Jack With a Twist bm-2

by Brenda Janowitz

  “Fine, but I’m coming to sit at your table,” Vanessa says, grabbing my hand, and we walk back to the ballroom together.

  “Oh, my God,” I gasp, “is Noah your mystery man?”

  “He’s married,” Vanessa says. “What do you think, I’m pulling a Miranda?”

  “Is that our new term for cheating?” I ask.

  “It’s our new term for making a move on a married man,” she says. “Yes. Think of it as the new Miranda warning—you do not have the right to hit on a married man. Anything you do with said married man can and will be used against you by every other woman you know.”

  “You know what? I kind of feel sorry for her.”

  “I feel worse for the wives of the men she’s messed around with,” Vanessa says. Said like a wife who’s been betrayed. I feel a tug of sadness for Vanessa and all she’s been through.

  “Oh, honey. Me, too. I feel terrible for the wives. What she did, what she does, is awful. I mean, I’m not saying that what she did was in any way excusable, I’m just saying that I feel sorry for her. It’s like she just can’t help but fall in love with the wrong guy.”

  “Are you trying to say that you fell for the wrong guy, too?” Vanessa asks, as we approach the ballroom.

  “You know what? I don’t think so, but I guess we’re going to find out right now.”

  The double doors to the ballroom open with a swoosh and the people at the few tables nearest to the doors turn around to look at us as we quietly make our way to the SGR table. I sit back down in my seat and Vanessa takes Rosalyn’s seat. Noah looks at me from across the table and smiles. He mouths the words I’m glad you came back.

  I mouth back the words, “Me, too.”

  Judge Solomon’s law clerk announces that Jack is going to be giving the closing statements, and the crowd applauds as Jack takes the mike once again.

  “Thank you all for coming today to honor the Honorable Edward Solomon. My father. The man we all love and respect, and by being here today, you’ve truly honored him. Thank you for that.” The crowd all stands to applaud. Then, as everyone begins to take their seats again, Jack turns to his father: “Dad, you’ve made me the lawyer I am today. The man I am today. You’ve taught me how to fight to the death in a courtroom, and I’ve litigated against the toughest adversaries in the jurisdiction without flinching because of it. But the one person I could never go against is you. I always thought that having respect for you meant never standing up to you, but I was wrong. Now, I think that having respect for you would actually be to show you that I’ve become the man you’ve always taught me to be. To be strong, to take responsibility for things. To stand up for what I believe in.” Jack says, to a round of roaring applause. The judges on the dais all begin shaking Judge Solomon’s hand and patting him on the back. The Judge’s law clerk begins to get up from his seat, thinking that Jack is done speaking, but Jack doesn’t move a muscle. He stays firmly planted at the mic. He runs his hand through his shaggy brown hair and takes a deep breath.

  “Dad, I love and respect you, but I don’t want lobster at my wedding if Brooke doesn’t want it. And, Dad, if you want lobster, then that’s fine, but then you won’t be at my wedding, and I’ll have to respect that, just as you’ll have to respect my decision here today. Because I love Brooke Miller and I’m going to do anything in the world to get her back. I let my fear get in the way of the best thing that ever happened to me, and I’m correcting that mistake here and now. Being afraid cost me the most important thing in my life and I’m going to get it back. I’m going to get it back right now.”

  And with that, Jack jumps off of the dais and begins walking straight toward my table. Everyone stops and stares as he makes his way through the massive ballroom, straight through to my table.

  I get up from my seat and walk toward him.

  Finally! My real, live Breakfast at Tiffany’s moment! You know, without the whole $50-for-the-powder-room and kept-man thing, though.

  What? Wouldn’t you want your Breakfast at Tiffany’s moment to be cleaned up a bit, too?

  “I want to settle,” I say as we meet in the middle of the ballroom, both gasping for air.

  “Being with me is settling?” Jack says. He runs his fingers through his shaggy brown hair and I can tell that he’s not sure whether he should put his arms around me. “I thought that my speech wasn’t half bad.”

