Were they the same any more, or had they changed their appearance? A part of him felt thrilled; it was his brothers. His baby brothers, who he used to tickle to make them giggle when they were small, before they had reached their terrible two's where they would rough house and tumble around.

A part of him still loved them. How could he not? They were his brothers. A larger part of him was angry at them for leaving, though. They hadn't even put up a fight against their mother, yet, could they have? Brett and Chet were always so simple minded, so slow and easy to please and easy to lead. With a woman like their mother at the helm, she would steer them right into Hell and back and they could be incapable of saying anything.

He pitied and hated them at the same time and it wasn't a nice feeling to have towards what could be your only living blood relatives left alive in the world, not counting Helen and Ted.

Helen… it was one thing to learn the Once-ler was her father, but what about learning she had uncles, as well? He groaned internally. She won't like this.

After the long walk back to town they finally reached Ted's house on Giesel Street; and Once-ler had to stop at the corner since there was a white van parked out front of the house. Realization struck him that his brothers weren't 'free' like he was. They were in a home. A nursing home; for the elderly. Why did that hurt his heart so much, so suddenly?

The orderly was standing besides the van, looking bored.

Once-ler walked up to the van but then he heard a familiar laugh coming from not Ted's house, but the back yard of the neighbor's house. Audrey's house? Ted hopped off his bike once Norma was off, and they slowly made their way around the back of Audrey's house. There stood Helen, arms folded, looking very put out.

"Yeah that's it," Audrey said enthusiastically as Norma and Ted rounded the corner. "Oh hey Ted!"

She was standing besides the two old men that Ted had seen inside his house. They both had long white beards, bald heads, and bent black hats. One tilted forward, the other tilted back. One wore a plaid red and black shirt while the other actually wore blue. The one in red had his pants pulled up so high it may as well be up to his arm pits whilst the other wore suspenders, keeping his pants up.

Once-ler, when he finally saw them, stopped dead in his tracks as his eyes widened. His brothers, his little brothers, were so close suddenly. He hadn't been this close to them in decades and they were… painting on Audrey's house. She didn't seem to mind, which was nice of her, he guessed.

"Oh. Well they haven't changed that much." Norma commented with a shrug as she watched the one in blue draw a huge circle in white paint, smiling as he did.

Once-ler said nothing but walked around her and approached the two old men slowly, as if approaching a wild animal. How do you start a conversation like this? Was hello suitable? He didn't know.

"Uh. Brett? Chet?" he asked.

They looked at him at the same time; their faces as wrinkled and spotty as his was, their eyebrows bushy and grey to match those long curling beards. Though there were differences. Brett, the one in red, his beard curled inwards whilst Chet's curled outwards. They both looked at him with an equally lost, blank expression at first before it looked as though a light switch was flicked in both their memories.

"Once-ler!" Chet cried out, dropping his paint brush, and rushed (as much as a man in his early seventies could) at his brother and wrapped his arms around Once-ler.

"Once-ler!" Bred echoed his brother and did the same, until Once-ler was more or less being group hugged by his brothers. The tall man, still taller than them, stood rigid and still as his arms were all but pinned by his sides.

"We wuz a'scared you'd be worm food, Once!" Chet declared.

"Ever so scared." Brett echoed.

"H-hyeah well I might be if you guys don't let me go." he said through gritted teeth.

"Uh?" the twins asked as one.

"Let me go. Please."

Soon he could breathe again, and he found it so odd to find himself sitting on a chair against the patio swing that Audrey's parents had out back in which his brothers were sitting. It was alarming how much they had aged. Heck, how much they had all aged since the last time they saw one another. They had been in the RV besides their mother, announcing Brett to be her favorite child before they drove away, never to be heard from again.

Until now.

"Boy Oncie you sure got awful old." Chet commented.

"Same can be said for you, Chet." as always, even as a child, Once-ler can tell his brothers apart. Funny since their mother never could.

"Hyeah he got that true." Brett giggled.

"So uh. What've… what happened after you two left?" Once-ler asked.

