(My thanks go to Linda62953. She did a great job of finding my mistakes and pointed out the errors in the story line that I missed.)
Sitting my father down and having a conversation about this with him, left him laughing so much, I'm sure they heard him in the next state.
"Dad, there is something else. As I left, Gretchen told me they are a package deal. If I agree to this, I not only get Victoria, Gretchen comes with her."
My father sat and thought about this for a moment and nodded his head, this time he didn't laugh.
"I suppose, given the amount of time those two have been together, the train wreck relationships that Victoria has had and the constant assault she has had to deal with in the boardroom, it would stand to reason they would seek comfort with each other, both physically and emotionally."
As I stood to make us drinks, my dad continued with his conversation. He told me he had noticed how close they were when they came to visit. The strange thing was that my father seemed to take all this in his stride. We even talked of the logistics of their visit as though it was the most natural thing to have the owner of one of the biggest diamond companies in the world come visit.
"I must say, you seem to be taking this most bazaar of situations in your stride."
It wasn't until Dad had his drink in his hands that he spoke again, and what he said next made sense to me.
"Son we're Ellington's, we've had to deal with strange situations for generations. I'm not saying we're unique in that, but we have sure lasted longer than others have. Even if we discard generations of our history and concentrate on you, no one could foresee Carol dying in childbirth, or what happened to Lou-Lou. Yes I know you went wild for a while and frankly, I wanted to kill you myself a couple of times but your mother and Connie knew you would settle down."
We both nodded our heads in agreement.
"I want Connie to keep Lou-Lou for awhile yet. This whole thing needs time dad, and to be honest, I'm still not sure I know what I'm doing. Carol was my life all through college. Then she gave me Lou-Lou and then left us both. Perhaps I'm floundering around and all this was meant to be, or I could be another of her train crash relationships. Hell, I've not even kissed the girl, yet she seems to think I'm the one."
My father listened to me rant and waited until I had finished. It was clear to me; he was holding his own thoughts in check by the way he held his cup so tightly.
"Lou-Lou told me she felt something the day she mapped Victoria's face. Blind people connect with other people on a different level son. I think my granddaughter knew before you both did, the outcome of you going to Boston. She told Connie you would be a changed man when you came back and hoped it was going to be for the better."
As my father spoke there seemed to be steeliness about him, he looked hard at me, almost to assess what he saw in front of him.
"Son, since Carol's death your dick has either been in your pants or you've had your hand wrapped around it and that ain't natural. If this.... this relationship is what you both or rather all three of you need, then grasp it with both hands. Victoria mapped your face. She has seen the real you. Not the one every sighted person sees and she's not shied away from him."
All I could do was nod my head. We talked the logistics of both Victoria's and Gretchen's arrival, he surprised me when he suggested we use the old house. When Mom and dad first got married, they lived in the old house behind the barn I had converted to a workshop. In reality, it was nothing more than a large cabin with two bedrooms. When I came onto the scene, mom insisted dad build out. Rather than that, he built her a new house and the old house became a place for guests.
The next day, dad organized a cleaning crew. A day and a half later, the place was spotless and smelling of all sorts of flowery stuff, we guys have never heard of. On my father's insistence, all of the furniture was placed in one corner. When Victoria gets here, we would spend an hour or so letting her tell us where she wanted the furniture, so she could make her own map as we went along.
While the cleaning crews were busy, we set about digging a gravel path from the front door outwards, it split after twenty yards, one branch ended up at the front of my workshop and the other led to the front of dad's house. Connie came by and brought Lou-Lou with her, we held hands and walked over to the seat that my daughter had first met Victoria and Gretchen and I sat her down.
It was one of the strangest 'honey we need to talk' moments I had ever had with my daughter. And one of those times I found out, she sure had Carol's genes. When I had finished explaining my trip to Boston and what all three of us talked about when I was there, Lou-Lou simply sat and pondered for a moment.
"You know, this kinda reminds me of an arranged marriage, only with an Ellington twist to it."
We both smiled and then a thought struck me, something that dad had said and something I had seen my own daughter do.
"Honey, you mapped Victoria's face. When you did that, I noticed that you frowned for a moment, you felt something."
At first, my daughter tried to brush my question away, but I kept at her.
"It was just a feeling dad. For a rich girl she sure is lonely. Grandpa told me that she came here with men with guns to protect her, I know rich folks do that sometimes, yet when I mapped her face their was a sadness about her."
Lou-Lou reached out her hands and I held them in mine as she squeezed them.
"Remember last summer you took me fishing down by the creek. We sat all day and talked. Just as we were fixin' to leave, that catfish pulled on your line. You took close to half and hour to get that damn fish out of the creek. The line you used should have snapped, but you adjusted what you were doing to what needed to be done to get him."
My own daughter nailed her argument then and there.
