I sank down into the armchair in the sitting room and stared out the window. Marilyn asked what I was thinking about. I turned back to her, where she was sitting on the couch, looking worried at me, and I smiled. “I was just feeling depressed about this morning,” I told her.
“Carling, forget about it. Nobody will care.”
“I don’t know, honey. I’m just feeling so depressed. Can you think of anything that might cheer me up?” I tried to act innocently.
“Cheer you up?” Suddenly her eyes widened. “Cheer you up! Did you have anything particular in mind?”
“I don’t know, Marilyn, but I’m pretty depressed. I’m going to need a lot of cheering up.” I slumped back in the armchair and spread my legs out on the floor in front of me.
She snorted. “Is that what they call it these days?” I just hooked my finger towards her and motioned her closer. “And what if I needed cheering up?”
“I’d return the favor.”
She stood up and stuck her tongue out at me. “Maybe some other time.”
I laughed at her. “There was this newlywed couple and they wanted to have some silent signals about when they wanted to have sex. So she said that if he wanted sex to touch her left breast, and if he didn’t want sex, to touch her right breast. Then she asked him what he wanted as signals. The answer was, that if she wanted sex, to tug on his cock. Then she asked what if she didn’t want sex. The answer was, tug on it another hundred times.”
“You’re so gross!” she said, fighting back the laughter.
At that, I jumped up from the chair and chased her around the room before trapping her in the bedroom. That led to the inevitable, and an hour later we were both cured of our depressions and taking a well deserved nap. After waking up, I decided the tourist thing could wait for another day. I preferred snuggling up to Marilyn, and we tore off another piece before the afternoon was finished.
“Well, my depression is certainly cleared up now. How’s yours?” I asked.
“Fine for now, but I might need another treatment later,” she teased.
“I’ll see what I can do tonight. Considering how long it’s going to be before I see you again, it’s almost like I’m trying to store things up.”
“When do you think that will be? Are you going to be able to visit before we get married?”
“Not sure. Let me find my schedule.” I crawled out of bed and rooted around in my briefcase. I found my schedule and shook my head, carrying it back into the bedroom. “Next month we have Harlan’s wedding, and then I can probably finagle a three day weekend. After that, though, nothing.”
“Oh my God! We’ll never get it done!” she said, back on that kick.
“Marilyn, you’ll get it done, because you’ll have to get it done!” I said with a smile. “As Doctor Johnson once said, ‘When a man knows he is to be hanged in the morning, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.’”
“Ha ha! Is that what you think marriage is? A hanging?” she harrumphed at me.
“I think you need another cure for depression!”
Marilyn squawked at that, and threw a pillow at me. I chased her down and tickled her until she almost cried, and then we cured our depression again. Thank God I was still a young man!
The concierge had come through with reservations at eight. I had packed a nice charcoal suit and looked distinctly un-military. Marilyn had the blue silk halter wrap dress I had bought her in Vegas a few years before, and slipped into some hose and the matching heels she had bought back then. I wasn’t sure if she was wearing stockings or pantyhose, or panties, and I tried to find out, but Marilyn made me behave. She did have a wicked smile on her face, though, so I thought I’d enjoy finding out later.
Mortons was very nice, and very expensive. We both had the surf and turf, consisting of a filet mignon and a lobster tail, along with a very nice bottle of Pouilly Fusse. While we were there I glanced around the restaurant in search of anybody famous, and smiled when I recognized Congressman Clarence Long of Maryland. He was the representative for the district my family lived in, and I had grown up knowing his nephew. I mentioned this to Marilyn.
“Really? That’s your Congressman? And you grew up with his nephew? Wow! What was he like?”
I grinned. “He was as big a crook as his uncle!”
“What!?”
“He was a real punk. Always getting in trouble and his uncle was always pulling strings to get him out again.”
“That’s not right!” she protested.
I shrugged and smiled. “Uncle Clarence knows how to get things done. My father used to say that he’s so crooked that when he dies they’ll have to screw his coffin into the ground.”
She smiled at that. “You sound like you approve.”
“Maryland may be a small state, but we’re just as dirty as those big states. We bow to no one in our graft and corruption!” That got her to laughing, and for the rest of the meal I talked about how we had two governors in a row, Spiro Agnew and now Marvin Mandel, go to prison for corruption.
Later on I got to find out what was under that dress. Marilyn wasn’t wearing any panties, and she had stockings, not pantyhose. It was… inspirational!
The next day was the end of our little vacation. The captain met me down in the lobby that morning at 0600 with a cab and we drove over to the Lincoln Memorial and he took photos of me running around. Then we went back to the Hilton and cleaned up and left after breakfast. Marilyn had a flight right after ours, so I got her on a cab to the airport, and then the captain and I headed over to Andrews for our return flight.
I reported in to the battery office the next morning. Captain Harris immediately ordered me into his office and shut the door behind me, so I figured it was his turn to chew my ass ragged about my argument with that jerk mathematician. I figured wrong. He didn’t say anything to me about it, but just asked what I had done and if I had fun. The he reminded me I was back in the Army and to get my ass in gear and my head in the game and get back to work, pronto! Maybe Captain Summers hadn’t had time to turn me in yet.
Still, nothing came up over the next few days either, not from Captain Harris or the colonel, so I guess Captain Summers hadn’t decided to burn my career. Maybe hearing an O-6 like Captain Hopper say it wasn’t a problem changed his mind. Either way, I wasn’t going to bring it to anybody’s attention.
About a month after the trip, a photo of me delivering the presentation showed up on the cover of the Paraglide, below the fold, with a few paragraphs. Deep inside there was a photo of me jogging and a few more paragraphs. Nothing ever showed up in the Army Times. Strangely enough, I wasn’t heartbroken. It was bad enough putting up with Jonesy’s jokes after hitting the Paraglide. I didn’t need to be any more famous.
Chapter 50: Get Me To The Church On Time
June 1978
Wedding preparations proceeded slowly on Marilyn’s end, but they did proceed. Along the way she cried, threatened, screamed, protested, and told me more than once that the wedding was off. I would let her vent over the phone and then calmly move her forward. Suzie visited over the spring break and she was much calmer than Marilyn, despite being a teenager going to her first wedding. The reception would be at Trinkaus Manor, a local landmark and banquet hall in Oriskany, just a few miles from the Lefleur place. It had been there before, too.
I bought an Army mess dress uniform, and made sure that Harlan and Joe got theirs, too. They are really quite expensive, but Harlan was going career, and he might use it again. Joe found a place he could rent one. Tusker promised to get a basic black tuxedo, although basic black for Tusker might involve flashing lights. He might be the most flamboyant of any of us, including the bride and bridesmaids! Tessa promised to rein him in if necessary.