by Libby Malin
“These should help.”
“Thanks,” he said, blinking fast, as if taking in where he was and what they were doing.
Her adrenaline rush faded, now replaced by guilt and sympathy. Crap, Thomas had beckoned her away from the altar for one reason, and she’d accepted the invitation for another. That’s why he must have phoned her the night before, poor guy. He’d wanted to talk her out of marrying Buck. If only she’d picked up the call! Maybe she would have listened to reason.
Her heart went out to Tom. She’d explain it later. The sorry fellow didn’t look as if he could think of much right now except his hangover.
“Just give me your address and take a nap, okay? You look like you could use one.”
He mumbled out something in Baltimore near University Parkway. Close enough for government work, she thought as she opted against the fast route over the Bay Bridge – too easy to get hemmed in with Buck on her tail-- and headed north up the DelMarVa peninsula into Cecil County over the very tiptop of the Chesapeake Bay. It would add an hour or more to the drive, but hey, what else did she have planned for this sunny Saturday morning?
In an hour Thomas was fast asleep, DeeDee was sure Buck wasn’t following her on this path, and she was nearing the top of the Bay.
She glanced at her passenger. His eyes were closed, his head against the headrest. She hadn’t talked to Thomas in-- how many years had it been? They’d broken up almost as quickly as they’d gotten together, right after their fifth high school reunion. He’d gone off to get his doctorate, and she’d learned everything she could about running a small business.
He hadn’t changed much since they’d been together-- he still had that lean, British-rocker look and puppy-dog eyes that had made her want to take care of him. He was slightly more muscular now, though, than when she’d crushed on him in high school and dated him after the reunion. The braniac and the beauty queen-- that’s how people had talked about them, and she’d liked it because it had meant she was good enough to snag a smart guy.
When had he heard of her wedding? She’d peripherally kept up with him-- had heard over the years that he’d become a professor. But what had spurred him to grab the chance to win her back?
She put the car on “cruise control” and flicked the radio onto an oldies station, turned down low, letting a Moody Blues song fill her head. Good. She didn’t really want to think right now. She’d figure out a way to make this up to Tom later.
***
Nearly four hours later, she was in Baltimore and getting angrier by the second as Thomas spat out confusing directions.
“No, it’s a right!” he said, grabbing his head as she whipped the car around the block.
“You said left a block ago! Dammit, it’s just like you not to know how to tell me to get to your place. You can write papers with all those twenty-syllable words, but you can’t direct me through a city laid out on a frickin’ grid!” She muttered a curse as they pulled up to a red light near the harbor. “Look, I can find my way to the north of the city. Howzabout you just chill out until we get around the college, okay?”
“The university,” he corrected. He wasn’t saying much, and whatever he did manage to mutter was through clenched teeth. The poor guy had really gotten ripped and was now paying the price. They’d made one quick stop in Cecil County for a cola, which he’d drunk in record time. He probably needed something bland in his stomach. Hell, she could use anything in her stomach, which was beginning to growl. With a fleeting sense of longing, she thought of the catered reception she’d planned at the Moose Lodge--- she’d chosen crab gratin and chicken fingers and salad with Vidalia dressing, pasta primavera, cole slaw, tomatoes and mozzarella… her mouth watered thinking about it. She’d have to get something to eat before she headed back.
Head back? Crap. Not possible. Not with Buck still looking for her. She couldn’t face that just yet.
The light changed, and she cruised on forward, finding her way to Charles Street and its long northward climb from the downtown area, up through the park-like square of Mount Vernon Place, past a bohemian district, into dicier neighborhoods and finally into the arty Charles Village.
“Okay, Tom, time to wake up. Tell me where you live now,” she said as they passed the green quads of the university.
He pointed to the left at University Parkway, and she took that and another turn he indicated. A few blocks in, he signaled for her to stop in front of a tall apartment building. She looked over at him and sighed. He was ashen.
“Just a sec,” she said, pulling into a parking spot with ease. She exited the car and came round to his side, opening his door and helping him to his feet, his arm around her shoulder.
“You don’t have to ...” He protested.
“The least I can do,” she said, dragging him toward the front door, while holding up her skirt so as not to trip.
Inside, she smiled at the lobby attendant, not caring what she looked like in her bridal gown and Thomas in his khakis and soiled shirt. Man, he needed a shower. After getting his apartment number from him, she maneuvered them onto the elevator and zoomed up to the fifth floor.
“God, I hope you have your key,” she said, as they got off at his floor.
He patted his pocket and dragged out a key chain. She grabbed it, positioning him against the wall outside Apartment 503 while she opened the door.
“Honey, we’re home!” she called into the empty flat as they entered, Tom finally walking on his own.
It was a sunny but small space, a long living/dining room off a narrow foyer, a kitchen off the far corner, and bedroom and bath off the other far corner. Thomas headed for the bathroom.
“Be right back,” he said. She heard him upchucking as soon as he shut the door.
She flipped on his AC-- it was unusually warm for spring and they were five floors up-- and walked into the kitchen, opening the fridge door and letting the cool air evaporate her perspiration.
“Now what?” she asked herself.
