Chapter 37

We made it downstairs with a lot of laughs, all three of us were trying to walk side by side down the steps. We were squeezed, but it only seemed to matter to me, because Kat and Sally were having a ball squeezing me. We walked into the kitchen and found Myrna setting the table, so Sally pitched in to help. Carver was sitting in his usual place. He had a smile on his face, so I figured he and Myrna had patched up their differences. We had just sat down, when my phone rang in the study, and I excused myself to answer it. It was Tiny, wanting to know if he and Jimmy were welcome to come to the funeral with us. I assured him that he was more than welcome, and if he brought the Limo, we could all go together. He said they would be here at three sharp, and hung up. I went back to the kitchen, and was immediately asked by Myrna about the call. I told her who it was and the arrangements I had made with Tiny. She just smiled at me when I finished. As usual, the meal was delicious and we quickly polished it off. While Sally and Kat cleaned off the table, Myrna gave us refills and a big slab of the apple crisp for dessert. I noticed the girls were putting the dishes in the dish washer, and me, being the dumb male at the table, I had to ask the question I had always wondered about.

"Myrna, if you have a dishwasher, how come you always seem to do them by hand and make Sally do them that way too?"

"Jon, if I need to teach Sally a lesson, there's no better way than to make her wash them by hand. It also gives her time to think. I do it because I don't like that dishwasher thing, 'cause it never makes the dishes shine like when I wash them by hand. It also gives me time to think and plan, to keep ahead of the men in the house."

I knew then I had better shut up before I got in any deeper, so I just smiled and took another bite of my dessert. I had a sudden thought and decided to ask Carver about it.

"Carver, are you going to wear your medals to the funeral tomorrow?"

"I hadn't really thought about it, Jon, why do you ask?"

"Well, I didn't want to wear mine unless you were planning on doing it too. I really hate to wear them, because they look so gaudy and out of place on my chest."

Before I got an answer, Myrna broke into the conversation.

"I would appreciate it if you both wore all of your medals to honor Bill, and remember, you're both head pall bearers. You should look your best since you're representing our family and should show respect for him as a fallen hero himself. What both of you don't know is that next to your grandfather, he was one of the most decorated veterans in this part of the country. I just hope and pray Jerry has him buried in the uniform he was so proud to wear for his country. It would be a shame if he went to his maker, a hero in a business suit."

"Myrna, I will call Jerry and make sure he gets Bill's uniform for his final rest. If it means so much to you, Carver and I would be honored to wear our full dress uniforms to his funeral. I don't know about Carver, but I have only worn all of mine when I went to my commander's funeral years ago. I have them all packed away, but I will dig them out for this occasion. I will need Sally and Kat to help me pin them on straight, since it's almost impossible to do it myself."

"I already have mine on my uniform, and it was just freshly cleaned and is still in the dry cleaner's bag. In this country, we use medal bar holders to mount them on, so it's a lot easier to put them back on our uniform when we have it cleaned. If I remember correctly, the legion has to pin them in place and in a certain order."

"That's right, Carver, and it's been so long, I will have to dig out my manual and refresh my memory about their order and position."

"Remember, Jon, we use the standard march here, not the crawl that the legion uses. If you march that slow, it will throw everyone off balance as we march with the casket. Here we use the standard marching step of 120 paces per minute. If my memory serves me right, the Legion always used the 88 pace minute, thus it's known as the crawl. Try to keep that in mind tomorrow. Since I will be up front with you, I will let you know if you fall back into the old habit."

"Now that I do appreciate, Carver. I marched for so many years using it, I will probably fall into the old habit automatically. Even when we marched in the Bastille Parade, we were always the last in line. Until now, I never knew why. Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but I am going to bed early and get a good night's sleep. I think tomorrow will be hard on all of us, and I am not looking forward to it. I hate funerals, and always did. I saw too many of my friends and comrades buried, in too many countries to mention. Like you, we never left a comrade behind, but we didn't have the luxury of being able to ship their bodies home. Good night, every one, I will see you in the morning."

