Princess Claire
Chapter 1
Disclosure and Acknowledgement:
I am using JE's wonderful characters for fun, not profit.
Thank you to Maggie, my wonderful content and copy editor.
One rainy afternoon in mid-October, Frankie Manoso, age three years plus, sat playing in his Grandma Plum's living room. He looked at a photograph hanging on the wall, one that he looked at many, many times, but never noticed. But, for some reason, he noticed it now. He put aside the toys that he was playing with and asked his Grandpa Frank, who was in the living room minding his only grandson and watching sports on television, "Who's that, Grampa?"
Frank Plum looked up from the game and said, "Who's who?"
"In the picture." Frankie pointed at the photograph. "Who's in the picture?"
Frank called out, "Helen, come here, Frankie has a question for you," and went back to watching his game.
"Oh, for heaven's sake, Frank," she called back from the kitchen, "can't you answer his question?"
"No. You need to answer this one."
"Okay, I'm coming," Helen rang out as she walked from the kitchen. Her mother, Edna Mazur, who lived with the Plums ever since her husband, Grandpa Mazur, took his last bite of goulash and went to Hungarian heaven, followed behind. "Frankie, what do you want, sweetheart?"
"Who's that?" asked Frankie as he pointed towards the photograph.
Helen looked at the photograph of Frank and her on their wedding day. They were so young when they married, Frank was twenty-one and Helen was just nineteen. It was a nice picture and they both looked good in it. It was professionally taken so airbrushing was done, but not too much. They looked like enhanced versions of themselves: Frank, handsome in his rented tux, and Helen, pretty in her big white dress and veil. The dress was a bit of a meringue with its flounces and frippery, but Helen loved the dress as a bride and still loved it. She hoped that maybe one of her granddaughters would wear it on her wedding day, since both of her daughters, Valerie and Stephanie, declined to wear the dress for their weddings since they wanted their own special meringues. Helen always thought that her girls should have worn the dress since it brought her good luck. She and Frank had a successful union that produced two lovely daughters and four wonderful grandchildren. Her own daughters both struck out with their first marriages, much to Helen's chagrin and embarrassment, but were, thankfully, successful in their second ones
"That's Grandpa and me."
"You and Grampa?"
"Yep, hard to believe that your Grandma was once young. She got old," said Grandma Mazur, as she fluffed her neatly curled silver hair.
Frankie looked at his grandparents and his great-grandmother. They looked old to him. Mommy and daddy and even Uncle Tank looked old to him. Frankie looked at the photograph again. "You was boo-ti-ful, Gramma."
Frank looked at Helen. "She's still beautiful."
Both Helen and her mother looked at Frank. He rarely spoke, even when spoken to. Helen beamed. It took her grandson to get her husband to tell her she was beautiful. Not just beautiful, but still beautiful, which meant even more to Helen. She'd have to bake a batch of cookies for both of her guys.
"Why you dressed up? Was it Hal-o-ween?"
"No, Frankie, it's our wedding picture. That's how you dress when you get married."
"Did my mommy and daddy dress like that when they got married?"
"No," said Grandma Mazur, "they didn't dress like that. They eloped."
"'loped? What's that?"
"That's when you runaway to get married," said Grandma Mazur.