Born Under a Lucky Moon (13 page)

Trying not to be seen, I skimmed close to the wall and scanned the crowd for Aidan. A few people I knew asked if I was all right. But most cut a large swath around me. In L.A. being uncool is considered a contagious and dangerous disease. And right now, I was clearly looking uncool. Still looking for Aidan, I bumped into something large. Looking up I saw, damn it, that it was Katsu. He was looking at me quizzically while keeping his iPhone pressed to his ear. He raised an eyebrow at my appearance. Mumbling something unintelligible, I moved around him. After a few steps I couldn't resist turning around to see if he was still gawking. He wasn't. His iPhone was lifted out in front of his face as he pressed a button on the screen. That bastard! He had taken my photo!

Gritting my teeth, I waded through the crowd. Finally, I caught Aidan's eye and waved above the heads of the people crowded around him. His return look was not pleasant. I moved over to cower by the concession stand for a while instead of facing him.

Minutes later I saw him push through the throng and stride toward me. Once he got a better look at me his step at first faltered. Then he practically ran to me.

“Honey! I was so worried when you didn't come back. You're hurt! Are you all right?” He swept me into a hug. Guiltily I pulled back and hung my head. Aidan held me by the shoulders and looked me up and down. “What happened?”

“I got hit by an ambulance.” My head hung even lower.

“An ambulance?” Aidan wrinkled his brow. “What were you doing outside?”

“I . . .” Good question. What
was
I doing outside?

“I wasn't feeling well so I went outside for some fresh air,” I lied. Now I knew for sure I was going straight to hell.

After a few more questions to make sure I was, in fact, all right, Aidan escorted me to my car. “You're positive you can make it home?” he asked, peering into the driver's-side window.

“I'm sure.” Blessedly, Aidan had to attend the after-premiere party; otherwise I knew he would have insisted on coming with me. I just wanted to get home, get into my comfy bed, and pull the covers over my head. Which is exactly what I did.

The next morning I was awoken by two phone calls. The first was from Elizabeth. “Aidan is out of town? Then can you explain to me why there's a photo in
Variety
this morning of him attending his movie premiere in Westwood last night? That's why you left so suddenly last night! Damn it, Jeannie, you have got to get over this thing with the family!” A dial tone then suddenly rang in my ear.

I had just pulled the covers back over my head when the phone rang again. “So you were at your niece's ballet performance at UCLA last night, huh?” Aidan's voice was apoplectic.

“How did you know?” I asked weakly.

“I subscribe to an electronic news service, Jeannie. It emails me any article with a name in it that I'm interested in. You appeared today in the
Los Angeles
Times
as a pedestrian who was involved in an accident with an ambulance. You gave a statement to the police.”

“But I got hit by an ambulance trying to get back to the premiere,” I protested.

“Let's hope it knocked some sense into you!” For the second time in five minutes a dial tone buzzed in my head.

My iPhone dinged softly, signaling a new email had come in. Out of habit, I checked it. Instantly, I was horrified to see a photo of myself looking like a crazed, bandaged escapee from the psych ward. The email was sent to the general address for all studio employees. The sender was no one I knew and it was a good bet that it was a fake address anyway. But I sure knew who had sent it. I burrowed deeper under the covers, then pulled the pillow over my blanketed head for good measure.

I hate the new age of instant media.

Chapter Fourteen
Sunday, June 29, 1986, 7:30 a.m.

I
cannot,
cannot
, believe you are not up yet!” Elizabeth stood over us like a prison warden. “Get out of bed and into that shower, Lucy. Jeannie, go check Anna's dress to see if she spilled anything on it. Dad has it downstairs.”

By the time I got to the kitchen, I had already pushed through the flower delivery people, the caterers, and the guys who were dropping off the rental china. The couch was vacant.

“Where's Chuck?” I asked.

Dad shrugged as he signed a check for the flowers.

The dress was lying over a chair. I went through all its folds carefully but found no stains. I gathered the dress up to carry it to Lucy's room.

“Did you have to wait outside their hotel door long last night for the dress?” I grinned at my father.

“Actually, it was embarrassing how fast it came out,” he grumbled.

“Good for Evan,” Sammie said, buttering her toast at the counter. Mom came in and turned on the water to fill a vase. A shriek from upstairs let us know that the water temperature had suddenly risen in the shower.

Sammie bit into her toast. “The entire town is buzzing about us. If this family ever moves out of town, no one will have anything to talk about.”

“I'd rather be talked about than ignored.” Mom sniffed and walked out. But I heard her mutter under her breath, “Small-minded people.” Then she called to me over her shoulder, “Jeannie, take the dress upstairs and bring your grandmother down.”

Grandma was waiting at the top of the stairs. I dumped the dress on Lucy's bed, came back, took her arm, and came down with her, step by shuffling step. Since there was no room in the kitchen with the flowers and china piled everywhere, I deposited Grandma in the living room.

“Coffee, Grandma?”

“Do you have any Dr Pepper?”