"Oh we gone went home again." they both said in unison. Brett took over for a moment. "Made our ways home with Ma 'n auntie 'n uncle 'n went back ta workin' the way we wuz before your call."

"Momma went 'n married the mayor a few years later, but they done get divorced not too long after that." Chet explained.

"How nice." Once-ler said flatly, and awaited to hear more but his brothers didn't continue. "And?" Once-ler asked.

"That's 'bout it." they both said at once.

"…well uh. What, what about Aunt Griselda? Uncle Ubb?" Once-ler asked, gesturing with his hands.

"On Uncle Ubb up 'n ran away long ways back. We don't rightly know where he went but one mornin' he was just long gone." Chet replied, "Aunt Griselda stopped talkin' ta anyone after that. She went 'n died bout… how long?" he asked Brett.

His twin shrugged. "Long time ago."

Once-ler wasn't sure how to feel at this news. His uncle had been the main bread winner in the family after his father had left during the Depression. Ubb was a lawyer, the only one in the area, so he got a lot of work. Weakling as he was at home, he was a different man in the court house. But he was never out rightly cruel towards Once-ler, they had shared an understanding of being stuck in the house. But… yes. He was glad his uncle had gotten away from that toxic environment they had called their home.

Maybe he found happiness somewhere. He hoped so.

The three brothers sat there, staring at one another, waiting for that ultimate question to be asked.

"….okay I'll bite. What about Ma?" Once-ler asked.

"Oh, she died." Chet answered casually as Brett shrugged. "Just last week."

Once-ler stared at them with wide, shocked eyes and he was sure he heard Norma gasp from where she was standing near by. He did a double take.

"Last. Last WEEK?" he asked, pure and utter horror on his face.

"Ma went 'n lived ta be at least ninety seven I think." Chet mused, counting on his fingers.

True, their mother had only been eighteen when Once-ler had been born so…

"Wow." Once-ler said quietly. "Just. Wow I mean. Wow. I…" he got up out of his seat and took a few paces away from them. "Just. She lived to be that old? What was she running on? Black magic?"

The two brothers shrugged in unison.

"So… wait so that. Are you guys here to ask me to attend a funeral?" he asked, looking at them. "Because I'm not. She abandoned me. You, all of you just left me behind to rot in a dead land I made, why would you—" he was obviously getting upset and even Chet and Brett, in all their simple souls, could see it.

"No, no." Chet shook his head as Brett got up and approached his brother, reaching out and grasped his arm. "We ain't comin' to ask you ta go to a funeral. We done buried her already."

"Fast as we could, she got turned into worm food." Brett added as once-ler looked at him with wide eyes.

"So why…?"

"Momma went 'n left ya somethan 'n we came ta give it to ya. 'N see you again cuz we weren't allowed ta mention you, or nuthin' after it all happened." Brett explained.

Once-ler stared at them, his brothers, and could see in their eyes the pain they'd been through. Cut off from a brother, taken back home. No doubt forced to work and probably even harder after Uncle Ubb left. How much had his mother and aunt changed after the men in their lives abandoned them? Did they push more onto Chet and Brett by way of expressing their anger, easing their built up disgust and bitter heartbreak?

And now they lived in a nursing home. But they looked well looked after, for their age. Well fed, cleaner than he'd ever seen them. They looked happy. Actually happy, even in this situation.

He lowered his head, slowly, and pressed a gloved hand to his forehead.

"She… left me somethin'…?" he asked weakly.

Brett nodded before reaching into his pocket and pulled out a letter and handed it over to Once-ler. The old man would be lying if he had been expecting something bigger but an envelope was more or less what he'd expect from his mother. He looked down at the terribly wobbly writing on the letter, which simply read 'Once'.

"…don't think I can read it now." he said quietly, looking back up at his brothers. "But thank you. For finding me and bringing it to me. I… never thought I'd ever see you two again."

"We done thought the same thing." Chet said, looking miserable.

"We thoughts you'd be dead. But we're gladder to see you ain't." Brett added, and Once-ler could see, and hear, the honesty in their voices. His heart was aching for so many reasons right now, the fate of his uncle and aunt, his brothers who were forced to work all their lives, his mother who had lived to be almost one hundred and the fact she'd written him something, on top of it all how his brothers had searched for him once they were finally free… he wondered, if their mother had died earlier, would they have sought him out just as quickly…?

