A Wedding Invitation

by Alice J. Wisler

  “Yep. You know, all that singing in the camp must have made me do it.”

  I feel my heart soften even more. “What kind of station?”

  “Music from the seventies and eighties.”

  “Do you take requests?”

  “We do.”

  Vaguely, I recall the voice on the radio station Beanie turned to when we were driving to Lien’s family’s restaurant. Could that have been Carson? At that time, my mind was preoccupied with seeing the Hong family again; I had not paid much attention.

  “How about you?”

  I think of everything that’s happened since I last saw him, all the things God has brought me through. “Life is good,” I say after a moment.

  “It is, isn’t it? Where are you working?”

  I wonder if Carson still has that sense of humor I adore. I decide to give it a try. “Well,” I begin, “I married a rich sheik who owns oil wells and we live in the Mediterranean with our seven children.”

  Carson’s laughter is rich, taking me back to the evenings when we would sit outside the cafés in the camp, drink from bottles of Sprite, and confide in each other about our dreams.

  “Actually, my mom owns a boutique in town and I work there.”

  “I thought you were going to become an ESL instructor and get your certification. What do they call that?”

  “TESOL.”

  “That’s it. Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. Wasn’t that what you said you were going to work on doing next?”

  Mom got sick, I want to say. The store needed help. As my thoughts churn, I imagine my dreams from my past, my lofty dreams, turning into puffs of smoke. “Things don’t always work out.”

  “I know,” he says. “I never expected to work at a radio station. So I guess life’s turned out a little differently for us both.”

  I want to ask about Mindy, but I hold back. Later, I think.

  Then he says he has to go. “Dat and Yung are here. We have a Bible study.”

  “Well.” Reluctant to end our conversation, I say, “Thanks for calling.”

  “It was right nice talking to you.”

  When we hang up, I let my fingers linger on the phone as Carson’s voice lingers against my ears. Quickly, like my mother would warn, I tell myself to be careful. You were young back then in the camp. You gave away your heart too quickly.

  Ten thousand miles from Mom, in the Philippines, I disregarded the warnings she’d imbedded in me and became spontaneous with my emotions. I never told my mother how hard that was for me to do, shedding all the stories she had shared about her own childhood—tales of relatives who lied, stole, and cheated. “Be careful about where you put your trust,” she often advised. “There are some who should never be trusted. Hold on to your heart. Do not be quick to give it away.”

  sixteen

  Three nights later, I’ve got another bowl of Asian soup in front of me, this one containing dried mushrooms and carrots. I’m seated at my coffee table watching Casablanca. I think this marks the seventh time I’ve seen it. I dream of Humphrey Bogart sometimes, the way I imagine my mother dreams of Elvis.

  As I bite into one of the two carrots from the styrofoam bowl, the phone rings. If I were watching a movie I’d never seen before, I might let the answering machine pick up the call, but tonight I leave the living room and grab the phone in the kitchen.

  Carson says, “Hi, Samantha.”

  “Hi again. How are you?” I suppress the desire to gush over how nice it is to hear his voice.

  “I was thinking that you should come down to Winston.”

  My heart lurches; he wants to see me. Cautiously, like a robot, I ask, “Why?”

  “Why?” His laughter is just like in the old days. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen you.”

  Carson’s words knit themselves into the corners of my heart, a fabric that is thin from being torn over the years. I see his face, feel his breath. In between these pleasant emotions, anger threads through my veins. I should say that I never understood so many things that happened at the camp. I should say that there is a box of photos from our days together that I have sealed in my closet under other boxes because I cannot bear to make that trip down memory lane. Instead, I try to focus on the here and now.

  “When?” My voice sounds tinny. “When do you want to see me?” I walk over to the TV and turn down the volume just as Ingrid Bergman is about to walk into the bar, the scene that makes any romantic swoon.

  “How about this weekend?”

  “What?”

  “Why don’t you come to Winston this weekend? What do you say?”

