CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
It wasn’t the next day as they had hoped, but two weeks later before JJ was no longer in any pain and was fully able to return to work.
He sat behind his desk inside his chambers that he greatly missed, with Tish right by his side just as she had been for the entire month-and-a-half of his ordeal, and he was relieved. “There was a minute or two when I didn’t think I’d see this place again,” he said to her. She knew exactly what he meant: early on she had similar thoughts as well.
Reeva and Nancy, along with Artie Kramer and a slew of judges and their clerks, were also in the chambers welcoming their chief back. It was a festive occasion. They all laughed and talked about this case and that case and JJ’s reputation when it came to harsh sentences, and how he was their role model. They all drank the punch and Danish Reeva had provided, wished the judge well once again, and then all the judges and their clerks left. They had to get back to work. And JJ had a press conference in half an hour.
“Are you sure you’re up for a press conference on your first day back, Judge?” Reeva asked him.
Tish looked at her. Reeva was always overly concerned about his welfare. Nan noticed it too.
Even Artie noticed it. “Why would you even ask him that, Reeve? Despite what happened to him in Alabama, this man is still in the fight for his judgeship life. He’s still up for reelection and although the race has tightened, thank God, it still could go either way. The citizens of the fourth circuit has not heard from him in over a month. They need to hear from him. Yes, he’s up for it. He has to be!”
“I’m okay, Reeva,” JJ said to his clerk. “Artie’s right. I need to address the voters. Besides, Tish is with me,” he said with a smile. “She’s my protector. She kept me in line during my recovery. She’ll keep those nasty reporters in line too.”
They laughed. But Tish, Nan, and Artie all glanced at Reeva, who barely cracked a smile.
Then a knock on the door. “Enter!” Artie yelled as if he ran the place.
When the door opened, and Tish saw that it was her parents, she hurried from around JJ’s desk and ran and embraced her mother. She and her father weren’t there yet, but she nodded at him. “Hello Daddy.” He nodded back at her.
“Come on in,” JJ said happily as he got on his feet and walked around his desk. “So good to see you guys.”
Viola had arrived in Jacksonville and stayed a week before she had to get back to help Earl with the store. But in that time she and Tish had become mother and daughter again. Exactly what JJ had wanted. It was pleasing to see. And although Earl could never stay that long, he phoned his wife often for updates. Which was, JJ and Tish both knew, as good as it was probably going to get with him.
JJ and Viola hugged too. Although any talk of marriage was put on the back burner during JJ’s recovery, they became close, too, as if they were already son-in-law and mother-in-law. And JJ came to realize why Tish still held her parents in such high regard during her estrangement from them. JJ saw them as the salt-of-the-earth kind of people, too, in their own way.
When it felt as if they were intruding on personal family matters, Nancy spoke up. “I guess we’d better get back to work,” she said, although Tish could tell Reeva wasn’t ready to leave.
“You go back,” Reeva said to Nancy. “I’m good.”
But JJ interrupted her. “Nancy’s right,” he said, looking squarely at Reeva. “You both need to get back to work.”
They all looked at Reeva. Although she smiled, she was fooling no one. She was pissed. “Yes, sir,” she said, and turned to leave with Nancy.
But then Earl stepped up. “Before anybody goes anywhere,” he said, “I want to make it known.”
“Make what known?” Artie asked suspiciously. He wanted no hiccups. No strangeness. Nothing but good vibes when JJ took that podium to face the press in less than thirty minutes.
But Earl was the kind of man that demanded respect. Everybody looked at him. He was looking at JJ. “When I saw the way you took your own body to shield my daughter from that assassin’s bullets, and how you pushed my wife out of harm’s way too, that did something to me. You took a bullet for them. You suffered for weeks on end for them. Just like I would have done. And I realized, as I thought about it, how remarkable that was. Should something happen to me, I know you’d be there for both of them. For my daughter. But for my wife too. And that was when I knew you was an upstanding human being. Somebody I am proud to give my blessing to. You have my permission, Judge Brant, to marry my daughter.”
Tish and JJ both were astonished. They really didn’t expect to get it since they didn’t have it after JJ put his life on the line for her. But they got it anyway. And they hurried to Earl, and despite his reluctance, they both hugged him. Viola was too busy wiping away tears. JJ included her into their group hug too.
But Artie and Nan were looking at Reeva. And she looked so upset that they knew she couldn’t even deal. She walked out of the chambers.
JJ and Tish didn’t even see her leave. Because JJ was too busy getting on his knees in front of Tish, and then pulling out a small box.
Viola clutched her pearls as tears of joy filled her eyes. Tish covered her mouth as shock and joy filled her heart. Artie was thinking how in the world was he going to spin it into a positive for the campaign.
But Earl nodded his head in total agreement. He liked how JJ didn’t waste time. He liked that level of seriousness about JJ.
And JJ said the words that Tish was beginning to think she’d never hear: “Will you do me the sacred honor, LaTisha Payton, of being my wife?”
Tish smiled and nodded her head vigorously. “I would love to be your wife,” she said to him, and he put a ring on it. And everybody applauded.
Then they laughed out loud as she had to help JJ back up on his feet.