19
19
MAID OF DISHONOR
A fter Ashley-Leigh finished gaping and gushing over the slew of Ranger pics I let her scroll through, I bribed her with my unused spa day and fobbed her off on Jess to get her out of my hair. I mean, how many ways could you sleuth for Pete clues in a half-hour period? As if, bitch. I remained as buttoned-up as the dress uniforms around here. After the slew of pangs passed, I scurried to catch up with my brothers before they hit the Nat. We wound ourselves along the path to the lake, stopping to feed the ducks leftover pancake. As soon as Mikey nabbed the largest chunk and speeded ahead, Andrew spilled all the words and worry he’d been holding in.
“Katie, I don’t wanna be Ranger’s groom at y’all’s wedding! I can’t believe you’re gonna marry him after what he did to us! Is he making you cause he’s in charge?”
“No, Andrew,” I responded serenely. “It was my decision.”
But I wondered, was it really. Could I have said no? Could I now? I pictured it in my mind. When the priest asked if I do, what if I said I don’t? What would happen? Would he reach across the priest to choke me? Would Weston burn me with his cigar? Would the chief-of-police step forward to arrest me? All hundred and fifty of the fillers that were my “friends” and well-wishers, would they boo? Tar and feather me and string me up by my toes?
“God, Katie! Why didn’t you just wait for Pete?”
I cupped a hand over his mouth and shook my head, waiting for the onslaught of pangs to pass with the wind. His blue eyes watered, an ocean of anger and hurt.
“Andrew,” I pleaded. “Try to understand. This is in everyone’s best interests.” I removed my hand and kissed the side of his golden head.
“No, it’s not,” he argued. “It’s not in his !”
I peered down at him sadly. “Yes, it is sweetie. It really is.”
I spent the day of my wedding, not strolling the sunny campus with my father, or in the posh spa getting pampered with my bridesmaids, but in the chlorine pool of the Nat with my two brothers. I was watching my decade-old brother learn how to swim while Mikey alternated between jumping off the diving board and swimming circles around him, throwing in some pointers that would be pretty hard for a big brother to take from a little one. After Andrew started to get the hang of it, Stew came wading over to where I was sitting on the side.
“Just like you,” he said.
“What?” I asked, pensively trickling water through my fingers.
He gave me his craggy grin. “Like teaching a dolphin how to swim.” Grabbing ahold of my foot, he yanked me back in. I came up sputtering but laughing and then Stewart and I leaned our backs against the pool to watch Andrew brave the low-dive.
“Jump in closer to the side,” I encouraged. “The water will automatically lift you up.” I remembered this instructional gem from my soon-to-be-husband. My stomach clenched.
Andrew was still hedging at the edge of the board, and it looked like Mikey was getting ready to plow him down. Stewart called out, “One at a time, Mikey. Give him a chance . . . you forget how high the low dive can look your first time.” He reached behind him for a flotation device and tossed it over. “Andrew, I’m right here.”
“Yeah, Stewart’s the best swimmer in the world, and he taught me, and I was the worst!” I called out.
“She ain’t lying,” Stewart concurred. “And now she’s a swim champ . . . just like you’ll be soon enough. Just go for it!”
After Andrew tiptoed off the edge and resurfaced, Stewart, Mikey, and I applauded. Huge grin fixed to his face, Andrew swam to the side and trotted over for a reward hug. He glanced at the big clock above the locker room, perpetually counting down the minutes to the hour.
“It’s almost four,” he announced glumly.
I sighed. “I guess you better get showered and back to visitor’s quarters with daddy.” We shared a frown. “Mikey,” I called. “It’s time to get out.”
“Okay, Katie!” Mikey cannonballed in one last time before swimming to the edge. He climbed the ladder and began trotting to the boys’ locker room. “Come on, Drewy, wets get weady for the weddin’!”
“Walk, Mikey,” Steward ordered, and Mikey slowed to a fast-clipped patter before picking back up to a lope.
