by Alice White
“I don’t think it’s anything. Did I say anything?”
“No, you most certainly did not, and that is part of the problem.”
Gretta sighed and took the pins out of her mouth, setting them beside Alice’s feet. She sat back on her heels and looked up at Alice with an expression in her eyes that told her that now was when her friend’s true feelings were going to come out about the whole situation. Talia took a nervous step forward but Alice held out an ever so slightly trembling hand, wanting her to stay still. Part of her longed for Talia’s peaceful intervention, that much was true. That was the part of her that longed to continue living in the comfortable world where all of them agreed to get along and none of them spoke much about the more unpleasant parts of their lives. There was another part of her, though, and she was slightly surprised to find that that the second part of her was stronger, louder, wanted something much different.
This pervasive mistrust and dislike had hung over her wedding preparations like a black cloud from almost the moment of her accepting Travis’s proposal. Alice’s cheeks still burned with the memory of it. She could remember how excited she had been to tell her dear friends her news the morning after her acceptance. She could remember the anticipation of it, waiting for what felt like forever for them to come calling so she could sit them down and spill everything. She could also remember the looks on their faces, how different they were than what she had been hoping for. Talia had looked completely stricken in those first moments before the response expected of her registered and she smiled an overly wide, overly bright grin. Gretta’s face had been absolutely horrified and there had been no attempt made to hide her feelings whatsoever.
“Oh, Gretta, what’s that face about?”
“Nothing!” Talia intervened, hurrying to sit beside Alice on the lovely little settee she had always favored and taking her hand to examine her stunning new piece of jewelry. “Nothing, don’t mind her. Let me see the ring. Oh my, it really is beautiful, isn’t it? You must be so happy.”
“Yes, yes, thank you. It is beautiful, isn’t it? And it’s true, I’m happy. But Gretta, why do you look so terribly unhappy?”
“Because,” she said quietly and without breaking eye contact for even a moment, “I am unhappy. I don’t think you should do it.”
“Getta!” Talia said breathlessly, little blotches of color starting to show in her cheeks, “You shouldn’t say that kind of thing. It isn’t nice.”
“Well I’m not trying to be nice, I’m trying to be a good friend. Unfortunately those two things don’t always play well together.”
“But Gretta--”
“No,” Alice said quietly, “it’s alright, Talia. She’s allowed to speak her piece. In fact she must. If we’re to remain friends, we can’t have secrets between us. It will poison the friendship and I simply can’t have that.”
Alice spoke to Talia but her words were really meant for Gretta. It was Gretta she looked at, Gretta whose eye contact she refused to break. She knew from the moment of truth that had crossed Talia’s face that her opinion of Travis was very much the same as Gretta’s, but she also knew that Talia’s constitution was such that she would want to be agreeable more than she would want to share that opinion. But Gretta? Gretta was an entirely different story. She was headstrong and when she believed something to be right she would not let it go. She was like a Pitbull whose jaw was locked tight and would not be moved. No, neither anger, threats, sorrow nor cajoling would convince Gretta to let this thing lie. Alice knew it and so she knew that there was nothing to be done but have it all out in the open.
“What is it about him that gives you pause? Why is it that you don’t think I should marry him?”
“Alice, you’re such a beautiful girl! You could marry anyone, anyone you wanted.”
“But what if what I want is him?”
For a moment it looked like Gretta might actually keep her mouth shut after that question, which only succeeded in giving Alice a chilled, almost frightened feeling. Gretta never kept quiet. If she was unsure whether or not she wanted to speak, the thing she had to say must have been unpleasant indeed.
“I don’t think he loves you. I think he finds you charming in the way one might find any beautiful trinket charming and I think he wants your money. Don’t marry him, Alice. Don’t settle for so little when you could have so much more.”