  I think of how I recently told Natasha I need to be less spontaneous, think of my mother more, and less of me. I think of what Ingrid Bergman would say if she were in a moment like this one. Finally, I come up with, “The drive is long. My car is old.”

  I hear Carson laughing. Again. “I’m sorry. ‘The drive is long, my car is old’ sounds like a Dr. Seuss rhyme. Like that book—”

  “One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish?” When I used to volunteer at the library for story hour, that was a favorite.

  “Yeah, that one.”

  Silence saturates the air. I note that my toenails need a fresh coat of polish. With everyone else, I always want to get rid of the quiet moments out of discomfort. Yet, even after all this time, tonight’s silence with Carson feels like it did seven years ago—acceptable.

  “Could you hop on a plane?” he asks. “I can pick you up in Charlotte.”

  My heart twirls as I try hard to calm it and put it back where it belongs in its safe and guarded place. “I work.”

  “Can you get some time off?”

  I feel the stickiness of an afternoon in the refugee camp, right before the air filled with the aromas of dinner cooking on portable stoves outside the billets. Closing my eyes, I recall our walks together.

  “Do you think you could come for a visit soon?”

  My teeth dig into my lower lip. I swallow and see scenes from the past sashay before me like the dance the bride and groom did at the wedding a few weekends ago. I wonder if Carson’s hair still falls into his face after he’s been caught in a downpour. I wonder if his eyes are as bright, flecks of green and gold dotting his irises. I wonder if his hands would still feel as good massaging my neck, easing the tension with just a few deep movements into my muscles. I wonder— “No.”

  After a pause he says, “No?”

  “I really have a lot going on now.”

  “You do?”

  With a final swallow, I say, “Thanks for calling. Bye.” Then I disconnect us. I try to eat my dinner, but the noodles are rubbery and the steam from the broth mixes with my tears and burns my eyes.

  I think about calling Natasha and telling her what just happened.

  But what would I say? I’m not even sure I know what happened.

  seventeen

  Natasha thinks I should go to see Carson. On this Sunday afternoon, we walk around the Washington Monument. The June day is too hot for a walk, but Natasha is one of those avid exercisers. During the colder months, she goes to a gym and sweats on a treadmill. She knows she’s unusual because she actually likes to sweat. Once she even had a personal trainer, but when she fell in love with him and he didn’t reciprocate her feelings, she told him she no longer needed his help. She switched gyms.

  Never stopping her quick strides, Natasha says, “Take a few days. You know that my schedule at the office is flexible. I’ll help your mom at the shop.”

  “Why?”

  “So that you can go see Carson.”

  “Why?” I pick up my pace to match hers.

  “Why not?”

  I pant and then push my drooping cloth headband up over my forehead. She’s adorned with long legs; I’m long-waisted and my legs don’t ever move quickly.

  She stops for a moment, looks at me in her deliberate way, and states, “You’re in love with him.”

  I raise my right hand to stop her a
nd pause at her side. A flock of tourists crowd around a woman in a navy suit carrying a miniature flag of Turkey. With my hand still in the air, I say to Natasha, “Not anymore. I was once in love. Once.”

  Natasha shrugs. “I don’t know why you think you can keep fooling yourself.”

  “I got over him.”

  “Really?” She starts to walk again, heading down the pavement away from the towering historical structure, dodging a group of kids playing in the grass with a Frisbee.

  “Yes.” I make a dash toward her, shielding the afternoon sun from my eyes, wishing I’d remembered to bring my sunglasses with me. “Besides, I went out with this guy I met at the wedding.”

  “Oh yeah, the cute one you told me about. So how was the date?”

  “Great!” I cheer, but we both know I am exaggerating. “Look,” I say as I feel a cramp developing in my calf, “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

  We walk in silence. Natasha comments about her father’s recent trip to Morocco. He works as a dignitary in the Clinton administration, but I can never remember his exact title. I feign interest and ask a few questions. She then says she’s ready to date again, but there is no one she likes. “Well, one guy at the office. But I found out he’s married.” She mutters, “Why do men try to hide these things?”

