Borrow-A-Bridesmaid

by Anne Wagener

  I nod, watching him slide out of the booth and amble to the bar. As he waits for the drinks, he chats with the bartender, pushing back those strands of hair that always seem to sneak out of place no matter how many times he tucks them behind his ears. He turns, sees me looking at him, and winks. The alcohol makes me brave: I don’t look away, just return the wink and lean back against the booth, still feeling warm from his touch. The Popped Collars are doing a surprisingly good rendition of “Bust a Move,” and I smile to myself.

  When he returns, we’re quiet for a bit as we drink. He’s got another Guinness, and he’s scored me two lime wedges.

  He licks a bit of froth from his top lip, looking thoughtful. That mouth! “You think you could get me hooked up as a groomsman? You know, if people wouldn’t mind a Muslim groomsman in a Christian wedding.”

  “Why not?” I pause. “Muslim, huh?”

  “Mm-hmm.” His lips are already back on his glass.

  “I’m kind of floating out there in agnostic land. Much to the chagrin of my Southern Baptist parents. Add that to the fact that I live with a gay man.” I roll my eyes. “I think there are prayer groups at their church dedicated to my salvation.”

  “Ha! Well, I’m mostly out there with you. I mean, I don’t live with any gay men, uh, unless there’s something my brother’s not telling me, but I’m a pretty bad Muslim. First of all,” he taps his glass, “I shouldn’t be drinking this stuff.”

  “Oh.” I take another drink, then lift my glass. “Cheers to us and our devious ways!” We clink glasses. “Not drinking, that’s a tough one.”

  “So is praying five times a day. I started off, you know, in the break room, hoping no one would walk in. But, of course, people did. Turns out Muslims in airports make people really nervous. After a while I gave up and decided I’d do it once or twice at home. A few months later, the only praying I was doing was during Monday Night Football.”

  “How about your parents?”

  “They— Well, okay. I’ve sort of led them to believe I’m super-devout. It seemed like the path of least resistance.” He drains his glass and sighs. “My brother and I don’t really do any of the things we’re supposed to, you know, praying and stuff.”

  “You sound like you feel guilty about it. It’s your choice.”

  “Yeah, but it’s not quite that simple. I mean, growing up, we tried so hard to keep all the traditions. My parents came over here from Pakistan when my brother and I were really little, and they want so badly for us to keep the faith.” He frowns, looks into his glass. “I think some part of me wants that, too. Maybe when I stop reading all that atheist existentialism, I can veer back toward religion.”

  “That’s a lot to balance. Your own beliefs, your parents’ expectations.”

  He nods. “I’ll figure it out. Just not tonight.”

  Hands free from having finished his drink, he slides his arm around my shoulders again. It’s so long, it’s like a Go-Go-Gadget arm. I giggle to myself, the lime-infused alcohol bubbling up to my brain.

  “How’d we get on religion, anyway?” he asks. “I thought we were trying to figure out your career.”

  I shake my head. “That’s hopeless.”

  He gives me a curious smile. “What do you like? I’m guessing shelving Magic Treehouse books isn’t your passion.”

  “How could you tell?”

  “C’mon. You know all my dorky hobbies. Fantasy football, reading philosophy.” He leans in close. “On a really inspired day, I go to the Library of Congress to read. Philosophy absorbs better if read in the proximity of large marble columns and sculpted gold leaves.”

  I consider him, running a finger around the top of my glass. “I don’t think I knew how weird you were, before.”

  He rolls his eyes. “So let me inside your weird little mind.”

  And I do. I tell him about the Melting Girl. He listens thoughtfully, then suggests a companion piece: Precipitation Boy. When I give him a quizzical look, he says, “You know, I’ll precipitate out of the atmosphere when people least expect it. BOOM! I’m in line in front of you at McDonald’s. BOOM! I’m saving you from a robbery.”

  “A robbery?”

  “I’d definitely use my power for good.”

  “You mean except butting in front of people to get your Egg McMuffin.”

  “Except for that.”

  “And here Melting Girl is using her power to hide from the world.” My finger stops midloop on the rim of my glass.