I was pretty sure there was no Dr Pepper anywhere in the state of Michigan. Finding a Dr Pepper here was like trying to find a Vernors soda pop in Texas—not going to happen. But I said I would go look and left her waiting patiently, like a toy dog that had to be moved from place to place.

Instead, I went back upstairs to shower and don Sammie's prom dress. I looked at myself in the mirror. The red rose pattern made me look like a small couch. How could she possibly have worn such an atrocity to the prom? I wondered. But remembering her boyfriend's prom wear—a rust red tuxedo with a ruffled shirt tipped with red—I figured it must have been a style that went in and out in a blink. Mom came into the bathroom, felt the top of the hot roller box, and, satisfied, started rolling her hair up. Sammie applied Lucy's makeup in her room.

“Has anyone seen Chuck?” Lucy called out.

“No,” Dad yelled from downstairs.

“He couldn't have gotten far. It's a small town; somebody will spot him,” I shouted from the bathroom.

“You're not helping her nerves.” Mom balanced a cigarette on the edge of the sink. She was wearing her pink, fluffy robe and was putting the last curler in her hair. “I thought you were going to help her pick out her wedding veil.”

“I did.”

“Jeannie, Lucy bought a white cowboy hat.”

It seemed I had been lax in my duties. Fortunately, a wail echoed in the hallway, interrupting this conversation. Mom and I hurried across the hall to Lucy's room.

“What's wrong?”

Lucy was standing in front of the dresser mirror holding up the strapless wedding dress. Mom pushed her way past Sammie.

Lucy looked at her with tears streaming down her face. “This is what's wrong!” She let go of the dress, which promptly sagged to her waist. Lucy stood there with her bee-sting breasts exposed.

“Now, honey, I'm sure we can fix this with some, um, safety pins. It'll be fine.” Mom hoisted up the dress and surveyed it from the back. Dozens of little buttons marched down the back and Mom looked perplexed about where to tuck a seam real fast.

“Don't you have a strapless padded bra?” she finally asked.

“I didn't bring it! And
why
didn't I bring my strapless padded bra? Gee, is it because I didn't know I was getting
married
?” Lucy dissolved again.

“I had just finished her mascara, too,” Sammie said.

“I have a strapless bra,” I volunteered.

“Go get it,” Mom said. Somehow, a mouthful of pins had materialized. I went and searched through my drawer, found it, and brought it back. Lucy slid the dress back down to her waist and put on the bra. We all stared into the mirror. The bra was not padded since I was better endowed than Lucy, to put it politely. The stiff cups stood out like empty vessels. Lucy flung herself away from us and threw herself facedown on the bed.

“It's almost ten o'clock,” Elizabeth said as she entered the room.

“Not now, Elizabeth.” Mom was stroking Lucy's hair.

“But—”

“Not now, Elizabeth,” Mom said sternly, giving her one last chance to shut up. Elizabeth looked at the faces around her and took it.

Mom got up, left the room, and came back with a box of tissues. Lucy sat up and eyed her warily. “No way.”

“I can only pin the dress so far.”

“Absolutely not.”

“It will look fine. No one will know.” Mom pulled about twenty tissues out of the box and handed them to me. I dutifully balled them up and stuffed the right cup. Mom took the left, while Lucy held her arms out to her sides and stared up at the ceiling, slowly shaking her head. After much of the box was emptied, we spun Lucy around to the mirror.

“Voilà!” Mom said. “You look beautiful.”

She did look good. The lace bodice of the top was filled out and Lucy appeared to be stacked. She touched the bodice gingerly. “Think it'll stay up?”

“Yes,” Mom said with probably more conviction than she felt. “Now wipe your eyes. Sammie, fix her makeup.”

Mom and I rushed back to the bathroom, where Mom frantically pulled rollers out of her hair. I leaned in below her for mirror space and put my eye shadow on.

A voice called out from the bottom of the stairs. “Mr. and Mrs. Thompson! North Muskegon Police here!”

“Uh-oh, are they here about Chuck?” I looked at Mom.

Lucy stuck her head out the door of the bedroom. “Is it Chuck?”

“No, honey, I'm sure it's not. Just keep getting ready. Jeannie, come with me.” Mom trotted down the stairs with half of her rollers still in.

The cop stood by the door ramrod straight. “Sorry to walk in but no one answered my knock.”

“Is Chuck all right?” Mom asked.

“Who's Chuck?”

Mom looked him up and down. “Marv Carson, what in God's name would make you walk into our house, shout up the stairs, and scare us half to death?”

Marv shifted a bit. “I have your dog, Buddy, in the squad car. I picked him up two blocks down, heading toward your house.”

“Thank you. That's very considerate. Could you bring him in?” Mom sounded testy even though her words were polite.

“You don't understand. Your dog is under arrest and I'm taking him to the pound. He'll have to stay there for five days for observation and you'll have to pay a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar fine.”

Mom was already brushing by him. She stormed out the door, down the front path, and strode up to the cop car in front of the house.

Marv was trotting to keep up with her. “Mrs. Thompson! You can't do this.”

