Come Rain or Come Shine (26 page)

Honey gave Mink a look. ‘You half kill 'im,' she said, ‘an' I'll handle th' other half.'

Say la vee, they had a boy who was out of control, a factor that came from her side, which was Irish. He sighed deeply and took Honey's pocketbook off the knob of her chair and slung it over his shoulder. He carried it for her everywhere but never asked anymore what was in it. Blow-dryer, a Bible-study book that weighed more than a refrigerator, a quart jar of beans to give a neighbor, her entire makeup kit with twenty shades of eye shadow, Lord knows.

The music was crankin', two or three people were dancin' in the aisle, he was out of here.

W
hile Jack Tyler was in the hall room they ducked across to the library and collapsed on the sofa, and there came Doc Harper with his Nikon.

‘Okay, hold it,' said the bride's dad, backing up to the pool table.

‘There you go.' Flash, flash. ‘Beautiful.' Flash, flash. ‘Okay, smile at the camera, perfect.' Flash. ‘Now kiss the bride, we got some great shots in the tent.' Flash, flash. ‘Laughing is good, fine, wonderful.' Flash, flash, flash.

‘And here comes our boy!' said the photographer, stepping out to the hallway. ‘Hold it, buddy. Right there. Give me a smile, there you go, like th' pants. Okay, walk this way, keep coming, good, great, we're done—posterity is served. You'll thank me for this, guys. See you at the barn.'

‘You can quit your day job, Doc!'

She loved seeing her parents so happy. At some weddings, only one side of the aisle was happy.

‘I'm hungry,' said Jack Tyler.

‘We are, too,' she said. ‘But we're going to look at our rings first.'

‘Why?'

‘Because there's a surprise inside.'

‘What?'

‘Take yours off and we'll see.'

Dooley turned on the lamp by the sofa and helped Jack Tyler remove the small band—it was a bit of a tug.

He held the ring under the light and squinted at the inscription. ‘See that really tiny word? It says . . . forever.'

Jack Tyler took a deep breath.

‘That's how long we're going to be a family,' said Dooley.

‘How long is forever?' His old granny said his real dad was gone forever and his real mom went gone forever next.

Lace slipped his ring on again, the ring she had bought based strictly on hope. ‘Forever is always.'

‘I won't go back to my old granny ever?'

‘You will be with us and we will be with you. Forever.'

He stood close to the mom and put his hand on her knee. Her shining dress was soft and smooth, and she leaned over and kissed the top of his head.

‘Is there words in your ring?'

She didn't know. She hoped; she really, really hoped. But maybe not.

‘Read your ring,' said her husband.

Yes! He had done it! She was happy in a small way she hadn't known before.

Jack Tyler crowded so close he could feel the mom's breath on his face. Something was going off in him like firecrackers because of the magic stuff that was happening with rings.

She leaned to her husband and kissed him on the cheek. ‘Love you always!'

She removed her ring and in the light of the lamp read the minuscule words inside the band.

Love you always back
.

‘You're crying at your own wedding,' he said.

So much happiness. It seemed dangerous, reckless.

Jack Tyler slumped to the floor. ‘I'm
hungry
.'

‘One more to go, buddy.' Dooley removed his gold band, peered at the engraving.

Cherish
.

He gave her a long look. ‘We can definitely do that,' he said.

Heading to the barn, Julie carried the giant meatloaf and Cynthia the loaves of bread packed into a box.

‘We're so happy you could come, Julie. It's the cream in the jug, as the Brits like to say.'

‘My family adores Kenny and we're very close to his grandparents. There are lots of us in Oregon, but he misses his brothers and sister. Right now his work is seriously demanding, and with the house payments . . . but we prayed
about finding a way to come and then the tickets showed up. We knew we were meant to be here.'

‘It's a whodunit!'

‘No note, nothing to say who the sender was. And business class! We were thrilled. Lace thought it might have been her parents, but they deny it.' Julie gave her a smile. ‘Did you and Father Tim do it?'

‘I'd love to take credit for such generosity, but no, we were convinced you couldn't come because of work.'

