A Wedding on the Banks (26 page)

“Beautiful!” Lola Craft gushed. “I mean, to the max!”

Amy Joy smiled. It felt wonderful to have slimmed down. It would surprise the whole congregation when they saw her. It was a perfect exit from Mattagash. Although she'd never been more than thirty pounds overweight, Amy Joy had heard the fat jokes for years. There were plenty of girls in Mattagash lots fatter, but she was a McKinnon's daughter.

“What time is it?” Amy Joy asked.

“Six thirty.”

Amy Joy drank her Pepsi and stared at the pile of letters on Floyd Barry's desk. A small calendar on the wall warned
The
Lord
Giveth
and
the
Lord
Taketh
Away.

“Not a sign,” said Lola, returning with the latest bulletin. “The church is almost full, but so far I don't see anyone from Watertown, or Jean Claude. Mr. Kenney is asking when you'll be coming around to the front door so he'll know when to be ready.”

“Well, at seven o'clock, I guess,” said Amy Joy. Her hands had begun to shake. She was cold in the mini dress, and Floyd Barry's office offered little warmth on such a chilly May first. But it was another kind of chill that was inching its way up her legs and arms, a small terror yet undefined. And there had been bad dreams the night before. She had heard a gun fire repeatedly—
bang! bang! bang!
—yet she couldn't see it or see who was firing it. She'd dodged bullets all night long and now here she was, feeling as if she were about to face a firing squad. Thank God for Pepsi.

“What do you suppose is keeping them all?” Lola asked nervously.

“The weather,” said Amy Joy.

“The weather.” Lola nodded agreement.

“That road is crappy even in the summertime.”

“Crappy,” agreed Lola. “Can I have that Pepsi now?”

“Help yourself,” said Amy Joy. Her shoes had begun to hurt.

“It was sweet of Mr. Kenney to give you away,” Lola said after her second nerve-calming sip.

“His being the school principal is kinda like representing Daddy,” said Amy Joy, and tears came to her eyes.
Daddy.

“I don't suppose we should call?” asked Lola.

“No, I don't think so. Even if his mother threw a Catholic fit, Jean Claude would still come.”

Amy Joy sat down by the window and looked off into the white snow, which was coming down more steadily, the flakes growing into larger patterns of themselves. She could be pulled into the snow, if she let herself, could be hypnotized enough by those unique snowflakes to go right out into it, in her mini dress, and curl up under some fat old pine tree, let it cover her completely so that not even the little roses on her stockings could be seen.

“What time is it?”

“Five minutes to seven.” Lola's hand shook as she held her wrist out to read the watch's numbers.

“Give me the phone,” said Amy Joy when Lola returned from a final report that the bridegroom appeared to be a no-show, as did his immediate family and friends. Amy Joy dialed the number slowly, making sure, very sure.

“Al-lo?” It was one of his sisters. His sister! Why wasn't she on her way to Mattagash?

“Is Jean Claude there? This is Amy Joy. He's not at the church yet and we're getting nervous.” The words burst out. She'd met his sisters once, at the Acadia Tavern, and she had been treated rudely by them.

“Jean Claude is very sorry, him,” the sister said. “But he's go to Connecticut to work with Rene and Guillaume.”

“What?” Amy Joy gasped. “What are you saying?” The door to Floyd Barry's office opened and Sicily appeared.

“Amy Joy dear,” Sicily began, but Amy Joy silenced her with an upraised hand.

“What are you saying?” she asked the woman who should have been her sister-in-law in a few minutes.

“He's not get marry, him. He go to Connecticut last night with Guillaume and Rene.”

“Oh,” said Amy Joy, and the word trembled. “Why didn't you call me this morning and tell me?”
Why
didn't Jean Claude call her?

“Mama, she say, let him get down dere firss.”

Amy Joy thought about this. What did they imagine? That she'd rally the police in three states to bring him back?

