Average Joe and The Angel

I could tell that my Joey was not happy with Gianni. As soon as we collected him from the school, instead of letting me handle it, Gianni, sorry, 'Johnny', jumped straight in and told Joey he was his real father and that from now he'd be known as 'Johnny Junior' and live in the big city.

Joey tried to hide behind me, insisting that he already had a Daddy, the only Daddy he knew and was Joey or Joey Junior, not any other nasty name that he didn't want. He was clearly frightened but defiant.

For a moment I thought, he's more Joe's son that he could ever be Gianni's.even the set of his chin, even though it was an exact match of Gianni's, was jutted out like Joe when he refused to budge an inch, like when I tried to stop trading with the farmer's co-op because they were so far in debt a couple of years ago and he said they'd pay up eventually provided we didn't kick them in the teeth. And they did and their smiles were still so intact that they turned into one of our best customers with the sweetest dairy milk you could taste; the Milk Bar was stock almost exclusively with their cream and buttermilk.

"Look, sweetheart," I said to Joey, crouching down to his level, "we'll have a long train ride into the city, you'll have a nice room of your own and, if you don't like it I can bring you back here to stay. Would that be all right?"

While Gianni, or "Johnny", as he now preferred to be known, went back to the hotel he'd stayed at for a couple of nights, to pack and meet us at the station, I went to pick up clothes and stuff for Joey and me.

When we got back to the Harris farm, Joe was still out on the farm working. I packed a small suitcase with a couple of changes of clothing for Junior and me, told Granny Harris we were heading for the station as my husband had come for me.

Chapter 5 1969

Joey Harris concludes his eulogy

"With Old Ernie keeping three crop dusters in the air, it was sure as eggs were eggs that I would fly with Papa as soon as I could sit upright on a sack of cornmeal so I could see out of the cockpit. So, it didn't take long before I was doing the flying while Papa operated the sprayer from the passenger seat. Momma, being the driving force she was in the family, was also solo flying planes, she learned to fly solo while I was still in diapers and she was a fine and careful flier. Yes sir, she had Old Ernie fixing everything that was slightly under regulation.

"As soon as the war against Japan was declared, followed by the declaration of war against Germany, Papa wanted to volunteer for the Air Force. He was 55 but told the recruiting Sargent he was 42 and had been a captain in the British RFC. I think they realised he had lied about his age, but they put him on delivering new aircraft from factory to airfields all over the country for training, or flew them close to the ports that were sending them overseas for the invasion of Europe, D Day. He was often gone from home for weeks at a time, but never happier than when he was in the air. He hardly ever spoke about his First World War, but you couldn't stop him talking about the Second.

I was only 12 when the war started, but you grow up real quick in war time. Momma had also joined up too, also volunteering to deliver airplanes from the factory to where ever they had to go. They both trained on a variety of aircraft from fighters to bombers and spent the next couple of years crisis-crossing the country, hardly ever meeting.

"Then in 1944 Papa flew bombers over the Atlantic in preparation for the D Day invasion of Europe. This was the first time back in his old country for eighteen years.

All through his life he used to tell us kids, and anyone else who was listening, or tried to heap praise on him, that he was just an Average Joe, doing his duty to the best he could. Well, we have packed out this church today to say say goodbye to a Joe who was son, husband, father, grandfather, colleague and friend and to us all he was anything but average."

Chapter 6

1969

Anjelica Harris narrating

I could see the tears roll down my Joey's cheeks as he finished saying goodbye in front of all our family and friends to the only real father he knew. I felt the tears running down my cheeks, too.

The woman standing next to me put her arm around me. I knew her, by face if not name, but she knew me and she must've known Joe and loved him too. He had just so much to give, everybody loved Average Joe Harris.

The coffin was laid on the shoulders of eight sorrowful but proud men. I knew them all well, three of them were my children. When they drew near, Joey spotted me at the back of the church.

"Momma, you made it!"

"Yes, they tried to filibust us all night but we got the Farm Reform Act through the House and onto the Senate last night, and I flew up early this morning."

I fell in behind the coffin, with our daughters Jelly Fox and Molly Andrews and we walked out to the Harris family plot, where Joe's mother and uncle lay along with memorials to Joe's brave cousins, lost in France while keeping the world free from imperial oppression.

Joe was a Justice of the Peace and a local Councilman, but he wasn't interested in politics, he was a working farmer, but he was interested in farmers' rights in Washington, so he urged me to serve in the House of Representatives for the State of Montana, which I did from 1969 to 1971, the second woman and the first person of color from my state to do so.

