Pat’s mother hugged her hello and pulled her to the stove. “You have to see the bird.
It’s magnificent. It’s a monster!” She opened the oven door to display the deeply browned turkey, enveloping Megan and twelve other curious onlookers in a rush of heat.
She gasped at the enormous creature. It was a beast, sitting in simmering splendor, disgorging stuffing from between its colossal drumsticks.
“I think I overstuffed it,” Mrs. Hunter said. “Pat stitched it up with his best surgical skills, but the darn thing split open about half an hour ago.” She lovingly basted it and shut it back up in the oven.
The big brown rabbit hopped across Megan’s feet, with Pat’s nephew in hot pursuit. Timmy gurgled happily from his new walker as he scooted backward over the kitchen floor. A football game could be heard blasting from the television in the bedroom overhead, and Megan helped Laurie fix a platter of crackers and cheese and carried it to the circle of women by the fireplace.
She was able to watch Pat from a distance. His face was flushed from the heat of the kitchen and the excitement of the day. He stooped to give Timmy a kiss while picking up a dropped toy. He surreptitiously took a small swipe of whipped cream from a pumpkin pie and carried a six – pack of cold beer up the stairs.
He was wonderful, she thought. Second only to the turkey, and when the turkey was picked clean, Pat would be the most edible dish in town.
The oven buzzer rang, and they all jumped to their feet. Laurie poked the potatoes bubbling in a caldron on the stove. “Done!” She picked up the electric mixer and stood there poised, ready for mashing.
Mrs. Hunter stabbed the turkey at the juncture of the thigh. “Done!”
Megan’s mother punctured a baked sweet potato. “Done!”
All action stopped while the women stared at the turkey.
“It’s big,” Megan’s mother said.
Mrs. Hunter worried her bottom lip. “The butcher said twenty – seven pounds, but I don’t believe him. Looks more like fifty.”
Mrs. Murphy had two big meat forks in her hands, but she didn’t make a move to lift the turkey. “How the devil are we going to get it onto the platter?”
“Well,” Pat’s sister Laurie said, “Pat bought it. I think he should be given the honor.”
Everyone agreed. It was Pat’s job.
“Hey, Pat,” Megan yelled up the stairs. “You’re needed in the kitchen for bird transfer.”
All the men trooped downstairs.
“No sweat,” Pat said. “Obviously, this is one of those things that requires a man’s cool head and brute strength.” He surveyed the bird and stabbed its midsection with the two forks. “Hold the platter,” he instructed his brother. “Hold the rack,” he instructed his father.
He raised the bird a fraction of an inch and moved it forward. The turkey rotated on the forks, its tender meat disintegrating around the tines, and the beast dropped with a loud thunk onto the open oven door. It jumped off the door and skittered across the kitchen floor, coming to rest toe to toe with Timmy.
“Brrrph,” Timmy said.
Megan’s mother never batted an eye. She set the platter on the floor, grabbed the turkey stem to stern, and hefted it onto the dish with a loud grunt. “Hardly touched the floor. And the thirty – second rule’s in effect. Good thing this floor’s clean,” she said.
Pat’s nephew’s eyes got as big as golf balls. “Oh, neat. It left a grease trail. Looks like slug slime!”
Pat’s niece wrinkled her nose. “Yuk. It fell on the floor! Now it has rabbit cooties. I’m not eating it. Not one single bite. You can’t make me eat rabbit cooties.”
Pat lifted the bird onto the table and grinned. “And to think I was worried something would go wrong today. Silly me.”
When everyone was seated, Pat carved from the top of the turkey, swearing to his niece by the Hippocratic oath that it was impossible for the top of the turkey to have rabbit cooties.
They worked through the mountains of potatoes, sampled all the vegetables, polished off the spoon bread, and ate and ate and ate, but they didn’t make a dent in the turkey. Even after second and third helpings, it was obvious someone would be eating leftover turkey for a very long time.
Megan looked down the table at the butchered carcass and contemplated a marriage ceremony that went: through good times and bad times, in sickness and in health, turkey soup, turkey salad, turkey croquettes… till death do us part.
Maybe she should reconsider her relationship with Pat. She could put up with his bizarre sense of humor, and she could live with his rabbit. She wasn’t sure if she could handle the turkey leftovers.
The turkey was replaced by four different kinds of pie, Indian pudding, gingerbread cookies, pecan bars, and the King’s Arms’ fig ice cream. After sampling nearly everything, Megan pushed her chair back and groaned. “I can’t eat another bite.”
Pat’s nephew burped. “ ’Scuse me,” he said. “This was great.”
“We should do this again at Christmas,” Megan’s mother said. “We’ll get a nice big Virginia baked ham.”
“Yeah!” Pat’s nephew shouted. “And Uncle Pat can make it slime across the floor. Boy, that was so cool.”
“What about the wedding?” Pat’s niece asked. “When is the wedding? Will I be a flower girl?”
Pat pretended to be serious. “The bride decides things like that.”
Megan wanted to kick him a good one under the table, but he was half a mile away, at the opposite end.
Everyone turned to her, waiting for an answer. She narrowed her eyes at Pat, who was obviously exerting every ounce of self control he possessed to keep from bursting out laughing.
“Well,” she said evenly, “I thought we’d have the wedding Christmas Eve.” She smiled at the little girl. “I’d be honored to have you as flower girl.”
Pat grimaced. Terrific, he thought. Now she’d set a date. This was like playing Monopoly, moving your pieces around the board. What would happen when they got to GO? Would they collect two hundred dollars? Or would they actually get married? He saw a look of triumph flit across Megan’s face, and thought she looked as if she’d just bought Boardwalk.
He was losing the battle of one – upmanship. He was also getting sucked further into his meddling mother’s fantasy. The time was fast approaching when he was going to have to decide if it was his fantasy too.
After the dishes were loaded into the dishwasher, the pots were scrubbed, the food was refrigerated, and the banquet table was folded up and stored in the shed, Pat’s brother and his family said their good – byes and returned to their hotel room. Timmy was bedded down, Pat’s three sisters went off in search of night life, and the four parents sat enjoying the hypnotic sizzle of the fire.
Pat held out Megan’s black coat for her. “Megan Murphy, would you like to go for a walk?”
“Is this a hint? Do I need exercise? Has the pumpkin pie started appearing on my thighs already?”
“You bet it’s a hint. But not about pumpkin pie. It’s about hugs and kisses and privacy for lovers.” He zipped his leather jacket and wrapped a scarf around his neck. “It’s about a romantic moonlight stroll through Colonial Williamsburg.”
They walked east on Nicholson Street. A horse whinnied in the distance. A low