Now, eat, she answered. He had eggs, milk, deli ham that had been purchased just two days ago, some spring onions, some cheese…. Okay, an omelet. No, make that scrambled eggs. She wasn’t any good at fancy stuff. She looked around and saw a coffeemaker, some French Press gizmo.
“Can’t you just have a regular ole coffeemaker like everyone else in America, Thomas?” She bypassed the French Press and put on a kettle of water to boil. Tea would have to do. He had some fancy oatmeal bread in the freezer. She pulled that out and set up the toaster. Glad to be working at something, she started whipping up the eggs and chopping up the ham, hearing the shower start in the other room.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE NAP in the car had helped. The four Ibuprofen he took helped. The shower helped. And the tea, scrambled eggs, and toast helped.
By the end of lunch-- was it lunch? Thomas wasn’t even sure what time it was-- he was feeling almost human again, his headache subsiding to a dull throb. He was grateful for her silence-- she’d been unusually quiet during the meal-- and not only because of his pounding head. As he’d eaten, he’d tried desperately to find a good way to tell her he’d stopped her wedding on a dare, not for the reason she might expect.
“Thank you so much,” he repeated as they finished eating. It was hard not to stare at her. She was so damned beautiful, even after having her veil ripped off, her dress tattered at the hem, her makeup smeared by perspiration, and her feet dirty from walking with no shoes. She was just so damned lovely.
Oh, she’d been cute in high school, but at that age, he’d not been very discerning. And when they’d reconnected at the reunion five years after graduating, he’d thought she was pretty, too. But now-- the years had been very kind to her, softening angles that had been too sharp and ripening features that had been too juvenile.
Now he could appreciate her beauty, the oval face and upturned nose, the crystal blue eyes, the gold-white hair so shiny and full he ached to touch it. Her shoulders were milky, her breasts li
ke cream, pressing ever so subtly against the bone of her bodice whenever she breathed or talked or moved. It was hard not to stare.
But he had to stop staring. He had to explain himself. He’d just ruined what should have been the most important day in her life. What on earth had he been thinking?
That’s the problem, Thomas. You weren’t thinking. Not thinking doesn’t work out very well for you.
He wiped his lips with his napkin and cleared his throat. Better get it over with. Be a man.
“About today…” he began, wondering exactly how to put this. I had this dare thrown at me by my cousin’s fiancé, the very same fellow who used to taunt me in high school.
Jesus, Tom, isn’t there a better way to put it??
He ran his fingers through his hair.
“No, don’t say a word. I need to explain,” she said, taking their plates into the kitchen and returning quickly. “I can’t stand another second without telling you. I feel so guilty about the whole thing. You see, I wasn’t planning on going through with it-- the wedding. I’d decided last night because… well, you don’t need to know all that. And I was just waiting for the ‘do you take’ parts so I could say a big, fat, fucking ‘No!’ that the whole church and Oyster Point would hear. But then you stood up, and I thought, what the hell… I’m so sorry, Tom. I didn’t know it was you at first…”
“What?” His once-swelled heart dropped. She’d not known she was leaving the altar for him? Blast it. It had seemed so sweet, so perfect… to have the dare deliver such a reward. He’d thought at last, he’d responded to a dare the right way. Now this.
She sat down again, putting her hand over his, sending a flash of warmth through the hand up the shoulder, down the body.
“My God,” she continued, “I think it was awfully, awfully sweet of you to do what you did. I can’t tell you how touched I am by it, to think that all these years you thought of me and screwed up your courage to do this incredibly crazy but incredibly brave act. Why, Tom, I just… I just can’t think about how hard it must have been for you… you never liked making a scene… and yet there you were, for me, making the biggest scene of your life… oh, God….”
She waved her face with her other hand, and he did feel brave… even though she clearly had the wrong idea about his reasons for that bravery. At that moment, he wanted to be the bravest man of her dreams. Especially since she’d left the altar, not to be with him but to advance some other agenda. Let her think he was brave. He’d at least take that away from this incident.
“I just never imagined you finding the guts to do something like that,” she went on.
Despite her praise, he bristled at the qualifiers. “Well, I’m not a complete wuss, you know.”
She waved the thought away. “You certainly weren’t one today.”
“Today? Just today?” Tom’s disappointment continued its expansion into irritation. DeeDee had always been something of a hothead. Memories returned of being embarrassed when she’d flown off the handle in public. During those times, she’d occasionally accused him of not speaking up strongly enough, which in his mind had been the same as being accused of being too timid. “I’m just reasonable. I don’t do rash things.”
Her face grew rosy. “Are you saying I’m rash?” She sat back.
“Well, you did just run away from your own wedding. One could argue that if the shoe fits…”
Pink turned to red on her perfect face. Her lips pursed, and she crossed her arms, plumping up her already fine breasts.
“Jesus Christ, but I hate it when you say ‘one.’ You mean ‘you.’ Just say it that way. You would argue that if the shoe fits, I should wear it. And here I was feeling guilty… Some things never change.”
