For Better or For Worse

by Robin Palmer

This was true. Unlike Alan, who paced a lot, Mom only did it when she was extra nervous or upset.

  “Why does this wedding have to be so…weddingly?!” she cried. “Why can’t it just be a nice small gathering with almost-immediate family?” she went on.

  “Because it is a wedding!” Alan cried. “A ceremony where we honor our commitment to each other as life-long partners!”

  At the word commitment, Mom’s face went from green to yellow, like mine had the time I had eaten some cottage cheese that was two weeks past its expiration date.

  “And I don’t know why you have such a big problem with the word,” he went on. “Honestly, Rebecca, the way you’ve been acting lately, you’d think you were getting ready to have a root canal.”

  Wendi turned to Nikko. “You’re getting this, right?” she whispered. “Please tell me you’re getting this. Research shows that there’s a huge spike in ratings with on-air fights.”

  Mom stopped pacing. “We’re not fighting!” she said nervously. “We’re just having a discussion. In a very passionate manner!” Mom was not a fan of the f-word, but I don’t know why she was so against fighting. I had learned from my fights with Laurel that they actually ended up bringing you closer because you got to air out all the stuff that was bothering you so it didn’t get stuck inside you like old gum on the bottom of a chair. Suddenly, she saw me. “Look—it’s Lucy!” she cried. “Let’s talk about Lucy’s life for a while now! What’s new in your life?”

  As Nikko aimed the camera on me, I could feel my face get all red. I cleared my throat and prayed that my forehead wasn’t too shiny because that would look very gross to people across the country. “Umm…” Sometimes I had a lot of success asking Mom for things in front of other people because it made it harder for her to say no, but I was thinking this was not the time to bring up the fact that Pete now thought he was invited to this wedding that she didn’t seem all that interested in going to herself even though she was the bride.

  “Before we go on, let me ask you something,” Alan interrupted. “If you were at a wedding, wouldn’t it make you happy if you found out that you had your choice of what you wanted to eat for the main course—”

  “Alan!” Mom cried.

  “Okay, okay. I’m sorry to have interrupted you, Lucy. That was very rude of me. So what’s going on?”

  Mom reached into her bag and pulled out a York Peppermint Pattie. Okay, this was serious. “Oh, you know, not much,” I said as I inched my way back toward my room. “Nothing that can’t wait until later.”

  Or, you know, never.

  Between me in my room trying to make sure Miss Piggy didn’t devour Dr. Maude (after so many years of not being able to make Miss Piggy stay put in my room, I now found myself unable to make her budge as she gave Dr. Maude a there’s-only-room-for-one-of-us-and-I-am-NOT-leaving glare); Laurel in hers practicing her weeping over her discovery that she was blind; Alan surfing the Internet for articles about what to do when your wife-to-be is less than excited about your upcoming wedding; and Mom scarfing down more mini-size candy bars than even I would’ve been able to stomach, there wasn’t a lot of QFT (Quality Family Time) going on.

  In fact, it seemed like the only time we were together nowadays was when we were being filmed (why Wendi thought her audience would be interested in us bringing our recycling down to the basement didn’t make sense to me, but I kept my mouth shut). But even then, we barely talked. Although Wendi started every segment with a whole thing about how we weren’t nearly as dysfunctional as the families of the other Week with Wendi’s subjects she had followed, we sure didn’t come off as all that loving and happy.

  “Okay, I’m calling an emergency family meeting,” Wendi announced one evening as we played what was probably the most quiet game of Monopoly in history. Well, quiet except for Miss Piggy’s low growls and the continual thump of Dr. Maude falling onto the floor whenever she tried to jump up on something because unlike most cats—but like me—she had serious coordination problems. While Laurel and I still weren’t officially fighting, we sure weren’t officially friends. We were barely even talking to each other. And when we did, we were polite, but it was the kind of politeness you’d show to someone you ran into in a girls’ room and you were the only ones there.

