Maggie
When I come downstairs on the morning of Mom’s wedding, she’s in the kitchen, hovering over the counter with Ron and Vivian,
who’s pointing to her iPad and talking them through the ceremony.
“Morning, Mags,” Mom says without looking up. “Vivvy is making sure we’re not a clueless bride and groom.”
“A rehearsal breakfast, if you will,” Vivian says in her big, cozy lavender hooded sweatshirt.
“Cute.” Out the window over the sink, I see that the caterers are already in the backyard, setting up tables and dozens of
chairs beneath an ominous blanket of gray cloud. “Exciting day.”
“I know,” Ron says, putting an arm around Mom and giving a gentle squeeze. “I barely slept. Just can’t wait to be married
to your mom.”
“Awww,” Mom says.
“I thought the bride and groom aren’t supposed to see each other until the actual wedding,” I say, with more downer energy
than I’d intended.
“Oh, that’s just a silly tradition,” Mom says.
“Yeah,” Ron agrees, dipping a pita chip into a container of lemon dill hummus. “We don’t need to hide from each other. We
have nothing to hide!”
“I always thought it was about, like, building up suspense,” I say. “Or drama.”
“We’ve all had enough drama,” Mom says. “No more drama!”
“Okay, let’s get back to it,” Vivian says. “Eyes on me. We’re up to the rings.”
“As you were,” I say, feeling my phone buzz in the front pouch of my big, cozy hooded sweatshirt as I investigate the contents of the fridge. I grab a slice of sourdough bread and throw it in
the toaster before pulling out my phone.
Can’t wait to see you dazzle em today, kiddo
It’s Dad. Ugh, so much for blocking out the fact that he’ll be at the wedding.
Thanks, I type. You sure you want to be there for this?
I can’t send that. I replace it with a See ya soon!, then plop the phone into my pocket and retreat upstairs to my room as Vivian points outside and tells Mom and Ron where
they’ll walk after their kiss.
“Check check, one two,” I say into the microphone while Misty, Shana’s dad’s friend who owns Bean-Age Dream, bends over the
portable speaker system she’s lending my parents for the wedding. She fiddles with a couple of the knobs as I continue saying
words. “Check check, sound check. Wedding. Love. Anxiety. Barf. Check check.”
Misty throws a rigid thumb into the air. “Yup.” She returns to a standing position, adjusting the light gray suit jacket she’s
wearing. “Levels sound great. Keys and vocals, both solid.”
“Okay, cool,” I say, nodding to Shana and Ember.
Things are better between Shana and me, though still not perfect.
I apologized for being a shitty friend and for putting so much of my focus on Carter, and I meant it.
Though I also had no choice since our band needed to be on good terms so we could do this wedding.
I feel even more nervous for this performance than I did for our first gig.
It’s just past one, and guests will start arriving at two. The ceremony is first, followed by a brief cocktail hour, then
us. I’m not sure where my panic attack slots in. Hopefully after the performance.
“You plugging in your ax?” Misty asks, pointing to Shana.
“Oh,” Shana says. “Sure?”
Misty gets to work, pulling a black device out of a tote bag and putting it into Shana’s acoustic. The confidence radiating
off Misty is intimidating but also calming. It’s almost enough to offset the extreme uneasiness I feel every time I notice
the charcoal sky. The caterers have set up a big canopy thing for if/when it starts raining. I’m holding out hope it won’t,
though.
“Oh yeah, now you’re in the pocket,” Misty says, responding to Shana strumming the opening chords from the new song I wrote.
I get a little lightheaded. I’m not sure I can go through with playing it. Our other originals and the assorted covers we’ve
learned—weird eighties shit Mom and Ron requested, like “Always Something There to Remind Me” and “I Melt with You”—all feel
doable, but the new one is a tribute to them, and, at this particular moment, I might prefer to literally jam a knife into
Dad’s back instead of playing this in front of him. I need to stop writing intensely personal songs about people I love.
“All righty, then, Angry Infant,” Misty says, “you should be good to go. Have a great show.”
None of us has the heart to correct her. I’m in such a vulnerable place, it leaves me wondering if Angry Infant is actually
a better name; maybe we should officially switch to calling ourselves that.
As Misty strides away, I pull my phone out of the skinny green purse I’ve brought out especially for today. Carter has texted.
You are a star, Maguel. And I love the new song
Thanks Coco, I write. I’ll letcha know how it goes. Hopefully won’t besmirch my family name
COME ON, he texts back immediately.
“You good?” Shana asks, sidling up next to me. “You’ve been looking a little pukey.”
“I’m okay. I’ll be okay.”
Ember whacks one of their cymbals, continuing to warm up.
