The Wedding War

by Talley, Liz

  Kit smiled at Charlotte and patted her shoulder. “I’m happy to be here for you.”

  Charlotte smiled at him. And then she smiled at Melanie with all her beautiful straight, white teeth. The spark in the woman’s eyes said all that needed to be said. “And I’ll take care of Kit for you, Melanie. Don’t worry.”

  Melanie swallowed and thought about ripping Charlotte’s hair out and then maybe beating her head against the tasteful gray wallpaper behind them. Really give her an effing headache. “I’m sure you would like to, but Kit’s pretty good at taking care of himself. So just focus on yourself, honey.”

  Melanie jerked Kit’s head down to hers and kissed him. Hard. Like a warning.

  He seemed to understand.

  “Okay, tell Emma I love her, and I’m very, very sorry to miss the shower. Also, try to behave. I have heard rumors of tents and peacocks,” Kit said, stepping away from both women and putting his hand on the door to the conference room.

  “Peacocks?” Melanie repeated.

  “You know Teeny.”

  Melanie had nodded and strolled away, leaving a now flushed Charlotte moving to catch up with her husband. She longed to turn around, remind Kit of his vows, to suggest he think hard about replacing Charlotte before she ruined their marriage, but she didn’t. Because ultimately Kit had to decide what he wanted in his life. He had a wife who loved him, who wanted to make things work, who got a blipping bikini wax and shaved her legs on back-to-back days in order to look like she cared. She’d let him do things to her she’d only read about. They had two children, a beautiful life, and a dog who occasionally chewed up their shoes. And if he wanted to toss that for a younger piece of ass, he’d do it with or without her reminding him what he’d be destroying.

  She couldn’t spend her life running around trying to stop her husband from cheating.

  “Hello, everyone,” Tennyson said, jarring Melanie back to the carnival in which she now stood. Her nemesis, who was starting to feel less nemesis-y, glided up to them with a martini in hand and Marc Mallow on her heels. Tennyson wore the electric-green dress she’d bought in Dallas with a pair of sky-high heels that allowed her to tower over everyone around her. Her hair had been piled upon her head in a manner designed to look haphazard but was likely secured within an inch of its life. Blingy earrings swished at her earlobes. She looked rich, attractive, and utterly interesting.

  “Tennyson, this is so incredible and so are you,” Melanie said, because it was true. She’d never attended anything remotely similar to this party. Not even close.

  The opera singing grew louder, and Tennyson winced and looked annoyed. “Thanks. Is he singing louder? It seems like he’s singing louder.”

  They all turned to the man gesturing wildly and singing passionately as if the gondola was about to go down and his life was at stake. Everyone else seemed to be watching the performance, too.

  “I had to pay him extra to get in the gondola. He was very miffed I wanted him to pretend to be a gondolier,” Tennyson yelled over the soaring notes Cesar amplified as he approached the high C note.

  “He’s really going for it,” Melanie murmured as the opera singer spread his hands and drew them together as his voice rose so high she half expected a gang of cats to join in. Finally, he peaked, his body sagging as he fell forward, almost pitching into the bow. The whole performance was rather astounding, if not totally odd to be occurring in the middle of a bridal shower.

  People around her clapped.

  Cesar smiled, nodding his thanks, before extending his hand to his assistant, who had pulled the gondola to the side of the pool. Cesar swayed only slightly before stepping from the vessel onto the pavers. He was a rather large man, so the boat wobbled under duress before he thankfully righted himself by grabbing one of the potted, lit trees. Several kumquats plopped off and fell into the pool. The celebrated tenor headed straight for Tennyson. “I quit.”

  Tennyson’s eyes bugged as he brushed past her. “You can’t quit. I paid for you for the entire evening.”

  Cesar didn’t stop. He kept trucking toward the triple pairs of French doors that led into Tennyson’s house, one of which was open so guests could presumably use the facilities. The three-piece ensemble just inside stopped setting up and watched open-mouthed as the opera singer stomped by. Before Cesar disappeared, he turned and shouted, “I, madam, am not for sale. I am no common hired singer. A gondola! Who sings Franchetti or Puccini in a swimming pool? It’s madness.”