  “No,” I say, “Not settle on you. Settle with you. Our case. I want to settle our case. And then I want to marry you.”

  “Whatever you say, counselor,” Jack says as he leans in to kiss me. And we kiss and we kiss and we kiss. And we don’t care that Jack’s dad is there, watching us with his mouth down on the floor. And we don’t care that we’re standing in a room full of judges and lawyers. We kiss and it’s like the rest of the world has ceased to exist.

  I’m vaguely aware that as we stand there kissing, some people in the crowd begin to clap. Soon, it becomes a roaring applause and I detach myself from Jack’s face long enough to look out and see everyone standing up and applauding for us.

  I turn around to see Jack’s father standing and applauding for us, too. He then grabs the mike and says: “Jack, I’m very proud of you. I’m proud of the man you have become. So, if you and Brooke don’t want lobster at your wedding, then I don’t want it, either. And Brooke, if I’ve done anything to offend you and your family over the last few months—well, it sounds like I’ve done a lot to offend you and your family over the last few months—I truly am sorry. I hope that you all will see fit to forgive me.

  “I really am happy that Jack’s found a woman like you, and my family would be lucky to have you as a daughter-in-law. Beauty and brains, that’s our Brooke!”

  “Of course we forgive you, Judge Solomon,” I call out, hoping that it’s loud enough for him to hear.

  “Why don’t you try calling me Dad?” Judge Solomon says, and the crowd begins to applaud again.

  I am so not calling that man Dad anytime soon.

  “Now, I think that I’ve got a conflict of interest here,” Jack’s father says. “So, who’s going to marry these two for me?”

  A voice booms from the back of the ballroom. Large and commanding, it’s a voice that doesn’t need the assistance of a microphone. I turn around and see a familiar face: Judge Martin, walking toward us, yelling, “I will!”

  Column Five

  You didn’t hear it from us…

  WHAT former model turned fashion designer was seen canoodling with an unidentified brunette at a midtown hotel for an afternoon rendezvous? Onlookers say they stopped in for a drink and tearfully declared their love for each other before embracing out in the open, just before sneaking off to a room.

  Could this be why her husband moved out of their Upper East Side brownstone a few months ago?

  31

  We’re all squashed into Judge Martin’s chambers for an impromptu wedding ceremony the following week. After having swept me off my feet the week before, Jack informed me that he refused to take another chance that I might get away from him, and insisted on marrying me as soon as humanly possible.

  Which turned out to be the following Tuesday—the day we were supposed to go to trial.

  We’ve turned the three rooms that make up Judge Martin’s chambers into an ad hoc wedding hall, with his personal chamber being used for the ceremony, his law clerk’s office being used as the bride’s room, and his assistant’s office in the middle, which connects the two, as a long, makeshift wedding aisle. Our immediate families and best friends are crushed into Judge Martin’s chamber, standing room only, while they wait for me to make my entrance.

  I’m out in the law clerk’s office, just waiting to be called into the ceremony—not quite walking down the aisle, but more of walking down the hallway, if anything—and do one final check for my something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue.

  My something old is Jack’s grandmother’s engagement ring, which I took immediate repossession
of from his coat pocket the second we left the Waldorf-Astoria.

  Oh, please. As if the diamond ring wouldn’t be the first thing on your mind the second you got the guy back.

  My something new is a custom-made wedding gown made lovingly stitch by stitch by Monique. Apparently, when I took on her case and then told her that I couldn’t buy her dress since it would be a conflict of interest, she decided right then and there that she would make it anyway and give it to me as a wedding gift. She kept throwing me off the scent by fitting me for fake muslins whenever I came to meet with her at her brownstone, but she ended up making me the exact dress that she sketched for me that first day in her studio. Good thing Jack and I ended up back together since I seriously doubt that you can resell one-of-a-kind couture. Especially one-of-a-kind couture that’s a size ten.

