His arms came around her from behind, his hands locking under her breasts.
"Sounds good to me. Maybe Esther would want to live in it in the summer while we're in Florida or running around chasing pictures."
"What?" She looked up at him.
"Detours, old lady. We'll stay here from, say, October through April or so. If I do any shoots, I'll do them on weekends or on two-day trips. Come April, when Esther comes back, we'll give her the keys and take ourselves to Pensacola beach. We'll live there in the summer, and maybe do a couple of two-week picture trips then. If I need to get away or if I actually get an assignment from someone other than our son, I'll do it if the marriage and the lifestyle permit it. If they don't-"
"Marriage?" she interrupted, drawing back.
"Absolutely," he said indignantly, though she heard the smile in his voice. "What do you think I am, some kind of floozy?"
He struck an outrageous pose, hipshot and head tossed, and she spent a moment helpless with laughter before saying, "What if we can't do it right this time, either?" She swallowed back surging hope. "What if everything that's behind us is stronger than what's ahead?"
"Then we'll just have to get past it. We told Joe once that all he had to be was Joe and we'd always love him." He turned her to face him, his bright blue gaze latching onto hers. "As long as you're Rags, I'll love you, and all the detours we have to make to and around each other will just make the trip more interesting."
"The freedom you wanted and just barely had..." she began feebly.
"We were around in the sixties, Rags. Remember the song that said 'freedom was just another word for nothing left to lose'? Well, we've got a lot to lose and even more to gain. The only kind of freedom I need is the kind that comes with being with you."
She pulled away from him and started across the yard, then stopped and turned to look back. "Are you coming?"
"Where?"
"Downtown. There's a furniture store there and if we're going to be sleeping together on a permanent basis, we need a king-size bed."
He stayed where he was. "Is that a yes?"
"Of course it is." She went back to him, her feet slipping on the crisp grass, straight into his open arms. "We can't have people thinking you're a floozy now, can we?"
~*~
"When I grow up," Marley announced, "I'm going to marry Daddy."
Ben looked at her with all the superciliousness a seven-year-old could muster. "Go ahead," he said. "I'll marry Mama."
~*~
"It only took me about sixteen years," Ben told the people assembled in Plumfield Inn's front parlor, "but that's exactly what I'm doing. I'm marrying my mama to my dad on Christmas Eve and it's the best Christmas present ever. Joe, you got Mom's ring?"
"Uh-huh." Joe dug it out of his pocket, blew on it, and rubbed it on his sleeve. "You could've bought her a new one," he told his father. "We'd have helped you out if you didn't want to spring for it."
"I didn't want a new one." Rags leaned around Tell. "Tuck your shirt in, Joe."
Ben sighed. "Marley, you got Dad's?"
She waved her little finger with Tell's battered wedding ring on it. "Get this show on the road, Ben. I have to go to the bathroom."
"Okay." Ben closed his book and looked at his parents. "Will you both promise to love and cherish each other forever? Will you" -his gaze moved past them to Joe- "love one another even when the road twists and turns and there are detours around every corner?"
"We will." They spoke together, and when Rags looked up at Tell, she felt tears gathering at the corners of her eyes.
"Then, by the grace of God, let it be so." Ben's smile was wide and open, encompassing the entire room. "With the blessings of all those who are gathered here, I now pronounce you husband and wife."
Tell's kiss was like a promise unto itself, and the tears slipped down her cheeks. "No more Bad Day," she whispered.
"Probably plenty of them," he said, running a caressing thumb over the tears, "but we'll have great years."
~The End~
About the author of Because of Joe...
I was always daydreaming as a kid, about living in elegant places where other people made your bed and dusted your furniture, wearing clothes that screamed triumphantly, "Liz Claiborne, size two!" every time I put them on, and writing blockbuster novels.
Instead, I live in a big old farmhouse back a dusty lane, where whoever is the last one out of bed makes it and no one bothers with dusting. My clothes mumble sheepishly, "J. C. Penney, buy a bigger size." And my novels aren't what you'd call blockbusters. What they are is stories about people like me and maybe like you, whose dreams have gone awry or simply withered up and died. It's my job as a writer to take care of those dreams, either by straightening out the old ones or finding new ones. Either way, I love it, and I'd love hearing how you feel about how I've done that job.
E-mail me at [email protected] and thanks for reading!
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Because of Joe Page 13