  Another man, presumably Cesar’s assistant or manager, threw Tennyson an apologetic look before he followed his meal ticket out the door. Many guests stood wide-eyed, paused in their imbibing and gossiping, as all this took place.

  “When they say opera singers are temperamental, they aren’t lying. Oh well, he was a bit too uppity anyhow,” Tennyson said, throwing Marc an irritated look. “What are we going to do for music?”

  “Don’t worry, Tennyson. I’ll pull the three-piece ensemble out onto the veranda. And we’ll have the Amazon Echo play something Italian inside the house,” Marc said, moving toward the house. The guests seemed to sense the drama was over and went back to the Aperol spritzes.

  Andrew strolled over. “What was that all about? Did Marc just call our patio a veranda? Do we have a veranda?” Her daughter’s fiancé was all smiles and good humor in spite of the scene with the opera singer. Maybe the cake throwing had prepared him for the ups and downs of doing a wedding with his mother and her sworn enemy. Melanie rather liked his ability to defuse situations.

  “Temperamental artists,” Tennyson said with a wave of her hand. “Now, where were we? Oh, yes, I was saying hello to you and . . . ?”

  “Tennyson, this is my friend Sandy Vines. She’s in my book club. Her son went to preschool with Emma,” Melanie said, glad Tennyson had decided to let Cesar go and not stubbornly demand he come back. After all, the man had a point. She had put one of the premier tenor singers in a swimming pool.

  “Nice to meet you,” Sandy said, extending her hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  “It’s all true, I’m afraid.” Tennyson laughed, sipping her martini and sounding blasé. Yeah, many people in Shreveport had heard what Tennyson had done, but it wasn’t something Tennyson should sound braggy about. There had been catastrophic ramifications, and to have Tennyson treat it all so cavalierly dragged back the resentment Melanie felt. Why did Tennyson have to be so . . . Tennyson? As her daughter would say—Tennyson was so extra.

  Sandy made a confused face and turned toward the buffet sitting beneath the covered patio. “I’m starving, so I think I’ll grab a plate. You coming, Melanie?”

  “Go ahead. I’ll be there in a moment.” She wanted to give Emma the bracelet in her bag. She and Kit had picked it out last week after their cathartic appointment with the therapist. Bearing a tiny row of sapphires, which was Emma’s birthstone, and a matching row of peridots, Andrew’s birthstone, the bracelet would work perfectly as the something blue and something new for the bride to wear on her wedding day. The twined length of gold chain also symbolized her full acceptance of this marriage. Or at least she hoped it would show that to her daughter. “I have a little something for you, Emma.”

  Tennyson perked up. “Are you giving a gift to her now? I thought we would open gifts before the toast and fireworks.”

  “Fireworks?” Melanie repeated.

  “Yes, just hold on to her gift for another hour or so. Mix and mingle, get a plate, and for heaven’s sake, have a drink or two, Melanie.” Tennyson pulled Emma and Andrew away. “Come on, you two. I have some friends who flew in from New York who want to meet the girl who caught Andrew.”

  Melanie was left standing in the middle of the party, her hand in her purse clasping the wrapped present. What had she expected? For Tennyson to let her have that moment with her daughter?

  This was Tennyson she was dealing with.

  The girl who had upstaged every principal actor in every production in high school. The girl wh
o wore her uniform skirts rolled at the waist so the hem was midthigh, and always wore a hot-pink lace bra under her white T-shirt. Tennyson never shared the spotlight.

  Melanie sighed, released the gift back into her bag, and went to find Sandy, who had somehow managed to locate Melanie’s mother. Her friend held two plates of food and was steering Anne toward a forgotten table on the opposite side of the patio.

  “Hello, Mother,” Melanie said, dropping a kiss on her mother’s dry cheek. Anne wore a black dress that covered her from neck to knee. The pearls her father had given her before he died sat at her throat like gris-gris against bad taste.

  “This is the tackiest event I have ever attended. Just look how half these people are dressed.” She eyed three women wearing tiny halter tops and sequined hot pants. At that moment another peacock strolled by, its feathers brushing their feet. Melanie’s mother looked aghast, stepping back and hissing at the impertinent bird.

