Chapter 18: Opening a Present

Saturday, December 18, 1971

I went over to Jeana’s about 5:30 on Saturday to pick her up. I had reservations at a steak house in Timonium for 6:30. The dance was at the school, from 8:00 until 11:00, and then the party was at Ray’s afterwards. His parents were away for the weekend, which was like leaving the hen house unlocked and inviting the foxes over for a free chicken dinner. He would cover for us.

“Well, don’t you look dashing!” commented Mrs. Colosimo as she ushered me inside. “Louis, doesn’t Carl look handsome!” she called to her husband in the living room.

He looked at me, with the confused look most men do when responding to their wife’s questions which don’t require a response. “Yes, very nice. Welcome. Come on in, Carl.”

“Thank you. Here, Mrs. Colosimo. I wasn’t sure if I would get a chance to bring this over before Christmas, so why don’t I give it to you now.” I was holding a large foil wrapped package, and she took it with considerable curiosity.

“Thank you. What is it? Jeana will be down in a moment, I’m sure. Take your coat off.”

“Thank you.” It was a chilly evening, like most December evenings in Maryland, cold but no snow. A white Christmas was a rarity there. Snow normally didn’t start until early January. I had worn a trench coat and dark leather gloves along with my trademark fedora. I peeled them all off, leaving me in my suit.

“Oooh, you really do look cute! Too bad there’s only one of you. Do you have a brother?” she teased. Mr. Colosimo gave a laughing snort.

“Yes, but he’s quite a bit younger than me, and I don’t think he’d be able to handle a sophisticated lady like yourself.” That got hearty laughs out of them.

Mister Colosimo went to the stairwell and yelled up the stairs. “You’d better get a move on, Jeana. Carl is putting the moves on your mother!”

“Hold on! Give me a break!” came bellowing back down the stairs.

I grinned at her parents. “You might as well open that up now and figure out what you’re going to do with it.”

They gave me a curious look, and Mrs. Colosimo tore open the foil wrapping. Inside was a large poinsettia plant in full blossom. “Oh, it’s beautiful!” she exclaimed.

“My mom is always getting poinsettias for Christmas. If you take care of them, they will keep blossoming for weeks and weeks,” I commented.

“I know. My sister grows them. This is very nice. Thank you,” she replied.

“Then ask her what to do with it, because that is the sum total of what I know about flowers.”

Just then the click of high heels announced that Jeana had joined us. I turned to face her and whistled. “Wow! Don’t you look good!”

“Thank you!” she said, blushing.

“Turn around.”

Jeana pirouetted and I whistled again. “I repeat, wow!” Jeana had gone with a bright red cocktail dress, nicely tight on her buxom frame, with a U-shaped neckline front and rear, and short enough that it came several inches above her knees. She was wearing sheer hose and matching red pumps. “We won’t be able to dance, since I’ll be too busy fighting the other guys off!”

“You look pretty nice, too,” Jeana replied.

Her mother agreed. “He’s pretty cute.”

I glanced over at Jeana’s father, who had an amused expression on his face and was rolling his eyes. I just gave him a good-natured shrug. I was dressed nicely. The only school dances you needed to be formal for were the proms, otherwise, a suit was sufficient. In those days, you wore a suit and a tie to a school dance, and the girl wore a dress. By the time my own children were going to school dances, the dress code seemed to max out at ‘clean.’ They looked the same as when they went to school.

That night, I had on a dark charcoal gray suit with an understated plaid, and a hint of a red thread in the plaid. Dark charcoal suits were good for any formal occasion. I had a brand-new black dress shirt, which for the time was rather daring, and a bright red tie to go with the plaid. Black dress socks and black wingtips finished it off. I thought I looked good, but when I was with a girl as gorgeous as Jeana, it wouldn’t matter in the slightest. Nobody would be looking at me, except her, and she was who I wanted to look good for.

Jeana looked exceptional, with just enough makeup to offset her dark complexion and add a splash of color to her lips. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a small Christmas-paper-wrapped jewelry box. “I thought about waiting until Christmas to give this to you, but I decided tonight might be better.”

“What is it?” she asked excitedly.

“You’ll never know unless you open it.” I handed it to her, and she quickly tore the Christmas wrapping off. Inside was the jewelry box, which stopped her in her tracks. She opened this much more slowly and stared inside.

“Ohhhh...” I had bought Jeana a gold necklace, with the centerpiece being a pair of gold hearts that were linked. “It’s beautiful!” she whispered, as much to herself as to any of the rest of us.

I took it from her hands. “Here, let’s see how it looks.” I touched Jeana on her shoulder and had her turn away, and then reached around and did up the clasp from behind. She could see what I was doing in the reflection in the mirror in the foyer. Her breathing stopped as I draped the necklace across her throat.