When All Hope Seems Lost

Chapter 4: "Hello Again"

~10 years later~

My husband and son were out on a father-son camping trip, so I had the house to myself. It was nice to have some alone time, no chores to worry about, nothing to keep up with, just me, myself, and I.

I was deep into a book and enjoying the ever dimming spring light of evening when there was a soft knock on the side door. Even though it was the door the delivery guy didn't use, I suspected it was a new guy who was finishing the rounds a little late. But why are we getting something? I didn't order anything.

"Maybe it's something Guy ordered." I mumbled as I got up from the couch and walked to answer the door or pick up whatever thing he had ordered.

When I got to the door, there wasn't a package there, but four hulking figures that took up the majority of the view of the windows in the door. I opened the door and gaped up at the huge, inhuman figures with colored cloth masks wrapped around their eyes in my doorway. They looked down at me with bright eyes and friendly smiles; they seemed oddly familiar... They looked like giant turt—

"Oh my gosh!" I gasped as I clapped my hands over my mouth. "Boys?" My voice cracked as the memories of the horrible winter in 2014 flooded back into my mind along with the four unique turtles that I'd met.

"Hi Jessie." The one wearing a blue mask said, it was his deep blue eyes that gave away who he was.

"Leo!" I squealed and reached up and held his face in my hands. "You've grown so much!" I slipped his mask back and saw the face of the little boy turtle that I'd pulled out of the snow ten years ago. "All of you have!" I looked up at the three others.

All of them towered at least 6'6" and were built like tanks—nothing but muscle. They wore their own styles of make-shift clothing that suited their personalities. Donnie had taped glasses now and a purple mask under them and wore an ensemble of different technologies on ranging from mounted Go-Pros on his shell to solar panels around his waist. Nothing less than what I'd expect from the lanky Brainiac of the brothers. Leo had a more Japanese traditional wardrobe, but still had his own twist—practical with the occasional button pin on a leather strap or an arm-band tattoo. Mikey was nothing but style—with his orange mask, beaded and shelled necklaces with a white pair of sunglasses that hung from them, a tattered white sweatshirt tied around his waist and some kind of thick athletic pants and high-top basketball shoes. Raph was the biggest and had some kind of leather-stripped belt around his hips and a red mask that covered the top of his head and eyes, no accessories really aside from black sunglasses that rested on his head and a toothpick in his mouth.

"What are you doing here?" I asked as I stepped aside to let them in.

"We were in the neighborhood and decided to stop by." Leo shrugged.

"How did you know where I lived?"

"We looked up your address." Donnie said simply. "It's also helpful when you live in the same house as you did when we were here last." That made sense. I took over the house when Mom and Dad decided to downsize a few years ago.

"We also kept a watchful eye on you, kinda an obligation thing." Raph said as we walked into the living room.

"So that means you know about Guy and Zachariah." I grinned.

"Zachariah is so cute! I'd love to meet him." Mikey exclaimed as he sat down in the recliner and the others on the couch next to me.

"Well, he's out on a daddy-son camping trip. They're supposed to be back tomorrow." I shrugged apologetically.

"Does he know about us?" Leo asked.

"I've told him the story about me saving you guys, but I let him and Guy believe that it's a fairy tale and that's probably the way it should be."