Chapter 17

Mark it on your calendar. Today's a first for me. The first time I ever woke up to a work week with my partner. The alarm went off and I did not want to get out of bed because when the music started, Jo slid down and wrapped her arms around my waist, purring.

"I really don't want to leave, sweetness," I said. "But I have work to go do."

"Mmmm, I know, baby. I have a class at nine, too."

"Let's just do what we have to do. At the end of the day, though, we come home together."

Sigh. "Yes we do, baby," she said.

I got a kiss when I climbed out of bed, another and a hug before I headed out the door. And then I was at work.

I didn't make a show of my new ring. Didn't take long to get noticed. Made it all the way to the Monday morning staff meeting.

"Hey, wait a minute! That's a wedding band!" Brad snorted. "When you left last week I thought you were going to spend the weekend on your boat." He said it loud enough to catch the ears of several others.

"You caught me. I knew I should've gotten a stealth wedding band."

"Anybody we know?"

"Not likely. D'you think that if I married somebody here it would be any kind of a secret?"

Brad's eyes flashed as thought patterns connected. "Hee-eeyyyy! Last time we talked you were seeing that college girl. Her?"

I smiled. "I am the husband of Johanna Elise Solheim Jackson," I said.

"And you just broke several hearts that were hoping to snag you," Jennie, our Documents Manager, said. Jennie was married, but she had a bunch of friends who weren't. I'd dated some of them. Some even twice. Wasn't anybody I considered a keeper in the whole herd. Jennie was just about jaded enough to understand what I meant when I told her I was begging out of the dating scene for a while.

"Okay," she said, "I know you have pictures. Trot 'em out."

"Step into my office. The good ones are on my computer," I said. I saw Brad start to open his mouth. "And Brad, get yer mind outta the gutter."

"Yeah, Brad!" Jennie said.

I pulled up a picture of Jo on my big monitor, full-screen. It was one of my favorite shots from the first time on the boat, a close-up of her face, showing the blue eyes, the freckles, the smile, that red hair wisping across one cheek.

"Shit!" Jennie said. "No wonder! That's a stunning young lady. College, Brad says?"

"Graduating in the spring. Business and music majors. When she plays the flute the choirs in heaven stop and listen." I connected with Jennie's eyes. "Seriously. She's a soloist with the university orchestra. Has been talking with the Symphony."

"Wow!" Jennie said. "So that's what it took."

"Yes, that's what it took," I said. "But I appreciate your trying."

"Thank you. I wish my motives were as pure as you act like they are," she laughed.

Several people dropped by my office during the day as word worked around. Lot of smiles. Lot of congratulations. And naturally, several 'you'll be sorry's' and 'what are you thinking's'. But that's just guys. I knew many of their wives and I knew that one of the 'you'll be sorry' bunch was happily married with a kid in high school and one in middle school.

Lunch was the sandwich shop around the corner. That was the plan. A phone call altered it.

Jo. "You goin' to the sandwich shop for lunch?"

"That's the plan," I said. "Where are you?"

"Just stepping out of class. Not to intrude, but I could meet you for lunch."

"Sweetie, that's no intrusion. You're the big news today. I don't mean to put you on exhibit, but if you show up, expect stares. Comments, too. And some of my co-workers wouldn't know sensitivity if it walked up and bit 'em in the butt."

"I think I can handle whatever they want to dish, baby," she said. "I already had a taste at class."

"Okay, then, sweetness, I'll see you there at eleven thirty."

"'Kay, baby. I love you."

"Love you too, princess," I said.

"I heard that," Brad hollered. "I wanna meet 'er."

"If you can restrain your baser instincts," I said.

"I, sir, am a college graduate engineer. I HAVE no baser instincts!" he laughed.

"Yeah, I know, dude," I laughed. "And Jo needs to see the adverse conditions under which I labor," I laughed. We went back to work for another hour until we were close enough to lunch, then streamed out. I couldn't shake Brad. I know that several others were headed in that direction out of curiosity.

Phone rang. "That's her!" Brad said, hearing the flute snippet that was Jo's special ringtone. "Hi, baby!" I said.

"Hi!" said the happy reply. "I got us a table. Four okay?"

"Yeah. I have Brad with me. The rest of them can have a fistfight over who gets the last chair."

"Oh, that's just NEAT!" Brad said. "She shows up and saves you a table."

"Your wife could do it," I said.

"Yeah. Let's see how that goes. 'Honey, get out of the office and go save me a table. That dick of a lawyer you work for won't mind!' And when she gives me that look, I say 'But Stoney's wife does it for him.'"

"Make sure you whine a little when you do it," I said. When we checked in with the cashier, a lady who knew us from our frequent visits, she said, "She's back there in the corner. You better hurry before we have a riot over that table."

We weaved our way through the burgeoning lunch crowd, Me, Brad, Jennie having caught up with us. Jo stood, said, "Hi my Stoney," and kissed me a quick one. She turned to Brad and Jennie. "I'm Jo. Stoney's wife. I suppose..."

"Hon, it's the news item of the day," Jennie said. "I'm Jennie.

"I'm Brad," Brad said, offering his hand. "I saw this coming weeks ago."

"Are you two... ?" Jo started.

