by Emily Giffin
My brother, Jeremy, and his girlfriend, Lauren, suddenly bounded around the corner like two overeager house pets. Neither of them was ever in a bad mood. My father once said that the pair had two modes: chipper or asleep. True to form, Lauren wasted no time postintroduction and launched into an inane tale about one of our neighbors. I have known Lauren since she was a baby—she lived down the street from us and Rachel occasionally babysat her—so I knew that she was the kind of girl who could dominate a conversation by saying absolutely nothing in the sort of way you expect from an old lady in church, not a twenty-five-year-old. The weather, the big sale at JoAnn Fabrics, or the latest winner of bingo at Good Haven, the nursing home where she worked.
As Lauren concluded her story, my father offered Marcus a drink.
“A beer would be great,” he said.
“Get him a chilled glass, Hugh,” my mother said, as my dad flicked off the top of a Budweiser.
“Oh, I don’t need a glass. Thanks, though,” Marcus said, taking the bottle from my father.
I gave him a look to indicate that he should have taken the glass as we all followed my mother to the living room. Lauren sat close to my brother on the couch, clutching his arm in a death grip. My brother is a bit of a dork, too, but as I studied his girlfriend’s sweatshirt with the Good Haven logo, acid-washed, cropped jeans, Keds with no socks (a look I couldn’t even stomach during its brief acceptable stint in high school), I determined for the hundredth time that he could do better. Marcus and I took a seat on the opposite couch, and my parents took the two armchairs.
“So,” my mother said, crossing her ankles. I assumed she was ready to interrogate Marcus. I felt nervous, but also excited, hopeful that he would rise to the occasion and make me proud. But instead of focusing on Marcus, my mother said, “Lauren and Jeremy have some news!”
Lauren giggled and threw out her left hand, revealing what appeared from my seat on the opposite couch to be a princess-cut diamond ring set in white gold or platinum. “Surprise!”
I looked at my brother. I was surprised, all right. Surprised that it wasn’t a marquis cut set in yellow gold.
“We’re getting married,” Jeremy confirmed.
Marcus spoke before I could. “Congrats.” He raised his beer.
Jeremy returned the gesture with his glass of Coke. “Thanks, man.”
Jeremy shouldn’t say man. He just can’t pull it off. He hasn’t a cool bone in his body.
“Congratulations,” I said, but my voice sounded stilted, unnatural. I stood to survey the goods, quickly determining that although the diamond was a decent size, it was slightly yellowish. I pegged it as a J in color.
“Very nice,” I said, returning Lauren’s hand to my brother’s knee.
My mother started to gush about a May wedding in Indy and a reception at our country club.
I told them how happy I was for them, my mouth stretched into a fake smile as I tried to suppress a stab of envy. I wondered how I could possibly be jealous of my dorky little brother and this girl with bad bangs and thick thighs shoved into acid-washed jeans. Yet incredibly, I was. I was bothered by my mother’s enthusiasm. Bothered that Lauren was replacing me as the bride-to-be, my mother’s focal point. And what annoyed me the very most was that their spring wedding was going to shift the focus from my baby and me.
“Should I ask her now?” Lauren looked eagerly at Jeremy.
“Go ahead.” Jeremy beamed.
“Ask me what?”
“We want you to be a bridesmaid,” Lauren chirped. “Because you’ve always been like a big sister to me.” She looked at Marcus and explained further, “Darcy used to babysit for me.”
“I never babysat for you. Rachel did,” I said.
“Well, true,” Lauren said, her smile fading slightly. Mention of Rachel sombered up the room. I liked the effect—liked reminding everyone of my suffering. But the result was short-lived. Lauren’s grin quickly returned in full force. “But you were always there helping her. You were so fun.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I try.”
“So will you?”
“Will I what?” I asked, pretending to be puzzled.
“Be a bridesmaid?”
“Oh. Yeah. Sure thing.”
Lauren clapped and squealed. “Goody! And I want your help. I need your help.”
