Slightly Married

by Wendy Markham

  When Buckley found out Sonja was invited tonight, he sounded even less enthusiastic about coming.

  Which is why I probably shouldn’t be so surprised that he hasn’t shown.

  Then again, he’s one of my closest friends, and I thought he’d be here for me.

  I find myself keeping an expectant eye on the door as I introduce Raphael to my grandmother, who hits it off with him immediately. The two of them chat like old friends about vintage fashion, show tunes and their mutual fondness for Judy Garland—the pianist is currently playing “Over The Rainbow”—and, naturally, Liza Minnelli.

  Then Raphael excuses himself to get a drink, and Grandma whispers, “Poor thing. I can tell he’s not over you, Tracey.”

  I look around, confused.

  “What? Who?”

  “Your handsome friend Ralphie. He’s in love with you. I can tell.”

  “I don’t think so, Grandma,” I say with a straight face.

  She taps her temple, wearing a sage expression. “You listen to your old grandma. I’m more intuitive than you think. I wasn’t born yesterday, you know.”

  “I know.”

  “And back in the day, I had my share of Ralphies, Tracey, even after I met your grandfather. All the most handsome, talented boys in the drama club were crazy about your grandma.”

  “No kidding,” I murmur.

  “Sure. I broke a lot of hearts the day I walked down that aisle with Grandpa. And I’m sure you’ll be breaking a few the day you get married, too.”

  I chat a few more minutes with my grandmother, the unwitting former fag hag, then tell her I’ve got to get back to mingling.

  I join Jack’s father and his sisters Jeannie, Rachel and Emily.

  My future father-in-law greets me with a perfunctory peck on the cheek.

  “I hope you’re having a nice time,” I tell him.

  He almost didn’t come, saying he was supposed to be in a golf tournament in Palm Springs this weekend. But somebody—Rachel, I assume—talked him into skipping it.

  “Jack is so glad to have you here,” I add—bold-faced lie.

  “I’m glad I came,” his father says, but he doesn’t particularly seem to mean it.

  “You look gorgeous tonight, Tracey,” Rachel tells me. “I love your dress.”

  “So do I,” Jeannie chimes in. “Emily, it’s kind of like the one you had on last weekend, isn’t it?”

  “Not really,” Emily says briefly. “Oh, look, Dad, isn’t that George Barnes over there by the bar?”

  “No,” he says. “I don’t think so.”

  Moment of awkward silence. I can’t think of a single thing to say.

  “Bacon-wrapped scallop?” a waiter asks, sidling up with a trayful, and, relieved, I seize one—along with the opportunity to move on.

  “Is it my imagination,” I ask Jack when I manage to work my way back to his side, “or is your sister Emily cold-shouldering me?”

  “Probably not your imagination,” he says promptly. “She’s really upset that you didn’t ask her to be a bridesmaid.”

  “What? How do you know?”

  “Rachel told me.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? Oh, God, I feel so bad. What did she say?”

  He shrugs. “Just that Emily’s hurt because she’s the only one you left out.”

  Terrific. I should have known.

  I accept my fifth Candelltini from a conveniently passing waiter. No, I’m not wasted at my own engagement party. I keep getting drinks, taking one sip, setting them down, then getting dragged away to meet someone or pose for another picture.

  “Well, what about Kathleen?” I ask Jack. “I left her out, too.”

  “Yeah, but you’re having the girls, so she figures that covers her. She’s fine with it.”

  Is it my imagination, or is Jack suddenly speaking gibberish?

  “What are you saying?” I ask him impatiently, thinking it’s been one long day.

  “The girls,” Jack repeats cryptically. “I guess Kathleen feels like they’re stand-ins for her, or something.”

  Okay, he’s making no sense whatsover. I’m about to ask him how many Candelltinis he’s had when he adds, “And anyway, Kathleen said it’s better that she’s not a bridesmaid. She gets low blood sugar and passes out if she’s on her feet too much.”

  “I know that,” I say impatiently, because who doesn’t? By now my parents probably know Kathleen’s medical history, real and imagined. “But what are you saying about the girls? What girls?”

