A May Bride

by Meg Moseley

  I held my breath, afraid she still wasn’t ready to accept Gray’s place in my life.

  She gave me a worried squint. “That close? I hope you’re not over there at all hours. I’m afraid that’s how Alexa will be too. If I’ve told her once I’ve told her a hundred times, just because Eric’s moving into the apartment doesn’t mean they can start playing house.”

  “I know, but I wish you would lighten up a little.”

  “She’s a kid. Kids need some guidance.”

  “She’s an adult.” I pointed at a clump of jade-green hens-and-chicks, their succulent rosettes growing so close together that they smashed each other. “See how crowded the hens-and-chicks are? That’s how Alexa must feel. She’s one of those chicks, trying to find room to grow.”

  “Baloney. She’s got plenty of room.” Mom touched a fingertip to one of the small green rosettes. “This old hen will be glad when the wedding’s over.”

  “Old hen? Mom, you’ll be the prettiest mother of the bride ever. You were stunning at your fitting, and you didn’t even have your hair done.”

  “Huh. I only know I’ve had enough of your sister’s meltdowns. When it’s your turn, I hope you’ll keep your head on your shoulders.”

  “I’ll try.”

  That was the closest she’d come to acknowledging that Gray and I might get married. I wanted to blurt it out, then and there, but that wouldn’t have been right. He had to be part of the happy announcement. I could hardly wait.

  Mother’s Day had come and gone. Gray and I had spent the day with our respective mothers, and we still hadn’t shared our news.

  On a Wednesday afternoon halfway through May, I washed dishes at his kitchen sink while he caught up on work in the living room. Once the heat and humidity arrived, Atlanta would hum with air conditioners. For now, Gray kept his windows open so we could hear songbirds and enjoy the sweet scent of jasmine from a neighboring balcony.

  The next few weeks would be crazy. Alexa had two bridal showers, her final fitting, and umpteen appointments to confirm this and that. As her maid of honor, I was in the thick of it and so was Mom. Although Mom and I were on reasonably good terms again, tensions between her and Alexa were rising. I stayed out of it whenever I could.

  Gray’s computer chimed as he shut it down. “There,” he said. “That’ll hold ’em until tomorrow.”

  “Good.” I’d given up trying to understand exactly what his job entailed. I only knew his company had recently given him a generous raise to keep him from being poached by a competitor.

  I wished I had some extra money too. I’d had more bills lately, for everything from a new radiator to a new computer, and I hadn’t earned many commissions. I needed to devote more of my time to drumming up prospects.

  Once we were married, I wouldn’t have to worry about money. Even though I planned to go on working, his income could support both of us—and a family someday too.

  I imagined a toddler in tiny jeans and miniature boots. Mr. Boots Junior. Or Miss Boots, maybe.

  I scrubbed the starchy residue of pasta from Gray’s beat-up metal colander. When we went public with our engagement, a decent colander would be one of the first items I’d add to our gift registry.

  I was tired of living in limbo. I wanted a ring on my finger and a date on my calendar. Without a date, we couldn’t make real progress on our plans.

  “Gray?”

  I heard his bare feet padding across the kitchen floor. His hands snuggled around my waist, and his lips brushed my right ear.

  “You called?” he murmured.

  “Mm-hmm.” I rinsed the soap off the colander and stuck it on the drying rack. “It’s weird to be so involved in Alexa’s plans without saying a word about ours.”

  “Do you think it’s time to fess up?”

  “I do. Even if we kept it a secret for months, my mom would still say we’re rushing things. Besides, I’m excited and I want to tell everybody.”

  “I do too.” His lips tickled my left ear. “We can tell my folks before they run off to their Wednesday night church thing, and then we can go tell your mom and Alexa.”

  “You mean tonight? Right now?”

  “Why not? Got cold feet?”

  “About marrying you? Never.” I wiped my wet hands on my shorts and turned around, his fingers skimming my midriff. “It’s just . . .”

  “I know. Mama Bear is scary.”

