Poor old Charlotte. She had been seeking Julia’s friendship and asking her advice and sharing her secrets for so long. What was Julia’s responsibility now? What was the right thing to do, the thing that, in her heart (if she could find it), she knew that she should do? Charlotte deserved to be happy. If she stayed with Peter, she would spend the rest of her life trying so hard to be interesting, trying so hard to maintain her parents’ social and economic position (even as she tried so hard not to care too much about that), trying so hard to have creative, brilliant, French-speaking children who (not that it really mattered) would go to the same schools that Charlotte and her siblings had, despite the orders of ten by which the competition for places in them had risen. But if she threw it all away and ran off with the man she loved and who loved her, she might actually be happy. She might be miserable, but she might actually be happy. Julia knew that passion faded and couldn’t be counted on for the long haul. Everyone knew that. Except, deep in her heart, Julia didn’t really believe it, if you found the right person.
Oh, hell. Damn. Julia found herself both smiling and beginning to tear up as she imagined Charlotte living in a castle with the man she loved, the heir and perhaps some little sisters scampering around. With or without money, it was a brave thing that Charlotte was contemplating, to throw away her comfortable life and her family’s approval for love. That word, that damn word. It could all happen with the help of a fairy godmother, and who might that be?
And it wasn’t only Charlotte. There was Holly.
When Julia thought of Holly, as of course she often had in the previous months, her heart was filled with tenderness and with excruciating guilt. The second emotion was understandable, but the first less so, since she and Holly had barely spoken. Julia remembered when she had first seen her, without knowing who she was, at the dinner before the wedding. She noticed a young woman who was so pretty that Julia reflexively did a check of her own looks, with an adjustment for age. Even with that handicap, Julia had the unsettling thought that she could not claim to be the prettiest woman in the room. She did not feel too competitive, though, because the young woman neither carried herself in a way that would have declared a challenge nor dressed with the hard-edged chic that also would have done so. She did, however, exhibit a modest elegance in her dress that Julia admired and that she knew required a ton of money to achieve. (Julia remembered the tall, fantastically beautiful South American bridesmaid, but Julia never considered people like that rivals. Rather than being human, a tall, beautiful South American was a phenomenon of nature, and therefore didn’t count.)
Julia did not know who the young woman was but felt that she bore some study. There was a sweetness about her looks that Julia was drawn to. When Julia first saw her, the young woman was talking to a short, overweight man. As he spoke, an ill-kempt mustache wiggled like a caterpillar on his upper lip. She was taller than the man and inclined her head toward him, thus extending a neck that Julia found troublingly long. The young woman had piled up her hair on top of her head, which showed her neck to good advantage and revealed her broad, level shoulders. She wore emerald and diamond earrings. These Julia could identify, even at a distance, as some quite fine dead-grandmother jewelry. The young woman nodded at what the man was saying and then laughed, covering her mouth with long, slender fingers. She extended a long, slender arm and rested her hand on the upper arm of the man and said something that caused him to burst into laughter in turn.
What was it about the young woman’s appearance, aside from her prettiness (and the dead-grandmother jewelry), that struck Julia so? She was embarrassed even to have the thought that came to her mind, which was that the woman she was looking at seemed . . . good. The fluid, if erect, way she held herself allowed physical give in the way she responded to her companion, and the word seemed to describe her overall manner. To the extent detectable, she seemed to be enjoying her conversation with the horrid little man; certainly, she was not behaving in the way that telegraphed that one was miserably bored by the wretch one was talking to and humiliated to be seen in his company. Julia felt a twinge in her conscience: this young woman somehow served as a rebuke to her.