“Thanks a lot,” she said. Her voice was thin and vague. She was dreaming. She must be dreaming. Oh please God, please Ed Lawler, please Chester Lee Gifford, please Aunt Marge, please all the spirits and ghosts and gods out there in the realm where all the answers lie to all the really big questions, please tell her she's dreaming.

“I'm going to throw up,” she thought.

“Oh no!” Sicily screamed. “What have you done to my wedding dress?” Amy Joy put her head back against the wall and closed her eyes.
Bang! bang!
She could hear the bullet again, the lonely bullet from the unknown, dreamy gun.

Sicily's scream may have been heard out in the church, but chances are it was not. At least it was never mentioned among the volumes of mythology that grew out of The Day When Amy Joy Lawler Got Stood Up. They said other things, the carriers of this tale. They mentioned the frantic waiting by the guests. They mentioned the tired pacing of principal Robert Kenney at the back of the church. They spoke of Sicily twisting and turning in her chair and finally disappearing behind the thick, red curtain that led to the back office. They heard voices rising and falling back there. The truthful messengers of this tale would say the words were indiscernible, muffled, lost to posterity. The less truthful would say that Amy Joy was crying her heart out, and swearing in French to boot. This wasn't true. This was one of the threads of
possible
truth
that attach themselves to a good strong mythology, a long-lasting legend, and hold on.

“Answer me!” Sicily shouted. “What have you done to my dress? Where's the rest of it?”

“There won't be a wedding,” said Amy Joy. “Jean Claude is in Connecticut.”

Floyd Barry knocked on the door.

“Seven ten,” he said cheerily. “Are we running a little late?”

“It's off,” said Amy Joy. “Would you tell everyone?”

If the wedding had gone on, it would have given birth to much speculation and much replay over the next few months. Everyone in Mattagash knew how unhappy Sicily Lawler was with the situation. They knew that Amy Joy was dieting for reasons of pure vanity. They knew her innermost secrets as she prepared for her wedding day. Lola Craft, whom she regarded as her very best friend, told all to everyone. Lola liked being the possessor of unknown facts. It gave her some much-needed personal attention for a few fleeting minutes. And everyone in Mattagash said Lola couldn't help it anyway. It was in her genes, thanks to her mother, Winnie.

The wedding would have had monumental effects anyway, but to have Amy Joy Lawler stood up, like a lamb at the altar, was beyond the wildest expectations of any sports crowd.

“I think I'm going to die,” Amy Joy said, and placed her hand on her heart. Later, Lola reported this item faithfully.

“She put her hand right on her heart when she said it,” Lola would widen her eyes and say. But Amy Joy did not cry out, “Jean Claude, please come back!” as Lola reported, for sensationalism alone.

By the time Lola had backed the car up to the office door to carry Amy Joy and Sicily home, the crowd had spilled out of the church and was standing curiously around, as snowflakes piled up like rice thrown on their heads. It was already decided that, since all the women had contributed the food waiting down at the gym, there was no need to waste it. They would take the numerous gifts home first, so that the Giffords wouldn't get them. They would leave them wrapped and ready for the next foolish couple. “You might as well tell them to go to the gym and enjoy themselves,” Sicily said to Floyd Barry. “They're gonna anyway.”

When the long red maxi coat ran from the office door to duck into the Oldsmobile, there were cries of “There she goes! There's Amy Joy!” And then the car disappeared, with Amy Joy covering her face in the backseat, like some reluctant star of the old silver screen. They disappeared into a snowy spring day, into the mind of every Mattagasher watching with mouth agape, into the very heart of the new legend.

Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?

And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists?

And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air?

Oh they're taking him to prison for the colour of his hair…

Now 'tis oakum for his fingers and the treadmill for his feet

And the quarry-gang on Portland in the cold and in the heat,

And between his spells of labour in the time he has to spare

He can curse the God that made him for the colour of his hair.

—A. E. Housman, “Oh Who Is That Young Sinner?”

