2 Months 'Til Mrs. (2 'Til Series) (30 page)

She rolled to a stop at the base of the front steps,
within inches of her very first visit here, back when she didn’t know what to
expect at all from Joel “Fynn” Trager. She’d come full circle, not knowing what
to expect yet again. Last time he had refused to sell her what she wanted. It
had taken her days to break him down, less than a week to fall in love with
him. This time she wanted him to
give
her something even more precious….

Catherine stepped out of the car and turned just in
time to see flapping lips before the tongue that came with them lapped at her
face.

“Magnus!” she squealed, an explosion of happy
surprise. At least he was excited to see her, paws on her chest, pinning her to
the car—lucky not to be knocking it over what with their combined weight. “I
missed you, buddy.” She ruffled his fur, so relieved to have the unconditional
love of a dog.

“Magnus, down.” The voice was low and flat, but still
smooth as ever as he came around from the garage side of the house. Her heart
beat with increasing anxiety and the thrill of just being near him again, as
her eyes took in the tousled golden blond hair on his head that looked like
someone had been running her fingers through it—a flash of jealousy at the mere
thought.

Magnus got down immediately and retreated to his dog
life of sniffing at the tires and marking the car his.

Satisfied, Fynn turned to go, speaking over his
shoulder. “Saved me a trip to the post office. Your stuff is inside.”

She winced. “Fynn, wait,” she said softly, battling to
keep up a brave front. He could crush her so easily right here and now and she
would totally deserve it.

He stopped in place but didn’t turn back around,
instead he just ran his hands through his hair the way he did when he was
frustrated.
There was no “she” playing with his hair, thank God
.

“You don’t seem surprised to see me,” she said to his
back…
or happy or interested or even curious
.

“News travels faster than that car of yours.” He turned
to face her finally, his eyes slipping to her hand—
the ring
—a mixture of
anger and hurt.

“Oh.” She covered her left hand protectively, blushing
as she realized Tara wasn’t joking about what she’d seen on Main Street. Her
presence in town was all too obvious. She’d finally given the people of Nekoyah
what they’d been ribbing her about for months—little Catherine Hemmings in her
tiny little car.

“Where’s your cohort?” He looked past her, squinting
in the windows beyond. “I’m guessing you brought your ‘lawyer’ with you. Are
you asking for a settlement?”

She ignored the jab and choked out, “Tara’s up at the
gate.”

“Is she playing lookout?”

“Kind of.”

“Well, some things don’t change…. Too bad other things
do,” he said bitterly.

“Nothing changed.”

“What do you mean nothing changed?” he charged with
frustration, hands back in his hair again. “You broke up with me. Called off
the wedding. Ended this… out of nowhere.” His voice cracked. He swallowed and
spoke lower this time. “You can go in and get your things. You know the way.”
And with that he walked away, leaving her alone with Magnus and Glenda, whose
muffled voice inside the car was asking where she would like to go next—to
hell…
no, wait, I’m already there.

She walked up the steps like she was going to her own
execution, but what else was she supposed to do? Run and throw herself down in
front of him? Not take no for an answer?
That’s what you would have done before
,
Catherine Marie reminded her, which seemed weird since she hadn’t agreed with
anything that went down last spring at all. But Catherine Marie loved
Fynn.
Everyone did: parents and friends and babies and kids of all ages and animals.

Catherine couldn’t even get any love from herself.

I disgust me.

*****

Ideally he would have been less cold and shown a
little more willingness to speak to her.

Ideally he would have been so relieved to see her that
he dropped everything, gathered her in his arms, and forgave her for every
painful word she’d said.

Ideally he would have gotten a minor head injury since
she’d last seen him that would have given him selective amnesia, a loss of
short-term memory for a span of exactly one week’s time.

But life is real, not ideal.

She opened the front door and stepped inside the house
that smelled so much like him and their life together that she felt weak in the
knees. Everything was exactly as it had been the last time she’d been here. Her
mind started churning with pointless imaginings of what it would have looked
like if she’d combined her things with his and they’d woven their lives
together. She’d never looked at the space that way. With new paint and some of
his furniture and some of her own, it could have worked.  

