The Humper Game Pt. 06 Ch. 06

At one point, we all went over to look at Sam's drawings, and for once she was the one who was asked questions about them. Almost all of these people had at least heard of the decisions she was facing up to, and they all were people who cared about her.

Three or four times, other new arrivals dropped in for the chance to say hello before the wedding day. They didn't stay long, but I was sure glad to get a few minutes with them. More than I expected had responded to the general invitation we had tried to broadcast, Some of them were specifically there as Ellen's friends, but I was again a little surprised and touched by how many people apparently cared about me, people I had never thought it of. Sam and Ellen pointed out, again, that what had come out in the trial had made a difference in a lot of people's eyes.

About two-thirty, we had to set out for the church, for the wedding rehearsal. We had my car and Steve's, and other people had cars there at our apartment building, so there was no problem driving everyone. Everyone was in nice clothes, but not too dressy—we had specified this ahead of time, for both the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner. OK, "dressy casual" is an oxymoron, but it looked like everyone there understood it.

The rehearsal went very well. Steve brought our parents, but wasn't in the ceremony himself. The actual musicians of the quartet were not there, but Charlotte was, and she actually played a bit of the prelude music on the piano, apparently by ear and ad lib, as we started the walk through. I was pretty sure she had rehearsed the quartet, so she was familiar with the music, but I was impressed with her ability as musician as well as director.

We started with Pastor Mac going through the sequence of the ceremony, then Charlotte played a bit, coming to a cadence, soon after we entered. Supposedly, the pieces to be played at the appointed time were ones which could be brought to a final-sounding conclusion fairly quickly, and we were prepared to wait for as much as a minute or two. I had been in too many church services where the goal seemed to be to have a smooth flow with no awkward pauses to wait for music to finish, or for someone to go sit down while someone else came forward, and I made it clear that I'd rather not have the music butchered for the sake of never having to pause and wait while it finished. Ellen thought I was being kind of picky, but went along. Nonetheless, we practiced entering several times, so that we knew when to open the doors and about how far apart to enter, so that we would arrive at about the right time.

Sam and Jim and the rest had relatively little to do, since we weren't doing a slow processional with each bridal attendant met and escorted by a groomsman. We went through the things Ellen and I were to say, without our actually saying any of them. At the end, the attendants would follow us up the aisle. The church members who were serving as ushers were to dismiss the congregation in an orderly way, from the front to the back, so that the receiving line wouldn't be a big bottleneck. That part was pretty normal for weddings, of course, and we thought it still made sense.

Ellen and I had flatly rejected having an official photographer and a lengthy photo session. On hearing this, Steve appointed himself unofficial photographer. Pastor Mac told him he would need to be in the balcony or the sound booth, not intruding on the service in any way, and asked him to please avoid even taking any pictures—making shutter noises, anyway—while people were speaking up front, if he chose the balcony. The church would have a video camera running the whole time, unattended once the person controlling the sound board started it. In the end, however, Steve discussed it with the sound guy on duty, and he—Steve—zoomed in on some things during the service—almost everything after we entered, in fact. I couldn't figure out how he managed both the video camera and his own at the same time, but he did.

At the point where Sam's solo would occur, she played a little music, but not the song she had written. That was to be a surprise present for us. This was the one part of the service we went through several times, just to let her rehearse when to turn and walk over to the piano, and exactly when to begin playing. When she was done, she was simply to sit until Pastor Mac had begun speaking, and then walk back to her place.

As the rehearsal was ending, Pastor Mac and Charlotte asked Sam to play and sing a song or two, just as a sample of what we might expect. Most of those present hadn't heard her before, of course. She played and sang "Cleanse Me," and then the Gottschalk song Aunt Sally had played for us in August, "Holy Ghost, With Light Divine." She certainly wasn't just playing the four-part harmonies they had in the hymnal. Both songs left me near tears.

Pastor Mac had declined our invitation to the rehearsal dinner, but promised that he and his wife would be at the reception the next day. We thanked him and Charlotte both for their time as well as all the other things they had done in preparation. We asked if we might sit in one of the rooms and talk, as it was a quite bit early to leave for the dinner. Pastor Mac said that was fine, adding, "It's a much more common problem for couples to underestimate the time needed for a rehearsal. Partly, you have a very simple service planned, but you also were very well organized. And I thank you for that." He went off to his office, possibly to work on his sermon—either for Sunday or for the wedding.

We sat and talked as a whole group, our parents and our peers with Ellen and me, except that Sam and Charlotte went over in a corner and spoke quietly together for a while at the beginning. We reminded everyone of when to be there and dressed in the morning. Ellen and I had insisted on nothing fancier than dark suits for the men and dresses for the women, though early on we had sent pictures of Ellen's dress so that the women could try not to clash—and I think Sam and the bridesmaids had coordinated their own dresses somewhat. Still, our intention had always been that all of these clothes be something suitable for any fairly formal occasion, not things that would never be worn again, and not even things necessarily needing to be bought for the occasion. Though of course, our high school classmates hadn't all owned anything really dressy, after four years of uniforms during which we had all grown, followed by one year at college, at which they mostly were pretty casual about dress. I hadn't owned a suit, myself.

To the best of my knowledge, all of those participating arrived at the church the next morning dressed for the ceremony. I was very pleased about that.