A few minutes after seven o'clock, when Amy Joy was being chauffeured from the church still a single woman, Goldie Gifford threw the switches to all her magnificent lights and the Gifford hill rose up in a swirl of color to meet the pelting snow. The wedding would last almost an hour, so Goldie told her children they must have their water heated for the galvanized bathtub upstairs and be bathed no later than six thirty. They were to
keep
clean
until eight o'clock, and then they could walk safely together to the Mattagash gym a mile away and attend the reception. Once there, they would, or so help her they'd be in trouble,
behave
themselves
. This would give Goldie and Irma enough time to heat their own pans of water and leisurely bathe themselves without curious little eyes peeking around corners or into windows.

Irma had toted the large pans of steaming water off the stove and up the stairs until her thick glasses were steam-ridden. Now she was in her own room, bathing. Goldie would get the tub, Irma promised, no later than seven thirty. Then at nine o'clock, the two would thumb a ride over to the gym with Goldie's sister Lizzie. The celebration would be in full swing by then and Goldie would not feel so uncomfortable walking in before the condescending eyes of Crafts and Harts and Fennelsons.

Miltie, Missy, and Hodge were indeed bathed and ready by six thirty. Under direct orders to keep clean, Miltie grew impatient with
The
Wonderful
World
of
Disney
on TV. He sought out Goldie in the kitchen.

“Mama, can we decorate inside the house, too?' he pleaded.

“Oh, honey, I don't know,” Goldie started to protest. “I think we pushed about as far as we should. People'll think we're crazy as it is.”

“Aunt Vera's crazy, that's who,” Missy shouted from the living room.

“Pleeeeeeease.” Miltie tugged at Goldie's hand. She looked down at her youngest child's face, already losing the soft roundness of babyhood. Would it happen overnight, as it had with the other children? Would Goldie get up one morning soon to find in horror that her baby was gone, a little man in his place? A few more Christmas decorations wouldn't hurt.

“Okay,” said Goldie, “but just a few.” She brought a small box down from the attic and opened it up. There was a little plastic cone centerpiece, and numerous shapes and colors of extra bulbs for the outdoor tree. In the bottom of the box was the small Christmas angel, the one Goldie had bought from the old woman in Bangor. She removed the red tissue paper. The angel's small face looked up at her. This was Goldie's secret angel. There were things about this angel she would tell no one, not even her sister Lizzie. Just Goldie and the angel knew
some
things.

While Goldie pondered the best place for Miltie to display the angel, the telephone rang.

“Will one of you kids get that?” Goldie shouted into the living room.

“It's Uncle Vinal, Daddy,” she heard Missy say. “He wants to talk to you.”

“Vera's on her way up the hill,” Vinal said to Pike. “It seems Little Pee massacred them puppets she's got in the front yard. She thinks Goldie put him up to it.”

“I see,” Pike said, businesslike. For all the family knew, the two patriarchs were discussing hubcaps and tires.

“I don't know about you, Pike,” his brother said. “But I say we let them two git it all out of their systems before the reception.”

“I'll bring that wrench down tomorrow,” Pike said cryptically into the phone. Goldie heard him plunk the receiver down and tell the kids to flick the station to a rerun of
Bonanza
. Then she heard him flop out on the couch.

“It's the one where Hoss gets shot and almost dies,” Goldie heard Pike say to the children. Seconds later, a knock sounded on the kitchen door. An angry battering. In the living room, Pike winced.
He
wouldn't want to be at the other end of Vera's wrath. He'd prefer the sheriff from Watertown any day.

Goldie went to the door and opened it a crack, not because she was expecting Vera, but because all day long the wind had been picking up small tufts of snow piled on the porch and tossing it inside each time the door opened. Little Pee had promised several times to shovel it away, but he had disappeared after supper and Goldie hadn't seen him since. She opened the door a crack and saw Vera Gifford in only her housecoat and Big Vinal's winter boots.