  That being said, I decided to take some of Dr. Maude’s (Dr. Maude–Dr. Maude—not the cat–Dr. Maude’s) advice about how to make up with people even if you were NOT the one who started the whole thing. I had found it during my most recent search through my DVR library of her shows. According to her, the best thing to do was extend an olive branch. Not, like, an actual olive branch with olives on it, as she impatiently told this woman in the audience who had raised her hand to ask whether you had to go to a nursery for one or if she’d be able to find one at Walmart because now that there was a Super Walmart in her town she could get everything from tires to milk to laundry baskets in one place. It was more a fancy way of saying to suck it up and be the bigger person EVEN IF THE OTHER PERSON HAD JUST AS MUCH OF A PART IN THE WHOLE THING.

  I leaned in toward Laurel, whose fake blindness miraculously hadn’t gotten in the way of her getting ahead of me in the game with four more hotels. “I didn’t think non-family members could call family meetings,” I whispered. That seemed like a decent-size olive branch to put forward.

  I waited for her to say something but she didn’t.

  “I guess you’re not just blind, but deaf, too,” I said.

  Just as she turned to me, Wendi clapped her hands. “Nikko, camera off for a minute.”

  At that, we all looked at one another. Wendi never wanted the camera off. This was serious.

  “Look, per my editor, there’s been a severe drop in fun over the last few days of footage,” she said. “And while research has proven that viewers like drama and conflict and intrigue, they also like fun. So to that end, Camilla and I had a call with the network this morning and we’ve come up with what we all feel is a fabulous way to infuse more fun into things.”

  “It’s not bra shopping, is it?” I blurted out. Because if it was, I was taking Dr. Maude and bolting.

  She shook her head. “No. Although that is a cute idea.” She snapped her fingers. “Charles, write that down.” She smiled. “We’re going to go…wedding dress shopping!”

  From the look on Mom’s face, she was ready to bolt.

  In the movies wedding dress shopping looks fun, but in real life? Not so much. We were at Saks Fifth Avenue, our third store of the afternoon that Saturday when it got very unfun.

  Mom held up a flowy multicolored thing. “How about this one?”

  I wrinkled my nose as I slumped down in a chair. I was all for color, but this was just wrong. “Maybe if you were getting married on a beach in Hawaii,” I said.

  At that, Wendi and her crew burst into laughter.

  “Lucy, you are just so funny!” she chirped.

  “Really? You think so?” I asked, sitting up a little straighter. I glanced over at Laurel to see her reaction, but she was too busy rehearsing the scene where she’s gotten her sight back and is seeing herself in the mirror for the first time to notice.

  Wendi turned to Nikko. “You got that on tape, right? That’s going to be a nice bit of comic relief among all this drama of the upcoming wedding.”

  “I keep telling you—there’s no drama!” Mom laughed nervously as she dug in her purse for a mini Mounds bar. It was a good thing Mom had no interest in being an actress because she was awful at it.

  Nikko rolled his eyes. “Of course I” —as he looked at the camera, his face paled— “didn’t. Whoops. Seems I forgot to turn it on.”

  Wendi snapped her fingers at Charles. “Charles! Put ‘Find new cameraman’ on my to-do list,” she said as she glared at Nikko. When she looked at me, she smiled. “Lucy, love, do you think you can do that again?”

  “Do what again?” I asked, confused.

  “Say that line about the beach in Hawaii,” she replied.

  Befo
re I could say, “Um, I hate to tell you this, but this is a REALITY special not a MOVIE where you get to do scenes over and over again,” she waved her hand. “Never mind, it’s fine. Let’s move on. Go back to bonding.”

  Mom, Laurel, and I just looked at one another.

  “Bond! Bond!” Wendi chirped.

  We shrugged and continued looking through the racks.

  Suddenly, Wendi click-clacked over and picked up a frilly, lacy-white-gauzy thing and held it up to Mom. “Oh, this would look just so darling on you!”

  Mom wrinkled her nose and gently pushed it away. “Thanks, but that’s not really my style.”

  Wendi yanked another white dress off the rack, this one equally girly and nightgowny-looking. “Then how about this one?”

  Mom shook her head.

  Wendi sighed. “I don’t know why so many women don’t like to wear white to their second weddings.”