  We sit by the National Mall on a bench so that Natasha can re-tie her shoelaces.

  I look out over the strip of water and say, “Wonder why he didn’t marry Mindy.”

  Wiping sweat from her neck, she says, “I thought we weren’t discussing this.”

  “You’re right; we aren’t.”

  As we start walking again, Natasha says, “But if we were talking about it, I’d say Carson wasn’t really in love with her.”

  “I was really rude when he called,” I admit.

  “Rude to him? Why?” She turns to give me a quizzical stare.

  “I just want him to go away.”

  “Away?”

  “I don’t need him back in my life.”

  “Really?” She squints at me.

  “Yes, things were going well without him.”

  “They were?”

  When I get back to my apartment, I check my mail at the row of boxes and pull out a power bill, a water bill, and a flyer for a new Italian restaurant in Arlington. I’m not hungry since Natasha and I had chocolate Häagen-Dazs popsicles after our walk. I don’t feel like turning on the TV or reading, so I gaze out my window for a few minutes as the maintenance man cranks up a lawn mower. Then I water my two planters of ivy. I can’t stand it when houseplants wither on my watch. But since I don’t have a green thumb, sometimes they end up dying no matter how loving I am when I talk to them.

  In the kitchen, I immerse four tea bags in a saucepan of boiling water, and after ten minutes, remove them and add a cup of sugar. Stirring the mixture, I make sure all of the sugar dissolves, and once it has, I squeeze lemon juice into a pitcher and then pour in the thick concoction. I fill half a glass with ice cubes and then top it off with tea. As the sweet liquid cools my throat, I see that my answering machine light is flashing. With a press of the play button, the messages begin. The first one is Dovie, inviting me to come down to see her again. “I’m having a dinner party on July fourth and have a surprise for you.”

  Message number two begins with, “Hello, Sam. This is Taylor. Sorry to miss you. I’ll call again later.”

  My stomach does a little happy flip.

  I hope he calls back, but by eleven I give up my childish notions and get ready for bed, reading the last chapters of Deceived in Denmark, one of the newer Busboy Mysteries. As usual, the author gives just enough clues to make me think one character is the culprit, but by the second-to-last chapter I’m suspecting another.

  I met the author, R.C. Longjay, once at a book discussion and signing. At first I didn’t recognize her because she had gray hair, wrinkles crisscrossed her forehead, and she wore horn-rimmed glasses. She didn’t look at all like her glamorous book jacket photo. The elderly woman seated next to me had Cornered in Cairo, the just-released mystery by R.C., opened to the author’s photo. To me, this stranger whispered, “Guess this picture was taken when she was in college or something.”

  I was about to comment when the woman must have read my thoughts, because she said, “I suppose she wants to remind us that she was young once.” After smiling, she closed her book, rested it against her heavy thigh streaked with varicose veins, and sighed. “I don’t blame her at all.”

  eighteen

  We always close the shop the week of July fourth. Mom says it is patriotic to take time off and not be intent on making a buck off the holiday.

  I create posters that we place around the front door of the boutique, letting customers know that we’ll be gone. We also make sure to tell each customer who comes in before that week. Although Mom tells me her philosophy on not working, she contradicts herself by wanting people to think it’s a working week. To those who raise their eyebrows and say, “A whole week off?” she gives them the sense that she’ll be heading to our suppliers to check out new products. But the reality is that she drives to Virginia Beach with her friend Maralinda, another breast cancer survivor. They eat seafood, drink chardonnay from skinny glasses, and take walks on the beach in bare feet. They have been known to be noticed by single men. Perhaps, if the weather is cloudy, Mom might venture to a wholesaler in Richmond to see what they have in stock, allowing plenty of time for lunch along the way. But that’s the extent of her “working week.”