“Did you put him up to it? Did you?” Vera was shouting. “Who give him that can of spray paint, anyway? And where'd he get that hatchet?” Vera was trying to open the door and Goldie was holding it with all her might, as they'd done earlier that January. Only now there was a four-month-long pent-up torrent of anger pushing with Vera.

“Who are you talking about?” screamed Goldie. She was wondering why Pike didn't come to her rescue. But she dared not turn her head to look, for fear Vera would find the sudden strength to break the door down. Instead she shouted, “Pike! Pike!” But her husband didn't answer. The children ran to the stair steps, like mice, to watch the goings-on.

“My three wise men are strewed up and down the road!” Vera railed. “He pulled the head completely off Joseph! And you ought to see what that little pervert done to the Virgin Mary!” The thought of her dead figurines renewed Vera's anger. She heaved on the door and Goldie, without Pike to help her, was pushed back until Vera was able to reach one arm inside. She caught Goldie's thick hair in her hands and pulled her out into the cold, colorful night. Goldie still had the little angel in her hand, but she dropped it when her feet hit the wet snow on the porch and slid under her. Vera, with one hand still buried in Goldie's hair, used the other to throw a few well-aimed punches to the face. Goldie tried to fight back, but she couldn't seem to push the bigger woman off. Vera was now straddling her, and Goldie felt fingernails scraping across her cheek. She turned her head sideways to avoid the lashes, and that's when she saw her, lying on her back in the snow. Lying with her two blue eyes staring up to heaven, as snow came down to fill them. Goldie's Christmas angel. Full of sadness and secrets.

When the torrent of anger rose up in Goldie, she remembered that it had not been a smashed pencil box, all those years ago, that made her hate Vera. It had been something else. And she remembered what she had always tried not to remember. She remembered the day at school, when she was ten years old and a tomboy, but suddenly bleeding like a woman. She had heard the elusive stories and vague reasons for this blood from an older girl at school. But she wasn't sure. She couldn't ask her mother, who was more interested in the long line of men who passed through her bedroom than in her children. Goldie felt as if her body had broken, and she was bleeding from it. She was sure there was a little red wound inside her, seeping. She had rolled up bathroom tissue at school into a small pad the first day. That was the day she looked down and saw her panties spotted red, as though tiny roses were growing in the crotch of them. The flow was very light, as it is the first time it comes to young bodies. It was a small flow, but it required attention. That night at home, Goldie found an old sheet her mother had thrown under the sink to be cut into rags, and with a pair of scissors she cut a few small strips from it, which she shaped into pads. Then she sneaked the tissue pad from school outside, wrapped securely in a newspaper, and when no one was about, she dropped it down one of the holes of the outhouse. She crumbled pages of the catalog and tossed them down onto the newspaper. She needed to be sure. And that's how she safeguarded her awful secret for years, until she married, until she was in a house of her own. Her mother never asked once if she had any questions about her body, about the upheavals it was sure to go through on its way to womanhood. Still, Goldie might have grown into this new knowledge of her body with unashamed certainty if it hadn't been for that day at school, the second day of her trauma. That was when the little homemade pad sneaked its way up the back of her panties as she was playing Red Rover. She simply hadn't thought about belts or pins or such things. She was ten. That's all she wanted to be. She had been dared over by Vera to the enemy side. She had been dared to break the clasped hands of the opposite team with her body, which was already broken. And she had run with all her might, had given it her very best, only to be stopped by Vera's strong grasp of another girl's hand. Goldie was a captive of Vera's team. As she hurried to take her place at the end of the line, the little pad slipped out of her panties and fell limply to the ground. Goldie felt lighter suddenly, but she didn't miss the pad. She had forgotten it the way some women forget pocketbooks. Vera noticed it first. Vera grabbed it up, held it high over her head. Vera, who was fourteen and over the shock of it. Vera, mature, held it up to the others. “Look who's a woman now!” she had shouted. Goldie looked up at it as if it were Jesus on the cross, as if it were a little red comet streaking the sky. There was no denying it was hers. She felt her compatriots—the very girls she'd run across the field
for,
the reason she'd lost the awful thing in the first place—swarm up behind her. Those who didn't know what it meant stood before it, all open mouths. Those who knew, those who were shell-shocked at thirteen and fourteen, pointed and giggled. Goldie looked at them all. Their faces were flushed, as if they'd been fighting a war, not playing. Then she looked up again at the folded sheet, in need of a bleaching, with its thin curvature of blood. It looked like a bottom lip. Like a half smile. And Goldie was embarrassed of her breasts, which had begun to push out from her chest and hurt her. She was embarrassed of the awful malfunction in her body. And for years afterward, when she bled, she felt it was her heart bleeding. It was her heart crying out for the old days of tree climbing and hopscotch.

