The
Groom
The church smelled of wax and roses.
Suffocating, although I seemed to be the only one who thought so. I felt too
warm, too restricted wrapped up in this expensive monkey suit. There were far
too many buttons, too many shiny, uncomfortable poky bits, and this bow tie … what
was up with this damn torture device anyway? I reached up and tugged on it,
only to have Amanda pull my hand away and look up at me with her squinted,
hazel eyes. I parted my lips but kept my teeth clamped together.
“It’s too tight,” I hissed.
“Stop fidgeting or I’ll make you hold my
hand like I did when we were little.”
The truth was, Amanda had always been
little. The top of her head barely reached my shoulder and she weighed just
over a hundred pounds. Still, she was a force to be reckoned with, and normally
I would listen and comply when she gave an order. Now she was issuing a threat,
one she thought would stop my somewhat childish behavior, but I wanted to move
and pull at my bowtie even more after I heard her words in the desperate hope
that she’d follow through with her punishment.
I scanned the room and realized that it
was full. There were easily two hundred guests if not more. I shook my head. Who
in the hell knows this many people? I certainly didn’t.
The pews were separated by a center aisle.
On one side sat a collection of individuals that were in some way either
related to me by blood, or attached by some other means. I squinted. Okay, that
guy, the older one, the one sitting next to Aunt Audrey. What’s his name? He’s
the guy who packages up Mom’s pork chops and freshly ground beef over at
Simpson’s Market every Saturday. I realized I had never seen him dressed in
anything other than the blood-stained, yellowing apron he always wore wrapped
around his round, Santa Claus belly. He wasn’t related, but he had supplied the
main course of every meal served on my mother’s dinner table since as far back
as I could remember. Nothing says family like a neatly trimmed pork roast.
Wait. It’s coming to me. Mr. Gregory. Yes,
that’s his name. Memories of Mom greeting him with a smile on her face as I
tagged along with her as a child on her weekly shopping trips poked at my over
addled brain. They were gone as quickly as they’d appeared.
I reached up and pulled the collar of my
shirt away from my neck so that I could swallow down the horrid taste that had
accumulated on the back of my tongue. I couldn’t help but notice that Mr.
Gregory looked wildly out of place in his fancy pin-striped suit and silk tie.
Almost as out of place as I felt.
“Stop it, Caleb.” Amanda reached up and
gave the sleeve of my jacket a hard tug. “I mean it.” Her voice was a whisper,
but I heard it loud and clear. She’d been talking to me for years. Now I wish I
had been better at listening.
I turned my head and looked at the
assortment of people I’d never seen before seated on the other side of the
aisle. My eyes scanned the rows of well-dressed guests. The longer I looked,
the faster my heart seemed to beat. I was beginning to panic. I needed to find
someone, anyone I recognized.
Finally, my gaze landed on two people who
looked vaguely familiar. James and Alex, my soon to be brothers-in-law. James
sat still, his hands in his lap. It was obvious the kid was bored, but he was
politely so, just as he’d been taught. I spied the cords trailing from the buds
in Alex’s ears. They were attached to his phone, which had undoubtedly been
snuck into the church. A quiet rebel, that one. He was looking at me, his mouth
moving, but the words he silently spoke were not meant for me. By the way he
bobbed his head, my guess was that he wasn’t listening to a ballad. The tempo
to his unheard song was at least as fast as the pounding of my heart.
My stomach clenched. Yes, I’d seen these
two before. I’d even spent some time with them. Still, I didn’t know them any
better now than I had months ago when we’d first been introduced. Seeing them
now made me feel worse instead of better, and I nearly jumped when the first
few notes of the wedding march sounded.
I looked away from the boys and took in a
huge breath of waxy, floral scented air. Everyone in the pews shifted toward
the center aisle, and like a wave on the ocean, all heads turned and looked at
the back of the room.
There she was, my bride, all dressed in
white. Her head was covered in the filmy netting of an intricate veil and her
neck was draped in a single strand of pearls. I watched as she walked toward
me, the skirt of her full gown swinging forward and back like a large, silent bell
with each step she took.
