Lilac Avenue

by Pamela Grandstaff

  “I took a picture to her,” Hannah said, “and she had them shipped overnight.”

  “It wasn’t cheap,” Erma said. “But don’t they look pretty?”

  “They’re gorgeous,” Claire said.

  Claire was sincerely pleased; the flowers were more beautiful than any she had seen anywhere else in the world. She had underestimated Bonnie, Starlina, and Erma, and they had all put her low expectations to shame.

  The bridal contingent of the wedding party made their way up the stairs to the narthex at the entrance to the sanctuary, where Maggie’s brother, Sean, was waiting. Claire thought he looked movie-star handsome in his black suit.

  “You look amazing,” he said to Maggie, and kissed her cheek.

  “How’s Dad?” she asked him.

  “He’s up front, fussing with Mom,” Sean said. “But he’s fine.”

  He offered his arm to Maggie and she took it.

  “You may have to hold me up,” she said.

  “I’ll be happy to,” he said.

  “I’ll lock the door,” Hannah said, and Melissa pinched her.

  “Ow,” Hannah said. “You must have learned that from Bonnie.”

  “I been practicin’ on Patrick,” Melissa said.

  Claire went to the arched opening and looked up the aisle. Scott and his groomsmen were seated in the first pew. Ed looked back, smiled at Claire and winked. She felt her face flush.

  The church was full and the crowd was murmuring. In the background Sister Mary Margrethe was playing “What a Wonderful World” on the piano.

  “Good job on the music,” Claire said to Hannah.

  “Just wait,” Hannah said. “It gets even better.”

  Claire felt a sense of foreboding.

  Sister Mary Margrethe ended the song, and looked toward Claire, who nodded. Father Stephen motioned to Scott, who stood up and went to stand at the top of the aisle. Ed, Patrick, and Sam followed, and they all turned to look at Claire. Patrick stuck his tongue out at her, and Sam’s expression was, as usual, inscrutable. Claire ignored Patrick and Sam, hard as that was, and smiled at Ed and Scott. She clutched her bouquet and turned to Maggie.

  “The hard part is over,” Claire said. “It’s all smooth sailing from here.”

  Maggie looked as if she couldn’t hear, as if she were paralyzed with fear. Claire looked with concern at Sean.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ve got this.”

  Sister Mary Margrethe began playing again, and Claire started walking. At first Claire didn’t recognize the music. She was halfway to the front of the church before she realized what it was, and then she almost laughed out loud. To the tune of Marvin Gaye’s “You’re All I Need to Get By,” Claire walked up the aisle through a packed church.

  “Claire,” she heard Sammy say. “Auntie Dee, there’s Claire.”

  Claire looked to each side of the aisle. Smiling at her from the pews were people she’d known her whole life. People with whom she went to kindergarten now sat with their grandparents, parents, and children. Her mother and father were there in the second row with Sammy, her father Ian looking confused and irritated, her mother, Delia, with tears in her eyes. Uncle Curtis and a tearful Aunt Bonnie stood on either side of Uncle Fitz’s wheelchair at the front row. Uncle Fitz’s face was pale with the effort it took him to be out among people, but he, too, wiped his eyes as he watched the procession.

  Claire smiled at Ed as she took her place on the left side of the aisle at the front. He looked so pleased to see her. He waggled his eyebrows at her and she almost laughed again. Claire looked at Scott, whose eyes were fixed on the back of the church. He was almost smiling, but also looked as if he was holding his breath.

  Melissa, looking shy, arrived at Claire’s side, and Claire could hear her let out a deep breath she must have been holding. Claire looked at Patrick, who was looking at Melissa in a soft and tender manner, a look Claire had never before seen on Patrick’s face. She scanned the church quickly but did not see Ava. She had been invited, but Claire was glad she’d stayed away. This pretend christening didn’t need any bad fairies.

  Hannah arrived next, taking exaggerated bridesmaid steps, her tiara having slipped a little off to the side.

  Sammy called out, “Mama!” but Delia kept a firm grip on him.

  Claire looked at Sam, who was looking at his wife with deep affection, his lips clamped together to hold back his laughter.

