Toss the Bride (3 page)

“Are you gonna eat that?” Avery asks as his fork descends. He swoops in without waiting for an answer because he knows what I will say. Mr. Leland always piles way too much food on my plate. It's Friday and dinner is almost finished; we are relaxing on one of the verandas on the back of Avery's parents' house. Avery lives there, too, in a three-room suite on the first floor.

“You like that, Macie?” Mr. Leland asks and pours more white wine into his wife's glass. Mrs. Leland hums a little tune under her breath and then eyes the driveway. She is waiting for her masseuse or manicurist or some other attendant. So far, in my time with the Lelands, I have figured out that Mrs. Leland is rarely without a pampering appointment. She also asks what time it is frequently. Avery told me a long time ago that she refuses to wear a watch. She genuinely seems to be grateful when you answer her. She asks, “Do you have the time?” in a small little-girl voice, and then when you produce the hour and minutes of any given day, she acts delighted, even overjoyed.

I nod to my now-empty plate and tell Mr. Leland that I enjoyed the fish.

“There's a secret to grilling the perfect fish,” he says mysteriously.

Avery and I wait, expecting more. Mr. Leland returns to his grill. It's a shiny stainless-steel number built into a little alcove on the veranda. To the side is a wood-fired brick pizza oven. A French door leads to the real kitchen inside.

“Avery,” Mr. Leland says, “remember that chef we had out to the house when you were, oh, I don't know—how old were you?”

“You'll have to be more specific, Dad,” Avery says, a smile on his face.

“The guy who liked fish with every meal? Chef Pack-asomething.”

“Packanac. He was written up in all the foodie magazines,” Avery says. “He taught Dad how to grill and sauté every type of fish. But if he didn't like the way something turned out, he'd toss it into the bushes. Plop! Over the edge of the veranda.”

“We were picking rotten fish out of the azaleas for weeks,” Mr. Leland says. “You were just in high school, right?”

“Dad! I had already graduated from college when he was here.”

“Ah, well, it seems like you're still our little boy, Avery,” his mother says idly.

A welcome breeze moves across the veranda. I tap my toes on the wooden planks under my feet. I'm restless tonight.

Sensing my mood, Avery puts down his napkin and smiles at me. Right then, I love him in one of those perfect moments you have when you're really lucky. His green eyes are kind and his hair lifts up a bit in the late-afternoon breeze. I think: I want to be with this man. But Avery does not talk about this kind of thing. Tennis, fish, even architecture, Avery will gab about all night long. But get him to discuss the future? Of us? Forget it.

“Let's get out of here,” Avery says. “Want to walk in the park?”

We love Piedmont Park. It's Atlanta's version of Central Park. Tall office buildings, condos, and hotels surround the playing fields and trails. It's hard to believe I live here sometimes. In my hometown of Cutter, Georgia, a five-story office building is a big deal.

We zip down to the park in Avery's convertible. From his neighborhood in Buckhead, it takes about fifteen minutes. We park on a side street and enter the park through one of the stone gates off of Piedmont Avenue. Since it's summer, it's still light out. Too late, I realize I should have sprayed on mosquito repellent. It's getting on toward dusk, and my arms and legs will become a feeding ground. Avery's wearing pants, so he's less likely to be bothered.

“Dog park?” he asks me, and I nod. We turn toward the old bridge.

Piedmont Park has an off-leash area for dogs and their owners. I love to walk in through the double gates and watch all the dogs play with one another and with their humans. Poor Avery has stood in there with me for hours. I seriously want a dog, but I figure there's no point in getting one until I'm married. I want to pick one out with my husband. Avery has never owned a dog. I find this to be a serious flaw. I grew up with them, like they were furry brothers and sisters. In fact, the last two years are the longest I've ever gone without a dog in my life.

As we walk, I play a little game and count the number of weddings Maurice and I have had in the park. There, over by that fountain near the gazebo was a nice small one. I like those. Small-wedding brides usually have a sense of decency. There are no celebrity singers or hand-embroidered cocktail napkins. The outside brides are, on the whole, a little more reasonable. Sure, they have money, but they want to put it toward their honeymoon climbing in the Alps or camel-trekking in Africa. I've never climbed a mountain in another country or ridden a camel, but it sounds like a nice way to spend the first few weeks with your husband.

