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“Hey, y'all!”
With which big, warm greeting Mrs. Gladys Jubilee Trent, mother to Sgt. Vincent Trent, paternal grandmother to Melvin, Vanna, Velma, Milton, and Gracie Trent, announced her arrival, and the Trent house emptied out to greet her – along with all but two of the people in the Ludlow home.
“You ever feel like we're just here to cook the food and lock the doors and stuff?” Mrs. Maggie Lee laughingly said to her husband Col. H.F. Lee as he laughed.
“You gotta know your position in life, Maggie,” he said as they followed the little Ludlow cousins they had charge of for a few more days out to meet Mrs. Trent.
Mrs. Trent was a large, tall woman with glowing onyx skin and a strong face topped with a shock of silver hair – striking in appearance in a long golden-hued sun dress. One could look at her and almost see her ancestor Hubert Jubilee, the Shooting Conductor on the Underground Railroad, looking out of a daughter's sharp eyes – but her expression was full of love as she embraced all her grandchildren, their first cousins Tom (16) and Vertran Stepforth (9), all their little Ludlow friends Eleanor (11), Andrew (10), George (9), Edwina (8), Amanda (7), Grayson (6), and Lil' Robert (5), and then her grandparent counterparts Mr. Thomas and Mrs. Velma Stepforth. To them she had more of love to say.
“Prayed for y'all like I prayed for Vincent and Melissa, and I just thank God that y'all also decided to do what you were supposed to do and get back together.”
“Yeah, there was nothing else out there that either of us wanted,” Mrs. Stepforth said. “Thanks for the prayers, Gladys.”
“We needed them, and we appreciate them, and yeah, basically I got my life together and Velma was right there,” Mr. Stepforth said.
All their grandchildren tackled them again for all that, knowing their shared ancestors were combined in love, and then the Ludlow little ones just piled in, to be gently peeled off by their big Lee cousins.
“It's all right,” Mrs. Trent said. “I have heard so much about my grandchildren's little friends – it's so nice to meet y'all, and Col. Lee, I know you.”
“Mrs. Trent, indeed we are acquainted. You sang at my uncle Hopkins Sr.'s funeral, and your voice is still known to me. This is my wife, Mrs. Maggie M. T. Lee.”
Mrs. Trent smiled.
“Is that my friend Maria Milano I see in your face, Mrs. Maggie?”
“That's my grandmother!” Mrs. Lee said.
“I know Nabucco and Maria Milano, your grandparents – also wonderful people,” Mrs. Trent said. “So, basically, we're all just one big extended family here!”
“Basically!” Mrs. Velma Stepforth said with her granddaughter Velma.
“Ain't it the truth,” granddaughters Gracie and Vanna said along with Gracie's friends Edwina and Amanda Ludlow.
“Oh my … it's starting already,” nine-year-old George whispered to ten-year-old Andrew Ludlow his brother.
“And we thought only Rob was doing real grandparent twinnifications, but, no – the echofications have begun!” Andrew said.
“No, we're not just here to cook food and lock doors,” Col. Lee said to Mrs. Lee later. “We are also here to make up on all the laughs we may have missed in our years of grief – echofications and twinnifications?”
“Oh, we're going to need a lot of snugglecouragement to get through this!” Mrs. Lee said as she started laughing all over again. “
“Ain't it the truth!” Col. Lee said as he dabbed at his eyes. “Wait until Robert and Thalia get back, and there are five grandparents here in the space of four and all their little twinnifications can bounce off of all five of them every day while we cook food, lock doors, and get treated for broken ribs for laughing!”
“I was already down for the count,” Mrs. Lee said, “but it would have to be Edwina, Grandlee Ludlow herself, to come by and kick me when I'm down, talking with Gracie about, 'See, I totally get it because why would you break bad up close when you can learn from people that can get folks from two miles off – I see why the Lees-of-the-Mountain and the Milanos are friends with the Jubilees-of-the-mountain because you can get peace all around if you just learn the right sharpshooter stuff – it all makes sense to me!'”
“And then Gracie being all, 'Ain't it the truth, but, you gotta be at least as tall the gun is long before you can get that kind of training,' and then Edwina imitating her baby brother with 'Next week, though!'” Col. Lee said as he fell out onto the bed.
“Basically!” Mrs. Lee said before she joined him.
“Wait a minute – have we become part of the echofications?” Col. Lee said, and at that, both of them were laughing so hard that by the time they got over it, they had laughed themselves pretty much to sleep, sore ribs and all!