At the ceremony the next day, Julia noticed her again, sitting in the third row on the groom’s side. She sat with people who looked like the groom’s aunts and uncles, and Julia wondered what relation she had to Peter. Julia, in the first row, made a backward glance or two. She could not take in much, but she saw that the young woman, deep in thought, was looking straight ahead at the altar. Julia became a little curious. To her, and she had a keen eye for this kind of thing, the young woman’s expression almost looked like that of someone who had a stake in the proceedings. Poor girl! An afterimage of her — so pretty and good, and possibly wounded — remained with Julia for a moment after she had faced forward again.
During the chaos at the reception, Julia had kept to herself, and in the days following she had spoken to no one but Dick about what had happened, and to him only minimally, so she remained in ignorance of the wife named Holly whom Jonathan had discussed. The name caused Julia dread, since it had for some reason seemed appropriate for many members of the wedding party to reassemble at Jonathan’s funeral, whether or not they had known the deceased, and Julia feared that she might have some kind of breakdown when she met the widow. How could she withstand the waves of guilt, grief, and remembered horror that would crash upon her at the moment of that encounter?
Holly. As Julia dressed on the morning of the funeral the name kept running through her mind as dread now mixed with gruesome curiosity. Who was Holly? What was she like? At the church, while she and Dick sought out seats, Julia looked anxiously toward the front pew. A young woman was sitting there, along the aisle, and it seem certain that she was the widow. Julia could not see her face, but the back of her head triggered a spark of recognition. From what Julia could tell, she wore a black suit. Julia stared at her back and broad, level shoulders; then at her reddish blond hair, which was down.
The little girl sitting next to the widow spoke to her, and she tilted her head down to hear. Then she turned her face toward the girl as she made her reply. Julia could see her profile: yes, it was that same young woman, the pretty one she had noticed at the dinner and the wedding service. So she — so pretty and so good, and possibly wounded — was the one whom Julia’s degraded and ill-fated acts had so brutally harmed. Then her stomach turned over and she felt faint. The widow, Holly, was now having what looked like a very serious conversation with the little girl. Holly was beautiful; she was good, Julia felt certain. Julia had managed to live through the previous few days with the help of cigarettes, alcohol, a wee pill here and there, but, most important, she had survived because of that well-known phenomenon whereby a horrifying event seems unreal to the participants. “It was like a movie.” Now, though, Julia suddenly felt the rough wet grass beneath her feet, she smelled the earth and felt the rain, and she saw the bolt strike Jonathan. In the pew, she almost leapt back as she had at the time. She felt ill. At that moment Holly and the little girl turned around to look down the aisle. Out of the corner of her eye, Holly must have noticed Julia looking at her; she returned the look and gave Julia a smile of recognition (“I remember you from the wedding, too”). Julia attempted to smile back. Holly pointed at something and began to talk to the girl, and Julia looked down at her hands and began to sob.
At the cemetery Julia kept to the rear of the crowd, and she intended to remain elusive during the reception afterward (held at a friend’s apartment). But while she was standing near the wall drinking a Bloody Mary, there came the inevitable. Dick appeared by her side. “Here you are,” he said. “I thought I’d lost you. We’d better say something to the family; we won’t have to stay too much longer after that.” He took Julia by the elbow and led her over to where Holly stood among in-laws and her own relatives. Jonathan’s mother was plump, with golden hair and red lipstick. Near her stood a tall woman, beautifully dressed, who appeared to be Holl
y’s mother; she had a long, lovely nose. A large, dissipated man with long blond-and-white hair stood with his back to her, talking to someone. He wore a black suit with a ventless jacket; it didn’t fit too well and looked a little worse for wear. He, Julia gathered, was Holly’s father.
Julia and Dick approached the group and stood by for a moment. Then a guest released Jonathan’s mother, and she turned toward Dick. “May I introduce myself?” he said, taking her hand in both of his. “I’m Dick Montague, Charlotte’s father.”
“Caroline Gould,” Jonathan’s mother said. “How nice to see you.”
“We are all so terribly sad about what happened,” said Dick.
“That’s so kind of you to say.”
Dick removed a hand, put it on Julia’s back, and drew her forward. “This is my wife, Julia.”