“If by ‘some things’ you mean that I remain a rational man who uses reason to solve problems instead of resorting to hurried solutions not well thought-out, then yes, those things have not changed.” Now his lips were pursed and his arms crossed, and his Lottery of Life prize appeared withered completely before his eyes. He recalled the parts of DeeDee McGowan that had bothered him. Underneath that peaches and cream body was a stubborn, reflexive personality that equated higher learning with snobbery and compromise with defeat.
As they glared at each other, something she’d just said nipped at him.
“Guilty -- you said you felt guilty.”
“Yeah, guilty about that rash move I made to respond to your rash move to stop my wedding.”
“I admit that my stopping your wedding might appear… impetuous… on its surface, but I assure you, it had been well thought-out and thoroughly planned.” Well, maybe not so thoroughly planned, but he had certainly considered, if even for a short time, the implications of stopping her wedding-- no, wait, stopping Wendy and Corey’s wedding -- the night before. It had been intended as a quid pro quo. He responded to the outrageous dare, which had been hurled in a collegial way, after all, and the townspeople responded by laying down their arms. That is, by dropping the use of “Timid Tommy” when addressing him. A simple, peaceful solution to a troubling internal Thirty-some Years War.
His statement seemed to soften her, and now he remembered something he’d loved about DeeDee-- her ability to “cease hostilities” in a flash if she grasped she’d been wrong. He smiled and relaxed. Okay, maybe she was still not wholly enlightened about his real intentions, but at least she wasn't mad anymore.
“All right, Tom. I give you that. I don’t know what was going through your head and how long you planned this. All I know is I’m glad I had an excuse to leave that altar, even though I’d been fixing to do it in a few minutes anyway. And that’s why I feel guilty-- because I didn’t mean to lead you on into thinking I was running toward you. I was running away from Buck…” She looked down at her manicured hands. How pretty they were! When he’d known her, they’d usually had grease under the nails from peering inside the cars her father sold.
She looked him in the eye. “So, thanks, Tom. Thanks for making it easier for me to do something hard.”
Her gaze locked on his, and he didn’t even try to look away this time. And a good thing he didn’t. Because if he had, he would have missed the perfect, small tear that slid from her right eye down her cheek and the subtlest inward movement of her lower lip as she bit it.
His chest tightened as he watched her. DeeDee rarely cried. She’d prided herself on not being a sissy, on being as strong as any of the guys she worked with.
He wanted to get up and put his arm around her and tell her it would be all right-- whatever “it” was, whatever needed to be fixed. He may have stopped the wedding for the wrong reason, but she clearly was a damsel in distress and he’d been the knight at just the right moment. Despite her discomfort, he felt uplifted. He had done something courageous to help someone. On campus, those opportunities were so rare.
She sniffled, using the napkin to wipe her eye. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s been quite the day.”
Rising, he came around to her and, after hesitating a few seconds, placed his hand on her shoulder. It was warm and soft.
“What are you going to do?” he asked. This was not the DeeDee he remembered. She’d always been tough and independent.
She turned and looked up at him, her eyes glistening. “I d-d-don’t know.” She looked about to cry again, her lips trembling as she struggled to hold the tears in. The tension of the day had caught up with her.
“Oh, DeeDee,” he murmured. How can I help you? “Don’t think about it now,” he offered.
Before he had a chance to say more, he heard the Toreador Song playing from somewhere in his bedroom. His cell phone! He’d left it in the pocket of the pants he’d just thrown in the hamper.
“Be right back,” he said to an oblivious DeeDee as he raced to grab the phone.
He caught it just before it kicked his sister to voice mail.
“Tom, where are you?” Megan said, her voice carrying a note of panic. He could hear music and laughter in the backgrou
nd. She must have been calling from Wendy’s reception.
“I’m home,” he said, sitting on the edge of his bed. “You’ll never believe what happened.”
“Well, before you tell me your story, let me tell you some juicy Oyster Point gossip-- did you know that DeeDee McGowan was getting married today? She apparently left Buck Bewley at the altar today when some nutcase stood up and objected to the nuptials! Can you believe it?”
“Yes,” he said, grimacing and rubbing his forehead. “I can believe it. I am said nutcase.” He told her the Cliff Notes version of what had happened the night before and this morning. When he was finished with his story, the line was so silent he thought he’d lost the connection.
“Megan,” he said. “You still there?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. I’m just… digesting your news.” The background noise subsided. She must have moved outside the hall. “Holy cow, Tom. She left the altar for you and you thought you were stopping Wendy’s wedding?”
“That’s the picture.”
“Does she know-- I mean, have you told her it was a mistake?”
“Not exactly.”
“Tom! You have to tell her-- you just ruined…”
“Look, she obviously didn’t want to marry Buck. Why was she marrying him in the first place? He’s a thug.”
“He was in a bar fight two years ago, but there were extenuating circumstances.”
“Spoken like a true lawyer.”
“Look, I’m not going to argue Oyster Point history with you. You’ve got to let her know. This is serious.”
“I will. I will.”
“Where is she now? Can you call her?”
“Uh… she’s safe.”
“Oh geez, Tom, you’re hiding her, aren’t you? Buck is flipping out. He’s looking everywhere for her. You could be in danger!”
“I thought you told me his previous thuggery was a one-time incident.”