by Maggie Way
“So, how have you been?” he asked. “I keep seeing you and John rushing in and out, but I haven’t gotten to talk to either of you in a while.”
Gretchen knew he felt the same way as John did. He would rather avoid John if at all possible, but she appreciated the effort to include John as a friend. “I’m doing fine. How about you?”
Carl shrugged. “Same as always, I guess.”
“Good,” Gretchen said. How exactly was she supposed to tell him? Just blurt it out? Any method she thought of seemed like the worst possible one. Why hadn’t she listened to John?
“So, did you just feel lonely without your personal chef hanging around?” Carl asked. He was always so blunt. Gretchen loved that about him.
“Actually, I came over to tell you something,” she said, trying to sound as casual and happy as possible.
Carl’s hand froze in the middle of reaching for his glass. He brought his hand back without ever touching it. Gretchen’s breathing sped up. She couldn’t do it. She should have listened to John. Telling Carl was only going to break his heart.
But if his heart was going to get broken, Gretchen knew it had to be done by her, and not by some casual acquaintance. Carl deserved better than that. He just sat in his chair staring at the TV without really seeing it. Waiting.
“John and I are getting married,” she said quietly.
Letting out a breath he must have been holding, Carl slumped a little in his chair. It was hard to tell with how much he was slouching in his chair to start with, but Gretchen had sat next to him watching too many random games not to notice it. She wanted to run away and hide from his hurt, but she forced herself to face it.
“Congratulations,” Carl said quietly. He still sat there without meeting her gaze.
“Carl,” she asked, “are you okay?”
He nodded, but remained quiet. The silence was heartbreaking. This wasn't a side of Carl she had ever wanted to see. Laughing and joking no matter what, was who he was. Had Gretchen stolen that from him? John once told her Carl was in love with her, but she hadn’t believed him. Now she was starting to doubt herself. Could I have really been that oblivious?
“Carl,” she started, but she didn’t know what else to say.
Standing up, Carl left his recliner behind and sat next to Gretchen on the couch. “You know,” he said, “I thought I would hate John when this day finally came, but I don’t. I just envy him.” He dropped his head into his hands and sighed.
Gretchen could feel tears welling in her eyes and she wasn't sure she could contain them. “I’m sorry, Carl,” she whispered.
Carl looked at her with a pained smile. “You don’t have to be sorry, Gretchen. You love him. You love who you love, there’s no apologizing for it. It just happens. I know that better than anyone, I suppose.” Touching her cheek, Gretchen leaned against his hand and brought her own up to his.
Carl’s hand trembled against her skin, belying his calm words and showing how much he was hurting. Losing control of her tears, Gretchen felt them slide down her cheeks and connect with Carl’s fingers, sweeping back and forth as he wiped them away.
“I love you, Gretchen. I have for a long time,” Carl said. Gretchen started crying in force. John was right, and she’d never allowed herself to see it. How many times had she hugged Carl or let him put his arm around her as they watched a game together? He was always so happy and lighthearted, she told herself his stolen hugs were purely playful. That was how she wanted to see it, anyway.
“The thing that makes it so hard to take is that I think you did love me, Gretchen. You were just too scared to see it.” Sliding his hand from her cheek to the back of her neck, he brought his other hand up to match it. “Why couldn’t you give me the same chance you gave John?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Carl,” she whispered through her tears. “I wasn’t ready.”
He looked down at her ring, picking her hand up to put it between them. “This could have been us,” he said. “I know it could have been, if you had just given me a chance.”
“I’m so sorry,” she said. How could she have done this to him? He told her it was too hard to see her with John, but she begged him to stay. What had she done for him, but hurt him like he promised never to do to her? Gretchen selfishly had to have him in her life. Had she been kidding herself the whole time when it came to Carl?
“Tell me you never loved me at all,” Carl begged. “I need to hear you say you never loved me.”
“I…” It should have been easy to say. Gretchen had spent a year and a half telling herself he was just a friend, but as she stared into Carl’s desperate eyes she saw the times he held her in his arms, the hours he spent keeping her company those first few months when Gretchen had wanted to sit down and cry, the way he could make her feel better simply by being near her. Those were the reasons she couldn’t let him go.
Apparently, that was answer enough for Carl. Tilting her face up to his, he moved quickly, pulling Gretchen into a kiss that sent a shockwave through her entire body. All his pent up emotion rushed into her. She should have pulled away, but she couldn’t. The delusions she had been holding onto for so long finally cleared. Gretchen did love Carl. She just didn’t see it soon enough.
Slowly, Carl pulled back, leaning his head against Gretchen’s. “I know this doesn’t change your mind, but I couldn’t let you leave without showing you how I really felt. It’s selfish, I know, but I never would have forgiven myself if I hadn’t.”
She looked up at him and opened her mouth to say…something, but he stopped her.
“Please, don’t say anything, Gretchen. I don’t think I could bear it right now,” he said. He smiled then, though not nearly as bright as before. “Do me a favor, though. Don’t tell John about this. He’ll want to defend your honor or something like that, and I’d really hate to hurt him.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Timing
Desi’s car pulled up to the curb and Gretchen dashed out the front door to meet her. Desi was halfway out of her car when Gretchen plopped down in the passenger’s seat. Staring at her friend, Desi sat back down.
