Chapter Eleven
Celebration And Tribulation
Johnny had seen a New Years’ Eve celebration advertised in the Owensboro Messenger and he was wondering how he could manage for him and Chrissy to go. The tickets were fifty dollars each and they would probably go quickly. Only a hundred tickets would be available since Red Lobster had a limited amount of space. The place would be closed to the public and only couples could attend. They insisted the guests had to be sixteen or older but, of course, drinks would be served only to those at least twenty-one. They had spent most of the few days after Christmas getting everything squared away—all the gifts put away and putting away almost all of the decorations at both places. The young people had walked back and forth between Chrissy’s and Johnny’s homes and had enjoyed playing in the snow. On Wednesday, Johnny and Chrissy had spent nearly the entire day addressing and mailing their wedding invitations. There had been a lot of consulting with their respective Mom’s to get all the addresses they needed; but they had finished all of them and they were all on their way. They had bought fifty and had sent forty-two of them. Now Johnny felt they were due some fun. He had been wracking his brain to try to come up with blind dates for his siblings so they could all go to the end of the year party. Bill Weedman had a daughter who would be about the right age for Sean and Frank Tinsley’s brother could be Kathleen’s escort. He made some phone calls and invited them over for a visit to meet his family and his fiancé and his plans worked out perfectly.
Ed had been talking to Bill about possibly joining forces and bidding on a job in Hartford. He knew Johnny would be out of the country for a while on his honeymoon. And the job really needed at least two experienced cabinetmakers to do it properly. Johnny believed the friendship would be furthered by the social interaction between Bill’s daughter and Ed’s partner’s brother.
At last, it was all set: Phillip Tinsley would escort Kathleen and Sean would squire Paula Weedman and with Johnny and Chrissy, the six should have a night to remember. It was agreed that none of their group would be drinking at all since most of them were underage. They knew they could have just as much fun without drinking anyway and no one would have a hangover in the morning.
As soon as the plans were concluded, he called Red Lobster and made the arrangements. Sean and Kathleen never realized that Johnny had set up the whole thing so they would have dates and he and Chrissy could have a night out.
They did have a fantastic evening. The price of the tickets entitled them to a full meal starting with a salad and their famous garlic and cheese biscuits. They had their choice of any seafood entrée on the menu from shrimp to lobster, to crab, or clams or salmon or tilapia or even rainbow trout. They all declared it was the best seafood they had ever tasted. The desserts were absolutely sinfully rich and delicious and the portions were generous enough that almost everybody went home with a ‘to-go box’ full of leftovers.
They had live music and had cleared an area in the middle of the restaurant to serve as a dance floor. When the band took breaks, they turned on the karaoke machine and they had a load of fun with it, too. At a few minutes before midnight, they started singing “Auld Lang Syne” and at the stroke of midnight, everybody was kissing and toasting the New Year. The O’Reilly-Wroe group toasted with their champagne glasses filled with ginger ale but hearts still intoxicated with love and feelings of companionship and good cheer.
When the doors were unlocked at twelve-thirty, Johnny, Chrissy and their group went home. Both Kathleen and Paula spent the night with Chrissy and Phillip crashed on the couch at Johnny and Sean’s place. Of course, Johnny and Chrissy would have preferred other sleeping arrangements but they had at least been able to spend the evening together.
The next order of business for them was to make final decisions about who would be in the wedding party. Chrissy had asked Paula Weedman to be one of the bridesmaids. She had called her Aunt Genny’s house and talked to both Mattie and Emily Parsons and they had been quite pleased that she had wanted them to be in the wedding. They were almost the same as her mother’s sisters; she was a little older but when Aunt Genevieve had adopted Penny at the age of eleven, she became a foster sister to Aunt Genny’s kids. And, of course, until she and her family had moved to Kentucky, Chrissy had almost grown up with them. Chrissy had grown more and more fond of Kathleen and she had decided to ask her to be maid of honor instead of just a bridesmaid. Of course, Andy would be the ring bearer and Candy would be the flower girl.
Sean would be Johnny’s best man and he had asked Phillip Tinsley to be a groomsman. Two more friends from Fordsville, Paul Trent and Steve Bernard had said they would be honored to be in his wedding. With that, the wedding party was decided. One other change had been made; the wedding had originally been planned to happen at Chrissy’s house; but with more people planning to come than they had anticipated, they had decided to have it at the Fordsville Baptist Church at two o’clock on Valentine’s Day. And so their invitations had indicated. Her colors were set with maroon and a harmonizing pink for the attendants and Johnny in black and Chrissy in white.