  ‘That’s good,’ Claire thought. ‘That’s what I want to see.’

  Maggie and Sean were now framed in the stone archway of the nave. Sister Mary Margrethe paused. Everyone seated in the pews stood up and turned toward Maggie. As Sister Mary Margrethe began playing, “Let’s Stay Together,” Maggie and Sean started up the aisle. Scott’s face broke into a huge grin, and Maggie smiled widely in return. As far as Claire could tell, they didn’t seem to notice there was anyone else in the church; they only had eyes for each other.

  When Maggie reached the front, after Sean went through the ritual of handing her over to Scott, only Claire and Ed were close enough to hear what was said between the bride and groom.

  “You clean up nice,” Scott said.

  “Shut up,” Maggie said, but she was smiling.

  Scott’s hands trembled as he placed Grandma Rose’s ring on Maggie’s finger. He was relieved to feel her hands were trembling as well. He looked up into her face; she looked scared.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” he said.

  “I know,” she said.

  After she placed his father’s ring on his finger, he grabbed her hand and held it for the rest of the ceremony. Later, in his memory, it was all a blur of standing, sitting, kneeling, praying, repeating words, singing from hymnals, lighting candles, and then, finally, being pronounced husband and wife.

  The whole time, Scott kept his focus on the way Maggie’s hand felt in his. Through her fingers he thought he could feel her heart beat, even though it may have been his own. Her hand was dry and warm. Her grip was firm. Their hands fit together perfectly. It felt good.

  He thought about when he first met Maggie, in the Sunday school of this very church. Back then she was known to him only as one of the Fitzpatrick children, of which there were many. Hannah’s four brothers and Maggie’s three brothers had absorbed Scott into their pack, which was long the bane of Sister Mary Margrethe’s existence.

  Back then Maggie was just the freckle-face sister with the red curls. She, Hannah, and Claire had been inseparable. They may have fought amongst themselves, but no one dared say one word against one of them to the others. He once saw Maggie square off against a boy who was twice her size, when he dared to pick on little Hannah. By the time Maggie was done with him, the boy was bleeding, had snot running down his chin, and was crying for his mother.

  In grade school they were aware of each other, but in the way boys and girls sometimes do at that age, they each thought the other was cootie-covered and repellent. It wasn’t until sixth grade, when Scott realized Maggie was not so much cootie-covered as she was adorable, that he developed a deep, unrequited crush on her. The beautiful Ava may have starred in a few of his boyhood fantasies, as she did in many others’, but Maggie wedged herself deep into Scott’s heart, and there she stayed.

  He remembered the day her father fell off a ladder and broke his back while painting the trim on their house. Scott was standing next to Maggie in the hallway of Rose Hill Elementary when the principal came to get her. Scott followed them to the principal’s office, where Maggie reached for Scott’s hand and held it as she cried. He had stayed there with her until her Aunt Delia came to fetch her.

  When Scott’s father died, just a year later, after the funeral Maggie had sought him out, had told him she was sorry about his dad. It had meant more to him than anything anybody else said to him that day.

  Over the years, Scott, along with Ed and Sam, had become honorary members of the Fitzpatrick’s extended family. It was Curtis Fitzpatrick who always included Scott when he t
ossed a baseball with his sons in their backyard, and invited him to come along when he took his boys camping, hunting, or fishing. It was Chief Ian Fitzpatrick who mentored him when he decided to go into law enforcement, hired him to work in the Rose Hill Police Department, and then recommended him for the position of chief when he retired.

  Scott had not been the only informally adopted son. After Ed’s mother ran off, the Fitzpatrick mothers had stepped in, absorbing Ed and his dad into their holidays and Sunday dinners. After Sam came back from the service, disabled and depressed, it was Maggie’s father Fitz and her Grandpa Tim who got him to talk about his war experiences, through sharing their own, thus helping him begin to recover.

  For many years Maggie treated Scott like a brother, which was to say, with irritated toleration. As they grew up, and went through high school, Scott had made clear his devotion, with every valentine and dance invitation. Maggie, in return, had made her position very clear with every rejection, sometimes in very blunt terms. Still, Scott stayed loyal.