She could say that again, I thought. And sure enough, she did. “I need you to help because you’re so good at this stuff.”
“Why? Because I’m the wedding expert now that I just spent almost a year planning one?” Another reminder of my pain.
Lauren flinched, but then recovered. “No. Not that. Just because you have the most excellent taste.” She turned to Marcus again. “Incredible taste. Nobody has taste like Darcy.”
This much was true.
Marcus nodded and then took another swallow of beer.
“So I need your help,” she continued excitedly.
Okay. Let’s start with those jeans. And the Keds. And your bangs.
I looked at my mother, hoping she was thinking the same thing. She was usually right on board with the Lauren criticism, recently ranting about her application of blush: two round circles of pink missing her cheekbones altogether. Not that Lauren had much in the way of cheekbones. She wasn’t bringing the best genes to the table. But clearly my mother was not in her usual critical mode; she was hypnotized by the rosy glow of a new wedding to plan. She looked at Jeremy and Lauren adoringly. “Lauren has been dying to call you. But Jeremy and I convinced her to wait to tell you in person.”
“I’m so glad you did,” I said flatly.
“You were right, Mom,” Lauren said.
Mom? Had I heard that right? I looked at Lauren. “So you’re calling her ‘Mom’ now?” Pretty soon she was going to lay claim to my mother’s jewelry and china.
Lauren giggled, pressed Jeremy’s hand to her cheek in a nauseating display of affection. It looked like a bad Kodak commercial, the kind that’s supposed to make you cry. “Yeah. I’ve felt that way about her for a long time, but now it feels right to call her that.”
“I see,” I said, with what I hoped was maximum disapproval. Then I glanced over at Marcus, who was finishing his beer.
“You want another?” I asked, standing for the kitchen.
“Sure,” he said.
I gave him a look. “Come with me.”
Marcus followed me into the kitchen, where I went off on my family. “How could they go on and on about this wedding after what I just went through? Can you believe how insensitive they’re all being? I wanted to tell them about us getting married. Now it just doesn’t feel right. Probably because I don’t even have a ring,” I said. I shouldn’t have shifted the blame to Marcus like that, but I couldn’t help it. Casting the blame net wide is just my natural instinct when I’m upset.
Marcus just looked at me, and then said, “Can I get another beer?”
I opened the refrigerator with such force that a bottle of Heinz ketchup flew from the side shelf onto the floor.
“Everything all right in there?” my mother asked from the living room.
“Just dandy!” I said, as Marcus replaced the ketchup and grabbed another beer.
I took a deep breath, and we returned to the living room, where my mother and Lauren were talking about the guest list.
“Two hundred seems just about right,” Lauren said.
“I think you’re going to realize that two hundred is the bare minimum. It adds up fast. If your parents invite twenty couples, and we invite twenty couples, that’s eighty guests right there,” my mother said.
“True,” Lauren said. “And I’m going to want to invite a lot of people from Good Haven.”
“Well, that should cut down on the liquor bill,” Marcus joked.
Lauren shook her head and tittered. “You’d be surprised how much they can put away. Every year at the Christmas party, they get lousy drunk.”
“Sounds like a wild and crazy time,” I said.
“Do they ever…you know…hook up?” Marcus asked. His first substantive contribution to the conversation was about geriatric sex. Lovely.
Lauren giggled and then launched into a story about Walter and Myrtle and their recent escapades in Myrtle’s room. After she exhausted the nursing-home romance tales, my mother finally turned to my boyfriend and said, “So, Marcus. Tell us a little about yourself.”
“What would you like to know?” he asked. Dex would have posed the same question, but with a completely different tone.
“Anything. Everything. We want to get to know you.”
“Well. I’m from Montana. I went to Georgetown. Now I work at a pointless marketing job. That’s about it.”
My mom raised her eyebrows and recrossed her ankles. “Marketing? How interesting.”
“Not really,” Marcus said. “But it pays the bills. Barely.”