On January 9, Grandmother and the O’Reillys came to dinner at Ed and Penny’s house. After a most pleasant dinner, everyone retired to the family room and Johnny and Chrissy explained the complete arrangements they had made for the wedding. When the full list had been read and they asked for approval, doors slammed upstairs three times. Janet was really startled.
“What on earth was that?” she asked. “Isn’t everybody down here?”
“Everybody is down here. But when we asked for approval, I guess the ghosts decided we needed theirs, too. Uncle Cliff and Aunt Lorraine who lived here before us called this their ‘Kentucky Hideaway.’ We’ve begun calling it our ‘Ghostly Hideaway.’ We’ve been totally unable to explain away logically more than a few of the things that have gone on here. Since we became accustomed to the noises, they don’t bother us anymore, so we decided to just co-exist and forget it. It sure was startling at first, though." Penny tried to explain their ‘other’ residents. “After all, they were here first.”
At any rate, the wedding plans were all approved and Janet and Penny made plans to go dress shopping the following day.
Ed went out to pick up the mail from the mailbox right after they left. Going through the mail, he found an envelope addressed to Johnny but in care of Ed at Ed’s address. The return address was from a sheriff back in North Carolina but from neighboring Stokes County rather than from Fairmont. Ed couldn’t figure what it would be; he’d give it to Johnny as soon as he saw him.
While they were gone, Ed got a call from his friend, Bill Blass, in North Carolina. He had called to tell him that the trial date for the Norman Jones case had been set for January 25. The prosecution thought they had a slam-dunk; the girl he was accused of raping had already picked him out of a line-up, as had several others who had been in the bar the night they had left together. Jones’ attorney had said they would be ‘mounting a vigorous defense.’ But nobody had figured out what kind of defense he could possibly ‘mount.'
Ed thanked him for calling and asked him to continue to keep him updated. If the trial hadn’t been very close to the time for Chrissy’s wedding, he would probably have gone to see the outcome for himself. He still found it exceedingly hard to associate the things Norman Jones had done with the man he had grown up with, worked with and called ‘friend.’ Nevertheless, there could be no doubt that he had tried to burn his home with him and his family still in it.
He was telling Penny about the call when she got home. “You know, Penny, when the wedding is over and the kids have left on their honeymoon, we could go for two or three days and maybe see some of our old friends in Fairmont. The trial would probably still be going on and we could see some of that, too. With the visit and the trial both, it would be worth making the trip, don't you think? Lydia had said she wouldn’t be leaving until a week after the wedding. We could maybe get Bruce to come down and take care of our stuff
until we got back just as we will theirs while they’re gone. What do you think?”
“It just might work. If Bruce can take care of Lydia’s livestock and everything for the week, he should be capable of doing ours, too. They could take the cow and the dogs back up on the hill; we could leave the furnace on low so the pipes won’t freeze and the only thing down here that would need doing would be taking care of the chickens and gathering the eggs. I like that idea a lot. It would be good to see everybody again. Of course, I’ll see several, such as Aunt Genny and her brood but there are others who won’t be here that I’d love to see, too. Let’s talk to them and see if they think it would work.”
“We could talk to Johnny about it first and see what he thinks.”
“That’s a good idea, too.”
Chrissy had spent the day at Lydia’s with Johnny. When he brought her home that evening, they discussed the possible plan with him.
“Do you think it would be alright to broach the subject with Bruce, Johnny? If you think it would be asking too much, we don’t have any real need to go. I just thought it would be a nice trip for us.”
“I think Bruce would feel gratified that you would be comfortable asking him. He already feels they will be imposing on you to take care of things on the hill while they’re gone even though you volunteered to do it. This way he can feel that he'll be reciprocating and it won’t be such an imposition.”
“Okay, I can understand that. I still feel weird about asking him, though.”
“Let me bring up the subject and I think I can guarantee he’ll volunteer just as you did. Would that make you feel better?”
“Yes, it would. Thank you, Johnny. You know I may forgive you one of these days for taking my little girl away from me.”
“Hey, I’m going to make her so happy, you’ll never regret that she’s with me.”
“I know you will, Johnny, but we sure will miss her around here.”
“We sure will, but I guess I would have to untie the apron strings some time or other." Penny had tears in her eyes but she held them back.
“Oh, changing the subject and I think it’s about time, this letter came for you today. I have no idea what it is or why it came here instead of directly to you." Ed handed Johnny the letter from North Carolina.
“I don’t have any idea, either. I don’t know anyone in North Carolina. Is this the county you came from?”
“No, Fairmont is located in the next county over from Stokes.”
“Well, I guess the easiest way to find out is to open it." When he opened the envelope, a piece of paper fell out and he began reading the letter that was inside.
The Ghostly Hideaway Page 19