After the far too expensive lunch Andi and her husband went to the park, found a wonderful quiet spot, a private quiet spot, just on the bank of the river and spent literally the whole rest of the afternoon there. She fell asleep at one point and woke embarrassed, to find that her husband was also asleep. His hair was wet so he had no doubt gone swimming. She was glad she had been asleep for that.
And now they were walking, hand in hand, down an alley in the New City to see another of his uncles, an uncle Xavier. He hadn’t said anything about him, and she was determined to try to just take it as it came. She was dressed as her husband wanted her to be, she couldn’t really do anything about her speech or her manners… not in time for one visit, anyway, so she would just take it as it came.
But she was a little surprised by the route they were taking. He hadn’t asked her about the route, so she didn’t know where they were going, but this was getting into rather street class neighbourhood.
After walking down the alley for a few minutes her husband suddenly turned her into a side alley and she stopped, appalled. The entire alley was lit with lanterns, and was fully of people, street class people, all drinking, and half of them with instruments. This was some party. They should go around.
But suddenly one of the men in the alley saw her and her husband and shouted, “The Honey Couple is here!” and the entire alley erupted in sound… everyone yelling, cheering, probably singing altho she couldn’t tell it was all so loud…
And they were being drug down the alleyway, lads, lasses, littlies everywhere in all forms of dress, all street class, indeed everyone seemed to be street class, and there were dozens of navy men there, and, she supposed, their families.
“And here is my nephew, finally,” she heard as they got to a house in the middle of the street, and a dozen men lifted her husband up onto their shoulders, indeed, they had him stand on their uplifted hands. “And his wife,” she heard, and, shrieking, she herself was lifted up and, trembling all over, stood on the hands. She had seen this done but had never been part of it!
“My nephew and his new bride!” the man yelled, and everyone roared in agreement and, she saw, beer mugs were lifted and drunk, even by the littlies. “Almost done their honey trip,” he said, “They’ll be finishing it in our bedroom!”
Another roar, and another drink.
“And then they’re off to the army!”
This got a round of boos, and a large number of ‘up the navy’. One man, seemingly a bit drunker than the rest, tried to start the navy hymn, but her new uncle ignored him.
“One for the army, start right here, unless they’ve already succeeded!”
“God bless the womb,” the women all yelled and it seemed the introductions were finished and they got set down, and the musicians all started competing with each other.
“But, isn’t your uncle shop class?” Andi asked her husband… yelled at him, really.
“No! He is in the navy, but he has a job as a landing boat mechanic, so he doesn’t get any prize money. But he doesn’t really care. He’s home every night and contracted for eleven offspring, so he should do well on the exchange eventually. He might retire shop class… or maybe just a rather wealthy street class. He loves this kind of thing.”
“Eleven offspring. But not fully fertile?”
“Oh, no. No… I will be the only one in my family with that. My uncle Borron, well, he teased me about it. But he wouldn’t dare mention it to you. No, they just have a very strong willing contract.”
“Dance, dance!” the crowd began to chant and soon everyone was in four lines and the musicians all managed to get on the same song at the same time and the dance began… weaving all the way up and down the alleyway in the four long lines. And everyone was singing at the same time.
The dance seemed to go on forever, broken only when someone thrust a mug into their hands and they had to leave the line to down the rather strong beer… quite a bit stronger than what Andi was used to drinking. As soon as she finished her mug someone would drag her back into the line and the line would drag her back down the alleyway.
Finally, however, her husband found her and drug her off into her new uncle’s house. “Top floor,” he yelled at her, and they climbed and climbed. Up to the top floor where he took her in a room. “We have the final partition,” he said, and she saw that the long thin room was partitioned by curtains into three rooms. “Uncle and Aunt have this first area,” he said, waving. “Then my cousins, there are only three so far, have this middle area. And they partitioned off this final area just for us.”
A rough pile of blankets with a couple of pillows lay in the corner of the room, next to the window. Andi stared out the window as she undressed, watching the line continue. There were very few littlies left outside, and indeed most lads and lasses seemed to have either gone home or fallen asleep in the alley. Indeed quite a few adults were asleep on various doorsteps.
She turned back and saw him grinning at her, “Different from uncle Borron, no?”
“Very much so.”
“You didn’t have to worry about what to wear here.”
She snorted, “I could have gone stark naked and no one would have batted an eye.”
He grinned, “Well, you certainly would have added to the comments if you did that.”
“I don’t think that half the men that kissed me were related to you,” she said. “They were just taking liberties.”
He grinned, “Taking liberties is what my uncles friends do best… or so he always says.”
Andi flushed.
Song
The lad and the lass went sailing, on the deep blue sea
The lad and the lass went sailing, fleeing the fathers three
The fathers three went sailing, to capture the runaways
“We’ll drag them back by the mainmast,
And bring them home to stay!”
—
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Von