Alice felt stung, as if Gretta had reached out and slapped her across the face as hard as she was able. Her words cut, drilled into Alice’s insides and got to the fears she kept locked inside for fear that speaking them out loud might make them real. What Gretta had said was true. Alice was exceedingly humble about her attributes, but those attributes were many. She was talented and smart and she was also heartbreakingly beautiful. She had skin the color of fresh cream with a healthy pink just below the surface that made her appear to glow when in just the right light. She had thick, loose curls the same color as the richest mahogany and rich honey hued eyes full of laughter and curiosity. Her lack of consideration for herself and her charms made her utterly irresistible to almost every person she met and she had many friends who loved her deeply. She also had a family that was extraordinarily wealthy, and that aspect of her life was a bit of a double edged sword. On the one hand it provided her with comforts that many people could only dream of but on the other hand, it made her a target for tricky, devious people, both men and women alike. Gretta had been her friend since they had been small children and she had early on taken the role of protector. She was not nearly so beautiful as Alice was and did not come from as much money, but she was practical and level-headed and fiercely loyal. Alice knew that Gretta had always suspected that some man would try and take advantage of her some day and that it was her duty to see that such an awful thing didn’t happen. But the truly awful thing, the thing that Alice tried very hard not to think about, was that she worried that Gretta was right. She was never entirely sure of people’s motives with her but she couldn’t stand the idea of being suspicious and cautious all of the time. For her, the only way to reconcile those two things was not to allow that looming fear to color her life at all. She had made that decision and once she had done it, she had not looked back and so when Travis had come into her life she had allowed herself to be open to his flattery and charm. He had been easy to become enamored with and she believed that he felt the same way about her. Yes, she was aware of the fact that Travis had no family to speak of. In fact his background remained very much a mystery even after their (admittedly brief) courtship. He didn’t like to talk about himself, not ever. He had alluded to having had a sort of a tragic upbringing and Alice, not wanting to cause him any further pain, had not pressed matters further. When he said that he loved her and wanted to spend his life with her, she believed him. It did not matter what his past was, only what he saw for his future. But to Gretta his tight lipped nature was a glaring indicator of his being some sort of a rogue, a crook, and she objected strenuously to her friend even speaking to him, let alone marrying him. There had been absolutely no way of persuading her otherwise, regardless of what Alice said. The two of them had let the topic lapse into a kind of an uneasy silence and rarely spoke of it after that first terrible truth telling.
“Alice? Alice dear, are you alright?”
The sound of Talia’s soft, worried voice was enough to bring Alice back to her present situation. She smiled at Talia and Gretta both, not wanting either to worry any more than they already would. She looked over Gretta’s head again and her smile widened. This smile was for her and her alone. Gretta’s fingers truly were magic! She had done an amazing job tailoring Alice’s dress, just as Alice had assured her mother that she would. No employed seamstress could have done a better job. Looking at herself now, she believed that things were going to be ok. Gretta would come around once she saw that Alice and Travis were blissfully happy together. This was not a time to be melancholy. This was a time for jubilance, for celebration! She was getting married in two days
and her life would never be the same. That was the sort of thing a girl should be happy about. She looked at herself for one moment longer and then turned to Talia with radiant eyes.
“Yes, I am. I’m more than alright. I’m about to get married.”
Chapter Two
Alice could not sleep, no matter how hard she tried and how desperately she wanted to. Wasn’t that always the way of it? The moments when one was most keen on falling into an easy sleep, when one felt that doing so was of the utmost importance, those were the nights when sleep was the most elusive.
Alice knew that both anecdotally and from her own personal experience, but the knowing didn’t make it any less frustrating. She tossed and turned fitfully in her lovely canopied bed for what felt like an eternity before sitting up and swinging her feet over the edge of the bed. She let out a little shiver (the fire the maids had set for her before she went to bed was now more ember than flame) and lit the little gas lamp that sat on the table beside her. There was simply no use. What was the point in her just lying there feeling helpless? If sleep was not ready to come, well then who was she to challenge him? She knew that it was better to treat him like an old friend, to allow him to make his presence known in his own good time. She had never been one to struggle with sleep, not in any real way, and she trusted that this anomaly would not continue for long. It would just be too awful if she were to have her only completely sleepless night the very night before her wedding. It would be such an unfortunate time to make her journey into insomnia that it would be almost laughable. Almost.
