Epilogue

They waited for sunrise before beginning the ceremony. Wind whipped through the gathering, sending the white wedding gown built by her mother high enough to reveal Melissa's red and black silk garters on her white stocking covered thighs. Even Zelda's heavy, low cut, black velvet dress adorned with silver moons, one for each phase except the new moon, rose from ankle length to her knees. Her black lace scarf fluttered, but glistening five pointed silver and gold star pins in her hair kept it in place. Others attending the wedding held their skirts down, but Melissa and Zelda ignored nature's revelations.

The actual full moon large and blood red set on the horizon. The large rising sun cast a scarlet glow on the sparse clouds and on the faces of the small group attending the ceremony. The figures cast long shadows to their right except Zelda's cast to her left.

Several of the attendees had occupied a rented bus as it drove through the night from New York City via New Jersey, driven by James, the African limo driver who usually drove Elliot around the city. Paid exorbitantly by Elliot, Sophie and Sarah, he used the week and a half as a sort of busman's holiday, bringing his pretty blonde wife and their two preschool daughters along. The cute girls had strewn gardenias and lilacs in front of Melissa and Marjorie as they walked down the improvised aisle, Sarah, dressed in a black tuxedo and white shirt and matching cummerbund and black bow tie, a red rosebud pinned near her heart, awaiting her bride.

Deciding it constituted the most spiritual place in the Eastern United States; Zelda spoke inches from a dramatic hill, an Indian burial mound in Northern Kentucky.

"Mother Earth and Father Sky and Sister Moon and Brother Sun
Bare witness this June morning to two souls becoming one.
As hard matter becomes our structure and soft clay forms our skin
And sea water blood feeds us and the wind lets us breathe in
We are one with all the heavens and with the earth on which we stride.
Though where nerves channel lightening as thought in minds do hide
Seeming ever to be separate and seeming to keep us all alone
When two souls intermingle by their union it is shown
The universe surrounding us is equally within us all.
It takes two true loving souls to breach the skull's tough wall.

So heaven and earth and friends and lovers and family please embrace
The sacred bond these two have wove, a mesh none can erase
And celebrate their binding choice and celebrate their trust
In letting go of singleness, making union right and just.
As priestess to the third eye's sight and chosen by these two
I solemnize this unity and bestow on them their due
To become two as one in marriage and forever on this land
Once vows exchange their souls shall walk through life hand in hand."