The Families in Rossford
E P I L O G U E
The last time Layla Lawden had worn a white gown upon entering a house of worship was ten years ago, when Will had thwarted her wedding to Kevin Royce. Then it had been just after Thanksgiving, now it was late in summer, right after the time of fasting that ended at Tisha Bav. She was in piles and piles of white. Her mother and her grandmother, Marta Fromm and Laurel Houghton, had to help her out of the car. Maia straightened the veil over her face. She came out a thing of beauty.
The bells from the steeples rang merrily, for these were the carillons of Saint Barbara’s. The long and short of it was how long it took for a conversion to go through, and how good the priest at Saint Barbara’s was about letting a fourth generation member marry here, especially when she and the spouse had been students of the school. And then there was the rabbi.
There was no a rabbi in Rossford who would perform the wedding, and not a rabbi amongst their Orthodox friends who could. And then Layne Brown, the wife of Rabbi Brown at Or Chodesh Reformed revealed that she was a qualified rabbi.
“I did to see if I could.”
She, to her husband’s consternation, would perform the wedding.
The Fromms, who seemed to not care about the lack of Orthodoxy seeing as Layla was an impressive woman on her way to being a Jew, and the aunt of Laurel, whom their son had his eye on, gathered together a choir knowing that, “Liberal Jews like that sort of thing.”
“This time I didn’t bet against you,” Fenn whispered, squeezing his niece’s hand.
Neither Tom nor Brian were in the loft. Brian sat with his brother, talking to Jonah, and Tom kept looking back from where he and Lee sat with Dylan, Elias and Lance Bishop.
As the women straightened Layla’s gowns, from the loft the choir sang:
Ashrei!
Avrid me, galanica que ya va 'manecer.
Avrid me no vos avro, mi lindo amor.
Esta noche yo no duermo, pemsando
en vos Yale, yale, yale, bombon.
“It sounds Mexican,” Elias commented.
“It is Mexican,” Lance said. “Sort of. It’s Ladino.”
“How in the hell did you know that?” Dylan whispered on the other side of Elias.
“Am I not allowed to know things?”
“Here we go again,” Elias murmured.
Along with spring break and Easter, and then with the extended summer that was ending, where Lance would go back to school, and Dylan would begin at Loretto, the dimensions of their new relationship were being learned. Because all three of them were amorous and affectionate, three to a bed sometimes worked. But they were all also fairly temperamental and solitary, and so for one of them to say, “You take him, I’m sleeping at home,” worked too. By May they had infuriated each other. By the end of May Elias, at least, was sure he could not live without either of them.
Logic said that Bennett should be the one in a happy relationship, but Maia was not ready to forgive, or to trust just yet. Elias did not exult in this. Bennett was his twin, and then a shadow passed over him so often thinking of his love with Lance, and with Dylan. He remembered talking to Jonah soon after the three of them had come together.
“I want all three of us to be together forever.”
“Well, why won’t you be?”
“It didn’t happen for you.”
“I didn’t want it at the time.”
“Do you think of Keith?”
“God, yes,” Jonah confessed. “Now all the time. More than ever. It seems like the more I love Sean, the more I appreciate Keith.”
But an unsympathetic voice interrupted Elias’s thoughts and Dylan and Lance’s argument.
“Do you all think you could have your lovers’ squabble after the wedding?” Maggie Biggs leaned forward and whispered. She was sitting beside her great-grandmother, and never had an old woman been so pleased as Barb Affren at a new addition to the family.
“Are you really going to always be around us?” Elias asked her sourly.
“Manners,” Lance reminded him, affecting to pay attention to his shoe.
As the wedding party processed toward the altar, that today was a bema, a hand reached out and caught Laurel’s, and Dylan looked to see the handsome, swarthy face of Moshe Fromm. Laurel was right about him, but he had eyes only for her and she for him. He kissed her hand, and she turned away to hide her smile. On their side, beside Dylan, Bennett and Matthew sat, Bennett looking at Maia.
“I see you,” she mouthed, and with a smile she turned away.
And of course there was Will. Well, of course the bride was the star, but Will in black suit and beautiful white tallit, white kippah on his head, was her heaven. By him stood Liam and also a blond woman named Pam with two other Brits who claimed to be from the adoption agency in England. Will came to receive his wife under the canopy. She, all flowing in white, circled him once, twice, seven times, and joined hands with him before Layne Brown. Then, the rabbi’s wife who complained that she could never cantor, chanted the ketubah.
