16
Wednesday, December 18
6 days until the wedding
Gwen
The pulse of music in the club is so loud that it reverberates in my chest. How does Teddy work here and not get permanent hearing damage? For Christmas, I’ll buy him earplugs.
Stop it, I tell myself. Earlier today I told Mom I wouldn’t parent him anymore and yet here I am, doing it again.
A few more steps inside and I see that Teddy was right. They really decorate this place for the holidays. Twinkling multicolored Christmas lights are everywhere. They hang across dark painted walls, dangle from elegant, mismatched crystal chandeliers, and are strewn among the bottles of alcohol behind the bar. Giant ornaments, taller than my head, in white, silver, and gold, are stacked into pyramids in the corners of the room. A sleigh, pulled by eight reindeer, is suspended from the high ceiling. It sways above the dance floor.
It’s packed in here. People everywhere. I slip through the crowd, ducking under the flailing elbows of dancers and around a couple who embrace passionately. Seeing them brings a pang of longing for Caleb. I’d love to take him out on that dance floor. Let the music sweep us together, let our bodies move to the beat as one.
But that’s a foolish dream. If Caleb were here, the crowd would mob him. Unless he was surrounded by bodyguards or in a disguise, we couldn’t go dancing. It’s another part of regular life I give up by being with him, like my anonymity at my medical conference. We’ll never be normal Gwen and normal Caleb. We’ll always be a spectacle, and I thought I was okay with that, but after the Lola kiss, the fiasco of my lecture, and now being here, the first bit of doubt trickles in.
I find a couple of open seats at the end of the bar, away from the DJ who plays music on the stage in the front of the room. He’s wearing a bright red Santa hat with bulky headphones over the top of it. I sit on a swiveling stool. It’s quieter here, so I don’t have to yell as loud when I ask a gorgeous female bartender for the gingerbread martini I saw advertised by the club’s entrance.
“Sissy!” a deep voice booms.
I lift my head and there he is, my younger brother Teddy. Almost five years separate us in age so you would think we wouldn’t be close, but when Dad died I was 17 and Teddy was 12. We’d clung to each other, life rafts in a stormy sea. Mom worked all the time, and our older brother was busy with community college. We trauma bonded in a way that’s unbreakable.
He comes from behind the bar to hug me. I throw my arms around him, rising up on my toes. Has he grown? That’s impossible, right? He’s twenty-five now. An adult. In that instant, I understand what Mom was talking about earlier. It’s hard to look at Teddy and not see the skin-kneed little boy he used to be. I give my head a small shake and focus on the man in front of me.
He’s gotten so handsome, my brother. Not as tall as Caleb, but still above-average height. Short, spikey, light-brown hair. Pale blue eyes, same as mine. Eyelashes long enough to make any woman jealous. He must be working out more, because his biceps strain the sleeve of his tight black T-shirt. Just like the DJ, he has on a comical holiday hat, although his is something an elf would wear.
He looks me over, grinning, then pauses, tips his head to the side, and narrows his eyes. “Is that a fanny pack you’re wearing?”
“It’s a waist bag,” I correct, hands on my hips.
“I don’t think so. That,” he says decisively, pointing at it, “is a fanny pack.”
Seriously? What’s up with the fanny pack shaming?
Before I can argue, the bartender hands me my drink. When she passes behind Teddy, she grazes her fingers along his shoulder, giving him a flirtatious smile. He sends her a grin paired with a secretive wink. Then Teddy looks over my head with a smirk and nod of acknowledgment. I follow his gaze to a pretty brunette two tables away, who’s staring at him with undisguised longing. My jaw loosens as I watch Teddy smile and wordlessly flirt with several more women in the space of five minutes.
Oh my gosh.
My brother is a player. My formerly sweet brother, who only had one girlfriend in high school, is a bona fide hottie with a harem of women.
When did this happen?
“Teddy,” I grab his arm and hiss, “who are all these women?”
He grimaces, pulling out of my hands. “Ouch. Stop it, Gwen. You’re going to mess up my new tattoo.” His face contorted with pain, he pulls up his sleeve to show me a tattoo, so fresh it’s still outlined in an angry red, slathered in shiny ointment, and bandaged with something similar to Saran Wrap. The plastic over it is clear, allowing me to see the pattern. To the untrained eye, it might look like a distorted version of Saturn. A black ball in the middle with six thin rings circling it, all crisscrossing over each other. I know what it is. It’s an atom, with its central nucleus and surrounding electrons.
