Waiting for Sunrise (21 page)

John Sikes took a deep breath. “Billy . . . I don’t know if I could have been half the man you are at eighteen, to be honest, and I was a pretty fine catch.” He smiled. “Just ask my wife.”

“Hear, hear.” There was a long pause as Ronni’s parents looked at each other from opposite ends of the table. “Go ahead, John,” Mrs. Sikes finally encouraged.

“Let’s start with the Cedar Key idea. I’ve done some research into the seaside village. I’ve read up on the history. Fascinating, I must say. I’ve made calls into renting one of the buildings along Dock Street. Put together some numbers . . .”

Billy waited, his eyes fixed on the man who held his future in his hands.

“I think it’s a viable plan, Mr. Liddle.”

Billy exhaled a breath he’d not been aware he was holding. “Really, sir?”

“But I also think eighteen is awfully young to take on such a thing as management.” He glanced at his wife. “Mrs. Sikes and I have discussed it. For the first year, I’ll manage and you’ll be my assistant manager. Can you live with that?”

Billy nearly leapt in his chair. If he was saying yes to the restaurant, then maybe . . . “Yes, sir.”

“And one year should also give my daughter and her mother time to plan what I’m sure will be the wedding of the century.”

Billy felt one side of his mouth rise in a grin. He looked at Ronni, who had stopped holding back her tears as she looked at her father. “Oh, Daddy,” she whispered.

John Sikes winked at his daughter. “You all right with that, kitten?”

Ronni nodded in answer and her father turned his attention back to Billy. “Mr. Liddle . . . do you have something you’d like to ask my daughter?”

Billy looked at his mother. She, too, was crying. One look at Mrs. Sikes told him she had joined in as well.

“Go ahead, son,” Mama said.

Billy stood, slipped his hand into his front pants pocket as he walked behind his future father-in-law, and then came to stand beside the young woman he would one day call his wife. Retrieving the small ring box from where it had been tucked all evening, strategically hidden by his suit coat, Billy knelt on one knee. He opened the box.

Ronni gasped; her hands flew to her lips.

“Veronica Sikes, will you do me the honor of being my wife?” he asked, having practiced all afternoon.

“Yes,” she whispered as her slender fingers came along both sides of his face. “A thousand times, yes.” She looked up at her father, and Billy did the same.

“Chaste only,” he remarked.

Billy looked again to Ronni, who smiled with closed lips. Billy stretched toward them, and they met his halfway. For the first time, they sealed their love with the briefest of kisses.

It was the sweetest moment of his life.

24

Summer 1961

The wedding was set for June 24, 1961, the last Saturday of the month, and the opening of the restaurant exactly four weeks after that. For a year, Billy had worked side by side with his future father-in-law (who insisted Billy call him John) and had done his best to soak up everything he could about opening a restaurant and keeping it going. He’d put in long hours for very little pay, and John had matched him hour for hour. He’d also helped Billy purchase a 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air, black with white tail fins and wide whitewalls. It was both reliable and not so shabby to look at.

The two men rented a two bedroom, one bath cottage with bead-board interior on 5th Street that would one day be home to Mr. and Mrs. William Liddle. The men called it practical while Mrs. Sikes and Ronni declared it to be “precious.” The rooms were small, but both the exterior and interior had been renovated after 1950 when Hurricane Easy had hovered over the town for nearly ten hours. The damage had been extensive but, in true Cedar Key fashion, cleanup and renovation had been sure.

During the week, as workmen clamored and hammered around them, Billy learned by doing and by listening.

“You’ll never be bored, Billy,” John told him one afternoon as they walked from 5th to the Dock Street location of what would soon be Sikes’s Seafood Cedar Key.

“I haven’t been so far, sir.” While Billy had reluctantly taken to calling his mentor by his given name,
not
calling him “sir” was out of the question.

“We’ll need to look at hiring soon enough. Have you made a list of employees? Hostesses, waitstaff, cooks, washers . . .”

“I went over the list you gave me.” They walked along G Street—a longer route, but they enjoyed the view—the wide expanse of the Gulf of Mexico to their right and before them. The beach the locals called “the spit” was covered by a high tide. Large pelicans flew with purpose toward the east while seagulls made lazy trails overhead. Billy looked across the way to Atsena Otie, the original Cedar Key. Its narrow white beaches gleamed under the early morning sunlight. “I’ve made some posters for the outside of the building to let people know we’re hiring soon. Whenever you give the word, I’ll change the ‘soon’ to a date.”

“Soon . . .” John said. He looked up, breathed in. “Nice day.” They rounded the bend where G became 1st.