“You know, I would have rang the doorbell if you’d given me a chance,” Desi said.
“Just go, Des. I want to be out of the house before John gets back,” she said. Folding her arms across her chest, Gretchen sunk down into the seat. She had little doubt Carl was watching her. She didn’t know what to think about that.
“Okaaay,” Desi said as she pulled away from the house.
It wasn’t until they were out of Gretchen’s neighborhood and heading toward the restaurant that she finally relaxed. Still, Desi had sense enough to leave Gretchen be until they were seated at their table. Setting her planner to the side, Desi waited. Gretchen had no doubt Desi was dying to start their planning session. Desi loved weddings, but being a good friend was always more important to her than anything else. She took a sip of her water and waited.
“I kissed Carl,” Gretchen blurted out then punctuated it by dropping her head onto the table with a thud.
Desi choked on her water then set it down carefully. “You kissed Carl? Why would you do that?”
Lifting her head, Gretchen said, “Well, actually, I didn’t kiss Carl, he kissed me, but I let him.”
“Gretchen,” Desi said shaking her head, “start over. How did this happen?”
“I went over to tell Carl about the engagement,” she started.
“Alone? You should have gone with John.” Desi shook her head.
“I know. I see that now,” Gretchen said. Why hadn’t she listened to John? “Anyway, he wasn't very happy.”
“Apparently,” Desi said.
“He looked so sad. Then,” Gretchen paused, trying not to cry again, “then he told me he was in love with me and begged me to tell him that I never loved him.”
Desi blew out a breath. “And what did you tell him?”
Shaking her head, Gretchen mumbled, “Nothing. I couldn’t tell hi
m I never loved him, because I think I did. I think I still do.”
“Oh, Gretchen, of course that poor man is in love with you. I think you were the only one who didn’t see that.” Desi sighed and took Gretchen’s hand. “But do you really think you love him, too? More than John?”
“I don’t know Desi. When he told me he loved me and kissed me, it was like I finally opened my eyes. I finally understood why I still needed him in my life even with John there, and why when he offered to back off I wouldn’t let him,” Gretchen said. She shook her head. She was so confused. “Did I ever tell you that…that Carl offered to leave me alone and I told him no?”
Desi shook her head. There was sad understanding in her eyes. Did she already see this, even when Gretchen couldn’t? Did John?
“I love him, but I love John too,” she said. “Not more or less, not even in different ways. I don’t know. It’s just different timing, I guess. I just wasn't ready to love anyone when I first met Carl. John gave that back to me.”
“What are you going to do?” Desi asked as she waved away a smiling waiter.
“About Carl?” Gretchen asked. She wished she knew. Taking away his pain was something she wanted to do very badly, but didn’t think there was any way to actually do it. “I don’t think there’s anything I can do. I’m marrying John. I hate that I hurt Carl, but there’s no way to fix it now.”
“I think Carl will understand that,” Desi said, “eventually.”
Was that good enough? Gretchen didn’t want him to just understand why she’d hurt him. She wanted him to forgive her. Maybe that was too much to ask.
“He didn’t ask me to choose him over John,” Gretchen said. “The only thing he asked me was why I didn’t give him the same chance I gave John. John was a huge risk. I didn’t know anything about him, but I was still willing to put everything on the line for him. I knew Carl. He was kind and sweet, and would do anything for me. I should have given him a chance.”
“But you didn’t,” Desi said. “And if you had, you never would have taken John in and you wouldn’t be getting married in two and a half months.”
Married. Gretchen was getting married.
Her whole goal in not dating Carl had been to avoid hurting him. She hurt him anyway. In the end, all Gretchen could do was look back and decide whether it was worth it, and she knew it was. As sweet and kind as Carl was, John was the one who had been able to show her that loving was worth the risk of the pain it could cause. She’d needed John to show her how to open herself up again.
She wanted to marry John. Even knowing how much she had hurt Carl didn’t change that. Part of Gretchen loved Carl, and probably always would, but she had given the rest of her heart to John. She had no intention of taking it back.
“Desi, would you please not mention this to John? And not even Jake. I just want to put this behind me and hope Carl will forgive me one day,” she said.
“Of course, Gretchen. You don’t even have to ask,” Desi said.
The waiter approached the girls’ table again, his smile hesitant after being sent away by Desi the first time. Desi’s brilliant smile made up for Gretchen’s moping demeanor and gave him the courage to nod and step a little quicker. Politely taking their order, he then hurried back to the kitchen with their requests. As soon as he was gone, Desi pulled out her planner and faced Gretchen.
“Let’s forget about Carl for now and start planning your wedding.”
Clearing her mind, Gretchen refilled it with her wedding dreams. There was so much to go over, her dress, flowers, food, location, honeymoon, and a million other things Gretchen wasn't even considering probably. Luckily, Desi was there to help. She had helped Mel with her wedding, so Gretchen knew she was in good hands.
“Okay,” Desi said, “so I think the first thing we need to figure out is how to get John a real identity so you two can legally get married.”