When I got up, there was silence around the table. I headed to my room, to try to forget all of the previous funerals I was remembering, and to settle my jitters about going tomorrow. I got about a third of the way up the steps, when I remembered that I needed to call Jerry to pass on what Myrna had said about a uniform for Bill. I went to my study and called him, and he answered on the first ring. He told informed me that he was at Bill's house now, getting his suit for the funeral. I passed on what Myrna told me, and he said that was a good idea. He was glad she had thought of it, and he would make sure it was done as she asked. We hung up after that, leaving me with the distinct impression he sounded lost, and was barely holding on to his emotions through all of this. I thought about it, and came to realize I was almost in the same boat he was. I headed back to the steps, and almost run over Kat. I was deep in thought about tomorrow. She never said a word, just held my hand as she walked up the steps with me. I stopped outside my room and looked at her, wondering how I had ever found a woman so beautiful and understanding. I had always been fairly lucky, but this kind of luck only came along once in a lifetime.

"Jon, if you would prefer to be alone tonight, I understand."

"Kat, I don't want or need to be alone. I have become accustomed to waking up and looking at your beautiful face in the morning. I don't think I am ready to change that any time soon, so let's just go to bed and try to forget about tomorrow."

I got that little girl smile from her, and for the first time in a long time, I felt at peace inside. We went to bed with her wearing that ugly purple shirt as a night gown. When I looked at her in surprise, she just smiled and said; "If I wear it to bed and forget to wash it before we leave, I won't have to look at you wearing it."

Jeesh, I thought, I liked the color and thought it matched my jeans. But, I didn't tell her that, since she obviously looked a lot better in it than I did. Especially with only one button buttoned and the sleeves rolled up. I fell asleep, with her wrapped around me like an octopus.

I woke the next morning, hugging Kat's back, wondering how we had gotten switched around during the night. Since it wasn't daylight yet, I fell back asleep, still wondering. When I woke the second time, the sun was shining brightly and I was alone in the bed. I heard Kat in the shower and decided to join her. When I opened the curtain she was shampooing her hair and I decided to help. Bad mistake, because I ended up finishing my shower in almost cold water, and we hadn't been in the shower that long. That was when I remembered I had been meaning to replace the hot water tank, because this had been happening a lot lately. I would let Tiny know to go ahead and order a great big one, and have him and his crew replace it for me. I hated showering in tepid water, and I knew I was going to hear from Sally about us using all the hot water again. The last time this happened, before Kat came, Sally had gone to the caretaker's cottage to shower. The tank there was less than a year old and never seemed to run out of hot water. I quickly rinsed off and got out. I could hear Sally down the hall, yelling that there was no hot water again. I smiled to myself and yelled back for her to take a cold shower and wake up in a better mood. Kat was laughing when I went back into the bedroom. She was getting dressed to go downstairs, so I quickly put on shorts and a t-shirt. I opened the door and was faced with Sally, getting ready to knock.

"Dad, will you please fix the hot water? Now I have to go to the little house to get a shower, and you know I hate that."

"Sorry, honey, I'll have Tiny order a new tank and have him install it as soon as he can fit it into his schedule. If it's any consolation, I had to take an almost cold shower, since Kat used all the hot water."

Sally chuckled and headed down the steps with all her stuff and I got a smack from Kat.

"Jon, that was a dirty trick, blaming me for the shortage of hot water. It would have been fine if you hadn't tried to massage my scalp off. Next time, you wait till I'm done showering before you come in."

"Ahh, where's the fun in that? I like helping you wash, and I get to see things I would only normally wish I could have."

She gave me a dirty look and busted out laughing. Then she kissed me, and while I was recovering, she went down the hall to the steps. I almost had to run to catch up with her. We walked into the kitchen, and Carver and Myrna were having coffee. Kat got us some too and we sat down to wait for Sally to return. Of course, Myrna had a few things to say about Sally having to go to the little house to shower.

"Jon, I thought you were going to have that old tank replaced months ago. It's been actin' up for almost a year. You don't notice it, because you take such quick showers. Now that there's another female in the house, you better get on the ball and get it done. Hearing Sally yell is bad enough, but I have a feeling if Kat gets a dose of cold water in the middle of a shower, you're gonna be sleeping alone until it's fixed."

I looked over at Kat. She was almost choking on her coffee to keep from laughing out loud. I smiled and told Myrna I was going to have Tiny order a new one today and get it installed as soon as possible, hopefully before we got back from the island.

"That's gonna be kinda hard, since he and his family are going with us. I called and chartered a jet to fly us to the airport in the Virgin Islands, where I hired several helicopters to fly us all to the island."

"Myrna, where are we going to put everyone? I don't even know how large the house is or anything about it, other than the fact that it's just been remodeled."