Avery is always traveling somewhere. He doesn't exactly work, per se, but he does explore. I've never asked to go with him—not even once—although I used to think I would be thrilled if he offered. But lately, I have begun to consider our future. Traveling together to foreign lands is starting to seem like something I would rather do as his wife, not just his fun, happy-go-lucky girlfriend.

I guess I'm also touchy about traveling with Avery because I know that he would have to foot the bill for everything, right down to the cab racing down the Champs-D'Élysées or the gondola ride on a canal in Venice. In some ways, I do feel like I travel to exotic places with my boyfriend. He takes pictures of himself next to volcanoes and marble statues and sends them home to me. He buys gifts of coral necklaces and leather boots from faraway markets and then tells funny stories about shopkeepers when he returns.

At about the time I'm bored of counting wedding sites in the park—I'm up to twenty-two—Avery and I pass under the old stone bridge and arrive at the dog park. Inside, I spot my favorite breed and migrate toward them. There's something I love about a German shepherd. The regal head, the loyal brown eyes—it's the perfect dog for me. Alongside the chain-link fence that surrounds the dog park, three German shepherds romp with one another. Their big paws turn over the wood chips, making little clouds of dust pop up here and there. I sit down on a rock to watch. Avery stands beside me and plays with my hair.

“So, I guess you have another one tomorrow?” Avery asks, even though he knows that Saturday is my big workday. We're only together tonight because there's no rehearsal dinner for Darby's wedding tomorrow.

“You got it. It's the restaging.”

“Ah,” Avery says, nodding. He knows about this one.

Darby was one of our biggest clients. Her father owns a ton of radio and television stations up and down the East Coast. Darby is a puffy-haired blonde who works as a news anchor in Atlanta. Her remarkable talent for mispronouncing the names of famous people and major capitals of the world has brought her some fame and even a few fans. When it came time for her to marry, she chose Maurice before she chose the groom.

Darby's wedding was actually three months ago. Big affair—splashy ceremony in a huge cathedral off of Peachtree Street, even bigger reception at an exclusive Midtown club. Guests took home baby magnolia trees as favors. Horse-drawn carriages brought the entire wedding party to the reception—not an easy thing to do on Atlanta's overburdened city streets. I worked for months on this wedding. When I say we tossed her, I mean we tossed her. Maurice took a week's vacation after that one. He even turned off his cell phone.

I pet a shepherd who trots over to me, pink tongue practically dragging on the ground. “You're playing hard, aren't you, boy?” I rub his big, friendly head. Dogs tend to establish cliquish play groups at the park. The bigger dogs run with one another, while the little guys, like Jack Russell terriers and poodles, form a protective club near the front gate. Occasionally, a dopey boxer will try to crash the small dogs' party. When that happens, one of the small fries sends the bigger dog running off with a whimper. Those small dogs are a tough lot.

“So, what time's the restaging?” Avery asks, rubbing another shepherd who has jealously arrived on the scene. Their owner, a middle-aged woman, smiles at us from a few feet away.

“I have to be at the church at 10:00
A.M.
That's the earliest they would let us do it. And we have to be out by one because a real wedding's coming in.”

When Darby's wedding pictures came back from the New York photographer (who had been flown down to Atlanta on Darby's father's jet and was put up in a rented private home for the wedding week), I was told she almost hyperventilated. Apparently, the tall photographer got a few too many shots of the much shorter Darby's dark roots cresting out of her blond curls. “He was looking down on me!” she wailed to Maurice. She compared her stripe of dark roots to a skunk or a zebra. Now, according to my unscientific count, about every second woman in Atlanta dyes her hair some color of blond. It's a southern thing, which doesn't necessarily mean it's tasteful. Most women let their roots show way too long before they trot into the salon for a touch-up. One would think Darby would have taken care of a little detail like this prior to the wedding.

Other minor picture snafus ruined Darby's “whole wedding experience,” she told Maurice, who enjoyed telling me about it later over lunch. “She wants the whole thing redone,” he said, attacking his arugula salad.