My throat instantly closes, my vision blurring with tears. I lift my gaze to his, which mirrors my expression, both of our faces drawn in sorrow. “For Dad?” I ask, voice trembling. Our father was a nuclear physicist. He had just gotten promoted to head his own lab when he was diagnosed with colon cancer at age 45. He was dead six months later.
Teddy nods, mouth turned down. “For you, too,” he says. “Since you’ve always loved science so much.” I smile weakly, remembering how little Teddy would help me with my experiments when we were young, patiently holding test tubes while I poured a mixture of ingredients into them and then exclaiming with wide-eyed glee when the contents of the tube would erupt like a volcano, spilling foaming liquid down the sides and over his hands.
“I love it.” I point to his arm and sniffle back my tears, not wanting to cry in a crowded room.
He smiles, the gesture not quite reaching his eyes. Something metallic glints in his mouth.
“Teddy!” I grab his shirt and pull him closer, rising onto my toes to peer past his lips. “Is that…a tongue piercing?”
He brightens and sticks out his tongue, proudly displaying the long silver rod that goes through it, tipped by tiny balls on each end. “Yep. Hurt like heck when they stabbed it in.”
I roll my eyes with a grimace. “Gross, Teddy. Too much information.” That’s a mental image of my brother I can do without.
Teddy chuckles, his shoulders lifting with the motion. Eventually, he quiets and leans an elbow on the bar. “Sorry. That was too funny. Anyway, how was lunch with Mom?”
“Fine,” I answer automatically, then correct. “Actually, not fine. She’s annoyed with me. I told her some truths she didn’t appreciate.”
“Oh, yeah?” he says, smirking. “That makes me happy.”
“Teddy! Don’t say that,” I protest, swatting at his arm. His other arm, the one without the tattoo. “That’s mean.”
He laughs, easily fending off my ineffectual punches. “Sorry. It’s just nice to not be the only black sheep in the family for once.”
“Black sheep?” I drop my hands, my brow furrowing. “You’re not the black sheep.”
Teddy frowns and says, “Come on, Gwen. We all know I’m the wild child. The disappointing college dropout. With a brother who’s a lawyer and a sister who’s a doctor about to marry the most famous man in the world, it’s hard to compete.” His voice is breezy, his body relaxed, but I see the tightness in his jaw. He’s joking, and yet there’s a kernel of truth in his words.
“What?” My heart sinks, realizing this is the way he views himself. As a failure. “That’s not true. You’re in college.”
He scoffs, “I take night classes at the local community college. At this rate, it’ll take me eight years to graduate.” Seeing my troubled expression, Teddy softens. “It’s okay, Gwen. I don’t mind who I am. I don’t want you to be embarrassed, that’s all.”
For the second time tonight, I want to cry. “I’d never feel that way about you.” I sling an arm around his narrow waist and bury my head in the side of his chest. Teddy wraps his arm around me and tucks me in tighter.
He sighs and says, “I’m just giving you a hard time.” After a minute, he releases me. “What made you upset with Mom?”
“You know, stuff from the past.” Teddy knows there’s friction between Mom and me from when Dad died. He doesn’t need the details. The last thing I want is for him to think he’d been a burden.
Teddy leans against the bar, crossing one foot over the other. “You’re never going to get what you want from Mom. You understand that, don’t you?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, confused.
“You want closure. You want her to admit she’s wrong.”
“That’s not true,” I argue, wondering if he remembers more than I give him credit for about that dark long-ago period of our lives.
Teddy cocks an eyebrow at me, and I flounder because he’s got a point. I want acknowledgment from Mom. Maybe even an apology. But that’s childish. This need to always be right.
Teddy draws my attention back to him, affectionately rubbing his knuckles on my head, messing up my hair. “You won’t give up trying to convince Mom. Does Caleb know that about you—how stubborn you are?” His words take me back to before I left New York. Caleb and me laughing over that same topic, except now it’s not so funny.
Take the jet.
Am I being that way with Caleb? Too stubborn? Too convinced my way is the only way? A flash of regret for how I handled that conversation back at the penthouse. So far, Caleb has been righter than I was.
“He may have figured it out.” I run my fingers through my hair, smoothing it out. Quieter, I ask, “You don’t think she’ll ever see it my way?”
