Getting Married

by Theresa Alan

  It occurs to me that the little boy hasn’t actually done anything to win my affection so completely. He hasn’t jumped through any intellectual hoops. He isn’t a successful entrepreneur who has saved businesses from the brink of bankruptcy. He doesn’t have to worry about whether he’s cute enough or thin enough or funny enough or smart enough. He is just being. And that is more than enough.

  After a time, Will appears at the door, all bundled up in his wet, snowy coat, hat, and gloves. Even though we’ve been together for a year, I still smile and feel a flutter of excitement when I see him.

  He takes off his coat, hat, and gloves. He shoves the gloves and hat into his coat and hangs the coat on the hook on the outside of the booth. He sits next to me and leans in to give me a quick kiss. “How’s Julia?”

  “Julia’s going to be okay. She should be able to go to home in a few days.”

  “Thank God.”

  “I know. It was really scary for awhile there.”

  I give him more details on the accident and Julia’s condition. I’ve pretty much gotten him up to speed when the waiter swings by and takes Will’s drink order. After the waiter leaves, I just stare into my beer, taking a moment to summon my courage.

  “Will, I asked you to meet me here for a reason.”

  “Yeah? What’s up?”

  “Do you remember where we had our first date?”

  “Of course I do. We met right here. You were sitting at the bar and I saw you and I remember thinking, that can’t possibly be her. She’s much too pretty.”

  I smile. “Right, we met here, and that’s why I thought this would be a good place for me to ask you to marry me.”

  “What?”

  “I do want to marry you. I’ve wanted to all along. I have my fears, but I want to work through them instead of running away from them.”

  “How…when…what changed your mind?”

  “Today, when I watched Jon and Rachel together, I don’t know, the way they were there for each other, it was so amazing. I mean what they have together isn’t perfect, but it’s really incredible, and I want that with you. I want to share my life with you.”

  Will smiles, gets up from the booth, and fumbles through his coat, unzipping one of the inner pockets. In it is my ring box. He sits down, opens the box, takes the ring out, and slips it back on my finger.

  “You’ve been carrying that around with you all this time?”

  “I was hoping you’d change your mind. I had a pretty good idea that you would.”

  “Really? How?”

  “Because we were meant for each other, Eva.”

  I eye the glittering ring on my finger. The ring is absolutely perfect for my hand and my taste in jewelry. It’s perfect, and it’s about the only thing in our relationship that is. We’re two flawed people with messy pasts who still have enough optimism and hope to dream that our relationship can do what so many others don’t—make it.

  “I was thinking that we won’t do the whole big wedding deal,” I continue. “I don’t want to get stressed out. I thought we could go to the justice of the peace and then go to Mickie’s with our closest friends for a few beers or something.”

  “Great. That sounds great.”

  “We’ll lose our deposit money on the DJ and the reception hall.”

  “Fine. No big deal. We’ll still save a lot of money over all. When do you want to do it?”

  “Well, I want to give Mom, Dad, and Sienna enough time to buy their plane tickets. I think we should have it on the same Saturday in May we planned to have it originally.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “You’re a tough guy to make happy, you know,” I tease.

  “I just want to marry you.”

  “I still want us to dress up a little for the pictures, but I think if you get a nice suit and I buy a new dress, that should cover us.”

  “I’ll start shopping for a suit tomorrow.”

  “You don’t have any?”

  “I work with computers. I don’t think I’ve ever had to wear a suit in my life. I’ll wear a tie for job interviews, but that’s about as far as I need to go.”

  “So it’s decided then. We’re getting hitched. I believe this deserves a toast.” We raise our beer glasses and clink them together. “To love,” I say.

  “To love, forever.”

  We sip our beers and then kiss. I feel, for the first time in months, the serenity that comes with certainty.

  I n the days that follow, I feel calm and happy. I feel certain I’m making the right choice, with none of the doubts that plagued me before. I’ve decided to resume my habit of stopping by Rachel’s shop every now and then for no other reason than to shoot the shit. Today when I go to her shop, I have to wait for a few minutes while she rings up a customer.

  When the customer takes her bag and leaves, I come around behind the counter and sit on my stool.

  “Hey, you,” I say. “How’s Julia?” Julia had gotten home from the hospital three days earlier.

  “She’s going to be just fine. Her spirits are really good. Last night Jon was reading her a story and she was all animated and happy. It was such a beautiful thing to see I just started crying. What’s up with you?”

  “Well, the wedding is back on.”

  Rachel whoops and claps her hands together. “I knew it. I knew you two would get married ultimately. Congratulations.”

  “I’ve decided just to have a few friends watch Will and me sign the marriage certificate and then go get a few drinks after, someplace casual. I don’t want to kill myself trying to plan a wedding.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “I still want to get a pretty dress though. Not a wedding dress, just something pretty that makes me feel special.”

  Rachel gets wide-eyed and points her finger at me. “I’ve got the outfit for you. You said you wanted a nontraditional dress. This is nontraditional.” Rachel goes to the back of her store where she keeps new items before putting them out on the shelves.

