Chapter 19
Jones waited until everyone was seated at the table, after they said grace, and after the food had been passed. Marjorie had heated up a casserole that they had gotten yesterday for dinner. It smelled good, though he doubted it would be as good as Marjorie’s cooking. She had a real talent in that area, and there weren’t too many things she made that he didn’t love.
There had been vegetables left over, and they’d made fresh dill pickle dip, and it was on the table as well. Another one of his favorites. He didn’t even need vegetables; he could eat just the dip. Although, if he did that, Amy would elbow him and tell him that it was weird, and they’d end up in a squabbling match that Marjorie would have to regulate, except they’d be laughing too, and they’d all be joking.
They’d done that plenty of times over the years, as the dip had become a staple as soon as Marjorie realized it was his favorite.
She’d been like a mom to him, far more of a mom than his own mom, and yet his mom knew that he was planning on getting married before Marjorie. And if Marjorie knew that, she wouldn’t be upset at all. Because that was just the kind of woman she was. She understood that not everybody could be first, and she was happy taking a place at the back.
He admired that about her and knew Amy was like that as well. She didn’t always have to be first, although it made him smile when he remembered how she had told him that he better not tell anybody else if he wasn’t going to tell her, and he knew that was partly because she wanted to be special to him. Not like she didn’t already know that she was. She surely did, but he understood. When you told someone else something first, it made it seem like they were more important.
Regardless, he took a breath, then pushed his chair back away from the table and stood up. When he just stood there, everyone looked at him.
Even Isadora, who had come for lunch, and Gilbert, who had come out of his room as well, though neither one of them had been at church.
“I have an announcement,” he said, and immediately he saw Marjorie’s eyes widen. “It’s a good one, I think.”
He looked down at Amy, who looked around the table and then stood up, looking at him and smiling.
“You guys are getting married too!” Roland called out.
“Welp, yep. That was my announcement,” Jones said, nodding at Roland. “Thanks for making it easy for me there, bro,” he said, not upset at all. Roland was the youngest of six, and Jones had often figured that he felt like he got lost in the crowd. It was probably true he did. Even now that he was an adult, he probably still felt that way at times, like nothing he did was ever matching anything that anyone else did. Jones actually remembered having several conversations with him about that when Roland was still in high school. He just felt...like he never stood out for himself.
Jones made a note to try to talk to him later. It was probably overwhelming to lose a sister-in-law, have a sister lose her husband, and then have two sisters get married. He might be feeling the same. And while Jones wasn’t exactly sure what to do about it, he could at least reach out. See if he thought of anything, or he could chat with him for a bit, make sure he was okay.
“Congratulations!” Marjorie said, breaking the silence that had descended, maybe from shock.
That seemed to be the instigation that everyone needed, and chatter broke out around the table, with congratulations and questions called from different ends of the table.
Jones put a hand up. “You guys know that Amy and I have been good friends forever, and there’s a little bit more to the story.”
He and Amy had talked about it and decided that it would be best for them to just be straight-up honest about the reasons for getting married. They had also decided that they weren’t going to give a figure on the money that he was inheriting, just so that that little bit remained private.
“You guys can keep eating if you want to, I didn’t want to hold up the meal, but we wanted to tell you for a reason.” He looked around the table, then at Amy. She was going to tag team with him, he was pretty sure.
“It started with the mistletoe kiss for me. That was your fault, Robert.” She smiled down at her nephew, sitting at the other end of the table. “You are the one who brought the mistletoe over, and Jones kissed me. That...got me thinking. I had never thought of him like that before.”
“That was pretty fast. Because that was Friday,” Wilson said, not looking upset but still sounding surprised.
“I know. But we’ve been friends for years. I know him better than anyone. He knows me better than anyone, and it just seemed natural, once we started talking about it.”
“And I know your mom knows that we got a letter saying that one of my aunts had died and left us money, and it said that I would inherit money from her, but I had to be married. I was looking for someone to marry, and Amy was helping me. Until that moment, I hadn’t really considered that Amy would be the perfect one. But after that, it was obvious.”
“Yeah. We all knew it,” Gilbert said, and Jones figured that was probably a good thing that he was at least invested in this and it didn’t seem to be making him feel bad. Maybe it wasn’t going to be hard for him to hear.
“Anyway, you’re right. It was obvious to everyone but us. But the other stipulation in the will was that it had to be within one month of her dying. That’s Friday.” There were gasps around the table.
“I talked to Terry, and we found out that we were both thinking about getting married soon, and we said why don’t we do it together?”
“So you’re getting married tomorrow too?” Marjorie said, her hands at her throat.
“I’m sorry if that bothers you, Mom. Normally I would ask for your advice, but it doesn’t feel like there’s any choice in the matter.”
“It doesn’t bother me at all!” she said. “Why would it bother me? I’m thrilled for you guys!”
“Well, there’s not going to be any wedding to plan, obviously. We’re just going to go to the church tomorrow and get married. It’s not going to be a big deal, and it’s just going to be the family, although Jones’s parents are invited as well.”
No one had anything to say about that. They all knew how his parents could be. They might show up, but they probably wouldn’t.
“Well, we have all this food that everybody’s been bringing, and now we have a reason to eat it and celebrate. You could invite people from the church to come over after you’re married, for a better reception if you want,” Gilbert said, and Jones almost swallowed his tongue.
Gilbert was almost acting like...he had forgotten that his wife died. Or maybe he just needed to. Maybe he needed to be like the kids and have periods of normalcy followed by periods of deep sadness. Jones didn’t really know, but he appreciated the fact that Gilbert had volunteered, and he would no more have turned him down than he would have cut off his own arm.
“Does that sound good to you guys?” Amy asked Terry and Judd, who nodded, smiling .
“Any excuse to eat sounds like a good thing to me,” Judd said, and the table laughed.
“Well, there we have it. It’s settled. We’ll be getting married tomorrow evening, around six. We all have to get off work and get to the church.”
“It’s a good thing too, because there’s a storm coming on Tuesday. Although, they have been calling for twelve inches of snow, but now they’re saying it’s going to be an ice storm.”
Jones hadn’t heard that. There were too many other things going on, and he hadn’t checked the weather lately. “Thank you. I might end up closing my clinic for Tuesday.”
“You’d close your clinic for an ice storm, but you won’t close it for our marriage?” Amy said, putting a hand on her hip.
“Really, darling? In front of your family?”
It sounded so fake that the entire table laughed. It was probably going to take people a while to get used to Amy and him being more than just bantering friends. But he didn’t care. It had taken him a little bit of time too, but now that he had, he couldn’t think of anything that would be better.