“What does the ‘whole thing' mean?” I was horrified. I never wanted to see this woman again. At the reception, she cornered me in the bathroom and demanded I check her honeymoon luggage in the waiting limo to make sure her kiwi face cream was packed. When I found the monogrammed luggage and the favored face cream—which I did open and sniff, nice stuff—I also found a peculiar book tucked under her makeup case.
Fixing the Loveless Marriage
seemed a bit premature, but I'm not nosy. Anyway, when I reported that the face cream was packed and ready to go, Darby screwed her face into a picture of long-suffering resignation. “Oh that, I know that's there. What I really need you to do is make sure my last broadcast is cued up on the DVD player in the limo. I want to surprise Trey when we pull away from the reception. We can watch my last interview together.”

Darby “retired” from the news business when she married, to much ado. Before the wedding, she confided to Maurice that the retirement was a staged thing—“designed to encourage adoration of the talent,” she helpfully supplied—and after her first child, she would return to a morning show and tell stories about her offspring to an eager Atlanta public.

Now it's three months later and Darby has quietly returned to the air. There is no pregnancy, and Maurice has two different home numbers for the couple. Regardless of this, the “wedding” is rescheduled for tomorrow.

I take Avery's hand as we wind our way out of the park. He has great hands—strong and soft at the same time. I ask him if he would like to restage our time at the dog park, just to get it right. “I can have that woman bring her dogs back at exactly the same time. I'll even tell her to wear the same outfit, if you'd like.” Laughing, Avery pulls me closer to him, and I wrap my arms around his back.

“I'm so glad you're not like those other girls you marry off,” he says. “That's one of the best things about you. You're real and different and not stuck on, I don't know, material stuff.”

“You like that about me?” I look up toward Avery's face. A mosquito whines near my ear, and I swat at it.

“Yup. And I like that you don't hold what I have against me.”

I assume Avery's referring to his family money. “It's not your fault that your great-grandfather made a fortune. You're kind of my charity project. ‘Be Nice to Rich Boys, Inc.' I do this out of the goodness of my heart.”

Avery gives me a kiss, sighs, and leans down and whispers in my ear. I hold my breath and hope that I don't smell like fancy tuna. There is the sound of a jogger softly padding by on the asphalt trail. I try not to move. Avery is about to ask me something.

“Would you like to get some ice cream?”

Darkness is falling in the park. The day is ending. I nod and slap at another mosquito. We walk quickly to the car, dodging other couples strolling at dusk.

*   *   *

I first met Avery in a neighborhood not too far away from the park, on a hot Atlanta morning. I was moving into an old apartment building off Ponce de Leon. It was my first big-city move, just me and the U-Haul all the way from Cutter, Georgia. Mom and Dad had to work, and couldn't make it up to help me. To tell the truth, I think they were relieved. Heavy traffic and parallel parking are not their favorite things.

My new apartment was on the top floor of one of those old antebellum houses that had been chopped up into a zillion little odd-shaped living spaces. I rented it over the telephone, trying desperately to sound like I knew what I was doing, and talking with a clipped accent that was definitely not Cutter, Georgia, USA. The landlord told me later that she thought I was from England.

I wedged the U-Haul into an empty spot in front of a Dumpster and turned off the engine and the last blasts of air-conditioning. By the time I got the key from the landlord and said good-bye to a month's rent, my shirt was soaked in sweat and I was dying for a shower. I opened the truck and started pulling out boxes of clothes, books, and CDs. I decided to make a little pile beside the truck and then trek up and down the interior stairs of my new apartment building.

On my second trip down to the truck, I noticed a cute guy watching me from the veranda of the house next door. This home was gracious and broad—and definitely not chopped up into apartments. Its glossy white clapboards were adorned with green painted shutters. Immaculate plantings of salvia and vinca set off the perfect southern mansion. By contrast, my new home was a big, sagging thing, with a broken pot of geraniums out front and
NO PARKING
signs tacked onto the listing pine trees surrounding it. A mailbox with six boxes was bolted to the front porch. Still, it was home, and I was determined to learn something about big-city life.