The door to the garage squeaked open, the sound so achingly
familiar to her that she realized
that
was what home was about. And then
she heard Fynn’s footsteps in the kitchen and she hurried up to the master
bedroom to collect her things and hide her tears from him.

If the smell of the house bowled her over, the smell
of the bedroom—his cologne pervasive—was completely overwhelming. It was enough
for her to make it to the bed before collapsing. Their love nest. She had to
fight against the desire to burrow her face into his pillow just to breathe him
in. And then she saw her red union suit sprawled in the corner of the room next
to the little wastebasket, and she froze in place—hurt. Just a piece of garbage
that was too big to fit inside.

“You left a few of your ‘woman’ things in the
bathroom,” Fynn said suddenly from the doorway. 

“I’m surprised you didn’t have it all packed up
already. Or in the trash.” She pointed toward the deflated union suit.

“I was going to wash it before sending it, but Magnus stole
it right out of the hamper,” Fynn admitted. “He lays on it, drags it around the
house. I don’t know what has gotten into him, but I didn’t have the heart to….”
He drifted before finishing.

At least somebody here misses me.

“I was hoping to talk to you,” she blurted.

“You know, the phone is a helluva lot cheaper for
talking.”

“You deserve more than that,” she said earnestly.

“I don’t think that I deserve
anything more
from you,” he said pointedly.

“Fair.” She nodded her head lightly, casting her eyes
down toward the floor.        

Silence settled between them—uncomfortable, awkward,
heavy silence that seemed to last minutes, even hours, instead of the seconds
it probably was. When she finally chanced looking back at him, he was leaning
against the doorframe, his eyes focused elsewhere—a knot in the wood molding, a
fly speck, anything else.

“I guess I’ll leave you to your things. Did you bring
something to pack them in?” he asked, his eyes skating over her. “I can give
you a bag or something—”

She took a deep breath, found her center, and captured
his fleeting gaze head-on. “I don’t need anything,” she said with calm
certainty she didn’t actually feel. “I didn’t come for my things.”

“Cat, I’m not into games, okay? You know that much
about me by now. Let me get you a bag.”

“No.” She stood up from the bed and planted her feet
like she was gearing for a fight—hand-to-hand combat. “And please don’t call me
Cat.”

“Everyone calls you Cat.”

“My
friends
call me Cat. Not you.”

“Soon enough I won’t have to call you anything.” His
eyes slipped from hers again.

“That’s not what I mean,” she said earnestly, wishing
she could step toward him, reach for his face, and pull his gaze back in her
direction. But she knew she didn’t have the right to force him to do anything.
All she could do was speak and hope he listened. “
You
call me Catherine.
You always call me Catherine. That means something to me.”

“Does it mean something to you when telemarketers call
you Catherine? Complete strangers who read your name off a list?”

“You don’t understand,” she said lowly.

“No. I don’t understand. I don’t understand you or any
of this,” he said, resigned, turning to walk out of the room, hands going to
his hair again, giving him a Christopher Lloyd mad-scientist look. 

“If you won’t talk to me now—here—I’ll just follow you
until you will.”

“Where are you going to follow me? Downstairs?
Outside? Across town?” he challenged.

“Everywhere. I’ll make a general nuisance of myself.”

He turned back, eyes flaming with emotion. “Otherwise,
do exactly what you always do.”

“Pretty much.”

He stood looking at her. Eyes steady on hers. No
response for what seemed like the longest time as he appraised her.

“That’s what I do when there is something I’m after.
Something I want so bad I can taste it. Something I can’t live without,” she
said. The words that had seemed so hard to say when she was thinking them
through, worrying about seeing him again, poured forth readily and easily—the
truth unstoppable.

“Are you telling me that you’re back?” he asked.

“If you’ll have me.”

“I mean
you
are back. The
you
that I
fell for. A fighter. Instead of that… wackadoodle I was engaged to for the past
month or so.”

“Wackadoodle?” she snorted.