  “Is it used?” I ask.

  “Think of it as preowned. It’s going to look perfect on you.”

  “You know I don’t like used stuff.”

  “Honey, please, for me. I saw it and it just screamed Eva to me.”

  She dangles the dress in front of me. It’s red satin, very sumptuous. It does look sort of pretty.

  “Okay,” I say.

  We go back to the dressing rooms and I try the dress on to placate her. After Rachel zips me up, I spin around and look into the mirror, and I gasp. I am a goddess. The dress is breathtaking, and in it, so am I. It has a sweetheart neckline and short off-the-shoulder sleeves. It’s tight in the bust and sucks in my stomach, playing up my hourglass figure. The skirt is loose and flowing, making it comfortable to move in. The fabric is sexy and sensual.

  “Oh, my God, Rachel, it’s beautiful.”

  “It looks perfect on you.”

  “But it’s used,” I protest again, with less feeling this time.

  “Maybe. But this dress was made for you. Some things just fit.”

  She’s right. I keep turning and twisting in the mirror, trying to find anything that’s wrong with the dress, but I can’t find anything.

  “How much is it?”

  “It’s my wedding present to you.”

  “It’s so beautiful. It looks pretty pricey.”

  “The fabric is exquisite. I’m sure the woman who owned it before paid a mint for it.”

  “Did she tell you the story about why she was selling it?”

  “She didn’t really sell it, she basically gave it away. She brought me a whole bunch of clothes. She didn’t even want to haggle with me. She actually said she didn’t need any money. She was just trying to downsize so she could move to Paris.”

  “Why?”

  “She said to pursue her true love. I got the feeling she wasn’t talking about a guy, but about another kind of passion. Singing maybe. She had a sultry lounge singer sort of look to her. She was
curvy like you. She gave me a whole bunch of clothes and only took fifty bucks in payment. The clothes were worth several times that.”

  “Still, you shouldn’t give it away if you could make some really money selling it.”

  “People who come to used clothing stores are on a budget. They couldn’t pay what this is worth anyway.”

  That gets me to thinking that maybe even though this dress is gorgeous, maybe it’s just a well-done knockoff of the real thing. Cubic zirconium masquerading as diamond.

  “The cloth is pricey, but how do you know that it won’t fall apart while I’m wearing it?”

  “This is a well-made dress. Look at how carefully it was put together.” She runs her fingers along the top edges of the dress and along the sides. “If you have quality material and take the time to put it together right, the results can be spectacular.”

  I don’t know why I can’t just accept that the perfect dress has fallen from heaven into my lap, but I just keep worrying about what could go wrong. “What if I spill something on it? What if I catch it on something and it tears?”

  “Then you’ll have a gorgeous dress that fits you like a glove with a stain or tear in it. I can’t sprinkle fairy dust on it and guarantee that nothing will happen to it, but I can say that as an amateur fashion maven, this dress was made for you.”

  “You’re right. Thank you so much, Rachel. Thank you so much.” I hug her tightly. She smiles. I feel immensely relieved to have something to wear for my wedding at last. I change and we return to the storefront and sit on our stools behind the counter.

  “Hey, so has anything ever happened with your email flirtation with Shane?” I ask.

  “I finally told him I had to stop. I deleted every last email. I learned my lesson when Julia landed in the hospital. My family is the most important thing in the world to me. I’m not going to do anything to mess that up.”

  “Are you going to tell Jon about it?”

  “I don’t think so. I don’t want to hurt him if I don’t have to.”

  “How did Shane react?”

  “I think he was disappointed, but not surprised. He knew I didn’t want to leave my husband.”

  “I have to say I’m relieved. I think you’re making the right decision.”

  “I know.”

  W hen I get home from Rachel’s store, I call Sienna. “Guess what? Will and I are going to get married after all.”

  “That’s wonderful! What changed your mind?”

  “He knocked me up. No, I’m just kidding.” I tell her about Julia’s accident and how watching Jon and Rachel get through it together made me realize that marriage is what I want after all. “I’m thinking we’ll still have it on the original day we planned, but I kind of just want to do it without thinking about it anymore. It’s not very romantic to say this, but I just want to get it over with. I’m sorry if you have to cancel any performances…”

  “No, don’t worry about it. I’ll be there. I can’t wait to see you. Are you going to have a party afterward?”

  “I thought maybe we’d grab some food and some beers some place. Something casual. It’ll just be Will and my closest friends, you and Mark, Will’s Mom, and Mom and Dad and their significant others.”

  “Mom and Dad are coming out?”

  “They are. Mom and Dad in the same room—that hasn’t happened since you graduated from college six years ago.”

  “And boy was that fun.”

  “Wasn’t it though? I think I’m more afraid of the two of them together than pledging to spend my life with Will.”

  “Well, I can’t wait. Congratulations again. I’m really happy for you.”

