Chapter 12

The Big Day had arrived. Meet the parents day for Paul. It was a Friday, and Lois had extracted solemn promises from both her father and her brother that they would leave work on time, so as not to delay dinner at 8 p.m. And she made clear that "on time" meant they'd be there early enough to sit down and meet Paul, at least briefly, before dinner.

Her sister-in-law, Edwina, was fully engaged in the dinner preparations, along with Lois' mother, Prudence. There was a cook in the Silverthorn residence, but that didn't prevent Prudence and Edwina from doing some extensive dinner-related preparing of their own.

Everyone, of course, already knew that Lois' dinner guest had lost his legs in Afghanistan. Lois had also been quite frank in telling her family that Paul Elias might very well turn out to be the permanent Number One man in her life. No games were being played.

Still, in conversations with her family, Lois had been careful not to run the subject of Paul Elias into the ground. She had chosen to let the family meet him without having recited his pedigree in excruciating detail.

The family knew he was a disabled veteran, a former pro baseball player, and a college graduate.

And, pretty obviously, Lois was sleeping with him.

That was about it.

Raymond Silverthorn and Raymond Silverthorn, Jr. were cool with the whole Paul Elias business. They were accustomed to deciding, for themselves, about the merits of people with whom they came in contact. Instinctively, Lois had known that trying to "sell" Paul to her family wasn't the best course.

Paul would have to do that himself. Could he? Lois wasn't really sure. They hadn't known one another that long. She had never seen Paul when he had been engaged significant interaction with anyone, other than herself and his own parents -- and, perhaps, Ophelia, back at the hospital. Would he be intimidated by the Silverthorn's home? By their obvious prosperity?

Would Paul be cowed by the personality of her high-powered father and her almost-equally supercharged older brother?

Would he recognize that the two men were, underneath it all, warm and accepting people? Or would Paul be frightened out of his mind? Lois didn't really know, and not knowing worried her.

But she was pretty certain that Paul was up to the challenge.

Her mother and her sister-in-law were a lesser challenge, Lois thought. Edwina was older -- older than Lois' brother, her husband, by almost four years. She was almost 40, and she had a teen-aged daughter, Amelie, who was something of a rebel, and who was, at 16, almost too old to be her brother's daughter. Amelie and her stepfather seemed to get along reasonably well, but Lois knew the girl could be a trial, sometimes.

Lois wondered about all five of her family members, and how each would relate to Paul.

Well. No time like the present to find out.

The Silverthorn home wasn't a mansion. Not quite. But it was an exceptionally large two-story house on what looked to be a three-acre lot. The grounds featured rich grass, big oak trees front and back, and a multiplicity of flower gardens surrounding the house and scattered elsewhere on the grounds as well.

Paul was pretty sure it would have qualified as the biggest house in Pikeville. As they drove up, Lois gestured toward the nearest neighbor's house, equally large and imposing, barely visible through the trees. "That's my brother's house," she said.

"Didn't stray too far from home and hearth, did he?" Paul said.

"Oh, he's plenty independent of our parents. The reason he's next door is, he married the girl next door! She was the older sister of his best friend, growing up. Her parents are dead, and she got the house. And Raymond Jr., well, he got her -- eventually. It's a long story."

"Well, with the size of these lots, I guess they don't suffer from too much togetherness with the parents."

"We all see a lot of each other," Lois said, "but it isn't forced. As it happens, we like each other."

"Well. I hope they like me, too."

"Don't worry. They'll love you!"

"Yeah, right."

The front steps -- six of them -- rounded and rail-less, were a significant challenge to Paul, so Lois drove her car alongside the house and steered him toward a driveway-level side door that would allow them to enter through the library. "There'll be some steps-up, inside," Lois told him, "But at least the steps are next to a doorway, and you'll have a railing to hold onto."

Inside the library, Prudence and Edwina were waiting. Lois had told them in advance that they'd be entering the house that way. "Hello, Paul," Lois' mother, Prudence, said. "Lois has told us so much about you!"

"I'm happy to meet you, Mrs. Silverthorn. And you must be Edwina."

"That's right. Ray Junior's wife. He's on his way -- we live next door. And Lois' dad is already here. He's still upstairs, but he'll be down in a minute."

"Come on into the living room," Lois mother said, retreating across the library and up through the little stairway that would put them on the same level as the main floor of the rest of the house.

"You and Edwina go on ahead, Mother," Lois said. "Paul and I will meet you there."

Slowly, Paul negotiated the small set of stairs. He did considerably better after gaining the house's main level. The hallways were ample -- half as wide, Paul thought, as his parents' entire house -- and the hardwood floors made for a friendly surface. Paul was using two lightweight canes. He found himself making an extra effort to appear to walk normally. He tried not to swing his legs out so stiffly to the sides to take his steps.

But walking "naturally," he soon realized, was dangerous. It made him feel less stable. The light canes might not be enough, if he took a wrong step and started to fall.

"I'll just do my usual Frankenstein bit," Paul thought. "At least, I probably won't fall on my face, that way."

As he entered the large living room, Prudence asked him if he would like a drink. "A white wine, please," he said. Lois asked for the same and Prudence disappeared to get their drinks.

Lois steered Paul to what she judged to be the most comfortable chair for his use, and helped him take his seat. The walk from the car had been a pretty long one, by Paul's standards. He tried not to let on that he was slightly winded.

Edwina seemed relaxed and not the least rattled by the presence of her in-laws' severely handicapped guest. She steered the conversation to Lois and her upcoming full-time employment at the law firm.

Lois went along, deciding that it was a good initial topic. If, as seemed certain, Paul was going to have to field a lot of questions, they might as well wait until the entire family was there to hear his answers.

Paul did get a chance to ask Edwina if she, too, was a lawyer, but she laughed and said that no, she and Paul were the only non-lawyers in the house, other than her daughter, Amelie, who would be arriving shortly, with Ray. "We call Raymond, Jr. 'Ray' and his father 'Raymond, '." Edwina explained. "We all do it. Makes it easier, and Ray doesn't particularly love it when people call him 'Junior.'"

"No," Paul said. "I'm a 'junior, ' too, and I never liked it, either. But I also didn't like 'Paulie, ' which is what my family used to call me, to make the distinction."

"I just call him 'Reginald, '" Lois said, smirking.

"Really?" Edwina said. "Is that your middle name, Paul?"

"No," Paul said. "It's just an inside joke. Your sister-in-law has a corrupt sense of humor."

"I guess this is something that comes under the category of 'Don't ask?'" Edwina said.

"You're pretty quick," Lois said, smiling at her sister in law.

Paul heard car noises, and then conversations being held elsewhere in the house, and, finally, everyone entered the living room at once -- Lois' father, her brother, her mother, and a pretty young girl who had to be Amelie.

Paul started to rise, but he was quickly restrained by Raymond, Sr. The older man held his left hand on Paul's shoulder, holding him in his seat while he shook Paul's hand. Ray followed, mumbling something about remembering Paul from their very-brief earlier meeting, and Amelie was then introduced. She, too, came over and, somewhat shyly, shook Paul's hand.