“Cara,” he said by way of explanation. “That stuff
rubs off. And it
does
fit.”

“It’s better than raving bitch, I suppose.”

“Or psychotic lunatic…. Or—”

“Okay, already. I get it. I was totally nuts there for
a while and I took it all out on you,” she admitted.

“Did you really think that I was just skating into
this whole thing without any worries at all?”

She nodded her head the slightest assent.

His hands shot to his hair once more, this time in
disbelief. “I am less than a month from being outnumbered. I was just getting
used to the idea of having a woman-in-training under my roof, when you came
along—full-fledged female—and suddenly I was looking at a future of chick
flicks and feminine products and home décor and hormones and
feelings
.
You think that’s going to be easy on me? You might be giving up your home, but
mine is under attack.”

“You have Magnus to even the odds,” she joked lightly.

“Yeah, Magnus who will side with anyone who dangles
some food in his face.”

“I’m sorry,” she said earnestly. “I didn’t think about
your side of things.”

“Well, I didn’t mean to make it seem like I wasn’t
into our wedding. I mean, I truly don’t care about all the little pieces. They
don’t matter. But not because I don’t care about getting married. The married
part is always what mattered to me. And now—”

“Now I stand before you, just plain old Catherine
Hemmings… hoping to be Catherine Trager in… what say about twenty-three days? A
proud Nekoyan resident. Happily ever after.”

“Can I trust that New York won’t be rearing its ugly
head again?”

“Well… I did get a promotion just the other day,” she
admitted, coming toward him as he edged away warily. “I turned it down. In
fact, I quit this morning. Emailed my notice.”

“Really?” His response was genuine surprise. “But what
if this all didn’t work out?”

She reached for him, sliding her arms around his waist
whether he wanted her to or not. “Then I’d be jobless
and
homeless,
because I sublet my apartment this morning too. I guess I thought it would make
me look pitiful enough to take back.”

“But how… so quickly—”

“Tara is finally ready to live on her own. She’s
taking over my past so I can focus on the future.” She covered his mouth with a
kiss that she hoped told him everything she was feeling at this moment—relief,
love, joy, excitement. And when she started to pull away from him he pulled her
close and squeezed her tightly, his ear close to her mouth. “Thank God I don’t
have to move back in with my parents,” she whispered breathily.

Tuesday, February 15
^th

“Oh my God, I’m so glad you’re back!” Georgia squealed
through the phone. “I was beginning to worry that you were never going to leave
Minnesota again. Not even to get your stuff. Not even to get married…. You are still
getting married, right?”

“I
had
to stay through Valentine’s Day. It’s
for lovers you know, and I am completely, totally in love!”

“But the wedding—”            

“Yes! Of course! Everything is wonderful, Georgia. I
mean truly spectacular. We stayed in bed for days. We made plans for the house;
how to make it not just his place, but ours. We talked about… well, everything.
Kids. Finances. Traditions. Life. The universe. Conversations that were long
overdue. And I am just so ready to get married already.”

“Then let’s make you a Mrs.,” Georgia said
definitively. “What do you need me to do?”

“Well, I’m actually in Philly right now on my way to
see Vinnie at SG Weddings. I have to give him the good news and finalize
things. This is all going to be so much easier as an unemployed bride! I’ve got
so much time on my hands!”

“Not that much time on your hands,” Georgia cautioned.

“You’re right. And I not only have to finish the
wedding plans, I have to move too. I want to go from the honeymoon straight to
Nekoyah. So… can you meet me this afternoon at my apartment? Help me start
packing? Be there for moral support as I try on my dress and see the damage
this past week has done to my chances to fit in it? First depressive gluttony
and then throw-all-caution-to-the-wind celebratory gluttony—it’s not going to
be pretty.”

There was a pause and then Georgia eked out, “Sure… of
course. Do you need—”

“You don’t have to come,” Catherine interrupted. “I
understand if you have other plans.” This
was
last minute, although she
knew that the hurt in her voice was hard to hide entirely.

