Chapter 74
“Where do you want me to put these?” asked the guy in the gray-green uniform. The name patch on his shirt indicated that his name was Larry.
Stacey responded with a completely bewildered look before she realized the decision was entirely hers at the moment. “Uh, how about right over there,” she replied with a wave of her arm in the general direction of the living room. “Here, let me help you with that.” She grabbed a large vase of fresh flowers from the guy following Larry. He had foolishly loaded himself down with three bunches of flowers and it looked like he was about to lose one of them. She stood in the middle of the near empty room and marveled at the huge bunches of out of season flowers being brought in. “She really went all out on the flower thing, didn’t she?” Stacey chuckled.
Larry returned her comment with a blank stare. “There’s plenty more where that came from. Nobody here better have any allergies, I’ll tell ya that much.”
“There’s more?”
“Lady, I got a whole truck full of flowers and plants and whatnot.” He and his assistant turned to head back to the truck for the second of what would undoubtedly be many loads.
Stacey puzzled over the assortment of flora in Gen’s all but vacant house. She hoped that there was some sort of plan for the placement of these things. Arrangements of all sizes and colors were being paraded before her eyes and she was clueless as to what to do with them. Glancing at her watch, she hoped that John and Robby would return soon from whatever mission they were on. As more and more fragile and clearly expensive floral creations entered, she thanked her lucky stars that Josh had decided to take the kids on a sightseeing trip this afternoon. She hesitated to imagine the destructive effects of bored children on delicate flowers on a chilly Saturday afternoon.
When the last of the florist’s artistry had been deposited in the house. She let go of an enormous puff of breath, causing the hair around her face to flutter. “What was Gen thinking when she ordered all these flowers?” she muttered to herself. Thinking that, surely, there must be a plan; she hiked up the stairs to the room where her friend was getting ready. Maybe Gen could at least give her a little bit of direction, she hoped.
Setting foot inside the master bedroom with the beautiful view of the wooded back yard, she admired the newly purchased bedroom furniture and wondered how the rest of the decorating would shape up in the next few weeks or months. She wished she could be around to help Gen in the furniture shopping. But, if the rest of the furnishings were anything as nice as these were, she knew the house would be beautiful. Even though drawers stood empty and walls were bare, this room was exquisite. It was evident that, despite the fact that they had purchased these pieces in haste so that they could, at the very least, sleep in their new home, they were selected with great care and attention to detail.
“Gen?”
“I’m in here,” she heard a quiet, voice meekly call out.
Stacey walked around the corner into the bathroom where Gen sat at her dressing table with rollers in her hair and in the middle of putting on makeup. She could tell by her reddened eyes that she’d been crying. “What’s the matter?” she asked compassionately as she took a seat on the countertop facing her.
“I’m just… I
don’t know….” Her voice trailed off until it was barely a whisper.
“I’m just really, really….” At this point she once again burst into
tears.
“Gen, what’s the problem? You should be so thrilled right now! You’ve got a beautiful home, a man that you love, and, like, fifty thousand flowers downstairs!” she giggled, still amazed at the sheer volume of plant life. “What could there possibly be to cry about?”
“I don’t know Stace. I’m just so… so… sad,” she whimpered as she dissolved into tears.
“Sad?” Stacey hated to sound insensitive, but she was really puzzled by Gen’s reaction. “What for?”
“It’s Johnny. He’s… he’s….” She sniffed a few times, then took the tissue that Stacey handed her and blew her nose. “He’s why I’m so sad.”
“Why?”
“This move, it was for the wrong reasons. I didn’t really hate California that much.” She wiped at her teary eyes.
“Whatever it is Gen, it’ll be Ok. You guys will be so happy here. He’s really glad to be home, you know. He’s not just doing this because you didn’t like California. He wants to be here.”
“I know he does… That’s not really it. It’s just so sad.”
Stacey wasn’t sure how to help her. She wasn’t even sure what the problem was. While she considered what she might say next she heard the low-pitched crunch of tires on gravel. “Hold on, sweetie, I gotta see who that is.” She patted Gen on the back and hurried out of the room, praying that it was John and Robby returning from wherever it was that they were.
As she bounded down the stairs and to the kitchen door, she was disappointed to see that it was yet another delivery van. This one was from a party rental store and came bearing a plethora of chairs and tables for their use at the party tonight. She held open the door as two more delivery guys plodded through carrying dainty gilded chairs. “Just put those in the living room, I suppose,” she shrugged.
Upwards of fifty chairs found their way into the house. Tables of every shape and size were paraded in- squares, rounds, rectangles- there would be no shortage of surface area tonight. Lavender colored linens were unceremoniously tossed atop the counter in the kitchen.
“Don’t clean those. We pick ‘em up as is,” she was cautioned sternly.
Just when Stacey thought they were finished, the two men began carting in candlesticks of varying heights.
“Where do you want these, ma’am?” the more polite of the two delivery people asked of Stacey.