  After graduating from high school, while Maggie worked in her family’s bakery, Scott attended community college, and dated other girls. Over the years they cheerfully passed each other on the street, and sometimes stopped to catch up, but Scott’s devotion had receded into resigned acceptance. He eventually dated and then married a nice girl he had met at school. Maggie met Gabe and, much to her mother’s chagrin, moved with him into a house they built up Possum Holler.

  The two couples socialized, and Scott came to feel that Gabriel was his good friend, right up until the moment he found out the man was actually a drug-dealing ex-con. At that moment, his loyalty to Maggie easily won out over any friendship he may have thought he had with her boyfriend. Every action he took after that was to protect Maggie.

  The same year Scott and his wife divorced, Gabriel abandoned Maggie, and she was devastated. Scott did what he could to help her through, whether it meant offering a shoulder to cry on, someone on which to take out her anger, or an endlessly patient ear to listen to her worries and fears. Their friendship grew stronger, and, eventually, turned into something very precious to Scott, albeit more uncomfortable to Maggie.

  Scott thought of all the nights in which Maggie was the last thing on his mind before he slept, and the first when he awoke. Even during the years when they were estranged, Scott had prayed for her forgiveness, for her understanding, and for the restoration of their friendship. When his mother became ill with cancer, and Scott was at his wits’ end, it had been Maggie he wanted, needed. Miraculously, at least it seemed to him, when he called her, she came. They hadn’t spent a night apart since.

  There was no doubt in Scott’s mind that today he was doing not only the right thing, but the thing he had wanted most in his life: to be the one Maggie could count on; to protect her, to help her, to love her, and to share her life. In some ways this was only the beginning of their love story, although it had started so many years ago.

  When Father Stephen pronounced them husband and wife, Scott felt the happiest he had ever felt, in his whole life. It was tempered only by the sadness that his father and mother couldn’t be there to witness it; other than that, it was a perfect moment.

  As he walked back down the aisle, still holding Maggie’s hand, Sister Mary Margrethe again played, “Let’s Stay Together.” He looked at Maggie.

  “They’re playing our song,” he said.

  “Did you arrange that?” she asked him.

  “Sure I did,” he said. “I know people.”

  “You have connections,” she said.

  “And now I have you,” he said.

  “Good luck with that,” she said.

  He had to laugh. Marriage may not change Maggie Fitzpatrick one little bit, but that was fine with him.

  Clutching Ed’s arm, Claire followed Hannah, Sam, Melissa, and Patrick down the aisle.

  “You did a great job,” Ed said.

  Claire was barely listening. This song had played for their procession as well; why had Hannah chosen it? It seemed like an odd choice for a wedding, but then, almost everything about this wedding was odd. It was not often one featured a reluctant, contrary bride, an eager groom, and a bait-and-switch ceremony.

  “Believe me,” Ed said, “none of this would’ve happened without you.”

  “Thanks,” Claire said. “This must be Scott and Maggie’s special song.”

  “It is,” Ed said. “What will our song be, do you think?”

  Before Claire could respond they were caught up and separated by the crowd lining up to go downstairs. Although many people hugged and congratulated her on a job well done, Claire felt curiously deflated. It bothered her that the ceremony wasn’t the big secret she thought it was, and that so many people knew ahead of time. She didn’t think there was one person there who arrived thinking they were attending a christening.

  “It seems like everyone knew it was their wedding and not a christening,” she said to Melissa.

  “This is Rose Hill,” Melissa said. “Ain’t nobody in this town kept a secret longer than five minutes since time began.”

  “But yet no one told Maggie they knew,” Claire said.

  “Folks is scared of Bonnie Fitzpatrick on account of her temper,” Melissa said. “No one wants to get on the wrong side of that one.”

  Melissa seemed excited and exhilarated; Claire wondered why she didn’t.

  “You seemed nervous coming up the aisle,” Claire said. “Are you okay now?”

