This chapter marks the final installation of Homecoming Scandal. Hope you've enjoyed this story; there will be other stories coming soon on the former Fabulous Five characters as well as the Baby-Sitters' Club and other characters from other stories! Check my profile under CNJ often. Enjoy this epilogue!
Homecoming Scandal
By: CNJ
PG-13
Epilogue
Jana:
"I'm ready..." I called to my parents, meaning my mom, dad, and my stepparents who were in the living room. My half-sister and half-brother were there too. I double-checked my hair, which was pulled back into a roll-like bun, pulled up the long white train of my wedding gown and walked slowly into the living room on the morning of Saturday, June 5, 2004.
"Oh...!" Mom gasped, her eyes growing huge and tearing up. Dad came over and kissed my cheek. So did my stepdad, Pink.
"You look wonderful, dear," Dad said.
"Thank you."
"Come on, kids, let's get going," Erma, my stepmom, announced as she rounded up her two kids, seven-year-old Leola and three-year-old Ty.
They both looked up at me a minute, then followed Erma. My mom and Pink followed.
I smiled up at Dad as he took my arm in his and we walked out the door together. For years, I'd wondered if Dad would be able to walk me down the aisle because he used to be an alcoholic. That was way before he met and married Erma when I was in seventh grade. It was with Erma that he had Leola, and Ty.
It was going to be a beautiful wedding after all. After so many years of dating Randy and being through a lot, including that awful scandal, we were finally getting married.
By tonight, I'd be Mrs. Randy Kirwan. And I was going to be a June bride! I got all dreamy thinking of Randy waiting at the church alter with me heading toward him.
I remembered that when my mom married Pink, I'd dreamed about my own wedding with a white lacy dress with a long train and veil. Looks like that came true, I thought once we got outside and I looked down at my long white wedding gown.
We were headed over to where my uncle, aunt, and two cousins, Jay and Tara Drake were staying and picking them up, then heading to St. Micheal's Church on Blanche Lane near Randy's house. My uncle is Mom's younger brother.
Dad drove one car with me in it while Pink drove the other car with the others. When we got there, Mom's parents were there as well as the Drakes and so was Randy's cousin, Todd Kirwan. So for the next few minutes, there was the re-shuffling on which cars to take. Just then, Randy's parents pulled up and got out.
"Randy's on his way to the church with his other cousins and his sister," his mom announced. "My, my, Jana don't you look lovely!"
"Tara...Jay?" My aunt Georgia called into the motel. "You kids ready?"
"Yeah..." It sounded like seventeen-year-old Jay and he came flouncing out.
Nineteen-year-old Tara took longer. She and I have never gotten along. I've always found her to be spoiled and I'm glad that she lives in North Carolina and not around here, so I don't have to put up with her often.
Finally, after taking her dear sweet time, she came out wearing a pure white long dress! I stared at her in disbelief as she said hello to everyone but me.
"Why is she wearing white?" I snapped. Aunt Georgia looked surprised, then looked at my dress, then at hers.
"I've never heard..." Aunt Georgia looked over at me questioningly. She knows why I can't stand Tara.
"Only the bride is supposed to wear white," I told my aunt as if she didn't know.
"Tara..." Aunt Georgia's face flushed a little. "Do you by chance have another dress in another color you can quickly change into?"
"No..." Tara glared at me and folded her arms across her chest. "Why? Is the bride afraid of me stealing the show?"
"Oh, don't worry, you couldn't if you tried," I sniped back at her, annoyed at her already.
"I guess...I'm sorry." My aunt looked helplessly at me. "It was my fault; I should have checked with Tara before we came." So that was that; my spoiled brat of a cousin showing up in white like a bride when I'M the bride here. Fabulous.
Tara:
I was going to be sooo glad when this wedding was over! I only came at Mom's insistence, but my cousin Jana I can do without. She's twenty-one, yet practically threw a tantrum like a five-year-old just because I wore the same color dress! Big, fat deal! She has to be the center of attention all the time and gets all offended if anyone deigns to step on "her" turf.
We finally decided who would go in which car and I wound up in the same car is Jay, Todd, and Jana. I didn't want to ride with Jana, but Mom heaved a gusty sigh and ordered me to in this exasperated voice. Jana looked as if she was going to throw another tantrum, but her mom also gave her a LOOK, so she flounced into the back seat.
Jay was driving and Todd sat in front next to him, so I had no choice but to ride not only with Jana, but be crammed in the back with her pompous, puffed-out dress all over the place.
On the way to the church, Todd and Jay rattled on and on about different things and occasionally I put in something while Jana sulked and sighed in silence. Well, sor-ry if I ruined HER big day!
I guess Jana realized that she was making an idiot of herself and didn't want to look stupid in front of her fiancee's cousin, so she added in an occasional comment to either Todd or Jay.
My brother joked a little, I think trying to put Todd at ease, since Todd is a very reserved person unlike Randy, who's very outgoing.
Once we got to the church, we scrambled out, well everyone except Jana, who got out very slowly since I gathered she didn't want to have a single wrinkle or smudge on her precious dress. I almost gagged when I saw her preen her hair through her veil. I turned on my heel and headed into the church vestibule.
Jana's little half-sister Leola was there with Erma. Leola is one sharp kid. She's got these big brown eyes and thick, straight, dark hair with a fringe of bangs.
"Hi, Tara!" she called.
"Hello, dear!" I gave her a small hug. "Don't you look wonderful!"
"Thank you." She beamed up at me. She was wearing a lavender silk dress and had matching little pearl-like barrettes in her dark brown hair. "You look pretty too."
"So how do you feel about Randy and your sister getting married?"