“What?”
“Well, somehow I doubt the country clerk will give a marriage license to a ‘John Doe’. I’m pretty sure they’re going to want some documentation of who he is. We just have to figure out how to do that.” Desi flipped to another page in her planner and turned it so Gretchen could see. “I called my dad and asked him about it since he deals with immigration law at his law office and he said he’d look into it and call me back when he has a plan.”
Gretchen’s excitement about the engagement and dealing with Carl had completely forced out of her mind the problem she and John had been dealing with since day one. They didn’t know who he really was. He had no legal standing. Sighing, Gretchen tossed this newest problem on the heap of everything else she was struggling to work through at the moment.
“Thanks, Desi,” she said. “I hadn’t even thought about any of that yet.”
Smiling brightly, Desi flipped her planner closed. “Yeah, I didn’t think you had. But that’s what I’m here for. We’ll figure this out, Gretchen.”
Gretchen nodded her thanks as the waiter returned with their drinks. With the help of Desi’s father, she was sure they would get John’s lack of identity straightened out, but would it be in time for the date they had set? Pushing the wedding back would be disappointing. Their other option was holding the ceremony without it being legal, which she wasn’t opposed to doing. As Gretchen took a drink of her soda, another thought came to her. What if this new push to get John an identity found, not a new one, but his original one?
Chapter Forty-Five
Biggest Fear
“Gretchen we only have six weeks left before the wedding and we still have a ton of stuff to plan,” Desi complained.
Gretchen sat on the floor next to her looking through swatches of fabric for the bride’s maids’ dresses. She had a stack of dress designs sitting beside the swatches that she hadn’t looked through yet, as well as choices for flowers, napkins, decorations, and a hundred other things. It seemed like every spare minute they’d had since getting engaged, which wasn't a lot of time, was spent planning the wedding. Well, Gretchen and Desi planned, Jake and John were left to run errands and generally leave them alone.
John was in charge of food for the reception, and it only took him about two days to lay out the menus. Until the wedding, he was pretty much done except for the occasional request for his opinion on something. John was fine with that, not because he didn’t want to participate in the wedding plans, but because he was afraid to.
“What do you think, John?” Gretchen asked. She held up the swatches and he had to force himself not to groan as he turned to look at them.
The array of five colors immediately sent his vision into a spiral of cloudiness, clearing only to reveal what looked like a large dressing room. The memory woman stood in front of him with another woman. The other woman stood in front of a set of mirrors in a willowy, strapless gown of lavender that had layer upon layer of sheer ruffles cascading down her body in a shapeless silhouette. The memory snapped closed.
Pursing his lips as if in serious consideration, John stared at the colors. Pale pink, ochre yellow, soft turquoise, royal blue, and lavender.
“Not the purple,” John said. “I don’t like that one at all.”
Gretchen frowned as she dropped the lavender and considered the other four.
Desi sighed. “Great, that still leaves four to choose from. We’re never going to get anywhere at this rate. Gretchen, we have to order the dresses by Monday if we want to get them back in time.”
“I want the yellow fabric,” Gretchen finally said. Then, moving on, she picked up the pattern choices and looked at each one carefully even though she had already spent hours staring at each design.
“Did you get those papers from my dad signed that I gave you?” Desi asked John suddenly.
“Yeah, I did. They’re on the kitchen table. I’ll go grab them for you before I forget,” John said. Signing documents was his other job in the whole scheme of planning the wedding. Desi’s father was patiently working toward turning John into a real person. He wasn’
t sure everything would be worked out in time for the wedding, or that his ploy to use immigration laws to make John a real person was even going to work, but it was a step in the right direction.
Getting up from the couch, John paused and peeked over Gretchen’s shoulder at the dress patterns. Choosing the one that looked least like the woman wearing the lavender dress in the memory, he pointed at one. It’s fitted bodice, ruffled sleeves, and simple tea-length skirt was as opposite as you could get from the dress he had just seen. Plus, he knew it was Gretchen’s favorite, even if she couldn’t bring herself to decide on it. “I like that one,” he said.
Looking up at John, she smiled and kissed him. “Thanks.”
“Yes, thank you,” Desi said. “You’re the only one who seems to be able to make their mind up around here.” She smiled through her frustration, though. Desi was having fun.
Leaving them behind, John crossed the room to the kitchen. The documents were sitting on the table. He picked them up and stared at the words. “John Palmer”. That was how he’d signed them. Palmer was the last name John had chosen for his new identity.
He had considered at first simply taking Gretchen’s last name. Then she wouldn’t have to deal with changing her name after the wedding, when and if it became legal, but Gretchen thought John should choose a name of his own. She insisted he choose a name that meant something to him, but part of John laughed as he wondered if she only wanted him to choose something else so he wouldn’t be tempted to call her Gigi anymore. John almost chose a name that started with a “G” just for that reason.
Once he started looking into different last names and what they meant, he found himself oddly excited by the assignment. He avoided any of the names that ended with “son” or “sen” since those usually meant “son of…” because John didn’t want his new name to be a lie. Instead, he looked for names that described his life now. That search led him to Palmer.