Meg's Best Man: A Montana Weekend Novella (7 page)

Soon everyone else was summoned to the “dance floor,” the part of the meadow that would be the aisle of a wedding chapel the next day. Sonya told everyone to find a partner, and Gage instantly took Meg by the elbow. “This is part of my valet duty,” he assured her. Sonya had everyone line up across from their partner, women and girls on one side and men and boys on the other. It was a motley bunch of dancers, with kids and grandparents and complete strangers paired up. Those who tried to hide were lured in by whatever charm, or threats, Sonya felt it necessary to use.

She had every other couple switch places to mix the boys and girls. Now Meg was standing across from Gage and between Caleb and Joshua. “This looks like square dancing,” Joshua said.

“This isn’t a square, it’s a rectangle,” Caleb corrected his brother.

Sonya informed everyone that they would be doing four, count them, four moves, and anyone on earth could learn that many. She also said they’d better learn them because they would do them over and over again for the next twenty minutes.

She called it contra dancing. For the first move, everyone stepped forward, passed in back of their partner, and backed up to where they were. It took a ridiculously long time for everyone to get it right, which made them all laugh. For the second move, the women turned to the man on their left and they both got into a ballroom dancing position and turned around one and a half times. There were two more moves, and when all the moves were completed in order, Meg and Gage had moved one position toward the right, giving them a new set of neighbors to dance with.

Sonya kept everyone going until all she had to do was call out the name of the move, and then she had the makeshift band begin to play. “Slowly,” she suggested. “At least at first.” The music started, sounding not much better than an orchestra tuning up. And the crowd of dancers were a disaster. But Sonya kept cheerfully calling out the steps and words of encouragement.

Just when it all seemed hopeless, something shifted. The band found its rhythm and so did the dancers. Any time Meg forgot the next move, there was a partner there who remembered it, and the reverse was true as well. For each round she do-si-doed and swung once with Gage and then with whoever was to her left. When they hit the end of the long line, they switched places and came back the other way.

Because of the way contra dancing worked, Meg ended up dancing with every single man and boy in the long line, and she laughed her way through every bit of it. Gage was smiling and gracious to every dance partner and was pretty smooth on his tennis-shoed feet. When they made it through the whole line, Sonya encouraged the band to speed it up, and they danced faster and faster until it all fell apart in a foot-stomping, hilarious mess. The band took a well-deserved bow, and a few of the dancers and musicians offered to switch places.

There was hardly enough time to get some water before Sonya was teaching the band another simple song. This time almost everyone came back to make happy fools of themselves again, no coercion needed. Sonya added two new moves to their repertoire and arranged them in a new combination, and as complicated as it seemed at first, Meg got to a point where Sonya calling the next move seemed to go straight from her ear to her feet without her having to think about it.

It was evening, but during summer in Montana the sun lingers into the night. The cooler air soothed the dancers, who had worked up a sweat. It was a hardcore and determined crew of newborn contra dancers that stayed for a third and then a fourth song—and demanded something more complex. Sonya’s voice was getting hoarse but not quieter. She led them through new moves and patterns with enthusiasm. Meg wished she could have seen the dancers from above, as they must have looked like flowers unfolding and shifting across the meadow.

Meg was beginning to like the moment in each cycle when she came back to Gage’s arms. He was tall, that was certain. But he had a way of holding her that was firm and steady. They could spin like crazy across the dirt and grass, but his arms were like the eye of the storm. For someone who seemed to break things a lot, there was nothing but grace in his dancing.

And while it seemed at first that she had to lean back to look him in the face, she found that up close she didn’t notice very much other than his amber eyes and the dark streaks of sweat at his temples that did little to tame his wavy hair. And always, every moment he held her, the grin. She couldn’t help but smile back.

Then he would gently lead her into the next move, charm his next dance partner, and be there to pull Meg into the dance again.

When the song was over, the musicians nursed sore fingers, the dancers were worn out, and Sonya sounded like a frog. Meg teased Caleb about line dancing, since they had in fact been in a line, and Caleb said that if you got to hold a girl it didn’t count. That sounded a lot like Gage’s reasoning to her and she would have teased him, but Meg let the conversation drop because Caleb seemed to have his eye on one of Joshua’s friends. As she expected, he scurried over to where the girl was standing.