I almost left Conrad with Johnny and without Joey back in 1936. Joey flatly refused to go. At the station my first husband Johnny Bianchi was disappointed about leaving Joey behind. As soon as Joe reached the farmhouse and between them Joey and Granny Harris explained to him how I'd left with my first husband and how it came about that he was still alive, Joe jumped on his bike and rode hell for leather to the railway station.

Why the station? Johnny, the businessman and club owner from Chicago, was afraid of flying. Joe had me comfortable flying solo in all three of our planes, all very different, within six months of bringing them home.

"Angel," Joe said at the station, as we stood there the three of us, "please don't break up our family. I know you told Mum that your former criminal husband is now legit, but do you really know this man? Do you remember what life was like when you were his wife and how your life is now? Do you realise how many people are relying on you for their jobs, at the dairy, the farm, the small businesses and tradesmen in this town? Do you realise how much I would miss you? Granny would miss you and Joey, if he joined you, and how you going without him would tear Joey apart? And what about the baby?"

The baby! In all the excitement, I'd forgotten the baby, our baby, Joe's baby inside me, due before Christmas. How could Gianni, Johnny make me forget my baby? Was I mad?

I looked at Johnny, clean-shaven, tall, dark and handsome, his black hair slick, in his smart double-breasted suit, sharp down to his patent leather shoes. The Windsor-knotted tie complemented his sharp silk shirt, diamond tie pin and matching diamond cuffs, his shirt cuffs being tugged by his soft, manicured hands as I looked him up and down, every inch the stylish businessman in his mid-30s.

Joe, on the other hand, his sandy-colored hair thinning and uncombed, he was of just above average height and wiry build, his worried face scarred and tanned by daily contact with the elements, in his late forties, his work dungarees freshly soiled and permanently stained by the toil of his labours, his thick cotton unbuttoned shirt frayed at the collar and cuffs, his working boots scuffed and caked with mud, his hat pulled from his head and screwed up in his calloused hands as he pleaded with me to reconsider.

I had kissed his scars nightly, lovingly, thanking him for doing his sacrifice and service for both his countries when they needed him. I was proud of him in company, an honest, decent, modest man, successful because people like him, respected him, trusted him. I loved him for caring for me and loving me completely when only a couple of days before I met him I was dismissed as a 'fat colored cow'. Joe had loved my son as if he was his very own. I loved him because he treated me with respect as an equal, in our businesses, in our home and in our bedroom. I loved him for his dedication to work, making us indispensable to the town. I loved his slow gentle smile and his passion for life. I loved him for loving me as much as I loved him.

I did love him, this man who insisted he was so average and yet was so much more than the sum of his parts. I loved this man who had been the real father to his son and would be the father of all fathers of the baby to come and any other babies to follow.

I smiled warmly at him, and he smiled back with that lovely smile of his.

I turned to Gianni, to apologise to him.

And I looked at Gianni closely again, the hazy mists and old feelings of memories which had affected my perception began clearing. His face was no longer handsome, but haughty and sneering, his eyes full of hate for this challenge to his wishes and expectations from this humble farmer.

"Go back to your farm, old man," Johnny snarled at Joe, "Anjelica's mine again, she's always been mine, and no hick farmer's gonna take her away from me. When we're settled at home, we'll be back for my son Johnny Junior, and there ain't nothin' you can do to stop me if you know what's good for you."

With that, he undid his jacket with his left hand, revealing a handgun in a shoulder holster which he reached for with his right hand, after letting go of my arm.

"No!" I yelled at Gianni.

By the time he had his hand on the gun, Joe was onto him. I never saw him move so fast, except in the stables when instinct told him a horse was about to kick him or Joey. He stamped on Gianni's slim shiny shoe with his left foot, grabbed Gianni's hand and holsters with his strong work-hardened hands so neither hand nor gun were going anywhere, and lifted his right knee into Gianni's groin. Then he held him upright even though Gianni's legs had completely turned to jello.

Joe asked if I was all right, all the while looking into Gianni's eyes. I nodded and said, "Yes, are you all right, honey?"

"Yes, I'm fine." He replied, still locked on my first husband's eyes.

