Chapter 2: Chapter 2
Shelby had joked about coming as the house that fell on the wicked witch. In the start of her last trimester, she felt rather large. All was going well with the pregnancy, though. Her Ob-Gyn had cleared her for travel down to Cocke County, Tennessee. Goose and I would have married back in New York, otherwise, a ceremony there and a second here, maybe. He’d joked about he and Shelby dressing as a munchkins, since diminutiveness ran in their family. In the end, he decided he would have chosen Dorothy for his sister, because she seemed like the glue that held us all together, the one who believed in our journey, even when hope seemed lost to the rest of us.
Our Carrie would have been The Wizard, since she knew all about the three traits the yellow brick road travelers sought. She recognized them in others and proved she possessed plenty of each herself when facing prejudice and hate.
Finally, there was Carrie’s new friend, Nami, who called herself a good witch. She’d already worked some magic, as our whole group tried to unravel the mystery of what our guardian angels were up to down on Earth since parting ways with us and one another back in Heaven months earlier.
Sadly, that mystery was still only half solved. Goose’s Halloween ghost and his husband, our Jefferson and Daniel, were still not beside us. They hadn’t appeared to Goose or me since April, not as we wished them to, at least, as themselves, in a form we could see and even touch. Though I couldn’t imagine them not wanting to attend our wedding, we hadn’t yet put the last piece in the puzzle that would make that possible, apparently. Hopefully, before the official “I dos” we would.
After so much discussion about attire, seasonal colors accessorized with Halloween splendor—a glittery pumpkin brooch, a Boo! necktie, flying witches on socks, and skeleton earrings—was deemed agreeable by all. Most importantly, perhaps, an oak leaf adorned every lapel.
“No brainer, Scarecrow. Oak leaves are a must,” I’d said when Goose had suggested them.
This time around, one or two frosts had them already tinged with copper, unlike the pristine green we’d found back in springtime in Heaven, the last time we’d been at the tree.
“So, let’s truly begin,” Mae suggested.
“Yes, let’s,” I said.
Just about one year after Goose and I first met at a Civil War reenactment, months after we’d both been given a second chance at life, the two of us were eager to pledge our commitment to one another forever.
Mae offered smile. “And we’ll do that with another song.”
“Amazing Grace,” a through line in our story, in Daniel and Jefferson’s, too, was the hymn we had chosen to begin the ceremony. Jefferson’s singing was what had first caught Daniel’s attention, back when the two fought side by side as Union soldiers, and Daniel was known as Calvin.
“If this song doesn’t trigger something,” Goose whispered, his eyes bright, his smile hopeful, “I don’t know what will.”
Micha cleared his throat. He looked a bit jittery, there on the large monitor set up by electronic marvel Rip, to project images from several phones. I had Micha on video chat on mine, currently held by my baby brother. Micha, this young, sweet soul, a soul we still believed to be Jefferson Eaves’, sang like an angel, we knew, whether he was our angel or not.
“Fingers crossed,” I said.
“Next to the finger with the strip from a vinyl floatie on it.” Goose’s smile was always a treat.
“And another in just a matter of moments.” I couldn’t wait to see it.
The first few notes Micha sang gave me goose bumps. Goose, too, I would have bet. We would have jokingly called mine Patrick bumps. Was this beautiful singer our Jefferson? Would his song be enough to get Tate, aka Daniel, to remember how in love they were, so their spirits could return together to Heaven? Did they have to remember, in order for that to happen? Only time would tell.
The guest list was small. Micha and Tate had to be there, of course, in order for our plan to work, since nothing else had, so far. Getting them in the same place had proven to be no easy task, but we’d eventually managed, with the help of technology.
I had too many siblings to choose one as a traditional “best man” figure, so I’d chosen my mother, instead. A few other O’Hanlon relatives were out amongst the trees to the side of us, with the promise of a full family function at Christmastime.
In yet another outside the box move, Shelby and Rip both stood up for Goose. Technically, Shelby sat, because Goose and Rip were both overprotective, at least according to her. Later, we would all pile into cars to travel a few miles up the road to the fancy inn where Goose first entered my life. Any spirit friends who crashed the day would follow in their own way, we hoped, to gather with us for our reception.
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone