Chapter 8

It seemed like approximately forever, but on the evening of August 3, Lois called as usual, but this time, she was exuberant. "It's over!" she announced. "The bar exam is history!"

"You think you did all right?"

"Yes, I think so. The essay questions -- most of it -- didn't seem all that daunting. There's a multiple choice part, called the Multi-State, and that part was kind of a bear. It seemed like, for a lot of the multiple choices, at least two answers in every group could be right. It was almost like I had too much information. I started doubting my own answers."

"But -- you think you got through it?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure I did fine. There won't be any results for weeks."

"You ready to come meet the parents?"

"I'm ready to come and play Horsy!"

"I think that can be arranged. I'll have to consult my calendar."

"I've got lots of free time. I can leave tomorrow, stay overnight somewhere pretty close to you, and then arrive early on Friday."

"Sounds good."

"How long do you want me to stay, before we head back?"

"Can you say until Monday or Tuesday? Make it an extra-long weekend?"

"No problem. Your folks -- they know we are an item, right?"

"An item?"

"Don't play dumb. They know we're having sex, right?"

"All they know, right now, is that you've been calling me every evening, and that 'something' is up. But tonight, and tomorrow, I will prepare them. By the time you arrive, they will know that both of us are going to be sleeping in the guest room."

"I was kinda hoping I'd get to sleep in your old bedroom, with the high school baseball trophies and the UK Wildcats and -- what? Cincinnati Reds? -- pennants on the wall, and maybe some model airplanes."

"Atlanta Braves. And you can sleep in my bedroom if you want to, but you'll be all alone. It's a single bed."

"Well, then, you better check the mattress in the guest room, make sure it doesn't make too much noise, when you bounce on it real hard!"

"You'll be glad to know there's a goodly distance between my parents' bedroom, and the guest room."

"Yeah, but I'm pretty noisy, don't forget."

"My Dad is going to love you."

"Not -- literally, I hope! I mean, I know you come from a small town in Kentucky, but, I have standards!"

"We're not quite that rural. No, our problem will be of the opposite sort. I'll have to persuade Mom and Dad that we're not just having casual sex."

"You could tell them I'm your fiancé," Lois said. "Wouldn't that make it better?"

"Are you?"

"Are I what?"

"My fiancé."

"I'm -- ready to be, when you decide to ask for my hand -- and all that other good stuff that comes with it."

"We haven't known each other very long," Paul said. "How sure are you -- about what you're saying?"

"I'm a trained lawyer, boy! I don't go around making reckless statements."

"I'd marry you in a New York minute," Paul said, "if I had a job, and an income, and a future."

"You been working on that?"

"Indeed I have! I'm eager to talk to you about it."

"I've got a couple' ideas, too."

"God, Lois, I can hardly wait until you get here!"

"Better warn Mama I'm a screamer."

"Naw. We'll let her learn it the hard way."

"Don't say that," Lois said.

"What?"

"Don't say, 'hard'."

Paul's parents, of course, had already been told that Lois was coming to visit them after the bar exam, and that when she went back to Philadelphia, Paul would be going back with her.

Now, though, he hung up the telephone and got specific. He told his parents, Paul Sr. and Marjorie, that Lois would be there from early Friday until at least Monday.

"I've got the guest room all ready for her!" Marjorie said. "And I've got some wonderful ideas for meals while she's here."

"Mom, you know, don't you, that Lois and I will be sharing the guest room."

"Well, I -- I'm not surprised."

"I'm sorry you didn't get the opportunity to meet Lois on one of your trips to see me at the hospital, but I hadn't known her all that long, and there were only, maybe two opportunities, since I've known her, for you to meet her. It just didn't work out, while you were in town, because of her schedule."

"Well," Paul's father said, "we're gonna meet her now."

"Yes."

"A lawyer, she is?"

"Yeah. Just graduated. Just finished taking the bar exam."

"She got a job?" his mother wanted to know.

Paul laughed. "Oh, hell yes! She's worked for her father's law firm for years. Now she'll join the firm as an associate. They're a very well-established family. Her mother and brother are lawyers, too!"

"Hmmm. She sounds kinda upper-crusty for a small-town boy from Pikeville," Paul Sr. said.

"She's upper-class, but she's not snooty, Dad."

"You met her people yet?"

"Not really, no. I met her brother, briefly, once, but just to say hello. I haven't met her parents."

"You think they're gonna be all right? I mean, about their daughter dating a small-town boy like you?"

"You mean, a small-town boy with no legs and no job?"

Paul's father wasn't deterred. "I reckon they're probably civilized enough to overlook the 'no legs' part," he said. "But, if I was her father, I might be a bit concerned, about the 'no job' part."