  T he Saturday afternoon that Will and I vow to spend our lives together is a warm, sunny, beautiful day. We head down to the county clerk’s office accompanied by Gabrielle and Richard, Rachel and Jon, Sienna and Mark, Mom and Frank, Abby and Jerry, Dad and Annabella, and Will’s mom. We all troop to the justice of the peace office to sign the marriage license. Sienna is taking pictures like mad. She is a cheap, but perfectly adequate photographer.

  It’s nearly two when we’ve finished the paperwork rigmarole and have posed for about seven million pictures.

  “So, I was thinking we could head over to this bar called Mickie’s…” I say to everyone. “It’s located at, um, it’s right on, where is it again?” I ask Will. Luckily, unlike me, Will is able to think straight, despite just signing his life away to a psychopath such as myself, and gives everybody directions.

  “We’ll all meet over there, okay?” I say.

  After getting about a thousand more hugs and congratulations, Will and I pile into his car.

  “I want to stop at home for just a second,” he says.

  “Okay.” I’m too nervous to argue. I clutch his free hand as if my life depended on it and don’t say a word the entire way home. I just keeping thinking the words, I’m married, I’m married, I’m married, I’m married!

  I feel nervous, but I actually think I’m doing pretty well considering the enormity of what we’ve just done. In fact, I feel pretty good, happy even. I look over at Will and smile, he smiles back and gives my hand a squeeze.

  He pulls into the driveway. “I’ll wait for you here,” I say.

  “No, why don’t you come in.”

  “Why?”

  “Ah…I sort of got you a present.”

  “Oh.” I’m beaming like an idiot.

  Instead of going inside, he opens the fence gate and I follow him around the side of the house to the backyard. My jaw falls open.

  “Surprise!”

  About fifty people—friends, acquaintances, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and various coworkers are milling about in a backyard decorated with flowers and ribbons and bows. A long table overflowing with food lines one side of the yard.

  “A surprise wedding reception?” I say.

  “I didn’t want you to be stressed out by the wedding plans,” Will says, “but what did you think, I was going to marry the girl of my dreams and not loudly let the whole world know?”

  “How the hell did you get everybody here on such short notice?”

  “Never underestimate the superhuman powers of a man in love. Do you like the flowers?” he asks. “I was worried about choosing the wrong ones.”

  “You could have decorated the place with swamp algae and I would have loved it. The flowers are perfect. Everything is perfect. And it’s quite a spread you got there,” I say, nodding in the direction of the buffet. “I bet there isn’t a single nut on the menu.”

  “Not a one.”

  Tears pool in my eyes as I look across the lawn at the people I love most in the world. In all of their dazzling imperfection are my mother, my father, Sienna, Gabrielle, Rachel, Richard, Jerry, Abby, all of my extended family and friends, and, of course, the love of my life, Will.

  And I feel profoundly blessed.

  Sometimes in this life, it’s hard to remember to love yourself. Sometimes, it’s easier to hate yourself, to focus on your faults, on the ten pounds you still haven’t lost, the scars, the cellulite, the creeping signs of age. And because you don’t always remember, it’s imperative to surround yourself with people who love you, even when you can’t manage it yourself.

  In this world, having someone there to look out for you, to love you, to catch you when you fall, to remind you that you’re pretty damn special, not despite of, but because of the flaws and imperfections that make you, you—that is no small thing.

  That is everything.

  Please turn the page for an exciting sneak

  peek of Theresa Alan’s next novel

  SPA VACATION

  coming in 2008!

  SPA VACATION

  Chapter 1

  The Tuesday before the trip

  A my Harrington had never been the kind of woman who was consumed by lust. Desire was a messy and fickle thing. Amy didn’t act recklessly or hastily. She wasn’t a big fan of spontaneity. She liked making rational decisions based
on the best information available. She was a sensible girl, always had been.

  That was why what was happening to her now was throwing her world into a frenzied, baffling orbit. She had never experienced such an immediate carnal reaction to anyone before, and the feelings were making her thinking blurry and confused.

  Amy couldn’t focus on what he was saying. She watched his lips moving as he sat behind the desk in his tastefully decorated office, but she couldn’t seem to actually put together what the words coming our of his mouth meant.

  He was good-looking, certainly, but that wasn’t enough to explain what was causing this reaction in her. She’d encountered hundreds of sexy, handsome men in her life and none of them had turned her insides into quivering mush like Brent Meyer did.

  Amy’s friend Caitlyn, the poet, would be able to find a turn of phrase that could explain exactly what it was about his smile that was so captivating. She would have the words to describe the precise bright green shade of his eyes. Stoplight green maybe? No, that conjured traffic and headaches, not beautiful, brilliant Oz-emerald eyes. Amy didn’t have Caitlyn’s gift with words, that was obvious.

  Amy’s friend Leah, the scientist, would be able to explain the exact chemical and physical reactions that were happening in Amy’s body. It involved an increase in adrenaline, probably, and maybe something about pheromones, but Amy didn’t know about that sort of thing. She knew about financial planning and making budgets and ensuring that all the numbers at the bottom of the spreadsheet added up. Love? Attraction? Lust? These simply weren’t her areas of expertise.