A Merry Little Christmas

by Melanie Schuster

  “What are you talking about? Ever since he met you Warren has been knocked off his feet; what do you mean you had to beg him? And is there any more of that fruit salad?”

  Lisette went off and came back with the bowl of fruit salad and three big spoons. She shrugged as she handed out the spoons. “May as well eliminate the middle man, you know we’re going to eat it all. Now, my dear Paris, the thing is that my Warren was being a perfect gentleman. A true gentleman; `he took me out, wined me and dined me and he never put his hands on me,” she said indignantly “Oh, he would kiss me until I couldn’t remember my own name, but he never acted interested in anything else. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong because he always told me how much he loved me. And I love him, too, too much to not find out why he didn’t want to make love to me.” She stopped to scoop up some fresh pineapple from the now-communal bowl and went on.

  “Well, I’m bold, but not that bold, so I had a hard time figuring out how to approach him. And then everything sort of became clear one day. We were invited to a party given by a dear friend of mine. I was very pleased about the invitation because Clinton was my very first sweetheart and we had stayed friends for years, even though he lived in Texas. Now he’s moved back to Michigan and he was throwing a party and Warren didn’t really want to go, but he didn’t want me to be unhappy, so we went. And when he met Clinton, the look on his face was simply priceless.” She laughed.

  “Clinton is about six feet tall and he has reddish-brown hair, light skin and lots of freckles. And he’s a big man, actually bigger than Warren, in fact. Warren was too polite to react, but on the way home he had all kinds of questions for me like how old I was when I dated Clinton, how long we went together, if Clinton had a weight problem then.... That’s when it dawned on me. Warren is somehow self-conscious about his body. He seemed to think of me as some kind of little porcelain doll and he didn’t want to get undressed in front of me. I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry, so I yelled.”

  Angelique’s eyes filled with merriment and she said, “You went to the Evilene School for Mean Divas, did you? Shame on you!”

  Lisette didn’t look one bit ashamed as she finished the story. “I was just furious with him. It was as if he thought I was too shallow to appreciate a big, handsome man like him,” she said with a flash of remembered anger. “What did he think I meant when I said I loved him? Where was all this leading to if I didn’t find him sexually attractive? Oh, I went off on him for old and new, I really did. Of course we had to make up after that, and we made up and made up and finally it began to sink in that I find him irresistible in all ways. We were almost there when he discovered that I’m a virgin. Well, honey, he jumped off that bed like it was on fire and the whole argument started over again. He refused to touch me because I hadn’t been touched.”

  Paris stopped fishing for mango pieces to interject. “Wow, that’s what you call a deal breaker. So what did you do?”

  “I got a chair and stood on it so I could yell in his face. It was terrible. I was so angry that I sounded even worse than Pepe Le Pew. I was crying and yelling and talking broken English and the bottom line was if he didn’t plan to marry me, he’d better get out of my house, out of my life and leave me the hell alone because I loved him too much to play games and I was through with being frustrated. Now you have to understand that I was wearing a sheer pink push-up bra and a matching thong and nothing else. I was quite a sight, I assure you.”

  “Ooh, Lisette! No, you didn’t, girl! What happened then?”

  “He put his shirt on, zipped up his pants and left. I called my sister Miriam and talked to her half the night; I was sobbing the whole time, of course. And the next day he came to my door with a dozen orchids, a bottle of Moet et Chandon, a huge box of Godiva chocolates and this,” she said merrily, waving her two-karat ring with the perfect blue-white oval diamond. “Et voila, here we are about to be married. Although he is still a perfect gentleman,” she said ruefully. “He’s making me wait for our wedding night.”

  Paris looked particularly impressed with Lisette’s story, something that didn’t escape Angelique’s notice.

  “I see those wheels turning over there,” Angelique said. “I hope you’re taking notes. You’re going to be back in Atlanta full time pretty soon and you won’t have an excuse for not getting your man. Titus Argonne’s agency is based in Atlanta, and from what I could see at the exhibit, he’s quite interested in you, too. So when are you gonna bust a move?”