Jennie laughed as she sat. "Oh, gosh, no! There's not enough alcohol in the world. I'm the Documents Manager. He's got a wonderful, it not horribly deluded, wife. I've got a husband that is learning after a decade and a half that I am a goddess."

Jo giggled. "Sorry. You two just looked so happy..."

"That's because we didn't have to wait for a table," Brad said. "This place fills up fast."

"I saw that," Jo said.

"And just so Mizz Jennie knows she's been doing it wrong, Stoney already thinks you're a goddess."

Jo smiled. "I suspected as much, but I don't like to brag. How did you arrive at that conclusion?"

"Oh," Brad smiled, "for weeks his office is an altar to this redheaded thing. Jo wallpaper on his computer. Pictures of Jo on his wall."

"I have the same thing.," Jo said. "My roommate thinks I went crazy, but good crazy.",

"Uh, yeah," Jennie answered. "Stoney's been dodging women ever since I've known 'im."

"That's what he says," Jo smiled. "Nice to hear it from somebody who's known him for a while."

"Yeah," Brad said. "I don't know that I would have exercised as much self-restraint."

Jo glanced at me with a twinkle in her eye. Smiled.

"Stoney goes on about your music," Brad said.

"Oh, he's not bad himself. We cross genres like nobody's business."

"We?" Brad blurted.

"Yeah. You didn't know he plays banjo?"

"Uh, that's not on his curriculum vitae on the company website," Brad answered.

"See, Brad, Stoney's hiding things from his co-workers," Jennie said.

Jo fixed me. "Honey, as good as you are, you didn't tell them?"

"Uh, baby," I said, "in a lot of circles proficiency on a banjo ranks right up there with marrying your cousin in things you want to tell people."

She giggled and my co-workers smiled. "You should hear him. And I have 'im playing Mozart."

"Last time I looked, Mozart didn't write any banjo parts," Jennie said. "I know a bit about music. Maybe that part escaped me."

"No, you're right," Jo said. "But I gave him sheet music for the harp part of Mozart's Concerto for Flute and Harp and asked him to try. He's actually doing it. Pretty impressive."

"Oh, really?" Jennie said. "I'd almost want to hear that."

"Not ready for prime time," I said. "Jo is a very good teacher. She makes me play better. But she smiles and encourages."

"And I'd talk about you like a dog? Oh, come on, Stoney, you know me better than that."

"Jo does quite well in a concert hall," I said. To Jo I said, "I caught some screen captures from your Austin concert. You know which ones."

"My spouse is a video voyeur," Jo giggled. "Yeah, it's still kind of scary standing up for a solo."

"You're going to do that for the Veteran's Day concert, though," I said.

Jennie questioned, "What are you going to solo on, dear?"

Jo smiled. "Only ONE thing that I've been wanting to do. It's the Piccolo lead in Stars and Stripes Forever. That reminds me, Stoney, I need to borrow your dress uniform jacket."

"Oh?"

"Yes. Last year when I did it, I had Dad's dress blues coat. This year, it's you. I know you still have it."

"Oh, that's cute, Jo," Brad said. "You know, I need to see that."

I knew about the concert. This was the first I'd heard about her wearing my coat. Made me feel good. Nerd guys in high school didn't have athletic team letter jackets, so I missed that whole schtick. Jo and I were both well past that stage. But this, her, her music, a concert, and she had a choice. She could've done her dad's coat with a colonel's eagles. Instead, my first lieutenant's silver bars.

After lunch we parted ways with a kiss and I trooped back to the office with Brad and Jennie and a dozen others who I had to introduce to Jo. She left with a smile on her face. Typical Jo. The only time she really wasn't smiling was the day I had to shut David down. I wasn't the only one to notice.

"She's a doll," Jennie said. "That smile. I'd die for that hair. Is that it, Stoney? You just had high standards for looks?"

"Nope," I said. "I had no standards. She just ... I dunno. We were like a couple of magnets. Got close and -click- and it's been that way for the last few weeks."

"Hope it stays that way, Stoney. Really I do. And I can throw that list away."

"List?" I asked.

"Oh, yeah," she laughed. "I had some good ones lined up. But ain't none of 'em anything like the one you got."

"Ain't nobody I ever met that comes close to being like Johanna," I said. "Completely snuck through my radar."

"Well good for you," she said. "Really. Is she gonna do that lunch thing very often?"

"I dunno," I said. "I guess if it doesn't interfere with classes or whatever. Mondays might be a possibility. I'll talk to 'er."

"Yeah," Brad said. "I like how that worked out. Plus, she's a whole lot prettier to look at than you are."

"Uh," I said, knowing I had him in my sights, "what about Jennie?"

"Yeah, asshole," Jennie said. "What about me? I'm what? Chopped liver?"

"Yeah, Brad! Jen's been the house cutie for years. All those cute young temps come and go, and ol' Jen here just keeps plodding along. Plus, she's got a brain."

"Thanks, I think, Stoney," Jennie said.

Back at the office, I went back into the project. Work is easy to get lost in. I look at lines and numbers on drawings and imagine the hardware that goes with them. And in this case the exotic environs of Central America where they'll be used. Makes the day fly. Quitting time came and I found a good stopping point, grabbed my computer bag and headed out the door. Gone were the days of hanging around shooting the breeze. I had a hundred and ten pounds of redheaded incentive waiting on me at home.