“How do you do?” said Jonathan’s mother, shaking hands with Julia, who mumbled a greeting.
“We are so sorry about your loss,” Dick said. “We didn’t know Jonathan well, but we certainly heard a great deal about him from Charlotte and Peter. I know what a terrific friend he was to Peter.”
“Jonny and Peter were such dear friends,” Jonathan’s mother said. “Peter has been wonderful through all this. He’s such a fine person. Jonny was such a fine person, too. I think that’s one reason why they were such good friends. I feel terrible that Jonny’s accident happened at Peter and your daughter’s wedding. It should have been the happiest day of their lives.”
“Please, you needn’t worry about that,” said Dick. “I know all their thoughts are with you and the others who loved Jonathan.”
Jonathan’s mother wasn’t listening. She pulled on the sleeve of a man standing nearby. “Skip, come meet Charlotte’s parents. You know, the girl who was getting married.”
“Oh! Yes!” said the man, turning around. He had a beautiful head of silver hair and “distinguished” features, although his expression was vacant.
“This is my husband, Skip Gould,” said Jonathan’s mother. “Skip, this is Dick Montague and — I’m so sorry, it’s Ju — ?”
“Julia,” said Julia.
“Oh, yes. And Julia Montague.”
Dick and Julia exchanged greetings with Skip Gould. During the conversation that followed he stood by wearing a charming smile and saying nothing.
“Skip, darling,” said Mrs. Gould, “Dick and Julia’s daughter was the girl getting married when the accident happened. My goodness, it was quite a shock. We had gone out to dinner at Allie and Ned Barstow’s. We’ve made some wonderful friends since we moved — oh, it must be three years ago now. And the Barstows are so attractive. Allie is such fun. It was such a fun group! Some of Allie’s young were there . . .”
Jonathan’s mother continued in this vein for some time, smiling and beaming with almost psychotic sociability given the circumstances. Julia did not listen closely, for she was acutely aware that she stood within Holly’s conversational sphere of influence. Moreover, she had remained a little behind Dick, and Jonathan’s mother did not address her directly, so she was not locked into an alliance with this group. Holly was talking to someone else, but if she made a quarter turn after he left, it would be natural and almost inevitable that she and Julia would speak to each other. Julia could see Holly in her peripheral vision, and she could feel the emanations of Holly’s presence almost smother her. Julia was trying to look as if she were rapt in the conversation with Jonathan’s mother, but she was actually planning her escape. Then she saw out of the corner of her eye that the man talking to Holly was moving away. Julia froze. She could not just walk off and leave the widow alone, especially since Julia was the person nearest to her and with whom it would be most natural for her to speak, and since, as was evident, the reason Julia and Dick had approached in the first place was to pay their respects.
Julia concentrated on Jonathan’s mother. A moment passed, a moment passed, a moment passed. Then Julia heard a pleasing, rather low female voice say to her, “Excuse me, aren’t you Julia Montague? Charlotte’s stepmother?” With the veins in her head pounding, Julia turned and said in a startled way (or as best as she could imitate one), “Oh! Why, yes!”
“I’m Holly Speedwell.”
“Of course. I know,” Julia said. She was taken aback by Holly’s green eyes: even red-rimmed and bloodshot, or perhaps on account of that, they were striking. They both made hesitant movements with their hands and shoulders, not knowing how to greet each other. Finally, Holly took Julia’s hand in both of hers.
“We never got a chance to meet,” Holly said. “Thank you so much for coming. Everyone in Charlotte’s family has been so kind.”
As she heard this, Julia was thinking about her hand and how Holly’s enclosed it, with their long fingers and their cool, soft, youngish skin. She recalled how and where her own hand had recently caressed Jonathan, and she felt a shiver.
