getting married in two weeks?” Stanley asked Clarissa, who was sitting next to him at the dinner table. “Ain’t you a little young to be considering marriage?”
Clarissa wiped the spaghetti sauce from her lips with her napkin and giggled. “I’m not getting married,” she replied.
Stanley leaned closer. “Are you sure?”
“I can’t get married, Poppa Stanley, I’m just a little girl,” Clarissa explained. “I can’t get married for at least ten years.”
“Twenty,” Bradley inserted from across the table.
Chuckling, Stanley turned to Rosie who sat on the other side of him. “I thought you said there was going to be a wedding in two weeks,” he said. “Clarissa tells me she’s not getting married.”
“My daddy’s getting married,” Clarissa exclaimed
“Oh, your daddy,” he replied. “And who is he going to marry?”
“He’s going to marry Mary,” she answered.
“Yes, I know he’s going to marry, but who is he going to marry?”
“Mary!”
“Yes, I know that. But who is he going to marry?” he asked again, his eyes twinkling.
“Nanna Rosie, help me,” Clarissa pleaded, leaning forward in her chair to look at Rosie.
“Now Stanley, you stop teasing her right now,” Rosie said. “You know darn well that Bradley and Mary are getting married in two weeks.”
She leaned over Stanley towards Clarissa. “Are you excited about the wedding?”
Clarissa nodded. “Yes, I have a dress and everything.”
“That’s lovely, dear,” she replied.
“Maggie told me she had a dress at your wedding,” Clarissa continued. “I didn’t think old people got married.”
Ian swallowed hard and nearly choked on his food. Mary leaned over and patted him on his back. “Be nice,” she whispered.
Stanley glared at Ian for a moment and then turned to Clarissa. “The wonderful thing about love, girlie, is that you are never too old to find it,” he said. “And when you find it when you are older, it’s even sweeter because it’s a surprise.”
Rosie placed her hand over Stanley’s and smiled at him. “Your own Prince Charming can come at any time in your life and in many disguises,” she said.
“And Stanley has the best disguise I’ve ever seen,” Ian commented softly and Mary slapped his arm.
“So, my Prince Charming can come when I’m eight?” Clarissa asked.
“No,” Bradley said immediately. “Not until you’re thirty-four, at the very least.”
“Well, that gives me plenty of time to get her invitations created and out,” Rosie said. “Now your invitations are another matter.”
“Oh, I hadn’t even thought about the invitations,” Mary said, falling back in her chair. “I can’t invite people with less than two weeks to go.”
“Of course you can,” Rosie assured her. “I have your list. I’ll call everyone and let them know how the circumstances have changed, and then I’ll send the invitations out at the end of the week. Then you can concentrate on…your newest assignment.”
“And I’ll help,” Stanley said. “I can make calls too. And iffen anyone says they can’t make it because of the short notice, I’ll give them a piece of my mind.”
Rosie patted Stanley’s hand. “You can help with the addressing, dear,” she said. “You have such nice handwriting.”
Mary breathed a sigh of relief.
“Don’t worry, Mary,” Rosie said with a wink. “Everything will be fine.”
Later that evening, when the house was finally quiet, Mary tucked herself into the corner of the couch and called her mother.
“Hi Ma, it’s Mary.”
“So, Mary darling, how’s the bride-to-be?” her mother asked.
“A little frantic,” she replied honestly. “Bradley asked me to move up the wedding.”
“Oh, and did he now?” her mother said. “And why would he need it to be sooner?”
“Well, it’s been hard on Clarissa to have a divided family,” Mary explained. “So, he thought, with everything going on, getting married sooner rather than
Dawne Prochilo, Dingbat Publishing, Kate Tate