  “I didn’t even wear white to my first wedding,” Mom said. Because my parents were creative hippy types, their first wedding was held at one of their friend’s houses on a farm in upstate New York. I was glad I hadn’t been born yet and didn’t have to suffer through it. They used to make me watch the DVD of it back when they were still married, and it looked like it had been a super-weird day. There were people playing all sorts of corny instruments like the ukulele and the zither, and instead of a priest or a rabbi doing the whole thing, they had a bunch of friends read different poems, and sing songs. It was like a really bad school talent show but with adults. And Mom wore this funky boho-like patchwork-dress thing that she had gotten in Russia because back when she was single she used to travel all around the world. She still had the dress. She didn’t wear it anymore, but she kept it in a fancy plastic cover so it wouldn’t get eaten by moths, which was something that had tended to happen in our house in Northampton because it was so old (needless to say, moths—like ants—were not a problem in our New York apartment).

  Laurel picked up a yellow dress with a lace collar that was about ten sizes bigger than Mom. “Ooh—this would be perfect for Rose!”

  I wrinkled my nose. “That’s a little fancy to wear while you cook, don’t you think?” I asked.

  “No, I meant for the wedding,” she replied.

  Mom looked over at her. “Laurel, honey, what are you talking about?”

  I reached into my Girls Rule…Boys Drool tote bag and took out a pen and the small notebook I had started carrying around titled “The Change.” Tuesday, 4:17p.m.—Mom calls Laurel “honey” AGAIN—making that the seventh time this week. # of times she’s called ME “honey” this week? ZERO!!! I wrote. I figured that having all this evidence might come in handy if The Change started to get really out of control.

  Laurel cringed. “I…kind-of, sort-of ended up…inviting her to the wedding,” she said sheepishly.

  “You invited Rose to the wedding?” I asked excitedly. This was great. If Laurel invited Rose, that meant I wouldn’t get in trouble for inviting Pete.

  Mom glanced over at the camera and put on one of her fake smiles. She was using them more and more and getting a lot better at them. “Laurel, sweetheart, we really wanted to keep this a family-only affair, remember?”

  # of “sweethearts”—5, I wrote.

  “Well, she is family,” Laurel replied. “She’s been with Dad and me since I was five.” Oh, so now Rose belonged just to her and Alan? That was definitely something to add to the notebook. “She just looked so sad when I was talking about it.”

  “Yes, but honey, we said immediate family,” Mom said.

  Another “honey.” I should have bought a bigger notebook. At the rate things were going I was going to fill this one by the end of the week.

  “She is immediate family—she lives with us five days a week,” Laurel replied.

  Mom shook her head “Fine,” she sighed.

  Here was my chance. “Well, if Rose is coming, we should probably invite Pete then, too, don’t you think?” I asked innocently.

  When Mom turned to me, I could tell from the look on her face that, actually, this was not fine. “Lucy, we’re not inviting Pete,” she said firmly.

  “But why?!” I asked.

  “Because Pete is not family.”

  I waited for my “honey” or “sweetheart” but it didn’t come. “He is to me!” I cried. “If Austin and Beatrice and Rose are coming, then Pete should be able to!” I glanced at the camera. I really, really hoped this part ended up on the cutting room floor because Pete’s feelings would be beyond hurt if saw this.

  “Oh, this is good,” I heard Wendi whisper. “This is really good.”

  So much for that happening.

  “Lucy, that’s enough,” snapped Mom. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore right now. We can talk about it later. In private. But the answer is still going to be no.”

  I had learned my lesson enough times the hard way to know that the longer I waited to come clean about something, the bigger the mess I made. “There’s something I should probably tell you, then.”

  “What?”

  “You know how Austin misunderstood Laurel and thought he was invited?”

  Mom nodded.

  “Well, the same thing happened with Pete,” I said.

  “You invited Pete to the wedding without asking us?” Mom demanded.

  “No! I just told you—he ended up thinking he was invited!” I cried. Jeez. If this was a listening- comprehension test, Mom totally would’ve failed.

  Mom put her hands on her hips. Never a good sign. “I have an idea,” she said. “Why doesn’t everyone just invite everyone they want and we can just broadcast the whole thing on national television?” she cried.