The fact they'd come out here, seemingly right away, looking for him told him that… yes. They would have. His brothers, the same boys who he used to follow after once they were old enough to walk and run through the house and barn yard to make sure they stayed safe, had come back to him as fast as they could. It had only taken them forty one years to do it.

He wordlessly moved to them suddenly and wrapped an arm around both of them, pulling the twins into his arms and pressed his face down against their shoulders. Brett, and Chet, both looked equally surprised by this. Simple as they were, of course they'd picked up Once-ler's reluctance at hugging them when he first arrived. At the same time though they wrapped their arms around their older brother.

He decided, then and there, not to tell them that he'd sat in solitude for forty years. They were better off not knowing that information. Better off thinking he had made a life for himself after they left him. Last thing he wanted was them feeling bad for not coming sooner; just why he cared so much, he couldn't understand. Seemed as though blood run deep and wouldn't be denied, even after so long apart.

Unfortunately Brett and Chet couldn't stay too long. They had a nursing home to get back to, though Once-ler did insist on giving them his telephone number, got theirs, and promised he would make it out there to visit them one day soon. Funny that, he only just now realized how badly he'd missed them. Sure they'd been rough with him, playful with their punches and slaps and jokes but he had long since accepted they hadn't done it because they hated him. It was just the way they were, easy going, simple minded, gentle giants who wouldn't really lash out at him in anger.

They never had done it, after all.

Norma, in the end, had decided to leave Once-ler to talk with his brothers alone, and return to Helen's house. The two women sat in the lounge, watching from the couch, the white van drive away. Once-ler was stood out on the sidewalk, waving after the van.

"You got to think," Norma suddenly spoke up, making Helen jump slightly, "He lost his entire family. His mother, his aunt and uncle, his brothers. Then he lost the animals, and lost himself in all those years out there. On top of everything else he lost me, and in a way lost you as well."

"Hnnn." Helen said nasally as she held her arms across her chest, holding herself.

"It couldn't have been easy feeling as though you were the most horrible person in the world. Yet look at him, now. He's so much better. He's the man he used to be, again." Norma smiled fondly, remembering those days so very long ago when the two were young and in love. How she'd snuggle in his lap reading a book, his hands resting against her hips as she did and she could almost feel the heat radiating off of his face when she would do such a thing.

"Ya thinkin' I should give him a chance aren't you Ma?" Helen asked, cutting to the point.

"Always was a sharp one, Helen. You got that from me." Norma winked up at her.

"Mhh. I know. I know." Helen sighed as she adjusted her glasses, irritated. "He just made a whole messa trouble 'n made a tonna mistakes. He's sorry I see that. 'N I do see how well he treats you, Ma. I ain't blind to that."

"Oh well good. I'd hate to think your eyesight has gotten any worse." she smirked playfully.

"Ey lay off." Helen chuckled.

"I hope you do give him a chance, dear." Norma spoke softly, seriously, as she placed a hand to her daughter's side. "He'd love to get to know you. What kind of a woman you turned out to be."

Helen sighed, heavily, and reached down to touch her mothers hand against her side. "I know Ma. I know."

~*~

He sat out on the grass outside of his house that evening. The stars were sparkling in the inky blackness that was the night sky, and it was clear as crystal. Not a cloud in sight. The old man was wearing a thicker jacket than normal, since being so old and skinny meant the cold winds went straight through him and Winter was fast approaching. It hadn't snowed in the valley for a long time, but he had a feeling that, maybe, this year it would be snowing.

Another thing he'd missed had been the weather changes. After forty years of seeing fog and blackness the chance to see snow, to feel the balmy warmth of autumn, and the feeling that spring brings… it would be enough to make the old man weep.

Resting in his hands was an old guitar. He ran one hand along the neck of it, his old, knobby fingers touching the strings. He hadn't played it in years; could he still remember how to play? In order to do it he would have to remove his gloves, something he didn't like the idea of but he really had no choice. Resting the old instrument in his lap he slowly tugged his gloves down.

