by L. Langdon
Sven knew that he should have seen this coming. Of course, Olivia would have mentioned the picture to Rich, and Rich probably asked Gerri about it this afternoon during their private conversation on the boat. And Gerri, preoccupied with Rich’s and Olivia’s reactions to her romance, had undoubtedly failed to mention Sven’s secrecy about his paintings.
What’s done is done. Right now, the woman he loved was miserable—and silently berating herself. Sven couldn’t tolerate Gerri’s misery. After all, he rationalized, his secrecy was a product of his insecurity. It was time to grow up.
“Sure, I’ll go get it,” he said, throwing a wink and what he hoped was a comforting smile at Gerri. “I like it, even though I probably shouldn’t have shown it to your parents.”
As he left the room, he could hear the conversational dam break. Mindy said, “Sven painted a picture of you?” in a tone trying to be polite but nonetheless skeptical.
He returned with the picture and handed it to Rich.
Rich’s eyes widened. This was ‘little sister’ all right, but ‘little sister’ was all grown. “Wow!” He finally said. “It’s a great picture,” he said to Sven, “but I can see why Ma freaked.” He turned to Gerri. “Gerri,” he started, “I’m impressed. I promise I’m not going to think of you as a little kid anymore.”
Mindy was clamoring for a look, so he passed it to her and John. John was the first to react. He chuckled. “Lookin’ good, Gerri. This is the kind of picture that college men put up in their rooms.” He extended his hands in a framing gesture. “‘Arctic Sistah!’ I’m serious, man,” he said to Sven. “Somebody could sell prints of this.”
Gerri, embarrassed by the praise, felt like hiding her face. Instead, she eyed Mindy, anxious to see her reaction. It was not long in coming.
“Wait a minute!” She was squinting at the signature. “This is a Hush picture. I ought to know. I’ve looked at enough of them in the window of Taku Books.” She looked at Sven almost accusingly. He shrugged.
Gerri was regaining her composure. She was almost limp with relief that Sven seemed not to care about her goof. “It’s true, Mindy. Sven is Hush.”
“Sven?” Mindy asked incredulously. But she immediately reached out her hand placatingly. “Sven, I’m sorry. I don’t mean that the way it sounds. But really?”
Sven moved to the door. “Let me get an older picture. I’ll be right back.” He returned momentarily and handed another picture to Mindy and John. Gerri peeked over their shoulders and had to swallow her laughter. It was a picture of Mindy looking rather fierce—or was it angry? But somehow, it was a flattering picture.
John reacted first. “I love this. Let me buy it from you.”
“No,” said Sven, “but please accept it as a gift.”
Mindy finally found her tongue. “I look angry,” she said in a dismayed tone.
“Ah, but you’re beautiful when you’re angry,” John said with a grin.
Mindy rounded on him. “That’s such a male chauvinist thing to say.”
“I assure you,” John said, undeterred, “you’re just as beautiful when you’re not angry.”
“Thank you,” Mindy said, much more cheerfully.
But John wasn’t done. “It’s just that I haven’t had a chance to see you as often when you’re not angry.” Mindy threatened him with a throw pillow as the rest of them laughed.
Sven watched the horseplay with a smile. He experienced a deep satisfaction that surprised him. Gerri’s mistake had been a blessing in disguise. Still, there was one more base to touch. Quietly, he left the room.
When he returned, the noise had died down and they were again examining the pictures. “Here, Mindy,” he said. “This one is for you. Or your mother, if you like, but don’t tell her that it came from me.”
It was a picture of Laura. But not the glamorous shots that were typical of her. This one showed her with a small smile, but looking faintly melancholy. Silently, Mindy stared at the picture. The others, loathe to interrupt her, looked quietly over her shoulder. Gerri thought it was the best image of Laura that she’d seen. Laura came across as a real person—one to whom the world had not always been kind.