Teddy frowns, compassion in his eyes. “No. The things that happened to us with Dad. We experienced the same events, but we all processed them differently. Mom only understands it from her point of view. That won’t change.”
He sighs, shrugs, then asks about our older brother, “Have you talked to Brandon recently?”
“A few months ago. You know he barely ever calls. We’ll see him at the wedding, though.”
“At least he talks to you.” Teddy’s jaw tightens. “He calls me once a year at most. If it weren’t for holiday get-togethers, I wouldn’t even know him.”
We had both looked up to our brother, but when Dad died he became angry and pulled away from all of us. It’s better now that he has a wife and twin daughters, but still far from perfect.
“I miss him,” I admit, eyes downcast.
Teddy squeezes my arm. “I know. Me, too. That’s family for you, right? Love, affection, bitterness, resentment all wrapped up together like a Christmas present with a big bow on top. Nothing’s easy, but we don’t give up on each other. No matter what.”
Tears threaten once more. “Stop making me cry, you brat.” I breathe in through my nose, then out through my mouth, trying to soothe the ache in my chest. A newfound respect for Teddy emerges. “When did you get so smart, anyway?”
He lifts one shoulder, standing tall, acting like it’s no big deal, but I see the way his chest puffs out at my words. “You know what they say about bartenders. We’re untrained and underpaid therapists.”
I snort with laughter. An air horn rings out, so loud it makes me startle. Everyone cheers as fake snow, the foamy kind, drifts down from the ceiling, landing on upturned faces and outstretched hands. I gasp, delightfully surprised.
Teddy grins at my reaction. “It’s a holiday thing. They do it every hour on the hour.”
“It’s beautiful,” says Helen, who’s just arrived. In unison, Teddy and I turn to find her staring upward, her face lit with joy. She’s lovely tonight with her straight, jet-black hair swept up into a high ponytail that bounces when she moves her head. She wears a tight red dress and has an extra earring, in the cartilage of her upper ear, that I didn’t notice when we were at the medical conference. A tiny bubble of snow lands on her pert nose. She ducks, brushing it away. When she glances back up, her gaze finds Teddy and she freezes.
My hand is still on Teddy’s shirt, so I feel when he stops breathing. His eyes dilate, a deer caught in the headlights.
What? My head pivots, taking in the two of them staring at each other.
Oh no. This is not good.
My brother…and Helen?
He would eat her alive.
I pull him close and whisper in his ear, “Leave her alone. She’s sweet.”
Teddy yanks away and scowls down at me. In a loud, offended voice, he asks, “And I’m not?”
“No! That’s not what I meant.” I sigh, exasperated, unable to explain what I’m thinking. Of course, I think my brother is nice. It’s just that this version of him is new. I’m not sure how to interpret it. He seems…volatile. Not ready for the kind of relationship I assume Helen wants.
Teddy’s scowling at me, not the happy sibling reunion I was hoping for. To appease him, I make quick introductions with Helen, explaining how she’s moving to L.A. soon. She looks unblinking up at him.
Just for spite, Teddy shoots me an angry glare, takes her hand, and smoothly grazes his lips over her knuckles. He stares into her eyes, smiles innocently, and says, “It’s nice to meet you. Any friend of my sister’s is a friend of mine.”
Helen melts under my brother’s burning gaze. I kick him in the shin, moving slowly so she won’t notice. Teddy grunts in pain and drops her hand. He glowers at me, and I glare right back, remembering how it feels to fight with him. We’re close, but it’s not like we didn’t have our squabbles as kids. This interaction is as familiar as pulling on an old, worn-out T-shirt. Annoying but also weirdly comforting because I know no matter how mad we get we still love each other unconditionally.
Teddy drops her hand and asks, “What can I get you, Helen?”
“How’s the Eggnog White Russian?” Helen gracefully takes a seat next to me.
“Like Santa made it himself,” Teddy says, and we all laugh. He catches the eye of the female bartender and motions for her to get Helen the drink. Then he says, “I’d better go back to work. It was good to meet you, Helen. Let me know if you need help moving in.” He envelops me in a tight hug.
“I’m glad I saw you, Gwen. Next time we get together, it’ll be in New York for your wedding.” A quick kiss to the top of my head, again messing up my hair. “I can’t wait.”
“Me either. Have a safe flight out tomorrow.” I hug him back, saying, “Love you, Teddy Bear.”
“Ditto, Sissy.” Then he’s gone, high-fiving people as he makes his way behind the bar.