“Hug, Mikey,” I ordered, and he sheepishly backtracked to give me a wet hug and a wetter kiss. I turned to Andrew. “I’m proud of you, Drews. ”
“What about me, Katie?” Mikey dripped water all over my face with his words.
“I was just about to say I’m proud of you too. You’re such a good brother, showing Andrew all around.” I winked at Andrew and squeezed him to me. “I’m so glad you’re here, Drews.” After another tight squeeze from both boys, they trotted away to go get ready.
I let out a sigh, and Stewart looked at me sideways. “Aren’t you supposed to be . . . I dunno, having your hair done and painting your toenails blue?” I snorted, and he said, “Or something bridely on your big day?”
I made a face. “Don’t remind me.”
He frowned. “Trouble in paradise?”
I shook my head. “It’s not that,” I lied. “I’m just nervous, I guess . . . all those VIPs comin’ in their fancy clothes to stare at me standin’ up there. I’m likely to trip down the aisle, or faint from sheer embarrassment.”
Stewart slung his ropy wet arm around my shoulder. “Haven’t you realized yet . . . it’s them who’re coming to see the VIP?”
“Yeah right.” I laughed it off.
He shook his head at me, and I smiled at him. Stewart’s face just missed handsome, but his beautiful eyes sparkled back at me. “I really hope you’ll be happy, Katie.”
I swallowed back tears. “Thanks, Stew. I’m glad you’ll be there . . . I’ll see ya at the church,” I called behind me, before diving under the water to relieve myself of some churning anxiety.
Since I’d opted out of the St. Regis spa day, and my father was shut away in his visiting quarters, ordering up heaps of healthy room-service that wouldn’t make a dent in his cholesterol number in one weekend, and the boys were getting fitted and tucked into their tuxes, I squeezed every last drop of freedom I could, ordering up a late snack. André himself had to come confiscate me from my bench, where I was blithely munching on cheese crackers and ignoring the tick-tocking clock on the wall.
“What, pray tell, are you doing still sitting around with soggy chlorine hair?” He tossed his hands, so exasperated he forgot to choose an accent.
“Sorry, André. I guess I lost track of time.” I couldn’t put it off any longer. I sighed and began marching toward my wedding, with what felt like sand in my shoes. André was already sweating profusely when we arrived via emergency cart to my room.
“ There you are!” accused Ashley-Leigh the second I stepped in. She was ensconced at my desk, in front of a floor length pop-up mirror, while André’s assistant buffed her face with a puffy black brush. “Maybe a little more lash,” she directed him, like the pro she was. I noted she was in full makeup yet devoid of clothes, other than her strapless black bra and panties.
Jess wandered in from the bathroom, also in full makeup and fully dressed in her classic-black knee-length dress. “You okay?” she gave me a quick hug. “We were starting to get worried.” She peered at me with dark, sympathetic eyes. Her matching long hair was swept up, showcasing her heart-shaped face. Her normally minimal makeup was amped up, some foundation masking her cute freckles, her lips painted a pretty pink.
“I’m fine,” I assured her. “You look beautiful.” I turned to Ashley, who was blotting her dramatic matte lip on rice paper. “And so do you.”
She shook out her newly coiled hair, fussing around a bit with some strands near her ear. “Thanks!” She slid out of the chair and struck a pose, hipbones proudly protruding. “I had the best day with my new friend Jess,” she exclaimed, pausing to beam at her latest object of affection. “After telling her all about our childhood—how our moms were best friends, and we were best friends and the “two Leighs,” and how we basically grew up like sisters, well, she agreed that it would be best if I walked down the aisle with Slater, and she could hold your bouquet for you.” Big, winning smile.
I cut my eyes to Jess. “You must’ve showed her a picture of the best man. ”
Jess burst out laughing. “He is pretty hot.”
Now that she’d won, Ashley-Leigh shared a laugh at her expense. “Oooh! I’m just so excited! I wouldn’t have missed this day for the world!” After this dramatic declaration, she threw herself into my arms. “I really love you, Katie-Kat.” After she broke away, she began rapidly flapping her hand at her eyes as though to dry the moisture that was beginning to gather.