  “Beatrice and Ashley…you know, that they’re the flower girls, so Kathleen—Hey!”

  In the midst of sipping, I just spewed Candelltini all over my fiancé.

  “Geez, what are you doing?” He wipes himself off with a blue Jack and Tracey cocktail napkin.

  Too shell-shocked to apologize, I manage to ask only, “Did you just say Kathleen thinks Beatrice and Ashley are our flower girls?”

  “Yeah…why?”

  “Because they’re not. That’s why! Didn’t you tell her they’re not?”

  “Obviously I didn’t, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  “Why didn’t you? How could you not tell her?”

  “Because I didn’t know they weren’t our flower girls. How would I know that?”

  “How would you not?” I snap before remembering that this is the man who just this week finally decided who his groomsmen would be, and would probably be hard-pressed to rattle them off now without prompting.

  Oh, and in case you were wondering, yes, he did ask Buckley. Which is why it makes it all the more frustrating that Buckley isn’t here. Jack also asked Mitch, Jeff, his two brothers-in-law, my three brothers, his old roommate/my former boss, Mike Middleford.

  Which leads me to wonder…

  “Jack, did you get mixed up somehow and accidentally ask your nieces to be our flower girls?”

  “You’re not serious, are you?”

  “Then why does your sister think this?” I wail, setting my drink down. “Listen, you need to go tell Kathleen right now that the girls are not in our wedding party.”

  “Why not just have them in it?”

  Why not? Because we have too many people already, that’s why not.

  But if I bring that up, he’ll throw it back in my face and tell me he’s the one who just wanted a maid of honor and best man.

  So I say, as calmly as I can, through clenched teeth, “Because if I had your nieces I’d have to have my niece, too.”

  “So have her.”

  That does it. He’s off his rocker, truly.

  “What about Cousin Joanie?” I ask shrilly. “Huh, Jack? What about her? Did you even give Cousin Joanie a second thought?”

  “Have her, too,” he says with maddening calm. Then he has the gall to grin. “Seriously, who’s going to notice one more face in the crowd that’s coming down the aisle as it is?”

  “Hardy freaking har, Jack.” I can’t believe he’s taking this so lightly. “How about if you have Aldo and Bud as your ushers? Hey, maybe Fat Naso can be your best man. How would you like that?”

  He just shakes his head. “Calm down, Tracey.”

  “I’m sorry…” I rake a hand through my hair. “You have got to talk to your sister.”

  “Relax, Tracey.” He gives me a little hug. “We’ll straighten it out, okay? I promise.”

  That’s better.

  “I just don’t get why on earth Kathleen would get such a crazy idea into her head,” I say queasily. “I mean…we should go tell your mother about this, so she can help us—”

  “Oh, she knows.”

  “She does?” That stops me short. “Are you sure?”

  “She was saying something about taking the girls shopping for their flower-girl dresses, I think.”

  “What?”

  Oh my God.

  I cannot believe I was just rhapsodizing about Wilma not commandeering our wedding, because obviously there’s a complex Candell conspiracy afoot h
ere. There really is.

  “Where’s your mother?” I ask Jack, seething.

  “Right there.” Jack points her out, a stone’s throw away, talking to a white-haired man, Uncle-somebody, who’s been wielding a camera all night.

  “Wilma?” I call.

  She turns around and the man she’s with says something to her.

  “Smile!” Wilma descends upon us, putting an arm around each of us. “Uncle Jim wants to take another picture of me with the two of you!”

  We smile.

  Well, mine is more like bared teeth and it’s all I can do not to snarl, after the flash, “Wilma, can we talk to you about something for a second?”

  “Sure. What is it? Is everything all right? Are you having a good time?”

  Wilma, I notice with a pang of remorse, is positively glowing tonight. She’s having such fun, being the hostess at this wonderful party.

  I soften a little.

  I mean, I’m sure it isn’t her fault her crazy daughter thinks I want demonic flower girls.

  I take a deep, cleansing breath, then say, “There seems to be a misunderstanding, and Jack and I are hoping you can help us straighten it out.”