“I’m . . . we’re . . . so very sorry,” she said. “I . . . I . . . I . . . I. . . .” Julia felt faint; she was unsure about whether she would be able to utter a sentence. She finally managed it: “I sat next to Jonathan at the dinner.”
“Yes, he mentioned that. He enjoyed that very much. You had a great talk, he said.”
“Yes,” said Julia. Her open mouth quivered and no words came out. “Please,” she said finally, “please tell me if there is anything I can do.”
Dick loomed up and introduced himself to Holly. Julia stepped back and only half listened as Dick purred his condolences. He tilted his head and knit his brow in the way that he always did when he wanted to convey to a pretty young woman that he took her seriously.
Julia took this opportunity to drift away and go to the bar. Just as the bartender handed her another Bloody Mary, she began to shake, and weep, and to pant so hard that it sounded as if she were hyperventilating. Then she felt a large hand on her shoulder.
“Hey, are you okay?”
Julia looked around and saw Holly’s father. She could see some of Holly’s features in his big, masculine face — the same green eyes; he was even better-looking.
“I’m . . . yes . . . I’m . . .” Julia now began to break down completely. A couple of people turned around and stared.
“Hey, hey,” Holly’s father said softly. “Come on. Come on over here.”
He put his arm around Julia’s shoulders and led her into another room, a library where no lamps were lit. Taking her drink, he eased Julia into a leather chair. In the gray light, she wept. Her tears made black sunbursts on the leather armrest. Holly’s father stood a few feet away, watching her and guarding the door.
When Julia had finally gained some control of herself, she spoke. “Thank you. I’m so sorry. I’m not sure what’s come over me.”
“Graham Edwards.” He held out his hand, and she took it and squeezed it.
“Holly’s father?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Julia Montague, Charlotte’s stepmother. The bride —”
“Sure.” He handed Julia her drink. She took a big swallow.
“Thanks,” she said. She breathed deeply a couple of times. “This has all affected me very much. I don’t know why. I didn’t know Jonathan, but I sat next to him at the bridal dinner, and we talked quite a bit. You must think I’m a hysterical female.”
“Well, yeah, I do. But there’s nothing wrong with that,” said Graham. He moved his hands dramatically when he talked. “Some of my best friends are hysterical females. And if somebody wanted to get hysterical, this seems like a pretty good time. A young guy you just met, you get to know him, and the next day, this happens? Whew. Anybody’d be hysterical.”
Julia tried to smile to thank him for his effort to reassure her. Then she looked as if she would cry again. “Is Holly,” she said, “is Holly doing okay?”
Graham didn’t answer for a minute. “She’s all right.” He paused again. “Do you have children?”
“Stepchildren.”
Graham stared at the floor, then looked at J
ulia. “I have two daughters. They’re both in their thirties now, and I worry about them just as much as I did when they were little kids. More — I worry about them more because now it’s the real thing, real life. When the girls were pretty young, their mother and I split up for some dumb reason that neither of us can even remember. I tried to stay as close to them as I could. I really think I did okay. I just wanted so badly for them to be happy and safe. Their mother too. Well, I don’t know if we succeeded. I don’t know. This guy, Speedwell.” Graham shrugged and tilted his head back and forth. “Anyway . . .” He was lost in thought.
“I’ll tell you something,” he said, coming to. “I love Alex, the older one. I love her beyond anything. But Holly, you know, just between us, Holly is the apple of my eye. To see her hurt . . .” He winced. “They could do anything to me, any kind of torture, if I could prevent that.
“So I’m just hoping, after all this passes . . . Of course, it’s not everything, having the right guy. But maybe there’ll be a nice guy she finds.” He gave a soft laugh. “Somebody who really deserves her! I guess every father sets that bar impossibly high.”
He looked at Julia and tried to grin. His big, masculine, handsome, dissipated face seemed to struggle to light up, like an engine that wouldn’t start. He spread out his long arms. “Hey, I was in pictures,” he said. “We’ve got to have a happy ending!”
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