30 June 2025, @mariannewest's Freewrite Writing Prompt Day 2784 : mild illness

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Col. H.F. Lee was just about to sit down to dinner with his beloved Mrs. Maggie when a phone call came in. He looked at the number, and sighed.

“I need to take this one, Maggie, but it will be the last of its kind, ever.”

It was brief; the colonel returned to the table calmly and smiled. His wife knew he was troubled, but was not ready to talk about it, not least because little Ludlow cousins and their Trent and Stepforth friends tended to bop through the Lees' open back door until their bedtime, and one of those Ludlow cousins really had a lot to say.

“See, I got my plan, because, see, I'mma get my hollow legs filled on nine meals a day and be as tall as Papa next week because, see, first I'mma have breakfast at my house, and then get the plates y'all and our friends the Trents will leave for me, and by the time I finish eating those – and then boom! – lunchtime, and then I'll eat at the Trent house, and come eat the plates y'all have for me at your house and at home, and then boom! – dinnertime, so I'll eat at my house, and then come eat the plates y'all and the Trents have, and then go to bed, and then boom! – breakfast again, and start over! I'mma get big real quick this way!”

“Next week, though,” Col. Lee said gently to his five-year-old cousin Lil' Robert Ludlow.

“Next week, though!” Lil' Robert said as he went home with a whole tin of cookies Mrs. Lee had made for the Ludlows' dessert. “Y'all get my to-go plates ready for next week!”

“The boy understands multiplication – three meals a day, three times – but not division, so he doesn't know we would break down his meal size into three parts,” Mrs. Lee said, and put her hand up for a high five with her husband.

“Higher-than-him mathematics for the win,” he said, “although for a five year old, him knowing his time tables and math on the fly is quite high. We may need to pull out the algebra by the time he is seven! Lil' Robert and Grayson both are probably quants, with one going to build all the restaurants for the other to eat at!”

Mrs. Lee cracked up laughing.

“Yeah, Grayson is really good at practical geometry and he needs to be if that's what he's going to need to be doing! You know Glendella was crushing on Lil' Robert until Papa Robert said 'if you marry him, you have to feed him!'”

“Lil' Robert is definitely on track for bachelor for life at nine meals a day,” Col. Lee said. “Run, Baby Glendella! Run like Big Glendella being chased down in high heels by your new sister Edwina – run!”

Mrs. Lee leaned over onto the counter to wipe the tears from her eyes from laughing so hard at that.

“It's like you just pray to the Lord not to let you live so wicked that He sets you up at 68 years old to be trying to hurt your own grandchild but get run off by her eight-year-old new adopted sister with a hollow plastic baseball bat talking about 'It ends today!' It was horrible, but also hilarious!”

“We pray hard,” Col. Lee said, “because that ain't what we want!”

That was where he started the conversation about that phone call, later, when all the little ones who were neighbors to them had gone to bed and were no longer running in and out of the Lee home.

“How you live is important,” he said as the Lees sat chilling out on their couch listening to calm jazz. “I had that call from Ms. Gloria Gebhardt, telling me about the outcome of a conversation I had with Colonel Gebhardt, her uncle who served with me. He had called a week ago to essentially tell me off about advising our circle to respect the Covid-19 restrictions and make good use of the time to rest and refresh and work on personal and relational growth. He had defied all that, gotten Covid, and recovered – to him it was only a mild illness, and he had called to tell me to stop giving in to Democrats and their fearmongering and get back to living. I reminded him that I am still serving as a police officer, and when not there I am with my favorite person in the entire world.”

“Aw,” Mrs. Lee said, and snuggled into him. “I have the same privilege, Harry – and we get to hang out with so many of our favorite people because they are our neighbors!”

“We even get to help feed the youngest of them nine meals a day, next week, though – I don't think our lives need any more excitement,” Col. Lee said.

“Nope!” Mrs. Lee said. “But, everyone doesn't see that.”

“Nope,” the colonel said. “But see, Covid-19 or not, how you live is important, because it is also how you die. Col. Gebhardt, like many of my comrades, had PTSD, and like many of my comrades, he self-medicated. His niece was glad for Covid to shut down things so he wouldn't be on the road as much while under the influence, but he refused to take that opportunity to really focus on his mental and emotional health. He became a regular at the Lofton County speakeasy rounds quite quickly, and was drunk when he called me from one.”

“Oh, no,” Mrs. Lee said.

“General C.I. Williams, my mentor, is still saying to me about such situations, 'Colonel, you will come to understand that some men are safer in a foxhole than they will be in returning to civilian life, because unlike you, the discipline is not within them. There is absolutely nothing you can do about the consequences they will face for not internalizing discipline, so learn how to detach yourself from their outcomes.' He did not state that as a suggestion; that was an order, and so I have been learning. I deeply regret that I have so much opportunity to learn nowadays.”

“I see why Capt. Ludlow has his grand brood under such loving but consistent discipline,” Mrs. Lee said. “There's still room for them to be kids, but he is growing them up so discipline becomes part of them. Like George – George and Milton both, actually, because Sgt. Trent has the same mindset – are getting into less trouble than they were, because they are choosing to get together and read or play games more often. Voluntarily co-grounding is a form of mutual self-discipline; they are in essence saving play days of their own lives.”

“Yes,” Col. Lee said. “How you learn to live is important, because it is how you learn to save your own life – or not.”

One huge tear formed at the edge of the colonel's eye.

“Col. Gebhardt's niece called to give me the expected news,” the colonel said. “It is far more dangerous to be driving on these backcountry roads drunk than Covid-19 will ever be to most people in Lofton County. On that night that he called me, I got up and went and got him and took him home. He threatened to shoot me for having him leave his car to get towed because he knew I did that on purpose.”

“For anyone to know you and threaten you, given your record – oh, he was in a bad way,” Mrs. Lee said. “I mean, stupid drunk.”

“Got sober the next day, but stayed on the first part of your descriptor,” Col. Lee said. “Got the car out of impound, sent me the invoice for it that day with the threat, and went on and found that car accident he was looking for that night. He was 57.”

Mrs. Lee gently kissed the tear away as it slid off her husband's chin.

“I'm so sorry,” she said.

“I'm going to detach myself from the outcome,” Col. Lee said, “next week, though.”