  Wendi shook her head. “Don’t take this the wrong way, honey,” she said, “but I don’t think the public would be all that interested.” She click-clacked over to Laurel and put her hands on her shoulders. “Now if it were this one’s wedding,” she chirped, “that would be TV-worthy. Especially if she were marrying Austin. Talk about a royal wedding!” She looked at her. “Have you guys discussed that possibility, sweetpea?”

  Laurel looked at her like she was crazy. “I’m fourteen.”

  Wendi shrugged. “Never too early to start thinking about this stuff.”

  Mom glared at me. “Lucy Beth Parker, you had no right inviting Pete.”

  “I just told you I didn’t invite him!” I cried.

  Wendi poked Nikko. “You’re getting this, right?”

  Mom shook her head. “And I can’t believe I agreed to live my life in a fishbowl like this,” she huffed as she started to walk toward the escalator. “I’ll meet you girls in the sock department.”

  At that, Laurel looked like she was going to cry. “But I told you I wouldn’t have agreed to do this if you guys didn’t want me to,” she called after her. She turned to me. “You really should have asked them before you did that, you know.”

  Huh? What was this about?! Where was the big fristerly pat on the shoulder with an “It’s going to be okay—she’s just acting super weird nowadays, and as soon as we get home we’ll figure out a way to fix things”?

  “Wait a minute—so it’s okay for you to invite Rose, but then when Pete thinks he’s invited, even though I didn’t actually invite him, I’m the one who screwed up?”

  “But I told you—Rose is like my family.”

  “Oh, so now she’s your family?” I demanded. “Not mine?”

  “Lucy, that’s not what I meant—”

  “Fine. Well, if Rose is your family, then Pete is part of my family,” I shot back. By saying that I was probably giving up my right to any of Rose’s yummy fried plantains, which had become one of my favorite foods since moving to New York, but that meant I’d just have to learn to make them myself.

  By this time even more of a crowd had gathered. “But I want Pete to be part of my family, too,” she said.

  I shook my head. “Nope. You already chose Rose.”

  Her eyes narrowed. �
�Okay, now you really are being immature.”

  I narrowed mine. “And now you really are embarrassing me in front of not only a camera crew but half of Saks.”

  Laurel twirled on her heel. “I’m going to the sock department, too.”

  “Well, I’m…not,” I huffed. The socks were right next to the bra department, and with the mood Mom was in, I was not taking any chances. The last thing I needed was to have America watch me be humiliated as some saleswoman talked about how bosomy I was. “I’m staying right here.”

  “Fine,” she huffed as she strode away.

  “Fine,” I called after her.

  After she was gone, I looked over at Wendi and her crew. The way their mouths were in little O’s, it was like staring at a bunch of Cheerios. How could I save this? “So, uh, seeing that the camera’s still rolling, is there anything you wanted to ask me about?” I asked. “Like, I don’t know…my advice column I write for the school paper?” I sure hope no one asked me for advice about what to do when your family went nuts because I had no idea. “Okay, then. Well, I guess I’m going to…go to the sock department, too,” I squeaked as I slithered away.

  I don’t know why people said weddings were supposed to be such a happy time in your life.

  Because this one? Was a mess.

  Dear Dr. Maude,

  I don’t know what the heck is going on, but it’s like instead of hot air coming out of the heating vents in our apartment, it’s blowing some sort of weird gas that when you inhale, it makes everyone start acting all CRAZY, like what happened in that movie that Austin and Connor did last year. Did you happen to see it? Usually I’m not big on action-adventure movies, but this one was REALLY good, even though it didn’t have a monkey in it, like most of their movies do.

  The closer we get to the wedding, the less everyone seems to be getting along. Not only do I feel like Mom is being extra nice to Laurel, but now Laurel and I are officially in a fight. That would be bad enough on a regular day, but on a day where we’re supposed to be taped spending quality time together by Wendi and her crew it’s even worse. I’m sure you know this because you’re on TV all the time, but it’s HARD having to pretend nothing is wrong when something is.