Bygones (3 page)

Lisa began passing the serving bowls and the room became filled with the sounds of spoons rapping on glass.

“Mmm . . . stroganoff,” Michael noted, pleased, while he loaded his plate.

“Yup,” Lisa replied. “Mom's recipe. And your favorite corn pudding, too.” She passed him a casserole dish. “I learned to make it just like Mom. Be careful, it's hot.” He set the dish beside his plate and took an immense helping. “I figured since you're living alone again you'd appreciate a good home-cooked meal. Mom, pass me the pepper, would you?”

Complying, Bess met Michael's eyes across the table, both of them grossly uncomfortable with Lisa's transparent machinations. It was the first point upon which they'd agreed since this unfortunate encounter began.

Michael tasted his food and said, “You've turned into a good little cook, honey.”

“She sure has,” put in Mark. “You'd be surprised how many girls today can't even boil water. When I found out she could cook I told my mother, I think I've found the girl of my dreams.”

Three people at the table laughed. Bess, discomfited, hid behind a sip of rosé, recalling that one of the things Michael had criticized after she'd returned to college had been her neglecting the chores she'd always done. Cooking was one of them. She had argued, What about you, why can't you take over some of the household chores? But Michael had stubbornly refused to learn. It was one of many small wedges that had insidiously opened a chasm between them.

“How about you, Mark,” Bess asked. “Do you cook?”

Lisa answered. “Does he ever! His specialty is steak soup. He takes a big old slab of sirloin and cubes it up and browns it and adds all these big hunks of potatoes and carrots, and what else do you put in it, honey?”

Bess shot a glance at her daugher.
Honey?

“Garlic, and pearl barley to thicken it.”

“Steak soup?” Bess repeated, turning her regard to Mark.

“Mm-hmm,” Mark replied. “It's an old family favorite.”

Bess stared at the young man who was shaped like Mount Rushmore. His neck was so thick his collar button wouldn't close. His hairdo was moussed on top and girlish on the bottom. And he thickened his steak soup with pearl barley?

Lisa grinned proudly at Mark. “He irons, too.”

“Irons?” Michael repeated.

“My mother made me learn when I graduated from high school. She works, and she said she had no intention of doing my laundry till I was twenty-five. I like my sleeves and jeans with nice creases in them, so . . .” Mark raised his hands—his fork in one, a roll in the other—and let them drop. “I'm actually going to make some woman a pretty good housewife.” He and Lisa exchanged a smile bearing some ulterior satisfaction, and Bess caught Michael adding it up before he swept his uncertain glance back to her.

Lisa said, “We might as well tell them, Mark.” The two exchanged another smile before Lisa wiped her mouth, replaced her napkin on her lap and picked up her glass of sparkling water. “Mom, Dad . . .” With her eyes fixed radiantly on the young man across the table, Lisa announced, “We've invited you here tonight to tell you that Mark and I are going to get married.”

In almost comical unison, Bess and Michael set down their forks. They gaped at their daughter. They gaped at each other.

Mark had stopped eating.

The tape player had stopped playing.

From an adjacent apartment the grumble of a TV could be heard through the wall.

“Well,” Lisa said, “say something.”

Michael and Bess remained speechless. Finally Michael cleared his throat, wiped his mouth on his napkin and said, “Well . . . my goodness.”

“Daddy,” Lisa chided. “Is that
all
you have to say?”

Michael forced an uncertain smile. “You caught me a little by surprise here, Lisa.”

“Aren't you even going to congratulate us?”

“Well . . . yes . . . sure, of course, congratulations, both of you.”

“Mother?” Lisa's eyes settled on Bess.

Bess emerged from her stupor. “Married?” she repeated disbelievingly. “But Lisa . . .”
We hardly know this young man. You've only known him for a year, or is it that long? We had no idea you were this serious about him.

“Smile, Mother, and repeat after me, Congratulations, Lisa and Mark.”

“Oh, dear . . .” Bess's gaze fluttered to her ex-husband, back to her daughter.

“Bess,” Michael admonished quietly.

“Oh, I'm sorry. Of course, congratulations, Lisa . . . and Mark, but . . . but when did all this happen?”

“This weekend. We're really sold on each other, and we're tired of living apart, so we decided to commit.”

“When is the big event?” Michael inquired.

“Soon,” Lisa answered. “Very soon. Six weeks, as a matter of fact.”

“Six weeks!” Bess yelped.

“I know that doesn't give us much time, but we've got it all figured out.”

“What kind of wedding can you plan in six weeks? You can't even find a church in six weeks.”

“We can if we're married on a Friday night.”

“A Friday night . . . oh, Lisa.”

“Now listen, both of you. Mark and I love each other and we want to get married but we want to do it the right way. We both want to have a real church wedding with all the trimmings, so here's what we've arranged. We can be married at St. Mary's on March second, and have the reception at the Riverwood Club. I've already checked and the club's not booked. Mark's aunt is a caterer and she's agreed to do the food. One of the guys I work with plays in a band that'll give us a pretty decent price. We're only going to have one attendant each—by the way, Randy has agreed to be one of them, and he even said he'll cut his hair. With only one attendant there'll be no trouble matching bridesmaids' dresses—Mark's sister can buy one anywhere; and as for the tuxes, we'll rent them. Flowers are no problem. We'll use silk ones and keep them modest. The cake we'll order from Wuollet's on Grand Avenue, and I'm pretty sure we can still find a photographer—having it on a Friday night, we're finding out, makes last-minute arrangements pretty easy. Well?”

Beleaguered, Bess felt her lips hanging open but seemed unable to close them. “What about your dress?”

A meaningful look passed between Lisa and Mark, this one without a smile.

