My Kind of Town
My Kind of Town
>> Queen's Medical Center Yes! Yes! Yes!
Technically, it wasn't a question.
"I can't call you cousin any more, Lily. But I could call you my wife. If you'd marry me."
Technicalities, schmechnicalities.
"Yes!" Lily Ah Sun said and threw herself into her former cousin Quinn's muscular arms as he sat up in his bed, a big bandage on his right thigh. "Yes! Yes! Yes!"
It was a refrain that would be repeated often in their years together.
And the tears that had just moments ago flowed so bitterly when she learned that she was not a love child but a rape child started again.
But they tasted different, Quinn noticed, kissing them away.
"And you won't even have to change your last name," he said. As if further convincing were necessary.
"People at the Health Department are going to wonder, though," Lily said with a giggle, "when two Ah Suns apply for a marriage license."
How is it, Quinn wondered, that she could laugh and cry at the same time. The marvel of a woman.
"When?" Lily had seen friends' engagements drag on for years. She did not want to be a fiancee forever. "I want to do something old-fashioned and wait for our wedding night to make love. But I don't want to wait too long."
"Well, since most of our family is already here in the hospital, let's do it right away."
"Yes! Of course!"
But then the shadow of a frown passed over her. "Quinn, on second thought, I'm not so sure I want this family involved."
"Good point. There are things I still have to ask my dad about."
"And I have to talk with my mom. Unfortunately, I'm afraid that after his heart attack, asking my dad -- I can't stop calling him that -- asking him questions about Bobo would be a bad idea."
"Probably right."
"But I absolutely have to talk with my mom. And the sooner I ask, the sooner I can be Mrs. Ah Sun."
She started to get up.
"And the sooner you can be making love with Mr. Ah Sun."
That stopped her in her tracks, and the kona-weather way she looked at him, then the way she kissed him, Quinn knew he was going to enjoy every sticky, sweaty moment of blessed Mister-and-Missusness.
They were still kissing when they heard a rap on the door and a familiar voice calling "I just wanted to say so long ..." And then "Oh my God!"
"Hey, Laird," Lily said, casually sitting up, catching her breath.
"I can't believe it! You two are cousins!"
"Didn't you hear? You and Quinn are cousins, but not me."
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin
with weekly summaries on Sunday.
He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com