Cancel the Wedding (2 page)

My phone rang. It was my sister, Georgia, calling. I put it on speaker and Logan made a face at the screen. Being fourteen she often hated her mom for no particular reason. I said, “Hey, Gigi.”

“Livie, you left your ring at my house.”

I was hoping it wouldn't be discovered quite so quickly. “I know, sorry. I meant to tell you. Can you just hang on to it for me?”

“I can FedEx it down to you if you want.”

“No . . . that's not, I mean you don't need to bother.”

“Why?” I could hear her tapping her foot at me over the phone line. Georgia was my older sister in every conceivable way. It didn't matter that we were now adults. She would forever view me as the baby who needed constant reminders, nudges, and prompts. Otherwise there existed the very real possibility that I might forget to get dressed before leaving the house.

“Jeez, Georgia, just hang on to it for me will you? It's no big deal.” I thought,
Don't tell Leo
. But I didn't say it. I was ten hours into a poorly planned, spontaneous road trip and I was too tired to fight with her. When I had picked up my niece that morning I slipped the ring off and put it in her bathroom. For some reason I didn't want to wear that noose when I fled, but I didn't feel like trying to explain it to Georgia.

Leo and I had been engaged for almost three years. He asked me to marry him right after my father died. Last year, when my mother died, we bought a house together. With each death, Leo and I ratcheted up our commitment level. I was in a race to keep the houseplants alive for fear of ending up pregnant.

I kept my eyes on the road as I spoke toward the phone's speaker. “Look, I'm driving. I gotta go. Logan, hang up on your mother.”

She clicked the phone off and put her bare feet up on the dashboard. “Finally, something we agree on.”

I merged right. “What's that?”

“Hanging up on my mom.” Logan was now picking at the peeling polish on her toenails. “Why'd you ditch the ring?”

“I meant to have it cleaned.” I lied. “It's no big deal.” I lied again.

“Are you going to cancel the wedding?”

“What? No, I just . . . no.”

“It's cool, Livie. Whatever. But you know sometimes you talk about marriage like it's the Bataan Death March.”

I looked at her. “The Bataan . . . ? Can't you just read zombie love stories like a normal teenager?”

“Can't you just wear your ring like a normal fiancée?”

I stole a Twizzler from the bag she was holding and bonked her on the head with it.

This impulsive little escapade, driving from our home in the DC area to a strange town in the northwest corner of Georgia, had materialized the day before.

My fiancé, Leo, had picked me up at work so that we could rush over to my sister's house for a family supper. I wish I could say that I didn't usually work on Saturdays, but that wouldn't be true. I just really wish I could say it.

Leo was waiting for me in the circular drive in front of my office building as I hurried to roll up the last set of blueprints, which were incredibly heavy but not in fact blue. I dropped one copy on my boss's desk with a note telling him that the project was finished, that he was a jerk for making me drag my team in over the weekend, and that I was taking Monday off. I may not have actually written that middle part.

I pushed through the heavy glass doors to the outside and was engulfed by the thick, wet summer air. It instantly smothered the chill I had from being in the air-conditioned office all day. My mom, whose name was Jane but who everyone called Janie, referred to air conditioning as “store-bought air.” My sister and I would get into trouble if we wasted it by leaving the back door open. The familiar wave of grief swept through me as I thought of my mother.

I got into the car and buckled as Leo pulled away from the curb. I glanced around to see if he had remembered the wine. He knew what I was looking for and pointed to the floor by my feet. After so many years together we didn't need many words. I tried to see that as a comfort instead of a toxic premonition.

Leo didn't mind that I had to work all the time. He was an attorney and was under the mistaken impression that this was a normal number of hours for one to spend on the job. There was no use arguing with him about it.

Sometimes I wondered if we had accidentally backed into our engagement simply because the timing had worked out. We got engaged at a time when I was in the process of losing both of my parents; I think Leo felt understandably a little bit sorry for me. It also happened to coincide with Leo's consideration for a junior partnership. The senior partners at the firm liked for the junior partners to be stable and solid, which roughly translated from legal jargon meant “married.”

We left Tysons Corner and headed north around the Beltway to my sister's house for dinner. It was the one-year anniversary of my mother's death, which in my opinion was a bizarre thing to celebrate, but no one asked me. I missed her and my dad every day and I couldn't shake the rudderless feeling of being orphaned. It wasn't something I liked to mark with cocktails and grilled meat.

I sighed a little, which made Leo ask, “What're you thinking?”

“I just can't believe it's already been a year. And we haven't even scattered her ashes yet. I'm irritated with Georgia that it's taking so long.”

Leo patted my leg. “Filter.” He said it in that type A, slightly controlling, but well-meaning voice he used on me when he thought I should keep my thoughts to myself.

Our mother left very specific instructions for the scattering of her ashes. We just couldn't figure out why she had requested it. The letter our mother had given to her attorney with her last will and testament was frustratingly brief. It read:

Our mother, Jane Rutledge Hughes, grew up in Huntley, Georgia, but she never once talked about it. Her personal code of silence was on par with a mafia omertà. We had never visited her hometown, we knew nothing of her childhood, and she had no living relatives.

But now this, she wanted to be laid to rest there, in the place of which she never spoke. If her hometown meant so much to her that she wanted to be there
permanently
, then why had we never visited Huntley? Why hadn't she ever talked about her past? The people, the town, her life there? None of it made sense. This was probably why her urn had still been sitting on the mantel in Georgia's living room a year after her death.

We pulled up to Georgia's house, a bungalow sitting just outside DC's city limits, safely tucked into the jurisdiction of Chevy Chase. My nephews were playing in the front yard. Will, the ten-year-old, was sitting on Adam, his younger brother, and hitting him repeatedly with a lacrosse stick. Without breaking my stride I confiscated the lacrosse stick from Will as I walked by. I figured Adam should at least have a fighting chance. We younger siblings had to stick together.