  Melanie would have laughed, but she knew her mother wouldn’t appreciate it.

  “Where’s Hilly?” Melanie asked.

  “Don’t use that ridiculous name for your sister,” her mother said, sipping a glass of water with a lemon wedge teetering on the rim.

  “Sorry. Where is Hillary?” Melanie asked, looking around, hoping to spy her sister ideally holding a plate of food. Hillary had promised she’d come, even going as far as sending Melanie pictures of three different dresses she was deciding among. Melanie had told her she would come by and pick her up, but Hillary said she’d escort their mom since the party was at Tennyson’s and Anne needed some moral support to show up at the home of someone who she often and vocally proclaimed had ruined their lives. Melanie agreed it would be good to have Hillary with their mother so she hadn’t pressed the issue and had instead offered Sandy a ride so she wouldn’t have to arrive alone.

  “Hillary isn’t here.” Anne inhaled and blew out a breath. “She has good sense.”

  “But she said she would come. That she wanted to be here for you. And Emma,” Melanie said, feeling sharp hurt her sister had yet again refused to show, but that was followed immediately by anger. How selfish did a person have to be? Yeah, Hilly was thin and embarrassed about her appearance, but shouldn’t her love for her niece—for her own sister—be enough to drag her from bed for a few measly hours?

  “I didn’t need Hillary to accompany me here. I will stay until Emma opens my gift, and then I will leave. Your sister didn’t feel well, so I suggested she stay home.”

  “She never feels well.”

  “She is fine, but tonight felt ill.” Anne arched an eyebrow as if daring her to say differently.

  Sandy lifted the plates and jerked her head toward the still-empty table. Melanie gave her an affirming nod, and her friend quietly exited stage right.

  Melanie returned her focus to her mother. Anne stood like a soldier ready to defend the fortress, one hand fisted at her side, her knuckles white on the sweating glass. Her fierce expression the same it always was when they battled about Hillary. Anne hid the shame and pretended nothing was truly wrong with her sister beyond a nervous disposition. Her mother’s refusal to yield to weakness, to allow her concern to come up for air, was what had crippled Hillary for far too long. Her mother being who she thought she should be—polite, private, and prideful—caused more harm than good. Anne’s ridiculous ego and refusal to address the ugly beneath pretty veneers had been part of what killed Melanie’s father.

  Anne liked to blame Tennyson for what happened to their family. But she had played her own role in Albert’s suicide.

  “Hillary has been ‘ill’”—Melanie crooked her fingers in the air—“most of her life, but she can’t get better if she uses that as an excuse . . . if you let her use that as an excuse. This is Emma’s wedding shower. Hillary should have come even if it were for only a little while.”

  Anne gave her a hard look. “It’s better for your sister to remain home.”

  “So everyone doesn’t have to see what she’s done to herself? So she doesn’t embarrass the family?”

  Melanie didn’t want to feel so hurt by her sister, so angry at her mother for enabling Hillary, but she did. Both Hillary and Anne used Hillary’s “condition” to get her out of familial obligations. Though she knew her sister loved her, Hillary’s actions made her feel so unloved, so not important. Couldn’t her mother see this wasn’t about Hillary showing up, but more about Hillary making a flipping sacrifice to show she loved Emma and Melanie?

  Damn, she was tired of always taking a back seat. In everything. This wedding. Her family. Her marriage. People didn’t see her anymore. They were too caught up in their own issues. Same song and dance she’d sat through for years.

  “I refuse to have this conversation here of all places,” Melanie’s mother said, her face tight from the plastic surgery and bitterness she carried around like a badge of honor. The proud widow and beleaguered mother who refused to show one iota of vulnerability.

  “Wouldn’t matter where it was. You try to pretend issues away. Sometimes you have to acknowledge that other people are weak. That they make mistakes. You have to recognize—”

  Anne turned in the middle of Melanie’s tirade and walked off.

  Melanie snapped her mouth shut and glared at her mother’s back.

  “Right,” Melanie said, sucking in a breath and releasing it.

  “What’s wrong?” Tennyson said, appearing at her elbow. Tennyson was like a weed, popping up where she was not needed. But even as she had that thought, even as Tennyson bugged the crap out of her, she was glad someone who understood how infuriating her mother was stood right beside her.

