Winter was now in full force in Pleasantview. At the Lassiter home, things were quieter; Grace and David were 26 and 25 respectively and each had found a new home, Grace’s was house was older, while David’s was a modern stucco over on Professional row.
It was fall when they left and everyone had gathered around the dinner table to be together one last time. In actuality, they had spent two days moving all their belongings to their respective new homes. But this was the night they would finally move into the homes. True, Grace and David could and would come by to visit any time they cared to and naturally at the holidays they’d be over, but they would probably never live there with the twins again. It made Trey and Lori very sad, but they both enjoyed the evening as much as they could. Grace and David had been there ever since they twins first opened their eyes as babies. Neither Trey nor Lori could remember their older sister and brother as anything but young adults. Actually Grace and David had been 16 and 15 when the twins were born.
It was fall when they left and everyone had gathered around the dinner table to be together one last time. In actuality, they had spent two days moving all their belongings to their respective new homes. But this was the night they would finally move into the homes. True, Grace and David could and would come by to visit any time they cared to and naturally at the holidays they’d be over, but they would probably never live there with the twins again. It made Trey and Lori very sad, but they both enjoyed the evening as much as they could. Grace and David had been there ever since they twins first opened their eyes as babies. Neither Trey nor Lori could remember their older sister and brother as anything but young adults. Actually Grace and David had been 16 and 15 when the twins were born.
The twins sleeping in their nursery next door to John and Melora's room, this was right before their birthday. Upstairs you can see Grace sleeping and behind her room the new room for the twins.
They had helped the twins with their homework when Melora or John were unavailable, wiped their respective noses and been just down the hall or outside the door when they slept upstairs. Sometimes David had taken them for a spin in his car or Grace had helped them make cookies. Grace and David were very happy and excited about moving and even Melora and John seemed happy, so the twins just looked at each other and tried to smile, too. They had one of their school friends over, Tina Traveler; so they especially needed to put on a good show.
L to R: David, John, Grace, Lori, Melora, Trey and Tina
After dinner Grace and David left amid tears and hugs. John said it was silly, they were only going to be a couple miles away, but Melora could see him blinking a tear away. It was the end of one era and the beginning of another.
From now on it would be just John, Melora and the twins in the big house by the ocean. It meant extra time for the twins, so that was good. They were ten years old now and only a couple more years and they would be teenagers. Melora wanted all of them to enjoy these last years of real childhood for the twins. The snow had been coming for a week or so, just little flurries that hardly stayed on the ground and then it began to snow in earnest one afternoon and by nightfall Pleasantview became a winter wonderland.
John and Melora had been working on improvements and changes inside and just got these finished. They took down the wall between Lori’s room and what had been Grace’s room and made it into a large bright room for Lori. She could get her dollhouse, little oven, desk and even her ballet barre in there. It was much bigger than Trey’s room (which is David’s old room), but that was okay because they took down the walls of Trey’s old room and now most of Trey’s stuff was in there. Large things like his train set, the kids’ activity center, and John’s putting green (which he hardly got to use since the kids tended to monopolize it). That big room was also where the kids worked out to the radio.
Some things never change; the kids continued to invite kids home after school. Their parents were happy that the twins were such social beings but, “Must it be every day?” Melora wondered as she cooked up what seemed like enough food for an army at nearly every weekday supper time.
Lori with Skylar Scott. This was before they got the train set moved upstairs.
Lori playing Miss Mary Mack with Tina Traveler
John had been thinking of buying real estate as a business opportunity (he was always looking for business opportunities—that was his nature). He found what he thought was a good deal on a home on Twikkii Island. John had owned a beach house on the east coast in South Carolina for quite a few years, but decided to sell it back when the twins were born. As the snow fell, the idea came to him that not only should he buy the house on Twikkii, but that they should take the twins there for a week to get away from the weather and the sooner, the better. Melora loved the idea.
Lori was all wide-eyed with excitement when Melora told her they were going on a 6-day vacation to the islands.
Now, Lori was a bookworm, just like her friend Lucy Burb, and she read for fun all the time, but she still loved to have Melora read to her occasionally. A couple times a week Melora did just that. The night before they left on their trip, she read Lori a book about a family going on vacation that discovered an enchanted golden crab. He transported them to many exciting journeys. Melora could not even finish the book that night, but put it away to enjoy over many more nights. Lori went to sleep with visions of magical crustaceans in her head.
Lori, as usual, reading a book before the school bus arrives
Trey was very excited, too, his Dad told him that where they were going there was a real pirate ship they could go to and pretend they were on the high seas. Trey kissed John goodnight (something he was starting to think he was too old for, but forgot about that this night). Then he, too, went off to dream of sailing on the Jolly Roger, calling out things like “Avast, ye swabbies!” and “Shiver me timbers!”.
The little family of four would leave early in the morning for their new second home nestled on Twikkii Island.
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