A plastic glass of water appeared in front of her. “Here you go, Mouse Girl. Turns out you can dance as well as you write.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “Thanks for the water.” She looked through the crowd until she spotted Leah, who was sitting with Joshua.

“Leah’s fine,” Gage said, without looking behind him to see what she was looking at. “You’ve been looking like a nervous mother hen.”

“I have not!” Had she? Meg hoped Leah hadn’t noticed.

“So how does she look to you?”

Leah was smiling, and Joshua reached up gently to lift a strand of hair from her face. “Happy,” Meg said. “Josh, too.”

“I think your work here is done,” Gage said with a smile. “All that’s left to do is walk down the aisle without tripping.”

She laughed. “Oh, sure, plant that idea in my mind. And it’s not as easy as it seems!”

“From what I’ve seen, you could dance down it very well.”

“Wouldn’t that be classy? No, I’ll walk down, high heels and all. The skirt on that dress is so skinny I’ll have to take itty bitty steps, so there’s no chance I’ll be going too fast, either. And I may have to arrange the bride’s train or swat a bee. Or fan Leah’s face if she faints. Or bounce the hordes of rejected women who will be weeping in the back as Joshua is taken off the market. It’s a very complicated job, being the maid of honor.”

“Yes, but I’m the one who has to catch Joshua if he faints. I also have to pin the flower to my lapel without bleeding on anything, and I have to entertain—”

“The hordes of rejected women?”

He shook his head firmly. “I’ll leave that to a younger and much more foolish man.” He was lost in thought for a moment before adding, “I was going to say, entertain the maid of honor.” He gestured to the deck, where they turned two chairs toward the meadow and sat down. Off to their right, near the edge of the meadow, Joshua and Caleb now seemed to be arguing about the fire pit while Uncle Jacob ignored them both and poured on some gasoline.

“You won’t have to be entertaining the maid of honor, your job as valet will be finished.”

“No. It’s in the job description; I looked it up at the Montana Wedding Job Services website. It specifically says I have to walk the maid of honor back down the aisle and keep her from either tripping or dancing too much. I have to dance my first dance with her, and just to make sure I did it right, at least the next six or seven dances, until she gets used to taking tiny little steps in her very snazzy, very green dress. That’s unless they play the Chicken Dance, because then you’ll have to fend for yourself. I am an expert, and no one can defeat me.”

“I bet Aunt Sonya could give you a run for your money.”

“Bring it on, Aunt Sonya.”

Whoosh
. Meg felt the percussion of the gasoline fireball as the fire was lit fifteen yards away. A column of fire rose, turned to a ball of black smoke, and drifted up into the dark blue sky. Jacob nodded once at his handiwork, apparently pleased. Meg couldn’t be sure from here, but he seemed to still have his eyebrows. Gage applauded, and a smattering of other people applauded as well.

Meg was thinking about what Gage had said. She was also thinking about what Leah had said about his having a checkered past, and if she were to guess, that past had a lot to do with women. She decided she should let it drop, that there was no reason to get involved, but then the words slipped out of her mouth. “I’m glad to hear you’re not young and foolish. Although you’re not exactly old. You have to be about my age, and I’m not quite sure I can claim to be completely grown up.”

He gave her an appraising look. That look said he knew exactly what she was really asking about—the hordes of women. “Well, when I started college I was pretty normal, not too smart, not too dumb. Then instead of growing up, I just got stupid. About the time I moved in with Joshua I started growing up again, and I’ve had a lot of catching up to do. I’m not wise, but I’m not going to be foolish anymore. At least in some areas of my life.” He put his feet up on the railing and let those words hang in the air for a while. Then he added, “I’ll give you some of the gory details someday. For now, let’s just say that I may be a slow learner, but I’m a determined one.”

Someday. Not likely, she realized, and besides, it wasn’t any of her business. He would be heading back to Texas soon. “When do you fly out?”

“Sunday evening, a red-eye. I have to get back and move out of Joshua’s and my place by Tuesday night. The new tenants move in a few days after. Since I found out my roommate was going to ditch me for a bride, I’ve been thinking a lot about where I want to move.”