Sven watched Mindy’s face with anxious fascination. Finally, she took a deep breath and looked up. Her eyes were wet. “Thank you, Sven,” said Mindy, blinking to dry her eyes. “This is so true to her. I’ll love this.” She hastily handed the picture to John, stood up, and hugged Sven with all of her strength. She held the hug for some time until Gerri’s eyes started watering. The reconciliation is complete, Gerri thought. How could this day be any more perfect?
Chapter 45
Gerri left Mindy’s apartment very early the next morning. Even though she and Mindy had stayed up late talking, Gerri couldn’t sleep. She had much to talk over with Sven so that they would have at least tentative plans in place before they broke the news to her family. Gerri was uneasy about that and had already given considerable thought about how to break the news, while causing the least contention.
To put off telling them would only make it worse. The same time zone difference which had allowed Gerri to plausibly defer calling last night would remove any excuse for delay this morning.
Gerri had left the apartment quietly so as not to wake Mindy. This morning reminded her of her first morning in Juneau—the sun was just up, but the streets were still deserted. That first morning was almost exactly a year ago. She had to smile in wonderment. What amazing changes there had been in her life during that year.
When she got to Sven’s house, it was quiet. I’m probably not the only one who stayed up late talking. As much as she would have liked to let him sleep, she didn’t have time to wait. She quietly climbed the stairs and entered his bedroom. Sven was indeed fast asleep. Gerri glanced around quickly. Curtains! I’m going to have to get curtains. She buried that thought with a quick grin. It sure hadn’t taken her long to develop a proprietary interest in his house.
Her hand had barely touched his shoulder when his eyes opened and he peered at her groggily. He reached for her, saying “You came to join me, I hope?”
Gerri danced out of the way. “No. We can’t. Not while my brother’s here. But we need to talk. Can you come downstairs?”
Sven stretched and yawned. “I figured that out, believe it or not. After you left, he and I talked for hours. He seems like a tentative ally right now. And we want to keep him that way.”
Gerri nodded, grateful for his understanding. “I’ll wait downstairs.”
By the time Rich came downstairs, they had roughed out their plans. He blinked in surprise at finding them deep in conversation. “You two must not believe in sleeping.”
“Hard to sleep when you have a marriage to plan,” Gerri offered. “It’ll catch up with me later, but there’s still a lot to do today.”
“Do you expect to get it all planned today?”
“Actually, the wedding plans are already roughed out. I still have some school work to do for tomorrow; we want to show you around, and, last but not least, I have to call home and tell the family. I’m not looking forward to telling Ma.”
“I wanted to ask you about that.” Rich grimaced. “Let me talk to them first. It’s the least I can do—this wouldn’t have happened so suddenly if I hadn’t shown up yesterday.”
“Don’t feel guilty, Rich.” Gerri cast a mischievous glance at Sven. “You did Sven a big favor by coming.”
“I’ll say.” Sven winked at her. “I’ve been trying for months to find the right moment to propose.”
“Oh, that,” Gerri dismissed it airily with a wave of her hand. “I was talking about the fact that we were able to delay painting the boat.”
Sven growled and reached for her. “You make light of my agonized waiting, woman?”
Gerri grinned and came into his arms willingly. Then her smile faded as she turned serious. “No. And I appreciate your patience. I’d love you for that even if I didn’t have plenty of other reasons.”
Ri
ch waited while they kissed. When they didn’t seem to be in any hurry to finish, he finally cleared his throat. “Umm, as you said, there’s a lot to do today. Tell me your plans so I can tell the family.”
Gerri didn’t look remotely guilty as she broke the embrace. “We’re going to get married after school lets out for the summer. Late May, probably. It’ll be a small wedding—just us and a few friends in front of a J.P.”
“Ma always imagined your having a big church wedding.”
Gerri shook her head. “We don’t want to be ostentatious. There are bound to be a few people who are offended. We’re prepared to ignore them, but we don’t want to rub anybody’s nose in it unnecessarily.” She paused and winced a bit. “We’d love it if the family could come, but…”
Rich was shaking his head. “That won’t happen. You know that Dad can’t leave the farm at that time of year.”