“I’ve never been to Montana,” Jeremy remarked.
“Neither have I,” Lauren said.
“Have you ever been out of the state?” I muttered under my breath. Then, before she could tell us about her childhood trip to the Grand Canyon, I said, “So what’s for dinner?”
“Lasagna. Mom and I made it together,” Lauren said.
“You and Mom, huh?”
Lauren was unfazed. “Yeah! And you’ll be my sister! Like the sister I never had! It’s just too, too wonderful.”
“Uh-huh,” I said.
“So Marcus, do you have brothers and sisters?” my mother asked.
“Yeah,” he said. “One brother.”
“Older or younger?”
“Four years older.”
“How nice.”
Marcus gave her a stiff smile, took another sip of beer. I suddenly remembered how much I wanted to kiss him the night of Rachel’s birthday as I watched him drinking a beer at the bar. Where had those feelings gone?
The cocktail hour mercifully ended, and the six of us made our way into my mom’s Ethan Allen dining room. Her china cabinet was polished to a high gloss and filled with her Lenox china and crystal.
“Take your seats, everyone. Marcus, you may sit there.” She pointed at Dexter’s old chair. I saw a pained look flash in my mother’s eyes. She missed Dex. Then another look crossed her face—one of determination.
But despite her efforts, dinner was painful. There were stilted questions from my parents and terse answers coupled with more beer-guzzling from Marcus. Then he made the comment that will go down in history.
It started with Jeremy talking about one of his patients, an older man who had just left his wife for a much younger woman. Thirty-one years his junior.
“What a shame,” Lauren clucked.
“Shocking,” my mother added.
Even my father, whom I sometimes suspected of committing his own indiscretions, shook his head with apparent disgust.
But for some reason, Marcus couldn’t just get on board and disapprove along with the rest of the group. Or simply say nothing at all, which he had mastered up until that point. Instead he chose to open his mouth and say, “Thirty-one years, huh? Guess that means that my second wife hasn’t even been born yet.”
My father and Jeremy exchanged glances, wearing identical raised-brow expressions. My mother deflated as she stroked the stem of her wine glass. Lauren laughed nervously and said, “That’s really funny, Marcus. Good one!”
Marcus smiled halfheartedly, realizing that his joke had not gone over.
Suddenly, I was in no mood to salvage the night or my new boyfriend’s image. I stood and carried my dishes into the kitchen, my posture ramrod erect. I heard my mother excuse herself and click after me in her heels.
“Sweetheart, he was only trying to be funny,” my mother said under her breath when we were alone in the kitchen. “Or perhaps he’s just nervous, meeting your parents for the first time. Your father can be intimidating.”
But I could tell that she didn’t believe her words. She thought Marcus was crass, subpar, nowhere close to Dexter’s caliber.
“He’s not usually like this,” I said. “He’s just as charming as Dex when he wants to be.”
But as I tried to convince my mother, I realized that I knew that Marcus was absolutely nothing like Dex. Nothing. The last remaining drops of coffee dripped into the pot in time with my one and only thought: I. Picked. Wrong.
We returned to the dining room, where everyone pretended to enjoy a strawberry cream pie from Crawford’s Bakery. My mother apologized twice for not baking one herself.
“I love pies from Crawford’s! They taste homemade,” Lauren said.
My father whistled the theme from The Andy Griffith Show between bites until my mother glared at him to stop. After another few painful moments I said, “I’m not in the mood for pie. I’m going to bed. Good night.”
Marcus stood, drummed his fingers on the edge of the table, and said he was “bushed” too. He thanked my mother for dinner and followed me silently, leaving his plate at the table.
I walked up the stairs ahead of him, then down the hall, stopping abruptly at our guest room. “Here’s your room. Good night.” I was too exhausted to gear myself up for a big fight.
Marcus massaged my shoulder. “C’mon, Darce.”
“Are you proud of yourself?”
He smirked—which only further riled me.
“How could you embarrass me like that?”
“It was a joke.”