“Oh stop it, you’re being silly.”
She spoke the words out loud and was startled by the sound of her own voice. She did not know precisely what time it was, but she could tell by the heaviness of the dark that lingered outside of her window that it was very late indeed. She was a solitary passenger in that journey that was the no man’s land of in between, those hours when almost nothing seems recognizable and it is very easy to feel entirely alone. It was sort of a terrifying feeling, but somehow a beautiful one as well. It seemed almost fitting to be the only one awake in this massive house that she loved so well. It was as if, subconsciously, she had set aside a time for saying her goodbyes. Because this house was the only one she had ever known, after all. This house was the place where she had been born and had continued on to be the setting of a great number of the most important events in her admittedly short life. She loved it well, as well as any person could love a thing without a real live beating heart. She couldn’t imagine not calling it home. She couldn’t comprehend what it would be like when, after her wedding, she went to some other building and began to call it home instead. Although she felt herself to be slightly ridiculous, just the thought of it brought the prick of hot tears to her eyes. She ran her hand along the rich mahogany of her bed post and did not bother to wipe those tears away. If she was being ridiculous, then so be it. She would be an adult again in the morning. For now she allowed herself to feel like the child that still lived inside of her heart.
She sat that way for a long time, grieving a little and saying her silly goodbyes. She sat that way until the oil in her lamp began to run low and even the embers of the fire began to seem like a distant memory. Finally, when her eyes burned from fatigue as well as tears both shed and unshed, she blew out the light and buried herself back down under her plush quilt. Her thoughts traveled involuntarily to the conversation she had had with Gretta and Talia. How many times had they had some variation of that exact same conversation? How many more times had Gretta wanted to have the conversation and instead bit her tongue? Thinking about it was unsettling to Alice. There was something that didn’t feel quite right about one of her closest friends harboring so much dislike for her future husband. As tired as she was, a tiny little voice spoke to her from the back of her head. What if there was some truth to the many times she’d voiced concerns for her friend? What if the man who was to be her husband was something other than what she believed? But no, she couldn’t think that way. That was just her fatigue getting the better of her, that and her exceedingly strong desire to get along with every person she knew as well as humanly possible. That desire was even greater when it was her best friend she was at odds with. But she had made the decision to be positive and have faith and that was what she was going to continue to do. That was the thought she held on to as she finally allowed herself to drift off to sleep. With not insignificant effort, she pushed all of her fears aside. She fancied that she could see the light in the sky blanketing the city beginning to change, and she pushed that thought aside as well. She needed to sleep, needed to get some small amount of rest if she was to survive the day ahead of her. And once everything was said and done, there was nothing that could rob her of the fact that she was finally going to be joined with Travis and after that everything else would fall into place.
“Didn’t you sleep last night, darling?”
“Oh dear, not nearly as well as I would have liked. So then it shows, does it? How bad do I look?”
“No, no,” Alice’s mother reassured gently, “you don’t look bad at all. Not even close. I only see it because you’re my daughter. I’ve been trained to see it, you see.”
“Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure, mother?”
Alice had hoped that when she awoke the nerves from her late night musings would have been a thing of the past. Unfortunately, that did not seem to be the case. If anything, she was feeling even more unsettled and anxious than she had been in the dark hours before the morning came. But how? Why? Was this how one was supposed to feel as she made her way to join her betrothed in marriage? Upon asking herself that question, Alice realized that she had no idea what the answer should be. And why should she? Never in her life had she received any kind of advice about what it was like once a proposal had been accepted and a ceremony was imminent. All she had ever heard about, and on this topic she had received copious amounts of advice, was the process of becoming available for marriage and then landing a man who wanted her hand. Now that she had done that, the well of advice and knowledge seemed to have dried up completely. What happened after the wedding was never spoken about. It wasn’t proper, she supposed. Once she became a wife it was right that the details of her experiences remained between her and her husband. She understood this, in some ways agreed with it even, but that didn’t make the day feel any easier. It didn’t make things feel any less terrifying not to know how much (if any) of her experience of and feelings about the day were normal. She was surrounded by all of the women she loved and cherished and yet, somehow, she still felt as if she was entirely on her own. She smiled at her mother, appreciating her fussing and reassurance of how beautiful she looked but not really listening any longer. She was very much inside of her own mind, unsure of how to calm herself and feeling just a tad bit silly.
