“So one day, I was sitting on my back deck fishing, and I closed my eyes for just a moment,” Bebop winked at me, “resting my eyes as I do, and the next moment I’m sitting in a stranger’s living room with an old man and woman staring back at me.”
He had us all enraptured, Cooper, Jeffrey, Eoghanan and me all standing around him, listening intently to his tale of how Morna had brought him here. He had the unique ability to tell any story, even everyday stories that weren’t truly as interesting as the one he told now, as if they were the grandest of tales.
No wonder my son had such a vivid imagination and that he’d developed an early love of books. Who wouldn’t with a grandfather like that to tell you stories? He was the sort of man one could listen to for hours.
Bebop, whose real name was Charles Oakes, was a good decade older than both of my parents. He and Maggie had given birth to Jeffrey later in life, after over a decade of trying to have children. Bebop stood the same average height as Jeffrey, about five-seven, although his shoulders now hunched a little, making him look shorter than he really was. An avid cyclist, he was in phenomenal shape for a man his age, but he still looked very grandfatherly—like a surprisingly sprite Gepetto.
He still had a full head of hair but it was entirely gray, and he wore a pair of spectacles that often lingered on the end of his nose. He continued relaying his tale, laughing as he spoke.
“Well, I’ll tell you. For a moment I thought my mind had either caught up with the age of my body, or I’d had a heart attack sitting right on my deck and heaven was just very different than I’d ever imagined it.”
Cooper leaned back, still in Bebop’s arms and gripped either side of the man’s face, as if he couldn’t believe he was really here. “So how did she make you believe everything? These two,” he pointed to me and his father, “had a real hard time with it.”
Bebop leaned in and pressed his forehead to Cooper’s, speaking only to him. “Did your mother read you the story that your Dad and I picked out for you?”
Cooper nodded, their foreheads still touching. “Yeah, I loved it, Bebop. When I first saw E-o, I thought maybe he was like that little prince in the book, and he’d come here on a spaceship.”
Bebop, pulled back, his cheeks still framed by Cooper’s little hands. “Well, I’m not ruined like the grown-ups in the book. I can still see things like a child. I’ve always believed in a bit of magic.” He turned his head to the side to look at us ‘ruined,’ grown-ups. “But, I’ll tell you. I don’t know if I could have dreamed up something like this. How very exciting. Now,” he shifted Cooper into his left arm and reached up to grip his head with his right hand. “I need someone around here to give me something to help with this bloody bad headache.”
Chapter 37
“How’s my sweet girl doing? You look stunning.”
I turned and threw my arms around Bebop, still stunned and delighted at his sudden appearance here. “I’m great. How’s your head?”
“Oh, that,” he dismissed it with his hand, “much better actually. I have to tell you Grace, the last time I saw you in a dress about to walk down the aisle, the sight made me ill.”
I snorted, laughing into his shoulder. It had made me ill as well. “Geeze, thanks.”
“You know what I mean, Grace. My heart was broken for you that you planned to do something so foolish as to marry my son. This is very different. I don’t pretend to know the man you plan to marry, but it feels very right to me. And my gut is always right.”
It was. Bebop’s advice was something I’d never taken lightly.
“Thank you. I can’t tell you how glad I am that you’re here. It seems rather impossible to me.”
“Less impossible to you than me, I imagine. Childlike I may be, but truthfully, all of this is a lot to take in.” He paused, releasing me so that I could take one last glance in the mirror. “Can I tell you a story?”
I would never turn down a Bebop story. “Of course you can.”
“Good. Are you ready? I’ll tell you while we walk down if you are.”
“Yes.” I smiled and looped my arm in his.
I wasn’t altogether sure where exactly the wedding would take place. We’d announced our impending nuptials the morning after Bebop arrived, but had decided to have a private ceremony with only the closest of family. Cooper, Jeffrey, and Bebop on my side. Baodan, Mitsy, and Kenna on Eoghanan’s.
As a result, there’d been very little to prepare, and I gladly allowed Eoghanan to plan all of the little surprises he seemed so intent upon.
As we moved down the hallway from the bedchamber where I’d readied myself with the help of Mitsy and Kenna, Bebop began his story. “Do you remember what I told you when you were pregnant with Cooper? When you were so worried that you would be a terrible mother?”