"I'm so sorry, Joe, I was just confused. I love you both but I really only loved Gianni as a boy, a kid. As a grown up, well he never really grew up, you know? But we were married for better for worse, even though most of our marriage was for worse. I knew he cheated on me, I know he would always cheat on me. Only, because you and I were so in love I could forget what an ass he was and just remember the few good things, like saving me from bullies, and ignored the fact they he was a bully too. When he turned up today ... without you here to ground me ... I was ... lost, lost in a fantasy that never really existed, could never exist. Will you forgive me honey? Could you forgive me?"

"We'll talk when we get home. I can see Charlie has called the police ..."

I could also see that the Station Manager was on his phone in his office, in fact I could even hear the sirens, the police station was only two minutes away. Briefly I recall Gianni being charged not with drawing a concealed weapon, which is permitted in our state, even in town, it was an illegal weapon with all serial numbers filed off that he had drawn in anger and witnesses waiting for the 8 o'clock train testified they thought he drew the weapon with intent. At the trial, his name and history was revealed and, after a three-year jail time in Montana, he was extradited to Canada where he was re-sentenced for the shootout in 1929, taking into account previous convictions and sentenced to a further 10 years. The illegal gun he carried was about twenty years old and responsible for at least twelve unsolved murders in Chicago since 1925, four of them in the two years he had lived there since his release, however, there was no evidence how long he had held the weapon. Gianni was released in 1942 but was gunned down shortly after returning to Chicago. Joey only saw him the once and Joe and I only saw him briefly, during Joe's testimony.

Chapter 7

1990

Anjelica Harris narrating

I rarely think of that day in 1936 any more. Most of my memories are pleasant ones of my life with Joe, my much better than average partner in life.

"Jelly" Anjelica Elizabeth Harris was born just before Christmas 1936. She married Aaron Fox in 1958, and gave us three beautiful grandchildren. "Molly" Mary Ellen Harris followed in 1938. She married Harry Andrews in 1961 and went one better, giving us four grandchildren. "Bobbie-Gee" Robert George Harris lived from 1940-2003, and took over the farm as dairy/arable farmer; Bobbie-Gee was a quiet, shy man who never married but was always smiling as loving favorite uncle to all the children in the family. "Hughie" Hugh Browne Harris, born 1944, took over the dairy and now his only son Joe runs it.

Joe and I delivered new combat aircraft for as long as we could during the war, relying heavily on Granny Harris to look after the homestead as we traversed the skies in our lonely flights, helping the war effort the best way we could. That came to an end in1944 when "Hughie" was born and I had to stay home, by then Granny was 75 and five kids ages 12 down to zero would be too much for her. The wonderfully kind and generous Granny Harris passed on in 1953 and still missed every day of our lives.

I only entered politics for the benefit of local issues and only served two years in the House, and glad to get away from there at the end of my two-year term. My biggest regret was that I had to dash away from Joe's deathbed to debate in Washington and vote on a bill dear to our hearts and missed the first few minutes of his funeral. Those 39 years we spent together were wonderful years and losing my suitcase and being rescued by my real life hero was the best thing that ever happened to me.

The end

Note: Mrs Anjelica Harris died in 1996 at the farm which had been her home for 66 years, surrounded by children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, to many to count as they were blessed with the energy of their beloved forebears.

Colonel Joey Harris never went into space, but he was part of the training program for pilots at Houston until he retired and died in 2009 a venerable old man of 79 who had no end of wonderful stories to tell about early space exploration; he had three children and seven grandchildren.

More notes: this is pure fiction, none of these people exist, it is a fictional story, told to entertain me and none prepared to tarry a while ad listen alongside me. A person of colour (sorry, I'm English and use my original mother tongue when I can) has never represented Montana in the House of Representatives. A woman Jeanette Rankin (1880-1973) did represent Montana twice, 1917-19, 1941-43 for the Republicans, a lifelong suffragette campaigner and pacifist, she voted against declaring war on Germany in 1917 and was the only member of Congress to vote against declaring war on Japan in 1941; she was instrumental in introducing the 19th Congressional Amendment granting universal voting rights to women and was politically active for over 60 years.

Although the story may appear to align itself to the present Black Lives Matter, the story and all of its plot points were determined 5 years ago when I started the story, and dropped it back the , using some of the details for new characters for a different novel completed between 2016 and 2019. It was a pleasure to return to the plot and complete it during the long COVID-19 lockdown and presented to you now in its completed form.

However, my sentiments that there is only one human race and we should learn to live in harmony and respect, whatever god we admit to and to whatever tribal sensibilities we might prefer to live by, that shouldn't affect our respect for the liberty and fraternity of us all in the single community that is mankind.