“He looks sharp as hell, doesn’t he?” Sheridan whispered to Brendan.
“That’s our Will,” Brendan said.
“Almost makes you want to live back in Rossford.”
“Almost,” Brendan said. “But only almost.”
Casey and Chay sat beside them. Logan Banford sat on the other side of Brendan, and he said, “Sheridan, you’d look good in a get up like that.”
“It’s called a tallit and a kipa,” Casey said precisely.
“My, don’t you get high and mighty when you put those glasses on,” Logan rejoined. “At any rate, you and Bren standing up there doing the same thing: it’s an idea.”
Sheridan looked at Brendan, who gave a casual shrug and said, “Well, now that’s true. It is an idea.”
“I think,” Kenny said behind him, “it’s a good idea.”
“What about us?” Ruthven asked him with a wink.
“No, Ven,” Kenny differed. “That’s not a good idea at all.”
Layne Brown stepped out and said, “And now I present to you, at long last, Mr. and Mrs. William—”
“Lawden,” Will said quickly.
“What?” Layla said.
“Your name means everything to you.”
“That’s right,” Layla said. “And that’s why I’ve been thinking about taking yours all this time.
“Klasko,” Layla said. “Layla and Liam Klasko.”
Layne beamed back at them and cried, “I present to you the Klasko family!”
Everyone stood up to cheer and, at the altar, Adele, who was weeping, hugged the crying Margaret Klasko, and then she said to Fenn, “Are you crying too?”
Putting the back of his hand to his face, Fenn grumbled, “This sun is so damned bright. It’s so bright.”
“It’s not bright,” Todd argued. The tall man took a handkerchief out of his breastpocket. “And I am crying.”
That night the families in Rossford rejoiced. There was a great reception at the large white house Hoot and Adele had bought thirty years ago and children, Claire and Julian’s children, Meredith’s son and daughter, Bob and Cara, ran up and down the stairs and through the yard until they were sleepy or irritable and it was time to be carried off to bed. In one grand concession toward peace, Maggie told Dena, “I will take Bob and Cara home. You can stay here.”
At Dena’s wary expression, Maggie said, “Or you can forget me offering to do anything for you again.”
While Maggie walked out with the children, Dena said, “She reminds me of someone.”
“Yes,” Meredith and Layla said together, not daring to look at each other, “she does.”
Elijah was asleep on Meredith’s lap, and Mathan came for him. Then Charlie came for Meredith and said, “Shall we?”
Charlie’s son waited for Maggie to come downstairs with her little brother and sister, and when she returned he said, “Shall we?” and she nodded regally and said, “We shall.”
Well into the night, the tall Moshe Fromm danced with Laurel and Layla, sitting down beside Brendan, said, “She’s going to be the new belle of the ball. I can see it. Can’t you?”
As the night wound down, Jonah Layton approached her.
“Thank you for coming,” she said, wrapping her arms around him. She hugged Sean too.
“Thank you for inviting us.”
“I hope you took some food.”
“We had enough.”
“No, get some cheesecake, and one of those bottles of champagne. We got too much.”
Sean shrugged and, feigning humility, said, “Well, if you insist.”
While Sean was gathering up things, Elias spoke with Jonah. Now and again he looked to Lance and Dylan, remembering what he had said to Jonah:
Sean and Jonah drove to their apartment in high spirits, and as Sean parked, Jonah said:
“You leave the lights on?”
“Could have sworn I turned them off,” Sean muttered. He climbed out of the car, followed by Jonah. Jonah opened the door without reaching for his key and frowned when it turned out to be unlocked.
“Who’s in here?” Sean barked, walking in ahead of Jonah.
The place smelled glorious, though, as if someone was cooking. Jazz played low on the stereo.
“Who?” Sean barked again, “is in our house?”
“Relax,” a voice shouted back. “Relax already.”
They heard the sound of a flushing toilet and then, in khakis and a white shirt, his glasses in his breast pocket, he stepped out.
“Ohhh,” Jonah said breathlessly.
Keith approached them, and Sean and Jonah looked like the disciples at the empty tomb.
Suddenly Sean kissed him, and Jonah embraced him, kissing him on the cheek.
“Keith! Keith Richmond.”
“I found you,” Keith said, kissing Jonah’s ear and rubbing his shoulder fiercely.
“I found you.”
THE END
Next I will present Night in White Satin, the conclusion to Geschichte Falls. When we return to Rossford some time from now, it will be with the seventh and concluding Rossford tale: The Ends of Rossford. Until then, farewell from Rossford, with all my love.