His hands still showed sight signs of scarring from the burning of his factory but they had long since faded, now nothing more than a few marks here and there. Naturally, the engagement ring he had proposed to Norma with still sat on his ring finger. He'd gotten so used to it being there he no longer noticed it there.

"All right." he said, picking up the instrument again. "Let's do this."

And so he began to slowly play. It wasn't a real song or anything compared to how he used to randomly break into musical moments in his youth but it was still a song. He watched his fingers, aged, wrinkled, scarred and with age spots on the back of his hands, slowly remembering what it was what they were doing. Yes, this was familiar. This was music. He loved music, he'd loved it ever since he was a little boy and his father would play his guitar for him. It was an escape, however small and precious it was.

He slowly began to play a proper song, though, going by memory. Once-ler had never been one to use sheet music; he had learned to play by example, by trial and error and no books pointing out what to do. The young man had practiced up in his attic bedroom, long limbs barely fitting into his small bed, and it gave him a reprieve of his life as a lowly stable hand, a lumber jack for hire… with his music he could be anyone, anything.

But then he realized he was no longer just strumming random chords, it was a song. An old song he hadn't heard in a long time. What was the name again… oh yes. "I'll be seeing you again." he spoke the title to himself but instead of singing along with it, the old man continued to play the chords of the song on his guitar, not missing a beat, no droppings of notes; it felt as if no time had passed since the last time he'd picked up his guitar.

By the time he finished there were tears running down his face, and he stared solemnly out at the world, heart hurting. His mother was dead, his aunt and uncle were dead too. His brothers were alive, finally free after a lifetime of being under his mothers control and now stuck in a nursing home. They had never known true freedom. And the letter… the letter that still sat unopened in his pocket.

He knew he should read it.

Didn't mean he wanted to though.

Licking his bottom lip, he set his guitar on the ground and pulled the letter out of his pocket and opened it up, slowly. Swallowing dryly, he pulled the single page piece of paper out and opened it out. The writing was horrible, hard to read, but that's probably because his mother wrote it herself rather then trust anyone else with it. He took a deep, steadying breath, and began to read.

'Dear Oncie

It's been an awful long time since I last saw you. But it hasn't been long since I last thought of you. There's so many things to be said but I know it may be too late already. I know I wasn't the best momma a boy could want. You know I didn't want you, you know I hated your father for getting me pregnant. I made no attempt to hide these facts from you. I was always an honest woman but maybe too honest. That's just how I am though and how I always was.

So let me be honest; I loved it when you were rich. I loved the parties, the food, the clothes, the people; everything. It made me feel special. I was living vicariously through you. I am a little sorry for that but I think I was entitled to some kind of fun in my life. My life, which now, is very nearly over since I'm certainly quite old now. I think pure nicotine and hair spray is keeping me in one piece as I write this to you. Hell you may not even open the envelope. Either way Oncie, know your momma loved you deep, deep, deep, deep down.

All my love, Momma'

He was glad he was alone. My God, was he glad he had read this when he was alone rather than surrounded by family. His hands were shaking, the letter crinkling at the parts in which he was grasping it tightly. She was still the same, wasn't she? Even in her old age she was painfully honest. Even writing it down in a letter, that she hadn't wanted him, hated his father for getting her pregnant, it packed the same powerful punch as it had been when he'd been informed of this as a little boy.

Once-ler let the letter drop to the ground, not even thinking about how she hadn't left him anything. Even if she had, he wouldn't want it. She had belittled and controlled him for so long, her final words to him being an echo in his mind for so long it was now maddening when he thought about it. The old man lifted his hands and pressed them to his face, shoulders shaking, as he was racked with sobs he didn't even know he still had in him. Everything came pouring out, the thoughts of his brothers, his uncle, his aunt, his mother, his fiancé abandoned by him, his daughter growing up without him, the whole town being twisted and changed into a fake Utopia all because of him.

Even with all the good happening in his life now, that amount of guilt will probably never ever truly leave him.

And he hated himself all the more for feeling it.