  I look at Jack and realize the only thing he’s hoping is that someone will come rescue him from this hell.

  Obviously, it’s going to be up to me to straighten things out here. Big surprise there.

  “Kathleen seems to be under the impression,” I say cautiously, “that the twins are going to be flower girls in the wedding.”

  “Oh, I know. The girls were so excited I couldn’t tell them no.”

  “Listen, Wilma, I need—”

  Wait, she couldn’t tell them no?

  Where was I when Wilma was voted stand-in bride?

  I stare at her, slack-jawed.

  “They kept begging Kathleen,” she explains, “because a little friend of theirs had just been in a wedding—”

  Beelzebub the ring bearer, no doubt.

  “—and Kathleen said she’d ask you about it, but she was too shy to do it.”

  Kathleen? Shy?

  Okay, I’m really starting to feel like I just rode up the Saw Mill in the backseat of Billy’s Beemer.

  “So she asked me to find out if you’d mind, and I said I would,” Wilma goes on, “but I kept forgetting—I’ve just been so caught up in planning this party, I guess.”

  Is there such a thing as Presbyterian guilt? Because I could swear she’s laying it on right now, thicker than fresh mozzarella on my mother’s lasagna.

  “Then the other night the girls asked me about it, and they were so earnest and adorable I said yes. I was sure you wouldn’t mind, Aunt Tracey,” Wilma says cheerfully, and gives me a big hard squeeze. “After all, the more the merrier—that’s what Jack said your philosophy is about your bridal party, and I think that’s very refreshing.”

  No, mojitos are very refreshing.

  And man, could I use one right now.

  “Wilma,” I beging…

  But before my future mother-in-law discovers that Aunt Tracey is actually a bitch on wheels, my grandmother appears out of nowhere, looking distressed. She’s toting that shopping bag again and it’s starting to tear from the weight of whatever is in it.

  “Tracey, there you are! I need to talk to you.”

  “What’s wrong, Grandma?”

  “In private.” She drags me—and the shopping bag—off to a distant corner near the corridor outside the restrooms. “I wanted this to be a surprise for you, so I hate to do this, but—”

  She pulls something out of the bag and hands it to me.

  I find myself holding a roll of toilet paper, and my flower-girl woes are instantly forgotten.

  Oh, God, no wonder she hates to do this, poor thing.

  And I certainly am surprised. Nobody said anything about Grandma having trouble with bowel control.

  My first thought: she probably shouldn’t be going around wearing hot pants, all things considered.

  My next thought: it’s probably time she went into a nursing home, where people are trained to handle this sort of thing and let her maintain her dignity.

  My next: of all the people in this room, she chose me—the guest of honor—to wipe her?

  But she’s my grandmother and I love her, and I’m sure she did the same for me when I was a baby.

  “Grandma,” I say gently, and have to pause, a little choked up at how life comes full circle, “we should probably go into the ladies’ room so that I can—”

  “And here’s the rest.” She pulls something else out of the bag.

  It seems to be a plastic doll—a stiff, generic version of a Barbie, the kind you buy at the dollar store. She’s wearing a hand-crocheted frilly white veil and matching dress with a huge, droopy ruffled skirt.

  Grandma lifts the skirt, plunks her unbending plastic-doll legs down into the core of the toilet-paper roll I’m holding, and smooths the skirt over the roll.

  “I made it myself. What do you think?” Grandma asks.

  I stare down at the bizarre object in my hand.

  What do I think? I think I’m looking at some kind of twisted toilet-paper-cozy-meets-antebellum bride gone wrong.

  “Well?” Grandma prods.

  “It’s…so…”

  “Tacky?”

  “Tacky? My God, no,” I sputter. “Why would you think that?”

  “Because your mother just said it was.”

  She did?

  I look around and spot my mother heading in our direction. She’s looking vaguely alarmed.

  “Why,” I ask Grandma, “would anyone say such a thing about this—this—creative homemade, um, creation?”

  Which begs the additional question, why in the name of all that is good and holy would anyone make such a thing?