  “Your writing—will you hide that from the world, too?” he and his inviting brown eyes ask.

  I bite my lip. “So far, yes, with the exception of my college lit journal.”

  He nods. “Don’t let the world put its grubby fingerprints and judgments all over it. They’ll convince you there’s an objective reality and that your creation is not good enough. There’s no objective reality; it’s all absurd. As your writing suggests. Catering to other people just to have your work published will taint it. What matters is that you keep creating. For you.”

  I was about to tell him about the City Paper job, but I swallow it back down with the last gulp of limey G&T. I want so much to tell Charlie about the contest—since I got his e-mail I’ve been composing draft replies.

  But back to Kalil-town. Something about his comment bothers me on a deep level, but I can’t tell why. Like trying to read the bottom line of an eye chart, it’s not clear no matter how hard I squint. The alcohol doesn’t help: My peripheral vision is beginning to Ferris-wheel. I try to focus on a couple in a corner booth. They’re eating fried pickles and looking everywhere but at each other. I nudge Kalil. “What do you think their story is?”

  He follows my gaze. “What do you mean?”

  “Over here, we have longtime married couple Dave and Kimberley Cardigan. Their love life has gone a little dry, so they’ve come to Ned Devine’s to do something different. But their attempts at reigniting the spark were thwarted by the subduing effects of the infamous fried Devine dills.”

  Kalil frowns at me. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Even through the boozy haze, his words cause a small sting in my gut. “I’m just interested in people’s stories.”

  He considers Dave and Kimberley for a brief moment before turning back to me. “And I’m only interested in yours at the moment.”

  The sting dissipates as he massages the back of my neck. “So what do I do with my life, O Wise One?” I ask.

  One of his fingertips grazes the top of my hand, draws an incoherent message across the thin layer of skin. Then he flips it over to examine my palm, running a finger across each creased tributary. He looks into my eyes as if about to share a revelation. “I have no idea.” He grins, then says sheepishly, “But you’re not totally bad off.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Well, there’s this tram driver who has a huge crush on you and wants to pay for your bar tab.”

  “Oh, really?” I giggle again. Honestly, I don’t usually giggle, but the gin and tonic is stirring my brain with a swizzle stick. “Well, that’s something.”

  “Something good or something bad?” He peeks at me with those eyes. I see a tiny reflection of myself in them.

  My cheeks flush, and I look down at my empty glass. “Good, definitely good. I was seriously considering hopping on a flight to Fiji and never returning.”

  He pulls me close, whispering in my ear, his lips grazing my skin, his breath warm. “Don’t do that. Who would I drink with?”

  I shrug. “Marcus?” We burst out laughing.

  Hours later, after guzzling water and sobering up, we find ourselves out in the parking lot, standing next to my car. One of his long arms pins me against the car door. My eyes find the North Star before falling back down to meet his.

  “Good night, you sexy agnostic bookseller, you,” he whispers. A
nd then he stoops down and kisses me. I feel like I’ve lit up again everywhere he’s touched me—my lips, my waist—his fingers casting neon prints across the small of my back. I close my eyes and kiss him back, the imprint of the starry sky glowing on the inside of my eyelids.

  Another Etch A Sketch memory of Charlie and me outside the reception hall. But I shake it off and lose myself in the moment. The whole world is Ferris-wheel spinning, and I let it take me for a ride.

  Fourteen

  BlondPrincess742 drives a spotless silver BMW with a personalized license plate that reads SMILYFC. She makes her way toward the DSW, a bounce in her step and a pair of oversize gem-studded sunglasses perched on the bridge of her nose.

  I switch off Wulfie’s engine and pat the dashboard. “Please hang in there,” I say soothingly. “After this next gig, I’ll fix you, I promise.”

  I sit in the car for a minute longer, watching BlondPrincess742 scan the parking lot, an expectant smile on her face. I can already tell I’m not sufficiently caffeinated for this. But if I sit in the car any longer without AC, I’m going to suffocate.