“Well…” she hemmed and hawed for a moment trying to assemble some order among the random placement of all today’s deliveries.
“Just put ‘em over here,” John said pointing to the corner of the eating area in the kitchen. “We’ll find a place for ‘em later. Thanks, man.” He walked up to Stacey and gave her a knowing grin. “She made you take care of everything, I see.”
His silent entry had startled her, but had ultimately been a relief. Finally, she had someone else on whom she could push off the decision-making. “Yeah, I don’t know what to do with everything,” she said with an exasperated sigh.
“I know,” he chuckled. “There certainly is a lot of it! More than we need, I’d say.”
“Hey, mister!” came a deliveryman’s voice, “You wanna look over these candles here? There’s dozens of ‘em but you gotta make sure they’re Ok. I’d ‘ave brought ‘em in right away, but the numskull who loaded the truck put ‘em on first.”
“Yeah, no problem,” he nodded, taking a box from the man’s arms.
“No, wait!” Stacey called out suddenly. “Gen’s upstairs, I think you should talk to her. I’ll do this,” she said, grabbing the box from John.
“Ok, whatever,” he shrugged and turned to make his way up the steps, pausing just long enough to choose a beautiful floral arrangement to carry along with him. He hurried up the stairs to see his fiancée. But as soon as he entered the room, he immediately set the flowers down on the dresser. “Darlin’, what’s wrong?” he asked, barely disguising the worry in his voice. He sat down on the bed beside her, wrapping his arms around her.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m just so sad,” she moaned, weeping on his shoulder.
“Why are you sad, sweetheart?” he asked as he wiped the tears from her cheeks.
“It’s you.”
“Me? What did I do?”
“You didn’t do anything. I’m just… I’m just….sad for you, is all.”
He pulled away from her slightly so he could get a good look at her face. “Do you mind telling me why?”
“Well, it’s…. it’s…. I’m worried about you,” she sniffed, the tears beginning all over again.
“Gen,” he groaned, “if it’s about the smoking…”
“No!” she whined. “That’s not it!”
“What then? Throw me a bone here, I’m really lost, darlin’.”
“It’s just… just…” Her breath came in short little gasps. “You… you… don’t have a mom!” she sobbed loudly and pathetically, dropping her face into her hands.
He quietly rolled his eyes and reached to hold her closely again. She had been prone to fits of melancholy ever since she’d found out she was pregnant and her reasons for crying were getting more bizarre everyday. Yesterday, he’d found her teary over the color of the bedding they chose for their new room. Today it was this. He wondered what the next day might bring and hoped to God that it was all just hormones and not a new personality that she was slowly revealing to him. “Gen, that’s no reason for you to cry, darlin’. I’m Ok. You know that.”
“No, no you’re not. My mom’ll be here tonight. Stacey’s here, your sisters’ll be here with their kids… everyone’s got a mom, but you, Johnny. That’s so sad!” The sobs were uncontrollable, almost making it hard for her to breathe.
“Genevieve, listen to me. It’s Ok. I’m fine. My sisters are fine. Everything is fine. Can you stop crying?” He hated to admit that sometimes she tried his patience.
“But your parents won’t be here tonight and they should be,” she said in a sad, weepy voice.
“Aw, Gen, I think they will be, y’know.” He watched as she lifted her head from his shoulder and looked at him with moist eyes. “I think they’re up there,” he spoke softly, his eyes focusing on a point somewhere off in the distance, his palm extended out before their faces as if he were reaching for a distant memory. “I think they can see us, Gen. And I think they’re happy for us.”
She dropped her head back to his shoulder, seemingly satisfied with his answer. It seemed for a quiet moment that all was well. But then the waterworks began again. “But our baby… our baby’s gotta have two parents. I don’t want you to die!”
“I’m not going anywhere! Gen, I’m telling you I’m fine!” He was straddling a fine line between laughing and yelling. Her worries were getting to be ridiculous. She’d woken him in the middle of the night over this one before. This was just the first time she’d approached it from this angle. “Gen, darlin’, you need to calm down. Ok? Everything is gonna be all right. I love you and I wouldn’t do anything to leave you with a baby to raise on your own. You know that.” He sighed as he began to pull the drooping rollers from her hair. “I eat healthy, I don’t smoke anymore, I work out. I’m gonna be around for a while, babe. Can you trust me on that one?”
“Mmm hmm” she nodded almost imperceptibly into his chest. She began to feel the morose feelings lifting. It was always so good when he soothed her like this, even though she was fully aware of how much it bothered him when she got this way in the first place. It didn’t make her too happy either; it was frustrating.
Gently tugging the last strand of hair from a hot roller, he held her closely, running his fingers over her soft, clean locks. “C’mere,” he smiled caringly as he lifted her face to meet his. He placed a tender kiss on her lips and held her secure in his arms while she calmed down from her heartrending panic.