Looked like all those acting lessons were paying off.
“Love ya too,” I said, feeling a little bad because I knew she probably meant it in the moment, and was reveling in the drama that comes with being front and center of a big event. I hugged her to me, shrugging helplessly at Jess. “Are you okay?” I mouthed over Ashley’s heaving shoulder.
She nodded and broadened her smile. “Here, let me take your picture.”
“Why don’t we take one with all of us?” I relieved her of her cell and handed it off to André, who looked like a kettle about to blow by this point.
“Okay , one before picture,” he conceded. “Then we kick it into high gear.”
Sixteen-hundred-hours and a few lost minutes, found me in the shower while André shooed my bridesmaids out the door so he could concentrate on me. While I lathered up, he alternately cursed in Spanish and French and banged around his cosmetics cart. The ceremony was at six o’clock, and, apparently, it would take half an hour just to get me dressed. Who knew?
When I stepped unhurriedly from the shower ten minutes later, I saw André had called for backup. Two more assistants practically grab-assed me out the shower naked before they commenced to grooming me to within an inch of my life. I was buffed, polished, mannied, peddied, and blown dry while André painted my face like it was the Sistine Chapel. Forty-five minutes later, fat rollers were plucked from my hair, so that André could work his magic. Throughout the whole shebang, I was bored as a model on her last day on the job. Or else the half circle of blue I popped before we began had me feeling blank. André, usually so astute, was in too much of a “crunch-rush” to notice. Or to object when Jess and Ashley-Leigh crept back in for the big reveal. Hyper focused and humming, André swept up the front part of my hair, attached the veil to my crown, and stepped back to assess.
He tapped the side of his face. “What else?”
“The lipstick,” offered an assistant.
“Mondieu! Brush your teeth first, quickly.”
I rolled my eyes and complied, rinsing and spitting, while he unzipped the dress worth more than the house I grew up in. The assistants held it for me, one on each side, while Jess and Ashley-Leigh oohed and awed over it. It was a white column of silk with an extremely fitted waist, accentuated by a Swarovksi belt and a sweetheart neckline. The crystal sash was black and bound so tightly around my waist, you’d of thought my husband’s hands were at the wheel. I wondered if they would call off the wedding if the bride tanked over from lack of circulation. Maybe that cheese and fruit platter was a bad idea.
“Um, André. You have to loosen it a little.” The first words I’d spoken since he began working me over.
“But that is the emphasis.” He circled his hands around my waist. “And, honey, you’re not gonna have that figure forever . . . and Ranger insisted.”
I sucked in a sharp breath. My BC! I suddenly remembered the prospective end result of this marriage. Not if I could help it! I’d been so intentionally forgetting about today, that I’d forgotten to take it.
“André, did you send the luggage out already?” The most emotion I’d shown all afternoon.
“Jez, they’re already packed in the cart, my darling. Not to worry,” André reassured me.
“What do you need, Katie?” Jess inquired calmly.
“My toiletry bag!” I made to dash for the door when André arrested my flight.
“No time. I have to do your lips.”
“No, please! Can you dig it out of my suitcase? . . . I forgot to take my pill!”
Andre snapped his fingers, and an assistant ran out the door to retrieve my protection from my husband’s master plan.
“What pill in particular?” Jess asked, getting up to take some action.
“My—” I broke off, blushing profusely. “Birth control,” I whispered, thinking longingly of the circular disk of pastel pills. A jolt of anxiety churned my stomach. Each pill was so miniscule, it didn’t seem like it could do much to fight against Ranger’s manhood. Oh gah! Ranger’s manhood . Now my stomach fell into a lurch. I sank down onto my bed, and realized it would probably be for the last time. I deep-breathed in and out. I had to calm down or risk throwing up all over my wedding dress.
My face must’ve registered alarm because Jess came back over and calmly stroked her hand down my arm. “It’s okay, Katie. I’ll get them for you.” Like a hero, she immediately bolted into action.