Leo and I let ourselves in the house. “Gigi, we're here.”

I found Georgia in the kitchen. A door slammed overhead and she flinched. That would be Logan. I came up behind my sister and hugged her shoulders. “Sorry we're late. I had to finish that project this weekend.”

“You're working too much.”

“I know.” I raided her liquor cabinet and made myself a stiff drink.

She waved to Leo as he passed quietly through the kitchen on his way to help William with the grill. “Are you two fighting?”

“No, we don't fight.” I wondered if we had come to a place where neither one of us cared enough to get into a decent argument anymore. You really only have a passionate row if you feel completely confident that you can get through it, or if you're using it as the hand grenade tossed over your shoulder on your way out the door.

Georgia was hacking at a head of lettuce. She pointed her knife at my glass. “Then why are you drinking so much lately?”

I took the knife out of her hands, deciding that preparing the salad myself might be safer. “Why are you judging so much lately? Relax.”

Logan had appeared out of nowhere and let out a snide laugh at my comment. “See Mom? You're too judgey.” She was already walking out the back door, throwing a “Hey, Aunt Livie” over her shoulder before Georgia could respond.

Georgia stole my drink from me. “I need this. Logan is being impossible.”

“She's a teenager. It's kind of her job to be impossible.”

We all sat down to dinner, which was its usual bout of lovely chaos. My nephews were kicking each other under the table relentlessly as Georgia gave a sentimental speech about our mother on this one-year anniversary of her death. The kicking was very distracting. I finally kicked them both back simultaneously. To eight- and ten-year-old boys, getting kicked by your aunt is hilarious apparently. Milk came out of Adam's nose. It landed on Will's plate. I was in trouble.

Logan hardly touched her dinner. Either she was still mad at Georgia or she was protesting the steaks. Sometimes she was a vegetarian.

I was finally starting to relax, no doubt the effects of my second vodka tonic. My brother-in-law, William, was finishing a story about some baseball game and then just like that, with no warning or hint that it was coming, Leo stood up and demanded everyone's attention.

“I have an announcement to make.” Georgia glanced at me to see if I knew what this was about. I shook my head slightly and shrugged. I couldn't imagine what he would have to announce. But this was just Leo. He liked to control situations and conversations. I very rarely bothered to step in or protest.

Once everyone at the table had quieted down and the boys had stopped fidgeting, Leo said it. “The scheduler for Trinity Chapel called the house today and there's been an opening.” He paused for dramatic effect. I felt my stomach drop suddenly knowing what was coming next. “So I booked it. Olivia and I officially have a wedding date. Mark your calendars for the last weekend in September.” He took my hand, smiling down at me. “Surprise!”

I could feel the blood drain out of my face. I felt like I was falling, rushing toward something, and I needed to make a drastic move quickly before I hit. My sister and her husband were happily congratulating Leo and me.

Through the clamor I heard Leo explaining everything, but the words were taking a while to make their way to my brain.

“The timing couldn't be better.” He was explaining that the end of September was perfect, logistically, for a wedding. He should be finishing one of his cases by then, it was always a slow time for me at work, and the firm's off-site in Kauai wasn't until the beginning of November. I had not been to any of his firm's off-site conferences yet because they were strictly “spouses only” and so far I had not qualified. I knew Leo felt it was bad form for me to miss another one. The timing for the end of September worked nicely into his schedule.

My nephews were taking the distraction this offered to feed their vegetables to the dog. Logan was staring at me with the strangest look on her face, a hybrid of amusement and empathy.

My vision went slightly fuzzy and gray around the edges and without thinking I jumped up, nearly knocking my chair over. “I have a surprise too. I've decided to leave in the morning and drive down to Georgia to see where Mom wanted us to spread her ashes.”

Leo dropped my hand. “You're what?”

I started making plans as the ideas popped in my head. “It's the one-year anniversary of her death. I have a million vacation days saved up at work and this is a good time for a break. It would be so easy to just drive down there. We could all use closure, right? Right?” I was babbling, my voice trying to keep up with the excuses my brain was feeding it. Leo looked concerned but kept quiet. I knew he hated it when I blurted out every single thought racing through my mind, but I wasn't in control enough to stop it.

That was not the reaction Leo had expected from me, clearly. He turned me by my shoulders until I was facing him and spoke quietly. “We shouldn't keep putting this off. This was the chapel you wanted to use; it was your parents' chapel and it's available, finally. Let's stop waiting and move forward.”

Leo looked so sincere. I did love him and I did want him to be happy. “I know. And you were right to reserve it. I just . . . before we plan too much . . . if I could just . . .” I hoped he would understand my need to do this first. “I think I need to go do this, to put her to rest.” I looked at Georgia, hoping she would back me up.

Georgia said, “You can't spread the ashes without me.”

“Then come with—”

“You know I can't just leave.” Her arms moved around the table pointing from one kid to the next. “Why can't we just fly down one weekend?”

“No, you're missing the whole point.” The trapped feeling that had materialized when Leo dropped the wedding-date bomb was still holding firm and the urge to flee was palpable. I sounded a little more frantic than I meant to. “I want to go down there and find out who Mom was and where she came from. It's been a year since she died. How long are we going to wait to do this? I won't actually spread the ashes without you, not until you can come down, but don't you want to know why she picked those two places from her past?” I could feel myself clinging to the idea of my mother, as if she were the rip cord for my chute, and if I didn't pull it right that second I wouldn't survive the impact. “Maybe we could investigate Mom's childhood. Finally learn something about her family and where she came from. Aren't you dying to see where she grew up?”