  “I hate it when you talk slang, you do it so poorly,” Paris said haughtily. Then she sighed deeply. “I have no idea what makes me so tongue-tied in front of that man. Although this time it was much, much worse. He asked my about my work with Cochran Communications and I started babbling like Bubba from Forrest Gump. ‘We got big radio stations and little radio stations and we got medium-sized radio stations and we got stations in Michigan and we got stations in Chicago....’ It was horrible. And the worst part was I couldn’t stop,” she moaned.

  Angelique’s eyes twinkled in sympathy. “Tell Lisette what happened next,” she suggested. Paris took the last slice of peach out of the bowl with her fingers and ate it moodily. She mumbled something Lisette had to ask her to repeat.

  “I was babbling like a maniac and he was standing there looking at me with this really nice expression on his face and all of a sudden he leaned over and kissed me. Not a big juicy kiss, just a nice little peck. And then I could talk like a normal person,” she said in wonder.

  “Well, it seems as though he knows what he’s doing,” Lisette said with a laugh. She rose to clear the table of the empty fruit bowl. “What is it about this man that perplexes you so? Is he very handsome?”

  Paris groaned and clutched her heart, raising her other hand in mute testimony. “Girl, girl, girl. He’s about six-five and his skin is a little bit lighter than Angel’s. He has these high cheekbones, and his eyes are a funny color. Sometimes they look blue, sometimes gray. His hair is somewhere between light brown and dark gold, he’s clean-shaven, broad shoulders, really good butt... Yeah, he’s pretty handsome,” she sighed.

  Lisette cleared her throat and waved her left hand with its sparkling bounty under Paris’s nose. “Being shy gets you nowhere, my dear. Being bold, now that’s another story. Do what you have to do, but get it done. I have spoken!” All three women burst out laughing.

  ***

  Paris and Angelique watched carefully as Lisette’s dress was lowered over her head. She had chosen a simple, elegant confection of white silk georgette, off the shoulder with elegant re-embroidered Belgian lace around the deep neckline and the cap sleeves. She was going to wear a delicate wreath of gardenias in her hair in lieu of a veil and she was far and away the most collected person in the room. Her mother, Amyanah, was shedding happy tears as she attempted to put the wreath on her daughter’s head and Miriam was fussing over the bridesmaids.

  Warren’s mother, Pauline, was also teary-eyed from sheer happiness. She was so relieved that her son hadn’t married the harlot Tracy, and so pleased with Lisette as a daughter-in-law, that she couldn’t contain herself. Janice Bowden, a friend of Lisette’s and her final bridesmaid, also worked at the design salon with Lisette and was a raving beauty. It was hard to believe she bad four children. After Paris and Angelique exclaimed over how well she’d kept her figure, Janice smiled and confessed that while she had four children, she’d only given birth to one.

  “I adopted my three oldest long before I met my husband Curt,” she explained “And before I had my baby I was as skinny as a rail. Thank goodness I have a little meat on my bones now. I can’t wait to have another.”

  All five attendants were wearing soft, pale green, tea-length dresses in silk chiffon. The lone flower girl was Justine, Valorie’s adorable three-year-old daughter. She was wearing a beautiful green frock with a white lace bodice and puffy organza sleeves and was being very well-behaved Miriam’s current woe was that Angelique was showing a lot more cleavage than she
had at the last fitting. Angelique shrugged as she looked at herself in the ballet-style gown with the thin spaghetti straps.

  “Sorry about that, Miriam, but this is the baby’s doing,” she said cheerfully. “Remember, we’ll have those chiffon stoles on in the church, that’ll help cover me. And nobody’s going to be looking at me anyway. This is Lisette’s day and all eyes will be on her.”

  Lisette did indeed look like a vision in her gown with the flowers in her hair. The gown set off her petite figure perfectly and her expression of loving serenity made her even more beautiful. Angelique was busy snapping pictures of all the preparations for the ceremony, even though Lisette insisted on her being in the wedding party; she didn’t want her friend acting as photographer, A.J. agreed to do that for the couple, just because they were Angelique’s friends.