Now, on the snowy porch, Goldie reached up for Vera's mouth because it was red and gaping before her. She reached for Vera's bottom lip, as if it were the thin trace of blood Vera had stolen from her, a lifetime ago. Goldie wanted to make blood come out of that lip, to make it hurt. She wanted to take it back, as she couldn't do that day in the school yard when Vera was fourteen, and tall, and holding it over her head. And now Vera was crying like a baby, and Goldie let go of the torn lip. She let Vera put her hands over her mouth to cover it—something Goldie had wanted to do when she was only ten and standing naked in front of those girls, girls who would become the women she would meet every day in Mattagash for the rest of her life. She had wanted to hide her womanhood because it was a cut, a sore, and even though she was only ten, it had set out to hurt her.

Vera was sobbing above her now, and Goldie pushed her off and onto the white snow on the porch. She touched a finger to the scrapes on her face where Vera's nails had dug away the top layers of skin. There were little bloody lines there now. She brushed away the spit and some blood from the corner of her mouth. One of her front teeth felt horribly loose. She had bitten her tongue and it throbbed wildly. Vera was pulling the torn housecoat about herself and trying to stand up in Vinal's huge boots. Goldie picked up the Christmas angel. It was wet with snow but undamaged. She held it gently in her hands as if, like childhood, it could break at any moment.

“Now you go on home,” she whispered through her swollen lips to Vera. “You go on down the hill.” Missy and Miltie were crying and pulling at Goldie's arm. Irma ran to the door, wrapped in a bath towel, and shouted, “What's going on?” They helped Goldie to her feet, and then they all stood still to watch Vera go back down the snowy hill. Popeye nipped at her bootheels, thinking the unsteady gait and all the racket meant that Vera wanted to play. Goldie closed the door behind them. She could hear Pike's snores floating in from the living room. “He knew what was going to happen,” Goldie thought. “He knew from that phone call.” Her children stood quietly around her like rabbits, their ears leaning forward.

“I want all of you to go to that reception and have the time of your lives,” Goldie told them. “But don't let me hear word that any one of you did one thing you shouldn't. And if you see Little Pee over there, you send him home. You tell him I mean it this time.”

“Are you sure, Mama?” Irma asked, her big blurry eyes trying desperately to focus without her glasses. “It doesn't seem fair. I mean, for us to go.”

“I'm sure,” said Goldie. “I've never been more sure of anything.”

When Irma was ready, Goldie watched her load the children into Lizzie's car. The snow was too deep for them to walk, so Lizzie came by early in her big gray Ford to whisk them down to the gym.

Goldie stood over Pike's body on the sofa. His mouth was wide open, displaying several cavities on the inner ridges of his teeth. His face was puffy with alcohol, and he needed a clean shave. Goldie stood and looked down at him.

“I
will
divorce you,” she said. “I
will
save my children from you.”

“Huh?” Pike grunted himself awake. He sat up and looked at his watch. “I gotta meet Vinal,” he said, and brushed past Goldie, ignoring her black eye and swollen lip. She heard the front door slam.