“It’s not something I can’t back out of. I’ll just
call—”

“No, it’s okay. I can’t ask you to drop everything
just because I’m suddenly getting married again.”

“It’s Lacey,” Georgia blurted suddenly, coming clean.
“She was coming for a visit today with Niki.”

“Oh….”

“I’m going to cancel,” Georgia said definitively.

“No….” Catherine paused for a second. “Bring her with
you.”

“You don’t have to—”

“I’ll call Tara too. I need to round up the
bridesmaids—minus Drew, who is already as big as a house, by the way. We have
plans to finish and you all don’t even have dresses.”

“But Lacey will just feel out of—”

“I want to ask Lacey to be in the wedding,” Catherine
said with certainty.

“You don’t have to do that just because of your
mother… or me.”

“Do I ever do anything because I have to? I don’t have
that obligatory gene,” she assured her. “And Lacey has really—she’s not as bad
as I thought she was. She totally threw my mom off my scent this weekend and no
one is the wiser that this was the wedding that almost wasn’t. Plus, she tamed
my brother so he is only half the pain in the ass he used to be,” she joked. “And
she never told you about Penis Grove either, did she?”

“Penis Grove?” Georgia asked, bewildered.

“That’s what I thought,” she said, satisfied. She had
been so certain, ever since Lacey and Connor had gotten one of the original
invites, that at some point Georgia would bring up the “Penis” problem, proving
that her new friend must have told her all about it. But it had been weeks and
not even one word. Seems Lacey might just be good people.

*****

“Cat Hemmings!” Vinnie bellowed warmly. “What a
surprise! You’re absolutely glowing now that you’re not heading down the aisle.”

“That’s just it. The wedding is on. Everything is back
in place.”

“Oh,” he said, then sucked air back in through his
teeth uncomfortably. His size paired with his consternation made him look even
more comical behind his too-delicate desk.

“What is it?” she prodded lightly. She could hear a
couple of women enter the outer office from the hallway, tittering excitedly,
probably a bride and her best friend/maid of honor. She’d been in a similar state
not moments ago, but she felt the bottom dropping out from under her hopes and
dreams as she watched Vinnie’s pained expression—either he had gas or something
really awful was about to happen.

But Vinnie was a professional and he collected himself
quickly.  “So this is wonderful news! You’s need a wedding in just… what is
it—”

“March 4
^th
. My wedding is on March 4
^th
,”
she asserted.

“Putting a wedding together in less than three
weeks—eighteen days to be exact—is a challenge. But Vinnie Delrio is the king
of the wedding challenge.”

“What do you mean putting a wedding together? I
have
a wedding. On March 4
^th
. Invitations sent. Location booked.
Cameraman polishing his lenses. Flowers probably being picked as we speak….”
But she was gradually losing steam as Vinnie shook his head lightly,
sympathetically, through her speech. 

“
Had
a wedding,” he corrected.

“I know I canceled it, but I’m here to
un-
cancel
it.”

“Should have come back to me earlier. Or called me
sooner. Over the weekend. First thing yesterday even.”

“I was—” —
having make-up sex. Lots and lots of it.
“I
was out of town. Working things out. And yesterday was Valentine’s Day. I had
to be with my Valentine!” she whined, three beats from a tantrum.

“Your groom I’m assuming,” he said gravely, as if
looking for holes in her story or in her newfound desire to reopen her marriage
case.

“Of course I’m talking about my groom,” she snapped.

“The same groom?”

“I can’t believe you would even ask that!” she
exclaimed, incensed at the inference that she was a slut who was also the
marrying kind—or at least the engaging kind. 

Ignoring her, he continued, “See, the wedding business
is a 24/7 operation. Valentine’s Day is one of my biggest days of the year… behind
the 4th of July—there’s just somethin’ about fireworks.”

“So what does that have to do with anything?” she
asked as calmly as possible, trying to make sense of this sudden turn in her
day. She’d expected Vinnie to be as thrilled as she was. He would get all of
his commission and she would be getting married like she was supposed to.

“Your wedding is gone,” he said, adding a visual
poof
motion with his hands.  

