30. Ribbon Shirts

Nylah's and Bonnie's wedding is this afternoon.

Babs went home three days ago. She's going to start her novel when she gets there, she said. She already has the first chapter in her head. I asked her to send it to me when it's done. Hey, I'll be eighteen in March, it's not that far off.

"I actually don't like to leave here," she said wistfully, as I carried one of her bags to her car. "This place has kinda put a whammy on me."

"It does have a way of doing that," I agreed. "Couldn't you stay here? I'm sure we could find you a job. And you could stay in my room until you find a place of your own."

"I may do that someday," she said. "But I gotta go back and get my affairs in order, yanno? And then there's Harry. I wonder how he'd go for it."

"Get him out here. Maybe the place will put that whammy on him too."

When she finally drove away, I sighed and shuffled on back inside. School will be starting in just a week. I'm both dreading it and looking forward to it. Seth will be going to veterinary school at that time. I've bought him a Smartphone as a going-away present. He doesn't know it yet.

Tanner finally asked Charlotte out. She told him quietly and gently that she appreciated his offer, but she's with Curt now. She really does like Curt. At the same time, I think she regrets having to turn Tanner down. Although I like him a lot better than I did, I can't help but think he'll turn out to be another Royce Whitmeyer, and Charlotte was smart to refuse him. Curt may be less exciting, but at least he's got eyes for nobody else but her….

The wedding is held at Nylah's home. A Cherokee man comes over to perform the ceremony. He's a cousin of Nylah's. She introduces him as Roger Honey Lips. Yes, really! He's wearing buckskin pants and a ribbon shirt. She's wearing a tear dress—first time I've ever seen her wear a dress. A Cherokee tear dress is similar to a prairie dress, only simpler, made of strips of cloth that are torn rather than cut—hence the name. That may not sound very attractive, but they really do look nice when they're well made and trimmed. Not to mention comfortable. They originated from when the Cherokees were robbed of their land by the U.S. government and were sent on a long march to Oklahoma. The women didn't have scissors to cut fabric, so they had to tear it and sew the strips together. Nylah's is peacock blue calico, trimmed with red and white and green ribbons. Roger's wife Ellen made it for her. I think I want one. Or would that be cultural appropriation? I do have Cherokee blood on Dad's side. His great-grandpa was a German immigrant who married a full-blooded Cherokee woman. They both caught hell for it, him for being a German during the first world war and her for being an "injun" who married out of her tribe. It shows in Grandpa, and Uncle Grover too. Not so much in Dad, who caught more of his mother's Irish DNA. Same here.

Bonnie also wears a ribbon shirt, which Ellen also made, deep red with black and white ribbons, and a new pair of jeans. I'm wearing the outfit I wore in the concert, the peasant blouse and skirt. Seth says I look like a lovely Irish lassie in it. I think the word he wants is actually "colleen"—lassie is Scottish—but I don't tell him so.

All Bonnie's siblings and her parents and grandparents are there. So are mine. The wedding is held outdoors, out front of the house. Everyone sits on blankets spread out on the ground. Seth holds my hand. His leg is almost healed and his face looks pretty much back to normal, and his hair is growing out. He looks good with it short, but I hope he'll let it grow out a little more. Still, he'd look good bald, far as I'm concerned.

Roger Honey Lips drapes a blue blanket over the wedding couple as he speaks the words to join them in matrimony. After he pronounces them married, he takes the blanket and changes it for a white one, officially joining them.

They each drink from the same cup. I'm not sure what it is, then Seth whispers to me that it's strawberry moonshine.

I have tears in my eyes now. But they're happy tears.

Then Roger says, "Well, let 'er rip," and everybody laughs, Ellen louder than anybody. There's plenty of good grub, and everybody digs in. Seth and I help ourselves to some of that strawberry moonshine. Let's just say, it's a lot stronger than champagne.

Later we go for a walk down the creek, where we went that first day I was out here. He walks with a cane now, instead of the crutches. A four-footed one. Just like a little ole grampa, he says. There are lots of wild flowers growing out here. Rhododendrons, and chickory, and goldenrod, and all kinds of others that we'd need Ariel to come out and name for us. Butterflies are out in force like ladies at a half-price purse sale, and I can hear frogs and grasshoppers everywhere, echoing off the bluffs. And the water purrs over the mossy rocks, cool and pure and seductive like you'd expect to see sirens sitting out there, washing their clothes and singing. We sit down on some dry rocks, holding hands and looking out at it, then at each other, then at the water again.

"Wow," I say, "this has been one crazy summer, hasn't it." It sounds dumb once it's out, but I have to say something.

"It's been that," he agrees. "I don't know what to make of it. Been a bit like hell and a bit like heaven, all done up in one package. Maybe life's kinda like that too."

I don't speak for a minute. Tears spring into my eyes, I don't know why. I'm just feeling a trifle overwhelmed.

"I'm sorry 'bout your momma, honey," Seth says after a bit. "I know that's gotta be hard on ye."

"It's not that, Seth," I say. Even though it sort of is. But that's not all. Maybe I just don't want him to go yet, even though I know he must. Even though I wouldn't want him not to go, in fact. I know he's got a dream and he's got to go after it. And I want him to. This phase is coming to an end and another is beginning and I've just got to go with it. I just wish there was a little more time for the previous one. But even so, it wouldn't be enough either.

"Yanno what?" I say. "I've decided I want to go to college after all. I discussed it with Dad the other night. I'm going to the community college here, and I'm going to study small business management. So I can better run my wood-turning business. Dad suggested it, and I think it's what I want to do."

"I think that's what you should do, Tanya," he says. "I think it'd be a good thing for you. College and all."

"Yeah," I say, looking right up at him. I can't look away from him now. I never want to look away from him again. I want to get my eyes so full of him, it'll last me until the next time I see him. "It'll be better than going to some bigshot university where there'd be so many distractions, I wouldn't be able to concentrate on my studies, but I'd go running off to parties and sorority activities and all. Although I do hope there'll be parties here. I mean, you've gotta have some fun, right?"

"Course you do," he says. "I hope you can come down where I am sometimes. Maybe there'll be parties there too."

"I'd love it," I say. He looks down at me and smiles real big. Then first thing I know, we're lip-locked, there on that rock like that sculpture The Kiss, only we've got clothes on. Oh boy, do I want them off, and do I want them off right now...

"You and Roger should swap names," I tell him after we come apart, panting a little. Seth Honey Lips. Yeah. Works for me.

"You sure about that?" he asks grinning.

"Well...not quite," I say with a giggle. "Maybe we should try it again and see?"

We try it again. Yep. They should definitely swap names.

"Tanya," he says as we come apart again, panting a little, "know what I'd like?"

"No, what?" I think I can guess. I hope I can. I hope it's what I'd like because I'd be more than pleased to give it to you right here and now….

"A shirt. Like the one that Injin feller had on. Maybe a white un. With...can you guess?"

I shut my eyes for a moment. A ribbon shirt? Like Bonnie's? Does this mean what I think it means? Oh be still, my beating heart….

"Umm...Would it by any chance be...scarlet ribbons?"

"You got it," he says with a big grin.

***FINIS***