  “And she’ll think we just got engaged. It’s almost a lie.”

  “We’ll tell her the whole truth, then. We’ll admit we’ve been engaged for a while.” He shrugged. “What’s the big deal?”

  “We’ve only known each other since February. If we admit we’ve already been engaged for a while, it’ll only look more scandalous to her.”

  “Maybe she won’t ask for details,” he said hopefully.

  “Oh, she will. And then she’ll say it still isn’t official because we don’t have a ring and a date.”

  “Guess what? She’s wrong. Come on. Let’s go for broke.” He scooped me off my feet so suddenly that I shrieked. “I’m practicing for when I carry you over the threshold. We’re getting married!”

  He spun in a circle, whirling me into dizzy giggles that almost made my worries flee. Almost.

  We interrupted Gray’s parents in a cheek-to-cheek tango in their living room, but they showed no signs of embarrassment. When we shared our news, they whooped and hollered, welcomed me into the family, and proposed a toast with sweet tea. After visiting for an hour, Gray and I hit the road for Mom’s house.

  Alexa’s car was in the driveway when we arrived, and the roses and peonies were blooming in happy profusion. We ran through the yard, paused on the porch for one quick kiss for luck, and walked right in. Alexa’s lacy white wedding binder lay on the couch along with a few leftover invitations.

  “Mom,” I called. “Alexa. Where are you?”

  Then I heard them in the kitchen. Yelling. Their volume and pitch rose with every word.

  “He did not!” my sister screamed.

  “He did too!” my mother screamed back.

  “Oh boy,” I whispered. “One of Lexie’s famous meltdowns.”

  Gray’s eyes were wide. “Maybe I should wait outside.”

  “Good idea. I’ll come get you when they’ve calmed down.”

  He escaped to the porch, and I entered the kitchen. Mirror images of each other, Mom and Alexa stood at opposite ends of the table, their hands clenched into fists at hip level. Alexa’s cheeks were streaked with tears and mascara.

  “Hey there,” I said. “What’s going on?”

  They glanced at me and resumed their argument, nearly drowning each other out. None of it made sense, but it was something about the apartment. Something about Eric. A huge disappointment.

  “Call it what it is,” Mom shouted. “It’s immorality.”

  I sucked in my breath. If Eric was cheating on my little sister, I would rip his heart out. Shove it down his throat. Pull it out his butt.

  “What happened?” I asked. “Mom, Lex, what’s going on?”

  Alexa stared out the window, her chest heaving. “She nagged me with nosy questions until I confessed.”

  “Confessed what?”

  “Go ahead, Mom. Tell her.”

  Mom turned toward me, tears on her face too. “They put the bed before the wed, so the wedding’s off. Or at least the big church wedding is off.”

  “What? Why?”

  She turned back to Alexa. “I warned you. I told you not to spend so much time there. No chaperones. No accountability. All the temptation in the world.”

  “Can you blame us? You never give us a moment’s privacy here.” Alexa grabbed a paper napkin from the table and blew her nose. “Okay, so we messed up. It’s none of your business.”

  “Yes it is, missy. I won’t pay for a white-dress wedding now. You can’t stand there in church, in front of God and everybody, and pretend you deserve a white dress. It’s hypocrisy, that’s what it is.”<
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  “Who’s the hypocrite? You had to get married. At least I’m not pregnant.”

  Mom murmured something unintelligible. “I should’ve known a good-lookin’ boy like him would lead you astray.”

  “Maybe I led him astray. Ever think about that?” Alexa snatched her purse from the counter and ran out, slamming the front door so hard that Mom’s prized collection of delft blue plates shook on their narrow shelf.

  Oblivious to their peril, Mom aimed her angry gaze at me. “What do you want?”

  “Some common sense. Some kindness.”

  I heard Lexie’s car spitting gravel. In her blind rage, she might have run right past Gray without seeing him, but he couldn’t have missed seeing her.

  I put my hands on my hips and braced myself for battle. “I don’t care what they’ve done, Mom. You can’t renege on paying for—”

  “Watch me. God won’t bless couples who don’t keep themselves pure, so I can’t either.”