  My something borrowed is the pair of ruby earrings that Vanessa decided to buy from Moishe that day we went wedding ring shopping. They look absolutely perfect, especially since I’ve got my hair tied up loosely and they peek out from the waves falling down from the top of my head. These earrings also satisfy my grandmother and Aunt Devorah to no end, both of whom insisted that I wear at least something red, so as to ward off the evil eye which would undoubtedly be following me on my wedding day.

  My something blue is the baby-blue garter that my mother wore at her own wedding. And as a special wedding gift to me, she didn’t even say a word about the fact that the fit was a bit snug, to say the least.

  Vanessa has been taking her maid of honor duties very seriously, and in addition to having the Vera Wang whip up gorgeous navy bridesmaids’ dresses for her and Jack’s sisters at the last minute (another favor courtesy of her mother), she also insisted that, as maid of honor, she be allowed to plan the reception. So, we’ll be heading over to her mother’s downtown art gallery after the ceremony for the reception. (“She lives for this stuff and would actually be offended if you didn’t have it there.”)

  She also (as part of her duties, of course) did me the favor of posting bail for my wedding videographer, yet again (yes, that’s two federal arraignments in the course of one engagement, for those of you who are keeping count), since I felt that it wouldn’t help relax me to have to go down to the Manhattan Detention Center yet again just days before my wedding. Unfortunately for Vanessa, these charges were much more serious than the last—something about filming someone’s honeymoon down in Mexico and sticking some contraband into his camera case—so, Vanessa actually ended up referring the case to one of our friends from law school who practices criminal law. But on a lighter note, now my mobster wedding videographer owes Vanessa “a solid,” should she ever choose to cash it in. She was none too pleased about the whole situation, solid or no solid, to be sure, but she did it with a smile since she’s such a good maid of honor.

  (Note to self: Must look into whether or not the solid I owe Jay can be traded for the solid that Jay now owes Vanessa. There really should be somewhere to look this sort of stuff up on the Internet.)

  “You ready to go, BB?” my father asks me as Judge Martin’s assistant buzzes us on the law clerk’s intercom to let us know that it’s time to come into the judge’s chamber.

  “For God’s sake, Barry,” my mother says, “why are you asking her that? Do you want to give her another chance to run away?” And then to me: “We’re going.”

  “Let’s go,” I say, and then we do.

  Jack breaks the glass with his foot and we are officially husband and wife.

  “You may now kiss the bride,” Judge Martin says and Jack takes me into his arms and kisses me. I can feel a camera flash go off as we kiss and I have a feeling that this will be one of those perfect photos that you keep framed in your house forever and ever. And then it becomes a family heirloom and eventually your kids all fight over who will get to keep it since they all chipped in equally for that really really really expensive sterling silver picture frame from Tiffany’s for your thirtieth wedding anniversary and then they all start laughing about that funny story when Mom and Dad fought and almost broke up while registering at Tiffany’s and then they all forget what they were even fighting about in the first place. You know, a picture like that.

  Sorry. I just get a little worked up at weddings.

  But we kiss and we smile and then, there being no aisle for Jack and I to then walk down, we simply spin around into the arms of our families and friends.

  With all that we went through with the planning of our big formal wedding, we never once considered what it was that we actually wanted as a couple. Did we want the traditional Long Island temple wedding that my parents dreamed of, with our friends and family close, and God, undoubtedly, that much closer? Or did we want the fabulous, splashy Manhattan hotel wedding, with a fancy wedding planner, designer food and guest list that read like a Manhattan phone book?

  As I look around Judge Martin’s chambers, with his various diplomas and certificates on the wall (papered and painted circa 1979), institutional carpeting and run-down leather couch and visitors’ chairs, I can’t help but think that what I got was the most perfect wedding in the world.

  “You’re married!” Vanessa calls out, grabbing me for a hug. “I can’t believe it!”

  For so long, it was Vanessa who was the married one, and me as the crazy single friend, and I’m just so happy that she’s got someone new in her life to share this day with her. I just couldn’t be as happy as I am today if I thought Vanessa felt lonely or sad.