She held onto her father’s arm as he
escorted her down the aisle. Funny, I thought, as I scrutinized the man walking
beside her. How come I hadn’t realized until now just how big and formidable he
is? Then I realized it wasn’t funny at all.
The notes from the organ seemed to swell
in the overheated, over scented room. The space was large, but I felt boxed in,
like I was being crowded and deprived of air. My bride continued to make her
way toward me, her steps timed perfectly, just like she’d practiced at
rehearsal.
In another few seconds, she was standing right
in front of me, the organist timing the conclusion of the oft played piece of
music with my bride’s last approaching steps.
“Who gives this woman to be married to
this man?”
“Her mother and I do.”
Again, just as we’d practiced, I reached
to take the edge of the white, tulle veil she wore between my clumsy fingers.
The room was hushed, the only sounds filling the silence were the swishing of
wedding programs as they were used to fan heated faces.
“You’re crazy,” I thought to myself. “So
dramatic.”
I felt a spark of confidence return to
urge me on and I took a deep breath. I smiled as I slowly lifted the fabric up
and over my bride’s head. That’s when I knew I’d been right to be so ill at
ease.
The face I uncovered didn’t belong to the
woman I truly wanted to marry.
The
Bride
Mama fussed over me, making sure the long
line of tiny buttons climbing up my back were all fastened correctly. She
hummed to herself as she fluffed, folded, straightened, adjusted, then
readjusted. I imagined I was much like any bride, decorated like a beautiful cake
and made to stand still while all the frosting and other sparkly things were
placed until they were just so.
I’d waited a long time for this. Today I
was the diamond, and I was going to shine, shine, shine.
Daddy had gone through this past week
acting tough and manly like always. A man of few words, he’d shake hands or
engage in a brief and awkward looking hug when greeting out of town guests. He
can’t fool me, though. He tries to hide them, but I have always been able to
find his vulnerable spots. I’m his little girl. Those spots are there because I
gave them to him.
The sun was shining brightly in the hall
when Mama and I walked out. She kept telling me not to cry, not to ruin my make
up while she dabbed at her own eyes with a smudged tissue. Daddy was there, a
close-mouthed smile hiding beneath his neatly trimmed mustache. He was a big
man, handsomely dressed in his black tuxedo. Before Mama lowered the veil over
my face I thought I saw that his eyes were looking a little red, too. I just
smiled up at him without saying a word. He wasn’t on the verge of tears. It was
dust, I’m sure, or the pollen swirling around in the summer time air.
I saw Daddy move his elbow away from his body
and I slipped my arm inside. His hand was warm when it covered mine and I
leaned into him.
“You’re beautiful, baby girl.”
I smiled. Yes. The pollen sure was thick
this morning.
My heels clicked along the tiled hall. Mama
pressed a kiss to my cheek before she slipped between the big double doors and disappeared
inside. In a few moments, she would be sitting in the first pew and it would be
time for the wedding to begin.
It had taken awhile for us to get to this
point. To say Mama and Daddy had not been excited about me marrying Caleb
Graysen would be an understatement.
Mama never denied the fact that Caleb was
handsome. His hair, the color of mahogany, and his eyes, a light green framed
by dark lashes were an appealing combination. She’d mentioned once or twice
that the two of us would have beautiful babies someday—if that was what I
wanted, of course, to have babies with someone other than the handful of worthy
suitors she and Daddy had been suggesting over the years. Mama never argued
Caleb’s well-mannered demeanor, either. Even though he’d never traveled further
south than Oklahoma City, he always remembered to say yes or no ma’am. She wasn’t
completely won over, but she wasn’t completely opposed to our union. Caleb had
charmed her just as he’d charmed me.
Daddy, however, was a different story.
Caleb wasn’t good enough for his little
girl. Caleb didn’t have enough money, or a well-known, highly respected family
lineage. He thought Caleb was soft. He never used the word spineless, but I
know it had crossed his mind a time or two. The fact that Caleb wasn’t
incredibly fond of whiskey … well, that didn’t help much, either.
