The four Howes and Garret left their car and walked in a tight group up the front walk of Hector's house. When they reached the porch he indicated the different chairs, inviting them to sit.

"Hello, Mrs. Howe and Molly Howe, hello Garret. This must be your father eh, Molly Howe?"

"Yes it is and this is my brother Brian. This is Hector Nublado, the Cloud Reader."

"Call me Doug," dad said reaching out to shake Hector's hand. "I've been hearing some pretty strange tales about you and this place." Dad waved his hand around indicating the house.

There was a sudden crack of thunder and we jumped, moving further from the railing with our chairs.

"Were they strange?" Hector calmly asked mom and I. We shrugged and managed a smile. "How about you, Garret, were the things you heard here strange?"

"No, I guess not. But nothing's changed for me."

"And what did you think might happen?"

"Well you said there would be much new love and friendship to be enjoyed." Garret shifted uneasily on his seat.

Hector nodded. "And you haven't found that." It was a statement not a question. "But there have been changes, no?"

Garret 's head snapped up. "How-?" Hector just lifted his eyes to the heavy black clouds over the house.

Ann slowed to a crawl when they saw the car stopped at the side of the road and Frank waved her ahead, his eyes straining through the rain to the indistinguishable images in the field.

Frank turned away and looked back out the window. "What the hell's going on out there? Is that the Howe family? Why are they all just sitting in the rain?"

Ann stared at the back of his head, stunned by his comment. She saw the group sitting on the porch of the tiny house, and yes, it was the Howe family along with Garret. "I know where we are, this must be that man's place. You know, the one Mrs. Howe's daughter talked about."

"I don't know what you're talking about, and what do you mean, his place. This field?"

"No, the house there."

Frank turned and gaped at her. "Are you trying to be funny? There's five people sitting in a soaking wet field and my son is one of them."

"But Frank- can't you see it? The house?" She pointed past his shoulder.

"I'm afraid he can't, Miss Hairston." Ann shrieked and bounced over toward Frank.

"What the-?"

"Who are you?" Ann spoke to the driver's side window and Frank's mouth fell open as he stared at her.

"It's Hector, Miss Hairston." This time Frank yelped as Garret stood beside his door. "He's the Cloud Reader, dad."

Twenty minutes later a confused, angry and slightly scared Frank Steadman stood with the rest of the group on the tiny porch of Hector's tiny house. It had taken a considerable amount of explaining and coddling to get both men to accept what was happening and in the end they had settled down to work out their perplexities.

"This is just too bizarre," Frank wailed.

"It is exactly what you want it to be, Mister Steadman." Hector offered.

"Garret, are you telling me you came here to- to- here to see what was going to happen in our family? To listen to some mumbo jumbo about clouds?"

"It's not mumbo jumbo, Mister Steadman," I said boldly. "It happens to be true." I glanced at Hector, remembering his lecture on truth. "I mean it- it was a way to feel better about what was happening." I moved my eyes to my mom and dad. "You know more about that."

Frank looked at his son again. "And you wanted to feel better about us." He nodded at Ann.

"I just wanted to know if it was possible."

Hector stood and went to the steps away from the group. "I only told Garret what I felt from him in the clouds. I never predicted anything he couldn't achieve on his own, nor did I for Molly Howe or her mother."

"But you did for Kenny Snowden," Mom argued, and I knew what Hector was going to say.

"Kenny Snowden predicted his own future, Mrs. Howe. The difference in what has happened is that Kenny was only worried about himself and what his future held personally. He could have guessed that he would fail his first test because he was too cocky and that a second attempt would succeed because he desperately wanted it to and he controlled the outcome.

Your daughter was concerned for you and her father first, not herself and Garret was concerned about his father first. These feelings can be sensed from the clouds and their outcomes are simply derived from a positive outlook, hope and faith. You, Mrs. Howe, needed to be positive for your daughter and you were, right?"