“How about you, Rich?”
“I’d love to, but my training starts next week. I don’t want to screw that up.” He saw Gerri’s disappointed look. “I’ll be there in spirit; you know that.”
She nodded resignedly. “When are you going to call?”
“As soon as you two leave. Go run an errand. Take a walk. Something.” Seeing Gerri’s frown, he elaborated. “You know that the first thing Ma is going to say is ‘Put Gerri on the phone.’ I want to soften them up first.”
“But then she’ll think I’m ducking her.”
“No she won’t. I’m going to tell her that I grabbed the phone when you guys went out on an errand.”
Sven turned to Gerri. “You want to take a walk?”
“I guess so. It’s not like I have a choice.”
___
It took some time to calm Olivia down. Albert was accepting from the start and Marilyn and Joetta were excited. But Olivia was a harder sell. In the end, Rich reminded her about the high rates for long distance calls—there was no direct dial between Alaska and the other states—and summarized his argument quickly. “From what I’ve seen, Sven loves her, he respects her, and he likes her. Those are three distinct things, and each one is important.
“They’re aware that not everybody will approve, but they have a core of supportive friends. I’ve met some of those friends and they seem very nice.”
Olivia sighed. “I hope so.”
Rich got an inspiration. This was a bit beyond his mandate, but… “They realize that you can’t leave the farm to attend, but Gerri and Sven would love it if you could come up later in the year.”
He waited while she relayed that to Albert. “We’ll see,” she finally said.
When Gerri and Sven got back to the house, Rich was standing on the porch. Gerri tried to read his expression without success. “Well?”
“I can’t believe that you two are out here without coats on.”
“Quit stalling, Rich.”
“It went well—eventually. They want you to call them, but Ma promised not to give you any grief. And, of course, the girls think that this is the most exciting thing ever.”
Gerri sagged against Sven. “Thank heavens. And this was the easy one.”
Sven was only too happy to put his arm around her. “What do you mean?”
“They’re family. Even if Ma disapproves, she still loves me. The harder thing is going to be telling the people at school. I think most of them will be fine, but there are bound to be a few… I just hope that the few—the nasty ones—don’t make too big a fuss.”
___
Gerri arranged her notes on her desk in preparation for her first period. The nervousness was bubbling beneath her calm exterior. She had come in early this Monday morning to sign her contract for next year. It had been waiting there for several weeks while she had been agonizing about her future. Nobody in the office had noticed her ring.
That ring was a ticking time bomb. She wouldn’t know what to expect until the news was out. Momentarily, she regretted being right-handed—if she had been left-handed, they would surely notice the ring the first time she wrote something on the board. Still, somebody—some girl, no doubt—was bound to notice it during a visit to Gerri’s desk before the day was out.
She didn’t have long to wait. At the end of the first period, Barbara Pruitt had a question on her homework paper. Her discovery was marked by a squeal and a total loss of interest in the homework question.
“You’re getting married?”
“Yes, I am.” Gerri smiled and gently attempted to return to the homework question. But that was a lost cause. Barbara and several friends clustered around, hoping for more gossip.
“Does that mean you’re leaving? Please say ‘no.’”
Gerri smiled. “No, I’m not leaving.”
“Who are you marrying? Is it someone from Juneau?”
Gerri thought she heard the name ‘Dr. Wheeler’ mumbled in the second row of girls, and she tried not to cringe. “He’s from Juneau,” she said firmly. “Sven Halvorsen is his name.”
This met with some recognition. A couple of the boys, having joined the periphery of the group, pantomimed boxing motions. Barbara overrode any other comments, saying triumphantly, “I thought so. My dad said that he thought you two liked each other.”
Gerri was finally forced to push them out to make way for her next class. As she did so, she reflected on how lucky she was that Barbara had been the first to notice—someone friendly to Gerri and whose family was friendly to Sven.
