Flying Bob was given a dishonorable discharge from the air force and so lost his maintenance job because, no matter why or for what reason, it was clear he had simply awarded himself a day off and walked off the base when he should have been maintaining. No one mentioned Gladys, because they wished to spare Crying Alice’s feelings and also because they were a little sick of the Maddens. Crying Alice had gone back to crying at every opportunity and the possibility of having her move her family back on base now that she and Flying Bob were reunited was so awful that the military was happy just to be rid of the two of them. Flying Bob was okay with that because he was a one-plane man and now that the plane he loved was gone, he figured he might as well get a more regular job. Also because it was clear he was going to have to spend a lot of his time for, oh, say, the rest of his life apologizing to and appeasing Crying Alice.

Naturally, Winifred, Wilfred, and Zebediah, who didn’t get an opinion but had one anyway, hoped to stay on in the house they had inherited in Sooke, but Crying Alice said she was done with British Columbia and all its sad memories. She could not live in a place that had been the source of so much anxiety. She didn’t mention Gladys, but we all assumed that was a factor, too. When Crying Alice and Flying Bob came to pick up the children, she announced that they would be moving to Saskatchewan.

“Saskatchewan!” said Wilfred.

“What’s there?” asked Winifred.

“Nothing,” said Flying Bob. “I like to think of it as one long runway.”

“No, you don’t,” said Crying Alice. “There will simply be nothingness. There will be nothing good and nothing bad, nothing to disturb my tranquillity. No planes.”

No more wishes, I thought. Those had been used. No hundreds of dresses, no motorcycles, no horses, no whatever Zebediah would have wished for. No happiness of that kind. From the things they thought would bring them happiness. Perhaps no happiness at all. Perhaps Crying Alice would always cry and Flying Bob would always yearn. But there was family. If there was to be misery, they would all be together in it. When it came to the crunch, that is what they had chosen. I pondered it again, the weight and wonder of this. What we think we want is not always what we choose. But what we choose becomes our lives.