  “Hillary. And Mother.”

  “I heard Hilly wasn’t doing well,” Tennyson said, her hand grazing Melanie’s back before Tennyson seemed to think better of it. “Um, that she still battled bulimia. I thought I would try to go visit her. You know I always loved Hilly. She’s the best.”

  “She is,” Melanie said, her voice softening. Tennyson had always loved Hillary. When they were younger, Tennyson always sought Hillary out to fix her hair, check that her eyeliner was straight, or just gossip about the older girls Hillary knew. Her concern was sincere.

  “Is she well enough to see me?”

  “I don’t know. My mother hides so much.” As soon as she said the words, she wished she hadn’t. Because it was like taking the gauze off a wound before one should, making blood pulse out and splatter the grounds. Reminding her of what was once hidden and how Tennyson had unearthed the secret and then used it against Melanie. Reminding her about the hurt that still sat in their family, fat and oozing, with her mother refusing to acknowledge that it was still there and needed to be dealt with.

  “Everyone hides things,” Tennyson said, her voice . . . regretful.

  “I guess.”

  “All I’m saying is that everyone here has things they don’t want others to know. Everyone here has regrets, wrinkles, and crazy uncles. Everyone has a closet with a skeleton.” Gone was the cocky, brash woman, and in her stead was a woman who perhaps had weathered her own battles, who understood that things hidden away could corrode a person, leaving her a shell. What things had Tennyson hidden? What hurts had she borne? Melanie had never considered that the invincible Tennyson might have deep scars or places still unhealed. She’d been too busy hating her to see her as an actual person.

  This woman didn’t feel like the one who barged into her house with sunglasses, stilettos, and a dog in her purse. This woman was her old friend. If Melanie squinted enough, she could see the freckles Tennyson hated and the scar from a bike wreck nestled in her eyebrow.

  “Well, my mother has always been the warden of our vault of secrets.”

  For a moment they were both silent. The world whirled around them in unbelievable fashion, people laughing, clinking glasses, jugglers performing, an empty gondola floating like a forgotten centerpiece. But for one small moment, she and Tennyson were suspended in something deeper than they s
hould be flirting with. Something laced with regret and hemmed with uncertainty on how to proceed with who they now were. It was like standing on a cliff, deciding whether to jump into the water and embrace the danger and exhilaration . . . or turning around and climbing back down, deciding the fall could break a person apart.

  Tennyson snapped out of her sudden reverie and smiled brightly. “My mother and Bronte are here. They wanted to say hello to you. I mean, if you want to say hello.”

  “I will. Let me get a drink,” Melanie said, grabbing another Aperol spritz off a passing waiter and nodding toward the open tent where Tennyson’s family had to be sitting.

  Fifteen minutes later, while Bronte was laugh-snorting her way through a story about Tennyson and Melanie trying to learn how to drive Heathcliff’s old Mustang, Marc Mallow stepped to the front of the tent and struck his fork against his glass, demanding attention.

  “Hello, everyone. Welcome to Emma and Andrew’s wedding shower. I hope you all have been enjoying the food, drinks, and entertainment.” Marc did a weird jazz hand circle with one hand, a bit of razzmatazz. The people gathering around him nodded because who didn’t enjoy stuffed jumbo shrimp and crawfish étouffée pistolettes? And free top-shelf liquor? And mimes? Well, there were plenty of people who didn’t like mimes, Melanie being one. She didn’t nod for that reason alone.

  “As you know, Tennyson has so lovingly thrown this party in celebration of her only child’s forthcoming nuptials in August, and she has a special gift she’d like to bestow on the happy couple,” he said, motioning Emma and Andrew forward.

  The betrothed couple clasped hands and looked slightly embarrassed by all the attention. Emma’s ears had turned scarlet, a true indication of her nerves, but she smiled and looked adoringly at Andrew, who kept looking down at her like she was the second coming.

  Had Kit ever looked at Melanie that way? She couldn’t remember that much warmth, that much pure adoration ever shining in those blue eyes. Maybe she’d just forgotten to remember.