Note: This is the second part of the story, following
Ramona Jean's Sinful Weekend.
*
Despite the fact that Mona was now on her honeymoon, as she sat leaning on and clutching the upper arm of her dozing husband on the swaying, thumping train, on a journey to a faraway land, she felt like a character in a spy novel. Never had she been privy to so many
secrets
. In the midst of such a public event as a wedding - even her small ceremony was announced in the newspaper - much secrecy surrounded the wedding night and the scandalous boudoir gifts acquired. '
Don't ever let your father see this, even just on the hanger,'
Madelyn had said about the homemade halter-necked nightgown she had crafted for Mona. Assembled mainly from the open lace remnants of the wedding dress, but
only
the lace, its upper bodice left practically nothing to the imagination, and even Jeff's mother blushed at the sight of it during the bridal shower.
The height of Mona's new career in espionage was the early morning spiral notebook briefing from Madelyn on what to expect on the wedding night - and beyond. Her mother, surely violating church teachings but not wanting her daughter to be as uninformed as she had been, even produced a tattered, illustrated book. The text was Hindu, Mona surmised, but it was filled with primitive, eye-opening drawings of Asian people copulating in various positions, and included depictions of oral gratification.
'Remember all this now, because I'm going to burn this thing before your father gets home!"
Mona's mother had written about the heretical, exotic volume, hidden in the attic after it was found among the belongings of a deceased bachelor uncle years before.
In the railroad coach, blonde Jefferson, in a jacket and tie, his hair freshly cut as it had been the day they met, slouched in the seat. Mrs. T. Jefferson Payne, feeling very grown up in heels, stockings, a lavender suit and pillbox hat with a bit of netting surrounding it, occasionally refused to believe she was Mrs. anyone, and she was still a young girl in overalls on a trip to see Maw-Maw. The reflected image of her in the darkened window, in full makeup, corsage beginning to wilt, was surreal and occasionally obscured by red crossing flashers and auto headlights, seemingly trying to peek into the car at the newlyweds.
While the distant lands of the many books Ramona had consumed would always beckon, their 'faraway' destination this night was not so much
where
as
when
. Eighteenth Century Virginia awaited them in the form of restored Colonial Williamsburg. The town was always nicely decorated for the holidays, and both Mona and Jeff had enjoyed their high school field trips there. As a sensible wedding and Christmas gift, his parents had reserved them several nights' stay at a tourist cabin in town, as well as their train tickets.
The horn blasts of a passing train of black coal cars awoke Jefferson, who immediately grinned at his bride. Moments later a couple stepped past them with aromatic paper cups of coffee, and the young blonde man spelled out an invitation with his burgeoning sign language skills and Mona nodded, both of them arose and stretched. They passed hand-in-hand through the cold vestibules toward the lounge car, the shifting floors reminiscent of a fun house. Once in a narrow corridor, Ramona made a sudden detour into an empty sleeping compartment. The door had been swinging back and forth with the motion of the nodding car. The light from the narrow lavatory revealed the sheets were hanging sloppily from the upper bunk, which was folded against the wall over a sofa strewn with a discarded newspaper.
Mona had concluded the compartment had been vacated during the train's recent long stop in Richmond, as no occupant would tolerate the flopping door. She latched it behind them and wasted no time in feeling around her husband's jacket pockets for his flask, a bourbon filled, surreptitious gift from his best man, who was a neighbor and classmate.
Jeff chuckled, as he hadn't been sure if his new wife knew of its presence. She took a surprising double gulp and gently pushed him backwards until he was sitting on the newspaper-covered sofa. The young woman's assertiveness remained from her younger days, when she knew not of words, and of necessity had to nudge, pound or grab something to call attention to it. Her lover had not seemed to mind, as it was a more precise expression than a clouded phrase or reference, even though the latter was more 'ladylike'. All afternoon, they had told each other how wonderful they felt, and no more words seemed necessary now, as the moonlight created passing shadows on the portions of the walls that weren't lit by the compartment's aluminum clad washroom.
Ramona looked at the blue eyes of her smiling husband
-
they even sparkled in the dim light of her shadow.
Husband