Johnny’s plan was simple. Neither the dessert Melissa served, nor the continued demands of Chet’s phone distracted him as he laid it out.
“We have some catching up to do. Pete is gone for a while, so I will need to spend a lot of time in the shop. I’m pretty handy, but not a mechanic, not nearly as experienced as Pete. If Isaac does the specialty stuff, I can for sure get a lot of the grunt work done. But between that and hauling equipment around, my schedule will be full. Why don’t you hire Mary here to work weekends and a few hours in the evening? She’s really good at scheduling, making plans, and contacting people. Many times, when I’m busy, she takes extra overtime at the store – no reason she couldn’t put that time into working for us.”
Mary was surprised. She hadn’t seen this coming and appreciated the compliments from her husband.
Johnny continued. “She is going to be quitting her job in the next year or so anyway, because we want to have kids.”
Mary’s eyes widened, and she stared at Johnny. It was so sudden she wasn’t even embarrassed, at first, that is.
“Well, we’ll start with one baby I guess.” Johnny grinned. He liked a good reaction and had been thinking for hours in the truck. He had been hoping an opportunity like this would come along.
Chet took the news in his matter-of-fact way. Starting a family was just what people did, no surprise there. But Melissa reacted properly, jumping up and hugging Mary, who was beaming, happy tears now brimming, momentary embarrassment forgotten.
“So, Mary should be available to help us get started, giving us time to get Pete back in the shop, and then if she is coordinating the schedule, she can show me what she has done, and teach me how to do it too, or just keep coordinating herself. She can email the stuff to the four of us, and you can make any tweaks needed before she sends it out to everybody. If anyone has questions, they call Mary. She is used to this. She’s coordinated the staff at the grocery store for what, five years?”
Johnny sat back, looking satisfied with his quick presentation of ideas.
While Melissa was congratulating Mary, she was seeing Johnny in a new way. He looked like the big quarterback on the poster in Lance’s room, what was his name?
Yes, Johnny might make a pretty good quarterback for their team, calling plays, directing traffic, calming people down. And he was big and confident enough to direct a team, and with Mary helping coordinate…
Melissa looked at Chet, nodding her head. “I like it, Chet, what do you think?”
He looked at Mary. “Well, young lady, does this sound like a possibility?” Without waiting for her reply, he nodded, answering for himself.
“Yes, sir, I like it. It’s a good plan.”
And that was how a new and rewarding chapter in the history of the Amund family began, a familiar pattern in the human story of supply and demand. The Banks’ extension of trust gained a little brother, a rather large little brother, and the talented woman who was his wife.
The Amunds were given that wonderful commodity, opportunity. A place to exercise their skills, talents, and experience; a place to be pushed into new trials, stretched in their thinking, taxed to the very core as they began to deeply care for the interests of their benefactors.
And Johnny was not so young as to have no experience. The story of Melissa and the loader impressed Johnny deeply, and he inwardly vowed never to begin big changes without getting advice from the boss. And as Johnny had planned, involving Mary was pure genius, She proved to be a gem, especially over the winter season when nerves were stretched, and workers were known to throw in the towel and quit on a whim.
On Christmas Eve, Chet and Melissa took a drive. It was a clear night, and the boys had driven to Prince George for some last-minute shopping. They dropped off cookies at the homes of several elderly couples, visiting for a few minutes in each place, spreading Christmas cheer and receiving some of their own.
Mary had called Melissa earlier and asked if she and Chet could stop in later, if they were not busy. Melissa was looking forward to the visit and said so to Chet, chatting as he drove.
“I am so glad we offered Johnny this new job. What a difference in our schedule, especially weekends.” She laughed. “He’s a lot sharper than I would have expected a year ago.”
Chet nodded, watching the moon as it seemed to flit through the trees, remembering the same view when he was a kid.
“He’s made a couple mistakes, but nothing compared to the load he has taken off your shoulders.”
Chet cleared his throat. “You know what the best thing is? He hardly ever says no, always willing to get right in it. But he won’t push safety limits. If he’s too tired to do a good job, he will say no and mean it. The man has judgment, good judgment.”
Chet was right. Johnny seemed to always be working, keeping them in the loop with concise texts, and earning respect as a capable foreman in the eyes of the other employees almost overnight. At the Christmas party Johnny had been commended. The occasion had been held in the Banks Mountain shop as an encore to the success of the November party.
Melissa had set up a speaker and microphone, squelching the festive din of the children playing with their gifts in the lunch room. A few men had thanked Johnny at the open mic, for kind things he had done in his several weeks of being foreman. One thanked him for driving his last load so that he could attend his daughter’s Christmas play. Another recalled how Johnny had brought a shop truck and pulled him out of the ditch and quickly replaced several blown tires several days earlier, allowing the man to finish his day, the implication clear: no money lost on a paycheck at Christmastime.
Jason took the mic nervously and thanked Johnny for working with him in the shop, and clumsily explained how Johnny even made sure to find him a ride to work when his truck broke down.
Mary had also been thanked, and though all were gracious to Chet, the message was unmistakable, the new attention to communication was well received and greatly appreciated.
Johnny had thanked them for their kind words and went on to mention some of the highlights of the year. He had taken the time to express appreciation to the guys he worked with, and especially to Frank, for being a good example of a man he wanted to be like, surprising the quiet man, who gave him a thumbs-up, sleeping toddler in his arms.
A delighted buzz went through the forty or fifty people present when Johnny and Mary called up the Banks and presented them with two wrapped presents. They opened their gifts together and held them up for all to see. Each had received a beautiful die-cast model: a 1945 Harley Davidson Knucklehead for Chet and a Caterpillar 966 loader for Melissa. Chet grinned, hunching down, twisting an imaginary throttle and making the appropriate sounds. Melissa shook her fist at Johnny, and then gave Mary a big hug.
Now turning into the Amunds’ driveway, they were surprised to see at least a dozen snowmobiles on the snow-covered lawn and a similar number of vehicles in the parking area. Some small children were tobogganing on the gentle slope along the driveway, but the yard was empty of adults. Walking up the steps to the house, Melissa stopped to read the sign.
“Look, Chet.” She read the sign aloud, and then the translation Mary had typed on thick paper and tacked below the glowing wood. A few small spotlights had been carefully placed, flooding the thick plank with warm light so the sign seemed to be alive, separate from the wall on which it hung.
A little girl tugged her sleeve. “Hi, Mrs. Banks!”
She knew this nice lady. She was the one who had parties that kids could come to and always had fun games and treats. Her gift at the Christmas party had been a Banks Mountain toque, which was on her head at the moment, pink tassel caked with snow.
“All the grownups are around back at the fire. I had marthmallowth!”
She darted away, message delivered, tassel bouncing.
Chet stood stock-still, staring at the sign. “Well, I’ll be! Wonder how long that’s been up. Sure does explain some things.”
Melissa took his arm, but he held still for a moment, captured by memories. “You know, I’m positive that was up on Lars’ house, out on the farm. Johnny must have brought it down, probably years ago.” He shook his head. “But I’ve never seen it here before.”
They circled the house and followed the packed trail toward the glow behind some outbuildings where they soon could see a giant bonfire and heard laughter and happy voices.
Chet hefted the package of jerky he had smoked himself several days before, yep, should be enough.
He said it aloud again. “Bare is the back of the brotherless man.” He reached out a warm, ungloved hand. “Come on, Melissa, let’s give this jerky to our little brother.”