“That's where I'll need your cooperation. I want to wear yours, Mom.”

Bess looked dumbfounded. “Mine . . . but . . .”

“I'm pretty sure it'll fit.”

“Oh, Lisa.” Bess let her face show clear dismay.

“Oh, Lisa, what?”

Michael spoke. “What your mother is trying to say is that she isn't sure it's appropriate under the circumstances, isn't that right, Bess?”

“Because you're divorced?” Lisa looked from one parent to the other.

Michael gestured with his hands: that's how it is.

“I see nothing inappropriate about it at all. You were married once. You loved each other and you had me, and you're still my parents. Why shouldn't I wear the dress?”

“I leave that entirely to your mother.” Michael glanced at Bess, who was still laboring under the shock of the news, sitting with her ringless left hand to her lips, her brown eyes very troubled.

“Mother, please. We can do this without your cooperation but we'd rather have it. From both of you.” Lisa included Michael in her earnest plea. “And as long as I'm laying out our plans, I may as well tell you the rest. I want to walk down the aisle between you. I want my mom and my dad both there, one on either side of me, without all this animosity you've had for the past six years. I want to have you in the dressing room, Mom, when I'm getting ready; and afterwards, at my reception, I want to dance with you, Dad. But without tension, without . . . well, you know what I mean. It's the only wedding present I want from either one of you.”

The room fell into an uneasy silence. Bess and Michael found it impossible to meet each other's eyes.

Finally Bess spoke. “Where will you live?”

“Mark's apartment is nicer than mine, so we'll live over there.”

And the piano will need to be moved again.
It took great control for Bess to refrain from voicing the thought. “I don't even know where he lives.”

Mark said, “In Maplewood, near the hospital.”

She studied Mark. He had a pleasant enough face but he looked terribly young. “I must apologize, Mark, I've been so taken off guard here. The truth is, I feel as though I barely know you. You do some kind of factory work, I think.”

“Yes, I'm a machinist. But I've been with the same company for three years, and I make good money, and I have good benefits. Lisa and I won't have any problems that way.”

“And you met Lisa—?”

“At a pool hall, actually. We were introduced by mutual friends.”

At a pool hall. A machinist. A bodybuilder with a neck like a bridge abutment.

“Isn't this awfully sudden? You and Lisa have known each other—what?—less than a year. I mean, couldn't you wait, say a half a year or so and give yourselves time to get to know one another better, and to plan a wedding properly, and us a chance to meet your family?”

Mark's eyes sought Lisa's. His cheeks colored. His forearms rested on the table edge, so muscular they appeared unable to comfortably touch his sides.

“I'm afraid not, Mrs. Curran.” Quietly, without challenge, he said, “You see, Lisa and I are going to have a baby.”

An invisible mushroom cloud seemed to form over the table.

Michael covered his mouth with a hand and frowned. Bess drew a breath, held her mouth open and slowly closed it, staring at Mark, then at Lisa. Lisa sat quietly, relaxed.

“We're actually quite happy about it,” Mark added, “and we hoped you'd be, too.”

Bess dropped her forehead onto one hand, the opposite arm propped across her stomach. Her only daughter pregnant and planning a hasty wedding, and she should be happy?

“You're sure about it?” Michael was asking.

“I've already seen a doctor. I'm six weeks along. Actually I thought maybe you'd guess, because I'm drinking the Perrier instead of wine.”

Bess lifted her head and encountered Michael, somber, his food forgotten. He met her dismayed eyes, straightened his shoulders and said, “Well . . .” clearing his throat. Obviously, he was at as great a loss as she.

Mark rose and went to stand behind Lisa's chair with his hands on her shoulders. “I think I should say something here, Mr. and Mrs. Curran. I love your daughter very much, and she loves me. We want to get married. We've both got jobs and a decent place to live. This baby could have a lot worse starts than that.”

Bess came out of her stupor. “In this day and age, Lisa—”

Michael interrupted. “Bess, come on, not now.”

“What do you mean, not now! We live in an enlightened age and—”

“I said,
not now,
Bess! The kids are doing the honorable thing, telling us their plans, asking for our support. I think we should give it to them.”

She bit back her retort about birth control and sat simmering while Michael went on, remarkably cool-headed.

“You're sure this is what you want to do, Lisa?” he asked.

“Very sure. Mark and I had talked about getting married even before I got pregnant, and we had agreed that we'd both like to have a family when we were young, and that we wouldn't do like so many yuppies do, and both of us work until we got so independent that
things
began mattering more than having children. So none of this was nearly as much of a shock to us as it is to you. We're happy, Dad, honest we are, and I do love Mark very much.”

Lisa sounded wholly convincing.

Michael looked up at Mark, still standing behind Lisa with his hands on her collar. “Have you told your parents yet?”

“Yes, last night.”

Michael felt a shaft of disappointment at being last to learn but what could he expect when Mark's family was, apparently, still an intact, happy unit? “What did they say?”

“Well, they were a little surprised at first, naturally, but they know Lisa a lot better than you know me, so they got over it and we had a little celebration.”

Lisa leaned forward and covered her mother's hand on the tabletop. “Mark has wonderful parents, Mom. They're anxious to meet you and Dad, and I promised them we'd introduce you all soon. Right away Mark's mother suggested a dinner party at their house. She said if you two are agreeable, I could set a date.”

This isn't how it's supposed to be, Bess thought, battling tears, Michael and I practically strangers to our future son-in-law and total strangers to his family. Whatever happened to girls marrying the boy next door? Or the little brat who pulled her pigtails in the third grade? Or the one who did wheelies on his BMX bike in our driveway to impress her in junior high? Those lucky, simpler times were bygone with the era of transient executives and upward mobility, of rising divorce rates and single-parent homes.