chapter twelve      When Ellie got off the plane, she made her way over to the arms of a waiting Bernice.      "How are you honey?" she asked.      "I'm fine Bernie, thanks for asking though. Anything major happen while I was away?"      "Nope, nothing," she said, looking at her employer funny.      "What's wrong? Why are you looking at me like that?"      "You don't want to talk about this?"      "About what?"      "What happened in England, why you're home early, why you didn't send them a bill, etc. etc."      "There's nothing to talk about Bernie, I made a mistake, and I feel terrible about it, end of story. Let's go." Ellie began making her way to baggage claim trailing a very confused Bernice behind her. .:.      As Ellie was making her way home, William was sinking further and further into a depressive state. He stayed in his room, not wanting to see or talk to anyone. His father would wander in periodically to check up on him and to see if he was hungry or anything.      "Will, I'm sure a well place call and a rational conversation can fix a lot of this," his father said in a soothing voice. Sitting down next his son on the window seat in his room. William's gaze had been fixed on the barn all day, and he could feel the tears in his throat, yet again.      "Dad, I know you mean well, but I'd really like to be alone right now," he whispered in a wavering voice. His father lovingly patted his son's knee and quietly made his way out of the room and pulled the door closed behind him. He knew that his son would need time, the magical medicine for broken-hearts; but as any other parent he wanted time to speed up, end the pain quicker.      Charles walked down to Harry's room, he found his son perusing a site with rather busty women in scant clothing.      "Harry, can't you look at something else on the Internet?"      "Nothing's as interesting as this Dad!" he said with a smile. His father sat down in a near by chair.      "Would you mine directing your attention to you father for a moment, or am I not as exciting as those two ladies?" he paused and took a closer look at the screen, leaning forward a bit. "My God! What are they doing?" Harry chuckled.      "No Dad, you're not as interesting as those two!" he said, pointing at the women on the screen.      "Well, close that please, it's degrading; entertaining, but degrading." Charles remarked, a hint of sarcasm to his voice. His son smiled broadly, but closed the window anyways.      "Did you need something?" Harry asked, turning around in his chair to face his father.      "I want you to make a phone call for me."      "You want me to call Ellie, don't you?"      "Very much. Your brother looks like a freight train drove over him."      "Yeah, I noticed."      "I can't even imagine how we're going to fix this."      "Maybe we shouldn't dad, you know?"      "You brother bursts into tears at the smallest thing, why shouldn't we help him?"      "Because, he's going to get his heart-broken, it happens. If he doesn't learn that, if he can't see that there is more to life than just rainbows and kittens, he's going to get clabbered." Charles sat there, silent for a few moments, contemplating what his son had said.      "I suppose that that methodology has some merit, but I can't help but want to help him."      "I know. But he has to learn to help himself."      "Looks like Ellie was a good influence on you too."      "She took me through some repressed emotions, and she also helped me come in contact with my inner courage, it was very helpful."      "Glad to hear it. What about Will, what did they talk about?"      "Well, seeing as he eavesdropped on a couple of my sessions, I listened to a few of his."      "Harry! Those sessions are private! So what did you hear?" Harry laughed.      "Well, they talked a lot about Mom. About how Will felt when she died, how he sort of became a surrogate mother to me, etc."      "And what did she say about that? More important, what did Will say? I know he doesn't like to talk about it."      "Well, at first he got really angry with her, and told her that Mom was none of her business."      "Yeah, I could see him doing that."      "Then she yelled back at him, like she did with me, and I got to tell you dad, that was bloody brilliant!"      "What do you mean?"      "No one ever has enough courage to stand up to us, it's like they're afraid or something. Not only did Ellie stand up to both of us, but she had no problem yelling at us, putting us in our place, you know?"      "Good for her, the two of you need putting in your place sometimes."      "Anyways, they also did a lot of yelling, well actually Will did a lot of yelling."      "At her? What on earth for?"      "Not at her dad, he would just yell."      "I don't understand."      "It's therapy dad, they would just walk out into the field and he would let out this big long yell. It's supposed to release all the built-up anger and rage and shit."      "Watch your language," Charles said firmly.      "Sorry."      "Did it work, he's better, yes?"      "Oh yeah, till she left."      "Well, obviously."      "Yeah, I mean it was really working, he was letting me go, he wasn't being as protective. He was also talking about Mom more."      "Well then, obviously we need to get her back."      "I don't know if that's going to be easy."      "Try Harry! The two of you are finally communicating and opening up and we've never been closer. And if even a shred of that is because of her, then she's worth fighting to get back! Call her!" he tossed her business card onto his desk.      "Why don't you call her?"      "She'll listen to you."      "Fine." Harry muttered as Charles left the room. back