  She spots me as soon as I close the car door and meets me in the middle of the parking lot, clacking across the cement in strappy pink sandals. “Piper?” she asks, already grinning. We agreed over e-mail that I’d wear a pink T-shirt so she could recognize me. I chose a Cheer Bear shirt from Goodwill. The irony! Right now, cheer feels as far away as Pluto in my emotional solar system. I’m hungover. My face hurts.

  I extend my hand, but she throws her arms around my neck.

  “I’m Stacey! It’s so great to meet you!” As she pulls away, she clasps her hands together and beams at me. She’s a perky, petite number with a heart-shaped face, glossed lips, and huge eyes. She looks like an anime character come to life.

  Standing together, I imagine the two of us look like a before and after makeover sequence. But I return her smile, the wattage of mine much dimmer.

  “You have no idea how much this means,” she says as we walk in step toward the store. “The thought of doing this whole thing without a sister—well. Do you have a sister?”

  The first thought that pops into my head is the American Girl doll I pretended was my sister for a whole year. Much to the chagrin of my parents, I insisted on having her sit at the dinner table while I mashed peas against her vinyl lips. My parents had to pull two extra chairs up to the table: one for my doll and one for my imaginary friend Phyllis. Phyllis was magical and could do cartwheels up the steps. Also, every time she did a cartwheel, a vegetable somewhere on the planet died.

  “I’m an only child,” I say.

  “Me, too! So there’s a part in the ceremony especially for the bride’s sister, and I need someone there with me. Oh! There’s another part that’s especially for an unmarried friend of the bride. I was hoping you could handle that, too.”

  Great—the token unmarried friend. Glad to oblige.

  We walk inside, rows and rows of shoes expanding before us, and I wonder why Stacey doesn’t have another girlfriend who could fill in. She’s the kind of picture-perfect type who, in high school and college, at least, must have been part of some girl flock or other.

  “So I need gold shoes to wear with the sari,” she’s saying. We start walking down the first row of heels while she fills me in on her fiancé, Raj, and the Indian wedding ceremony. Her other college girlfriends (aha! I knew she had a gaggle of them stashed somewhere) are coming in from out of town to be in the Christian wedding. But Raj’s family insisted on having the Hindu ceremony a week before the Christian one, and none of Stacey’s friends could take enough time off work to be in both. I’ll be posing as a sorority sister, Kappa Kappa Delta.

  “I have work friends,” Stacey explains, “but I don’t really feel close enough to ask them to be in my Hindu wedding. Then I have my church friends, but when I mentioned the Hindu wedding, they were kind of reserved about it. I mean, they’re totally supportive of me and Raj, but they didn’t seem too keen on the idea of being in the Hindu ceremony. When I saw your ad, something clicked.” She loops her arm through mine. “This is perfect. I mean, you’re a pro! How many weddings have you been in, anyway?”

  I make a mental note to thank Lin for making my ad sound so professional. I’m not sure if Stacey would have gone for the late-night haiku I originally composed. Lin had stood over me, shaking his head and editing my ad as he peered, proctor-like, over the top of his glasses.

  I smile, trying to look like a pro. Not like someone who is unemployed, desperate, and eighty-five dollars and seventeen cents away from bankruptcy. Don’t mention that you’ve never done a Hindu ceremony. “Oh, you know,” I say, going on a whim that she’s the kind of person who’ll read whatever she wants into ambiguity.

  “See, you’re like, a wedding guru! You’re perfect.” She hugs my arm closer to hers before veering sharply toward a pair of white sandals studded with bling. “Speaking of perfect—squee!”

  After an hour, she’s settled on gold flats, so she can easily slip out of them when she goes into the mandap wedding tent. We’ve also found a pair of white fluffy slippers that have “Bride” spelled across them in sequins. Lord, she is girly. But I have to admit I like her. She’s like one of those popular girls you wish you could hate but secretly hope to be invited to sit with her lunch table.

  Walking between aisles of handbags, she slips her arm through mine and tells me how she met Raj at a party, how they struggled in the early days of their relationship. “You grow up being told that love is love, that it crosses all boundaries, that you can choose who you love. But what I realized was, underneath all that, my parents wanted me to marry someone like—well, like them.”