“It wasn’t funny.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No you’re not.”
“I am sorry.”
“How am I supposed to tell them that we’re getting married and that I’m pregnant with your baby?” I whispered. “The man who plans to leave me in thirty years for another woman?” I felt a stab of vulnerability, something I had never felt before I got pregnant. It was an awful feeling.
“You know it was a joke.”
“Good night, Marcus.”
I went to my room, hoping he would follow me. He didn’t. So I sat and stared at my lavender walls covered with photos from happier days. Photos that were yellowing and curling at the edges, reminding me of how much time had passed, how far removed I was from high school. I studied one picture of Rachel, Annalise, and me after a football game. I was in my cheerleading uniform, and they were both wearing Naperville High sweatshirts. Our cheeks were painted with little orange paw prints. I remembered that Blaine had just caught a long touchdown pass to win the game and advance our team to the state quarterfinals. I remember how he took off his helmet, his hair and face drenched with sweat like the sexy star of a Gatorade commercial. Then, as the crowd roared, he beamed up at me from the sidelines and pointed, as if to say, “That one was for you, sweetie!” It seemed as though everyone in that stadium followed his finger right to me.
Life was good then, I thought, as I started to cry. Not so much because I missed the good times, although I did. It was more that I knew I was turning into one of those girls who, upon looking at high school photos, feels wistful.
Fourteen
The next morning I heard a light rapping at the door and my mother’s voice. “Darcy, are you awake?” Her soothing tone—an unnatural one for her—made me feel even worse.
“Come in,” I said, as I felt a wave of morning sickness.
She opened the door, crossed my room, and sat on the foot of my bed. “Sweetheart. Don’t be so upset,” she said, patting my legs through the covers.
“I can’t help it. I know you hate him.”
“I like Marcus,” she said unconvincingly.
“No you don’t. You couldn’t possibly after last night. He barely said anything—except to announce that he plans to leave me someday.”
She gave me a puzzled look. “Leave you?”
“The ‘second wife’ comment,” I said, rearranging my head on my pillow.
“Well, you don’t have plans to marry this boy anyway, do you?” she whispered.
The way she said “this boy” told the fu
ll story.
“Maybe,” I whimpered.
My mother looked anxious and continued to whisper. “Marcus is probably just your rebound boyfriend.”
I sniffed, stared back at her, wondering if I should tell her the big news. You are months away from being a grandmother. Instead I said, “He’s just going through a difficult stage.”
“Well, if he doesn’t straighten up, just dump him and start over,” she said, snapping her fingers. “You can get anybody you want.”
If only it were that easy. If only I could go back to the drawing board and fix my mistake. The realization that I couldn’t, that I was stuck with Marcus, made me feel even more nauseated. I told my mother I wasn’t feeling so well, and that I thought I should get a few more hours of sleep.
“Sure, dear. You get your rest…I’ll just get your laundry.”
Our housekeeper always did the laundry, so my mother’s offer was further confirmation of how much she pitied my current state of affairs.
“My dirty stuff is all in that turquoise mesh bag,” I instructed as I closed my eyes. “And please don’t put my La Perla bras in the dryer. They’re very delicate.”
“Okay, honey,” she said.
I heard her unzip my suitcase and pull my clothes from it. Then I heard her gasp. My mother’s gasp is one of her trademarks. A dramatic inhalation with more noise than you’d ever imagine possible. For a moment I thought she was making a point about my volume of dirty clothes. And then I remembered what I had popped last minute into my luggage: What to Expect When You’re Expecting.
“What in the world is this?”
I had no choice but to fess up. I opened my eyes, sat up, and said, “Mom. I’m pregnant.”
She gasped again, pressing her hands to her temples. “No.” She shook her head. “No, you’re not.”
“Yes I am,” I said.
“Dex?” she asked hopefully. She wanted desperately for me to tell her that Dex was the father. She wanted to believe that I could reconcile with the ideal man. Get my charmed life back.
I shook my head. “No. Marcus.”