  The women were almost ready to form their processional. Amyanah gathered all the women together for a final prayer before the ceremony began. Every eye had a tear when it was finished except for Warren’s irrepressible sister, Valorie.

  “For the love of Mike, this is a wedding, people. This is a happy occasion so get with the program. Waterproof mascara is only going to take us so for,” she said with loving exasperation. “We all look fabulous. Lisette, you look like a dream, and mamas, y’all need to get to steppin’ because it’s almost time to begin.”

  In a few moments the women had lined up for the processional. Armand, Lisette’s tall, handsome father, was ready to escort his daughter down the aisle to the man who had waited a lifetime for her. The church was fragrant with the scent of gardenias, freesia, and roses, as well as the earthy smell of the ferns used abundantly in the decorations. Angelique had to fight for control; she wanted to weep as she entered the church and was escorted down the aisle by Adam Cochran. Donnie was already at the altar, as he was Warren’s best man. When all the bridesmaids were assembled, the doors to the church closed as the processional for the bride began. The doors opened suddenly and Lisette floated in on the arm of her father, looking so luminous with love for Warren that she almost didn’t look real.

  Donnie completely missed the part where Lisette entered the church—he was totally focused on his wife and couldn’t see anything else. She looked incredible with the afternoon sun slanting through the stained-glass windows, bathing her in an opalescent sheen. The sheer chiffon scarf draped over the front of her gown and loosely held in the back with a gardenia was identical to the other bridesmaids’, but it looked very sexy on her. Her incipient motherhood made her more than lovely to Donnie; she was the personification of all that was woman. With a sudden spark of recognition, he remembered the night he and Angelique had taken their vows in a gaudy little wedding chapel. He remembered everything, as if something had just knocked him into another sensibility and all the memory came flooding back. They deserved, no, she deserved to have a beautiful wedding with all their family and friends in attendance. Right then and there he decided that no matter what it took, he and his Angel were going to have a real ceremony, and soon.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Lisette and Warren entered the elevator and rode up to the bridal suite in complete silence, due mostly to the fact that they were kissing madly the whole time. They were spending their wedding night at the Athenaeum, the ultra-posh hotel in Greektown. They would be taking a flight to Aruba the next morning where they would have a long and leisurely honeymoon. When they reached their floor, Warren swept Lisette into his arms without breaking the kiss. He carried her to the door of their suite and they crossed the threshold into their married life. Warren gently set Lisette on her feet and took both her hands in his.

  “Hello, Mrs. Alexander,” he murmured

  “Hello to you, Mr. Alexander,” she returned. “Have I told you how happy I am that you married me?”

  “It was my pleasure entirely, Lisette. I love you more than I thought it was possible to love anyone,” he said softly.

  Lisette stood on her tiptoes to receive his kiss and smiled with tender love after it was over. “Then show me, my love. Show me how much you love me. I’ll be back in a very few minutes.” She pulled out of his embrace and blew him a kiss before going into the suite’s master bathroom where her things had been placed earlier. Before Warren could go into the other bathroom, she was back with a sheepish smile.

  “Can you undo this for me? I forgot that I had an army of women helping me into it.”

  Warren was happy to oblige in undoing the row of tiny lace-covered buttons. When the buttons were undone, the low cut strapless bustier she wore under the gown was revealed. Warren stroked her velvety back and was chastised by his bride.

  “Oh, no, you don’t! You made me wait forever for this night and now you have to wait for me.” She turned around and pulled him down by his tie to kiss him. “But not very long. You’d better be ready for me, my love.” And she disappeared back into the bathroom, leaving her love-addled husband alone.

  He recovered nicely, though, and went to take a quick shower and don the opulent-looking silk jacquard robe Lisette had purchased for him. It was a rich creamy French vanilla color that looked wonderful against his dark brown skin. Earlier, Valorie had come up to the suite and added a few special touches. There were expensive candles scented with gardenia, a stand with an ice bucket in which a bottle of Moet et Chandon chilled, two Baccarat crystal flutes, a basket of fruit, cheese and chocolates and an array of romantic CDs. The bed had been turned down and there were pink rose petals and white gardenia petals strewn across the bed.