  “Excuse me? Where’s the grace? Sure, it would have been best if they’d waited, but that’s no reason to call off the wedding.”

  “There’ll be a wedding, all right. A quickie. Tomorrow I’ll drag ’em to the courthouse.”

  “You think they would let you? Get real.”

  “I won’t pay for a white-dress wedding. It’d be a charade.” Mom sniffled. “I tried so hard to raise godly girls.”

  I ached inside, remembering Alexa as a little girl at our cousin’s wedding in Savannah. Awestruck by his bride’s beauty, she’d started dreaming of her own wedding. But not like this. Never like this.

  I choked back a sob. “You’re not paying for my wedding either. I don’t need a dime from you, thank you very much, and I’m buying an ivory dress. Not because I don’t deserve to wear white, but because it’s my dream dress. And Gray’s my dream man.”

  Mom’s mouth dropped open. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m marrying Gray.” I started crying in earnest.

  This wasn’t the way I’d wanted to tell her. Gray wasn’t even in the room. He was outside somewhere, probably wanting to run from me and my crazy family.

  “I guess you’re shacking up too,” Mom said sorrowfully.

  I blushed, not because I was guilty—I wasn’t—but because her fixation on the topic was embarrassing. “Don’t even go there,” I said between clenched teeth.

  “Oh, Ellie.” She wiped a tear away. “You are, aren’t you?”

  “No, I’m not! But back to Alexa—you can’t cancel anything. The invitations already went out.”

  “We can call people.” She muttered something. “I’ll lose my deposits.”

  “You’re worried about your deposits when Alexa’s heartbroken?”

  “She should’ve thought about that before she messed around.”

  “Who are you to judge? You were no angel. Neither am I. Gray and I try to behave ourselves, but I’ll admit I’m looking forward to—to—consummating our relationship. Sorry, but I’m human. News flash, Mom: God loves humans.”

  “Humans can be mighty messed up, and now you’re marrying one you hardly know? Doing the same thing I did?”

  “It’s not the same. I know him. I trust him. I love him. We’re engaged.”

  Mom glared at my left hand. “I don’t see a ring.”

  “We didn’t get that far yet. Deal with it.” I walked out, breathing hard, but I managed to shut the door in a civil manner.

  Gray stood on Mom’s lush lawn, facing the spot where Alexa’s car had been. I could only imagine what he thought of my family now. He would love them for my sake, but that didn’t mean he would ever understand them. Or even me.

  As I hurried through the yard where my sister and I had played as children, I remembered teaching her a new song when she was three or four. She’d picked it up right away. For days, she’d walked around singing it at the top of her lungs.

  Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.

  I couldn’t stand to let her think Jesus stopped loving her when she and Eric fell to temptation.

  They are weak, but he is strong. Yes, Jesus loves me . . .

  I wouldn’t tell anyone else about Alexa’s private troubles, but Gray needed to know the basics. He would be far more merciful than Mom.

  “Gray,” I called, and he wheeled around. “We have to find Alexa. She’s probably on her way to Eric’s place. Can I drive?”

  He tossed me his keys, and we ran to his car.

  While I drove, I brought Gray up to speed. “I can’t believe Mom sometimes,” I finished, still fuming.

  “Yeah, I’d say her reaction is a little over the top.”

  “A little? It’s downright un-Christian. I was so mad, I told her I don’t need her money for our wedding.”

  “You told her we’re getting married?”

  “It kind of slipped out.” Slowing for a stop sign, I glanced at him. “I’m sorry.”

  He was frowning straight ahead. “It’s okay.”

  “No, I shouldn’t have said anything. It should have been a happy moment, like it was when we told your mom and dad.”

  “A together moment.”

  “That too. I’m sorry, Gray.”

  “It’s okay,” he said again, a little too quietly.

  When we reached the apartment, he elected to wait in the car. My sandals made a racket as I ran up the metal stairs. Stopping at 2D, I knocked on the door.

