Three things happened in the last six months of her residency. The first was that Nina began looking for a position in a Spokane emergency room. The trauma center expressed immediate interest in her and the employment process began. I flew her back and forth for interviews three times and she was offered the position. Her starting date was to be two weeks after she passed her final boards.
The second thing occurred directly because of the first. I began to scout out locations for our future home. We had long talks about our dream house during this time. I assured her that we could afford whatever it was that we came up with and that I would make it happen. We both listed what we wanted and compared the lists. Eventually we came up with a master plan. I searched out and eventually found a good architect. He flew with me to Spokane and we began scouting out land for sale in the region. It didn't take long to find exactly the plot we were looking for. I started the legal process of purchasing the land while my architect began the process of planning the house we wanted. Construction began three months before we were to leave Seattle.
The third thing that happened had nothing to do with houses and jobs. Well, almost nothing. Nina and I had several long discussions and finally, two months before we returned to Spokane, a month after our new house had begun the process of being built, Nina threw away her birth control pills. October 18, 1995, the day she started her first day as a staff physician in the emergency room of the trauma center, she was two months pregnant.
We spent our first six months back in Spokane living in a house we'd rented in the River View section while construction on our dream-house was underway. Nina swoll up with pregnancy, her breasts edging into the territory of the C-cup for the first time in her life. She continued to work and I continued to oversee the construction, making sure everything was just right.
Our house was being built on four acres of shoreline property on Lake Pend Oreille. It was a very rural part of the lake, accessible only by a twisting, two-lane road. Our land was covered with evergreens and brush. No water or electricity ran there and we had to arrange to have it; as well as a septic system; put in. The location was exactly forty-two miles from the Spokane City Limits; forty-eight miles from the trauma center. Nina assured me that she didn't mind the commute. It would take her just under an hour both ways but since her schedule was only three twelve hour shifts one week and four the next, it wasn't a terrible hardship. After the horrors of internship the schedule, including the commute, seemed almost serene.
I was able to watch the land change from forbidding forest to a nice plot overlooking the lake. The house itself is nearly six thousand square feet. It has seven bedrooms, five bathrooms, a large family room, two dens, a game room, and a wine cellar. It has a built-in swimming pool that looks like a tropical lagoon (Nina's idea). It has a tennis court and a par three golf hole (my ideas). It has a large, redwood deck in the back with access from the master bedroom and the living room. The deck contains a covered hottub capable of holding eight adults in comfort. Forty-eight steps lead downward from the deck to a private dock and a huge boathouse. These days the boathouse contains a forty-foot cabin cruiser, a ski-boat, a small bass boat, and a couple of jet-skis. Real water enthusiasts are we Stevens'.
One month before Nina's due date the finishing touches were finally completed and we moved in. We kept up with tradition and made love before the boxes were even unpacked.
Laura Stevens entered the world on June 18, 1996, a tiny, red-faced infant, nearly bald, that looked so much like her mother that it was difficult to believe that I had anything to do with the conception.
Since then we've had two others. Jason, born September 20, 1997, also looks like Nina though there is at least a hint of my facial features in his form.
Megan, born October 3, 1998 is the baby of the family. God help her, she looks just like me. There's no denying paternity there.
I spend my days watching these children, caring for them on the days that Nina is at work. My life is happy. There is little else I'd rather do. I go fishing at least once a week. I go hunting once a year. I go to Mariners games in Seattle at least three times a season. I've replaced my single engine plane with a twin engine capable of holding ten. Trips to Las Vegas or Reno occur frequently.
I spend about three hours a week monitoring my investments. I was able to take huge advantage of many initial public offerings, especially over the last four years. I got in on America Online, Amazon.com, E-bay, and many other Internet stocks that went through the roof. The Stevens' family holdings have nearly tripled in the last five years. On the day I type these words our net worth is just a hair over eleven million dollars. A good thing because I've now reached the point where my pre-knowledge has run out. Obviously I've gained considerable knowledge of stocks and investments so I'll keep some money in the market but I'm planning to begin shifting the bulk of our holdings over to CDs, Mutual Funds, Treasury bonds, and other safe, quiet storage vessels.
Nina works her shifts and is a very popular doctor among the staff and her coworkers. But at the same time her superiors consider her somewhat of a pain in the ass. She doesn't work any of the many overtime shifts that are offered to her. She doesn't write papers for publication in the hospital journal. She doesn't participate in the education or training of the area's paramedics. She goes to work, does the job that she loves, and then comes home to the family that she loves.
Mike took the test for the Spokane Fire Department in June of 1985. By then he had a year of being their courier and two semesters of Fire Technology classes from the community college under his belt. He'd worked out obsessively throughout the year in fire station workout rooms and his body was an efficient, well-honed machine. He passed the written test in the high nineties but it was the physical agility test, the combat challenge, that was his shining moment. He didn't just break the previous record, he shattered it by more than eighteen seconds. His oral boards were just a formality at that point.
Early that August, while Nina and I were still sharing my old bedroom prepatory to heading back to Seattle, Mike entered the fire academy. On November 3 he was given his first assignment; an engine company very near where a girl named Julie had once thrown me out of her car. It was the busiest station in Spokane and he spent eighteen months there.
Once his probation period was up he began taking more Fire Tech courses. He collected his associate's degree in 1987 and then transferred to State College. By 1990 he held a bachelors degree.
He continued to date Maggie throughout the year prior to his hire. Unfortunately when he made the discovery as a rookie firefighter of how damn easy it was to get laid when the public adored you, he gave Maggie the old, "I think we should see other people" speech. I heard all of this from Nina, who corresponded in letters and phonecalls with Maggie. It was very apparent that Maggie did not take the speech well.
I felt sad for both of them, part of me wondering what Mike was thinking – it was obvious how he felt about her – the other half knowing exactly what he was thinking and what organ he was doing it with. Mike went on something of a rampage, very similar to what I'd done upon my recycling with exactly the same sort of blindness. I didn't interfere, didn't try to talk him out of what he was doing. I knew he wouldn't listen to me. I only hoped he would catch himself before it was too late.
Maggie was in her first year of nursing school when they broke up. She grieved for a while and then carried on, beginning to date again after a few months. She drifted back into her pattern of changing boyfriends as often as she changed her socks for about six months. She then began to date a radiology tech that she'd met during her hospital time.