After everything they had been through, Jeff and Ginger were finally
husband and wife. Two years of waiting . . . of denying their urges
and appetites. They could hardly believe their ears when the Porter
informed them that there were no berths or roomettes available. To
add insult to injury they would have to wait eight hours before
changing trains and hopefully get a roomette on the train from
Chicago to Wichita. God was truly testing them.
"Ginger, let's get you a ticket. We'll just have to think
of
something else to keep our minds pre-occupied until we can get to
Chicago." Jeff tells his new bride, trying to convince her as
well
as himself that eight hours is not that long in the grand scheme of
things. He had absolutely no idea what they would do for eight
hours. He didn't think he could discuss the contents of the well
stock modern pantry for eight hours and even though Ginger had
learned a lot about baseball in the last year, even he couldn't
talk
about baseball for that long. If there wasn't a roomette or
berth
available on their connecting train, he didn't know what he would
do.
After they got Ginger's ticket, they decided to return to the
dining
car and have some dinner. Jeff hadn't know he would be on his
honeymoon on this trip. He didn't have that much cash on him so
they
had to settle for a sandwich and a couple of beers. He would have
rather given his bride a steak and a bottle of champagne, but that
would have to wait.
"Ginger, I know this isn't exactly the wedding you had
dreamed of."
He couldn't take his eyes off of her. He still couldn't
believe that
she had dragged Father Dreher to the train station and on top of
that, Father Dreher had actually agreed to marry them on the train in
such a rushed ceremony.
"I was not about to wait weeks or possibly months for us to get
married. We had to postpone it too many times in the past. I
wasn't
about to take the chance of anything else happening to gum up the
works. Besides, it may not have been the wedding of my dreams, but
it was perfect." She was trying so hard not to think about the
fact
that she was sitting up in the dining car of a train to Chicago, in
her wedding dress, when they should have been doing something about
her appetite - and it had absolutely nothing to do with food.
"Ginger," Jeff whispered, "if you don't stop looking
at me like that,
we are going to end up embarrassing ourselves and everyone else in
this car."
"Whatever do you mean? Looking at you like what." She tried
to act
innocent but knew it wasn't working.
Jeff leaned over the table and gave his new bride a deep but tender
kiss. "You know exactly what I mean. We will never make it
eight
hours like this. Let's go to our seats and see if we can get
some
rest before we get to Chicago. I have to be well rested for the game
tomorrow night and if we manage to get a roomette on the train in
Chicago, I don't plan on getting much rest between Chicago and
Wichita."
Ginger recognized that look in Jeff's eyes . . . "Oh, my
word."
