There were moments when Diane Ford held Doug Ford’s hand.
Her youngest son, Toronto’s mayor, had just been re-elected to council in his old north Etobicoke ward.
The family and the campaign staff applauded in the basement of her home, and Rob Ford kissed his wife, hugged his children.
But not one minute later came the next news: John Tory, not Doug Ford, would be Toronto’s new mayor.
Rob, now bald and weakened by his chemotherapy, got up to shake the hand of the older brother who volunteered himself for a late mayoral run after Rob’s cancer diagnosis - and briefly dragged Doug out of his seat.
"That’s less than three per cent," the mayor said to his brother, assessing Tory’s margin of victory. It was meant to be encouraging, but Doug sat frozen on the blond leather couch for several minutes more on Monday night, while Diane, whose late husband Doug Ford Sr. was a politician before either son, gave Doug her maternal comfort.
"Do you want to head over to the hall?" he asked finally.
At the hall, somewhere between Woodbine Racetrack and the airport, the younger Ford didn’t speak and Doug’s speech was brief, stressing he gave the campaign everything he could, and could hold his head high.
Nephew Michael Ford, who had run for council until Rob replaced him last month, didn’t rate a specific mention, despite winning a school trustee seat, a sort of consolation prize, at the age of 20.
Ford Nation, a suburban taxpayer movement that built itself into a formidable force behind the brothers, faced a future in which one of their champions was shut out of city hall and with the other, now ailing, in a minor role.
Some chanted for a recount, and others gamely predicted a Ford – it wasn’t clear which one - would win the next battle for the city four years from now.
Klaudia Dynowska, a volunteer driver for the Ford campaign who said she voted for the first time, signed herself up for the rematch.
"After Rob is done, I don’t have a mayor anymore," added the central Etobicoke resident. "Mister Tory, he’s for the rich."
Ford Nation will be coming back a lot stronger, said Chris Glenny, a Scarborough man who said his area had been ignored by the previous mayors of an amalgamated Toronto.
Only the Ford brothers, he said, ventured out to Scarborough to find out what people there wanted.
Glenny, as did some others, argued Tory won because Doug had been forced to jump late into the mayoral race. Rob, had he been able to keep campaigning, would "be mayor tonight," he said.
One woman said supernatural explanations should be blamed for Doug’s defeat. "They work very hard, the forces of evil," she said.
Kuljgeet Singh, another Etobicoke man in a Ford Nation shirt, offered a wrestling fan’s perspective.
"Ford’s the people’s champ – he needs a belt," he shouted, gesturing at where that championship trophy would be worn.
"And if his mom decides to run in the future, she needs a belt."
What politician would give you his cell number, as Rob Ford did, and tell you to call at any time, Singh asked, describing Tory as being "like a robot."
A few young men holding Ford placards were former football players Rob Ford once coached at Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School, such as Jasir Ashfaque, who described the mayor as "the realist, the finest and the kindest of heart."
Support for the Fords will never die, said Ashfaque, though, he added, "some Torontonians made the biggest mistake of their lives tonight."
It was the Ford brothers and Drake, the hip hop artist who put Toronto on the world map, he said.
"It feels like someone took part of my city away from me, and I’m left homeless."
Tom Keenan, a campaign volunteer from Whitby, used springs to wear two Ford Nation flags on his head.
Formerly from Rob Ford’s ward, he said he agrees with the Ford philosophy of not spending more money than the city takes in.
"If you just keep spending, you have to have more money coming in, which takes more money out of my pockets, which makes me hard done by," Keenan said.
Asked why Doug’s mayoral run wasn’t successful, Keenan thought it might have something to do with the candidate’s personality – or at least how the media presented it.
"Maybe people think he comes across as abrasive."
Comparing Doug Ford with Tory, Mark Varadarajan of Scarborough, conceded both are men of business, but said Ford "has connections in the real world" as well as in the business world, while his brother is genuinely liked by people of every culture.
"You can’t really put that on, right?"
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