  “Is this a present for me, Grandma?” I ask, eyeing the still-bulging bag a tad uneasily. “Because I love it!”

  “I knew you would!” she says triumphantly—and snatches it back just as my mother arrives. “Connie, Tracey said everyone will love them.”

  “Pardon?” Uh-oh. An ominous thought has just appeared on the horizon.

  “She made two dozen of those as party favors for tonight, to surprise you,” my mother explains.

  Two dozen? There are two dozen of these things?

  “But once we got here and I saw how—fancy—the party is, I didn’t think it would be right to hand them out.”

  “She doesn’t think they’re fancy enough,” Grandma sneers.

  “Well, they’re very fancy,” I say, fingering the doll’s very very fancy ruffled skirt. “It’s just—”

  “I know what you’re going to say. I didn’t bring twenty-four rolls of toilet paper. Just this one, for an example, so they can see how it’s supposed to work. They’ll have to use their own T.P.”

  “I’m sure they won’t mind, Grandma, but—”

  “I know what you’re going to say,” she cuts in again. “There aren’t enough of these to go around. Well, that’s not my fault. I thought you said Jack had a small family,” she adds accusingly.

  “He does. Compared to ours.” And if I had to guess, I’d say the vast majority of Jack’s family—and our friends—probably aren’t toilet-paper-cozy kind of folk.

  “Well, I was thinking we could pull numbers to see who gets them, or give them away as door prizes,” Grandma suggests, “or—”

  “What are we talking about, girls?” That’s Raphael, popping out of the men’s room and sidling right into the conversation in his Raphael way. “Oh my God, what is that?”

  “It’s…” I falter helplessly.

  “Oh, I love it!” Raphael grabs the toilet-paper bride out of my hand. “It’s so kitschy! Tracey! Where did you get it?”

  “I made it,” Grandma says proudly.

  Raphael screams with joy. “Of course you did, Grandma! I should have known!” Raphael hugs her. “You’re the modern-day Martha Stewart!”

  Okay, Martha Stewart is th
e modern-day Martha Stewart, and I wouldn’t necessarily call my grandmother a modern-day anything. Nor can I imagine Martha crocheting two dozen bridal latrine dolls. But Raphael is gushing and Grandma is glowing, so who am I to rain on their little parade?

  “Someday when you have time, Grandma,” Raphael tells her, “I’d love it if you’d make one for me!”

  “You can have one right now, Ralphie!”

  “Are you serious, Grandma?”

  Hugs abound; there is much rejoicing.

  Never in the history of the world have two people been more delighted with each other.

  I look at my mother, who turns her hands up a little, as if to say, “What do you want from me?”

  “Tracey? The Carsons have to leave now.” Wilma has penetrated our little huddle outside the ladies’ room door, and she has a middle-aged couple in tow. “They wanted to ask you something about the wedding.”

  “Sure!” I aim a big, bright bridal smile at the Carsons, Jack’s childhood neighbors, who seem like nice people. “What is it?”

  “We were just wondering how long a drive it is to get to your hometown—Buffalo, is it?”

  “Brookside. It’s about eight hours, give or take.”

  “Eight hours!” The Carsons exchange a glance.

  “But it’s an easy plane ride,” my mother, the jet-setter, pipes up. “Just a hop, skip and a jump. We hope you can make it.”

  “We’ll certainly try.”

  The Carsons and I do a couple of those double handshakes, each of us using both our hands to clasp both of the other person’s hands—warmer and more intimate than a one-handed, businesslike handshake, but we’re not on hugging terms yet.

  Or maybe we won’t ever be. I’ve noticed people don’t hug as much in Jack’s world as they do where I come from. Things are predictably more stiff and formal amid the country-estate crowd than among the country-bumpkin crowd.

  Mr. Carson reaches into his pocket and takes out an envelope. “Congratulations.”

  “Oh, thank you!” These nice country-estate people just gave me a card….

  And, good God, Grandma just gave these nice country-estate people a toilet-paper cozy.

  “How…sweet.” Mrs. Carson turns it over in her hands, not quite sure what to make of it, or of the batty old lady in the hot pants.