  For the first time this afternoon, the SMILYFC vibe fades. She stops in front of a display stand, picking up a beaded clutch and absently opening and shutting it.

  “So where do things stand now?” I ask her.

  “I guess I don’t know.” She opens the clutch again, gazing into its blue silk interior. “Certain family members still don’t love the idea. I mean, heck, even me, I always thought I’d marry a Christian guy. Things don’t always turn out like you think. Anyway, my mom especially, let’s just say she’s . . . not keen on the idea.” She presses her lips together. “At one point she said she wouldn’t come to a ‘heathen’ wedding.” I raise my eyebrows, and Stacey nods vigorously, looking like she might cry. “Yeah. I know. She skipped the engagement ceremony, even though Raj’s parents came all the way from India.”

  “Well, she’ll come around eventually, won’t she?”

  “I don’t know.” She loops her arm through mine again and presses it against her body. “One night I laid it all out for her. I told her that nothing was going to change my mind—or my heart—about Raj.”

  I try to imagine standing up to my own mom, who would probably say something similar if I were having a Hindu wedding. “Don’t they pray to an elephant?” she’d drawl, scrunching up her face and twisting her lips to the side. I picture an older, grayer version of Stacey making the same face.

  “Anyway,” Stacey continues, “it made her stop criticizing me, at least openly. I guess she saw she wasn’t going to talk me out of marrying him. But I doubt she’ll come to the Hindu wedding. Maybe not even the Christian one.” Her lip quivers.

  “Oh, Stacey.” This time I’m squeezing her arm against mine. And before I realize it, Writer Piper is making notes for the article: “I never imagined that weddings would be as much about division as about union. For some families, announcing a wedding is like rolling an apple of discord in with you at dinner.”

  “What can I do? I can only pray she’ll come around. And I do—every day.” She wipes her eyes. “Okay, back to handbags. I need something sizable for the honeymoon.”

  Between leopard prints and polka dots, she fills me in on Hindu wedding rituals, even though she can’t seem to remember the name of
anything. “I’ll give you a study guide,” she says, laughing. “Once I get more of the details from the priest and his wife. And my wedding planner, Deb, will be there to help. You’ll love Deb. She’s British and totally adorable!”

  As we walk back into the sunlight, she turns to me, blond curls bobbing. “This was a blast!” She puts a hand on my arm. “I know you’re going to be a perfect Hindu bridesmaid.”

  I grin. Despite all her full-volume cuteness, Stacey has won me over. But when I drive outside the radius of her brightness, I feel edgy. I’m going to earn a few hundred from the Hindu wedding, but it’s not enough to make next month’s rent without another source of income—not to mention I’m having visions of knocking over the Hindu priest’s sacred fire. Stacey’s was the only legit response I received to my ad this time. And some of the responses made me wonder if I’d ever post on Craigslist again. Case in point: The man who sent a picture of himself dressed in a banana suit, explaining that he was naked underneath. Would I like to pick a fruit suit and meet up with him at the market?

  I put on my right turn signal, noticing that Wulfie’s usual grumbling noise has acquired a death rattle. I say a silent prayer as I pull onto the Beltway, wondering if, like Stacey, I should afix a small Ganesha figurine to my dashboard. (“Look at his lil’ trunk! He’s totally cute!”)

  The noise increases as I accelerate to merge, and I grasp the steering wheel tighter, as if I can will the car to make it back to Fairfax. As I approach the next Beltway exit, I make a quick decision to abandon the four-lane highway as the death rattle grows louder and Wulfie stutters violently, trying to buck me out of my seat. I make it through a green light on Route 7 and set my sights on a gas station about a quarter mile down the road.

  But Wulfie’s not having it. He’s been ignored, he’s been worked to the bone, and he’s not going to take it anymore. The power underneath me gives way. The accelerator stops responding to the ardent requests of my foot. A Hummer behind me blasts the horn as I drift ten miles per hour under the speed limit. There’s nowhere to go: The left lane is blocked with construction cones, and there’s an unforgiving curb on the right in lieu of a shoulder. I continue drifting, praying I’ll have enough momentum to make it to the gas station.