Now it was Ashley-Leigh who looked alarmed. “You can not forget your BC!” she exclaimed. Pause to brainstorm. “I guess you could just get some morning after pills there,” she concluded, trying to calm me down. “Because nobody wants condoms on their honeymoon .” Now she looked horrified.
“Why not?” I asked, thinking that’s about all the sex education I’d ever had: protection, protection, protection.
Ashley swiveled her head to stare at me, eyes bulging and lips popping open to speak when André cut in: “I’ll usually stop in the middle of a shit for a good gab sesh, but we have no time for this sex chit-chat. Your future husband will kill me if I don’t get you done in time.”
My stomach flipped again. I fingered the Rx bottle scuttled away in my wedding bag. I’d only taken half a pill to take the edge off, but the edge was starting to feel like a serrated knife again.
A few minutes of me tapping my toes later and Jess made her appearance with my new luggage.
“Oh, thank God!” I gushed, squeezing some of my relief into her.
“Katie, don’t worry. You have The Academy at your disposal. They can call you in a prescription for anything you need anywhere you are.” She cut her eyes to Ashley-Leigh, who seemed overly impressed by this. “Just make sure you take them about the same time very day,” she advised.
I released a gust of pent-up anxiety. “Okay.”
Ashley-Leigh gaped at me. “Wait! You still haven’t had sex yet?”
André stopped preparing my lip kit, and his assistants quit packing cosmetics. Jess gracefully bowed out. I shook my head.
“Wow!” Ashley’s pillow lips popped. “I guess I’m not that surprised. But wow. Is that why you’re gettin’ married?” Again, tact not being her strong suit.
“Not exactly,” I murmured, searching through my embossed luggage for the pills I’d squirreled away.
“Well, I think it’s sweet. A real white weddin’! You must be so excited!” Ashley squealed.
“Not exactly,” I muttered to myself.
Jess cleared her throat. “Speaking of your wedding night, I have something for you.” She handed over a small white box with a powder-blue bow.
“Thanks, Jess.” I was able to conjure a smile for her. That’s so sweet.” I opened it up and pulled out a lacy garter.
“Something blue,” Jess explained shyly, helping me shimmy it up my leg while my cheeks turned pink.
Not to be outdone, Ashley-Leigh ran over to her over-sized Louis Vuitton bag to retrieve a mini bottle of champagne that looked too cute to pop. “And something new,” she beamed at me.
I actually cracked a smile as Ashley-Leigh ceremoniously popped it open. We giggled as it spewed out golden fizz. Then I popped out my very first pill from its Saturday pouch and said, “Down the hatch” before swallowing it down with some cheap champagne. Even with my pregnancy prevention swimming around with half of my anti-anxiety pill, the nerves in my stomach were beginning to tremble my hands, so that I couldn’t work the borrowed diamonds into my ear that my husband had procured for me. Jess stepped up to help finagle them in, while André stepped away to concentrate on his buzzing earpiece.
“Okay, darling.” André stepped back up, in business mode. “Most of the guests have arrived, the groom and best man are in route to the church. I’m sending your bridesmaids with Amos and Annie to stall off the panic.” He eye-balled his assistants, who rapid-packed up.
Jess kissed my cheek. “You make such a beautiful bride,” she declared, eyes misting. She took her cue and sallied out the door with two encouraging thumbs-up.
Ashley-Leigh took her own cue. “Can’t believe my best friend in the whole world is gettin’ married today!” She crushed me to her before re-fluffing her hair and buffing away some imaginary shine in the mirror. The assistants began escorting her politely out the door.
“You’ll ride with your father and brother,” André finished directing while coming at my lips with a tiny black brush. “But I’ll be there, sitting front row.”
I thought of all the VIPs sitting in the audience staring at this exhibition/business arrangement. This wedding was a lot of things, but a happy occasion it was not. I popped the other half of Dr. Patel’s magic pill into my mouth and swallowed it down with the last of the bubbly. Feeling flat, I stood really still while André painted my mouth blood red.