“Freedom 7 lifts off in two days,” Billy noted as though the thought came to him from nowhere. He tilted his head to look at the perfect blue of the sky arched over them. “Hard to believe an American is going to travel in space.”

“I told Harriett we’d come in early Friday morning so we can watch it on television with the family.”

“Oh?”

The older man grinned. “Stanley and Travis don’t want the rocket to take off unless their old man is there to watch it with them.”

Billy smiled. “Does Ronni know? That we’re coming in?” They walked between the shadows of the small, old homes along both sides of the street. A local had told Billy that “they were floated over from Seena-Otie after that hurricane late last century. All that was left, near-bout.” Every morning, when he and John walked this way, Billy felt stirred by the history surrounding him.

“I told Harriett to be sure to tell her.” John cast a sideward glance toward him as they turned onto C Street. “Harriett said Veronica’s dress is finished and that it fits like a dream.”

Billy made a pretense of waving his hands about his ears. “Ahhhh . . . don’t tell me,” he said with a laugh. “I’m not supposed to know anything about the dress.” The sun now blazed across the water and onto them.

John chuckled. “You’re not supposed to
see
the bride in the dress. Hearing about it . . . my boy, prepare yourself. It’s
all
I hear about. Veronica’s dress, the bridesmaids’ dresses, flowers and petit fours.”

Billy raised his voice as they walked up to what would soon be their restaurant to be heard over the workmen who came even earlier than they. “Petit fours? What in the world is that?”

John Sikes slapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll know soon enough . . .”

———

On most weeks, Billy and John drove home to Gainesville for a day or two, but on different days, always depending on what had to be done in Cedar Key. Some weeks there was no trip inland at all; a meeting with insurance and supply company reps or the need to work out licenses or food supply issues took precedence over their need to be with those they loved. Their Sunday worship time was spent at one of the churches on the island.

Most evenings while in Gainesville were spent with Ronni, usually at the local movie theater. Together they’d giggled over
101 Dalmatians
, felt inspired by
Swiss Family Robinson
and
Exodus
, and been frightened by
Midnight Lace
. Afterward they’d meet up with friends at a nearby soda shop and then either go back to Billy’s to spend time with his mother or Billy would take Ronni home. He rarely lingered; he felt he’d taken enough of the Sikes’s family time, what with John pouring so much of himself into the Cedar Key venture and the efforts for the wedding.

But the early morning of May 5, both families gathered at the Stone residence with Mr. and Mrs. Stone. Mrs. Sikes had gained permission from the school to allow Stanley, a high school senior, and Travis, now a seventh grader, to stay home the first half of the day so they could watch an American’s first venture into space. The school had graciously granted permission.

Mrs. Stone made a pot of aromatic coffee and Billy’s mother brought both orange and grape juice. Mrs. Stone’s dining room table was laid out with a variety of breakfast foods from all three households, decorated by tiny American flags flying stiff from toothpicks.

Breakfast was finished amongst a high level of excited conversation, and then everyone went into the living room to gather at the sofa, the matching chairs, the transferred dining room chairs, and the plush white carpeting. Early delays in the liftoff had everyone sitting on edge, but Walter Cronkite kept them informed. Coffee cups were drained and juice glasses sat empty on the coffee table. No one dared move from the Olympic console television set Mr. Stone had purchased just for the occasion.

A last minute delay at T-15 minutes. Billy held his breath as information about the real-time trajectory computer was explained to the American public. “Fascinating stuff,” he said out loud, but to no one in particular.

Finally, at just past nine-thirty, they heard what all of America, if not the world, had been waiting to hear. “. . . three . . . two . . . one . . . zero . . .” They watched as the long arm fell away gracefully. “. . . liftoff . . .” The long white bullet with the dark head seemed suspended in a puff of white smoke until it eased upward into the perfect sky, marred only by a few thick white clouds ringing the horizon.

Newscasters had already explained that they were not allowed as close as they’d like to be. To Billy, what with the black-and-white of the screen and the cameras so far away, the rocket looked more like a narrow school pencil than a ballistic missile. Further complicating the visual of the home viewer was all that smoke rising from its base.

“It’s all kinda fuzzy,” Travis said.

“But it’s history,” Herbert Stone pointed out. “And at least we can hear what’s going on in the control tower and from Freedom 7.”

“Oh . . . roger . . .” As if on cue, Shepard’s voice, marred by static, came through the Olympic set. “Liftoff and the clock has started . . . all systems are go!”