Helen’s drink gets dropped off. She tries it and licks her lips, murmuring, “Delicious.”
I settle onto my seat next to her. Her eyes follow my brother as he works, flashing smiles at customers and shaking mixed drinks in chilled metal containers. I almost warn her away from him, then stop myself. They’re both adults. Let them figure it out. If I butt in, how am I any different from Mom when she got upset about my dating Caleb?
Thinking of him reminds me to check my messages. I don’t want to miss his call, which would be easy to do since it’s loud in here. My notifications show nothing yet.
“Waiting to hear from Caleb?” Helen guesses.
I’m still staring at my phone. “Hmm. Yes.” There’s a picture of Caleb on my home screen, one I took when he wasn’t looking. In it, he’s in bookworm mode, lying on the couch in his penthouse with a novel in his hand and his white-socked feet crossed. My favorite part about the photo is the book he’s reading. It’s Pride and Prejudice. I touch the image, longing for him.
Just a few more days and I can kiss that handsome face. Our flight leaves tomorrow afternoon. I smile at the thought of seeing him, but that grin fades as I remember those comments at my lecture.
Your work will be discredited.
Change the trajectory of your career.
That’s what the middle-aged lady said. Is she right? A flare of resentment strikes. It’s unfair that all my hard work, my accomplishments, are eclipsed by Caleb’s fame. It’s not his fault, I understand that, but still, it’s difficult not to feel bitter.
“What’s it like? Being engaged to him?” Helen asks, leaning her elbow on the bar. She turns her stool toward me. I appreciate the question, happy she’s not asking for details about Caleb but rather my experience with him.
“It’s amazing—and complicated.” I sigh, thinking back to Caleb when I left, how tight he held my hand during the drive to the airport. “He’s wonderful. So smart and hardworking. People don’t understand how much he rehearses or how he spends hours perfecting a recipe. He’s a good listener too. Lets me tell him all about my day. Every gross detail from the hospital. He likes learning about that stuff.” My heart warms as I describe my fiancé. This is what I need. To remember all the great things about him.
“I’m glad for you,” she says, swiveling her stool side to side and sipping her drink.
I search Helen and find only sincerity. “Thanks. It’s hard sometimes, though. We can’t do activities like a normal couple, and everyone treats me differently now. You saw at the lecture.”
Helen listens quietly. “He’s so famous. It makes you famous, too.”
“It’s weird to me.” I shake my head. “I get why Caleb’s well-known. He’s accomplished a lot, but that’s him. Not me. We’re two separate people.”
She purses her lips. “That’s not how you’re perceived, though. His fame rubs off on you.”
“I guess you’re right.” I take a sip of water. “Did you know followers post marriage advice for us on Caleb’s social media accounts?”
“Really? What do they say?” She leans in, like she wants to take notes, which makes me giggle.
“Most of it is nonsense. Caleb thinks I’m crazy for even reading it, but I figure there’s got to be some gems of knowledge in there. The people writing him are married, so hopefully they’ve figured it out?”
We chuckle together. “I read a couple of good ones. One lady wrote that in marriage you fall in and out of love many times, always with the same person, which I thought was interesting. A man said to argue naked because that way you won’t stay mad for long.”
Helen laughs, covering her mouth with her hand. “I’ll have to remember that.”
An idea comes to me, a lightbulb going off over my head. “You should come to my wedding, unless you’ll be with your parents?”
For a brief moment, her face lights up eagerly, but then it shifts into something cooler, more restrained. “I’m not going to California yet. I have to pack up my apartment in Manhattan, but I couldn’t intrude—”
“Yes, you can,” I interrupt. I like her. She’s sweet and thoughtful. I’ve been so busy with medicine and then Caleb that I haven’t had time to make a lot of friends. Inviting Helen to my wedding will help cement this new friendship. “I’m serious. Please come.”
She debates with herself silently for a minute, which only makes me like her more. Most people would jump at the chance to go to the “wedding of the century,” but not Helen.
Finally, she says, “Okay. If you’re sure, I’d love to attend.”
My phone vibrates with a message from Caleb, the one I’ve been waiting for. I’m happy to see his name on my screen, but there’s a moment of unease when I flashback to how people asked about him during my presentation.
Still with Helen, I text. Call you soon.
He texts back, Okay. Love you. Forever and always.
Love you, too. I pause, then add. Forever and always.