  Five days before the fourth, Mom’s lab results from her annual physical are in.

  “Well?” I watch as she places the shop’s phone in the cradle. My mind spins as the back of my neck grows clammy.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Really?” I swallow.

  She pops a licorice morsel into her mouth. “Well, he says I eat too much licorice. Stains my teeth, you know. He isn’t happy about that.” She’s talking about her oncologist, Dr. Burgess.

  “What else did he say?”

  Mom looks at me with her hands in her apron pockets. “I suppose I’m going to live a while longer.”

  My smile is broad. I dive into her arms.

  She pats my back. “So,” she says, stepping back, “I guess we’ll be carrying on with our plans, then.”

  “For what?”

  “Take your dad’s old camera when you go.”

  “Go where?”

  Mom takes off her clip-on silver earrings and adds them to her pocket. “To Dovie’s. You always have fun there. Dovie loves having you visit. Take the camera and get some pretty photos of the butterflies.”

  “What do you want them for?”

  “I’ll put them around the shop. You know, spruce it up a bit.”

  “I have to use Dad’s camera?”

  “You have one?” Mom’s eyebrows rise.

  “Mom, you gave me a Nikon for graduation.”

  “That was ages ago.”

  “I still have it.”

  She watches me. I know she’s questioning whether or not it still works. I have been known to break a few items in my lifetime.

  “Send Dovie my love but know that Maralinda is counting on me to join her at the beach house.”

  Softly, I say, “I know.” Those two have a bond like glue. In fact, although I insist, Mom won’t let me drive her to her physicals; she only lets Maralinda do that. Dovie invites her to Winston, but Mom rarely visits. “She should come up here,” Mom tells me. “This city has so much to offer. I could take her to the Smithsonian, and then there’s Folger Theater.”

  Once, just to play the devil’s advocate, I asked if I could come with her to the beach house.

  “Of course, you are welcome.”

  “I didn’t ask if I would be welcomed. I asked if I could spend a week there with you and Maralinda.”

  “Oh, there are only two bedrooms.”

  “I have a sleeping bag.”

  “Her children usually st
op over.”

  I didn’t pursue it after that. Beanie told me, “Sometimes folk just want time away from their kids. Nothing personal, Sammie.”

  On the third of July, after we close up the shop at noon, Mom leaves for Maralinda’s. She hands me a crumpled piece of paper with a phone number written on it. “The beach house has a phone, and if you need me, you can reach me there.”

  I want to say, What if I just want to talk to you but don’t really need you? Will that be all right? But I just take the paper, give her a hug, and watch her take off her apron. She puts on a billowy hat that flops over her eyes. “You like it?”

  It’s from a shipment we received the other day from a wholesaler my mother has been eyeing. “Looks good, Mom.” There are times I know Mom orders certain products because she wants them for herself.

  I head home, can’t decide what to pack, make a turkey sandwich, clean out the outdated milk and sour cream from my fridge, and eat the sandwich. Within an hour I start my drive to Winston-Salem.

  Leaving Falls Church, I say aloud, “If I were married . . . Yep, things would be different.” I’d fly to Cancun this week with my charming husband. But I’m not, and although Natasha invited me to her parents’ condo in Cape May, I’d rather visit Dovie for the holiday.

  When I called Dexter last night to catch up, he told me that I should be glad that I have time off from work. From the sound of his voice, it seemed he was going to have to be working.

  “So no time off for you, then?” I asked.

  “No, and no sunny warm weather for me, either. Where I’m going, I’ll need my parka and lots of hot coffee.”

  “Where is that?”

  “Our team is headed to the Arctic to study the vocalizations of the beluga whale.”

  One of the things I love about being friends with Dexter is that he has fascinating tales. His job as a marine biologist has taken him all over the world.

  “I never even heard of a beluga whale,” I said.

  “You’ve heard of white whales, right?”