The small group clapped and cheered as though they were a part of the onlookers, mostly men, the television now displayed. They stood with binoculars pressed against their eyes. A few held cameras that they tried to shield against the bright morning sunlight. Reporters and cameramen from various television stations appeared to be on alert for the next moment . . . and the next.

“Oxygen is go . . . cabin holding at five-point-five.”

“It really does just look like a tiny dot on the television screen,” Mama muttered.

From the television speakers they heard more chatter exchanged between Shepard and the control room. “All systems go,” Shepard said.

“That’s all systems go,” came the static-covered response.

“. . . switching to manual pitch . . .”

“What does that mean?” Ronni looked up at Billy from where she sat at his feet with her legs curled under her.

“Shhh!” Travis said.

Ronni scowled at her little brother. Billy leaned down and said, “It’s an aeronautical term . . . something they do in the flight rotation. Pitch, yaw, roll.”

Ronni looked at him as if he were the smartest man in the world. His heart flipped before he turned his attention back to the television. “. . . from the periscope . . . what a beautiful view!” Shepard gave a bird’s-eye report of the state of Florida.

Travis, who had been sitting on the floor near the television, came up on his knees. “Boy, imagine that. He just said he can see where we live!”

“. . . forty-five thousand feet now . . . roger . . .”

Stanley scooted to the edge of a dining room chair. “It’s really something, huh, Dad? It’s like all those Buck Rogers comics coming true.” He glanced up at his father, who stood behind him, hands on his son’s shoulders.

John Sikes laughed. “It sure is, son. It sure is.” He gave his son a playful shake.

Billy glanced toward his mother, who sat on the sofa next to Nadine Stone. Her eyes moved from John and Stanley to fix on the television screen. Her lips pressed together. She seemed both in the moment and not a part of it at all. Billy knew, as only her son could know, what she was thinking. John Sikes was more than just here with his boys; he was making a memory for them. Her sons—one in prison and the other sitting close by—were without a father to share this moment, much less take anything away from the experience of having had it with him.

His heart sank. He wanted to speak out loud, but he didn’t dare spoil the moment. He wanted to let her know that it didn’t matter to him. Not really. Not anymore. That he hardly thought of the man, and when he did it was with great relief that Ira Liddle was out of his life. He wanted her to know that his prayers daily went before his one true Father, asking that somehow both his earthly father and his brother be brought to righteousness. And he wanted to assure her that he recognized the gift God had given him in the form of John Sikes.

There was more he wanted to tell her. Something he’d held inside for a few weeks now. Something he had not even spoken to Ronni about—and he told her everything. A decision he had to make. Had to make alone. And, for now, without hearing the opinion of everyone around him.

He patted Ronni’s shoulder and she smiled up at him. Together they turned their attention back to the television set. Just a little over fifteen minutes after liftoff, the capsule carrying Alan Shepard hung suspended from a helicopter over the Atlantic, making its way back to land. Again, the small audience clapped.

Nadine patted Billy’s mother on the knee. “Come on, Bernie. Let’s have some more coffee.” She looked to Harriett Sikes sitting next to Bernice. “Harriett?”

“I’m with you. The rest of this is going to be male-oriented, I can just tell.”

“Mama!” Ronni chided. “I’m interested in this.”

Harriett Sikes gave her daughter a knowing look. “You, my dear, just don’t want to leave Billy’s side.” She pointed playfully. “Or his feet.”

John Sikes took a step back. “I’m going to have a little more coffee too . . .”

“I’ll get it for you,” his wife said. “Why don’t you just sit on the sofa where it’s more comfortable.”

A half hour later, as Billy and John stood together at the dining table replenishing their red, white, and blue paper plates, Billy spoke quietly to his future father-in-law. “John . . .” He cleared his throat and hoped he wouldn’t be heard, even over the voices coming from within the living room and the kitchen. “I need to ask you a question.”

John stopped spooning fruit salad onto his plate and looked at Billy. “What is it, son?”

“Your attorney . . . Mr. Morris.”

“What about him?”

“Do you think you could make an appointment with him? For me? I have some questions I’d like to ask him.”

John blinked at him. “Anything I can help you with?”

“Ah . . . no.” Billy forced a smile to defuse the moment. “I just have a couple of legal questions. Things to do with Mama . . . but . . .”

John glanced toward the living room and back to Billy. “Does this affect my daughter in any way?”

“Oh no, sir. Not at all.” Billy raised his right hand. “On my honor.”

John nodded. “All right then. I’ll call him later today. If he can’t fit you in this week, will that be okay?”

“Sure . . . of course. I’d just like to ask him some questions as soon as I can.”

“Fine then . . . I’ll call him this afternoon.”