“Did you decide?” She told herself that she was just being polite, but there she was, being absolutely ridiculous and wishing he was about to tell her he was moving to Montana.

“I’ve been looking all over, but I think I’ll probably end up moving nearer to my hometown. That’s where my parents are, and my sister and her family. If I could be within a few hours’ drive of my nephew, that would be the best thing ever.”

She was going to ask more, but the sound of an engine caught her attention. She turned to see a familiar car coming up the drive. It was Catherine’s Expedition, but there was no reason for her to be back so soon.

“I thought Catherine just left,” Gage said. He put his feet down and leaned forward.

“She did, she went home to finish cooking the reception food before everyone invaded her home… and her showers.” She glanced at Gage. For the first time that she had seen, he looked worried, and it gave her a bad feeling.

Joshua started walking over to the driver’s side window, but Leah stayed by the bonfire, peering at him while she held a hand up to block the light from the headlights. As he approached, the passenger door opened and out bounded a tall woman. She ran forward into the beam of the lights and Leah opened her arms for the hug she got, one that nearly knocked her over.

The woman was wearing over-the-knee boots, skinny cream-colored jeans, and a leather trench coat with a belt that showed off her slim figure. Above that was a flood of shining red waves of hair. She had a stylish green scarf on and sunglasses on her head, although the sun had set. In the middle of the creek-washed, sweaty, smoky crowd in the meadow, she looked like a supermodel.

“Brie,” Gage said, but Meg had already guessed that.

I bet Brie looks great in Kelly green, she thought. And although she knew she should feel happy for Leah and relieved for herself, instead she felt a sad, sinking feeling that she couldn’t quite explain.

She talked herself out of that. It was wonderful that Leah’s friend was here for her important day. Brie certainly looked healthy enough, and she had run faster in her high-heeled boots than Meg probably could in tennis shoes. “Looks like I’m out of a job,” she joked to Gage, but when she turned back to him she saw him frowning, the knuckles of one fist pressed to his lips. He didn’t seem to hear her.

Meg stepped around him to go introduce herself, but Leah and Brie were already headed toward the cabin. Behind them Meg caught sight of Joshua taking two suitcases and a purse out of the Expedition. Leah threw Meg a distraught expression as she approached, and she touched her hand to her heart. The last thing Meg wanted was for Leah to feel badly about kicking her out of the maid of honor job. She never wanted it anyway, so what did it matter? She winked at Leah. “You must be Brie,” Meg said. “I’m so glad you made it! I know Leah was hoping you could.”

It wasn’t too dark to see the big, movie-star smile Brie gave her as she stepped up onto the deck. Meg had to look up at her. “Hi! And you are?”

“My name is Meg. I was going to be the backup maid of honor, but luckily you’re feeling better now.”

“Yes, it was awful. But I bounce back pretty fast.” She suddenly looked over Meg’s shoulder, and her eyes narrowed. “Well, if it isn’t the best man. I guess you finally found a way to meet up with me again after all.”

Meg glanced at Gage, who was standing behind her. His face was blank in the dim light.

“Well then! Shall we get you settled?” Joshua said, and he nudged them all forward, arms full of suitcases. Meg backed up and away from the wedding party. She stared at the faded wood of the porch, blue in the evening light.

“There’s no electricity?” she heard Brie say over lower conversation. She saw a dim light through the window and knew someone was lighting the lanterns. Well, I’m off the hook, she thought. But her head felt like it was on fire. She was thinking all sorts of things, and none of them had to do with her cousin’s wedding.

Leah came back out on the deck, arms outstretched. “I feel awful,” she said, and her tone of voice proved it.

“Well, don’t. I got to do all the fun stuff—decorate, hang out with you, and eat French toast. Leah, the fact is, I love you, and I’m really glad you’re going to be a Parks. I’ll be standing up for you whether I’m up front or in the back.”

Leah gave her a big hug and didn’t let go for a while. When she pulled back Meg spotted the sparkle of tears in Leah’s eyes. “Thanks for making me feel so welcome, Meg.”