Mom turned to him all aquiver in her pink robe with her half head of curlers bouncing. “Marv Carson! I have been through a week that you could never imagine. I have a daughter upstairs crying exactly one hour before her wedding because her breasts are too small. I have a son-in-law-to-be that we can't find. And you tell me I can't take my dog? Watch me!” Mom threw open the back door of the squad car and grabbed Buddy's collar. Buddy was out of the car so fast he didn't know what cyclone had hit him. Mom marched him back up the walk and into the house and slammed the door behind her. I stood helplessly on the walk. When Marv Carson looked like he was about to appeal to the good citizen in me, I bolted for the door, closed it behind me, and locked it. Then I dropped to the floor below the window for good measure.

“Did you find me a Dr Pepper?” Grandma asked.

“Not yet,” I said as I lifted a corner of the curtain to see if the cop had left yet.

“I would have thought Chuck would be back by now with a bottle,” Grandma said from the living room.

“Where is he?” I asked her.

“He was going running this morning so I asked him to find me some Dr Pepper. It's not like your mother would bother having any in the house for me.”

I hoisted myself up. “Grandma, I'm sure Mom didn't mean to forget your Dr Pepper. It's just been a little crazy around here. I don't think anyone has even remembered to feed the dog.”

“Are you comparing me to Buddy?” she asked.

I silently wished Grandma would go back to low volume. Just then, Chuck slammed in through the back door carrying a six-pack of Dr Pepper and a round tin of Kodiak chewing tobacco. He had on a pair of red running shorts and his shoes. Sweat shone on his lean body. Bounding into the living room, Chuck flopped down next to Grandma and gallantly opened a can. It promptly fizzed up and squirted all over the place. Chuck put his mouth to it and sucked up the excess, then handed the can to Grandma. She nodded her thanks. Chuck pulled his white mouth guard out and rubbed the strings of saliva and Dr Pepper on his forearm. “Sorry it took me so long but I had to run nearly ten miles over to someplace called Twin Lake to find any Dr Pepper.” Bouncing back up, he took the stairs two at a time. I stared at spilled soda pop on the carpet and then the sweat outline that his back and legs had made on my mother's prize antique couch.

It had been decided that Chuck would wear his dress uniform. This was mainly because Evan's wedding had wiped out most of the tuxes at Le Tux Shop. Plus, no one trusted any of Evan's groomsmen to get a tux back on time without major dry cleaning needs. Lucy, I think, was pleased that Chuck was wearing his army uniform. It represented her new life and she was far more comfortable with it than the life she had lived here for twenty years.

Elizabeth was outside completely coiffed, put together, and perfect, directing where the tables were to be set up under the tent. Ron was sitting near her in the same clothes he had worn the night before, reading the paper and drinking coffee. It was 11:20, so I scrammed out of her way. As I went upstairs to finish my makeup, I heard her belt out like a drill sergeant, “Ten minutes until we leave!”

“Did one of you girls take my black bow tie?” Dad shouted from deep in his closet. There was a pause as we all considered.

“I think I have it,” Sammie said as she ran from the bathroom to her room holding a towel in front of her. I went in behind her, watched her root around in a bottom drawer, held my hand out to receive the tie, and took it back to Dad.

“I don't even want to know why she had it,” he said. He fumbled with it and Mom went to help him. Chuck was now showered, dressed, and sitting downstairs with Grandma. At 11:30, Elizabeth finally could not restrain herself. “It's time. Right now. And I do mean right now. Everyone down those stairs and into the cars.” For once we all listened and assembled in the hall foyer.

“Oh, Harold, just look at these two.” Mom looked at Lucy and Chuck with tears in her eyes. I wasn't sure if they were tears of happiness or what. “Let's get a picture.”

“There is no time. Period,” Elizabeth barked.

I looked at Lucy as we trooped down the walk. She had her white cowboy hat on with her frilly lace dress. She looked kind of like a Dallas debutante.

Dad opened the car doors, and I heard Lucy say to Chuck, “Spit out the chewing tobacco.”

“This mouth guard thing holds it in real good.”

Lucy gave up and threw herself into the car with Chuck, piling up the white tulle and satin behind her. We got to the church at 11:58. Father Whippet ran out to meet us. He practically pulled all of us from the car. “Everyone is seated. I took care of that. Jeannie, you just have to walk down the aisle when I point at you from the altar. Step, smile. Step, smile. Harold, you've been through this before with Elizabeth and Sammie so just same thing, different daughter.” He pointed at Chuck. “Come with me; I'll place you. Relax, everyone, and good luck.”

Chuck went with Father Whippet, while the rest of my family raced to the front pew. Lucy, Dad, and I waited in the entry hall before walking down the aisle. Lucy gripped her bouquet and turned to look through the open doors at the backs of the hundreds of people waiting for her.

Dad walked up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. “Sweetheart. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. Your mother and I can call the whole thing off right now. We will always love you no matter what.”

“I know,” Lucy said. “But what if I'm not sure and I call it off? What if I was meant to go through with it? If I call it off now it means that Chuck and I are done.”