The rest of the morning was predictable. The news of Gerri’s engagement had spread quickly, so Gerri had to take a minute at the start of each class to acknowledge it and answer a few questions. Student reaction varied. Most took it in stride, some appeared delighted, and a few frowned. Of course, Gerri reminded herself, some of the latter might have been in the ‘Laura Schumaker’ camp—disapproving of Sven more than the marriage per se.
As Gerri approached her usual lunch table, Sharon Ingram was ready. “I’ve been hearing about this all morning. Show me your ring.”
After Gerri obligingly displayed it, Sharon asked, “Sven Halvorsen? How did you even meet him?”
Gerri gave a quick explanation of her summer job. Jake interrupted at this point. “Is he local? I don’t recognize the name.”
Sharon nodded. “He was before your time. He graduated about ten years ago. I had him in one of my classes. He…” She cut a glance toward Gerri, who nodded.
“Yes, I know all about his troubles.” She summarized quickly for Jake. “He got married too young and, when his wife was killed in a car accident, some people really resented him.”
Sharon looked relieved to be spared that explanation. “I liked him. He was an engaging young man. He had a lot dumped on him in his last year of high school. And I don’t think his wife’s family has forgiven him to this day.”
“Mindy has.”
Sharon blinked in surprise. “Oh! I’m glad to hear that. If anybody in that family is capable of forgiveness, it would be her.”
The comic relief came in the last period of the day. Unsurprisingly, it was orchestrated by Frank Arquette. Frank was one of Gerri’s most frustrating students but, at the same time, one of her favorites. He was universally acknowledged to be one of the brightest students in the school, and he was definitely the best math student that Gerri had ever taught.
He was frustrating because he grew bored easily when class went too slowly for him—which was more often than not. Gerri had taken to suggesting challenge problems at the beginning of class for the students to think about. She never mentioned Frank explicitly, but rarely would anyone else touch one of them.
He was also something of a cutup. His sense of humor reminded her a bit of Sven’s, except that it leaned less on wordplays and puns and more on baroque (and generally bogus) math calculations. He, like Sven, seemed to revel in his audience’s groans.
Gerri had won Frank’s admiration with an offhand remark. After hearing one of his frivolous calculations, she told him about the Drake Equation for estimating
the number of galactic civilizations. It had been told to her in much the same offhand fashion by Dr. Kuznetsov, and she had never imagined that she would use it, but something about Frank’s elaborate calculations reminded her of Drake’s ambitious attempt to quantify—however roughly—the unknowable.
Today, Frank came into class announcing that “This marriage is going to cause a lot of trouble.”
If it had been anyone else, Gerri would have been alarmed. With Frank, she waited until he settled into his customary seat at the back of the room—he had always liked elbow room and didn’t want anyone whispering next to him. Then she cocked her head and gave him an inquiring smile. Wild horses couldn’t stop him from elaborating.
He consulted a sheaf of papers that he had in his hand. Ostensibly, these were calculations, although Gerri knew full well that they were just there to look impressive—whatever he was about to say, he had memorized. “You probably get addressed by students around 100 times a day.” As usual, he was willing to fudge his numbers for maximum drama. “And there are almost 200 days in the school year. So that’s 20,000 times that your name is spoken.
“Now, ‘Miss Barton’ is three syllables and ‘Missus Halvorsen’ is five. That’s two extra syllables every time we call your name. So, in all, there’s a total of 40,000 extra syllables in a year. If each syllable takes a quarter of a second, then there will be 10,000 extra seconds—almost three hours that are taken away from our learning.”
He stopped with a triumphant grin, and the rest of the class reacted in their usual fashion—a stunned silence while they tried to process his math, followed by objections from those willing to joust with him.
“She could use ‘Ms.’ instead of ‘Mrs.’ Then there’d only be one extra syllable.” Gerri grinned—Mindy and the Women’s Libbers would be pleased.
“She could keep her own name,” another girl piped up. “That’d save another syllable.” Even better—Gerri would definitely have to tell Mindy about her acolytes in this class.
A boy spoke up. “She could ask us to call her ‘Teach.’ That’s only one syllable.”
