by Cee, DW
That’s when I lost it. “I’m sorry, Jerry. You haven’t lost me. I’m not engaged to Roland. At least I’m no longer engaged to him, not that I was ever really engaged to him.”
*******
Jerry
What? Had I heard her correctly? Before she said anything else, I held my future wife for the first time in months and kissed her passionately. It felt damn good to have her in my arms again.
“Tell me again what you just said, my love.” I continued to kiss her until Estelle looked like she was bursting to tell me her tale.
She explained her grand scheme to me in one breath. “I’m sorry! It was childish of me to trick you and selfish of me to use Roland. I can’t believe what a bad person I am. I did whatever I needed for my gain. Do you forgive me?” There were giant teardrops falling from those beautiful eyes.
“Are you still engaged, Gorgeous?”
“I don’t know. Have you revoked our engagement?”
I laughed. “Last I heard, you had cancelled our promise to marry. If you’re no longer going to be Mrs. Ascot, I’d like for us to marry—immediately.”
The tears stopped and her jaw dropped. “What?”
“I love you. Do you still love me?”
“Of course I do.”
“Will you honor me with your trust again? I promise not to break my pledge to you, Estelle. We will make every life decision together.”
“All right.”
“If you love me and trust me, will you marry me?”
“Yes!”
“Tomorrow?”
This answer didn’t come as readily. “Yes, I’ll marry you tomorrow, but what about our families?” Her reservation made me stop and take note. “You have no worry of us separating again, Jerry. I don’t want to marry on the run. If possible, I’d like for our families to celebrate with us.”
Damn. She had a good point there. “How about we make a few life decisions, first. Do you want me to come back and finish med school?”
“No.” She was emphatic in her answer. “What you’re doing affects our future family. I want you to do what’s best for all of us.”
“Will you then come to the States with me? What about design school?”
“If I can be with you forever, I can give this up.”
“But—”
She cut me off to say, “No buts, Jerry. I’ve done this. It was fun, but it’s not my future. I can continue to draw and design for pleasure. Don’t feel any guilt that I’m giving this up.”
I still felt bad, but the selfish part of me didn’t want to be separated from Estelle. “How about if we try to get you back into RISD or the graduate program at Harvard?”
“Let’s talk about that after we’ve settled in the States, Jerry. Though, I do have one request.” I watched her expectantly. “How will we survive financially? Will you allow me to work?”
“Shite. I was so excited about having you back in my life, I forgot about our reality.” I sighed. Why were there so many damn hills to climb?
“I might have a solution for us. Will you indulge me and meet a friend of mine who might be able to help us?”
“A friend?”
“Just a friend...” she reassured.
*******
Roland
How the hell I went from being engaged to the woman of my dreams, to being dumped within days of our engagement, to having dinner with that same said woman and her fiancé, was beyond me. Damn my life.
“Stop growling at one another, Boys.” Estelle spoke those words with a sweet giggle. “I’m sorry you are meeting under strained conditions. It’s wholly my fault that you think you can’t be friends. I promise you that one day, the four of us will be good friends.”
“Who’s the fourth? Harry?” I asked sarcastically.
She giggled even more. “No, Roland. The fourth will be your wife.”
“Dear God!” I muttered. “Why is it that we are meeting, Sweet Stella?”
Jerry’s eyes practically popped out of their sockets when I called Stella by an endearment.
“Behave, Jerry. We are in need of answers. Roland is the only one who can give them to us right now.” She warned her man and then she gave me a similar threat. “I’ve come to ask you for help, Roland. If what you said about always being my friend was a lie, then I’ll turn to someone else.”
The sigh of resignation was evident in both of us. We had no choice but to make peace.
“How can I help you?” Her smile, in response, was blinding. Jerry and I were both dumbstruck. “Lucky Bastard,” I cursed Jerry, who was grinning like an idiot. Somehow, that moment changed our relationship forever. Through that exchange, we found common ground—over the pains and joys—of one Estelle Cowper. “What can I do for you?”
“Jerry and I are getting married as soon as possible and I’m moving to the States with him. I wondered if you could help me get a good paying job.”
“Estelle.” By the sternness in his voice, obviously, Jerry wasn’t privy to this conversation beforehand.
“Don’t start, Jerry. Let’s be realistic. You’re a student with a part-time job. I’ll be a wife with no job and too much time on my hand. I need to help in any way I can.”
Jerry wanted to protest, but he had no good response.
“I can help, but I’m unsure how well these jobs will pay.”
“We don’t need much. We’ll be surviving mostly on love,” she said with a bashful boldness.
“I seriously want to kick your arse right now.”
“If that’ll make you feel better...” Jerry left the words unsaid. “I know how it feels to lose this amazing woman. What you’re feeling can’t be much different than the knife stabbing through my heart when I read Estelle’s letter.”
“Gentlemen!” Estelle brought us back to her attention. “Enough with the ‘Estelle broke my heart’ speech. We need solutions here.”
I loved her spirit. “When are you headed back?” I asked the couple.
“As soon as possible since I’ve already missed a week of class and work.”
“Since there’s no need for me to be in Paris any longer, I’ll head back with you and help you find a job.”
“You will?” Estelle asked, surprised.
Truth be told, I surprised the hell out of myself. I needed a new job and a woman of my own, so I wasn’t doing these foolish things like flying across the world to be with a woman who didn’t want me.
“I will. Give me your itinerary and I’ll follow suit.”
“Thank you.” Jerry put out his hand and offered his gratitude as well as his friendship. “I owe you for taking care of Estelle in my absence, as well as taking care of us during our time of need.”
I shook his hand and kidded, “Just know that if Stella and I are alive when you return to your Maker, I’m marrying her the moment her mourning period is over.”
Jerry laughed. “Over my dead body!”
Jerry. Estelle.
Harry
“Damn Roland Ascot III! He always was a sycophantic arse. I can’t believe he went all the way back to America to be near you.”
My mood was souring by the hour. “Shall I stop recounting the past?” she asked with her eyebrows arched.
“No! I want you to tell me the entire thing.”
“At the rate you’ve interrupted me and glowered, Michael and Chloe will be married with two kids by the time I finish.”
“Cheeky Woman. Tell me about your wedding. So, did you and Jerry really have a civil service wedding?”
“Yes, initially.”
“Explain in detail,” I demanded.
“If you must know,” she answered with a smirk. “Jerry wanted to bed me. I was in agreement. We chose to marry immediately so we could have sex.”
I growled my disapproval. “You did that on purpose, just to piss me off,” I accused.
She didn’t deny it. She kissed me on the lips and suggested,
“Why don’t you start packing so we can make it to our grandson’s wedding on time?”
“Damn Woman,” I muttered and did what she told me to do. “So what happened after the wedding and the sex?”
“We made a quick stop in London, our parents threw us a small reception and we flew to America.”
“When did Jerry have time to start the pearl necklace tradition?”
Estelle laughed. “Even in the craziness of missing school and getting married, it was important to Jerry that he buy me a wedding gift. Since he had usurped both his older brothers and got married first, he thought it’d be fun to make it even harder on his brothers, and came up with this wedding tradition. Since then, Jerry made it a goal to come up with many Reid family traditions.”
“Damn man was perfect in every way.”
“I have a question for you, Harry.”
“What?” I answered in a surly manner, which earned me a glower.
“When did you come to Paris?”
“Coincidentally, I was already in Paris, meeting my future duchess, around the time you had arrived. After I came back to London, I learned what had happened between you and Jerry. Your mother encouraged me to go see you and so I did.”
“But I never saw you.”
“When I arrived at your apartment, I saw you with Roland and I heard enough to believe you were engaged to him. At that point, I knew all was lost. Dejected, I went back to see my soon-to-be fiancée and set a wedding date with her parents.”
“I’m sorry, Harry.”
“You should be! You broke my heart too many times to count.”
“Shall we stop here and focus on us?” she asked with penitence.
I shook my head, no. “I want to hear it all. We’ll get to us at the end.” I harrumphed. “It’s a damn shame I can’t gloat to Jerry and Roland that I emerged as the victor in the end.”
“Seriously Harry?”
“Hell yes! That’s the first thing I’m going to tell them when I see them in heaven.”
“And what will you do when you find out that I’ve married for a fourth time?”
“WHAT?” I bellowed louder than my wife laughed. “Just continue the damn story. It won’t be a happy ending until you get to the summer where you married me.”
“All right, Dear Husband.” She shook her head and laughed heartily at me.
(Sixty-plus-years-ago)
*******
Jerry
“How the hell does that English duke of yours know whenever you’ve given birth? Does he have a spy in our house?”
“I have no idea, Jerry, but Harry can be pretty amazing. I love foxgloves. I don’t know how he does this.”
“Damn man has to show me up at the birth of my son.”
My wife laughed at me. “Really, Jerry? I just bore you three boys in the past seven years and you’re competing with an elusive man who sends me flowers?”
“I just don’t understand how he does this.”
“It’s just as much a mystery to me as it is to you.”
“Enough with talks of the duke. I have a gift for you.”
“Is it as painfully produced as the one I just gifted you?”
My wife was forever the cleverest woman I knew. “No, my love. The gift that I have for you was a stroke of pure luck and a little genius.”
“Pray, tell.”
“The two pieces of land I invested in struck gold! The government wants them to build on, and they’re willing to give me a good amount of money.”
“So you sold?”
“Nope. I held out and played chicken.”
“And?”
“And they took the bait. They came back with an astronomical number that might have you fainting on me after having given birth to this nine-pounder.”
“That’s wonderful, Jerry! I knew you’d be spectacular in real estate.”
“You were right, Estelle. I’m glad I didn’t go work for that corporation. I love being my own boss and having time to spend with you and the boys.”
“So what will you do with all that money?”
“I’d like to take you to a nice part of town that has a good-sized empty lot.”
“Will you build more commercial buildings?”
“No. I thought I’d turn it into a cul-de-sac and build a house for us, and eventually a house for each of our sons. That way, we can keep them all near us.”