“Alice?”
The sound of Gretta’s voice pulled her back to her surroundings again. She turned to her friend and saw the tears in her eyes. Were those tears of happiness or of sorrow? Alice had a feeling that maybe it was a bit of both and she took her friend in her arms, hugged her tight before letting out a nervous little laugh.
“Gretta! You’re here.”
“Of course I’m here. How could I not be?”
“I don’t know. I suppose part of me thought that you might not come.”
“Not possible. Alice, you are my dearest friend and you always will be. I will never choose to be anywhere other than where you need me. I’ve said my piece, have I not?”
“I--I think so.”
“I have and now that it’s done, I will be there for you. Whenever you need me. That’s the promise I make to you.”
Alice knew that saying a thing like that did not come easily to Gretta. She was not the sort of girl to speak words like that unless she had thought them through, thought about them from every possible angle. She found that she had no words in return and so she gave her a reassuring squeeze and a smile. Gretta hadn’t said much, b
ut somehow it was enough. It did not rid Alice of every fear that had gripped her, she didn’t think anything but time could do a thing like that. What it did accomplish, however, was a far more profound sense of peace than she could remember having in a long time. She hadn’t even realized the amount of pressure she had piled upon herself until she felt a portion of it released but the weightlessness upon that release was heavenly. It made her feel as if she really could make the long walk down the aisle of the church where she had been raised and when the double doors opened and revealed everyone she cared for standing and smiling back at her she was overjoyed. This was really happening. Every step she took was another step she was taking towards the rest of her life and knowing that caused her imagination to run wild. She saw the children that she and Travis would have, the home they would build up for themselves and the business she would help him grow (assuming that he ever let her in enough to do such a thing). She saw an entire life unfolding before her and by the time she was standing beside Travis she could not wait for the nuptials to be complete. She was so deeply immersed in her joyous thoughts, in fact, that she did not notice the look on Travis’s face. At least not at first. When the minister began to speak was when she really took a look at him, got a real glimpse of his expression, and when she did she felt her heart leap into her throat. It felt so entirely lodged there that she was almost sure she would be sick. She knew she shouldn't say anything while the minister was talking. She knew that to interrupt was terribly rude and, after all, who on earth spoke over the minister at her own wedding? She wanted to bite her tongue, really she did, but she just couldn’t. Not with Travis looking at her that way.
“Travis?”
The minister’s voice faltered but did not cease. She could feel her mother’s concerned eyes boring into her back and hear the beginnings of her guests’ soft whispers. Still, all she could look at was him. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair disheveled. She would have assumed that he had been struck by the same sleeplessness as she had, but the pervasive stink of alcohol made it clear that he had been drinking into the small hours of the night. At first he would not even look at her, despite the fact that she had just interrupted their wedding to make sure that he was ok. When he finally did look at her, she wished that he had not. She knew what was going to happen before anything actually did. She could feel it in the slick sweat that sprung up in a fine film across every inch of her skin and in the heart beating much too quickly and still stuck in her throat. She felt like she might faint, felt sure that she was going to suffocate if he didn’t say something to her quickly. She needed him to tell her that everything was alright. If he couldn’t find the words, she needed him to smile at her. Just that small gesture would be enough, but it was not to be. He looked at her with tormented, almost angry eyes and shook his head slightly. She reached out one shaking hand but her fingertips never touched him. They would never touch him again. Because instead of offering her reassurance he turned to their two hundred guests with a sad smile, his eyes darting back and forth quickly in a way that she thought a criminal’s might.