  “I was just thinking ‘bout all them folks knowing where I been the last three years,” she said. “I kinda feel like I got no right to dress up and parade in front of them.”

  “You have every right,” Claire said, giving her a side-arm hug. “You’re as much a part of this family as any of us.”

  “You mean that?” Melissa said. “I been worried you was thinking I’m trying to horn in on your mama and daddy.”

  Claire thought about how irritated she’d been every time Melissa showed up and her father was so glad to see her. She guessed she wasn’t that good at hiding it. Melissa hadn’t figured in her vision for herself and her parents when she had decided to stay in Rose Hill, and she had resented the intrusion of what seemed very much like her replacement. Melissa had lived in their house during many of the years Claire was gone. What must it have felt like for Melissa to come back and find the prodigal daughter back in the fold?

  ‘I’ve been stingy and controlling,’ Claire thought. ‘I’ve been selfish and rude.’

  Claire hugged Melissa and kissed her cheek. She would have to find a way to make it up to her, to make her feel more welcome.

  “No, we need you,” Claire said. “We need all the help we can get.”

  “I been meanin’ to tell you I’m glad about you and Ed, there.”

  “We’re just friends,” Claire said.

  “I seen how he looks at you,” Melissa said. “And I think it’s a good thing. He’s a good person, and you two make a cute couple. He’s takin’ good care of Tommy, and I know you’ll be good to him, too.”

  Claire thought it must have taken a lot of courage for Melissa to say what she had, and it would be rude to insist that there wasn’t the potential for that very thing to happen.

  “Thanks,” Claire said instead. “I think Tommy’s a good kid. You should be proud.”

  Downstairs in the fellowship hall, Bonnie was insisting that Maggie join the rest of her family in forming a reception line. Maggie put her hands on her hips and her eyebrows went way up as she squared off against her mother.

  “It’s my wedding,” Maggie was saying.

  “And I’m your mother,” Bonnie said. “It’s the least you could do considering all you’ve put me through.”

  Scott was standing back, looking uncomfortable. Claire rushed to stand between the two women as people started to notice the fuss they were making.

  “Look at the beautiful cake,” Claire said loudly. “Maggie’s mother made it.”

  M
aggie’s face softened as she looked at the cake, and Bonnie beamed as she looked at the expression on her daughter’s face.

  “Mom, it’s beautiful,” Maggie said. “Look at all the lilies of the valley. That must have taken you hours upon hours.”

  “I was up all night,” Bonnie said. “Of course, Melissa helped, too, but I did the decorating.”

  Maggie’s eyes welled up and she looked at her mother with great tenderness.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I know I’ve been an aggravation to you all these years.”

  “Nonsense,” Bonnie said. “You’re my only daughter, and I wanted it to be perfect.”

  “It is perfect,” Maggie said.

  The two women hugged, and then dabbed at their eyes and laughed at themselves. Scott winked at Claire and gave her a thumbs-up. The crises momentarily diverted, Claire quickly separated the two women before they could find something new to argue about.

  “I really need you to take charge in the kitchen,” she told Bonnie. “It’s chaos in there.”

  “Don’t you worry,” Bonnie said. “I’ll soon get that lot sorted out.”

  Bonnie headed toward the kitchen, where the unwitting ladies who had volunteered to help serve were no doubt doing a wonderful job, not knowing they were about to be mustered by the she-devil mother of the bride.

  Claire escorted Maggie and Scott to the cake table, and then directed people to get in two lines to receive plates of cake, cups of punch, or glasses of wine. She watched Ed retrieve his camera and start snapping photos.

  Claire called to the ladies in the kitchen to come and watch, and then said, loudly, “Time to cut the cake.”

  “If you smash that cake in my face, I’ll turn the whole thing over on your head,” Maggie told Scott.

  “I wouldn’t want to start out married life that way,” Scott said.

  Maggie and Scott cut the cake, and even though he pretended he might not, Scott kept his word about not smashing cake in Maggie’s face. That crisis averted, Claire bustled about, making sure everyone had something to eat and drink, and guiding people to tables decorated with white table cloths and Erma’s beautiful flower arrangements.