“I feel like I should be more, like, unconditionally happy about today,” I say. “Vivian seems thrilled.”
We glance over at my sister, in an animated conversation with one of the caterers.
“She’s just a good actor,” Shana says. “I’m sure she’s feeling a lot of the same things you are. Have you talked to her about
it? About them getting married?”
“A little. Not really. I don’t know. She usually just points out how happy Mom is and says it is what it is.”
“Oh, she’s walking this way. Hey, girly!”
“Hi hi hi,” Vivian says, her dark hair perfectly stacked into this magnificent spiral bun thing. She looks gorgeous and put
together in a way that makes me want to pull out my phone again, use the camera to look at my makeup. “How did sound check
go?”
“Amazing,” I say. “Misty was very pleased.”
“Great. So why do you look . . .”
“Pukey?” Ember offers.
“I was gonna say worried,” Vivian says, “but yeah, pukey works.”
“I just . . .” I’m hesitant to finish the sentence. Shana gives a little flip of her chin to nudge me forward. “I feel strange about doing the song. In front of Dad. The whole thing is, like, about how happy Mom is since she met Ron.”
“Mags.” Vivian takes my hand. “It’s beautiful. It’s a beautiful song. Mom and Ron will love it, and today is for them, so
that’s all that matters. Dad chose to be here, so if he can’t handle it, that’s on h—”
“Vivvy!” Mom emerges from the sliding door in the back, looking panicked and pretty in her simple, long-sleeved white dress.
“Yeah?” Vivvy says, dropping my hand.
“Do you know where the rings are? Ron says you know where the rings are.”
“Yes, Mom, rings are safe, don’t worry.”
“Okay, thank god. Could you just come in and go over everything one last time with me and Ron?”
“Mom, it’ll all be clear during the ceremony, I promi—”
“Please, Vivvy! We’re flipping out a little!”
“Ron’s flipping out?”
“Well . . . Mainly me. But please?”
Vivian sighs and gives a comic roll of her eyes. “Okay. Let’s go.”
Mom applauds. I try to silence the voice in my head wondering if she’s ever needed me that badly.
“You got this, Mags,” Vivian says, squeezing my shoulder before turning to Shana and Ember. “You all do. I can’t wait to finally
see Angry Baby.” Glad she got the name right. We definitely shouldn’t switch it.
I nod, and Vivian makes a beeline to the house, a swagger in her step not unlike Misty’s.
How does one achieve such a swagger? I may never know.
“Let’s go inside and hide in the basement till this starts,” I say.
It’s a gorgeous ceremony.
Of course I expected nothing less from something engineered by Vivian, but, sitting there in the front row next to Shana and
Ember, I’m still thrown by how moved I am. It helps that I haven’t seen Dad arrive yet, so I don’t have to feel uncomfortable
as Vivian talks about when Mom and Ron first met at Barnes & fricking Noble, of all places. Mom was holding a book about Cleopatra,
and Ron said it was really great, even though he’d actually read only a third of it, and they’d proceeded to stand in the
aisle chatting for over an hour (leaving me wondering where the hell Mom was and what the plan was for dinner, but I’ve forgiven
her). Vivian talks about Mom and Ron’s lake walks. She talks about how Mom seemed like a giddy teenager during that first
year of dating, topped only by Ron, who literally clicked his heels together one night when they were waiting for a table
at Vincenzo’s.
It’s all so charming and hilarious that I start to feel like the song I wrote is actually not enough of a tribute, that I’m yet again going to offer up the dinky supermarket frozen pizza as Vivian presents a coal-fired pie
made on premises with 100 percent fresh ingredients.
Somehow Vivian’s wizardry has even kept the granite boulders in the sky from releasing their haul of raindrops, which leaves
the canopy feeling like an artful framing of the space rather than a crowd-size umbrella.
But the real triumph of the ceremony is when Mom and Ron read the vows they wrote for each other.
This is another win that belongs to my sister, as Mom was fiercely resistant to the idea, saying again and again that she’s not a writer, pushing Vivian to look online and find some vows there.
Vivian wouldn’t let it go, though, and Ron started to get really into the idea, enough so that he was eventually able to convince Mom.
His vows are very moving, but it’s Mom’s that send me spiraling into a snotty mess. I’ve never known her to write anything
more involved than a to-do list or a two-sentence birthday card, so it’s sort of a revelation. She, too, talks about Barnes &
Noble, how taken aback she was when this handsome man started chatting her up, partially because she found it shocking that
a man would actually read a book. (I wince at this not-so-subtle dig at Dad, who famously hasn’t read one since college.)
She says she felt better about her instincts when she later learned Ron hadn’t actually finished the Cleopatra book, but then