  “So when is this mystery man of yours going to show his face?” I whisper into her ear.

  “He’s actually meeting us after the ceremony at my mom’s art gallery,” Vanessa says. Her face is glowing as she says it.

  “Meeting your best friend and your parents at the same time?” I ask. “You are truly one brave woman.”

  “I have a feeling that it’ll be okay,” she says, looking down.

  Judge Martin’s intercom goes off and his assistant announces that our cars are here, ready to take us to Millie’s gallery for the reception.

  “Our chariots await!” my father calls out as we each file out of chambers.

  There’s something incredibly sexy and fun about being downtown at the federal courthouse—where I normally wear my most conservative suit—being all dressed up in my wedding dress instead. Sort of like that time I went to a friend’s wedding in Chicago and we all went out at 3:00 a.m. after the wedding, still in our formal wear, to go and get authentic deep-dish pizza. Vanessa said that she felt that way, too, in her gorgeous custom-made bridesmaid dress.

  When I told this to Jack, he suggested taking the subway downtown to make my fantasy complete. Instead of screaming at him Have you lost your goddamned mind, you idiot, even suggesting such a thing? I don’t even take the subway when I’m wearing fancy jeans, much less my wedding dress! at the top of my lungs, I simply told him that I didn’t need the subway to complete my fantasy, since my fantasy was complete by being married to him.

  See how good I am at being a wife already?

  32

  It is an old Jewish custom, dating back to the time of Rebecca, that the bride and groom must go to a private room after the wedding ceremony and be alone for the first time. Since Jack and I were living together for almost a year before our wedding, we most certainly have had occasion to “be alone” together, but, nonetheless, my father made sure that, the second we got to the art gallery for the reception, we went back into Millie’s office to have our time in the Yichud.

  “We’re finally married,” Jack says, as he grabs me and gives me a kiss. It’s not the sweet and innocent and totally family-appropriate type of kiss that he gave me in Judge Martin’s chambers. This kiss is serious, earnest, burning—downright smoldering. It’s a kiss that tells me everything I need to know about the type of life we are going to have together: Jack loves me and always will.

  And I love Jack and always will.

  We kiss shamelessly for God knows how long when finally one of us real
izes that it might be bad form to spend the whole of your wedding making out with your new husband in your best friend’s mother’s art gallery office. It’s actually Jack who says it, because I don’t really see a problem with it.

  “We’re finally married,” I say to Jack as I touch up my lip gloss in the reflection of Millie’s huge floor-to-ceiling window. You’d think a former model like Millie would be vain enough to have a mirror somewhere in her office….

  “You didn’t think I’d let you get away from me again?” Jack says.

  “I was hoping you wouldn’t,” I say, turning around to look at my new husband. “I was really hoping you wouldn’t.”

  Jack and I finally walk out into the reception and I’m awestruck by how Millie’s created such an ethereal space out of her art gallery. Sure, it’s in a huge penthouse loft in Tribeca, with fourteen-foot ceilings and views looking out to the water that make you feel like you’re in a movie. Sure, it’s all exposed brick and original wood, framed perfectly by its many picture windows on each of the four walls. But, for the reception, she’s taken out the huge eight-foot white walls, normally arranged like Stonehenge, on which the art is displayed, and has replaced them with tables dressed in crisp white linens with chairs dressed to match. She’s got tiny little white lights strewn across the ceiling, making you feel like you’re outside on a crisp summer’s night.

  I see Vanessa from across the floor with her father and the new guy she’s dating. I’m shocked to see that this new guy is actually someone I know. The new guy is also someone who her father already knows. It’s someone Vanessa knows, too. Very well, I might add.

  Her husband. Well, ex-husband as the case may be, but the fact remains that Vanessa’s here with Marcus. And they’re holding hands and giggling like two children. Two children who are madly in love.

  Jack and I walk over to the other happy couple of the evening and say hello.