Mom nodded slowly and blinked back some beginning tears. "Why did you let us see you today?"

Hector smiled and stretched his arms to the sky, embracing the thunderclouds and the steady rain. "Aaah, a very good question, Mrs. Howe. For everyone's confidence and all the positive feelings to have a chance of success it was a very grand opportunity since you were all together at one time. I see some skepticism still from the gentlemen but that's fine. After all, it is a common commodity among doubters. All good fortune should be tempered with caution and care however, it is, after all, of our own making."

"I still don't see-"

"You will only see what you wish to see, Mrs. Howe, as with the rest of you. My interpretations of the clouds are nothing more than an insight into the emotions you all have buried inside. I remind you all to think positively."

I jumped and yelped along with some of the others as a huge flash of lightening lit up the field with a shimmering glow, followed by an ear-splitting crack of thunder. When the lightening vanished, so did Hector and the tiny house and we were all standing in the empty field getting soaked. As we ran for the cars I saw Peter's mother standing in her doorway, her mouth agape and her head shaking side to side with derision. I giggled, thinking about what the gossip around the market would be like in the days to come.

*****

The experience with Hector, The Cloud Reader, seemed to create a need for our family and Garret's to spend time together rehashing the events. Most of the time we all gathered at our house and mom would shove one of her famous casseroles into the oven. Miss Hairston was invited and came each time with Garret and his dad; Garret seemed to be a new person when they were together.

Brian was uncommonly quiet at these gatherings, muttering something about needing time to think positively about some stuff he wanted. I don't think he got the full message. It was Ann who remarked on one occasion that the name Nublado was of Spanish or Mexican origin and that it meant cloudy. Nobody had anything to add.

After a few of these meeting dinners things kind of shifted from Hector to more personal topics and even the socializing switched to just an occasional dinner out at the Dippy Diner. The friendship stayed solid, partially since Miss Hairston had become a regular escort of Garret's dad but particularly because of the shared experience with The Cloud Reader.

We never talked about it much any more and by the following summer, not at all. It wasn't until Garret came flying up to our front door one Saturday, jumping around like he was on fire and beaming from ear to ear. I barely got the door open when he started.

"Dad and Ann are getting married! They're getting married!"

I smiled and beckoned him in, prying for all the details as we waited in the kitchen for mom and dad to come in.

"Tell them, Garret."

"Tell us what?" Dad took mom's hand.

"Dad and Ann are getting married!"

"Oh wow! When, Garret?"

"Next month! Ann's gonna be my new mom and you're all invited!"

"Well I think I should speak to Ann first but thank you very much. We'd be honoured to attend." Mom grinned and went to the phone. "Is it all right to call? I mean it's not a secret for them is it?"

"No! They knew I was coming here."

"Okay, We'll get it from the horse's mouth and see what we can do to help."

******

In the days following the extraordinary meeting with Hector, Frank, Ann and Garret had been regular visitors at the Howe's but at work, Frank was discovering a decline in his attention to detail and his thoughts running more often to his personal life than the patients under his care.

He made an appointment to speak with Victor, the senior medical officer, and he explained that he needed some time off, time to get past the personal problems and get his domestic life in some kind of order. Victor had agreed, happily, as various nurses had been suggesting this very action for some time.

Ann expressed her enthusiasm for his decision, encouraging him to get more involved with his children without always having her around. She was wise enough to know that blood was thicker than her romantic tears.

The first act, however, after taking his leave of absence, was to whisk Ann off to an evening of fine dining and intimate music. Refusal was out of the question, not that she would have except to retain her respect for his children, and as the evening progressed, so did their involvement.

Frank coaxed her into dancing on the covered atria where stars gleamed down through the glass ceiling, holding her comfortably and saying all the things she'd imagined for so long. At the end of the evening Frank popped the inevitable question and had to interpret her choking, garbled response as a yes, dusting away the tears that streamed down her cheeks.