We told them when people from the church would be bringing in flowers. We had agreed not to go overboard on flowers, and not to have any other decorations. But it turned out the next day that someone in the church had taken pictures of Ellen and me talking to each other, and had these blown up and printed as posters, which appeared with the flowers in the morning. Oh well. That turned out not to be the biggest deviation from our plans.

The rehearsal dinner was really nice. The restaurant had a private room, with one table set up for us. That was better than having us at two tables, but it did mean that for the most part conversations tended to be small. Sometimes, though, people spoke loudly enough for half or even the whole table to take part.

The table was set for two at each end, with six down each side. Ellen and I sat at one end, with her parents next to her and mine next to me. That left the others to arrange themselves, and they surprised me. Sam and Jenny sat at the other end of the table, with Pete and Tammy next to them on one side and Jim and Helen on the other. In the middle of the two sides were Fred with Ellen Manning, and Bill with Deedee. I'd expected those two guys to sit together, and the two girls ditto. They were much closer friends that way, after all. But this put the girls across from each other, and the guys as well, so conversation was very possible that way. Mostly, though, I had no idea who talked with whom—except that our parents spoke to each other, occasionally including us, usually to ask one of us a question. Dad declined to say anything about his work beyond that he went where he was sent, usually trying to iron out difficulties. Mom and Mrs. Chan found a lot to say to each other, a surprising amount of it compliments on each other's children. With the questions they asked each other, that could have gone on much longer. Mr. Chan described some things about his own work, some of which I had already heard. It was plain that Dad in particular knew more about this whole type of business than I did, and I really found their discussion very interesting, all through.

The Chans had stepped up to pay for this dinner, and they'd chosen the menu. There were some choices, though not too many, but no one complained—well, it was a restaurant I would normally avoid as a little too fancy and way too expensive, but it deserved its reputation.

When we took our parents back to the motel, we also stopped and visited with one more group of guests. These had rented a car at the airport and had also reserved their own rooms. They were people we had really not expected to attend, when we invited them, but they had told us they would be there, and they were definitely on the list for the reception.

We had sent invitations to a few of our instructors from high school, figuring that they would not be able to get away, but four of them had. Mr. and Mrs. Lanigan, and Mr. Miles and Ms. Miller were attending. Mr. Lanigan was there as Mrs. Lanigan's husband and escort, not in his own right—though the invitation had been addressed to both. I had nothing against him, but his attempts to teach me music had been as frustrating for me as for him, and he hadn't taught Ellen. Mrs. Lanigan—Signora Lanigan—was someone Ellen as well as I was very fond of. Mr. Miles and Ms. Miller both were definitely more my guests than Ellen's, but she was glad to have them come. Neither had brought an escort. They were sharing a room, and we didn't inquire as to whether that signified anything more than economy. We had invited three other instructors, who had all sent regrets.

We were somewhat startled to be told very firmly to call them Bella, Gene, John, and Mary, and to be addressed as Phil and Ellen. All of them were enthusiastic in their congratulations and best wishes. We didn't stay very long, but their being there was much appreciated. Later, in the receiving line and again at the reception, we also spoke with them. Mr. Miles reminded me of our last talk, without saying any more about it.

As we left, I shook hands firmly with each of the men. I embraced each of the women. I gave Mrs. Lanigan—Bella—a kiss on the cheek such as a young boy might give his nonna in parting, and she laughed. I attempted to kiss Mary on the cheek as well, but she made a preemptive strike on my mouth. Nothing extended enough to be inappropriate, not passionate but friendly. Ellen knew of my attraction to and fondness for both of them, and considered them in the same light as so many others—friends, not competition.

In fact, Mary made a little parting speech to Ellen. "That first night, when Phil checked in with Sam, for her room, I was very happy to be able to congratulate them on getting past all their many problems, and they both spoke to me affectionately. At that point, I would have expected this wedding to be Phil and Sam. I hope that Sam will find someone as good for her as Phil was, before too long, and I expect to say that to her tomorrow. To you both, congratulations on getting through all your many difficulties. Ellen, there aren't many women I would think he should prefer to Sam, but you really are one—really, the only one. May you have a long and fruitful life together. I do hope you'll take seriously what John spoke to you about, months ago, but whether or not I see you again, you both will be in my thoughts a lot."

I said, "We really do need to go, but you all know how given I am to curiosity." They all laughed. "Have you had the same problems regarding fitness with this year's senior class? And if so, what have you done about it?"

John laughed again. "A very fair question," he said. "You understand that Mary and I are not directly instructing that class, don't you? But last year, when they were juniors, we observed signs of the same problems developing. Those signs were there for your class in your junior year, but we didn't take them seriously enough. So last year their own gym instructors put in place better monitoring of each student's performance, in an ongoing way. They arranged for rather more direct negative sanctions for those who slipped back. This has generally been effective, but it takes time, and it's not as good for morale. Nonetheless, we won't repeat the experiment we made with your class."

We finally went home and got ready for bed. We both had much more trouble getting to sleep than we usually had been—both desire and nervousness keeping me, at least, awake. I should have expected this, but somehow I was surprised. Nonetheless, we did finally fall asleep. I know Ellen finally did—because it took me even longer. But I expected this to be our last night like that, together but still apart, and I was very eager for morning.

This is the end of Part 6. Part 7 begins the next morning, the morning of the wedding day, and covers the wedding and honeymoon, and then ensuing events to the end of the story.

Thanks for reading!

Revision: 7/24/2019