  Warren lit the candles in the bedroom as well as the ones in the living room. He put on a Kevin Mahogany CD and was about to uncork the champagne when a soft noise drew his attention to the bedroom. Lisette was standing in the doorway wearing an outfit that made him bless the day he had asked Angelique to go to that auction. It was a very short gown made of silk organza with lace cups and very thin straps. A lace thong was visible through the nearly transparent fabric and she was also wearing a short matching robe that was open to show off the sheer gown. On her small feet she wore a pair of high-heeled satin mules with a silk flower on the toe. One of the gardenias from her wreath was nestled in her hair, right above her ear. She looked incredible: sexy, yet innocent and totally in love. He held out his hand to her and she came to him at once, floating across the room like a goddess. He sat down on the chaise longue and pulled Lisette into his lap, where they kissed for several long minutes before either of them said anything.

  “Lisette. My Lisette,” he said softly. “Is this real or another one of those dreams I’ve been having about you?”

  By way of an answer she took his handsome face in both hands and pulled him down to kiss him softly, gently and thoroughly. “This is as real as it gets, Warren. I’ve been waiting for you my whole life; I don’t want to wait any longer,” she breathed.

  He offered her a glass of champagne, which she refused. “Not right now. Right now, I want my husband,” she said with a wealth of meaning in the simple words.

  Warren stood up with her in his arms and said, “As always, Lisette, your wish is my command.” He carried her off to the bedroom to begin their lifetime of love.

  ***

  Donnie was looking at his wife with his heart in his eyes. They were in the kitchen of their home eating a midnight repast that consisted of scrambled eggs, grits, toast and grilled ham. Angelique had found that one of the best ways to avoid morning sickness was to eat when the baby said it was hungry, which was why they were eating breakfast food at such a late hour. Lisette and Warren’s wedding reception had ended earlier but they had opted not to attend any of the after-parties; they just wanted to go home. Angelique had changed out of her gown and was wearing a cute sundress with little flowers all over it; she often wore it around the house. Donnie had also shed his tuxedo and was wearing a pair of drawstring pants and an old T-shirt. They talked about the wedding and how happy Lisette and Warren had been.

  “It was so beautiful.” Angelique sighed. “
It was the wedding she dreamed of ever since she was a little girl. She was so happy.”

  “Warren was so happy he couldn’t stand himself.” Donnie laughed. “He’s so in love with Lisette, he was crying when she walked down the aisle. You hear about stuff like that and you think it would be embarrassing, but it was nice. It was very appropriate for him; he holds nothing back from her.”

  Angelique nodded in agreement and began to clear the table in her usual frenzy to put things back in order. Donnie took her wrist and stopped her. “You sit down, baby. I’ll take care of this. You do too much around here as it is. Mrs. Montez feels like you don’t want her here,” he said, referring to their weekly housekeeper.

  “I had no idea,” Angelique said sadly. “I’ll try to do better. And Mrs. Montez should just wait until the baby comes, there’ll be plenty to keep her busy.”

  She continued to sit at the kitchen table, deep in thought. Donnie watched her for a moment as he put their few dishes in the dishwasher. He joined her as the table, taking one of her long, slender hands in his as he leaned forward to get her attention.

  “Angel, I have to tell you something. I finally remembered it, all of it. Our wedding, I mean. When I was standing at the altar today watching you, it all came to me out of the blue.”

  Angelique’s eyes grew huge. They had never talked about it before. Even though Angelique’s memory of the Las Vegas nuptials had come back to her after her amnesia went away, they had never discussed it. But now that they both had a recollection, it seemed right. Donnie continued to hold her hand and led her through the dining room into the living room where there was soft music playing and a couple of her favorite candles were lit. A provocative fig fragrance drifted through the room and seemed to personify the late summer. They sat on the sofa—rather, Donnie sat and Angelique sat in his lap with her legs elevated. She laid her head on his shoulder and he began to speak.