"Half-sister," Leola amended. "It's all right, I guess. I don't know Randy that well. I hear we're going to have a huge party afterward."
"That's right."
"Is it 'spensive?"
"I imagine it is," I laughed a little. "But it's covered. I think Jana's dad, Pink, and Randy's parents are paying for this wedding and the party."
"Hey, Tara..."
"Yeah..."
"Doesn't it bother you that men are doing all the driving here?" she asked.
"What...I guess," I was startled by her frankness. "I...guess now that I think of it, yes. People kind of assume that the guys do all the driving in mixed-gender situations, but it is rather old-fashioned thinking. In a lot of other families, women do just as much of the driving. After all, it is the twenty-first century." Tara nodded, seeming to think it over as more people came into the church.
The ceremony itself was a little dull. When the church organ sounded to Here Comes The Bride and Jana walked into the church on her dad's arm, everybody stood and looked over at them.
I stifled the urge to boo or thrown a hymn book at her. Jana's mom, who was behind me, teared up and had to get out tissues.
Once Jana and her dad reached the front, her dad sat and with Jana and Randy standing side by side at the altar, the minister gave this overly long sermon about the covenant of marriage and all that from the Bible and God joining two souls into one, yakyakyak.
Finally, when he pronounced Jana and Randy husband and wife and they kissed, Jana's mom burst into tears. Randy's mom reached over and handed her more tissues.
I just hoped Jana wouldn't see her mom blubbering all over the place; I know Jana would be mortified and probably avoid her mom for days for tarnishing her social "image."
"God...married..." I heard Erma sigh. "Hard to believe."
Randy:
Hard to believe, yet not so hard. Somehow, I always knew this day would come. Jana becoming my wife. I thought that over as we left the church to head to the reception. Outside, Leola wound up near us and talked up a storm. I pulled out my keys to the car. It felt so good knowing I'd have Jana beside me as my wife in the car.
"Hey, Jana," I heard Leola pipe up. "Do you always let Randy drive?" I stifled a laugh.
"Yeah, guys like to drive," Jana told her with a sigh.
"Doesn't that bother you?" Leola asked. Leola's one corker, I thought. In some ways, she reminded me of a girl Jana and I used to know back in middle and high school, Katie Shannon, who was a feminist and always sounding off on one cause or another. I wondered if Leola was heading in that direction too. Maybe she should have been Katie's little sister.
"No, why should it?" Jana asked defensively.
"Because it shows that females are considered second-class citizens."
"Leee-ola..." I heard Erma calling. Leola ran off calling, "Byyyyye!" Jana let out a sigh of relief.
"I hope she doesn't wind up like Whitney Larkin," Jana groaned once we were in the car and on the way to the hotel ballroom where the reception would take place. "Remember that girl who skipped sixth grade, nerdy and tiny? I'm afraid Leola's too precocious for her own good."
"I was thinking that she reminded me of Katie Shannon," I chuckled. "Remember what a feminist she always was spouting off on how terribly women were treated?" We both laughed.
"Heeeey, I'm a woman and I don't feel mistreated or second-class," Jana fluttered her eyes at me and we kissed.
Jay:
The reception itself was a little dull, but the food was good. Randy and Jana smooched every few minutes. As the meal wound down, the photographer took a million pictures of them and since both Jana and Randy love to have their picture taken and be the center of attention, they ate it all up. Randy was especially having fun and at one point started hamming it up for the camera and stuck out his tongue and crossed his eyes once, making some of the guests around him laugh.
"Randy..." Jana tugged at his sleeve. She whispered something at him. Randy shrugged, then I guess Jana didn't want him getting TOO goofy because after that, Randy settled down and they smiled normal smiles of a traditional proper couple.
Next to me, my sister glared at Jana and muttered something about, "...that pompous phony..." Me, I couldn't wait to get back home and e-mail my girlfriend, Jeri Zyman. Next year, we'd both be seniors and ready to graduate. Seems hard to believe that Randy and Jana graduated from high school just three short years ago and now they're a married couple.
Randy:
I was so glad when I got to drive home with just Jana later on that night. We talked a little as I drove, then Jana drifted off to sleep, her head in my lap.
It was a little past midnight and I thought over the fact that we're now married. Mr. and Mrs. Randy Kirwan. Wow. I grinned.
We were both living with my parents now. Pink, Dad, and I had moved Jana's stuff over to my house yesterday and my parents had bought a double bed for my bedroom so it could become our bedroom.
My dad's friend, who's a lawyer, had gotten me a slightly better-paying job as an office clerk. It's not my ideal kind of job, but hey I figured eventually, I could save up little by little and get back into sports, maybe look up a local team or something that professional coaches scouted out and maybe I'd be noticed and they'd pick me for one of their teams.
I know professional players make a lot of money, even starters, so once I got in, I figured I could get a house for Jana and me and we'd really be on our way.
Jana still worked at Tanninger's since we could still use all the money we could earn right now and last Christmas, Jana had done a little modeling for Tanninger's catalogues.
But until I got into pro sports or something along that line, we'd have to just live at home with my parents; even an apartment was way too expensive for us now.
Thank God that Homecoming fiasco at Connecticut U. was behind us now. My parents definitely had put it behind them and so had Jana's 'rents. I was sooo glad not to have to deal with those other jerks in that mess, especially Logan Bruno and Melanie Edwards, two of the most self-centered idiots on this side of the world.
Neither Jana or I have seen or heard from any of them since last November, when we had the big fight at the re-union dance and we were just as glad. So, it seemed like that debacle was over and we were turning over a new page in our lives, Jana and I. And now that Jana and I were officially adults, we'd be the ones to decide our lives from now on...together as a married couple.
Storyline Copyright 2002 by CNJ