  “Lex? It’s me.”

  A long silence ensued, but she must have heard me. Through the thin walls, I could hear her blowing her nose.

  I knocked again. “I’m alone.”

  “Mom’s not with you?”

  “No. It’s just me.”

  Alexa opened the door, her eyes puffy and her nose red. “What am I gonna do?”

  “It’ll be okay.” I shut the door and hugged her.

  She cried while I massaged her back, the magic trick that had always stopped her meltdowns when she was five or six. It didn’t calm her now.

  Eric had turned the apartment into a bachelor pad. A Georgia Dawgs T-shirt hung over a chair in the dining nook, and he’d crammed a weight set into one corner of the living room. So far, the room had no feminine touches except their engagement photo flanked by stubby white candles on a thrift-store coffee table.

  “I don’t even know how it started,” she said, her speech garbled with tears. “I’d come over here just to get away from Mom . . . and . . . things happened. I wish we’d waited, but it’s too late.” She gulped. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  “I know, Lex.”

  “I wanted to be one of those beautiful, happy brides,” she sobbed.

  “You still can be.”

  “Not if Mom won’t pay for it.”

  I kept remembering the couple from the guerrilla wedding. With a baby on the way, with no support from their families, they’d still had a joyful, romantic ceremony.

  “A simple wedding can still be beautiful,” I said. “You don’t need the fuss and feathers. You only need each other.”

  “But if we just run down to the courthouse, everybody will think we have to get married.”

  “Who cares what people think? It doesn’t matter.”

  She collapsed on the couch and started bawling again.

  I couldn’t stay dry-eyed either. Even if I could help them put together a scaled-down version of their original plans, it would feel like second best. And Alexa, the sentimental one who felt everything deeply, would never get over that wound. She would think she was second best.

  I knelt beside the couch. “Forget everything Mom said. God still wants to bless you. He doesn’t love you any less than he did before. Okay? You and Eric can forgive yourselves because God does. And you can move on.”

  “With a cheap, ugly wedding. Because I’m cheap and ugly.”

  “You are not. You’re precious and beautiful. To God, to Eric, to me.”

  No matter what I said, she only cried harder. I had to think of something.
I couldn’t let her start her marriage with a bundle of shame on her slender shoulders. With “condemned” stamped on her tender heart.

  Dis-grace. No grace. That wasn’t God’s way.

  Mom had a lot of nerve.

  I was in the middle of imagining what I’d say to her when inspiration struck. I had the resources to salvage Alexa’s happiness.

  It was crazy. It was perfect.

  It was going to hurt.

  I imagined Alexa exiting the church on Eric’s arm, smiling, celebrating vows that started not with past mistakes but with the present.

  From this day forward . . .

  Go for broke, Gray had said. Boy, would I be broke.

  I took a deep breath and exhaled, letting go of that fabulous Jenny Packham gown and so much more. A good photographer. A good band. A nice reception menu. Alexa mattered more than all of it put together.

  “Lexie, you can still have the wedding you’ve planned. Remember my wedding fund?”

  She nodded in the middle of a sob.

  “It’s yours,” I said. “I’m giving it to you.”

  She gasped. “You can’t do that.”

  “Yes, I can.”

  “Why? Why would you want to?”

  “Because you need to know how much you’re loved. No matter what.”

  She pressed her lips together to keep from crying, the same way she’d done as a toddler in trouble. “Ellie, no.”

  “Yes.”

  She slid off the couch to sit beside me on the carpet. “You mean it? You’re giving me the money?”

  Unable to speak, I could only nod as my dreams dissolved . . . but light gleamed in my sister’s eyes.

  She hugged me fiercely. “You’re the best, El. I—I don’t know what to say.”

  I didn’t either, and I sure didn’t know how I would explain it to Gray. I pulled away from her hug. “Call me later, because unless Mom comes around, I’ll have to take over her to-do list.”

  “She won’t come around.” Alexa’s chin wobbled, but then a dazzling smile lit her face. “Thank you, Ellie.”