WASHINGTON (CNN) --The grandmothers of Elian Gonzalez say they
                  know they won't be able to take the six-year-old boy back to Cuba after a
                  scheduled reunion on Wednesday, but they are excited about seeing him for
                  the first time in more than two months.

                  "I'm dying to see him, to hug him, to be with him even for a short
                  while," Mariela Quintana, Elian's paternal grandmother said.

                  His maternal grandmother , Raquel Rodriquez, said: "I don't know if
                  when we see him tomorrow I'll be able to say anything, if I'll cry or if
                  I'll laugh. I really don't know yet. When I have him in front of me,
                  that's when I'll know."

                  The Justice Department on Tuesday, ordered the boy's Miami relatives
                  to bring him to a neutral site for a private visit with his grandmothers.

                  The order came a day after the two Cuban women had flown to
                  Miami but failed to see Elian.

                  The boy's Miami relatives refused Monday to allow a meeting with the
                  grandmothers anywhere except their home, where Elian has lived since
                  the boat he was riding in capsized off the Florida coast two months ago.
                  His mother and 10 others drowned in the accident.

                  But immigration officials told the Miami relatives on Tuesday that they must
                  bring Elian to meet his grandmothers Wednesday at the Miami Beach home
                  of Jeanne O'Laughlin, a Roman Catholic nun who is president of Miami's
                  Barry University.

                  The INS says failing to comply with the reunion would be a breech of the
                  conditions under which Elian has been allowed to stay with his great-uncle.

                  Elian's grandmothers are in Washington, and it is unclear when they will
                  leave for Miami. Snow closed the city's airports Tuesday.

                  Security a concern for Elian's Miami relatives

                  The INS says one of the reasons it chose Sister O'Laughlin's house for the
                  meeting is that it is "in a gated residence where security can be assured."
                  However, that has not eased the fears of Elian's Miami relatives.

                  "I'm very concerned about what's going to happen tomorrow because every
                  night I go to sleep and (Elian) tells me, 'Don't let them take me back,"' his
                  cousin Marisleysis Gonzalez, who has helped care for the boy, told reporters
                  outside the family's Little Havana home late Tuesday.

                  "And I'm going to be the one taking him to this house where I don't know
                  what's going to happen and I don't have control of," she added.

                  Grandmothers building support on Capitol Hill

                  Elian's grandmothers say they are still confident they will be able to take him
                  back to Cuba, and spent Tuesday meeting with sympathetic lawmakers.

                  Connecticut Democratic Senator Christopher Dodd strongly opposed efforts
                  to make Elian a U.S. citizen, saying he should be sent back to Cuba.

                  "This is not a matter for Senate debate," Dodd said "For the House and Senate
                  to determine the fate of a six-year-old boy is pathetic."

                  President Clinton also asked Congress to let the legal system take its course
                  before going ahead with the citizenship measure.

                  He declined to say if he would veto any bill Congress approved on the boy's
                  status. "I have not decided what to do, and I wouldn't rule that out," he said.

                                    Reuters contributed to this report.