‘We didn't call to say we were coming, we just thought, Here are the tickets, of course we're going. It was so interesting that no one seemed to expect us.'

She liked this pretty young woman who was twenty-four but looked like a schoolgirl and who, at five foot three, was a perfect bookend to herself.

They handed off their provender to Lily, who passed it along to Arbutus, who, in tandem with Violet, made the distributions.

‘If you could sit with Etta while I put Ethan to bed after dinner, I'd really appreciate it.'

‘I'd like nothing better.'

People were gathering at the shed, and a group tour was headed their way from the chicken lot.

‘Everyone seems to enjoy visiting the chickens,' said Julie.

‘Wait till they bring in the llamas!' She was excited about the possibility; there would definitely be a book in it. Maybe a pop-up this time.

It had come to her just now, the urgency. She must feed on God's grace and she must hurry. If she waited beyond this day, she might never see her sons again—Sammy was leaving tomorrow; Kenny and his family would be gone early Tuesday. The words she read aloud in the ceremony had spoken directly to her. ‘. . . to recognize and acknowledge our fault and seek each other's forgiveness.'

She could not ask their forgiveness. That was asking too much. She had long recognized her sin toward her children, and now her job was to acknowledge it through one simple admission. She had declined to give such admission all these years; instead, she and Pooh and Jessie and Dooley had stepped over and around what some called the elephant in the room.

This simple admission was all that God wanted of her right now, she felt certain of it. To forgive or not to forgive would be their choice.

He was searching for a backup cake server for the barn when Pauline came into the kitchen, out of breath. She had been looking for him, she said.

‘I need to tell my children I'm sorry.'

‘Yes.'

‘Sammy will be leaving and Kenny . . .'

‘I understand.'

‘Pray for me, please. Pray that I won't cry. I don't want to do that to them.'

He nodded yes, crossed himself.

She looked desperate. ‘Is there anything you can tell me, Father?'

‘God is with you. Speak the name Jesus if you can't do more. He's listening.'

She tried to breathe.

‘I just saw Sammy in the library,' he said. ‘He'll be coming down to the barn in a few minutes. And Kenny is getting something out of their rental car at the front door.'

Both of them at once . . . if she could hold back the tears, she could do anything.

She would no longer use the crutch of blaming their father or the old, disastrous craving over which she tried to believe she had no control—blaming, always blaming someone or something—and she would no longer try to believe that her dues had been paid in that terrible fire years ago.

She stepped out to the porch. This was the hardest. Of all her heedless acts of disgrace, giving her son into the hands of a stranger had been the most unforgivable.

He closed the hatch of the car and looked up. He was holding a diaper and a sippy cup.

‘I'm sorry,' she said. She couldn't speak above a whisper.

Kenny felt his heart cracking open like a geode. Someone
had sent the tickets anonymously; they just showed up in the mail. He'd known that if they came to the wedding, it would come to this.

To forgive her was the right thing. It's what God asks people to do and what Julie would want him to do. He actually felt a certain compassion for this woman who he didn't know. To forgive her would free him in ways he couldn't imagine, maybe even to be a better husband and father. But he could not.

‘For everything,' she whispered.

‘I'm sorry, too,' he said. ‘Sorry I can't forgive you for handing me off to a stranger. Sorry you're not even anybody I remember.'

She watched him walk around the corner of the house, toward the barn and his life in Oregon and the years of his future. She had added to his sorrow, not subtracted. She could not seem to stop hurting the people she loved.

Sammy stood by the table with a cue, squinting at the balls on the felt.

She forced herself to walk into the library, felt her chest heave with the pounding of her heart.

Sammy concentrated on the table, not looking up. The set of his jaw, an old scar livid on his cheek; he knew who had come into the room.

‘I'm sorry,' she said. ‘So sorry.'

‘No,' he said. He stood like a statue, refusing to look at her. ‘No.'

She would not force anything from him, nothing at all. She turned and walked away on legs that would barely support her and went into the hall room and locked the door and lifted the seat.

‘Jesus,' she said, weeping, and vomited into the toilet.