“What do you mean my wedding is gone? It was just here
last week! I put deposits down and everything,” she mewled unbecomingly. This
was like some kind of nightmare.

“That reminds me,” he said, plopping an envelope in
front of her on the desk. “I said I would take care of everything.”

She looked inside. A wad of dough. “What is this? Are
you paying me off?”

“It’s your deposits. You’re welcome.”

But she wasn’t thanking him. She didn’t want to thank
him. “How did you get these back? I thought that if the wedding didn’t happen
then you kept—”

“You’re confusing me with a traditional wedding
planner.”

“Excuse me?” She was already cursing out Tara in her
head for leading her to Vinnie Delrio in the first place—under the exact
assumption that he
was
a wedding planner. But of course whenever Tara
was involved there was more to the story.

“I’m a broker, remember?” he said proudly.

She looked at him, puzzled, only vaguely recalling any
such thing in her bridal haze.

“I deal in weddings.” Since she had been struck dumb,
unable to get from here to there with the conversation, he continued, “I buy
bad weddings—cancelations due to drama, tragedy, irreconcilable differences,
whathaveyou’s—and repackage and resell them…. Need a wedding quick, Vinnie
Delrio is your guy. Plus, if things don’t work out for you’s, I can get most of
your money back by selling your wedding to the next bride in need of a
quickie.”

“A quickie?” she eked out. It sounded so sordid and
gross and
cheap
.

“Nothing wrong with a quickie. When you’s know, you’s know,
I like to say. No reason to wait six months or a year or more. Heck, sometimes
you’re under the gun.”

“But I don’t have a clue what you mean.” She was hopelessly
frustrated. “I don’t even
want
my money back. I want my
wedding
back.”

“No can do. It’s someone else’s dream now.”

“Someone else’s dream?”

“I found a new investor in your wedding dream. Where’d
you’s think your wedding came from?

Her jaw dropped. “My wedding was someone else’s first?”

“It was the chick who came before you’s dream. The
death of her love became your wedding made to order. Easy enough. Took her
whole package over, except the flowers—jilted bride found the groom doing the
nasty with the chick doing the flowers for the wedding. Vinnie doesn’t do business
with an establishment that breaks up weddings. Gina’s Flowers is out for good. But
Gina was always trouble—she’s my first girlfriend. Seventh grade. Let me see
her—but I guess that’s beside the point.” He clasped his hands together before
they completed the outline of a female silhouette. “Anyways, I might be a
broker, but I still believe in true love.”

Catherine felt a creepy, unclean feeling. “How can you
do this to people?”

“Pairing the wedding losers with the last-minute
nuptials? It makes good business sense.” He shrugged; no shame at all.

“It’s so clinical and cynical.”

“I prefer to think of it as servicing a niche market
that was being ignored by the traditional wedding planners. Let’s just say I
know a lot of people with... bad luck. Guy falls for a girl, turns out she’s
carrying a sword, if you get my drift—anyways, wedding off…. Or girl finds her
husband-to-be with his ex.” Vinnie drew an imaginary line across his throat. “Maybe
the groom messes with the wrong people and ends up at the bottom of the river—should
his bride end up with nothin’?” He shrugged and cocked his head. “Shit happens
and Vinnie is the guy who can make everything all right. I get the losers their
money; provide a dream wedding for a new loving couple who is on the wrong side
of time; and save the local businesses who would lose out on their profits.
It’s a win-win-win. What can I say? I’m a sucker for the fairytale, but I’m
also a realist—no harm, no foul in making a buck.”

“But my wedding is gone!” she exclaimed. “What am I
supposed to tell everyone? What am I supposed to tell my Fynn-ancé? I can’t
tell him I screwed everything up again. He just took me back!” That was when
the tears started—fat, heavy tears rolling down her face.  

“Oh, ay, no crying at Vinnie’s,” he warned. “You’s
want a wedding; I’ll build a wedding. Prob’ly have to change the date, unless
something happens in the interim—a family rift, runaway bride, death and
dismemberment—”