“What a marvelous idea, Jerry. I love it! I trust you have picked out the perfect spot for our family?” I nodded yes. “Buy the land now before someone else takes it.”
“You don’t want to see it?”
Estelle laughed. “Between Robert, Henry, and this little one, I don’t know that I’ll ever have time to get out there. You are a genius with properties, Dear Husband. I know you’ll pick only the best for us. Know that you have my blessing and do what you believe is right.”
“I love you, Estelle. I can’t wait to build these homes with you!”
“I love you, too, Jerry.”
(Fifty-plus-years-ago)
*******
Estelle
“Have Robert and Henry told you their good news?”
“No. What good news?” My husband wondered.
“Why don’t you ask them yourself?”
“Robert! Henry! Come here.”
“Yeah Dad? What’s up?”
“Robert, your mum tells me there’s good news in this family. Can the man of this house know what’s going on?”
“We’re headed to med school, Dad.” Henry would always bring the spotlight to him. He never did it in a malicious way, but somehow, most conversations turned to him as the focal point. He liked to talk, and that got him into trouble more times than not.
“Med school?” It wasn’t that Jerry wasn’t pleased. In his heart, he thought perhaps his eldest might follow in his footsteps.
“Yes, Dad. I’m about to apply to college and I thought I might apply to a seven-year undergrad/medical school program.”
“Yeah, Bobby? You think you can do all that in seven years?” Jerry beamed. He was proud of his quiet, but hardworking eldest.
“I think so, Dad. Science is definitely my forte and I know it’s something Grandma and Grandpa want from at least one of us. I’d like to make their dreams come true.”
Jerry pulled his seventeen-year-old in for a hug. “You and your brothers make me so proud. Every day, I go out to work trusting that you’ll make the Reid name stand tall.”
“What about me, Dad? I’m going to med school, too. I decided today I’m going to be a heart surgeon.”
Jerry laughed and brought his second son in for an embrace as well. “Yeah? You think you’re smart enough to be a heart surgeon?”
“Grandma thinks so—she’s the one who told me to be a heart surgeon.”
“Your grandma is living out her dreams through her grandsons. You’ll have to tell them when they come for a visit next week.”
“Are Uncle Stephen and Uncle Dillon coming with their families?”
“They’ll all be here, Henry,” I explained. “Your grandparents wanted the entire family together for their wedding anniversary.”
“That’ll be cool.” Henry and Bobby agreed.
With talks done, the boys went to finish their homework and we retired to our room.
“What have I done so right to have a perfect wife and five upstanding sons?”
“We’re lucky to have found one another, Jerry. The boys are definite bonuses.”
“Let’s try for another child, Estelle. I want a little girl who resembles her mummy.”
“Do you know how old I am?” I asked with much laughter.
“You’re not that old. We have five healthy boys. You can have one last child and she’ll be our greatest love.”
“She will most likely be a he and no thank you. The Reid men do not know how to produce girls.”
“We’ll be the first to ha
ve one.”
“Jerry, we’re almost on the other side. Soon, the boys will get married and have kids of their own. You can dote on your granddaughters.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to try for one more?”
“Positive!”
(Forty-plus-years-ago)
*******
Jerry
“Leave it to Henry to usurp his oldest brother’s right to marry first.” I said with much pride and humor.
“Bobby and Sandy didn’t care. They wanted to wait until Bobby was done with med school.”
“I know. I’m marveling at the fact that our second son is able to command everyone’s attention with a smile and a funny anecdote. There isn’t a person around who doesn’t like that kid.”
“Especially Babs. She’s perfect for him, though I was a bit startled at how fast their relationship moved.”
“Me too, my love. It seems as though we’re moving into the other half of our lives, huh?”
“I think so, Jerry. I can’t wait to have grandchildren.”
“Me neither. I’m hoping for a healthy first grandson, then I want all granddaughters.”
My wife couldn’t help beaming at the beautiful bride and groom. “Did you not have a talk with Henry about doing something a little nicer for his bride? Must his sense of humor extend to our Reid family wedding tradition? A blue garter? Seriously?”
“Dear Wife, don’t you know I’ve raised my sons better than that?”
“What do you mean?”
“What everyone saw was a blue garter, but what’s hidden in Babs’ trousseau is an exquisite set of emeralds, sapphires, and rubies—necklace, bracelet, ring, and earrings of each kind.”
“No!” Estelle breathed. “When did he do that?”
“Our son is a hell of a romantic at heart. He had Henri from Paris make the jewelry, then had them sent to your mother, and asked your mother to bring them with her.”
“Why was I left out in all this planning?”
“Because, Dear Wife, while my son was taking care of his bride, I had Henri take care of mine.” I pulled out a ring from my right pocket and placed it on Estelle’s finger. “When we married, I didn’t have enough money to buy you more than a gold band and a pearl necklace. Once married, your mother presented you with a six-carat Asscher cut diamond that no man could compete with. It’s always bothered me that you never received a proper engagement ring.”