Then there was that whole thing about
Caleb asking his best friend, Amanda Martin, to stand up with him at the
wedding. Mama couldn’t get past the fact that he had chosen a best woman
instead of a man. It was untraditional. Didn’t he have any brothers or a cousin
somewhere who would do him the honor? Daddy thought it unnatural that a man would
have a female best friend. They had been best friends, though, since childhood.
It was something Caleb felt strongly about, having Amanda up at the altar with
him, and it was one of the things I knew I would not be able to talk him out
of.
My parents didn’t understand what it was
that I found so intriguing about Caleb Graysen. I could see where they were
coming from. He wasn’t the kind of boy I’d been attracted to in the past. He was
not all that interested in sports, although he pretended to be knowledgeable in
tennis when we first met. It was obvious that he’d never picked up a racket
when I finally got him on the court, although the black eye he sported for more
than a week after I accidently hit him with a ball was somewhat endearing. He
had no interest in watching football or television, or playing eighteen holes with
Daddy at the club.
His clothes were something else. I’d
called him slovenly many times in the past. He thought the term harsh and
inadequate, and defended his blue jeans and soft button down shirts as
acceptably comfortable.
Being well-dressed was not the only thing Caleb
shunned. He was also quite helpless with social interaction. He fumbled over
small talk, and had only lived outside of the small town in which he was raised
since attending university five years ago. Fortunately, his nose was always
stuck in a book. He’d filled his head with things he’d never experienced,
traveled to places he’d never seen, and lived a multitude of lives he’d never
lived. He had a college degree on which to stand, and he held his own, although
the tight smiles my friends wore on their faces while we were all out for the
evening told me they talked badly about Caleb behind his back.
There was that stain on his favorite
sweatshirt that drove me crazy, and his hair always seemed just a little too
long. He wore sneakers all the time, and his dog liked to sit with him on the
couch. Heath wasn’t the worst dog in the world. He was sweet, but he was big
and hairy, and he slobbered. A lot. And why did he have to go everywhere Caleb
went?
I cleared my throat as Daddy moved me
closer to the doors. The organist had not yet begun to play and I felt the grip
I had on my bouquet slip. The palms of my hands felt sweaty, and I was finding
it hard to breathe from beneath my veil.
I heard them, the first notes of the
wedding march, and I saw Daddy look over at me out of the corner of my eye. He
patted my hand again before pressing his palm against the door. When he pushed
it open, I felt a rush of warm air pour over me, the scent of wax and roses
hovering around my covered head. Everyone in the room turned in one fluid
motion. Their eyes were all on me.
Shine, shine, shine.
I wanted to wipe my sweaty palm on the
full skirt of my dress, but I didn’t. I wrapped my fingers tightly around the
handle of my bouquet and took a step.
Pause. Step. Pause.
As I passed each pew, I saw people smiling
at me. There were murmurs as I moved. “Such a beautiful bride!” “What an
extraordinary dress!” “Those flowers are stunning!” These whispers carried me
to the front of the church, and all the while I ignored the gnawing I felt down
deep in my gut.
Cold feet. That’s all it is. Just cold
feet.
I heard a male voice. The pastor. Then
Daddy was speaking. I looked to the side, saw him smile at me again before he
sat down next to Mama. When I turned, I was facing Caleb.
He reached out and took the edges of my
veil in his fingers. Was he shaking? The gnawing in my belly grew worse as he
lifted the lace and tulle. When he moved the veil over the top of my head, I
caught his gaze.
Not cold feet.
I knew in that instant that Caleb did not
want to marry me.
What surprised me even more than that,
though, was the realization that I didn’t want to marry him, either.
Amanda
Caleb turned and looked at me, a sheen in
his green eyes. I took a deep breath and smiled at him. It’s taken him years to
see it, but it looks like Caleb finally figured out that I’m the best woman—at
least the best woman for him—after all.
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